 Good morning, everyone, and welcome to the sixth meeting of 2016 of the Public Petitions Committee and the final meeting of this session. I can remind all present, including members, that mobile phones and blackberries etc should be turned off as they can interfere with the sound system. Before going to our formal agenda, I would just like to bring the committee's attention to an issue in relation to petition 1593, which we have been considering over a period of time from fans against criminalisation. A complaint was made under the terms of the code of conduct section 7.3 volume 2 of the code details the requirements in relation to members' conduct during a committee meeting. This section of the code cross refers to rules 7.3.1 and 7.3.2 of standing orders. Section 9.1.6A of volume 2 of the code provides the complaints about the conduct of a member of a committee are to be referred to the convener of the committee. Upon receiving that complaint, I thought that it was only fair to afford the member complained about the opportunity to respond to the terms of that complaint. I therefore extended this opportunity to Kenny MacAskill as he was the person who had been complained about, but at no point made any comment about the substance of that complaint. This simply fulfills the responsibilities that come with the role of convener under the code of conduct, responsibilities that are determined by the Parliament and with which I must and have acted in accordance. I provided clarification to Kenny MacAskill of the basis on which the complaint fell to me to consider in that role and advised of how to go about seeking clarification from the standards clerk should he so wish. It appears to me that Mr MacAskill conflated an invitation to provide comments with a finding on the terms of the complaint, and he responded with comments that challenged both my authorities, the committee convener, and attacked me personally. I therefore asked him to withdraw his comments about my conduct and to apologise for them and to respond to the complaint that he has done neither. On November 21, 2012, I made comments in the chamber of the Parliament in response to which the Presiding Officer said that the standing orders of this Parliament explicitly state that members shall respect the authority of the Presiding Officer. It is inevitable that decisions of the chair will not meet the approval of all members at all times. That has always been the case. Nevertheless, it is imperative that the authority of the chair is respected at all times. I acknowledge that Mr MacMachan apologised. As Presiding Officer, I will support to the limits of my powers, the conduct of parliamentary business in this chamber. I will, however, not tolerate behaviour that falls short of the standards that the people of whom we are privileged to represent expect of us. The PO did that and found that the standing orders in the code of conduct—I have found that the code of conduct and the standing orders have offered me no such protection whatsoever in respect of the deliberate contempt with which Mr MacAskill has shown towards me and, more importantly, the petitioner and the third sector body who also complained about his comments. I just wanted to put that on the record because I feel that it is completely inadequate that the code of conduct does not provide any protection to the convener in this regard and to advise the committee that I will be writing to the standards committee to advise them of my concerns in that respect. With that, I will move on to the next agenda item, which is agenda item 1, consideration of continued petitions. The first of which is PE1319 by William Smith and Scott Robertson on improving youth football in Scotland. Members have a note from the clerks and the submissions and I welcome Chuck Brody to the meeting who has shown an on-going interest in this petition. Chuck, do you want to make any comments? If I am making any, thank you very much for allowing me to attend and to speak before I do so. I have just seen the letter from the SPFL and I may, with your indulgence, comment briefly on that. The answer reflects an answer that I received to the letter. I also wrote to the SFA in SPFL about the transfer and the payment of one individual that we have several others. I quote in the middle of paragraph 2. They say that we are often told of these payments, but to date we have been provided with no evidence and therefore are of great concern to us that there is continuing allegation and innuendo without any actual substantiation. I wrote to them highlighting the name of the individual, which I will not mention here, in the transfer between two Scotland senior clubs for a sum, we believe, in the region of £40,000 or £8,000 of which went to an agent. The body's SFA and SPFL said that they were not aware of that, and yet, lo and behold, on the front page of the website of the agent, they declared that they had registered the individual for whom we sought information. We will go back to them and we will highlight not just the one but the others that we have, but it is stretching it a bit far to say that they have been provided with no evidence. The agent has declared publicly that they have registered an individual, and I have to question the registration competence of the body's concern. In saying, I am delighted to speak. Before I really go into some substance, I will be brief. There are two real tests to this petition, which I was happy to speak to before and happy to be involved with those who brought the petition to us. One, in the most important aspect, as reflected in the Children's Commissioner's report, is the expectation, the expectation and the potential exploitation of children. Some, as I am told, are as young as six years old. The Children's Commissioner reports are invaluable to—I will show a window on what he believes is necessary and what he thinks has been happening. The second is the outcome for the performance of Scottish football generally. It is not good. Failure to an international level, the world level and the European level are evidence-based as to what the national performance is. It is far too centralised, too short-term looking at the future and skewed towards larger clubs. That does not help, as I see the expectation of young people who are brought into that environment. I believe that we need a major overhaul, a major reorganisation that has a stronger emphasis on Scottish youth and reflects Scottish youth. We need only, in my opinion, a national organisation that can do that. I have to ask which of the two organisations is truly fit for purpose with regard to the creation of a youth and elite academy that reflects the size of the Scottish population and does not try to emulate, as we have heard before, a disproportionate level of elite academy related to the population as we have tried to almost have equivalence with that of Germany. The overhaul in terms of young people's football, in terms of the role of the agents and qualification of them, particularly with regard to children and, of course, there is an emphasis on the role of parents. There should be clear guidelines and penalties on the role of agents. Indeed, consideration of the role of parents in how some might be seduced into being persuaded to sign their children up to professional football clubs. There is a wider role of clubs, I believe, in social and other local sports and community activities. Importantly, the last thing is to ensure that, in no way is there a default on the education of children who are involved, boys and girls who are involved, in trying to fulfil the expectation of being good professional footballers in some places, great professional footballers. That can only be done, I believe, if we return football meaningfully to schools, to communities, to boys and girls club at the grassroots, and to ensure that we begin again to believe that football should be competitive but should be fun for children that are not for sale. On that basis, I am more than happy to talk to you. Again, I applaud the petitioners for bringing it forward and I am happy to support the petition. We asked that the committee consider that the approval reaction be taken. Within the Parliament, I spoke with the Sports Minister several times about this, and I believe that the time for action is now. Thank you for your interesting contribution. Do members have any comments on Angus? Thanks to the petitioner, the SFA SPFL, I have taken the issues concerning youth football reasonably seriously. The petitioner himself has stated that the petitioner is moving the clubs and governing bodies in the right direction. We have also seen that the commissioner for children and young people has stated that it is clear that there have been some improvements in the approach that has been taken to children who are involved in youth football. However, there are still matters at standing. I also note the commissioner's comment that he no longer believes that matters that remain outstanding can be dealt with by self-regulation, and he recommends that the committee refers the matter to the Scottish Government to consider how the issues may be dealt with through external regulation, a suggestion that has also been backed by the petitioner. In light of those responses and taking on board Chick Brody's comments this morning, I would suggest that the committee should be minded to close the petition, but in doing so, it is right to the Scottish Government to ask for it to look at regulation through legislation to prohibit controls over young people that would not be permissible in any other walk of life, as the petitioner has already put it. Unlike my colleague Angus MacDonald, I do not think that we should be closing the petition down. I think that we should be, as Angus MacDonald has suggested, writing to the Scottish Government to seek its views regarding the regulation, because, clearly, the commissioner for young people has indicated that there are concerns in having sat through and listened to some of the evidence from the Scottish FA and SPFL. Clearly, they do not seem to be taking the issue as far as I am concerned as seriously as the general public and the petitioners. It is only by right now that we write to the Scottish Government seeking its views on it, but we include that as part of our legacy for the next committee. I think that there are still issues that need to be addressed here. By writing to the Scottish Government, I hope that the successor committee will get some response and some idea from the Scottish Government about what action it will take. Unfortunately, too often, we hear about self-regulation not being regulation at all. Organisations such as the Scottish FA and SPFL are not prepared to regulate or accept and acknowledge that there are some issues out there in relation to youth football, so we need to look at some form of regulation that captures and protects young people and their families from what could be seen as abuse from unscrupulous agents or clubs. I am minded to argue that we should keep the petition open as well into our legacy paper. The Scottish FA and SPFL are entities in their own right to any other commercial organisation. They have the right to make rules to govern themselves, but equally, they take public money. Recently, they have asked the Scottish Government to contribute to initiatives that they have been pursuing. I do not think that they can have it both ways. They cannot, on the one hand, make the argument that such cultural importance and importance to the Scottish Government has a responsibility towards them, but they do not have any responsibility to act in a way that those who represent the general public would consider to be appropriate. I do not think that they have been pushing hard against having a discussion around this. I think that they have indicated that they would be prepared to sit down in some sort of round table discussion. It could be that we could suggest to the Public Petitions Committee in the next session that they could pursue such a round table and see whether any discussions that could be had in a constructive manner could lead to some consensus being achieved as to how that could go forward. Mr Brody will be able to testify to the first attempt to get the SFA and SPFL to a committee meeting of the Public Petitions Committee. They resisted and felt that they were not accountable to the Scottish Parliament for their actions. The reality is that, although I agree, it might be useful to re-invite them to a future committee meeting, I advise any future committee to look back at the initial responses from both the SFA and SPFL in relation to the original invitation. It took some persuasion, as the best way to describe it, to get those two bodies sitting in a committee meeting to discuss and answer some of the issues that were being raised by the petitioners. It is just to make you aware of that, that they have given evidence in the past but reluctantly gave evidence. I, too, had meetings at Hamden Park with the SFA and SPFL. There are some things happening in Scottish football that are encouraging me. The fans' involvement in the role of hybs and hearts, for example, in widening the involvement in the franchise, are encouraging, but that is at the senior level. The meeting at Hamden again reiterated the need for evidence-based, which I think has been produced, but around the table is certainly a continuation of the petition with that information and with the involvement. I mean, I have had parents who have come to me with problems that they were having with the major clubs in Scotland and the impact that was having on children's education. If you like the binding contract, I will make contracts of inverted commas in terms of how the parents have signed up children to be involved and tied very much to one specific club, and hence the issue that we raised with transfer fees. I would be encouraged if the petition were to carry on as part of your legacy paper and that around the table, with more evidence than we had the first time, and perhaps bringing in parents who would be willing to comment on what actually happened in their experience. I thank everybody for the next committee to determine how to do it, but I think that we can certainly suggest that they consider such an action if we then keep it in the petition open. I take on board John's request to write to the Government and get a response in relation to that specific point, and I think that we can do both. Members agree? Angus, do you want to know? Just to say that it is a general consensus of the members to keep the petition open and to include it in the legacy paper, I am content with that, so long as John Wilson's suggestion about writing to the Scottish Government is included. With regard to a further evidence session, we have tried that in the past, however, a chick Brody's suggestion that parents should be part of that round table is certainly a good one if we are going to go down that route, because it is good to hear straight from the horsey smith, as it were. I reluctantly concur with the consensus to keep the petition open. I feel that this has been on-going since 2010, and I am not sure that we are going to make any significant further progress as a committee at all, as my own view. However, I note what the commissioner says, which is summed up in John Wilson's recommendation that we ask the Scottish Government whether it has any will to intervene, but it would be on that basis that I am agreeing with. I think that there is a consensus that we try to keep it open and pursue it a bit further. Okay. Thanks very much, Trichfer. Okay. Our next petition this morning is PE1412 by Billy McDowell on bonds of cation. Members have a note from the clerk and submissions in relation to this. I will open up to the committee to suggest what we do, if there is anything at all. I do not see any indication that there are any suggestions that we can bring forward. The next petition is PE1477 by Jamie Ray on behalf of Throat Cancer Foundation on gender-neutral HPV vaccination. I will invite contribution. I note the petitioner's request for the JCVI to accelerate its assessment so that the decision on vaccinating adolescent boys is made this year and not in 2017. However, I also note the JCVI's comments that it would be inadvisable to take shortcuts, which could undermine the validity of the results in order to expedite the review. While I can understand the petitioner's frustration at the length of time that this is taking, I think that we should take on board the comments from the JCVI. That said, convener, I think that we should write to the Scottish Government, as suggested by the petitioner, to ask that it considers early adoption of the programme and to keep this petition open as part of the legacy paper when we await the response from the Scottish Government. I would have been minded to recommend to close the petition on the basis that the objectives set out in the original request have been agreed to by the JCVI and that they will be making recommendations that will full the request of the petition. Therefore, I am not sure what further more the committee can achieve. I think that we could wait until we get the response from the Scottish Government. I take your point, Jack. There is not much left to do, but there is still a response due back from the Government if we write to them. I think that we could wait to see what that response is, notwithstanding the fact that I think that some progress has been made in terms of the JCVI. I would be minded to close the petition myself, but I am taking on board the petitioner's comments and I think that we should take it that way a bit extra. One more letter, I cannot do any of that. Agreed that we write and just keep it open for that response to come back. The next petition, PE1493, by Peter John Gordon on a Sunshine Act for Scotland. Members think about actions on this one. Stun, silence. Close the petition under rule 15.7 on the basis that the Scottish Government has undertaken to review the need for updated guidance on what the petition calls for and is consulting on the issue to gather views. Again, we have fulfilled the objectives that were originally sent out by the petitioner. It is not for us to do it, it is for the Government who has said that they will. Our next petition is PE1517, by Elaine Holmes and Oliver McElroy on behalf of the Scottish Mesh Survivors to hear our voice campaign on mesh medical devices. John Scott has joined us this morning and you have been pursuing this with some diligence. Do you want to make some comments before we consider the petition? I am very grateful for the Petitions Committee having carried out the work that they have. I am very grateful for the letter that has now been received from Cabinet Secretary Shona Robison in this regard. I think that the committee has taken this very serious matter forward in a very thoughtful and sensitive way. I am delighted that it has done so. I note from your paper that you believe that this petition should be extended into the next session of Parliament. That is a view that I would share if that is indeed the view of your other committee members. On behalf of the many affected petitioners, I congratulate you on your efforts so far, but keep up the good work, keep watching because I do not think that all the problems have yet been solved. I am very aware of recent reports in the press of huge claims having now been paid out in America with regard to injuries that have suffered as a result of these mesh implants. I can only see that that is likely to lead to more litigation here in this country. In terms of avoiding that in future, we have to be vigilant in how we look at dealing with this in problem in future. That is clearly a petition that we should keep open and include in our legacy paper, but I note two specific points in the cabinet secretary's letter. One is that we will be seeing a copy of the report on the single incision many slings. More urgently, the de facto determination that the regulation of medical devices is reserved to Westminster and that our concern about the conduct and interrogation of those devices by the MHRA cannot be addressed by our looking to the Scottish Government to set up any parallel or operation. Therefore, it will be useful for the committee to write to the UK Government minister, who is responsible for the MHRA, drawing their attention to the work that this committee has done on this subject and asking how we can influence the debate that it is taking place over whether or not those devices are being properly regulated by the MHRA over which we have such significant concern. I think that most people would agree that there is certainly more information appearing all the time about this. We are learning more and horrendous information about the impact of these implants. I think that there is a good bit of work still to be done on this petition and in general terms about the whole issue that is being raised. I think that there is a consensus on the committee that we keep this when open and allow the petitioner's committee in the next session to continue to scrutinise this. No-one has agreed. Our next petition is PE1548 by Beth Morrison on national guidance on restraint and seclusion in schools. I think that there is some work that we still need to do on this, and I think that writing to the Scotland's children and young people's commissioner inviting his views on the proposed guidance in the context of this petition and to include the petition in our legacy paper for the session 5 would be advisable. Members agree? Petition PE1563 by Doreen Goldie on behalf of Avonbridge and Standburn Community Councils on sewage sludge spreading. Thanks, convener. Obviously, I declare an interest as I have had a constituency interest in this issue. As we can see from the petitioner's submission, they have broadly welcomed and agree most of the recommendations that have come out of the Scottish Government's sludge review. However, saying that it has to be noted that the petitioners are disappointed that there is no planned reduction in the spreading of sewage sludge in the near future, I think that the petition has achieved a great deal. It has brought forward the review. In fact, you could argue that the review might not be happening had it not been for the petition. In addition, following pressure from myself and Margaret Mitchell, MSP and John Wilson, a large number of the points that have been raised have been taken on board by the Scottish Government. Coupled with the new legislation on the way and the knock-on consultation that will generate and the fact that the petitioners now have direct access to the lead Scottish Government officials, which again is a welcome development, I would normally have been minded to close the petition because it is a success story for the petitioners and for the petition's committee. However, despite welcoming the progress, I think that the committee should keep the petition open to allow us to keep a watching brief on any progress that is made with the introduction of legislation and also with regard to the issues that have been raised on giving SIPA more power to control the issues. I think that there is a strong argument to keep the petition open, convener, and I hope that other members of the committee are similarly minded. Thank you, convener. Like Angus MacDonald, I think that we should be keeping this petition open. I think that we have achieved a lot and there has been useful progress made. However, the petitioners have raised a number of questions on the submission on 1 March in response to the Scottish Government's action to date. When we are continuing the petition, it would be useful to write to the Scottish Government with the questions raised in the latest submission to find out whether those questions can be answered or dealt with as part of the review process to ensure that we do not just have a review in place and guidance issued, but we have the questions that are being asked particularly by the petitioners answered at the same time because there is no point in the Government coming out with a review document and saying that this is what we are going to do. Some of the questions that have been raised by the community council are still outstanding. It would be useful to write to the Scottish Government to say that there have been further questions asked, can we get clarification on those issues and ensure that they will be covered as part of the very guidance that is going to be issued, particularly the issue about CEPAS powers. As we have discussed in the committee before, it is okay to say that an agency has powers, but if the agency does not have the resources to carry out those powers, the powers will be effective when meeting us. I would have been minded to advocate that we closed the petition. It was a petition that called upon the Scottish Government to ban the use of sewage sludge. The Scottish Government has made it clear that it supports the practice of spreading raw sewage. I do not know if that is a more general metaphor, but in any event it has declined to support the aims of the petition. I hear what my two colleagues say, and if they believe that that would allow us to pursue the petition into the next session, I am minded to support that. However, it is pretty clear that the actual objective of the petition is not going to be agreed to by the Scottish Government. I think that we have been in that position before. We accept that the Government is not going to do what the petition asked for, but that does not mean that there is not an area of work that the committee could continue to scrutinise and ask questions around and hopefully get some answers in terms of the on-going review of it. As I understand it, the petitioners have submitted their own response direct to the Scottish Government. As I mentioned earlier, they now have direct access to the lead officials, which I am sure is welcomed by everybody. However, there is no harm in the committee submitting the questions that are raised so that we get some feedback direct from the Scottish Government. That is a good suggestion. I would be happy to take you open just to get that response back. At that point, the session 5 committee can determine whether there is any value in taking it beyond that. PE1577 by Rachel Wallace on adult cerebral palsy services. I think that we still have not pursued this to the fullest extent and there is a bit of work to be done. I do not think that there is anything that we can do specifically at the moment, but we cannot close the petition. I think that this is one that has to be left open. The meeting between Murdo Fraser, Ms Wallace and the minister was delayed until the beginning of March, which means that some of the work streams arising from that have not had a chance to mature, so I think that it would make sense to allow them to progress and for the committee to consider it in the next session. Petition PE1581 by Duncan Wright on saving Scotland's school libraries. I am very depressed by the response that we have received. I have to say that it almost to my mind validates the need for the petition, because essentially what many of the councils have said—I think that it is summed up very nicely here by Glasgow—is that school libraries are running different ways across the country. Given the financial challenges that councils are facing, that is an area where reforms have taken place, which essentially means closing libraries down or merging the more undermining and reducing facility. Most of the local authorities that have responded have more or less said, hands off, that is our territory. As far as I can see, they are undermining things. Last week we had what was it, a national good reader or whatever it was. I saw the first minister appearing with Harry Potter and Sundry and other characters, all reading books and encouraging children to read. That is not going to be possible if there are no libraries for them to go and borrow books from or educated and trained librarians who are in a position to advise on a system in that job. To my mind, there is a need for us to pursue that, not just now with local authorities but with the Government, because I do not see how that strategy can be fulfilled with the current way in which libraries in schools are being undermined. John Swinney, I totally agree. The petition was brought forward based on the on-going situation, but there was also a comment made by a number of people about the concerns about what would happen in this spending round with the budget restrictions that local authorities were going to face. I think that people thought that a bad situation was going to get worse. It would appear that that is exactly what is happening and I just do not think that we can walk away from the table with the shrug on our shoulders and ringing our hands. I think that we have to continue to press this issue, so I think that we have to keep this one open and let the future petitions committee continue to look into this issue based on what is coming out of the current cuts at local authority level. The next petition is PE 1595 by Alex Ander Taylor on a moratorium on shared space schemes. I just do not think that we have concluded our deliberations on this one. I think that there is a lot of information that we are gathering in in relation to this petition. I am certainly learning a lot about the concerns around it and I think that there is more that we can learn and we cannot close this petition until we have pursued this a lot further. I agree, convener, and again I was very disappointed by the quality of the response that we received and the variability of it. One council responded saying, However, due to acknowledged conflicting disability needs and preferences particularly surrounding car abuse, it is not possible to deliver a street design to meet the specific desires of all disability groups. I just thought that that does not really take matters very much further forward. Given that what was being represented to us is that the street schemes that were being introduced were actually more prejudicial to disability groups than they were before they became shared schemes, I do feel that this is an area where there is a need for further action. I also note the comment by Lord Holmes that the UK Government has asked for all UK authorities to submit details of any shared space schemes that they currently operate in order that a review can be undertaken. I do think that if the UK Government is pressing a review of the way in which those schemes are functioning, there may be a case for a parallel initiative here in Scotland. I would make one comment in terms of some of the submissions that we have had. There appears to be a belief or a misconception that this committee has got the authority to order local authorities not to do those things. I just think that we have to put on record that we do not have that authority, but what we can do is scrutinise what is happening and ask for policy direction to be looked at. However, we cannot make a ruling in terms of the ability of any local authority to implement such a scheme or otherwise, and we certainly cannot order a planning authority to undo any decision that it may have made. John Swinney? That perception may arise from the East and Barnasher submission where they described this committee as the Scottish Government Public Petitions Committee, if only. We are the Scottish Parliament's Public Petitions Committee and we do not have legislative powers to force the Government to do that. I just think that we have to make that clear in case people are working under a misapprehension. We will definitely keep that petition open and take it further forward. Next petition, PE1596, by Paul Anderson, James McDermott and Chris Daley, on the in-care survivor service Scotland. Given the on-going discussions that we are aware of taking place, I do not think that we can close this petition. We have to leave this in our legacy paper. Members agree? Our next petition is PE1597, by Bill Welsh, on Michael Plasma fermentans in regressive autism. We really have to close this petition and the Scottish Government, which acts upon the advice that it received, has made it clear that it does not support the aims of the petition and therefore I think that it is impossible that it can proceed. Members agree that that is the case? That brings us to agenda item 2, the annual report. It is consideration of the committee's draft annual report for the parliamentary year 11 May 2015 to 23 March 2016. All committee annual reports follow a standard format, as agreed by the convener's group, members have a note by the clerk and the annual draft report. Do you have any comments on it? It is a pretty standard document. Everyone is happy to agree the report then. That is agreed. As agreed at our last meeting, the committee will now go into private session for item 3 on today's agenda.