Seòmar agus comataidhean

I am talking about specialist environments, specialist schools and specialist places. Is the line in the appropriate place?

My question is on the theme that you have just been discussing. What work have you done on the relationship between unmet ASN and the absence from and behaviour in schools that we have been hearing about? I am particularly anxious about making sure that we get it right for every child in the class, and sometimes I feel that we are not achieving that in the round.

Without giving names, will you give me some specific examples of when things have changed for young people you have seen and therefore things have also changed for the rest of the class?

Good morning. I will first give you a chance to tell us how you think things are just now, but with a particular focus. We have seen a sharp rise in the number of applications over the past period, although it is still not as high as the number of applications in England, and I would like you to explain that. You can perhaps range a bit wider as to what you think is happening in the system. Where are the pressures, and what is your assessment?

That is really interesting. Various factors will influence a child behaving differently at school compared with at home, but I presume that parental behaviour has an impact on a child, because the behaviour of parents is obviously different from the behaviour of teachers. Can you give us an insight into how you ensure that you focus on the shortfalls of school provision? Is there a system in place that helps parents to cope with the consequences of that and of their behaviour?

That is excellent. Thank you.

Do you have good examples of new buildings having been constructed that are sympathetic to the issue? In your discussions with Government and local authorities, what do they say?

But how about specialist advice on what kind of buildings they should be building? We are building a lot of schools, and it is alarming that they are not really fitting in with the mainstream policy that the Government has in place. What are you doing about that?

Glenn Carter, your point goes to the heart of what we discussed last week. There was some discussion of compulsory training, but it was felt that that would be inappropriate, because there is not one type of additional need—there is a huge range. That range is constantly moving, and I presume that the training is constantly moving, too.

Your point is that, instead of expecting teachers to be experts on everything all the time, we should reflect on that model and say that we need specialists to give direct assistance rather than put extraordinary pressure on teachers to be up to date with everything all the time. Is that your summary?

I am going to be a wee bit provocative and say that I think that you disagree with the other panel members, some of whom have even mentioned compulsory training. Can I flush that out? What is the actual consensus on that? Are we in favour of compulsory training? Do we want every teacher to be an expert, or should we rely on pulling in experts as required?

Suzi Martin, do you want to come in?