Chamber and committees

I think there is something in this petition. The reality is that, in the United Kingdom, the battle to stop people smoking has largely been won, with the long-term trend such that smoking will eventually be only a peripheral activity for most of the population. However, there has been a massive expansion in the use of e-cigarettes and vapes, initially designed as replacement products, particularly among young people and under-18s, despite that being illegal.

It would be worth writing to the Minister for Public Health and Women’s Health, asking for clarity on what steps the Scottish Government is taking to increase support, as well as awareness of support, for those who are trying to quit e-cigarettes and vapes, with a particular focus on young people.

I welcome The Shetland Times campaign. The member has highlighted the value of those seizures. One way to combat the drug issue is through the efforts of Dogs Against Drugs and the specialist training it offers. I do not know what breeds are there and whether they are beagles, short-haired pointers or German shepherds, but they are all fantastic dogs that can help to tackle the scourge of drug problems.

The committee should follow up with the Scottish Government to ask for clarity on the specific work that it has done to improve grant-making practices, including progressing the development of a consistent baseline for third sector funding, and what practical actions the Government is taking. It might be an overstretch to ring fence those funds entirely, but priority should perhaps be given to third sector organisations such as Dogs Against Drugs.

I fully agree with Mr Ewing.

It is outwith the scope of the petition, but the nub of the issue is around recruitment and were a petition to be submitted in the next session with that slightly wider scope, it might allow the new committee to look at other aspects of what councils are doing to aid recruitment, particularly in councils outwith the central belt. I am certainly aware of some initiatives in Angus Council. This specific petition is just one part of a wider recruitment issue.

Unfortunately, we will need to close the petition under rule 15.7 of standing orders, first, on the basis that the Royal College of Nursing is not in favour of student nurses being paid while on clinical placement. Secondly, the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Care is carrying out a review of the financial support package for nursing, midwifery and paramedicine students.

However, in closing the petition, we should highlight to the petitioner that, were that review not to take place or were it not to meet with the petitioner’s particular asks, the petition could be brought back in the next session of Parliament.

With the delay to the response, in addition to its generality, it would be worth while writing back to the minister seeking detailed views on the action that is called for in the petition; details of the current accessibility standards for the design and signage in publicly owned buildings for people with colour blindness; and the minister’s view on whether it is acceptable for the Scottish Government to fail to provide a response to the Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee, as the convener has highlighted. Perhaps it would also be as well to write to Disability Equality Scotland seeking its views on the action that is called for in the petition.

Yes—it is a fantastic space; I enjoyed lecturing there just a few months ago. It is very modern inside.

I think that we all want to avoid the type of situation that we see today, walking down Princes Street, in which a lot of our heritage has been destroyed because the council of the day wanted progress. The same happened with the royal arch in Dundee, which has sadly been lost.

A specific example, which leads on to my question, is Castleroy house in Broughty Ferry in Dundee. It was built by one of the jute barons in 1867 and had 100 rooms and 365 windows—one for every day of the year. Sadly, after world war two, it was demolished—those involved did not try to recover very much, but if you visit Dundee, you can see the gatehouse, which is still standing and is usefully deployed for housing.

The issue with Castleroy house was that it was allowed to deteriorate. Are there any early interventions that could be deployed in such cases? If there are, who would do that, and how would it work?

It might be helpful to set out the context for all that before we actually look at the petition. I want to clarify one point. Tess White said that the consultation was disgraceful, but Douglas Lumsden suggested that the relevant organisations were undertaking pre-application consultation anyway, which would be good practice. Was Mr Lumsden referring to other organisations? If an organisation is undertaking good practice, that would strike me as not being disgraceful—does that make sense?

Okay, sorry.

Quite. With regard to the context for all this, all Scottish Conservatives, in the 2021 manifesto, wanted to showcase Scotland as world leading in tackling climate change, so candidates were very much standing on the agenda of tackling the issue of net zero and being ambitious in doing so.

I appreciate that communities are up in arms regarding the infrastructure. There was a very simple way in which we could have avoided building the infrastructure, and that was by not building the generation at a point where we need to transmit electricity via said infrastructure. That happened under 14 years of UK Conservative Government.

There are ways to unpick that, but it is much more difficult, with regard to the context of the petition, to do it from this point. Nevertheless, there are possible follow-ups with regard to the Scottish Government aspect, which is only a part of the entire project. One would be to ask the Scottish Government what action it will take, now that the consultation on reforming consenting processes in Scotland has closed, specifically with regard to implementing the proposal for a statutory pre-application community engagement process, and what mechanisms it will put in place to strengthen community participation for the life cycle of energy infrastructure projects beyond the pre-application stage.