Seòmar agus comataidhean

Good morning, cabinet secretary and officials.

Like most committee members, I am minded to agree to the instrument, but my concerns, which have already been articulated by Collette Stevenson and Jamie Greene, relate to the vulnerability of a lot of our prisoners. We should all feel slightly uncomfortable about extending such powers, but we need to recognise that we are still in the pandemic and that we need to do what is necessary to keep people safe.

Given that—and perhaps going where Jamie Greene was going in his questions—I want to ask about the vaccination status of prisoners. How has that impacted on the Government’s decision to go for an extension? I know that, this afternoon, there will be another debate on the important part that vaccines play in allowing us to reopen and live with fewer restrictions. Is there an issue with staff or inmates being vaccinated? I know that the Howard League, for instance, has raised concerns about visits—there is a real human rights issue in that regard—but has vaccination status been taken into account in the Government’s decision?

I have nothing to add to what I said when the cabinet secretary was before us. My points have been summarised well by colleagues. I have concerns, but on balance and with the safeguards that have been mentioned by others, I am happy to note the instrument and acknowledge the cabinet secretary’s offer to come back to us if required.

I feel almost a moral duty to come in at this point. Committee members will be aware of this, but our panellists might not be. I am taking part in this meeting remotely, primarily because I wanted to help with childcare this morning after our original plans fell through. Had I been unable to do that, which would have been the case before the pandemic, the care of our three young children—one is at school, one is at nursery and one is a nine-week-old baby—would have fallen to my partner, a woman.

Before the pandemic, we would have just got on with it. We would have known that that was wrong, but we would have got on with it. Last night, when I was chatting over text messages with the convener, who has been absolutely excellent, it struck me that that was absolutely unacceptable, and the pandemic should have taught us all that. I am fortunate enough to work in the Scottish Parliament, which is democratic and modern, but a lot of people work in situations where that is not the case. I felt a duty to comment on the issue given that my situation today relates directly to it and has highlighted the issue for me.

How can we ensure that the notion that childcare responsibilities fall naturally to the woman is no longer acceptable following the pandemic, and that all workplaces respond to that? Eilidh Dickson might be best placed to comment on that. I came to my question eventually, convener.

Good morning to the panel from my office in sunny Coatbridge.

This has been a very interesting and useful discussion today. Panel members and the rest of the committee will be glad to hear that my questions are quite general and a lot of it has already been touched on, but I suppose that that will give the panel members a chance to home in on any points that they wish to make.

One of the things that MSPs hear a lot of on committees and during our daily work—I know that it has been referred to already—is the gap between what has been agreed or said at the policy level and how it is implemented. Can we do anything to improve the difference between the policy intention and how it is enacted on the ground?

I apologise to those who are using the chat function—I put a wee note there for people to come back in, but I did not mean to put the second half of that sentence in capitals.

I have a specific question for Emma Congreve. I want to ask about your views on the national care service, because you wrote something recently about it being unlikely to do any better than the system that it seeks to replace if it is underfunded. Can you comment on that and on the grander scheme of the issues that we are talking about?

I welcome our online panel—thank you very much for being here today. As the convener says, my questions are quite general—I want to give the panellists an opportunity to open up.

Following on from Rona Mackay’s questions and from what Marsha Scott and Rabia Roshan have said, do any other panellists wish to discuss the impact of Covid on violence against women and girls?

First, I want to reflect on the work that was done in the previous session by the Justice Committee, of which I was a member. We talked quite a lot about the issue when we were considering the impact of Covid.

When the first lockdown kicked in, I remember an incident at a popular local park in my constituency, which was very busy one day. At that stage, of course, everybody was the Facebook and Twitter police, calling people out and saying how dreadful it was that they were going to the park. Most of the people who were there were young women with children, and people started to comment on that, saying, for example, “You don’t know their circumstances. You don’t know why they left the house today.” They made really powerful points that certainly got me—and others—thinking. I tell that story because I know that the lockdown will have been particularly difficult for women experiencing violence and abuse.

Can any of the witnesses talk about the impact of Covid and of the first lockdown in particular? Perhaps Moira Price could answer first.

Convener, I was going to ask about the barnahus model later, if that is okay.

Good afternoon. I will ask about the development of the barnahus, or bairns’ hoose, model. The issue came up during the passage of the Vulnerable Witnesses (Criminal Evidence) (Scotland) Act 2019 in the previous parliamentary session. It was a big part of what the committee asked the Government to commit to, and I am pleased to see that that commitment has been taken forward.

Mary Glasgow, what has been the role of Children 1st in expanding that work? What have you done and how have you worked with partner agencies? What stage is the work at?

Thanks, Mary. It is really encouraging to hear that. I would like to bring in Kate Wallace to speak about the role of Victim Support Scotland in that development. What impact could that have for child witnesses?

I know that Rona Mackay has an interest in the same area, convener, so I am happy to leave my questioning there.