Chamber and committees

That would be helpful, yes.

I have another couple of quick questions. Patrick Harvie raised a point on protests and so on. You can tell by the tenor of the questioning that the very heavy presence that UEFA insists on, whether it is crushing indigenous entrepreneurs, which is one way of looking at it, or the monopoly that it has on merchandise—I understand the point George Adam made—seems very heavy-handed sometimes. It seems to be the price that you have to pay. This time, however, is it not the case that the UK was willing to step forward to host when others were not, so perhaps that is a bargaining position? Perhaps the question is for Rachael McKechnie.

I have mentioned to the First Minister on previous occasions that his uncle is remembered by every single person who goes through Royal Marines training, which is a lengthy and difficult process. They learn about the exploits of Corporal Thomas Hunter, who won the only Victoria cross given to a marine in the second world war. I hope that it will provide at least some comfort to the First Minister’s family to know that his uncle’s name is always remembered.

Will the First Minister take an intervention?

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.]

This has been a really interesting discussion, even though it is probably not completely aligned with the nature of our inquiry.

I first came across the Alice and Humpty Dumpty quote in A level politics, not in literature. I do not think that that means that Humpty Dumpty was a politician, but perhaps Lewis Carroll was. The quote is something like, “When I choose a word, it means exactly what I want it to mean,” or words to that effect.

If we have to choose how we regulate, surely one of the fundamental things is that we should take a rights-based approach. We should all know when AI is being used, and we should have some explanation of how it is being used—in theory, even if we do not understand it—at the point at which we consume it. I realise that that is more difficult in the security space, but it applies generally.

I should say that the convener mentioned that she and the deputy convener are on the EU-UK Parliamentary Partnership Assembly, and I am on the Council of Europe, and those bodies discuss the issue quite a lot.

Especially if we have platforms that are produced elsewhere and we are trying to overlay a regulatory system on those, surely individuals must have the right to know when and how AI is being used.

In addition, I want to go back to something that Lisa said about Scotland being too small a country to sustain whatever it was—I did not catch the rest of it. It would be useful if we could have your views on that and if you could say how Ireland seems to manage to sustain whatever it is, while we cannot. Colin, will you answer that first?

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?

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?