Chamber and committees

If the minister is going to support that, I will certainly give way to her.

The minister will be aware of the “Dying in the margins” work by Marie Curie and the University of Glasgow, which has reinforced the significant demand for adapted properties for people who are diagnosed with a terminal illness. When someone passes, there is an impact on their family when they have to move out of an adapted property very quickly.

What will the Government do to engage with that piece of work to ensure a sufficiency of adapted properties and support for people who are grieving?

The minister knows full well that we had a number of debates in this place prior to Christmas on the devolution of employment law, and we have stated clearly that we need to have a UK floor for the standards that are expected. Our new deal for working people, which I am about to come on to talk about, has to represent the floor in terms of what we will deliver for people across the UK, with a view to the second phase, which will be on exploring what we can devolve further. We need to ensure that the standards are embedded across the UK.

What are those standards? They are a real living wage paid to workers, rights from day 1, the end of zero-hours contracts and the end of fire and rehire. Those should be the standards; that should be the floor—and that is supported by both the Trades Union Congress and the Scottish Trades Union Congress. That new deal for working people could represent a huge moment under a Labour Government, hopefully in the not-too-distant future, putting money back into the pockets of working people and supporting people in work. The point that I was making prior to the minister’s intervention was about that persistent low pay, which impacts on families across Scotland and hinders people from accessing all the support that they need in order to afford the essentials.

I will refer to some of the excellent work that has been done across Scotland, which I think would attract a degree of consensus in the chamber on where we can learn and do more. Fife Gingerbread is an excellent organisation, from which we heard during our inquiry. It has excellent advice and support services for lone parents and families in need. It co-ordinates with local employers to parent proof vacancies, establishing an action plan to help parents through training, education and going into employment, backed up by financial advice and all the holistic services that we would expect to be offered in supporting people on their journey back into work. I met representatives of Fife Gingerbread, and they commented to me that their whole approach is not just about the individual and the person seeking work; it has to be about the employer and the flexibility that we can expect from employers—which is not always forthcoming. I encourage the Government to continue to work in that space, to meet Fife Gingerbread again and to do further work.

As I have said already, I think that we need a floor of rights for workers and expectations on employers, and I think that we can do that at UK level with our new deal for working people. I am being expected to take a lecture on employment rights from a Scottish Government that does not pay £15 an hour to social care workers, despite the demands of the trade unions, that sold off £700 million of renewables licences without a single condition for workers and that itself used zero-hours contracts to deliver leaflets for the Rutherglen and Hamilton West by-election, so I do not think I will take any further lectures on employment rights from the Government.

Having been generous with interventions and having relied on your generosity, Deputy Presiding Officer, I am conscious of the time. I will conclude by saying that Scottish Labour remains committed to working with whoever is willing to drive forward a mission to tackle child poverty. We welcome the report and what it has done to highlight parental employment issues. We hope that we can do more to tackle childcare and transport issues, for example. However, fundamentally, we know that we must have a floor of rights across the UK and that that can come only with a Labour Government.

Good morning. In the first evidence session, I was particularly interested to hear about PrEP and to hear people’s views on the progress of the online clinic proposals. There are wider views about how that online service could enhance the reach of PrEP. We will go on to talk about people who still feel excluded from PrEP or who face stigma.

Who wants to come in first, with an overview?

That is useful for us to hear, following the earlier conversation. It is something for the committee to consider.

Good morning. In the opening remarks and through the conversation, we have spoken about PrEP, which it is important for us to consider further. The Scottish Government has been developing an online PrEP clinic, which would allow people to order the medication without having to go through specialists, as we heard. I ask the witnesses to provide an update on the progress of that.

Thank you for that very comprehensive overview for the committee. Members might not always have been fully aware of the issues.

I do not know whether anyone else wants to add anything, but I was wondering, Dr Howe, whether you have a view on rurality and, say, the Highland area and the impact of this approach with regard to getting the service out more widely in a geographically challenging area.

Does anyone else want to comment on either of those issues?

That was really helpful, and you have, I think, raised an important point about capacity more broadly, and about building the capacity that will underpin these services.

In relation to harder-to-reach groups, Dr Howe mentioned people who feel inhibited to access PrEP for many reasons. I know that the Terrence Higgins Trust has looked in some detail at the transgender community, intravenous drug users, heterosexual men who have sex with men, and black and minority ethnic populations. How do we encourage greater access for those groups?