 Welcome to the second meeting of session 6 of the Qualities, Human Rights and Civil Justice Committee. Apologies have everyone's here today, so there's no apologies and thanks for everyone for attending. The first item on the agenda is to agree whether to take items 5 and 6 in private, which is consideration of today's evidence. Are we all agreed? Okay, thank you. We now move on to agenda item 2, which is an evidence session with Tristan Gray and Blair Anderson. We're really pleased to welcome Tristan, who was the principal petitioner and Blair Anderson on behalf of End Conversion Therapy Scotland. I refer members to papers 1, 2 and 3. I invite you to make a short opening statement. That's actually going to be Blair. Sorry, Blair. Thank you all for having us. I'm Blair Anderson, Brennan Teaneham, Tristan Gray. I'm also here on behalf of End Conversion Therapy Scotland. Thank you all for having us today. Just a brief update on the petition since it was submitted last year. I have since joined the End Conversion Therapy Scotland group. There are four of us. We couldn't be here today, Sophie Duncan and Erin Lucks. Since the petition was submitted, it was passed from committees and what we're considering it today, but on the End Conversion Therapy Scotland side, we've co-hosted events with all our conversion therapy organisations across the UK and Ireland. We met with MSPs to discuss our campaign asks. We ran a very successful pledge campaign during the Holyrood election. I'm sure some of you signed off pledge, thank you very much. We had 214 candidates signing, 55 MSPs returned, and all five Holyrood parties committed to a ban on conversion therapy in their manifestos. Since then, we've been meeting regularly with LGBTQ plus sector organisations, and we're happy to answer any questions that you have for us today. Brilliant. Thanks very much for coming along. We're now going to move to some questions. I'm keen just to kick off with a first question just to ask just generally what would you say was the definition of conversion therapy that we should be recognising. A lot of the evidence that we've received from our consultation says that we need to be really clear about what we mean by conversion therapy, so I guess if you just indicate who's wanting to take. So conversion therapy can be best understood not as an attempt to change the box someone believes they fit in, but to change their behaviour to better fit the box that society or their community has placed them in. You can't actually change someone's gender identity or sexuality through the various forms of pressure and psychological abuse that are used as part of conversion therapy. You can only force them into expressing themselves differently to how they feel, or to live in denial to prevent the abuse continuing. Conversion therapy has the directed intent to change someone. It's not simply expressing an opinion, faith or distaste at someone's identity or behaviour. It's a concerted effort to change that to what is considered correct way to be. The targets of conversion therapy are often made to feel as if the behaviour they're most comfortable with, the expressions of how they feel means they're broken or wrong. They are pressured or threatened by psychological abuse or torture if they express themselves and rewarded with acceptance and freedom from this abuse if they fix their behaviour to fit the box they've been placed in. Conversion therapy therefore is a broad term for psychological conditioning that seek to force people to change or suppress their sexual orientation to repress or reduce their sexual attraction or behaviors or to change their gender identity to match the sex they were assigned at birth. Do you want that anywhere? Yeah, additionally, we would just like to stress the importance of a fully comprehensive ban in legislation. We know that there are various issues to consider, but it's all belief as a group that any ban has to be fully comprehensive to be worth the paper it's written on. That includes covering sexuality and gender, includes forced conversion therapy and so-called consensual conversion therapy. Any attempt to change or suppress someone's sexuality or gender identity in whichever form it takes, whichever setting it takes place in and we would stress the need for this to be done without loopholes, without exemptions and in particular we would make sure that it covers non-affirmative forms of therapy for trans people. Trans people are perhaps most at risk in the LGBTQ plus community from conversion therapy and any ban has to make sure to protect particularly trans young people. Glea, can you just tell us what you mean by non-affirmative? Perhaps the best international practice is the change or suppression brackets conversion practices prohibition act 2021, which just passed this year in Victoria and Australia. In particular, that does not cover any form of conduct, but particularly therapy or counselling that is supportive of or affirmative of someone's sexuality or gender identity. Any therapy or counselling that has the intended outcome of changing someone's gender identity to match their sex assigned at birth, we would ask that that be covered in legislation. My question is around the definition of conversion therapy, but what can it impact on the support provided by the religious leaders? We do not believe that freedom of religion is going to be impacted by any legislation brought forward. We understand that there has been submissions to the consultation that express concern that a ban on conversion therapy would have an impact on people's right to practice their faith and the right for religious leaders to promote their faith. However, the majority of religious leaders and denominations support a ban on conversion therapy. The Ozan Foundation's open letter featured over 400 religious leaders who committed to a ban against conversion therapy, such as Edmund Tutu and Mary McCleesie. There is nothing in a conversion therapy ban that should pose any restriction on the right of people to practice freedom of thought to hold someone in their thoughts and prayers as they see fit. This is distinct from the practice that some have outlined as part of the conversion therapy that they experienced in which they are expected to take part in prayer to correct their sexuality or gender identity or where such a practice is used to place pressure on someone by their community. That crosses the line, we think, from freedom of religion into an abusive situation in which the target of this pressure is made to feel sinful or broken for simply living and loving others as others do. That, I think, is the line that should be made clear in any legislation brought forwards, that the freedom to pray for others to have faith shouldn't be impacted by the legislation. However, the practice of pressuring someone using faith is something that should be covered. Fulton, do you want to come in at that point? Maggie, I think that it's over to yourself. Thanks very much. I've got a couple of questions to explore around, I suppose, the medical profession and the role of the medical profession in this. Could you just talk a little bit about how the definition blur that you've outlined of what conversion therapy is, how the links are with the medicalisation of what we're talking about here, and I suppose how the relationship between support for people and potential criminalisation of medical professionals, what are your thoughts, what do you want to see happen in that space? It's probably worth saying from the outset that the majority of cases, as far as we understand it, of conversion therapy do not often happen in a medical setting. They often take place in religious settings or behind closed doors in family homes, etc. In terms of the healthcare setting, a number of sector-wide bodies, the Royal College of Psychiatrists, etc. Almost all healthcare bodies in the UK have cosigned a memorandum of understanding, expressly denouncing conversion therapy and stating that it is not acceptable under the operating procedures. In terms of the medicalisation aspect, there are a limited number of instances where healthcare comes into play. For example, under the Faith and Sexuality Survey 2018, conducted by the Ozan Foundation, some of the forms of conversion therapy that were listed, alongside things like prayer. Some forms of treatment included hormone treatment, electroconvulsive treatment and counselling in psychiatry. We do not know presently the prevalence of those practices in regulated professions, but we do know that they have been expressly condemned by the regulatory bodies. Can I come back on that? Two things to come back on. I suppose one just in the counselling or therapeutic space in psychiatry or psychotherapy, how would you see, although there are already guidelines around not doing this, how would you see the survivor of such behaviour having what routes would a ban open up to them that they do not already have? A question around the criminalisation of the non-medical and non-religious behind closed doors in a family home, can you just say a little bit more about how you would see that playing out? On the psychiatry and counselling aspect, the purpose of psychiatry or counselling, and not a medical professional, but the purpose of psychiatry or counselling is to provide a space for someone to explore their feelings and their experiences is not with a set outcome in mind. If a psychiatrist or a counsellor had went into a relationship with a patient with the intention of changing, suppressing or, rather, affecting someone's sexual orientation or gender identity, we would like to see that covered by any potential ban, but provided they are providing a space for people to explore their experiences, that may be difficulties people having and their sexuality or gender identity. Providing that space, providing a supportive and affirmative environment without preconditions and without an intended outcome in mind, that would not be affected. We do not foresee a significant tightening of regulations when it comes to people practising psychiatry and counselling. On the behind closed doors or religious settings, the other settings that it takes place in, we would like to see the conduct itself banned, the conduct of the practice, however it takes place. If it fits the aim of conversion therapy, we would like to see it banned, regardless of setting, because there are more settings than we can count where the stuff takes place. People might have an idea on their heads of what conversion therapy looks like, Christian summer camps, or in a one-to-one prayer group. That is not often the case. I am a survivor of conversion therapy. What happened to me happened at the hands of a parent entirely within the family home. There was no organisation behind it. It was purely motivated by that parent's homophobic beliefs. Over the course of seven years, there was intimate abuse, psychological abuse, isolation from friends, peers and other family members. There were barriers put up for me accessing health care because the situation that I was in would come to light. There are lots of overlap, we feel, between what happens in conversion therapy and what happens in cases of intimate partner violence, psychological abuse and coercive control. There are lots of elements of psychological abuse. It is not often a straightforward or a clear quote-unquote procedure of conversion therapy. Often it can take place over a series of years entirely informally, entirely on the basis of prayer or other forms of psychological abuse, isolation, gaslighting, et cetera. I think one of the important things on handling situations where it is happening in community or within the household is the second branch of what we are calling for, which is the non-legislative support. Without giving a strong reporting mechanism for people of survivors to come forwards, that will provide them with support and counselling. Should they need it, we are unlikely to come across most cases of conversion therapy. In fact, this support and having a body that is capable of handling the cases of survivors is, if anything, as important as any criminal ban. That's great. You? Okay. Fulton, you too. Good morning to both of you. Thank you, Blair, for sharing your personal experiences there, because I think that that is always very helpful to the committee to hear that. I also want to say, as I suppose, a declaration of interest. I feel like I was one of the MSPs that signed the pledge during the election campaign and was pleased to be returned by the electorate as well having signed that pledge. It's sort of gone back to the earlier question. I wonder if you've got any or what your understanding is of the prevalence of conversion therapy in Scotland. I know that you've touched on this in earlier answers and in the opening statement, but I wonder if you could expand a wee bit on that, what your understanding of the prevalence is now all over, perhaps, the last five to ten years? One question that we often get asked when we start talking about conversion therapy is, does that really happen? No, really. People don't think that this happens. It does happen. It happens to me and it happens to countless others. In terms of prevalence, because of the nature of the conditions that people are in when they're undergoing conversion therapy, often psychological abuse, as I say, there are not as many people coming forward as it affects. Again, the National Faith and Sexuality Survey from 2018 by the Ozan Foundation had thousands of respondents and around 20 per cent of them said that they were either advised or forced to undergo conversion therapy. That's self-selecting, that sort of data pool, but just based on the demographics of that, 4 per cent of the respondents that's available based in Scotland. There is definitely an issue in Scotland of conversion therapy. It happens to countless people. People have come forward to us as an organisation to say that this is happening to them, but they don't have the opportunity to speak out about it. I know that it can be difficult, but it's difficult to put a natural number or figure on that, which sometimes we as politicians look for, but I can understand how difficult that would be in this situation. Moving on, convener, if that's all right to the main theme of my questions. I think that I said earlier that I supported the campaign and probably made my position reasonably clear, but part of my job in this committee as an MSP is to scrutinise so that we can make sure that anything that the Parliament is doing is as good as it can be. I wanted to ask some questions, which may be in the more difficult bracket, if that makes sense. I wanted to hear both your views on your position and the idea. I think that Tristan did refer to that, but I will elaborate on the idea that people may wish to seek support for what they may perceive as their discomfort with being LGBT. Is it possible to have consent to any of those practices by organisations? I suppose that the situation where somebody is not coerced, as you are speaking about there, and is maybe seeking that therapy, if that is for want of a better word. I put that question to you under the caveats that I have said at the start of my question. Thank you for that. It is probably worth stating, just from the outset, that it is useful to consider conversion therapy not as a form of quote unquote therapy, because, in the first instance, it does not always take place in a therapeutic or counselling atmosphere. It can take a number of different forms, but conversion therapy is not a positive or therapeutic or beneficial treatment for want of a better word. It is often seen as a form of torture. The International Rehabilitation Council for Torture Victims said that conversion therapy violates the global ban on torture, the United Nations independent expel and sexual orientation and gender identity. It says that some cases, depending on the severity and the form, can amount to torture. On that basis, we would say that people cannot consent to be abused. People cannot consent to torture. It is not possible to change your sexuality or your gender identity. It cannot work. Anything that comes out of that process is based on trauma. It is based on suppression. It is based on denial of fundamental, unchangeable aspects of who someone is, the sexuality and their gender. Just from the outset, we would say that we consider conversion therapy to be a form of torture and it does not work. It cannot work. You cannot change your sexuality or gender. In the cases where people may consent to it, people cannot consent to torture. We are aware that people find our sexuality and gender identity difficult. Most people do coming out, especially growing up in, for example, very religious households. They will struggle with their sexuality and gender identity. We are not trying to ban people getting support to explore their sexuality and gender identity, so we would not be criminalising therapy or counselling where people say, I am uncomfortable with my sexuality. Often, more often than not, that discomfort will come from the setting in which they have grown up, where they have been told that it is sinful or it is wrong or it makes them broken. That will have traumatic effects on people and people will need therapy and counselling. However, we are not trying to criminalise people who are struggling with their sexuality or gender. What we are seeking to prohibit is where people have an outcome in mind. Conversion therapy is based on the homophobic and transphobic belief that something needs changed or fixed in people. If someone is going into a counsellor's office or a therapist's office or one-on-one with a minister or another faith leader, they are going into that in the person on the other side of the table who wants to quote-unquote fix them. That is never going to work. That is based on a false assumption that they can be fixed or changed or need fixed or changed. We are not trying to prohibit people being more comfortable in their sexuality and gender. We are trying to prohibit people forcing a change or a suppression in their sexuality or gender, even if that comes in the form of say, group prayer. It can be difficult to draw the line between consensual and not. If someone says, I am uncomfortable with my sexuality and I want support with it, if they have been brought up in, say, a fundamentalist religious environment where that discomfort has come from the fact that they have been taught since childhood that they are broken or needing fixed, we do not believe that to be truly consensual, because they have been conditioned into believing that they need fixed or changed. That is where we draw the line at things like group prayer or any sort of treatment that is forced or pressured or coerced on to someone. Thank you very much for that and thank you for the really strong and robust response. I think that when you say, you know, you can't consent to torture, I think that that was really strong, possibly, the quote of the session so far anyway. I have got one other question, convener, if that is all right, a sort of supplementary to this and actually comes from a constituent who has asked me to ask this question. It is in the same vein, if you like, but it is asking what account have you taken of individuals who have on my detransition, that is to say, later change their gender identity. Is that something you are able to comment on? We do not necessarily have first hand experiences or testimonies from people who have gone through detransition or who have developed their gender identity over the years. Again, I think that we would just like to stress that, provided there is no presupposition of an outcome, provided there is no conditioning or coergen or pressure in any form, if people do freely make changes in how they understand their gender identity over the course of their lifetime, provided that there is no attempt to change or suppress that, we don't think that that would come under the remit of any legislation. Thank you for that and thank you both for all the work that you're doing on coming to committee today. That's making the up. Thank you. Pam, were you want to come in? Yes, please. Thank you both for coming today just to echo my colleagues' comments and also to declare an interest, as I also signed up to the pledge during the campaign and I was delighted to be returned to the Parliament to support the work that you're doing. Thank you also for your personal testimony. It's really strong. My initial question was about the comprehensive nature of a ban, but I just want to maybe dig in a little bit more to that, if that's okay. Can you tell us a little bit about the importance of including sexual orientation and gender identity in the definition and the comprehensive nature of a ban? Could you also say a little bit about your views on the UK Government's approach and the Scottish Government's approach and whether you think that one may be more suitable and whether you think that it's something that we should do in Scotland or wait and see what happens at the UK level first? Just in terms of covering gender as well as sexuality, just to go back to basics, it comes from the same principle, it comes from the same homophobic and transphobic belief that someone's sexuality and or or gender is in need of being changed. We know that currently in Scotland and in the UK, particularly in Scotland in public life, we do have a culture where transphobia is often accepted and put forward by people in high profile public positions. We think that it's unacceptable from the world to go, but in the case of conversion therapy, we would not be happy with any legislation that does not comprehensively protect trans and otherwise gender non-conforming people because it comes from the same place, it comes from the hatred and the bigotry that underpins both homophobia and transphobia. Any ban has to protect trans people. We understand that there are additional sake complexities because it's more likely than not that transitioning can be difficult for trans people compared to coming out for gay people, for example, but we do not believe that there are additional barriers to protecting trans people in the legislation. Any legislation can comprehensively protect people's sexuality and their gender identity. We'll be able to provide you a bit more information, but we know that we will be hearing from the Scottish Trans Alliance next week who will be able to provide more expertise on conversion therapy around gender identity. On the approaches by the UK and Scottish Government, the UK Government approach, we are sceptical. It's going to provide a comprehensive ban that will be applicable in Scotland, both because of the announcements they've made so far about who it will cover and what situations it will cover, and also because they have stated that at the moment the territory that they are intending for the ban to cover is England and Wales, not Scotland. As a result, there is a need to progress legislation here rather than delay only to have to pick it up when it inevitably doesn't cover the situation in Scotland. In terms of the Scottish Government, we are aware that the Scottish Government has a lot on its plate at the moment, especially given the on-going pandemic. As a result, there may be a delay to legislation coming forwards via the Scottish Government due to workload. They have committed to bringing forward a ban if something doesn't come forward from the UK Government or from this Parliament by 2023. We don't believe there is a need to wait for that to happen. We are confident that this committee will be able to progress with legislation in that time. Good morning, and it's nice to see you both here today. I'll declare an interest as I also signed your pledge. I particularly want to thank Blair for your lived experience in bringing that to committee. I think that that's crucially important for us to hear from you today. I would like to ask a question in regard to the Scottish and UK Government legislation in terms of devolved and reserved powers. What do you think in Scotland within our devolved powers that we could do? Is there anything further that we could do in terms of education and health that would not be covered by a ban? As far as we're concerned, looking at the devolved powers versus reserved powers, everything that we're calling for in terms of legislation brought forward by this Parliament would be things that come under devolved powers. The criminal ban, the healthcare support, the setting up of a reporting service are all things that would come under reserved powers and therefore can be implemented by this Parliament. The one area that is reserved is professional certifications, things that would be covering psychotherapy in terms of professional certification of psychotherapists. However, all of the organisations involved in providing those certifications have signed the memorandum of understanding on conversion therapy. They already consider it a disqualification to operate as a certified provider of healthcare to provide conversion therapy. As such, we do not consider it a priority for any legislation coming forward to cover this area. If the UK Government covers that area separately, it's fantastic, but it is not a priority. As a result, it's not something that we've called for in this committee. Everything that we have called for would fall under devolved legislation. Just to come back in there, in terms of further work that could be done out with the legislative process for education as well, where do you think the work on this could lie in that remit? The main headline of the ban would be the criminalisation of conversion therapy. However, there is a lot of stuff that goes alongside it to stop it happening in the first place. That would include things such as outreach to communities where we know that conversion therapy is particularly prevalent. That can include things such as engaging with faith leaders to provide clear guidance from the top-down and religious organisations. We think that that is all doable under the devolution framework. Additional support must be provided for conversion therapy survivors. Conversion therapy more often than not leads to significant mental health issues. The surveys show that it leads to incredibly high rates of anxiety, depression, eating disorders, self-harm, suicidal ideation and post-traumatic stress disorder. I myself have post-traumatic stress disorder from the experiences that I went through in seven or eight years down the line. I am still struggling to access appropriate health care because of that. There is a need for specialist health care that the Scottish Government and the NHS can be providing and provided that they are instructed to do so. Thank you very much for how frank you are being. It is really appreciated by members, I am sure. Alexander Stewart. I also thank you for the frankness of your evidence and the personal testimony that you have given us today. It is very useful for this committee to see and hear first-hand the experiences that you have. I would like to focus on where we are when it comes to evidence. If you can give some examples of how a legislative ban has and continues to be effective, and are there any areas of best practice that you can call on or advise us on, maybe we should be looking into when we are looking at how the evidence is being managed and how it is being processed? One of the key benefits of legislation provides clarity. It explicitly states that this Parliament in Scotland as a whole condemns and prohibits conversion therapy. That single statement of clarity could be immensely useful to people going through conversion therapy. I, when I was going through it myself, did not understand what I was going through. It was only when I was out the other side of it that I came to understand it as conversion therapy. I did not know what support I was entitled to as a child going through it. I did not know what the options were. I did not know what the legal consequences would be or any protections that I would get if I was to try to remove myself from that situation. I think that clarity and a statement of first principles from this Parliament that conversion therapy is explicitly wrong and explicitly prohibited would provide lots of support for survivors, not just knowing that the principle of support is there, but a bit of clarity in terms of the experience that they are going through, they can understand what they are going through as conversion therapy, they can understand that there is criminal liability for the person who is putting them through it that is not currently there. That would be a key benefit of the clarity of legislation that prohibits it. On international best practice, I believe that what we consider to be international best practice is the change or suppression brackets conversion practices prohibition act 2021 that came out with Victoria this year. We have not had time to see that fully come into effect, but there is a lot of stuff in there that we would hope that Scotland can also enact and would have real tangible benefits for survivors. On that example, you have given us of what is happening in Australia. Are there any other international benchmarks or international practices that we should, as a committee, be trying to investigate and be trying to analyse so that we can collate as much information as we can to see what is happening in other parts of the world? The Australian State of Victoria is the case that we consider to be the best practice so far, and it covers the same criminal ban that we are currently calling for. The distinct area that Scotland would have to strike its own path in is in the non-criminal legislative aspects of the coming forward from this Parliament because Victoria uses the equal opportunity in human rights commission in order to set up a body that survivors can report to and has the power to investigate claims of conversion therapy undergoing. Scotland has different circumstances and different public bodies that would have to be investigated which one would be most capable of taking on these responsibilities. Other states that have brought forward legislation that is similar and considered to be strong cases of legislation include Germany, which has a slightly different criminal approach than what we would be calling for, but its non-criminal approach is very similar. Canada, unfortunately, due to the election being called in Canada this summer, the legislation that had passed its house and had gone to its senate has been put on hold. We hope that it will be returned in the next parliamentary session, but that is also a case of a strong set of legislation that we would advise the committee to look into. I should have done right at the start to declare an interest, as I supported the campaign and signed the pledge. I really appreciate your frankness and openness and honesty, and I know that talking about personal stories is not always easy, so I appreciate your willingness to do that in a public forum. Maybe this is a little bit off-piste, but you might not expect anything else from me. When you talk about a complete ban, I know that you are specifically focusing on the LGBTQI-plus community, and I was wondering what your thoughts were for, as we talk about this and as we consider either potential legislation that comes from a UK Government or if we want to put something together ourselves, what would be the consequences if we were to expand that out to include, for instance, conversion therapy for people who are not neurotypical? Autistic conversion therapy in my view has exactly the same kinds of coercion, torture that you have both been talking about, and what would be the pros and cons of widening this out into a ban of all conversion therapy, not just around gender and sexuality? About six months into our campaign, we were approached by several autistic people asking the same question. Unfortunately, as a campaign team, we are all non-autistic people. We don't have the expertise or lived experience to take up that campaign, so we've offered them our support to campaign on their own behalf with what information we've gathered over time. Unfortunately, from what we've gathered, although the roots of autistic conversion therapy and LGBT-plus conversion therapy have a strong overlap, they might have been founded by the same person, we don't have extensive information on how this is happening to autistic people and how it's going forward. As a result, we felt that it wasn't our place to take on that campaign and potentially lead it in a direction that wouldn't be supported by autistic people. If the committee has the capacity to take that on and potentially alter any legislation going forward to be inclusive of autistic people and take on the expertise of organisations that represent autistic people, we'd be delighted by that. However, as a campaign group, we felt unable to do so. That's been really helpful. Obviously, we are at the start of our process in terms of the committee of gathering evidence. We've got a substantial amount of evidence that has been submitted in writing from organisations and individuals. Some of that is going through a process before being published. However, we are keen to hear from ourselves if there are any further groups that we should be engaging with and potentially hearing evidence from as we go through our inquiry. We know that next week you'll be hearing from various LGBT-plus organisations. We've been working with them for the past year. We know that they have a lot of expertise to bring to the table in advising you on how to progress any legislation going forward. In terms of dealing with the more complex areas of a criminal ban, we think that engaging with legislative and legal experts who have experience with domestic abuse and coercive control would be an extremely useful direction for the committee to progress in, because we feel that there's a strong overlap in how the boundaries lie on the edges of those criminal activities and the situations in which they're carried out. We think that it would be useful to hear from those experts. Additionally, I'd like to also send a note of caution. Aside from the territorial application issues from the UK Government, we are also, as a group, not entirely convinced that the UK legislation that comes forward will be comprehensive purely on the basis of the people involved in writing that legislation who they've been meeting. We know—as far as I understand it—that Liz Truss and Kemi Bidnock, the people responsible for equality in the UK Government, have had meetings with the likes of the LGBT Alliance and the Evangelical Alliance, people with the intention of coming through this legislation and opening up loopholes to prevent protection for trans people and to insert religious exemptions. We would be, personally, as a survivor. I would just ask that, first and foremost, you consider survivors when drafting any legislation and not to allow those loopholes to be opened up. There is a point of absolute principle here that conversion therapy is wrong in all of the form that it takes. That includes sexuality, gender, places of religion, if it takes place in religion. It is a form of torture. Torture should be outlawed outright, in all instances. We would ask that you are mindful of that when you, perhaps in future, receive evidence or receive pressure from certain organisations with the intention of opening up this legislation to loopholes. I thank you for your openness today. One of the groups that we want to take evidence from is a wider group of survivors. We need to make sure that we are doing that in as sensitive a way as possible. Although it is great that you have been able to come and speak so openly and give voice to so many people, we know that some people will not be in a position to do that because of the trauma that they face. You can rest assured that that is one of the areas that we are considering. Any suggestions around that would be helpful if you wanted to feed that in. First of all, thank you very much, Blair, for opening up so honestly. You talked about the obvious that you had a lot of pressure around you from your family and certain groups. I want to know about language and cultural barriers. How do you see if that is a problem? How do we overcome that? Could it be in any religious leaders? You know that it could be backwards. I know that you mentioned earlier on that there was not a lot of that that you could see, but if it does come up, how do you see tackling the language and cultural barriers on that? I am obviously a cisgender white man. I am not necessarily best equipped to talk about overcoming cultural barriers, but I would stress that from the national faith and sexuality survey, I think that it was around 60 plus per cent of respondents were coming from Christian households. That is defined as what religion was taught in your home as a child. That was around 60 per cent Christian for various denominations. There was also around 20 per cent who were non-religious, so that is not an exclusive religious issue. More often than not, it can tend to be coming from a place of religion or from culture. In terms of overcoming barriers, I want to stress the importance of outreach and engagement with faith leaders. We have had positive engagement and the Ozan Foundation down south. They have had very positive engagement with faith leaders across the board, religions and countries. We feel that that is very important and clear step that faith leaders can take. If a leader of a church or faith group clearly states to all of its followers that this is not in line with our practices, that would send a clear message. For me personally, my experience of conversion therapy was not done at the hands of our religion or our religious organisation. It was one person's interpretation of their beliefs and whether they were part of a larger church. There is the potential for people to interpret their belief in their faith in any sort of way, but if faith leaders can send a clear statement, I feel that I would go a long way. You talked about 60 per cent. Obviously, it has come from Christianity. Do you think that there is a gap there that people from other religions have not come forward? Do you believe in that? Some people are quite open and they will talk about it, but there are many cultures that do not talk about those things. Do you think that there is a gap there as well? Yes, more likely than not. The survey was self-selecting. It was an opt-in. It is not entirely objective. There will be people from other faiths, non-Christian faiths, who are perhaps more at risk, such as the barriers that are facing people of colour when accessing healthcare and reporting to other institutions. I would ask the committee to be mindful of those barriers, but there is definitely—this is not confined to any one faith. It is also not confined to faith at all. People can use their faith as a means of channeling their homophobic or transphobic beliefs, but not necessarily. It can come out in other ways. We are not an anti-faith or anti-religious organisation. Some of our biggest allies are people of faith and religious organisations. If homophobic or transphobic beliefs are used in the context of faith, we would ask the state to step in. We have touched on faith, but in some of the evidence that we have seen in some of the statistics, there are about 20 per cent of those individuals who have undergone conversion therapy by the medical profession or the healthcare providers. What lessons can we learn from that sector? 20 per cent is quite a large percentage when you think of the whole sector. There are much stronger rules and regulations in that sector that we can, as parliamentarians, have more impact on to ensure that they are following the proper procedures. What areas do you think that we should strengthen and lessons that can be learned from that profession? Medical settings are another significant place. Conversion therapy takes place. That being said, the NHS in Scotland, the NHS UK and a number of sector-wide organisations have explicitly condemned conversion therapy. A number of people who have said that in healthcare settings or medical settings they have been advised or encouraged or had the issue of conversion therapy broached. That is not to say that there is force or coercion there, but one step that could be taken is to clear our guidance to all healthcare professionals, in particular in the context of trans-health care. I am very pleased to see the Government commit to trans-health care reform, but, as we know, the current trans-health care system in Scotland and the way that the UK does not fit for purpose. Gatekeeping and the barriers that trans people face when accessing healthcare. There is a lot of overlap between being unable to access healthcare and being unable to fully express your gender identity. There is more to be done in terms of guidance, there is more to be done in terms of training, but we feel that there is a clear message that could be sent that healthcare, religion and every other setting is an appropriate setting for an affirmative and supportive approach to sexuality and gender. If I could just return to something that Cafina said earlier, talking about statistics, just to advise that as a group we are working with LGBT organisations at the moment to set up a survey that will look into discovering what the experiences are of survivors in Scotland currently and we are presently in the process of setting that up and we are hoping that we will be able to return that evidence to the committee later in the session. Thank you for allowing another question. I am interested in the survey that you just mentioned because do you have any data on the experience of disabled people in conversion therapy? It is similar to Maggie's point about neurodiverse people. The question is not so much about changing people's neurodiverse, although that question was about that, but it is about the experience of disabled people and whether they are more or less likely to have experienced some form of conversion therapy. If you do not have the data yet, is that something that you could look to work with disabled people's organisations to do in the survey? We do not yet have that information. Thanks for raising it and we will be sure to make sure that that outreach is made. It is also just worth pointing out that, obviously, disabled people will face additional barriers when it comes to reporting, when it comes to being able to escape situations. One of the biggest barriers that I faced was that when my conversion therapy started, I was 14, I was a child, I was unable to look after myself and to provide for myself and, you know, escape to a different setting. Additionally, disabled people may rely on, for example, close family members as caregivers, and those barriers provide additional risks when it comes to conversion therapy. We do not have the data yet, but it is very clear that there are additional risks there when it comes to being able to escape those sort of settings. It was just in terms of the education that I was questioning earlier. It was really in terms of the school education system and you think that if that has a role to play in this, particularly in regards to, you know, how I have a culture that CIS-HET is the default setting and, you know, how do we move away from that? What part do you think that that has to play in that? I mean, I know that the TIE campaign has been very successful. Are you going to be linking in with that? Right at the beginning of our campaign, when we first put in the petition the group that we went to for advice was the time for inclusive integration campaign, because we acknowledged the incredible success that they have had in their campaign and campaigning for change through Parliament. We are keen to continue working with them and we think that any legislation going forwards that will, as we have called for, in non-criminalisation form parts of legislation should involve outreach and education and we think that the TIE campaign will have a lot to add to how that can be expanded through schools to ensure that children know what conversion therapy is, how to identify it and where they can go if they experience it. Yeah, and just on that issue of reporting, obviously there is a role that the schools will have to play in any reporting framework more often than not when the first people that people come out to as a teacher or a guidance councillor in the school. So there is a role for school education to play on there and there will need to be training and support for staff in terms of how to deal with what is often very complex and very difficult situations, but yeah, additionally in the education point, obviously the time for inclusive education, seeing that rolled into schools will be an incredible step forward and hopefully it will also go a long way to tackling the root cause of conversion therapy. The root cause of conversion therapy is not anyone belief system or anyone personal organisation, it's the underpinning homophobia and transphobia that LGBTQ plus people needs changed or need fixed or need converted. Hopefully as the years progress, culture will change, Scotland will continue to become more accepting and inclusive society and hopefully education will have parts playing that. Okay, well I think that's a really good point to end on so thank you both very much for your evidence. Obviously we've got a number of other sessions planned and we're continuing to consider our approach to ensuring that we're getting the widest range of evidence on this, but for now thank you so much. I'm going to suspend the meeting until 11 o'clock. Nice very much guys. Okay, thanks very much, reconvene the meeting. So the next agenda item is to hear from the cabinet secretary for justice and veterans and the minister for community safety about their priorities for session six in the civil justice area which is part of this committee's remit. So I welcome to the meeting Keith Brown, MSP, cabinet secretary for justice and veterans, Ash Denham, MSP, minister for community safety, Neil Renwick, director of justice, Scottish Government and Denise Swanson, deputy director of civil law and legal systems in the Scottish Government and I refer members to papers 4 and 5. Can I first invite the cabinet secretary to make a short opening statement? I wonder if it's okay given that the portfolio split is at civil justice rest with the minister if she will speak first and I can come in after that if that's okay. Thank you convener and thank you to the committee members for inviting us both here to speak to you about our priorities for Scotland's civil justice system today. So many of our daily interactions and important milestones in life are obviously governed by civil law. So whether that's getting married, having children, buying a house, entering into a contract when you're ordering goods or services, taking out a loan, using social media to name only a few examples, when things go wrong we're likely to come into some degree of contact with the civil justice system. So I'll just give you some figures to set out the context. So in 2019-20 the proportion of adults who were victims of crime was 11.9%. So that's down from 20% 10 years before. However the Scottish Crime and Justice Survey shows us that nearly three in 10 adults, that's 28%, were estimated to have experienced at least one civil law problem during the previous three years. Evidence tells us that people with certain characteristics, so those who are economically disadvantaged, are more likely to experience civil justice issues and then to have to rely on their civil justice system. Over the past 18 months our civil courts and tribunals have really had to adapt to the Covid-19 pandemic. So with the help of amended court rules and the extensive use of technology they've ensured that the vast majority of activity has been able to proceed effectively and efficiently. I'd like to take this opportunity to thank the legal profession, the court staff, our judiciary, social workers and police who provide order in our court buildings for all of their efforts. I think that we would all agree that it's because of the dedication and the hard work that they've demonstrated that civil justice has managed to continue as well as it has during this public health pandemic. Now all of this doesn't mean that we want civil justice just to remain as it is, we want to obviously drive forward changes and improvements so that we can have a modern civil justice system that really works for the people of Scotland. So in our manifesto we've set out an ambition to increase the choice that people have in deciding how to resolve disputes because there's widespread evidence from across the world that disputes arising from a range of issues so that could be things like debt, housing, consumer purchases, contractual matters and family problems etc can all be resolved quickly, cheaply and more effectively for all parties by using alternative dispute resolution, so ADR methods rather than going to court. So the Scottish Government is going to work with stakeholders to expand the availability of things like mediation and arbitration services within civil justice, consult as appropriate and that should give our citizens, businesses and organisations that access to flexible, affordable and less stressful means of settling those disputes, benefiting them and saving us time in the courts. In line with disclosure requirements of other senior participants in public life including all of us here today, we're also going to begin work to establish a judicial register of interests that will improve transparency and trust in our justice system as a whole. Last session the Scottish Government engaged with the Parliament and in particular the Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee to consider the criteria for Scottish law commission bills and given this effort we will try to accelerate our implementation of SLC recommendations as set out in various reports coming over the session. Reform of these areas brings Scots law up to date so that it serves the people of Scotland and finally on access to justice we will reform the legal aid system to ensure that Scotland has a modern flexible and user-focused service. The legal profession obviously contribute to the social value of Scotland and help protect our human rights and our freedoms and they play a vital role in upholding the rule of law and providing that access to justice and as such we'll obviously continue to engage with the legal profession to consider how best to reform the regulation of legal services. Our manifesto sets out priorities for reforming civil justice over the course of this term and I really look forward to working collaboratively with the members of the committee to make sure that we can have a modern system that works for everyone, thanks very much and I think the cabinet secretary would like to say a few words as well. Okay, thank you. I'll be very brief and just to say thank you for the invitation to come along. We both appeared before the criminal justice committee or the justice committee last week for a similar session but I would imagine that given that the minister's portfolio responsibilities are the ones that cover civil justice it will be the minister that you'll be looking to talk to over the coming months but as ever happy to come and answer any questions on the wider issues. Just to take at one point that the minister has made already about the impact of public health measures and court business I think is a very important point because in discussions about court backlogs and you can imagine those are substantial some people may have been looking at this issue as purely a criminal justice matter but we do need to recognise that resources essential to our recovery work like the judiciary, court staff, court buildings can't be stretched in one area without having an effect on the work in another area and it's essential that we look at the criminal and civil justice system as one in relation to that rather than two distinct issues. From my own part of the portfolio recent legislation on hate crime and protection from domestic abuse orders passed in the last session each in their own way demonstrate ways in which criminal law impacts on our civil legal system. Parliament's taken the decision of course to split the justice portfolio between the two committees but we know that such a split can never be entirely clean or absolute when we cleave apart their criminal and civil justice system. We'll see that over the coming months and years when we discuss manifestal commitments which the minister has touched on but things like legal aid or the register of judicial interests for example that will touch on both areas and last week as I say the minister and I appeared before the criminal justice committee to discuss our priorities we both expressed our willingness to work collaboratively with members of that committee when taking forward the proposals for reform and like to reiterate that commitment to build consensus where possible with the civil justice committee and together I believe that we can reform for the better the way that civil justice works for the people of Scotland. Thank you both very much that's been really helpful to give us an outline of your priorities. Cabinet Secretary touched on the potential for the backlogs particularly within the justice the criminal justice system but keen just to hear where we are in terms of the status of the backlogs within the civil justice system as a result of closures due to the pandemic and just if you can just give us a wee update on where where things are. Yes I mean I think it's an issue that's clearly been in the news I think particularly on the criminal side I think that's been quite a bit in the news with the the fact that you know there is quite a bit of a backlog that needs to be cleared on the criminal side it's not quite being the same on the civil side so the proceedings have continued throughout on the civil side there's been a number of adjustments that have been made many of those have been able to be made by court rules so some by legislation obviously the Covid legislation but some by court rules and sheriff courts restated business very quickly I would say after the first lockdown and the business continued to take place through the pandemic so they were conducted a lot of times on the phone so they used telephone conferencing but they also have a system called civil online I don't know if the committee are familiar with that and so they're able to to use that to carry on by the end of last year all the sheriff and civil courts were able to conduct proofs debates evidential and fatal accident inquiry hearings rather virtually using their WebX video so I would say there has been an impact I think I'll perhaps bring Neil in to give a little bit more detail we think that business is down in general so there's no black backlog as such in civil but we think there has been an impact it has reduced the amount of business that's gone through so I don't know if Neil wants to give the committee a little bit more information on that yeah thank you minister and to see that the minister's reflected the position very well what we saw was relatively quickly after the start of lockdown a drop-off in the volume of business being initiated in the civil courts but very quickly the courts were able to put in place particularly using technology moving much of the business either online initially using telephone and then more recently as the minister says using the video techniques by the summertime the civil the court of session had largely moved its business online and then that spread over the civil court so I wouldn't want to say there's been no impact because there has been an impact in terms of the drop in business but we're not seeing the same level of backlogs there may be an impact on individual cases and again I wouldn't want to deny the impact of that for family cases and so on but on aggregate the business has been dealt with very well by the the courts and by the legal profession a couple of following questions from that then there's some concern that for some people perhaps a minority the virtual hearing provides a barrier and maybe that's partly explains the reduction in business so just to hear a bit about how we're making sure that folk aren't falling through the cracks and if business has gone down does that mean that folk are just not seeking justice or does it mean that these are cases that are going to come down the line and we need to be prepared for that going forward? Yes well we don't know I think is the answer in terms of the number of cases we think that the number of family cases in particular there's been less cases that have been started in court so it may be as you say that those cases will come through in the future but at this point we don't really know I think in terms of virtual business you know it's a mixed picture I think there was in terms of remote hearings I think there was a lot of positivity around the remote hearings particularly for procedural hearings I think right across and I think that would apply in civil and criminal as well that there was positivity around that there's been a number of there's been quite a lot of engagement actually and I'll maybe ask either Denise or Neil to speak to this there's been a number of surveys done by the law society I think and so on I think the faculty of advocates as well have done some engagement with their members around you know what do they think about this going forward the Lord President has actually suggested that he thinks perhaps remote hearings should certainly feature going forward in some form or other and I think Covid and sort of adapting to Covid has has presented us with opportunities I think so that ability to change things I think in some cases it's been really beneficial so previously for civil business the business was actually pinned to the walls of the court that was the way they used to do things and obviously during Covid nobody was going into court anymore so they then published that online and I think most people would say that those type of changes are you know they're more efficient that you know they're allowing us to get business done so I think going forward what we need to look at and I think this applies to the criminal system as well as to the civil we need to think about which of these changes you know what use of technology is working is improving the system and what we should retain and what we shouldn't and obviously we want to make sure we maintain access to justice we don't want participants you know if that's complainers whatever to feel that they're not you know being able to present their evidence in the best way so we we definitely have got to get a balance there so I don't know if one of the officials wants to come in a little bit more about the sort of the research that's been done into is it Neil? Yeah happy to cover that and just you're absolutely right that you know one of the things we have to be aware of is that different people engaging with the system have different needs and we need to take account of that in terms of the use of technology and it's important to distinguish between what was possible during the pandemic when the choice was between cases not being able to go forward at all or moving them moving them virtually and the position as we emerge from the pandemic where we want to learn the lessons of what's worked well and what might potentially be able to continue as the minister says so the committee may be aware that the scotty civil justice council that has a role in terms of looking at how the civil justice system operates published a consultation document this week specifically seeking views on the types of business that going forward would be appropriate for electronic procedures and those would be better for in-person procedure and part of that is exactly the issue that you raised convener around different people engaging with the system have different needs and ensuring that that's reflected in the choices that are taken. Great well thanks very much I think the committee would really appreciate being kept appraised of any developments in your thinking in that area that would be really helpful. Pam Gossel followed by Pam Duncan-Glancy. Good morning I've got a follow-on from the convener in relation to that I am the portfolio holder for the shadow minister for education so my question is really around the interest of having broadband poverty and how you've dealt or fitted that in with your remote hearing. Absolutely that is an issue because let's take the example of maybe family court you know if you are fleeing domestic abuse and you're not living at home and you maybe you're you haven't got your phone you haven't got an internet connection you know you're not going to be to potentially be in a position to sit down in front of a computer and calmly kind of access and take part in your court proceedings so anecdotally we have we have heard about issues around that so we we do have an option for telephone so they used phones instead so they didn't expect everybody to have a broadband connection because I think you know that's not necessarily everyone would be able to do that so I think there definitely was consideration made of you know the fact that not everybody is able to use technology obviously to interact and you know as we've been discussing earlier as we go forward we want to make sure we look at that we don't want to completely move and we're not suggesting that we are going to completely move everything to an online platform because that wouldn't be appropriate but yes I think that's a good point to raise. Thank you. You touched a little bit minister on data so my next question is around that given the importance of equalities data measuring and tackling structural inequalities whether there are any plans to improve data collection in the civil justice sector? So we do have a cross justice working group on data and evidence on race so that has been established recently and that is working to improve the collection and reporting of race data and evidence within the justice system. I'll ask Neil if that's okay to give a little bit more background on that for the committee. Yeah you're absolutely right in terms of the importance of equalities data and as the government moves forward with its agenda for focusing on human rights that becomes all the more important so this isn't just an issue for the justice system it's recognised as a cross government issue ensuring that we improve the data that we've got around equalities issues so there is an analytical group that's been set up looking specifically across government at what we can do to improve data on equalities issues and justice is represented on that group. As the minister says we've also recognised on the justice board for Scotland that includes the key justice leaders a specific need to improve the information that we've got within the justice system around race and the information about people within the justice system and again there's a specific targeted group that's been set up to look at that recognising that as a gap that we need to do more on and it fits within the wider context that certainly over the last 10 years we've been working to try and strengthen and improve the information on justice as a whole but civil justice in particular which is an area that's always required some further attention in terms of proving that so again all these areas of work that are leading together to try and deliver that improvement that you're describing. Thank you I've just got one from a constituent that I'll bring up as well with the minister if it's okay that obviously going to remote hearing this was a family case and my constituent felt that they couldn't be there in person so they couldn't feel that they were they could justify things or talk about things more when you're face to face you have that empathy they can talk more and they felt that remote hearing was a barrier is that something that you came across that people put forward to you did you have any findings from that any data that people felt that they just couldn't communicate or felt heard yeah I've certainly heard that anecdotally but I don't think we've got any we haven't got any research findings at the moment on people's experience of the remote hearings I think you know I think we've covered it we we moved online for a number of these areas particularly in civil in order to keep that business going and I think most people would say that they didn't want to wait a year for the outcome of the hearing in a family court case they want to get that business through court and to you know hear from the sheriff and to decide what you know is going to happen to their family issues going forward I do completely accept that for some people their remote hearing would not have felt you know like the same as sitting in a room and being able to to have that interaction with the sheriff I think for some people they might have preferred it I know that also there are some people that perhaps are in a domestic abuse situation who find it really difficult to sit across the table from from the person that they consider to be their abuser so for in some instances I think remote hearings may have been an improvement for them so I think it's a mixed picture but I do take your point yeah do you mean I wonder back you just add to that to say that the point that you raised was also raised with us by the faculty of advocates when the minister and I met with him and I think they have a similar concern that even putting their own case across is somebody very accustomed to a courtroom they feel they can get you know as you say body language you can lip read to some extent what people are saying so so there are two sides that as a minister says there are real benefits to this in certain circumstances on the one hand the faculty of advocates also raised with us the point that was first raised there shouldn't be a practical logistical reason for somebody not being able to participate so we talked about additional keyboards and iPads being used by some people and what we can do to help with that so going forward it's going to have to be being aware of both I don't know about others but certainly in my political party we will not be dispensing with the use of online fora because people can make these meetings which you can otherwise make so it is going to be a blend and I think just the last thing to say is that the Lord President is a very good refreshing attitude to this to say that he is very keen to learn from what we've done during Covid keep the best of it but be aware of some of the shortcomings one of what she mentioned going forward. Thank you for the statement so far I'm really pleased to hear what you've outlined in terms of the qualities data and that kind of cross-government approach because I think it is really important I know that organisations that I've met have said that there is a real lack of data so that's really helpful and about 75% of the 550 calls to the equality advisory support service from Scotland have recently come from disabled people about disability discrimination related issues and given that the service deals with all protected characteristics I think this shows that there could be evidence of quite a gap in unmet need for legal advice on discrimination for disabled people what's your analysis of underrepresented groups access to civil justice? I think that's a very good question so I mean we are obviously looking at reforming legal aid and I think one of the advantages perhaps of doing that is that ability to direct it to groups that may be facing barriers to accessing that I'm not sure if the officials can fill in on any research that we've done on that do we have any statistics? Yeah, we've spoken about this many times in the past. The legal aid system as it currently is framed in statute does have some limitations in terms of being able to flex and I think what in the reforms that we set out, the consultation that we undertook we did get some very good valuable feedback from consultees on the issues around access to justice access to legal advice for those with protected characteristics and indeed from those that provide those services as well and I think in reforming the legal aid system this is one of the things that we might be looking at as a means of improving the way in which the system can operate to meet individual or more kind of marginalised kind of needs at the moment it's a kind of one size fixed all it does have its issues it does have its limitations but these are the kinds of issues that can be dealt with in terms of the reforms that that ministers are involved in and as I say we got some excellent information from consultees in the consultation paper on it. One other thing to mention is obviously we do the the Scottish Crime and Justice Survey additional to the information that we collect specifically on civil justice statistics and part of the reason for that is to try and identify that unmet need that where people self-report having civil justice problems that we can compare that to the number of cases that are feeding through but you're absolutely right it's one of the challenges that we face particularly on the civil side of identifying that unmet need and it's something that we clearly need to do some further work on. Thank you can I ask just one one further question just to follow up that's really great about the consultation and the depth analysis that that brought for you and do you have a timescale for when when some of these reforms could come in because I did them I do remember working with you on this but it does seem like some time ago since that was done so if you have a timescale on it that'd be that'd be really good and do you have any other plans to look at access for access to justice for people with protected characteristics beyond the legal aid system but also looking at some of the expertise in the support from law centres for example? Yeah no you're right it does seem like quite a long time ago for the benefit of the newer members I've been in the justice portfolio for the previous three years of the last session as well and so I've been working on legal aid reform and reform of legal regulations as well for quite a few years. As the committee will probably understand there's quite a lot to work through here we're trying to take it at the right pace we're obviously trying to build consensus on some of the some of these changes are really quite they'll be quite widespread and they would have quite an impact in the sector so I think the right way to go about a lot of this and I think the way I try to work in general is to try to build that consensus and sometimes that takes quite a bit of time I appreciate that's not always what people want to hear because when people see there's a need and you've obviously outlined one well there you want to move forward and you know to address these things and and do it so I can apologise for the fact that it is going quite slowly on legal aid which obviously does give us that ability to to kind of to target legal aid in a way that we perhaps haven't been able to do before we're working towards legislation now so I can't give you a time frame in terms of you know when we would publish the bill because that is not up to me but it was certainly and we're looking at working towards something in the in this session of Parliament. That's very helpful thanks for that. And following on really from from hands questions thank you for what you've both said so far this morning already but just can I can I explore a little bit more around that the changes to legal aid? Denise was really interesting really grateful to hear what you said about what opportunities or what potential areas were in some of the views from the consultation and and how you might be taking those forward. In addition to Pam's time sale question which I think is really really key there are several other areas around access to justice particularly around debt advice that currently is is maybe not not very well met by the system and could you say a little bit more about that and I wonder also if you could say whether there is something connecting minister to what you said earlier around the ADR and whether there's a way to tie tie those two things together because not everything has to go through the the sort of more formal court process as as you suggested but there needs to be support for people to go through that process not only financial support but but sort of the the wraparound support to support mediation to support just other forms of dispute resolution. Thanks for that question yeah so I think just to set out a little bit of context about legal aid because I think sometimes we hear quite a lot about the problems with legal aid and I just want to for the committee's benefits just to set out a couple of the positives about legal aid in Scotland so the community might not be aware of this but 72% of the population in Scotland are eligible for for legal aid and we're actually a leading jurisdiction in terms of legal aid and we're one of the only uncapped funds that's a completely uncapped fund so it's entirely demand led and it's only us in the Netherlands that operate a system like that so it's just to give a little bit of context so I think it is you know it does work it is it is working for the people of Scotland but I think there's this idea that we wanted to modernise it we want to have a little bit more flexibility a bit like what we were talking about before we want to be able to direct it a little bit more than we have and also I suppose there's a way of thinking about legal aid and perhaps more in the way we think about our other public services because if you think about it it is kind of a public service so it's that idea of do we try to kind of reframe it in that way and potentially put the user more at the centre of how people access it and how we kind of set it up going forward so in terms of the timings obviously we've kind of talked about that already and I'll ask maybe Denise can talk a little bit about some of the the themes that were sort of coming through in the consultation but I think it was generally the case that people are looking for that sort of user-centred and much easier to use and access so Denise can you add a little bit more to that? Taking on kind of debt advice probably first you'll be aware that the Scottish League of Aid Board manages a range of grant-funded projects on behalf of the Scottish Government and those are around civil civil law areas there has been in the past quite a concentrated programme where multiple partners were part of that and that included debt advice when debt funding changed and the funding came directly to Scottish Government it now sits with Cabinet Secretary for Social Justice, Housing and Local Government and our colleagues in that side are taking a different approach to the way in which debt advice is delivered so in some of the projects that SLAB ran for us have changed in terms of the debt advice so there is a I think it's a route map or a pathway it's called so some of that debt advice project work has changed slightly in the past so we're still very involved in that we're still engaged in that work and SLAB is still doing it but it's part of a wider package and a more strategic approach to debt advice and how that is delivered in Scotland so previously to the changes in the way the debt levy was managed we were only able to access funding for Scotland through money advice service and now it comes directly to Scottish Government so in terms of that there is a very specific stream of funding and work underway for debt advice nonetheless many of the grant funded programmes that SLAB runs for us provide advice on a whole range of things including debt advice although that's not their their main area of work so those are really third sector organisations that are working right in communities and providing frontline advice and those are very important for us and not necessarily legal advice or legal representation they're very much at that entry level advice services we also have a civil legal aid offices that SLAB operates on those are employed solicitors that work around the civil legal aid and then of course we do have our law centres that do benefit from legal aid funding going back to the reforms one of the ways in which we might be able to adjust the legal aid system and again this is from the consultation paper is looking at the way in which law centres are funded it's quite a convoluted funding arrangement that we have for law centres and we're not necessarily able because of the legislation to provide direct grant funding to them so that's maybe one of the opportunities that I know ministers are very interested in in terms of how we move ahead with the reforms but we do work very closely with law centres we have been working with them throughout the pandemic and continue to discuss with them ways in which we can increase their direct funding packages through the the legal aid funded and of course the Scottish legal aid board is very much involved in that. Is that helpful? I'm just wanting to move on a bit. Minister, it doesn't seem that long ago you were at the previous Justice Committee on the Children's Scotland Bill and I wanted to ask a couple of questions around that. I want to ask what key issues the Government have identified in relation to the statutory regulation of child contact centres and child welfare reporters and if you can outline when you think the committee can expect the secondary legislation on these topics? Yes it doesn't feel like that long ago but I think it is I think it was September last year so we're still working on the analysis of the consultation responses so I'll have to come back to the committee if that's okay with the committee once that work has been completed. So I mean there were just the broad issues I guess that you probably would expect to come up so you know things on how would the child welfare reporters, how would it operate, how would the reporters be appointed and on contact centres as well as there was more of a sort of broad consensus that the centres need to be safe, they need to be welcoming, disabled access has come up as one of the themes as well that's come through on the child contact centres so those are the kind of things that have come up there. In terms of timings we're hoping to be able to lay the regulations this autumn and that would allow us to then make the regulations after that so we're working towards laying them commencing in this October, not October but it's that autumn so probably around about that time. Yes. Thanks for that minister and I think you touched on that you're still going through the responses obviously to the consultation but I wonder if you're able to outline a wee bit for the committee if you're able to some of the areas because I remember from being one of the members that helped to take the bill through last term and I think it was a really good bill and I know you yourself, we're really proud of it as well but some of the issues that did come up that the committee made comment on as we went through around the welfare reporters was who would be welfare reporters perhaps expanding that and then in terms of the contact centres some of the issues there in relation to perhaps how contact can be managed when there's maybe domestic violence in play. There's just like two examples I'm able to expand a wee bit on that if they are the things that are still likely to come up through the consultation. Yes, there's quite a lot that needs to be worked through with these and obviously child welfare reporters you know clearly that was quite a big part of the bill and we spent quite a bit of time discussing that and I think there's a real opportunity with child welfare reporters and their creators ads like them as well you know having that you know having that ability to sort of set training set standards make sure that the people that are doing these jobs you know are sufficiently trained to work with children can work in a trauma informed way you know all the things that I'm sure people in the committee would want to have but what we need to do now is work through the sort of feedback that we've had from the consultation and work that into you know the regulations that we'll look to lay so I think we've still got quite a bit of work to do. Denise are we able to say any more about what came through in the consultation? I think quite a mixed bag as with many of these things the devil is in the detail and as you know we maybe get broad headline responses a lot in favour and a lot against issues but in some ways the responses are dependent on the detail of how these things are going to be implemented to take them forward so some of those little knots are being unraveled at the moment. Thanks very much for that. Thank you I was following on from what Fulton was asking so you might have to come back with this answer as well but it was just in terms of that statutory regulation and what had came forward talking to domestic violence survivors and coercive control survivors who feel that they don't have much confidence in the civil justice system when it comes to family law who feel that maybe perpetrators know how to use and work the system as well so it was just to see you know what had anything came back on that and what would be worked on but you kind of answered that in that last question but just really highlighting that and also talking to groups of adverse childhood experience groups and child development experts who have highlighted the need for these trauma informed services and the importance of that so that when you know particularly families and young people are going through the civil justice system that limits as much damage as possible and people feel safe and confident within the system. No I would agree with you on that. That was one of the aims of the Children and Scotland Act that we took through the Parliament in the last session was this recognition I think that we needed to do more to protect victims of domestic abuse on the civil side. I certainly had a number of representations made to me by groups who said you know they were going through criminal proceedings for domestic abuse sometimes very serious domestic abuse and yet they would go into the civil court and you know it wouldn't kind of be taken account of in the way that you potentially might expect it to be so that was one of the aims of that bill and changing that law was to try to protect victims of domestic abuse more we're at the point obviously now we haven't commenced all the sections of the bill so that's why we're having this conversation now so it's not all in force I am very hopeful that when all sections of this bill do come into force that hopefully the perception and what actually happens to victims of domestic abuse and also to children when they're going through the family court system is much much better because that was what we set out to do really I set out to you know make sure that the welfare of the child was paramount but also to bring the child's voice into the proceedings so the sheriff will now be able to speak to the child and ask the child what they want and would just get that feedback and also with the child's welfare reporters and the register which is what we're discussing now that gives us that ability to make sure that the people that are doing that job and obviously these people are going into families to speak to children to speak to members of the family that they're able to spot things like domestic abuse because I think many people have you have to be trained in order to to be able to see what what you're seeing it's not always obvious and you know to act in that sort of trauma informed way as you've just described so that children are getting a better experience so so we're hopeful that that that will be the case I can't remember if there was sorry if there was a second part of your question have I covered have I covered that yet no I think that was it was a trauma informed services and support for domestic violence okay yep Maggie sorry no it's okay changing tack a little bit I know that earlier this year the Scottish government published its response to the consultation on challenging men's demand for prostitution in in the consultation there was no specific approach or proposal set out by the Scottish government can you give a sense of what the approach might be and also what kind of timescale we might be looking at for the next five years yes so last year we published what I think was a first so it was a consultation on you know what sort of approach we should take to tackle prostitution in Scotland with an emphasis on challenging men's demand for prostitution but also with the aim as well of working to reduce the harms as well and then supporting women should they wish to do so to exit as well so we received about 4 000 consultation responses which is quite a lot there were some from organisations and some from individuals as well and I think it would probably I mean they've been published so obviously members of the committee be free to go and have a look at the consultation responses that we received I think it would be fair to say that they were kind of evenly split although we didn't ask about should we change the law on prostitution in Scotland and there are lots of people who wrote in to say that they favored one criminal approach or another so lots of people supported the Nordic model which is the one where you decriminalise the seller and you criminalise the buyer and such as is done in Sweden and a number of the other countries in Europe and there was also probably about an equal level of support for what's called the decriminalisation model which is I think the sort of thing that they're doing in New Zealand so we've got a strategy in the Scottish government the committee may be aware of this it's called equally safe and so that sets out the commercial sexual exploitation of which prostitution is a part is a type of violence against women so I think we need to think in Scotland about if we want an equal society we need to think about how women and girls should be treated in Scotland I'm particularly interested in making Scotland a hostile place for sex traffickers I'm not going to be about the bush there I'm really keen that we set that out we're very firm on that and so to my mind challenging demand for prostitution is one of the ways that you can do that so that's kind of a long answer to your question and we're going to develop a model for Scotland which has an element of challenging demand in it but we haven't got to the point where we are you know we can set out exactly what that model will be I think we've got a quite a bit of road to go ahead of us so I wouldn't anticipate this bill is going to be coming forward you know eminently but I think there's a lot of potential here to to really think about how in a modern Scotland we want women and girls to be treated can I follow up thanks very much for that I suppose I hear what you say about it being an issue that divides opinion and I suppose I'm interested very very pleased to hear what you say about sex trafficking and you know making Scotland a hostile place for that I think that that's that's well said and I doubt there'll be many people around this table who would or any people around this table who would disagree with that I suppose I'm interested in in where there is division and where there is conflict on this issue around what harm reduction actually means and also separate to that just a question around hearing the voices of of sex workers and people who are who are not in prostitution for or as a mechanism of abuse or people who are not in it as a way as their only means of financial support or security and I suppose I'm interested in understanding how the work over the next couple of years or two or three four years to gather support gather information for the Scottish Government's approach how that will recognise those very very vocal but dissenting voices from organisations like scott pep and all the people who support their approach and sex workers rights and approach in all of this yeah I think you've hit the nail on the head there there's a quite a polarity of opinions in this area and I think that's one of the reasons why you know taking a little bit of time again I know I've spoken about this before but taking that little bit of time to see if we can build consensus on this issue might be a good way forward and I think you know the consensus where I see it is probably in a couple of areas so in terms of decriminalising the seller I think almost everybody agrees on that and I think that's something that we absolutely should do so I think that's something we can all agree on so there's good consensus on that area and I think having support services that are designed to reflect the priorities of of women because it is mainly women and girls who have been exploited in prostitution and I think that's really important and that we give priority to that service design and we make sure those services are there and that they're easy to access so I think that's another area that there's probably a lot of consensus I think I'm very interested in listening to the voices of people who have been involved in prostitution I'm probably some of the committee will be aware that yesterday there was a survivor led organisation that we're calling on the government to to really look at this area and see what you know more we could do so there's certainly voices there that we could all listen to so what what we're going to do I think there's there can sometimes be a problem with this we've we you know sometimes people who have worked in prostitution do not want to come and sit in a Scottish government focus group and talk about all the ways that they were traumatised sometimes they don't even want to admit to the fact that they've worked in prostitution so that that can be an issue so I think there are challenges around doing this but I'm determined that we will try to get those voices in here somehow so we're developing a programme for lived experience engagement so we're going to be working on that over the next year or so so I mean I'll be very happy to engage with the member further if she wants to contribute to to that to that work in terms of harm reduction though to my mind you know you reduce the harm if you can reduce the number of people that are being trafficked into the market of prostitution and if you look at the data trafficking inflows are much lower in countries that that challenged men's demand to purchase sex so for me I think we we do have a duty to kind of to take note of that I think we also have international commitments as well that we we need to make good on in Scotland and sort of move move in that direction and you know I'm sure we all want the same I think we all want the same things I think we want to reduce harms I think we want to protect women and girls from that sort of exploitation and I think we want to promote equality so that's kind of the starting point that I'm working from so I hope that you know I don't know if it'll come to this committee or or another committee but I really hope that we can work together to try to achieve those aims it's one of the areas that could there could be a couple of committees but we'll certainly take an interest I think is the point whether we're the lead committee and that's obviously for others to decide going forward but thanks thanks for that. We've got a couple of questions before I bring in Alexander Stewart. South of the border England and Wales there has been some legislation in relation to what would be called a system of no fault divorce or dissolution so just to ask whether there are any plans or whether we feel there's a need for such a system to be introduced in Scotland? I don't think there is from my recollection I think the divorce law in Scotland and England and Wales are quite different I think the issue if I remember if I'm remembering this correctly I think the issue was it was quite a long time frame in England where you would have to wait if the other if the other person didn't agree to the divorce I think it was five years them officials can correct me if I'm wrong on that whereas that's not the case in Scotland it's two years so we don't have any plans at the moment to do anything similar because I don't think that there's the necessity to do that in Scotland. Fulton. Thanks convener, this was the area where my supplementary was on and that relates to a constituent case that I'm dealing with just now and it relates to the issue of coercive control which we've already spoken about and we obviously in the criminal justice committee in the last session brought forward a really really good piece of legislation to outlaw coercive control. My constituent has given me details about a situation where she's experienced that coercive control through the civil court systems to quite a horrendous extent. I'm dealing with that constituency MSP and it's not for this committee but I did commit to asking under under this section today if you know if the government has any thoughts about strengthening the area there in order to parallel almost the criminal justice approach that we've now got in Scotland and I know that there are some safeguards already in place and that's in previous discussions but I think that you know there is obviously cases like this that are continuing to be exploited through the system if you like so. I wonder if you might not be able to comment on that today and minister I would have given you prior notice to this had the query not been so recent but just wonder if that's something that's in the government's thoughts. Given the change in the criminal situation I think it is. I think it's always a you know we are always sort of cognisant of that you know that potential for things to be used you know in that way but would it be okay if I give that bit of thought and come back to the member. Thank you and one more from myself obviously as well as the pandemic we are having to deal with the impacts of Brexit and so I just whether there's any reflections on the impact of Brexit on the civil justice system and particularly whether there are any common frameworks between UK Government and Scottish Government that you would feel it would be helpful to update the committee on. Okay so obviously Scotland didn't vote for Brexit and you know we're not it's going to be very difficult I think in a whole host of areas and I won't rehearse all of them now stick to my own brief where you know what we're going to end up with is far shy of you know the arrangements that we had previously so in terms of civil justice there's a co-operation that obviously existed between the members of the of the EU before that is obviously not the case now that Brexit's gone through so we're in a bit of a we're in actually a bit of an uncharted territory and I maybe ask if Neil can come in and give a little bit more background on this because it is quite complicated where previously the committee might be aware so we had Brussels 1A and we had Brussels 2A and we also had the Logano convention as well so we're not party to any of that anymore so that means that there is quite a bit of an issue with regard to that sort of civil justice co-operation on a number of civil justice issues across borders it's going to make things a lot more complicated and I think it's going to slow things down now on family matters we do have the Hague convention so that does give us somewhat of a backstop there or a fallback if you like maybe that's a better way of expressing it but for some of the civil and commercial we don't have that so the the best option here is going to be for us to to get the Logano convention now I think that will protect the interests of you know Scottish businesses and citizens the best although it's not as good as it was before but that's where we are now the position with this at the moment is that the European Commission has advised that the the EU shouldn't let the UK be a party to this so that's but they're not the decision makers it's actually the nation the nation states in the council that will make the decision at the moment some countries I think France particularly has said that they are not a fan of this and they do not want the UK to have it and some other countries are saying that you know they're okay with it so in terms of of where we're at now I don't know if Neil can add a little bit more detail on you know if someone has a civil issue right now when we're not covered what's happening and the I think that the ministers described the the position very accurately and well and I think to answer your question the honest answer is we don't know what the overall impact of Brexit has been or will be long term because this isn't the impact on individual cases it's also business that won't go ahead because the sorts of mutual recognition arrangements that were in place previously are no longer in place so we are very much relying on anecdotal evidence from the the legal profession in terms of assessing the the impact of Brexit and the law society said at the time that the Brexit deal was was agreed their real regret that civil judicial cooperation was not included within that and that it would have an impact they were very keen to see the as the minister says the the legano convention put in place swiftly and that that hasn't been the case so you know based on the advice we've had from the legal profession that will be having an impact on individual cases and more generally on the business that's able to go through the civil courts and as far as my understanding is that we don't have a date for either so we're kind of in an unknown territory right now okay thank you i'm sure you'll keep us up to date with any developments alexander stripped thank you convener we've touched on reforms already this morning in the committee but can i ask with specific to the reforms of the regulations of legal services and some of the recommendations that came from the roberton review and ask the the government how you're planning to to manage that that relationship with the reviews that have been proposed yes no i think you've alluded to something there so obviously we had the roberton report um i was a few years ago now i think was it 2018 so it's quite quite a while ago and um you know obviously that was quite a wide-ranging report and it put forward some some quite revolutionary i would say potential changes to the legal system so this idea that you move to a different model and i think it's fair to say that the the main recommendation of that report was not well received by many of the stakeholders i think i think that's clear so we're at the point now where we've we've consulted on that um and we have worked very hard um i'll ask Denise to to give a little bit of a flavour on this about how we've again tried very hard to build consensus to work with all the stakeholders um to to see where there might be a way forward and we're actually going to consult on a number of different models um in the autumn um so that will obviously give everybody an opportunity to see what kind of things um we're laying out and then for people to give their views on what that might be but um i think the thing to say is that really what we're trying to get to here is we're trying to um you know i would say improve things really for consumers um we want to to give that um a little bit more focus but also we completely accept that you know the legal profession are very important to what we're trying to do here and um we want to really make sure that we can put forward a system or a model that everybody can can work with and be be happy with so i'll ask if Denise can give a little bit more information on that um yes the report uh as Miss Denham has alluded to uh raised some quite quite challenging views and very polarised views as well um we embarked on uh and Miss Denham and her response said that she wanted to meet to make some kind of get some kind of consensus point so we um we um established a working group uh made up of members from the law society faculty, law com um complaints commission consumer bodies uh to try and work away through and understand where where the resistance lay to the roberton recommendations and why and uh try and work out ways in which uh there were alternatives to delivering on the the key kind of um outcomes that that ester wanted to achieve by perhaps a different route um that was uh that worked very well um it you know it was a very useful forum to share views across the different across the different viewpoints we did um develop a paper that set out all of the various issues that set out where there was points of agreement that set out other models that might of delivery that may improve the regulation of legal services in the way that ester roberton wanted to to see that meant the needs of consumers but also didn't didn't perhaps go through quite the revolutionary route that ester roberton suggested and that has formed the basis of a consultation paper which minister has has mentioned um the the recommendations made by the roberton review will still be there these uh we're not uh suggesting those aren't consulted on but uh what we have are some options that have tried to work our way through some of the more polarized uh views it's quite a tricky issue as well for consumers to consult on and to take views on so we've been working quite steadily with consumer groups and the legal complaints commission consumer panel for example to try and find a way of um um kind of developing an accessible means of consultation as well because as you identify that the consultation was very mixed in its views and opinions and it's how you manage to then take the wood from the trees and and come through that so that you actually do get the benefit of what the report was trying to indicate but also the consumer and the legal profession all marrying that together so that they all feel as if they've achieved something because if they don't there'll be people who felt that they've missed out or they've lost something from this whole process and that could be the danger we find ourselves yeah it's quite a challenge to get all of sorry minister it's quite a challenge to get the whole range of views in this work because quite quite a lot of it's quite technical so it's trying to achieve that balance where we do have the professions views but we do have those that use the services views we have those that represent consumer bodies and so on so it's quite a challenge to to manage through that and make sure that everyone's voice is heard thank you um so another couple of quick points um there was a consultation in i think the last parliament maybe maybe earlier in relation to maybe the parliament before in relation to succession law and the law of inheritance um and i think the there was a commitment by the government to legislate at the next available legislative opportunity obviously there was the succession scotland act which had some technical tweaks to the law but um you know that that commitment in 2020 i think for further legislation on a a law which i think dates back to 1964 um so you could just hear what your thoughts are on on how we might take that forward yeah so i think um attempts to reform uh succession law have been going on for about 35 years and again we're we're back into a situation a bit like the one we've talked about before where it's quite complicated and technical um and there isn't a lot of consensus on on the way that we should proceed so um in the last consultation that we did we did note that there were a couple of areas where we did find consensus so that was things like prohibiting someone who's convicted of murder from acting as an executor of their victims estate and reviewing the small estates limits and so on and we are definitely considering those type of reforms perhaps progressing them ahead of more fundamental reform as i said because of that lack of consensus around the sort of broader terms of what we should do in in a fundamental reform so it was sort of looking at those areas we're doing a bit further research on that we're looking at um public attitudes on that so i don't know if one of the officials can maybe add a little bit to that and we i can't really give you a time we're we're trying to look for a sort of a legislative vehicle for taking that forward but um but that's kind of where we're at at the moment. Denise do you want to add a little bit more about the research? Yes we've established a partnership with some universities to create the Scottish civil justice hub and the succession research will be one of the first jobs at the take-on so we're in the final stages of just final you know just making sure that we have the right kind of research project where the topics are the where data will be collected and so on so we we are in the very final stages of putting that together and being able to to get that research started. Okay thanks minister in your opening remarks you mentioned Scottish law commission bills there's two that i think are on our radar trust and movable transactions clearly there's an interface between ourselves and dplrc but it would be good just to to hear your thoughts on timings in relation to those two and whether there are any others that we should be alerted to. Yes so um we really value obviously important work that the slc carries out in you know updating and continually trying to modernise um scots law and bringing forward the reports so um there was a working group so i don't know if the committee aware of that so it was the the law commission um parliament officials and it was this way of looking at a more strategic way of progressing the slc bills through the parliament um i think traditionally it always been the minister for community safety that does that but i think there's been some capacity issues with the part of the committees and so on over the the last um maybe over the longer term because i think in the last five in the last session of five years we did take forward five slc bills so um but it's just this way of sort of looking at what you know more we could be done on that um so that that works on going i can't sort of preempt i think there may be an announcement in the programme for government on that later is that later on today so um i won't say any more on that i think in terms of um you know that referring of bills you know it's not really a decision that obviously a minister would make you know that that would but those issues certainly moveable transactions is certainly something that you know we know to the stakeholders a very important bill that they're very keen for us to to look at the modernisation of scots law in that area so it's something that we're very alive to okay thank you any other members got any last questions well thank thank you all so much that's been really helpful um obviously um no doubt we'll we'll see you again particularly the minister um given that your portfolio covers a big chunk of our committee's remit so thank you all very much and i'll suspend briefly the next agenda item is in relation to our work programme so i refer members to paper six and ask them to note the decisions that were made at our business planning day if any member has any comments please can they email the clerks directly um so that concludes the public part of our meeting our next meeting will be on tuesday the 14th of september when we'll continue to take evidence on the petition to end conversion therapy and we'll hear from stakeholders representing the lgbti community we'll then hear from the cabinet secretary for social security housing and local government on the priorities for the scolish government in session six and i suspend the meeting