Seòmar agus comataidhean

Heather Williams would like to come in, followed by Allan Faulds. I encourage people to be as succinct as possible, because colleagues have a range of questions, and you might be covering some of those already.

I apologise, Heather—you are breaking up a wee bit and we are not able to hear you just now. I will come back to you, and bring in Allan Faulds.

Thank you very much. That concludes the formal part of our business this morning. I take this opportunity to thank all my colleagues and our witnesses for their patience with tech issues. I think that we managed very well. I also thank the witnesses for their contributions. They have been extremely helpful, as part of our scrutiny process. I wish you well and a good morning.

We move into private session to consider the remaining items on our agenda.

Good morning, and welcome to the 16th meeting in 2023 of the Equalities, Human Rights and Civil Justice Committee. We have received no apologies this morning.

Agenda item 1 is to invite our new members, Meghan Gallacher and Annie Wells, to declare any relevant interests.

Thank you. I call Annie Wells, please.

I thank you both. Once again, on behalf of the committee, I offer you the warmest of welcomes.

Agenda item 3 is consideration of a Scottish statutory instrument under the negative procedure. I refer members to paper 1. Do members have any comments to make on the instrument?

No member has indicated that they have comments to make. Are members content not to make any comment to Parliament on the instrument?

Members indicated agreement.

That concludes our consideration of the SSI. We will move into private session to consider the remaining items on our agenda.

Agenda item 2 is to decide whether to take items 4, 5 and 6 in private. Are we agreed to do so?

Members indicated agreement.

Agenda item 4 is consideration of a negative Scottish statutory instrument. I refer members to paper 2.

Do members have any comments to make on the instrument?