The Scottish National Party likes to point the finger at wasted expenditure from decades ago, but its own track record on that front is not exactly glowing. What lies behind my question is the relative inefficiency and ineffectiveness of the Scottish Government’s ability to deliver projects. What is the Scottish Government doing to ensure that financial assessments are carried out to provide best value for the public purse?

I am grateful for the opportunity to take part in the debate and congratulate Kenneth Gibson on securing it.

I apologise to you, Deputy Presiding Officer, the members and the minister, as I will not be able to stay for the full debate because I have a pressing engagement to attend to.

As we have heard, 2023’s eating disorders awareness week goes from 27 February to 5 March. Eating disorders in males, on which this year’s week focuses, are underreported. As the motion rightly highlights, although there are approximately 1.25 million people living with an eating disorder in the United Kingdom, around 25 per cent of them are male, which equates to around 300,000 individuals. Indeed, the National Centre for Eating Disorders confirms that it is hard to know just how many men are suffering from the condition at any one time. It is also hard to know what proportion of newly reported cases are male related. There could be many reasons for that. Perhaps, over the years, we have been overly sensitised by the media in relation to weight loss in individuals. Indeed, there are many who are likely to talk about the complexities of age. When it comes to dealing with the complexities and anxieties about shape, size and weight, those issues come into the equation.

Women often talk about food and dieting much more in relation to weight loss than men do, whereas men with eating problems often hide their difficulties by exercising—or over-exercising—when they visit the gym. Men are more likely to avoid seeking help, because of peer pressure. It is also widely known that, historically and across many cultures, men have been celebrated for how active they are and what they can conquer, while women have been valued for their appearance. That has changed as the culture has changed, and it is no longer the case, but there is still a complexity around media involvement and the shift that relates to all ages and genders.

Taking health orientation as a benchmark, it would seem that men are becoming increasingly involved in this area. The number of men with gym memberships has greatly increased, and cosmetic surgery has even become more apparent in males, along with dieting. There are changes that are taking place, and we all acknowledge that.

I have spoken about eating disorders previously in the chamber, and I have talked about Beat’s campaign, sock it to eating disorders. I also spoke in a similar debate last year, which was secured by Emma Harper, as I have an awareness of what is taking place and how it is managed. We have to understand and acknowledge conditions such as anorexia, bulimia, binge eating and other disorders.

In recent years, the support of MSPs has helped to increase the political profile of eating disorders. However, there is still much work to do to ensure that we encapsulate what is going on. I pay tribute to organisations such as the Scottish Eating Disorders Interest Group, Diabetes Scotland, Beat and our national health service, all of which provide vital support and ensure that vulnerable individuals are supported and looked after.

We must encourage and empower people to take action, no matter how long their symptoms have been present or what they have dealt with.

In conclusion, eating disorders are a terrible affliction for many individuals, male and female, and I encourage everyone to get the message out about them, whether or not a campaign is taking place, to ensure that as many people as possible, as often as possible and wherever possible, get that message.

NHS Tayside developed the Scottish emergency medicine-Malawi project, with the aim of delivering in Malawi a national emergency and trauma network. What progress has been made on that project to date?

It is important that we collate as much information on this topic as we can. If we contact those agencies and organisations that you indicated, convener, they will be able to give us their views on any action that may be required. That will enable us to take a much better and a more holistic approach to challenging the issues raised by the petition. As Carol Mochan has said, the law requires updating. It has been decades since the issue has been examined in that way. By collecting that information and putting it all together we will have a much better picture as to how the issue is being approached across those organisations in Scotland.

This is a very important issue. We have heard about some areas in the submissions that we have already received, but we need to get more information. We should write to the Scottish Government highlighting the online systems that have been introduced in Australia and in the Netherlands and seek information on what considerations have been given to developing a similar service in Scotland for parents who have separated. It would be very useful for us to collate information on other countries that have put that in place.

It might be quite useful for us to seek the views of some of the organisations that we have here in Scotland, such as the Law Society of Scotland, the Family Law Association, the Scottish Legal Aid Board, the Scottish Courts and Tribunals Service, Relationships Scotland and the family law committee of the Scottish Civil Justice Council, to find out where we can take the petition. Those are my suggestions, convener.

I think that we need to write to COSLA to ask which of the local authorities are yet to roll out the mentors in violence prevention programme in secondary schools, requesting information about what challenges have prevented implementation and details of work planned to address those. We should ask what challenges local government faces in embedding schools-based prevention of violence against women and girls.

We should also write to Rape Crisis Scotland to request information on its reporting mechanisms for its equally safe at school—ESAS—strategy and whether its planned work with local authorities has resulted in an increase in ESAS activities across Scotland. That information would be very useful and clarify where we are in this whole process. As you have indicated, convener, this is an immensely important issue. If measures are embedded at school level, that will help to prevent gender-based violence once pupils have left school.

You also talked about people closing ranks and your belief that you were not given all the facts or information.

As a mother of a family—a grieving mother—it is so important that you are given that respect and support. We have to trust organisations like the police to deliver that service, but obviously in this situation that was a massive failing.

We have asked questions about the petition in the past and we have received some assurances. However, there are a number of issues that we might still want to ask about. It might be advantageous to write to Social Security Scotland to ask whether it intends to set targets for application processing times for special and normal rules cases. That is vitally important for an application process. If we have targets, we will get an answer as to where we are, and there are other options that we can look at thereafter.

I think that we should write to the Scottish Government requesting an update on when the analysis report and policy response to the consultation into ending the sale of energy drinks to children and young people will be published. In addition, I would suggest that we recommend that it commissions further research into the effects of fast-release caffeine products on children and young people, particularly those participating in physical activity.

It might also be useful to seek some clarity from UK Athletics, to seek its views on where we are in relation to the issues that are raised in the petition. Information on any action that it is undertaking to address the potential risks to athletes under 18 using fast-release caffeine products for performance enhancement would give us an indication as to how that is being managed and processed.