 Good morning, and I'd like to welcome everyone to the 11th meeting of the Citizens Participation and Public Petitions Committee of 2022. We are beginning this morning with agenda item 1, which is an evidence session, with the Scottish Government response to the expert working group on institutionalising participatory and deliberative democracies report. Members will recall the working group's report sets out a range of recommendations for how the Scottish Government's ambition for transformative change can be delivered to make Scotland's democracy more participative and inclusive. We last considered this issue at our meeting on 20 April, and we took evidence at that from the working group itself, which was very interesting. I'm therefore delighted to welcome George Adam, Minister for Parliamentary Business to the Committee this morning, and he is accompanied by Doreen Grove, head of open government, good morning, and Gerald Byrne, team leader of the constitutional policy Scottish Government. Good morning to you both. Minister, I understand that you would like to say a few words by way of opening before we just pursue our questioning and see where we get to. Over to you, thank you. Thank you, convener, and with your indulgence to say a few words to start with. Thank you for the invitation to give evidence to the committee here today. I welcome the opportunity to talk about the IPDD working group report. The Scottish Government responds to this and our ambitions for the future of participatory and deliberative democracy in Scotland. I'd first like to thank the members of the IPDD working group for their all their hard work. We value their input, which will help us to build on the range of good work that we have so far done in the field of participatory and deliberative democracy. That's easy for me to say, convener. In many ways, Scotland is leading in the nations of the UK and strengthening our democracy. We recognise that the innovation in the field of participatory and deliberative democracy offers a range of benefits. People feel listened to, the trust in government improves and we are better equipped to take complex and difficult decisions. Policies are better informed and more successful and Scotland's democracy is strengthened. Scotland has so far held two citizens assemblies. Both of those were established to deal with complex issues on the basis that the policy outcomes would be improved. We know that the valuations of each assembly that the members of each assembly, including the children involved in the climate assembly, enjoyed their experience, learned a lot and want to take part in more activities. The combination of those benefits is why we have committed to running more regular citizens assemblies, including a citizens assembly for under-16s. We have also committed to offering people more opportunities at a smaller scale to be meaningfully involved in decisions that matter to them. Those are big commitments and we recognise that they represent new parts of our democracy. We know that we will need infrastructure and new processes to deliver those commitments and to learn the lessons from the previous assemblies. That is why the IPDD working group was convened in the summer of 2021. We are now considering the works group's recommendations and we will publish a response in due course. As always, convener, I am happy to take questions. It is worth noting that this whole process began with the previous Presiding Officer's parliamentary commission, which I sat on, and which looked at the whole question of public participation and deliberative democracy. A lot of work has been done here in the Parliament and I know by the Government in the time since. I will get round to a whole series of questions that we had a focus group just last week with a deliberative democracy event to understand. We will touch on it later but one of the issues that everybody will be wrestling with is the expectation that is created in the minds of those who are participating. That will be quite a challenge in terms of the reputation and sustainability of the whole concept over time because people will expect something to follow. I want to start off with some technical questions and colleagues will come in. We met the group with a very worthwhile and productive evidence session. How did the Government decide on the composition of the group? I know that Scottish Government officials were involved with the act of equal members of the group or were they there in a sort of supporting and advisory role? What was the kind of structure and how was it put together? I could probably talk for about five minutes but I'm probably better at asking Doreen who was at the coalface with regards to that issue as well. Thanks very much and thank you for the question. It's an important one. We looked across at bringing in expertise that could be seen as independent but provide ministers with very clear advice that was both relevant to Scotland experience and relevant to the international experience and looked at the learning from research in this field. It was about a third practitioner who are on the ground doing this kind of work, many of whom were from Scottish organisations. We also brought in European expertise, expertise from the US and Australia and also academics who have done a really solid study, not least being involved in the work around assessing our two citizen assemblies so that we could make sure we were properly learning. It didn't just involve Scottish Government public servants, we also brought in someone from COSLA and people from the Parliament's own participation working group. That was very deliberate and was approved all the way through because we had a clear terms of reference that was about setting out standards and values and looking at the overall way. There is a big appetite in Scotland for people to be more involved but, as you said, that can't just be random. It has to have some focus and it has to have real impact so really the working group was very clear about trying to look at how that would happen. That was what sat behind it. Public servants were on the working group, it was chaired by Kelly McBride who you met last time. There was a real set of equal voices but it was the expertise that we needed. That expertise wasn't sat in Government so that's why we brought in external expertise. Obviously, you haven't published a response yet but are you able to say in general terms what your overall reaction is to the report that you have received? Well, at this stage we're factoring and we're talking about this in the way over here. As in all things in life, convener, it's probably best that we step back and look at the information because part of the expectation of what the public are looking for out of this is that if we get it wrong at this stage then it's not going to recover from it because you brought that point up yourself earlier on, convener. I think that we're going to take our time to make sure that we get the process correct so that we can deliver for the people involved. One of the things that struck me was when I was talking to those who had been involved in the previous citizens assembly, was the fact that how enthusiastic they were about absolutely everything involved in it, how they felt that it engaged them politically again, which is obviously for us an important thing because we can all fall out and have discussions in various points of the day but the public sometimes they take a step back from the whole process and I think that's one of the advantages of that. We're going to make sure that we get it right and that we take time to deal with the issues that are there. I don't know if Doreen has anything to add or possibly contradictives than I've just said. Oh, would I dare? I would actually, to be fair. I think it is important to look at making sure that we are learning the lessons so there's quite a lot of work to do to look at making sure we can, for instance, one of the things that we really have to learn is around the independent governance of these processes but independence governance means that you're at a distance either from government or from parliament so making sure that it also has impact so putting those processes in place. We've created a set of standards and values that the IPDD group have set out so we're trying to work our way through those so that we can come back to you with a really clear view of how that will operate and to make sure we don't raise expectations that can't be met. If you're being slightly circumspect then at this stage on what your overall reaction to the report is would you go so far as to say that you feel that the group fulfilled your expectations in terms of fulfilling the brief that was set for them? Yes, we do. As I said in my opening remarks, we thank them for the work that they've done and it gives us an opportunity to reflect on it. It's given us pause for thought as well to see because we don't believe—you might be surprised that it's given you—a Government doesn't believe that we have a monopoly on all the good ideas and it's always interesting to see what others have to say so I would say that the answer to your question short would be yes. That's not the official record, Minister, so I'm sure we'll all take great pleasure in quoting that back to you. You will, but it will all be the first time in the last period of your time to test the water. I will dabble my toes in the waters of that statement and to see what response I get at the appropriate time. I understand, and having participated all the way since the commission itself and in other events, it's easy to set a timeline up and then actually because we do this in parliamentary structures to set up timelines because in a sense we anticipate what we might be going to hear and think therefore we can benchmark when the next milestone will be. With that and with the evidence that you are hearing, you obviously hear maybe fresh thoughts and challenges and ideas that may contradict positions that people have held before. In the sense that you are reflecting, do you have an idea in your own mind as to when you think the Government will be in a position to indicate what its thoughts are in a formal way to the report? As I said previously, convener, I probably couldn't give you a timeline at this stage because I want to make sure that we get this correct right from the start. I'm a strong believer in any form of public participation in the political process and we need to make sure that exactly what you said right at the beginning that people's expectations are correct. At this stage, I couldn't commit myself to anything. I've not been difficult. If I had, and I thought in my head that there was a timeline I had, I'd probably tell you, convener, but I just want to make sure that we get this correct. I think that I would conclude from that that we are not looking at anything imminent. It's going to be a reasonable period of time before we see a properly considered response. Would that be reasonable? Okay, thank you very much. Paul Sweeney? I think that there's a major point raised about local government engagement and wider and deeper engagement of local governments. What would the Government's response be to that recommendation about deeper engagement? From my own perspective, I come from a local government background myself as a previously being a councillor. My first experience of this type of engagement was as a councillor where local authorities went out to various groups and said, this is our plans for the next year. What do you think? How do you think? I was one of the few councillors that turned up at every event, mainly because I enjoyed engagement to see what was happening. I would say that a perfect example of that is what part of the Bute House agreement, one of the citizen assemblies that we're talking about, is looking at local government finance and how we deal with that one. That will be interesting to see what the public comes up with, because let's not give ourselves as politicians, it's something that we've spoken of and had various ideas for probably over the last decade at least anyway. We've discussed, so it will be interesting to see what the public does when they get all the facts and everything put in front of them as well. I'd be interested in that, but we're always going to work with COSLA on that one in particular, and I'm always one for looking at these different ways. It's not necessarily just citizen assemblies, but we can also look at the people's panels and things like that as well at a smaller level where we can actually get that form of engagement. It's about making sure that we do engage with the public and they feel listened to. As a politician, one of the things that I was quite interested in when I first came in at post last year, one of the first bits of work that I got to read was on the Citizens Assembly in Scotland's future, and one of the first things that I said to Dorian was that, as a politician, I'm trying to find out bits of this where I can deliver something to keep, as the convener says, the expectation that there's something to deliver here. I found that one very difficult to actually pick something that I could say I can deliver X, Y and Z in that one, because it was so complex. I think that one of the things that I've learned, having read that, is that, possibly, as Minister, we should maybe, when we're asking these questions, define them. The ones like the Citizens Assembly that were proposed on local government finance is a defined question. They can look at it. If I used other examples of questions that maybe we, as politicians, have difficulty with, and there's differences of opinion and quite passions, end of life choices, I'm just saying that. I'm not saying that there's a plan for a Citizens Assembly in that, but I'm saying that when it's questions like that, it gives you a real idea of where you can go. I think that one of the things that I've learned is that it might be less as more when you're asking the question. You get more value from it. From my perspective, I've gone off on a tangent there, Mr Sweeney, but effectively what I'm trying to say is that I do believe that we should engage with local government on that particular example, but there's other ways that we can work with them in public participation as well. Thank you very much. You just also want to know the Government's view on how this fits into the wider opening Government plan, particularly in monitoring and evaluation of the work. How would you see that working? Well, we've talked about evaluation part of what I just told you earlier on, is the fact that we have to make sure that there is value for those who are involved in it. One of the things that struck me was when you spoke to the people who have been involved in the Citizens Assembly, it was as if their eyes had been opened to a whole new world of the politics that wasn't for them or the political process, and then all of a sudden their eyes have been opened to it. Now, I want to keep that going, but at the same time, you need to make sure that there is something that you can deliver there. If I am critical—I wasn't in post at the time, but if I am critical of the way some of the previous questions were asked—there were huge, massive questions, and it was difficult for me to be able to distill that and deliver them. You said that we delivered. Mr Carlaw might be thinking that I'm going back to our bothers' respective car sales backgrounds here when I say that, but it's important. I used to have a councillor in Paisley, Jim Mitchell, who used to say that George Adam thinks that he is selling cars all the time. People are people and you need to work with people in a certain way, and being able to deliver and feel as if they have some kind of value from a process is the important thing. That is one of the things that I am hoping that I can bring as a minister to put that in that direction. Can you ask a bit more about what the Government's specific governance arrangements might be to oversee that exercise to ensure that the satisfactory outcomes that you envisage would be achievable? I am happy to answer the general open government question, if that is helpful. Open government is something that we, as a country, signed up to four or five years ago. It is about how we do government, what are the things that hold us to account that make transparency important, but that last little bit of open government is how people can participate. Absolutely, this is front and centre of what we are trying to create is a public service that is confident and competent in order to involve people effectively. That is not everybody in every room, but it is looking right across the piece at how you get effective ways of getting people involved. We will really strongly see this as supportive of representative government, much as the participatory work you do within Parliament. It is about getting the right questions answered and having very clear transparency around the process also gives you the scrutiny that you just asked about. We would be very clear and the IPDD working group proposed an oversight committee, which is much like the one that oversees the participatory budgeting process at the moment that I am sure you are all aware of, which will bring in a range of expertise. Also, because of the importance of Parliament, you will see that the IPDD report recommended that this committee perhaps take a role in that, or that the relevant committee to whatever the issue around the citizen assembly, in particular that sort of scale of work really is. There is a clear route and these are some of the things that we are keen to set out for you as we do the response, so where those lines will sit and who does that and how it is done, and how we can demonstrate that there is that clear independence of governance that would give you that satisfaction. I just want to ask a bit more about how this fits into the wider agenda on participative and deliberative democracy. How does this report fit into that wider vision or objective? Very clearly. It emerged because we are, as Mr Adam already said, we are leading in the UK already and we work quite a lot internationally with OECD and others looking at how deliberative democracy can be established and can be really supportive in helping to work through complex issues. This committee, the working group, was set up in order to learn those lessons, to bring in the examples and to set out how we think we can do it here in ways that support the government's priorities, that support really getting better decision making. This is about how we create that infrastructure and what it means to have a responsible way of thinking about how you involve people in decisions that affect their lives, because if it doesn't do that, then it's wasted. It absolutely fits with the community empowerment agenda. It fits with the developments around participatory budgeting. We are trying to make sure that it links right across to the outcomes, because if the outcomes aren't improved by this, then you find another method. It isn't just about one method. We use user research and design thinking. We use improvement processes. We use citizen juries. We use citizen assemblies and people's panels. There are all sorts of methods. It's about finding the right one to do the scale of the task. As Mr Adam has already said, being really thoughtful about what that task is, not everything needs to go to a citizen assembly. Not everything is appropriate for that sort of scale of event. One of the things that we're really thoughtful about is how you make sure that all of this kind of work is properly inclusive. What are the mechanisms to get the people involved that aren't generally involved in decision making? How do you do that? How do you make sure that you're going to the people furthest from Government in order to make sure that you pick everyone else up on the way back in? At your last session, you heard from Talat Yaqoub, who set this out really very carefully. Within Government, we're trying to look at all of that advice from RSE, from Talat and others, to make sure that inclusivity is meaningful, that that's not just a word, that it's fitting into how we develop the participants, how we think about the ways that their participation happens, how we present ourselves in the room. Being really thoughtful about where you hold this, whether it's online, whether it is in person, what support you put in place for participants to make sure that they can, that kind of pastoral care that makes sure that it can happen effectively? It's one of the points that I brought up earlier on, as well, as the make-up of six assemblies and various organisations that we do for them. I remember from my time in local government, a lot of the time sometimes it could be the usual suspects that turn up at absolutely everything. David, Mr Tons is nodding, because he remembers from these days as well. One of the things that I said, particularly with the young people one that we're talking about, my first thing to Dorian was how do we get the young man and woman from Ferguson Park? I used the language of the hard-to-reach people, and Dorian quite rightly corrected me at that stage and said, that language is part of the problem, because you're saying they're hard to reach, because it's just the shorthand that we use as politicians to say, but how do we make these things valid and get those people involved? It goes back down to ensuring that they're enshrined as part of the process here and also delivering and also making sure that it's something, the question or what you're asking is something that means something to the individuals as well, but I'm not saying it's going to be easy, it's challenging, but it's one of the things that I want to make sure, because I don't want to be in a room full, I have a room full of people who have, this is yet another, organisation or kind of thing they've got involved in, because I don't think we get the value we really need. I think your points and reflecting on them raise a valid point about the tension, inherent tension between representative democracy and participative democracy, and there's inevitable conflicts. I think we can all sit here and kind of notionally say, I'll be great if everyone just agreed, and you throw everybody into this process and it will spit out a harmonious outcome and very rarely in reality politics. There's power relationships, there's dynamics that are in conflict, there's potential for tyranny, whether of a majority or a minority, and I'm just keen to understand a bit more about your reflections, your honest reflections on the limitations of some of this. I mean, one example that always strikes me, there's two actually, participative budgeting in my experience can often be an exercise in the sharpest elbows win, and if I can hustle the most people to an event, it goes right enough, things like that. And then another example that I often encounter is planning processes, particularly when there are consultation events, there are opportunities to engage, but it's only when people suddenly realise, oh, this construction started, what, when did it be, you know, and then that's when you get the emails and you get the agitation about why has this suddenly happened, you're like, well, you should have gotten touched six months ago when the guy was at the community centre with these notice boards about it, oh, and then I didn't know anything about it. You know, so I'm just saying there are already these examples which are defective as the Government recognising where these limitations are and how to address them. I agree, and I think it's, listen, sometimes we're going to ask questions and we're going to get answers that we probably don't expect as you, as I've already said, it will be extremely interesting to see what citizen assembly on local government finance comes back with when they're presented with all the facts in front of them, but it might not necessarily be an answer that any of us in this room would possibly think it would be, but for me, I always use the example of how you deal with these things and manage things. Again, when I was a councillor, I was in Renfrewshire access panels. There's access panels for those with disabilities all over Scotland. I went into the room initially and it was angry people who weren't being listened to by the local authority, and then I got to say exactly what you're saying, got them involved, the town halls being renovated, you're part of the planning process, get in there, you know, and find out how we can make that accessible, and it's making sure that they can be involved and deliver something for me. That's always going to be the most important thing. Is that easy to achieve? No. Is it challenging? Yes, but nothing good in life that's worth doing is easy. All of us are probably used to the political process, as you quite rightly said, Mr Sweeney, and how we deal with it. This is a completely different animal, and this is a situation where the public may, on certain occasions, give us answers that we will all be surprised at, but is that a good or a bad thing? Not necessarily. Does Government need to take that seriously when it comes in? Yes, it does. Will that be challenging as we go on forward? Probably, but we just need to get sleeves up and get on with it. I'll just add a little bit to that if it's helpful. One thing is that there are examples around the world where politicians are involved in this. So, in Brussels, the Parliament have members of Parliament who are involved in their citizen assembly, so we will get the learning of that, and I think it's really important that we do learn from those things. But power isn't a zero some game. We also have really clear evidence from the World Bank that where politicians get involved in really putting in place effective ways of your public getting involved, then you're more likely to be elected. Some of these are myths, and we need to be really thoughtful about them. But what we're trying to do with this is make a process that fits with our current representative processes, so it's not about finding something that's in competition. Thank you very much. David Torrance. Thank you, convener. Good morning, minister. The Government's view on the group's definition and whether the minister sees any issues with him not being definitive. The reason I'm asking that is when I asked Kelly McBride about definitive, the group acknowledged that there was no one set of agreed definitions that could be used as best practice. So how does the Government see this? Best practice in regards to… In regards to all the actions in the international, does it make sense for the definitions? As Dory has already said, we look to the international experience regularly to try and find out what is best practice. As I keep saying it, and I'm sorry if I've sounded from repeat myself, but this is the type of thing that's not going to happen overnight. We need to make sure that we get this to a place where it's right, it's proper and it delivers what the public more importantly want it to deliver. As I say, will that always be simple for us? Probably not. However, we always look to… It would be difficult to define it. I'll ask Dory to come in at one point. Personally, I think that it would be difficult to find that definition and to understand why it came to that conclusion. We wind that back. The working group looked at a set of definitions. Kelly McBride is absolutely right, of course, that there is no internationally agreed set. The OECD has done some fantastic work, which Scotland's been part of, looking at what's been described as the deliberative wave around the world. There are a set of definitions of process and we can define what we mean by it, but it's important that we do that in Scotland and do it in a collaborative way, so it makes sense here. What we're understanding is that we're all talking about the same thing. We've got a set of definitions of what a citizen assembly is, what a citizen jury is, what a people's panel is. They will change. The whole point of this is that it's about innovation, it's about finding better ways to do stuff. Those definitions will be changing. We will constantly look at the international parallels. Scotland has been a really active part of some of that international work, thinking about how we align this to existing systems, because every system is different. Definitions kind of matter, but they're a moving target and we will keep our eyes on that, but also try and get agreement on what they mean here, rather than setting out a blueprint that others absolutely have to follow. It's about having a collaborative way. You'll have seen some of the ambitions in the IPDD report, it's about collaborative work in the future. That's because we recognise that the Government doesn't have all the answers, that this really needs us in Scotland to look, as the RSE said, at that longer term, at having a strategy around how we build the capacity and understanding around that in Scotland. If you're looking for a definition, Mr Torrance, I quite like Doreen's better way to do stuff. That seems like I probably sums up everything that we've been talking about for the last few minutes. Sorry, I'm a fairly basic Jody. No, it works for me. Can I ask whether the Government agrees with the commitments in the programme for government and the Covid recovery strategy can be more effectively delivered with routine use of participative democracy and, if so, how? The perfect example is one of the people's panels, not necessarily a citizens assembly, but the people's panel that we've done in the lived experience of those with Covid. Again, it's an example of horses for horses. At this stage, we thought that a people's panel would be the best to get the information that we could get from the members of the public who had lived with that. Again, as politicians, we get caught in the bubbles that are here. That gives us an opportunity to look at how the public dealt with Covid in itself. Yes, long answer short would be that it's an important part of Covid recovery that we use options like that to be able to deliver and listen to in particular. Good morning, minister. As the minister knows, I'm very keen to get out with the bubbles from time to time. Indeed. Therefore, citizens assemblies are one of a number of different ways, convener, of achieving that objective. Can you, in all seriousness, say what lessons, what are the key lessons, have been learned from citizens assemblies? The ones that we've had at this stage, Mr Ewing, I would say probably for me, the lesson learned is the complexity of the questions when you're dealing with it. I think you need to find a way where the public can debate the issue and it's basically here is the issue. It was at Ireland that they did the abortion. They took a very difficult question for people in the Republic of Ireland and they did a citizen assembly on it and they delivered on the process. For me, sometimes it might be helpful for us as politicians and things that we've had difficulty regardless of party politics. It might be a way for us to be able to listen to what the public is saying. I use the end-of-life choices example as a perfect example of what the public has led to believe a specific opinion on that issue, but the Parliament seems to have a different issue. If you look at the previous votes that I've been with Margot MacDonald's bill in the previous session, it can be very helpful from that. However, it's down to the question of keeping it simple but keeping it in a stage where we can have the discussion and move on. The complexity of the first two, you had climate change and Scotland's future, so you had Scotland's future and saving the planet. Big, big questions! There was, if you've read what came back in both, very complex and no definitive actual, we want you to do X, Y and Z. For me, and I don't know, it might just be me, but I'm trying to say, well, how do I deliver what the public has said here, and that's where, I think, for me, that's a big important part, but Dori is probably more likely that she's been involved in a day-to-day basis with all the groups, so she'll probably be able to tell you more detail. One of the things that I'd like us all to learn, I guess, is how effective people were at dealing with very complex issues. One of the responses that we very often get from experts is, this is too complicated for people to understand. That's simply not the case. If you look at, and I'll use the example that the minister gave, the Irish Constitutional Convention met to look at a whole series of difficult issues for their constitution. The Constitutional Convention said, well, we'll do that, but actually we would also quite like to look at these other two, which were both abortion and same-sex marriage. Their processes were designed to set out how people could properly understand it, so particularly the abortion case. That is something that was very toxic for almost any politician in Ireland to deal with, but in the end what it meant was very clear because the whole process of doing a citizen assembly is about respectfully hearing each other's views, getting a shared understanding of the evidence, and then coming to some conclusions. The recommendations from our two citizen assemblies are actually being looked at right across government. They won't be delivered in one big bang, as Mr Adam says, but absolutely we are taking those seriously and looking at how they can be delivered. It is the mix of a much more credible set of policies around particular issues because you are dealing with the people who they are going to affect most. Being able to look at complex things as long as you are given sufficient evidence and sufficient time to debate it, we are all facing more populist Governments, we are facing misinformation. What it does is give people the opportunity to hear evidence, to hear really clear explanation. It is really important that that is balanced. It is cross-party that it is set out in a way that the participants are able to look at the issues and not the politics around it. It gives Government the opportunity to look at complex and difficult problems and make decisions on that after the public had had a look at it. I will ask how the Government is going to address the points on inclusion and equality that is made in the report, please. This is part of a really clear programme of work in Government around inclusion, the mainstreaming of inclusion. This work will connect very clearly to it. As I am sure you are aware, citizen assemblies are randomly selected, but in all instances they are also awaited to make sure that we have a broad cross-section of the population. We would specifically seek to overrepresent places where people who are going to be more seriously affected by whatever it is that we are dealing with. We will work that out for each instance, but we will have a set of principles that will be applied. It connects very clearly to that whole programme of mainstreaming of equalities that runs across what Government does. I just remind Mr Ewing what I said earlier on, particularly about the Children and Young People's Assembly that we are planning on doing, making sure that the inclusion of people and young people across Scotland, regardless of where they come from and where they live, is quite important. The equality and inclusion aspect of that is extremely important in order to get the kind of balanced view back. You are not getting the usual suspects turning up at various events. It is not quite easy to reach out to children in what I think you said that we can no longer call hard-to-reach areas, but at least everybody knows what hard-to-reach means. It is not quite easy, because children tend to be in schools and if you visit schools, you can reach the hard-to-reach children in schools because they have to go to schools. Is that not a simple answer? We are talking about children and young people in themselves who many, as we would admit, have a cynical view of politicians and politics. If I use the example that I used of a young person in Fergusley Park in Paisley, I might get away with going into Fergusley Park as I am one of them, but you might have difficulty, Mr Ewing. It is probably just the case that we need to make sure that we… I have given a perfect example, because I am one of them, they would talk to me, but we need to make sure that we, as a Government, can engage with them in that way and ensure that we get those young people involved in that process. Doryn seems to be itching to say so. No, I was just going to add that one of the things you see mostly Government talks to proxies, talks to people who head up organisations who work with, this is about going beyond that. It is not to say that working with stakeholders is not right and in some places that is exactly what we will do, but in this sort of circumstance, you are going to find people who are not involved in any particular way. Of course, we can go to schools and that is what children's parliament did, the work on the children's element of the climate assembly. It was extraordinarily impactful. They did it in a really different way and they reached out to the islands and to the highlands and to urban centres. We are trying to do this in a whole range of different ways, but absolutely it will be about reaching people that we do not normally reach. Thank you very much. We are going to slightly return to where we began, because Mr Stewart is keen to pursue some of the issues relating to the recommendations and press a little further. Alexander Stewart. There is a range of recommendations that have come out from the review. It is quite a wide range when you look at participation and the understanding of the shared process. It would be good to get an overview from Government as to what your views are about the range of the recommendations that have been put forward. If those recommendations are to be implemented in full, have you got any timescales as to how you might manage to do the implementation? Are there any that you would find difficult to deal with and may disregard? To answer your question, timescales are no at this stage. We appreciate the work that the IPTD did. We will need to look at it in detail, as I said earlier on. We need to ensure that we get that right. Will there be difficult things amongst all that? Probably. Nothing easy. If you are going to do something properly, it is not going to be easy. We need to suck it up as Government and get on with it and do it in various points. It is basically back to what I said to the convener's original part, is that we will step back, have a look at what is there and make sure that we can create the process to deliver what the public is looking for. Would you see there being a top priority Minister for what the Government from the recommendations is a one area that you think, yes, that is where we need to be going and that is where we are going to go first? Of the recommendations, nothing jumps out in the recommendations as that is to go to other than the fact that I want to get that right. I want it to be of value to those involved in the process and I want to make sure that, as a minister, I can say that I was part of that process and we managed to deliver something that changed our democracy for the better. Out of the report, there is the idea of creating a unit that will be there to participate. Can I ask, with reference to the Government, the proposed new unit that is being suggested and whether the Government has done any costings of the implementation of the report's recommendations within that? That is quite important to make sure that, if the recommendations are there and there is a unit going to be specifically involved in that, there will be the opportunity to manage that effectively, but that can only be managed effectively if there are resources and proposals that can support and make that reality. In this very conversation, as we came in, I will get Doreen Shill articulate a lot better than I would. There are a couple of things in there. We know how much staff and resource went into each of the citizen assemblies. We know that there is a need for some of that to, if we are going to make good use of skills and expertise, we want to centralise that. At the moment, what we are doing is looking across the Government at where the existing expertise is and what can be pulled together in order to properly support that. What more do we need? That is not set out very clearly at the moment. That is clearly a recommendation that we will look at very carefully and see how that expertise can come to bear to make sure that we have the independent governance, to make sure that we have the oversight. However, we have not done a direct costing on what that is, although, of course, you have seen the published costs of the citizen assemblies. It will not be so far different from that. In the end, it will save us funding if there is central expertise, because you are not building it up and then losing it. The other thing that I would say is that what that does in the end is create a way of getting policies that deal with the problem of fiscal failure, so when you have better policies. In the end, that kind of participative work has to also help us with our budgets in the longer term. As you have identified, it will take time, but you have some track record already about how that has been managed. However, some of the recommendations also have implications for the Parliament itself. It would be good to get a flavour of how you are trying to engage with the Parliament to ensure that the recommendations that have an effect in the Parliament do then become reality. We will see improvements in the process going forward for the Parliament to manage the situation. The evolution of the committee to what it is now is a perfect example of the Parliament being part of that participation and ensuring that we can, because, as you know, it has gone from petitions committee to now being the key committee for all kind of engagement like that. Scottish Government believes that we need to work with the Parliament to make sure that, again, it is all about the value for the process. If you are going to be delivering anything that is coming from the citizens assemblies or any of those types of groups, then we need to have the processes within Parliament where we can do that as well. To me, that goes without saying that we need to ensure that the Parliament and we will work with the Parliamentary authorities to make sure that, as I said, this committee is a perfect example of that. The key committee, I am sure that you flatter the deceive minister. Mr Barnett, you have been listening quite patiently to the evidence presented by the minister and your colleague. I just wonder if there are any flexions that you just wanted to contribute as we come to the end of our evidence. It is only just on that very last point that you will have noted in the response to the Assembly for Scotland, for which my team is the sponsor division. We pointed to the constitutional significance of some of the recommendations for the Parliament that they need to work with the Parliament in taking those forward. We need to pick up Mr Sweeney's point about how you have a participative democracy system working with the representative parliamentary democracy system. Making the two match together is the challenge for this committee as it looks forward. I would reflect on that as my contribution. I will put a poorer contribution next to Doreen and the ministers, obviously. Thank you very much. Colleagues, is there any final thought that anybody has that they would like to pose an additional question? We have a minister then on that basis. Thank you very much to you all, and we very much appreciate your contribution to the key committee considering these issues this morning. I suspend the meeting at this point briefly. Welcome back. Agenda item 2 is consideration of continued petitions. Members will recall that, at our meeting on 8 June, we held a round-table discussion embracing four petitions relating to rural health care. We heard from all four of the petitioners themselves—Gordon Baird, Moray Eakin, Billy Sinclair and Rebecca Weimer. We were joined in that discussion and very much welcomed the participation of our MSP colleagues Rhoda Grant, Emma Harper and Colin Smyth. We heard during the round-table discussion about a range of challenges facing rural communities, accessing health care services, including the distances, particularly the distances involved in travelling to appointments, and travelling to appointments, particularly in emergency situations. Some of those were vividly demonstrated when, in a way that we might more easily understand, sitting here in the central belt, it was said that it would be the equivalent of us going to Newcastle and back for a minor check-up, which brought home just the difficulties faced from some points in the area that maybe with which we are not familiar, and that really did bring home the extent of the distance involved. How that affected the recruiting and retaining of staff, which became an issue in all of it all, and how the voices of those communities are properly heard as new services are framed and developed, rather than those communities finding that those new policies are imposed on them, rather than without proper consideration. We agreed to hear the evidence on all four of the petitions at this meeting. I am delighted that Rhoda Grant is back with us again, particularly in consideration of petition 1890. I think that because we considered the four petitions together, it strikes me amongst the options that we were asked to consider was the potential to refer the petitions on. What I will do is maybe just summarise the four petitions, and then we will take a collective view, because I think that that is very much the position that we would want. We heard in 1845 that there was an agency to advocate for the healthcare needs of rural Scotland. That was the agency proposal put by Gordon Baird, calling on the Scottish Government to create an agency that ensured that health boards offer fair and reasonable management of rural and remote healthcare issues. I was struck last week when Mr Baird talked about what he felt were the inadequacies of the existing routes, which should ensure that the views of rural residents are heard by decision-making bodies. I think that Mr Ewing tackled as well on whether a single agency could manage the responsibility that could arise from issues that are common across health boards, far flung across the whole of Scotland. Dr Baird also welcomed the establishment of a national care centre for excellence for remote rural health and social care, but I felt that that would only be part of the point that he was raising, because he felt very much that, without his proposal, there wasn't really somebody advocating for these services, rather than being part of the delivery of it. On petition 1890, the one that Rhoda Grant has an interest in, too, which is to find solutions to recruitment and training challenges for rural healthcare Scotland. That, obviously, calls upon the Government to provide much more localised training and to find ways both to recruit but also to retain healthcare staff in difficult to recruit positions in Scotland. Quite often, communities with limited resource in terms of even housing and other services mean that it can be almost an unaffordable prospect for some people to contemplate accepting some of the positions on offer. The petitioner highlighted how technology had enabled distance and remote learning to take place for teaching staff, which has supported the recruitment of teachers in rural areas. She suggested that a similar approach could be taken to train, recruit and crucially retain healthcare staff to positions in rural Scotland. Members may also be aware that there was a member's business debate that has been secured and which took place last Thursday, I think, at which Rhoda Grant herself led. I wonder, Rhoda, since you have joined us this morning, if there is anything that you would like to contribute to our reflection before I touch on the other two? Really, I suppose, I do not want to repeat what you have said but to echo what you have said. The issue seems to be that, from the very start of training staff all the way up through the system, there seems to be a systemic fault that is totally geared towards urban areas and does not focus on rural areas. What is clear is that if we can base the structure on a rural area, that then works in an urban area. During Covid-19, people throughout health boards started using the near me system, which was devised especially for keithness to help to save people travelling those long distances. We need to have the systems in place and talk of a commissioner or the like. Someone needs to advocate to make sure that the whole system looks at rural areas and makes sure that we are looking after their needs initially, and that can translate to urban areas as well. It needs to be a written branch. We will come to just solutions in a second or two. At petition 1915, which was lodged by Billy Sinclair on the reinstatement of the County Council and the NHS Board, Billy's position was that, since those services became under the aegis of the NHS Highland and Highland Council, he felt that the local delivery had suffered greatly. That was very much evidenced by the 120-mile journey to Rigmor hospital in Inverness, which many expectant mothers to contemplate. He has submitted a further paper following his session last week of which members have a copy. Finally, at petition 1924, which was the petition from Rebecca Wymer into a complete and emergency in-depth review of women's health services in keithness in Sutherland, Rebecca stated that she felt that the services now being provided were in breach of basic human rights and was very concerned that there could be a loss of life due to the failures in gynaecological care provision. In the wider round table discussion, she echoed the point about the difficulties and lack of attractiveness of people moving to positions in professional capacity in keithness due to the lack of women's healthcare and maternity services, which people who are coming from areas where they are taken as very much for granted suddenly become aware that the absence of them is potentially quite a serious issue. It was actually Edinburgh to York, not Edinburgh to Newcastle. I had understated the scale of the journey that was used by Way of Illustration. Again, Rebecca has provided further written submission. I believe that it was suggested, I think, from some of our MSP colleagues that the way forward for these petitions might be for us to consider whether to refer them. I wonder if colleagues have had any thoughts, David Torrance? Thank you, convener. As a member of the Health and Social Care and Sport Committee, we are finalising our work programmes now, so I would like to refer 1845, 1890, 1915 and 1924 to the Health and Social Care and Sport Committee and the context that the committee has wider consideration for health inequalities. Alexander Stewart? I would certainly agree with all of that. I think that what we have found from all of these petitions is the dilemmas that communities face. Even with the technological advances that we have seen in medicine and the opportunities that can be dealt with from an urban area to a rural area, that does not seem to be working in many communities, either. I think that a more in-depth look at the health committee might well bring to the force some of the areas that have been addressed and some of the areas that have been given in concerns by many of the people from the petitions themselves. The continued support that communities have not received is vital and important for their livelihood and for their support within any medical process. I think that the health committee could do a much deeper and a more in-depth analysis of some of the areas that have been brought to our attention, and that might help to unravel and support the petitioners going forward. I support the reference to the health committee that David Torrance has suggested. In the evidence that we heard, there were many concerns enunciated about particular issues that affect people in rural Scotland. Most of Scotland is rural Scotland in terms of geography. I would also add that I thought that some of the issues that affect, as I understand it, as a constituency MSP with a partly rural constituency, have not actually been raised in evidence and that is no criticism of the petitioners. For example, the availability of vaccination services locally provided by GPs is something that does not take place any more because of the terms of the GP contract. Many people feel that that is an unfair restriction on GP practices that would like to provide vaccination and other services. This is a hot issue right now, convener, that was not raised, but I will just raise it as an example from my own case work of a really important nitty-gritty issue. The last thing that I would say is that it was raised in evidence by the petitioners but also by Rhoda Grant to mention her remarks that the allowances paid for travel for those who must undertake operative treatment, for example in Inverness, who have travelled from the western Isles and who must stay in hotels and who probably drive are woefully inadequate and completely do not cover the issues. I suspect that that is because of the UK tariff, because I have looked into that before for constituents again that have had to travel from Inverness to the central belt, but I do think that the level of travel allowances and travel costs are a really unfair issue. I just mentioned that in the hope that, if there is a reference to the Health Committee and the Committee so agrees, those kinds of issues can be considered as well as the particular ones raised by the petitioners. I think that that was a very important point well made and really very challenging for some people in the situation where that is the only option that they have. It really was seemingly an inadequate provision basically for them to rely upon. I thought that came across quite strongly. Have you anything you want to add, Mr Sweeney? Yes, the only thing that I want to add was just the general point that I felt was a common theme across all the petitions was the issue of governance and the checking balance on structures of health boards. I think that the rights of rural communities would be better enshrined in a formalised setting by creating some sort of statutory body that advocated for that and placed obligations on health boards. I think that that idea about setting a standard of safety, you could identify very clearly that driving such distances to access critical care would be inherently unsafe. Therefore, placing an obligation on the health board to address that is a standard issue. I think that there needs to be some reflection on how that might look. It is not a clear ask or demand of the petition, but I think that that emerged from the conversation at the evidence session about some sort of body that could say that this is a defective system because of the reasons that you need to address it. It might be equivalent to the housing regulators or something, where they can apply that obligation on a health board. The idea that it could be done through the health board seemed to be challenged because I think that there was an idea that that would not be prone to groupthink or whatever, but it would not necessarily come through just by having a rural representative on a health board. They would be very much drowned out. I think that the committee has agreed to refer the four petitions to the Health, Social Care and Sport Committee. In the context of that committee's wider consideration of health inequalities, we agreed. I think that if the clerks could encapsulate just the essence of the discussion and members' reflection this morning of the evidence in any way in which we then offer those petitions to the committee for their further consideration. That is just a final thought from Rhoda Grant. I haven't spoken to Mr Sinclair in detail, but I did speak to him obviously just at the end of the committee last week. He was pointing out that his petition was half about health, but the other half was about local government. He was a wee bit concerned that the local government aspect of his petition might be lost. I don't know if the committee wants to look further at that. I am just making that point. I think that, really, in essence in terms of the general themes that arose from it all, I think that we would still refer that on to the committee and, as the best way forward from our point of view at this stage, but I take note of that. Thank you very much. That brings us to agenda item 3, the consideration of new petitions. The first of those is petition 1932, which is to ban smoking in Scotland and develop a strategy for vaping. This has been lodged by Doug Mutter on behalf of VPZ and calls on the Parliament towards the Scottish Government to impose an outright ban on smoking and develop a transformative public health strategy for vaping. Doug notes that the pandemic has triggered an increase in smoking rates and suggests that Scotland has lost momentum in creating a tobacco-free generation by 2034. He suggests that vaping is the best way to quit smoking and strongly believes that a public health strategy for vaping will help to realise that target. In its submission, the Scottish Government has indicated that there is little evidence on the long-term effects yet of vaping over the last decade of evidence that has been growing. Due to the relative short space of time that these products have been available, more space than there was previously, but even so. As such an outright ban in smoking in favour of a pro-vaping policy is not something that the Scottish Government is currently considering. I wonder if, colleagues of anything, Mr Torrance. Thank you, convener. I would like to close the petition under rule 15.7 of standing orders on the basis that the Scottish Government is not currently considering an outright ban on smoking in favour of vaping. Petition number 1933. To allow the Fornethys survivors to access Scotland's redress scheme, this is a new petition lodged by Iris Tinto on behalf of the Fornethys survivors group and calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to widen access to Scotland's redress scheme to allow Fornethys survivors to seek redress. Iris notes in the background information to this petition that survivors need acknowledgement closure and compensation in states that, despite being in the care of Glasgow Corporation, the decision to exempt groups such as Fornethys survivors from the redress scheme has magnified their suffering. The Fornethys survivors group has also provided a powerful and detailed account of the range of abuse that they suffered and the outcomes associated with this in the written submission, which members will have seen in their papers. In that submission to the committee, the Scottish Government states that it recognises that the abuse of children in all circumstances is wrong and harmful, but despite that recognition, and herein lies a common theme, I think, in relation to the petition that we heard not so very long ago, the Scottish Government states that the exclusion of those abused in short-term respite or holiday care is in keeping with the core purpose of the redress scheme. Well, eligibility for the scheme is not based on how long a child was in care, but rather on how the child came to be in care and the type of care setting that they were in. Members will recall the petition that we have been considering about the abuse inquiry and the terms of reference with all of that. So I was quite struck that when I read the notes that we—it's a different petition, it's a different set of circumstances, but it did seem to be again that the drafting of the regulations is quite tight and allows groups to fall through the net, which is acknowledged, but not really without any resolution to follow from it. I just wonder what views any colleagues might have had of reading those notes. David Torrance? I think that we should write to the Deputy First Minister to draw attention to the issues raised in the petition and to ask that we consider adjusting the current eligibility criteria to allow for neffy survivors and other survivors with similar experiences of short-term respite or holiday care to access the redress scheme. I would very much endorse the course of action recommended by David Torrance that we write to the Deputy First Minister. I wonder if we may, in the text of the letter, seek clarification about why it should be that the criteria seem to be based on how people came to be in care rather than the experiences they had in care. If an individual suffered a wrong, surely that individual should be entitled to receive some kind of remedy of whatever sort, whether it's a monetary compensatory award or an apology or something else. It does seem to me that the criteria being used to restrict groups of people are at least open to question. The other point that I just wanted to raise, convener, is that I had a constituency case if not in dissimilar circumstances, although I perhaps will need to come back and check that. However, my recollection is that part of the answer that the Scottish Government gave is to why the category of potential claimants were excluded from entitlement to claim a remedy was that Parliament had so judged in the passage of the relevant legislation. If that's the case, I wonder if a little bit more work needs to be done to check out what the evidence was and what the basis was that Parliament came to that conclusion. That's my recollection. If that's faulty, I must apologise, but I think that that is part of the reasoning that the DFM has adduced in reply to me on a very similar issue. If that was the case, it does suggest that Parliament has actually considered the principle of this issue before, and maybe that's something that Clark could check out for me to see if I'm just rambling on incoherently and talking complete nonsense or whether I may have another point somewhere. Alexander Stewart? I think, convener, that Mr Ewing makes a very valid point here with reference to how we should examine this. I do agree with David Torrance's recommendation to go to the Deputy First Minister, because I think that this entire saga has and continues to unlock and show survivors and individuals across the care sector or the support sector or how they were dealt with in this entire area. I do feel that we should be examining as much as we possibly can so that we capture, because as you've identified, convener, organisations and individuals amongst us are falling through the net. That's the last thing that we want to achieve, because we want to try to encapsulate as much information as we can so that we get the broadest views and opinions brought together. I think that, by both the suggestions of David Torrance and Fergus Ewing, we'll achieve some of that, so I'm very supportive of that proposal going forward. Okay, thank you. Paul Sweeney? Yeah, I concur with what Mr Ewing said in regards to this about our need for remedy. It's clear in terms of natural justice. I think that there's another stakeholder. Glasgow City Council is the successor body to Glasgow Corporation. Therefore, in question of liability, we'd probably need to be discussed, and I think that that requires a response from Glasgow City Council as well as the Scottish Government. In that sense, I think that we should also be making inquiries with Glasgow City Council on this regard. I think that the instincts in the bureaucracy are to defend against liability and extending liability, but I think that in this instance that's the wrong approach, so I think that we should be trying to establish a remedy for a group that has suffered harm. Thank you. I wonder why they might also write to some of the bodies representing victims and survivors just to call in aid to the argument and get some understanding of their views on widening the eligibility criteria, because they must be aware of the particular circumstances of the groups that are falling through the net and may, in fact, be able to identify others that they would say are in a similar situation. We agree to do that together with the suggestions that have already been made. Thank you very much. It's an important petition and we'll keep that open and see what progress we can make. I'll suspend very briefly the minister is now with us and so we'll be able to take forward our final continuing petition just in a moment's time. Thank you. Welcome back again. We come to item 4 on the agenda, which is the consideration of continuing petitions. We're going to be covering two petitions this morning that we've thought to bring together on the focus of planning proposals and decisions relating to wind farm developments. The first of these is petition 1864, which is the increase in the ability of communities to influence planning decisions for onshore wind farms. This has been lodged by Aileen Jackson on behalf of Scotland Against Spin and calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to increase the ability of communities to influence planning decisions for onshore wind farms by adopting the English planning legislation for the determination of an onshore wind farm development. Empowering local authorities to ensure local communities are given sufficient professional support in order to help them engage in that planning process and to appoint an independent advocate to ensure that local participants are not, in the words of the petition, bullied and intimidated during public inquiries. We last considered this petition on 2 February when we agreed to write to the local government association who unfortunately have not been able to respond to us ahead of today's meeting. We've coupled this with petition 1885 to make offering community shared ownership mandatory for all wind farm development planning proposals. This is a proposal lodged by Karen Murphy calling on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to make that community shared ownership a mandatory requirement. Our last consideration of this petition took place on 2 February when it was agreed that we would invite the relevant minister to join us this morning to give evidence to each of these petitions. Therefore, I'm delighted that we're able to welcome Tom Arthur, Minister for Public Finance, Planning and Community Wealth. Good morning. Andy Kinair, Head of Transforming Planning and Neil Rafferty, Senior Advisor for Heat in Building Strategy in the Scottish Government. Good morning to the three of you. I know that the minister has made a hot dash across Parliament to campus from another committee to join us, so we very much appreciate that effort. It's all worked very nicely in terms of timing, as it turns out. We're also joined this morning by our, I should say, welcoming back to the Petitions Committee, our MSP colleague Brian Whittle, who has a particular interest in the latter of the two petitions that I referred to. I will obviously return to Brian Whittle when members of the panel have had an opportunity to put their questions to our guests, and he will be well used to the format and protocols of our procedures. Members have a number of questions that they'd like to explore this morning, so we're going to go straight to these. Some of this is familiar territory, so we're trying to focus the questions in on the issues that are specifically raised in the petition, and David Torrance is going to lead us off. David. Thank you, convener. Good morning, minister, and other witnesses. This is probably key to both the petitions. Does the Scottish Government have legislative competence to increase or abolish a 50 megawatt threshold for renewable energy developments that can be considered by planning authorities? If so, has this been considered? If not, have you spoken with the UK Government about the devolved power? Thank you very much, deputy convener, and good morning. I appreciate matters pertaining to planning within the Town and Country planning Act set with me over 50 megawatts, as you alluded to, sits with the electricity act, which is a reserved piece of legislation. With regard to the means of adoption, that will maybe just ask you to come in with regard to our flexibilities with regard to devolve competency to modify that particular threshold? My understanding, and I don't work in that area anymore, is that we don't have any competence to do anything with the provisions in the electricity act, which affect consent applications for electricity stations. Whether or not that is something that has been explored, I also couldn't say, but the hard and fast fact when it comes to electricity generation supply transmission et cetera, is that there are reservations, so there is no kind of flexibility for the Scottish Government to do anything differently on its own back. It reflects the general reservation over energy within the Scotland Act. Indeed, the processes that pertain to the consent process, in line with that legislation, are reserved as well, so it's not something that may have any direct influence over in this Parliament. That was a technical question answer in terms of our understanding of things, Alexander Stewart. Can I go on to talking about the treatment of pre-application consultations, because that is an area that does create some difficulty with individuals, organisations and communities? Can I ask if there is any evidence that, when from developments that have, and how they are treated when it comes to the pre-application consideration, is there anything other than, as some people have seen, a tick box exercise, because that is the perception that some have, and what is the Scottish Government doing to improve such engagement? Well, the procedures and process are clearly set out, but there's a consequence of the reforms in the planning act 2019 with significant change happening around the PAC process. I'll ask Andy Cymyn to come in and narrate these particular points. So we have some changes being made with effect from this October in the pre-application consultation arrangements, and this is a follow-on from the 2019 planning act itself. So coming in to force on 1 October, there will be a requirement to apply for your permission within 18 months of the pre-application consultation having taken place, and that's about making sure that the consultation that has happened with communities is still relevant at the point that the application is going in at the moment that's much more open-ended. But also sort of crucially, within the new provisions, we're setting in statute the requirements that need to go into the pre-application consultation report, so by doing that, what actually has to happen through the process, and the regulations will also add up second mandatory public event as part of that process at the moment that it's just one that's required. The statutory provisions had been suspended by coronavirus legislation, which expires at the end of September, which is why the new process won't come in to effect at the start of October. All of those new provisions are entirely for that point, so we want to make sure that we are much stronger on the content and quality of that consultation with communities. Can I follow that up? When we look at the legal support and technical support that is sometimes provided, there is a question about whether the Scottish Government would consider providing legal and technical support to individuals and community groups appearing before public inquiries into the proposed wind farms and developments. Do you think that there's any opportunity for that to become reality? We already provide support to past formerly planning aid Scotland, which can provide a range of different supports with regards to the planning system to individuals and community groups. I recognise the concerns that the member was articulating. I think that there's also been a part of us all to be familiar with this. The examples of some excellent work at community groups have done in engaging with the planning system and have set forth their views robustly and competently with a great deal of expertise and consideration. I don't know if there's anything that you'd want to add to that, Andy. Through the inquiry itself, there's an important role for the reporter in managing the whole process that the reporter will ensure that those who are perhaps less experienced in the planning system will be supported and able to give their evidence as best they can. Individuals could put them off, not having that technical support or that legal advice. In comparison to developers themselves, who may well have all of that in their package that they can bring to the table, that creates some disadvantages for individuals in themselves. By the Scottish Government supporting that process, it will help to maybe unravel and support the communities and individuals that want to put forward their views and opinions. In developing that slightly further, there are already opportunities for things to happen, but it still isn't at the level where the communities and the individuals themselves feel as if they are participating in being given that support mechanism. There's still a gap between what is being perceived and what is being achieved. How do the Scottish Government see itself reflecting on that and supporting it to ensure that that gap is reduced? On the specific points that I've articulated around the chain that the support has provided through the past, Andy has addressed the issue of the role that the reporter has. Your point speaks to bigger issues such as cultural interaction with the planning system overall. It is a priority for me to shift the dial and move away from conflict to collaboration. That is about earlier engagement for communities within the planning process. Earlier this year, we introduced regulations to establish local place plans, which is a mechanism for local communities to feed in to their local planning authority in the development of the LDP. About what their priorities are for their particular area, we are considering the responses to the consultation on new style LDPs, which again will provide opportunities for greater community involvement and engagement. I recognise that that is an issue that all members have an agreement from. We want to see more engagement for our communities in the planning system at an earlier stage, so that the conversation of our movements on one of conflict and discussions about what developments people perhaps may not want to see to a conversation about what people want to see for the future of our places. There are specific points around the role of reporters, support through funding for past. There is also that broader cultural change in the planning system that we are seeking to take forward with specific actions such as the introduction of local place plans. I do not know if there is anything that you would like to add to that, Andy. Sweeney, just winding back slightly, you had a supplementary you wanted to ask in relation to Mr Stewart's first point. Yes, it was actually in relation to question 1 on the 50 megawatt threshold in relation to devolved versus reserved. Can I just ask, has there been engagement with Alistair Jack at the Scotland office or Greg Hans at Bays on this issue from the Scottish Government's perspective and maybe to seek a remedy of some description in relation to planning reform? I do sense that in occasions where those issues are raised, they are discussed and potentially there are discreet elements that are devolved as a result perhaps or released as a mechanism that can be established. It might be worth taking as an action if not perhaps this committee can support that effort by calling for those ministers to come before the committee in due course. I am sure members of the committee will understand the Scottish Government's position on where a whole range of powers should rest, but I am happy to write back to the committee to provide further information and detail on what the Scottish Government's position is, has been in this area historically, and I am obviously happy to respond to any further correspondence that the committee may have in this issue. Mr Stewart, I heard you say that there would be the incorporation of a second public event. Is there a definition of what constitutes a public event? It is not defined in law, but it is just expected that the developer will engage and will advertise that they are going to be around and will engage with people from within the community, hear what they have to say and that is happening before they finalise their proposals and submit their applications. Do you expect that to be a physical public event that members of the public can engage with, or can a public event be a holistic affair? As it stood, since those provisions were introduced, it was a physical public event. The coronavirus legislation removed that temporarily, and what we have done is advised that virtual events should be happening, and that is what we have had for the last two years or so. When the coronavirus legislation haunts, we will not be going back to the physical public events that will be happening. There has been a lot of support for the virtual events, so they seem to have attracted larger numbers of people participating, so there is a question that is being asked around whether both events need to be physical. Have you been able to evaluate whether, when a public event is virtual as opposed to physical, whether that affects the balance of the developer's ability to influence the conduct of the engagement as opposed to one that would take place in a physical way? I am genuinely interested to know whether it has added a different dynamic, which is pro or anti one particular aspect of the outcome that might be arrived at. We have heard suggestions, but it is all anecdotal from both sides, whether it is an advantage to one or the other. It is why we have not just gone straight on to continuing with a virtual event as we can bring forward the new regulations. I have not been with any research yet as to what that might be. My experience is the same as I am not sure, as the answer is. I think that, as it becomes more commonplace, that at some stage it might be useful for us more widely, even beyond the context of the discussion that we are having here, to understand what that material does to the management and control of the outcome of the discussion. Good morning to the minister and to the witnesses. Community ownership has been something that the Scottish Government has very much supported. When I was energy minister in 2014, there was a programme for government commitment that states that we should secure the co-operation of energy developers to offer a stake in developments to communities as a matter of course. Across the board, perhaps in politics, that is seen as a very worthy objective and one where much progress was made in 2014-2015, where a target that we then had of achieving 500 megawatts of localised supplied energy was met five years early, which is not always the case that government targets are met five years early, I have noticed minister. There were 154 projects and £10 million of investment, and things were going really well until the UK Government decided to pool the abrupt cessation of rocks, which meant that this just fell off a cliff. That is in the past now, but the response from the Government as to why we cannot mandate community ownership of energy is that the Electricity Act makes that challenging. I wonder, minister, whether it is yourself or the energy minister or both of you, have you approached the UK Government to seek approval for changing the necessary legal format, including the Electricity Act, if necessary, to enable mandating of community energy having a stake? If you have 10 turbines in a wind farm development, you could very often add, say, one or two which would go under the community. The developer would still proceed with the development, but the community would get a stake. Bankers such as Treados co-op close brothers back in 2015, as Mr Rafferty will remember from his good work then, were very willing to lend, and they even brought the major banks to the table funny enough to lend money. It is an extraordinary proposition that major banks lend money, but they even became slightly willing to do so towards the end. Therefore, because there is an income stream, there is a bankable proposition for communities. It is entirely doable. If I have gone on for too long, it is because I think that this is one of the unmet big challenges of our time across the UK, given the commitments to renewable energy. Is this not the time now for the Scottish Government really to bring the UK Government to the table to mandate community ownership of renewable developments, which would be a tremendous achievement and legacy for people throughout those islands? The first thing that I would say is that I am sure that Mr Ewing, I know for fact that Mr Ewing and I are completely aligned in this. We are undertaking a process where hopefully we will not have to ask the UK Government for these particular provisions to be devolved, because we will have them in their Parliament and can have these conversations in full. I am conscious, if you ask my minister about responsibilities, as planning minister we all have a clear understanding of what the planning system is for around land use and what is appropriate for the planning system to ask of developers in terms of planning obligations and what is not. With my community welfare on, I recognise hugely the importance that community ownership and participation in renewables can have. I have seen examples of first hand right across Scotland where it is in a vast awe-inspiring scale, as in the convener's constituency, or that it is a single turbine and a remote part of Northern Lewis and the impact it can have in supporting fragile and remote communities not only to sustain populations but to grow populations and support local economic development. With a community well-building perspective, I absolutely recognise the importance and, although I recognise that these are ultimately as things stand, voluntary agreements. I am very alive to the huge contribution that can make locally and the role that community energy can play in advancing the community well-building agenda. Specifically about interactions with existing legislation, I invite Neil to come in to say a bit more. I will probably end up repeating what I said earlier that, as far as I am aware, there has been no engagement on that issue. It is worth pointing out a couple of things. One is that the UK Government has recently followed, along behind the Scottish Government, in publishing its own fiximally of our good practice principles and guidance for community energy and shared ownership and extolling very much the same principles for the same reasons. There is a common understanding there. It is also worth highlighting that, because of the guidance that we have had in place for several years, which you introduced when you were a minister, there are huge quantities of community benefits going to communities. I think that 23 million pounds over the last year went to communities. We are finding that developers are generally quite front-footed about this. In over half of the applications that are currently in the system at the moment, discussions about shared ownership are taking place. There is a lot of momentum there. Hypothetically, could the electricity act legislation be made to or amended to compel discussion about shared ownership and community benefit? I do not know the answer to that, to be perfectly honest. However, my understanding is that we have not had any of those kinds of discussions, so I am not sure what kind of reception or openness I might be to that. As I mentioned earlier, I am happy to update the committee on writing on those matters. That would be very helpful. I want to ask one further question or area of questions, which is also important and which it lies within the minister's portfolio of planning, which is the response to the Scottish Government that seems to have been, well, we cannot mandate this but we can use the planning system to at least encourage or require it. I have not read the document, I must confess, but I read here that draft NP4 makes no reference of community benefit and only one passing reference to community ownership of renewable energy projects. If I am right in assuming that we want to use planning laws as a tool to try to deliver more community interest, whether it is ownership or benefit or both, or a mixture of the two, both are desirable, although ownership is immensely preferable in the long term. If we are to use NP4 and the planning system generally as a means, a compulsor of delivery, why is there a scarce scant reference to that? Just in passing, and this is not the minister's responsibility, the same criticism equally applies to the bute house agreement. Quite extraordinarily, there does not seem to be a strong emphasis on delivery of these things in the bute house agreement, which although I know part of the drafting of, one would have expected that there might have been a prime candidate, given the political support for the constituent parties of the bute house agreement for community ownership. Can the Scottish Government do more in NP4? Can the minister put me on the spot here in the final version of NP4? Can we not really use that as the means to deliver this policy by a much stronger reference to the need for community ownership? If that is not possible, whatever reason, it is strong and a major community benefit, so that communities really do benefit from the natural resources that are there to many people's way of thinking. I know that Mr Sweeney had an interest—I do not know if it is an interest that matches Mr Ewing's passion for the question—but is there anything that you would like to add on that theme before we go to the minister, Mr Sweeney? I think that Mr Ewing covered it fairly comprehensively. I am intrigued to hear the minister's response. We have, obviously, concluded the public consultation and parliamentary scrutiny process for draft NPF for just over two months ago. We are in the process right now. We have received in the region of over 780 responses. It is great to see such engagement on that. Throughout the process of consultation, I had engagement directly with a range of stakeholders, including representatives of the renewable sector, as did officials. Central to what is in draft NPF for is addressing our contribution to climate change and addressing the nature emergency that is central. Within the draft document policy, 19 on green energy sets out our position. That is consistent with our ambitions on onshore wind, which is to see an increasing capacity of between 8 and 12 gigawatts by the end of the decade. That policy sets out in some detail within the draft about how we would plan to contribute towards achieving that. Of course, that is a draft document. I cannot get into a position of speculating on what will be in the finalised version when we bring back to Parliament, but I assure the committee that we are giving very careful and detailed consideration to all the representations that we have received. I recognise the points that Mr Ewing has articulated, but we have to be very careful and remember that the role of the planning system is around the use of land. When we get into the territory of planning obligations, they have to be linked to a material concern with the development itself. That is a long-standing principle of how the planning system in this country operates, and it does so for very good reasons. I do not know if there is anything that you would want to add to that, Andy. I will sum that up. What is material in any decision in the planning system must relate to the development or use of the land, and it must fairly and reasonably relate to the development that is proposed. It is about the development and use of land itself. I cannot come down to who may benefit as a result of the consent. It is not entirely concerned with the issue of ownership, but rather the use of land. That is very important to remember. I am sure that members understand the reasons for that why and how the planning system operates. In terms of what is in the draft NPF4, there is a clear commitment and recognition that onshore wind has got an incredibly important role to play in meeting our obligations towards net zero by 2045 and, indeed, our reductions by 2030. Mr Sweeney, you first. I wanted to flag up the—it was actually quite an interesting interaction with the previous evidence session that we held today with Mr Adam, the minister who is dealing with participatory democracy, the levels of democracy agenda in the Government. There is a big concern over the attachment of community benefit to big planning projects, whether energy or otherwise, and I think that that is definitely something that needs much more rigorous addressing in the NPF4 generally. I know certainly, for example, from planning decisions made in Glasgow, for example, that there is real concern in the community that just disappears into a budget line in the central council and is not attached to actually material tangible improvements in the community or the locus of the development. So I think that there are clear issues there that need to be tightened up, so I just flag that as a matter that might be want to be brought into consideration both potentials and interface with that agenda from Mr Adam's portfolio. I take that point with broad engagement and participation within the planning system that we touched on earlier. In more general terms, we are, as you will be aware, continuing our process of reviewing planning obligations, and we have the provisions around an infrastructure levy within the 2019 planning act, which we will be considering how we take forward later in this parliamentary session. So I just thought that it would be useful to bring that to the committee's attention. Mr Ewing? It does occur to me, convener, that we can consider the later response, but one option would be to invite the minister back again after he has had an opportunity to finalise the process, because I entirely understand that he cannot prejudice the process where, with simple under an 18 consultation responses, he must properly consider those before coming to inclusion. I also appreciate the evidence that we have heard about the planning system only being able to do so much. In life, things have always been difficult. As Seneca said more than 2,000 years ago, he said, it is not because things are difficult that we do not dare, it is because we do not dare that things are difficult. I leave that helpful thought with the minister. Is Seneca not throwing himself into a volcano? Well, maybe he just found that things are too difficult, I'm sure. That's a little exchange. There are benefits of classical education all round. I'm very impressed. The minister may have heard me, when I open, say that the first of the two petitions was keen to appoint an independent advocate to ensure that local participants in the words of the petition are not bullied or intimidated during public inquiries. We've received some written evidence which suggests that some individuals participating in public inquiries feel that they've actually thereafter been treated with contempt and abused by some of the windfarm development legal representatives, and somewhat to their disappointment, the reporter hasn't intervened when this has been happening. I just wonder if the Scottish Government is aware of these instances. It's always difficult because we have received evidence from individuals who have made submissions to us that this has been a practice and that the reporter hasn't intervened. I wonder if there's anything that can be done to validate that or, indeed, if it is taking place to try and ensure that there is a remedy to it, because it seems unreasonable. As Andy McLeod outlined earlier, the reporter has a key role to play in that process. All of our expectations would be that the reporter would ensure that the behaviour that you are and the conduct that you are relating in the submissions that you've received should not take place and that it's not acceptable. We want to ensure that the greatest opportunity to participate and the reporter, as has been discussed, has a role to play in that and also recognising the respective backgrounds and positions that people are coming from within that process. I wonder if there's anything that you'd want to add, Andy. It might then be that we will summarise some of the evidence that we've received, just so that you can be made aware of the experience of those who have written to us, and it might be something that you'd care to have a look at. Mr Whittle, you've been with us, and it has been my practice, as convener, to invite colleagues to make a statement, but also before we hear finally from witnesses if there's anything that occurs to you that you would like to put by way of a question as well, I'm quite content for that to be the case. Thank you very much, convener. I think that I would start by just getting at the committee to recognise and represent South of Scotland region, which has a high propensity of wind farms, and my postbag reflects that. I was fairly interested in the question around the 50 megawatt limit when we have white lease wind farm, which is the second biggest one in Europe. It's just sitting up the road and down the road from your constituency and up the road from mine, so it's obviously perfectly feasible. The second biggest was overtaken. It used to be the biggest. It was the biggest. There's one in Holland, and I was connected. Apparently, it's now bigger. I'm not keen on being second best. No, I'm not a silver medalist myself. One of the things that I would say is that, when you alluded to your question, convener, was that one of the things that's often shared with me is the lack of consultation, or the feeling that there's a lack of consultation with local communities, and that they are bullied and steam-rollered, and even when the council declines to give plan permission for a wind farm, it is often overtummed routinely by the Scottish Government, and there's a lack of connection between local communities and that planning decision. To Mr Ewing's point, communities have to benefit. Currently, what was described to me as there's motorways taking the energy away from where it's generated into the central belt and leaving the communities where it is that that energy is generated running on b-roads. To me, that's a very good analogy. It's extremely important, going forward, that communities feel engaged and also that communities benefit, which brings us to the point that we're talking about today around that community share ownership and making that mandatory. I was interested with Mr Ewing's questioning, which I want to follow on from, around the fact that we can use the planning to encourage wind farm operators to ensure that there's a benefit to the local community. Andy Knair's response to that was that planning is around the use of land, but surely the use of land is there for the benefit of the community at large, so I don't see how the two can be divorced. I certainly think that if planning applications were passed or not, depending on whether or not there was a shared community element to that, surely that would encourage wind farm operators to follow that route. Well, thank you for that, Mr Whittle. Minister, if you and your colleagues might want to just pick up on that point, and if there's anything else you'd like to say, since formal questioning is finished by way of any concluding remarks, we'd be happy to hear those two. Certainly, I think that there were two points that I would make firstly, as recognising the perceptions of your constituents, Mr Whittle, on the lack of engagement or consultation with the planning system. I touched on that earlier, and I recognise that need and the opportunity that we have with a new natural planning framework coming forward and the rolling out of provisions of the Planning Act 2019 to increase engagement with communities. That's so important. Earlier this morning, I was giving evidence on town centres and the future of our town centres. Town centres offer solutions to so many of our big problems that we face around climate change, around living local, around decarbonising and reducing our carbon emissions, and a range of other areas as well. However, for them to be successful, it needs community engagement and people need to feel that they have an opportunity to shape their places. I recognise that as a case in urban environments. I also recognise that it is a case in rural environments. Where applications are coming forward for energy development to communities feel that they have a role in shaping their place. That is why, and I won't repeat what was discussed earlier, there are various measures that have been introduced, such as the reformed pact process, local place plans and so on, to enhance community engagement and involvement. On the broader point, when it comes to the use of the planning system, it is about land. That is fundamental. Ownership is not really a part of it. It is about how we use our land and it is that for very good reasons. That is why, for example, where planning obligations can be used, it is quite tightly defined. It has to relate to the development and the aspect of the development and use of land. That has been established for quite some time for very good reasons. I will ask Andy Cymyn to come in and stage a bit more on that. I think that it is just sort of back up straight from that point. The existing guidance that we have around community benefits and community ownership within wind farms is already supported or encouraged through the planning system. We just have to be very careful around that fine line of what planning is here to do about the development and use of land and not about the beneficiaries. On that point, I therefore thank the minister, Mr Cynaird and Mr Rafferty for joining us this morning. I also thank Brian Whittle for his participation. Colleagues, are we content to consider the evidence that we have heard this morning at a future meeting of the committee? We are. On that note, then, I am happy to close this morning's meeting and we will meet again on the last Wednesday of the session on 29 June.