To ask the Scottish Executive why there is no uniformity across police forces as to what constitutes an informal or a formal warning; whether these warnings are recorded at force level, as recommended by the ad hoc Ministerial Group on Youth Crime, and why only five out of the eight police forces could provide annual figures for warnings issued, as identified in the Audit Scotland report, Dealing with offending by young people .

Action point 6 of Scotland's Action Programme to Reduce Youth Crime 2002 , which we announced in summer 2002, was to develop a Scotland-wide system of cautions/warnings. At the time, we recognised that there were variations across Scotland in the approaches adopted by police forces in relation to warnings. In December 2002, following discussion with the Association of Chief Police Officers in Scotland, we made available £250,000 to the Scottish Police Service, across all forces, to enable the police to put in place formal training and support for restorative justice methods linked to warnings. The next stage will be to commission researchers to gather information on existing activity and to produce national guidance (including guidance on standards and recording) under the auspices of a steering group involving representatives from the main public and voluntary organisations with an interest. Future funding would then be linked to the criteria set in that guidance.