The Scottish Government has developed a calamitous skill in producing daft legislation. That the Hate Crime Act would bring out every grievance crank, of which there are many, who would report anybody who had looked at them the wrong way to poor old Police Scotland, which had made the dreadful mistake of promising to investigate every report, was entirely predictable. Not just predictable but predicted, by many people, many times.

The hate crime legislation is unnecessary because the things that are real hate crimes are already covered by appropriate laws. The Hate Crime Act is just more “progressive” posturing. Look busy, be useless – that is the SNP way.

The Hate Crime Act should not be dismissed as merely SNP nonsense which will eventually slide into obscurity; its harms are real. Police time really is wasted on investigating hurt feelings rather than things like burglaries. You and I pay for all this. The effect on free speech is also real. The Act is so vague that you don’t know what might be illegal so, better safe than sorry, you stop saying what you mean or think. Free speech does not exist without the right to say something which offends.

The hate crime legislation is not the first of such Scottish Government muck-ups. Offensive behaviour at football matches and transgender rights are both examples of legislation brought forward under the no-need-to-listen-we-know-best progressive banner.

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Laughably this list has now been added to because Patrick Harvie and his Green mates have sneaked through a law banning wood-burning stoves in new houses. In central Glasgow there might be some logic to this but can anybody sensible (rules out you, Patrick) explain why people in rural areas should not be encouraged rather than banned from using local sustainable wood supplies to heat their homes?

Much worse is in the pipeline.

Patrick Harvie (yes, him again) has launched a consultation on draft proposals to force us to make our homes more energy efficient. The thrust of that policy is fair enough but when you look carefully at the detail of what is proposed it gives the Scottish Government, probably the least competent organisation in the world, the ability to require energy efficiency measures which people may well not be able to afford and might make the value of older homes drop significantly.

The endless spewing out of ill-thought out legislation has got to stop. Ultimately it is up to us, the voters, to get rid of these incompetents but some sort of self-rationing in the meantime would be helpful.

Nothing, and I mean nothing, which has been introduced up to now, compares in its adverse impact on ordinary citizens to the Scottish Government’s plans for further reform to the legal system.

In England, a majority of 10 out of a jury comprising 12 jurors is required to deliver a guilty verdict.

In Scotland, 8 out of 15 jurors can deliver a guilty verdict but they have two other choices: Not Proven or Not Guilty.

The Scottish Government doesn’t think enough people who are brought to trial in the High Court for rape are being convicted. More than 80 per cent of the trials in Scottish high courts relate to sexual crimes so this is not a small matter but the overwhelming focus of the system.

The Herald: If trial by jury goes along with the other changes proposed it guarantees there will be miscarriages of justiceIf trial by jury goes along with the other changes proposed it guarantees there will be miscarriages of justice (Image: free)

If you are accused of a sexual crime your advocate has not been allowed, for some years, to ask questions of the complainer that many people might regard as highly relevant in forming a view on what happened. Last year the need for corroboration, a vital safeguard in the Scottish legal system, was significantly weakened for sexual crimes.

The Scottish Government, once again pursing its “progressive” agenda, is hellbent on sacrificing fair justice if it can get more convictions. For some reason it wants to reduce the size of juries, which increases the risk that the outcome is swayed by one or two vocal people. The Not Proven verdict is firmly in its sights for the chop.

The three verdict system we have now allows a jury to conclude whether the prosecution has or has not proved its case beyond reasonable doubt and, if it has not, to decide whether the case is merely not proven or whether the jury view the defendant as not guilty. The distinction matters, more importantly there is a delicate balance between the size of a jury, the size of majority needed for a conviction and the three verdicts available. Removing one without carefully addressing the others risks upsetting a delicate balance, yet this is what the Scottish Parliamentary Committee which looked at the proposals seems to have steered towards.

The proposed removal of the jury in serious sexual – or indeed any – crime trials is a simply appalling idea. Trial by jury is a cornerstone of the rights of individual citizens in a free society. Juries are the last defence against an over-mighty government.

If trial by jury goes along with the other changes proposed it guarantees there will be miscarriages of justice. You, your partner, your son might one day find themselves on the wrong side of a very bad change to the law if the Scottish Government are not made to think again. Red alert, this one must be stopped.