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Good morning to the panel. My question follows on from Maggie Chapman’s line of questioning. You will be aware that the UK Government is proposing a British bill of rights and the Scottish Government has plans to introduce a Scottish human rights bill. What are your thoughts on how those might change the human rights landscape across the whole of the UK and with a particular focus on Scotland? Has your team any thoughts on how those bills might interact?

Thank you for that. Many members here share those concerns. Will you commit to keeping this committee up to date with your thoughts on and analysis of the bill as it progresses?

I will ask about one of the points that Kate Ramsden made, and perhaps Anil Gupta could refer to it when he responds to the question.

Kate, you said that folk will know that change is coming if the bill is passed, but is that the case? Is that the feeling that people have? My understanding is that the bill simply allows the Scottish Government to consult, with the possibility of change. Therefore, does some work need to be done with the workforce and people who use the services to say that change is only a possibility? You were quite definite in saying that folk believe that, once the bill is passed, change will come, rather than that change is a possibility.

Good morning. For the purposes of this particular evidence session, I refer members to my entry in the register of members’ interests—I am registered as a social worker with the Scottish Social Services Council.

The issue of integration in some form or other is nothing new, as committee members and witnesses know. It is probably fair to say that the workforce as a whole would not be overly happy about it, but that is beside the point of whether it is a good thing or a bad thing.

I agree with the comments that have been made so far—I think that we need more information. I can probably guarantee that this is not the Government’s intention but, in a bill of this size, it feels a bit like the issue has been added on in a “We’ll deal with that later” way, which is not a great place to be, because we do not have enough information.

What more can be done at this and future stages of the consultation to make sure that people who work in the sector and use the services can have their say on what the positives and the negatives might be? In your respective organisations, how can you make sure that you get that information out to the people who work in the sector, so that we can get that feedback and see how we can move forward collaboratively?

As Lynsey Smith pointed out, there probably are advantages to the inclusion of justice social work. We do not want to fragment the social work workforce if other aspects of social work are moving over, and there is also a lot of health overlap. However, the same argument could be made that, if we were to take the responsibility out of local authorities and lose the link with, for example, housing, which is also very important, it would almost be a case of taking with one hand and losing with another. The joined-up working needs to work anyway, regardless of where justice social work is situated, whether that is with local authorities or with the new national care service. How do we get the workforce to be involved and engaged in the process?

I have an issue to raise on that point, so my question ties in nicely with Pauline McNeill’s line of questioning.

I have had contact from local police officers this morning. They know about this evidence session and they made what was almost a plea. They know that resources are tight and that things will be difficult, but they are making a plea in relation to going to court; they think that the effect of the pilot could be massive due to the amount of time that they spend in court being “huge”—that was the exact word used in the text. I suppose that it is a plea about the pilot somehow being sped up and improved, which the officers on the ground think could be game changing in respect of freeing up resources.

The police officers asked me to raise two specific issues; the other issue is not quite as related to Pauline’s point but also relates to police time. They feel that they are spending a lot of time covering for the ambulance service just now. We know the pressures that it is facing.

Those are the issues that I was asked to raise today. I appreciate that the point about time in court has already been answered, so I do not need a further response on that. It is more a plea—if we could get the pilot sped up, it could be good for everybody in the justice system as a whole.

Thank you.

I turn to Kate Ramsden and Anil Gupta. On the basis of what has been said, what could the committee ask of the Government in that regard? Would it be helpful for the Government to provide more information on what is proposed or are you, as organisations, happy for it to be more of an abstract concept just now and to have a full consultation at a later date? Does the justice social work aspect need to be taken out of the bill and dealt with completely separately? Those are devil’s advocate questions, but I want to put them out there.

I hope that I can help you out with that, convener, because instead of seeking a response to a particular question, I want to make a point on the back of my colleague Collette Stevenson’s question.

I chair the Parliament’s cross-party group on social work. About a month ago, the minister Kevin Stewart was in front of us for what was, I have to say, a very good session on the national care service, and he took a range of questions from people across the social work sector who were excited or were anxious about the proposals. It is up to you, convener, but if it would be helpful, I can make the minutes of that meeting available—they are available anyway—to committee members and witnesses today.

My question is in a similar vein. Cabinet secretary, I know that the Government is not overly keen on accepting a huge number of

“For the avoidance of doubt”

amendments, but I know that you are considering Pam Duncan-Glancy’s amendment 37 in particular because it encompasses a wider remit. When you respond to the interventions, if you are suggesting that the committee should support that amendment, please say whether you think that it captures the intent of my amendment 111, and to what extent it does so.

Good morning, cabinet secretary and colleagues.

I say at the outset that amendment 111 in my name is a probing amendment. Prisons are clearly an area of concern for many people in respect of the bill. Personally—and I know that other colleagues share this view—I do not believe that prisons are the place for women at all, apart from in the most serious of situations, but that is, of course, a matter for wider discussion. I do appreciate the new women’s custody suites that the Scottish Government has put in place. However, it is vital that those who are housed in prisons feel safe.

I want to put on record my grateful thanks to MurrayBlackburnMackenzie for suggesting an initial form of this amendment following the stage 1 debate, in which I spoke about this issue. The initial amendment stated that the possession of a gender recognition certificate was to have no bearing on allocation decisions made in respect of housing in the prison estate, but the legislation clerks got back to me, saying that they felt that that did not fall within the scope of the bill. That is why the amendment before colleagues today is a “For the avoidance of doubt” one.

The amendment simply sets out what the Scottish Prison Service says that it already does and what everyone wants to be the case, which is that trans prisoners are risk assessed to ensure that they are housed in the most appropriate facility for the safety of other inmates and, of course, the trans person themselves. I put on record my thanks to the Equality and Human Rights Commission Scotland, Scottish Trans, the Equality Network and colleagues from across the chamber for their support and for understanding the intention behind my amendment. I am simply attempting, as we bring forward legislation, to make the lives of trans people easier and to provide reassurance in an area where there are genuinely held concerns.

I know from speaking to the Government that “For the avoidance of doubt” amendments are not great, and I know that there are some concerns about them. I know, too, that the Government is keen to hear about a later amendment from Pam Duncan-Glancy that might cover what I intend to achieve with amendment 111. I look forward to hearing about that amendment.

Based on all that, I am not inclined to move the amendment at this time—I want to hear the debate on Pam Duncan-Glancy’s amendment—but I encourage the cabinet secretary and the Government to consider further improvements in this area and others ahead of stage 3 to ensure that the bill commands as widespread support as possible in the chamber and with the public.

Although they are well intentioned, I am unable to support Michael Marra’s amendments 45 and 48. I do not think the comparison with the passport process is a good one. As I mentioned earlier, the core purpose of the bill is to make the process easier for trans people.

Michael Marra suggested that the amendments would raise the bar for bad-faith actors. We have had a discussion about bad-faith actors. We need to use stages 2 and 3 to further consider the issues, as happened with Pam Duncan-Glancy’s amendment in the previous group, and we need to do more on bad-faith actors. However, Michael Marra’s amendments raise the bar for all trans people and go against all the principles of the bill, on which the committee has taken a lot of evidence and produced a stage 1 report. I will not support amendments 45 and 48.