Seòmar agus comataidhean

Can you give us more of a flavour of some of those projects might be, or is it too early to say? One challenge is that the Government says, “We’ve got this money for community cohesion”, but people on the ground wonder what it actually means for them, especially if they live in situations where there is conflict and tension and they feel powerless to resolve it.

I appreciate that the examples that you have given are indicative and that you have not given an exhaustive list. However, one of my concerns is that, although such work is very valuable and important, people need to opt in, so there is a challenge in how we get those resources and have those conservations in communities that do not want to know about those things. In such communities, there might have been generations of disenfranchisement—there could have been a series of situations that have led people to think that nothing good can come from engaging with the state in a meaningful way.

How can we tackle the structural barriers that prevent the fostering of good relations? We can say that we will have a knit and natter group, for example, but the people who need such groups will not necessarily be the ones who come to them. How can we ensure that it is not just a case of opting in and including people who are already interested in being in these kinds of spaces and having these kinds of conversations?

Do I have time to ask one last question, convener?

John, you mentioned the police taking a fostering good relations approach in managing different situations in which race, ethnicity and other characteristics in that space are causing flashpoints in communities. Has the EHRC had any conversations with Police Scotland about that? Can you give us a bit more detail? Many communities and many people across Scotland are greatly frustrated by the rising levels of hate, whereby people of colour are being targeted on the streets and the police are doing nothing about it, or are seen to do nothing about it. Can you shed any light on the work that you have done with the police on those issues?

Okay—thank you. It does represent a shift in focus for public bodies, where awareness may not be as high as it should be across the board. John Wilkes, who was on the previous panel, said that there might be good understanding of the PSED at the top of certain public bodies but that it may stop at that point and not filter all the way down. However, in our inquiry, we also saw clear examples of where people on the ground understood exactly what they should be doing but they were hampered by processes elsewhere. A shift is needed away from it being a legalistic process.

Minister, you raised this in your opening remarks, but it has been a bugbear of mine for a long time that the fostering good relations pillar is clearly the poor cousin in the three pillars of the PSED. In your conversations with ministerial colleagues, how often do you talk about fostering good relations? Do you talk explicitly about that element of the PSED?

It is possibly indicative that there is no shining example. There might be, but I struggle to find one. If you find one, please let us know.

I will do.

My final question follows on from what you said about having people who can get into the middle of things, as it were. In the community discussions that I have been part of, one of the frustrations that I have heard has been about a perceived lack of awareness and understanding among police officers. Attempts by police officers to balance people’s rights and those of different groups might create more conflict, because people might not see police officers acting on racist attacks on people of colour who just happen to be walking past or on much more targeted attacks. How can we bring Police Scotland into some of this work, because police officers are in every community? How can we ensure that the need for balance is not used as an excuse to do nothing?

What am I trying to get at here? I am not at all suggesting that this is what you are doing, but I think that it is sometimes easy for regulators and for people who are not politicians to say, “Oh, we can’t get involved in the politics of that.” However, as you have just said, it is the job of us all to ensure that we get involved and have those conversations.

I will change tack a bit. You talked about your work in the higher and further education sector and with the SFC in response to, I think, one of Karen Adam’s question. Given that some of the fertile territory for debate and discussion is in institutions in that sector, how do you see colleges and universities understanding the element of the duty to foster good relations? We have seen some pretty poor examples of understanding, particularly around sex and gender-related issues. How does that element feature in your conversations and work with the SFC and those institutions?

I thank the cabinet secretary for taking my intervention. Given the point that I made about when an incompatibility issue could be raised—and given that, under the provisions in your amendments, such an issue could be raised only when there were live proceedings—what options will be open to public bodies to raise issues of incompatibility without there having to be live proceedings in place? Could that happen informally? Is there any mechanism for doing that?

I take on board your concern about having a statutory responsibility and about the threat of legal action one way or another, but there is an issue about pre-empting live cases and how we could prevent stuff from going to proceedings.