Chamber and committees

Will the cabinet secretary outline what engagement has been undertaken with people and stakeholders to ensure that the voices of rural communities are heard in work to tackle rural crime?

I am looking at amendment 158 and listening carefully to what you are saying. I am not aware of the evidence that you are speaking about, and that evidence was not presented to the committee during stage 1. I am a health practitioner who has given patients strong medication such as fentanyl and morphine, among other things, and I am not clear on the side effects that you are talking about. I apologise for having a sidebar with my colleague, Joe FitzPatrick, but thank you for letting me in.

I am looking at your amendments—

The Maggie’s centre in Dumfries is in progress. Does the member agree that it would be absolutely fitting that a Maggie’s centre is located in Dumfries, because it is the home toon of Maggie Keswick?

I am grateful to colleagues across the parties in the chamber for supporting my motion, and I thank Make 2nds Count and Breast Cancer Now for their support ahead of the debate.

I declare an interest, as a registered nurse. If I went back to January 1988 and told the newly qualified Emma Harper RGN about the advances in the diagnosis and treatment of cancer that have taken place since then, the young Emma would have been amazed and chuffed wi all that progress.

The risk of dying from cancer is at its lowest level on record. Public health campaigns have helped to change lifestyles and tackle risk factors, while treatment and diagnosis have advanced hugely over the decades. We should acknowledge that, along with the fact that we are doing some incredible work in treating primary cancers with surgery, chemotherapy, radiotherapy, endocrine therapy and medication such as trastuzumab—I had to write that down twice so that I could make sure that I said it properly. Trastuzumab is a type of targeted therapy drug, known as a monoclonal antibody, for breast and stomach cancers. It is used if tests show that the cancer cells have too much of a protein called HER2. Those life-changing and life-saving leaps forward in prevention and treatment are all welcome, and we all hope that there is more progress to come.

However, we should and must do better with regard to metastatic cancers in particular. We can go back through years of mortality statistics for primary cancer because Public Health Scotland and its predecessor bodies have been collecting that data for decades. Unfortunately, however, that is not yet the case for secondary and metastatic cancers, including secondary breast cancer.

At best estimates, around 4,000 people across the country are affected by metastatic breast cancer, but the numbers alone cannot convey the human impact of living with a condition that you know cannot be cured. Until we know accurately the scale of the challenge that we face, it makes meeting that challenge harder than it needs to be. Improvements in care and research would benefit hugely if we had a better data collection and analysis service and knew for certain how many people in our country are affected.

I hope that the Minister for Public Health and Women’s Health will be able to update us on progress on making that happen. However, as I said, the numbers are just that—numbers—and they do not convey what the individual impact is, not just on those who are living with secondary breast cancer but on their friends, family and loved ones.

Secondary cancers are often misunderstood. People often assume that they are a further, separate condition, when in fact they have metastasised from primary breast cancer or another cancer. The original condition may have been treated successfully but, unfortunately, cells from the original tumour break away and seed in other tissues and organs of the body. That is one of the biggest tragedies of secondary breast cancer: people may think that they are clear, but they face further heartbreak down the line.

We have a job to do in educating the public and spreading awareness of the facts about secondary breast cancer, not just so that people know about the symptoms for their own health but so that the people around those who are diagnosed with metastatic cancer are prepared and equipped for that diagnosis and are as ready as they can be to give the love and support that their loved one needs.

I know that there are treatments for secondary breast cancer, using a combination of chemotherapy, radiotherapy and other targeted and immunotherapy treatments. I am also aware of the recent denial of two specific medications by the Scottish Medicines Consortium. Both Make 2nds Count and Breast Cancer Now have responded to that decision, and I know that there are many disappointed people voicing their concerns.

I welcome to the public gallery women who are living with secondary breast cancer, whom I and other members met earlier today in Parliament. I thank the minister for also taking the time to meet them. It was a dreich day outside, and folk got a bit soaked, so it was welcome to meet them in the Parliament cafe. We covered issues such as needing specialist nurses or other healthcare practitioners for secondary cancers, and the challenges that people who live in rural areas such as Dumfries and Galloway and the Scottish Borders face in being able to see specialists.

I acknowledge that digital technology can be part of the engagement with, and care for, people with secondary breast cancers. I am, however, looking forward to progress being made to establish a Maggie’s centre in Dumfries, which was announced in August this year.

Members know what it is like to lose a colleague and friend to secondary breast cancer. Ahead of the debate, I have reflected much on the mentoring and advice, and the friendship, that I had from Christina McKelvie MSP. Christina was an amazing person, an amazing MSP and a fabulous minister. It was Christina, through Keith Brown, who asked me to take forward the motion and debate today. It will be a short debate, in fact, because I am aware of the time.

Let us all leave here today resolving to do better and to look at data, care and treatment for people in rural areas. We need to improve the lives of those who are living with secondary breast cancer and secondary cancer and metastatic disease. We need to improve their chances so that their life lasts much longer, as long as possible. I look forward to hearing colleagues’ contributions and the minister’s response.

This April, a massive wildfire struck Galloway in the heart of the forest park. Thankfully, no one was injured and no lives were lost. The work of the local community in Glentrool was highly helpful to responders such as the Fire and Rescue Service and Galloway Mountain Rescue Team. Will the minister outline how the Scottish Government is encouraging partnership working across communities and responders, not just for wildfires but for other issues in our rural communities?

I thank Audrey Nicoll for her motion and for securing the debate this afternoon. As the Scottish Environment LINK nature champion for ponds and small lochs—I am the natterjack toad champion, as well—I have a particular interest in today’s debate. Dumfries and Galloway is home to some of our country’s most spectacular and important rivers and waterways, from the Ken and the Dee, whose power is harnessed through forward-thinking hydro schemes that were built nearly a century ago, to the Liddel and the Sark, which have formed the border with our neighbours to the south for centuries.

As Audrey Nicoll’s motion makes clear, the biodiversity of our waterways is crucial to ensure not only that the areas they are in have a blossoming ecosystem but that we, as humans, are able to enjoy what they have to offer. That was not always the case. As a society, we have a lot to be proud of when it comes to the improvement of the cleanliness and sustainability of our rivers in the past years. Not so long ago, rivers such as the Clyde and the Carron could well have carried a Government health warning next to their lifebuoys. We had built industries—not just in the central belt but in our more rural communities—that used our waterways as dumping grounds and made biodiversity a bit of science fiction.

In my region, the work of organisations such as the Galloway Fisheries Trust has been hugely important and a local cornerstone of the wider work that is going on nationally. The existence of the trust is a demonstration of how our use of river resources and the conservation of our rivers go hand in hand. Without the coming together of local district salmon boards in Dumfries and Galloway, the trust would not exist.

The value of freshwater fishing to fragile, rural local economies is huge. We have a world-quality offering of that, and anglers from around the world come to experience it. If our waterways and rivers become biodiversity deserts, we lose not only the natural resource but the economic benefits that it brings.

Groups such as the Galloway Fisheries Trust are not just helping to clean up water. They are working to eradicate invasive non-native species such as Japanese knotweed and giant hogweed, both of which can have huge and devastating impacts on the wildlife along the riverbanks as well as destroy riverbanks through degradation and erosion, forever changing the local environment. Anyone who has tried to buy or sell a house where Japanese knotweed has been found will tell you the huge challenges that it brings. Therefore, although the primary aim of such work might be to protect our natural environment along waterways, it can also bring big economic and social benefits that might not be immediately connected to biodiversity.

The on-going scrutiny and passage of the Natural Environment (Scotland) Bill will, I am sure, result in an act that will put nature restoration and biodiversity in our waterways at the heart of Government policy. As climate change figures increasingly in our public policy and decision making, we have to protect the balance in nature, which, as Audrey Nicoll’s motion says, is,

“the lifeblood of the landscape and central to the nation’s brand”.

This debate reminds me of the work that Galloway Fisheries Trust is engaged in—lots of research and lots of projects. I have lodged a motion to recognise one of its recent initiatives, called flowing forward—restoring Galloway’s rivers. When I recently met the trust’s chief executive, Jamie Ribbens, and its chair, Mark Davies, they told me all about some of the work that was going ahead. Jamie described a local project in the River Bladnoch. A farmer there had said that the land was not productive. However, once Galloway Fisheries Trust started its work to remeander the river, do riparian repair and increase the area’s biodiversity, the farmer changed his mind about what “productivity” means—in his mind, it had been only about farming rather than biodiversity and nature restoration.

Galloway Fisheries Trust has also engaged in a temperature-checking project for local rivers, which Audrey Nicoll described. Temperatures have reached more than 30°C in some of our waterways. There is lots to talk about, and I am celebrating Galloway Fisheries Trust today.

I recognise that the recently announced housing emergency action plan commits to additional planning actions to accelerate housing delivery. Can the cabinet secretary speak to the positive impact that that is expected to have on the delivery of new homes in Scotland, including in Dumfries and Galloway?

In the expert working group’s discussions on helper dogs, has the issue been raised of the ownership versus the handling of certain dogs? For example, although an expert sniffer dog that is used at airports might not necessarily be owned by the handler, the handler might take care of the dog and take it home every night. Has the clarity that is required regarding the owner versus the handler been part of the discussions?

Consolidation legislation was talked about when I was pursuing my livestock-worrying bill, the Dogs (Protection of Livestock) (Amendment) (Scotland) Bill. My goal at the time was to update the 70-year-old legislation in the UK, as alpacas and llamas are now livestock, which was not the case under the original legislation. Consolidation legislation is an option. However, it is resource intensive to pull all the legislation together. Although it is an option, producing such a bill is very resource intensive and time intensive. Is that what consolidation legislation would involve?