Parliament Workbench

Petition · PE01799 · Session 5

Make it illegal to publish a defendant's address in the press.

Closed Submitted 25 Feb 2020 Justice
Signatures
0
123 online signatures with a country
Comments
4
Considered
1 meeting
in the Official Report

What it asks

Calling on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to make it illegal for any press or media outlet to publish a defendant’s address.

What the petitioner did first

We raised awareness of our No Address in the Press campaign at a meeting of the Scottish Parliament’s Cross-Party Group on Families Affected by Imprisonment. The Cabinet Secretary for Justice was in attendance, answered questions and heard directly from families. He was supportive of the aims of the campaign. Mary Fee MSP chaired the meeting and was also supportive, committing to submit a motion on the issue.

Where it was considered

Official Report
  1. 3 Sep 2020
    Public Petitions Committee
    New Petitions
    1 mention

Signatures by country

123 online signatures
  1. Scotland92 74.8%
  2. United Kingdom27 22%
  3. England3 2.4%
  4. Slovakia1 0.8%

Comments

4 comments, oldest first
  1. Henry Mowat Rendall 25 Feb 2020
    Agree
  2. Elyse Brown 5 Mar 2020
    Offenders families are innocent, they are victims too. Innocent children are being put at risk by having their address printed in the press
    - how is this in the public interest? Quite simply it is NOT. It must be made illegal in order to protect families and especially children whose very lives are being put at risk. I ask the Scottish Government to silence the press immediately!
  3. William McLean 13 Mar 2020
    It is obviously a good idea .
  4. Anthony Buxton 21 Mar 2020
    It is simply not right to punish the families of defendants for being related to them. Damage to the family has already been done by the defendant and the state. It should not be compounded by the press for financial gain.