THE Scottish approach to the imprisonment of women offenders is set to be revolutionised after the Government's acceptance yesterday of the key findings of a major report which recommends a drastic cut in the number of females sent to jail.

Scottish Home Affairs Minister Henry McLeish immediately committed the Government to action and to providing the money to back up the changes proposed in the report, which was commissioned after a series of suicides at Cornton Vale, Scotland's only all-female prison.

The report, compiled by teams from the prisons and social work inspectorates, recommends a huge cut in the number of women sent to Cornton Vale by the year 2000 and an end to jailing women under 18 years of age.

The prison itself will have extensive work carried out to provide double-sized cells, so that women can share and provide mutual support. Women on remand, who can be and often are locked up for most of each day although technically innocent, will be provided with TV.

One of the report's authors, Clive Fairweather, the chief inspector of prisons for Scotland, said: ''We see this as a pilot scheme. American prison practitioners say TV is the best child-minder going. It is vital for us to stop vulnerable women indulging in morbid contemplation.''

The report, Women Offenders - A Safer Way, arose directly out of the seven suicides in 30 months in the jail, which included those of two 17-year-olds. After the death of the last victim in December last year, Mr McLeish commissioned the report from Mr Fairweather and Mr Angus Skinner, chief inspector of social work.

An important side issue arising from figures disclosed in the report will be that Glasgow authorities, including Strathclyde Police, will have to review the way in which they deal with prostitution.

The last figures, for 1995, disclose that, of the 743 convicted of prostitution-related offences, 642 were from Glasgow and five from Edinburgh. The law will not be changed, Mr McLeish stated, so a new Glasgow criminal justice steering group he announced will have to provide solutions.

He announced it would be chaired by Sheila McLean, professor of law and ethics in medicine at Glasgow University, and would bring together all the main partners in criminal justice, social, and health provision in the West of Scotland, home to 80% of the women who end up in Cornton Vale.

It will be charged with developing an integrated approach to assessment and service provision. Specifically, the group will develop effective services for jailed drug misusers including speedy access to a methadone-prescribing regime on release from custody.

The group will also drive on the provision of community-based diversion and non-custodial disposals which meet the needs and circumstances of women offenders. Mr Skinner said afterwards: ''This will be a powerful group of leaders from every agency who have the power to get things done.''

Mr McLeish added: ''This is a watershed report, not just for women offenders but for our entire criminal justice system.

''This will change the whole nature of how women are dealt with in the system. For the first time, we have a basis for taking forward future policy and practice in relation to women in the criminal justice system which is geared to their specific situation.

''We cannot turn back the clock and wipe out the tragedies which have occurred, but we can learn and we are determined to do that,'' he said.

Glasgow City Council welcomed the report. Its social work convener, Councillor Mary Beckett, said: ''Many women offenders present a risk to themselves because of their vulnerability and behaviour.

''Drugs, with women turning to prostitution and other offences to feed their habit, is a major problem for Glasgow. These underlying problems must be tackled if we are to reduce the number of women going to prison.''

Stirling MP Anne McGuire, whose constituency contains Cornton Vale, said: ''Scotland's justice system has failed in the past to take into account the many and complex reasons why women offend. For many of these offenders, prison should not be an option. Women who have serious mental health or drug-related problems are not best placed in a prison regime.''

Former Dunbartonshire councillor Jim Bollan, whose daughter Angela, 19, was found hanged in her cell in Cornton Vale in April, 1996, said: ''The report is a year too late. The Government should have commissioned it when they first came into office.''

But he added: ''I welcome the main thrust of the document. Had people listened a couple of years ago when Angela died, we might not have had any more deaths.''

Circle of despair Page 14