Official Report 291KB pdf
Green-belt Development (PE435)
The first item on the agenda is PE435 from Mr Peter Stephen, on the subject of policy and guidance on green-belt development. I invite Mr Stephen to the table with Gillian MacKenzie and Mike Dunbar, who are accompanying him. Our usual rules are that you have three minutes in which to make an opening statement about the petition and then members of the committee will question you. I hope that you will be able to answer their questions. I invite you to introduce your petition in your opening statement. After two and a half minutes, I will indicate that you have 30 seconds to go.
The proposed football stadium is only an application at present. It has not yet been dealt with, so I will refer to it only as background information.
That is smashing. Please go ahead.
I am a resident who also speaks on behalf of Kingswells community council. We represent a considerable weight of public opinion against what we perceive to be abuse of the green belt. On my right is Gillian MacKenzie, who is also a resident, and on my left is Mike Dunbar, who is from the Kingswells Infrastructure First Group.
You made your statement in good time.
The relevant papers show that the structure plan has been varied. The circular of which I have a copy gives examples of alterations that can be made to the structure plan for the green belt, but the proper procedure for altering a structure plan does not seem to have been followed in this case. Although the circular talks about flexibility, such flexibility does not seem to cover this kind of case. Surely the people who bought their houses must have been entitled to rely on the structure plan as it then was. That seems to be a serious flaw in principle.
Is that a comment or a question?
Do the petitioners share that view?
Yes. We are concerned that the process might have been abused in this case; it has certainly been truncated. We do not feel that it meets the standards of integrity and transparency that are appropriate to a body that is as august as the Scottish Executive. The process is proceeding with undue haste and we have received no explanations about why that might be so.
Is it the case that there has been no formal variation of the structure plan that existed when the residents bought their houses?
That is most certainly the case.
In your opening remarks, you said that no planning application had been submitted. What stage has been reached in the process, and how much consultation is taking place?
A planning application has been submitted. However, there has been a very perfunctory process of consultation. That process has failed to address the concerns not only of those who will have to live daily with the stadium, but of the whole of Aberdeen. The scale of concern is evident in the fact that Aberdeen City Council has received 1,500 objections to the proposal—not just from Kingswells residents, but from people throughout the city. We are concerned that those people will receive the same dismissive treatment that the 389 objections to the Scottish Executive's proposal to remove the land from the green belt received.
You say that the planning application has been submitted. Has the council granted planning permission?
Not yet.
So the council is currently consulting residents.
Yes. We are now in the 28-day consultation period.
Are you concerned that not very much weight has been given to objections?
That is one of our concerns. The importance of the objections has been undermined by statements that have been released on behalf of Aberdeen City Council. Furthermore, there has been manipulation of the media to ensure that the objections are buried beneath the release of information that the applicant and council feel is favourable to the proposal.
Are you still waiting for the council to reach its decision?
We are.
There seems to be a discrepancy between the local plan and the structure plan in the planning application. Will you clarify that point?
The new city structure plan received its final input on Friday. As we have been working from the 1998 structure plan, we find ourselves caught somewhere in the middle.
I was also concerned to find out that any proposed development will be close to the local crematorium. That is a sensitive issue. How close will the development be to that building?
It will be immediately next door to the crematorium. Although we have raised the issue in various objections to the city council, we are not happy with the response that we have received. We have even advanced the scenario of grieving people having to listen to the shouts coming over the wall from the stadium; we just cannot relate the two circumstances.
The crematorium and garden of remembrance will share both a boundary fence and the traffic infrastructure with the proposed development.
I have lived in the area for nearly 50 years, during which time I have seen the erosion of the green belt. Building at Kingswells started about 17 years ago and is still not finished. Last week, it was announced that building would be extended to an area south of the proposed stadium, and another 1,500 houses are going up at Bridge of Don, which is to the north. The infrastructure does not seem to us to support that building work, but that seems to be what the council wants to do. A proposal to build a small rescue centre on derelict land was turned down, yet a park-and-ride scheme went up in the green belt after very little consultation, and a proposal for a leisure centre at East Middlefield is in the process of being investigated. All that happens without the local people having much idea about what is going on, which we think is rather unfair.
I presume that the council owns the crematorium.
It is a municipal crematorium.
I take it that the crematorium authorities, or the relevant committee, have not lodged objections. Have the local clergy who use the crematorium lodged objections?
Kingswells church, which is the closest church to the site, is a formal objector to the proposal.
Have you approached other local clergy, even informally, to ask them to add their names to your protest?
No. We do not want to manufacture support. We want only to convey genuine support. We do not propose to canvass people who otherwise would not support our position, nor to try to persuade them to throw their hats into our ring. We did not think that it was feasible that Aberdeen City Council, which owns the crematorium, would object to a proposal for which it had already expressed support with unseemly haste.
As you know, the green belt is being invaded in many parts of Scotland. Councils tend to protect the green belt until an occasion arises on which they find it more convenient not to protect that land, but instead to invade it. I wonder about the other areas of Aberdeen where you said the football stadium development could go to. Do you want to expand on those comments?
We have suggested that those areas would like the development. Local people, through their community councils, have expressed a wish for the stadium to be built in their area.
Our planning consultants have identified an alternative site on an area of land that is known locally as Charleston. The site is about four miles south of Aberdeen and is adjacent to the main A90 dual carriageway and the east coast railway line, on which a halt could readily be provided. It is a brownfield site that is already zoned for industrial use. In any circumstances other than those of commercial gain, we are quite confident that that site would have been selected on its technical merits.
We must be absolutely clear. It is understandable that most of our questions have revolved around the planning application for a new football stadium. However, the committee has no remit to get involved in individual planning applications. Do you accept that the elected planning authority—rather than this committee—will deal with that application and that the role of the Scottish Executive ministers is to call in the planning application if they decide to do so?
We take that on board. We appreciate the committee's indulgence in allowing us to expand on the circumstances a little for the sake of providing background information.
One of the early questions that you asked was about how the committee could ensure equity. Are you suggesting that the Scottish Executive reporter would not be fair?
It has not been satisfactorily explained why the 389 objections that were lodged to the Scottish Executive's proposed modification of national planning policy guideline 11—which is essentially the green-belt provision—were dismissed as incompetent. That is significant objection and it should have been given far greater credence.
Did those objections go directly to the Scottish Executive?
Yes.
Why did the Scottish Executive say that the objections were incompetent?
The Executive said that the objections were site specific, but the proposal was generic.
Did the Executive say that because no decision had been made on a planning application and it is not for the Executive to intervene at that stage?
That was not the basis of the Executive's dismissal of the objections. They were dismissed on the basis that they referred to the removal of land from the green belt at Kingswells, but the proposed modification of NPPG 11 was a generic, non-site specific provision for removal of land in support of the Scottish football bid for Euro 2008.
So, you question whether the Executive reporter would act fairly and impartially.
Yes. We are concerned that the principles of integrity and transparency are not being fully upheld in the treatment of the objections.
You are saying that the planning guidelines that were issued by the Scottish Executive to councils have been amended to allow companies to use green-belt sites for football stadiums.
That is true—it is the de facto position—but our objection is not to the decision that has been taken. Our objection is that we do not believe that the Scottish Executive has followed its own guidelines in allowing the removal of land from the green belt. A football stadium's structure does not meet green-belt provisions.
Green-belt policy has been around for a long time—I think that it first came into existence in 1985. Are you saying that the Scottish Executive should have reviewed green-belt policy long ago?
No, we are not commenting on that. We want to maintain the precious amount of green belt, regardless of how long the policy has been in place. Green belt remains important, regardless of how long it has been described as such.
Are you concerned with the application of the current policy guidelines rather than with a review of policy guidelines?
Yes. We are concerned about the implementation of guidelines.
Section 7 of NPPG 11 deals with recreational uses of land. We believe that that does not include add-on commercial retail development that takes over a fair part of a whole proposal. We are not talking about just a football field or two.
Green-belt legislation states that one must consider noise and light pollution—which is important in this case—when considering how green belt should be used.
I want to return to an answer that I received about a new structure plan. When was that plan? How long did it take? Who arranged it?
Work has been continuing during the past few months. In early December, there was upset in the council chambers when the plan was not approved. An eleventh-hour, last-minute amendment was added. The plan for an additional 1,500 houses to be built on the green belt was brought back to the council last Friday and approved amid chaotic circumstances.
I want to be clear about what you are saying about the powers of the committee and the Parliament in relation to the Scottish Executive. You are concerned about the application of the green-belt policy guidelines by the Scottish Executive and particularly that exceptions to the policy guidelines are being promoted by the Scottish Executive to facilitate its bid for the Euro 2008 football championship. You see that as leading to a less than fair and reasonable judgment of applications for planning consent for football grounds.
It fails to meet the Scottish Executive's own guidelines on the modifications of the guidelines.
Thank you. You are now free to sit and listen to the discussion.
Perhaps we should also refer the petition to the Local Government Committee for its comments.
The Transport and the Environment Committee would deal with the petition, and we will send it a copy for its information. However, until we receive the Scottish Executive's response, we should not formally refer the petition. We will write to the Scottish Executive, asking for its comments on this morning's discussion. Once we have had its response, we will consider whether to refer the petition to the Transport and the Environment Committee, which is the relevant committee to deal with planning issues in the Scottish Parliament. Is that course of action agreed?
We do not have to wait, do we?
We will keep you fully informed of what is happening.
Through me, presumably.
Yes, as you are the main petitioner. Steve Farrell will keep in touch with you and tell you what is happening to the petition.
Thank you.
Advocacy (Mental Health) (PE436)
The next petition is from Marcia Ramsay on behalf of Advocacy 2000. It calls on the Scottish Parliament to take the necessary steps to ensure that, in the development of the new mental health act, access to independent advocacy by individuals is implemented and a duty is placed on health boards to make provision for collective advocacy in hospitals and communities.
I thank the members of the Public Petitions Committee for considering the petition and for accepting my request to speak to it. The petition seeks a right for users of mental health services to access individual independent advocacy and a duty on health boards and local authorities to fund and support provision of independent collective advocacy for people who use services and could be subject to the new act. We have not included a duty on health boards to ensure provision of individual independent advocacy, as that is already noted in the policy.
Thank you. That was excellent.
What is the difference between the duty to provide advocacy and the right to access advocacy? Is it a matter of emphasis?
We are asking for a duty to be put on health boards and for a right to be given to individuals. The difference is that people will be able to take the right with them. They will be aware that it is an individual right. Many people are unaware of the duties that are placed on health boards and local authorities to do things. Health boards, local authorities and other agencies do not always carry out the duties that are placed on them. If people use services, perhaps by being detained, they may ask for an advocate. If there is no advocacy service in that area, they can challenge that at a later date. However, at the time that the person needed the advocate, one was not available.
You do not want a change in the law. You want the Public Petitions Committee or the Executive to ensure that all health boards have an advocacy service that is available there and then for patients when they need it. Is that your view?
We want an independent advocacy service that would be available for people who need it when they need it. At the moment, there are real issues about the ability to respond to that demand. We also propose a change to the law. The Millan committee said that people should have a right to access independent advocacy on an individual basis. However, that recommendation was dropped when the mental health policy was developed.
Does that mean that, although hospitals have an advocacy service, you want an independent body that provides a service to patients, which they can access in hospital and which would follow them and remain with them in the community?
Advocacy services are structured differently in different areas of Scotland. There are about 80 small and large projects. Some work in hospitals and the community, but others work only in hospitals. We do not challenge how projects are structured as long as they are independent and have no conflict of interest with the service that they might challenge. We believe that, wherever people use services, they should be able to access some form of independent advocacy.
That was an important recommendation of the Millan report. Unfortunately, it seemed to get buried under other vital matters that the report tackled.
I suppose the challenge of implementing a policy is in deciding whether it is a duty or a right. Even if it is just a duty, different levels of work require to be done. One level concerns educating people who provide services, as well as those who use services, about what advocacy is and why it is important. I agree that it is vital for people to be informed about the right to access an advocate, if that is what they want. Independent advocacy is also vital in upholding the principles, such as participation, equality and reciprocity, to which the policy statement subscribed.
As a lawyer, I find the matter a bit puzzling. Who are the independent advocates?
There are different approaches to independent advocacy. When I talk about independent advocacy, I do not mean legal advocacy. However, there are relationships between independent advocacy projects and lawyers and legal advocacy. Independent advocacy happens on individual and collective levels. It involves getting ordinary members of the community or paid individuals to stand alongside a person or group to help them to have their views heard and their rights and interests protected.
Who pays them?
That varies. In some places the health board or the local authority funds projects, but in others they are funded by the national lottery or other forms of trust. As I said, I am aware of 80 schemes and organisations in Scotland. They are all structured differently according to what local people need and want.
Are the advocates volunteers?
Some are paid, but the majority are volunteers.
What is wrong with informing mental patients that under the legal aid scheme they can access legal advice at any time?
It is not always for legal advice that people need advocacy support. I have worked as an advocate for the past seven years. Some issues involve helping someone who needs to see their psychiatrist. The psychiatrist might be good and helpful, but the person feels daunted because of the imbalance of power between them as a detained person, perhaps, and the person who can tell them what will happen next. It is vital for a person who feels disempowered to have someone who is on their side and who will help them to stand up for themselves and say clearly what they want.
As a lawyer, I often acted for mental patients or their relatives in connection with release or unfair treatment. I think that I did a satisfactory job. The right to an advocate exists already.
Not all issues are legal issues. People who want a change of medication will not ask a lawyer to go with them to a meeting to discuss the matter. On many occasions, a lawyer would not think that that is a legal issue. However, people still need support.
The present law imposes a duty to provide independent advocacy services. Does that create a situation in which, although there is an advocacy service in every area, those services are not adequate and do not meet the needs of patients because demand outstrips provision? Is that what is behind the petition?
Not every area has a project or organisation; the coverage is patchy. Last year, an audit of what is available was carried out. Not everyone who uses mental health services and who wants to access an advocate—
So there is no legal duty on health boards to provide independent advocacy.
As far as I am aware, there is no duty.
Is it possible that, by requiring health boards to fund independent advocacy, the independence of the service would be called into question? Sometimes the advocacy service will have to take on the health board.
The Scottish Executive, the advocacy organisations and the people in health boards who commission advocacy are doing a lot of work on the development of independent advocacy. One reason why we talk constantly about independent advocacy is that, to be able to act, advocates must be as free of and as far away from conflicts of interest as possible. Organisations can achieve that in various ways. Health boards fund some of the schemes and organisations in Scotland, which works well and is one method that we recommend. However, we try to ensure that projects have more than one source of funding so that, if they are in a difficult or compromising position with the health board, they will not disappear overnight when the health board feels challenged.
Is there evidence that when the budgets of health boards that fund independent advocacy services come under pressure, those services are the first to feel the pinch?
I do not think that advocacy is the first service that is removed. Compared with the funding for service provision, the funding for advocacy is a small piece of the cake. We try to support development and expansion, but the service is still a small piece of the cake. There is no need for huge resources. When the proposed mental health bill is introduced, proper resources will be required for advocacy for people who use mental health services. If proper resources are not provided, the money that has been put into advocacy for mental health and other areas might suffer when advocacy becomes a right in law. It is important that advocacy is properly resourced.
Has the Executive said why it did not include in the proposed mental health bill the Millan committee recommendation for an individual right to advocacy?
We had lengthy discussions with the Executive about that. To some degree, the conversation is continuing. The issues that concern the Executive are the definition of independent advocacy, on which a lot of work has been done, and the ability to obtain advocates to fulfil the role. It is my opinion that resourcing will also be an issue when we consider what might be needed. It is important that the right to advocacy does not get lost for the sake of a worry about resourcing.
You have not mentioned collective advocacy. What exactly do you mean by that term?
The Millan committee said that health boards should support collective advocacy; it did not say what it meant by support. As far as I recall, the policy document did not talk about that.
It may benefit your case to point out that advocacy—where it works and where it is at its very best—can be a protection against abuse in hospitals. Advocacy can be even more important in relation to mental health than it is in relation to physical health, although advocacy extends to people who have physical illnesses as well. However, the term is not well known to the public because there is so little investment in the service. The service is vital, because few people are able to stand up for themselves. Furthermore, those people's relatives often find it extremely difficult to deal with those in authority or to expose injustice or abuse.
I could not agree more. People who are disempowered or who feel voiceless are the least likely to make approaches. An advantage of independent advocacy organisations is that they can go out and find the people who need the service. Often, services wait for people to come to them, but it is important that we reach the most vulnerable people.
Thank you for your evidence. You are welcome to sit and listen to our discussion of the petition.
I found the explanation of independent advocacy a bit vague. In the witness's statement, she admitted that the service was "patchy"—better in some places than in others, or non-existent in some places.
Such advocacy is provided in some places but not in others. When I used the word "patchy", I was not talking about the quality; I was talking about the amount.
Strictly speaking, we have finished questioning the petitioner.
I still found the explanation a bit vague, and to put something vague into a bill will always lead to difficulties.
It is important to get the Executive to explain its position on advocacy.
Yes—I agree with your recommendation, convener.
Could we ask the Executive where advocacy is available and where there are gaps in the service?
Yes, we could do that.
I do not think that the Executive should, at this stage, worry about the cost implications, as Governments often do. It is important to enshrine in legislation the principle that people have the right to access this service. A duty should be placed on health boards. We all know that the service is in a fairly embryonic state in Scotland. We are looking to the future and it will not be good—to put it mildly—if we miss this chance.
As well as asking the Executive where independent advocacy is available, we could ask what part cost considerations have played in its decision not to recommend a right for individuals to access the service.
Yes, but we should not ask those questions in an over-critical way.
No—we would simply ask for the Executive's position.
The Executive may, at this stage, be thinking, "Oh dear—another cost to consider." However, we must think long term and build up the service.
Do members agree with the suggested course of action?
We will find out the Executive's position and then consider how to proceed.
Parental Alienation Syndrome (Sibling Contact) (PE438)
The next petition is PE438, from Mr George McAulay, on resources to allow children to establish a right of contact with alienated siblings. Mr McAulay is here. Do you have someone with you?
Yes. I shall make a brief statement, then Gordon Ross and Hayley Forrest will make some points. We will then be available to answer questions.
That is fine as long as you do not take longer than the three minutes that you have been allocated. I draw members' attention to the fact that Mr McAulay has supplied us with additional papers.
Do you mean those that refer to the European rulings?
An extract from the treaty establishing the European Community has been circulated to the committee.
In that case, I shall be even briefer.
Two years ago, I separated from my wife. I had no idea what the term alienation meant in relation to children. My child is nine years old and I have not seen him for 18 months. I have exhausted every avenue and agency. I have been through the courts and have exhausted my funds. I can no longer go any further. I turned to social work services and took a witness with me. When I asked the people there whether their institution was sexist, after I had asked many questions about its refusal to deal with the situation, I was told that it was. They had never heard of PAS. It is not on their agenda and they have no training to deal with it. I put pressure on them to do something about it—perhaps even to make a home visit, on which someone with training would recognise the problem—but my request was refused. They phoned the school, as Mr McAulay has told you, which said that everything was fine and that there were no problems at all.
My name is Hayley Forrest. I am 13 years old and I am in my second year at Hunter High School, in East Kilbride. I am not a disruptive or unruly child: I have a very good record of behaviour and achievement at my school.
Thank you, Hayley. This is obviously difficult for you. You have done exceptionally well in giving evidence to the committee this morning.
Is this an attempt to change the law to give a right of access to siblings?
No, there does not necessarily need to be a change in the law—it could be done by parliamentary methods. The petition is supplementary to our initial petition on the mainstream recognition of parental alienation syndrome. Mainstream recognition of PAS would have led to early intervention in Hayley's case and that of young Robert, Gordon Ross's son. Early intervention is the key. PAS can be mild, moderate or severe. If it is arrested in the mild stage, it prevents much harm from being done to the children, the alienated parent and even the alienator, who if often a desperately unhappy individual. Parliament should mainstream recognition of PAS, just as it has advocated recognition of domestic violence, through schools and social work departments.
For the benefit of people who are listening, I state that your earlier petition, PE413, which dealt with mainstreaming recognition of parental alienation syndrome, was referred by this committee to the Executive for comment. We are still awaiting a reply.
We have had support from men and women all over the world on this matter. Within the past week, there has been a whirlwind. I mentioned the European convention on human rights in relation to my previous petition. Since my first petition, a lot of case law has been forwarded to us and I understand the situation better. I am a layperson, but clinical psychologists and consultant psychologists are contributing to our understanding of the problem. We hope that the Public Petitions Committee will create an avenue for us to pass our information to the Executive.
That is happening already.
If rights of access were upheld by social workers and so on, would the present system of getting rights of access through the courts be sufficient?
I went through the system and followed my lawyer's advice to the letter. I was told to play the white man. When I went to court, I was dealt with by Sheriff Johnston, who is one of the leading family sheriffs in Scotland. I was denied the right to defend myself. I was told that I should sit there and say nothing and that the sheriff would decide what was in the best interests of the child. I would argue that my wife and I knew each other better than anyone else. I knew where we were going: nowhere fast. She had already made up her mind and we went round in circles for months as the process dragged on and on. After every visit to my child, I received a detailed letter from a lawyer. My child had obviously been interrogated when he went home. Some of the allegations were absolutely ridiculous and frivolous. The legal system does not want to deal quickly with cases such as mine.
Talk about your lawyer thinking that there was something wrong with the letter that your boy wrote to him.
My lawyer received a one-line letter from my son, which read: "I do not want to see my dad." My lawyer said that that was unprecedented. I should point out that it took a lot of encouragement to get the child to write five sentences for his spelling homework—I had to sit with him while he did it—yet we were told that he wrote the letter off his own bat.
To answer Miss Grant's question, the point is that the sheriff did nothing.
The sheriff did not want to impose sanctions against my wife. At the end of the day, I had to withdraw to a certain extent, partly due to a lack of funds and partly because I could imagine what the process was doing to my son, given the intimidation that I had endured. I could not get that message across in court—at one stage, he turned away from me and would not listen.
Did the court grant you access rights?
I was told that my son would meet me, but he was not there when I arrived. The sheriff would not impose sanctions against my wife.
I have spoken to many men—and their female relatives—who have had court-ordered access denied by their former partner. It is a fact of life that, in this country and in most western countries, courts will not impose meaningful sanctions on women who are guilty of blatant contempt of court because they have blocked access. Until the nettle is grasped, that situation will continue. I know that the Executive is committed to not putting more women in prison. We do not want such women to go to prison either because we know that, if you hurt one parent, you hurt them both. However, some sanctions must be placed on them. In the United States of America, there are examples of alienation and other hostility ceasing when sanctions have been applied.
I am interested to hear what kind of sanctions you would like to be imposed.
I maintain that that is not my job; it is the Parliament's job. The European Court of Human Rights has ruled that, in the case of a breach of the European convention on human rights, the Parliament has to provide for alienated children and alienated parents of either sex. The Parliament must provide the mechanism, although I could certainly make suggestions.
Is not it the case that sanctions such as imprisonment or financial sanctions would have a dire effect on the children involved?
We must bite the bullet, because the effects of parental alienation syndrome are much worse. I will provide a small booklet that Sue Stirling, who suffered alienation, wrote. She was a polio victim and she thanked God that she was sent to a residential school for nine months a year, because it got her away from the alienating parent, who happened to be her mother. Her whole life has been scarred and she has been devastated.
I thank everyone for appearing here today, especially Hayley. You will have noticed that there was a little pause before we began our discussion. I think that was because we were all pretty stunned by your testimony. We were stunned, but not surprised, because the problem is fairly widespread.
It is fresh in that we have just introduced the issue of alienation. I take your point. What is important about the petition is that the Parliament observes its obligations under the Elsholz v Germany ruling, and others, to provide individuals—in this case, Gordon and Hayley—with the right to access to siblings. Hayley is 13 and, as the committee can see, articulate and composed. What does a five-year-old child do? What does an inarticulate eight-year-old child do?
Hayley would convince anyone, believe me. I accept your argument.
That is why we must have mainstreaming.
Are you saying that the siblings have no right to see each other at all at the moment?
In Hayley's case, the mother has blocked those rights. That is my understanding. Is that right, Hayley?
Yes, they have been blocked.
I have encountered that before.
It is obvious that the issue has been massively neglected—grandparents would say the same. However, progress could be made first and foremost on the rights of the children. Perhaps a member's bill is required. Do members have other suggestions?
We will discuss the petition later. At present, we are simply questioning the witnesses in order to elucidate—
Further to Dorothy-Grace Elder's point, the previous petitioner mentioned advocacy, which there is a burden on the state to provide. As I said, the state should be proactive in doing so. We should not have to wait until the Hayleys and Roberts are 10 years down the line, with permanently warped and twisted personalities. As happens with sex abusers, many affected children go on to become—
I take it that you know that social work departments no longer separate siblings and place them in different homes as they used to do. Indeed, they are encouraged not to separate siblings when they put them into foster care if that is at all avoidable. Unless a problem exists between the siblings, they try to keep the family together.
Your point being?
My point is that the opposite happens when separation occurs behind closed doors. Social work departments are not allowed to separate siblings when they decide to send children to homes or to put them into foster care.
Social work departments have singularly failed to intervene. They are institutionally anti-male. You make much of Hayley's pain, but I would say that Gordon's pain is every bit as potent. Nothing was done by the social worker—Gordon knows her name. Perhaps it would be unfair to name her, but we can certainly tell you her name in private. She admitted to institutional, anti-male bias, but her decision went against Gordon. In my experience, social work departments do nothing. I could also tell the committee about a wealthy businessman who—
Dr Ewing wants to ask a question.
I wanted to ask Hayley a question. You are with your father and you say that you are happy there. Does your father have custody of you?
I think that he has custody of me.
You are not sure. Did he go to court to get custody changed?
We went to several children's panels.
So you have been to the children's panel.
We have been to lots of them. A supervision order has been put on for a year or so.
So you are with your father for a year.
Yes, but I am going to continue living there.
Mr McAulay referred to the ECHR and to public health. I want to be absolutely clear about the petition. You talk about establishing procedures, but that would not necessarily change the law. Are you talking about getting social work departments and the national health service—the mainstream, as you put it—to recognise the existence of the condition and to take it into consideration?
Yes.
That can be done through Executive policy guidelines and so on.
That is correct. We offered to lecture the Sheriffs Association about the condition, which it said it recognised. Sheriffs may recognise the condition, but they do not act upon it. It is incumbent on that arm of the state—
At the beginning of your presentation, you said that the condition is recognised in the United States and Canada. In what sense is it recognised?
Through necessity, I have studied the condition a fair bit. Dr Richard Gardner has been detailing it for nearly 30 years and the courts in the United States have been dealing with it for 20 years. Many of the states impose sanctions because they realise the damage—
Are you saying that the condition is legally recognised in the States?
Yes. Dr Gardner lectures throughout the world and is very well known. I bought his book, but I could not finish it because so many of the symptoms that are described in it made me feel as if I was reading my own life story. The condition is both recognised and taken on board in the States, but the difficulty here is that people do not want to recognise that the condition exists. In my view, that is like going back 20 years to the time when no one wanted to admit to the existence of sexual abuse of children.
That is a matter of interpretation.
Not quite—to put it simply, I would like the Executive to take whatever action is necessary to ensure that the problems that I mention in my petition do not arise, in line with the Executive's public health obligations and the decisions in Elsholz v Germany and other cases.
The first stage is to get the Executive to respond to the petition.
That is fairly obvious. I do not mean that sarcastically—I am simply confirming what you said.
I just want to be clear about the intention behind the petition.
Obviously, Mr Ross was not satisfied with his appearance before the sheriff. Presumably, the sheriff gave custody to the wife and Mr Ross quarrelled—he went back to court.
Custody was never decided. I was told that I would have to go to a proof hearing to get custody. The sheriff refused a proof hearing. I hired one of the best lawyers in Glasgow. We sat there—it was like banging my head against a wall. I had to dig my heels in and demand a proof hearing.
You did not get that.
I decided to withdraw, because my funds were exhausted. I was warned that if I went to the Court of Session, I should be prepared to lose, as that can always happen. It costs £10,000 a day.
You did not manage to get legal aid for your cause.
I am in a catch-22 position. I am in the grey area. I am above—
You do not qualify. In custody disputes, the sheriff has the power to appoint a reporter. On many occasions, sheriffs have appointed me as a reporter to investigate a dispute. A dispute over custody is never happy. A broken marriage is not happy, but it happens. People try to pick up the pieces. Sometimes the sheriff accepted my recommendation that custody be given to the male—the father. Usually the mother has preference. That is human nature—the mother will rarely leave a child, although it happens.
We are moving on to discussion. At this stage, we are just meant to be questioning the petitioner. Are there any other questions to the petitioners?
Dr Ewing's point on legislation has a great bearing on our petition. We have asked for all the mechanisms to be made available to the child. That is much more important for children, because they have no advocacy and no access. I think that what Dr Ewing said is right on the button.
That is the end of the questions. We move on to discussion about what to do with the petition. The petitioners are welcome to stay and listen. Thanks very much for your evidence.
Thank you.
Mr McAulay referred to the earlier petition, PE413, about parental alienation syndrome. We referred that to the Executive at the end of November and we are still awaiting a response. The suggestion is that we should pass on petition PE438, along with the earlier petition, to the Executive and ask for a joint response. Once we receive that response from the Executive, we can give further consideration to the petitions in tandem. At this stage, we will send petition PE438 to the justice committees for information only. Once we have the Executive's response, we can decide whether to refer the petition formally to the justice committees.
Many weeks ago, I half decided to introduce a member's bill on access to siblings and grandparents. I might make further inquiries along those lines. Before then, I was unaware that children had no legal rights to see each other. The situation is almost as bad as it was in the 1950s, when they used to ship some kids out to Australia and leave some of them here. It was a scandal.
The important thing is the general principle of parental alienation syndrome and whether the Executive will take a position on it. We will refer the matter to the Executive and wait for its comments on both petitions before we consider them further.
I just want to mention the term "parental alienation syndrome", which right away is difficult for the Executive to grasp. Using that term almost confuses the issue. Perhaps Steve Farrell could put in a basic explanation—
The Executive gets all the papers that we receive, all the background evidence and the comments of the petitioners, so there will be no confusion about what we are talking about.
State Hospital (PE440)
The next petition, which is from Mr and Mrs Dave Crichton, calls for the Parliament to investigate the problems that are being faced by patients who are ready to be released or transferred from the State hospital at Carstairs.
First, I thank the committee for the opportunity to present my petition, as I have exhausted all the other avenues that are open to me. Despite recommendations by all the doctors concerned in 1999 and since, Darren Crichton is still incarcerated in Carstairs. We, along with other interested parties, including the Mental Welfare Commission, find that intolerable.
I back up what Mr Crichton said. When Mr and Mrs Crichton met me, I could hardly believe that, purely because of resources, their son Darren had been trapped in Carstairs for two and a half years when there was no need for him to be there. First, the reason was that no bed was available at Murray royal hospital. Now that a bed is available, Mr and Mrs Crichton have been told that the problem is that there are no staff for that bed.
It was very interesting to hear about the categories that people who are sent to Carstairs fall under. Which category is your son in?
Darren was receiving electroconvulsive shock treatment at Murray royal hospital. However, it went wrong and he was sent to Carstairs to restart the treatment.
So your son's case has nothing to do with the courts.
The court system was involved initially. My son went to Murray royal hospital under a hospital order because he was mentally ill.
Does he get any treatment at Carstairs? For example, is he visited regularly by a psychiatrist?
Yes. He receives constant treatment and is seeing a consultant psychiatrist.
Is he seeing him regularly?
Well, not as often now that he is more settled.
Who said that your son was due for release? Was it the psychiatrist?
Darren went to Carstairs in January 1999. In August 1999, a clinical review by a number of psychiatrists deemed that he was fit enough to go back for further treatment at Murray royal with a view to releasing him into the community.
Is your son a suitable case for care in the community schemes, in which people who are released from a mental hospital stay with others in houses and are looked after by wardens?
Do you mean a halfway house system?
Yes.
I agree with that totally. Because my son has been in Carstairs for three years, he has become institutionalised. From the minute he wakes up until he goes back to bed, he has a regime and his time is spoken for. Similarly, when I came out of the army, I had to adjust to civilian life. If my son came straight home, he might wonder what had hit him and might not be able to cope. The halfway house system is ideal; in fact, it is what Murray royal hospital was supposed to provide.
Have you asked whether your son could be found a place in that system?
We have tried everything.
Given that a number of people in Carstairs are waiting to go into a halfway house, has the hospital considered creating its own halfway house where it could deal with those people instead of being involved in what amounts almost to bedblocking?
That is a really good idea.
From what you have said, it appears that no specialist facilities are required. All that is needed is a placement with medical back-up teams that are already in place.
Back in 1999, it was thought that my son would need only a few weeks back in Murray royal and some time at the day centre, and then he could come back home.
So the health boards do not have to employ a different specialist to help with the treatment. They already have the staff.
He would still be under the care of Murray royal hospital, which would be his first port of call if anything went wrong.
Mr and Mrs Crichton, would you be kind enough to check the facts that I have written down? You said that your son was admitted to Carstairs in January 1999 and that, in August 1999, he was judged to be much better.
He was deemed fit to be moved back to Murray royal hospital.
He has therefore been in Carstairs for a further two years, which means that he has been well in Carstairs for a lot longer than he has been unwell there. Could you also tell me how long he was at Murray royal hospital before being transferred to Carstairs?
He went to Murray royal in August 1998. He was moved to the State hospital in January 1999.
You said that ECT treatment had not been suitable or had gone wrong.
He was receiving medication, but that was not working. We were advised that he would like to try a course of six treatments of ECT. Unfortunately, that totally blew his mind—if members will excuse my language. He assaulted a chief nurse of whom he had no knowledge. Because Murray royal did not have the necessary staff and facilities, it was decided that it would be better for him to go to Carstairs, where the treatment could be restarted.
Thank you very much.
Mr Crichton, I heard you on the radio this morning; you did very well. I also heard the medical director of Carstairs hospital telling the nation that 33 patients in Carstairs have been assessed as needing to return to local care. Are those cases spread across the country, or are there problems in particular areas?
They are spread across the country. There are 46 or 47 patients in Carstairs who are ready to be moved. The hospital has changed the way in which it counts those people. Although a clinical review may have stated that they are fit to move, they are not counted until their local consultant has deemed them fit to move. The figure of 47 refers to the total number of patients who are fit to move. Thirty-three of those patients have been diagnosed by their local consultant as fit to move.
So the figure is higher than 33—it is 47.
We are still waiting for that.
Were you part of the consultation?
I am a member of Tayside Forensic Voices carers support group.
Were you consulted about the structure of forensic psychiatric services in Tayside?
The report is now two years late and it is still not finished. The consultation probably took place before my time.
I am interested to find out whether the consultation involved only staff, patients and carers at Murray royal, or whether it also involved people at Carstairs who would be transferred to Murray royal.
I think that only people in Perth were consulted.
We have received the agenda for this week's meeting of the health board, and the restructuring of forensic psychiatric services is not on it, even though we were promised that it would be. You are right to say that there has been delay.
Tayside Forensic Voices carers support group was supposed to make a presentation to the board on Thursday. Last week we had a meeting to discuss our strategy for that meeting, but Tayside Health Board has said that it is not yet ready to receive the presentation.
Have you been given any indication when the issue will be discussed?
Perhaps next month.
So it is the usual story—not this month, but next month. Would you like to make any further points that we have not covered?
I think that everything has been covered.
Thank you for your evidence, which has been very helpful to the committee. You are free to listen to members' discussion of what to do with the petition.
Should we not take up the issue with the health board?
We will do that anyway.
As you said, the restructuring of forensic psychiatric services is not on the agenda of Tayside Health Board's next meeting.
Individual MSPs can take up the issue with the health board.
You can put the matter on the agenda.
It has been placed on the agenda. We will ask why it was not discussed at the January meeting of Tayside Health Board, as promised to MPs and MSPs. The health board will have to explain itself.
The picture is very gloomy, right enough.
It is indeed, particularly when you remember that mental health is one of the three priorities for the NHS in Scotland. The petition gives the lie to that. Something will need to be done.
Darren was ill for 13 months, during which time he was transferred between the hospital in Dundee and the one in Perth. He was then transferred to Carstairs, but after being cleared in August 1999 as well enough to progress, he has spent another 30 months still incarcerated. That would be enough to give someone a long-term illness.
Mr Crichton's evidence this morning, that 47 patients are in a similar situation, is alarming. When we ask the Scottish Executive to respond, we can ask for details about how long those patients at Carstairs have been waiting to be placed locally. That evidence will help the progress of the petition.
I thank the witnesses, who are the last of the petitioners to give testimony this morning.
Gaelic Language (PE437)
Petition PE437, which is from Mr John Macleod, calls on the Executive to secure the future of the Gaelic language through the creation of a Gaelic language act. It calls on the Executive to develop a co-ordinated strategy for the language in partnership with local authorities and Gaelic organisations.
Am I right in thinking that Mike Russell already has a Gaelic language bill?
Does anyone know?
That was my understanding. Perhaps John Farquhar Munro knows whether that is correct.
I do not think that a bill has yet been published.
Is that the intention?
Yes, there is an intention to publish a member's bill. What concerns me is why we are not taking evidence on the petition.
That is just the decision that was taken. We are allowed to take evidence on only three or four petitions every week. I am told that there was a request to give evidence but, because we had dealt with those previous petitions and had received a lot of information from the Executive, it was felt that other petitioners deserved to be given the opportunity to present evidence.
It is strange that the petitioner does not call for the Gaelic language to be given official status, which is what is usually called for. That was in the manifestos of various parties.
The petitioner does not call for that.
It seems to me that that is the thing that should be called for first of all.
In the circumstances, it is important to get the Executive's response to PE437.
Absolutely.
The clerk's note on the petition clearly suggests that the previous petitions have simply been referred. That was admirable in the circumstances, but we have not received a response. That seems to happen with many of the petitions that come to us. When we refer them, we do not insist on a report from the committees to which we refer them. My fear is that, if we simply refer the petition, as we have done with the others, the result will be the same.
I take your point on that.
I will take your advice on that, convener.
Our clerk, Steve Farrell, can make inquiries about the powers of the Equal Opportunities Committee. When we get the response from the Executive, we can consider further whether we should refer the petition to the Education, Culture and Sport Committee or the Equal Opportunities Committee.
The background information in appendix A to the petition says that a
We could ask for a copy of the brief and the Executive's response to it. We should try to get the Executive's response and decide what to do once we have it.
I have one other point. The Standards in Scotland's Schools etc Act 2000 contains a section that deals with Gaelic-medium education, which we secured when the act was passed through Parliament. The act makes it clear that local authorities in Scotland are expected to report annually on the provisions that they make for Gaelic and, if they make no provisions for Gaelic, what steps they intend to take to promote Gaelic. Two years have passed since the act was passed. I am not aware of any local authority having reported annually. Could we ask how many local authorities have reported?
We can raise that with the Executive and ask for detailed information on how many local authorities have responded to the act and submitted reports. We can ask for detail on what provision the local authorities have made or, if they have not made provision, what they intend to do.
Planning System (PE439)
The next new petition is PE439, from Mr W and Mrs A Flanagan. The petition calls on the Parliament to take a range of steps to introduce safeguards to protect the rights of the public in relation to the planning system. The petition arises out of Mr and Mrs Flanagan's experience when a planning authority chose not to defer the granting of further planning permission for a development until an investigation had been carried out into why planning conditions relating to water and sewerage systems for the previous phase of the development had not been adhered to. The petition states that complaints made to the local government ombudsman—about the failure of the council to follow planning policy and to take into account relevant factual information that had been provided by the local councillor and a legal adviser—were not investigated.
Water Boards (Consultation) (PE441)
The last of the new petitions is from Mr Dereck A Fowles. It calls on the Parliament to investigate whether the water boards in Scotland should be able to take actions and decisions without consulting interested and concerned bodies. The concern relates to a decision taken by West of Scotland Water to terminate sheep farming on Loch Katrineside. The decision was made known in a press release and the petitioners claim that local interested bodies and individuals were not consulted before the decision was taken.
The water authority has a responsibility to produce clear and uncontaminated water. Therefore, in circumstances where someone was causing pollution and contamination, it would be incumbent on the authority to take steps immediately.
The letter from the Scottish Executive to Mr Fowles says:
Given that the drift of the petition is about consultation, we should hear the Executive's official position.
Absolutely.
I do not think that there is a requirement to consult. I am dealing with a case that is to do with not only the water supply but the sewers. The authority administers both and, to be fair, it sometimes has to take emergency action.
It is important to do this properly and get the official response. Do members agree to the recommended course of action?
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Current Petitions