Seòmar agus comataidhean

One issue that we discussed at the meeting that I referred to earlier sits rather apart, so I will discuss it separately. PE2071, which was lodged by Sally Witcher, calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to take action to protect people from airborne infections in health and social care settings—specifically, to improve air quality in health and social care settings through addressing ventilation, air filtration and sterilisation; to reintroduce routine mask wearing in those settings, particularly using respiratory masks; to reintroduce routine Covid testing; to ensure that staff manuals fully cover the prevention of airborne infection; to support ill staff to stay at home; and to provide public health information on the use of respiratory masks and high-efficiency particulate air—HEPA—filtration against airborne infections.

We last considered the petition on 5 March 2025, when we agreed to write to the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Care. In a response issued by the chief nursing officer directorate, the Scottish Government reiterated that it has no role in the development of the “National Infection Prevention and Control Manual”, or NIPCM, or the “Care Home Infection and Control Manual”, the CH NIPCM.

The petition notes that antimicrobial resistance and healthcare associated infection Scotland are the national clinical infection prevention and control experts, and it highlights the ARHAI’s response.

During the evidence session in September 2025, the cabinet secretary said that he would write to the committee with a timescale for publication of the infection prevention and control strategy. In his letter of 30 October, the cabinet secretary stated that a 10-year IPC strategic vision and priorities statement was being developed collaboratively by the Scottish Government’s IPC strategic development and oversight group by spring 2026.

In her most recent submission, the petitioner considers that the pandemic and its cumulative health impacts remain on-going and that that is being ignored by the Government. She notes that, this winter, the NHS has again been overwhelmed by airborne infection, and she argues that much of that could have been avoided had the actions and measures suggested in the petition been put in place. She adds that she can still find no evidence of expert input and quality assurance on infection prevention and control, and she questions the accuracy and completeness of ARHAI’s advice.

We have the petitioner’s further submission and the follow-up from the cabinet secretary, which confirms that the infection control strategy will be published by spring this year. Do colleagues have any views on what more we are able to do at this stage, given that the cabinet secretary’s letter says that a document will be published in spring 2026, which will be after the Parliament has dissolved?

I thank the petitioner for raising the issues, and I hope that they can be pursued when Parliament reassembles.

We will move on to consider a number of petitions that raise concerns and call for action on issues that are related to emergency cardiac and stroke care. Since the last formal consideration of each of the petitions, the committee has taken oral evidence from the Minister for Public Health and Women’s Health on the themes that were raised across them. That session took place on 12 November 2025.

PE1989, which was lodged by Mary Montague, calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to support the provision of defibrillators in public spaces and workplaces. We last considered the petition on 7 May 2025, which was ahead of the evidence session. During oral evidence, the minister highlighted the importance of optimal defibrillator placement and pointed to the new PADmap tool, which shows the location of public access defibrillators and identifies the areas where defibrillators are most needed. The evidence session highlighted that the location, ease of access and continued upkeep of defibrillators are all important considerations, and the committee noted that there is a reliance on community fundraising and external sponsorship to provide and maintain public defibrillators. The issue of bystander confidence was raised during the evidence session with the minister, which highlighted the importance of engagement work with stakeholders through Save a life for Scotland.

The minister gave some interesting evidence about how deficiencies in the PADmap tool can be addressed, but she also gave some fairly structured arguments about why taking the blanket approach that defibrillators should be located in any one particular place might not prove to be appropriate. Do colleagues have any suggestions on how we might proceed in the light of the evidence that we heard?

The next continued petition is PE2048, which was lodged by James Anthony Bundy. It calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to increase awareness of the symptoms of stroke by reviewing its promotion of the FAST—face, arms, speech, time—campaign and ensuring that stroke awareness campaigns include all the symptoms of a potential stroke. We previously considered the petition at our meeting on 25 February and agreed to write to the Minister for Public Health and Women’s Health, NHS Fife, NHS Ayrshire and Arran, Chest Heart & Stroke Scotland, the Scottish Ambulance Service and the Chartered Institute of Marketing. The committee previously heard concerns, which are not universally shared, that moving from FAST to BE FAST—balance, eyes, face, arms, speech, time—could produce false positives and have a concerning impact on clinicians’ ability to treat strokes.

A submission that was received from NHS Forth Valley mentioned a range of FAST stroke awareness initiatives that it has been supporting locally, and it highlighted that its emergency department has been using the BE FAST stroke assessment tool since early 2024. However, it underlined that it has not yet been able to undertake any formal evaluation of the impact of those initiatives.

At the evidence session in November, the minister, Jenni Minto, said that the Government

“will converse with the health board to understand what it is doing, where it is in the pilot and when we can expect the report.”—[Official Report, Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee, 12 November 2025; c 18.]

We found the minister’s suggestion that the Government is keeping its current position under review quite encouraging, because that had not been expressed to us in writing. Additionally, we were impressed by the fact that the minister had been actively engaged with the issue and had met a number of the individuals concerned with the proposal.

The minister highlighted that, following a meeting with the petitioner, the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Care asked the stroke specialty adviser to the chief medical officer to review stroke awareness education for clinical staff. That led to the Scottish Government developing and funding an education package for general practices, emergency departments and the Scottish Ambulance Service that also covers the less common but important presentations of stroke, including symptoms relating to certain presentations of loss of balance and visual field defects—the B and E aspects of BE FAST.

This is another important petition that we have considered. Do colleagues have any comments or suggestions for action?

We thank the petitioner for submitting the petition.

If I may return briefly to PE1989, for the avoidance of doubt, I assumed that, when Mr Golden said that his view on the petition was similar to Mr Torrance’s, he meant that he was in favour of closing the petition. Are colleagues content with that proposal?

Members indicated agreement.

The next continued petition is PE2067, which is another one concerning an issue that is well known to the Parliament. It was lodged by Sharon Duncan following the death of her son and our colleague David Hill. It calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to commission research to establish how many people aged 14-35 are affected by conditions that cause young sudden cardiac death; to clarify the number of people who die annually in Scotland from those conditions; and to set up a pilot study to establish if voluntary screening can reduce deaths.

We last considered the petition on 5 March 2025, when we agreed to write to the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Care and to the Italian embassy. We then took evidence from the Minister for Public Health and Women’s Health on 12 November and agreed to consider the evidence at a future meeting.

The submission from the consulate general of Italy in Edinburgh highlights evidence of screening leading to an 89 per cent decrease in the incident rate of sudden cardiac death among young competitive athletes—a figure that I think the committee found quite compelling. The Scottish Government has reiterated that it adheres to UK National Screening Committee guidance in this area; the UK NSC evidence summary shows that international guidelines do not recommend population-level screening, although they support pre-participation screening in competitive athletes. We understand that the UK NSC considered the study highlighted by the consulate general of Italy in its 2019 review, and it is now conducting a new review of relevant evidence over the following three years.

At the evidence-taking session in November, the minister informed us that the 2025 Scottish cardiac audit programme has included

“data on inherited cardiac conditions for the first time”.

Additionally, we heard that work is on-going

“to develop a proof of concept for a sudden cardiac death registry”—[Official Report, Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee, 12 November 2025; c 3.],

with the aim of including preliminary data in next year’s Scottish cardiac audit programme.

We also heard from the British Heart Foundation that it has funded clinical nurse specialist sudden cardiac death roles in order to expand and roll out a successful west of Scotland pilot to implement a new clinical pathway for sudden unexpected death, sudden cardiac death and out-of-hospital cardiac arrest. The aim is to achieve full national coverage by the end of the 24-month period, with progress being monitored throughout.

In the light of all that, do colleagues have any suggestions as to how we might proceed with the petition?

Yes, we thank Sharon Duncan and the rest of David Hill’s family, including his father Rodger, and indeed all those who have so assiduously pursued the aims of the petition over the course of the parliamentary session.

A lot of schools are being built in out-of-town locations, so defibrillators would not necessarily be accessible to the local community in those circumstances. Therefore, they might not be the most appropriate place for a defibrillator to be sited.

Are colleagues content to agree with Mr Russell’s recommendation?

Members indicated agreement.

On this occasion, action that was supposed to be taking place is still yet to happen.

The first of the new petitions is on an important public policy matter that is in the eye of the public at present. PE2190, which was lodged by Mandy McGurk, calls on the Scottish Parliament to commission an independent grooming gang inquiry to identify and understand the prevalence of child grooming in Scotland.

In its response to the petition, the Scottish Government states that it is prepared to give every consideration to an inquiry if it is deemed to be necessary. The response highlights the national child sexual abuse and exploitation strategic group, which brings together key services and expert stakeholders. The submission notes that there is currently no comprehensive national data on the prevalence of child abuse in Scotland. Therefore, the Scottish Government is working to address that.

To review its operations and response to the issue, Police Scotland has taken forward a series of actions such as creating a timeline of action on child sexual exploitation since 2012.

After the Scottish Government issued its initial response to the petition, it announced that an independent national review of responses to group-based child sexual abuse and exploitation would take place. The review has begun, and ministers plan to update the Parliament more fully on the review by the end of February. Additionally, the Scottish Government has announced financial investment and support for victims and families who are impacted by sexual offending; access to training for professionals; and improvements to Police Scotland’s forensic capabilities.

Clearly, important issues are raised in the petition.