Meeting of the Parliament (Hybrid)

Meeting date: Tuesday, December 14, 2021

Official Report 1009KB pdf

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Community Defibrillators

The final item of business is a members’ business debate on motion S6M-02093, in the name of Jenni Minto, on the importance of community defibrillators. The debate will be concluded without any question being put.

Motion debated,

That the Parliament notes the importance of access to defibrillators in communities across Scotland; understands that a defibrillator is required within three minutes of cardiac arrest for it to be effective; believes therefore that a wide spread of these devices across communities could play a key role in saving lives; understands that people living in the least affluent areas of the country are 60% less likely to survive an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest; recognises the incredible community effort nationally, including in Argyll and Bute, of people who have raised funds to install and maintain defibrillators, but notes the view that more needs to be done; commends the work of the British Heart Foundation, in partnership with the Scottish Ambulance Service, the NHS and Microsoft, in establishing the Circuit, which is Scotland’s first network of defibrillators; notes the calls for more work to raise awareness of, and improve education on, defibrillator use, and further notes the calls for anyone with a defibrillator to register it on the Circuit to help the Scottish Ambulance Service find its location in the event of an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest.

18:08  

My dear friend Carl Reavey died of an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest in January 2018. He was 61. Carl was a force of nature and his sudden shocking death impacted on the many people who had the great fortune to know him. This debate is in Carl’s memory and is for all those who have lost loved ones as a result of cardiac arrest. It is also in recognition of the work of communities across Scotland, including in my constituency of Argyll and Bute, who have raised funds, completed training and helped to save lives through installation of defibrillators.

I thank members from all sides of the chamber who have supported the motion. We are in the privileged position of being able to help to raise awareness of the work that the British Heart Foundation is doing alongside the Scottish Ambulance Service, NHS Scotland and Microsoft, in establishing the Circuit—Scotland’s first network of defibrillators.

I never met my maternal grandfather—he died of an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest in 1964. Back then, there was only a vague understanding of the processes that underlie heart disease. Doctors could not do much; they simply let nature take its course. Since then, the Scottish death rate from heart and circulatory diseases has declined by more than three quarters, but for out-of-hospital cardiac arrests—there are about 3,200 in Scotland every year—the survival rate is only 10 per cent. The figures are stark: every minute without cardiopulmonary resuscitation and defibrillation reduces the chance of survival by 10 per cent.

The Scottish Government’s document “Scotland’s Out-of-Hospital Cardiac Arrest Strategy 2021-2026” aims for

“20% of ... cardiac arrests”

to

“have a defibrillator applied before the ambulance”

arrives. Research suggests that that means having a defibrillator situated every 200m in urban areas, and having one for every 1,000 people in rural areas, so it is quite a target to reach.

Cairndow, around the head of Loch Fyne in Argyll and Bute, has three community defibrillators. Two are community funded, and one is funded by a local business. Last year, one was deployed when a visitor fell ill in a remote part of the community. The response was exceptional. The British Heart Foundation had provided two basic life-support training sessions in the Cairndow village hall. The first person to arrive on the scene had attended that training and commenced manual CPR, while directing someone else to get the nearest defibrillator and raise the alarm. The air ambulance, an ambulance crew and police all attended, and the community defibrillator was applied before the services arrived.

That community response was made possible by British Heart Foundation training, locally funded defibrillators and good community awareness. The next day, the defibrillator pads were replaced by private community donations in order to keep the defibrillator in service. Without individuals donating or communities fundraising, the defibrillators will not be there, and so the Scottish Government’s target might be difficult to achieve.

My motion notes that more could be done. I have two suggestions, although I am sure that many more could be made. By using building planning regulations, could new developments be mandated to put in a defibrillator cabinet? Following on from my question in the chamber in response to last week’s budget, could the Scottish Government campaign for a removal of, or reduction in, VAT on defibrillators?

I started my speech by remembering Carl Reavey. Carl’s life was action packed. He was a sound engineer with The Undertones, a bird watcher, a photographer, an editor, a hotelier, a promoter of whisky and a cyclist. He was a son, a brother, a husband, a father and a friend. Carl’s smile and laughter lit up the room, but an electrical malfunction in his heart forced the life from him. Jan, his wife, was alone with him when it happened. She dialled 999. She administered CPR, having been told not to stop until the ambulance arrived. She could not leave him. No one knew to get the village defibrillator. Registering a community defibrillator on the Circuit might help in circumstances like that, so please—please—do it.

I finish with the words on the memorial for Carl in the community woodland that he and I worked together to establish:

“A lover of nature
By nature good natured
By nature a friend
A lover of a dram (naturally)
By nature a thinker
By nature a doer
A force of nature”

I simply ask, on behalf of Jan, that we lose no more forces of nature simply because a defibrillator is not registered on the Circuit.

18:14  

My contribution is quite short, but it is important that I advise members of the activities and influence of Scottish HART in campaigning to increase the distribution of defibrillators. Scottish HART, which stands for Heart At Risk Testing, was founded in 1997 by Kenneth and Wilma Gunn, who have, for some time, been my Selkirk constituents. I know that it is not among the various organisations that are listed in the motion, but it is an important little organisation.

Tragically—just like in the story that Jenni Minto recalled—on 27 May 1991, the Gunns’ son Cameron collapsed and died during a five-a-side football match. Even more cruelly, it was the night before his 20th birthday. He suffered from hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, although nobody knew about that until after his death. Regrettably, other young people—often active sportsmen and women—have died in a similarly tragic fashion.

From 1997 onwards, Wilma Gunn and her husband Kenny have been fundraising; raising the organisation’s profile, even in Parliament; and campaigning not only for early testing of young athletes but for accessible defibrillators. Back then, not many people knew what a defibrillator was—I include myself in that. The profile was raised here, with debates and petitions in the early years of the Parliament, and in 2014 Wilma was deservedly awarded an MBE.

Today, we have defibrillators at many points—in trains, bus stations, airports and supermarkets, and in the Parliament and some workplaces—but Kenny and Wilma Gunn have not stopped campaigning, and they are keen for even more defibrillators to be distributed. The new ones are easy to use—you cannot hurt the patient by using them. In fact, it is better to use a defibrillator and have the patient die in front of you, as you cannot do any more harm than if you had done nothing.

I have practiced on defibrillators, in the Parliament and elsewhere, and if I can use them—because I am hopeless at it—anyone else certainly can. Those invaluable minutes on the defibrillator will mean life or death until the medics arrive. That is especially relevant in rural areas such as my constituency, where paramedics cannot simply arrive within eight minutes.

I wanted to take part in the debate to remind members of other less well-known people who have campaigned, through tragic circumstances, to try to bring defibrillators, which save so many lives, to the forefront. I congratulate Wilma and Kenny Gunn who, all these years later, are still campaigning for Scottish HART and for defibrillators.

18:17  

I warmly congratulate Jenni Minto on bringing this vitally important debate to the chamber, and on the tone that she has set with her very moving speech.

We all have our part to play on this issue. I actually witnessed the life-saving capacity of rural defibrillators when one member of my constituency staff suffered a cardiac arrest in a rural part of Perthshire. I have no doubt whatsoever that if the village had not had a defibrillator to hand, that colleague would not have survived. The office that Murdo Fraser and I share is part of the building for the Scotland’s Charity Air Ambulance team, and I know just how much they appreciate all the work that is done.

Now more than ever, we are so aware of what our healthcare services do for us, and of just how precious the principles of the national health service are, given that it meets the needs of everyone on the basis of clinical need. We are also so aware of the work that the exceptional NHS staff undertake; we must also include in that the work of all those who look after our rapid-response ambulance teams and all those who are involved in campaigning for defibrillators. In addition, it is important to compliment, as Christine Grahame did, the members of our local communities who are so much a part of this very important campaign.

Every year, more than 3,000 people suffer an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest, but if you are one of those 3,000 and you live in a rural area, you are 32 per cent less likely to survive than others. People from more deprived areas are 60 per cent less likely to survive to be discharged than those from less deprived areas. There is a responsibility on us all to ensure that no matter where people are, we are able to respond to any out-of-hospital cardiac arrest.

It is good to hear that, in the past five years, the Save A Life for Scotland partnership has equipped more than 640,000 people with the necessary skills for resuscitation. It is vital that we continue to train people on how to react, but we also need to ensure that defibrillator equipment is readily available and, just as importantly, that it is properly maintained. As Christine Grahame and Jenni Minto flagged up, information on where defibrillators are located is crucial. I whole-heartedly support the provision of more defibrillators, and I was delighted to hear that, in November, the Rattray community became the latest in the Perth and Kinross area to install a new defibrillator.

However, there are challenges, such as to ensure that the yearly monitoring, which is so important, actually happens, that parts-replacement costs can be met, that the location of the devices can be made more consistent, and that we can support our local communities. We know that in Wales, the Government has pledged £3 million to improve public access to defibrillators. As Jenni Minto rightly pointed out, we in Scotland could do a little more to ensure that there is further outreach.

In 2015, only around one in 20 people survived an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest. Thankfully, that statistic is now a little better—it is one in 10—but the survival rate is still too low. I therefore welcome the progress that we have made, the increased chance of survival and the continued installations of defibrillator equipment across the entirety of Scotland. However, we still have a long way to go to ensure that people’s lives are fully protected. We need not just to ensure that clinical assistance is provided, but to take responsibility and ensure that our local communities are very well prepared and know exactly what to do. As MSPs, we all have a part to play in helping that process. I warmly thank Jenni Minto once again for the debate, and I will do my part to ensure that we give that support.

18:21  

I congratulate Jenni Minto on bringing this important debate to the chamber. I agree whole-heartedly with her motion, as public access to defibrillators has become one of the biggest constituency matters that I have ever dealt with.

In 2017, I met a local woman, Kathleen Orr, whose son Jayden tragically died following a cardiac arrest. In her evidence to the Public Petitions Committee in 2018, she said:

“Jayden went skating in the morning, as usual, and to his normal skate club in the evening. While he was doing his normal skate routine, he collapsed on the ice and never got back up again. That was when my world fell apart ... I do not remember too much after that, but I know that there were a lot of members of staff and not one of them knew what the others were doing. To my knowledge, there was a defibrillator, but none of the staff used it because they were not fully trained and were scared of doing so.”—[Official Report, Public Petitions Committee, 22 November 2018; c 1.]

Kathleen was giving evidence after lodging her petition to make it a legal requirement to have a public access defibrillator placed in all new buildings over a certain size; that is the option 1 that Jenni Minto outlined earlier. I have got to know Kathleen on her mission to increase the number of defibrillators across Inverclyde. When she started her charity in memory of Jayden, which is affectionately called Jayden’s Rainbow, there were only four automated external defibrillators in Inverclyde. Today, there are 41, including two at Ferguson Marine in Port Glasgow—one on each of the two ships that are being built. If it were not for Covid, there would already be more across the constituency.

Following discussions with Kathleen, I brought local and national stakeholders together to help to increase AED provision across Inverclyde and Scotland. St Andrew’s First Aid was so impressed with Kathleen’s work that it gifted her 30 of its old AEDs, which were then reconditioned. She is placing those AEDs across Inverclyde, in addition to those that she has given to local schools, which have been purchased through her campaigning and fundraising efforts.

Kathleen, her daughter Kerri and her son Declan all now volunteer with St Andrew’s First Aid. As well as improving access to AEDs, they want to show everyone that we should not be afraid of AEDs—in fact, they are foolproof, and they will not work unless someone has a shockable heart rhythm.

According to St Andrew’s First Aid, people from the most deprived areas are 43 per cent less likely to survive a cardiac arrest. Given Inverclyde’s challenges with deprivation, Kathleen’s efforts have become all the more significant when we acknowledge that statistic.

In the past few years, there has been a real awakening to the need to increase access to AEDs, and to the importance of having a record of where they all are. That is why the work of the British Heart Foundation, in partnership with the Scottish Ambulance Service, the NHS and Microsoft, in establishing the Circuit, Scotland’s first network of defibrillators, is vital.

The British Heart Foundation provided a helpful briefing for the debate and I will highlight three key points from it. First, performing CPR can more than double the chances of survival in some cases. Secondly, every minute without CPR and defibrillation reduces the chance of survival by up to 10 per cent.

The third point is that the ambulance services currently do not know where tens of thousands of defibrillators are. Knowing a defibrillator’s location can be the difference between life and death. Owning a defib is great but, if nobody knows where it is, that life-saving machine could be lying dormant in an emergency. I appeal to anyone who is watching the debate or who reads the Official Report after it to register their AED with the Circuit.

18:25  

I thank Jenni Minto for bringing her important motion to the chamber for debate. She gave a lovely speech.

The debate allows us to consider and connect two important elements: the life-saving technology that we are lucky to have available to us and the community that brings it to our doors to ensure that, whenever possible, lives are saved.

We have heard a bit about cardiac arrest from members who have spoken before me. Sudden cardiac arrest occurs suddenly and often without warning. It is the abrupt loss of heart function, breathing and consciousness. We need to understand and remind ourselves that death occurs within minutes if the victim does not receive treatment. Therefore, it is important that we raise understanding and awareness of the condition. Debating in the Scottish Parliament can be a step towards raising that awareness but, as members know, we must go further in our campaigns after the debate.

Figures that we have heard reveal that, every year, more than 3,000 people in Scotland experience an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest. The British Heart Foundation’s figures show that only one victim in 10 survives. However, crucially, the chance of surviving a cardiac arrest jumps from 6 per cent to 74 per cent if the casualty is in a shockable rhythm and a defibrillator is deployed within three minutes. That statistic shows clearly why it is important, as the motion states, to have accessible community defibrillators that are well maintained and easily available to every community.

If we are to reduce deaths from out-of-hospital cardiac arrest, it is important that people know how to use the defibrillators. It is important that we train people to use them and that they feel confident in using them. Understanding that, with quick decisive action, we can save a life gives us all great purpose to do more. Access to defibrillators is vital to saving lives. I say to Jenni Minto that I would happily support any of the campaigns that she advances from the debate.

I also pay tribute to the communities that fundraise for and maintain defibrillators, which are life-saving pieces of equipment. In my community of Mauchline, a well thought out strategy has, following some fantastic fundraising, resulted in a community defibrillator being based at the centre of the village, with another due to be installed in another part of the village. The Mauchline Community Association, which is based at Centre Stane, has implemented a plan that includes good maintenance, ensuring that there is a high level of local understanding about how to access and use the equipment and registering it with the Circuit. Those measures are to be commended in any community and I am proud of the efforts in my village.

As I mentioned, my local defibrillator is registered with the Circuit, the national defibrillator network. The network provides a national overview of where defibrillators can be found and connects to the NHS ambulance services throughout the United Kingdom. That ensures that, in the crucial moments after a cardiac arrest, the defibrillators can be accessed quickly to help to save lives. At the moment, many defibrillators are never used because emergency services do not know where they are. That can cost lives and it is why it is important that the Circuit’s infrastructure is available.

I reaffirm a key point that I have made in previous debates: inequalities in health and healthcare cannot be ignored. It is no different in this instance. People from more deprived areas in Scotland are almost twice as likely to have an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest and are 60 per cent less likely to survive to leave hospital than those from less-deprived areas. We must not forget those factors when planning for the future. It is crucial that the Government addresses inequality as a matter of urgency before it is too late for more people. Key to that is tackling the root causes of health inequality.

I again acknowledge the importance of the motion and commend the work of the volunteers and organisations that raise awareness of the issue. I thank members for contributing to this important debate.

18:30  

I thank Jenni Minto for bringing the motion for debate and congratulate her on her personal and powerful speech. I know how close the subject is to her, as I first met her at a British Heart Foundation round-table event during the election campaign. That day, I saw someone who is as passionate as I am about doing all that we can to ensure access to defibrillators.

Defibrillators can mean the difference between life and death for someone who suffers cardiac arrest. That highlights the important role that they play in our communities. It is therefore important that they are widely available, that they are accessible and that folk know how to use them to save someone’s life.

Defibrillators are used to administer an electric shock to a person who is having a cardiac arrest and are designed to be used by an average person with no medical training to save a life. They can and should be available in public places for use by the public when they are required. They are designed to be used by members of the public who have not received any training but we need people to be confident and not scared of using one in a life-or-death scenario, so the devices provide audible instructions and, sometimes, visual prompts on a screen to help people through the process, which makes them easy and safer to use.

It is important that people know what to expect when using a defibrillator. My understanding is that, when a person puts the pads on someone’s chest, the device will analyse the heart’s electrical rhythm and, if it detects an abnormal rhythm that is likely to respond to a shock, it will charge itself. That takes away huge responsibility from the person who is going to use it.

Some devices deliver the shock automatically without needing any further action by the operator. Others instruct the operator to press a button to deliver the shock before instructing them to carry out CPR for a period. It might require more than one shock to save someone’s life, but the machine will talk the operator through every step, so people should not be scared to use one. One of the key things for people to know is that a defibrillator will not allow a shock to be given unless it is needed. That means that it is extremely unlikely that it will do any harm to the person who has collapsed.

I was extremely pleased that Aberdeen City Council recently agreed to have officers consider the feasibility of providing defibrillators in all schools and sheltered accommodation. That received cross-party support, which is probably rare nowadays in Aberdeen City Council. It was brilliant to see councillors coming together to agree that.

As I have said repeatedly, it is important that defibrillators be put in accessible locations and that people in the communities know where they are. A key point to their success is knowing where to find one and their being accessible and close to where they are needed. Unfortunately, I could not find a central bank of locations to which people can log on to find their nearest defibrillator. A quick internet search puts the nearest one to my home at Northfield community centre but I know that there are closer ones and I encourage everyone with a defibrillator to register it on the Circuit website to ensure that everyone can quickly find the nearest one in an emergency.

Once again, I thank Jenni Minto for bringing this important topic to the chamber.

18:35  

I am pleased to be speaking in this very important debate and I also thank Jenni Minto for bringing it to the chamber. Her powerful speech has really set the tone. I also thank the British Heart Foundation for its briefing.

Since the 1960s, huge strides have been made in heart attack survival. In the 1960s, more than seven out of 10 heart attacks were fatal, whereas today at least seven out of ten people who have a heart attack survive. Currently there are 10,000 hospital admissions for heart attacks each year, which is an average of one every 50 minutes.

We need to do more work to make people aware of heart health risks and the implications of such risks for their long-term health. We know about the links between poor diet, lack of exercise, smoking and poor health. Inequality as a driver of poor health cannot be underplayed and the prevalence of heart disease in areas of higher inequality points to the work that still needs to be done. As Stuart McMillan pointed out, people in areas of high inequality are less likely to have access to a defibrillator.

I must stress that it is never too late to look after our heart health. The new year often gives rise to attempts to establish new healthy habits, but I encourage everyone to take a serious look at their heart health and any small but important lifestyle changes that could be made to improve it.

Preventative care plays a huge part in cutting down the number of heart attacks and potential cardiac arrests, but when such things happen outwith hospitals, CPR and community defibrillators can be life saving and, indeed, have saved lives on a number of occasions. As Christine Grahame and Liz Smith have noted, that is especially true in rural settings. It just shows how many people are touched by these issues.

Learning CPR could be one of the best things that everyone could do at home over the Christmas holidays. After all, we never know when we might need it. For someone who has a cardiac arrest, their likelihood of survival decreases by up to 10 per cent every minute without intervention. Defibrillators might appear daunting—and the word is difficult to say—but the important point is that no one needs to be trained to use them. There are clear spoken instructions, and no one can be shocked accidentally, because the machine will provide a shock only when it detects the target rhythm.

Currently less than 5 per cent of out-of-hospital cardiac arrests involve bystander intervention, but I am sure that everyone in the chamber will have read stories in the press about those incredible people who step in and make that difference. I cannot stress this enough: knowing what to do could save a life.

Many communities across the country, including in my region of Central Scotland, have raised funds to put defibrillators in key places. Unfortunately, however, many of them have not been registered with the Circuit, which provides a national overview of where defibrillators can be found and connects them with NHS ambulance services to ensure that, in those crucial moments after a cardiac arrest, they can be accessed quickly to help save lives. The Circuit also does life-saving work with regular reminders about maintenance. If communities know of a defibrillator that is not on the Circuit, they should get in touch with the network and get it registered. Knowing where it is might just save someone.

Once again, I congratulate Jenni Minto on securing this debate.

18:38  

Before I start, I draw members’ attention to my entry in the register of members’ interests as I am a serving member of West Dunbartonshire Council.

I congratulate Jenni Minto on securing this debate on an issue that I know is very close to her heart. It is important to take the opportunity to raise awareness of the need for more accessible defibrillators in our communities. According to the British Heart Foundation, fewer than one in 10 people survive an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest, and it is calling on us to act to reduce two factors in relation to that tragic statistic. The first reason is that there are not enough people who feel prepared and confident enough to perform CPR, and, the second is that there are not enough defibrillators.

I have a strong interest in promoting the accessibility of this life-saving equipment not just in my role as a councillor on West Dunbartonshire Council but on a personal level, having lost my own father to a cardiac arrest at the age of 52. Had defibrillators been more readily available, the outcome might have been more positive.

In 2017, I was delighted to launch a campaign to compile a list of defibrillators that are available in public buildings or in the ownership of businesses, organisations and groups across West Dunbartonshire. I was able to follow that up by securing £50,000 from the council and £25,000 from the West Dunbartonshire health and social care partnership. The funding was used to ensure that there is a good geographical spread of automatic external defibrillators throughout the local authority.

I thank my colleagues on West Dunbartonshire Council for the cross-party support on this important issue. There are things that can unite us, and the gains from this important work are there for all to see. In fact, in recent weeks I chaired a meeting of the council’s defibrillator working group, during which we managed to secure another defibrillator for the Linnvale community group in Clydebank. We will help the group to get it installed in a prominent position in the area.

We have real experience in our working group, and the members’ continuing efforts are helping to save lives. On the working group are: Sheena Nelson, the heartstart co-ordinator from Helensburgh & Local District CPR/Defibrillator Association; Dr Jan Chesham, who represents the Trossachs Search and Rescue Team, which has developed an app; and Anne Harrison from the Scottish Ambulance Service.

Also in the group is Brian Martin, who is a retired paramedic. Brian collapsed while playing football at Scotstoun leisure centre and owes his life to his colleagues from the Scottish Ambulance Service. Following successful fundraising events by Brian and his colleagues, a defibrillator had been installed in the centre just weeks prior to his collapse, and that defibrillator was used to save his life.

My thanks also go to my constituent Norma Docherty, who lost her son to sudden arrhythmic death syndrome in 2011. Norma fundraised in her son’s memory to install defibrillators in his former primary and high schools.

Overall, there are now 220 publicly accessible defibrillators across the area between Clydebank and Garelochside. Each has a dedicated guardian who looks after it and checks that it is in good working order.

In addition, I commend the excellent work of the Milngavie Community First Responders, which is a volunteer group in the Milngavie and Bearsden area that responds to specific 999 calls prior to the arrival of an ambulance. With more than 600 call-outs to date, it is a lifeline service for our community in the drive to save lives.

We all know about the serious levels of heart disease, and that access to the machines can increase survival rates. In West Dunbartonshire, 28 lives have been saved to date through publicly accessible defibrillators being installed throughout our communities. Of those defibrillators, 11 were used during lockdown. Our work has shown how important it is to take ownership of the issue. We know that doing so saves lives.

I also congratulate heartstart projects in Argyll and Clyde on winning the volunteer of the year award at the Scottish health awards ceremony, which was recently held in Edinburgh. The heartstart projects continue to deliver emergency life support and defibrillator awareness training.

I am really proud of all the volunteers in my community who continue to work so hard and to dedicate their time to the cause. It has been an honour and a privilege to share their experiences on their behalf in Parliament.

18:43  

I remind members of my entry in the register of members’ interests, which shows that I am still a serving councillor for Aberdeen City Council.

I thank Jenni Minto for bringing the debate to the Parliament. I enjoyed her powerful speech.

Like other members, I commend the work of community organisations in fundraising to purchase defibrillators. Likewise, I commend the work of the British Heart Foundation and others. That work has increased the number of defibrillators throughout Scotland. However, we must do all that we can to provide more support to ensure that that network of life-saving equipment is properly registered, checked and maintained. After all, it really is a matter of life or death, and that is the reason why I feel compelled to take part in the debate.

Earlier this year, a constituent of mine was in desperate need of a defibrillator. His son rushed to the defibrillator that was in their local village but, for whatever reason, it was not on the 999 system or the Circuit. He tried desperately to get it open but, without the code to unlock it, there was nothing that he could do. He was tantalisingly close and I cannot think of a crueller situation than that. Tragically, my constituent passed away. He paid the ultimate price—losing his life—and his family are left with the tortuous, traumatic thoughts of, “What if?” for the rest of their lives.

It is unacceptable that we find out that a defibrillator is not properly connected or maintained only at the point when someone calls 999 with a desperate medical need for it. Currently, local authorities regularly check life rings to ensure that they are fit for purpose. I would like the Scottish Government to provide funding to local authorities or community groups to allow them to carry out similar checks on a regular basis. Like a life ring, a defibrillator is—we hope—never needed but, in an emergency situation, we need to know that the kit is available and that it works. At that point, it is too late if it has been vandalised or broken or it suffers from another kind of fault.

Like Jackie Dunbar, I welcome the fact that Aberdeen City Council is investigating the possibility of installing defibrillators in all schools and sheltered housing locations. As she said, it is a rare moment when all parties in Aberdeen agree, but we certainly did at that time.

As has been mentioned already, too many people have undiagnosed heart conditions that cause out-of-hospital heart attacks. As Jenni Minto said, currently, only one in 10 people who suffer out-of-hospital cardiac arrest survives. We must do more to prevent that, and we can.

The work that small community groups have done to help to fund defibrillators throughout our country deserves tremendous praise, but there is a huge problem that needs the attention and resource of Government to bring in recommendations from charities such as Heart Valve Voice and other heart disease specialists. At present, too many lives are lost prematurely to heart disease in Scotland. I hope that there are steps that the Government and everyone else can take to help to tackle that.

I call Rona Mackay, who is the final speaker in the open debate and is joining us remotely.

18:46  

I thank my colleague Jenni Minto for bringing this important debate to the chamber and for her moving opening speech.

As we have heard in excellent speeches from across the chamber, it is clear that defibrillators save lives. We know that a defibrillator is required within three minutes of a cardiac arrest for it to be effective and that the availability of defibrillators is becoming widespread across the communities of Scotland. However, we also know that people who live in the least affluent areas of the country are 60 per cent less likely to survive an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest because defibrillators are not as available in those areas. More needs to be done to address that quickly. That is why the importance of the work of the British Heart Foundation in partnership with the Scottish Ambulance Service, the NHS and Microsoft in establishing the Circuit, which, as we have heard, is a map of Scotland’s first network of defibrillators, simply cannot be overstated.

We must raise awareness of and educate people about defibrillator use, and register all defibrillators on the Circuit, to help the Scottish Ambulance Service to know where they are in the event of an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest. We know that early defibrillation can more than double a person’s chances of survival from a cardiac arrest. Many defibrillators are never used because emergency services currently do not know where they are located.

On Christmas day 1982, my dad collapsed with a cardiac arrest while he was out walking the dog near our home. A bus driver stopped to help him, but nothing could be done. Of course, I will never know whether a defibrillator would have saved him, but there is every chance that it could have. That is why I am passionate about defibrillators, expanding their use, and getting them into as many communities as possible. All forms of public transport should carry them—many already do—and they should be available in sports clubs, supermarkets, high streets and any public space in which they could be urgently needed. As I said earlier, it is important that we get more defibrillators in areas of need. That is absolutely vital.

I completely agree with Jenni Minto’s comments on planning regulations for new buildings in relation to defibrillator cabinets and scrapping VAT on defibrillators. Surely that is not too much to ask.

Defibrillators are not expensive, and they are easy to maintain. They are also easy to operate. I witnessed that during a demonstration by the St John Ambulance service in the village of Torrance, in my constituency. The St John Ambulance service and other charitable organisations that help to save lives throughout Scotland provide advice, training and funding to communities that wish to install a public access defibrillator. Such organisations can give vital training in CPR, which, in conjunction with the use of a defibrillator, will give sufferers the absolute best chance of survival. They can work with people to establish the best location for a defibrillator in their local area, give advice on fundraising and help with the costs.

Every minute without cardiopulmonary resuscitation and defibrillation reduces the chance of survival by up to 10 per cent, which is why it is so important that the Ambulance Service has quick access to defibrillators. Registration on the Circuit is essential.

As we heard, there are around 135,000 people in Scotland who have survived a heart attack. Although survivor rates are generally high, when it comes to the 3,200 or so out-of-hospital cardiac arrests in Scotland each year, the survival rate is only one in 10.

Currently, fewer than 5 per cent of people who experience an out-of-hospital cardiac arrest receive bystander defibrillation. The rate will increase as more defibrillators become available and, crucially, more people have the confidence to use them. I hope that this debate will help in that regard.

We should remember that the locations of tens of thousands of defibrillators are currently not known by the Ambulance Service. Knowledge of a defibrillator’s location can make the difference between life and death for a person who has suffered a cardiac arrest.

18:51  

I am grateful to Jenni Minto for lodging the motion. She made a powerful speech—as we have learned to expect from Ms Minto in this chamber—and she used her personal experience to make a powerful point, from which we can all learn. It was a brilliant tribute to Carl Reavey to tell his story in the chamber, so that we can all learn from it.

The debate gives us an opportunity to raise awareness, more generally, of the importance of defibrillator use and registration. I commend the work of the British Heart Foundation, the Scottish Ambulance Service and other partners who are involved in developing the Circuit, which is an important tool to support our aim of ensuring that defibrillators are as accessible as possible in times of need.

I also thank the many other organisations and individuals who have taken and continue to take action to improve survival from cardiac arrest in Scotland. That includes people who deliver CPR training and anyone who takes up that training—more than 640,000 people across Scotland have done so since 2015. It includes people who raise funds for the placement of a defibrillator in their community, the emergency services who respond to instances of out-of-hospital cardiac arrest and, of course, anyone out there who has stepped in to help when witnessing someone experience a cardiac arrest.

I also take this opportunity to congratulate the heartstart group in Ms Minto’s constituency, Argyll and Bute, which recently won a Scottish health award for its commitment to delivering CPR training in schools, workplaces and community settings.

Since Save a Life for Scotland, of which the Scottish Government is a key member, published its first strategy in 2015, there has been a significant increase in the number of people who survive a cardiac arrest in Scotland. In 2015, around one in 20 people survived; the rate now is one in 10. That is incredible progress, of which we should be extremely proud.

However, we know that we can do more to save lives. That is why the Save a Life for Scotland partnership refreshed its strategy this year. The partners have now set the aim of increasing survival to 15 per cent by 2026. We have seen the survival rate increase from 5 to 10 per cent; now we are aiming for 15 per cent.

I draw members’ attention to two important points about the strategy. The first is its focus on addressing inequalities—a number of members raised that issue. The second is its focus on the importance of increasing the defibrillation rate.

Although we rightly celebrate the improvements in survival since 2015, we are acutely aware that some people are less likely to survive than others. We know that people who live in more economically deprived areas face substantial inequalities. They are more likely to have a cardiac arrest and, when they do, they are less likely to survive than people who live in less deprived areas.

We also know that people who live in rural areas are less likely to survive than those who live in urban areas.

We want to tackle those inequalities. That is why the refreshed strategy embeds a focus on working collaboratively with such communities and delivering targeted work around awareness and training.

As has been highlighted throughout the debate, the role that prompt defibrillation plays in the chain of survival is absolutely key. As part of the overall aim to increase survival, the refresh strategy seeks to increase the number of out-of-hospital cardiac arrests that have a defibrillator applied before the ambulance service arrives from 8 to 20 per cent. First, we are going to improve bystander confidence in using them. Save a Life for Scotland is already working to achieve that through better embedding defibrillator use into awareness-raising campaigns and CPR training across Scotland.

We need to ensure that defibrillators are optimally placed and that they are as accessible as possible. On the issue that Mr Lumsden raised on access codes for defibrillator cabinets, we would thoroughly recommend that defibrillator guardians follow the advice of the Resuscitation Council UK and consider placing their defibrillators in an unlocked cabinet to make them as accessible as possible. RCUK highlights that, thankfully,

“Despite widespread use of unlocked cabinets ... instances of theft and vandalism ... are relatively uncommon.”

Let me outline how the registration of defibrillators is crucial. First, in an incident of cardiac arrest, it is important that the Scottish Ambulance Service call handler can quickly identify whether there is a defibrillator nearby and then direct a bystander to collect it. Then, they can talk them through applying it. That is only possible if the defibrillator is registered and therefore visible to the call handler. That is reason number 1 to register a defibrillator: it increases the likelihood that it will be used if a cardiac arrest occurs nearby.

The second reason is that the registration of defibrillators will enable us to have an overview of the defibrillator footprint right across Scotland. We know that there are many defibrillators out there but, as many members have said, we could be better at ensuring that they are placed in areas where cardiac arrests are most likely to occur.

That brings me back to the importance of addressing inequalities. We know that most incidents of cardiac arrest occur in areas that are less likely to have extensive defibrillator coverage. The registration of all defibrillators in Scotland would provide a wealth of evidence to support people and organisations in making informed decisions about where to place their life-saving device. That would help to ensure that their generous actions would be most likely to have the impact intended.

Rather than pursuing legislative routes to mandate where defibrillators go, for example in new buildings, we are really keen to continue the collaborative, partnership approach to improving outcomes from cardiac arrest—an approach that has been so successful to date.

In relation to building regulations, however, we are carrying out a review of permitted development rights, which involves removing the need to apply for planning permission for certain forms of development. As part of the review, we have committed to considering the case for introducing new or extended PDR for a wide range of development types, including defibrillator cabinets. At the moment, it is necessary to apply for planning permission to place a defibrillator in an external area of a building, but we are consulting on whether that requirement should be removed. That consultation has been affected by the pandemic, but it remains part of our work plan, and it will be published in due course.

I am more than happy to write to the UK Government on the issue of VAT. I know from an answer to a question in Westminster recently that there is already a VAT relief scheme for the purchase of automated external defibrillators—AEDs—which covers local authority purchase, eligible charities and the NHS. The UK Government stated in its answer that it keeps taxes under review. Far be it from me to defend the UK Government, but there is a scheme there. I will absolutely lend my weight to anyone else in the chamber who wishes to write to see whether we can get that scheme extended to all defibrillator purchases.

We have seen significant progress in survival from cardiac arrest in Scotland over the past five years. That is a testament to many individuals and organisations, and it is a reminder of the many tragedies that have led people to campaign, as we have heard this evening. I thank them for their work to date, and I look forward to working together to continue progress.

I reiterate my thanks to the British Heart Foundation, the Scottish Ambulance Service and other partners for the development of the Circuit. Finally, I offer my thanks to every defibrillator guardian in Scotland. Your actions play a vital part in helping to save lives from cardiac arrest. I finish by asking: have you registered yours yet?

On a point of order, Presiding Officer. My apologies: I was so excited that we had cross-party support at Aberdeen City Council that I forgot to refer members to my entry in the register of members’ interests. I am still a serving councillor at Aberdeen City Council.

Thank you, Ms Dunbar, that is on the record. On that consensual note, I close the meeting.

Meeting closed at 19:00.