Chamber and committees

You can have one more.

You have one minute.

I am sorry, Mr Fairlie—we had been doing well for time, but now we have run out of it. I will bring in Alex Cole-Hamilton for some brief questions.

We will now take evidence on the latest ministerial statement on Covid-19 and subordinate legislation. I welcome the Cabinet Secretary for Net Zero, Energy and Transport, Michael Matheson; the national clinical director, Professor Jason Leitch; Angus Macleod, who is deputy director of the Scottish Government’s community surveillance division; and Graham Fisher, who is deputy director of the Scottish Government’s legal directorate. I thank them for their attendance. We will consider the following regulations.

Thank you, cabinet secretary.

I am conscious that we have only 35 minutes for this session. Questions and answers should therefore be restricted to around four to five minutes each, please.

I will ask the first question. The recently updated Scottish Government travel advice, including the removal of the amber and green traffic light system, seems like great news for Scottish people who have been fully vaccinated and are hoping to go abroad on holiday. However, as I have been reminded by one of my constituents, a remaining challenge is that Scottish people who work abroad and are fully vaccinated are able to return to Scotland for a holiday to see their families only if they have been vaccinated in one of a limited number of countries—those in the European Union, the US and a small handful of other countries. Scots who live and work outside the US, the EU and the small group of other countries and are looking to see and reconnect with their families are not currently considered as vaccinated under the new guidelines, even if they are fully vaccinated with the Pfizer or AstraZeneca vaccine. The issue seems to be where they were vaccinated, not what vaccine they were vaccinated with.

Are you aware of those challenges? When do you expect the list of qualifying countries to be expanded so that fully vaccinated Scots can return home for a holiday without a 10-day quarantine?

The committee will in due course publish a report to the Parliament setting out our decision on the statutory instruments considered at this meeting.

That concludes our consideration of this agenda item and our time with the cabinet secretary, and I thank him and his supporting officials for their attendance this morning. The committee’s next meeting will be on 30 September, when we will take evidence on vaccination certification. We will also hear from the Deputy First Minister and Cabinet Secretary for Covid Recovery on the ministerial statement on Covid-19 and subordinate legislation.

That concludes the public part of the meeting.

Item 3 is to decide whether to take in private item 7, which is consideration of the evidence that we have heard. Do members agree to take item 7 in private?

Members indicated agreement.

As members have no further questions, we move to item 6, which is consideration of the motions on the made affirmative instruments.

I propose that the motions on the agenda be moved en bloc. Are members content?

Members indicated agreement.

Motions moved,

That the COVID-19 Recovery Committee recommends that the Health Protection (Coronavirus) (International Travel) (Scotland) Amendment (No. 17) Regulations 2021 (SSI 2021/301) be approved.

That the COVID-19 Recovery Committee recommends that the Health Protection (Coronavirus) (International Travel) (Scotland) Amendment (No. 18) Regulations 2021 (SSI 2021/307) be approved.

That the COVID-19 Recovery Committee recommends that the Health Protection (Coronavirus) (International Travel) (Scotland) Amendment (No. 19) Regulations 2021 (SSI 2021/319) be approved.—[Michael Matheson]

Motions agreed to.

Cabinet secretary, would you like to make some opening remarks before we move to questions?

Next, we will take evidence from a range of stakeholders on vaccination certification. I welcome to the meeting Professor Sir Jonathan Montgomery, from the Ada Lovelace Institute; Rob Gowans, policy and public affairs manager at the Health and Social Care Alliance Scotland; and Judith Robertson, chair of the Scottish Human Rights Commission.

The Scottish Government announced on 1 September its intention to introduce a vaccination certification scheme, to be in place by 1 October. The purpose of this meeting is to take evidence from stakeholders on the proposed scheme. Some of the scheme’s details are still to be worked out, so we intend to listen to your views and to feed them back directly to the Scottish ministers in our regular evidence sessions with them. Any issues that you raise will also inform our scrutiny of any relevant legislation that is introduced to give effect to the scheme. As such, your input is valuable to the committee and we are pleased to hear from you.

What are the key priorities that should be embedded in the scheme to make it work?