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Those who assault police officers in Scotland will soon have fines taken straight out of their benefit payments to pay for support services for the victim.

Date - 19th May 2020
By - Chloe Livadeas

Those who assault officers in Scotland will soon have fines taken straight out of their benefit payments to pay for support services for the victim.

Restitution orders give courts the power to force offenders pay towards the specialist services which assist in their recovery – such as psychological support. These have been in place since 2012.

Now, the Victims and Witnesses (Scotland) Act 2014 (Consequential Modification) Order 2020 allows for payments to be directly deducted from offenders' benefit payments if they are unable to pay with their own funds.

The order was requested by Scottish Parliament and approved in Westminster as benefits policy is a matter for Westminster Parliament.

In the first three weeks of the current restrictions, officers in Scotland recorded more than 100 coronavirus-related attacks and threats aimed at officers.

Scotland minister Douglas Ross said: "Behind this important order today are police officers and staff who are unacceptably being attacked in Scotland and we must do everything we can to prevent that."

"Attacks against our officers and staff are deplorable and completely unacceptable, and this order to be debated today facilitates police officers in Scotland receiving the support they need should this ever happen."

Shadow Scotland secretary Ian Murray said Labour supported the order.

He said: "This is a very necessary statutory instrument which will allow the justice system to work for victims, allowing them to see that the actions of the perpetrator do have serious consequences and playing an important role in the victims' recovery, and we're therefore very happy to support the order."

David Mundell, Conservative MSP and former Scotland Secretary said: "Abuse and assault is not simply part of the job of police officers and can never be tolerated, and that's the heart, I think, of this piece of legislation in the Scottish Parliament, and this subsequent order to ensure that we are not in any way accepting that abuse or assault on police officers can be in any way regarded as routine or tolerated and they must, in the event of that being the case, they must be supported in every way."

Mr Mundell noted that "we've waited six years for this piece of subordinate legislation to come through".

David Hamilton, chair of the Scottish Police Federation, said: "We welcome this latest step on the long path to enacting this legislation.

"Later this year we expect to see these orders being served on those who attack our members- punishing the offender in the pocket and supporting our officers back to health ."
 

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[gallifrey + 588]

This will only work if these offenders are left with no benefits and they are made to do community work to pay their benefits otherwise effectively we are paying their fines.

[Wikicop20 + 186]

Still, interesting to see some actual legislation to back up the "this will not be tolerated" sort of speech alone. 

[Radman + 2,165]

On 21/05/2020 at 12:22, gallifrey said:

This will only work if these offenders are left with no benefits and they are made to do community work to pay their benefits otherwise effectively we are paying their fines.

I once had an offender say words of that effect to me "What are the courts going to do? Fine me? Yeah that's like you paying it for me." 

The reality is alot of offenders have literally nothing to lose at all... The state gives them whatever they need, even pays their court fines for them, hence why so many don't care. 

I used to live safe in the knowledge that I'd atleast inconvenience the more proflific ones for a day by making them go to court the consequence being that a warrant not backed for bail would be issued which would waste even more of their time preventing them from committing further crime... Now I just think what's the point, the paperwork in doing that really just isn't worth it. 

[Zulu 22 + 4,642]

The Courts do have power if they choose to use it.  I had one case where the bench sentenced him to 6 months suspended for 2 years together with an order of £100 compensation.  The sentenced had a proviso that the suspended sentence was subject to the £100 being paid within 28 days or the sentence would not be suspended.  I checked on the 28th day with the Magistrates Clerk and the £100 had been paid that morning and was on its way to me.

So much depends on the Magistrates and the Magistrates Clerk knowing their powers.

[stewie_griffin + 484]

6 hours ago, Radman said:

I once had an offender say words of that effect to me "What are the courts going to do? Fine me? Yeah that's like you paying it for me." 

The reality is alot of offenders have literally nothing to lose at all... The state gives them whatever they need, even pays their court fines for them, hence why so many don't care. 

I used to live safe in the knowledge that I'd atleast inconvenience the more proflific ones for a day by making them go to court the consequence being that a warrant not backed for bail would be issued which would waste even more of their time preventing them from committing further crime... Now I just think what's the point, the paperwork in doing that really just isn't worth it. 

All very true.

Also worth remembering that if it's not worth doing the paperwork, it's also not worth risking your health and your future for.