Chamber and committees

That is very helpful. I have no other questions, convener.

Thank you both for those helpful answers. The first panel pursued a line about people’s identity being slightly different from their practice. I may identify myself in lots of ways, whether that is to do with disability, sexuality and so on—we identify ourselves in different ways. However, my practice will not necessarily be the same. Different identities will practise differently. Do you see a difference there? People from some faith backgrounds might see celibacy as the right way forward outwith marriage—that teaching comes from Judaism and some Christian faiths. In pursuing this, would a counsellor, minister or rabbi differentiate between a person’s identity, which they are not necessarily looking to change, and the practice of how they live their life? Can that be looked at, or would it be too difficult a definition?

There has been a big movement in faith communities on child protection and how issues are reported.

My final question goes beyond religion and relates to therapists in general. How would you advise a therapist if someone comes to them and says that they want to change their identity? That might not necessarily be about religion—they might just purely want to have that discussion. Can that discussion take place or, as a therapist, if the law came in, would you have to say that you cannot even discuss that change? How do we make sure that that is done with the consent of the individual and without their in any way being manipulated?

Good morning. I thank the witnesses for coming along.

In my previous life, I was a church minister; different people from my congregation would come to me looking for counselling, advice and prayer on lots of topics. They would come because they wanted my advice; they approached me and gave their consent for me to do that. Often, it was done with somebody else there, so that it was a safe environment. Under the proposed change in law, would it be illegal for me to pray for somebody, if they asked me to do that? If so, how would the change not affect religious liberty?

Good morning. Thank you for coming here and for the evidence that you have given.

I want to follow a similar line of questioning to that which I had for the previous panel—I am not sure whether you heard that. As I said, I used to be a church minister. People would come to me to talk, for counselling and for prayer, and they would bring a variety of issues. I am seeking a bit more clarity from you on how we protect religious freedoms, such as the right to pray with somebody and the right for someone to talk about their faith and how that works out in practice, while stopping a practice that is clearly wrong. How do we hold that balance? Briefly, how would you write that into law? That is the key thing.

I am acting as a substitute member of the committee today, but I read the evidence from the past couple of meetings, as well as the submissions, which were extremely helpful.

Obviously, many laws already exist that outlaw torture, rape and any forms of abuse. What benefit would a new law have with regard to effective enforcement? Is it simply the case that we need the law that we already have in Scotland to be enforced properly? What added benefit would a new law give? I do not mean this in a bad way, but would a new law be more symbolic, in that it would highlight the issue in the public’s mind, or would it have a better legal effect in bringing about more prosecutions, where that would be appropriate?

It might be helpful if you could write to the committee on that, because I would be interested in hearing about where the gaps are in the present criminal law. I absolutely take Barbara Bolton’s point about the taking a more holistic approach, but I think that it would be interesting for the committee and the Parliament to know where the gaps are in the criminal law. I appreciate that that is quite a broad question that you will not be able to answer today, but if either of you could write to the committee on that, I would find that beneficial.

I have nothing to declare, convener.

I will push you a wee bit on that. I still have not quite worked out what a change of law would mean in criminal law terms. I appreciate that this is a civil matter. Is this more about educating civic society, the police and the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service than it is about seeking to change the law?

We rightly spend a lot of time talking about universal credit, but a different Parliament and different politicians make decisions about that. We can have our own views here, but we cannot change that. As a committee, we are trying to focus on the Scottish Government’s budget and what MSPs can do.

I want to go back to a point about the role of benefits and the social security system in the short term and the medium term that Bill Scott made in his opening statement and which John Dickie picked up, and I want to reflect on two issues.

First, in the previous parliamentary session, the Social Security Committee looked at the Scottish welfare fund. Is that working? Is it being funded in the right way? Should it be more centralised or devolved down to local authorities? Is the money getting to the right people?

Secondly, we now have control of a number of benefits in Scotland and, if there was the political will, we could see increases in personal independence payments, the attendance allowance and all the other benefits. Of all the benefits that are now under the Scottish Government’s control, which would you put more money into to affect child poverty? That may be more of a wish list than what will happen in reality. Would you put more money into PIP or child payments? Would that make a difference to the figures and to people on the ground?