Chamber and committees

Thank you, Presiding Officer. Thank you, too, for the personal support that you have given to me and the family, not just in the past couple of weeks but in inquiring after Christina’s health for so many months. I also thank the First Minister, not only for doing the same thing—constantly expressing concern for Christina’s health—but for the way that he was able to manage her absence from Government and, crucially, for his two visits to the hospital, the first of which had a huge impact on Christina’s family, who were there at the time.

I also thank the members of the SNP group for their support over many months. I know that you are all hurting, as we are. I thank the party leaders and all those who have spoken. There is not a great deal left for me to say. You have hit all the right notes with regard to who Christina was and what she was about.

It might be invidious to do so, but I would like to quickly mention three people. Kirsty in the coffee bar, who has already been mentioned, was always keen to hear about how Christina was doing. Similarly, Edward Mountain always inquired after Christina, notwithstanding his own issues with cancer. I also thank Jamie Greene, not just for what he said today but for the fantastic card that he sent to Christina. He and I know what was in that card, and that will stay between us.

I also thank our constituents and all the groups that have been in touch. It was an absolutely incredible response.

Christina was everything that people have said of her today. She genuinely was—I know that, sometimes, after somebody passes away, lots of things are said, but she was all those things. She was a feminist, a staunch supporter of the LGBTQ community, and a staunch supporter of Travellers when many people were not. I know that this is contentious, but it would not be true not to say it: Christina was a trans ally. Christina supported trans people.

She was also, of course—it is no surprise to anybody to hear me say this—a very staunch supporter of independence. Christina loved Scotland, its people, its culture and its history, but she also knew that many other people who did not believe in independence felt similarly strongly about their country. That is why we saw such an absence of malice and vindictiveness on the part of Christina.

It has been mentioned that Christina came from Easterhouse. She was extremely proud of the fact that she came from Easterhouse. She received some really snide comments when she was first elected—misogynistic and classist comments—but those people did not know the real Christina. I think that that is where she imbibed her values of social justice. Many of us learn those things, quite legitimately, when we read or learn about politics, but social justice was instinctive to Christina. It is who she was.

She was also an artist—a very gifted artist. She was a poet: she wrote a fantastic poem for our granddaughter, Maeve, when she was born. She loved to travel. She loved to swim in a warm ocean. She was not for sitting by the pool—she wanted to be in the ocean. She loved science. A tribute was paid to her by David Blanchflower, the astrophysicist, on Twitter, who said that he felt that he had lost somebody who was extremely intelligent and fearless. She was also a very gifted photographer.

I always thought Christina to be a stunningly attractive woman, but the real measure of Christina was not how she looked; it was in her mind and in her heart. She never walked by on the other side. I think of the number of times when we were out that she would stop by somebody in the street, to give them money, food or her time. One time in Campbeltown, a drunken man had fallen down and she would not leave his side until the ambulance came. Another time, a mother who had just given birth to a child had no money for a pram. Christina bought one, and also the bedclothes to go with it.

Christina loved a cup of tea: black, two sweeteners. This will underline the point that I just made: once, in the hospital, I asked Christina whether she wanted a cup of tea. It was not a great time for Christina. Unusually, I was the only person with her in the hospital at the time. She said, “Yes, please, but make sure everyone else has got one.” There was nobody else in the room, but it was her instinct to say that.

I want to reassure people—those who loved her the most—that during the last week or so, Christina was never on her own. At every point, 24 hours a day, members of her family sat with her, held her hand and told her that she was loved. She was surrounded by love in that last week.

When she was first elected, Christina went to an event in central Scotland. She met an MP from a different party—or, rather than met him, she saw him, a large man, haranguing a young woman who was a Scottish Government communications officer and shouting at her. She stormed over and stood between them. She said, “Your size, your shouting and your toxic masculinity don’t intimidate me, so you can back off.” I think it was “back off” that she said—it was something like that. [Laughter.] If you were going to intimidate a woman, you did not do it around Christina McKelvie.

She was, as we have heard, very proud to be an MSP and a Government minister. When she became a minister, I wrote on Twitter a line from Simon and Garfunkel:

“Sail on, silver girl ... Your time has come to shine.”

Christina sparkled and she shone.

In the chamber, she never hated anybody. I remember that the worst thing I heard her say was to a Tory MSP. She asked why, if he had come to engage her in a battle of wits, he had come unarmed. It was meant in good humour and it was taken in good humour.

Liz Smith will remember the endless Thursday morning education debates in that session. In one of her contributions, Christina managed to get virtually every ABBA title into her contribution. She was great fun.

Christina and I apparently first spoke in 2001. I do not remember it, but, of course, Christina, who had a mind like a steel trap, remembered it. I was the leader of Clackmannanshire Council. Two of her members, who she was representing, had been arrested at Faslane, and she wanted to make sure that their employer, Clackmannanshire Council, did not further penalise them. She made sure that that did not happen. She recollects saying that she found me to be opinionated and cocky, which just goes to show that, sometimes, Christina could be wrong as well. [Laughter.]

In 2007, at a pre-election rally for SNP candidates in Napier University, I just thought that she was a stunningly attractive woman and way, way out of my league. Then I became a committee convener and Christina was on the committee. I found a way to try to get on her good side, because she hated being called Christine—apologies to Christine Grahame, if she is here. I was the person who jumped down the throat of anybody who had the audacity to call her Christine, in a bid to impress her, as her defender. I am not sure whether it worked, but it was 18 months before we got together. Christina’s phrase for that is, “We found love in a hopeless place.” [Laughter.]

I have often thought of Christina as a star. People have talked about how much fun she was. To me, she was glamorous, she was sparkly and she was fun. Of course, planets revolve around stars. I just do not know what a planet does when its star has been extinguished.

She was a credit to her two sons, Lewis and Jack, and she took such pride in her grandchildren, Leo and Maeve. They will never be allowed to forget Christina. She was a credit to her community, to Easterhouse, to the Scottish Government, to this Parliament and to Scotland. She was more beautiful inside than outside, and, apart from my children, Christina McKelvie was the best thing that ever happened to me.

Thank you. [Applause.]

I have two questions, one of which is for the entire panel. I will ask it first, but if you could answer it second, that would be great—if that makes sense. This might have been implicit in what you have already said, but is it possible for you to give us one ask that you have for the Scottish Government and one ask that you have for the UK Government?

Before you give us those asks, I do not know whether Lisa Whytock is still with us—

I will ask my second question. If your preferred ask of the Scottish Government is a Scottish export office—as it is Lisa Whytock’s—what would its function be, beyond being an investment source, given that reserved issues such as carnets, immigration, visas and stuff like that are not determined in Scotland?

I have a final question, and I ask you to give a yes or no answer if possible. A lot of people predicted that Brexit would lead to a cultural cul-de-sac, so the issues are not a surprise to people. However, is it more accurate to say that nobody talked about abolishing freedom of movement during the Brexit referendum, and the loss of that is causing the bulk of touring artists’ problems?

We are all gutted about that. Thank you.

I have a very quick final question that follows on from what Professor Basiri just said. I do not know whether you will have views on this, too, Professor Schaffer.

On the point about losing personnel—I note that University College London was mentioned—it seems to me that, because AI is going to dominate in so many areas and because it will be so crucial to the economies of different countries and their future, we should really be a bit more assertive about how we get it. You have mentioned the absence of Erasmus+, and we are not getting what we need currently—because of Brexit, in my view.

However, the fact is that UK Governments past and present have been pathologically opposed to immigration of any kind. When the US did the same thing a number of years ago, they immediately had to reverse it, because they were losing some of the best minds in the world, who could no longer go to universities in the States. Is there a case or any scope for the UK Government to look at either exemptions or special cases, for example, to encourage the best brains to come here?

Moreover, when I was in the military a long time ago, you could get training to be what was then called a telecommunications technician. It involved a year-long course, with a lot of investment from the Government, and anybody who undertook it was obliged to stay in the armed forces for five years. Is there a case for saying that somebody who benefits from a special visa to come here has to pay it back by staying for a period of time? Might that stop the dispersal of personnel elsewhere?

I am just interested in hearing your views on that. Do you want to start, Professor Schaffer?

Thank you.

It is not dissimilar to the use of ethical hackers, who are used in Dundee in particular.

You talked about data; there is a lot of discussion about where Scotland and the UK stand on that. From reading between the lines, it seems that you are suggesting that we—both Scotland and the UK—sometimes big ourselves up to be bigger than we actually are.

You said that we are lagging behind in some areas, especially in recruitment and personnel, but that we are perhaps at the leading edge of technological development in some cases. Is that hampered by the fact that, as far as I know, Scotland does not have a supercomputer? That has been discussed a lot recently in relation to the University of Edinburgh; the supercomputer is going to the Oxford-Cambridge corridor instead. I do not know what you would call it—I do not even know if it relates to AI, to be honest. You have talked about data and storage of data. Is not having that computing power in Scotland a big constraint?

If that is your ask of the Scottish Government, what is your top ask of the UK Government?

I suppose that I was not arguing for something that would require university training to understand it—I am talking about a more basic consumer right. I appreciate Professor Schaffer’s example of a call centre, but it seems to me that that is much more mechanistic; you wait for a few seconds before somebody speaks.

The idea that I am talking about relates mainly to disinformation in either images or language. It also touches on intellectual property; in the next session, we will hear from musicians, as the issue is very important for them. When someone has been using AI, I am not saying that it has to be labelled, but it, and the purposes for which it has been used, should be discoverable.

You mentioned the gap a number of times—there is always a gap—and you have both mentioned how fast moving this area is. Regulation, or policing, often has to catch up with what is developing in a lot of different fields. However, AI is moving so fast that the gap can be huge, and so much can happen before the law catches up with it.

This question might be facetious, and it is probably born of my ignorance. Nonetheless, is it possible to consider—or is it being considered—that AI itself might present the best opportunity for policing and enforcement? If we use AI to anticipate what AI is going to do, we can use it to help to regulate AI. Is that being looked at just now?