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I agree with members that it will be important to review and report on the legislation, and I am content that we have a requirement on that in the bill.

Several amendments have been lodged that relate to the operation and impact of the bill across a number of areas. We need to consider carefully the areas in which it is possible and appropriate for information to be gathered and the most suitable timescales in order to ensure the effectiveness of any review.

I am happy to undertake to review the operation and effect of the bill. I consider that the best approach will be to have a single review that covers a range of suitable areas, some of which are covered by amendments that have already been lodged.

I agree with the timescales in some of the amendments. The timescale should be three years after the new system has been established, to allow for the system to bed in and for data to be collected. Therefore, I will seek to coalesce a number of reporting requirements in some of the amendments that have been lodged into a single provision for post-legislative scrutiny at stage 3. In line with that approach, I can support some of the amendments in the group, with a view to further work being done at stage 3. I do not support other amendments, but I will consider all the issues in developing a proposal for stage 3.

I support Pam Duncan-Glancy’s amendment 145 in principle, as it would place a duty on ministers to initiate a review of the act within three years of commencement. That is an appropriate timescale for ensuring an effective review. I will use that as the basis and include other items at stage 3.

However, I cannot support Pam Duncan-Glancy’s amendment 146, which would impose too broad a requirement in relation to reporting on the bill’s impact on the Equality Act 2010 and healthcare in prisons. As I said at the outset, we need to consider carefully what is possible and appropriate for information to be gathered about and reported on.

On that point, the NHS will, through the patient rights charter, try to accede to someone’s demands and needs. However, in some circumstances—say, with a very small specialty that can be carried out by only a very small number of NHS professionals—that will not always be possible. Pam Gosal herself has recognised that the NHS will try to accede to needs and demands, where possible.

On her other point, the discussion that we had with the Faith & Belief Forum, which comprises various religious leaders from various faiths, was very full, frank and open, and no one had any qualms about giving me their views either in favour of or in opposition to the bill. That was absolutely right and proper.

It would be for the NHS to manage that situation. I do not believe that NHS professionals would want to put themselves in a position in which they were giving medical support to someone who did not want them to give them that support.

The NHS would, and does, manage such situations. We cannot legislate for something like that situation, so it would be for the NHS to manage it, as it currently does. The NHS currently manages difficult situations in which someone may not want a particular person to manage their care for a whole variety of reasons, whether that is right or wrong. People make demands around their own requirements, and the NHS—as you said yourself—will try to accede to those demands where possible, doable and reasonable. It does so day to day, and we should enable it to continue to do that in the way that it currently does.

I do not support amendments 139 and 140. I said last week, and I reiterate, that applying for and receiving a gender recognition certificate and clinical decisions about gender identity healthcare are separate issues. The bill is about the process for obtaining a gender recognition certificate. A GRC is not required in order to access gender identity healthcare, and there has never been a requirement for someone to have undergone surgery or any other medical treatment in order to obtain a GRC under the 2004 act.

I am aware that the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Care, Humza Yousaf, has written to the committee setting out all the actions that his officials and the NHS are taking in order to address some of the concerns about gender identity healthcare, not least some of the waiting times, which were mentioned earlier. It is for the health service to resolve those issues, rather than addressing them in a bill that is about the process for obtaining a gender recognition certificate.

It would always depend on the circumstances of the case, but, for example, if it could be shown that the person had no intention of living in the acquired gender and was obtaining a gender recognition certificate in the full knowledge that they had no intention to do so, that evidence could be gathered and presented to the court.

In the very unlikely circumstance that someone had sought to obtain a gender recognition certificate fraudulently, had no intention of living in the acquired gender, and then went on to commit an offence, the aggravator would show the seriousness of that—not just in relation to making a false declaration, but then in going on to commit a crime having obtained a GRC under false pretences. As I said, the circumstances of each individual case might be very different. That is one example of where that evidence would be shown. The court would then have to consider the circumstances of the case and make a decision on that.

I agree. Pam Duncan-Glancy’s amendment 145, which calls for a three-year review, has the right time frame, because it allows for data to be generated. That leads to the question of what we review and what can be reviewed, based on the information that will be available. Would that monitoring in and of itself be kept under review? I agree with Sarah Boyack, but my question is: what will the review criteria be and what information can or will we gather?

On Karen Adam’s question, people will not require a gender recognition certificate to work in healthcare or in any other walk of life. As far as I am aware, that will not be required.

Finally, it is for the Equality and Human Rights Commission to consider the guidance given to public bodies, including the NHS, and it has done so. The commission has already issued public bodies with guidance on the operation of the Equality Act 2010.

Yes, and they can be applied if it is proportionate to do so. If an employer or service provider—you gave the example of the NHS—wanted to use such an exception under the 2010 act, they could do so as long as it was proportionate. The bill changes none of that—those protections are still there. The Equality and Human Rights Commission’s updated guidance clarifies and reiterates to public service providers that they have that exception but that, if they use it, they must show that it has been proportionate to do so.

I am happy to continue the conversation, but it is important to recognise that some of the exceptions, protections and rights that are already the case are not changed at all by the bill. It is important to reiterate that for the record. For the sake of clarity, I am happy to discuss further with Pam Gosal whether anything more can be done on the issue.

What is important—

The guidance is already provided through the Equality and Human Rights Commission and through governing bodies. Mr Whittle is talking about two slightly different things. On the way in which a public body manages its spaces, there is guidance from the Equality and Human Rights Commission on the proportionality of who would be excluded from certain spaces in sports provision.

If you are talking about competition and athletes competing at whatever level, however, the guidance has to be specific to that sport. That is why we have seen sports governing bodies very publicly making those changes in the light of the evidence that they have gathered and research that they have done. Each sport is very different with regard to the physicality of athletes, so the guidance, as I have said, has to be specific to the sport.

Thinking about the guidance that sportscotland issued last year in Scotland, I cannot see how you can possibly legislate for every scenario and every sport in a bill that is about the process for obtaining a gender recognition certificate. That said, if the Equality and Human Rights Commission believes that guidance requires to be revised again in the light of the bill, we will of course work with it on that. However, the guidance is already there, and sports governing bodies are changing their policy in certain circumstances.

We have done so. Let me be absolutely clear: we have considered every single amendment. We have examined them and assessed whether they are required or not required, what their effect would be and any unintended consequences. We have done that for all of them—every single one of them.

For clarity and simplicity, having the protection or the catch-all clarity of Pam Duncan-Glancy’s amendment 37 offers the clearest way to say that, for the avoidance of doubt, there is no change to any aspects of the Equality Act 2010. To go further than that would actually introduce a lack of clarity. I hope that I could not have been any clearer in my answer to Daniel Johnson’s point regarding the exemptions, which will continue to apply.