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Another piece of evidence is national health service injury data, which includes firework-related diagnosis. I will say—if I do not, my officials will get very cross with me—that we have to be a bit cautious about that data but, nonetheless, broadly, it tells us that such injuries have increased fairly consistently over the past 10 years.

The final example of evidence is lived experience. We know that that has been reflected very strongly in all the consultations that the Government has done, and I am sure that it will have been reflected back to the committee. It includes powerful testimonies about the significant impact that not only the misuse but the legitimate use of fireworks can have on people and on animals.

The bill has been carefully constructed to reflect the evidence that I have gone through and to be proportionate. Many people have said to me over the past few years that we should just ban fireworks. Under the devolution settlement, Scotland does not have the power to do that, so that is a legal reason why we did not go down that route. However, there is also a policy reason, which has a kernel of Jamie Greene’s question about whether the bill is proportionate. It is proportionate because there is still an obvious route for people to go through to purchase fireworks. Albeit that we are putting slightly more restrictions on it by suggesting that we set up the licensing scheme, if people want to, they will still be able to buy fireworks and use them.

People have made it clear that they want tighter controls on fireworks so that people can continue to use them safely. I hope that that answers Jamie Greene’s question.

Yes. That is part of what I was saying earlier about making sure that there is awareness raising and that people are clear that what they will be doing is an offence. Black market or illegal fireworks—however you want to describe them—will not have the same kinds of safety checks, so will potentially be dangerous, and people could injure themselves by using them.

There is a potential risk of displacement of sales and, as the bill has been developed, we have carefully considered that in three areas, about which I will ask Elinor Findlay to speak in a second. However, I come back to wanting tighter controls because that is what the public wants, because of some of the evidence we have talked about. We are trying to strike the right balance between introducing restrictions to ensure public safety and not introducing things that are too much of a barrier to buying fireworks.

I take your point about the black market. However, I am sure that you have spoken to Police Scotland about the fact that there has been a lot of national, multi-agency work by the enforcement agencies, including the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service and trading standards, to tackle illegal sellers of the type that we have been talking about, to tackle illegal products, which I have no doubt we will talk about later, and to undertake various actions such as removing websites, referring cases on and reporting breaches to the Health and Safety Executive. Routes are in place and are already being taken, and if people see white vans selling fireworks to kids in the street, I am confident that they will ring the police and that the police will deal with that. I ask Elinor Findlay to add a little more detail.

We want to get the licensing scheme right. As I said in my exchange with Pauline McNeill, we want to ensure that it works really well, so we need to do quite a lot of work on the implementation. We think that the scheme should be set up and working by the end of 2023, but I am afraid that we cannot be any more specific than that. We have to do some consultations and, as you would imagine, we have a lot of work to do with stakeholders on the scheme in order to get it right. We will also have to introduce secondary legislation on it.

Does Elinor Findlay want to add anything to that?

To go back to your point about reducing the times when fireworks can be used, the use of fireworks during those periods will still affect people, but it seems like a proportionate approach to take. Reducing the times when fireworks can be used will allow people to prepare. They will not be taken by surprise because they will have been able to prepare, which means that the use of fireworks will become a bit more tolerable, if I can describe it in that way.

I forgot to answer your question about flexibility. We consulted various faith groups and so on, and we wanted to be sure that the dates that we picked would align with dates when other faiths’ traditional celebrations involve fireworks and that we would be able to capture that. Having done that, we need to be careful that we do not introduce any more confusion. Allowing local authorities further flexibility to change those dates might not be a good idea. It could introduce an element of confusion. We have a lot of work to do to communicate to the public exactly what the changes are. Once we have done that, I hope that people will have a good level of knowledge about what they are allowed to do, when and where. That is important.

Elinor will be able to provide more information about impact assessments.

You are right to say that—we have covered this already—industry representatives were members of the firework review group. They were full members, like all the other members. The review group decided on its remit and what evidence it would look at, and it came up with an action plan at the end of that process. The recommendations that were made form part of the bill—not all the recommendations are in it—that is in front of you. As a Government, we are working through all the recommendations.

The industry was fully involved in the process. It gave very helpful information that has been worked into the draft legislation. As I said, I met the industry a couple of weeks ago, and we had a long, full and frank discussion. Obviously, its views are different, and the conclusion that it draws is that it would have liked things to have gone differently. However, the industry was fully involved from the start of the process. Some of its views have been taken on board; others have not.

There were probably members of the review group who—this happens in a lot of similar situations—would have liked the measures to go even further. In this case, that would be further measures on public safety, animal welfare and so on. The industry was perhaps more on the side of wanting to maintain the status quo.

I suggest to the committee that we have ended up somewhere in the middle, with a view to creating a bill that responds to what the public want. At the beginning of the meeting, I set out clearly that there is a strong desire from the public to change the way in which we sell and use fireworks, and that the measures in the bill have a lot of support, of which we must be cognisant.

We looked very carefully at the issue of unintended consequences through three different lenses, which we have spoken about. There is not a lot of data, but we used the data that we could find to inform the issue. That comes back to our exchanges with other members of the committee about ensuring that the licence system is easy to use and is not too expensive, so that we do not create barriers to people buying fireworks.

We have accepted that a very small number of firework suppliers might be adversely impacted by the provisions of the bill. We have said that, if that is the case, we will set up a compensation scheme for them.

No, I do not.

Lots of lawyers are still doing legal aid work. This measure represents an attempt to listen to what the profession is saying, and it puts a significant amount of Government funding into legal aid. We take the matter very seriously.

Thank you for that question. One of the instruments that is before the committee today includes, as well as the 5 per cent uplift, a new payment—a supplementary fee for holiday custody courts. That is a direct attempt by the Government to address the matter, having listened to solicitors who told us that they wanted that. Solicitors who work in holiday custody courts have not been getting an additional payment, so if the committee agrees to recommend the instrument, they will get additional money. We listen constantly to the profession. As I have said, we will adjust fees where we think that doing so will have an impact.

You mentioned civil legal aid. I know that this is quite confusing, because we are talking about lots of different things. In the reforms package that we have developed and put in front of the profession on Monday, and on which the committee will have seen correspondence, there are proposals on solemn and summary courts. The proposals on solemn courts represent significant additional funding, which is a response to requests from the profession to change fee rates and so on. We have done that. In a minute, I will ask Denise Swanson to explain a little more about that.

In discussion, it was—I note for the committee’s information—agreed that the civil side would be left to a later date. That is not to say that we think that everything is fine on that front; we have made a commitment to go back to look at fee reforms for the civil side.

I would, therefore, like the committee to think of this more as a starting point; we are starting here and will continue to consult the profession about changes. We are putting money in: the reform package that we have put on the table this week represents several million pounds of additional funding. I ask Denise Swanson to add a little more on that.

I do not know whether you caught our earlier in-depth discussion about those points. I regularly meet representatives of the profession; I met the chief executive of the Law Society yesterday. Those are full and frank discussions; there are no holds barred. The profession talks to the Government and tells us what it perceives to be the issues. We then have to assess the evidence and make policy decisions based on that.

We have listened to the profession, which is why we have given the uplifts that we have given over the past few years. We know that the legal profession, among other businesses and industries, has been impacted by the pandemic, so we sought to give it additional resilience funding.

I accept that the profession feels very strongly about the matter. The Law Society is right to strongly represent its profession and to try to get the best deal. That is completely legitimate. We have talked about the spending review as one way for the Government to decide on priorities and on how to allocate spending across the board. My job is to try to find a way through the matter and to make fee reforms where they will be of benefit.

The instruments that are in front of the committee represent a significant investment. Before Jamie Greene arrived, we had a discussion about the funding package, of which I hope he has been able to see some details. That funding is additional to what is in the instruments.

I am listening to the profession and I am doing my utmost to respond to the concerns that it raises. My officials work with the profession weekly to develop fee packages to respond to concerns that it has raised. I have been trying to work on that over the past year. For instance, holiday custody courts were raised with us; I wanted to resolve that issue so that practitioners who work in those courts get a supplementary payment. That is one of the measures that is in front of the committee.

I have said before and am happy to say again that my door is open. I am willing to talk with the profession and to work with it on fee reforms. That is what we will continue to do.

A 5 per cent uplift is included in one of the sets of regulations that are before the committee—that was a commitment that the Government made during Covid. I will run through what the Government has done in that regard over the past few years. We made a 3 per cent uplift in 2019 and the 5 per cent uplift in 2021 to which I have already referred. There is the 5 per cent uplift for 2022 that is in front of the committee today, and we have put £1 million into funding 40 trainees, which was in response to issues that the profession raised with us about capacity. The training was an attempt to go some way towards finding a solution to that issue. We also invested £9 million in Covid resilience grants.

In general, the Scottish Government considers the profession to be a partner with us in access to justice, in running the courts system and, because of the pandemic, in addressing the backlog, particularly in the criminal courts. The Government is attempting to demonstrate how much we value the profession by continuing to uplift the fees.

We are also working on packages of fee reforms, one of which we referenced in a letter to the committee—we are developing that at the moment. The full package of fee reforms has gone to representatives of the profession—I think that was last week, was it?