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I will bring in Ms Davidson to provide more detail on that in a second. Ms Whitham is correct in her assessment of the intended direction of travel of the charter and legislation. Along with the First Minister, I was at the launch of the charter, which is an internationally recognised piece of work that further embeds service users’ understanding of their rights to access treatment and services and the greater support that those things should provide. I cannot take a position on the potential impact of the bill, but the committee has heard evidence that suggests that it has the potential to conflate some the elements of rights and the treatment that is available. Should the bill be enacted, I believe that it would be the first time that a right to a treatment would be provided in legislation. That is not incorporated in any other aspect of health and social care. In and of itself, that is a potential challenge.

As there is legal interaction on the matter, I will defer to Ms Davidson.

We do not have a timescale for that at this stage. Work is under way to review not only the national mission on drugs and drug-related harm but where we are with alcohol services. We have had a number of sessions with a wide variety of stakeholders, including those with lived and living experience of substance dependency—alcohol and drugs—to look at the areas that Ms Mochan is interested in. Our intention is to set out our plan at the conclusion of the national mission, which will be at the end of this parliamentary session. We are cognisant that the work is demonstrably not complete and that we still have much work to do. Although the national mission is coming to a conclusion, there is still work to be done. We are embarking on a review of the efficacy and performance of various aspects of the national mission, as well as our alcohol interventions. We will set out our plans for both before the end of this year.

It is for the member in charge of the bill to discuss some of those elements rather than for the Government to take a position on them at this stage.

I have read with interest some of the evidence that has been taken. Concerns have also been expressed about the need for a diagnosis to access services, as opposed to those services being available for anyone seeking help. I stress the importance of making sure that we get this right for everybody. We want to meet people where they are—I return to that phrase—and make services accessible, rather than exclusionary, at all points. Those points have already been made in evidence to the committee.

I cannot comment on what should be in the bill, but, as somebody who grew up in an island community, I recognise the challenges of rural service delivery.

Ms Mackay talked about recognising the importance of the multidisciplinary team, and that importance extends to the community and voluntary sector groups that Ms Harper referenced. A number of organisations in rural and island communities can be the first point of interaction and can provide the first opportunity for engagement on a recovery pathway, so it is important that we continue to ensure that that breadth of opportunity for engagement exists through support for community and voluntary organisations. That point has certainly come through in the round-table discussions and stakeholder interaction that I talked about in response to Ms Mochan’s question. That work will continue over the coming months.

I will bring in Ms Zeballos at this point.

As we are setting out the tools and seeing the act being implemented in local areas, and as we see the response that comes back from boards on how they are reviewing and ensuring that they have safe staffing levels, of course we keep under review areas such as those that have been suggested by the Royal College of Nursing. The process is dynamic and flexible—it is not a one-size-fits-all approach—so that we can deal with potential elements that need to be worked on as the legislation is implemented. We keep under review concerns such as those from the Royal College of Nursing that Mr Gulhane has raised.

I thank Emma Harper for that question, because she has illustrated what I was setting out in response to Sandesh Gulhane about the processes that are in play in all environments, in both health and social care, and what must be taken into consideration in order to understand what will be a safe staffing level for a particular shift.

Emma Harper rightly points to the fact that a number of factors will be dynamic and have to be flexible. In the example that she provided, the number of people who are intubated or in intensive care and requiring ventilation would change depending on the number of patients who are in that particular unit at that time. There is an understanding of that. The safe staffing legislation provides transparency around the tools that are used, the way in which the safe staffing level is determined, and ensuring that we comply with that across the NHS and social care estate. That is essentially what the legislation is designed to do.

The tools are there as guides for local decision makers in ensuring that there are safe staffing levels. As I said, they are intended to be dynamic and flexible to respond to local need and clinical demand. As Christopher Thompson set out, HIS is working on developing the tools to ensure that they are responsive—the tools are works in progress. As a result of the legislation and the work that the Government is doing with boards on supplementary staffing, significant work is on-going to ensure that establishment staffing levels are appropriate. A considerable benefit is coming through as a result of the legislation and the on-going work that is being done by HIS and by boards.

Obviously, we will keep under review what we publish. We have to publish the board’s responses, which we will get at the end of next month. We will keep under review and consideration the data that is published alongside that.

We will see what the reports from boards say. I have not had sight of those, and they are not due to arrive with us until 30 April. Challenges remain across the system in ensuring that we have sufficient staffing levels. I will not shy away from that, but I think that this, alongside some of our work with the nursing and midwifery task force, our work on GP attraction and retention and our work with the royal colleges and others on attracting and retaining staff in all disciplines, will help us to build towards ensuring that we continue to have the high-quality and safe clinical environments that people expect.

I am not going to pretend that, on every shift in every ward, staffing is at appropriate levels, because I know that we are sometimes short. However, this is about ensuring that we get to that point. Improvements in that respect will have been made over the past year, and I am looking forward to the reports demonstrating that.