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Are members content with that approach?

Members indicated agreement.

I thank members for their contributions.

The next continued petition is PE1891, which was lodged by Lewis Alexander Condy and calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to ensure that all children have the opportunity to learn to swim by making it a statutory requirement to provide lessons in the primary school curriculum.

I am delighted to say that we are joined by our colleague Foysol Choudhury MSP. Good morning, Mr Choudhury. I will invite you to speak in a minute or so but, before I do so I will provide a bit more background to the following proceedings.

We previously considered the petition in November of last year, when we agreed to write to the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities to seek data on how many schools provide swimming lessons as part of the curriculum. We also wrote to the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents and Scottish Swimming.

COSLA’s submission states that, currently,

“There are no local or national mechanisms in place”

to collect the data, and notes that the delivery of swimming lessons can depend on factors such as access to facilities, cost and delivery model. The latest figures, which are pre-pandemic and are for 2018-19, suggest that

“21 Local Authorities were offering swimming activity through the Active Schools Network.”

Scottish Swimming notes in its submission that

“there were over 106,000 children enrolled in learn to swim programmes ... prior to the pandemic”.

The submission also highlights data that suggests that

“there is a direct correlation between a child’s socio-economic background and their opportunity to learn to swim.”

Scottish Swimming states that it has submitted a proposal to the Scottish Government in support of a programme of school swimming and is currently involved in discussions with sportscotland on its potential development.

We also received a submission from the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents, which highlights the need for any swimming programme to include consideration of outdoor water survival skills.

The petitioner suggests that the current policy of allowing councils to choose whether to provide swimming lessons is unfair, leading to many children missing out or being forced to take private lessons, which might be inaccessible to lower-income families or those living in rural areas.

Before I turn to members of the committee, I ask Mr Choudhury whether he would like to comment on the petition’s aims.

Thank you for those very helpful comments.

We have had quite a comprehensive discussion this morning. I see no indication that other committee members wish to come in, so I thank Foysol Choudhury for joining us this morning.

I think that we will keep Mr Condy’s petition open and write as David Torrance has suggested, but I suggest that we also include some of the themes that Paul Sweeney has talked about and highlight not just the teaching of swimming as people would traditionally think of it in controlled environments such as swimming pools but the life-saving benefits of what one might call, for want of a better description, wild swimming in its widest sense and as described in the conversation that we have just had. It might go slightly broader than the range of the petition, but we could look at what more might be done to progress the issue in a way that would save lives, even though ultimately the petition’s objective with regard to swimming pools is slightly impractical for certain local authorities. There is certainly a very important issue at the heart of this.

Do members agree to keep the petition open and to seek further information on the basis that has been proposed?

Members indicated agreement.

Once again, I thank Mr Choudhury for joining us this morning.

PE1912, on funding for council venues, has been lodged by Wendy Dunsmore. It calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to provide councils with the necessary additional revenue to run essential services and venues.

It is worth noting that the SPICe briefing on the petition, the Scottish Government’s submission and the petitioner’s submission were all written before the Scottish Government budget 2022-23 was published, which happened on 9 December 2021. Key points from a separate SPICe briefing on local government finance that was produced following the budget’s publication include the facts that, once additional revenue and capital grants are factored in, the total local government settlement increased by £603 million, or 5.1 per cent, between 2021-22 and 2022-23; and that there will be a real-terms increase in provisional revenue allocations for all local authorities, except Western Isles Council, Shetland Islands Council and Orkney Islands Council, which all experience small real-terms reductions.

In his submission, the Minister for Public Finance, Planning and Community Wealth highlights the 2021-22 settlement of £11.7 billion, stating that it provided “a cash increase” in local government spending. The petitioner’s submission is a collective response to the minister from Unite, Unison and the GMB. Although they recognise that local authorities make decisions about service provision and delivery, they note that those decisions are not without

“unfair challenges caused by a real terms reduction of funding”.

The petitioner’s submission also points out that, as much of the £11.7 billion settlement figure is ring fenced for Scottish Government commitments, it is therefore “not technically available” for local authority spending decisions.

I invite comments from colleagues.

Our last new petition is PE1916, which requests a public inquiry into the management of the Rest and Be Thankful project and was lodged by Councillor Douglas Philand and Councillor Donald Kelly.

As promised, I am delighted to welcome back Rhoda Grant for the final petition this morning. I will come to her shortly.

The petition calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to instigate a public inquiry regarding the political and financial management of the A83 Rest and Be Thankful project, which is to provide a permanent solution for the route.

Transport Scotland explains in its submission that, following a number of landslides across Scotland in 2004, a nationwide Scottish road network landslides study was carried out. The study concluded that the A83 Ardgartan to Rest and Be Thankful is one of the most highly ranked debris flow hazard sites in Scotland.

In 2012, Transport Scotland commissioned a study to identify and appraise potential options to minimise the effects of road closures. The final A83 route study, which was published in February 2013, explains that the decision was made to progress with the red option, as it was considered at that time to offer the best performance and the most cost-effective way of meeting the study’s objectives. Those objectives included maintaining the existing alignment of the A83 with a range of landslide mitigation measures such as additional debris flow barriers at locations where the landslide hazard was considered highest; the improvement of hillside drainage adjacent to and under the road; and the introduction of vegetation and planting on the slope.

In its submission, Transport Scotland provided a range of data that shows the number of days on which the various stretches of road in and around the A83 were closed due to landslides. The data shows that the events that occurred in 2020 and 2021 were significantly larger in scale than any of the previous events.

Following that, several new measures were introduced to make it quicker, easier and safer to open the road should it be closed by a landslide. In 2020, a consultation exercise was carried out to consider 11 route corridor options to address issues at the Rest and Be Thankful route. More than 650 people provided feedback, and the Glen Croe corridor was chosen as the preferred route.

The Transport Scotland submission advises that

“timescales for completion of a long term solution to the issues at the Rest and Be Thankful range from 7–10 years”.

In the interim, Transport Scotland advises that work is progressing

“to look at a medium term resilient route through Glen Croe”

and that

“that work will seek to develop a finalised proposal by Autumn”

this year. The submission states:

“Since the A83 Taskforce was set up in 2012, meetings have been held every 6 months”

and that “a substantial project update” is due

“at the next Taskforce meeting in early 2022”.

A project-specific web page has also been launched on the Transport Scotland website.

Against that background, I am happy to invite comments from Rhoda Grant.

I remember standing there on a site investigation with the previous committee. You are absolutely right that the military road sits in the shadow of the principal route. It is hardly a wonderful alternative, but at least it was an alternative, although not when there was a significant landslide. The route in the valley opposite was regarded as being far too steep to be developed for heavy goods vehicles or other larger vehicles. It has been a significant on-going problem.

Our second agenda item is the consideration of continued petitions. The first of those is PE1723, on essential tremor treatment, which was lodged by Mary Ramsay and calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to raise awareness of essential tremor and support the introduction and use of a focused ultrasound scanner for treating people in Scotland who have the condition.

I am delighted to welcome Rhoda Grant MSP back to the committee to speak to the petition. Before I come to Rhoda, I will provide a little more background. When it last considered the petition in September of last year, the committee agreed to write to the University of Dundee to seek an update on the magnetic resonance-guided focused ultrasound—MRgFUS—scanner system.

A response from the University of Dundee has now been received, which confirms that its focused ultrasound system has been used to treat five patients with essential tremor. Funding approval has been obtained from individual national health service boards for patients to be treated in Dundee over the coming months.

The committee also wrote to the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Sport requesting an update on plans to submit a proposal to the national specialist services committee to allow the treatment to become a standard form of care. Applications to the committee have now been halted due to the pandemic. At present, the majority of those wishing to access the treatment are forced to travel long distances to access care in England.

Although I sometimes tease that she is with us more than some of our committee members, it is a pleasure to have Rhoda with us again this morning. Would you like to update the committee on anything in relation to the petition?

No other members of the committee have indicated that they wish to comment.

To summarise, we are keeping the petition open. It looks as though Natalie Don will propose a member’s bill. We might require some clarification on our ability to progress the petition if a bill is introduced and proceeds but, in any event, it looks as though the scope of such a bill will not comprehensively cover the scope of the petition. Therefore, we will keep in mind members’ desire to hear evidence from the petitioner at a future meeting, clarify with Ms Don when she might be likely to lodge the proposal for the members’ bill and invite her to participate in our consideration of the petition on that date.

Does that course of action meet with the committee’s approval?

Members indicated agreement.