Seòmar agus comataidhean

Thank you for those interesting and helpful answers.

Good morning. I want to broaden the discussion to consider the wider issue of public awareness and public engagement. Where are we with that?

We have a target to get a million houses to zero emissions over the next 10 years; that is more than 100,000 houses a year. I turn to Bruce Cuthbertson first. What is your perspective on the public’s awareness of the whole agenda that we are embarking on? Are the public aware of and signed up to it? Do they expect that target to be met? Do they anticipate needing help and assistance to get there? What do we need to do to raise public awareness of the agenda?

Do Bryan Leask and Derek Logie have any comments on how we could improve on wider public engagement?

I turn to the other witnesses. How do we take the public with us on that journey? The Government intends to set up a national public energy agency to co-ordinate a lot of that work. How can we engage more directly with the public to ensure that they participate in that agenda?

Good morning, everybody. I want to ask for your perspective on the wider issue of public engagement and awareness of the agenda. If you were listening to the previous panel, you might have heard me mention the target to deliver zero-emissions heating systems in 1 million homes in the next 10 years, which is about 100,000 homes per year. Where are we on public awareness of that? What might be the role for a national public energy agency in helping us to meet that target over those 10 years?

I am the MSP for Kilmarnock and Irvine Valley.

Can we have a final key ask from Euan Leitch?

Thanks very much, convener. I have really enjoyed our colleagues’ contributions. The discussion has been absolutely fascinating.

Most of the questions have now been asked. I hoped to give our colleagues a last chance to offer a final thought about what their key wish would be now. We are the Public Audit Committee of the Scottish Parliament and, as has just been discussed, we have to follow the public pound, with the Auditor General’s help.

I was struck by some of Ryan Smart’s contributions. He mentioned giving food parcels to families who are desperate for them. Is that an audit function? How on earth do we audit such things and the outcomes that flow from them?

I want to give our colleagues a wee chance to offer some final thoughts about what a key ask would be to protect, enhance and retain the good things and the good practices that have come through Covid. How can we retain those into the future? I would be obliged to hear a short contribution on that from each of the panellists, if that is possible.

Good morning. I am delighted that a wider review is taking place of the 1991 act and the 2010 act, which was the subject of the work that the Public Audit and Post-legislative Scrutiny Committee did in the previous parliamentary session, as the minister will recall. I am sure that members who served on that committee will be listening in to this meeting.

I ask the minister to clarify something. If a person who has been served with a dog control notice in one local authority moves to a different local authority with the dog, does the dog control notice cease to apply in the second authority, or does it still apply?

As for getting time off for public duties, it is pretty much down to the employer and the councillor—the employee—to agree that sort of thing. My experience is that an employer wants to give you as little as possible when, in fact, you need much more if, as you have said, you are to do your job correctly. Do we need to look at what is proper in that respect and recognise that a councillor needs time off for public duties to be able to do the job properly?