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Green light for disclosure plans
Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill has confirmed that the Scottish Government will bring forward the timetable for rolling out a sex offender disclosure scheme, currently being trialled in Tayside.
"The sex offender disclosure pilot currently operating in Tayside allows parents, carers and guardians to request information on a named individual who has regular unsupervised access to their child," said Mr MacAskill.
"Feedback I have received from Tayside is very positive - people are aware of it and concerned parents are approaching the police to request information," he explained. "It provides yet another avenue to identify and address the risks posed to children by sex offenders, and empowers parents to address concerns about the safety of their children."
The pilot will run until the end of May and a full evaluation will be published in August. The national roll out will begin soon after, ensuring that the lessons learned from Tayside are applied all over Scotland.
Fife Constabulary and Central Scotland Police have already indicated that they are keen to have the scheme running in their areas by the autumn.
Assistant Chief Constable Iain Livingstone, who holds the Public Protection portfolio for the Association of Chief Police Officers in Scotland (ACPOS), welcomed the decision.
"The 'Keeping Children Safe' pilot in Tayside has been a positive step which adds to existing child protection measures and increases the intelligence the police have in relation to monitoring sex offenders," he said. "The implementation throughout Scotland will increase our ability to protect children and other vulnerable members of the community."
