 Welcome everyone to the 17th meeting of the Public Petitions Committee, everyone. The first item on our agenda today is a consideration of new petitions. For consideration, the first is petition 1707 and public access defibrillators by Kathleen Aure. The committee will take evidence from the petitioner this morning and accompany the petitioner is Trudeau McMillian MSP. Members might be aware that Mr McMillian has worked closely with the petitioner a wediwybamos i'w ddoch iawn i April yma o'i ar hyn o ddim ond iawn i bethau gyda'u chympasau i Ddflwyfer. mae'n fwy cael ei fod yw mae'n mysgu'n gweld i'r ei seef yn gwybodaeth a chympasau i ddflwyfer, a chympasau i ddflwyfer, a dyna'r wneud o'r cymdeithasig DUIT Cymru. Rwy'n trace i fod yn bwyll gwisio'n gwoesbeth eu lleiddo, byddwn ni'n gofyn i'r gyfnod Maenon swydd mewn portision i baryfaw diameter yn winneb o'i ffas edrych. Deni'r ffordd iawn agdain iads o'i middylai gyda gwyfer, oedd te Sunday mewn yn unrhyw ffurth ac yn gyffinio이다eth eu bethau Achos gweetio ar ye datblygu cybernydd â eich Ballagion. Cala ddigon dwylai enemies? Pawe progresses yn y ffrif. Heimau yn yr ynnig functional biad o'r gatheredau, ac yn fawr o'r hollod a'r tyfnwyr, Jayden yn gweithio i gynllun i'w ffawr i'r ddechrau. Lleidio i'r lleidio cyfnod, yn y gweithio. Mae'r lleidio i'r lleidio cyfnod, mae'n rhaid i chi. Mae'r lleidio wedi ei gweithio i'r gweithio, mae'n gweithio i chi'n gweithio i'r ffawr. Jayden yn ddiwedd. Rhyw ddiw i'r lleidio i'r gwneud i'r gweithio i gwybod, ac mae'r lleidio i gweithio i'r llwy. I don't remember too much, but I know there was a lot of staff, not one of them knew what the other one was actually doing into my knowledge, there was a difficulty there, but none of them used it as none of them were fully trained and proper scared of it. I started this campaign in January this year. I want to and I will achieve my goal. That is to make sure that all schools, public places within a map distance, all have one. I started with the schools as they have a lot of school activities, like they have after school clubs. While doing my research on defibrillators, I noticed that a lot of young people pass away suddenly of a cardiac arrest while they are all taking part in a sporting activity. I am now Jaden's voice and I will be the voice of other families that have lost their loved ones that has passed away, but they could have been saved if there was a defibrillator registered out there in the public for use. I would like to thank Telegraph for always standing by me, the whole way through my campaign, and Stuart McMillan has been by my side from day one, taking it at my own pace and never pushing me in any way at all. That makes me feel a lot more comfortable. I appreciate just how difficult it is for you. We will go at your pace just now as well. We want as much as possible to be helpful to use the petition and the issues that you raised, but we are very conscious that the personal dimension to this is something that must be very tough for you. We are going to ask a number of questions. We are really trying to tease out some of the issues that we would want to address with other people, but I think that you very powerfully told us what the motivation is, and I think that we can all relate to that. You mentioned that you have met officials from the Minister for Public Health's team. What was the outcome of that? There was no further correspondence from the Minister's office. I personally myself did not really feel that it was of any great benefit. We were also supposed to come back to me with information on local contacts, but that never happened. That is something that we can raise and pursue. In your meeting, did you discuss the possibility of there being an official public awareness raising campaign? What sort of response did you get to that? I did ask if they would consider piloting some scheme in Inverclyde, because that is where we are from and the nature of what we are doing. They said that this was happening in other places around the country and that they would then pass me on the details of what was happening, but I still do not receive that either. Thank you very much for coming in. I am aware of your particular tragedy. I spoke in the debate that Mr McMillan brought to the chamber and highlighted the issue very eloquently. I think that the question that I have is in your petition. You were asking for PADs to be fitted in buildings by floor space. Is there a particular reason why that size of floor space was highlighted? We have sat down and looked at the empty properties that were on websites, such as RightMove and Zoopla. We looked at commercial properties that are currently up for rent. We looked at their floor space per square metre. We then tried to figure out what seemed to be significant enough for footfall, each day also significant amount of people working in that building. However, I would be happy to discuss if Hughes feel that it should be higher or decreased. We are keen to establish whether that is the size of the building or the footfall that would be most relevant to delivering on the aims of your petition. In April, the Government said that the Government had funded a university of Edinburgh resuscitation research group to carry out that modelling to inform whether the defibrillators are best located to save lives. Are you aware of that? Have you seen any of the outcomes? At the end of the day, what we want is the very best outcome? I am not aware of any work that has been carried out by the University of Edinburgh. However, I do believe that we need to strike that balance between the footfall and the floor space. It is purely based on footfall because we could end up having a defibrillator in every shop on a high street and it is just too much. If it was the other way around, it would be balanced out on the floor space. That is why I came up with the 7,500m2 space. However, I would be happy for any guidance from the University of Edinburgh. We had quite a lot of discussion on that particular aspect. There was a feeling that, if the floor space were going to be too small, it could potentially have a financial impact upon smaller businesses. There are some tough economic conditions across the country. We felt as if it was going to be in a larger floor space as compared to a smaller one. It would probably encompass larger businesses with both more footfall and there wouldn't be an economic impact upon that small business. As Kathleen said, the issue of the 7,500m2 square metres is not fixed in stone. In order to put something down on the petition, that is why that figure was the result. The only reason that I am raising it is because I am trying to put it in the context of one of the main towns within the constituencies. I do not think that there is a shop within the town centre of 7,500m2 square metres. That is the reason that I am raising the subject because we would want one within that vicinity as well. You are suggesting that you would want a principle of accessibility to establish and then look at how best that could be done? That particular figure in size came about through a discussion to have for it to be a further discussion point, so it is not fixed in stone. Ritcha Hamilton. Kathleen, can I commend you for bringing this to Parliament? It is something that I am working on. I have been asking the Scottish Government some questions recently due to some constituency work that I am doing. Some of the questions are available. You can look on the parliamentary website and I am due the answers in five days, so they might help your campaign too. I think that it is important because performing CPR and using a defib can double the chance of survival and this is such an important issue. I want to ask you a little bit your opinion of one of the questions that I have asked the Government because it is so important that within the Scottish Government's out-of-hospital cardiac arrest strategy, which I do not know if you have had sight of, but it aims to ensure that arrangements are in place to ensure that pads are mapped, maintained and accessible to the public. What I asked the Government was what its plans are to introduce a standardised identification system for all public access defibrillators to enable the Scottish Ambulance Service to more easily locate them in an emergency situation. I wondered what your thoughts are on that and how that would work in with your campaign as well. When I started my campaign, there was only a handful of PADs that were registered in Inverclyde. Now there is a lot more people realising that they are actually needed and they now understand the real importance of having them registered. I have said to a lot of places when I have went that there is no point in having a defibrillator in it not being registered because nobody actually knows that you have one in the building. I have made it really a high importance level that it has to be done but at the beginning there was not a lot at all on it. I think the strategy of the Government is real meaning that it needs to be done by 2020, which was the target that was set. David is going to ask you some questions about the British Heart Foundation but I think that they are integral to this part and I just wanted to put that on record because within the Scottish Government and the Scottish Ambulance Service and the British Heart Foundation I think it is really important that everybody works together. I wonder if you felt at some points within the work that you are doing, your research, that you had found that everybody was doing different things? We are all doing different things but in the same way we are all still trying to do the same thing. I suppose it might help if everyone came together. Mr Hamilton's question just to the end part of it. Locally, as a consequence of the Jeetan-Rainbow campaign, we set out about trying to talk to all of the local partners who would be involved in this sphere. It was clear that each organisation seemed to be doing its own thing without some type of in-proclide focus or in-proclide strategy. One of the things that has come from that, and it has taken a bit of time to tie down a date, but on Monday I am hosting a round table. The St Andrew's First Aid will be there and the Heart Start Inverclyde will be there. We have asked the Inverclyde council that they could not supply anyone for Monday, but we will keep them fully abreast of the discussions and outcomes from it. The purpose of this is to try to have that focus within the in-proclide area. Since the campaign started earlier on this year, not only has around £20,000 been raised, the defibrillator machines have been purchased and carefully started to distribute them to local schools. It has also been clear that the different organisations want to work together, but it was about finding the way of trying to do that. Monday is the first step of trying to forge an in-proclide wide strategy. Angus MacDonald Cymru yn agmarin, Cacelyne. Good morning to Stuart. I would like to move on to some of the detail that you have put in the background information of the petition. You have said that PEDs have an excellent safety record and low upkeep costs, and you went on to say that you have been going into schools and showing kids how to do basic CPR and how to use a PED in schools. You stated that, while conducting the work, you have realised that placing PEDs in schools is great and showing the kids how to use them is vital. That is obviously how you have moved on and trying to roll it out further. The briefing that we have appears to support your position that PEDs give a significant life-saving advantage. For example, if delivered within three to five minutes of a collapse, it can produce survival rates as high as 75 per cent. I would be keen to hear what your views are on that. Also, if you could give me a rough idea of what we might be looking at in terms of the low upkeep costs that you have mentioned. For replacement pads, if they ever had to be used, they can come in between £70 to £90. That depends if you are buying replacement pads for a child or a replacement pad for an adult. It really does depend on what repair pads you are replacing at the moment at that time. Batteries come in around £100 that is depending on the making model of the machine. The ones that I am giving out, I know that a replacement battery is £100. It has a lifespan on that for two to three years. Regarding the initial installation for a box to be housed, it comes in at around £400, but that is just a one-off cost. There is no other further cost after that. The only other cost would be regarding the electricity to the power, the heat for the machine. That is the only up-cost. David Torrance. Good morning, Kathleen. You have partly answered my question, but how aware do you think people are of the Scottish Ambulance Service public access defibrillator service? People in Inverclyde are definitely more aware now than they certainly were a few years ago, but I think that is part due to my campaign and the stories that has been in my local paper. Stuart promotes the Scottish Ambulance Service yearly campaign to get pads registered. However, it is only a vehicle only that my campaign I am aware to get pads registered. Certainly, I absolutely agree with Kathleen that there has been an increase in awareness locally of the importance of defibs. With the change that is going to take place with Microsoft and the database, I was a bit concerned initially. I felt as without having all the information, but it was then clarified to me. I felt as if there might be some type of confusion if there was going to be two databases running in tandem, but that is not going to be the case. All the Ambulance Services UK-wide will feed into this Microsoft-supported database. Clearly, that will have a positive effect upon people who live in the borders. The closest one might actually be in England, or for someone who lives down south, it might be in Scotland. There clearly is a positive effect upon that wider database, but the important element of any database is the information that goes into it. In terms of people purchasing a defibrillator, or one being donated to a school or to a community hall or to whichever type of facility, it is about registering. It is important to purchase them, but they need to be registered. If they are not registered, the Ambulance Service cannot direct someone to go to get it, to use it to try to save a life. The registering is so important. In that particular database, the information that goes into it will help to save lives. On that point about registering, there was a defibrillator in a shop in my area. It was put there four years ago. When I went to ask and check, none of the staff knew where it was because the staff had changed so much. How do we keep things updated within the premises, with staff members or in leisure centres or whatever? My minds have been placed in schools at the moment, but within the year I'm actually trying to get it on outside of a school building, so they'll be accessible and people will see it. Within a school, even with staff changing, it is clearly notified that they have a defibrillator in exactly where it is placed. When I hand over the defibrillator on that day, I hang about until I know you've been online and you've registered your machine before I leave the building. That's how I push on that subject, but it gets registered while I'm still there. I'll just go home and check on my side. I'm not going home to check on my side. I'm just making sure that they're definitely registered while I'm still there. I suppose that the challenge is that everybody's not got a Kathleen to make sure that we're doing the right thing. I suppose that the powerful message that you've got is how to make sure that this is systematic across the communities. I've been involved in a bit of work around giving people confidence around CPR and first aid training. If I asked a question of a pupil in this room, where is the defib near here? If something happened, would you know what to do with it? I suspect that most people wouldn't know and wouldn't have the confidence. I was lucky to be involved in work around St Andrew's first aid about CPR because the defib might be there. If we all walk away from it because we don't have the confidence or we don't do the initial things that might help, there's a huge issue. I've been involved not just with the Bridgeshark Foundation but with other first aid organisations and taking that message into schools and communities. It's not just for the first aid designated person in a building but it's a school that we should all have. I have spoke with HeartStarter and I do know that they are going round the schools that I've played at the moment. We also, as a family, me, my son and my daughter, we go in with training defibrillators and we let the kids have a shot, we set up a scenario because the way I see it is the kids are the ones that's out in the streets playing these days. If they see a defibrillator and it's housed outside a box, they'll know exactly what to do when they go and get it and they'll not be scared, so I take my training defibrillators and I'll take all of them and I'll let everyone have a shot. The questions the kids actually ask me is quite amazing because I think maybe how much it's been published and how much everybody's talking about it right now, everybody seems to want to go training HeartStarter when they're setting up places in community centres and stuff. There is a lot of people that actually do attend and it's only really just became, it's like everybody really wants to just go and start doing it and it's only really just been since this campaign came out. Now everybody wants to know where the defibrillator is, how they're going to use it, of all the kills somebody with it, how they're scared to use it and then when they have a shot they realise that it's not going to kill anybody because it would more administer a shot if it doesn't have to. It's an amazing skill to have if you think you can save a life. I've been told that Fulton MacGregor MSP is a question at questions to the corporate body this afternoon and this question of support for first aid in the Parliament, so I think that is also something that's really important in terms of that general awareness campaign. Is there any specific round raising awareness or training that you think should be done? You're doing wonderful things in your area, but how do we make sure that is something that happens across the piece and is not simply relying on somebody with your willingness to be so focused on this? What does Government or local authorities need to do to support that kind of work do you think? I do know that in higher schools, secondary schools and stuff, they actually have a part where they do their first aid training, so they sit at a wee first aid course. What I find unfair is that it doesn't get taught to primary school kids is that I still feel the younger they learn. They're going to grow up and they're going to know a whole lot more rather than going into high school. They're going to take it seriously, but it's going to be fun. But your younger kids, they need to know how to use it because it would be maybe a nine-year-old at the street to collapse. It's that nine-year-old that's going to go and get that box and that nine-year-old is then going to save that person. I don't want any kids at all to be scared to use it. It's not scary. Like it says to all the kids when I've been there, don't worry, you're not going to ever hurt the person. The schools are taking it on but they're not pushing for primary kids and I don't think it should just be high school children. I mean, I suppose it's the age and stage stuff is into what a child is capable of understanding. I mean, certainly the advice I was given when we did our first aid training was once you use it, it tells you what to do and it's not possible to do it wrong, which is like a very simple message to give people that would be helpful. Rachel, did you have a last question? I just thought actually we've covered so many parts of it from actually encouraging people to have the defibs in place for the training and the maintenance and everything and I just think that your campaign is going to highlight this so much. I just wanted to add one little point there, but Stuart said that the national defibrillator network is going to launch in spring 2019, so everybody can register their defibs through the local ambulance service and I know that seems like quite a long way away but I just think that what you're doing is really going to highlight your campaign and I hope that everybody will replicate what you're doing and I think that we'll take on board your point about the training for primary school age children as well. Stuart? Can I just comment on your last question, convener? In terms of next steps are going forward, I generally am very hopeful that with the round table that we are going to have on Monday and also with Inverclyde being quite a compact area, I'm hopeful that the various partners who will be around the table that we can actually help forge ahead in terms of a coherent localised strategy and then when that, when something comes of that, that could then be rolled out to other parts of the country. Clearly, the Jason Drainbow campaign has helped hugely to make more people aware about the access to defibrillators but also the importance of them. Hartstart, Inverclyde, they've increased the number of training sessions that they've undertaken in Inverclyde over the course of the last number of months. I went on one of them summer time and the first aid, it's not just first aid, they've certainly increased the activity that they are undertaking locally as well. So there are three organisations, three willing organisations who want to do the best for Inverclyde and if we can put something coherent together and something that could also be deliverable, then that could be laid out in Scotland and could be utilised for other parts of the country. It would be useful for us to get an update from you after your round table happens if it comes out of that, that you think would help inform our thinking and I appreciate that. I suppose the question about the petition is how do we take the experience and the lessons from your tragedy and also the experience of Inverclyde in trying to address that question and help communities across Scotland. I think that the points you make are very powerful made and sometimes I think that these things are so obvious but they're clearly not being done and it's just a question of maybe driving that through. I mean I'm taking from the committee that we are very aware of I think the sensible comments, points that have been made or the requests that have been made in the petition of the suggestions about who would contact Brian. I was actually to one of your points convener around that knowledge of being able to administer and not be frightened of defibrillator and it strikes me as we are aware just now that in this Parliament everybody has access to a certain training and if we can have access to that why would we not lead the way and give everybody in Parliament access to training on defibrillator and understanding where, I don't know where the nearest defibrillator is in here and if we're able to roll out that kind of training that we're currently on why on earth would we not be able to do something similar in here and I think to me that would, one it would add a great deal of way and publicity to the campaign that Mrs Orr is doing and Parliament would lead the way. This is something I've been banging on about for a while and just in simple terms of in any workplace I've ever been in there's been an identified first aid who you think well something happens they can but if they're not there what happens and actually giving everybody that life skill really matters so I think that is something that we can pursue further but in terms of the petition itself I would suggest we write to the Scottish Government maybe to get an update from them and following up from your meeting with the Minister of Public Health. But also in response to the petition itself you've mentioned the bridge heart foundation I would also suggest St Andrew's first aid maybe before we could contact with their views about how we take it from your location out into the broader communities. You're suggesting that we write to them I think this is such an important issue that perhaps we should have around table and a kind of a more of an evidence session with the Scottish Ambulance Service and British Heart Foundation. The resuscitation council UK who are working very much on the registration you know they're so important as well. I don't know how practical it is to get those people round the table. St John's is another one based here in Edinburgh it's not St John's ambulance it's St John's and they have volunteers right throughout Scotland training people up to use them. What is the practicality of bringing people in for evidence? There is a live petition from St Andrew's first aid round taking first aid into schools I think. Is there asking saying that all primary school children should be given that so it may be that once we look at that we can maybe think about a further session but pulling all of that together but I do think it would be worthwhile in the first instance to get a response from the Scottish Government. From organisations we've all identified, we've specifically identified, round the asks from the petition itself because that would then inform whether we want to have a round table and get the information from your event on Monday as well. Not to leave it at that but to reflect on what comes back because I think there seems to have been a conversation with Government which looks as if it's run into the sand are we but if we're being honest they haven't come back to you with the information that you were expecting so we can raise that with them as well. Would that be acceptable then that we recognise as something that we will definitely be coming back to as in other petitions and issues round it but specifically round your petition that we asked directly about these demands as a starter for 10? Would that be acceptable? Then finally you would want to say before we complete. I would like to add that across to these machines are, the ones that I'm buying are £1,000 in upwards, maybe making it like further down the line that when there's a new build put up, a new school put up that they spend the extra £1,000 by putting one already in because they've been on my own area. They've been refurbishing schools quite a lot and that can go between £1,000 to £1,000 for their refurbishment and in a whole time they've done it not once have they thought and even put an outlet on the outside of the building for if anybody was to put another devibrator for them and even one for inside the another once thought and maybe an extra £1,000 for them. A big massive company that's nothing but £1,000 is a saving a life equipment. Everybody has to have a fire extinguisher because it's law because a fire extinguisher saves a life but a defibrillator saves a life. I think we've just made a very important point there, very rational, sensible, logical and you have to ask why has it not already been done but I think that's something again that we can pursue. There are avenues where we could maybe pursue that in legislative terms but actually just simply asking the Scottish Government perhaps coesla what their policy is round where they're building. We've had this conversation about fire safety and so on, what's now built in, hardwired into a sprinkler system and so on, built into a new build. Would it not be logical to make sure that any new building would have at least the opportunity to attach a defibrillator to it as well? I think all of that is certainly hugely interesting and I think very practical in terms of taking your proposal forward. With that I thank you very much for your attendance. I appreciate just how difficult it is for you and your family and we want to thank you very much for all you've been doing to raise and pursue these really important issues. Thank you very much and we'll suspend briefly till we call a meeting back to order. The next petition for consideration is petition 1709 by Clare Muney on installing CCTV cameras and providing full-time social work support in all additional support needs schools. Members have a copy of the petition and the briefing prepared by Spice and the Clerks. The petitioner raises concerns about restraint practices in additional support needs schools and is of the view that the way to address this is to install CCTV cameras and establish full-time social work presence in all additional support needs schools in Scotland. Our briefing note explains that approaches to the delivery of specialist additional support needs education differs between local authorities. The note also draws our attention to petition 1548 on national guidance on restraint and seclusion in schools, which covers similar issues with regard to restraint practices in schools. Members, do you have any comments or suggestions for action? We looked at a petition specifically around restraint in here, which I will have a mind to reflect back on in the outcome of that. It seems to me that the petition is about child protection, which I think is laudable, but the flipside of that seems to me that it is becoming very big brotherly rather than the education of the staff. Beth Morrison's petition has been going for a while around the inappropriate restraint, excluding young people putting them into spaces that are not comfortable spaces. The petition has quite an interesting point, which is how we ensure or how we are made aware of those practices. A young person with a learning disability is regarded as not being reliable in terms of being a witness. I think that those are interesting questions. I am not quite sure if the conclusion that we would come to is that you then put it in CCTV, but you can understand what is driving it if there is inappropriate behaviour towards a young person. There would not be regarded as being able to describe what has happened, what evidence is, and I think that that is why there is a suggestion that you would have social work in every additional support needs school. The petition would also be what are the protections for young people with those circumstances but who are in mainstream education. I would be interested in what the Scottish Government's response to local authorities' response is to that challenge that the petitioner quite legitimately makes. How do we keep our young people safe? What is the evidence? I imagine that, in a lot of circumstances, other colleagues within the school would be aware of inappropriate behaviour. I am sure that they have an obligation responsibility to report if they saw something that was inappropriate. For the committee, we need to think out what are the issues and then the questions separately are the solutions proposed in the petition, the correct ones. I would be interested to find out whether CCTV in similar settings is being used in other countries. What examples do we have? What evidence is there to suggest that this is working really well? At the moment, I feel slightly unaware of—it is a great idea—unaware of how it could benefit. I would like to see some evidence, perhaps, if it is being used. I might be wrong, but it might not have ever been considered anywhere else in the world. Is that something that we could ask Spice to look at to see if there is an international comparison? I think that, as has already been mentioned, given the concerns that have been expressed to this committee in the past, particularly with P1548 from Beth Morrison, regarding a constraint in ASN schools, I can actually see where the petitioners are coming from. I do think that there is some merit in Rachel Hamilton's suggestion that we do look further afield and see if there are any examples of the CCTV being installed in other countries specifically for this purpose. I think that it is quite interesting to note from the papers that those who are employed in those settings do not support the proposal. I think that there is some suggestion of a concern about how you manage inappropriate behaviour should it be through CCTV. I suppose that it would be interesting if not that, then what is really the question that we are asking, is not it? I suggest that we do write to the Scottish Government, to COSLA, the Scottish Social Services Council, and we will ask Spice for what the international situation is, any other suggestions? Of course, there is data protection and the right to privacy as to whether we should... You know, this might be a non-starter because of that, and therefore, should we be looking at whether it does breach any human rights regarding privacy? Are the human rights of the young person or the human rights of the employee? These might not necessarily be in... I think that we need to look at both of them because we might get to a point where we have seen good examples of Spice do the research, and then suddenly we have come across a barrier that says that this is completely impossible because of the protections. I would be quite interested in asking from organisations that represent people with learning disabilities and advocacy organisations. If not this, then what? How do you... If somebody is not able to say for themselves, this is what happened to me, how would an advocacy system work in terms of understanding what has happened and giving people a right to... Because I think that the petition does frame in terms of the human rights of the young person, so how are their rights enforced? How are the rights of somebody who is not regarded as seen to be a credible witness or a reliable witness? How are their rights enforced? I think that that's quite an interesting area that is opened up as well. I agree, I think that this... Is there a gap there in the first question? And if there is, how do we close that gap? Is CCTV the way forward? Does it say social services, what their take on that is? Social work... It might also be to speak to the representative organisations of people who are employed in the sector because yes, of course their view will be coloured by the fact that they are representing their employees. But it would tease out this issue about human rights, responsibilities and accountabilities of people who operate in social work because clearly the petitioner regards social work services being in the institution as a way of protecting rights. But what would the teaching unions or support unions think? I think that it would be worth a pile of maybe plugging that up. I think that we are agreed. I want to thank the petitioner for lodging the petition with us. It does raise important and challenging questions, which we very much in tune with the earlier petition that we have. We would want to explore whether the proposal in the petition is the solution, but if not, then what? I think that it is reasonable to say that young people should feel safe and protected in their education environment, even if they themselves are not able to be in a position to witness to their own challenges that they have experienced. I think that we have quite a bit to do with that one. Again, I thank the petitioner very much for bringing that to our attention. If we can now move on to the next item in our agenda, which is the consideration of continued petitions. The first continued petition for our consideration this morning is petition 1629 by Jennifer Lewis on MRI scans for ocular melanoma sufferers in Scotland. Members will recall that, in our previous consideration of the petition, we invited the Scottish Government to respond to questions provided in a submission by Ian Galloway. The clerks note sets out the Scottish Government's response to those questions, along with subsequent submissions from Mr Galloway and the petitioner. In her submission, the petitioner refers to a specific case and to a meeting that the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Sport had with an individual in that case. Members will recall that we have previously agreed to invite the cabinet secretary to provide evidence at a future meeting. I wonder if members have any comments or suggestions for actions on the petition. I would start off by saying that you can feel the frustration and annoyance. I was very concerned at the extent to which it was almost as if they were having conversations about two completely different things. Both the petitioner and Ian Galloway have been very rational and logical in saying the importance of the MRI scans, but they have almost batted back without really hearing what those concerns were. I would hope that we could do more on that. Something that has always underpinned the petition is that, because it is so rare that people are not hearing what they are saying about their condition and they seem to know more about it than anyone else does. I would echo that frustration. Sometimes we hear petitions in here that just seem logical and we cannot work out why they are not already happening. For me, this is one of them. I know that we have invited the cabinet secretary quite a few times in the near future. I know that she is coming in, but this is one of the ones that I would like to ask very specifically to be able to bring this directly to the cabinet secretary. I am pretty sure that, given the evidence that we have had, there is certainly a logic to what the petitioner is asking. I would like to ask the cabinet secretary whether she thinks differently. There are two things that jumped out at me. The fact that they asked for a minute of a meeting that happened a year and a half ago and the minutes are not yet available, even probably in our own political parties, the weakest local branch will have been able to deliver minutes in less than a year and a half. There is an important point that relates to the question of the mesh petition. When they established the independent review on their patient reps, they asked who were the patient reps and how they were identified. Those are two folk who clearly are in front line of this and understand it, but the Scottish Government does not seem to want to think, well, maybe yes, you might be the best people to do this. I think that those are two small points that perhaps indicate a broader lack of engagement with the issue that the petitioner is highlighting. The timing is important as well, if we are considering meeting the cabinet secretary to bring evidence to the committee, because it says that the Scottish guidelines group are expected to have an initial draft complete in autumn 2018. I think that it is important that we get the timing of bringing Jeane Freeman in front of us. I should note, just for the record, that we are asking the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Sport to provide evidence on a number of petitions. The petition 1533 on the abolition of non-residential social care charges for older and disabled people. The petition 1545 on residential care provision for the severely learned disabled. The petition 1619 on access to continuous glucose monitoring. The petition 1690 on review and treatment of people with ME in Scotland. The cabinet secretary has indicated that she is willing to meet the committee on its simpler question of establishing times. I think that our preference would be to have two separate sessions in these so that we can give every one of these petitions a proper hearing and have the cabinet secretary's opportunity to respond. Are we agreeing then that we invite the cabinet secretary to give evidence specifically on the issues highlighted in this petition? For preference, we would have those in over two separate sessions in order to give each of them the time that they require. Is that agreed? Thank you very much for that. The next petition for consideration is petition 1653 by Michaela Jackson on behalf of the Gorebridge Community Trust on active travel infrastructure. During our last consideration of the petition, we agreed to write to the Scottish Government to seek an update on when it intended to publish its active travel task force report and trunk road walking and cycling strategy, respectively. We also agreed to seek information about evidence provided to the Environment, Climate Change and Land Reform Committee by the acting chief executive of the Committee on Climate Change in relation to the environmental impact of cycling in relation to air quality and climate change. That information is in our meeting papers. I wonder if members have any comments or suggestions for action. That petition interests me somewhat in the work that this committee is doing around the 7775, specifically around the Mabel bypass. I wrote to the Scottish Government to ask what consideration it is giving to active travel in terms of when it developed that, and it hadn't been considered at the time. Now, that is something that is being considered. I think that the petition for me is really important. I think that we should be considering active travel when developing a trunk road. It seems an obvious thing to me. The whole thing that I think of is getting an update from the Government on when it will bring the strategy forward. I certainly think that it is worth continuing to push. I agree with Brian, because within the act of travel task force report it says that the national transport strategy must consider all the walking and cycling and active travel, but it does state that it must be mainstreamed into regional and local transport strategies. That is absolutely integral to how our local authorities are mainstreaming it within their own prioritisation and strategies. Currently, there are active travel strategies, but maybe they are not as strong right throughout Scotland through every single local authority than perhaps we think. I think that, from the memory of the petition itself, the evidence was given what even the most committed cyclists would think twice about going out on to that particular part. I mean, I wouldn't go in somewhere very safe. But people who are confident cyclists are deterred from that, and that is obviously against public policies. I think that that would be worthwhile, Angus. I think that it's worth just putting on record that it's good to get the clarification from the Scottish Government with regard to the national transport strategy. We had asked for further detail on it and for our transport users, and the general public would have an opportunity to feed into the NTS. It's good to see that there's a timeline now of engaging with the public and stakeholders in spring 2019. Obviously, we're going to seek further information by looking at it, but I was just wondering if it's within our remit to feed into the national transport strategy ourselves once we've concluded the work on the petition. Further, we're looking for an update, and we can then look at how we can best help and inform thinking on it as well, and bearing in mind responsibilities at the Scottish level and at the local authority level around us. Is that agreed? For the clocks to look at if there's any other committees currently considering any active travel as well. It might feed into some of the work that they're doing, and I'm unaware of other committees looking at it. It's almost only a clear committee's radar, and obviously there's been an increase in funding for it, but the petitioner I did notice in the papers had suggested that the REC committee should also have been... Well, she didn't specifically mention the REC committee, but she states that if the Public Petitions Committee is liaising with other committees, the most relevant committee on cycling is the committee which deals with transport policy, which would be the REC committee, which I don't serve on, but it might be. We put in a bit for a transfer for you, if you want. I think that we recognise the broader issues that have been highlighted by the petition, and there's a series of actions there that we can get an update on. In that case, if we can move on to the next petition, which is the consideration of petition 1674 by early stiddling on managing the cat population in Scotland. We'll ask to consider this petition in May of this year when we agree to write to Professor Anne Meredith, the partner organisations of the Scottish Wildcat Conservatives Conservation Action Plan and the Scottish Government. The clerks note summarises the submissions received. Professor Meredith and the SWCAP referred to the report previously prepared by Professor Meredith. This report is included in our meeting papers at Annexby to the petitioner submission of 22 November 2017. Those submissions appear to suggest that the findings of that report are still relevant and required to be addressed. We also received a submission from the Royal Zoological Society of Scotland, which supports the specific aspect of the petition calling for compulsory neutering, vaccination and microchipping of domestic cats. The Scottish Government is open to any public awareness raising efforts and education campaigns and refers to its on-going consultation on the licensing of dog, cat and rabbit breeding. That consultation is due to close next week and is expected to collect helpful information, which may be of relevance in the context of this petition. The petitioner herself has provided two written submissions in which she posed a number of questions and provides her perspective on the issues still to be addressed. I wonder if members have any comments or suggestions for action. The points that you made about the consultation, the awareness campaign and the Scottish Government indicating a further paper from the Scottish World Action to be published shortly. Those are all actions from the Scottish Government that are in progress. Therefore, would it be relevant to wait for the consultation and then take evidence from the Cabinet Secretary? I was quite struck by the strength of the responses on an issue that most people haven't really thought about. I found some of the evidence quite alarming in terms of the consequence of not doing something and animal welfare and the suffering of cats as well. I know that there was some suggestion that there was issues around the dangers of the procedure of neutering, but I did think that the balance of evidence was quite strongly in favour of the need to be action around the cat population, even if it weren't affecting the wild cat population. I thought that there were some important issues about animal welfare. That's not a topic that I've been aware of in the past, but one of the things that the petitioner has done is to put that into the light. I agree with you that we should be considering something that we should be doing. I just thought that there were quite serious people who had written pretty challenging evidence to us that not doing anything is not an option. On the proposal that we invite the Cabinet Secretary for Environment, Climate Change and Land Reform, we agreed on that, and we should ask the clerks to think in terms of timing round the best point at which we would get the Cabinet Secretary and round any consultations that are on-going. I think that we would want again to put in record a thanks to the petitioner and to those people who have taken the time and trouble to respond with really very thoughtful and substantial submissions. If we can then move on to the next petition, which is petition 1684 on the composition of local authority executive committees by James Swann on behalf of Whitburn and District Community Council. This petition is calling for the Local Government Scotland Act 2004 to be amended to ensure that, where an authority has an executive body, that body reflects the political party membership of those elected. The clerks note summarised submissions received from 11 local authorities and the Scottish Government following our previous consideration of the petition in May of this year. Those submissions do not support the action called for in the petition for a variety of reasons, including that the operation of a local authority is a matter for that local authority, the external membership of such a body and the checks and balances available through the current structure. In this response, the petitioner considers that the single transferable vote system has caused difficulties, which result in the electorate being the losers. I wonder if members have any comments or suggestions for action. I think that it's quite telling the responses from the local authorities and of course the Minister for Local Government as well, who basically said that local authorities should be able to decide their decision making processes for themselves, rather than have it imposed on them from on high. What I can understand is that the Scottish Government's reluctance to interfere in local authorities' decision making processes, I have to say. I've seen how unfair the current system can be at times. There's been an example in my own local authority where it was far from democratic for a while, but they did manage to sort it out eventually amongst themselves. I would tend to agree that there's the proof there that local authority decision making can resolve the issue of the issue of a local authority. I think that the issue of a local authority decision making process is a matter for that local authority. Local authority is constrained both by the law and by standards. I'm quite sure now how that works, but there is a standard for that. I think that local authority decision making can resolve a specific issue with regard to representation and administration, so it is solvable. Local authority is constrained both by the law and by standards. I'm quite sure now how that works, but there is a standard. There is a process for how local authority councillors conduct themselves. What I found interesting was that nobody would suggest that, because a range of parties are represented in the Scottish Parliament, that the Cabinet must represent them proportionately. I can get that committees are done on a haunt basis, but none of us would have assumed that the Cabinet should be. If it is possible for political parties to construct alliances to create an executive, they are then accountable to electorate for that. I'm not sure if we should apply a different standard to local authorities than we do in here, but everything should be in the context of fairness, transparency and a willingness to work together so that people are not excluded when they are elected members from scrutinising. One of the things that came out for me was the checks and balances, the way in which scrutiny committees operate at a local level. Maybe the question is how much support they are given to do that, but that would seem to me to get the balance right. The submission from Murray-Cancel was quite interesting because, as far as I am aware, local authorities have not supported this action. Although they have not supported it, some of the comments that they have made are quite interesting. Murray-Cancel, for example, says that it's hard to see how it resolves the governance issues, because the budget has to go to full council anyway. As you say, there are checks and balances, there are scrutiny committees within that, there currently are, I think the local authorities what they're saying overall is that there are things in place to ensure that there is a fair balance. I think that there is one local authority that said that the scrutiny committee can refer it back, and it was not resolved, but it then goes to full council, which everybody does have a say, and I felt that that perhaps worked. It's also evident, too, that if you look at the submissions, different local authorities are different, like the ones who have always been independent, some were majority independent and others, which are maybe more famous battlegrounds for the public authority. I think that we are grateful to the local authorities for their response and their measured response. We recognise the points that the petitioner is making, which I think that one of you is at these points in terms of accountability and transparency. You have the right to have, as a citizen, to challenge your own local authority to do that and make sure that they respond to you, but whether we need this external imposition of the way in which they do their business. I don't think that the committee is minded to agree with the petition in that regard. I'm just wondering what options we have. Being led by the evidence that I'm reading, as you say, it is interesting. However, we may decide that we cannot go any further with this petition and perhaps consider closing it. We were agreeing that we would close the petition, and that would be understood in order rule 15.7, on a basis that there is no support for the action called for in the petition. As a committee, we feel that, as outlined, checks and balances are operating in the system in terms of how the executive of a local authority operates and the capacity we would want to ensure that there was scrutiny of its actions. Is that agreed? We then close the petition, but we thank the petitioner very much again for raising those questions with us and giving us the opportunity to explore further the questions that his petition has identified. In that case, if we can move on to the next petition for consideration, which is petition 1694 on free instrumental music services by Ralph Rudd of our previous consideration of this petition in September, we agreed to write local authorities asking them to respond to three questions. The drop-out rate of children having instrumental music tuition in the past two years. The projected drop-out rate for this year of charges for instrumental music tuition continued to increase, as it has done in recent years. Is there a particular reason that instrumental music tuition is not being regarded by education departments as a core subject? Responses have been received from 24 local authorities, which is a very substantial response, and we would want to thank them for that. Those responses have been included in our meeting papers. In his submission, the Deputy First Minister and Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills sets out ways in which the Scottish Government is supporting music education, including £3 million to the Stema Scotland since 2012 and £109 million to the Youth Music Initiative since 2007. The Cabinet Secretary states that he respects the autonomy of local authorities but says that he is, quote, concerned by decisions by a number of them to reduce access to musical instrument tuition and adds that he is, quote, committed to working collaboratively with other stakeholders to find solutions. He adds that he is due to appear before the Education and Skills Committee in early December in relation to its inquiry into musical tuition in schools. The petition acknowledges the submission from local authorities, but considers that those demonstrate a marked difference in the approach across Scotland to the provision of musical instrument tuition. He also refers to the Education and Skills Committee's inquiry, adding that he has provided a written submission to that inquiry. He states that he would like to see the petition referred to the Education and Skills Committee for consideration as part of its inquiry. I wonder if members have any comments or suggestions for action. The petition has generated an awful lot of interest. It probably speaks to a wider general issue around access to opportunity outside of what we would class as core subjects within a school. What it speaks to is the driving of inequality. If we look through the council's drop-out rate, it has created market over the past couple of years. For sure, there is an issue around access to opportunity, and it flies in the face of everything that this Parliament discusses about closing the attainment gap and closing that inequality gap. I know that the Education and Skills Committee is doing a big inquiry into that. The best thing that we can do is to send our petition to them for consideration. I am very struck by the scale of the response and some of the figures that have come back, and the range of what some local authorities do. I should say that, for reassurance as a deputy convener of the Education and Skills Committee, the inquiry has been very substantial. We have had informal sessions with young people, with people delivering instrumental tuition, we have had with the conservatoire young trainee teachers in last week. We have met parents and groups, but we have had three evidence sessions, and we will meet the Deputy First Minister in the near future. It is a substantial inquiry. It has thrown up a lot of questions. The answers are slightly more challenging, because what comes across quite strongly is that nobody in the process wants young people not to get music tuition. There is a question about why it is seen as slightly outside the core business of schools for some local authorities. A lot of it is about budget constraints and squaring off one thing against another. I do not know what the conclusions of that would be, but what strikes me as a very strong understanding and appreciation of the power of music in young people's lives. During that evidence, are we looking at the impact of that kind of almost extracurricular, if it seems to me the impact of that on attainment in the real core subjects, as there has been a correlation between those two? I think that it is asserted, and I find it pretty compelling that the whole thing about self-esteem, capacity building, team building, learning to work with other young people, there are probably parallels with sport in terms of the way in which all of these things shape your capacity to learn in other ways. There is a question about, for example, the way in which the concessions and the way in which you might access free tuition are wide-reaching across the country can be very different criteria, but there are a group of people who, if you remember from the evidence that we have, do not really entitle to anything but are very squeezed if the charges are going up. The question that I think some of the evidence that we have got challenges, is there a displacement from people who simply cannot afford it, opening up places to people who might not, who might have been selected out because they weren't amongst the best performers, but they can now take up those places because they can afford them. There are all sorts of inequities playing in, but there is no doubt from the evidence that we have got from local authorities yesterday, Perthington, Ross, West Lothian and Glasgow, although all their approaches are very different. They all cite budget constraints and challenges in terms of them having to make choices. Do you ration by aptitude or do you ration by charging? It's not a simple question. I don't think that anybody has been able to do any instrument they want at any time, but there is a whole range there. We were struck yesterday by the evidence from the council from West Lothian, who was saying that they would need to review the decisions that they had made around charging because the drop-off rate had been very marked. He was expressing a lot of concern about that. I was struck by the high level of engagement, and this has been amazing, but the difference in the instrumental tuition across the local authorities. We all agree that it is so wide and varied and it is obviously made on budgetary constraints or decisions. I think that probably the Education and Skills Committee will be looking at this for quite a long time. I was hearing from Liz Smith, my colleague, that you were getting comparisons with other countries such as Finland and how they look at instrumental tuition. I think that it will be quite thorough in that committee. I have a huge interest in that. I would be sad to pass it on to Education and Skills, but I note from the comment by the petitioner that he would be happy to pass it on to your committee. As an aside, any member of the Parliament can attend any committee that they wish to. It may be that, for example, if we make sure that you are notified of the session when the Deputy First Minister, if you were able to go, might find of interest, but it is true that the committee's whole has taken it seriously. I note from Liz Smith's paper that there are some musician unions that are talking about the consequences of them as well around us, which I found very interesting. One of the things that comes out is the reduction in the number of ensemble orchestras and the capacity to put together an orchestra because people are no longer perhaps doing the more unusual instruments. There is a massive cultural issue for us as well. Are we agreeing to refer the petitioner into the Education and Skills Committee for its consideration with its on-going inquiry into music tuition in schools? If that is agreed, we can pass on comments from committee members around the evidence that we have accrued. As I have said, people can attend that committee if they choose to do so. We thank the petitioner again for bringing the petition to the attention of the committee. If we can move on to the final petition for consideration today, which is petition 1698 by Karen Murphy, Jane Rental, David Wilkie, Louisa Rogers and Jennifer Jane Lee on medical care in rural areas. During our last consideration of this petition in September, we agreed to write to the Scottish Government and the Rural GP Association of Scotland to seek its views and the specific action that has been called for in the petition. Responses have been received and are included in our meeting papers. Members will note that we have also received written submissions from one of the petitioners as well as from other interested parties, including two rural-based doctors. Those submissions all raised concerns regarding how the new GP contract will work in practice for rural communities, as well as concerns about how the workload allocation formula was calculated and the transparency of the remote and rural general practice working group. I wonder if members have any comments or suggestions for action. What did strike me again was the strength of feeling in this petition. It is not the first one today. The frustration and concerns—I will open up to other folk in a minute—was that they were saying that the allocation was unfair to rural and remote communities, but also to depend on GP practices in some of the poorest bits of our cities. The way that the formulation has been raised with me before is that some of our poorest communities are not well served by the funding allocation, because if we put age in as a criterion, our poorest communities who suffer from comorbidity and die early then do not get that kind of funding. I know that the D-Pend initiative is supposed to help that a bit, but it is quite explicit in saying that it does not help them. I thought that in itself. It felt counterintuitive, but it is very challenging as well. I think that this is being exercised in the wider Parliament, and in the debating chamber quite a lot. If I am right, stage 2 of this is due next year. The question is, as you say, there is a strength of feeling that there is a disparity between how stage 1 of the GP contract delivers for rural communities. As opposed to urban, and as you have highlighted, convener, to those in the deprived areas as well. There is something here to investigate, and hopefully to report back on and inform the Government. It is something that is being exercised almost weekly, which seems in Parliament. I would agree, convener, that it is not as if there were not warnings in advance of the GP contract that there would be issues here. We clearly have to look into it in a bit more detail. There is certainly a lot of concern out there in rural areas about it. Some of the processy things, the chair of the group resigned out of frustration. The fact that civil servants suggested that they should not be commenting. I have a general sense that this has been driven through without people being particularly clear on the consequences. I think that I read the figures somewhere that the numbers that were voted were not high, and of them it was not conclusive. The solution is that there will always be a challenge in terms of allocation. If we manage to not fund rural and fragile communities, again, the evidence tells us that they rely more on GP practice because they are not going to have access to other services and some of our poorest practices, it feels as if there is something not right there. The question is, who do we ask? I think that the suggestion that we ask the Scottish Government how it will be allocated, although the workload allocation was calculated, would be an interesting one. I would support that. We should not be writing to the Scottish Government to flag up the key issues that have come in the evidence. The workload allocation formula is around the transparency of the working group. We would not reassure around that. Have they tried to squeeze one GP contract or design a GP contract that does not really understand the way in which rural communities rely on GP practice in a different kind of way? A lot of health service deliverers would need to come through a GP practice, which, even in small towns, even on urban bits of Scotland, would not necessarily be the same. I think that it is important because it was highlighted in the evidence that we reiterate how that will affect the recruitment and retention of GPs. The transparency applies to the scrutiny of the process. I note that the Government's submission had said that they intend to carry out a programme of visits to rural areas, engaging with patient groups, and the chair will attend the next meeting of the Scottish Rural Parliament. It might be interesting to find out what the Scottish Rural Parliament is if they are looking at this as well as part of their responsibilities to rural areas. I suppose that my sense from the submission was that you can get quite bogged down. You can see the way that the Scottish Government pushes back on technicalities, but what you then, to me, go back to, are we risking the services point that you make about recruitment and retention? Under what circumstances do you have a formula that seems irrationally to draw resources from rural and vulnerable poor communities? What is irrational for that? Even though they say that nobody loses money but they do not get increases in the way that other parts of the system do? In the future, rural practices do not offer services such as flu jobs or such. You just do not know what could happen with the change in funding. I think that the danger is that if we do not get that right, it is the retention. In not being able to retain, you do not have to recruit and then we have to start considering having the pay structure required to recruit into the more difficult and rural areas and it will skew the whole system. I do not want to suggest that there is a straightforward solution. There will always be tensions when you allocate and everybody will fight for their own patch. There will always be pain when you reallocate out of one area of spending. It looks as if it has been done poorly and I think that there are questions about transparency. We are worth pursuing and the question of rationale and the logic of what we are doing. In order for people to sign up for it, my sense is that the alarm that has been in the evidence that is coming forward must give us pause and we would want least to explore it further. We agree to write to the Scottish Government in the terms that we have suggested. In that case, I thank everyone for their attendance and I close the meeting.