Scotland's justice minister, Cathy Jamieson

Cathy Jamieson has defended her response to the accidental release of convicted murderer James McCormick.

Speaking on Wednesday, Scotland's justice minister insisted that she had taken a "hands-on attitude" since the incident.

She argued that the prison service was "responsible" for overseeing the contract with Reliance, the company which released the inmate after a court appearance.

Jamieson said the use of private firms in escorting offenders to and from court is still possible.

"The idea was to free up police officers from front line duties and we wanted to free up prison officers, who are dealing with a rising prison population," she told the BBC Newsnight Scotland programme.

"It does work well in other parts of the UK, and there is no reason why it cannot work well here.

"The company has accepted that it [the mistaken release] was something that should not have happened.  I understand the outrage of the public and the victim's family."

Jamieson has the support of Scotland's first minister, Jack McConnell.

"It is not just the responsibility of the justice minister to address this situation, it is the responsibility of all the different agencies involved - the prison service, the company, the courts and the police to work together to ensure that we do not see a repeat of these incidents," he said.

"There is absolutely no doubt that Cathy Jamieson is an outstanding minister."

However, SNP justice spokeswoman Nicola Sturgeon accused the minister of ducking responsibility for the incident.

"Most people would expect public safety to be a ministerial matter," she told the BBC Good Morning Scotland programme.

"As the minister has said, policy is down to ministers and the policy decision to privatise this contract was taken by ministers.

"Cathy Jamieson sounds very much as if she is trying to shut the stable door after the horse - or in this case the prisoner - has bolted.

"I think a competent minister would have made sure that procedures were in place, that staff who were expected to do this job had adequate training for the job, before a private company was allowed to have custody of prisoners.

"Because she did not do that, we now have one prisoner on the run and what sounds to me like chaos in our courts."