Chamber and committees

I know that Maggie Chapman, like Jamie Greene, has a keen interest in the matter—as do I. Both the Scottish Government and the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service set as a high priority protection of the safety and wellbeing of firefighters. I know that the SFRS is taking action across all aspects of operations to reduce exposure to contaminants, which includes investment in new fire appliances and facilities. I am keen to engage with it and the FBU on the issue. Difficult decisions have had to be taken on allocation of the finite capital budget that is available to the Scottish Government but—as I said—we have protected the capital budget for the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service as far as possible.

Jamie Greene raises very important points, of which I am well aware. We have committed to increasing the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service resource budget by £10 million this coming year, and we have protected the capital budget as much as we could.

It is worth noting that, when we merged the former services into one service, that came with a £389 million capital backlog. I will make sure to engage with the service and the Fire Brigades Union in the short term about their priorities for the buildings, fleet and equipment.

As I mentioned, the draft 2023-24 budget includes a £10 million increase to the resource budget for the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service to support service delivery and reform. That will bring the total budget to £362.7 million, which is more than £55.3 million higher than the budget for 2017-18.

Currently, the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service has 357 fire stations, which provide fire and rescue cover to communities across Scotland.

I know that Pam Duncan-Glancy is passionate about the issue. I understand that people need to get home safely, so I am willing to continue to engage with all partners, including Glasgow City Council, to ensure that we make progress.

The Scottish Government will continue to ensure that Police Scotland and local authorities have appropriate powers to prevent and deal with antisocial behaviour in all Scotland’s communities.

Local authorities and Police Scotland are best placed to understand the issues that the communities they work with are facing and to work with them to address those issues through a wide range of options, including the use of antisocial behaviour orders, fixed-penalty notices and formal warnings, alongside positive diversionary and early intervention activities in appropriate circumstances.

I am sorry to hear of the issues that Mr Kerr’s constituents are facing and I am happy to engage with him directly on that, because people have the right to enjoy their own home and to feel safe and secure in it.

Obviously, local authorities and the police have powers in relation to antisocial behaviour and there is a range of options that the local authority could and should be using in that instance. I am happy to engage with Mr Kerr on that.

Public safety is a central priority for the Scottish Government. In Glasgow, as in the rest of Scotland, we work for a society in which people feel, and are, safe in their communities. To that end, we will continue with our transformative policies, including those outlined in “The Vision for Justice in Scotland” and the programme for government. In doing so, we will engage with a range of partners, including not only the emergency services but wider community safety organisations such as the Scottish Community Safety Network, Crimestoppers and Neighbourhood Watch Scotland, as well as local community safety partnerships.

I congratulate Fulton MacGregor on securing this important debate, which gives me my first chance as a minister to respond to a debate. What a wonderful debate to do that in.

The debate has looked at fresh perspectives and initiatives on an area that can often be difficult and challenging: how to bring up children when separating parents do not agree. The debate has raised a number of issues about parents who separate, including support for the children involved and support for the parents. It is in our collective best interests that the rights of children are seen as paramount. Those rights are hugely important when parents separate.

The Scottish Government is pleased to work with Shared Parenting Scotland, members of which I welcome to the gallery. In this financial year, we have provided financial support to the organisation from the children and families portfolio and the justice portfolio. In 2022-23, we have provided a total of £77,574 of financial support for Shared Parenting Scotland. That includes some money for supporting the New Ways for Families programme that is mentioned in the motion.

Following my recent appointment as the Minister for Community Safety, I will meet Shared Parenting Scotland on 2 February to learn more about its work and future plans. I am already aware of the valuable work that the organisation carries out through its helpline, its publications, its training, its group meetings and its WhatsApp groups, which are fantastic in enabling parents to access support at any time they need it. All that work supports separating parents through what is a stressful, emotional and difficult time. Research published by the Scottish Government notes the stress that separating parents go through, and the stress and trauma that are experienced by parents who go through that situation are regularly raised in the correspondence that we receive from parents.

That stress and trauma can, of course, impact on how the parents speak to their children about what is happening. In any disputes or disagreements between separating parents on how to bring up their children, the welfare of the children must be paramount. That underlying principle is the key principle in the Children (Scotland) Act 1995. We need to follow that principle when disputes or disagreements between separating parents about bringing up their children are resolved outside of courts as well as when they are resolved within the court system.

The research carried out by Jamie Wark, who is a Robertson scholar, which is mentioned in the motion, raises the issue of how best to support children when parents separate, and I congratulate him on carrying out that research and raising that very important point.

The research shows that the separation of parents can have a direct impact on an individual’s perception of relationships and their own life, so, as we have heard from members this evening, there can be longer-lasting, generational impacts. The Scottish Government has recognised that having separated parents can be one of the adverse childhood experiences that we talk about. Jamie Wark’s research shows that children might not always have enough support and advice when their parents are separating.

In his eloquent speech, Bill Kidd outlined how that trauma can have lasting effects. When we think about parents who are apart—especially when incarceration is involved—we need to remember the generational impact that that can have.

The Scottish Government plans to consult in 2023 on how best to implement the provisions of the Children (Scotland) Act 2020 on child advocacy services, and we will include in that consultation some discussion on how best to support children when parents separate while recognising that parents, along with other trusted family members, will always be the key source of information for their children. That speaks to some of what Stephen Kerr and others have mentioned.

Of course, we need to make it as easy as possible for parents to communicate with their children, and one of the aims of the New Ways for Families project, which Fulton MacGregor mentioned in his motion and others have referred to, is to make family separation less traumatic and stressful for parents and their children. The project aims to provide enhanced skills in a range of areas such as managing emotions, flexible thinking, modelling behaviour and developing empathy and respect, in order to provide parents with the skills and insights to provide solutions and to put their children first, which is not always easy at a time when resilience is low and positions can become entrenched. As Stephen Kerr rightly pointed out, as parents, we do not get a manual when our children are born, but this project helps to equip parents in this greatest of endeavours. Further, those important skills can transfer into lots of other areas in people’s lives, too.

As Fulton MacGregor mentioned, the evaluation in North America has shown positive results for the New Ways for Families project, and I am aware that initial feedback from parents who have gone through the pilot in Scotland has also been positive. Some of those experiences were brought to life by Jeremy Balfour, who talked about his constituent, and Fulton MacGregor, who quoted some of those parents. Clearly, the full evaluation of the Scottish pilot is crucial to enable funders and Shared Parenting Scotland to consider next steps in this area, and I welcome Shared Parenting Scotland’s commitment to evaluate the pilot, and look forward to hearing its final results. It will be interesting to see whether the pilot merits the positives that we have heard from the evaluation of the project in Medicine Hat in Canada in terms of the reduction in children’s experiences of stress and anxiety, which result in stomach aches, headaches and episodes of acting out. I am keen to see that evaluation.

The Scottish Government will continue to work with Shared Parenting Scotland, Scottish Women’s Aid, children’s organisations and others to improve our family justice system and, where possible, to encourage resolution of disputes outside of court.

I was struck by Rhoda Grant’s speech for a number of reasons, one of which concerned the surrounding housing issues. That took me back to 2005, when I was practically supporting my ex-husband to remain in secure housing, as we had agreed to fully share the parenting of our son. A lot of people do not recognise that such arrangements are for the benefit of the children—at the time, a lot of people thought that it was a bit strange that I was doing that.

We want to build consensus in this Parliament and among key stakeholders about how to support parents and children during separation and about how disputes should be dealt with. There may well be differing views and perspectives, but there will also always be common ground in relation to matters such as welfare of children and the reduction of stress and trauma. It is also important to emphasise that we will always support both parents to be fully involved in a child’s life, where that is safe—as a former women’s aid worker, I am pleased that Shared Parenting Scotland’s approach recognises that, where a history of domestic abuse is at play, that must be fully considered, and contact should not be used to further and continue abuse at any point in the process. I take on board the concerns that Rhoda Grant and Bob Doris expressed in that regard, and I will continue to ensure that that issue is at the forefront of our considerations.

The motion and this debate raise some interesting questions and, importantly, we have debated some solutions, too. I look forward to seeing the evaluation of the New Ways for Parenting pilot and I assure the chamber that we will discuss with Shared Parenting Scotland the outcomes of the evaluation and its thoughts on how best to take forward the project in Scotland.

Across all sectors and portfolios, we must consider how we look at society as a whole, and think about how families can be supported to ensure that children thrive in an environment in which everyone has their welfare at heart.

Thank you, convener, and good morning to you and fellow members. Thank you for the opportunity to speak to the committee about the draft Legal Aid and Advice and Assistance (Miscellaneous Amendment) (Scotland) Regulations 2023.

The regulations have been introduced to deliver changes to legal aid regulations, and primarily to ensure continuing access to justice for vulnerable people in our society. My first point is that they will do that by supporting the response to the cost of living crisis through enabling the Scottish Legal Aid Board to disregard for means assessment additional state benefit payments that have been made in recognition of the increased economic hardship that is currently being suffered by households that are reliant on social security support. If the regulations are not approved, the Scottish Legal Aid Board will be unable to disregard such payments across all aid types. That will mean that, for example, additional money that is paid to recipients of disability benefits could form part of an assessment, should publicly funded legal assistance be sought.

Secondly, the regulations will enable the Scottish Legal Aid Board to disregard for means assessments compensatory awards made by the state arising from a person receiving contaminated blood or blood products from the national health service prior to September 1991. Again, those payments by the state, which recognise a wrong against a person, can be disregarded for all types of legal aid only if the regulations are approved.

Finally, the regulations will also extend the provision of a type of legal aid that is known as assistance by way of representation—ABWOR—so that it may be available to siblings of a child who is subject to children’s hearings proceedings and who either have or are seeking rights to participate in those proceedings. Under the current legislation, ABWOR provision is available only to a child who is subject to the proceedings, relevant persons or a person seeking to be deemed a relevant person in relation to that child.

The availability of ABWOR to siblings will not be means tested and subject to an effective participation test that is approved by the Scottish Legal Aid Board. That recognises that, although the role of siblings in the children’s hearings system is important, it is limited, and other procedural safeguards are in place that can facilitate regard being had to their views.

That is a brief overview of the regulations and their context. I am happy to answer any questions.