Chamber and committees

In the light of the withdrawal of COSLA’s support for the bill, do you still accept that there is a need to amend the Public Bodies (Joint Working) (Scotland) Act 2014 to improve integration of health and social care, and if so, are there adequate options in the secondary legislation in the 2014 act to allow that?

My questions are about the accountability and functions of a national care service board. What do you understand to be the purpose of such a board, and to what extent could it—or should it—contribute to fundamental reform of the social care landscape?

How should the views of the wide range of providers be represented, not only on the issues that are relevant to them but in relation to providing solutions, innovation and intelligence on provision?

I agree.

I wonder whether the committee would consider writing to the Scottish Government to ask for its views on the petitioner’s request to abolish absolute discharge in cases of rape or sexual assault and to introduce a statutory minimum sentence for those offences.

Yes. I also wonder whether the committee would consider writing to Victim Support Scotland and Rape Crisis seeking their views on the action called for in the petition. As Mr MacGregor has already highlighted, I would like to inform the petitioner about the Scottish Sentencing Council’s consultation on the draft sentencing guidelines on rape—although I have no doubt that the petitioner is already engaged with that process.

As a member of the Health, Social Care and Sport Committee, I can confirm that we are already looking into and reviewing gender identity services for children and young people. I wonder whether the committee would consider closing the petition under rule 15.7 of standing orders on the basis that the Health, Social Care and Sport Committee is currently taking evidence on the independent review of gender identity services for children and young people, including hearing evidence from the chief medical officer at the end of October.

I bow to Mr Golden’s suggestion but, in that case, I wonder whether we could also write to the teaching unions to get their views on the matter. It is their members who will be engaging with it.

Considering that the Scottish Government has recently published new guidelines setting out what schools may wish to consider when developing policy on mobile phone usage and engaging with parents, carers and the wider school community, and the Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills has stated that the Scottish Government cannot unilaterally ban mobile phones in schools as that is a policy decision resting with headteachers and local authorities, I wonder whether the committee would consider closing the petition under rule 15.7 of standing orders.

As somebody who uses forestry car parks quite a lot in Aviemore and other places, I know that there are additional pressures as a result of the numbers of people who are turning up to the beautiful locations and trails. We know that £5.8 million is spent on repairing or restoring the car parks, but they bring in only £1 million in revenue.

I think that we should close the petition under rule 15.7 of standing orders on the basis that car parking charges have been in place at popular Forestry and Land Scotland sites for more than 20 years. The decision to increase the number of Forestry and Land Scotland sites where car parking charges apply followed the Scottish Government’s challenge to public bodies to actively seek to increase income from visitors in order to offset the increasing costs of managing visitor pressures. Abolishing parking charges at Forestry and Land Scotland sites would have a substantial impact on its finances. Forestry and Land Scotland highlights that the cost of managing trails and car parks is considerably more than the income that it receives from parking charges and that two thirds of its car parks will remain free for use by the public.