Chamber and committees

The wording of sections 4 and 5 means that an offence would occur not only where a person has the intention to influence, prevent access or cause harassment but, beyond that, where a person is “reckless”. It means not only that people should not attempt to protest against abortion services but that they will require to be actively vigilant, beyond their normal, everyday considerations, to ensure that their actions do not have that implication.

My position is that that is an unduly onerous burden on the general public. For example, if family members are leaving the Queen Elizabeth university hospital in Glasgow and they have been told that their grandfather is about to die in hospital, it is not unreasonable for them to stop within or just outside the grounds and pray or silently contemplate what they have just been told. That activity might be covered by the bill if people who are walking past feel that their praying is intended to intimidate.

The committee heard the police say that they are not the thought police and will never ask what somebody is thinking. My amendments 17 and 18 seek to require that an effect be objectively “reasonably foreseeable”. There should not be an offence

“where it is not reasonably foreseeable”

that an act would cause the effect. I believe that my amendments would avoid imposing an onerous burden on the public while retaining the principles of the bill. Reasonable foreseeability is a common test in Scots law and the reasonableness test appears in similar existing legislation such as the Protection from Harassment Act 1997. The Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service told the committee that guidelines that are issued to Police Scotland around the bill will require satisfaction of intent or recklessness beyond reasonable doubt. My position is that the reasonableness test should be specified in the bill for absolute clarity and for the sake of proportionality.

I move amendment 17.

I declare an interest as a practising national health service GP.

I thank the minister for her remarks. This is not a debate on abortion. I firmly believe that women have a right to access healthcare without fear or intimidation.

Amendment 38 seeks to remove section 10 of the bill. My position is that the definition of “protected premises” should not be capable of modification by secondary legislation. My concern is that, if there are changes to abortion service delivery that mean that new settings, such as pharmacies and GP surgeries, are approved to provide abortion services under the 1967 act, safe access zones could be established around them, which would take the extent and number of zones beyond what is reasonable and proportionate.

Safe access zones could cover significantly larger areas than the initial 30 sites. I am thinking of GP surgeries and pharmacies, but we could even be talking about Amazon warehouses in the future. Although I acknowledge that the bill requires consultation with the provider, the operator and, where considered appropriate, the health board and local authority, I do not consider that there is sufficient scrutiny for such potentially wide-reaching consequences. The modification of the meaning of “protected premises” should happen only by way of primary legislation, with full parliamentary scrutiny. As the minister says, we do not know what abortion care will look like in the coming decades.

Committee members will recall that the stage 1 report highlighted the likelihood of the future extension of the definition impacting on the rights to protest or undertake vigils that are set out in articles 9, 10 and 11 of the European convention on human rights. The stage 1 report recommended that any changes to the definition

“should be subject to a further enhanced level of parliamentary scrutiny to that currently provided by the Bill.”

The deletion of section 10 would remove the power of the Scottish ministers to amend the definition without introducing new primary legislation. In other words, there would be full parliamentary scrutiny. Remember, Governments can change, and a future Government might extend the definition, despite the minister saying right now that that is not the intention. I genuinely believe that such an extension would be a significant change, and significant change requires significant scrutiny.

We must also remember that there are staff who could feel upset when they are attending work when the clinic is closed.

Given what the minister said about an offence requiring a high degree of recklessness to be demonstrated, I will withdraw amendment 17 and I will not move amendments 18 and 19.

Amendment 17, by agreement, withdrawn.

Amendment 18 not moved.

Section 4 agreed to.

When the 2018 GP contract was put in place, did the Scottish Government feel, at that time, that it would have a negative impact on rural general practice?

I am glad that you said that, because it relates to my next question.

Scottish Conservatives have produced a 26-page document, “Modern, Efficient, Local—A new contract between Scotland’s NHS and the public”, which looks at how our NHS can be improved. I would be keen to hear your feedback on that.

There was a promise of 800 more GPs, and I have heard you say multiple times that we are on track to have that number. Is that the case? How many of those 800 GPs will be in rural communities?

I refer members to my entry in the register of members’ interests, which states that I am a practising GP.

I welcome HIS being able to inspect to a greater extent than it is doing at the moment and to have some more powers in that regard, because, ultimately, we want healthcare to be provided in a safe and efficient manner. However, I point out that a strand of healthcare is being provided by non-registered doctors and nurses—in fact, by beauticians. I am talking about non-surgical procedures such as fillers.

Those procedures can have significant side effects and, when they go wrong, it costs the NHS a lot of money to rectify them, but there is no regulation and HIS has no ability to go and look at sites to see whether they are safe and clean. Ultimately, those people are doing what I consider to be medical interventions. How can we ensure that that area is included in the legislation?

Before I ask my question, I want to address one point that John Dunne made. Nicotine is a highly dangerous and addictive chemical. It can increase your blood pressure, raise your pulse, increase the flow of blood to your heart and cause narrowing of the arteries. It is not a benign product, as has been said. It is very important to have that on the record.

My question is similar to what David Torrance just asked. It is obvious that someone is eight or 16, but, in 20 or 30 years’ time, how are we going to stop people who are eight or 16 now from purchasing cigarettes? Will people always have to show ID when they want to buy cigarettes?

But if the police cannot confiscate these things, how can a teacher?

I am glad that we are talking about children, because I am a bit concerned about the repeal of under-18 offences. It will, for example, stop the police confiscating tobacco products from children. Is that something that you want to be put in place?