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It is about attempting to future proof the legislation, which is always quite difficult. Of the officials who are on the screen, Nico McKenzie-Juetten might be the best person to reassure you about some of the niceties. If he is not, he will direct me to someone else.

They were quite right to point out the importance of consultation. Clearly, the Government would want to carry out as much consultation as possible before we made regulations, and I completely appreciate that universities would want to consult if powers lay directly with them. However, the point about the speed of decision making is key. We live in an imperfect world during a pandemic, and we must endeavour to ensure that the speed at which we can make decisions allows us to deal with that pandemic.

Our work with universities continues, particularly as we move out of the current stage of the pandemic. Their ability to work at a more local level with staff representatives and students on how to deal with the current phase and future phases of the pandemic is to be commended. However, as I said, we are not in a perfect world at the point of decision making. That was particularly the case in the early days of the pandemic.

The bill allows us to deal with a public health emergency. I have dealt with the issue of whether it is necessary and whether it is within our human rights obligations. With the greatest respect, we are really getting down into the detail of the bill. Mr Mundell and I must continue to disagree on various education policy issues, but we have the opportunity to ensure that, as a Parliament, we all rise to the occasion and pass a bill that will allow us to pass legislation that any of us could be in government to put into practice. There is an obligation on all of us to ensure that the bill is the best that it can be.

—of it taking days to get regulations through Parliament, and by then—

With the bill, we are taking our time, through non-emergency legislation, to have—quite rightly—the level of parliamentary scrutiny that such an important bill, with such wide-ranging powers, should have. The bill allows, within the education setting, the powers to make regulations—

I do not think that there is any misconception about the fact that Universities Scotland thinks that there should be emergency powers—I quoted its written evidence earlier. It is about the how, and the importance of that.

I appreciate that Universities Scotland is coming from a different starting point, and that it would prefer a framework approach that would leave matters to the universities. However, I stated earlier the reasons why I do not feel that that would be appropriate. Government needs the ability to react if we are at a point where an institution is taking a very different approach from what the public health advice to Government suggests that we should do.

In saying all that, I note that we have worked closely, as I mentioned earlier—

When we look carefully at how the bill is progressing, we see the optimum way to produce legislation—in a non-emergency setting. The non-emergency timetable for the bill has involved a 12-week public consultation and the evidence that Parliament is taking. On the current timetable, we would expect this to commence—

I am glad that, from outside Parliament, it seemed to be working well. Perhaps Graeme Dey, who was the Minister for Parliamentary Business at the time, can at some point allude to the genuine difficulties of working through a public health emergency when we could not all sit in one room and pass legislation.

Unfortunately, the legislation that we need when we are in an emergency is needed in a very short time, which does not allow for proper parliamentary scrutiny. When you face a public health emergency, every single day counts. It takes days for legislation to go through Parliament, and we then go through the process—

I appreciate that the Conservative members of the committee might agree with the approach taken to the coronavirus by the UK Government, but, if a senior management team of an institution took more of a Boris Johnson approach to dealing with coronavirus rather than listening to public health guidance, such as we have up here, we would need the powers to deal with that. Otherwise, large institutions with thousands of staff and thousands of students, that are integral part of our communities, will be able to take a very different approach to dealing with coronavirus than the Government does, and I do not think that that would be particularly welcome in our university towns and cities across the country.

We absolutely need to take account of the different scenarios that will arise. Boarding schools and school residences are unique environments. Throughout the pandemic, we worked closely with the Scottish Council of Independent Schools and individual schools to reflect their special circumstances in the measures, particularly for boarding schools.

It is important that we are cognisant of the fact that we are dealing with young people who are away from home and that, in essence, those places are their homes during term time. It is about providing the foundation for the correct support and ensuring that we do not make any unnecessary calls on that sector. We want to ensure that young people can still have their education and be supported, but that that happens in a safe way that recognises that, for example, many pupils might come from different parts of the United Kingdom or from across the world.

Obviously, there is a specific requirement to ensure that what is put in place for boarding schools and school residences takes that type of environment into account. However, I suppose that it comes down to the same types of issues about provision of support and the protection of the wider public. The guidance on how we might do that will be very different for university halls compared to boarding schools. However, the continuity that runs through the measures in the bill is to do with support and the protection of public health.