Chamber and committees

Yes, I will ask about roles and accountability. In particular, I draw the witnesses’ attention to paragraph 9 of the Auditor General’s briefing and the first bullet point under paragraph 13. That bullet point is the first priority that the Auditor General lists, which is that the Scottish Government needs to consider

“Whether all stakeholders involved in the planning and delivery of community justice have a shared understanding of lines of accountability and areas of responsibility.”

Do they?

Do you believe that the individual stakeholders involved have a common understanding of their responsibilities and roles?

Given that you believe that Community Justice Scotland has the powers to act, why is it not using them? This is not the first time that this issue has come up. During the consultation on the proposals for the legislation that became the 2016 act, many stakeholders said that they were unclear about roles and responsibilities. It still sounds as though there is a weakness in that regard. If Community Justice Scotland has the powers, why does it not use them? If it does not use them, why does the Government not push it to use them?

I did not use the term “not working”.

Have you accepted the Auditor General’s report?

It is.

The analysis of vaccine take-up indicates that it is not necessarily the case that there is higher take-up in the cities than there is in rural areas, which is what I would have expected. Vaccine uptake is below 50 per cent in areas that are occupied by students. Is it possible that that figure is skewed by the fact that many students who were resident in, for example, Edinburgh, went home during Covid and got their shots there? Does the data mask a better situation than the analysis suggests?

As you have highlighted, vaccine take-up has been lower in some groups of the population than it has in others. Your briefing states that the Scottish Government is taking action to address that lower uptake. What action is being taken and is it sufficient?

Back to the action.

Have they done so?