 Welcome everyone to the 20th meeting of the Public Petitions Committee in 2017. Can you remind members and others in the room to switch phones and other devices to silent. If we can move first to agenda item 1, consideration of continued petitions. The first item in our agenda day is consideration of petition 1603, which is called for greater scrutiny, guidance and consultation on armed forces visits to schools in Scotland. For this item can I welcome Edward Mountain MSP who joins us for this issue. We are happy to be hearing today from representatives of the armed forces in order to understand more about the work that they do in relation to visiting schools in Scotland. I would note for anyone viewing our proceedings this morning that the witnesses for the first panel will not appear on screen. This is to reflect the wishes of the Ministry of Defence in relation to the personal safety of officers. I welcome to the meeting Brigadier Paul Buttery, Head of Training Education Skills Recruiting and Resettlement, the Ministry of Defence, Wing Commander Ian Garnett, Field Force Commander North, Royal Air Force, Commander Billy Adams, Commanding Officer, Recruiting, Field Force and Area Recruiting Officer, Scotland and Northern Ireland Royal Navy and Major Deborah Scott, SO2 Recruiting and Engagement Coordination Headquarters 51st to Infantry Brigade and Army Headquarters Scotland. I welcome you today and I ask our witnesses to make an opening statement in total of around 15 minutes or so after which members will have the opportunity to ask questions. In doing so, I would note that if there are any questions which the witnesses are not in a position to answer, members will understand that Brigadier Buttery would like to lead off. Convina, ladies and gentlemen, thank you very much. Firstly, thank you for accepting the Minister for Armed Forces offer and thus providing us the opportunity to come here and give you this presentation, which I hope will help with your consideration of the petition. As mentioned, my name is Paul Buttery and I am head of the Training Education Skills Recruiting and Resettlement branch of the Ministry of Defence. I work for chief of defence people and, therefore, I am responsible on behalf of chief of defence people for the policy framework associated with training education skills, recruitment and resettlement. It is within this policy framework that we set within the MOD that the Single Services Act. With me, as you have heard, I have Commander Billy Adams from the Royal Navy, Wing Commander Ian Garnett from the Royal Air Force and Major Deborah Scott representing the Army. Our brief will take a number of sections. Firstly, I will provide you with an overview of the policy that covers the outreach activity of the armed forces. Then my colleagues will each explain their services approach to their respective outreach activity, describing the type and volume of activity as it relates to school visits. Then I will expand the presentation to include some broader context. Finally, we are at your disposal to answer questions within our areas of responsibility. Moving on to the next section, outreach activity, which includes the visits of armed forces to schools and is the main topic of this brief, is covered in our policy and published within joint service publication 545. Each of the armed services have their own outreach teams, as represented here. The outreach teams bring the armed forces the attention of the wider community through their outreach programmes of direct to public external events and community engagement. These fall into one or more of the following categories, raising awareness, recruiting events, support to education and community-based engagement. Outreach teams only visit educational establishments following a specific invitation, and they are not to actively recruit in schools and students cannot be signed up or otherwise make a commitment to become a recruit into the armed forces during the course of any such visit. The purposes of these visits, agreed with the establishment beforehand, can range from raising awareness of the armed forces and their place within a democratic society to practical sessions aligned with the national curriculums designed to enhance teamwork, communications and STEM. By STEM, I apologise for the abbreviation science, technology, engineering and maths skills, as well as building interest in the services and, in some cases, explaining the wide range of careers available. In accordance with defence legal advice, outreach activity within educational establishments is only conducted once a letter of agreement has been exchanged with the establishment and the unit, following a risk assessment of the environment and the activities to be undertaken, only with a member of the establishment staff present and once a copy of the MOD's insurance arrangements have been exchanged with the establishment that has been visited. I think that, from a policy perspective, the three key points that I would perhaps emphasise is that armed forces outreach teams only visit schools after a specific invitation. No pupil or student is ever signed up or otherwise makes a commitment to become a recruit during a school visit. The visits range in activities, including career events, citizenship talks, raising awareness of the armed forces and their position within democratic society, educational support, including science and maths that support the national curriculums and the team building and leadership events that I have already mentioned. With your permission, I would now like to hand over the discussion to my colleagues, starting with Billy on my right. Good morning, everybody. I introduce Commander Billy Adams. I am the commanding officer for the naval service, recruiting and outreach teams. The teams in Scotland are located in Glasgow, Edinburgh, Dundee, Bresaith, Aberdein and Inverness. Our approach to school visits is very much in line with the Brigadier's brief that we do not target particular schools and we will only visit schools at the invitation of either the head teacher or the careers teacher. Covering specific areas throughout the country, the teams will offer secondary schools within the catchment area, updated publications related to career opportunities that are available in the naval service. The schools are requested to make that information available in public areas, such as libraries. We will also offer head teachers and careers teachers a range of outreach activities that we may be able to conduct in support of the school. The various activities that are offered are such as practical team building leadership tasks, STEM-related activities, interview technique sessions, tabletop problem solving exercises and the promotion of health and wellbeing that is achieved through physical training sessions and cookery demonstrations. In addition to the range of curriculum supported activities, the teams also offer bespoke presentations that will inform students of the role of the naval service, operations that members of the service are involved in currently and have been involved in and we will also offer career opportunities, information on those subjects. Members of the teams will also attend bespoke school careers fairs and again that is an invitation only. Unfortunately for us we have a limited number in our teams in Scotland and we cannot facilitate every request that we receive but we endeavour to fulfil as many as we can. Wing Commander Ian Garnett, I am the Field Force Commander North and I am responsible for the delivery of processing and outreach activities from the East Midlands, North of England, Scotland and Northern Ireland. The RAF will only ever go into a school where we are invited by the head teacher or the careers master or some such personality. The RAF categorises schools according to previous application and intake history. Therefore, if a community has no record or history of RAF involvement applications to join us, we are less likely to go to that school. We will still write and contact the school that is unoffering the activities that I will come on to the moment that we offer but if the school does not want us to attend we simply will not go there. The activities that we offer are fivefold, presentations and careers fairs, presentations raise awareness of the career opportunities within the RAF and we focus very firmly on apprenticeship opportunities that we offer. Those can be delivered as an informal discussion or a formal presentation as requested by the school. My personnel also attend schools and organised careers fairs along with other employer organisations. Personal development training primarily to develop teamwork, leadership and communication skills and allow students to assess their skills and qualities by undertaking alien tasks. This training can enhance their employability, raise self-confidence, improve communication skills and encourage teamwork. Interview skills workshops enhance the student job seeking skills by means of interview instruction, how to prepare for an interview, delivery, post-interview actions. Sessions include demonstrations and role-playing and if requested can include mock interviews and constructive feedback to the students themselves. STEM activities. Those activities help to develop hard and soft skills such as following instructions, developing a plan, teamwork, effective communication, conflict resolution and peer negotiation. They also help understanding of STEM principles. As a subjunct to that we sponsor a third party to carry out a STEM roadshow across the UK and in Scotland at the moment. Tour schools across the UK give demonstrations of science, engineering and cyber in an interactive and exciting way so as to encourage students to take up science and engineering. Presenters wear RAF branded polo shirts but are not RAF personnel. A member of the RAF is present but only to answer specific RAF questions at the end not to carry out any specific presentations or careers briefs. Finally, other activities that we do include in Operation X is an attractive learning experience that uses multimedia platforms in a humanitarian aid mission to engage students in literacy, teamwork, communications, health and wellbeing. My personnel also visits schools to discuss visits and career opportunities with the careers martyrs and careers guidance staff. I'm SO2 recruiting and engagement based at the Brigade in Stirling. As my title suggests, I'm double-hatted and responsible for the oversight of army reserve recruiting in Scotland but also I'm a fundamental part of the brigade engagement team. The army advertises the support that it can offer through various channels to schools, including the army websites, emails direct to schools but also through educational organisations such as Skills Development Scotland and Energy Skills Partnership. In addition, we are able to network at many of the educational events that we attend to inform schools about the activities that we do. Some of the schools already know about them but some of the teachers are very much more interested to find out more. The army does proactively contact schools to ensure that the information that is displayed in their careers information libraries is current and this is usually done on an annual basis. Once schools become aware of the activities available, they are able to book through a central booking service for some activity or indeed local connections with military units can be and are used. All recruiting group delivered activity is formally booked by schools through the headquarters of recruiting group in Uphaven. Other army units in Scotland only visit a school once it has been co-ordinated through the brigade headquarters in liaison with the recruiting group. That ensures that activity is de-conflicted. We have issued clear direction to our army units in Scotland who may be contacted directly by schools to ensure that they understand and follow the policy regarding engagement with schools. We have numerous relationships in existence with schools that have used our services throughout the years to support their activity. They often contact us following an initial engagement as they see the value in what we are able to deliver to their pupils and therefore want it to be repeated. At no point do we physically visit a school uninvited. It is always through an invitation and we confirm that our attendance is still appropriate with the school prior to the event if required. Indeed, reviewing whether our attendance is appropriate is an ongoing process. If a school requests our support in any form, we will try to support it if we can. We are not selective and do not look to include or exclude schools based on any set of criteria. We aim to support all schools be they independent or state sector or a special needs school and regardless of postcode area. We have a range of activities which we can deliver and can be tailored to meet the needs of the school's request subject to our resources being available. There are various types of activity that can be delivered by the army or you have heard by the other two services. Some activity is formal with a set lesson plan to deliver and have to be booked formally. The teams that deliver those activities are all disclosure Scotland and PVG cleared in the appropriate ratios and selected by the army to be part of the delivery team. Other activity is more formal and those activities are usually booked on an ad hoc basis requests from schools. In terms of the formalised activity that we do, base is the British Army Support Education and it is a range of resources and activities to support and enhance the learning experience of pupils in year S4 and above. It includes workshops on citizenship and science where pupils can design a ration pack snack. There is a forensics lesson and a maths lesson too. They are activities based on what we do in the army. As you would expect, we use our areas of expertise to design and deliver lessons to support the curriculum. For example, the maths lesson is based on planning a skiing expedition to Norway. Resilience, team building and leadership activity, known internally as the introductory personal development activity, are part of the base but, in addition, often local contacts provide them with team tasks. The army's core values and standards include courage, physical and moral, loyalty and respect for others, all of which can be encouraged in pupils through the team tasks that we deliver. The team building is often an activity that is requested time and time again as a repeat activity by the same schools. We also deliver mock interview skills, which obviously help people to prepare for the world of work. In terms of STEM, the army is continuing to support Defence's contribution to a Majesty's Government STEM agenda. Race for the Line season 3 will take place in 2017 and 2018, following two successful years already, where we ran it in conjunction with ESP in Scotland, and this year it will be with the learning partnership. The army, indeed all three services, will act as hubs for local high schools who have entered the competition, aimed at 11 to 12-year-olds, and will assist in running race events ahead of regional and national finals. In fact, the army was instrumental in bringing the bloodhound rocket car challenge competition to Scotland, financing and organising the launch event at the Scottish Science Centre and the training of college staff to deliver the workshops. This led to the formation of college hubs and the rocket car challenges and long-term improvement in the collaboration between colleges and the local schools. We have been working closely and in direct partnership with ESP for the past two years. In doing so, we have delivered, for example, big bang events and the science festivals. The army has a STEM youth engagement team. They have individuals based throughout the UK, and we have two personnel allocated to Scotland in order to support the army to support defence's commitment to increasing the take-up of STEM careers across the board, not just within the military. Operation Reflect is an army initiative commemorating the centenary of the First World War. Trained soldiers provide direct support to teach a led delivery of First World 1 lessons. With 2018 marking the centennial anniversary and the end of Opreflect, we obviously have a fundamental part to playing assisting schools in commemorating. In terms of attendance at careers fairs and careers presentations, we inform pupils of army careers opportunities through formalised internal school career fairs or externally organised fairs where a number of schools are invited to attend. Here we give advice on the bursaries and scholarships available and apprenticeships, whereby the army is the largest employer of apprenticeships in the UK and also the various career streams on offer. The careers presentations are delivered to small groups or to full-year groups on the army as a careers option. A set presentation is delivered and this is tailored to Scotland. The school will determine the audience composition and size. The army also offers a five-day work experience course, giving an insight to pupils who have indicated an interest in the army as a career. It informs pupils of the various career opportunities available and the recruitment process and is aimed at year S4 and above. Regarding careers fairs presentations and work experience, the policy is that anyone over 14 but under 16 can be given a brochure but any further contact with the army is subject to providing parental consent. Over 16s but under 18s can register an expression of interest at an event but they must then attend a careers office or apply online to progress their application, which is also subject to parental consent and process checks. In terms of the less formalised support that I have mentioned, this includes examples such as Gala Days, where we go and attend schools and we practice taking some of the personal kit and equipment that soldiers have and this helps pupils understand the army's purpose and increases awareness of us and our place in society. We also receive specific requests from schools to support their individual activity and examples of this include providing help during the schools health week where we took in the 10-man ration pack to show them how this would be used. We provided climbing walls and bouncy assault courses also. Another specific example would be Loudon Academy, whereby the police community support officer contacted us to assist in developing some team building skills for some troubled pupils that they had there, so we were working closely with the police in that instance. In the same vein, another is the army support to youth advantage outreach programme, which is in support of the violence reduction unit and this is a residential course that is aimed at teamwork and team building. That concludes the brief on army's activity with schools. If I may just finally say that the Ministry of Defence has provided a great deal of evidence in terms of where the visits have taken place, if I can just put some of that in context if that's possible, over the period of 1 April 2016 to 31 March 2017 the army made 8,635 visits to schools across the UK. 8 per cent of those, or just under 8 per cent of those, were to schools in Scotland. Based on the work that my team did, the Scottish population represents 8.2 per cent of the UK's population, so we're arguably underrepresenting our visits to Scotland by albeit a small fraction, but I hope you'll forgive us for that. I hope that that puts a little bit of context into the scale of the visits that the armed forces do across the whole of the UK and the proportion of those visits where they take place. Thank you very much. I think that we find that very helpful. Probably some of the questions we've were going to ask if you've already answered one. The question that I was going to open up with was really just to confirm that you all have to be invited into school, but I suppose it was quite interesting how you let schools know that they can invite you in there. I think Major Scots indicated how the army might do that. In terms of the Navy and the RAF, what process do you have to make schools aware that you exist in those services available? From an RAF perspective, we will contact the schools by letter in the first instance as we do across the UK. They will then come back and contact us, but an awful lot of it is repeat schools who like our products and what we offer, and then words spreads around the other schools and then they contact us as well. A lot of its words are mouth, at careers fairs, where other teachers will come and say, what do you do? They're here from other schools, but we will always write a letter annually to all the schools offering our services. In case they change their minds or whatever, but that's the only time we'll do it, so word of mouth or by letter. The specific letter goes out every year to all schools across Scotland? Across Scotland and the UK. And to the Navy? Yeah, it's very much the same. We send an annual letter out with updates on careers information and activities available, and what we do is we learn from the previous year on what activities have been popular within certain schools or if we've got new activities that we would like to offer. The range is there, but generally it is spread word of mouth, or if we have been in contact with careers teachers at specific events and they learn of what is available to them. Okay, thanks very much for that. We can move on in Angus MacDonald. Okay, thanks. Thanks, convener. Good morning to the panel. Looking at the data that we've got, and as you've touched already in your opening remarks, it seems that the purposes of the visits can be split into two broad types, curriculum-related visits and careers-related visits. Can you tell the committee whether those visit types are arranged separately, or if the armed forces might work with schools to offer a package of activities that might be delivered on a number of different dates? Could you expand on those processes and the discussions that you have to the committee? If I could start off and I'll ask the colleagues. As we said to start with, the activities are, schools are made aware of what the activities that are available, and then the armed forces teams only go and visit the schools on the invitation from the head teacher. Then it's a case of trying to programme the right visits that the school wants in the timeframe of the resources that the armed forces have, so that it is accurate to say that some schools get visited more than once in an academic year for different sorts of events. However, if you want to expand... As we said before, it's very much on what the school wants. We have a leaflet that they can have that lists all the activities that we do, and it's normally them looking at what they've got in their timetable. We find that, at certain times of year, some activity is more popular than others. The personal development activity, when you're coming up to exam periods and there's a lot of revision time, and the schools often request us to come in at exam times to come in for that. Again, the other is just in relation to what the school wants, so if they're doing a particular focus on World War 1 in history, they'll request the up-reflect. If they're requesting something that's not on our list of activity, then we'll look at whether we've got the resources and capability to do it, and if we have, then we would do it. Do you have any figures on how many schools have visited twice a year or three times a year? We do have the data, but I haven't got the actual statistics for you. I haven't calculated those numbers, but they are available. Okay, so it's possible to share that with the committee? I think that when you've got the list of... Hang on, Dave. From the work that we did last week, number of schools receiving three or more visits from the army team is 70. The number of schools visiting three or more visits from the Royal Navy is 14, and the number of schools visiting three or more visits from the RAF is 12, and the number of visits that receive... The number of schools that receive visits from two services is 98, i.e., two different services, if that makes sense, and the number of schools receiving visits from all three services is 22. That's out of a total of just over 1,000 school visits from across the three services. That's across Scotland? That's just Scotland, yes. Thanks, it's good to have you on record. You can be in here, good morning. One of the biggest concerns that I have, and lies behind this petition, is the potential targeting of schools in areas of higher economic deprivation. I know that those concerns are refuted, but the concerns do remain. I just cite some of the figures that we have, that 83 per cent of the visits were made to state schools, 50 per cent made to independent schools, and all army visits were made only to state schools, with one school being visited 31 times in an area. Can you maybe explain that? That seems extraordinary to me. Can you maybe explain what that is? Can I ask you what timeframe those figures are pulled from, please? From 2010 to 2012. The data that I've got that we've been sharing with the committee is more recent than that, and our approach to engagement activities has matured and is quite different now from about 2014. We've had a far more control, if that's the right word, in terms of how our engagement activity is monitored, who engages and what messages is what is explained and delivered to the schools. I don't think that I know now that there is no targeting of schools based on gender, on social background or on the relative level within any surrounding area of deprivation or anything like that. There is absolutely no targeting on those grounds. I'm afraid I can't comment on whether there was or not. I genuinely don't know. It might be anecdotal, but I would be surprised if there was a deliberate policy to do that. I would find that surprising. Certainly the current policy isn't that and hasn't been since about 2014. How does that square with the army only visiting state schools? Do you have a policy not to visit independent schools? I don't believe that that's accurate either, I'm afraid. There isn't a policy that says— No, I'm asking if you think there is, but that's according to— No, I know there isn't. You do visit independent schools. I'm quite concerned about the data that we have that says that you visit primary and nursery schools. I'm confused as to why you would do that. The MOD says that those visits are not career visits and yet a number of career advisers have been visiting those schools. Can you comment on that, please? Yes. Visits to any school, regardless of the age group that the school deals with, will be only at the invitation of the head teacher. The specific details of those sorts of visits. We are focusing on high schools, but in terms of nursery schools and primary schools, again, it's normally visits. Careers advisers might be double-hatted. It might be a title that says Careers Advisor, but they are also part of the outreach team. For example, I am recruiting an engagement because a lot of where we go to, we don't want to have too many people getting in touch with them, so it sits with one person to maintain control. The schools have only got one point of contact as well, so it's less confusing. I myself have been into a primary school where I've shown my respirator and my web-in. That's the sort of thing we would do. It wouldn't be a careers-based visit. It would be a, what's the army about. Do the navy and the RAF go into primary school? From an RAF perspective, my teams would never go anywhere near a primary or a junior school because I don't simply know how to have the resources. What does happen, though, is parents of children in said school will get in touch, and they'll have a, what does mummy and daddy do a day, or a careers day, and they'll just ask daddy if he wants to bring his pilot's uniform in and tell stories of flying fast jets. So it's apparent, generally, not one of my teams, because frankly, I don't have the time to cover those schools. But it'll be a generic, what does daddy and mummy do at work because we have, obviously, female fast-jet pilots. So it's what do they do at work and can you come in and show them a uniform and that kind of level of service. So it's to show and tell, not a formal or any kind of structured attempt to talk to children about careers or briefs or anything like that, did you check? Not at all. Okay, maybe? A specific example that I could give you is, we do not send any information careers or otherwise to primary schools, but a member of my team went to a primary school in Versaith last year at a request to give a presentation on a project that the school was doing on the battle of Jutland and it was preceding a battlefield tour that the school had organised and that is really the type of engagement that we would have at primary level. Just one final question. I'm still confused as to why two schools were visited 32 times. Would that be by request from the schools? According to the pie, absolutely. I can't think of a reason why that would be the case if it hadn't had been for the school. There's no way that an armed forces team would be, I can't imagine how an armed forces team would be entertained turning up to the school that many times if they hadn't been by invitation. Surely the head teacher would have invited them to leave or not bother turning up anymore. That's what I would do if they were becoming a nuisance. I'm required to declare an interest before I ask you your question. My husband was an army officer, two of my sons have served in the British army and I was an RAFERT officer. Looking at the data that we have provided, it's clear that the armed forces and schools offer delivery to a wide range of year groups. Can you explain a little bit about how you address age-appropriate content and what you do in terms of presentations when you're looking at different year groups? I'm not the designer. It comes from the army recruiting and training division that I presume have looked at their curriculum, so I can't answer. From an RAF perspective, the only thing we will start engaging with them generally from about 14 years old onwards in terms of formal careers, briefs and presentations and start doing the mock interviews and preparing them for life outside. The only thing we have a specific targeted group is our STEM roadshow, which is from the ages of about 11 to 13. It has no careers input whatsoever. It's more to encourage STEM because we are a highly technological service and we want to encourage more people to do STEM, to do engineering, to do technology, to do cyber, so that's the only predominantly targeted group. The rest is personal and eligible, but by and large it's to give them the skill sets and we don't promote it. We just merely wear uniform. We just have to wear a uniform when we're doing mock interviews, but the interview is a generic issue, so nothing specifically. I've got to start by saying that I'm disappointed that there's no naval service history in your family. We don't have any specific policy in how we would approach various age groups, but the general rule of thumb is that anybody who's not looking at leaving school and heading towards a career, presentations would be based around information only. It would be information on the naval service, operations that are being undertaken, what life is like being in the service and where we are specific. I do believe that the skills are very good though. They will invite you to give a specific presentation or activity depending on the year group and the age group and the theme of what it is that the school is trying to achieve. We collectively have three services that all work together, on many occasions, trying to deliver exactly what it is that the school wishes us to achieve. It's perhaps worth mentioning that, in the headquarters where the products are developed, civil service psychologists are employed, professional educational staff are also employed, so they will be involved in the formulation of material, but the exact process, I'm afraid, I haven't got the expertise here today to be able to answer that question for you. Can I also ask—obviously, the cadet forces played quite a big part, particularly with some of the younger early teens, 12 upwards. Can you explain to the committee how you relate or work with the cadet forces because they have quite a bit of contact into schools as well and are, in effect, promoting and recruiting into cadet units? Obviously, the CCF is embedded in the independent school sector and it is active often daily because they are part of the school system. Would you like to explain to the committee how that works in terms of advisory career and information around schools and children? Of course, the cadets is a national youth organisation and therefore separate from the armed forces as the distinct British armed forces, in that sense. It's an organisation that is a voluntary organisation with voluntary helpers. As I understand everything that the cadets do involves parental consent either to be a cadet for their children to be a cadet and for any of the activities that the cadets undertake. The cadets do get supported by the armed forces but, in the same way with schools, it is at the request of the cadets' units whereby the armed forces offer the support that has been requested. If that's the right way around. Again, none of us are actually working in the cadet space here. There is a separate element of the Ministry of Defence that covers cadets and reserve forces and it might be more appropriate that that question is dealt with by then perhaps. I wonder when looking at some of the papers and data particularly around the numbers of visits and that sort of thing whether actually on the information request that would have included cadet visits which would have had a significant impact. From an armed perspective I don't think it would because that's part of our normal business, a unit going in to support the cadets training activity. A unit is affiliated to a cadet organisation so they would be doing requests on a weekly basis and that's normal business. I can give from a career's presentation's perspective I know that the only time that we do brief the cadets is once a year at their annual camp and that's that we don't go in on a more frequent basis than that. Another significant concern is the way that the balance is addressed in any presentation or visit between the opportunities that may be offered in the armed forces as an armed forces career and the risks that might be faced by individuals who join the armed forces and I wonder if you could tell us how you think that balance is struck. I watched the careers video last night and I thought it was very balanced. Now that might be my subjective assessment of that but I suspect that anything that is watched is due to a subjective interpretation. It showed a diverse range of opportunities from human resource to combat to engineering logistics and a range of other opportunities that were there. There didn't seem to be as far as I could tell any shying away from the sorts of activities that individuals might be called to do within the armed forces but equally because it is a career opportunity to highlight those diverse and broad opportunities that individuals have within the armed forces. The presentations that are given in those careers fairs are just if you like the first presentation that would be given if somebody an individual then wanted to pursue their application through the armed forces, the process by which that individual would then go through, there are various checks and balances along the way whereby individuals are absolutely, specifically, it's brought to their attention of the risks and some of the sorts of operations that they may be deployed upon. My personal view is that it is balanced and is part of a journey and, as a potential recruit, once I've expressed an interest in joining, it's made very clear to them what the potential roles of the armed forces are, what we're here to do. As a former air cadet, I'm interested that the question here for me is where the armed forces are getting the majority of the recruits from. From your perspective, are you looking through the cadet system predominantly or through the school system to recruit? We don't recruit from schools or from the cadets. That's categorically a part of our policy. As I mentioned in my opening remarks, one of the written in GSP545, recruiting activity does not take place in schools. Likewise, the same applies to cadets as well. It absolutely is not a recruiting ground for the armed forces. In fact, the statistics for the cadets in Scotland relative to the rest of the UK is that far fewer cadets from Scottish cadet units join the armed forces than they do from other cadet units across the UK. I'm not suggesting that you're actively recruiting. I'm just wondering where you get the recruits from. The statistic is that somewhere about 16 per cent of army recruits have been a cadet in the past. Therefore, by definition, 84 per cent haven't. Those cadets that do choose to join the armed forces are a minority in that percentage terms. In terms of Scotland, it is only 10 per cent, so it is a lot less than the rest of the UK. With Northern Ireland being the largest with 22 per cent, 10 per cent of cadets will join the army from Scotland. I don't have any more specific breakdown of which geographical areas people have been recruited from or what the backgrounds were before. If 84 per cent are not coming from recruits, I'm interested to think about where they come from. If only 16 per cent of the people who are recruited into the armed forces are coming through the cadet system, where are the other 84 per cent coming from? Are there any figures around that? It's not a walk-in off the street. It's a bit where they're coming from. I haven't got that exact breakdown, but most of them are through either applying online, or they do walk into the armed forces careers offices and start their application process through that. I'm sorry that I haven't got the exact breakdown figures, but a good number of armed forces applicants now apply online and start their application through the online process, but a good number equally apply by going into an armed forces careers office and having a discussion with a careers officer in those offices. I think that's the two... For the RAF, you can only apply online. You can come in and talk to us, but you cannot apply there and then. We can't cajole anybody into doing anything. They have to have that breathing space to go away, have a think about it and apply online, which then goes through to a civilian company who will process the application in the first instance. It's handled by a civilian company who process it and you can only apply from our website. There's no other way of applying to the RAF. Part of your question there is who are the people who are coming through the door at the moment. Just to give you an example from the naval service, we do a new joiners survey and 44 per cent, I believe, of new joiners into the navy will have had a family member who has previous service in one of the armed forces. We have such a diverse range of people. We have two entry systems, one for rating entry and one for officer level. We have graduates joining his ratings and we have non-graduates joining his officers because there is such a wide range of opportunities and specialisations. For us, the age cap at the moment, which is under review, is for regular service up to the age of 37, but that is being reviewed at the moment, with the age being increased slightly. We get a lot more, as we call them, senior recruits through the door at the moment. We may have been interested in that. The average age of an airman entrance at the moment, as it stands, is age 24. The average age of an officer entrance is 28. That is coming down from what it was previously. If you like our demographic bell curve, it suggests that we are going towards the older end of the market rather than the younger end of the market. Interestingly, 33 per cent of our entry into the initial officer training at RF Cranwell are from our ranks. That is where we are gaining from. At least a third of our officers come from within our own organisation. We breed them and grow them and develop them within the service, but the average age is, say, 24 for airmen and 28 for all officers. They are coming from jobs, post-school and post-university. During your recruitment process, do you capture any information about whether young people who join the armed forces have previously participated in any of the activities that you have previously run in schools or careers presentations? Do you have any stats on that? I am not the time aware of that. We are doing on new joiners, so anybody joining the service will note where their interest was born. I have not got the exact figures, but I know that some of that will be through previous engagement with the service, whether it be at school, college or university, or another event such as Armed Forces Day. I would have thought that it was an easy thing to do when they were encouraged through the visits. On the up highs, where did you first become interested or what inspired you to join? As Billy said, it is a whole variety of reasons. The problem is from a psychological point of view, because we have done the analysis of that. It takes three contacts before someone will look at a particular job for a particular career. It may not have been the first time, but it is just the catalyst, whether it is just walking past during a coffee break because they are bored in their job or whatever. There are so many different reasons why people will come. It may just be saw the Armed Forces Day parade, saw an advert, saw a jet flying over their head when they are on holiday. There are so many variations on this. It is difficult to pin down. It was our outreach programme. It was an advert on TV or radio or whatever medium that we have used. It is a really difficult question to ask. I would like to ask you about inclusivity. As part of our consideration for the petition, we asked the Scottish Youth Parliament for their views. One comment was from an LGBT person who commented that he found the presentation stereotypical masculinity being portrayed and he found that discomforting. How can you ensure that the touring content of your visits, whether it is curriculum-based careers or whatever, are inclusive and do appeal to the diverse population? We absolutely do that. I would ask which, over what timeframe that particular presentation that data came from. Again, since 2014, our presentations and our policies have been directed to make the Armed Forces more inclusive. In fact, with the LGBT community, the Armed Forces are highly regarded by Stonewall as an inclusive employer. We are in their top 50 of employers. There is a wider perception and I am wondering how you specifically tried to dispel that. All the material that is used now is to say that I watched the video, the presentation last night, for my own satisfaction. Again, my opinion is that, as I mentioned before, it portrays a diverse workforce across a diverse range of employments. It avoids gender stereotyping. It does not specifically mention LGBT, but in terms of giving an impression of a diverse, inclusive workforce, my opinion is that the material that is used and has been used since 2014 is absolutely cognisant of wanting to portray the Armed Forces as a diverse and inclusive employer. Any other comments? I will say about the teams that we look to send the outreach teams. We try to get a cross-section of personnel from across the army, which includes females. It is not always possible, because you are after the most suitable person to go out into the outreach teams. However, we do look again to try and, you know, a female might want only to speak to a female and we try to offer that where possible. So, you know, it is something that we look to try and do. We attend pretty much every LGBT event, a Pride event across the UK. My team will always go in uniform. I have a number of LGBT, BAME, ladies. I have a whole range of people because we want to reflect our community to the community that we are inclusive. We go to great lengths to say, come and join, come and have a go. For us, it is best athlete. You pass the test, we will take you. We are an open organisation and we go to great lengths to be an open organisation. I think that that might be an old perception. Certainly, all the material that we use will be inclusive. We are very careful on language to make sure that we are. I think that one of the difficulties is showing that there is a person behind the uniform in every area of society. I completely agree with my colleagues. We are charged with working hard to attend as many of the outreach and engagement opportunities, particularly in the Pride and LGBT areas, which we are, hopefully, achieving. Can you tell us a little bit about how, if you seek feedback from both young people, parents, teachers on the presentations and activities that you actually do within schools? From our perspective, any brief that we have, we will invite the parents in. If we are briefing youngsters, we will invite parents in at all times and answer their questions. So, regularly on a standard and event or that I go to on a regular basis, the parents will come and have a chat with me and almost ask the question on behalf of their son or daughter. We should just get quite entertaining sometimes. We will always try and include them, so we will make sure that they have the material. We will answer any questions and say that we will openly invite and positively invite parents to come and ask the questions. Do we want them to be confident of what their son and daughter decisions are? Do you actually have any formal methodology for collating feedback on the people's feelings about the events or the input on how it went in order—you mentioned earlier—that you continually review what you have done. What do you do to continue to review it and decide to make changes and actually look at whether it is working? Our attendance and that it is appropriate based perhaps on the security situation at the time, I am not intimately involved in the delivery, so I would have to consult my colleagues back to check whether or not we do seek feedback. From my point of view, if they request us back, then it is positive feedback because it has obviously been a success. If they did not, then we would probably be reviewing what the activity is. Very quickly, there is a perception that when people join the armed forces, they are going out to fight. Obviously, a high percentage do not work behind the scenes in a myriad of apprenticeships. Do you have any data to explain how many youngsters who join the armed forces are doing things such as dental nursing or those kinds of jobs? I do not, off the top of my head, but that would be very easy to get hold of—the breakdown of trades. I do not know if you guys have got anything—no. Of course, the armed forces is a structured organisation and a hierarchical organisation. The manpower limits are well known. Each of the trade branches and trade groups have got a structure within them, so individuals can progress their career in terms of personal and professional manner as they progress through the various trade branches. As I alluded to when I was talking about the video that I watched last night, it explains the diverse range of opportunities, whether it is from HR to logistic accountancy through to medical, dental and combat roles. It does not show the whole range because the range is quite significant. If I take the opportunity, the armed forces provide over 40 different apprenticeship programmes, so it is generally a very diverse employment base that people can go into. Yes, Brigadier, thank you and your team for coming up. If I can just also make a declaration, I was 12 years in the army with eight years on the volunteer reserve and I have a son currently serving. I think that it is very interesting and you have highlighted, Brigadier, that the democratic society needs an armed service, not just active service. I did work in Cyprus with relief agencies and in Uganda with relief agencies. My son helped at the Olympics, helping the police and I deployed to Heathrow on various occasions to do security there. You have also said that the reason is clear for your visits to school. It is at the request of the school and no recruiting takes place. Brigadier, could you and your team maybe give us some indication of the costs of training somebody from the moment they join the services to the moment they pass out? Perhaps that would give the committee an indication of how it is important to get the right people, not just a number of people. Linking back to the previous question, if I may, because of the range of careers that individuals can start with or embark upon within the armed forces, the cost of training in individual varies, of course. The answer is, rather a slippery answer, as it depends, of course, because training a fast jet pilot because of the infrastructure, because the equipment is expensive and training a doctor is relatively expensive and engineers are relatively expensive. There are differences depending upon the trade that is required and the degree of specialisation in the overall training budget. Thank you, convener, and I would never accuse Brigadier of being slippery. However, I would say that we probably accept that the costs are considerable and varied. Therefore, I wondered if you would be able to agree with me that considering the high costs and the huge investment that the armed services put into each individual that they train, the quality of the individual in a professional service matters more than just the numbers, because I think that that is the nub of this whole petition, not just about trying to get numbers through the door, but about getting the right people with the right training. I would agree with you that getting them to the right individual with the right skills is hugely important to us with the right potential. I would say that because of the opportunities to develop both technical qualifications, whether they are educational or professional, and the individual's personal soft skills, such as teamwork, communication skills, leadership and valuable soft skills that they then return to society with, getting the right individual with the right potential to be able to train those skills in is the predominant factor that we seek. Thank you very much. When I was a generation that remembers the adverts where it was all about skiing, and at the same time people were being deployed to some quite difficult circumstances, it was in conclusion really to me that what drives the petition is the sense that poverty is the greatest recruiting sergeant to the armed forces, and that people do not get told about the reality. I have heard quite a lot of evidence that would argue against that. I wonder what your response is to that very strongly held view that people end up in the armed forces because of the limited choices and therefore the armed forces take advantage of that and that we are not honest about what they might face. In answering that, I wonder if you talked about pre-2014, was there something about that period where there was a reflection on how the armed forces were recruiting that meant that there was a change in policy or is this something that has developed over time? Well, I think that now we would say that our recruiting process is honest and open and transparent. As I have already alluded to, the realities of joining the armed forces are made very clear to a potential applicant once they have made an expression of interest. They are shown subsequent presentations that do not hide and shy away from what we might ultimately be required to do on behalf of the nation. That is not something that is tried to be glossed over or to be glamourised or understated in any way whatsoever. We are a professional armed force and therefore the nation would rely upon us to do what is needed when it is needed. However, as you mentioned, there are still opportunities out there for individuals that are on-going, that include skiing and to enjoy playing sport and to live a healthy lifestyle. That is part of being in the armed forces, but ultimately the sacrifice that individuals might have to make. We do not shy away from telling individuals that at all. The programme that we are now using, if you like, the approach that we have to our engagement I think has just become more professional as the armed forces have evolved and we have now a more professional approach to our engagement activities. As I have said since 2014, we have a methodology whereby we track the activity, we record the activity, we use geomapping to help us with that process. As technology has evolved, we have embraced the technology to help us with that. I think that our approach has evolved to become a more professional co-ordinated approach to better reflect the society that we are trying to engage with. My final point is that, given the suggestion that the biggest determinant was what your family involvement with the forces would be, is that true of the army as well? I do not have the figures, but no, as we referred to before and alluded to, it is the quality of the individual. I have got no previous military background, none of my family were, but if an individual wants to join, an individual would want to join. I was meaning more what created the interest rather than the act of seeking people out for the need in the area if it was. I have got the stats for that, I could not be able to tell you. Is it correct to say at the moment that the worst recruited regiment in the army is the Royal Regiment of Scotland, and prior to the amalgamation of the Scottish regiments, they were the best recruited regiments. There is something about allegiance and the sort of pals regiments that used to encourage youngsters, and that could be one of the things that is impacted in the change of recruitment within Scotland. I cannot deny or confirm that hypothesis. I do not have that particular detail in terms of which regiment within the British army is recruited to a greater or lesser extent than others, but I would agree with your hypothesis about the community feeling and the sense of belonging that individuals have when they join a unit. That is part of what we do, the teamwork piece. Our organisation relies strongly on cohesive teams working together, so that those soft skills that individuals develop within those teams bind the men and women together, so that they can do what—that is part of why the skiing, the sport—we call it adventurous training, it sounds—Glamorous just called it skiing, because it is not just skiing in that sense. The adventurous element of the sporting opportunities are all designed to develop leadership, to develop team cohesion, to develop individual courage. Whatever mechanism enables that, if the regimental system supports that in a way that people belong to the small teams that they join, they make friends for life. I suspect that I agree with your hypothesis, but I do not have the evidence to say whether it is a fact or not. We have come to my conclusion in terms of our questions. It is now a matter for us to decide what our next steps are in relation to the petition. I wonder if members have any comments or suggestions as to what those next steps should be? I think that there is a lot of comprehension in every session there. I think that it would be a good idea to allow the petitioner to reflect and maybe come back to us on there. We are feeling as history evidence is giving today. I would like to ask for a geographical breakdown from local authorities to name the schools that have been visited in their area, so that we can get a better picture of where the visits are taking place. I do not know whether that would be done through COSLA. Can we establish whether that is something that we are able to do in relation to data? I suppose that the question is whether the forces do not come in until they are invited. Are there some schools that are more likely to invite than others? That would be interesting to know. We have heard the evidence that some, for example, for the RAF, it is like whether there is an interest already, then people are more likely to be involved. We know that there are communities in Scotland that are connected to ARMU, particularly enforcing the way that others are, but that would be useful information if we can get it. I think that that would be interesting to know. Can we not just follow on from Ronas's point? Not just the number of schools that have been visited, but how many schools have been visited or which schools were visited two, three or four times? Although I suppose that the petition is about whether we are moving into an area that we are looking at the policy of schools in relation to engagement with the ARM forces, and whether there is an interest and it has been successful in terms of the curriculum, the logic of that is that you can see why they would then be inviting them back in. Again, that would also be true of other groups, whether it is theatre groups or whatever it tends to be. If you get an interest, if you get somebody a contact, the school then goes back to them. If we are going to look at the schools that have been visited by the ARM forces, it would be maybe pertinent to overlay that with ARM force communities? Yes. Convener, albeit that I have declared an interest in this and I have been actively involved in the past with going into schools, particularly with the cadet forces, and in direct conjunction with careers advisers in the area. I have to say that I do not see the point in pursuing this position. I have always found the engagement with schools to be extremely professional. It is not there to persuade youngsters to join the ARM forces under I suppose being mis persuaded that it is something that it is not. I have always found it to be very honest and balanced in the approach. I know a lot of youngsters who have decided to go into the ARM forces and it certainly has not been as a result of visits to schools. I think that the reality is that a lot of the work that is done in schools is very much about building confidence and it is about encouraging and improving children's engagement with their own abilities. I think that we are in danger here of going down routes that are not what this is really about. I think that what we want to establish, what people sense to be the case, is in fact the case in relation to the data and what the community clerk is saying, is that we have got the data and we can analyse that in terms of schools and so on. And to give confidence to the petitioners that, precisely, he described it, is actually what is happening in terms of people's. I mean, I think that our colleagues who have come along today have sought to give that a reassurance and I think that it would be useful to get the petitioners' response to that. So it's not to prejudge it but it's to test the sense of what's happening against actually what the facts are and I think that today's session has been really useful in that regard. Might it be useful therefore for us to look further at this petition once we've had the response from the petitioners, if that's agreed? In that case, can I thank our witnesses very much for their attendance today? I think that that's been useful. It has been a longer session than we would normally have but there has been a lot of interest in it from the petitioners but also we wanted to afford you the opportunity to respond to the questions of the committee. So can I thank you very much and I'll suspend till we change over for our next set of witnesses. I'll call meeting back to order and we now move to agenda item 2, consideration of a new petition. We have one new petition for consideration this morning, petition 1668, by Ann Glenney on improving literary standards in schools through research-informed reading instruction. Two written submissions in support of the petition are included with our meeting papers from Dr Marlon Grant and Dr Sarah McGowan. I welcome Ann Glenney to the meeting along with Dr McGowan, senior lecturer in development psychology from the University of Edinburgh and Gordon Askew MBE from the International Foundation for Effective Reading Instruction. You have an opportunity to make a brief opening statement of up to five minutes and after that the committee will ask a few questions to help inform our consideration of the petition. I'm very grateful for the opportunity to present evidence to the committee. I would especially like to thank Gordon Askew and Dr Sarah McGowan for giving evidence alongside me today. We have chosen to share the five minutes for our opening statements. I'm concerned about Scotland's decline in literacy standards. Through no fault of their own, teachers in Scotland lack the necessary deep subject knowledge required to teach reading effectively. This assertion is not new, it was highlighted in the 2014 review of the Scottish Government literacy hub approach. Despite being supported by research and being recommended specifically in the Scottish Government's literacy action plan from October 2010, synthetic phonics is not supported by current curriculum for excellence documentation nor is it covered adequately in initial teacher education. Reading research has moved on, but Scotland has not. We are around 12 years behind other countries on this. We cannot afford to wait any longer. This petition is about ensuring that teachers and teacher training institutions have access to and use research and foreign reading instruction to ensure that all children in Scotland can achieve their potential in reading. It is not about removing teacher autonomy and it is not about implementing a prescriptive approach to the teaching of reading. It is about empowering teachers by ensuring that all teachers have access to the most up-to-date research on children's reading instruction and allowing them to make decisions about how best to apply this, based on the specific students that they teach. I believe that synthetic phonics has the potential to achieve the Scottish Government's vision of narrowing the poverty-related attainment gap in reading. Children from disadvantaged backgrounds typically start school with weaker vocabularies than children from more affluent backgrounds. My research has shown that when children are taught by an eclectic approach to read, that is a taught a variety of strategies to read new words, such as whole-word recognition or use of context, then their language skills predict how well they are learned to read. However, when children are taught by a synthetic phonics approach, vocabulary skills do not predict whether reading success. If you are committed to narrowing the poverty-related attainment gap in reading, surely it makes sense to educate teachers in a method of instruction that is not dependent on good vocabulary for success. Finally, I know of no research evidence to suggest that synthetic phonics undermines the love of reading. I believe that we are all passionate about ensuring that young children have a joy and interest in books, words and stories from a young age. What we know is that synthetic phonics needs to be positioned within a curriculum which develops broader oral language skills and the love of reading too. Synthetic phonics allows children to become independent readers earlier on, and we know that more skilled readers and independent readers go on to have more positive attitudes towards reading and are more confident and motivated readers. Good morning. It is good to be with you. Although I am the advisor to the DFE in England, I assure you that I am not here because I think that you ought to do what England does. I am here as an individual to share my experience of what I know works with children reading the English language wherever they live. One of the really remarkable things about reading over the past 50 or 60 years is that a lot of children learn to read and pick up reading almost however they are taught. However—and it is a very big however—there have always been a very significant number of children who do not pick up reading. Since we have had decent information, that has varied from 20 per cent up to about 40 per cent, but it has never really dropped below about 20 per cent regardless of however much attention has been given to reading. Very, very importantly, that 20 per cent always includes some of the most disadvantaged children in our society. This applies at the moment to a lot of schools in England. I know from my international work that it applies to a lot of English-speaking countries right across the world. However, we now have a very significant number of schools teaching synthetic phonics alongside comprehension, where year on year, very high numbers of children—almost all children—high 90 per cent are turning out as effective readers. Those are not leafy suburb schools. In fact, quite the reverse in most cases is that they cover a whole range of schools including a lot of schools in disadvantaged challenging areas. Those 20 per cent, which have for so long been failed by the system, are now learning to read alongside all the other children. This is not theory. It's not what I believe. It's what I know. I have been to a lot of these schools myself, and if you didn't believe me, I could take you along to look for yourself. These schools don't follow a single prescription. They don't all use the same programme or they don't all use the same materials or books, but they do share an understanding that children read most effectively by decoding unknown words rather than guessing at them. When I say reading effectively, these children read with full comprehension and are developing real enthusiasm for books. It's a totally unmerited slur to say that these schools' teaching of reading is arid and mechanistic. They teach comprehension and vocabulary just as strongly as they do phonics. They have teachers who really share enthusiasm and love for wonderful books and reading. You could, by making sure that teachers have access to the right sort of information and training, be encouraging and supporting a system that would ensure that almost all children in Scotland learn to read, regardless of their background. Thank you very much for that. That's a helpful introduction. Can I maybe open up by saying in your petition that you indicated that you were written to the Scottish Government Education Scotland, Times Education, Supplement Scotland and the General Teaching Council for Scotland? Can I ask whether you have received any responses from any of those organisations and, if so, what sort of feedback do you receive? Yes, I have received responses. I can give you a flavour of them here. Generally, it's been to say thank you very much, but no thank you. We won't be pursuing it any further. I have a lot of papers here. This is from Geoff Maguire, Senior Policy Officer. Our understanding is that almost all Scottish primary schools use some form of synthetic phonics and that this approach is combined with other strategies in the context of active literacy learning. Schools have a responsibility to respond to the needs of their own pupils. For me, it's a misunderstanding of what I'm trying to achieve here. Yes, most schools in Scotland do use some form of phonics, but they're also using those other strategies alongside, such as multi-queuing, which amounts to word guessing. They're also using sight words. They're also using repetitive, predictable reading books, which it looks as if children can be in primary on in primary 2 reading well when they're reading these repetitive books, but effectively what has happened is that they are simply memorising the words. So what can happen in schools is that in primary 3 or primary 4, once we come away from those repetitive texts, children's skills then break down because they don't have enough solid phonics knowledge to attack any new word they come across. I've also had a reply from John Swinney. This was very recently, this was the 9th of August 2017, where he states that he's not convinced that it would be helpful to prescribe one particular approach to teaching reading. It would also contradict the philosophy of curriculum for excellence, which empowers teachers to choose the methods best suited to the needs of each child. Again, I feel that this shows a misunderstanding. I'm not asking for synthetic phonics to be mandated, to be statutory, as it is in England. I'm simply asking that our teachers are given the access to and are informed about the most current international research when it comes to reading. I also have a problem with the idea that it contradicts the philosophy of curriculum for excellence and I wonder whether we should be prioritising the philosophy of a curriculum, which in my eyes has yet to deliver the goods, so to speak, whether we should put that or teachers' right to choose from a flawed range of strategies. For me, it's more important that children get the correct research informed reading instruction and that that shouldn't be left to chance. Thank you very much for that, Michelle Bannartine. You stated that other countries are getting better faster than Scotland, particularly in terms of beginning reading instructions. Why do you think that that is the case? Well, as of 2014 in England, systematic synthetic phonics has been mandated as the sole method for reading instruction. Also in Australia at the moment they are trialling the phonics screening check, which originated in England. I feel that lots of countries have been for a long time taking note of the research, which ironically began in Scotland with the Clackmannanser research. Other countries seem to be learning lessons from our research, whereas we have chosen to do nothing and we have chosen to leave it up to teachers, but we have been doing that for the past 12 years. Without having all the information that they need, teachers cannot. That is through no thought of them. They cannot make an informed decision because they are not in possession of all the facts or of all the research. I am very concerned that, in terms of our professionalism, our pedagogy, we are actually falling behind other countries. Can I just pick up something that Anne said? I do not think that, when I am absolutely sure, that synthetic phonics is not a method of teaching reading. It is something that children need to know in order to be able to do it. There are lots of methods that you can use to learn it. It is like saying that children need to count in mathematics. Of course, they need to learn to count to be able to do it well. There are lots and lots of ways of teaching them how to count. That is not a method. Synthetic phonics is the same as learning to count. It is a basic skill that they need that we know when they have it and enables them to read well as long as it is with all of the other things. However, it is not a restrictive method. Schools can use lots of methods to teach it. It is content, not method. Would it be correct to say that synthetic phonics is not a new idea? I seem to remember that that is how I learned to read rather a long time ago. There is, if you like, an old way of teaching phonics, which has been around quite a long time. The thinking on synthetic phonics has now moved forward considerably from that. It is a much more complete, rounded system than the one that was used. It has something in common with that, but what we now mean, which is why training is so important, is that the understanding now of synthetic phonics has moved forward considerably. I am clearly closing the attainment gap very much on the radars of every single political party in this Parliament. However, you state that there is now ample, secure and compelling evidence that shows that children are taught to read, write and spell using a systematic synthetic phonics approach. The attainment gap and the gender gap can be closed. Could you expand on that a bit further, please? If you can imagine that there are a number of different ways in which you can teach children to read, one of the ways is by encouraging children to use context in order to decipher an unfamiliar word. A child sees a sentence and there is a word that they do not understand and that they cannot read, so they use the context to work that out. A child needs to have good language skills and good vocabulary skills in order to do this effectively, and it is children from disadvantaged backgrounds who typically have the weak vocabulary skills who cannot do that. Another approach to teaching children to read words is through sight word recognition, where you show them a whole word and you ask them to commit that word to memory and remember what that word is. For lots of children from disadvantaged backgrounds, when they start school, they know almost no letter signs whatsoever, so the way in which they remember these words is through visual cues, so they might remember, for example, in one school that I went into, children were being taught the words biff, chip and floppy, and children remembered the word floppy because it was printed on the largest card or they remembered the word biff because I had the two, the last two letters with the same shape. So these are just abstract meaningless symbols to students, whereas students from more affluent backgrounds, if they are starting school with the knowledge of letter sounds, they might see the word biff, chip and floppy and they may be making the connections between letter sounds and using that approach. So you've got use of context, you've got whole word recognition and then you've got phonics. Now what phonics does is it redresses these kind of inequalities in knowledge when children start school because right from the beginning of instruction, you're teaching children about the relationship between letters and sounds and you're asking them to apply that. So for example, the first three letter sounds that they might be taught are at and then they may be shown the words such as ant or at or tan and then they're shown another letter sound like eh and then they learn to read the words pin in it etc etc but what you're creating here is a situation where children from the more disadvantaged backgrounds are getting this critical letter sound knowledge right at the beginning and you're not teaching children to read by methods which is dependent on vocabulary for good word reading success and this is the way I think in which you would be able to close the poverty rate attainment gap in word reading and but obviously phonics needs to be placed within a curriculum where you're also developing children's oral language skills in more practical terms I could take you to hundreds not thousands but hundreds of schools where that actually is happening and it's children with free school meals children with English as an additional language white working class boys children from very difficult estates they have no gap between those children and any other in terms of learning to read I'd like to just give you an example of some school stats from England to show you how that contrast compares with what we have in Scotland so for example in East London we have Ilmhurst Primary School 52% of their pupils are disadvantaged 96% of their intake have English as a second language but despite the background despite the circumstances of their children they're achieving 94% of their children gaining equivalent of our second level at the end of primary 7 in reading compare that to our current our latest figure from teacher judgments was 72% also st George's primary school again in east London 71% of their pupils are disadvantaged 50% have English as a second language but again 96% of their pupils despite background despite circumstances are managing to achieve reading at a level that will allow them to flourish and access their secondary school curriculum I know both of those schools a good number of those 6% or whatever who don't read by the end are children who've actually come to that school partway through the school okay thanks put like that it's it's quite a compelling case thank you Brian thank you convener I'm interested in the list of benefits you believe would be achieved through the actions that you're calling for and I'm particularly interested in this idea that you would be able to reduce the number of children being identified as dyslexic I wonder if you could expand on that going back to Ilmhurst primary school I actually have a quote from the head teacher there who states that since 2014 and the introduction of a synthetic phonics program they've actually managed to eradicate dyslexia so what's sort of happening in some of these schools is that identifying fewer and fewer children with dyslexia however in my current experience as I travel across scotland and work with schools and teachers we appear to be identifying more and more children with dyslexia and what you will find is that the intervention approaches that absolutely work if someone is being identified as dyslexic are actually based on systematics and thetophonics so it's taking that teaching that works where children are struggling and applying that if you like to everybody so it's harmful to no one in a class but beneficial for everyone I mean there is a neurological condition that's best called dyslexia that I think applies to about one or two percent of the population nowhere near the 20 percent or so who are labelled as dyslexic at the moment a lot of those children could be taught to read if they were taught to read properly because is that opinion no no that's fact so you know that the schools that would the schools that we're talking about as Ann said have very few dyslexic children because they read they they all read the fact that you stated there that the actual numbers of dyslexia between one and two percent as opposed to the 20 percent and I wonder well is that an evidence based it is evidence based yes though those are the ones who you you can demonstrate clinically have some sort of neurological developmental condition most of the others the only real diagnosis for them being dyslexic is that they can't read I'd be interested to see that data that they may I we yes I haven't got it with me but we could find we could find you someday don't expect yeah yes yes but you remember it is a controversial area so people's definition of it to do does change you also believe that it would be allow us to aim for a hundred percent of children reading in scotland and can that kind of suggest that that's not the current aim is that am I correct in my understanding of that I mean can I just say I suppose from a research perspective I believe that synthetic phonics has the potential to improve the literacy skills of children in Scotland but what we do know is that even with children with the kind of most severest reading difficulties when they're giving an intervention which aligns with best practice about 10 to 25 percent of those children still don't respond to those and they have very difficult difficulties which we are not able to kind of remediate I suppose so synthetic phonics is not a cure for all literacy but it is a way of ensuring that all children achieve better literacy skills and will particularly benefit children from disadvantaged communities but you cannot promise a hundred percent three percent is too high there will always be a few children who for good reasons struggle but I think high 90 percent is totally achievable I'd just like to clarify that I did say aim for a hundred and I do think we should be aiming for 100 percent of our children reading in Scotland and to paraphrase you Gordon we should expect to get very close it will only be in these two to three percent of cases where there are real and severe difficulties that we will be unable to achieve that to sort of go back to your question are we not already aiming for this and this is not current but it will give you an illustration of what I'm talking about as part of the the raising attainment for all sort of meetings that have been taking place and conferences and so on this was when Angela Constance was education secretary teachers and schools were signing on the wall signing up to a commitment they were signing up to stretch aims and one of the stretch aims was that we would achieve 85 percent of our children achieving second level in literacy before leaving primary school and my immediate reaction to that was well what about the 15 percent I thought this was called raising attainment for all and if we're serious about raising attainment for all then we need to be aiming for 100 percent literacy for all of our children if you know teaching is being done effectively then it is easier to identify those few children who have real problems thank you okay thank you good morning this is happening in england and you've said you don't want it to be mandatory here I'm just interested to know what the your perception of the national guidance and training for teachers and support and resources would be here and what what do the what information do you believe teachers don't have here already you know to carry this out I think it's quite difficult I think the current documentation that we have in Scotland provides a very mixed picture it's very difficult to find real and concrete information now whether you're looking at the ease of those the experiences and outcomes the actual curriculum whether you're looking at the building the curriculum documents that go along with curriculum for excellence whether you're looking at the polar resource which is the primary one learning assessment and action resource these all present actually very contradictory things when it comes to reading so although it might appear that at the moment curriculum for excellence isn't prescribing any particular method actually when you look at the experiences and outcomes because they mention site vocabulary they mention context clues and polar for example mentions letter names these are all things that are part of a whole language approach which is the opposite of what synthetic phonics is so even though we think we're not prescribing anything actually by including all of these things we are even within the documents themselves it can be confusing this is from the literature English principles and practice paper teachers will balance play based learning with more systematic development and learning of skills and techniques for reading including phonics but then we have this from building the curriculum to active learning in the early years there is no long-term advantage to children when there is an over emphasis on systematic teaching before six or seven years of age so the actual documentation there is not helpful for teachers despite the you know the size and scope of the curriculum for excellence documentation which if you're familiar with the green glossy folder which is enormous it weighs six and a half pounds there's only a couple of lines on actual reading instruction there and I explore sounds letters and words discovering how they work together and I can use my knowledge of site vocabulary phonics context clues punctuation and grammar to read with understanding and expression I am learning to select a new strategies and resources before I read and as I read to help make the meaning of texts clear and that that really is your lot despite reference to strategies six times in the document doesn't outline what those strategies are but in many cases these are being interpreted as multi-cuing strategies so to give you an example you've always so sorry can I just stop I wonder if you could just answer specifically specifically do you think teachers are informed enough about this would they need special training teachers do need special training in the course of my day-to-day work I regularly speak to audiences of teachers over the last three years I've started now asking every audience for a show of hands please put your hand up if when you were did your teacher training you were taught um how to teach reading um my most recent example of this with a big audience 72 teachers in Scotland um I had three hands up and one of those teachers trained in South Africa um one trained at Murray House um I thought um I had slept in the day the teaching reading was covered I thought this was a personal problem for myself something that I had missed something that I lacked but through my research they're speaking to teachers I've discovered that we all have lacked access to this information when I said that these levels of attainment were possible I very very genuinely mean that I never said it was easy it has been a real uphill struggle in England partly because there is such an extensive need for training and that often includes the people who are providing the training at the moment which makes life very difficult and also there is 30 years of real ingrained prejudice and conservative thinking amongst teachers and teacher trainers that you know have this anti phonics attitude that it is not to do with comprehension that it is not to do with enjoyment of books and that has been very very hard to deal with and get passed that's that was one of the points I was going to raise teachers often complain that you know they're subjected to too much change and curriculums and teaching methods this would be another change presumably well and would you accept that resources are very stretched at the moment for to allow the training of teachers to do this yes but we're talking about a change from 20% of children not being able to read to almost all children being able to read I do not some changes just have to happen I know it's not popular with teachers I know they don't like it but you know we are failing thousands and thousands of children who could be given that gift of reading which opens the door to so many other things educationally and in life and opportunities and everything it is a price my opinion is that it's a price that has to be paid yes thank you in your position you suggest that by having national guidance to follow teachers will be able to adapt their classroom practice accordingly how would you address any of the potential concerns that having guidance to adhere to would restrict teachers professional autonomy so I mean in terms of how synthetic phonics programmes we deliver there are a number of different ways in which they can be delivered for example they vary in the number of letter cell mappings which are taught in the speed and pace of delivery in the reading materials that accompany them and in many other ways as well so it's about understanding synthetic phonics and then understanding the specific students that you're teaching what their needs are and then adjusting the pace of your delivery the number of letter cell mappings that you teach based on the knowledge of your students so it's about sort of I guess educating teachers on the topic so that they do feel confident to be able to adjust it to their classes it's a matter of I don't think in being honest with you now I don't think in position as such has worked in England those teachers that are doing it have been persuaded and shown all the evidence and on why it works so well and I don't know any teachers who are doing it but remember I think it's content you're asking teachers to look at specific content not at a particular method of delivery so it's not it is what they're teaching not how they're teaching it so that's important yeah it's interesting you you raise that you know you have to show them and they have to engage with it is your experience that once you've shown a teacher or our teacher has come with that knowledge that their engagement is then high and that they they then find synthetic phonics the the the primary way that they would choose to teach I know of no teachers who are doing it well who would want to do it any other way because they can see that their children can can read and can read with understanding and are enthusiastic and love books and so this is this is about outcomes ultimately but it's also about finding a way of getting people to understand their winning hearts and minds and then you know the evidence is there but yes it's really hard work to get them to look at it really hard how long does it take to train a teacher in synthetic phonics can we do that again yeah yeah I mean I I offer professional learning sessions which last for five hours and at the end teachers feel confident I think that they understand it enough to be able to deliver to the serve that bigger challenge really it's not that no two days would be good I think a day is is possible but it's pushing a day with follow-up might be possible two days a few hours no and then it's professional practice yeah can I thank you very much for that I think that has been really interesting one thing I would see my recollection is pre-2011 the Labour Party had a commission on literacy it was head up by Rona Branquin at that time and it talked about synthetics, synthetic phonics and it was accepted by the Scottish Government at that time it might rustle was the education minister so this is something that there has been a conversation on equal asset in education committee and we had an evidence session with a group of people who are an initial teacher education and they were concerned about the level of support they got in learning how to literacy and numeracy it was a very much a concern so I think it's something that people are alive to as an issue and I think people found that your presentation very very interesting I think I wonder what we think we should do in terms of taking this forward and just follow on from your comment there about the work Rona Branquin's team did I think it's worth pointing out that in 2010 Mike Russell the Cabinet Secretary for Education at the time said I agree that synthetic phonics has had considerable success so that begs the question if it was considerative considerable success way back in 2010 then why has it not moved forward and become more commonplace so I think the petitioners have made a very compelling case for synthetic phonics particularly with regard to the evidence of children from disadvantaged backgrounds particularly benefiting so I think we need to go back to the Scottish Government and ask what their current view is and also seek the opinion of the EIS and the GTC in Scotland. I think the other unions as well as the EIS, the SST and the NES, UWT and other unions would be useful Brian. Just to follow on from Angus there is that if we're going to write to the Scottish Government I think we've had a sort of generic response if you like the petitioners already indicated that they had a response from the cabinet secretary if we're going to ask that question perhaps we could ask that question in reference to comments from 2010 and also including the letter the evidence today that there's a particular benefit to children from disadvantaged backgrounds. Could we also ask for the evidence against using and embedding synthetic phonics because it seems to suggest as a resistance from the cabinet secretary and I'd like to know why what that's based on. In the context of professional responsibility and understanding it's not completely random you can just do whatever you like and I don't think any teacher would argue that that's what autonomy means but it defuses if that letter suggests that but that's something that we can obviously explore with. There's also an issue and it was briefly highlighted or mentioned by the petitioners that if those who are delivering teacher training don't know how to do it they can't teach it and therefore some resistance might come from that as well so I think we should explore that with the cabinet secretary as well. Could I very respectfully make one suggestion it might not be your way forward it might be into the future. I think dissemination of good practice is one of the most effective ways rather than imposing it on people you know identify people who are already doing it well and get them to share their practice with other schools so that it's school to school rather than top down. Of it is about confidence I'm very struck about the evidence that we now have a strategy for teaching children to learn reading which enhances the opportunities for those who already are advantaged because they've got those skills because they've been you know and so a mechanistic approach which then affords the opportunity to then learn from the other stuff you can see in terms I just find that very compelling that we've actually got strategies that are based on successes that are already there and not on understanding the disadvantage that some young people might have. I don't know whether there are other educationists and can you think of Scotland particularly around the colleges and the university that they are doing initial teacher education whether they have a view on this maybe something else that we could explore anything else no in that case can I thank you very much for your attendance today I think that was certainly very interesting and it will be useful to explore why something appears logical is perhaps you know there are people that have some concerns about it and I think that's how we would want to take it forward but can I thank you very much for your attendance today and we'll suspend until we allow the witnesses to move. The third item on today's agenda is the further consideration of continuing petitions. I would say just to alert this to the committee in my senses that we will not be able to get through the very substantial number of petitions that are here by 2012 and I would rather that we took time to do them properly rather than rattle through them quickly. I think that each petition needs a bit of time in its own merit so if we don't manage to deal with them all then obviously we will deal with them at our next meeting. Members may wish to note that I intend to deviate slightly from the order of petitions listed on the agenda and take petition 1591 last. This is to provide an opportunity for Kate Forbes to attend to the discussion of this petition in which she is taking an interest and Kate also has to attend the standards procedures and public appointments committee which is meeting this morning but is to be hoped that she will be able to join us later if indeed we manage to get to that petition at all. The first two petitions for consideration are petition 1480 on Alzheimer's and dementia awareness and petition 1533 on the abolition of non-residential social care charges for older and disabled people, which we have previously joined together for consideration. At the last consideration of these petitions in May, members agreed to write to the Scottish Government for details of a feasibility study relating to extending free personal care to people under the age of 65. The committee also asked the Scottish Government to meet with both petitioners to discuss their views on the study. The Scottish Government responses in relation to the two petitions are provided in our meeting papers. The petitioner for petition 1480, Amanda Cappell, highlighted in her written submission to the committee the value of considering both petitions together. She recognised that at the time of writing her submission, work had begun to explore the extension of free personal care to under 65s. However, that would not address other services that people with dementia and other long-term conditions rely on such as day services. In September, the Scottish Government's programme for government for 2017-18 was published and it outlines plans to implement Frank's law, which will provide free personal care to those under 65 who need it. Members will note that the Government provided a further update earlier this week, with the link to the feasibility study being provided, along with information about the planned implementation of free personal care for under 65s. I wonder if members have any thoughts or suggestions for further action on those petitions. I am certainly pleased that the Scottish Government has engaged and met with Amanda Cappell on a number of occasions. Of course, I am delighted that the Scottish Government's programme for government has included a commitment to implement Frank's law. Clearly, between the work of the petitioner and the media interest that has recently been seen in the issue, it has secured an end result that is welcome by everyone. However, there is still the issue of extending to other services such as day services that do not currently come under the definition of free personal care. There are still aspects of the petition that need to be pursued. There was a feasibility study being done by the Government on that issue, which I think was due to be completed by summer this year. I do not think that we know the outcome of that. I think that we should write to the Government and ask them what the outcome is to update us. I think that we have a link to that. I suppose that the other question that the other petitioner is concerned about is that there has been significant progress and we should commend the petitioners on the progress that has been made and the Government on responding to that. There are issues around conditions that are not dementia and there is an anxiety around what that means for other people who rely on these services. I mean that the whole Scrap the Care Tax campaign is predicated on the idea that it relates to the issue of human rights. The people have been denied the opportunity to achieve their potential because they cannot access services. I wonder whether that is something that we can raise with them. What is their intention beyond dementia but to other conditions that have that kind of impact in people's lives? I think that we should go back. As Angus has said, we should commend the Government on the decision to support Frank's law, but we should probe that question further. There are a number of conditions other than Alzheimer's that find themselves in the same place. I would like to know what the thoughts are around that. It is my understanding that it will extend beyond to dementia, but to what extent? I am not sure. I am just going to ask the question. That is agree. We will go back to the Scottish Government to get a clarification of what the plans are beyond the feasibility study in relation to taking that forward. We recognise that there has been progress in that regard. If we can then move on to petition 1551 on mandatory reporting of child abuse, the next continued petition for consideration is by Scott Paterson on mandatory reporting of child abuse. At our previous consideration of the petition in June, we considered the Scottish Government's position for not consulting on mandatory reporting. Members will recall that the Government's position was that, while it would be entirely within the Parliament's competence to take its own approach on that issue, it would be, in their words, prudent to await the outcome of the UK Government's consultation. The committee considered that the submissions that have been received from children's organisations in relation to the petition demonstrate that there are people in organisations who want to engage in a discussion on that issue. We agreed that any discussion should be in the context of the child protection system in Scotland and invite the Scottish Government to provide a response to those points. Once that had reflected in the committee's consideration, an update had not been provided by the time that our papers for this meeting were issued. However, an update was provided on Tuesday of this week and has been circulated to members. In that response, the Scottish Government acknowledges that the context around matters of child protection in Scotland differs in a number of ways to that in England and Wales and recognises that any analysis of responses to the UK Government's consultation would require to be considered within a Scottish context. The submission indicates that the UK Government officials have confirmed with Scottish Government officials that responses to the UK Government consultation are currently being reviewed with no indication of when the findings will be published. The Scottish Government indicates that the quote has had informal engagement with key stakeholders on the matter of mandatory reporting, which expects to continue. It indicates that it will provide the committee with an update on any outcomes from this informal engagement in February 2018. I wonder if members have any comments or suggestions for further action. I am not sure whether we can do anything until we get that feedback. Obviously, we have no idea when the UK Government is going to report, but I certainly think that we need to wait until we have got the feedback from the Scottish Government on their informal engagements. I am not sure whether I would go in the name to invoke with it. It would be sensible to write to the minister for childcare in early years to ask her to request the information from the UK Government about the timeframe to give us a steer. I am still at a loss why it has got nothing to do with that. I do not know if I do get it because I think that they have accepted that there is a different regime in Scotland. Indeed, so many of the things that are in the landscape around child protection are quite different. Although a lot of the issues around child abuse and the report on child abuse are no respecter of boundaries and borders or class or anything else, I do understand that. I am sure that it will just be for information to see what direction it is going in. That is the issue of mandatory reporting and what with the implications on people of imposing mandatory reporting. If somebody is doing a proper study, it is useful to see what they find. Ultimately, it will not mean that there is a natural fit. A wee bit of progress has been made in the sense that they have the inform on engagement. The same thing has been reported back in February and we could reflect on it further once we have done that. We indicate to them that we are very keen that that is done. We do feel that there has been perhaps delay for understandable reasons, but it is not really grappling with the issues that the petition has identified. Although I have a very empathy with the petition on this, I do not think that this is something that you could rush either because it could have huge implications. I think that it needs to be looked at quite carefully. We are agreeing to get an update from the Scottish Government in February, but to urge them that there is an engagement that we hope that could take place. If we can move on to the next petition, which is petition 1577 on adult cerebral palsy services, the committee will ask to consider this petition in May and agree to write to the Scottish Government to ask for the details of a pilot programme and a mapping exercise, and whether it will be minded to develop national guidance on adults with cerebral palsy based on this work. The Scottish Government's response states that the clinical standards for neurological health services are currently under review by Healthcare Improvement Scotland and that the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence is developing guidance for the management and treatment of cerebral palsy in adults, which we published in 2019. As such, the Scottish Government is not minded to develop separate guidance on adults with cerebral palsy. The petitioner has written submission and welcomes the guidelines that have currently been developed, but questioned whether there was an opportunity for the Scottish Government to provide leadership rather than waiting for guidelines to be developed. The petitioner also expressed concern that the Scottish Government had not contacted her despite making a commitment to work with her, and I wonder if members have any comments or suggestions for action. I think that we should take the petitioner's request seriously to write to the minister and ask why there hasn't been any further engagement with the petitioner when it was specifically stated. I mean, there obviously is a gap here in the system, but I think that the first step is to ask why that further engagement hasn't taken place. I think that it is actually very important because it seems to be a kind of a mismatch in the discussion. You can do this in the petition, but the transition to adults says that it doesn't apply. There are quite a number of examples in the briefing where it feels as if the dialogue is kind of missing the point. It looks like a standard response, as opposed to a response to a specific question, and I think that that's the issue. Anything else that we could be doing? Should we not be writing to nice to clarify what opportunity there might be for the petitioner to contribute to the work on developing the guidance? I think that that would make sense as well. If the sense is that the lived experience is not shaping the guidance, then how do people who have got those concerns develop that? I think that that would be useful as well. I think that it would be nice to be nice to be engaging with people with several thoughts that might not be as particular a petitioner, but I think that it's worth asking. If that's agreed, then. I think that we would be wanting to write to the Scottish Government to ensure that they fulfil their commitment to the petitioner because that in itself would give confidence that those concerns are being recognised. Our next petition is petition 1581, Save Scotland's school libraries, by Duncan Wright, on behalf of Save Scotland's school libraries. Our last consideration of this petition was on 25 May. We agreed to ask the Deputy First Minister to respond to the petitioner's request for clarification of the development and delivery of the national strategy and when the strategy would be in place. In the submission at the end of June, the Scottish Government advised that the Scottish Library and Information Council will lead on the development of the strategy, but will engage key stakeholders, including the Chartered Institute of Library and Information Professionals in Scotland and the Association of Directors of Education in Scotland. It added that development engagement would begin following publication of the guidance on school libraries, how good is our school for, with the aim of agreeing and publishing ahead of the 2018-19 school year. The clerk's note indicates that the guidance on school libraries has been published and refers to the recent announcement by the Deputy First Minister of the School Library Improvement Fund. The petitioner considers that significant progress has been made with a clear plan for development and delivery of the strategy to an appropriate timescale. Do members have any comments or suggestions for action? I think that we can welcome the progress that's made. I think that it's good to recognise that this is a petition that has achieved what the petitioner wanted, that the Government has responded to it and there seems to be a clear line of action. On that basis, I think that we would be agreeing to close the petition. The next petition is on health services later. The next petition is on wider awareness, acceptance and recognition of pathological demand avoidance syndrome. The next petition is on wider awareness, acceptance and recognition of pathological demand avoidance syndrome, submission from the Scottish Government, integration joint boards and the petitioners that are included in the annex to the paper provided for us. At our meeting on 15 June, we agreed to ask the Scottish Government whether it would look at policies, research or approaches elsewhere in the world in its submission. The Scottish Government states that it has already committed to international standards of best practice in the form of ICD-10 and DSM-5. It adds that the relevant international guidance, sign 145, was published as recently as 2016 and reflects the most recent evidence covering children and young people following a systematic review and critical appraisal of the current scientific literature. As such, the Scottish Government is clear that it does not intend to look at policies, research or practice elsewhere. The Scottish Government also addressed our question about how consistency and diagnosis and support can be delivered by local authorities. It notes that, under the Scottish strategy for autism, each local authority is required to have a published autism strategy and autism plan. The submission also refers to the availability and accessibility of a range of support tools and learning resources, including the autism training framework, an online learning space and a guidance document titled Key Considerations in Promoting Positive Practice for Autism Spectrum Disorders. That document advises all staff to be, quote, sensitive to differences in how individuals and their families or carers wish to view themselves and how they wish to describe autism. The submission from integration joint boards also refers to international guidance as being the gold standard. They appear to indicate that they will adhere to this guidance but update any practices in the event of any change that has been put in place based on any emerging evidence. IGBs, particularly Orkney and Chetland, highlight the importance of developing individualised strategies with child-centred and solution-orientated interventions as part of a positive behaviour support plan for the individual rather than the label. The petitioner considers that the Scottish Government has, quote, no willingness to address new developments and that the submissions from the IGBs reflect the varied handling of PDA across the country, where only those professionals with an awareness of the condition will respond accordingly. The petitioners present some proposals for further consideration, and I wonder if members have any views on action to take on this petition. I was particularly struck with this petition. We took the evidence around the apparent postcode lottery in terms of how treatment was brought forward, or not treatment was brought forward between one council area, recognising and treating in another council area, perhaps even sending them to parent classes. I am still not convinced that we have a response here that satisfies, I am not satisfied with the responses at the moment that would address that particular issue. I am not quite sure how we take that forward, but I am slightly disquieted by the fact that we have got to where we would get it. I felt a bit encouraged by some of the evidence that said, well, regardless of what the term is, your focus needs to be on the child and how they behave and how they are living this. Even though they are not prepared to put that title on the condition, the practice that says how that condition presents itself is what your focus should be, I do not know whether that is of some comfort to people. It feels quite difficult for us to be able to adjudicate on the professional understanding of those conditions. I absolutely accept that. I am just voicing the fact that I am not convinced that we have addressed what was most disquieting to me. I am suggesting that some people will be consent for good parenting classes rather than treating the child. I just want to understand whether you call it PDA or whatever you call it, that there is a child-centred focus on the condition. The complexity of the autistic spectrum and the complexity of behaviours that you see on it make it very challenging. PDA is an emerging conversation, so you will see it in clinical notes in some places and in other places that it will be denied as an existing condition on the autistic spectrum. I think that part of the problem is that some of the behaviours that are displayed under PDA can appear like poor behaviour and therefore are often determined to be poor behaviour in a child and therefore are related to a parent's unwillingness to set boundaries and demand better behaviours. I think that that is where some of the complexity comes in and that defends very much on the individuals who are making that assessment and that can be very challenging for parents and it can raise anxiety levels to quite a high level. I think that what the petitioners are asking for is a conversation about this and I think that that is quite important, particularly in an emerging conversation and emerging potential clinical diagnosis, where there is a disputed existence between clinicians, but it is only disputed in the sense that the learning curve is still fairly early on and the evidence base is not universally accepted, so that is going to be challenging. It is not something that we can push on to everybody, but I think that what we are perhaps asking for is an open-minded approach to looking at it and an open-minded approach to how we treat parents and individuals, but I think that the issue here is about not slamming the door. It is about saying actually that there needs to be an ongoing review of what this means and what this means for families, what this means for children, what it means for families because it is not just about parents, it is about siblings, it is about grandparents, aunts and uncles who are trying to cope with what can be quite extreme behaviour in some cases. The question that we have to ask is whether we as the petitions committee, in terms of continuing to look at the petition, help that process. I would have thought that the fact that we have raised it with the integrated joint boards is now an issue that they have had to respond to, they have been more aware of it. I certainly am comforted by the fact that that focus on the child and the fact that there has been an airing of the condition is something that we can usefully do. The question is whether we have neither the expertise nor probably the detailed understanding of how practice develops to influence that. I would possibly argue that we have already influenced it and what we have already done. The judgment that we have to make now is continuing to bring back the petition. Do we add anything or have we done our job in the sense that we have highlighted that? That conversation should be continuing. If we were to close it, the petitioners would obviously be able to come back again if they feel as if there has not been progress. We obviously cannot properly change our influence directly on DSMRICD diagnostics, but we can make a recommendation, if we feel appropriate, that professionals have an awareness and continue to look at where the PDA sits on the autistic spectrum. In my professional life, I have seen that as an awareness growing area, but, like all those things, it takes time and research and things that will back up or deny existence. In terms of what we have decided—I am not—if people have other suggestions, please share them with us. In closing the petition, can we confirm to the Scottish Government that we believe that there is an issue here, that there have been responses, that we believe that this conversation needs to continue and that we recognise the way in which autism and other conditions that express themselves mean that it is essential as a focus. I mean that we are teaching people who do not understand far more about this. You are not trying to teach somebody how to do their job clearly, not an awful lot more in the detail than I do, but I wondered, even in closing it, if we could make that kind of recommendation to the Scottish Government. I think that the comments are particularly relevant in the patchiness of approaches from different local authorities. I do not know whether local authorities have been made aware enough about it and I do not know whether we could include that in the request to encourage, as the petitioners want, local authorities to provide training and education to social care professionals or at least make them aware of it. If we closed the petition but then requested that this—I do not know if we have done that enough, I do not know if local authorities. Otherwise, why is there such a patchy response? I might suggest that, in closing it, we flag up to the Scottish Government that this is something that should be aware of in developing the Scottish strategy for autism and that it should be aware of developing the second round of condition. Does that agree? In that case, if we are agreeing to close the condition in those terms, we would want to thank the petitions very much before bringing the attention of the committee and through us to the integrated joint boards and highlighting the very specific concerns about a condition that is possibly ending up when people are getting all sorts of varied recommendations on how the matter should be treated and we would not want that to be the case. In that case, if we can move on to petition 1633, on private criminal prosecution in Scotland, which we will ask considered our meeting in June 2017. That meeting, we agreed to write to the Scottish Government, the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service and the Health and Safety Executive in Scotland to ask for their views on whether they considered there to be an accountability gap in relation to health and safety investigations in Scotland. The Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service stated that it does not have the statutory authority to instruct the health and safety executive in relation to its work. It went on to confirm that that was no different from the relationship between the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service and all other agencies that report suspect the criminality to the Procurator Fiscal. The petitioner's written submission set out concerns in relation to the existing health and safety executive guidelines in the context of sports-related injuries. He stated that, as the guidelines currently stand, unless someone is killed at a sporting event, it is very unlikely that there will ever be an independent investigation into an injury. The petitioner's view is that there is a failure by the health and safety executive and identified three alternative options to address this perceived failure, as set out in our meeting papers. I wonder if members have any comments for suggestion for further action. Can I say that this petitioner is a constituent of mine? I think that there is a real issue here. He highlights anormally important anomaly in the system. I am just not sure that we can take it any further, because I think that we have exhausted all avenues of inquiry on this one, and we just seem to be hitting a brick wall. Is there a case to refer to another committee? Which one? Do not get back to me. I want to give it to somebody else. I think that there was a really interesting argument, which said that, unless there is a fatality in which case there is an inquiry, if somebody seriously injured at a sporting event, who there may have been culpability, you may know more about this than me, but I was thinking of a gymnastics competition where somebody has failed to make sure that the equipment is safe, but that is not investigated. I was quite surprised by that. I think that it is a legal issue. I wonder whether or not I am not sure that we can do anything. I do not know where we can go with it. There is an undoubted issue. We looked at the round, which powers we would devolve to the Scottish Parliament and mean by we in one party. There is an interesting issue around how the health and safety executive Scotland sits and how it sits in relation to the UK body and how it sits in relation to accountability in Scotland. I am not sure whether it is something that we could address, but I am quite attracted by the idea of referring to another committee. I know that there is something that has routinely happened in the past, and we very rarely do it now. I think that it merits further discussion and investigation. I am just not sure that this is the vehicle. I suppose that the only question would be whether we would not want to mislead the petitioner by referring it to the Justice Committee, which I know has a very significant workload that would actually be able to address it. I agree that the place for it to be addressed. I know that it leaves us the option of referring it to the Justice Committee. I am on the Justice Committee. I am happy for it to go there. That is right. That is settled. It does not matter then. Do you support on behalf of the Justice Committee? Anybody who gives me a roundabout a referral concerns to yourself. I do not think that we want to create the impression that we think that this is something that is easily solved. We do think that it is an interesting area, but we do not feel that the petitioner committee can take it further. On that basis, we would be agreeing to close the petition under rule 15.7 of standing orders. Is that right? I am getting my technical advice right here. In that case, we are not agreeing to close it. We are agreeing to refer it to the Justice Committee and in doing so. We want to thank the petitioner. We are highlighting it to ourselves. We can move on to petition 1648 on nursery business rates. The next petition is petition 1648 on nursery business rates, which calls for business rates for nurseries to be abolished or frozen. The committee last considered this petition in June and agreed to seek the views of the Scottish Government, the boys union, parenting across Scotland and local authorities. A number of submissions have been received, which provided the committee with useful information. However, that appears to be an instance where consideration of the petition has been overtaken by events. Since we last considered the petition, the Barclay review of the non-domestic rate system has been published, and the Scottish Government has announced that childcare nurses should benefit from a new 100 per cent rate relief from 2018-19. That will be subject to review after three years. I wonder if members have any comments or suggestions for further action. I am absolutely delighted that the decision has been made. We can close the petition, I think. Take credit for it. I think that might be a stretch, but I think it is one of those ones where the petitioners have clearly been active, not just in terms of the petition committee, but there has been a campaign round. This whole question of the Scottish Government has responded to that, so we would be agreeing to close the petition under rule 157 of standing orders. On the basis that the Scottish Government has agreed that childcare nurses should benefit from a new 100 per cent rate relief from 2018-19. If we can then move on to our next petition, petition 1649 on council tax bans, the committee last considered this petition in June and agreed to write to the Scottish Government in Coesla seeking their views on the petition. The Scottish Government stated that, while it recognised the concerns raised by the petitioner, there are no plans to undertake a revaluation exercise for council tax purposes during the current parliamentary term. In contrast, Coesla is of the view that a wholesale revaluation of council tax bans is required as part of a wider strategic review of council tax in Scotland to make the system a fair and locally democratically accountable tax. I wonder if members have any comments or suggestions for further action. I sat on the Coesla's review of local government taxation and we spent an awful lot of time on it, so it's a difficult one. To some degree, we are where we are. The recommendations have been made and the Scottish Government made it clear that I'm going to look at it again at the moment. I'm not sure where we are going to be honest at this stage because there's been such a huge amount of conversation about it already to date. Given Michelle's comments and the position that we find ourselves in, I don't think that there's any option but to close the petition. Given that the Scottish Government has stated that it has no plans to undertake a revaluation exercise, if we were to ask the Scottish Government to comment on Coesla's submission, we're just basically going to get the same response. Rather than prolong the agony, we're probably better at just closing the petition. Regret fully. I think it would be worth just saying to the petition that this will be an ongoing conversation. Just because we close the petition doesn't mean that the conversation dies. This is an ongoing conversation between local government, between Coesla, between political parties. It's not a dead subject. I think that there are some petitions that highlight an issue that nobody is paying any attention to and no focus on. The reality is that in terms of council tax, everyone is wrestling with how do you have a fair local taxation, which is locally accountable. I think that all parties in the Parliament and beyond are wrestling with that. I agree with members that we recognise that it is a really important issue. We also recognise that people are wrestling with it as we speak. In terms of the petition committee's role, we've probably done as much as we can at this stage and we'd be agreeing to close the petition on that basis. The Scottish Government has no plans to undertake a revaluation exercise during the current parliamentary term, but we would highlight the fact that this is an issue that remains to be resolved and we'd want to thank the petitioners for bringing it to the attention of the committee. If we can then move on to the next petition for consideration, which is petition 1650, which relates to the student awards agency for Scotland's postgraduate eligibility criteria. We'll ask to consider this petition in June, and at that meeting I agree to write to the Scottish Government, the National Union of Students Scotland, the Student Awards Agency Scotland and University of Scotland responses have now been received, as well as a written submission from the petitioner. Misinformation is included within our meeting papers. The majority of written responses received do not support the action called for by the petition, believing that the current policies in place work well for the vast majority of students. If members have any comments or suggestions for further action. I think that given the lack of support for it, it would be difficult to justify continuing the petition, to be honest. I agree. I think that it should be closed now, because we have all those responses and they are quite unequivocal, so I think that it should be closed. I think that the evidence is clear in this one, and I think that, to us, you might have empathy with what the petitioner is saying, that the reality is not supported. I think that it comes down to the fact that the only students in Europe that don't have access to the same condition as Scotland are those from England, and the fact that the qualification that the petitioner is seeking is one that is very only a benefit in Scotland, so you can see why it wouldn't be funded elsewhere. I think that it's probably within a broader mix of what's going to happen when students support in the longer term. I think that we're in the same conversation, almost as last time, that all of this will be an on-going subject of debate, so closing the petition doesn't mean that this will never be discussed and looked at again, because it will be. Are we agreeing to close the petition under rule 15.7, of standing orders, on the basis that there isn't support for the action called for in the petition, but we would like to thank the petitioner again for recognising the petitioner's particular individual circumstances, which is clearly very frustrating. It has been important to highlight that, but it is in his broader context of student support. Is that agreed? Yes, I agree. Okay, the next petition for consideration today, which possibly will be the last one, is petition 1652, on abusive and threatened communication. The committee last considered this petition in June and agreed to write to relevant stakeholders, the responses have now been received and are included within our meeting papers. Police Scotland and the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service, both highlighted that the main challenge that exists in enforcing abusive and threatened communication offences is proving beyond reasonable doubt who sent an abusive or threatened communication. The petition suggests that it would be easier to enforce those offences if it is set out in law that the owner of a mobile phone is responsible for any communication sent using that device. The responses received highlighted the number of practical difficulties with that approach, which are outlined in our meeting papers. The committee also asks the Scottish Government what action it was taking to review the operation of corroboration and hate crime. The Government is currently in the process of commissioning jury research and that any future consideration of corroboration reform would need to await the findings of this research. The Government has also commissioned an independent review of laws covering hate crime offences in Scotland to ensure that those laws are fit for purpose. Those recommendations are expected to be considered by the Scottish Government in early 2018. I wonder if members have any comments or suggestions for further action. I think that you referred until the review of Lord Bracadil's review of hate crime is concluded. I have seen no merit in doing anything until that comes through, because it will be implicated. I agree with Rona Mackay, but I wonder if it is possible to make a further attempt to get the petitioner's views on the responses that we have received to date from the Scottish Government, Police Scotland, Scottish Women's Aid, Respect and Victim Support Scotland? I think that that would be worthwhile. I would have the concern since I may be able to lose my phone on a fairly regular basis that the idea that you would then be responsible is quite interesting. I think that we understand the point of it. The message there is about liability and so on, but I think that there is a challenge. However, if we are agreeing to defer, we are also asking if the petitioner has comments to make on the response that we have had so far. The last petition that we have is the question of the major redesign of healthcare. We have Rhoda Grant and Kate Forbes here. However, we only have four minutes, and my sense would be that there is an issue that is a bit more serious than that. We want to make sure that it was perhaps given a wee bit more time, but I am in the hands of the committee, to be honest. Time is ticking off, and we decide whether we have time or not. I will make a judgment. We will defer the consideration of the petition to our next meeting. I think that there are some petitions that you could probably get through. I would not want the petitioners themselves to think that we had not given it due consideration. If that is agreed, I would not want to thank everyone if there are 10s. We have got through a mighty amount of work today in some very useful petitions. I thank people if there are 10s in the post.