 Having good morning, everyone and welcome to the Justice Committee's 19th meeting of 2017. We have apologies from the convener Margaret Mitchell, who is absent on other parliamentary business and we welcome back Alexander Stewart as her substitute. Before we begin formal business today, I would like to make a brief mention of last night's ydw i chi wnaeth eu bod yn gyntaf ar gaeliaeth ac yn gael i'r dweud o'r ffamilies ylwyddoedd hyn o'r ffordd. Psychology services, and events such as last night remind us of the crucial work that emergency services perform at times like this. They put themselves in harm's way in service of the public." Before starting our evidence session, I want to underline on behalf of the committee just how much that work is appreciated. Agenda item 1 is an evidence session on the Scottish fire and rescue service. The The Parliament has a duty to keep under review the operation of the Police and Fire Reform Scotland Act 2012, which, among other things, led to the setting up of the SFRS, and we are taking evidence today in furtherance of that duty. So can I welcome today Alistair Hay, chief officer of the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service, Pat Waters, chair of the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service board, Chris Maglone, executive council member for Scotland, Farbergades Union, Derek Jackson, branch secretary, Scottish Fire and Rescue Service of Unison Scotland. So we'll go straight to questions and if I can open up with just a general question. It's four years since the SFRS was formed as a single service. Can you tell me what you think maybe some of the most challenging aspects of the transformation has been and just generally how you feel it's working? Open to anyone to answer first. Maybe if I could open up. I think that certainly over the past four years, and I remember that it is only four years, we have achieved in conjunction with our colleagues and the trade union and our staff a tremendous amount. We set out in this journey to ensure that what we had was the proper foundations to actually build on a world-class service for the safety of the people of Scotland. We have achieved that initial building. It is not finished by any minor of means and there is still a journey to be on, but we have those foundations right. There has been many trials during that particular period of major events where the Fire and Rescue Service has stood up. By and large, I think that the four years ago it was a brave decision to set up the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service. It was probably the right decision to set up the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service and it has brought our service together. We have spent that four years of integration on ensuring that what we get is a single service that is delivered very, very locally. Although we are a national service, we are still a local service and we have strived to try and achieve that. Our communication with our partners, both in local authorities and elsewhere within the public sector and our partnership working with our partners within the public sector, is outstanding, but it still can be improved on. We have started the journey and we are on the way in that journey. We believe that so far it has been a success in how we have managed to achieve that. I think that that is down to the partnership that we have had with our staff and the co-operation that we have had with us and other partners. I do not know if anyone else would like to add anything to that. The Fire and Rescue Union would absolutely echo the recognition of the role of employees and our members who have played in ensuring that we continue to provide a world-class all-hazards emergency service, especially against the current backdrop, the fiscal challenges, the operational challenges that clearly exist out there and are evolving all the time. The Government, in response to the Christie commission going back a few years, and Pat will probably remember this because I think that he sat on it, I think that it hit the nail on the head that transformational change can only be successful with a broad base of popular consent. The FPU certainly believes that that consent begins at home with its employees. I echo the fact that we have worked very closely with the service over the past four years. There have been some very challenging times and difficult decisions to make. The fiscal background is the worst that we have seen in living memory. We absolutely understand the difficult decisions and choices that the service has to make. We believe now that we are entering a new phase of the service. We have not completed the integration of the eight services and I think that there is still a fair amount of work to be done on that and I will be happy to expand on that later in the session. Obviously, the minister has indicated that we are now entering a transformational phase and that is why it is key to bringing employees along with us. I think that we have a lot of work to do there and that we need to get round the table and address some of the issues that I do not think have been addressed with our employees. I think that our employees at the moment are disappointed with the direction that the service has gone in in relation to their employment. I think that there is some fantastic work that has taken place. There has been some really good partnership work that has taken place. I think that we are now entering an incredibly difficult period for the service after the first four years, but I would give the commitment now that we are more than happy to sit round the table with the service and continue to work in partnership with the service to try to meet the challenges ahead and identify the solutions to some of the issues and problems that we have at the moment. Would you like to expand a bit on those issues and what the importance might be? I think that when we took on the amalgamation of eight very different organisations, there were initially some sort of pressing issues that we had to deal with. There were huge differences in the cultures of those organisations and the cultures within the employees and the manner in which we went about providing that service. I think that there were cultural barriers to break down, not just for the service but from the union's point of view as well. We are continuing to try to do that. We are looking at restructuring the union in Scotland to more closely align it with the service delivery areas. The biggest issue probably was the eight sets of different pay terms and conditions that are continuing to cause those problems now. I think that there should have been far more consideration given to the difficulties that would have been caused by bringing those sets of conditions together. I think that there should have been consideration in relation to transitional funding to address the difficulties that the service would have met in trying to bring those sets of conditions together, because there is a wide disparity of pay terms and conditions, especially when you come down to things such as continuous professional development, additional responsibility allowances and all the various rafts of different allowances that have essentially been locally negotiated through collective bargaining over the past 30 years. That is now causing us certainly from the union's point of view the biggest problem and the biggest issues. I am running out of excuses. I am now struggling to explain to our employees and our members why we still have not addressed those issues and why, four or five years down the road, we are still squabbling over elements in that. Thank you. Mr Jackson, would you like to? Yes, just like what my colleague says earlier, it is challenging to enter with eight services going into one for support staffs side of things. We have actually went through new teasing seats. It has been challenging as well. We have went through a job of aviation process, a long process for job of aviation as well. On that, we have had people coming and going purely down to how it has affected them, how it impacts on individuals, even strategic as well, where people have been moved from one place to another, bones have been closed, and that has been challenging as well. We have still got the same issue there at a disparity and pay even gone through a job of aviation and a new paying grading system. There are people who, for the first couple of years, were always chasing the people at the top and they still find themselves in that position for the next few years. Pay protection for staff are in detriment. That ceased on 27 February this year. That has had a quite big impact on us as well, with the fact that we have some staff in the region that are possibly £9,000 in detriment. We are looking for some sort of commitment as well that can these people in detriment that the service can do something for them to get them out of detriment as quick as they can. It is challenging and the financial constraints on it as well. It is no easy, but it has been a long, hard road so far and it is no finished yet. First of all, I thank you for your thoughts that you expressed for the victims and their families following last night's tragic events in Great Manchester. Of course, to a lesser extent, it was traumatic for all the emergency service workers. I am pleased to hear you expressing gratitude for the work that front-line staff do day in and day out throughout the country. I can only begin to imagine some of the horrific scenes that they had to witness last night. I welcome the opportunity to come along here today and to discuss the progress that the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service has made in the past four years. I think that you have to remember that we are still a very young service. Four years is not a long time. To give voice to some of the opportunities and some of the challenges that we face in the future, I have no doubt that the creation of the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service has been good for Scotland. It has been acknowledged by many independent observers that it has been the public sector success story. We continue to meet the expectations of reform, which were clearly set out, which was to protect front-line service delivery and, indeed, the outcomes. I am always very proud of the work that firefighters do and their colleagues in support services. If you think that the number of fire deaths in Scotland for the first four years of the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service are the lowest in Scottish history, the lowest in record, I think that that is testament to the work and the continuing journey. There were 356 fast stations in Scotland before reform and there are still 356 fast stations. In terms of meeting what the intentions of reform were, we can clearly indicate the success that we have had on that journey. I think that the two biggest challenges—to answer your question directly—have been the fiscal challenges. We have taken £55.3 million out of the cost base of the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service in the last four years. We have actually been running for five years because we had six months of almost shadow where we had a limited amount of finance and we have delivered against our saving targets every year. We have presented a balanced budget and our accounts have been approved on every occasion. I think that that was very challenging but we need to be proud of it. I agree when we are trading new colleagues and people. This has been extremely difficult for people. As Derek just said, if you close a premise where people have worked for maybe 20 or 30 years, you might only be asking them to move five miles down the road but sometimes we are asking them to move 40 or 50 miles down the road. That is extremely challenging. We have not been able to duck any of the tough decisions in relation to staff issues but we have absolutely tried to do it as empathetically as we possibly can. Money and people have been the two biggest challenges. I would also agree with Chris. The biggest challenge that remains for us in relation to our Fire Brigades Union staff is that we need to harmonise the terms and conditions of service. Perhaps if I can expand on that slightly, we have national terms and conditions of service. It was more pressing to do the harmonisation piece with our colleagues within the support trade unions because we did not have that national basis. The disparity in rates of pay, leave and all that type of stuff was enormous. We have dealt with that. In terms of our uniformed colleagues, we have national terms and conditions of service but, as Chris said, there is quite a lot of disparity in relation to particularly allowances. We have not harmonised those as yet but Chris has acknowledged on several occasions the excellent work that has gone on in relation to doing that. We have a partnership advisory group where, if things are not progressing, it can be escalated to myself as a chief, Patas the Chair and one of our colleagues, Kirsty Darman. The device chair is sitting behind us. We acknowledged that we should try and do that as quickly as possible. It was our intention to have had that done prior to the start of this financial year. We had challenges around the budget setting process but that is understandable and accepted. However, what we have been seeking to do is look to the future and look at service redesign to meet the challenges that the country faces and delivering service redesign. That would also require a re-evaluation of the role of the firefighters that perhaps could have lifted all those issues out. We have not been able to achieve that just yet but we continue to discuss it. I can absolutely assure the committee that we will now give priority to work progressively with the Fire Brigades Union to deal with this last outstanding issue as quickly as we possibly can. I want to come back to a point that you made, Mr Jackson, about the pay protection coming to an end in February of this year. Could you expand on that and give us some idea of how many staff are affected? Are they clustered in a particular grading and do you have an end date for resolving the issue? That was after job evaluation, as we said. People in detriment, I think, part or a chief might come in. Off the top of my head, it was roughly about 27 per cent that staff were in detriment. The pay protection run up to 27 February this year. I have no figures as to how many people or percentage is still in detriment. A few of them have left the service due to that. There are a few directorates or key areas where we have had to introduce market allowances to try to bridge that gap for external, to encourage people from outside to come in and even retain current staff. Roughly 27 per cent of staff were in the beginning. I do not know how many are remaining out of 27 per cent. Mr Hay, can you give us any more clarity on that? I think that I can. I think that what we have to remember as well is that we have a collective agreement in terms of the harmonisation with support staff trade unions. They balloted their members. On the first occasion, they rejected the harmonisation process. On the second occasion, by a very narrow margin, they did accept it, so we went through the proper harmonisation process. There were 227 employees who ended up in detriment at the end of that, which is roughly 27 per cent of our support staff. We have put in and we continue to have a number of change management policies to try and support staff to move into other roles in the organisation in which they can recover some of the detriment that they have experienced. Picking up on the point about staff turnover there, our staff turnover within support services sits at 2.5 per cent, which is remarkably low. The average within the public sector in Scotland, I understand, is around about 8 per cent. Across industry as a whole, it is around about 15 per cent. I do not, in any way, shape or form underestimate how difficult it is for staff that find themselves in detriment. The fact that we seek to be an employer of choice is evidenced by the fact that our turnover is so low. We are committed to trying to help staff as much as we possibly can. You have an anticipated end date to resolve the situation with the staff. For some people, we may never resolve that detriment, but we have a number of policies that are very supportive of staff to try and help them to move into other roles that will help them. A lot depends on the pay that we are in negotiation at this moment in time over this year's pay settlement for our support staff. One of the things that lifts staff out of detriment is their annual pay rises. For the foreseeable future, it looks like it is around about 1 per cent. I am not trying to circumvent the negotiations, but that is what it looks like. I cannot give you an exact date on that, because there are a number of factors involved in it. However, I can reassure you that we are working with staff to try and help them where we possibly can. No consideration was given to extending the period of pay protection to alleviate the detriment that members of staff are suffering. The chair is looking to come in. If I could just say that, that was all agreed the length of time within a collective agreement, and it was part of a whole package of measures that were put on to the table. Can I say that the negotiations were clear and understanding that there were people in detriment? Some of them were quite severely in detriment, and that is why there was a period of pay protection built into that. We also gave the commitment to the trade union that would work with the trade union and staff in detriment where possible to find alternative employment or to find retraining opportunities so that it would lift people out of that detriment, or even soft in the detriment where it was quite sizable. That is an on-going process to say that we will get an end date. No, we do not have an end date because it is a process that we will look to try and achieve. The agreement was for 18 months of pay protection. That 18-month came to an end at the start of this year. Therefore, people did revert to what was the agreed level of pay for that particular job. However, we continue to work with staff and we are a trade union representative to ensure that what we get is proper examination of where opportunities arise for our staff within the support region. I think that we will come on in due course to some of the issues around Mr Wat as you talked about a national service delivering locally and how that is achieved as well as some of the issues around capacity. It strikes me that, in setting the scene, you have talked about fiscal difficulties and variables in terms of conditions. As well as some of the issues around the physical infrastructure of the service. All of those have an echo in Police Scotland, but it appears that the concerns both internally within the organisation and more widely within the public around the process that the fire service has gone through have not been of the same magnitude that we have seen in relation to the establishment of Police Scotland. Do you have any ideas as to why that might be the case? What have you been able to do in Police Scotland that it has proved more difficult? I mean, I.T. would be another example, I think, that you cited, where issues have arisen in terms of the establishment of Police Scotland that you appear to have managed to navigate more successfully without the kind of headlines that Police Scotland has garnered? If you don't mind, I'll start. Other colleagues, we can't speak for Police Scotland. I don't know enough about Police Scotland's set-up and how they've approached the reform process. For us, there has been two key things. Or that Scotland very helpfully produced a document that was called best practice guide to public service mergers, which indicated a pathway to delivering success. It was based on evidence from previous public sector mergers, so we used that, and specifically in terms of the financial challenges. It was clear from the start that there was going to be financial challenges. There was a saving target set for the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service. It was in the financial memorandum that underpinned the Police and Fire Reform Act. In a sense that the savings target is established for Police Scotland, but presumably where there was a difference is that, looking at the figures, you've reduced head count in terms of officers as well as staff. Did you have more flexibility in what you were able to do in implementing that best practice that wasn't there because of the Government commitments on Police Scotland? I can't speak for Police Scotland. We followed the best practice guide. We knew what the saving targets were that we had to meet. We set out a critical savings pathway that would take us up to 1920. We looked at the main areas in which we would be able to take cost out of the organisation. That involves reducing the head count, so we did have a flexibility to do that. What also included was rationalising our assets and rationalising the amount of contracts that had been set by the eight different services. We have looked to a degree at shared services and we have streamlined process. For each of the years up until 1920, we were very clear against the main categories of what we would be trying to achieve, and that is what set us on the right path. For us, it was following that best practice guidance and it was systematically planning. I think that the other major success factor Chris Spoke earlier about building a willing coalition for change and building that willing coalition did have to start internally within the organisation, having a very clear focus for staff on what we were trying to achieve and why it was necessary. It has been highlighted that it has not been without difficulty for people in four years, although it seems that it has gone by in a flash for me. If you are one of the staff that has directly impacted, I am sure that it seems like a long time that we have not resolved their issues, but I would have to give credit to our staff in particular and the work that we have done in partnership with the trade unions in helping us to follow that best practice guidance and take those costs out of the organisation. We have kept a very strong focus on what is important, and I always say that there are two absolutes for me, and that is community safety and firefighter safety. Building on what we have in common and what separates us has been one of the things that has helped us on this journey. No, I am quite happy to come back on that as well in more practical terms. I think that there has definitely been a different public perception between what has happened in the single police service and the single fire service. A lot of that is to do with the fact that the public are acutely aware of a lot of the problems and issues that have arisen as a result of bringing those police forces together. It has been played out very publicly, I think, in the press. I have been very heavily criticised since I came into post for not essentially doing the same as my counterpart in the Scottish Police Federation Callum Steel has done. I think that Callum is in a slightly different position to myself in relation to the ability that I have to sit down with the service and collectively bargain. I think that what it recognises, that perception recognises, is the fact that we have done an awful lot of work behind closed doors and in private. We have sat down with the service and resolved an awful lot of problems and an awful lot of issues that have come up that have never reached the public domain. I think that it recognises that we have worked incredibly hard behind the scenes. We do have a working together framework, which is buying large works. However, I think that at some point, I do welcome the chief's assurances and reassurances about resolving some of the issues, especially around harmonisation of terms and conditions, but unfortunately I have heard them before, and it is time for those words to be delivered in actions. If our members have made such a significant contribution to the success of the new service, and I believe that they have, we make a simple demand that that recognition and dedication and hard work is recognised with a reward and not just a continual part on the back. The chief himself referenced the benefits of reform. The minister referenced those benefits of reform a few days ago in an international symposium. One of those benefits was, for example, access to, equitable access to specialist resources. That is a consequence of some of the issues and the problems that we have had inside the service and not being able to harmonise those terms and conditions. There are many other issues and problems inside the service just now that we are trying to resolve. The problem that we have and the message that is coming across loud and clear to myself and our officials is that the services are no longer listening. They may be listening, but they are not acting. They are not acting on the concerns and they are not acting on the issues that have been brought to us day in, day out. From the fibregage union point of view, I am finding it increasingly frustrating sitting week after week month after month with the service, resolving problems that are not of our making and sitting there quietly and privately behind closed doors and not getting a great deal of credit for it, to be honest. I think that we now need to, as I said earlier on, we are entering a new phase of the reform of the service, but those difficulties now have to be faced. We must be honest that there are problems in the background. There are lots of underlying issues and difficulties within the organisation. We have, I think, gone about it thus far in the right way, and it is only very recently that I think that I have come out quite publicly and started to be a bit more openly critical of the organisation the way that they have been handled. I would concur that there is a very good public response to the amalgamation, and there is clearly a lot of hard work going on. I want to pick up on the issue that Mr Macleon touched on later. That was the equitable access to specialist service. My understanding is that, as regards the national bargaining, there is national bargaining, but there was also local arrangements as well. I suppose that it is alone in the statement. I am disappointed that we are this far in and that there has not been harmonisation, but I am interested to know how that might manifest itself. For instance, what is referred to as water and line rescue, I understand that that attracted something that, again, you alluded to in your first response, Mr Macleon, additional responsibility allowance. Does that mean, and that is maybe for Mr Macleon and Mr Hayes, that that particular specialism is not being rolled out because that is still one of the issues that is to be resolved? I am quite happy to answer that. Additional responsibility allowances were paid to recognise areas of the role that sat out with the role map of a firefighter. By and large, there were areas in the organisation that perhaps did not warrant obligations within statutory duties. Specialist line rescue and water rescue were just two examples. We did inherit and the service inherited a broad range and disparity of payments across the organisations in relation to those additional responsibility allowances. However, we feel that it is only fair that four or five years into the new service those are addressed. I think that we have been very reasonable in the demands or the requests that we have made for payment for those services, especially in the areas that we are still having issues. You seem to be okay if you are across the central belt, if you are in Dumfries and Galloway or the northeast. We have specialist teams there who have been trained, who have not been deployed because the service is not prepared to pay them the same salary or the same amount of payment for conducting those roles. We think that that is unacceptable four years down the line. Is that the case? Is it the case that there is not equitable access to these specialist services? Is that what we are extremely disappointing at where at the case? I think that what we have done is we have created far more equitable access to specialist resources. In relation to water, as an example, we had 14 teams at the outset and we have now got 20 teams across Scotland. I think that the way that Chris is portraying this has a little bit more nuance to it than he is explaining today. We have a collective agreement that stands with the Fire Brigades Union at this moment in time in relation to additional responsibilities and what that was was that until the point of harmonisation, we would pay any new team that came online the rate that they were getting within their antecedent service. The two places that he is talking about specifically there, we have an issue in Aberdeen, we have an issue down in Dumfries, and to be fair to the staff in good faith, they have undertaken all the training and are now at the point where they are ready to be deployed, but they did not previously have an additional responsibility allowance. That has been raised. We have offered, as a gesture just now, until we do the full harmonisation £250 additional allowance, recognising that they are taking on new work. That at the moment has not been accepted, but it is a live negotiation, so we would hope to resolve that as quickly as we possibly can now. Against all the specialisms, we have far more teams rolled out across the country than we had at the start. We do not deny the fact that that harmonisation has not been completed. It is a priority for the organisation, and we have had collective agreements that we have been able to build on in the negotiation to finalise those, but it has not finished yet. For the voids of doubt, I am not seeking to turn this forum into a negotiating item. It is more around the practical manifestation of that. Is it the case, then, that there are any areas in which the water and line rescue facilities are not available? There are two specifics. We have shortly a line rescue team that we hope to bring on in Aberdeen, and a specialist water rescue in Dumfries. At the moment, because of the issue in relation to the harmonisation, we have been advised by Chris and his team that they do not accept the offer that has been made. Our understanding was that we did have an agreement, because we will do that until we harmonise. It is a good bill gesture that we have offered £250, but we know that that will not be the end. With the exception of those, to my understanding, every other additional asset that we have brought into the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service is deployed and is operational. You mentioned community safety, and that is of paramount concern. I am sure that you will redouble your efforts to reach a resolution on that. That is very important. Absolutely. Of course, because we have far more specialist assets than we had under the antecedent services, and there are no boundaries, we are able to deploy those assets pan Scotland very easily and readily, and that has happened on numerous occasions. In terms of the benefits to the people of Scotland, we can strongly evidence that that has already occurred. Mr Hew, you had some interesting facial expressions in reaction to Mr McLoone's comments about the harmonisation. Does that mean that you disagree with his perception about there being a lot of talk but little action? I am surprised that I had some strange facial expressions. It was very overt, and it was the only time during this conversation so far. I will watch that back on camera and try to get a poker face. I do not recognise the comment that the service is not listening. I genuinely do not recognise that comment. We have a partnership advisory group, as I explained earlier, where, if there are any issues where the teams that are doing all the negotiations are finding that they have met a stumbling block and cannot resolve it, it can be escalated up to the partnership advisory group, where Chris and some of his committee members can come along and speak directly to the chair, the vice chair and myself, and we can try to find ways around those stumbling blocks. In relation to the harmonisation, which seems to be the big issue, if we go back to the minutes in September of last year, it is very clear on the minutes that I was seeking to resolve that as quickly as possible. Chris acknowledged all the hard work that had been done up until that point. We were supposed to have a follow-up meeting in December and another subsequent follow-up meeting, but, on all occasions, it has been cancelled by the Fire Brigade Union. They said that they have no business to bring to the table. When you say that you are not listening and that you have these forums to resolve issues, it gets brought. We have tried to suggest a way forward, and then the follow-up meetings are cancelled because there is no business to bring. That is why it sounds slightly surprising to me that we are not listening. If you provide forums to bring those things to my attention, to the chair's attention and that they are not used, you can only make the assumption. The feedback that we are getting is that good, steady progress is being made, but, as I have already said, I have heard loud and clear that this is an issue, and I am absolutely committed to resolve it in the quickest possible time. I completely disagree with what the chief officer said. It is somewhat disingenuous to suggest that we have no business to take to the partnership advisory group meeting. I think that the conclusion was that the current path that we were on was not going to result in a resolution or a conclusion to the harmonisation of terms and conditions. Therefore, it would perhaps be sensible to seek another avenue to resolve that. We have had various formal discussions about the service, and certainly I have with one of the assistant chief officers in the service with regard to, for one of a better term, rolling up the harmonisation terms and conditions issue into service transformation and redesign. It is disingenuous for the chief to sit there and say that we have failed to bring that issue to the partnership advisory group. We have previously agreed on both sides of the table that it has failed and that it will not be resolved within the current forum. Therefore, we have to seek another solution in another forum, and clearly it is still a massive issue for ourselves. Believe me, if there was a forum sitting there just now where we could resolve that, because it is certainly the biggest issue for the Fire Brigade Union and it is giving us the biggest headache among members, believe me that I would take it to that forum. Daniel Watt, you mentioned that it was the intention of the service to harmonisation completed by the start of this financial year. You have not been able to achieve that. What is your target date now? We do not have an actual target date. What we want to do is come round the table, and as Chris has alluded to, if we cannot harmonise it here within Scotland, there are dispute resolution processes within our national joint council, and there are timescales attached to that. Therefore, we are more than happy to come round the table as quickly as possible to see if we can resolve it finally here within Scotland, and if not, we know that there are established routes to resolve those issues that we may have to go down. You are here today because it is part of the duty of this committee to monitor and evaluate the operation of the single fire and rescue service. How can we do that if we do not know what a timescale is? You previously had a timescale. What should we now be looking at as committee members of this parliamentary committee as a successor otherwise to this harmonisation project moving forward? It is extremely difficult to put a timescale on it. We are talking about a negotiation, a complete and extremely complicated negotiation, how we take the— Had a timescale? We had a timescale and, hopefully, to get to a conclusion, but that has not been met. I am a bit disappointed to hear that the mechanism that will sit up in the partnership advisory group, which we both sit on, both as employers and employees representatives, I normally chair the board, but I also chair that committee. It is the first time that I have heard that that committee is no longer functioning and is not equipped to solve some of the problems that it is up to do. That is the reason that it is there. The reason that it is there is to solve some of the problems, not to solve the problems but to oil the mechanism to allow the problems to be solved into the future. Is there a timescale? The timescale is for us to get this done as quickly as we possibly can. Chris is absolutely right that the chief officer also mentioned that there are two areas that are coming together at the same time. One is the harmonisation of the condition of service and two is the transformation of the service and how we move forward to protect the communities of Scotland into the future. That is not an easy solution and not something that we can say that we will solve that by ex-day, but it is an on-going discussion with our representative bodies on how we move that forward. Sorry, I just do not understand that because you had previously said that it would be done by ex-day. The ex-day was the start of this financial year and you have been unable to do that. How was it possible to set a date for the start of this financial year, but now it is impossible to say to this parliamentary committee who are trying to scrutinise your work when we should expect to see further action? I think that that is a fairly reasonable request. I think that perhaps I was not clear enough that that was a target at the 31st of March because we wanted to resolve those outstanding issues as quickly as was practically possible. It was an aspiration and it is clear that we did not meet that. We are not trying to be illusive here. What we are trying to say is that we want to get round the table as quickly as we possibly can, have a progressive discussion and resolve that. I think that we are in danger of turning this into a negotiation between myself and Chris, which, as Mr Finlay pointed out, is not the purpose of today. Once we have had that, we will have more clarity on the timescales that we are seeking to work to. If we cannot resolve it here in Scotland, there are timescales by which joint secretaries and resolution advisory panels can take place within the NGAC. Let us have a conversation. Savick can resolve it in Scotland. If not, we will know what the backstop dates are through those external resolution processes. I am sure that we can feed that back to the committee and to give you some degree of assurance. That would be useful to get that feedback. I come to another issue now. All the panel has spoken about the importance of staff. Mr Waters for saying that partnership and co-operation with staff was a priority. Why have the single fire and rescue service continued to fail to release the 2015 staff survey results? Why cannot we know what the staff are saying? We did not do a staff survey, but we did a cultural audit of the organisation. You have not been willing to reveal publicly the outcomes of that? We have revealed as much as we can publicly, but the bits that people have been pursing us on we spoke to staff who had focus groups and they were given an absolute promise that anything that they said would be treated in the absolute confidence. We have to respect the offer that was made to staff in relation to what they would say in the context in which they said that. The questions that have been asked for us have been taken to my understanding through the freedom of information commissioner and have upheld the stance of the Scottish fire and rescue service in relation to those things. We are not trying to be in any way shape or form elusive. We are not trying to be lack transparency. What we are trying to do here in relation to a cultural audit is that we set the frame of reference for it. We gave staff very explicit guarantees about how it would be used and what the confidentiality is. We have tried to respect it. You have been less transparent than the police service. They have been willing to reveal all their service that they do, even when it is bad information. It is a matter of commitment on confidentiality that we have already committed to staff, and that has been examined. You would not be able to tell them that we are less transparent. Douglas Ross said that a number of respondents had concerns over X, Y and Z. Surely you could do that without breaching confidentiality, because I think that the public would want to know where areas of concern have been raised by staff. I go back. It was not a staff satisfaction survey. It was a cultural audit. They were able to give the opinions of what they were happy and unhappy. I am sorry, but what we are talking about here is a tool by which we can try to address some of the cultural differences that Chris explained earlier, and it is working with staff to do that. The intention is not to be lack transparency, but to work with staff to find out the areas that we collectively need to work on to create a single, cohesive, positive culture for the Scottish fine and rescue service. I thank you for giving us a clear answer. We need to move on. I would like to hear from Ms Maglun. Just very briefly, we share your same concerns. I did request the responses from the cultural audit two years ago and got the same answer as yourself, I believe. The critical importance of the responses was that they were used to feed into the cultural plan. I am not convinced that there is any great degree of confidence in the cultural plan because nobody knows what the responses were or the employees do not know what the responses were. However, in response to that ourselves, it is the intention of the FBU to survey our near-5,000 members in the near future on their own views of the service, and we will release and fill those results to the Republic. Stuart Stevenson, just before I move to my bit, can I say do not set arbitrary dates, just deal with the issues that are in the entry on the appropriate dates that both parties deal with it? I am in a different place from Douglas Ross on that, so he does not necessarily speak for the committee. I wanted to just briefly turn to another matter that has not arisen so far, and it goes right back to where we started, that the staff are the important part of the service. We have not heard anything so far about how the retained staff contribute to the future development, and for someone like myself—and there will be others here as well—who represent areas that are quite rural, the retained staff are often the face of the fire service. Of course, I think that they will not be being represented directly by the trade unions, although some of them might be indirectly. I wonder how the retained staff feed into the future development of the fire service and, indeed, what their future is in the service. Can I have a kick-off and then ask the chief officer to come in with some of the information? To say something about retained staff, can I take you back to Stormfrank when it hit Scotland over Christmas and New Year? I will take you to the north-east of Scotland and have a look at how that retained staff unit and the units that are roundabout responded to that. It was not just during that terrible period for those communities that they responded, but continued to respond well into the weeks and months following. Some of the staff that were dealing with that were in the exact same circumstance of the people that they were trying to assist. Their homes had been flooded, their families were out, but they were still providing the service to their community. Nothing says more about the commitment to our retained staff than that kind of response. They are tremendous and we could not run the service in Scotland without the commitment of their staff. It was absolutely outstanding and continues to be outstanding at any time that they are needed there, but I will hand you over to the chief officer to give some of the The chief officer, can I absolutely associate myself? My constituency, as luck would have it, was comparatively unaffected in the north-east compared to neighbouring ones, but the value that people in the north-east got from the retained staff on that occasion, as many others, was exactly as you described, Mr Waters. You can only echo the admiration that everybody has expressed for the work that our retained colleagues do. When Stephen Tory was the chief inspector, he came to the committee and suggested that the words that he used were that the retained service was almost broken, not just here in Scotland but across the whole of the UK and perhaps across the western world, because the way that people lead their lives has changed entirely from the way that the retained service was designed and set up in the 1950s. I will not go as fast to say that it was broken, but it is certainly facing severe pressures. What have we done about that? Your question specifically was about how have they fed into that. It absolutely is about listening to them. One of our recently retired assistant chief officers led a major piece of work that looked into how we could make the best of the current terms and conditions of service and the current retained duty system here within Scotland. He also looked to options in relation to service redesign. We are still working very actively in relation to service redesign. We believe that service redesign cannot just look at the retained service and the whole-time service. It is looking at the totality of the resource that is available across Scotland and how that can then be deployed to best effect for maximum benefit to all the people of Scotland. That was one of the major things that came out of the piece of work, but in relation to making the best of where we are at this moment in time, as part of the work, we invited retained members to become involved in it and we also set up a sounding board so that we could try to understand what were the real barriers that they were actually facing. A couple of examples of that would be that they had to travel too long to access training facilities, so to go away from their home or their business for three days was just impractical for them. We have very much focused on investing in our training infrastructure. We have had great support from the Scottish Government in providing us with the money to provide training facilities in the Orkney Islands, in the Shetlands and also in the Western Isles so that staff can access those things locally, because we heard that from them. They are really concerned about the time that was taken from showing interest to them being told whether they had a job or not, so we have streamlined all the processes. Our intention is to try and do it within three months. We have heard some horror stories that it was taken well over a year, so we have listened to them and we have done all that. We have made some considerable progress in this area. By the time we get to the end of May, we will have retained firefighters in Scotland, which takes us back up to parity with where we were when the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service started. It is the first time in nearly 20 years that we have seen a reversal of the reduction, so that has been a huge piece of work and credit to everybody who has been involved in that. If I can indicate to you that this year alone, we have recruited 119 RDS firefighters this calendar year, with another 93 coming in May, and we have got over 370 that are now in the process. We have done that by listening to what the concerns are about support from colleagues within the service. I emphasise some really good financial support from the Scottish Government to improve the training facilities for the RDS, but I do not underestimate the challenges that lie ahead and I think that it will have to be addressed through the fundamental structural redesign of the service. I totally agree with Pat, what the chief has said in relation to our RDS colleagues. They do an absolutely fantastic job under difficult circumstances and within their communities. I have to disagree again with the chief in relation to those employees, and the chief did mention some barriers that they are facing. One of the barriers that we are facing at the moment is getting the service to listen to our concerns over the nationally agreed rates of pay in relation to holiday pay, disturbance payments, sick pay and at least three of the antecedent services, serious breaches of the less favourable treatment of part-time workers' legislation. We have raised this time and time again with the service and again it is falling in deaf ears. I just cannot agree with the chief when he says that we are listening to our employees and we are acting on what those employees are saying, because our experience is different. Any organisation that has such a transformational change in harmonisation is going to have difficulties, and I think that you have explained that this morning who you are. For me, you have talked about how successful you seem to have been as you have gone forward, but there are cracks beginning to show in this whole process. For me, the crux of the word is staff morale. What kind of staff morale do we have? There has been some questioning about surveys and audits that have been done about how things are progressing, but there seems to be some difficulty there. We have seen the morale in the police service at an all-time low because of what they have had to suffer in going through this process. As I said, you have been held up as a beacon of success in comparison, but in reality, where are we with the staff morale situation now? As you go forward, we have had four years of success, but it is obviously going to get much more difficult as you progress. From the reactions that I have had this morning, there are cracks within the system that are beginning to surface. That will have a knock-on effect for service cover that I would suggest across the country. I cannot speak for the chief's perception or the service's perception, but from the FBU's perception that is rock bottom at the moment, those same employees that are being trumpeted and obviously praised have gradually become despondent as a single service continues to be trumpeted as success. They become increasingly detached from the success story, feel undervalued, feel underpaid, and, in many areas of the organisation, they are overworked and understress. That is the reality of the situation and the experience of the Fire Brigade Union today. I will also echo some thoughts for the FBU. The job evaluation process for support staff was, if you want to hold a grail, it was going to fix everything. Everybody could be on a harmonised pay. Through that process, there has been a lengthy process. We have lost quite a few key staff members with serious amounts of service under our belts. We have heard the commitment for the chief today, saying that there are policies and processes in place that regard getting these staff who are determined as if and when they can. There are various examples, even in the current process, of advertising jobs that seem to be going external before they have gone internal, where that would relieve some of the people in detriment. We are talking about a number of our members, predominantly women members, who are in the low-paid grades, and that is like grade 1, grade 2. Some of those jobs are not professional jobs, meaning that we have people within the departments, within the directorates, maybe through some form of retraining or things like that. Basically, they could achieve that goal that we are getting out of detriment. Our staff are pretty much the morale is pretty low. They have been waiting. We have went through appeals process as well. The job evaluation appeals process. People are still waiting on outcomes. We have had outcomes through that, but there is still something in the background going on about that. People are still hanging their quotes firmly on job evaluation and the paying reward fix and everything, and it just hasn't for us support staff. If I come in there, this has been a success. It is not hollow words when I say that this has been down to the commitment to dedication of staff at all levels within the organisation. There is absolutely no doubt about that. Has it been easy for people? Clearly, it hasn't been. We can't deny the fact that any major change process is going to be difficult for people. I said that at the beginning, and it is a credit to them. Arthur Cracks, as Mr Stewart says, is beginning to appear. It sounds very much like that. What I can say is that what we need to do, perhaps, is to get back around the table, reflect on what has made this successful today, identify exactly what the priorities are to do the consolidation in relation to the journey that we have been on so far, and lift our heads to look at what transformation will mean for all staff. What I can say is that we are in the process of preparing a staff satisfaction survey within the organisation, so we will be doing that as well. Just some of the indicators of Derek's spoke about staff turnover. I have already said that 2.5 per cent is our staff turnover rate, which is well below the average here in Scotland in the public sector. In terms of attendance, sickness levels are significantly lower than they were prior to reform of the service. Those are indirect indicators, and we will do a staff satisfaction survey, but what I have heard loud and clear is that there are conversations that have to be underscored by action not to let the great work that has happened disappear, and I could understand that that could happen quickly. There has been major change within the whole organisation. Does that cause unrest and anxiety? Yes, it does. I indicate that the absolutely right that Derek quoted was that the 27 per cent of people who found themselves in debt at the end of the job evaluation exercise could reflect the other side of that. That meant that 73 per cent did not. 73 per cent were as good or better as a result of that job evaluation exercise. Does that minimise the impact on that 27 per cent? No, it does not. We need to continue to work to ensure that we try to move that forward, but it cannot change the outcome of the job evaluation exercise. There is just one other figure that I would like to indicate to the committee. Recently, when we advertised for new members of whole-time staff, firefighter staff, we crashed the local government website, which we use for recruitment, on three occasions. We had over 5,000 people applying for the jobs that were there. We are an organisation that people want to work for. We are in a major change at the present time, and are there issues? Yes, there are. Will we deal with them? Yes, we will. Will we do it in conjunction with our trade union colleagues? Yes, we will. That is what our partnership agreement says. That is what we agreed to do. That is what we are committed to do. Yes, we have got anxiety. Sometimes there is frustration. There will be frustrations in the trade union side. Let me assure you that there will be frustrations in my side as well. However, we will work it out together. The reason that we are in the position that we are in today is because we have managed so far to continue to work things out together. That is the way for the future. That cannot be done to the service. It has to be done with the service. There has always been a massive amount of goodwill so far in this whole process, and that is to all your credit. However, that goodwill will disappear, and your percentages may rise if you do not tackle that in the short to medium term. You have identified that today, so I would wish you well in that process, but it is not an easy one to manage. I would like to ask you a question about the closure of some of the control rooms. I think that there was a lot of concern and worry at the time when that was first suggested that there would be a lack of geographical knowledge in some of the areas. I would just like to ask about your thoughts on what the experience of that has been so far. Has that proven to be the case, or has that local knowledge been able to be maintained through the control room closures? We have predicated the change in the control rooms on a proven model. We know that the Johnston control room, which covered the old Strathclyde area, covered 12 local authority areas and handled over 50 per cent of emergency calls in Scotland, which were previously handled by five control rooms prior to the creation of Strathclyde fire and rescue service. We have predicated the moves that we have made to create three control rooms in Scotland on a proven successful model. Local knowledge plays a part, but what I say is that it is about professional knowledge. I grew up in this city here in Edinburgh on the south side, and the north side of the city is a complete mystery to me. Just because you grow up somewhere does not mean to say that you have the professional detailed type of knowledge that is required. That is developed by staff when they join a control room and they go through the relevant training programmes. That is also underpinned by the technology. Gazettears is one of things, which is basically mapping systems. We look at the risks and the type of resource that we would deploy. We match that to all the mapping information, and we ally that to the professional knowledge of the control room staff. There have been a couple of glitches when we first came over, but our layers of resilience have very quickly picked those up. I do not want to say too much more, because Her Majesty's chief inspector of fire and rescue services has done and has produced a report. I have spoken to him throughout the entire process, but he has not picked up any major concerns and any recommendations that are likely to go public. He has advised us of those throughout the process, so we have already taken action on those. It will be for the chief inspector to lay the report before Parliament. I am sure that, at a future day, we will have the opportunity to speak to him, and he will be scrutinised by the committee. On the back of that, the three control rooms that there are now have the right levels of staff there with the right knowledge, and they are all fully up to speed to provide that safe service. I think that we are providing a safe service. I think that we are still in the transition period for this. We agreed with the Fire Brigades Union what a safe model would be. We have had some challenges in relation to the north control staffing that up to the levels. We have offered overtime. We have taken staff out of other posts to try and keep it up, but there have been occasions when we have not had our agreed staffing within that, although it has never compromised public safety. However, at this moment in time, we have 10 trainees who are currently undergoing their training. Five of them will go into that north control, and five of them will go into the other controls to try and keep them up. However, what we have also put in place is a long-term succession plan for the control rooms to make sure that we have anticipated the vacancies over the next 10 years. We have anticipated our capacity to recruit support through their training process, and that is now all in training within the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service. However, that has to be properly and robustly implemented. I say at this stage that we have a few more questions to ask. We are rapidly running out of time, so if members can keep the questions and the answers very brief, please. I do not have another question, but I think that Mr McGlorn was going to come to the end. Just very briefly, I would welcome the chief's honesty there in relation to some of the difficulties that the control staff have experienced throughout that process. I think that it has been incredible, difficult process and not without pain and disturbance and all the other things that go with the closure of a workplace. We did in our initial consultation to the single service seek assurances that improved local control and mobilisation services would maintain local knowledge in line with existing structures. The importance of that local knowledge was reiterated in a recent report that was published by the Fybrid Brigade Union. It was reiterated by Linda Rowan and Neil who is the national control committee secretary. Just very briefly, if I can read that out, she states that many people do not know the location they are when they phone and for an emergency. We take for granted that perhaps somebody sits in a house or they know exactly where they are, they could be driving along the road, they could be in an unfamiliar area, especially when you go into the more remote rural areas of Scotland. Linda says that so much of the job is based on local knowledge. I know where the road that the pub you passed a few minutes ago is on, even if you don't. I know which motorway junction is nearest, based on a snippet of information that you caught out of the corner of your eye and the last sign you passed. I know where the old factory is despite the fact that it was closed down several years ago. I couldn't do my job nearly as well if I were unfamiliar with the area. Local knowledge is critically important. Modern systems are obviously critically important to the efficient functioning of the controls, but there has to be resilience as well. We have to have some kind of fallback when the sat nav doesn't work. We have five minutes for three questions, so they need to be very brief. I want to ask about the reduction in whole-time operational staff. Between 2015 and 2016, 166 whole-time operational staff left the service, and there were reductions in other areas as well. I wondered whether you could explain the rationale behind that. Was it solely down to the integration of the different areas that people leave because of dissatisfaction? Could you give us a bit more information about that? The vast majority of people who are leaving are leaving because they are reaching their pensionable point within the service. It varies depending on recruitment patterns that happened 30 years ago because, still, at the moment, firefighters normally retire after 30-year service, but between 150 and 200 is the normal retirement pattern within the service. We are losing about two people per month firefighters who are not retiring. That is the information that I have. It is down to normal retirement for the vast majority of people who are leaving the service. Is the staffing level at the correct level now across whole-time operational staff? We have agreed with the Fire Brigade Union on what we call resource-based crewing, which is the right number of staff that we consider unnecessary to be on fast stations to create a safe system of work. We are collectively proud of that. We ride five on the first appliance and four on the second appliance at whole-time fast stations in Scotland, and we are the only service in the mainland UK that has that as a minimum. The other service that it does is Northern Ireland. We have worked hard on that. We have a resource-based crewing establishment. That resource-based crewing is 3,071. That is what we have agreed with the Fire Brigade Union. As of yesterday, when I got the figures checked, we have 3,035. We have a small number, a small gap in there, but there is a buffer built in to the service to allow that. I can tell you that we have 111 people who are currently on a holding list. We have the intention of running three whole-time recruit courses this year. Those three courses will keep us as close as we possibly can to the agreed establishment level through resource-based crewing. I will move on to Liam McLaughlin's comments in relation to the local knowledge around control rooms, but I will wait to see what the inspector's report says. I will turn back to the issue of retained stations. I acknowledge Mr Hayes's comments about the investment in training facilities and the speeding up of the recruitment process. What specific work has been going on with other blue light services? In the islands that I represent, for example, part of the problem appears to be that you are dividing a very small population across a reasonably wide range of different services. They do not necessarily all appear to join up in terms of the requirements that they place upon those who are retained or volunteer. Is the work actively going on to establish where there is a demand for it, a more joined-up blue light service across fire and rescue ambulances and other services? There is work going on, particularly at a local level. Conversations are always happening between local senior officers in those communities directly with the communities to understand how each of us can be supported by the communities at the times when an emergency service is actually required. It is my understanding that you cannot hold the office of Constable and as a retained firefighter—that is in the legislation. There are issues around that, but perhaps something that might be of interest to you is that we have agreed, and there is a budget for it this year, to put a whole-time post into each of the three main island groupings in Scotland. The purpose of that is for them to work very closely with the local communities and to be able to respond to incidents, but they will set up a young firefighter scheme in those island communities. We will get in with the young people so that they are most likely to stay and return to some of the more remote parts and to understand what the fire service is all about. What we are trying to do there is to make sure that people understand the value of the service to their communities and how they can be a part of it, as well as giving them transformational skills. We are also looking to resolve those things, not just with the local community and their young people but also with our colleagues in the other services. That is an indication of the type of work that is going on to understand the needs and how we can best meet them. It was stated earlier that more than £55 million of cost savings since integration occurred. The committee is also aware that the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service, like Police Scotland, carries a VAT liability of approximately £10 million per annum, approximately £40 million since the financial year 2013-14. From the correspondence that you have had, has there been any movement from the UK Government on this matter? In your view, in terms of enhancing the service, how would that money have been spent if the liability was removed? In the first instance, we have the stock answer for the UK Government on every occasion. I have personally written to the Prime Minister, the Chancellor of the Exchequer. Every MP representing Scotland in Parliament copies to the representatives in this building. What the Treasury has said is that you knew that this has got to happen, and so therefore you should have taken care of it. It is full stop. We do not meet the legislation, which is absolutely right. We do not. However, neither did the legacy service for the London Olympics that went to cover the whole of the UK, and it was only a London-based organisation. There was an exemption made for them. Equally Transport for England was a local organisation and went UK-wide, and there was an exemption made for them. That is when we raised that matter. Could we use that £10 million that you better believe we could? We could maybe deal with some of the issues that we are facing at present time and some of the issues that we are going to face into the future. I think that the other interesting point is that when the people of Scotland have to provide for major emergencies, it costs them 20 per cent more than anywhere else in the UK to provide that. Is that right? It might meet the legislation, it might be there in the legislation, but is it right that you better believe that it is not? It is not that the people of Scotland to get the same protection for elsewhere has cost them 20 per cent more. It cannot be right even though it meets legislation or it meets the legal requirement. It is not right. I would just echo that. We have had a standard letter back from the UK Government, and we have taken it up in the Scottish Government. We really appreciate the support that they have given us in trying to pursue that. Thank you very much. I am afraid that we are out of time. I thank the panel very much for coming. I think that it has been a very useful and informative session. Thank you very much. I will suspend briefly to allow the witnesses to leave and the public gallery to leave. Sorry, but the public gallery can stay. We move to agenda item 2, which is a limitation childhood abuse Scotland bill. Agenda item 2, I would ask members to refer to their copy of the bill and to the marshaled list of amendments for this item. I welcome the minister for community, safety and legal affairs, and her officials. I apologise for the short delay in keeping you there. Can I call amendment 1, in the name of the minister, in a group on its own, and the minister to move and speak to the amendment? This amendment ensures that there is no doubt that abuse in the form of neglect is covered by the definition of abuse in the bill. Although the existing definition would not exclude other forms of abuse such as neglect, the amendment puts matters beyond doubt. I am very grateful to the committee for their scrutiny on the issue and to those who gave evidence. I agree with the witnesses about the importance of being as clear as possible and making every effort to ensure that survivors for whom the bill is intended are not excluded from its benefits. It is clear from the evidence that abuse, which takes the form of childhood neglect, can cause serious long-term damage and give rise to the same sort of difficulties that prevents survivors of other forms of childhood abuse from coming forward to raise a civil action. At the consultation stage, there were concerns raised about whether there was a potential ambiguity in including neglect and the potential for a wider interpretation covering negligent acts that would not necessarily constitute abuse. However, neglect will be included only as a form of abuse. That makes it clear that the bill is not dealing with cases where a person has simply omitted or neglected to do a thing. At the same time, it removes any doubt as to whether actions arising from childhood abuse, which takes the form of neglect, will be able to benefit from the removal of the limitation period brought about by the bill. I move amendment 1. Can I open up for any member who wishes to speak to the amendment? Just very simply to welcome the amendment being brought forward in response to observations in the committee. I, for my part, will find it very easy to support it. I think that the minister is right in saying that an argument could be mounted for saying that neglect was covered in the previous wording. However, as we discussed and heard in evidence, the clarity that the bill brings to survivors is absolutely crucial. I think that the amendment delivers that. I think that we heard that pretty strongly through the evidence that we got, in particular from the Scottish Human Rights Commission. I think that putting on record our gratitude to them for that evidence. However, like Stewart Stevenson, I will have no difficulty in supporting the amendment. I echo those remarks. Does anyone else want to speak on that? No? Okay. In that case, the question is that amendment 1 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? The question is that section 1 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? Thank you. We move on to amendment 2, in the name of Douglas Ross, in a group on its own. Can I ask Douglas Ross to move and speak to the amendment? Thank you, Deputy convener. This amendment aims to ensure that the bill is properly resourced. You will have seen in our own committee report at paragraph 245, we inserted a recommendation, which was unanimously agreed by all members of this committee, which said, it is important that the bill is properly resourced to ensure both that its policy intent is achieved and to prevent any negative impact on the provision of current services by local authorities. By agreeing with the amendment that I have submitted today, we ensure that that is in the legislation, and I move the amendment in my name. Thank you. Can I ask Stuart Stevenson to speak to that amendment? Thank you very much, convener. I note that Mr Ross, during the stage 1 debate, supported the bill and its aims. He also said that its paramedic survivors who had previously been unable to raise the civil action due to a time bar are not left frustrated and disappointed with the legislation because the Scottish Government had not put in place the necessary resources to support any possible increase in actions. He has just again properly highlighted the committee's conclusion about preventing and negative impacts on current services, but the amendment lays conditions on the Government that, if passed, the bill cannot be commenced by regulation, and that is because the test in his amendment cannot be met. The first test in the amendment requires, before commencement, that sufficient financial and other resources have been made available to meet any obligation. Since the effect of the bill, if passed by a Parliament, is to create an enduring right without limited time for individuals to act, for example, as an unlikely but legally possible example, person born in 2000 could take action in the year 2100 under this bill. It is simply not possible to provide now the resources to support an action nearly a century hence. The second test that is within the amendment lies more generally, and I quote, any obligations arising from the act. That unhelpfully captures obligations that might fall on all public bodies and all obligations, even where they arise solely from the actions or inactions of that public body, whereby they are responsible for providing financial recompense to victims. I do not think that that is what Mr Ross is seeking to do, but that is the effect, as I read it at least, of the words that are in the amendment. Without engaging the policy issue where I do not believe that there is any difference between Mr Ross and myself, the amendment that is before us goes much further than that policy issue, and de facto makes it impossible to support the amendment in its present form. It touches, of course, on the more general issue that arose in the stage 1 debate, where Mr Ross himself said that the Government must put in place necessary resources to support the possible increase in actions. Of course, the difficulty with possible increase in actions is that the number could be almost anything. Indeed, the minister himself pointed out that the 2,200 was the midpoint of a range of estimates between 400 and 4,000. It was generally accepted that we could look at this for as long as we like without coming up with a number. There was anything other than an estimate and an estimate range. On that basis, I am afraid that I find myself unable to support this amendment in the form that has been brought forward. Liam Kerr, on that point, pointed out that there is policy agreement around the concerns in relation to ensuring that the only way in which we will provide certainty is to ensure that the financial wherewithal is there to give effect to individuals who choose to go down the route of bringing in cases. As I would expect with Stuart Stevenson, he has done his due diligence in terms of what he sees as the precise impact of that specific amendment. That may very well be the case nevertheless. I think that the amendment itself highlights an area where the legislation that currently stands probably needs further clarification and reassurance to those who might be minded to bring forward cases. Therefore, if not the wording of that specific amendment, I would hope that the minister would reflect on what is said, the intent behind the amendment and potentially bring forward an amendment of her own at stage 3 that the Parliament as a whole can consider at that point. I would align myself with a lot of the comments that Stuart Stevenson made, and I certainly would not want to go into detail. Of course, it is entirely right that the legislation that has passed is adequately resourced, but the whole essence of that is that it is unknown. It is intended to give a signal and a signal of support to survivors that there is an opportunity. This is an evolving situation. I am concerned at anything that would be seen that would frustrate the progress of this, and I certainly will not be supporting the amendment. I understand the technical points that have been raised by my colleague. However, given the policy agreement, it would be advisable to include the amendment for the moment and to allow it to be refined at stage 3 when the bill returns. I will not be supporting the amendment. I think that we cannot do anything else that might delay the commencement of the act. I think that survivors have waited long enough. I think that, as has been said throughout our evidence-taking, it is impossible for anyone to estimate what that is going to cause. Therefore, the amendment is unworkable, so I will not be supporting it. The Scottish Government strongly opposes the amendment. What is proposed in the amendment is completely unworkable and could end up defeating the bill altogether. It is clear to me that we should not do anything that might delay the bill coming into force. As Rona Mackay has just said, survivors have waited long enough for this change in the law. Witnesses to the Justice Committee have accepted that it is not possible to estimate the impact in advance with any certainty. We simply will not know the impact of the bill until after it has come into force. It would therefore be premature to draw conclusions about resources without knowing the impact. Indeed, the amendment would put us in a catch-22 position. The impact will not be known until after commencement, but the amendment would not allow us to commence the act until the impact was known, or perhaps a blank check had been written. Hence, the conclusion that must be drawn is that the act might never be commenced. It should be remembered that the bill does not change the law of delict and the duty of care. On top of that, as the committee will appreciate, the current law allows new claims to proceed where the court considers it equitable to do so. That must be viewed at least as a potential liability for local authorities, which already exists, even aside from the bill. The bill is about access to justice for survivors. While we recognise that there will be financial implications for public bodies, that is the nature of civil litigation. We should not lose sight of the importance of the basic principle of removing an unfair barrier for survivors. The Parliament has unanimously supported the general principles of the bill, and the amendment runs the risk of derailing the whole aim of the bill. We need to respect the outcome of the interaction process and, most important, respect survivors who have campaigned for this change for decades. Our public bodies, such as local authorities, provide valued public services, and I share the member's views about the importance of maintaining those at the highest standard. Of course, we are in regular dialogue with COSLA and local government on a range of issues, and it would be open in the normal way of things to local authorities to raise concerns about any new and unplanned financial pressures that they are facing, which might impact on service delivery, so that we can consider together how those might be addressed. However, that impact will not be the same from one local authority to another, in terms of, for example, the number of cases and the position of any available insurance cover in any given case, so we do not yet know what the impact will be and nor can we know in advance of the implementation of the bill. I recently met the former children and young people spokesperson in COSLA, Stephanie Primrose, and it is clear that COSLA is not looking for a blank check. Rather, we agreed to continue the dialogue and to keep the situation under review. Once a new COSLA spokesperson has been elected on 30 June, I will seek a further meeting to discuss this issue. In conclusion, convener, I would say that this amendment does not provide a constructive solution. Rather, it would end up holding the bill hostage and could potentially derail the whole aim of the bill, which is to remove the insurmountable barrier to access to justice for survivors of childhood abuse that the three-year limitation period embodies. I urge members to reject amendment 2. I think that all of the speakers, with the exception of the minister, have accepted that the policy intent behind my amendment is not to derail things. I think that it is unfortunate that the minister spent most of her remarks looking at that aspect when Stuart Stevenson and others were all accepting that the reason that amendment is going forward is because there is a deficiency in the legislation that is in front of us. It is a deficiency that was accepted by every member of all parties on this committee when we agreed at paragraph 245, as I said in my opening remarks, that it was important that the bill is properly resourced. It is quite clear that it is not properly resourced and the biggest barrier to ensuring—sorry, not on that point, if I can continue—but the most important point in ensuring that we get it right for victims is to ensure that this legislation is properly resourced. The Scottish Government does have the opportunity to do some scoping on this issue and the Scottish Government must also take responsibility. We heard from a number of witnesses when we met with representatives from COSLA and local authorities that there were concerns over other services being cut and reduced to pay for the potential impacts of the legislation. Finally, I think that it is important that we highlight the deficiency in the legislation with particular respect to my amendment. While I accept some of the issues that have been raised by Stuart Stevenson and others, if my amendment is agreed at committee today, it will become part of the stage 2 bill, which can then be further amended at stage 3. For that reason, I would seek to press the amendment in my name. In that case, I will ask the question, is amendment 2 agreed to? Are we all agreed? No. There is a division, so we will move to a vote. All those in favour? All those against? Any abstentions? Thank you. The totals are three for the amendment, seven against the amendment and one abstention. We can move on. The question is that section 2 be agreed to? Are we all agreed? We are all agreed. The question is that section 3 be agreed to? Are we all agreed? Yes. The question is that the long title be agreed to? Are we all agreed? And that is in stage 2 consideration of the bill. I thank the minister for attending and her officials. That is feedback from the justice sub-committee on policing on its meeting of 18 May 2017. Following the verbal report, there will be an opportunity for comments or questions. Can I refer members to paper 3, which is a note by the clerk? I invite Mary Fee to provide feedback. Thank you, convener. The justice sub-committee on policing met on 18 May when it held an evidence session on the governance of the Scottish Police Authority. The sub-committee heard from Andrew Flanagan, the chair, and John Foley, chief executive of the Scottish Police Authority. That was a late change to business in response to the recent serious governance concerns raised by the Public Audit and Post-legislative Scrutiny Committee. Andrew Flanagan apologised for his letter to Moi Ali and told the sub-committee that he regretted not circulating the letter from HMICS to board members. The chair and the chief executive answered questions from the sub-committee on governance issues. The next meeting of the sub-committee is scheduled for Thursday 25 May when it will consider its report on governance of the Scottish Police Authority. I am happy to answer any questions. A comment and a question—I thought that it was a very useful session, and it was, as our sub-committee said, to address concerns. I have to say that those concerns were not allayed by anything that I heard—quite the reverse. We subsequently learned that, as we were told by Mr Flanagan, that the copy of his letter had been emailed. Yes, it had been emailed but a quarter of an hour before our meeting commenced. I have to say that it is a matter of concern to me that, whilst Mr Flanagan certainly believed that he was taking an appropriate position now, it did not seem to me and subsequent information about the timing of his emailed letter to Ms Moi suggested that he had learned very much at all from it. Any other comments? I think that John Fairlie sums up what we probably got to by the end of the session. I think that what was also not entirely clear was the extent to which other board members feel able to either comment publicly or speak truth to power. While we got offered some reassurances on that, the evidence was less convincing. It was, as John Fairlie said, a very useful session, but the concerns largely remain. I echo those comments. I was left with that feeling that I was not reassured that things would greatly change, but we will wait with interest to see how that pans out. I think that everyone on the committee shared the same concerns. Andrew Flanagan appeared contrite. I did ask him the question, although he accepted that he had been wrong in some of the decisions that he had taken, but there is a difference between accepting that you are wrong and believing that you are wrong. I have to say that I came away from the session not fully confident that he believed that he had acted in a way that was inappropriate, and that there are on-going issues of governance that the sub-committee will be looking at. That concludes our 19th meeting of 2017. At our next meeting on 30 May, we will continue evidence-taking on the Domestic Abuse Scotland Bill.