Chamber and committees

I mentioned earlier that the chief medical officer will soon write to those on the high-risk list to provide more advice about the move to level 0 and what that means for people who have been shielding. However, the main part of my answer is more general. We all have a role to play in making sure that, as we go back to normal, those who are at the highest clinical risk from the virus feel confident to go for medical appointments, as well as to the shops and places that the rest of us want to go. That will mean the rest of us being prepared to comply with some baseline mitigations, such as face coverings, for a bit longer than we might want to, in order to provide that sense of assurance.

We have come through lots of different phases of the pandemic. At points, it has been about collective endeavour, and I think that this is another one of those times. Although, as individuals, we might be really frustrated with certain restrictions, we are doing it not so much for ourselves but for each other. That sense of collective endeavour and solidarity with those who are most clinically vulnerable is needed now, perhaps more than ever.

I will ask the relevant officials what more can be done to ensure that the system operates as smoothly as possible. The paper-based system that is in place provides people with a record of their vaccination status, if they need that for international travel. When I last looked—which was earlier today or yesterday—the average time for providing that information was about three days. Obviously, in some cases, it might be longer, and we will continue to work to reduce that time as much as possible.

As I indicated in response to an earlier question, we are working to put in place a digital Covid status certificate system, which will include not only vaccination information but testing data. It will take time to implement that system, but the work is under way.

I will not repeat everything that I said in response to Alasdair Allan, but that answer is obviously on the record. Through Transport Scotland, we are talking to ferry operators about how we can get a better balance between safety measures and maximising capacity. That is important. As I said, for visitors to our islands, the situation can be frustrating, but for those who live on islands it is much more than frustrating. However, we have to have safety uppermost in our minds. If we did not do that and if we took measures that the crew on our ferries considered would put them at risk, Rhoda Grant and others would rightly raise concerns about that. Those are the difficult and often inescapable consequences of what we are all having to deal with. We are trying to find the best balances that we can.

If Rhoda Grant writes to me or the Minister for Transport on the issue of short-notice capacity, we can get CalMac to give more details about the provisions that are in place. I understand the difficulty, and there is a real focus on trying to alleviate the situation as much as possible, but, obviously, the safety of crew and passengers has to be a key consideration.

I take the opportunity to wish Willie Rennie all the best in his retirement—not from Parliament or public life, obviously, but as leader of the Scottish Liberal Democrats. Ten years is a good shift. I am sure that we all wish him well.

I will come to the second question first, if I may. What we have confirmed today is very positive in relation to getting services for adults with disabilities back to much greater normality. As I have set out before, it has not been the case that those services have been compulsorily closed, but there has, because of 2m physical distancing, been practical difficulty for operators in opening services up as normal. The move from 2m to 1m physical distancing indoors should pave the way to much greater normality, which will be welcome and will bring much-needed relief to many people in that category.

On the first question, I should say in passing that when health boards or individual hospitals within health boards announce the pausing of elective non-Covid treatment, we want that to be for as short a time as possible. We do not accept such pausing for a long time; it is kept dynamically under review, because we want to minimise it as much as possible.

There is a great emphasis right now on trying to get the NHS back to normal and on addressing the backlog of non-Covid care. The best way to do that is to keep Covid pressure to a minimum. Again, that comes back to my central point, which is that we must take a cautious path through this. Otherwise, we risk pressure on our NHS setting everything back.

I am grateful to Willie Rennie for raising the self-isolation of close contacts who work in the health service and social care. This answer might also apply to other critical parts of society and the economy. I did not mention the matter specifically in my opening remarks for reasons of time, but I will address it now.

As I said in my statement, we hope, as we go beyond level 0, to move away from the blanket requirement for close contacts of positive cases to self-isolate. For example, somebody who is double vaccinated and gets a negative PCR test will no longer have to self-isolate if they are a close contact. Positive cases will still have to self-isolate, of course.

We are considering whether, perhaps ahead of that, that kind of system could be introduced for some key groups in our workforce. Health and social care staff obviously fall into that category. We are discussing that right now with trade unions, among others, and we will listen carefully to their views. I am very mindful of the fact that when I talk about this—as Willie Rennie rightly has—as something that would help to keep key essential services going, the people who work in those services might hear it differently. They might hear it as us giving less protection to their health and wellbeing, so we need to be as careful and cautious about that as we are about everything else.

We will update Parliament if, in any areas, we move more quickly than the timings that I have set out today. I say in answer to Willie Rennie’s question that that is under active consideration.

That is an important question, as it has been almost since day 1 of the pandemic. There are—quite properly and legitimately—different rules in place in different parts of the UK. That is what happens when we have democratically accountable Government taking decisions that they then must justify to their electorates.

However, that means that there can be confusion about which rules apply in which parts of the UK. We have sought, through our marketing, radio and television advertising campaigns, and through my briefings—which are no longer daily, but I do them periodically—to make sure that we are communicating as clearly as possible in a complex situation what the rules in place in Scotland are. We will continue to do that at each phase of the pandemic. I say again that anybody who wants to check the detail of the rules can do that on the Scottish Government website.

Those are important issues. I recognise the frustration and pressures that the situation causes, not so much for people who want to visit our islands—although they are not unimportant—but particularly for those who live on our islands and who rely on ferry transport to get on and off islands. In common with providers of other modes of transport, CalMac is operating with reduced passenger capacity, which is in line with physical distancing guidance. Transport Scotland engages regularly with ferry operators on how to balance safety measures and efforts to maximise capacity. I think that the most recent meeting was at the end of last week. Obviously, crew and passenger safety is a key factor in determining the capacity of vessels.

The impact is understood. I know that CalMac has introduced turn-up-and-go spaces and has put in place a protocol to ensure that islanders who need to travel for short-notice reasons can do so. We will continue to engage closely on that issue. Vehicle capacity is mostly unaffected by physical distancing, but currently there are particularly high levels of demand for travel to the islands, so we are continuing to explore the potential charter of an additional vessel that would provide additional capacity on the Stornoway to Ullapool route. The Minister for Transport will keep the member and others updated on that.

I think that everyone will agree that one case of domestic abuse is one too many. We should have, and the Scottish Government does take, a zero-tolerance approach.

It is important that we all understand a point of context. The figures for 2019-20, which were reported last month, show that half the rise in the number of convictions was accounted for by the new offences under the Domestic Abuse (Scotland) Act 2018. The numbers are going up because we have legislated to make more domestic abuse behaviours criminal offences. No one should ever celebrate a rise in the number of domestic abuse cases, but what underlies the statistics is a sign that, as a country and as a Parliament, we have taken the issue even more seriously. Marsha Scott, from Scottish Women’s Aid, has said:

“Although it is very early data, our new domestic abuse law shows signs of living up to its global ‘gold standard’ label.”

On punishments, as Jamie Greene knows, we have had debates in other contexts over the past few months about whether the provisions on separation of powers between Parliament and the judiciary and criminal justice system are as robust as they should be. I think that they are. Every member should know that I do not decide what punishment a person gets when they are convicted of an offence, although we set the statutory framework for that. As Jamie Greene said in the question that he posed to me, there is a presumption against short sentences. The decision on whether a perpetrator goes to jail is not for me or for any member of the Government; it is a decision for the judge who presides over the case. That is how it should always be.

As Lorna Slater knows, and as many members across the chamber have rightly called for, we increasingly attach fair work conditions to all the grant support that Scottish Enterprise, or any other enterprise agency, gives. I do not have the figures in front of me, but I am happy to look into the details of the particular support that Lorna Slater has referenced to see exactly what it was for and what conditions were attached to it. We will continue to make sure that any taxpayer money that is going to businesses is about creating not just jobs but fair jobs and that companies are being challenged as well as supported.

On the broader point, clearly I am not responsible for the practices of Amazon, but we had a report just yesterday from Zero Waste Scotland about consumption and the need to become much more sustainable as a country and a society. We all have a duty to do that, but companies certainly do, and there are real questions about the acceptability of destroying things as has been reported this week.

I am happy to agree to do that. I certainly agree that the proposed closures will have a big impact on the local communities and I urge all parties that are involved, including the UK Government, to look at the matter again. As I mentioned in my previous answer, there has already been ministerial contact with senior representatives from CJ Lang and the Post Office, but we will make sure that those contacts continue and bring people together to explore what is possible. Scottish Government officials also continue to have regular dialogue with officials in the UK Government and Post Office Ltd around that issue more generally, and I have asked to be kept updated on that.

I hope that my answer will be helpful. For reasons that Daniel Johnson will understand, I will not rush to give too detailed an answer, because the Government wants to take time to properly consider the court judgement and its implications.

I have two responses to his question. The first is not to try to second-guess decisions that have been made by courts, which would be wrong. However, Daniel Johnson used the phrase “moral threshold”; I agree with the sentiments that lie behind his question. The instances of systemic child abuse that the Scottish Child Abuse Inquiry is currently looking at should shame us, as a country. The redress that we owe to people is, not only in a financial sense but in a wider sense, a serious obligation. The phrase “moral threshold” stands beside any legal or financial threshold and is important for us to recognise.

The second point is that the threshold for the redress scheme is already low, so we will have to consider whether the judgement has any implications for that. I am happy to ask the Deputy First Minister to write to Daniel Johnson once we have had the opportunity to look at the point in detail.