Chamber and committees

I have a quick question for John Thomson. It has been mentioned that community stations might need to close, subject to a risk assessment. Has any financial planning been done in relation to the revenue that could come in if you were to sell those premises? Is that within your ownership, and what could be brought in or gained from it?

I understand that, but could revenue come in from that?

I am pleased to speak in the debate. I congratulate my colleague Gordon MacDonald on bringing it to the chamber.

We live in troubled times and we must ensure as much as we can that children do not bear the brunt of social inequality. Inequality has always been with us but, shamefully, the gap is getting wider. It might sound clichéd, but it is nevertheless true that every child deserves the best start in life regardless of their background. A good start and the ability to reach their potential are the building bricks to a happier and more successful life as children grow into adults.

The project that we are debating is a fantastic example of an initiative that works. The BIG Project has been helping children and families for 20 years. That is quite an achievement. Children in the Broomhouse area of Edinburgh have benefited enormously from that vision and from the organisation’s innovative practices. Two generations of children have been helped to reach their full potential.

Projects such as the BIG Project are invaluable for young people. Many areas in Scotland have similar projects that have, once they have been established, become interwoven with the community. I am fortunate that, in my constituency, we have excellent schools and after-school clubs that encourage the ethos “Be all you can be” for children from all backgrounds. I know of the great work that they and other schools throughout the country do with children. I am constantly impressed by evolving initiatives to develop young people’s social responsibilities and confidence while letting them have fun at the same time.

However, I cannot speak in the debate without mentioning a project that is not in my constituency, but is in the east end of Glasgow—the Baltic Street Adventure Playground. I visited the playground in a personal capacity because a friend of mine is among the people who run it. I cannot speak highly enough of it. It is situated in one of the most deprived areas of Glasgow. It is not an exaggeration to say that it has become a lifeline for the hundreds of children and families who use it daily.

“Playground” is a word that cannot convey what the Baltic Street Adventure Playground offers. There is a space in which children can run, play, take risks, grow vegetables, light fires, and look after animals. It is their space. The approach is child led, and it allows them to develop and enjoy being children.

Baltic Street Adventure Playground also supports families by offering hot food to children six days a week, including during school holidays, and it has a food hub on Fridays. The project has become a focal point for an area that lacks its basic needs being addressed and, crucially, every service that it provides is entirely free. Like the BIG Project, it is a sanctuary for children and families that is run by dedicated staff and volunteers. A price cannot be put on the work that it does and the difference that it makes to children’s and families’ lives.

In conclusion, I wish the BIG Project the happiest of anniversaries and I wish every similar project throughout Scotland well, and I say a massive “Well done” to all the people who make such an enormous difference to young people’s lives.

I am pleased to be speaking in today’s important debate and I thank Mark Ruskell for bringing it to the chamber. Like Christine Grahame, I will not apologise for repeating some things that have already been said, because they are so important.

I am not going to mince my words: greyhound racing is barbaric. It is the exploitation of beautiful dogs purely to make money, and I absolutely abhor it. Animals are not products or commodities to be used for human entertainment. How anyone can find terrified dogs racing round a track entertaining is beyond me.

At least 1,026 deaths were recorded at tracks by the Greyhound Board of Great Britain in the past five years. Nearly 18,000 injuries were recorded in the UK between 2018 and 2021. The board reported that, during that period, 197 injuries were reported at Shawfield stadium in Glasgow, with 15 deaths. It is absolutely sickening. Thankfully, Shawfield stadium has not reopened since March 2020.

As we have heard, there is one track left in Scotland, at Thornton in Fife, which is unlicensed and therefore completely unregulated. The Scottish Animal Welfare Commission has stated that it recommends that Thornton be closed immediately. I sincerely hope that it is. We will never know how many animals will die or are injured and suffering at that facility, and it should close immediately.

Animal welfare charities such as Blue Cross, the SSPCA and Dogs Trust have for years tried to work with the governing bodies on the welfare of greyhounds, including on what happens when their racing days end. Now they have had enough. They want the so-called sport of greyhound racing to be banned. Great work by campaigners has highlighted serious welfare concerns for racing greyhounds, including a restrictive existence, a culture of drugging dogs, a poor diet and an uncertain fate—which is often euthanasia, once their “career” is over.

These beautiful gentle dogs spend most of their time in often dank and dirty kennels, and suffer from untreated wounds and injuries. They can also be constantly muzzled, which is unbearably stressful for them. There are also serious issues around racing of greyhounds in extreme weather. During this year’s hot summer, dogs have been forced to race in 32°C heat. That is downright cruelty.

Incredibly, the number of puppies that are unaccounted for between birth and racing registration are often referred to by the sector as “the wastage”. That is sickening. Dogs are not being regarded as sentient beings; they are merely “wastage”.

The Greyhound Board of Great Britain has been required to publish the data on deaths and injuries only since 2017, so I fear that the figures that have been released are just the tip of the iceberg. There is no independent validation of the data. The figures could be—in my opinion, they are likely to be—even higher.

Internal policy reviews that have been conducted by Dogs Trust, the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals and Blue Cross found disjointed and ineffective regulation of the sector, a lack of transparency regarding industry practices, and concerns around enforcement of regulatory standards.

There is no doubt that a culture of drugging dogs to enhance or impair performance—in effect, to rig races—is widespread. Substances that have been found in samples that were taken from dogs running at Shawfield include cocaine, amphetamines, steroids, beta blockers and prohormones. All those can have harmful side effects, some of which are severe, and all lead to the extreme suffering of dogs.

In addition, the fate of dogs, once their career is over, is unknown. However, I have seen quite horrific pictures of decapitated greyhounds lying in a ditch.

I hope that we are seeing the beginning of the end for greyhound racing in Scotland. The abuse of these beautiful and gentle dogs must end now. Like others, I thank for their determined and great efforts local campaign groups including one in my Strathkelvin and Bearsden constituency, Blue Cross, the Scottish SPCA, Scotland Against Greyhound Exploitation, the RSPCA, OneKind, the League Against Cruel Sports and others, for their tireless campaigning to stop this barbaric practice.

I need a bit of clarification. The Scottish statutory instrument comes into force on 10 October, but I have not seen much publicity about it. I assume that there will be some public awareness raising, but it is quite a tight timescale for that.

I agree with what has been said, including Collette Stevenson’s request for an update on the short-life working group.

I will follow on from what Jamie Greene said. The letter states that

“The Board has been tasked to provide oversight of the development of an outline business case (OBC) to support a set of clinical IT solutions for prisons”

with a view to supporting

“equity of care in prison healthcare settings.”

The letter states that the outline business case is expected in autumn 2022,

“after which the Programme will present recommended options for progressing to a full business case.”

I would like to know more about that business case. Will it address some of the things that we are talking about, such as digitisation and making the process much clearer? More information on that would be good.

That would probably be good, although the instrument might have come into force by the time that we get a response. I flagged up the issue because today is 5 October and it comes into force on 10 October.

I thank Daniel Johnson for bringing this important debate to the chamber. Indeed, it is one of many debates on this issue in which I have spoken over the years in this place. I also thank Jackson Carlaw and former MSPs Alex Neil and Neil Findlay for the immense amount of work that they did, long before I came on the scene, on the devastation that mesh implants have caused in women’s lives.

Today we are debating something that will go down in history as one of the greatest medical injustices ever suffered by women. Thankfully, there has been cross-party consensus since the horrendous problems of mesh implants came to light. That resulted in a moratorium on the implants in 2014, which was instigated by the then Cabinet Secretary for Health and Wellbeing, Alex Neil. Thankfully, now there is a ban on implants, which was brought in by former Cabinet Secretary for Health and Sport Jeane Freeman, which was warmly welcomed by campaigners. Award-winning journalist Marion Scott and mesh survivors Elaine Holmes and Olive McIlroy have blazed a trail on behalf of so many women and, after far too long, have achieved some form of justice.

I have to say that I was baffled by the text of Daniel Johnson’s motion on mesh treatment clarity. I now understand a lot more what the motion means. He is, of course, right when he says in the motion that women experience “difficulties and desperation” due their implants, although that is something of an understatement. I am genuinely sorry to hear of some of the issues that he has raised today. He asks very important questions, and I look forward to the answers.

This has been a long-running, complicated and distressing issue, with too many twists and turns to be detailed in a short speech. However, progress has been made—belatedly, I agree, but it is progress nevertheless. It builds on Baroness Cumberlege’s excellent 2020 report, “First Do No Harm”, on providing holistic care to women who have suffered with mesh complications.

Earlier this year, Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Care Humza Yousaf introduced legislation to establish a £1 million fund to support women who have been affected by mesh complications after receiving mesh implants on the NHS. Such women have to travel abroad to have the implants removed by an experienced clinician. The first successful applicants to the fund received a one-off payment of £1,000 to help towards the costs associated with emotional or practical support. Women were entitled to apply if they had had to pay for that support at their own expense. That included, for example, purchasing self-care items such as incontinence pads or undertaking considerable travel as a result of their condition.

I understand that there is now a mesh centre of excellence in Glasgow, with clinicians who have been trained to remove mesh, a procedure that has not been available in Scotland before. I also understand why many women, as Daniel Johnson has outlined, would not want the surgeon who inserted the mesh to remove it—the mesh that has ruined their lives beyond belief. After everything that they have been through, I think that it is important that women have a choice of clinician and of where they go for treatment.

It has been a long, hard-fought battle for those women to get justice after the medical establishment was not held accountable for the scandal that affected hundreds of women in Scotland and, indeed, throughout the world. That battle for justice was fought by strong women who, despite their pain and discomfort, did not want their daughters and granddaughters to experience what they went through. They were not listened to by clinicians and were dismissed by an inadequate review that they branded as a whitewash, and still they kept fighting. I congratulate them and hope that they take some comfort that their efforts have ensured that it will not happen again. It must never happen again. Too many lives have been ruined already.

To ask the Scottish Government what progress has been made on the rolling out of citizens assemblies. (S6O-01380)

Does the minister agree that, as we are in the middle of a cost of living crisis that is being exacerbated by Tory budget policies that benefit the wealthy, a citizens assembly forum on the issue is urgently needed?