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Notwithstanding everything that we have heard, I will try to encapsulate the issue in my mind. If I was a Fornethy survivor and I believed that the circumstances that had placed me there were not freely determined by my parents, is that the basis for me to make a claim?

I have two quick final questions. Given the attendant publicity that is associated with the scandal at Fornethy, and given your independent status, has the Scottish Government endeavoured to engage with you directly on the issues that have arisen in relation to Fornethy? You have talked about what I would call formal reporting mechanisms. Is that the chain of communication that has existed, or has any other communication taken place as a consequence of the attendant concern and publicity that are attached to Fornethy?

That is the case.

Thank you for those suggestions, Mr Golden. I know that you have previously concerned yourself with animal welfare issues relating to dogs—in particular, I seem to recall you speaking about electric-shock dog collars.

Are colleagues content to keep the petition open and to make the inquiries suggested by Mr Golden?

Members indicated agreement.

Thank you very much. One of the reasons why we thought it would be useful to have you along is that we have kept hearing these two words, “Redress Scotland”, throughout the process, without having any particular understanding of the organisation. Also, I have felt at times that people have said, possibly unfairly to you, “That’s nothing to do with us. That’s for Redress Scotland”, and we have not been clear about where authority actually lies. It has also been suggested that you have no discretion to act, but at other times it has been suggested almost that you have all the discretion that you would care for to act.

In the first instance, I would like to understand what your role is and what the Scottish Government’s role is. What is the distinction between the two and where are the respective authorities in all that? You now have a chance to make plain what your role and the Scottish Government’s role actually are.

Our final petition for consideration this morning is PE2091, which has been lodged by Kirsty Solman on behalf of Stand with Kyle Now. It calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to provide funding to enable a CAMHS worker and a school nurse to be placed in our secondary schools. The petitioner believes that access to a CAMHS worker and nurse would allow children who are struggling with their mental health to be identified early and would make it possible for any referrals to be completed correctly and efficiently.

The SPICe briefing notes that school counselling services for children aged 10 and over are available in all local authorities, although the delivery varies across local authorities, with some providing authority-wide services rather than allocating practitioners to particular schools or areas.

A 2023 report by the Children and Young People’s Commissioner Scotland identified further barriers to accessing school counselling services and recommended that all local authorities should have clear waiting time targets and that compliance with those targets should be part of the Scottish Government’s evaluation of the services.

In its response to the petition, the Scottish Government highlights that all primary and secondary schools in Scotland are able to access the support of school nurse services, and that the school nurse role has changed over time and now includes a focus on emotional health and wellbeing. School nurses can support the mental health of children and make referrals to CAMHS, where appropriate.

This is a new petition. If we wish to keep the petition open and to seek further information, do colleagues have any suggestions about action that we might take or who we might contact?

Thank you very much.

If you watch one of those television dramas that reconstruct some great injustice that took place decades ago, it usually involves somebody going to a warehouse in the middle of nowhere and turning on a light bulb, and there are a whole lot of boxes that have fallen apart, containing paper records that belong to a bygone era. Is poor record keeping and evidence availability an issue in all claims of an historical nature that come before you? When the digital age arrived, a lot of people just put away everything that was historical. It was a long time before anybody thought that maybe we should be transcribing such records in a format that would make them available in the future. Is that a commonplace occurrence?

PE2089, which has been much anticipated by members of the committee, has been lodged by Deborah Carmichael on behalf of the Lochaber National Park—NO More group. The petition calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to suspend any action to create further national parks in Scotland; to instruct an independent review on the operation of the current national parks, including an assessment of the economic impacts on businesses and industries within the two parks including, but not exclusive to, farming, forestry, crofting and angling; and to conduct a consultation with representatives of rural businesses and community councils in order to help to frame the remit of the said independent review.

In responding to the petition, the Scottish Government noted that the appraisal phase for the new national park has concluded and that a report is due imminently this summer. It adds that it has consulted local communities throughout the process and that further consultation will take place when the new national park process moves on to its reporter phase. It also points to evidence that existing national parks support thriving local economies, help to manage millions of visitors and protect the natural environment for the benefit of current and future generations. That includes 25 projects across the Cairngorms national park and the £450 million that was generated in the local economy in 2022 through visitor and tourism businesses in the Loch Lomond and the Trossachs national park.

In response, the petitioner raised concerns that the Scottish Government appears not to have acknowledged the

“widespread and well-documented problems associated with the existing two national parks”,

and reiterates her call for an independent review of national parks to take place before a new park is created, especially given that no review has been conducted in the 21 years since the current national parks were created. The petitioner states that, in the current national park areas, landowners and farmers are increasingly concerned about overregulation and the needs of those who look after the land being dismissed.

Do colleagues have any comments?

Petition PE2032, which was lodged by James Brebner, calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to improve the support that public bodies provide to injured soldiers and veterans in Scotland through the following series of actions: ensuring that there are clear patient pathways for their injuries to be treated by appropriate consultants; establishing a veterans trauma network similar to that which operates in England and Wales; ensuring that all correspondence from veterans to the Scottish Government that raises concerns or makes complaints about their treatment is acknowledged and responded to; and reviewing and seeking an update to the way in which the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman handles complaints from veterans about the health service.

We last considered the petition on 4 October, when we agreed to write to the Scottish Government and the Scottish Parliament cross-party group on the armed forces and veterans community. As some members of the committee are members of that group, I will make a joint declaration on behalf of all members of the committee who might be in that position. I am, and I think that Mr Golden is. That is now out there.

We also agreed to write to the armed forces personnel and veterans health joint group, Veterans Scotland, the Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Families Association—SSAFA, the armed forces charity—and the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman.

In its response, the cross-party group, supported by Mr Golden, has highlighted the fact that the first ask of the petition has been delivered through the veterans welfare and defence transition service, while the establishment of a veterans trauma network similar to that which operates in England and Wales is also being progressed, and the Scottish veterans treatment pathway is expected to be introduced during the course of this year.

In line with the information that has been provided to the cross-party group, the armed forces personnel and veterans health joint group has confirmed that it has engaged extensively with NHS England on the matter and it anticipates that the treatment pathway will be delivered in 2024.

We have also received a response from the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman that notes that complainants are not required to disclose their veteran status. As that is the case, the low number of complaints from self-declared veterans is not enough for the SPSO to draw out any themes or conclusions about which services veterans might engage with. The ombudsman supports efforts to improve how complaints to or about public bodies are responded to across the board and notes that the SPSO has recently updated its own guidance on vulnerability.

The committee has also received a response from the Scottish Government, in which it stated that, during 2023, 75 per cent of the items that were classified as ministerial correspondence were responded to within 20 working days, and that efforts are under way to increase the proportion of correspondence that is responded to within that timeframe.

It is clear from what the cross-party group and the other organisations that have responded have said that work to deliver significant aspects of the aims of the petition is under way and they will, we hope, be delivered during this year. In light of that, do colleagues have any suggestions?