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PE1933, which is an important petition for the committee, was lodged by Iris Tinto on behalf of the Fornethy survivors group. The petition calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to widen access to Scotland’s redress scheme to allow Fornethy survivors to seek redress.

We previously considered the petition at our meeting on 23 November 2022. We agreed to write to the Scottish Government, setting out the evidence that we had gathered and specifically recommending that action be taken to widen the current eligibility criteria of Scotland’s redress scheme to ensure that victims of the same type of crime, committed over shorter periods and in different care settings, are eligible for redress under the scheme.

The committee received a response from the then Deputy First Minister, John Swinney, which indicated that work was under way to test the existing eligibility criteria and guidance in relation to Fornethy and that we would receive a further update when that analysis was completed.

We have also received a submission from the petitioner, who is concerned that the matter might disappear into the long grass as a result of the recent changes in Government. The petitioner’s submission also requests clarification on the cut-off date for a person who was in care and who seeks to access the redress scheme.

I am slightly unsure what to do. The Scottish Government said it was open to representations, but it is not our responsibility to make those. We could ask the Scottish Government what it thinks of all this in practice, but that is not really taking forward matters, so I am uncertain. I have to say that, on this occasion, I am minded to close the petition under rule 15.7 of standing orders, but I am open to other suggestions.

Yes. It is not that I do not see an issue at the heart of the petition but that I am uncertain as to what productive opportunity there is for the committee to take forward the petition. Therefore, we are reluctantly minded, on this occasion, to close the petition. Are we agreed?

Members indicated agreement.

Okay. Do we agree to write to the organisations that Mr Stewart and Mr Ewing have identified?

Members indicated agreement.

PE2004, which was lodged by Line Kikkenborg Christensen on behalf of Jubilee Scotland, calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to abolish the use of public-private partnerships—PPPs, as they are affectionately known—and to commit to a new model of financing and managing public infrastructure in Scotland that has safety, quality, value for money and accountability to the taxpayer at its heart. The petitioner argues that public-private partnerships have left Scotland’s public sector with high levels of debt, poor service provision, lack of accountability and unsafe buildings.

In responding to the petition, the Scottish Government acknowledges that the use of private finance for infrastructure projects is more expensive than conventional public borrowing, and it shares concerns about the flexibility and value for money that historical private finance initiative contracts have offered.

The Scottish Government has stated that, as part of its national infrastructure mission commitment, a new approach to revenue finance, which includes the mutual investment model, has been announced. That follows a decision in 2019 to stop using the non-profit distributing model that was originally adopted in 2010. The Government highlights its view that current borrowing powers are limited and insufficient to deliver the ambitions of the national infrastructure mission, but adds that, should additional powers become available, it will examine all options to ensure that the lowest-cost financing route is utilised.

We have also received a submission from the petitioner offering comment on the Scottish Government’s response, with reference to Audit Scotland’s 2020 report “Privately financed infrastructure investment: The Non-Profit Distributing (NPD) and hub models”. The petitioner calls on the Scottish Government to act on Audit Scotland’s recommendations and to rethink the way in which infrastructure is managed and financed in Scotland.

That is all quite technical but nonetheless important and of considerable financial consequence. Do colleagues have any comments or suggestions on how we might proceed?

I am happy to agree with that.

I wonder, too, whether there are any bodies that are representative of home owners rather than factors. When the Scottish Government says that the current regulations require factors to provide home owners with clear information on the dismissal process, I would like to know whether there is anybody who can illustrate that that actually happens. That sounds like one of those vague provisions that I suspect exists in writing but not in practice. That is just from my experience.

I see that there are 13,255 children and young people who are looked after by local authorities. In 2020-21, 534 young people were recorded as entering continuing care, with 7,323 young people being eligible for aftercare. I want to be clear about this. In Jasmin’s experience, where advocacy was available and in place, she regarded the support package that she received as being superb.

There is obviously an appreciation of what the support should be. In Jasmin’s case, that happened. Is it that the resource is not there for everyone to experience the outcome that Jasmin did, or is it that there is, as you have both identified, a lack of understanding and availability of advocacy and a pathway to access the service? If that is the case, I would distil my question down to this: who needs to do what?

So who needs to do what? To whom would you like to say, “You need to change this, so that this happens.”?

That is helpful—thank you. For the benefit of those who might be following our proceedings elsewhere, can you explain the resources and infrastructure of The Promise Scotland?