Chamber and committees

I would certainly acknowledge that. Training will be crucial, but we are not reinventing the wheel here, as many of the materials and whatnot exist in other jurisdictions, so we will be able to draw on them as and when appropriate.

On-costs are very difficult to calculate. Even the Government finds it difficult to calculate and express on-costs in financial memoranda for its own bills. That is not necessarily a criticism; it is simply a reflection of the fact that, if you are going to include figures in a financial memorandum, you need to be reasonably confident about the basis on which you are doing so.

It is not unreasonable to say that, if training and support will be required to accompany the provision of the service, that will have a knock-on impact, but that will be happening all the time anyway. One would like to think that, whatever pathway a patient is on—whether that involves curative treatment or palliative treatment—the continuity of care will be such that the provision of treatment will be made as smooth as possible. There will be an opportunity to look at that on an annual basis and to see, as part of a five-year review, whether things have happened that were not necessarily anticipated or whether a shift has taken place in where the pressures arise and, if so, how we can address that.

The Netherlands uses an entirely different model. Its criteria have always been more expansive, as have the eligibility criteria in Belgium and, more recently, in Canada, where assisted dying legislation arose from a case brought before the Supreme Court of Canada on the basis of the Canadian constitution. Parallels with those systems just do not exist.

Eligibility criteria have not expanded in any of the jurisdictions that have passed a terminal illness and mental capacity model. What has changed—you may fairly allude to this—is that some of the ways in which safeguards apply have been altered. We heard that, in California, under the five-year review of the legislation, the wait period, which I think had been 14 days or thereabouts, was removed. It was found to have excluded a significant proportion of patients—I cannot remember how many, but around a third springs to mind. A significant cohort of those who had been found to be eligible had not accessed assisted dying because they died before they had a chance to take the medication.

The wait periods in other jurisdictions are shorter—I think that it is nine days in Victoria—but a witness to the Health, Social Care and Sport Committee the other week said that their figures show that those dying before they have exhausted the wait period is up to around a quarter or a third of those who are applying.

I think that 14 days is a sensible safeguard to put in at the outset. Where there is an expectation of death more quickly—within a month—there is a provision that allows you to accelerate that to 48 hours. I suspect that making the diagnosis and going through all the processes that you would be required to go through would take you beyond the 48 hours, but I have sought to learn from those experiences in the drafting of the bill.

If a safeguard is not providing any safeguard and is simply an obstacle to somebody accessing something that they should be able to access, that requires a different calculation. As I said, on the eligibility criteria point, there are no examples, which was the finding of the Health and Social Care Committee back in February.

I am happy to look into that and write back to the committee, if that would be helpful, but I am not aware of any. Had there been any, they would have stood out and I would certainly have drawn on them in the financial memorandum.

Tavish Scott almost picked up the question that I was about to ask. In the conversations that I have had with the sector over a number of years, its particular message has been that it is doing as much as it can, if for no reason other than the enlightened self-interest that Ben Hadfield set out. The question is, where does the drive for innovation come from? Is it sector wide, or does it come from individual companies trying to steal a march on their competitors?

Moreover, how does it sit as far as international comparisons are concerned? It is routinely suggested that the Norwegian industry operates at a higher level than or does things differently from the Scottish sector. I appreciate that the environment and the circumstances for operators here might be different to those in the Norwegian sector, but it would be helpful to understand how the drive for the research and the innovation that Tavish Scott talked about gives some confidence that, in a changing environment, we will continue to see significant investment to improve, rather than a message of, “We’re doing as well as we can—look how well we’re doing,” which I think can come across to some as smacking of complacency. I think, therefore, that a description of how that research and innovation works and what the international comparators are would be helpful.

I do not believe that I have any interest relevant to today’s proceedings.

I recognise that the make-up of the industry is such that you would expect that to take place. I am just curious as to whether techniques, approaches and technology are being deployed in Norway, for example, that are not being deployed here. If so, is there a rationale for that? Do circumstances mean that such things would not necessarily work in the same way?

Thanks.

Unlike Miles Briggs and Stuart McMillan, who are trying to crowbar certain visitors out of the bill, I am trying to shoehorn some visitors into it. It is worth putting on the record that the levy will work only if there is sufficient local flexibility that recognises the different ways in which tourism operates in different communities and at different times of the year.

Fundamentally, there needs to be fairness and equity in relation to the way in which the bill applies. As the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities has pointed out in its briefing, cruise traffic is now a significant and growing part of the tourism economy. As the bill stands, there is a risk that tens of thousands of visitors will be exempt from paying the levy.

At a local level, in places such as Orkney, where cruise traffic brings in a significant proportion of the tourist visitors who come to the area each year, there is a risk that, without being able to apply the levy to cruise traffic passengers, the viability of the levy will not be sustainable because the revenues that are raised otherwise would not allow the administration of the levy to wash its face.

In applying the levy to some but not to others, particularly in such a significant part of the tourism sector, local authorities might risk losing public confidence in what they are doing. It is an invidious position in which to place them.

I know that there are issues of competence in relation to applying the levy to cruise traffic. I am grateful to the minister for the engagement that I have had with him in recent weeks. I know that discussions are on-going with local authorities through COSLA on how they get around the issue, but I thought it important at this stage in the scrutiny of the bill at least to allow a debate to take place so that the minister could put commitments and assurances on the record, and to allow colleagues who have similar concerns or issues in relation to their own parts of the country to put those on the record. I look forward to hearing what they have to say.

I absolutely understand the complexity of applying the levy to motorhomes. To go back to my earlier point about flexibility, there would at least be an opportunity to apply it in island communities, where the issue of motorhomes is about their impact not only once they arrive but on the capacity of ferries to and from the mainland. There is an option to apply a levy to motorhomes travelling on ferries, irrespective of where those motorhomes come from or have been leased. The revenue gathered could be allocated to benefit island communities.

As you said, that would not necessarily apply across the board. However, there needs to be recognition that local authorities should be able to apply the levy flexibly.

I am encouraged by what you have said about your openness to discussing the issue. As I raised with the convener, there is an opportunity for island authorities to levy any such charge on vehicles that come via ferry. That seems to be an appropriate way to apply the principle that the levy is about supporting infrastructure and services. Are you open to considering whether an option exists for local authorities to apply such a levy through that route—albeit, as the convener said, it could not be applied in a similar way by mainland-based local authorities? In the spirit of allowing flexibility for the measure to be applied in appropriate ways, depending on need and circumstances, that option should, I would have thought, be available to island authorities.