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I apologise for cutting across witnesses—I am conscious of the time constraints, but I do not want to constrain your ability to put matters on the record.

Dr Clark, I am sorry that I did not cite more of the research, but I want to talk about another aspect of your findings. I believe that, when some of the pilots were conducted in England, up to 30 per cent of voters were turned away at polling stations. In relation to the pressures on polling staff, you mentioned the complexity of electoral law for some polling staff, and additional burdens and pressures would be put on staff at polling stations if voter ID were brought in.

If any of the other witnesses would like to comment on the additional burdens that would be placed on electoral registration officers and any additional challenges, that would be helpful.

I have a very brief question for Dr Clark.

You mentioned the 30 per cent turn-away rate for one of the pilots in England. Was there any evidence of conflict between people who were turned away and those who had to manage the integrity of the electoral system at polling stations during those pilots? I am a bit concerned about the potential for friction in the process, because at the moment there is a fantastic relationship between those who work in polling stations and those who vote.

Dr Burness, I apologise if my question seems a little process driven, but I think that it relates directly to the concerns. My initial question to you was whether there would be any degree of comfort in having something specified in the bill. That might need to be changed to something more appropriate than the reasonableness test, which could, in theory, be interpreted 32 times across Scotland and goodness knows how many times across the UK. I would hope that the Electoral Management Board for Scotland would do a good job on that—I am sure that it would—but that is not the point.

The issue is whether RNIB Scotland, Inclusion Scotland and others believe that a series of minimum standards that everyone should expect should be specified in the bill or in secondary legislation. Changes could be made speedily through secondary legislation after consultation with the various groups. Is it important to have something specified, as opposed to there being local interpretation of “reasonableness”? I apologise for the process-driven question, convener, but it is important to know whether something should be spelled out in statute or whether it should be open to local interpretation.

No, not at all. We can hear you.

Good morning. Thank you for helping us with our scrutiny of the legislative consent memorandum on the Elections Bill.

The first thing that the committee wants to ascertain is whether there is a need for voter identification. Putting to one side the policy intent, on which I have strong views—I am opposed to the proposal—I see from our papers that only 0.7 per cent of people who work in polling stations believe that voter fraud or personation is an issue. What are your views on whether it is necessary to go down the road of voter ID for UK elections?

This is a really interesting session. I have been trying to join the dots between different bits of evidence. I was struck by the convener’s comments about the cuts in the numbers of ASN teachers and assistants in specialist settings and by what James Dornan said about the increased presumption of mainstreaming, which is the trend for young people to be in mainstream settings. I do not want to get into a debate about the sufficiency of funding—I hope that we will look at that during our budget scrutiny—but perhaps we could look at the baseline that Michael Marra talked about and at how funding is used.

Our committee papers say that, over two financial years, £450 million was earmarked for education recovery—not for ASN, but for education recovery in general—and that £240 million of that has been used to support staffing. Again, that is not specifically for ASN staffing, but for staffing more generally. More significantly, because non-recurring funds are welcome but they do not necessarily sustain the improvements that we want, I note that £145 million for staffing will be put into local government funds and baselined from April 2022. That is my understanding.

I am sorry for giving you those numbers but, going back to the baseline that Michael Marra talked about, do we have any idea yet how that money has been used across the 32 local authorities? How can we follow how the money is used? When investment is placed in mainstream education, how can we ensure that there is a commitment to additional support assistants? I see that the number of support assistants has gone up by a couple of thousand in the past few years. How can we ensure that they have the correct qualifications, that they are there for the long term and that they are committed to supporting mainstreaming, rather than again being in the specialist sector?

I am sorry for the length of the question, convener, but it is important that, as politicians, we do not just exchange numbers but drill down to see what they represent.

I will not explore that further because of time constraints, but it is important that you have put that on the record. Linda O’Neill, do you want to add anything?

Mr McGhee, if you chime with what we have heard, I think that the convener is keen to move on and bring in other MSPs. I apologise for not bringing you in, but I can tell that my convener is minded that that might be inappropriate.

Thank you.

Convener, I defer to you. I have an overall interest in the topic and a number of lines of questioning. Do you want to continue?

I am conscious of the time.

The witnesses have said that the hubs were well intentioned and they performed very well at times, but there were self-evident challenges that all three witnesses have put on the record. What was support like across local authorities and education services for young people who could not attend hubs—for example, if they had additional support needs but did not fit the criteria or if they had other barriers to accessing them? I am sure that there are examples of good practice and of not-so-good practice. It would be good to get on the record a sense of where things went well.

We were listening earlier to Linda O’Neill. Perhaps she would kick off on that, followed by the other two witnesses. We can then pass on to colleagues.