Mr Salmond's spokesman has defended the non-disclosure on the basis that informing MSPs would have interfered in what was an "operational matter" for Tayside Police, whatever that means precisely.
However, Tayside residents have been familiar with this veil of secrecy in relation to Castle Huntly absconders for a couple of years, following a campaign by the Dundee Evening Telegraph to keep communities informed about the identity and past records of escaped criminals.
At that time the ludicrous crux of the case for keeping the public in the dark was that the absconders' rights to privacy (sic!) was given primacy:
Prison chiefs said they believed the privacy of people who illegally leave jail before the end of their sentence outweighs the public interest.Thus it seems that the human rights of criminals convicted of the gravest of crimes, the cover of police "operational matters" and the need for Kenny MacAskill and Alex Salmond to avoid political embarrassment are clearly more important than the public's right to know the facts.
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To put this in context here is a story I posted on Scottish Unionist's site from the Daily Mail.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-564022/Britains-wide-open-prisons-130-killers-14-000-convicts-escaped-low-security-jails.html
Almost 14,000 prisoners have gone on the run from open jails over the past ten years. These include 130 murderers.
The case is given of Roderick McDonald, a prisoner serving life for the murder of his wife. He was moved to Scotland's Castle Huntly open prison in 2005 and absconded soon afterwards after being refused parole.
McDonald lived secretly in Blackpool for two years where he carried out a violent rape on another man.
He then moved to London to avoid police attention, where he stabbed and strangled a Brazilian immigrant, Junior Pariz, in a hotel room.
Cathy Jamieson did not resign over this, nor did she come under any pressure to do so.
Clearly there is a major problem with prisoners absconding from open prisons. But equally clearly the problem is less serious in Scotland than in the rest of the UK judging by the figures. And Kenny MacAskill has been very much more effective at reducing the number of abscondees than his predecessors.
So calls for his resignation are both bogus and frankly preposterous. As a voter you should be angry that Iain Grey and Bill Aitken think you are stupid enough to be taken in by this. Since when did an improvement in performance become a resignation matter?
On the issue of what 'operational' means - it means simply that the police are responsible for police operations, such as catching escaped prisoners.
Ministers do not have the power to direct police in operational matters.
If they did we would be living in a police state.
Indy
Well I'm not bothered about the resignation aspect myself, because that's more a party political matter, and indeed if Labour had been in power at the moment I'm sure we'd be hearing much the same from the SNP.
As for the operational aspect, what I was getting at was that it's not clear precisely why this should preclude politicians from disclosing the information to the public.
The objections don't seem to be about how the police conduct their operations, instead it's more about how it all looks like a bit of a cover up and the politicians hiding behind this 'operational matter' diversion.
Then there's this nonsense about the absconder's privacy.
Of course, there may be sound operational reasons not to disclose the matter initially, but it all seems too convenient, and the issue seems to me to be all about a secretive state, but where exactly the truth lies is a moot point, because the facts are clearly none of our business.
Indy
I'm not sure why Cathy Jamieson didn't come under more pressure at the time over Castle Huntly and the absconders, but as I recall it seemed to be more of a local issue a couple of years ago and the SPS seemed to be the targets rather than the politicians.
Interesting story in the Dundee press here.
No Stuart if the roles were reversed and it was a Labour Justice Secretary and an SNP shadow spokesperson the SNP spokesperson would not be demanding a resignation because, as I said, to do so is utterly preposterous. I freely admit that the SNP may have been a tad opportunistic in opposition but I like to think we stayed on the right side of being preposterous!
The facts are that since Kenny MacAskill became responsible for justice the number of abscondees in Scotland has been reduced from an average of over 70 per year to 16. I would remind you at this point that that the UK ten year average (on the figures published by the Daily Mail) is 100 abscondees per MONTH from the open estate. While that may mean that the security of open prisons throughout the UK should be reviewed, on those figures the level of security in Scotland is very much higher than in England and Wales and we know that the level of security has become very much higher since Kenny MacAskill took over as Cabinet Secretary – a point very clearly illustrated by the story you linked to.
This is an entirely politically manufactured row. Opposition politicians are trying to see how hard they can push and what resistance they will meet if they attempt to pick off individual cabinet ministers.
It is a stupid tactic as they are politicising groups of workers who were not previously politicised. The prison officers association for example has made a very strong statement in support of Kenny MacAskill saying that under his leadership the conditions for admission to the open estate are far more stringent than was ever in place under previous administrations. That is a polite way of the prison officers telling Iain Gray to feck off.
Regarding the accusation of politicians hiding behind ‘operational matters’ to conceal information. In the course of any active investigation the police control what information is disclosed to the public, whether that involves the capture of absconded prisoners or any other criminal investigation. Ministers cannot pre-empt the police in these matters.
There could be any number of reasons why the police hold information back in the course of an investigation or delay making it public, such as they have a pretty good idea of where the person is and want to pick him up quietly. It is not for MSPs to get involved in that, they are stepping well beyond their remit and they know it.
Indy, yes clearly there's a lot of politicking going on as usual, but that article unearthed by Kezia Dugdale is certainly interesting, but I'll leave you to take her to task over the resignation calls, etc.:0)
As for politicising the prison officers, isn't it a bit ironic that instead of complaining about being used as a political football they've actively come out in support of Mr MacAskill - shouldn't they have kept quiet?
The 'operational matter' aspect seems increasingly suspect as well, as per what's in the Scotsman this morning and as per my latest post.
How can a minister be held responsible for a prisoner absconding from an open prison, particularly when his record is excellent. This is surely for the SPS to rectify and if they are unable to do so then the politicians must act.
Dark Lochnagar
Well clearly it's a moot point to what extent a minister can be held responsible, but on the other hand surely there has to be some degree of blame attaching to Mr MacAskill, but whether that amounts to a resigning matter or merely a ministerial footnote is perhaps best left to the politicians ;0)
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