Seòmar agus comataidhean

I thank you all for joining us and for your opening statements. Richy, I especially thank you for sharing your story with us. I am really sorry that you have been through that. Thank you for being here and helping us to understand why this is so important.

I have two questions, the first of which relates to the definition of conversion practices, which the committee has spoken about before. We made it clear in our report that we wanted to draw the definition of conversion practices as widely as possible. Issues around consent and intention to harm were part of that. The advisory group came up with a very clear definition of what conversion practices are. Why was it so important to draw that definition as widely as you did? How can we ensure that affirmative care—which we all recognise is important—is still okay?

Thank you—that was really helpful. I will leave it there for now, convener.

Sandra and David, I have learned so much from you this morning, so I thank you both for what you have said so far. I also thank you for bringing in the point about health settings, because I was going to ask about widening our consideration of the issue. However, I know that you are focused on the justice issue and the question of vulnerability, which David has just mentioned.

I will play devil’s advocate a little. I should say straight up that there is definitely something here for us to explore, although we will need to consider in more detail exactly what route we might take. One of the challenges that we might encounter as we pursue this work is the argument that there are already facilities for when somebody does not have “normal” mental capacity. For example, there are mental health provisions and learning disability provisions for those people. It could be argued that those should be the routes that we use to enable their involvement in and engagement with the justice system.

One of the challenges that I expect will come along with that is that legislation on mental capacity, for example, comes with measures to safeguard the best interests of the person who lacks capacity. What is your response to such challenges? It would be useful for us to hear from you, given your personal experience with your sister, how that wider legal framework supports her—or not, as the case may be.

I think that I do. Thank you—that is really helpful. Some of the challenges that I think might come at us exist because there is a rigid, inflexible justice system. You made the point that social workers and support workers can help up to a point but there is nothing that connects across the gap.

You have both given us a lot to think about and pursue, so I thank you for coming along this morning. I really appreciate it.

That was clear and helpful. It is important to outline the issues with that wide definition and the importance of enabling, supporting and encouraging affirmative care.

Paul Behrens, the way in which you laid out the societal context of the need for such legislation was clear and incisive. You started talking about the human rights context. Because you offered, I will ask you to say a little more about some of the specific issues that may be discussed or questioned around potential conflicts or tensions. What are the important provisions for younger people in a human rights context? It would be helpful to hear about that.

I suppose that that figure is even before talk about the costs of adaptation. I know that other people want to talk about finance, so I will leave it there for now.

I will follow on from Fiona Hyslop’s question on the allocations from the just transition fund, which are key to our having any hope of achieving our targets.

I and others—in particular, communities in the north-east—are concerned that millions of pounds have already been allocated to large companies, many of which are backed by the fossil fuel industry, which has made record profits in recent months, while just £4.2 million has been allocated over four years to community-led participatory budgeting. One of the key concerns is clearly that it is not enough just to give money to companies. The just transition needs to be genuine, and I am not sure that we will get that, unless we have the strategic work that Fiona Hyslop alluded to.

I want to talk about two specific projects. As you will be well aware, £14 million has been awarded to a contentious project in Torry, which is a community in the south of Aberdeen that has among the lowest life expectancy in Scotland—it is more than a decade shorter than it is in other parts of the city. It has not benefited at all from the oil and gas economy. In fact, all of Torry was bulldozed for the oil and gas economy.

There is a clear mismatch in relation to what we term “justice” when a community such as Torry has its only remaining green space concreted over for something that will assist the broader just transition but will not represent justice for that community. How do we tackle that kind of injustice if we do not have the dedicated focus to community leadership that is missing from the current allocations?

Can I ask one more question?

The question is about another project. At the moment, the Scottish Government has under way an independent review on how to cut climate pollution from Scotland’s existing incinerators. As you will know, the Ness incinerator in Aberdeen was awarded money from the just transition fund for research into the feasibility of carbon capture and storage. Putting aside the fact that nowhere in the world has CCS been used successfully in an incineration plant, I am curious as to whether you think that that award pre-empts the work that the Scottish Government has commissioned into how to cut carbon emissions from incinerators—given that it means that we are saying that we are going to fund an incinerator to bake in demand for waste generation.

Good morning, minister. Thank you for what you have said so far and for being here.

As you said, we have ambitious targets to meet in Scotland, but that is part of a bigger picture—the idea of what we see termed as “Keeping 1.5°C alive”. That rapid shift and pace of transition must happen with, as you mentioned, engagement and conversations with workers about job creation and the broader shifts in energy and the economy.

We will get into the details of specific community issues when we talk about the just transition fund for the north-east and Moray a bit later. However, in relation to the economy more generally, how can we ensure that we future proof our work and do not lock in disadvantage and inequality? You mentioned in your opening remarks that former mining communities are still suffering from the previous energy transition that we went through. How can we use this transition to ensure that we improve equality and make things fairer now for people who have not reaped the benefits of the oil economy that we have had for the past 50 years?