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:I look forward to reading that report.

I want to move to future visioning for Scotland. As a country, we have developed a significant capability in multisport event hosting and major event hosting for sport. We not only hosted the 2014 Commonwealth games, but we have been able to adjust to host the 2026 Commonwealth games at short notice, which is a significant challenge.

Even if it is slightly early, I wonder whether we ought to be considering the revised criteria from the International Olympic Committee on hosting potential for a summer Olympic games. I know that cities in northern England are looking at a potential bid with the British Olympic Association.

Should Scotland be contemplating potential participation in a British bid for the 2036 or 2040 summer Olympics? What could that look like? How do we use the 2026 Commonwealth games as a way to demonstrate our potential, given that Brisbane’s successful bid for 2032 hinged significantly on its successful hosting of the 2018 Commonwealth games?

:Great. Kim Atkinson, do you have a view on whether Scotland should join the emerging great northern bid for the 2036 Olympics and be proactive about participation in that or a 2040 bid? Is that something in which we ought to seriously engage?

I thank the witnesses for their contributions so far. There has been a bit of a buzz from the recent winter Olympics. We know, however, that there are significant barriers to entry to winter sports—not just the climate in Scotland, which tends to be temperate with unreliable snow coverage, but the significant equipment and facility costs. There tend to be class barriers to access to winter sports.

One of the sports where we tend to do quite well is curling. There will probably be an uptick in people booking slots at curling rinks around Scotland. How do you envisage improving access to winter sports participation in Scotland, particularly given the recent loss of facilities such as the indoor snow slope at Xscape at Braehead? What other opportunities might there be to enhance participation in winter sports?

:I will pick up on the costs of running some of the facilities. Common themes have emerged with swimming pools, given that the ski slope in Braehead closed primarily because of energy costs. Has any work been done to see how policy interventions can be developed to reduce the cost of operating such facilities, given their obvious public health benefits?

I will speak to amendment 111, in the name of Davy Russell, who sends his apologies because he is at a friend’s funeral and cannot attend the meeting today.

Amendment 111 would require the Government to evaluate whether the bill has accomplished what it sets out to do. After reviewing the amendments in this group, Mr Russell believes that that can be broadly accomplished by amendment 59, in the name of Maurice Golden, and by amendment 109, in the name of Carol Mochan, and so he would like to add his support to those amendments.

The only outstanding issue concerns the production of the evaluations: one on whether non-surgical cosmetic procedures have become safer, and one on whether there has been an adverse effect on the NHS workforce. Mr Russell would like the Scottish Government to be compelled to lodge a motion to repeal the bill within 12 months of the publication of both those reports—in other words, after the later of the two reports has been published—and seeks an assurance that the Scottish Government can commit to putting that in the bill.

:Amendment 121 seeks to provide for a delay that is very similar to that set out in amendment 63, in the name of Jeremy Balfour, with the exception of the length of that delay. The argument for having a delay of three years is to ensure that, in the event that other amendments to the bill do not pass, current practitioners would still be able to seek clarity on training requirements and make arrangements to qualify as registered prescribers, have an existing trained member of staff qualify as a prescriber or make provisions to hire a registered prescriber. Such a timeframe could also mean that price increases caused by the bill could happen gradually, and it could avoid the rug being pulled out from beneath practitioners.

The three-year delay is about balancing the bill’s safety aspects and the time that it takes to qualify as a prescriber. Mr Russell also notes that current practitioners are concerned that, if the bill were to pass without sufficient amendment, non‑medical practitioners could not possibly function in the sector, and that a longer wind‑down period allowing them to close rental and other contractual agreements, such as with medical waste management, would therefore be beneficial.

I should say that we would also support the 18-month delay period proposed in Mr Balfour’s amendment 63 as an absolute minimum.

Mr Crilly, I do not know whether you have anything to add on the dilution of democratic accountability, but perhaps you can tell us what practical impact it would have if all members of IJBs had voting rights. Will you talk us through your thinking on that?

Thank you. Mr Crilly, do you have any final points to make on that subject?

I appreciate that. Thank you.

11:00

I thank the commissioner for coming to give evidence today. I have a quick supplementary on prevention. We know that many in the NHS worry that cuts to facilities maintenance, for example, can create a culture of scarcity that is unhelpful for embedding a true focus on health and safety for staff. In the past few days, we have had a report about a lift at the Glasgow royal infirmary that has been broken for more than six months, leading to a significant number of lost appointments. There have been reports of sanitation issues in hospital wards, showers that have been broken for long periods of time and so on. That general pattern of poor facilities management can undermine confidence that the NHS is a prevention-focused organisation. How do we rebuild confidence? Do we use a combination of inquiry and lessons learned?