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I am pleased that the Inverness Courier, in its wisdom, has chosen to lodge the petition. I thank it for doing so and for championing the issue, which is of massive concern to everyone in Nairn as well as the wider north-east. In one way, it is quite a modest ask. It is not demanding that the whole project be completed by a certain time. It is simply asking for the Government to publish a clear timeline for the dualling of the A96 between Inverness and Nairn, and for the construction of a bypass for Nairn.

You have outlined the sad history of the work to dual the A96 by 2030. Thus far, £90 million has been spent on preparatory work for the dualling of the A96, but not one centimetre of tarmac has been laid. Many people, including me, find that almost incomprehensible.

In the Government response in defence of the lack of a timeline, a number of points are made, which I will cover briefly, in the hope that the cabinet secretary might appear before us to give evidence on that and other transport measures, as we might have mooted before. I hope that that will give her some indication of the issues with which she will be concerned and which will certainly be put to her.

The first point is on the made orders, which are an important milestone in the statutory process to determine which properties require to be compulsorily purchased and which ancillary roads need to be adjusted to fit in with the new road. Those are the two main made orders, although there are subsidiary ones. The response says that they were made on 12 March 2024, which is quite true.

There is something that the response does not say, however. I have a document here—I believe that we are not allowed to brandish documents, otherwise I would do so right now—from Transport Scotland. It is a 2016 document, which states that the made orders were expected to be published later that year. Well, that was 2016; we then got to 2024. What happened?

It used to be that draft made orders were displayed on the Transport Scotland website. They were displayed in draft, and they were ready for ages in draft. The year in the provisional date on this draft was 2-0-1-blank. In other words, it was planned that this work would be done nearly a decade ago. It was also promised in the 2011 manifesto and slightly before that by Alex Salmond.

The first point that I want to make is that no explanation has ever been given as to why there was a delay of eight years, which is the longest delay ever in respect of reaching this important stage of the proceedings. That is point 1.

The Cabinet Secretary for Transport has a personal enthusiasm for taking the issue on, to be fair to her. She is the fourth transport minister that we have had in four years, which is not terrific. Setting that aside, the submission says that the reason for the delay is that

“It is fundamental that ... authorities allow sufficient time to properly consider the range of procurement routes available”.

How much more time do they need? I do not want to be too political, but the Government has had four years of this parliamentary session, and I have raised the issue, as members will appreciate, fairly frequently during those four years. That is point 2.

There are two final points that I want to make. I do not want to go on forever, convener—I have a habit of doing that.

There is a proposal, which is that fair notice be given to the cabinet secretary.

I have tried to consider the petition carefully. As a solicitor formerly in private practice for a quarter of a century, I dealt with quite a lot of matrimonial work and the financial settlement on divorce, which, as the minister said in her reply, is covered by the Family Law (Scotland) Act 1985

One understands that both parties to divorce usually have very strong feelings and often feel that the division of the cake is unfair, and one can sympathise with that in certain circumstances. However, the Government has set out clearly that it is not in favour of that policy, and there is really no prospect whatsoever that it will change those principles.

I think that the 1985 act is a very good piece of legislation, and I want to make one specific point clear, which may not be immediately apparent. Under the act, the assets that fall to be divided between the parties are classified as matrimonial property, that is, property that is brought in in anticipation of marriage or property that is acquired or created during the period of the marriage, from the date of the marriage until the date of the separation or raising of the writ, if there has not been a separation.

In other words, the point is that, if you get married at, say, 50 and then divorced at 55, and you took out a pension when you were 25 and you still have that pension, then only the proportion of the pension attributable to the time period relating to the date of the marriage and the date of the separation falls to be taken into account. That is because the law recognises that there needs to be a recognition of the contributions of both parties in bringing up children and so on. If there is one breadwinner, the other spouse—usually, though not always, the female—may often have substantial childcare responsibilities.

The law is quite sophisticated. It seems to me to have stood the test of time. It seeks to be fair and, although the petitioner feels that it is unfair, I am not persuaded by her arguments. Therefore, on this occasion—I have not said this for a while—I agree with the Scottish Government.

Well, that is interesting. “Algorithms” was the word that I was unsuccessfully hunting for.

I think that we have probably pursued the issue as far as we can at this stage in the parliamentary cycle, so I recommend that we close the petition under rule 15.7, on the basis of four factors. First, the guidance on the visibility of pedestrian crossings is set out in the UK-wide guidance on the design of pedestrian crossings. Secondly, national planning framework 4 highlights safe crossing, pedestrian priority and reduced street clutter as desirable qualities. Thirdly, the Scottish Government considers that it is for local authorities to identify streets that are in need of decluttering. Fourthly, the day-to-day enforcement of the pavement parking prohibitions, along with consideration of reporting systems, is also the responsibility of local authorities.

Taking account of those factors, I recommend that we close the petition.

Which health board were you referring to?

I am impressed by how much Mr Golden knows about rubbish.

Yes. I know that the petitioner will be disappointed but, as you said in relation to a previous petition, convener, a lot of work has been done up to this time by the clerks to get a response from the minister and the petitioner. Were there any prospect of any reform, it would be our duty to explore and examine that, but my personal view—members may take a different view—is that there is no prospect at all of the Scottish Government changing its mind. If there is a different Government in the future, the petitioner might bring the issue back, if she so wishes.

If I phone up and say that my balance and eyesight are affected, what does the triage do? You have protocols and matrices—I do not know what the right word is—that determine the response given by the NHS operatives. However, I am not sure to what extent they are qualified—excuse my ignorance, Dr Cook. If I am asked whether I feel dizzy or I have slurred speech and I say, “No, but my balance is affected and my eyesight has suffered a bit”, what would you do then?

I am sure that all the witnesses will be well aware that the petition arose because of the tragic loss of the life of Tony Bundy. The petitioner stated that, when Tony suffered a stroke, his face and arms were unaffected and his speech was not slurred, and that meant that he passed the FAST test because face, arms, speech and time were not affected. The petitioner went on to say that the family is now raising awareness of the symptoms of stroke, including the inability to stand, which is balance, cold sweats, and eyes struggling to focus. That is where the B and the E come from—balance and eyes.

The evidence that you have all given is consistent: you do not think that, from the available studies and the evidence, the alteration of the awareness campaign from FAST to BE FAST would work. Mr Watson began by stating that there is a problem. To put that problem in layperson’s terms, the current system is not identifying all of those who might have suffered a stroke, but you think that FAST is best, and if we are to depart from that, it might make things worse, not better.

I can understand that. I am not a clinician, so it is not for me to second guess anybody. However, the committee wrote to all the health boards in Scotland and the written response from NHS Ayrshire and Arran describes the work that it has already done, which is quite substantial and quite impressive. I will not read it all out because it would take too long, but it says that

“the team at NHS Ayrshire and Arran would very much welcome the opportunity to be a pilot site if this was agreed.”

I have a point that I want to try out on you, to see what you say. Studies are one thing, but a health board is willing to carry out a pilot, and the Minister for Public Health and Women’s Health, Jenni Minto, has said that it is up to health boards to do that. As I understand it, she is not standing in the way of a pilot, although I am not sure that she is advocating one. Given all that, would it not be sensible to actually try it out? I do not mean to be impertinent in any way. Your evidence and knowledge come from your experience as professionals and clinicians, but a layperson might say, “For goodness’ sake, give it a try.”

Studies are one thing and, as has been pointed out, studies from the USA may be of limited efficacy because of different circumstances and the profit element, but surely it would make sense to have a pilot scheme. If it were conducted under scrupulously pre-arranged terms, it might be possible to measure the outcome and see whether it actually works.

I know that that idea was promoted by Stephen Kerr and Alexander Stewart, two other MSPs who have been supportive of the family in this case. I would like to know from all the witnesses whether they think that that might be worth trying.