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We have already spoken about the difficulty, so I will not repeat that. If somebody has been diagnosed with a condition and they are struggling to breathe, they are having interminable anxiety, they are suffering, there is nothing that can be done for them palliatively to alleviate them and they have decided at that stage that they have no quality of life and they want to access assisted dying, without a six-month prognosis—if they have, say, a year left to live—we are leaving that person to suffer. I wonder what Mr Doris would say to such an individual.

I did not want to interrupt your flow.

There is very low uptake of anticipatory care plans among the general public. I would love everyone to have an anticipatory care plan, power of attorney and a will in place; that would be great, and it would be good practice for everyone. Again, however, it is an individual’s right to choose not to have that, no matter how good it would be for them.

Does Rhoda Grant agree that, in section 7(1)(a)(iii), the bill places a duty on registered medical professionals during the first declaration to discuss

“any palliative or other care available”

to such individuals, and that forcing them into something, despite having had a discussion about what could be available to them, might be a barrier?

I want to start by saying how deeply concerned I am about Jeremy Balfour’s amendment 146 and the idea of an individual being presumed not to have capacity. If someone is diagnosed with a terminal—or very serious—medical condition, am I to say, “You can’t make any decisions about your treatment going forward, because you have been diagnosed with cancer and therefore do not have capacity. I need to prove that you have capacity first”? If so, I think that that is wrong. We cannot have a presumption that somebody cannot have capacity—the presumption needs to be that people do have capacity.

The convention is that doctors will look at a person’s capacity when they speak to them and bring to bear their judgment as to whether or not they have it. If necessary, they will then take that further and say, “I am concerned about the capacity this person has—or hasn’t—got.” Putting that the other way round is deeply concerning. I do not want to go into the other amendments in the group; that is the one that I really wanted to speak to, because it is of great concern to me.

My amendment 2 is very simple. I just think that 16 is a bit too young. We have a problem in Scotland with defining what an adult is; I know that there is another amendment that seeks to change the age to 25. I believe that an adult is somebody who is 18 years old, and I believe that, at that point, they have the right to decide on their medical treatment and whether to accept or refuse treatment. They have the right to go to a pub and drink legally; they have the right to smoke; they have the right to do a lot of things. In the majority of cases, they are no longer at school.

On balance, I think that that is the right age to—

How many notaries public do we have in Scotland who are readily available?

On good judgment, peer pressure and taking more risks, I was a doctor at the age of 24. Does that mean that it would have been okay for me to make a decision about other people’s lives, but not mine?

I feel that an individual has a right to say no. At the moment, I would love for every patient of mine who has a terminal illness or pain or a problem and who needs palliative care to be able to access it. I love the people who do palliative care—they do great work. However, a lot of patients say, “No, I don’t want that,” and it should be up to the individual to make that choice.

I am very sympathetic to your amendment, and I wonder whether you could perhaps change the wording to say that a palliative care support plan should be discussed with the individual. If they would like a plan, they absolutely should have one, but if they say no, despite best practice, it is their right to do so.

Will the member take an intervention?

I declare an interest as a practising NHS general practitioner.

Good morning, minister. You spoke about better data. There were 42,000 children and 23,000 adults waiting for an assessment as of March 2025, and we are talking about waits of years, not a few weeks. Children are becoming adults and going to the back of the queue again. You spoke of a needs-based approach, and you were twice asked by the convener for a timeframe for when the waiting lists will come down. I will give you a third opportunity to answer the question directly. What is the timeframe that we are looking at to reduce the waiting lists?

There is a high prevalence of neurodivergent young people and adults engaging with the criminal justice system. What steps are being taken to strengthen the co-ordination and collaboration between health service and criminal justice agencies for those people?

Following on from Elena Whitham’s questions, I note that it has been reported that NHS Grampian does not have the ability to separate out neurodevelopmental cases from its CAMHS data and, as a result, it could not provide the current length of its waiting list, even if it wanted to. I have also been told by colleagues that NHS Lanarkshire’s data, which was published in The Herald, is actually incorrect and that, when you call the board, you find that the waiting time is actually two years more than the two that had been stated. What is the Scottish Government doing to ensure that such basic data is being collected and published in a transparent way?