Commentary on Sections Section 19: Community justice outcomes improvement plan
30.Section 19 requires community justice partners to publish a community justice outcomes improvement plan for the area of a local authority in accordance with a timescale set by the Scottish Ministers in regulations. Regulations establishing a timescale for production of the plan will be subject to the negative procedure. “Negative procedure” means that the regulations may be annulled by the Scottish Parliament after they have been made (in which case, they have no further legal effect). The plan must set out the community justice partners’ assessment of the extent to which each nationally determined outcome has been achieved in the area, or how close an outcome is to being achieved. Thereafter, the plan should specify whether each outcome should be a priority in light of that assessment. Finally, the plan should detail what action the partners will take, either jointly or individually, to achieve, or maintain the achievement of, each outcome. In assessing the extent to which each outcome has been achieved, partners must use the national indicators.
31.The plan may also include other material in relation to community justice which the partners consider appropriate, and additional outcomes (“locally determined outcomes”) which they consider should be prioritised in their area. Community justice partners must also set out which indicators they will use to measure performance in achieving these outcomes, and the action they will take to achieve or maintain the achievement of them.
32.As soon as reasonably practicable after publishing the community justice outcomes improvement plan, the community justice partners must send a copy to Community Justice Scotland.