Chamber and committees

While we are online, I invite Rona Mackay and Fulton MacGregor to indicate whether they would like to make any comments.

Katy, do you want to say anything?

I appreciate members’ comments on the matter. I, too, put on record, on behalf of the committee, that although we agree to make no recommendation on the Scottish statutory instrument, we do not want the powers to remain in place indefinitely and we expect to be kept updated on how they are used and implemented.

That concludes the public part of the meeting. We will now move into private session to review the evidence that we have heard this morning.

Do not worry; we are just glad that you have arrived safely.

I hand over to Russell Findlay.

Thank you, Stuart. I will perhaps come back to you on a couple of points in relation to the impact on your crews, but I will bring in David Hamilton first.

I have a quick follow-up question for both of you. David, you mentioned that, recently, you have had to go to the extent of having full public order deployments. To what extent has the fireworks season had an impact, from the point of view of not just resources and planning but, ultimately, the cost of responding to fireworks and the issues that arise from the use of fireworks?

I think that Jamie Greene has questions for Alasdair Hay about the review group.

Likewise, if we have time later on, I will come back in on a couple of points about injuries. We now have questions on the licensing proposals.

We are a bit tight for time, but I would like to come in on a point that you made, Alasdair. As you know, on Monday, we visited Blackburn and met members of the bonfire night action group. They spoke about control zones and talked about the stigma of living in or near such a zone. Comments were made about the issue that Rona Mackay raised—that of control zones simply displacing bad behaviour. I would be interested to hear whether you have any further comments on that. What are your thoughts on how such zones would be policed?

I thank all of our witnesses for what has been a really useful session. We have covered a lot.

We will now have a short break to allow a changeover of witnesses.

We move to our second evidence session on the Fireworks and Pyrotechnic Articles (Scotland) Bill. I am pleased to welcome to the meeting Rob Holland, who is acting director of the National Autistic Society Scotland, Lorraine Gillies, who is chief officer of the Scottish Community Safety Network, and Gilly Mendes Ferreira, who is head of education, policy and research at the Scottish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. We appreciate the time that you have taken to join us.

I intend to allow from an hour to an hour and 15 minutes for questions and answers. We move directly to questions, starting with a general question from me. I will work my way around the room, starting with Gilly Mendes Ferreira, then Lorraine Gillies and Rob Holland.

Please outline your experience of and involvement in issues to do with fireworks and pyrotechnic articles. From your perspective, are the provisions of the bill the right step at the right time?