 Welcome everyone to the 31st meeting of the Equalities and Human Rights Committee for 2018. Can we please ensure that all electronic devices are on silent mode? We have apologies this morning from Annie Wells. Our business today is an oral evidence session with the Minister for Older People and Equalities, Christina McKelvie, MSP. For this session, we asked members of the public for their questions and concerns, and so today we will be putting their questions to you, minister. Before we move to those, the committee's call for questions received a number of comments about disability and the Department for Work and Pensions. Those referred to the overall treatment by the DWP of people with disabilities, work capability assessments and the recent comments of the UN special rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, Professor Philip Alston. As those issues are not generally within the remit of the committee or the minister before us today, the clerks proposed to write to the Social Security Committee, bringing the comments to their attention, and that letter will be posted on our website. I'd like to thank everyone who submitted questions and took the opportunity to engage with us. While we can't get through all the questions that we received today, you can still engage with the committee through the normal routes, for example by taking part in our calls for views. I'd like to welcome Christina McKelvie, minister for older people and equalities. Lisa Bird, director for equalities, human rights and third sector at the Scottish Government, and Duncan Isle's head of human rights policy at the Scottish Government. As this is the minister's first evidence session with committee, can I invite her to make an opening statement of up to five minutes? Thank you very much. Good morning, committee, and thanks for having me back at committee. It's a bit odd to be at this side of the table, but I'm absolutely delighted to be here today and my capacity as minister for older people and equalities. As someone who knows at first hand how important and essential the work of this committee is and the vital role it plays, I'm really pleased to be here too. As you know, the role has recently been advanced by your impressive report on human rights in the Scottish Parliament, and I will respond formally, but I wanted to take this opportunity to give an overarching welcome to your recommendations, which build directly on existing strengths that we already have in Scotland, and that was a really welcome report, and I'm looking forward to responding to it. I was obviously very honoured to serve as convener of this committee, and as minister now with responsibility for both equality and human rights, I look forward to being able to assist the committee today and in the future in the work that we undertake together. Before taking any of your questions, I want to say a few words about my approach to my role and where I believe we are already making a difference. Like this committee, I care passionately about deep-rooted unfairness and disadvantage in our society, and I actually came into political life in order to end that unfairness and disadvantage. But while it's important that we are able to identify and describe those issues, this can't be about simply feeling good about caring. What really drives me is making a difference in people's lives, and the officials will tell you that my famous cry is where's the outcomes. The reality is that while we have seen some progress, and evidence shows that that has not been fast enough or maybe deep enough, then it should be, and I'm very keen to ensure that that does happen. But above all, I want to see improved outcomes in relation to equality and human rights across government and the wider public sector. We will only achieve that by ensuring that we are listening to the voices of the communities and impacting on their day-to-day experience across a range of policy, development and service delivery. That's why your questions from the public are very welcome on that matter. I am very clear that I have an overarching responsibility for pulling together this Government's overall focus on equality and human rights. That's the role that the First Minister has asked me to undertake. However, I have a very experienced ministerial team of colleagues who also care passionately about those issues, too, and we're working very closely on that. There is much joint ministerial work going on, and I'll touch on that in a few minutes. We will be working with them, and I will be working very closely with them to ensure that we are driving change across their area of responsibility as well. My role is to challenge us all to do better and where necessary to ask the difficult questions, yes, even of my ministerial colleagues. I do believe that I'm pressing to make the progress that we now need to see across the board. We have some strong examples of areas where we are already making that difference. I am delighted that next week I will be attending a conference to discuss progress one year on after the publication of our race equality action plan. One of the most important actions in that plan was the initiation of the ministerial working group on gypsy travellers. I know that's of keen interest to Mary Fee. As the committee and others have highlighted, this is an area where the pace of change has not been enough and what fundamentally we all agree is a human rights issue. The ministerial working group has brought renewed focus, and I fully expect to be judged on the basis of the actions that we will publish next year, and I'm hoping that the new cross-party group is going to help us along the way with that to implement those actions. Related to key areas such as housing, education, employment. When we looked at employment about gypsy travellers, it became very clear, very early on, that we needed to change the focus on that a bit and look at the overall issues around poverty, benefits and everything else as an impact on people's employment outcomes and the lifting people out of poverty. We changed that focus slightly, and we had some great evidence from two women from one of the gypsy traveller sites on the very simple challenges that come along with that. If they're simple challenges, then they're simple fixes, and that's the approach that I'm taking. A key aspect of the work in this area has been supporting and listening to the voices directly from gypsy traveller communities, and I'm particularly pleased that we have been able to directly support women and young people to have their experience heard. The Gypsy Traveller Women's Voices project has just got off the ground and we heard some of the yesers of the cross-party group. I get great faith in making a difference with that group there. Of course, young David Donaldson, I met at this committee in the work that we did when I was on the committee, is taking forward the young people's assembly and with some of the other young people in article 12. Amazing work going on there. Also, the First Minister's advisory group on women and girls and on human rights leadership continue the theme of reaching out to hear voices in new and different ways and challenging us to improve. Both are producing reports for the First Minister and she is considering the recommendations as we speak, I believe. We will continue our strong commitment to take decisive steps forward towards gender equality and to embed human rights in Scottish life. On the latter, I am looking forward to attending the major human rights conference being held in the chamber on Monday by this committee, marking 70 years of the universal declaration of human rights and I want to take this opportunity to commend the committee on its work in making this event possible. I'm honestly really looking forward to it. Finally, I want to highlight an aspect of the work that I am responsible for which exemplifies the importance of working with my colleagues in a genuinely cross-cutting way. We will shortly be publishing our final social isolation and loneliness strategy, following a very, very wide range consultation. These are deep-rooted societal issues and the causes and potential solutions are not just straightforward, but I believe that the strategy that we are producing across Government will set a clear direction to make progress and real change in people's circumstances and experiences. All of the examples that I have just given you and those are only a few highlight the importance of putting both human rights and equality at the heart of everything we do and I know that that is something that this committee wants to do as well, not just with Government but with Parliament too, but there is so much more to do and there are questions that you have received from the public highlight that demonstrates how important that these issues are and I am very happy to take those questions now. Thank you Minister, without further ado we will move straight on to questions. Thank you. Good morning minister. It is nice to welcome you back to the committee. The minister will be aware that this committee considered the gender representation on public board Scotland bill earlier in this session. In fact she obviously led the committee through that process. In relation to that act, John Thomson asked on Twitter what is the status of the gender representation on public boards bill that passed almost a year ago. Is there any scope for public comments by the specifics of its implementation? The straight easy answer is yes. I will go into some detail on that on your question Mr Cole-Hamilton and thank you for your warm welcome back to the committee. As you know the act passed in January 2018 after being considered very thoroughly by this committee. It received royal assent in March 2018 and the regulations and the guidance will go out to consultation. That is why my straight answer to Mr Thomson is absolutely yes. There will be an opportunity at that point for full public consultation. I would encourage Mr Thomson and anybody else who has an interest in these matters to take part in that consultation. As you know Government wants to ensure that we use the lived experience in all of the policy making that we do now. Mr Thomson's thoughts and anybody else's thoughts on that will be very welcome indeed. Please look out for the consultation. It will be happening soon and as soon as it does please raise it with Mr Thomson in order to give him an opportunity to respond. Given where we are now looking back on the bill is there any gaps? Is there anything that we should have done differently with the years behind sight? I think from my point of view I don't think so. However, lots of people have lots of different views and possibly the consultation will throw some of that up but actually I'm quite confident that we scrutinise this pretty thoroughly when I was at this side of the table so I'm pretty confident that we haven't missed anything but if anybody thinks that we have we'd be happy to hear that. We're definitely going to get through all the questions so we're going to be very disciplined in our supplementaries and answers but Gail Ross has some subs. Thank you convener and I'd like to welcome your minister into your new role and back to the committee. It's good to see you. On the gender representation on public boards we did say at the time that we were hoping that it would encourage private boards as well to go down the same lines. Have you seen any progress on that or what can be done to encourage those? Interestingly anecdotally I've seen some private companies now looking at this and how the benefits of having a more diverse board and that's not just about gender representation it's about having a much more diverse board and the difference in the additionality that brings to any company. I don't have any examples at the top of my head right now but I have seen some anecdotal work towards that and certainly a lot of conversation and debate going on about the benefits of it so I would encourage all private companies in the public sector and use that as a template to take forward more diversity on their boards too. Mary Fee. Good morning minister. Public sector equality duty requires public authorities in Scotland to consider equality between protected characteristic groups and potential impacts on them. This question was asked on social media by Scottish women. As the Scottish Government undertakes the regulations, will the minister consider what recourse members of the public might have when public authorities fail to have due regard to those with relevant protected characteristics? Yes, as you'll know that the Scottish Government started recently to look at the public sector equality between what more we can do with that and whether it needs to be updated so there's a bit of work going on around that right now and looking at that. I called them over the summer. I managed to take most of the summer to meet with all of the stakeholders across all of my portfolio but a lot of the stakeholders who would have a real interest in this asked for some additional time so we were looking at quite a tight timescale to do this, they asked for the review to be stretched a bit so we agreed to that because we want to hear from people so we wanted to ensure that they realised that we were listening and we were acting in order to ensure that we have the best time. The provisional timetable for the review will be over 2019 with possible amending regulations on the basis of the feedback that we have from all of the stakeholders coming into force around 2020. Obviously at this point it doesn't stop groups from getting involved in this and we would encourage them to do so but you will understand that the equality acts are reserved to Westminster the duties on them are a matter for the equality and human rights committee we know that it's not a statutory requirement to do the review but we decided to review elements in relation to devolve matters and as I say, stakeholders have asked us for more time and we are about to do that you may also know that Scottish ministers have no powers to enforce we would possibly quite like those powers but we have no powers to enforce either the public sector equality duty generally or the specific duties in particular and the compliance process is set out and I can ensure that the committee is giving the link to the compliance process so that you can inform that your questioner is to where they can go to get some of that information but at this point in time specifically we don't hold the power over that aspect of it that is the equality and human rights commission and we would direct your questioners to the human rights commission thank you minister that was a very helpful answer and hopefully that will answer the question that was posed could I perhaps also ask the minister if she could update us on the Scottish Government's work to incorporate the UN rights of the child and if perhaps if the minister could give us a bit more detail around the first ministers group on human rights leadership absolutely there are other ways to the first minister has given the commitment to incorporate the principles of the UN convention of the rights of the child that work is obviously going on a pace right now it's work that's been undertaken by my colleague Mary Todd and maybe it'll be an opportunity for you to have a deeper conversation with her on the first ministers advisory group Professor Alan Miller has been working very closely and I know that he's worked closely with the committee too on recommendations the first minister told him to be bold he reassures me that he has been bold whether that presents certain challenges for us in government I'm sure it will but there will be challenges I think that they will be worth undertaking as you know the first minister is considering the recommendations now and Professor Miller I think will publish his report at your event on Monday so I'm really looking forward to hearing what he's got to say the first minister will make some initial responses to that on Monday so to prevent me from cutting across the very important job the first minister has to do because it is her advisory council that's maybe all I've got to say on that right now but I'm really looking forward to Monday to hearing what both Professor Miller and the first minister has to say minister in terms of the public sector equality duty it was raised with me actually only yesterday that there might be some issues around data particularly around race as a protected characteristic do you or your officials have any reflections on what we can do to better improve the quality of data that lets or bodies assess the outcomes of the policies that they're implementing I've not had that feedback I've managed to meet with Bemis and Crier over a number of occasions in the past two months and I've not had that feedback from those organisations so if that's a specific issue I would be keen for you to write to me because we want to sort that out we're obviously looking at the first year's review of the race equality action plan and if there's an issue in there about how we collect data especially if we go forward in the review of the public sector equality duty and what that means for public authorities and their responsibilities and the rights of people to access their rights in that sense and see on the specifics of that we can do that Oliver you do a quick supplementary I just wanted to return to the UN rights of the child and just ask the minister whether she was aware of any consideration that had taken place of the draft bill that the Children's Commissioner and others had suggested to the Scottish Government ministers and whether there was any work on going on that my quick answer is I'm not sure what would that work so if you allow me to consult with my ministerial colleagues I can come back to you on that very helpful, thank you okay, Gail Ross thank you convener and again good morning minister panel we're going to go on to gender recognition legislation now a number of questions were asked in relation to gender sex, the rights of women the rights of trans people the gender recognition act the Scottish Government recently consulted on a review of the gender recognition act a majority of people responding to that consultation supported proposals to introduce self declaration for legal gender recognition however, concerns were also raised about women's safety in particular about the potential for such a system to be open to exploitation and abuse by men allowing them access to women's spaces such as refugees and women's prisons and where they could potentially cause harm those concerns were also raised by those who submitted questions to the minister can the minister comment on the concerns raised regarding the safety and rights of women under a system of self declaration absolutely, thanks for the question it's a very good question and we completely understand some of the concerns that are being raised here 15,000 odd responses to the consultation some very detailed responses in that too and the proposal within the consultation is to shift away from a medical diagnosis in order to gain a gender recognition certificate to a more social diagnosis in that sense wouldn't be a diagnosis sorry it's probably the very wrong word to use but away from the medical model anyway the consultation proposed a new system and under this a person seeking gender recognition would continue to make a statutory declaration so you couldn't just flip back and forward because the statutory declaration has to take place in front of a notary public or a justice of the peace it's a solemn act in that sense and actually something if it's abused and there's been a false declaration made would be a serious criminal offence with a sentence of up to two years for someone who would maybe abuse that system so I would hope that that would reassure people that this is not just that you can flip back and forward to suit you that it's actually a serious declaration that you have to make in front of both either a notary public or a justice of the peace and it's a very solemn oath to take the other thing is about risk assessments now the equality act currently allows exceptions in women only spaces whether that's refugees or prisons and women's organisations in the prison service use these all the time so those exceptions currently exist there is no proposal to change that so those risks would always be assessed based on individual need and individual risk therefore minimising any fear that that would happen now the equality act is reserved to Westminster and the Westminster Government have already informed us that they have no intention of changing that part of it so that proposal will still be in place the way it is now so those risk assessments would be taken on individual risk individual need therefore there should be limited scope for any abuse in women only spaces in that sense so can you pinpoint for the people that are worried what is the exact change it's just making it easier to be amended is that correct there's no other changes to things like because we've had representations about things for example sports prisons as you said refugees and so many other things that are already happening at the moment there's no changes to any of these things at all the exceptions that currently exist under the equality act will remain in place so all of those fears and I understand that they are legitimate fears that people have shouldn't materialise obviously we can't legislate risk completely away but if we take the approach that we have taken thus far I suspect that those risk assessments will remain robust we're attempting to take the most inclusive approach to this as we possibly can and the main issue for trans people is whether they need a medical certificate or not the main change is that you wouldn't need a certificate but you would still need to go through the formal declaration procedure which is a north in front of a notary public or a justice at the peace we have another supplementary minister concerns have also been raised about the guidance issued by the equality and human rights commission on the provision of single sex services it was highlighted that the guidance is inconsistent with the commission's response to the UK government's consultation on the gender recognition act Lisa McKenzie asked if the minister feels that the commission's guidance is sufficiently clear and if it's well understood by organisations that wish to offer or do offer single sex services in the earlier answer and I had explained for the public sector equality due to that the equality and human rights commission is a reserved body I think if the UK government are not making any changes here it made there either and I think the specific concerns about the guidance may be raised directly with the equality and human rights commission but as I said in the earlier answer if there's no changes proposed in the exceptions that protect women and women only spaces right now I don't see how the risk would be increased however maybe the equality and human rights commission would be the best person to answer you on their guidance for them and the UK government it's not for me Thank you The intersectionality around this issue is quite stark and I struggled to think of an equality issue where tensions between equality groups are as fraught as they are with this and we've seen protests at Pride for the first time this year and other events like that I wonder can the minister tell us about any international examples where other nations have already embraced this, have already travelled this road and whether there are learning points for how we win hearts and minds of people who have understandable anxiety about this but at the same time that we achieve progress for our trans citizens Yeah, not off the top of my head can I think of any you've really caught me out here mystical Hamilton which is always always tricky aren't you off the top of my head any international examples I know that who are working on this and the cabinet secretary is leading on the proposals and the reform of the act are doing a lot of work to look at areas where we can learn from you're absolutely right, there is people who do have very legitimate concerns and fears around this our role is to try and find the information and the examples that maybe allay some of those fears and do the job of reassuring people that any risk that they feel is there that we can minimise that as much as we can and I would hope that they would be reassured by the actions this morning I can certainly go and look at international or ask the officials who are working with the cabinet secretary to look at the international examples and come back to you with some of those if that would be helpful I would be very grateful if you could I think you mentioned yourself that there are 16,000 responses to the consultation and I think that itself is symptomatic of the mobilisation on both sides of the argument that sort of went with that and so this issue has the potential to be very divisive I would like very much to learn from the experience of other countries about how we can heal those divisions how we can find a progressive and reasonable path forward which achieves the goals that I think we all share on this committee but heeds the anxieties from those other communities I completely agree Gailia Dabrif Thank you convener Just quickly minister there's been a lot of chat across social media and people have actually come to see me as well and one of the prevailing perceptions is that this is going to somehow erode women's rights I wonder if you could put people's minds at rest about that I'll be the last person in government who will ever allow anything to erode women's rights in government on that that's not to put aside some people do have legitimate complaints in issues we are taking all of that into account there was very very clear and detailed responses in the consultation some of them from international people as well who had some great support for the scheme and others who had some concerns about it so we've taken all of that on board my reassurance would be that we would not be undermining any women's rights in Scotland if anything we would be making our nation much more inclusive and understanding of the differences and the diversities that we all enjoy minister one of the concerns raised was about the conflation of sex and gender do you have any comments on that because I suppose that the fear in terms of diminishing women's rights might be around how we define women and Alec Cole-Hamilton talked about intersexuality obviously all the qualities are equal there's no hierarchy there so an answer to that question might reassure people I think you're absolutely right and the term sex and gender in lots of documents and policy over the years has been interchangeable so we don't see the two things as very separate there's an argument about biological sex and that's a scientific argument but when it comes to equalities and equality's policy sex and gender have always been pretty interchangeable in that sense and I don't see much an issue with this there's a clear understanding the protected characteristics and the equality actor are on sex and the hate crime legislation or the hate crime review has thrown up some issues around gender and misogyny and how we deal with that I think what we need is some really clear on how we can take that forward and we're working very very closely with the stakeholders in order to get some of that clarity because I think some of that has been a bit confused and we need to make sure that we have a much clearer and factual response to some of those arguments we're working on that as we speak OK, Fulton MacGregor Good morning minister in panel I've got a question here from Julie Van Den Drish what do you have in place to ensure children suffering from invisible disabilities and their families are fully supported do you have any plans to fund advocacy services to ensure all children are able to make the most of their early opportunities and not fall through the cracks Mr MacGregor will know this is an issue that's been close to my heart for a very long time I was instrumental in ensuring that the autism strategy came into place and was very pleased to launch it in 2011 my former colleague Hugh O'Donnell who was the central Scotland Lib Dem MSP worked very hard with me on that in the first session we were in Parliament he'll know that getting it right for every child is our national strategy and that underpins everything that we do our proposal and our ambition is that every child would reach their full potential irrespective of the barriers and the challenges that they have in that and all the learning environments should be meeting children's needs and whether that's in a mainstream school whether it's in a special school whether it's other flexible learning examples, for instance in the gypsy traveller community we have a bus that provides education so we're looking at all the flexible opportunities across that but it should be based on a child's need and what they need to do to thrive and flourishing in a flourishing school I'm working very closely right now with Mary Todd on how we support young people with disabilities in school at transition points which I know you will understand is sometimes the most difficult stages nursery to primary, primary to secondary secondary into further higher education or into workplaces or into adult services so we're currently working on a better strategy in how to make that much more seamless we're speaking to parents and stakeholders on that in order to make that difference so I know that there are key elements where no doubt the question was keen to understand as well but you're absolutely right about how do we make that all happen in schools so there's a number of ways we make that happen right now better joined up working between social work and social care departments in schools better understanding and support for the staff who work in school and that's not just the teachers when it comes to teacher education there's new sections in the initial teacher education training there's consistent and currently in CPD going on with teachers who have been through their initial teacher training and that's to help teachers to identify the challenges to come up with the strategies and the opportunities to support a young person and currently teachers and some young people are helping to redesign some of the products and frameworks and resources that are currently used in schools in order to do that we're also working with universities to explore how we increase the understanding of disabilities and the impact on learning in order for teachers to ensure that they can support young people better and to give teachers confidence in the tools that they need in order to take that forward one of the questions you asked about was about strategies and examples of advocacy you'll know that we fund Enquire which is one of the organisations to support parents and children you will know that any person with a mental health issue under the Mental Healthcare and Treatment Act will have independent advocacy you'll also know that NHS boards are funding I hope you know this NHS boards are funding the Scottish Independent Advisory Alliance which has been central at supporting young people to make their own decisions as well as supporting everyone around them for me advocacy services are central to ensuring that young people realise their human rights and families realise their rights are good, fruitful and education we're looking at how we can make more of this information available and there's publications going up on the children's advocacy guidance is all up on a link and I can provide that to the committee as well that will give you some information and the Scottish Independent Advisory Alliance recently published guidance for independent advocacy too many independent advocates when working with children and young people and that guidance is currently publicly available to some of the things that I realise and the work that I do when I'm working with families who have children with disabilities going through school and visible or otherwise is that they're not sure where all of this information is I think we've got a job of work to do to make sure that they understand where all of this information is how they can use that information as an independent advocate to realise their rights and the best way to make the learning experience for that young person the best learning experience it can be so there's a whole host of work going on, most of it being led by my colleague Mary Todd but some of it being led by both of us in order to deal with some of the real pertinent challenges around about transitions we have a couple of supplementaries if we could have them quite concise questions and answers that would be great. Thanks very much for that response minister and you can tell even the way you answered that your passion for this area and the work that you've put into over the years I've had a couple of constituents recently who have got children who are autistic or grandchildren who are autistic and have been quite concerned about their access to health services in the delays is that something you'd wish to comment on? How do you think health boards can improve in that area? The honest answer is that some of this can be quite inconsistent and one of the things that the Scottish Government worked on was the autism toolbox which can be used across lots of public authorities and that allows identification of need and support and planning in order to put that into place the autism strategy is obviously a 10-year strategy and we're coming close to the end of that if there's clear examples of where that's not worked and possible referrals to CAMHS for diagnosis and I suspect that's because I've had the same cases as you no doubt referrals to CAMHS but I have seen smashing examples of that and then I've seen some challenging examples of that as well. That's usually when individual cases are a bit more complicated in how we do that if there's a specific issue around how that's being conducted either locally or nationally and you have some evidence of that I would be keen to hear it and I could then have conversations with my health colleagues in how we address some of that would that be reassuring? Yes. I'll be very quick and ask two quick questions in one does the minister, given our concern and interest in autism feel that the not included not engaged not involved report is a cause for alarm for a lot of families and what is she doing to help end unlawful exclusion of young people from school and secondly, looking at my own local area does the minister think it's acceptable for parents and children to be waiting for three to five years to get an autism diagnosis? It thanks very much Mr Mundell for that question that you'll know that there's been a response from the cabinet secretary for health on some of the issues in the report obviously it was concerning for all of us there is work currently on going to look at how we do that better I think and I'm pulling this for the back of my head that Professor Ann Donaldson has done some work on placements out with Scotland which was one of the issues that was brought up especially around about young people with learning disabilities or autism my reassurance to you is that there is work going on right now I can bring you back some more information on that and I'm sure that that will be helpful on waiting times I don't think anybody would be happy with a waiting time for that length of time and again that I'd be happy to have a specific geographical issue there that we can attempt to address by having to do that thank you we're going to move on to disability and accessibility now minister we received a number of questions around accessibility my question is rather a long one but it does reflect all of the issues that have been raised with us Taryn Cotton asked about accessibility in public transport, retailers and the provision of disabled toilets Teresa Connor and Robert Duff asked about the enforcement of blue badges and pavement parking Catherine Calzika pointed out that a lack of disabled changing facilities can prevent those with disabilities and their carers from being involved in their community Mary Batchelor Clive said these may be small things but they have a large impact on our daily lives what is the Scottish Government doing to ensure that disabled people are not prevented from being able to participate in activities or undertake routine tasks such as shopping due to inaccessible buildings and the lack of appropriate transport absolutely can I agree with the questioner Mary who says that these may be small things but they have a great impact I absolutely agree, I understand that very clearly and maybe know that the Fairer Scotland for Disabled People Strategy and Action Plan has been published we've got five long-term ambitions in that and 93 individual actions and within those actions a whole host of issues in there so let me go through about accessibility public transport you've just reminded me something else in my head there I'm going to tell you a wee story about something in a minute but let's look at some of the strategies that are available to people in order to change some of this and there's a real commitment within the 93 individual actions to do this you may realise in the chamber a few weeks ago Liz Smith asked me a question about Purple Tuesday which was an event organised to increase accessibility to shopping coming up to Christmas people want to get out and do their shopping and how we can get out and meet people in our local communities better my response to Liz Smith was that we welcomed Purple Tuesday but we wanted to make sure that Purple Tuesday was every day ensuring that people have that better access and we're doing some work on that I'm going to meet with her soon to discuss some of the challenges with people like Ewan's Guide Ewan's Guide is very very close to my heart because I supported the event here to launch Ewan's Guide and to see it going from strength to strength and that's a guide that's informed by disabled people for disabled people on where the best places are to go where the accessibility is it's a very very positive one but obviously reviews everything so within that you see some of the negative reviews and some of the challenges that people have in accessing either their town centres or shops or theatres or whatever so we're working very closely with them to make sure that that goes from strength to strength and continues to do that so that's one part the other part is around public buildings and accessibility and how we can make sure that we can do that because it's older buildings it's a bit more difficult to retrofit that but I don't think it's beyond the realms of imagination to make sure that they can be retrofitted to do that and you will know that the Fairer Scotland for disabled people strategy has an actual action in it that says places that are accessible to everyone and that's not just maybe about people who have disabilities it's about how a community can grow as a community grows older as well it's about frail, dementia how that's all friendly and inclusive for everyone so there's some specific actions and the action plan around that the other issue is about accessible toilets and how we can do more of that and there's a bit of work being done on that right now we're working very closely with Pamys who are the gold standard in all of this and I've got two quick stories to tell you one is about public accessibility public toilets there's a family locally that I know who dropped their dad off on a Sunday night at Glasgow airport and pick him up on Friday night every week because he works abroad and one of their children, the youngest one has a cerebral palsy and there was no real decent facility at Glasgow airport so that mum campaigned alongside others and I was able to go along in one of my very first duties and people would say, you opened a toilet and there's a life changing for that family because Glasgow airport stepped up and came up to the mark consulted with Pamys and got one of the best facilities that I think I have ever seen that's an example of a private company that can do that and if we can all do that then we should be doing it and public buildings there's obviously a responsibility under the public sector quality to ensure that we've got more of these and there is work on going please reassure your questioners that there's work on going the other issue is about just getting to places being connected using public transport where that public transport is successful and you know that most of it is now but another story that I'm going to tell you is about a visit I did in the summer down to Gala Shields to the Gala Wheels project who were a small community transport project all of us noddy's head because they're absolutely amazing and they had just managed to raise some funds to get one of the big all-sing and all-dancing buses with all the different hoists and everything what that did was open up a whole world for people who couldn't maybe use other modes of transport and they are now using that and some of that support comes from the Scottish Government we have a fund to train their volunteer drivers to do that so in some cases public transport might not be the answer for someone because it doesn't address the need whereas funding for community transport links like that does address the need and I was hearing a great story from one of the organisers to say they take a trip into Edinburgh they take a bus into Edinburgh a lot of the people don't come back with any shopping because they just go for the journey the go for the connectedness the go to deal with maybe if they're facing some social isolation and loneliness and they use the community transport link to do that so lots going on it's maybe never enough to make the pace of change that we want to make but we would hope that when it all comes together there will be 23 actions that we will see real progress in the near future very much for that very full and helpful answer before I move on to the specific supplementary that's been sent into us I want to just to pick up on the issue of accessible toilets because I'm sure the minister will be aware of the recent amendment I got through the planning legislation to ensure that all new public buildings and stadiums and shopping centres have a changing places toilet there is quite a difference between a disabled toilet and a changing places toilet changing places toilets have hoists which enable people with more profound disabilities to be able to go out but there is the issue of the many many hundreds of buildings that currently do not have a changing places toilet and I would be grateful if the minister could perhaps give us some idea about what kind of work the government will do because retrofitting a current disabled toilet into a changing places toilet isn't that big a job? Is the government considering any work and perhaps putting in a fund to allow retrofitting? We've got the budget next week Mary and you'll understand that it's a difficult process to go through so putting that on the table is there in full view there's already work going on after I've seen what happened at Glasgow airport and had some representations from PAMAS and other organisations about the work that we can do your amendment very helpfully going through in the planning bill has added some impetus to that so we have got some work on going and we are looking at how we can fund some of that there may be more innovative ways of funding it as well especially when it comes to maybe business or public sector business as well so let me have a look at the progress we've made on that and come back to you on it and update you then I'm sure we've got things to say but I'm not sure whether I can say it yet That's very helpful, thank you Mary, can I just come back to you on blue badges because I know that I've been in there obviously blue badges, we keep that under review all the time when we've just done the review and extended that a bit there has been a call for some reform on this and Transport Scotland are currently looking at that so I'm just awaiting then coming back to me with some information on some of the proposals that are in that so I'm going to go back to you on that Mary and Barnett has asked us that due to the inaccessibility of certain local public buildings she is unable to participate in local democracy what steps can the Scottish Government take to ensure that people with disabilities are not denied the opportunity for political participation This is a really interesting one because you know that a building was inaccessible there should have been provision made to make it accessible or at least services within it accessible to that person so that's obviously a very particular thing I would hope that Mrs Mary and Barnett she would contact her local MSP in asking for some support especially if it's a public building that's my first thing on political participation per se we're doing quite a lot of inclusion Scotland along, funded by the Scottish Government is doing the internship programme and I suspect that many of you have had interns I've had one myself and for the UND of persons with disabilities last week I went to meet some of the interns to see where they are now and the work that they're doing and the progress that they're making and it was just fantastic a very simple partnership piece of working has created so many opportunities to have the right support and what was really heartening because I asked some of the tough questions but is your boss good to you do they look after you do you feel part of the team some of the things that can be the biggest challenges and the biggest barriers and they all had fantastic things to say they were not all without some challenges but they were able with the right support to address those challenges and to see that happening whether they want to become politically active and you would think when someone's got that amazing lived experience whether they want to be that political active and bring some of that experience to politics which would be absolutely wonderful that you'll know that the participation I'm trying to remember the name of it now but the participation and elections fund that the Scottish Government brought forward last year I think there was 30 odd people supported through that and I think 15 of them got elected it was a very simple way to ensure that we open up all the horizons and open up the opportunities for people with disabilities to get involved in policy making a few weeks ago I was along a partners and policy makers conference where there's a funded programme for parents of children with disabilities to take part in policy making to uphold their human rights and to be champions for those human rights and again you know another great example of the work we can do very simple good partnership good collaboration, good support and it creates so many amazing opportunities and I hope to see some of those 15 who were elected last time in this Parliament the next time Oliver Mundell Questions 6 What action is the Scottish Government taking to ensure that everyone has the right to adequate housing in Scotland? In particular social media user JHF I asked about the difficulties people who have been involved in the criminal justice phase when they're trying to access this right You'll know that rehabilitation back into the community if you've been part of this criminal justice system can be quite a tough one for people we would hope it would be a tough one when they come in contact with the public sector and public authorities who have a responsibility to house and look after people and leave some of the most advanced housing legislation in the world and we're currently reviewing that again to ensure that people get the opportunities that they need you will not be surprised Mr Mundell when I tell you that Mr Stewart is leading on all of this especially working very hard through the planning bill and the work that's going on right now you will maybe also know that the fairer Scotland for disabled people strategy has actions specifically housing related ones and that was to ensure that local authorities set realistic targets for new builds and Mary's very helpful amendment will ensure that that focus is even sharper now but set targets that create flexible housing opportunities that ensure that these opportunities are accessible obviously retrofrit in old homes is sometimes more difficult but if we can build out into the system and build out of the system the barriers then you would have more flexible housing opportunities to do that the local authorities have a duty on them to report annually to the Scottish Government on the progress made and we can get you the most up-to-date annual report on that if it would help you there's also wheelchair accessible guidance to local authority which will be available early in 2019 so again another action in relation to fairer Scotland for disabled people and we can get you that guidance as soon as it's made available there's also a refreshment of the local housing strategy guidance which will be expected early next year too so both of these things should come along about the same time and that's to enable local authorities to take cognisance at the planning stage how we build out the barriers and create those more flexible situations where flexible building actually meets the needs of people where that's happened already and new builds already of the 2016-17 new builds actually met the housing variant needs standards so we're already getting to a stage with new builds where we're getting we're making real progress here with the guidance, both pieces of guidance that will be out in the new year or early next year we should be making much more progress towards this and I think the amendment in the planning bill again gives that renewed focus that's excellent thank you I think that covers a lot of the supplementary questions that people have asked as well I'll just ask a very short question of my own I'm conscious that we want to get through all the public's questions so I was going to pause the members we've got two more to get through so I'm just alerting you and the minister to that because I know we'll want to have responses to all the public's questions okay, I just maybe just put a comment to the minister back to me separately to this just round particular problems in rural communities where the social housing stock and otherwise doesn't make there's not a lot of alternatives available to people and just what financial provision there is for people to adapt their own existing home okay can I speak to Mr Stewart on those specifics about your particular geographical area and come back to you then I'll be happy to do that Gail Ross I'm going to move on now to older people minister and there has been much discussion in the media recently of an intergenerational divide between young and old on everything from housing to Brexit as an example, earlier this year the new statesmen described baby boomers versus millennials as the defining schism in UK politics and in April the observer asked millennials are struggling with baby boomers Collette Gregg asked on Facebook what is planned to prevent the division between young and old which appears to be encouraged on all of the media it is negative and serves no real purpose other than to cause anger particularly from the young can the minister comment on what work is being undertaken in Scotland to foster positive intergenerational relationships I certainly can this narrative of them versus us and who's to blame is incredibly unhelpful however we are taking some steps to deal with that we believe that older people being the minister for older people but not defined by it obviously is that older people make a positive contribution they bring their wisdom they bring their experience they bring their life experience to all of the work that we do in creating the society we want to be we're all getting older our population is getting older as well so we've got some real demographic challenges to face in the future so in order to ensure that we can face those challenges and maybe not come up against too many it's to create the narrative that is positive it's wise, it's lived experience and it's that experience that we want to keep in everything that we do I would hope that about £400,000 £490,000 that we have committed to older people's organisations to tackle the barriers will be a way to do that and the framework around that is all about positivity it's all about the positive contribution and it's all about working together across generations we fund an organisation called Generations Working Together in order to do some of this work and they do fantastic work if you can get an opportunity to go in your constituencies to see the work they do please do it, you will be absolutely gratified I had a brilliant experience in my constituency in doing that but one of the things that older people's organisations when they're tackling the barriers look at is about independent living is about maintaining that independence in your community, in your household and in your family for as long as possible promoting people's rights and the equality around that should always be framed in a positive way we have the older people's strategic action forum which is chaired by me now and recently we freed up about £50,000 for the Opsaf members and organisations to help inform the work that we are doing on the framework and that takes me to the actual piece of work that we are doing in order to address all of this the older people's framework we hope will be published around about springtime the older people's framework will focus on a few key elements positive contributions is at the very top removing barriers and ending negative perceptions is there too in order to inform some of that work I went up to visit Hanover housing project in Elgin who have just built a new housing development which is not just for older people there's some people in there with some disabilities mental health issues, learning disabilities all living together in the community it's a beautiful new build fully accessible fabulous facility but in the centre is a courtyard and the courtyard was gorgeous I like gardens so and I was like how is the courtyard so nice and then they showed me why it was so nice because next door is the nursery school and the kids from the nursery came in and look after the garden and they go in the chap everybody's door saying come and help us sort out the high dangers and they were giving me all these Latin names for the plants as well but it was a perfect example of what we can do when we bring together the framework and we have generations working together we end all that negative perception we bring all that wisdom and lived experience back in to young people's lives we hopefully give them something that they can aspire to because when they hear some of the stories of the lived experience of maybe the older generation they can say I could do that or I could maybe be involved in that but to see that really key intergenerational work was a real joy and that's where we want to get to so much for that answer I guess the strategies that you just mentioned would protect the social rights of older people in Scotland as well for example the right to education and the right to take part in a cultural life as well could you maybe expand on that please absolutely and the framework looks at all of that and again another anecdotal story on a human face on policy you can see it in action and a recent visit on the day of the UN Day of Older Persons I went along to Queens Cross Housing Association in Glasgow who have got the most amazing community link worker set up there and I met a group of older people and some people who were social isolated and lonely within a tenement block but hadn't spoken to people for years who have used the community link worker team to bring them back to give them a new outlook in life to help them to upgrade their actual homes to deal with some of the health issues that they have but one amazing thing was every single one of them were registered at the local college didn't matter what age they were and I had a fantastic hand massage from an old lady who has decided after all these years that she's going back to college and taking full advantage of her student discount card Minister the young women and lead committee report into sexual harassment in schools highlighted that 91% of their focus group participants considered sexual harassment or gender-based bullying to be a problem at their school the report also noted that more than half of girls aged 13 to 21 think that those who report sexual harassment may be bullied or teased so on your portfolio responsibility for women and gender equality Twitter user Scottish Women asked what are the minister's views that sexual harassment and sexist bullying of school girls were not explicitly named within the respect for all anti-bullying guidance can she guarantee these incidents will be accurately recorded and monitored in order to tackle it Can I pay tribute to the young women lead project and the work that they've done because it's informing all of the work that I'm doing in this area Can I also pay tribute to the girl guides who came and seen this committee during the prejudice-based bullying inquiry that we undertook here who came and seen us in private first to talk about some of the issues that they had experienced and then felt confident enough to go on the public record some of that was absolutely harrowing so with all of that in mind that's how I'm taking forward the work that I'm doing now Can I be absolutely clear that sexual harassment or abuse of any form anywhere is unacceptable and it needs to stop I want to make that absolutely clear that the support of sexism and sexual harassment and or assault are very different things and we have to be clear about that as well and the support needed for a young person who is demonstrating bullying behaviour and a young person demonstrating inappropriate sexualised behaviour is very different to and we must ensure that children and young people get the support that they need to address that so putting that on the table what are we doing to address some of it all of it I suspect Equally safe at schools is currently being rolled out we had a pilot a couple of pilot areas running one in a school in my constituency currently 26,000 young people who have gone through that process the sexual violence prevention programme that comes along with Rape Crisis Scotland the stamp project along with Equally safe has now been rolled out just recently to all 32 local authorities so hopefully that will address some of the issues around what the difference is and how we can deal with that the PSE review also has elements of training in there for how we deal with consent because again that's another issue about interpretations of what that means the resources that are available there's many many resources available including the EIS booklet getting it right for girls and guidance for teachers but one of the specific asks on your question was about how are we recording this and how are we making sure it's been recorded properly you'll know as a result of this committee's inquiry there was data collection and how data is used and the richness of that data was a key element of that so we've taken all of that on board and CMIS which is a data collection scheme that's used in skills in order to address this will now allow schools to record any underlying prejudice or any negative behaviour reported as an instant of bullying and this includes an option to record an instant based on sexism and gender so let me be absolutely clear that there'll be opportunities now for schools to record that more accurately we can get more accurate figures which means that we can target our resources and our focus of attention much clearer but on the wider scope of things in the new year I will be launching a sexual harassment and sexism public awareness campaign and that will be early next year and there'll be a specific strand of that work with children so I would hope that all of that would reassure your questioner that the work is ongoing and we're taking it very very seriously Thank you for that answer When you say it will have a specific strand on children I suppose that the thrust of the question is that people may be concerned that naming male violence as what it is becomes diluted I mean certainly the answers you gave showed that it's not the case but would you recognise that concern that if we don't talk about violence against women and girls specifically that something might be lost? I suppose that that could be a legitimate concern but I would go back to all of the other actions because it's not just one thing it's not just the anti-bullying strategy and bullying is a very specific thing and I would be a bit worried that we would actually dilute the fact that there's violence against women if we don't separate it out in that sense and that's why equally safe with schools the sexual prevention stuff, the consent education all that work I think we'll reinforce the fact that we're absolutely serious that any form of sexual harassment whether it's in schools or out with schools is just not acceptable and we're taking actions to address it Thank you, we've a couple of supplementaries Mary Fee Minister you touched on the inquiry that this committee did when you were a convener and you may remember that there was a kind of a perceived not every single incidence of bullying was being recorded because of the perception of stigma that would be attached to the school how confident are you that that has now changed I accept that you've spoken about equally safe and all the work that's been done which is really welcome but if there is still a fear or a concern in some schools that they don't want to record everything how are you going to go over that? Two ways there's a whole school approach which means that the whole school has to change its culture and we've seen some great examples of schools who did that the other way is around about the inspection and regime so in schools so there's a bit of work being done which was a recommendation for the committee report which again one of my other ministerial colleagues is leading on that piece of work and Mary Todd, Mary and I we work together in a lot of things because they have that impact but there is a key piece of work going on around about that right now and it's her lead that's on it so I can get you some additional information on where we are with this but you will know that that was a recommendation from the committee's report and the government are taking forward all of those recommendations so we'll come back to you and give you an update Perfect Thank you for the comprehensive answers as you know sexual harassment is a spectrum it ranges from physical abuse to online grooming and exploitation before I came to this place I sat on the ministerial task force on child exploitation and I was the youngest person in the room and that was something I raised at the very first meeting and that saying something can I ask if we've made progress in terms of involving young people who know far more about the social media platforms and the fora and the frontiers where they are most at risk and what involvement are you using for them not just in online sexual exploitation but in the other policy areas around sexual harassment You'll not be surprised that one of the reasons why I commended the work of the young women lead project is that they're all over this stuff the Scottish Youth Parliament are all over this as well and the equivalent committee to Euros have raised some very very interesting work that they are doing around about the rights campaign and how we involve young people in one of the pilot schools which was in my constituency I went in one day for a meeting for something else and the rights respecting committee of young people were delivering equally safe in schools to their peers so there's a lot of work going on where we think that peer education will be the key to all of this and that's the approach that's being taken is how do we make sure that we have relevant policy that's informed of the experience of young people and in most cases delivered by young people the sexual violence prevention programme the pilots for that stamp project was all run by young people and they're absolutely amazing and some of them come here to some of the cross-party groups in order to inform the work that gets done here bringing that age ratio down absolutely very dramatically indeed so there is, I can reassure you there is all of the work that we are doing across the board has involved young people and just last week in this room we had an everyday heroes event which was young people who had been through the criminal justice system as victims and witnesses when it comes to domestic violence and all of the recommendations that they made to us last week have been taken on board on how we can improve that process for young people as well so be reassured that young people much younger than you and I, Mr Cole-Hamilton are informing everything that we do Minister, thank you very much for your evidence this morning we were staying on a little longer than was planned so that we could get through all the public's questions our next meeting will be on Thursday the 13th of December where we will continue to take oral evidence on the young women's lead committee report on sexual harassment in schools from both representatives of the committee and the cabinet secretary for education and skills, John Swinney I now close this meeting and Mary Fee Intimated to the convener that I wish an item before you close the meeting I didn't close it yet I'm grateful to the convener for allowing me to raise this issue I would like to ask that the committee reopens the evidence and scrutiny of the age of criminal responsibility bill and I am asking this for two reasons first, the amendments that have been lodged by our colleague Alex Cole-Hamilton and secondly, the intimation that the UN are consulting on the age of criminal responsibility with an intention to raise the age to 14 early next year and in relation to the amendments that have been lodged by Alex Cole-Hamilton the amendments would raise the age of prosecution to 14 and the age of criminal responsibility to 16 and committee will be aware that we took no evidence on the age of criminal prosecution or on raising the age of criminal responsibility specifically to 16 I do appreciate that we had some evidence from stakeholders that they would like the age to be higher but we did not ask for specific evidence on 16 and it is my view in light of this that it is impossible for this committee to reach any kind of decision on these amendments and as committee members we have a responsibility to thoroughly scrutinise legislation which comes before us and the power of this Parliament is and should always be in our committees and it is therefore incumbent on us as committee members to fulfil our obligation and take further evidence on the amendments submitted by Alex Cole-Hamilton and fully consider the UN's intention to raise the age of criminal responsibility to 14 otherwise we will introduce legislation that will already be at odds with recommendations from the United Nations and let me assure committee that this is not about party politics this is about us as a committee fulfilling our responsibility and obligation to this Parliament okay Mary Fee you've put your views publicly as you'll know agendas have to be published in advance so there's not capacity to take items on the record they're not on the published agenda the agenda is a matter no I just wondered given the point that Mary Fee's raised if it would be possible to have a discussion in private session around the work programme the agenda is a matter for me as convener and I suggest that we put this item on the agenda for next week agreed? okay I close the meeting