Chamber and committees

Good morning, cabinet secretary and colleagues. I return to the matter of the vaccination certification scheme, which the convener touched on in her first question. One of the purposes of that scheme, as set out by the Scottish Government, is to encourage an increase in the uptake of vaccinations. In last week’s committee meeting, Mr Mason asked Professor Leitch whether there was evidence that that had been successful. Mr Leitch gave a straightforward and honest response, as we would, of course, expect. He said:

“I simply do not know”.—[Official Report, COVID-19 Recovery Committee, 28 October 2021; c 21.]

Indeed, you have confirmed this morning, cabinet secretary, that it is not possible to disaggregate from the general data whether the scheme is actually delivering on the objective that was set out. We do not know whether there are positive outcomes from the scheme.

What we do know, however, is that there are negative outcomes. For example, according to the BBC this morning, more than 42,000 people have reported errors in their vaccination records, which is causing difficulties for them in accessing vaccination certification, and we know that the night-time industries have seen a major drop of 40 per cent in business at their premises, which is having a major negative economic impact. That policy is turning into something of a disaster, is it not?

I want to ask again about the issue of economic impact. We have heard from the Night Time Industries Association and the Scottish hospitality group about a major decline in business at many of their premises since the vaccination passport was introduced. Does the Scottish Government recognise that concern and, if so, what are you doing to try to address it?

To continue with the convener’s theme of public engagement, members of the public have also raised the issue of COP26, which will happen next week and the week after. Up to 100,000 people will converge on Glasgow. Some of those who are travelling internationally to attend the main conference may not be double vaccinated. There is therefore a risk of further spread of Covid.

The public would like to know what mitigations have been put in place to avoid further spread of Covid at COP26 events. Has the Scottish Government carried out any modelling of the possible increase in case numbers as a consequence of COP26?

Basically, you are saying that there is a risk.

It is helpful to understand the mitigations. The part of my question that you did not address was on the issue of modelling. People are concerned that we might see a spike in cases and that further restrictions might be brought in for people in Scotland as a consequence of a spike in infections caused by the COP.

If you get some more data, that would be interesting.

We have had many conversations about vaccination passports. Last week, the committee took evidence from Professor Stephen Reicher and two of his colleagues. They all raised concerns about a backfire effect from making vaccination passports compulsory in certain circumstances and said that it could have the unintended consequence of making it less likely that some vaccine hesitant people who start from being distrustful of authority would take up the vaccine.

Those witnesses all made the point that Scotland is the only country in Europe that now requires vaccination passports as the price of entry to certain events without giving the alternative of providing a negative Covid test. Their view was that allowing that alternative would deal with the backfire effect. Has the Scottish Government given serious thought to that, given that those experts are saying that it is a real worry?

Thank you.

My question follows on neatly from the convener’s last question, as it is about vaccine hesitancy. The committee has taken evidence from experts around that issue. There is a difference between anti-vaxxers and the vaccine hesitant, as you will know. Anti-vaxxers are people who are ideologically opposed to vaccination and nothing will persuade them otherwise—they just do not trust the authorities.

The vaccine hesitant are a different group. They are people who perhaps have hesitation about vaccines but are not intrinsically opposed to them. I am interested in what more is being done to try to encourage the vaccine hesitant to take up vaccination. From the data that we have been provided with, we see that some of the vaccine hesitant are young people, but the most stark differences are by ethnicity. For example, according to the latest figures, just under 80 per cent of the white population has had two doses of the vaccine, but that figure is 52 per cent among people of Black origin and 64 per cent among people of Asian origin. That is quite a substantial gap.

What is being done by the Scottish Government to understand the reason for vaccine hesitancy among those ethnic groups? Can we learn anything from other countries or other parts of the UK? Are their figures different, and are they better than ours? What more is being done to tackle hesitancy in those groups?

Thanks for that comprehensive answer. The one issue on which you did not touch is whether there is any difference in those figures in any other parts of the UK. I am interested in whether you have any data on that. Are you aware of any difference?

Thank you for that.

In evidence this morning, we heard from Professor Dye and others that the backfire effects might be minimised if the vaccination certification provisions were time limited. If people could see an end point, that could remove the potential distrust among vaccine-hesitant groups. Is that something that the Scottish Government has considered?