Seòmar agus comataidhean

What a segue—you are good at this, Larry.

You will all have received an email this morning from a parent called Laura, who is clearly concerned about young people’s health and raises the issue that primary school children have not been vaccinated. Do you feel that five-year-olds should be given the option of getting the vaccine? I would like all the witnesses to answer, but I will start with Larry Flanagan, as he is on the screen.

I ask Margaret Wilson the same question.

Margaret, you are on mute. Try again.

I have one last, quick question about Murdo Fraser’s earlier question about allowing parents to get into schools to see nativity plays or whatever else it is that the children are doing. I absolutely take on board that the purpose of the measure is to keep people safe, but would you have confidence in allowing parents into the school if they had a Covid passport or a negative lateral flow test? Larry Flanagan, I will ask you to answer first.

I ask Gary Greenhorn the same questions.

What I can say is that Devi Sridhar has quite publicly stated that she feels that it is essential that five-year-olds are given the option to get vaccinated, but I fully understand that parents may have a different view.

Jim Thewliss, you talked earlier about areas of deprivation and differences in the levels of infection. On the back of that, I have a question for you and also for Gary Greenhorn. In terms of the baseline measures, is it harder to maintain compliance with the rules in schools in areas of deprivation? If we do not do something about that, will that ultimately make it even harder to close the attainment gap?

Earlier, you said that areas of deprivation have been hit harder. Will that make it harder for us to close the attainment gap?

Gentlemen, I am loving this conversation. David Finlay, I think that you and I should sit down over a number of pints and have a lot of blethers. The idea that you just proposed is one that I took to Ross Finnie almost 20 years ago and it was pooh-poohed then. We will see where it goes from here.

Dee Ward, I should register an interest in relation to you, because, many years ago, I bought a blackface tup off your shepherd.

We talk about regenerative farming, but, as a new entrant into farming, I was not bound by the same constraints of what had aye been done. I did things that I thought were right. I always had the environment in mind. I got involved in farming because I wanted to be out in the countryside and I love nature. I was growing clover 30 years ago, and it is now being talked about as a great new product, even though it is not and it has been there for ever. How out of touch is the farming industry with nature-friendly farming? I do not know who is best placed to answer that, but I will go to Andrew Bauer first.

Yes. I am very interested in asking about the private funding that is coming into farming for carbon sequestration. How do you see that working? One of the things that people are up in arms about is big companies coming in, buying huge swathes of land and then saying that they are green because they own an estate in Scotland. Where do you see the private money coming in, and how would you hold it here?

It reconfirms my fears that it is an uphill battle, particularly given that supermarkets determine what we are going to have. I agree with Finlay Carson: they make all the promises that they are all about giving people choice, and they will do that, but people make a six-second decision when they walk into a supermarket—from the time they look at the product to the time they put it into their basket—and the first thing that they look at is price. We have to change the culture before we are going to get that wonderful warm feeling that we have in here out in the public domain. I am not saying that to be negative; I am saying that that is the challenge that we face.

I want to come back quickly on a point that David Finlay made earlier on. We have to give proper recognition to the farmers who are doing it to a level that is already what you call regenerative—I would call it old-fashioned farming. I planted 2,500m of hedging because I wanted shelter belts. Stuff is already being done. We need to take cognisance of that rather than starting at the bottom and trying to bring everything up. The ones that are at the bottom should be brought up to the level of where we currently are, using the baseline of an area. One size disnae fit all, and wherever someone lives, whether that is in the west, the south, Fife or Perthshire, there will be a baseline for that area. We need to look at what it is like in that area and then at how we bring everyone else up to that standard. It is hugely complicated, but I am thoroughly enjoying the conversation.

Can I keep talking, or are you—