Seòmar agus comataidhean

This is a massive issue. I am aware of surgeries in my region where patients are looking at 1,000 calls to see a doctor, which is unacceptable in relation to both treating health conditions and providing preventative care. The result is that many people present at accident and emergency departments because that is the only way that they can see someone.

The Scottish Government’s response that the “information is not known” to it is inadequate. If you are in charge of delivering healthcare in Scotland and you do not know how it is delivered and whether that system is adequate, that is a big problem. Therefore, the first thing is to ascertain that information.

I will segue to the point that the petition refers to same-day-only appointment systems. In my experience, many practices largely deploy that approach but they might also have some other appointments available. Therefore, in essence, it is a same-day-only appointment system, but that might not be captured in the data, because the surgery offers a few alternatives. For example, there might be some advance appointments, or, if someone was able to speak to a receptionist on the phone, they might be offered an appointment the following day, so that would not fit in with the definition of a same-day-only system. We need to ascertain that in order to understand the information.

The Scottish Government also said that it is not looking to take a similar approach to that of NHS England. That is okay, but, in that case, what is its approach going to be?

There are almost two parts to the issue and I cannot see that the Scottish Government has provided an answer, other than by referring to some general principles that do not really help people to get appointments.

If it would be helpful, I wonder whether we could write to some key stakeholders and then pass the petition over to the NZET Committee, so that it goes to that committee with some sort of evidence base. Mark Ruskell mentioned Professor Jill Belch at Dundee, who I think it would be useful to write to—and also the Royal College of Physicians. COSLA and the councils are key to all this in terms of air quality monitoring. I believe that the Scottish Environment Protection Agency has some air quality monitors as well, particularly for schools.

Mr Torrance has highlighted Dundee, but it would be useful to know the overall picture in every council area in Scotland because we would then be better able to ascertain where the pinch points might be.

Yes.

On your final point regarding intervention, are you comfortable with the level of oversight that the Scottish Funding Council has in relation to our university institutions?

I have a final question. I do not think that it is helpful to vilify individuals or to look at the report before it is published. However, I am interested in the aspect that, in the post-Covid landscape, the unique selling point for institutions such as Dundee university was the thriving student experience on campus. That experience has drastically reduced and therefore a unique selling point to attract students to the university has been severely diminished. Will the report encapsulate that, and will it provide guidance and assistance to other institutions that rely on a similar student experience?

I am concerned that the situation at Dundee university could be the tip of the iceberg and that our university sector could be in a financial bubble. I welcome your comments, Mr Dey, but, in principle, in order to mitigate that scenario, would the Scottish Government provide a bailout for individual institutions? If it did, what would be the criteria?

Yes—in general.

I think that we should close the petition under rule 15.7 of standing orders, on the basis that the Scottish advisory group on relationships and behaviour in schools, the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities and the Scottish Government have published a joint action plan on relationships and behaviour in schools, which covers the period from 2024 up to 2027.

I agree with Mr Torrance and Mr Ewing. I am concerned about the cumulative effect of such schemes, of which there are a number. In that regard, I have two suggestions to make. One is that we need to understand the context. Globally—whether in relation to the Hoover dam in the USA, the three gorges dam in China or the Gabcíkovo-Nagymaros dam between Hungary and Slovakia—there is a massive body of evidence on the environmental impact of dam building. If a particular pump storage scheme is looked at in isolation, that might lead to unintended consequences in the long term. Academia—I am thinking, in particular, of the UNESCO centre for water law, policy and science, which is based at the University of Dundee—might be where we should go to look at the wider context.

Secondly, we need to get an understanding from the Scottish Government of whether the planning system can adequately cope with and assess the cumulative impact of a number of such schemes.