Use of Crown Office money to Scottish Government Legal Directorate (SGLD) since 2017: FOI release

Information requested

"The Crown Office has told us following an FoI request that it has paid £1.45million to the Scottish Government Legal Directorate between 2017 and 2021 because the SGLD are acting as solicitors for the Lord Advocate as defender in the civil cases related to the Rangers malicious prosecution. The Crown says the total paid includes SGLD services, and those of counsel who bill through SGLD.

Can we ask:
1. How much of the money paid to the SGLD was then paid to counsel, and how many individual counsel have the SGLD paid since 2017?

2. How much money was kept by the SGLD legal directorate for its services?"

Response

1. The money paid to the SGLD that was then paid to counsel amounted to £797K and this was in relation to seven different individual counsels.

2. SGLD legal directorate was paid £653K for its services. It should be noted that the £653K is the cost for the entire branch who work on multiple litigations in relation to the Rangers malicious prosecution. We don't hold information on the proportionate of staff time dedicated to individual litigations.

About FOI

The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at http://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.