 I would urge all members who wish to speak in this debate to press their request-to-speak buttons now and I call on Angela Constance to speak to and move the motion in her name. Thank you very much, Presiding Officer. Violence against women and girls is one of the most devastating and fundamental violations of human rights. It has to stop and we all have to take meaningful action to stop it. This debate marks the annual 16 days of action to tackle gender-based violence across the world. The theme of this year's 16 days is to leave no-one behind, and I take that to mean two things. Firstly, that no woman or girl should endure any form of gender-based violence, and we need to make sure that we include every part of our society in our efforts to end it. Secondly, that we all in this Parliament and in our society have a responsibility to take action to end violence against women. It is time for everyone to realise that we are collectively responsible for eradicating violence against women and girls and the underlying attitudes and inequalities that perpetuate it. We must work together and we must leave no-one behind. I want to make clear from the outset that it is men who must change their behaviour and their choices. Men must join with the many women who have already taken action in this space to send a very clear message. In every space that men occupy, they must act to support women's equality and stand up to violence, harassment and abuse. We have all been moved by the stories told through the MeToo hashtag on social media, which has prompted thousands of women to disclose that they too have been victims of sexual harassment or assault. I would like to pay tribute to and acknowledge the bravery of those women and men who have raised their hands and said, MeToo, that it is not easy. We cannot forget that there are many more who have not shared their experiences publicly. Each individual is entitled to deal with their own experience in their own way. If the MeToo hashtag has achieved anything, it is indeed to shine a spotlight on men's violence against women and emphasise that we cannot take our foot off the gas. It has brought home the reality that no institution is immune from the scourge of sexual harassment. Tackling violence against women and girls is the role of every individual, every community and every institution of Scotland. The Scottish Government is committed to leading a collective response and playing our part to make that happen. That is why, on Friday, we published a delivery plan to identify and implement the very practical steps that will take us towards ending this violence for good. The delivery plan sets out 118 actions that we intend to take from now to 2021 to ensure that we can make progress towards Scotland where women and children live free from violence and abuse and the attitudes and inequalities that perpetuate it. Our work in this area has a very deliberate and decisive focus on prevention. That is why, over the next period, we will run a number of campaigns, including on the new domestic abuse offence, as well as sexual harassment and sexism. Feminist organisations such as Scottish Women's Aid, Rape Crisis Scotland, Gender, Close the Gap and Zero Tolerance rightly challenge us all to do more, as well as raise awareness and understanding across society. Ensuring that our young people have the right attitudes and an understanding of consent is critical for the future. That is why we are expanding the Rape Crisis Scotland sexual violence prevention programme to all 32 local authorities in Scotland. On Friday, I was delighted to visit St John Ogilvie's High School in Hamilton, which is the first of what will be eight schools over the next few years that we are supporting to develop a holistic approach to tackling gender-based violence. It was fantastic to hear directly from the students how committed they are to those issues, and I believe that the school will certainly blaze a trail that many others will follow. We must ensure that we build on the work that we are doing to give our children and our young people the very best start in life. That is why the delivery plan has a strong focus on education for young people and on improving the experience of the justice system for children and on strengthening links with our work in child protection. Just recently, I was privileged to meet a group of young people called Everyday Heroes, who have been working closely with us to shape equally safe. Their recommendations for action will be published in early 2018, and I will be responding to them. Those are fantastic young people, and I encourage other members across the chamber to engage with this group of young people as their voices should be heard and their views listened to. We need to harness the power of all our educational facilities, and we must make sure that our further and higher education campuses are free of this violence. I want to mention the tragic case of Emily Drewey, who is just 18 years old, and in her first year at university, she was found dead in her flat in March last year, having taken her own life. That serves to remind us that colleges and universities, like every other institution and community, have their share of men's violence against women. We need to do more, and that is why we will work with universities and colleges to support them in using the learning from our equally safe and higher education project at the University of Strathclyde to ensure the safety of students from gendered violence and to embed better understanding of those issues into their curriculums. I want to pay tribute to Fiona Ewing, Emily's mother, who has campaigned, along with the National Union of Students, for universities to tackle those issues on campus and to provide better support for students. My colleague Shirley-Anne Somerville, the Minister for Further and Higher Education and Science, has offered to meet Fiona Ewing, and I know that she will give careful consideration to the important matters that are raised by this heart breaking case. Raising awareness and embedding understanding are important, but the bigger challenge is delivering a societal shift where women no longer occupy a subordinate position to men. This Government has a strong track record, a gender balance cabinet, the establishment of an advisory councillor, women and girls, and the introduction of legislation to bock in the gains on ensuring equal representation on public boards are just a few of the important steps that we are taking. This is a matter of human rights enshrined within the UN convention on the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women, which states that we have a duty to provide women on equal terms with men the right to participate in government and public office at all levels. We take a responsibility to uphold those rights seriously and to do so demands action to ensure that women are properly represented in our political and public institutions and more widely in senior and decision making positions. Of course we know that in terms of equal representation we are not there yet. Just less than 35 per cent of members of this Scottish Parliament and 30 per cent of MPs are women, and at the current pace of change it will be another 25 years before we reach 50 per cent of women-elected members in local government. We all know that we have a lot more to do, and that is why the delivery plan sets out a series of steps that we believe will help to make progress towards advancing women's equality and a range of spaces for their economic, civil, social and cultural. We also want women to feel safer in every space that they wish to inhabit, and part of that is about holding men to account for their behaviour in real and online spaces. That is why we will work with local community safety partners to link equally safe to their work and hold a round table with experts to look at what more we can do to tackle the pernicious online abuse and misogyny that women use in social media often experience. A prevention is absolutely vital if we are to reduce and ultimately end violence against women and girls, but we also need to act here and now to ensure that those experiences, violence and abuse get the help and support that they need. We want to make sure that public services work together effectively to support victims and survivors and to put the rights of victims and survivors at the very heart of their approach. We recognise the important role that local specialists third sector services play, which is why we are providing three years funding for those organisations to enable them to plan for the future. We are investing significant funding in tackling violence against women and girls, and for this year I have committed nearly £12 million from my portfolio to support services and tackle the underlying issues that create the conditions for violence. The £20 million invested by my colleague the cabinet secretary for justice over the last three years to strengthen the justice response to tackling violence against women has been used to good effect to reduce criminal court waiting times, strengthen advocacy support across the country for victims of sexual violence and develop the capacity of perpetrator programmes. As I said at the outset, it is men who need to change their behaviour and their choices if we are to end violence against women and girls. If they do not do so, then it is right that they receive a robust response from justice services. That is why we are strengthening the law in relation to domestic abuse by making coercive and controlling behaviour a criminal offence to reflect the reality of domestic abuse. We have already passed the Abusive Behaviour and Sexual Harm Scotland Act 2016, which modernises the law on domestic and sexual abuse and created a specific offence of sharing private intimate images without consent. We also need to make sure that those men who are willing to change their behaviour get the support that they need. We will expand the Caledonian programme to ensure that male offenders can receive those interventions. To conclude, a lot has been done. We are doing important work in this area. I welcome very much the broad cross-party consensus on the agenda, but there is much more to be done. We cannot rest until violence against women and girls is indeed a thing of the past. I want to end with a quote from Frunzilla Malama Nukuka, the Executive Director of UN Women, who once said that the price of no change is unacceptable, and I am sure that we would all concur with that. That has been thrown into sharp focus by recent events in particular. The Government commits to moving forward and working tirelessly to ensuring that every woman in Scotland lives free from violence, and I move the motion in my name. I very much welcome the opportunity to speak in this afternoon's debate and to support the Scottish Government's motion. I personally like the line in it, calling on men everywhere to stand shoulder to shoulder with women in sending a clear message that violence against women and girls is never acceptable. Certainly this man stands shoulder to shoulder with everybody in this chamber on that. Sunday marked the international day for the elimination of violence against women, an annual campaign that has run for more than 15 years. It also marked the start of 2017's 16 days of activism against gender-based violence campaign. This is an opportunity for us as parliamentarians to not only increase public awareness but to take stock, to evaluate progress and to redouble our efforts. In doing so, we will no doubt hear many sobering statistics in the chamber this afternoon. We know, for example, that last year, Police Scotland received on average more than 160 calls a day reporting domestic violence, but there has been a 66% rise in the number of reported rapes and attempted rapes since 2010 and that almost 200 women and girls were forced into marriage in Scotland over a four-year period, with more than a third of those taking place in my own city of Glasgow. Those figures serve as a stark reminder of the scale of the problem that we still face. In fact, incidences are likely much higher due to non-reporting, but statistics tell only a small part of the story. They cannot possibly convey the horror of being violently abused in your own home, the betrayal of being sexually assaulted by someone and the trauma of being forced into a marriage while you are still in school uniform. Survivors have shown tremendous strength and resilience and I echo the cabinet secretary's thanks and appreciation of those activists and organisations, Scottish Women's Aid, Rape Crisis Scotland, Victim Support Scotland, Binados and many others who support them. The Scottish Conservatives stand with the Scottish and UK Governments as they work to eradicate gender-based violence at home and abroad. We know, for example, that one of the major challenges to efforts to prevent and end violence against women and girls worldwide is the substantial funding shortfall. That is why DFID's recent commitment to provide up to £12 million over three years to the United Nations trust fund and support of actions to eliminate violence against women and, indeed, the Scottish Government's additional £1 million for the equally safe strategy are particularly welcome. The additional UK aid, announced last week by our new international development secretary, Penny Mordant, is expected to help some 750,000 women and girls around the world. The Prime Minister often talks about the good that Government can do. Well, that seems to me is a first-class example. Also welcome was the news in October that the disclosure scheme for domestic abuse in Scotland, Clare's Law, has led to more than 900 people being told over the past two years that their partner has an abusive past. Ruth Davidson and my Scottish Conservative colleagues pushed hard for this scheme to be introduced north of the border after it was rolled out in England and Wales in 2014. The initiative is another piece in the jigsaw offering extra protection to women at risk of domestic violence, and it is very positive to see it working so effectively. However, as the cabinet secretary rightly said, there is so much more to be done. The Scottish Government is rightly finding ways to tackle the scourge of gender-based violence, but this process is impeded if the agencies on the ground are ill-equipped to cope with increasing demand. The thematic review of the investigation and prosecution of sexual crimes has raised a number of concerns in this regard, with victims of sexual violence variously reporting that the court system is, and I quote, degrading and terrifying, and that their ordeal in court was, and again I quote, worse than the rape itself. After taking the brave step to report the crime, the review found that a high number of victims disengage during the criminal justice process, and Presiding Officer, this isn't good enough, and this Parliament must monitor progress by the Crown Office urgently to address those criticisms. The theme for 2017's campaign against gender-based violence is Leave No One Behind, an imperative to support those women and girls most vulnerable to gender-based violence, including ethnic minorities, those living with disabilities, migrants and refugees, and those in humanitarian crises as a result of conflict or natural disaster. So it's concerning therefore that respondents to the consultation on the Equally Safe Delivery Plan feel that it has fallen short in relation to who it should cover, including women and girls with additional vulnerabilities. Presiding Officer, I make this point not to criticise or to condemn but as an MSP for the Glasgow region, currently the only asylum dispersal area in Scotland. The British Red Cross, with whom I met and spoke last week, assisted more than 2,500 refugees and asylum seekers last year in Glasgow. Some are women who have experienced violence in their country of origin or on their journey to the United Kingdom. On arrival, their level of vulnerability can be heightened by intense difficulties accessing services. Those are women very much at risk of exploitation and abuse, but the national framework to eliminate gender-based violence does not fully identify their additional vulnerabilities nor adequately respond to them. The Scottish Government has recognised stakeholder feedback that the delivery plan needs to be improved in this area, and perhaps the cabinet secretary could shed further light on this issue when she winds up for the Government later this afternoon. On female genital mutilation, too, the Scottish Government could and in our view should go further. Even though female genital mutilation has been explicitly illegal since 1985, there has never been a successful prosecution in Scotland. The national action plan on FGM commits to raise awareness of female genital mutilation among teachers and medical practitioners, to add to the national guidance for child protection, and for Police Scotland to issue internal guidance on so-called honour-based violence. Those are positive steps, and I welcome them, but why not go further, as the Scottish Conservatives have called for, and introduce court-ordered female genital mutilation protection orders, a mandatory reporting duty, lifelong anonymity for victims, a criminal offence of failing to protect your daughter, and statutory guidance, not just ad-hoc guidance but statutory guidance for professionals. All of those have been implemented south of the border. Why not also here, too? It is fair to say that we have made good progress on tackling gender-based violence in recent years, but there is evidently further that we can go and more to be done yet. In that spirit, we support the Government's motion this afternoon. Thank you very much. I am pleased that it is taking place during the UN's 16 days of action to end violence against women and girls. Although the motion before us today has a largely domestic context, the significance of this week reminds us of the global importance of this campaign, and the plights being faced by women and girls across the world who face daily experiences of threats of violence and sexual exploitation. Gender-based violence is constant. In times of conflict and in times of peace, it will try to damage, destroy and demean women and girls. At the heart of that is inequality, and societies where women and girls continue to be unequal in social, economic and political realms, where they are powerless, limited or restricted, cannot fully challenge and change this culture. The 16 days of action supports empowerment of women and girls and challenges political leadership to take action. The voice from this Parliament must be clear and unequivocal that, although we address the challenges at home, we are doing so in solidarity with all women and girls across the world. This year's theme leaves no one behind and violence against women and girls encapsulates this responsibility. We believe that we live in a tolerant, inclusive society, and those are the values that we promote. However, the reality of our society is that gender inequality still exists. It exists in the workplace, in the home, in the worlds of sport and education. That inequality in our society is the root for the growth of gender-based violence. In recent years, we have seen the reporting of rape, sexual assault and domestic violence all increase. Almost 11,000 sexual offences were reported last year, a rise of 5 per cent on the previous year. I know that significant efforts have been made by Police Scotland and other agencies to support reporting of these crimes, and that can be argued as an explanation for the increase. However, I fear that we are seeing a shift in the types of crime that is being committed, with a greater focus on intimate, personal crimes being committed against partners, friends and acquaintances and overwhelmingly women, many of which are not reported. As part of the 16 days of rape crisis Scotland have been providing snapshots, and yesterday he tweeted that, on 9 October 2017, 246 people received support from local rape crisis centres in Scotland. This year, rape and sexual abuse person can Ross celebrate their 10th year, and they held a fantastic exhibition called Inside Outside, which was informative, engaging, moving and ultimately hopeful. It showed the trauma of rape, sexual assault and sexual exploitation, but also showed the resilience and recovery that they support. Part of their workers and schools are challenging gender stereotypes and expectations, discussing consent and working to change the culture that young people are experiencing. Last week, we had the announcement of the chair of the expert group on preventing sexual offending among children and young people with an emphasis on prevention. That is a welcome appointment, which provides a focus for this difficult discussion. Alongside the research, there are people working every day with children and young people to address those issues and the need to be supported. I was pleased to hear the cabinet secretary talk about the funding specifically for working schools. Barnardo Scotland has emphasised the need for children and young people of all ages to have access to high-quality education around health and wellbeing, including healthy relationships and gender equality. The review of PSE is on-going, but it gives us an opportunity to address gender inequality. Barnardo's Children First and NSPCC also make strong points about child sexual abuse and child sexual exploitation, which the cabinet secretary may wish to address. The recent focus on exposing sexual harassment and assault within the film industry, the media politics, demonstrates the protectionism that justifies this type of behaviour. The resultant Me Too social media campaign showed that it was widespread. The typically weaker position of women in the workplace, which leads to fears over position, employment and status if they speak out, indicates that we have some way to go to achieve equality. We can see international examples where other more equal societies in terms of gender have challenged these norms at a very early age. If anything, our society, largely but not exclusively through marketing and commercialisation, have increased the gender identity and expectations on our children and young people. The emphasis is more on difference than on equality, and that underpins the power structures that we live within. Equally safe is welcome as the strategic direction to address these challenges. Recognising all forms of violence against women and girls offers a holistic approach to the problem. The action plan is welcome, but it must be properly resourced and widely disseminated and adopted. The work on domestic abuse is welcome and, as the bill progresses through Parliament, I hope that we can strengthen it and address the availability of specialist courts so that women can access a meaningful justice. However, there are concerns that the strategy is too focused on one area and needs to look wider. The area of exploitation is one area where we could be bolder. My colleague Rhoda Grant has shown her commitment to tackling this issue and will talk a bit more about proposals that were brought forward in her member's bill in the last session. I know that there is interest across the chamber in this issue, and that is welcome. The briefing from Zero Tolerance expressed his appointment that the Equally Safe Delivery Plan does not set out clear actions for how Scotland will prevent all forms of commercial sexual exploitation. Largely exploiting vulnerable women and young girls, Zero Tolerance has highlighted that around half of women become involved at age 18 or younger, and as many of 80 per cent of women are working in flats, saunas or parlers and not originally from the UK. I fear that those are forgotten women and that we do not do enough to disrupt the industry, which has clear links to human trafficking. There is not enough provision and support for women who often have language barriers, drug and alcohol addiction problems and mental health problems. There is not enough support for those women who are looking to escape from this life. I look forward to this afternoon's debate and the contribution from all MSPs. We now move to the open part of the debate, and we start with Ruth Maguire to be followed by Annie Wells. Ruth Maguire is a privilege to contribute to such an important debate. I would like to begin by welcoming the Equally Safe Delivery Plan that was published last week. We are debating that plan during the global 16 days of activism against gender-based violence. Gender-based violence encompasses a whole continuum of violence perpetrated against women and girls, from sexual harassment to domestic abuse, from rape to sexual assault and from commercial sexual exploitation and trafficking for that purpose to so-called honour crimes. The theme this year is to leave no one behind, end violence against women and girls. The year that we can speak to and pursue the aims of that theme with no caveats and with no whataboutery will be the year that we know that society has truly acknowledged and understood the magnitude of men's violence against women and girls, and that will be the year that we can move forward. It is important to be really clear that we are not there yet, we have not achieved gender equality and violence against women and girls, wherever it is on the scale is both a cause and a symptom of this inequality. There won't be a woman in this place or outside whose life hasn't been negatively affected in some way or another. It might not be all men, but it is all women. The Equally Safe Delivery Plan is to be welcomed. It builds on successes that are already achieved and actions that are already underway to set out 118 diverse and bold actions across four priority areas. Those range from an expansion of rape crisis Scotland's sexual violence prevention programme in schools to the piloting of an equally safe employer accreditation scheme aimed at tackling gender-based violence in the workplace. I have spoken about my concerns about commercial sexual exploitation in this chamber before, and I reiterate my position that, as long as sexual access to women and girls can be bought and sold as if we were objects, there can be no real equality and no real social justice. I was glad to read that, as part of the delivery plan, the women's support network will deliver a challenging demand programme to raise awareness of commercial sexual exploitation and build capacity across organisations to address it. I also welcome the Scottish Government's commitment in the plan to considering how it could enhance support for service providers supporting harm reduction and exit for those engaged in prostitution. At the same time, I am worried that those action points do not go nearly far enough and do not tackle the issue at root cause, which is male demand. Primary prevention is rightly a key priority of the strategy, ensuring that interventions are early, effective and maximise the safety of women and girls. When it comes to commercial sexual exploitation, I am sorry to say that the action points appear to fall a bit short of the mark in that regard. The focus in the delivery plan appears to be on supporting women and prostitution to exit, reducing the harms associated with this kind of violence, as opposed to preventing women from being exploited in the first place and tackling root causes. Where the delivery plan refers to the issues that can lead to someone becoming exploited in this way, it can feel a bit vague and non-committal, but most significantly it conspicuously fails to acknowledge the single root cause of commercial sexual exploitation, and that is male demand. Another priority area in the delivery plan is about ensuring that men desist from all forms of violence against women and girls and that perpetrators of such violence receive a robust and effective response. However, when it comes to commercial sexual exploitation, there is no clear action point under that priority. The Scottish Government is clear that commercial sexual exploitation is a form of violence against women. Surely the next logical step is to criminalise those who perpetrate such violence. Male demand, the root cause of commercial sexual exploitation, has to be explicitly and robustly addressed. As long as it is legal to purchase sexual access to our bodies, men will continue to perpetrate such violence against women with impunity, and our fight for real equality and justice will remain heavily compromised. If we do not act, we simply will not achieve our end goal of eradicating violence against women. We will not hold perpetrators of violence against them to account, and we will not radically change attitudes towards women, something that we all acknowledge as needed. I appreciate that the Scottish Government has recently commissioned an evidence assessment of the impacts of criminalisation, the results of which were inconclusive. In the absence of clear empirical evidence, though, we must be guided by what we deem to be right and wrong, by our own convictions on the issue. This is a point made in the review itself to quote from it. Ultimately, the absence of conclusive evidence is likely to require decision making based on political standpoint and consideration of the policy context and framework in which any potential intervention is required. If our own political standpoint is that prostitution is a form of violence against women and girls, the next logical step is clear to me. In that place, we will not always get an ambiguous and objective evidence that tells us exactly what to do. Sometimes, we have to put our heads above the parapet and fight for what we simply believe to be the right thing. I am once again pleased to speak in this debate marking the United Campaign's 16 days of activism against gender-based violence. Transcending borders and cultures, gender-based violence is a global issue that affects millions of people every year. To reflect on the horrific situations that millions of women and girls find themselves in around the world is sometimes almost too difficult to comprehend, which is why I am pleased that we can come together as MSPs to speak honestly about the issues that lie ahead and what can sometimes seem like an insurmountable task. Hinting at the scale of the global problem this year's theme, Leave No One Behind, reinforces the need to commit to a world free from violence for all women and girls, reaching those who are most underserved and marginalised, often blighted by war, natural disasters and a societal attitude towards women, which can render them socially and economically vulnerable. Data from a survey carried out in 87 countries between 2005 and 2016 showed us that 19 per cent of women between 15 and 49 years of age had experienced physical or sexual violence by a partner in the 12 months prior to the survey. Further to that, female genital mutilation 2 remains a global problem. The practice has declined by 24 per cent since around 2000, but in countries where it remains prevalent, it is estimated that more than one in three girls aged between 15 and 19 are still undergoing that unnecessary procedure. I am pleased that the extra UK aid was announced this weekend, which will assist 750,000 women and girls over the next three years by increasing access to crucial services such as legal assistance, healthcare and counselling. I also welcome the UK's push to eradicate gender-based violence through its 127 programmes, tackling the abuse in its many forms, including prevention of and response to domestic violence, acid attacks, FGM and child early and forced marriage. I am proud that the UK Government is playing a leading role in tackling those issues around the world, and it is only by raising awareness and taking serious action that we will continue to see progress against gender-based violence. Domestically, there is still a perpetual problem to deal with, and I fully support the Scottish Government as it works to eradicate violence against women and girls. I welcome the additional £1 million funding that is announced for the equally safe budget as a means of teaching school children the importance of consent and healthy relationships and creating consistency across our local authorities, as rape crisis Scotland's sexual violence programme has rolled out further. There are worrying trends for domestic violence, with latest statistics showing a 1 per cent rise to nearly 59,900 incidents in 2016-17. There were also nearly 2,000 rapes or attempted rapes recorded to the police in Scotland last year, a 4 per cent rise from the previous year and a 66 per cent rise from 2010-11. Although I absolutely recognise that it is due to an increase in reporting, it is with concern that I note the need for continued improvement and access to support services. Although I, of course, was pleased to see Glasgow Archway Centre receive a funding boost of £445,000, which will allow the sexual assault referral clinic to expand its opening hours until midnight five days of the week, I would like to highlight the scope for the model to be replicated across the country. When Archway was opened almost a decade ago, it was signalled as a first of many clinics across Scotland, giving victims access to a one-stop shop where all the services needed could be easily accessed, and I would urge the Scottish Government to look at rolling that out further. Furthermore, when it comes to FGM, an issue that is believed to affect 170,000 girls across the UK, although I will always support a consensual approach, it is important that we work together and improve on how we respond to and prevent its practice in our country. No-one wants to see this barbaric practice take place in Scotland, and echoing comments that I made back in a debate on FGM in February, I would urge the Scottish Government to take on-board calls for initiatives that have already taken place in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, including statutory reporting for professionals, protection orders and the creating of new criminal offence for parents and guardians who tolerate and facilitate FGM. Finally, I would like to draw attention to some of the local initiatives in my area, which help to drive greater public understanding and help to generate a national conversation. In Glasgow, supporters attending a Glasgow Warriors match at Scotland next month will be invited to sign the White Ribbon Scotland pledge as part of the city's 16 days of action, a request that will no doubt give food for thought for thousands of people who may otherwise may never have heard about the 16-day campaign. To conclude, there is a lot of positive and decisive work being done both locally and nationally as we bid to eradicate gender-based violence. I warmly welcome the Scottish Government's extra funding and the honest discussions and contributions that we have and will hear from members today in the chamber on what is such a very difficult topic. That is not an easy subject, but it is one that I am pleased that has been brought forward for debate today and one that I hope that we will all continue to tackle head-on. As a woman, it is my right, a right in terms of entitlement and a right in terms of morality, it is my right that I should not be subjected to violence, domestic abuse, rape, sexual assault, commercial sexual exploitation or honour-based violence and neither should the one in three women worldwide who are sexually or physically assaulted over the course of their lifetime. The 16 days of activism against gender-based violence ends on human rights day for a reason because women are every bit as human and every bit as deserving of respect and equal treatment. They are every bit as deserving of rights to dignity, rights of protection, to freedoms, freedom to believe, to learn, to express, freedom to move and to marry whom they please. And until women have those freedoms in every community across this planet, we will continue to observe and recognise the 16 days campaign every single year. Women are human and they are entitled to the fundamental freedoms inherent to all humanity, and that may be stating the obvious and yet globally today almost 40 per cent of all murders of women are committed by male partners and in Scotland just over half of the female victims of homicides were killed by their partner or ex-partner. For male victims, it was six per cent. If there was ever a more sobering figure that highlights that Scotland is not exempt from violence against women or the scourge of gender-based abuse, it is that. One of the real strengths of the 16 days campaign is that it starts with local activism. It could start in a small village in rural Scotland. It can be discussed in this Parliament, but we join with activists across the world to say that gender-based violence is not inevitable, it is abnormal and we condemn it. I quote Kofi Annann's comments in 1999, which was eight years after the first 16 days campaign was launched in 1991. He said that violence against women is perhaps the most shameful human rights violation and it is perhaps the most pervasive. It knows no boundaries of geography, culture or wealth. As long as it continues, we cannot claim to be making real progress towards equality, development and peace. I am glad that this Parliament is joining with women and men across the planet to condemn the trellis of inequality on which grows the poisonous suffocating ivy of violence and abuse, beneath which men shelter comfortably knowing their deeds will go unpunished and in which women die at the hands of their partners. I, like others in this chamber, want to put on the record that I utterly condemn the cultural and community norms that ascribe lower status to women and make violence acceptable. I condemn the domestic partners who still believe that their abuse is justified and okay because everybody else does it or because they couldn't control themselves or because of inebriation and drug use. I condemn the way that we continue to fail women in need because help isn't there when it's desperately needed, either because the public justice system across the world is broken, corrupt and dysfunctional, or because women don't believe that it will make a jot of difference if they speak up. What is worse than knowing that you need help and yet knowing that if you ask for it, it will not come? For every woman whose voice we heard during the Me Too campaign and for every woman whose story we read with great gratitude to them for their bravery in speaking up, for every woman there are hundreds of thousands more who live in fear or live with the consequences of violence, violence for one reason, violence because they are women. The acts of violence will differ but at the end of the day this is about the women whose only crime is to be born a woman in a world that still sees fit to abuse and attack them. On this I want to pay tribute to one of my invincible colleagues, Ash Denham, for her fearless definition of prostitution as violence against women and her unswerving determination to end commercial sexual exploitation. I pay tribute to Rhoda Grant 2 and to other MSPs, including Ruth Maguire, who continue to pursue this and will pursue this until they have succeeded in protecting what Claire Baker called the Forgotten Women. I fully agree in closing with Ruth Maguire's comments that caring for women exiting sexual exploitation is fundamentally important but it does not deal with the core problem. That problem is that we are raising today and that we have raised in every day of the 16 days campaign and that we will raise every single day until we have succeeded in solving it. That real problem is male violence against women. It must end, it will only end if we identify what the core problem is. I join with women across the world today in saying that we utterly condemn that violence that is perpetrated. I call Rhoda Grant to be followed by John Finnie. Thank you, Presiding Officer. This debate is an annual event marking the 16 days of activism against gender-based violence. Violence against women is rooted in women's inequality. Every time we take a step to counter that inequality, it feels like a new front opens up. This year, we have been faced with revelations from every walk of life of sexual harassment of women in the workplace, a practice that is used by some men to undermine women, to put women in their place, a place that says that they cannot progress their career without providing sexual favours, a place that they should always know remains submissive to men. Up until a couple of months ago, women speaking out about harassment would have been quickly denounced, her career over marked as a troublemaker or a prude. Maybe it does show a step forward that this is no longer the case, but it shows very vividly the despicable behaviour that has gone unchallenged for far too long. We need true equality to ensure that this cannot happen to another woman. This change of culture must be led by men as well as women. The vast majority of men are horrified by this behaviour. They have to speak out now. Sexual abuse is not a woman's problem, it is a problem with some men. Our society must also stop giving out mixed messages. We must stand for total equality and have zero tolerance to all aspects of violence against women. Surely, it is a mixed message to say that it is okay for men to buy a woman in prostitution, but it is not okay for men to demand sexual favours to enhance a woman's career. Both are wrong, both should not be tolerated. This stark inequality demeans women. Until we put it right, we will continue to be plagued by violence against women, which is a symptom of an unequal society. As we look at other countries, we can see clearly that those who prohibit the purchase of sex create more equal societies. Those societies have equal pay, equal maternity and paternity leave, they are much fairer societies because of it. Basic human respect for our fellow humans breeds kinder societies and the willingness to work together for the greater good. It is no coincidence that domestic abuse starts with financial control, followed by degrading behaviour and physical and sexual violence. This is a process that the perpetrator takes to gain control of their victim. As a society, we must not tolerate that in any guise. No human should have control over another and we must build fair and respectful societies. In Scotland, we have prided ourselves on our measures to combat violence against women and, indeed, we are legislating again on coercive control, but we still have a long way to go. Ireland, north and south have made the purchase of sex illegal, and that has led to more trafficking of women to Scotland to feed prostitution, and that is something that we warned off at the time. We really need to deal with prostitution in a way that has equality at its core. Currently, our laws penalise those who are forced into prostitution. They do nothing whatsoever to protect them. They are the people who are penalised and criminalised while those who feed the industry walk away scot-free. It is simply not good enough to just say that prostitution is wrong. It is a form of violence against women but then do absolutely nothing at all to stop it. Equally safe makes it clear that violence against women includes commercial sexual exploitation, including prostitution, lap dancing, stripping, pornography and trafficking. There are a majority of members of this Parliament whose party policy is to criminalise those who would buy sex and to decriminalise those who sell. Prostitution feeds off poverty, which is growing. Poverty makes people vulnerable and they struggle to survive. Prostitution also feeds off abuse. It is no coincidence that those working with survivors of childhood sexual abuse find that many of them have also been prostituted. Treated as objects for someone else's gratification in their childhood leads them into the same as adults. Some argue that every aspect of prostitution should be decriminalised. Pimps and brothel keepers should be free to abuse without sanction. If prostitution was legalised, it would be okay for a career advisor to recommend it as a job. Would it be okay to sanction somebody if they turned down work as a prostitute? It is women predominantly who are exploited, but some men are too, but what is clear, however, that it is always men who do the exploiting. Can I ask every member to consider whether prostitution is okay for them, for their parents, for their partner or for their children? I am going to ask you to do something that I heard Linda Thompson from the women's support project, Tell an Audience, and it really brought home the reality of prostitution to me. She told us all, when you leave here today, take note of the next 10 men you meet. What would it take for you to sell sex to them? How desperate would you need to be? And what price would you accept? Now tell me that that is a choice, a simple transaction between buyer and seller. Frankly, if it is not good enough for you and yours, it is not good enough for anyone. John Finnie, to be followed by Alex Cole-Hamilton. Thank you, Presiding Officer. Like many others, I am very pleased to speak in this debate, and as Rhoda Grant said, it is called for men to speak out. As Ruth Maguire said, it may not be all men, but it is certainly all women and girls who are affected by the subject that we are talking about here. I am very happy to lend support to the cabinet secretary's motion and to note that it talks about the global 16 days of activism. It is quite clear that the problems that are being alluded to by colleagues are worldwide. It is gender-based violence that we are talking about, and I almost feel that I should start every speech of this nature by apologising for my gender. However, what I think is important is that men do speak out. I welcome the publication of the Scottish Government's delivery plan, and it will go some way to addressing underlying attitudes. Of course, there is a lot of work that still requires to be done. I am very grateful to the various organisations for the briefings. I have got a quote from children first a couple of times. They talk about the domestic abuse bowl that my colleague Rhoda Grant referred to. I, too, am in the Justice Committee and see that this is one way that we are going to make things a little bit better. They say that it represents a vital step forward in tackling gender-based violence and in recognising the impact of that type of violence on children. Of course, it is simply the spouser partner that is affected by this. It is the entire household, and it goes often much beyond that. There is a lot of good work that has been undertaken by the Scottish Government and, indeed, by the third sector in relation to this. As many of you have held me speaking in debates of this nature before, my point of reference is the police service in the mid-70s. In my word, what a transformation we have seen is all for the good—so much better. It is because that recognises and the organisations now recognise the far-reaching impact of violence against women and girls. That continues, and I think that there are a number of subjects that some of us would not necessarily have felt very comfortable talking about in days gone past, but the exposure around issues such as female genital mutilation, the growing awareness of human trafficking and the signs of that. I always, if I write this phrase down, put heavy inverted commas around it because I find it a deeply offensive term. Honor-based violence, again, is something that, by some method of putting a couple of words in that offsets the word violence. But the focus has to be on prevention, it has to be on protection, and it has to be on recovery. Professional training is key to that. For not the first time, I will talk about judicial training or the lack thereof, or the voluntary element that I understand part of it. It is a crucial issue, absolutely crucial issue, particularly for the judiciary to understand the relationship between the criminal law and the civil law and how closely they interrelate, and how we all talk about access to justice, how justice should be there for the victims of domestic violence, and the mere involvement of the criminal justice or the civil legal system should not further victimise those individuals. Of course, we talk about women and girls, but, of course, it is children of both the enders that are affected by this. There are some structural and systemic problems that perpetrate this. Perhaps it is more than one colleague that has talked about the role that education would play in this, particularly in relation to respect. I think that you can achieve a lot by saying treat everyone with respect, regardless of of any qualification, not having to describe further. Key to that would be the teaching of consent. The growing awareness that there is that that is being disregarded—and, of course, it has to be age-appropriate, but it has to be addressed. We cannot have any area or any part of, for instance, the Highlands and Islands where this issue is not a tackled head-on, because those problems are universal. Children's rights and wellbeing impact assessment in the plan is most welcome, because, as others have said, we need an evidence-based approach to all the decision-making. It is also very welcome that the Scottish Government's commitment to consider incorporation of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child should perhaps declare an interest here with members about the eco-protection of children, giving them the same protection that you and I would have. I welcome the Scottish Government's comments in relation to that. It is essential that children's rights are fully respected. There was legislation last year on the question of sharing imaging. It is also important that we understand that technology advances in people's ways of visiting violence or intimidation, and others have changed. In relation to the on-going work that we are doing with the domestic violence bill, I looked at the stage 1 report and there was a phrase jumped out at me, and that was the powerful and moving private testimony of some of the people that we took evidence from. That was around the issue of coercive behaviour. The challenge that there is for people to understand that and all, again coming back to the judiciary and legal people, to understand that something that is seemingly well-meaning as a children's access visit can be used to completely continue and perpetrate the abuse. That is well-documented. Also, from case work, the trauma that thereafter has been visited by grandparents who seek to mediate in those circumstances. There are a lot of positive things happening. Reference has been made to the growing reporting of crimes against women. I want to take the notion—going back to my comments about policing in the 70s—that that is a recognition that the police have different approaches now, that there is support in place and that the third sector organisations are there to support people who do come forward. Access to justice is hugely important. I hope that, as we are discussing that, that takes that one stage forward. I have Alex Cole-Hamilton followed by Ash Denham. I would like to start by reminding the chamber that, before my election to this place, I was a member of the ministerial task force on violence against women and girls and helped to author parts of Equally Safe, the national strategy that we debate today. I want to thank the Government for an excellent motion and very much support the necessarily gendered nature of this debate. As such, I am proud to stand shoulder to shoulder next to colleagues like Adam Tomkins and other men who have given excellent contributions today as allies in this global struggle against violence against women and girls. In January 2015, the world-loss Dr Carl Jorasi, who is a lifelong feminist and inventor of the contraceptive pill, mentioned him in the chamber before. It was my pleasure to spend an afternoon with him as he got his honorary degree at the University of Aberdeen. I was astonished to learn that, during his research in the 1950s, prior to the release of Ennovoid, the first iteration of the pill, he came under pressure from politicians and senior management to develop an oral contraceptive for men. Such was the recognition of what the pill could do for the liberation of women in terms of putting family planning for the first time in women's control that there was a visceral reaction from the patriarchy to stop his work. That is an example of the control that men have sought to exert over women for time in memorial. It is a spectrum of control that starts with cultural constraints on women that men fight to retain and ends with the worst forms of violence that we have heard of today. We live in more enlightened times, but we are still learning how far we have left to travel in terms of breaking up that spectrum of control. However, in the year that has elapsed since the 2016 international day for the elimination of violence against women, new frontiers of our struggle have emerged. One such frontier was recently laid bare to us in the revelations to come out of Hollywood about the sexually exploitative behaviour of several Hollywood moguls, but they have used their power and their status to abuse women. Such allegations have indeed fallen closer to home, and it is vital that we in this place recognise the manifestations of the spectrum that have been revealed in the shadows of the chamber. I welcome the proactive response that is taken by Parliament to allegations of harassment. In the same way, I welcome the tenets and aspirations of Equally Safe that we debate today. We might not be talking about physical violence in the workplace there, but harassment is a tool of coercive control, abuse and exploitation, and as such should be considered in the context of the debate. That form of abuse is widespread. 23 per cent of women surveyed by Amnesty said that they had experienced online abuse and harassment at least once, and nearly half of them had said that the experience had made them feel physically at risk. In 2014-15, there were close to 60,000 incidents of domestic abuse recorded by Police Scotland. That is astonishing and heartbreaking. That problem is showing no signs of relenting. Just last week, UN Secretary General Antonio Gutierrez said that every woman and every girl has the right to a life free of violence, yet the rupture of human rights occurs in a variety of ways in every community. It particularly affects those who are most marginalised and most vulnerable. The value of services such as women's aid and rape crisis that I have worked with for many years are undeniable in providing support for victims. It is vital that the funding for those organisations should continue, despite tightening budgets across our public and voluntary sectors. They are undoubtedly key partners to our response to violence against women and girls, but we need to change our culture and the way in which we bring up our children. We need to teach children and young people about respectful, appropriate relationships from an early age, and we need to model positive behaviour. Indeed, it is small wonder that, for many years, a range of stakeholders have challenged several domestic norms. They are right to point out that we shall forever remain adrift of our aspirations to end violence against women if we legitimise the use of any kind of violence in the home. As such, I am heartily glad that, in the year that has passed since we last debated this issue, an insurmountable majority has been forged across this Parliament to end the physical punishment of children in this country through the private member's bill in the name of John Finnie. As I have said before, we need a dual focus in this agenda. I will use the remainder of my remarks to focus on the end game here that is almost as important as ending violence itself, and that is trauma recovery. Adverse childhood experiences, particularly experiencing or witnessing domestic violence, can have lifelong effects, which can reduce life opportunities. If we get trauma recovery right, we can build resilience and prevent the escalation of those problems to negative social outcomes. Article 39 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child lays out the right for every child to recover, but we are a considerable distance from achieving that for all too many of our children. An NSPCC report entitled right to recover revealed that 15 of 17 Scottish local authorities analysed had no dedicated trauma recovery services for the under-fives. We cannot turn that reality around overnight, but we can look to models of best practice, such as the Barnhouse pilot, which is delivered by children first in Edinburgh, which delivers trauma recovery and allows child witnesses to deliver witness testimony without being re-traumatised. Most importantly, we can ensure that all of our universal services deliver an approach that is trauma-informed with basic CPD for existing staff on the impact of trauma on young lives. To finish, by bookending that terrible reality in our culture in this way, we can begin to bring about meaningful and lasting progress towards the eradication of violence against women and girls in our society. I am grateful for the Scottish Government's efforts to foster consensus in their motion and to assure them of our support tonight. Over the past few months, countless women have come forward with their stories of gender-based harassment or violence. To our horror, but not to our surprise, women from Hollywood to here in Hollywood have spoken out about deep-seated power, imbalances and attitudes that have induced assault, abuse, harassment or rape. It felt and still feels as if we are on the cusp of a watershed moment that society has at last been provoked enough, perhaps disturbed enough to collectively confront the profound societal failings that have given rise to gender-based violence. I certainly hope so, but each of us must keep speaking up and keep the spotlight on the fact that the vast majority of violent crime victims are women, that the vast majority of domestic abuse victims are women and that the vast majority of those who are trafficked for sex are women. In speaking up and pushing towards a true watershed moment, we must act by the theme of this year's 16 days of activism campaign, Leave No One Behind. I welcome the Scottish Government's equally safe strategy and delivery plan because it attempts to tackle everything from changing and shaping attitudes through education to ending social, cultural, economic and political imbalances faced by women, as well as enhancing services around health, justice, housing and all in an effort to leave no woman or child behind. For example, the £1 million of additional funding that has been provided to teach school children about consent. Rape Prices Scotland's sexual violence prevention programme will also be rolled out to a further 11 local authorities, and an equally safe accreditation scheme will be available for employers to become equipped at inhibiting gender-based violence in the workforce. Those are real steps at solutions to preventing violence against women and girls, but in tackling gender-based violence, we must continue to target the behaviour of the perpetrators. Last year in Scotland, there were at least 150 victims of human trafficking. About half of those were women, and of those women, 92 per cent of them were trafficked for the purpose of sexual exploitation. Today, in Edinburgh alone, if you google it, you will find that there are 138 women available that you can purchase sex from, and some of them are even able to be delivered like a pizza to your door. However, women and girls are not commodities to be bought or sold, used and then discarded. A friend of mine, Yvonne Idohoza, who works to eradicate sex trafficking in her home state of Edo state in Nigeria, which is a source country for many of the women that are sex trafficked into Europe and, yes, into Scotland, alerted me to this recent story involving Nigerian girls that I will come on to in a moment. She works in this area because she believes, as I do, that these girls deserve better—better than the abuse, the rape, the violence and even murder—that awaits them at the hands of traffickers, pimps and punters if they make that journey across the desert. This story is about 26 girls aged between 14 and 18 who were found dead—they had been sexually assaulted—floating on a boat off the coast of Italy. I want us to remember those girls. We only know the names of two of them, and we know that another two were pregnant. 26 girls—that is a school class. That is almost the number of the members' seats that members could sit in over there in this chamber. That is 26 children, really. Children with parents, children with siblings, children with talents and dreams of the life that they might have, found dead on a boat, a silent floating coffin in the Mediterranean. Imagine it. Imagine being sold to traffickers at just 14 years old. Imagine your terror as you realise that you may never see your home again, never see your family again. Imagine having to watch and listen as others are being beaten and raped in front of you and knowing that there is no escape and that you are likely to be next. Imagine being forcibly loaded onto an unsuitable boat in rough seas and then feeling the boat capsize and the water rushing in, hearing the screams and then the water crashing over you. Traffic girls are routinely treated like this—we know that—because they are seen as less than human. And girls like these are trafficked and prostituted so their bodies can be used for the gratification of not just one man but many men or any number of men that can afford to pay. But you know what? Let's stop talking about the girls, what girls wear, what girls drink, what they do, what they shouldn't do and instead start talking about the men, the men that rape, the men that hit, the men that buy underage girls to have sex with. Let's turn the focus on to the men that abuse and the men that are violent—not all men but these men—and let's send a message to those men that these behaviours are not acceptable. Let's send the message that enough is enough that we are sick and tired of clearing away the dead bodies of girls as if they are less than human, as if they don't matter, as if any of this is somehow inevitable or excusable, as if we as a society will be complicit by keeping these secrets and looking the other way. Those girls were on that boat because the demand for young flesh exists in Europe and in Scotland, and as long as a man can pay to abuse women and children with no threat of consequence, the cycle of abuse where women have neither equal safety nor equal protection will continue and the bodies will continue to pile up. Our watershed moment is within our grasp for the sake of so many women and children who need our support, who need our action. We cannot let it pass by. Let's leave no one behind, and for the sake of the 26 dead girls on a boat and the many, many dead girls and women in Scotland, let's look seriously at challenging demand. Gordon Lindhurst, to be followed by Gillian Martin. Deputy Presiding Officer, today's debate is a very important one, and I hardly need to say that, particularly following the speech that has just been given by my colleague Ash Denham. However, as the British Deputy High Commissioner in Calcutta, Bruce Bucknell, said at the international conference on anti-human trafficking in recent days, I am disappointed that we still have to discuss those issues in the year 2017. We are talking about crimes that should have been confined to the dustbin of history long ago. As we have heard, significant UK Government action and investment has gone into tackling gender-based violence across the world, with the Department for International Aid now having in place 127 programmes, almost double the number from 2012, tackling issues such as domestic violence, acid attacks and female genital mutilation. The prevalence of physical and sexual violence is still high, with around one in five women across 87 countries worldwide having experienced the problem within the 12 months prior to a study carried out in 2016. There are practices and attitudes across the world today that can lead to violence against women, and sadly, that also includes our own country. However, there is positive work taking place to change some of those attitudes and behaviours. UK aid is, for example, contributing to the raising voices programme in Uganda, which seeks to change the stigma, discrimination and attitudes around the acceptability of violence. Within communities that have benefited from the programme, women are now reportedly 52 per cent less likely to experience physical violence. However, in spite of the UK taking a leading role in the world, we continue to face problems in dealing with the same type of violence here. Reports of domestic violence, rape and attempted rape have been rising in Scotland in recent years, as mentioned by my colleague Adam Tomkins. Whether or not the rise in reported cases is down to increased confidence in victims coming forward, the fact is that such crimes continue to occur. However, let us hope that changing attitudes and behaviours for the future will see a reduction in violence towards women moving forward. Some of the crimes can be complex and varied and may require further measures to deal with them. It is understood, for example, that 170,000 women in the UK have undergone FGM, which is a particularly barbaric procedure with specific cultural roots. As the UK Government has recognised, that type of violence can require its own approach with legislative change to offer effective tools to victims, community leaders and medical practitioners. The benefits of legislative improvements are what some of my Scottish Conservative colleagues have been highlighting today, which I myself discussed in a previous debate at the beginning of the year, specifically on FGM. Scotland may in some ways appear to be lagging behind the rest of the UK in combating that horrific practice. The UK Government has taken legislative steps to provide protection to girls who are potentially at risk from suffering from the procedure, as well as coming down hard on those who do not offer girls adequate protection or who actively seek to ignore its illegality. Organisations such as Shackty Women's Aid, based in Edinburgh, with outreach staff across Scotland work with communities in Scotland where women are at greater risk of FGM or forced marriage or who have already experienced it. I welcome that and thank them for it, but Scotland's justice system could do more to offer protection. That is why we have today raised possible ideas for reform, such as court protection orders for victims and potential victims, mandatory reporting for professionals and a new criminal offence for failing to protect daughters among others. The Government announcement around extra funding is to be welcomed, but it should go hand in hand with addressing other types of crimes against women that are happening here in Scotland where tools to deal with the problem may be significantly lacking. In closing, I would urge the Government to reflect on those proposals so that those who have suffered from unacceptable violence here are not left behind. It is commendable that we are having this debate during the 16 days of activism against gender-based violence. The Scottish Government has shown its commitment to safety for women and girls in Scotland through the Equally Safe Plan and investment in front-line services for those who are affected by domestic abuse and sexual violence. Combatting gendered violence and inequality goes beyond any one Government portfolio. It cuts across many of them. The mainstreaming of gender issues is key to protecting women and girls from abuse. One key way to mainstream the fight against gender-based violence is by linking it with our education policies. That is the focus of my contribution to the debate. Early years in education policies are crucial to preventing violence before it happens. I am happy to note that one of Equally Safe's main priorities is that interventions are early and effective preventing violence. One of the most effective ways to prevent violent unequal relationships is to explicitly and clearly teach children and young people how to develop healthy relationships with one another. The issue was raised recently in the Education and Skills Committee, as we were looking at the personal and social education review being conducted by the Scottish Government. I am pleased to see that the PSE review is part of the Equally Safe Delivery Plan. The action notes that the PSE review will allow the Government to better consider how consent is taught within early years, primary and secondary schools. I believe that the PSE and sex education that we teach in schools should go beyond the concept of mere consent when considering young people's awareness. We should be discussing enthusiastic consent. In recent years, the discussion around sexual health has moved on to enthusiastic consent, which is about promoting a healthy, positive and open conversation. This enthusiastic communication should be present from the start of a relationship. To adopt that approach, in addition to a message of violence prevention, I would like to see more work on a message of healthy relationship promotion, and that must involve young people and their parents in shaping the messages around it. I am afraid to say that things are taking an unhealthy turn. In what world is it okay for boys to coerce girls into sending them nude photographs on Snapchat, Instagram or other social media? In what world is it okay for boys to send unsolicited images of their genitals to girls? When did this behaviour become normal? I am not sure, but in speaking to many young people on this, I am told that it is not just common, it is becoming normal behaviour. How does that engender healthy, respectful relationships? I recently met Barnardo's, who also contributed to the equally safe plan through the consultation. Barnardo's has taken a forwarder report from the Centre for Youth and Criminal Justice, called Over the Internet, under the radar. We must also recognise that online abuse needs direct action. I am going to call on online platforms to do considerably more in sanctioning that abuse and working with law enforcement. The co-operation of social media with police is nowhere near good enough, and I have personal experience of that. I say this to those platforms. Stop protecting abusers by not releasing information that you hold on the IP addresses of your users when it is asked for in a police investigation, because that is what they do. This is an issue close to my heart. I have been working with Young Scot and local colleges to promote awareness of online safety for young people, particularly around the issue of coercion and harassment to share images online, and the consequences of that behaviour. Today, I gave the green light to two drama scripts written by students of television production at North East Scotland College on issues around consent for image sharing and sexting. Those will be used by Young Scot in their DJI campaign, which raises awareness around social media, consent, sexting and image sharing. Those are films by young people for young people, getting messages around consent out on a platform that is used by young people. The method of messaging is as important as the messages, and young people should be fully involved in the production of those messages if they are to be effective. On my campaign on the issue, I have also seen what Bernardo has concluded. There is inconsistent and unsure handling around online sexual violence, not least with parents who are struggling to know how to engage with their children on those issues. Equally safe in the PSC review should ensure that it particularly considers how online relationships may require different responses and further education of those working in our schools and public services. We must also support parents who are key influencers and, to be honest, need to know what they are dealing with and how best to handle it. Just as our actions to combat gendered violence should not be isolated into one policy area, health and wellbeing education should not be isolated into one class or one subject area, those lessons should not exist in isolation. Schools should be able to respond to incidents such as those that arise around sexting effectively. That means taking a no-wrong-door approach to teaching health and wellbeing in schools. A child should know that whatever staff member they choose to communicate with around those issues knows how to support them. I am heartened to see the connections that have been made with early years and education policies in the equally safe delivery plan. The fight against gender violence and promoting positive messages around relationships must start in our schools from an early age. I call Pauline McNeill to be followed by Richard Lyle. First of all, I would like to join with the cabinet secretary to recognise all the many women and girls who have stood up against gender-based violence and encouraged others to come forward. Women across the globe have been standing up against the endemic nature of violence against them. We know that it cuts across socio-economic backgrounds, continents and cultures, and women from ethnic backgrounds and those with a disability are at particular risk. Domestic abuse, female genital mutilation, rape, child marriage, so-called honour killings—it is a global problem, and it requires a global perspective, as others have talked about. Netonya Sandy's first year as a teenager would also have been her first year of married life. Up to the moment that water swept away her parents' fields in a district of Malawi, they had been scraping a life together. When a young man came to their door and asked for the 13-year-old's hand in marriage, the weather had changed everything from the family. There was not enough food to feed every mouth at the table. Netonya gave birth to her daughter before she was aged 14. Child marriage is a global issue. Millions of girls are forced into child marriage. Millions of girls miss out on their education and their lives because of it. Iraq recently dropped plans to allow girls aged 9 to marry. Across the world, there is a big message to be received. As others have said, it is arguable—I am not the first person to say this—that recent revelations on the sexual conduct of men represents a golden opportunity to make an even greater paradigm shift towards women's equality. If we create the conditions for victims to be listened to and the victims see that things can change as a result of coming forward, we can make a greater shift towards women's lives free from violence. As Adam Tomkins and others have highlighted, the backdrop of statistics showing an increase in violence is depressing but it focuses on our minds. I support the motion and the campaign equally safe, but I think that what is missing explicitly from the motion is the root of the problem. That is the men's power in society and the hold that they have in that power, displayed in the relationships that exist between men and women. Men are still the dominant sex in almost every area of society. It affects, of course, abuse of that power, which is the problem. However, knowing that that power is unlikely to be challenged and can be perpetuated, it means that those holding the power can behave as they like and challenged. It is that which has to change fundamentally for us to tackle those bigger and wider issues. Power cannot go unaccountable, it cannot go unfettered and it certainly should not be passed down generations of other men, which is why we must see that as a watershed moment. As in gender points, our access to resources is the fundamental aspect of gender inequality. Economic inequality increases the risk of a woman being the victim of violence as it creates subordination within the home and at work in wider society, meaning that many women are trapped. On average, women in Scotland still earn 182 pounds less a week than men due to occupational segregation. Globally, women are still paid far less than men and in some cases 60 per cent or 75 per cent of men's wages. The best hope of changing the status quo is to ensure that there are more women in positions of power and that that will not be done simply by good men volunteering to give up that power, but it will have to be women leading the fight alongside men. Anne-Marie Slaughter, who was the policy aide of Hillary Clinton, said that the best hope for improving the lot of all women is to close the leadership gap. Only when women wield power in sufficient numbers will we create a society that genuinely works for all women, but that will be a society that works for everyone. There are indeed 15 female world leaders in office and eight of them are their country's first-ever women in power, and they represent just 10 per cent of the 193 countries that are registered by the United Nations. You can see the extent of the problem. They have come a long way, but it is shocking to realise that it was only in 1989 in Scotland that rape was outlawed in marriage two years before England and Wales. In fact, the nature of violence against women shows that, by far, the most common perpetrators of sexual violence against women are current former husbands, partners or boyfriends, and it may go some way to explain partly why that abuse affects women's lives is extensively under-reported. Some national studies have shown that the figure was used already by another member that up to 70 per cent have experienced physical or sexual violence from an intimate partner in their lifetime. 70 per cent is a shocking figure indeed. Europe-wide, we can see that the response of women across Europe, across the world, to the revelations of Harvey Weinstein's alleged sexual assault, where in France, for example, 86,000 women posted comments on social media. I thought that it was worth mentioning that Macron, the president of France, has just announced a new law against sexism, which will find men who will whistle or who are lectures to women on French streets. Whatever you think about that, you can see that it is quite a strong response. What he says is that it is unacceptable that women feel uncomfortable in public spaces, and women in public spaces must not be afraid to use those spaces. I close, if I could, with a quote from Cheryl Sandberg, who is the chief executive of Google and, of course, women. She says that it truly equal world would be one where women run half the countries, half the companies and men run half the homes. That might be true, but I think that we would all like to start to see that women and girls can live their lives free from violence. I call Richard Lyle to be followed by Oliver Mundell. As members have already reflected on the motion before the chamber today, it is an important one. That allows this Parliament categorically to recognise and mark our contribution to the 16 days of activism under the gender-based violence, but also to underpin our absolute understanding that violence against women is a fundamental violation of human rights. We, across this entire chamber, are committed to tackling it, and I also stand with all in this chamber in that regard. Of course, the motion today focused on how we can practically make Scotland equally safe, the practical actions that we can all undertake but also the responsibility that we all have. Equally safe, as members have highlighted, is indeed Scotland's strategy to prevent and eradicate violence against women and girls. What that means, of course, is violent and abusive behaviour directed at women and girls precisely because they are women and girls. I am saddened to say that this behaviour is predominantly carried out by men and often stems from systematic, deep rooted women's inequality and can also include domestic abuse, sexual assault, commercial sexual exploitation and the so-called honour-based violence, like female genital mutilation and forced marriage. That is why I am particularly grateful for the opportunity to speak in today's debate, because, as men, we must also take a leadership role in tackling those behaviours wherever they exist. I would hope, as a result, to contribute to the overall aims of the equally safe strategy, which is to create a strong and flourishing Scotland where all individuals are equally safe and respected and where women and girls live free from such abuse. Those aims are entirely underpinned by four priority areas that Scotland society embraces equality and mutual respect and rejects all forms of violence against women and girls, that women and girls thrive as equal citizens socially, culturally, economically and politically. Those interventions are early and effective, preventing violence and maximising the safety and wellbeing of girls, women, children and young people. I have already mentioned that all men desist from all forms of violence against women and girls as perpetrators of such violence receive a robust and effective response. That will ensure, through our court system and family courts, that women are listened to and that women and children's rights are respected in those courts. Judges must, I now believe, attend training on that issue. Judges must address emotional abuse by men. Judges must now defend women. Judges should defend women and their children and get the true facts. Yes, the Government has committed extra funding. I note the briefing from children first and their proposals. First, I agree with their comments. I also say that we must safeguard our children before they get through that and have a better court help. Those initiatives must also be reflected through social work and must ensure that the rights of women and children are upheld. We must resolve to stop violence against women and children. First, I have reflected my earlier remarks on where we are going next, which is absolutely the right thing to do. We never should be complacent in our actions to tackle systematic problems of violence against women and children. Because we have indeed invested and continue to do so, record levels of funding to tackle violence against women and ensure that victims receive the support that they need. I understand that, between 2015-17 alone, £24 million has been invested from the equality portfolio to support a range of projects and initiatives, including a range of front-line specialist services working with women and children who have experienced domestic abuse. That comes from the March 2015 announcement of an additional £20 million from the Government over the period of 2015-18 to be invested in a range of measures to tackle all forms of violence and put in place better support for victims. That has meant a boost in resources to courts and prosecutors by £2.4 million each year to reduce court waiting times for domestic abuse cases to ensure that there is no undue delay in court waiting times. Those should be reflected by the courts, where women should be listened to also. One last area that I wish to look at, Presiding Officer, is what I began with, recognising the wording of the motion before the chamber, as we know that 25 November is the international day of elimination of violence against women in March, the beginning of the 16 days of activism against general and based violence campaign, an international campaign that originated from the First Women's Global Leadership Institute. Let us be clear, in this chamber today, we are speaking with one voice and saying that violence against women and girls and children in any form has no place in our vision for a strong, safe, successful Scotland. A society in which violence against women does not reflect the country of equality that we aspire to become. That regardless of the form that it takes, violence against women and girls can have both an immediate and long lasting impact on the women, children and young people directly involved. That equally safe programme places increased priority upon primary prevention. To conclude, Presiding Officer, taking this approach demands that Scottish society, as a whole, begin with our Parliament today, spread out to a whole of our country. It says clearly that we embrace equality and mutual respect, that together we reject all forms of violence against women, girls and children, and that women, girls and children should thrive as equal citizens, socially, culturally, economically and politically. It is clear from listening to today's debate that we are all united by our desire to wholly and thoroughly eliminate violence against women and girls. To work towards a Scotland where everyone, irregardless of race, age, gender and sexuality, can live free from the fear of violence and discrimination. Unfortunately, however, that is not the reality that we live in at the moment. As the Scottish Government report has brought to light, violence against women and girls is still very much an issue and one that we must work to continually work to eradicate and prevent at its most basic roots. As the report pointed out, women remain much more likely than men to experience serious forms of sexual assault and harassment. For example, eight per cent of all adults in Scotland have experienced at least one type of sexual assault since the age of 16, but that statistic was comprised of 13 per cent of adult women and just two per cent of adult men. Upsettingly, younger women are also more susceptible to gender-based violence, with one in three 13 to 17-year-olds reporting some form of sexual violence from a partner in an NSPCC study. We must work to protect all members of our society from harm, thinking both in terms of support for victims but also in terms of prevention. On how we are in prevention, because that is the only way that we will stop those abhorrent crimes from occurring in the first place. In this way, making Scotland equally safe is a bold statement of intent and a step in the right direction, namely its focus on prevention and the cultural shift that it demands. The report's recognition of gender inequality and social attitudes as the root cause of this problem is both a necessary and welcome step on the path to eliminating violence against women and girls. Unfortunately, we are not as progressive as we would hope. In regard to social attitudes, some things still remain truly shocking. For example, only three in five people in Scotland think that a woman is not at all to blame for being raped if she wears revealing clothes or is very drunk. As many as five per cent of those surveyed in the 2015 ScotSend survey, they thought that a woman was entirely to blame for the crime if she was very drunk. In another harrowing example from the same survey, it was found that sexual assault was thought to be less serious when coming from a partner or husband than when coming from a stranger. With 88 per cent of respondents saying that a rape of a woman by a man that she just met was very seriously wrong, compared with only 74 per cent saying the same thing when asked what they thought about a husband raping his wife. John Mason I thank the member for giving way. I do not know if he saw it, but the Traverse Theatre did a production in here, which was equally shocking about what men were saying about women. I just wonder if he has any practical suggestions on how we take that forward as men, especially in that place. Oliver Mundell I thank the member for that intervention. I think that the biggest thing that we can do as men is to call out that kind of behaviour very publicly when we see it and also to work on a cross-party basis as this debate has done to make it very clear that that behaviour is not acceptable in our country and that people who behave in that way do not have the support of ourselves or society. Although I recognise that some things are getting better, young people in particular are less likely to victim blame pointing towards societal progression. Reporting rates for crimes involving violence against women and girls are rising, which is very unfortunate. However, we are making progress on a global scale and movements such as the Me Too campaign, which a number of other members have mentioned, are helping to create an environment in which women feel more comfortable speaking out about their experiences. The fact that there has been a marked improvement, however, does not mean that, as I think that the cabinet secretary has said, we can afford to rest on our laurels, as there will always be more that we can do to ensure that women and girls are protected from gender-based violence. One issue close to my own heart is the inequality in services and resources relating to violence against women in more rural areas of Scotland. There are a number of local organisations doing good work in my constituency, such as the Dumfries and Galloway Domestic Abuse and Violence Against Women Partnership. Those organisations are working hard, but they need more support in order to ensure that women living in all areas of our country have the same support and access to services as those living in more urban communities. I welcome the fact that, on August 2017, national scoping exercise of advocacy services of victims of violence against women and girls conducted by the Scottish Government openly identified some geographical gaps and noted the urban rural split as one of the key issues facing service provision. Women and girls in those areas face additional barriers to receiving help, such as having to travel for forensic examinations and maintaining confidentiality in small communities where everyone knows everyone. Additionally, there is often very little accessibility to advocacy groups within some rural communities, with some forms of violence against women and girls, such as human trafficking, prostitution and violence-specifically targeting LGBT communities, being a particular problem where there are limited specialist advocacy services. While it is commendable that violence against women and girls is being treated like the grave and harrowing issue, and while things have been improving, there is more that needs to be done to ensure that every woman in Scotland has access to the help that she needs, regardless of how rural or urban a location she lives in. Until we see those issues addressed, it will be impossible to ensure that Scotland is equally safe for all women. Thank you. The last of the open debate contributions is from Bob Doris. I had the privilege of speaking at the Glasgow North West Women's Centre on Saturday last, at an event that marked the launch of the 16 days of activism against gender-based violence. I turned up with my wife and my wee boy, not in my capacity as an MSP, but rather just to remember local communities supporting a local event. Cameron enjoyed the face painting, the bubbles, the goodie bag, with a lovely day there, the time that we could be there. However, it was a really pleasant and deeply humbling and surprise experience to be asked to say a few words at the event, at a day that was there to celebrate the empowerment of women. The theme that they had chosen was a celebration of women's strength, success and roles. On the walls, they had about 20 plus pictures of women from the Marihill area, which had made huge contributions to local community, real female leaders over the years past and present. It was quite something to see and take the time to look at. I tell you that there are many, many more women who can fill those walls. It was just wonderful to see that. I want to say that here this afternoon. I felt unusually sheepish about speaking and a bit unsure, given that advances in female equality and empowerment are not well-served, usually by middle-aged white men bumping their gums. In fact, I do not think that it is ever well-served in relation to that, but I was asked and it was a privilege to say a few words. The centre's chairwoman reassured me that it was important that I spoke, that it was important that men played their part and that the centre was welcoming and respectful of men despite some very turbulent and distressing experiences that many of the patrons had had. To be fair, I knew the staff and the volunteers well at the centre and I knew that already. They were doing amazing work. However, the reassurance in those circumstances was really welcoming in relation to my appropriateness to say a few words. However, in reflection, that was a bit silly of me, because if this afternoon's debate has shown me anything, I did not know what I was going to say this afternoon until I came into the chamber and listened to the debate. I have got a duty to show my solidarity with the women and girls who have experienced for many generations the abuse and violence that they have suffered. I have got a duty to challenge my own complacency in relation to the fact that, while I am not a perpetrator, I do not particularly see it, everything must be okay. In fact, I know that that is not true because of my constituency caseload, so that does not even stack up either. However, I have to tackle my own complacency, and I have got an absolute duty to contribute to those who are leading the fight in my local area to make lives better for people. However, the experience also allowed me to reflect on the role of men, I suppose, more generally in this context, in the campaign to end violence against women and, of course, ahead of this afternoon's debate that I am speaking in. I thought that Ash Denham, in a powerful speech, called on us to turn our attention on the men that rape and hit women, on the men who buy children, on the men who abuse and are violent to females. However, I suppose that the learning opportunity for myself from this afternoon's debate might actually be the converse of that, because it is perhaps that many men should turn their attention to the men who do not do any of the above. Gillian Martin's contribution points also to the fact that the boys who do not do many of the above and what they have to do to play their part within society. We have to turn our attention to the men who can say, well, I do not do it, but what are you doing to tackle the problem? That is what we have to ask, because men are doing it. I know quite often that sometimes we look at the white ribbon campaign as being a symbol of that. The white ribbon campaign is a wonderful thing. This is not a reflection on the white ribbon campaign, but I will wear a ribbon on Thursday for World AIDS Day when we come to First Minister's questions, wearing ribbons becomes the thing that people do when their campaigns are on, but wearing a ribbon does not engage with the problem or the issue. It does not challenge the behaviour, it does not discuss and call out that unacceptable behaviour. I think that what men have to do, myself included, is to find the space and the environment to make sure that we do that all year round. That is the challenge that I have from this afternoon's debate. I should also mention in relation to the white ribbon campaign that Glasgow Kelvin College and Springburn, in my constituency, did something exceptional in May earlier in the year, where they had the college sign up and become an accredited white ribbon college on the basis, not just of signing a pledge but of activism on the ground, engaging with staff, students and the local community. Something meaningful around the white ribbon campaign, rather than putting it on your lapel to say that you show support, but perhaps no more than that, so absolute credit to Glasgow Kelvin College. If every man has a responsibility to do all that we can to make a difference, in closing, I am setting myself a challenge rather than just turning up at an event at the North West Women's Centre next year, as I am sure that they will have an event. The 16 days of activism against gender-based violence comes around every year. It is to make sure that I have managed to organise, shape and support a number of events in the communities that I represent for men who can stand up and speak up in support to end gender-based violence against women and girls, and then perhaps rather than just make a speech, hopefully a humble speech in the chamber this afternoon, filling my ways, I go along. I can actually do something that makes a little bit of a difference. I have really enjoyed this afternoon's debate, Presiding Officer. We now move to the closing speeches, and I call Clare Baker up to eight minutes, please, Ms Baker. Thank you, Presiding Officer. 16 days of activism for the Elimination of Violence Against Women and Girls was started in 1991 by the Centre for Women's Global Leadership Institute. Recognising gender-based violence as a human rights issue, those couple of weeks encourages activity at local, national and international levels. This afternoon's debate has been wide-ranging, encouraging and passionate. There have been perceptive and persuasive arguments made by members around commercial sexual exploitation, FGM and forced marriage, and education and consent. It has given Parliament an opportunity to add its voice to the campaign to end violence against women and girls, and members have spoken about the violence and abuse suffered by women and girls here in Scotland and around the world, some of which we see daily on the evening news, but much of which is hidden or so ingrained in society that it is hidden in full view. Over those 16 days, we can also see examples of courage, of challenge, of resistance and calls for change from both men and women, boys and girls who do not accept the way the world is, who do not accept that one gender is inferior, who do not accept the prevalence of violence and abuse in our everyday existence. We have received a number of briefings for the debate from Engender, Zero Tolerance, Children First, Barnardo's, NSPCC and White Rib in Scotland, and I would like to thank them for their expertise and the contribution that their knowledge has brought to the debate. I would like to highlight a number of the speeches that were made. Alex Cole-Hamilton, Pauline McNeill, both talked about sexual harassment, and I think that both emphasised that it is not about sex, it is about exercise and power, it is about power and status, and that is the context in which we are having this debate. It is about how we value women and how women are represented. How do we change our culture? Alex Cole-Hamilton talked about the way in which we bring up our children that we have responsibility here. I think that the points made around John Finnie's bill that has been brought forward that will give children equal protection of the law is relevant to this debate. I think that there is also an issue there about how difficult it is to take a non-gendered approach towards modern parenting when so much of the marketing and commercial aspects that we deal with as parents is so gendered. It is very difficult to buy children's clothes that are not gendered, children's toys that are not gendered, and I think that that has increased in recent years. You emphasise the difference between the genders rather than emphasising the equality. Pauline McNeill also brought a global perspective to the debate and talked about the millions of girls who are being forced into child marriage. Also about the debate that we have been having recently around sexual harassment, it did lead me to question whether we are experiencing a shift. Is this a golden opportunity within our time? You feel a bit like the story moves on that something else catches the eye of the world. It is bizarre to have the discussion that we have been having around sexual harassment and assault while Donald Trump is the US president. It takes us to continue to be vocal and to work to close the leadership gap. It emphasises the importance of political leadership. You feel that those who control the way in which we learn our news or the forums in which we have this public debate are moving on to other issues. It is important that we continue to highlight the damage that sexual harassment and sexual violence and sexual abuse causes to our society and the way in which it holds us back. While Pauline McNeill mentioned the steps that Macron has been taking in France, and we can also see Justin Trudeau in Canada, who is very vocal about being a feminist, we need to hear more of that. We need to increase the women's voices within that dialogue. Adam Tomkins made effective points around highlighting our responsibility to care and support for all refugees, recognising that many are here because they are fleeing violence. If you look at the experience of women and girls coming from other countries that are war-torn or have come from very difficult and conflict situations, they have often within that experience sexual violence and assault, and rape is used as a way of control when it is a weapon. Perhaps here, our services do not always recognise the additional vulnerabilities and barriers that can be for people around language and their cultural understanding. I think that that was well made points around where we could put a greater focus there. The speeches from Ruth Maguire, Rhoda Grant and Ash Denham made powerful and perceptive speeches around sexual commercial exploitation. Ruth Maguire made strong points around the need for radical change, a belief that there is a weakness in the delivery plan and questioning how we can. The document can recognise that commercial exploitation is recognised as violence, but at the same time, it allows the buyer to continue to exercise that right. The legal system does not criminalise the buyer under the current system that we have. How does that complement or sit beside the arguments that we are making around violence against women and girls? We need a more robust and effective response that we are not doing enough to prevent women from being exploited well made. Rhoda Grant again made strong points around society's mixed messages about how we can commercial exploitation sit alongside arguments that women should not be treated as commodities, that women should be treated as equals, that we should be valued human beings and equality should be promoted if we have a society that we could see as tolerating that type of behaviour. Our points around changes that have been made in Ireland and other countries about how they treat commercial sexual exploitation leave Scotland in danger of falling behind and being increasingly vulnerable to increased level of trapeting to Scotland. That might be seen as a soft option with those who want to exploit this industry and exploit women and girls in this way. Ash Denham made a very effective speech around human trafficking. The recognition of women and girls as a commonplace commodity in a global perspective. I think that our points around and the way in which she described the horrific experience of the 26 girls are shocking to think of them as being teenagers or 14 to 18 as an age. It is hard to imagine the horror of the exploitation that they experience and how cheap a girl's life is in this context, all happening off the coast of Italy, where many of us go on holiday. I thought that it was a very powerful speech. The three speakers talked about that as not being inevitable, that it is inexcusable and that we in Scotland must do more to disrupt the industry, to recognise that as a crime, to stop the trafficking and the slavery that comes with commercial sexual exploitation. I thought that all of our Mundell's points around public attitudes were interesting. The public attitudes to rape and sexual assault victims and seeing women as being responsible for the crime are shocking figures around public perception. I understand that the public perception over a victim's clothing or their inebriation levels was from both genders. It was not a survey that was done exclusively to men, but it was men and women who both responded and took part in that survey. It highlights how difficult it is to pursue those cases through the criminal courts, where they are often heard in front of a jury and the prejudices that people have when it comes to sexual assault. A number of MSPs highlighted the increasing number of rape and reported violence and sexual assault against women. We need a justice system that fully responds to that. Last week, we had the inspectorate report, which highlighted the barriers faced by survivors in getting justice through the courts. It was a very negative experience of giving evidence in court. Some are describing that it has been worse than being raped. We must look at extending measures to support that. Today, we have heard the news that David Goodwilly has lost his appeal in the civil rape case, which has testamented to the courage of Denise Clare in fighting for justice for nearly seven years. She had to go to a civil court to get justice, and that is not acceptable. We need to examine how we go forward after this case to ensure that no other women have to pursue justice through this route, which is not appropriate for a rape case. I would like to close on that point and say that this afternoon's debate has been very worthwhile and has been a good expression of the Parliament's commitment to this issue. I call Michelle Ballantyne up to eight minutes, please. Thank you, Presiding Officer, and I'm pleased to close this debate for the Conservatives. I've sat here today and listened to everybody's speeches and the commentary and the passion and the emotion. I think that what it highlights is that this isn't a party political issue, this isn't one country issue, this is an issue that affects everybody everywhere. I was lucky, I grew up in a safe household, I was brought up as a confident young lady, I was never made to feel that being female was any lesser than being male, but actually in the 55 years I've been alive I can think of numerous people that I know that have experienced being raped, that have been tortured, that have been victims of honour crimes, and I hate that expression too. I'm really sad to say that one of my first early experiences as a student nurse was a lady who came in to give birth and begged us not to discharge her because her child was to be taken straight to the airport, straight abroad, to experience the horror of female genital mutilation. Back then there was nothing we could do. We delayed her discharge as long as we could, but eventually we had to let her go and I had the very sad job of taking that baby down to the car. And you can hear even now I still feel really emotional about it. We have moved on, not as far as any of us would like, but we have moved on. And today is another step in that, and the minister has introduced today some of the steps we're going to take in Scotland, and I hope we do, to make Scotland equally safe for women and young girls. I hope that in doing so FMG will be something, FGM sorry, that will be something that never happens again in Scotland, and we never allow anybody to be taken out of Scotland to undergo that horror. One of the reasons things have changed is that we have changed stigma, not as far as we'd like to, but it is much easier now to come forward and tell about what has happened to you. The police have done an immense amount of work in making a safer environment if you've been raped to come forward and talk about it. But I think, as Oliver Mundell highlighted, it's not always good in some of the rural areas where you have to travel further and where your identity can't be hidden, so we still have things to do. I hope that the legislation that we're bringing forward in the offence of domestic abuse is going in the right direction, and I hope as it travels through this Parliament, we will iron out the debate points that we had the other week, and we will make sure that nobody who comes forward and talks about what's happened to them ends up going home still in fear. One of the things we are doing is recognising the 16 days against gender-based violence, and by doing so in this Parliament, it shows just how much our attitudes are changing, and it also shows that we as a country must not take just a moral stance, but we must take a legislative one as well. We've heard about some of the laws that have come in across the UK and the ones that we want to bring and help in Scotland. Adam Tonkin touched upon particularly many of the female refugees who sought sanctuary here in Scotland. They come often with addon vulnerabilities, having already been abused or exploited even before they've arrived. Their cultural and linguistic barriers have also caused difficulties in helping those who need assistance the most, and he highlighted how we must re-examine this issue to make sure that we can give adequate support for some of these victims. The UK Government did legislate in 2015 to protect young girls against female gentle mutilation. I really hope that the minister has listened to some of the commentary today, and we'll take up some of the actions to take that forward and make sure that Scotland also legislate against this. Annie Wells spoke passionately about the worrying trends that we've seen growing in Scotland over the past year, with domestic violence on the ground, and we're going to deal with domestic violence on the rise and the increase in the number of rapes and attempted rapes, and those are statistics that we should be worried about. This kind of behaviour is not only unacceptable, it does constitute a violation of basic human rights, and any increase in the number of incidents is to be noted with concern and should prompt action from the Scottish Government. She also drew attention to some of the excellent local projects such as the Archway project in Glasgow and called for the project to be replicated. There are obviously many good campaigns across Scotland, and what we need to ensure is that they have the necessary funding and that we make sure that we support them not on an annual basis so that they don't know from one year to the next whether or not they're going to be funded, but that they know that they are and that they can offer continuity of support to the women and the children that they help. Gordon Lindhurst featured on some of the positive work that the UK Government has done in the field to eradicate violence against women and children. There's 127 programmes addressing violence against women and girls, new domestic abuse legislation and, of course, the introduction of the FGM protection orders. In many respects, the UK is ahead of Scotland here and the Scottish Government should be looking to adopt similar measures if they are serious about it, but I have heard what the minister said and I do believe that she will work to do this and I will watch to make sure that it does happen. When we're talking about violence against women and girls and we've heard a lot today, we've heard some very impassioned speeches from Claire Baker, Kate Forbes, Rhoda Grant. I want to remember and Rhoda actually made this comment that the vast majority of men are equally be horrified by the behaviour of some men. I think that that is a really important point because we mustn't get to the stage where we vilify the idea that all men are perpetrators, but we must make sure that we identify those that are and hold them in abhorrence and make sure that they are duly punished for their attitudes and the crimes that they commit. John Finnie spoke eloquently about how gender-based violence affects the whole family and the need for judiciary training to ensure that victims do not suffer further victimisation through the justice system. We are making slow progress on this, but it is progress, but he's absolutely right ensuring that those who sit on the benches, those who work in the courts, understand just how it feels to have gone through that and then to have yourself explored in a courtroom is really horrific and we must make sure that people understand what that means and make sure that they're using the right language and the right attitudes and the right kind of questioning so that they aren't making things worse, not better. Alex Cole-Hamilton did speak very well about the need to change culture and ensure that our children understand respect for relationships and have good role models. We are doing a lot of work in the schools and I welcome the extra money that's going in to ensure that that is enhanced. We must make sure that the attitudes and the cultures that underpin the decision-making of our future adults is based in a good gender respectful culture. Bob Doris, I thought spoke very well when he said, as a man he has the duty to show solidarity with those who have suffered, the duty to challenge his own complacency and the duty to pay tribute to those who contrive to fight to make things better. I'm going to use those words to close out because I think actually that isn't just a duty for men, it's a duty for all of us and I think he framed it very well in those three comments. I now call Angela Constance to wind up the debate. If you could take us to five, please. Thank you very much, Presiding Officer. Today's debate is of course a very important opportunity to discuss one of the most serious of human rights violations and indeed to highlight the cross-party consensus that we have around this issue. Indeed, I'm conscious that I have often spoke that one of the gains of devolution has been the cross-party consensus that has been built over the lifetime of this Parliament and everyone who has contributed in today's debate has made excellent contributions. I don't want to be too complacent or congratulatory because I'm conscious that in this place we can be guilty of operating in our own institutional bubble and one of the joys of chairing the joint strategic board in Equally Safe with the full range of stakeholders is that they often remind politicians to get out of our bubble and the strength of some of the participation projects that are feeding into the Equally Safe strategy have indeed demonstrated that there are many people out there that are less than aware of the work that we're doing around Equally Safe. I'm very conscious that in terms of the contributions made across the chamber today, Presiding Officer, I think that members have been particularly thoughtful, I think that they've been particularly reflective and at times they've been particularly challenging and I think that that is in part due to recent events, as someone says, whether it's from Hollywood or to Hollywood, no institution or part of our society is immune from the scourge of sexual harassment or indeed other horrors. Also today we've had the opportunity with the publication of the Equally Safe delivery plan, we've had the opportunity to get our teeth into aspects of that plan, which outlines 118 actions to be taken over the lifetime of this Parliament. Of course, Adam Tomkins, Annie Wells, Kate Forbes and John Finnie, Pauline Neal and many others rightly reminded us of the action that we need to take both home and abroad and they mentioned international efforts of both the UK Government and the Scottish Government and that for anyone who's interested is reflected in page 21 of the delivery plan. Members were right to highlight the challenges about going further and faster with legislation and safeguards in and around how we respond to female genital mutilation. In the debate that we had earlier this year, I spoke of this Government's commitment to take further action over the lifetime of this Parliament. We are indeed looking closely at the experience south of the border, it won't necessarily be a shift in lift, we genuinely want to look and learn and we'll always incorporate what the evidence shows to work well and effectively. Another major theme from today's debate was to really guard against survivors being re-traumatised, either by their experience of justice services or, indeed, other services. It is imperative that our services are always victim-centred and trauma-informed. The additional investment to rape crisis Scotland of £1.85 million will help with additional advocacy and extend services to Orkney and Shetland, picking up on some of the issues that Oliver Mundell mentioned with regard to rural and more remote areas. I could also say to Michelle Ballantyne that one of the reasons that I was absolutely determined that the quality budget would incorporate three-year funding is that I want organisations the length and breadth of Scotland who are supporting women and tackling violence against women and girls to be concentrating on what they do well, which is supporting women and their children as opposed to continuously filling out forums. My final point about justice services is that there is a very important task force chaired by the chief medical officer to ensure that we are constantly improving services for children and adults who have experienced rape or sexual assault. Rhoda Grant, Ruth Maguire, Claire Baker, Ash Denham and others spoke very powerfully of the issue of criminal sexual exploitation and prostitution and the relationship that commercial sexual exploitation has indeed with Trafficon. Ash Denham spoke very powerfully of those lost children, those children lost, see children who were indeed victims of human trafficking and other horrors. Ruth Maguire rightly spoke of the actions that we are taking to reduce harm, to help women to exit prostitution and commercial sexual exploitation and the importance of raising awareness. What I certainly take from today's debate is that there is clearly an appetite for further action to tackle the root causes of some of that behaviour. I can say to Parliament that, although the research that was published earlier this year was inconclusive—if I can be candid—that, as a Government, we have not reached some final conclusions with regard to that research, it is fair to say that our work is not over and we will not be looking the other way. The other important matter that was raised is that, although we know that women of all backgrounds and of all ages experience violence, women and girls from a minority ethnic background, the LGBTI community or women who have a disability can be at greater risk of violence. We will indeed work with others over the needs of refugees and asylum seekers. One of my other responsibilities is to review and implement the new Scots strategy, and, of course, the UK contract on asylum accommodation and support is also important with that regard and, of course, not without its controversies. Can I end by saying that our strategic approach is drawn from the UN definition of gender-based violence, recognising that there is a function of gender inequality. It is an abuse of male power and privilege that women and girls experience violence and abuse because, quite simply, they are women and girls and because they continue to occupy a subordinate position within their society in relation to men. Our equally safe delivery plan will be the cornerstone of our efforts to work together to eradicate violence against women and girls. We are doing that by changing the law, investing record levels of funding, taking action to support victims and, indeed, to tackle perpetrators and the underlying attitudes and inequalities that create the conditions. Ultimately, we have to prevent violence and abuse from happening in the first place. To do that, we have to recognise that progress is never permanent, that it has to be redoubled, it has to be restated and it has to be reimagined if it is going to survive and, indeed, improve. I commend this motion to Parliament and, indeed, the equally safe delivery plan. That concludes our debate on making Scotland equally safe. The next item of business is consideration of business motion 9243, in the name of Joffice Patrick on behalf of the Parliamentary Bureau, setting out a revised business programme for tomorrow. I would ask any member who wishes to speak against the motion to press their request to speak, but now I call on Joffice Patrick to move the motion. No member has asked to speak against the motion. The question, therefore, is that motion 9243 be agreed. Are we all agreed? We are agreed. The next item of business is consideration of Parliamentary Bureau motion 9223, on committee membership. I would ask Joffice Patrick to move the motion. I turn now to decision time. The first question is that motion 9205, in the name of Angela Constance, on making Scotland equally safe, be agreed. Are we all agreed? We are agreed. The final question is that motion 9223, in the name of Joffice Patrick on committee membership, be agreed. Are we all agreed? We are agreed. That concludes decision time. We move now to members business, the name of Annie Wells on World AIDS Day. We'll just take a few moments for members to change seats.