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With the bill, we are taking our time, through non-emergency legislation, to have—quite rightly—the level of parliamentary scrutiny that such an important bill, with such wide-ranging powers, should have. The bill allows, within the education setting, the powers to make regulations—

No—there are individuals and organisations that support the way forward that we are taking with the bill, including the fact that we should have a bill of this type and move forward with the measures that we have proposed.

I fully appreciate the individual concerns of various sectors, and I am sure that we will come on to discuss some of those. At that point, I will be happy to go into why—with the greatest respect for the stakeholders, with whom I work closely—I have a different opinion from theirs.

The Government is trying to prepare for worst-case scenarios, and some stakeholders—not all of them, but you have asked me a general question, so I will give you a general answer, with the caveat that this does not apply to every person who gave evidence or responded to the consultation—based their evidence on best-case scenarios. In a best-case scenario, we might find agreement within sectors about how these things could move forward and that sectors are willing to work as quickly as the Government feels that public health guidance would require.

However, I am afraid that we cannot make legislation on the basis that everything will be fine and that we will get it through in time and lives will not be lost. That is the challenge. I cannot work on the presumption that everything will work just as it did during the coronavirus. I need to work to the worst-case scenario, and unfortunately that means that some of the powers that people may feel uncomfortable with the Government having will be necessary at that time.

There is a continuation of some of the powers that were in place for te coronavirus, but there are some important changes. As I said in my opening statement, we do not have that closure power, and we are looking to keep provisions for continuity of education. The other important change that is being made is a change from direction to regulation. The legislation is certainly different, but it is modelled on what we had previously.

I will bring in my colleague Craig Robertson to answer that question. Of the officials here, he is the one who works closely with higher education.

First, though, let me say that, since I came into post, we have had an exceptionally close relationship with universities. It has been absolutely necessary for the Government to consider how the guidance impacts on universities, and we have listened carefully to them about how guidance can be developed in a consensual way with universities, trade unions and students. We have endeavoured to do that all the way through; indeed, it is always the way in which we want to work. Obviously, there have been, as you would expect, differences of opinion at various points in those discussions, but we have had a good working relationship and I would like that to continue.

You are right to point out that much of what is proposed mirrors the powers in the Coronavirus (Scotland) Act 2020. With the convener’s permission, I will bring in Craig Robertson to provide a little more detail.

I agree with Mr Ewing on that point. As I said in my answers to previous questions, we take very seriously our obligations on human rights and on public health. As Mr Ewing rightly points out, we have obligations to take quick action, where necessary, if the public health advice suggests that that is an appropriate and proportionate thing to do.

It is also important to point to the responses to the public consultation. There was support for this move, for example, among local authorities and the public health sector. The idea that there is a consensus against this move is incorrect. Key organisations that supported the proposals to make the provisions permanent include COSLA, Public Health Scotland, the Health and Social Care Alliance Scotland, and the Scottish Childminding Association.

I absolutely appreciate that there are strong views that the bill is not necessary at this point or that we should be doing things in a different way, but there are people who support the measures that we are taking and the way in which we are taking them.

Mr Ewing rightly points out that one of the absolute obligations of Government is to protect the lives of citizens, and that is exactly what we are doing with the bill as we try to take it through Parliament.

You have made a very important point about the right to life. We have had a number of discussions about that with the committee, and I am sure that wider discussions on the bill will cover human rights aspects, too. As Fergus Ewing also pointed out, the right to life was the obligation that sat extremely heavily—and rightly so—on Government at the start of the coronavirus pandemic. Indeed, that will be particularly the case at the start of any public health emergency.

As I said to Willie Rennie earlier, the Government does not want to push the bill through Parliament, because we want to seek consensus on the legislation and ensure that it is fit for purpose for whatever public health emergency arises in future. We appreciate that a very heavy responsibility to get this legislation right sits on Government and Parliament, so we are keen to work with others to see whether changes could be made to alleviate some concerns.

It is certainly important to recognise that there are those who might not like particular parts of the bill. I suppose that I would point to Universities Scotland, which has concerns around some of the granularity of certain aspects of higher education. In its written evidence, it recognises the case for having emergency powers in the event of another severe new public health crisis; there is a recognition that the Government of the day requires powers to deal with that. It is important that I continue to work with stakeholders, including Universities Scotland, to see what can be done to reassure it and others about the powers that we are taking on at this time.

That is why I am keen for the Government to listen to the concerns raised by the EIS and to the experiences that local authorities want to relate to us about that time before Christmas 2020, or any other time when they felt that their powers were lacking, because that would clearly be a concern. As I said, we want to get that right and make sure that there is no dubiety about where the powers lie for that. The important powers around education lie with local authorities. The bill will give the Government particular powers only in a public health emergency, and without those powers being in place and a public health emergency happening, the powers for education remain with local authorities.

Convener, you will probably be glad to hear that I do not feel the need to expand much on what Mr Ewing has said. He is quite right to point to those specific details. Proportionality is key to how the Government would and, indeed, could move forward with any regulation. It makes sense for that provision to be included, because one of the lessons that we have learned is about the importance of continuity in education and ensuring that, wherever possible, we keep our schools, universities and colleges open, with as close to normal environments as possible.

The checks and balances provided by proportionality are key to our moving forward successfully during a public health emergency. I refer to my earlier answers on the right to life and protecting people’s health, but we must also think about the other harms that can be done if a Government introduces measures that are disproportionate to the level of public health concerns. Mr Ewing is quite right to point out that that is a key aspect of the bill.

As has been demonstrated during the coronavirus pandemic, the different Parliaments have reacted in different ways. I know that the English and Welsh approaches are different from the direction that Scotland is taking. There is a difference of opinion, and that has happened at different stages of the pandemic. One of the lessons learned is that sometimes we will learn different lessons from the pandemic.

When we look carefully at how the bill is progressing, we see the optimum way to produce legislation—in a non-emergency setting. The non-emergency timetable for the bill has involved a 12-week public consultation and the evidence that Parliament is taking. On the current timetable, we would expect this to commence—