Seòmar agus comataidhean

I wonder whether I can come back on that, cabinet secretary. In your evidence, you have made various references to the debate that took place in the chamber. That will include what I said, too. I suppose that I just went along with the hype; the background noise that the debate was being held against was that these things had been a wonderful, magnificent achievement and that everybody was absolutely aglow with their success. As such, it never occurred to me to think that there might be an alternative view. How very naive of me, you might say; nonetheless, that was the kind of atmosphere that was attendant on the debate.

Therefore, I have been quite surprised by how, in the evidence that we have taken, people are talking about the issue as being divisive in communities and becoming really quite an ugly stain when it comes to engagement between different organisations and people within the proposed landscape. As a result, although you can point to debates in the chamber, I do not know that they should stand as the benchmark against which all subsequent decision making must stand. Does it not alarm you that such a culture seems to be growing within the proposed landscape that you are operating in? Given that it is, how do you address it?

Agenda item 2 is consideration of continued petitions. Our first petition is PE2089, lodged by Deborah Carmichael on behalf of Lochaber National Park—NO more group. The petition calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to suspend any action to create further national parks in Scotland, instruct an independent review on the operation of the current national parks, including assessment of the economic impacts on businesses and industries within the two parks—including, but not exclusive to, farming, forestry, crofting and angling—and to conduct a consultation with representatives of rural businesses and community councils in order to help to frame the remit of said independent review.

At our previous meetings, we heard from a variety of organisations in favour of and opposed to the creation of a new national park. We have also heard from NatureScot, which is currently undertaking its role as reporter for the consultation on the proposed new national park.

Today, we are joined by Mairi Gougeon, who is the Cabinet Secretary for Rural Affairs, Land Reform and the Islands, Brittany Brown, who is policy lead for new national parks, and Lisa McCann, who is head of biodiversity, at the Scottish Government. Good morning and welcome to you.

I invite the cabinet secretary to say a few words—this is an exception—and then we will move to questions.

The Convener: That is what we will do. I hope that, by that time, we will have the orders that we have been promised and will be able to investigate the matter that Fergus Ewing spoke about, which is that a high road appears to be being delivered on a temporary basis.

We will keep both petitions open and will ask the cabinet secretary to address them at a subsequent meeting.

We move to PE2008, lodged by Kirsty Solman, which calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to provide funding to create a separate accident and emergency department for children and young people presenting with mental health issues.

We last considered the petition at our meeting on 7 February 2024, when we agreed to write to the Minister for Social Care, Mental Wellbeing and Sport.

In that letter, we asked about the training and resources available for Police Scotland and the Scottish Ambulance Service. The minister’s response highlights the work of the education and training advisory group, which has developed an induction training framework for the wider mental health and wellbeing workforce, volunteers and carers. The response also highlights more than £6 million in funding to Police Scotland, the Scottish Ambulance Service and NHS 24 since 2020 to support the pathway from Police Scotland or the Ambulance Service to the mental health hub. It also highlights £180,000 of funding in 2023-24 to support the Scottish Ambulance Service’s delivery of mental health training and education.

His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary in Scotland’s report on mental health and policing, published in October 2023, highlighted a gap in training relating to mental health. Two recommendations were made and a delivery group has now been set up

“to drive activity relating to those recommendations.”

For children under 12, more than 52 per cent of calls to the mental health hub resulted in a referral for a follow-up to a local out-of-hours general practitioner service, 28 per cent were signposted back to their own GP and 1.7 per cent were referred to accident and emergency.

The petitioner’s view is that the submission does not sufficiently focus on children’s mental health services. She also notes that, for each referral through the mental health hub, children are being put on long waiting lists.

So, colleagues, do we have any comments or suggestions as to how we might proceed, given the response that we have received from the Scottish Government?

So, are we content to close the petition, with some reluctance?

Members indicated agreement.

In that case, thank you very much for your evidence. I am sure that your colleagues were providing moral support to you this morning, but thank you all very much.

If members are content to consider this evidence later, we will have a short suspension just now.

Are we content to close the petition?

Members indicated agreement.

I thank Caroline Gordon for bringing the petition to us. The issues might well persist, and I very much encourage her to monitor events and potentially lodge a fresh petition in the next session of Parliament, when there might be a different perspective abroad as to how such matters might be addressed.

PE2109, which was lodged by Brian Shaw on behalf of the Ness District Salmon Fishery Board, calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to create a moratorium on any further development of pump storage hydro operations on Scottish lochs that hold wild Atlantic salmon until the impact of such developments on wild Atlantic salmon migrations is understood.

We have been joined for consideration of the petition by our colleague Edward Mountain. Good morning, Edward.

The petitioner feels that the economic case has been made for pump storage hydro but that the environmental impacts have been glossed over, denied or ignored. The SPICe briefing explains that operating a pump storage project requires planning permission or a section 36 energy consent from, respectively, the local authority or Scottish ministers. The Scottish Environment Protection Agency and NatureScot, as statutory consultees, would also be expected to comment on any planning or energy consent application in respect of impacts on hydrology, the water environment and nature conservation. The briefing states that the Scottish wild salmon strategy notes pressures on wild Atlantic salmon, including obstacles to fish passage that can be created by infrastructure or changes to the water.

The Scottish Government’s response states:

“The legal position of the Scottish Government is that processes under planning would examine the relevant environmental impacts and reach a conclusion, on the basis of evidence and facts relating to the particular development.”

Edward Mountain, do you wish to address the committee?

Please do.