Seòmar agus comataidhean

The final continued petition—PE2042—which was lodged by Undine Achilles-Day on behalf of Taynuilt community council, calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to abolish car parking charges at all Forestry and Land Scotland sites to promote access to forests and green spaces across Scotland.

The petition was previously considered at our meeting on 22 November. We agreed to seek more information from Forestry and Land Scotland, and I am pleased to note that we received a response from it that sets out the rationale for car parking charges at specific sites. The response provides details of the revenue that is received from the charges and of the management costs of maintaining its trails and car parks. The response states that the management of trails and car parks costs Forestry and Land Scotland £5.8 million annually, whereas the income that it receives from car parks is about £1 million.

We have a detailed submission with interesting information about the costs and the sums that are raised. Do any colleagues wish to comment or make suggestions on how to proceed?

Mr Ewing, you looked as though you were bursting to say something, or were you just bursting to say something but thinking better of it?

The second of our new petitions is PE2100, by Gary Wall, which calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to produce guidance under section 54 of the Nature Conservation (Scotland) Act 2004 to clarify the criteria for consideration of “no other satisfactory solution” in relation to licensing and to include the sustainable cultural use of natural resources under section 16 of the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981.

In his written submission to the committee, the petitioner notes that

“NatureScot can change their ‘will’ because they have no transparent conservation ‘objective’ to apply when making a licensing decision on sustainable cultural use.”

The petitioner is concerned that NatureScot’s application of the satisfactory solution test is not clear, and that Scottish Government guidance is therefore required.

In its written response to the committee, the Scottish Government highlights the fact that NatureScot’s licensing guidance includes specific guidance on the interpretation of the “no other satisfactory solution” test. It sets out the points that are considered by NatureScot when it applies that test and notes that

“where another solution exists, any argument that it is not ‘satisfactory’ will need to be strong and robust”.

I emphasise the fact that, in its response, the Scottish Government states that it has

“no intention to bring forward legislation to include the sustainable cultural use of natural resources under Section 16 of the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981.”

The key here appears to be interpretation of the “no other satisfactory solution” test and the petitioner’s assertion of something that I am not sure is actually detailed in the way that the petitioner believes that it is, together with the fact that the Scottish Government has said that it has no intention of bringing forward legislation, which is a pretty clear steer.

In the light of that, do colleagues have any suggestions on how we should proceed?

Do colleagues agree with that suggestion?

Members indicated agreement.

We will keep the petition open, and we will seek to pursue the objective of securing a defibrillator for every school in Scotland.

Welcome back. Before we suspended, we were considering PE2102, from Anna-Cristina Seaver, which seeks to require that anyone who is found guilty of rape or sexual assault to be registered as a sex offender. I read out and detailed the general principles of the petition.

Fulton MacGregor MSP has now joined us, and I am delighted that he will contribute some thoughts to the committee ahead of our consideration of the actions that we might take. Good morning, Mr MacGregor. The committee would be delighted if you would detail your thoughts to us.

Would that be for the Scottish Sentencing Council to respond to? Should we invite it, insofar as it is able, to identify circumstances in which absolute discharge would have been granted, without prejudicing the particular circumstance of any individual case?

Anecdotally—and it is only anecdotal, although first-hand anecdotal—I have been told by recent school leavers that, in fact, pupils are being encouraged to use their mobile phone as a working tool in the classroom to support the digital learning of the class. If that is an evolving practice in learning, I am not quite sure how that is consistent with banning the use of the mobile phone. There was talk at one time of every child being provided with an iPad or a laptop or something, but in the absence of that, how would digital learning proceed in the event of a total ban? That was the response of someone who had recently been at school and thought that there was a contradiction in that, albeit that they had been at a school where there were restrictions on when a phone could be used. The restrictions applied variably in different situations within the school.

I am interested in writing to the Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills to understand whether, in a digital learning era, consideration has been given to the phone being a necessary piece of equipment in the same way that a calculator used to be. Can you just say, “Don’t use them,” or will that prejudice certain individuals’ ability to participate in the learning of the class? I do not know, but I would like to be reassured on that point.

PE1997, which was lodged by Fiona McDonald on behalf of Sight Scotland and Sight Scotland Veterans, calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to introduce new legal requirements on retailers to provide Braille labelling on food products detailing the name of the item and its use-by or sell-by date.

We previously considered the petition at our meeting on 22 November. We agreed to write to the United Kingdom Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs—which is more commonly known as DEFRA—and to Food Standards Scotland. The latter has told us that it is

“looking to use all available relevant science, evidence and research to inform our thinking on the matter”.

Food Standards Scotland’s response highlights that no timescale has been set to carry out that work but that it will continue to discuss issues relating to Braille food labelling on a UK basis, in line with the common framework for food composition, standards and labelling. It says that it will continue to keep in touch with the petitioner as its plans develop.

In its response to the committee, DEFRA states that there are

“no immediate plans to initiate a public consultation on ... the introduction of mandatory braille labelling on food products.”

It notes that factors such as

“practical viability of braille labelling on a diverse range of packaging formats, and the costs and effectiveness of the use of braille labelling relative to that of using different methods”

would have to be considered before a public consultation was launched.

We have subsequently received two submissions from the petitioner, who has raised concerns that “current practices fall short” of UK standards for food labelling and is seeking clarification on how compliance with existing standards is monitored.

We were interested in the petition when we first heard about it, and we have had quite interesting and comprehensive responses from the organisations and bodies to which we wrote. How do members think we should proceed?

As there are no other suggestions from colleagues, is the committee content to close the petition?

Members indicated agreement.

I emphasise that this will be an on-going issue. Although there was an acceptance of the issues that have been raised, the responses that we received were not exactly a call to action at this stage, albeit that there was an indicative suggestion that action might follow at some point. The issue could well be considered afresh in the next parliamentary session.