Lord Advocate and Police Scotland questioned on Glasgow’s Safer Drug Consumption Facility
The Scottish Affairs Committee will hear from the Lord Advocate and Police Scotland in the next evidence session of its inquiry into Glasgow’s Safer Drug Consumption Facility (SDCF), commonly known as ‘the Thistle.’
Meeting details
During this session, the cross-party committee will investigate the legal basis of the Thistle and the legal challenges it faces.
In 2023, the Lord Advocate, Dorothy Bain KC, accepted a proposal from Glasgow City HSCP to provide a statement of prosecution policy which would apply the prosecutorial discretion needed for a SDCF to be established. This is in contrast to the previous Lord Advocate’s rejection of the proposal he received in 2017, where he stated that it was a matter for the UK Parliament.
In the first panel, members will question the Lord Advocate about what led her to a different decision to her predecessor regarding prosecutorial discretion and what will happen after the three-year pilot comes to an end. Questions could also focus on the potential further legal exemptions which would allow the expansion of services within the Thistle and explore calls for more facilities to be opened elsewhere in Scotland.
In the second panel, MPs will investigate Police Scotland’s approach to policing the Thistle, whether the facility has resulted in a change in local crime, and how the lack of an exclusion zone outside the facility operates in practice.