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Is the £820 million Barnett consequentials or is it on top of Barnett consequentials?

Does the member accept that every piece of legislation made in this place can be challenged in the courts? We cannot guarantee that any piece of legislation will not be challenged.

I think that we were expecting the report in January 2025, and then in July 2025, and now all we hear is that the review “is being finalised”. Can the minister assure us that NatureScot has been listening to the RSPB and the Scottish Raptor Study Group, and that their input will influence recommendations?

rose—

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on the progress of NatureScot’s species licensing review, including timelines for producing and implementing recommendations for improvements alongside charging for licensing services. (S6O-05192)

The member emphasises that businesses have had to pay the rates, but where would the £400 million come from? Would he support cutting it from local authorities?

I thank Michelle Thomson for securing the debate.

I will focus on Andrew himself. To start with, we might consider what we mean by a saint. In Christian scriptures in the Bible, the word “saint” is used to mean every follower of Jesus Christ, not just a few. Those were not exceptionally good people but people who believed that Jesus had been punished in their place, so their sins had been forgiven and they had been gifted eternal life. However, over time, a tradition built up that some people were somehow extra special and were therefore called saints, although there was still disagreement in the Christian church about exactly what we meant by a saint.

Nevertheless, Andrew is categorised as a saint under both definitions, so I thought that I would look at what we know of Andrew in the Christian scriptures. John’s gospel tells us that Andrew was previously a disciple or follower of John the Baptist—no connection to me—and John told them that Jesus was the lamb of God. That was a reference back to the Jewish scriptures—we call them the Old Testament—when God had led the Jews out of captivity in Egypt. They had to sacrifice a Passover lamb and were protected from the final plague by the lamb’s blood.

Andrew becomes the first follower of Jesus, but he immediately finds his brother Peter and introduces him, too. Andrew says to Peter, “We have found the Messiah,” and thus he becomes the first person to recognise who Jesus really was: the son of God—that is, he was God—and the new leader of the Jews whom they had been looking forward to for so long.

Another time that we read about Andrew is at what is called the feeding of the 5,000. Jesus had been teaching a large crowd out in the countryside, and the people were getting hungry. How to feed them? It is Andrew who finds a boy with five loaves of bread and two fish and brings them all to Jesus, admitting that they are not much. However, Jesus performs a miracle and feeds everyone. For the second time, we see Andrew bringing someone to Jesus, and it shows that Andrew was a practical kind of person. He could see that there was a big problem. He did not know what the complete answer was, but he threw in his tuppenceworth, and God used it and blessed it.

That is a good example for us. We can at least try to contribute a little to solving problems, even if we cannot fully tackle or maybe even understand the whole thing.

Our third picture of Andrew comes when some Greeks went to see Jesus. It is worth remembering that Jesus and all his disciples were Jewish and that there was quite a cultural divide between Jews and Greeks. These Greeks first spoke to another disciple—Philip. It is worth noting that Philip and Andrew were both Jews but had Greek names and so might have been more approachable. Philip might have been unsure of what to do, so he turned to Andrew, and it was Andrew who went to Jesus with the issue. So, for the third time, we see Andrew bringing someone to Jesus, which is very much a theme in what we know about him. Philip obviously felt that Andrew was somebody with whom he could share a problem.

We have a picture of Andrew as someone very solid and dependable and someone whom others came to for help or with questions. Overall, it seems to me that Andrew is something of an unsung hero. He is mentioned 12 times in the gospels, and four of those are part of a list of the disciples’ names. After that, in the book of Acts, which tells the story of the early church, he is mentioned just once. However, from what we know of him, Andrew is someone whom we can look up to and take as an example.

Andrew’s brother Peter is much better known and was the first leader of the early church after Jesus had left to go to heaven. Like Andrew, we may not be in the limelight all the time, and many of our constituents are in the same situation—they are people who serve faithfully as volunteers or as carers or parents of disabled children, or people who are conscientiously working in a poorly paid job. Such folk may never be recognised, paid high salaries or given awards but, like Andrew, they serve faithfully and we should be grateful for all of them, just as I believe that we should be grateful for Andrew.

I think that I heard Douglas Ross say that the error had cost millions of pounds, but does he accept that it has not cost anything, that correcting it will not cost anything, and that his opposition would cost millions of pounds? [Interruption.]

I thank Michelle Thomson for securing the debate.

I will focus on Andrew himself. To start with, we might consider what we mean by a saint. In Christian scriptures in the Bible, the word “saint” is used to mean every follower of Jesus Christ, not just a few. Those were not exceptionally good people but people who believed that Jesus had been punished in their place, so their sins had been forgiven and they had been gifted eternal life. However, over time, a tradition built up that some people were somehow extra special and were therefore called saints, although there was still disagreement in the Christian church about exactly what we meant by a saint.

Nevertheless, Andrew is categorised as a saint under both definitions, so I thought that I would look at what we know of Andrew in the Christian scriptures. John’s gospel tells us that Andrew was previously a disciple or follower of John the Baptist—no connection to me—and John told them that Jesus was the lamb of God. That was a reference back to the Jewish scriptures—we call them the Old Testament—when God had led the Jews out of captivity in Egypt. They had to sacrifice a Passover lamb and were protected from the final plague by the lamb’s blood.

Andrew becomes the first follower of Jesus, but he immediately finds his brother Peter and introduces him, too. Andrew says to Peter, “We have found the Messiah,” and thus he becomes the first person to recognise who Jesus really was: the son of God—that is, he was God—and the new leader of the Jews whom they had been looking forward to for so long.

Another time that we read about Andrew is at what is called the feeding of the 5,000. Jesus had been teaching a large crowd out in the countryside, and the people were getting hungry. How to feed them? It is Andrew who finds a boy with five loaves of bread and two fish and brings them all to Jesus, admitting that they are not much. However, Jesus performs a miracle and feeds everyone. For the second time, we see Andrew bringing someone to Jesus, and it shows that Andrew was a practical kind of person. He could see that there was a big problem. He did not know what the complete answer was, but he threw in his tuppenceworth, and God used it and blessed it.

That is a good example for us. We can at least try to contribute a little to solving problems, even if we cannot fully tackle or maybe even understand the whole thing.

Our third picture of Andrew comes when some Greeks went to see Jesus. It is worth remembering that Jesus and all his disciples were Jewish and that there was quite a cultural divide between Jews and Greeks. These Greeks first spoke to another disciple—Philip. It is worth noting that Philip and Andrew were both Jews but had Greek names and so might have been more approachable. Philip might have been unsure of what to do, so he turned to Andrew, and it was Andrew who went to Jesus with the issue. So, for the third time, we see Andrew bringing someone to Jesus, which is very much a theme in what we know about him. Philip obviously felt that Andrew was somebody with whom he could share a problem.

We have a picture of Andrew as someone very solid and dependable and someone whom others came to for help or with questions. Overall, it seems to me that Andrew is something of an unsung hero. He is mentioned 12 times in the gospels, and four of those are part of a list of the disciples’ names. After that, in the book of Acts, which tells the story of the early church, he is mentioned just once. However, from what we know of him, Andrew is someone whom we can look up to and take as an example.

Andrew’s brother Peter is much better known and was the first leader of the early church after Jesus had left to go to heaven. Like Andrew, we may not be in the limelight all the time, and many of our constituents are in the same situation—they are people who serve faithfully as volunteers or as carers or parents of disabled children, or people who are conscientiously working in a poorly paid job. Such folk may never be recognised, paid high salaries or given awards but, like Andrew, they serve faithfully and we should be grateful for all of them, just as I believe that we should be grateful for Andrew.

On that point, is such a choice not made when the parents and the child select, say, a Catholic school, and therefore choose to take part in religious observance, rather than it being made later on, halfway down the road?