Criminal Justice Modernisation and Abusive Domestic Behaviour Reviews (Scotland) Act 2025

20 Determination as to whether to expand the remit of a review

(1) Where the outcome of consideration of a death under section 19 is that a domestic homicide or suicide review is to be carried out in respect of the death, the review oversight committee must, if subsection (2) applies to the death, determine whether to expand the remit of the review in accordance with subsection (3).

(2) This subsection applies to a death only where—

(a) it is a death mentioned in section 12(3)(a), and

(b) either or both of the persons who are persons A and B for the purpose of that section—

(i) at the time of the death had a child who was—

(A) a young person, or

(B) an adult at risk, or

(ii) at the time of the death had a young person, not falling within sub-paragraph (i), living in their household.

(3) Subject to subsection (5), the remit of a review may, in line with a determination under subsection (1), be expanded to also examine any or all of the following—

(a) the extent to which the person mentioned in subsection (2)(b)(i) or (ii) (“the relevant person”) was able to provide views in relation to any decisions made by a public authority in the period following on from the death which directly concerned the person’s welfare and in which the person’s best interests were a primary consideration (such as where the person lives or the family members with whom the person has contact),

(b) the extent to which the relevant person received any support the person reasonably required in order to provide those views,

(c) more broadly, the extent to which the relevant person received any support the person reasonably required following on from the death (whether such support is normally provided by a public authority or not).

(4) Where more than one person is a relevant person for the purpose of subsection (3), the remit of the review may be expanded in respect of any or all of those persons.

(5) The remit of a review may be expanded in accordance with subsection (3) only where the Lord Advocate has given consent to the expansion.

(6) For the purposes of this section—

• “adult at risk” means a person whom the committee considers to have been, immediately prior to the death in question, an adult at risk within the meaning of section 3 of the Adult Support and Protection (Scotland) Act 2007,

• “child” is to be construed in accordance with section 12(7)(c),

• “public authority” has the meaning given by section 6(3) of the Human Rights Act 1998 but does not include a court or tribunal,

• “young person” has the meaning given by section 12(7)(d).