On 24 November 2023, the Criminal Justice Committee published its pre-budget scrutiny report, summarising the evidence received, with its conclusions and recommendations best summarised by the following:     

“[t]he Committee is of the view that the funding situation facing the criminal justice sector cannot be allowed to continue …. We cannot … continue to provide ever increasing small sums of finance seemingly to effectively stand still in a business-as-usual fashion…. The Scottish Government and others through its Justice Board should identify and implement what the Cabinet Secretary herself recognises are spend to-save reforms. With some upfront investment, such reforms should yield cost savings over the longer term and have clear timescales … [D]ebates around the numbers of people we send to prison and the need for effective alternatives to incarceration through community disposals have been longstanding with no discernible move to realising this…. There is still inconsistent provision of effective community justice disposals …. In time, this reform should reduce prison numbers which in turn reduces costs, reoffending and the number of prison places needed, or even the number of prisons. Savings from these reforms can be reinvested in the system.”

On 03 October 2023, the Cabinet Secretary for Justice made a statement to the Scottish Parliament on Scotland’s prison population. She advised that she was still “absolutely committed to    a replacement for HMP Barlinnie”, however, there is still no finalised timeframe for its delivery (“[o]nce the design plans are finalised, we will have a much better and more accurate estimate of both costs and timescales, but it is a journey that we are determined to pursue”).

HMP Barlinnie’s Governor-in-Charge, Michael Stoney, has recently repeated his concerns, saying, “[w]e sit on a knife-edge of worry that it might not happen … our hearts and souls are in it, but 2026 is looking highly unlikely. It will be 2027 at best.”