Chamber and committees

Thanks, Fulton. That follows on from some of the points that Eilidh Dickson made about the fact that, when schools are closed, it is generally women who are impacted. It also touches on Pam Gosal’s point about flexibility.

I thank the minister and her officials for attending.

Do members agree to the committee producing a brief report on the instrument?

Members indicated agreement.

You are covering a lot of questions in your answers, which is great.

There will be a brief suspension for the next panel to come in.

The next agenda item is to continue taking evidence on petition PE1817, which is on ending conversion therapy. We have two panels of witnesses today, and both are here in person. I welcome to the meeting our first panel of witnesses. John Wilkes is head for Scotland of the Equality and Human Rights Commission, and Barbara Bolton is head of legal and policy at the Scottish Human Rights Commission. I refer members to committee papers 2, 3 and 4 and I invite our witnesses to make short opening statements, starting with John Wilkes.

Agenda item 2 is consideration of the draft Children’s Legal Assistance (Miscellaneous Amendments and Consequential Provisions) (Scotland) Regulations 2021, which is an affirmative instrument. I welcome to the meeting the Minister for Community Safety, Ash Denham. She is accompanied by Scottish Government officials: Jill Stephen Poller is a legal aid policy officer in the access to justice unit, and Martin Brown is a solicitor in the constitutional and civil law division.

I refer members to paper 1 and invite the minister to speak to the draft regulations.

I thank both witnesses for their opening statements. I will start the question session with a question about definitions, which I have asked other folk. Obviously, much of the evidence that we have received makes the point that it is important that we get definitions right.

I will start with Barbara Bolton. Please sum up, as briefly as you can, your understanding of the definition of conversion therapy. The EHRC’s submission states that it is important that we have a statutory definition of gender identity. Maybe John Wilkes could cover that, as well.

Okay.

I thank the witnesses for the extensive evidence that they have already given us. In relation to the question of further written evidence, I think that John Wilkes mentioned that he was looking at the implications of the Australian legislation. We would be keen to hear any thoughts on the approach that Australia is taking versus the approach that New Zealand is taking versus the approach that Germany is taking. We will obviously need to get more evidence on that, but it would be good to hear your thoughts on that, John, if that is work that you are considering doing anyway. It would be helpful to get a summary paper from you on that.

Thank you both for your opening remarks. With my first question, I have been asking people to provide a definition, but I think that you covered that in your comments. Unless you have anything further to say about the definition, we will go straight to Jeremy Balfour.