Chamber and committees

For the reasons that Mr Stewart has outlined, we thank the petitioner, but we will close the petition.

Are there any other suggestions?

Our next petition, PE2019, which was lodged by Alan McLeod, calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to prevent all owners of self-catering holiday accommodation from obtaining rates relief under the small business bonus scheme.

The Scottish Government highlighted that reforms to the scheme were announced in the Scottish budget, aiming to make it the most generous scheme in the UK. Those reforms took effect from 1 April this year and provide 100 per cent relief for properties with a cumulative rateable value of up to £12,000, and the upper rateable value for individual properties to qualify for relief was extended from £18,000 to £20,000.

A consultation on council tax for second and empty homes has been published. It seeks views on the current thresholds for properties to be classified as self-catering accommodation and liable for non-domestic rates. It invites comments on the non-domestic rates system for such properties.

Do members have any comments?

I would be content if we did that on the basis that we would be asking the Scottish Government whether it will consider taking into account the petitioner’s call for action in that regard—I would not want to give the impression that the committee had taken evidence that led us to advocate that course of action. With that qualification, does that meet with the agreement of the committee?

Members indicated agreement.

The next petition, PE2020, which was lodged by Anne-Marie Morrison, calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to provide the same fertility treatment to single women as is offered to couples on the NHS for the chance to have a family.

The SPICe briefing explains that, currently, the eligibility criteria for NHS-funded fertility treatment in Scotland apply only to couples and do not mention the eligibility of single women. The eligibility criteria for NHS-funded fertility treatment in Scotland were last reviewed in 2016, based on recommendations from the national infertility group. The focus of NHS-funded treatment is on treating infertility as a medical condition. In contrast, other parts of the UK, such as England, have allowed single women to receive NHS-funded fertility treatment if they are infertile.

The Scottish Government’s submission notes that access criteria for NHS in vitro fertilisation—IVF—treatment in Scotland are determined at a national level, and discussions regarding potential changes to those criteria are conducted by the national fertility group, which consists of experts from various organisations and considers clinical research, evidence and data in order to make recommendations to Scottish ministers.

The submission states that Public Health Scotland is working on collaborative modelling techniques to assess the capacity implications of expanding access to NHS IVF treatment for single individuals. That topic will be discussed at a future meeting of the group. However, specific timescales for the modelling and subsequent discussion are not yet available.

In the light of that interesting information, including information about comparators, do members have any suggestions for action?

PE1978, which was lodged by Cristina Rosique-Esplugas, calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to allow raw drinking milk to be sold in Scotland, bringing it in line with England, Wales and Northern Ireland, and to allow farmers the opportunity to sell unpasteurised drinking milk. We last considered the petition on 18 January, when we agreed to write to the Food Standards Agency, Food Standards Scotland, the NFU Scotland and Dairy UK.

We wrote to those organisations, partly on the recommendation of Mr Sweeney, who was a member of the committee at the time, and of Mr Ewing, because we wanted to understand why there was a difference in policy. We have now received responses from the organisations, with Dairy UK agreeing with Food Standards Scotland’s view that raw drinking milk has posed a significant risk to the public in the past. Dairy UK also believes that compulsory pasteurisation has helped to protect consumers in Scotland and should continue to be in place. NFU Scotland shares that view, believing that the risks of selling raw milk significantly outweigh the benefits.

Food Standards Scotland’s response provides information on the decision that was taken in 2006 to retain the ban on the sale of raw cows’ milk and to extend it to other species, which was based on widespread support from industry, enforcers and public health bodies. Food Standards Scotland highlights that, although raw drinking milk is available in other UK nations, bans and restrictions on the sale of those products are in place in several European Union nations, as well as in several states in the United States of America.

The Food Standards Agency has provided information on the restrictions that apply to the sale of raw cows’ milk in England, Wales and Northern Ireland; it also shares details of the policy review that was conducted in 2018, which looked at the current controls and made recommendations for enhanced controls. That led to the industry guidance that was published in 2020, which reinforces the advice that raw drinking milk might contain harmful bacteria. The Food Standards Agency notes that it has regular productive meetings with the Raw Milk Producers Association.

The committee has also received a submission from the petitioner, which suggests that the information that was provided by Food Standards Scotland and others might not present a complete picture of the level of risk that is posed by unpasteurised milk products. The petitioner highlights information from a senior researcher at Utrecht University, which argues that inappropriate evidence has been used to affirm that raw milk is a high-risk food.

At the time, we very much sought views without an expectation that a change in policy would be likely. If we had hoped to understand why the policy in Scotland is different to that of the rest of the UK, I do not think that any of the responses that we have received identifies that. However, they are all unequivocal in their determination that we have the right policy in place and that it should remain in place. It is to that point that the Scottish Government has responded.

I should also seek the committee’s guidance in that we have received an unsolicited additional submission, and, under our new policy, we have to determine whether, by exception, to accept it. I thank the submissioner for the submission, but I do not know that it adds materially to the evidence that we have been considering, so I am inclined to suggest that we do not accept the additional submission on this occasion.

Mr Torrance, you look as though you are ready to offer a comment.

Our next petition, PE1983, which was lodged by Daniel Osula, calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to improve the transparency and accountability of the Scottish legal system by ensuring that clear information is provided to members of the public about how their case will be considered and that information is made available to members of the public about the processes for making a complaint about court staff.

We last considered the petition on 8 March, when we agreed to write to the Scottish Courts and Tribunals Service to ask what steps it takes to ensure that procedural rules and practices of the courts and their complaints procedures are transparent and accessible to members of the public. The Scottish Courts and Tribunals Service has provided a submission that notes that, although every court case involves different parties, facts and circumstances, information on the common procedures and rules that are used in a broad range of cases is made available. That includes an overview on the SCTS website of the most commonly used court processes, with SCTS staff available to provide procedural advice to people who are engaged in court or tribunal actions. It is, however, noted that staff

“must remain ... impartial in relation to the merits of each case”

and

“are unable to provide legal advice”.

The response also provides information on the SCTS complaints procedure, which is based on the Scottish Public Service Ombudsman’s model complaints handling procedure. The SCTS highlights that, as part of the steps that are taken to achieve customer service excellence accreditations, details including what service users should expect when accessing SCTS services are displayed on its website and in SCTS locations.

In the light of the responses that we have received, do members have any comments or suggestions for action?

PE1994, which was lodged by Margaret Fagan, calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to undertake a review of the trial process and handling of witness evidence in sexual offence cases. We last considered the petition on 8 March, when we agreed to write to the Faculty of Advocates, the Law Society of Scotland, Rape Crisis, Victim Support Scotland and the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service.

In that last letter, we sought information on the use of section 275 of the Criminal Procedure (Scotland) Act 1995, under which an accused person can apply to the court to lead evidence at trial that would otherwise be prohibited by section 274 of that act. We requested information on how many applications have been made under that provision and what proportion of them have been granted—I think that we did that in response to that having been advanced as a way in which matters could be progressed.

The Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service’s response highlights that the provisions of sections 274 and 275 apply equally to the Crown Office and the defence. Indeed, it cites data that suggest that a substantial minority of applications are made by the Crown and that the majority of applications that are made by each side are granted. It should be noted, however, that the response provides limited information on the total number of applications, which is what we were seeking, and it suggests that the committee might wish to seek more robust data from the Scottish Courts and Tribunal Service. That is important, because we wanted to understand whether, if this was a route that was open, it was being properly accessed by those to whom it was apparently open.

We have also received responses from the Faculty of Advocates and Victim Support Scotland. The response from the Faculty of Advocates raises concerns about unpredictability and the narrowing of the interpretation of section 275, which might have negative implications for the balance between the rights of complainers and the rights of the accused. Meanwhile, the response that was provided by Victim Support Scotland strongly contests the petitioner’s view that law reforms have resulted in innocent people being wrongly convicted. It argues that that view does not align with the experiences of people affected by crime, nor does it reflect the conviction rates for sexual offences.

In the context of our deliberations, it is important to point out that the issues that are raised by the petition are within the scope of the Victims, Witnesses, and Justice Reform (Scotland) Bill, which is currently at stage 1 of its parliamentary process.

Do members have any comments or suggestions for action in the light of that?

Thank you. In the lifetime of this Parliament, as we have successfully sought to destigmatise issues of mental health, we have brought to light the inadequacies of some of the provision and policies that exist in various fields of life. It seems arbitrary to determine that, irrespective of the personal circumstance of the person concerned, when someone’s child reaches the age of one, the ability of that person to be treated as they would have been when their child was not yet one disappears, with—as is the case in the petitioner’s sister’s circumstance—potentially harrowing consequences.

Do members have any suggestions for further action?

That concludes our consideration of new petitions, and that final flourish from Mr Stewart concludes his contribution to the work of the committee, which I again thank him for.

I wish our clerks and my colleagues on the committee a happy and restful summer. I look forward to seeing who we have on the committee when we return after the break, and we can all live in hope that we will be suitably refreshed when we meet again on 6 September.