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I am talking about the public. I understand about the professionals.

I have one further question for Dr Cook, if I may. I do not mean to neglect the other witnesses, but the question relates to NHS 24. Many people’s experience of NHS 24 is that it is not quick. It can be extremely slow, and there are practical reasons for that. People are often told that they will get a call back from a GP, for example, and that can take quite a long time. I am not really making a criticism, Dr Cook, but I am genuinely curious. What role does NHS 24 have in relation to strokes? Given the risk of very quick death, surely NHS 24 is really not the applicable service for strokes.

In the triaging that goes on in the first interview, how do staff who are dealing with those cases take account of the BE part?

I want to follow up on what Dr Cook said about making the distinction and FAST not being a measure to exclude people but to include people. I understand the distinction, but the two issues of balance and the loss of fully functioning eyesight—balance and eyes—are not included in FAST, so, as far as the public is concerned, it is exclusive. We are using an information and awareness campaign that does not include two of the factors that, in the case of the individual who tragically lost his life, appear to have been the symptoms that were detectable.

I am playing devil’s advocate a little bit but surely, as far as the general public is concerned, FAST is exclusive, not inclusive, by definition.

Thank you all for your responses. I understand that the issue is complex and multifaceted, and that the role of education is vital. A and E facilities not being available after 5 o’clock, where that occurs, is an obvious and very serious failing, and a gap in the service. I do not gainsay any of that: I accept it all. The petition is concerned with one aspect, and one aspect alone, although I am sure that the petitioner would welcome a much improved service in all those respects.

However, I go back to this question: given that what is involved is a potentially life-threatening condition, and one that the petitioner’s family lost their father to, does that not, when it comes to determining whether a pilot should be carried out, tend to push the balance towards conducting a proper test, as Mr Watson has said, with a set of pre-arranged and fixed criteria governing both the role of the Ambulance Service and the consultants and other clinicians involved? Surely, if a health board is willing to do that, it would be beneficial.

If, as the consistent evidence that we have heard from all four of you suggests, that does not work, then it does not work, but there seems to be a very strong presumption that people are not quite smart enough to be able to deal with complex matters. That could be interpreted as being somewhat dismissive—or a word that is even stronger than that, to be frank. After all, we are talking about a life-threatening condition. Some people, as Mr Watson said in his opening answer, lose their lives as a result of not coming under the FAST criteria.

Is the idea not worth trying? If it does not work, you will at least have tried it, and you will have a better cohort and evidence base on which to proceed as you focus largely on all the other issues that you have fairly and reasonably brought to our attention.

I am persuaded by what both of our visiting MSP colleagues say. I profoundly believe that the current system is inherently flawed, as the petitioners have maintained throughout the lengthy sequence of correspondence that I have read in preparation for this meeting.

We have a lot to learn from the Romans, including the first principle of natural justice: nemo iudex in causa sua—which means that no one can be a judge in their own cause.

The current basis of complaints in the health world and in education—for example, the GTC, which has been mentioned—is that the organisations deal with complaints against their employees, but it seems to me that their first instinct is usually to defend the system—the employee—against the complainant. It is almost a genuflection, and I have seen it time and again for 25 years.

I am grateful to the petitioners, because they have highlighted the existence of an inherent flaw. Child safeguarding is probably the most sensitive and important area that we could possibly conceive of, as both of our colleagues have said.

I find the cost argument to be utterly unconvincing. The petitioners have pointed out that the cost of the child abuse inquiry is likely to be £300 million. It seems to me that, in the future, we should try to tackle the cost of the existing system rather than worry about the cost of a national whistleblower’s office that will be minuscule in comparison with the cost of the damage that has resulted.

I strongly support the petition and I think that we should write to the minister. If colleagues are similarly minded, I feel that we have a sufficient evidential basis, particularly given the lengthy exchange that has taken place between the minister and the petitioners. There is no point in my rehashing it, but it is full of cogent relevant facts and material that the minister has not addressed in any way. Some of the very modest, minor work that the minister says is going on, such as making inquiries about what is happening at the moment, should have been done long ago, when the petition was first lodged. It is a bit late now.

There needs to be a whistleblower. We should not shilly-shally or dither and swither around but should instead urge the Government to get on with it and make that recommendation to the committee. Given that numerous members have registered their concerns about the issue, our impression is that there is widespread concern across the parties. Therefore we should get off the fence and recommend that there be a whistleblower. That should be considered in conjunction with the petitioners and others who can provide useful information about the whistleblower’s role, their remit and how the process would operate. As I have said, the costs would be very modest in comparison with the existing costs.

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 entirely agree that there should be a debate in due course. However, prior to that point, and to inform both the debate and the committee’s work, it would be useful to glean more information. We could write to the Deputy First Minister to seek an update on any further action that the Scottish Government is taking in respect of the action points that were mentioned in her correspondence of 5 December 2024. We could also write to the leader of Glasgow City Council to ask that she meet the Fornethy survivors to discuss their continuing request for recognition of and redress for the abuse that they experienced at Fornethy house.

There seems to have been what we might call a tussle as to whether the Scottish Government or Glasgow City Council should pay. That is a pretty unseemly scrap, and it is preferable that it not take place. However, given that the Deputy First Minister seems to be trying to get the council to pay up, I think that we should find out what the council’s view is.

In my view, the Government should pay up anyway. If it wants to use its muscle to try to recover from Glasgow City Council, that is fair enough. The Government has the firepower, the lawyers and the taxpayers’ money to enable it to get the money back, but the Fornethy survivors do not. Why should they be in the position of begging for what they should have had in the first place? I am sorry, convener—those last remarks were unscripted.