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Good morning. I will start by asking about the process issues between the Governments that you mentioned, and I will then come back to youth mobility specifically.

The word “reset” is thrown around very easily, in relation to the UK Government’s relations with the European Union and with the other Governments of the UK. I am not sure whether anyone has yet pinned down what the UK Government means by a “reset” in either of those spheres, but I would like to ask you to what extent you think that that is already happening. Is the UK Government’s approach to the TCA and how it develops being generated as a result of a facilitated discussion between the Governments of the UK and other voices in the UK, or is the intergovernmental discussion, in effect, telling you what the UK Government’s position is going to be?

Thank you, convener. I will take as an example youth mobility, which you have touched on briefly, to understand how the process is working. We have seen conflicting news reports in recent weeks about whether the UK Government is changing or preparing to change its position on a youth mobility scheme. It is no great secret that I would like a maximal answer to that. I think the loss of freedom of movement is tragic. It is bad for our economy and society and there is a basic injustice in the fact that a generation of people who enjoyed freedom of movement have deprived the younger generation of that freedom.

However, in reality we are likely to see, if anything, a more modest change than the full restoration of the freedom of movement. Is the UK Government actively engaging the Scottish Government and other Governments within the UK in discussions on youth mobility? I hear support for it from the Scottish Government. We know that the Welsh Government has tried to make progress on it and wants to do more. We hear employers, trade unions and economists calling for it. The range of voices seeking a serious youth mobility scheme is broad and diverse and it seems as though the only voice in the room that is unwilling to say where it is going to go with this is the UK Government’s. Is the decision about where the UK should go being reached collectively, with the voice of the Scottish Government and other Scottish voices being heard, or not?

One of the ideas that the UK Government appears to have floated in briefing certain parts of the press to report where it might be going with this is directly relevant to devolved responsibilities. It is around access to the national health service: if there was a youth mobility scheme, it would involve big up-front fees for the participants to access healthcare. If that was the way the UK Government went—if that was what it wanted to achieve—it would require a degree of negotiation with the Scottish Government around its devolved responsibilities.

I seek your assurance that the Scottish Government’s position will not be to commoditise access to healthcare in that way and that the Scottish Government would always argue against up-front fees for young people who are being welcomed to this country to be able to access healthcare?

And for young European people coming to Scotland?

The only point to add is that the argument has a stronger bite, if you like, in relation to a youth mobility scheme because if somebody is accessing a visa to come for their career, they are expecting to earn money while they are here, whereas somebody accessing a youth mobility scheme is likely to be somebody who does not have the resources. To achieve its objectives, a youth mobility scheme should be open and accessible to the maximum number of young people, not only to those who can come up with the cash.

Thank you.

I want to move on to another topic before we finish. Earlier in the second half of this inquiry, before we got deep into the youth mobility issues, we heard some evidence about energy issues. Could you reflect on that and, in particular, on the emissions trading scheme? It is an area where there is some co-decision-making, because the ETS is not wholly reserved—the Scottish Government is represented on an authority that makes some decisions.

We heard some evidence suggesting that, unless there is alignment between the UK ETS and the EU ETS, there will be an impact, from January next year, on businesses trading in and out of the EU. What is the Scottish Government’s position on that, and what is the status of that work? Also, is there a concern that, if a trade agreement was reached with a far-right US regime that promoted climate denial conspiracy theories, which would clearly not be likely to include a carbon price in products entering the UK market, there could be harmful impacts from that?

If I can move on to a practical example—

I am asking not whether you know what the UK Government really wants yet, but whether, as the UK Government determines what it wants, something akin to a co-decision-making process between the Governments of the UK is emerging. Are you in the position of lobbying someone else who will make the decision, or is there a process of deciding together what our shared priorities are?

Is there an informal approach that seeks to achieve that, or is the process fundamentally unchanged?