Official Report

Good morning. Before we start general question time, I remind members that, at 12 noon, building users will be invited to observe one minute’s silence to remember those who sadly lost their lives or were affected by the Grenfell tower tragedy one year ago. I will ask everyone present in the chamber, including people in the public gallery, to join me in observing the silence when we reach 12 noon. I will stop the question session a minute or so before 12 noon, and there will be a short pause afterwards before we move to First Minister’s question time.

I ask those in the chamber to join me in observing one minute’s silence for those who lost their lives and were affected by the Grenfell tower tragedy one year ago.

Thank you.

Before we turn to First Minister’s questions, I invite members to join me in welcoming to the gallery Andriy Parubiy, Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada, the Parliament of the Ukraine. [Applause.]

I ask the public who are leaving the gallery to do so quietly.

The next item of business is a members’ business debate on motion S5M-11398, in the name of Alex Rowley, on the impact of Mossmorran flaring. The debate will be concluded without any question being put.

Motion debated,

That the Parliament notes the concerns that it considers are being expressed by growing numbers of Fife residents regarding the increased incidence of flaring at the facility operated by ExxonMobil Chemical Limited and Shell at Mossmorran, by Cowdenbeath, the most recent being between 23 and 25 March 2018; understands that data provided by SEPA shows that ExxonMobil has flared 165,861 tonnes of gas in 670 events between 2008 and 2016, while Shell has flared 21,162 tonnes in 753 events; further understands that the two major incidents in June and October 2017 are under investigation by SEPA with a view to possible enforcement action, and regrets the impact that it believes these episodes are having on the surrounding communities.

I begin by thanking those members who signed my motion to enable the debate to take place today and the Labour business manager for agreeing time for the debate.

I was a teenager when planning was first sought for the Mossmorran petrochemical plant in Fife and when the work on the site first began. There was a view locally that many jobs would be created, not just in the construction of the site, but also because of the great boon for the local economy of the downstream work that would follow, as well as the spin-off opportunities for new industry in agriculture being fed from the site.

It is true that the plant’s construction brought plenty of work and the local economy has benefited, but nothing like to the extent that was envisaged by those who were the strongest advocates of the plant in those early days.

Throughout the years, concerns have continued to be expressed about the chemicals that come from the site into the air that we breathe locally. Over many years, I have worked with the former chair of the Cowdenbeath area committee, Councillor Willie Clarke, and have brought NHS Fife to the table to discuss the concerns. However, I believe that it is fair to say that, for much of that period, the community has not lived in fear about the safety of the plant itself—that is, until the past few years, when the episodes of unplanned flaring have increased at a pace that is causing major concern for the communities around the plant and much further afield. That is the key point that I want to make today and the key point that I have made in correspondence with the Cabinet Secretary for Environment, Climate Change and Land Reform. Most important of all, it is the key point that local people are making in growing numbers. We have lost confidence that the plant is safe.

Why has the situation come about? Every time that there is an episode of unplanned flaring, that means that something has broken in the plant. Flaring is a safety mechanism when the plant is unable to run, so, when the flaring is unplanned, that means that something has gone wrong. I do not know how many members have witnessed the flare of Mossmorran. At night time, the pulsating orange glow illuminates the surrounding towns. Ironically, a flaring incident took place during earth hour this year, lighting up the sky of Fife when, all round the world, people were turning off their lights to show solidarity with the aim of protecting our environment. I was told by someone driving past the plant during a flaring incident that they felt as if they were driving past Mordor.

The issue is not just that the sky is lit up at night. The levels of vibration and noise are very frightening for residents. I refer members to the website of the Mossmorran action group, where they can read a summary of 169 issues reported by local residents. Those include vibration and humming; sleep disturbance; irritable throat, eyes and skin; breathing-related issues; excessive noise levels; headaches and migraines; chemical smells; stress and anxiety; pain and ringing in the ears; and soot and particulate matter.

A lady from Lumphinnans contacted me yesterday when she saw in the local press that we were having the debate today. She wanted me to point out that the ornaments in her house visibly shake. A resident from Kelty recently described it to me as being like a helicopter landing in the back garden. Last June, on a beautiful sunny afternoon, I was in shock as I saw thick black smoke belch from the top of a stack and form a massive black cloud that sat over the top of the houses in Lochgelly, Glencraig, Crosshill, Lochore and Ballingry. It cannot be right, and it is not right, that people in those communities are having to go through those experiences and are now living in fear of the Mossmorran chemical plant that is on their doorstep. That is why I, along with many other politicians and local groups, have been demanding action.

A final warning was issued by the Scottish Environment Protection Agency in relation to a flaring event that took place in June last year, yet, following that incident, there were unplanned flaring events in October, March and again in May. To be clear, those events are not short episodes of a few hours; they are usually continuous and last for days on end. It is simply not acceptable for people to have to put up with that for so long, with little being done to address the problem at its core.

One of the key questions is: why does the plant keep breaking down? It is a 30-year-old plant, and we need to know what the issues are and how they can be addressed. The fact that breakdowns and therefore unplanned flaring events are increasing in number as the plant gets older must be addressed. That question must be answered by the operator of the plant, the public authorities and, ultimately, the Government.

Six days ago, SEPA announced that the operators of the petrochemical facilities that are run at the Fife ethylene plant by Shell and ExxonMobil are to face an inquiry, in a joint investigation by SEPA and the Health and Safety Executive. That has been welcomed across the communities of Fife, but we need to know that there will be transparency. SEPA has said:

“compliance with Scotland’s environmental rules is simply non-negotiable.”

The people of Fife need the confidence that that is the case and confidence in the safety of their surroundings and the place in which they live.

I thank Alex Rowley for bringing the motion to the chamber and for the opportunity to discuss the impact of Mossmorran flaring on our local communities.

Mossmorran is one of Europe’s largest ethylene plants. The plant, which opened in 1986, was the first to be specifically designed to use natural gas liquids from the North Sea as feedstock. The Fife ethylene plant at Mossmorran is an extremely important asset to the community and the wider Fife area, and it is an asset to Scotland’s energy industry, as it has an annual capacity of 830,000 tonnes of ethylene and it contributes more than £20 million a year to the Scottish economy.

Mossmorran is also one of Europe’s biggest and most modern ethylene plants, and it is among Fife’s largest employers, with 170 employees and 50 core contractors. Its highly skilled apprenticeship scheme has led to many ex-apprentices going on to join the workforce. More than 70 per cent of employees live within six miles of the plant, so the economic benefits that return to the local area from the highly skilled workforce at Mossmorran are obvious.

I want to highlight Fife ethylene plant’s long-standing and extensive programme of community support and engagement, including sponsorship of the safe drive, stay alive roadshow, which is attended by more than 30,000 pupils; various theatre and lunch trips for some 1,000 senior citizens; and invaluable support for Energy Action Scotland.

However, we are here today because of recent flaring incidents that have impacted greatly on local communities, the effects of which should not be underestimated and cannot be ignored. Although flaring is a vital feature that ensures the on-going safety of the plant, the noise, vibration and bright lights that are emitted during unplanned incidents—which have increased in frequency over the past year—have caused much alarm and distress among local residents. The light from the elevated flare can be seen for many miles from the plant.

Fife ethylene plant seeks to minimise the occurrence of such incidents as much as possible, and it has set about making a series of improvements following the elevated flaring in June 2017. Improvements in maintenance processes, continued investment in new technology and research into improvements to the flaring system through the use of best technology have all been undertaken with a view to alleviating the issues of unplanned flaring.

Regrettably, such problems will not be solved overnight, as recent further incidents have shown us. For that reason, I welcome the recent extensive discussions between local residents, politicians, environmental groups and regulators. I am pleased that there has been continued engagement from ExxonMobil and Shell, as the solution to the problems will be achieved only through true multipartnership working.

Once again, I thank Alex Rowley for bringing the motion to the chamber and those who are involved in the efforts to reduce the impact of flaring incidents, including the Mossmorran action group, which I thank for rallying the local community together, organising extremely well-attended meetings, informing residents of developments, taking on their concerns and ensuring that the issues that are raised continue to have a high profile, thereby putting pressure on regulatory bodies to investigate.

I thank SEPA and the Health and Safety Executive for their commitment to their joint investigation, and I thank the Mossmorran plant, whose apology to myself and the local community is very much appreciated. I am extremely pleased by the co-ordination of relevant stakeholders in responding to the incidents. Co-operation from all groups is crucial to mitigate the environmental and social impacts of unplanned flaring, as well as to prevent further incidences.

The plant has had a consistently high health and safety and environmental performance, and a long-standing history of compliance. I am confident that by working together we can find a resolution to the problems.

I am delighted to take part in the debate, and I congratulate Alex Rowley for allowing us the opportunity to have it.

The Mossmorran community has lived alongside the plant for decades, but over the past three years, there seem to have been concerns that the safety of the plant is becoming more problematic. I was delighted to learn last week that the Mossmorran chemical plant is to have a top-level joint investigation by the Health and Safety Executive and SEPA. The inquiry was announced after SEPA had to issue a final warning to do with flaring that took place 12 months ago. At the time, SEPA described that as “preventable and unacceptable”. Obviously, residents within a huge radius of the complex are very distressed that that flaring lasted for nine days. As has been said, it sounds like a jet engine to those who live next to it.

We understand that flaring is part of the plant’s safety programme, but many local residents have been kept awake and are very anxious about what is happening in their community. We have already heard from Alex Rowley about the noise, the pollution and the problems that individuals have to deal with. They are not able to sleep, and distress is caused to children and animals that live in the area.

The plant’s monitoring is limited. The air quality in the surrounding area has been talked about in the past, and there is real concern because we have no real idea about what levels of carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide and other pollutants there are in the air adjacent to the plant when flaring takes place.

More important, what are the short-term and long-term implications for people’s health? As one of the partners, NHS Fife has been actively involved in seeing what is happening in the community. There are concerns about that. SEPA has acknowledged that we have to work together to try to resolve that.

We have already heard that there was flaring a year ago; other flarings took place in October and March. As I said, there has been a plant at the location for 33 years, and it has not broken down much. However, things have happened recently. As I have said, the flaring has to be considered.

We have been told that a pump has caused some of the flaring over the past few months and in the past year. That is potentially down to maintenance of the plant, which is now being questioned. People are right to do that. Are the companies involved cutting corners? Questions are being asked.

There have been public meetings. The plant did not even send representatives to the first public meeting that I went to. That absolutely enraged the community, and it was right to be enraged. ExxonMobil and Shell have worked in the community—that has already been talked about—but the action group, councillors, MSPs and MPs have got the issue up and running in the past few months. I give credit to everybody who has achieved that. Without that, people would be quite tight lipped about what was going on in the facility, so no one would be aware of what was going on.

In conclusion, I say that I am delighted that SEPA is now carefully investigating the plant and that the Health and Safety Executive is taking more interest in it. The community deserves nothing less. The community has seen cross-party support, which will protect it in the future. That is what we are here to do: we are here to ensure that the community is protected. However, the community is fearful, and it is up to all of us to ensure that that is not the case and that we protect it in the future.

I am pleased to take part in this important debate, and I thank Alex Rowley for bringing it to the chamber. I acknowledge the consistent interest that he and other members from around the chamber have taken in the issue over the years, and I recognise the work of former MSP Helen Eadie, who was elected to represent Cowdenbeath in 1999. We all still miss her. She worked hard, endeavouring to represent the concerns of her constituents about the ExxonMobil and Shell plant in Mossmorran, and in particular about unplanned flaring. I also recognise the work of local people, community councils and the action group in raising concerns and working with the operators, SEPA, Fife Council and other partners to try to address concerns.

As the motion identifies, the past year has seen heightened concerns. I welcome the joint investigation by the Health and Safety Executive and SEPA following the recent unplanned flaring incidents at the plant. Those bodies have a crucial role to play. It is very concerning that SEPA has served final warnings on the operators, ExxonMobil and Shell, and has described prolonged flaring in June last year as “preventable and unacceptable”.

In response to that, the HSE will be serving operating permit variations next week, which will require the companies to strengthen controls, which will have an impact on noise and vibration coming from any future flaring. Those measures have been long awaited by residents in the area, who have complained about the increased disruption that they have experienced from the site. Some people are saying that the noise levels, vibrations and light pollution keep them awake at night. Concerns have also been raised about the impact on health—in particular, on the health of people who have existing health conditions, including lung conditions and chronic illness that can be exacerbated by interrupted sleep and aggravation from air pollution.

Communities withstood unplanned flaring in October last year, and in March and May this year, so I am pleased that the HSE and SEPA are saying that they will listen carefully to community calls for a root-and-branch review that will examine issues at the plant.

It is important that the work that they undertake—the joint investigation between SEPA and the HSE and the review of operating permits—is robust and transparent so that the local community can rightly be informed about the flaring incidents in October, March and May. There is also still the potential for enforcement action in relation to those recent incidents, which remain under investigation.

The recent joint meetings that were organised by Lesley Laird MP with key stakeholders, including many MSPs who are in the chamber this afternoon, local politicians, community groups and representatives from ExxonMobil, Shell and SEPA have been a positive development. The meetings have been an opportunity to discuss concerns about the plant, to make clear our concerns to operators and to work towards solutions.

Alex Rowley covered many of the key issues, but there are a few areas that I would like to highlight. First, because it opened in 1985, there are issues to do with the age and condition of the plant, but that cannot be an excuse. In its final warning letter in April, SEPA said that failures in maintenance practices had led to extended periods of flaring. That is not good enough, so the plant must be brought up to a higher standard. In the recent meeting, Shell said that it is investigating what is the best available technology. That work must be prioritised. ExxonMobil said that it is preparing an action plan with a timescale for elevated flaring to end. That must be expedited. Those issues must be addressed if the plant is to have a future.

Secondly, communication with the local community must be improved. Over the years, the plant has had a working group that involves community councils, but it needs to recognise that communication and engagement methods are changing and that there needs to be more proactive communication with the impacted communities.

Thirdly, I recognise the level of compliance with applicable laws and regulations, but we must not be complacent and we must be vigilant and thorough, so I support calls for increased air quality monitoring in the area.

I thank Alex Rowley for securing the debate. I also thank the Mossmorran action group, which has given a strong voice to communities who for decades have lived in the shadow of the plant.

It is about time that we listened and acted, because over the years there has been a collective failure of Fife Council, SEPA and NHS Fife to fully recognise the suffering of communities and then to hold the operators to account.

Why has it taken years for noise monitoring inside homes to be carried out? Why is it acceptable that families face sleepless nights, with only the cold comfort of the excuse that flaring is a safety measure? There has been no effective representative voice so far. It is all very well having a community liaison group handing out a bit of charity funding, but not if it is at the expense of proper scrutiny.

The air pollution monitoring group’s remit is too narrow and has been hampered by lack of robust data. Anyway, air pollution is only one part of the problem: the multiple effects of vibration, noise, and light and air pollution are destroying people’s quality of life.

I welcome the fact that, after our recent meeting, the Minister for Public Health and Sport has written to SEPA asking it to monitor vibration, noise and light pollution inside homes. There has at least been acknowledgement of the issue by SEPA.

However, I am not impressed with the response from NHS Fife this week to my letter asking it to investigate the health impacts of flaring. It is passing the buck and claiming that it is not its responsibility, and that the sample size around Mossmorran is too small to investigate. Try telling families that are kept awake for days on end that their suffering is not statistically significant. I ask the Scottish Government to take leadership and to commission a body that can study the impacts. I am sure that there are many people living in the shadows of other plants in Scotland who could boost the sample size.

In recent months, I have spoken to a number of former employees of the ExxonMobil side of the operation at Mossmorran. They have all told me of a corner-cutting culture at ExxonMobil that is stuck in the 1990s. However, a different approach seems to be in place at Shell, which goes beyond simple legal compliance.

It is clear that the increase in flaring has happened because ExxonMobil will not shut the plant down for longer periods to allow for proper maintenance and investment. The company’s objective of keeping the plant running at all costs and at all times is leading to problems such as the tripping out of safety systems during maintenance, which leads to longer and more frequent flaring incidents. ExxonMobil is, in effect, externalising its maintenance shut-down costs on surrounding communities. Sleep is being stolen to pay for shareholder profit.

I demand that, in their joint investigation of the plant, SEPA and HSE look at the critical issue of planned shut downs. Disruptive flaring can and should be minimised. If that requires a rebuild of the flaring infrastructure, the operators should see that as an investment in the plant’s future.

SEPA must give communities confidence that a final warning is just that—it should do what it says on the tin. The operators must get the message that they cannot rack up environmental breaches as though they were parking tickets. Repeated breaches are not a simple operational cost to be absorbed: this is about consent, and communities do not give their consent to having their lives ruined. There needs to be action: Mossmorran needs to be shut for proper maintenance, or it needs to be forced to shut.

I echo members’ thanks to Alex Rowley for securing the debate, and I thank the MSPs and MPs who have been assiduous in responding to people in the local community, many of whom remain concerned about what the future holds, as we have heard.

Whether one lives in the immediate vicinity of Mossmorran, in other areas of Fife or Kinross-shire or across the water in Edinburgh, Mossmorran is well recognised as the very large, gaseous ball of orange in the sky—or, sometimes, heavy black smoke, as Alex Rowley said. It is an alarming sight at times, and, notwithstanding the recent announcement of a joint investigation by SEPA and the Health and Safety Executive, it remains the principal focus of concern for many communities in the area.

Several members who have spoken in the debate have more experience than I have of the recent public meetings. The majority of the constituents who have written to me have cited transparency as the main issue. They want to know the details of the ageing plant. They especially want to know whether there are fundamental failings in the plant’s structure; why the pump failed; what tests have been undertaken with regard to air pollution and health risks and what the results were; and who knew what and when in terms of decision making.

Those are perfectly understandable and legitimate questions. For example, when SEPA says that an unplanned flaring incident was preventable, we need to know exactly what evidence supports that view, why the two companies were unable to deal satisfactorily with the concern at the time and why, since then, it appears to have taken considerable time for more facts to emerge. That obfuscation has served only to heighten tensions.

Moreover, the noise and air pollution that members have talked about, as well as the arrival, on occasions, of several emergency vehicles, give local people little cause for comfort.

Therefore, for me, full transparency is the priority. We need that as soon as possible. We need not only an independent and comprehensive investigation into what has gone wrong in the past but safety assurances about the present and especially about the future.

I have no doubt that there is a delicate balance to be struck between ensuring that there is a safe production environment and ensuring that Mossmorran’s position as Europe’s largest ethylene plant can be maintained and enhanced, not least because it is important in supporting the delivery of the maximum potential of the North Sea’s resources, which is where the tensions have been in recent months.

There have not always been clear lines of responsibility or—just as important—clear lines of accountability. Although both ExxonMobil and Shell claim that they are working hard in that regard, including by providing daily updates, there still appears to be mistrust within the local community. Addressing that is perhaps the most important priority, and I think that that will come down to the provision of clarity over legal responsibilities and exactly what obligations the two companies have in the context of SEPA’s final warning.

SEPA seems content that the new operating permit variations that will be served on ExxonMobil and Shell will be the necessary means of enforcing renewed legal obligations on the two companies. That is good, but there remains the statement from both companies that they believe that they already comply with the legal requirements. Of course, that raises the question of what would happen and who would be proven correct should the matter be taken to the courts.

This is a deeply worrying issue for the whole of the local community, not just because of the safety concerns but because, hitherto, the relevant answers have not all been forthcoming. That must change, and I hope that this debate will assist.

I thank Alex Rowley for initiating this debate on a matter that I know has been of significant concern to local residents and to the constituency MSP, Annabelle Ewing.

I also acknowledge Claire Baker’s mention of Helen Eadie. I was the convener of the Health Committee between 2003 and 2007, when Helen Eadie was a member of that committee. I assure those members who might not have been here at that time that Helen was an absolute terrier when she took up an issue and Parliament is the poorer for her absence.

A number of other members highlighted specific areas of concern in connection with this particular topic. Alex Rowley rightly highlighted the concerns and fears of residents. I recognise the significant impact that incidents such as these can have on people’s quality of life. The level of disruption that people have experienced is simply not acceptable—it is important to acknowledge that from the outset.

Mossmorran is, of course, one of Scotland’s largest and most important industrial sites. It makes a significant contribution to the economy, but it is important that it does so in a way that is sustainable and that minimises the potential for adverse impacts on the local community and the environment more generally. The site is regulated under the Pollution Prevention and Control (Scotland) Regulations 2012, which means that the plant requires a permit to operate, and that permit sets strict controls on a whole range of environmental issues.

Regulation of such sites is a matter for SEPA, the independent regulator that grants and varies permits on the basis of expert analysis and guidance. I am reassured by the strong and consistent message coming from SEPA that compliance with permit conditions is an absolute requirement, not simply an option. As Alex Rowley flagged up, SEPA issued final warning letters earlier this year. SEPA has committed to reviewing the permits of ExxonMobil and Shell at the Mossmorran complex, and permit variations are due to be served on both operators today.

Analysis of the information that was gathered during recent flaring events will be considered by SEPA when it decides what course of action to take. It would not be appropriate for me to prejudge what enforcement action SEPA should take, but it is reasonable for residents to expect SEPA to take effective action to address non-compliance when it occurs. I am aware that the SEPA chief executive, Terry A’Hearn, met local partners last week to set out, face to face, the action that SEPA is taking, and I know that that was a welcome development. That action includes launching a joint investigation with the Health and Safety Executive into the issues that have arisen at the plant, which will allow for co-ordinated action to address the causes of the flaring problem.

Mark Ruskell mentioned the recent meeting that he had with Aileen Campbell, the Minister for Public Health and Sport, to address specific concerns about the public health impacts of flaring. The minister has subsequently written to SEPA’s chief executive, asking for further information on the work that is being done to assess the public health issues.

A previous independent modelling study that was carried out on behalf of SEPA assessed the impact of emissions during flaring and concluded that the long-term and short-term predicted concentrations of pollutants were well within air quality standards for the protection of human health. However, I appreciate that noise and vibration issues remain of particular concern to local residents. As I said, the Minister for Public Health and Sport has now written to SEPA, seeking reassurance on those public health issues.

Today has shown the gravity that the Scottish Parliament attaches to environmental performance at industrial sites. I emphasise to members that the Scottish Government has set a strict framework for the regulation of industrial sites and takes the recent situation at Mossmorran extremely seriously. Parliament can be assured that we will continue to work closely with SEPA to understand the steps that it is taking to ensure compliance at the site and to address the concerns of local residents.

The next item of business is a statement by Michael Matheson on human trafficking and the first annual progress report. The cabinet secretary will take questions at the end of his statement, so there should be no interventions or interruptions.

I am sure that all members in the chamber agree that human trafficking is a terrible crime and an appalling abuse of human rights. It targets the most vulnerable, across the globe and here in Scotland, and the impact on victims is devastating.

This Parliament unanimously passed the Human Trafficking and Exploitation (Scotland) Act 2015, and I laid the first trafficking and exploitation strategy before Parliament in May 2017. The strategy was the result of extensive joint working and consultation, including through the cross-party group on human trafficking, and it reflected the views of victims.

During this first year of strategy implementation, we have continued to work in partnership with victims, with support organisations such as the trafficking awareness-raising alliance project, Migrant Help and the Scottish guardianship service, and with other bodies including the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities, Police Scotland, the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service and the Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner. Significant progress has been made and is set out in the first annual report, which is published today. I am grateful to all partners who have contributed to that work.

The strategy sets out a clear structure, with actions falling under four broad headings: the identification of victims and supporting them to safety and recovery; identifying perpetrators and disrupting their activity; addressing the conditions that foster trafficking and exploitation; and supporting child trafficking victims.

There is widespread interest in human trafficking, and guidance has been developed to offer accurate and consistent advice for both professional and public audiences. The advice covers what human trafficking is, its extent in Scotland, signs to look out for, the impact on victims, how to report concerns and how to access further information.

Police Scotland and partners have created an e-learning training resource for public sector workers who may come into contact with victims. That has been published on DVD and distributed through Scottish Government funding.

To raise public awareness, a standard presentation has been developed, drawing on material from Migrant Help, TARA, Police Scotland and the Scottish Government, which will be available for use by community groups and anyone with an interest.

Identifying potential victims is the first step but it is vital that, following that, effective victim-centred support is in place. Last year, I announced our intention to extend the minimum period of support from 45 days to 90 days. Following unanimous agreement by the Justice Committee, the change came into force in April 2018, alongside identical provision for victims of slavery, servitude and forced or compulsory labour. The 90-day period is double the minimum support period in the rest of the United Kingdom. We have backed that up with substantial increases in funding for Migrant Help and TARA—groups that support adult trafficking victims in Scotland—as well as providing more funding for psychological trauma support through the Anchor Centre service.

Child victims of trafficking are supported through child protection services and the strategy includes a section covering the needs of child victims. In January, section 12 of the Human Trafficking and Exploitation (Scotland) Act 2015 was implemented, ensuring that where doubts exist as to whether a victim is under 18, it must be assumed they are a child until their age is established. That will ensure that the individual receives immediate age-appropriate support. Following a process of consultation and development with partners, we published guidance in March to support social workers and others undertaking age assessments of potential child victims of trafficking.

Alongside the work to improve support to victims, Police Scotland has led on improvements to the identification and disruption of trafficking. In March, the first convictions under the 2015 act were secured, with one individual sentenced to 10 years’ imprisonment and another to seven years’ imprisonment for offences relating to slavery, servitude and forced or compulsory labour.

The 2015 act provided for two new court orders: trafficking and exploitation prevention orders, and trafficking and exploitation risk orders. Those provisions came into force during 2017, and both individuals who have been convicted under the act were also made subject to prevention orders, reducing their ability to further exploit others.

The national human trafficking unit in Police Scotland has co-ordinated intelligence-led operations throughout police divisions over the past year, focusing on labour exploitation, sexual exploitation, child trafficking, domestic servitude, illegal border activity and Romanian and Vietnamese traffickers. Those operations uncovered a range of offences, including criminal activity in respect of drugs, sexual exploitation and brothel keeping.

Police Scotland and partners have undertaken joint days of action, executing warrants, disrupting illegal activity and supporting victims to safety with the assistance of TARA. Police Scotland works closely with European law enforcement colleagues and has arrangements in place through Europol to share relevant information with law enforcement agencies right across Europe. That includes joint investigations with Romanian police, for example, focusing on individuals involved in trafficking women for sexual exploitation. Police Scotland has also benefited from the secondment of Romanian police officers to support human trafficking operations.

It is not enough to disrupt trafficking when it occurs or to support victims after the fact. The vision behind the strategy is to eliminate trafficking and exploitation and, to do that, we need to address the root causes and build a society where trafficking cannot flourish. Businesses and our wider communities have an important role in that work. From August to October 2017, we ran a national awareness-raising campaign, featuring a short film that was screened during advert breaks on television, and digital adverts via social media and smartphones.

Over that time, the modern slavery helpline recorded a significant increase in contact from Scotland, from two potential victims per week to 10 per week. To assess the impact of the media campaign, a public survey was undertaken in March of this year, which found that awareness of trafficking had increased. Of those surveyed, 87 per cent said that they would report trafficking suspicions to Police Scotland, which was a marked increase from 80 per cent last year. We are working with businesses in Scotland and have established a corporate group that is looking into the provision of guidance and training; raising awareness and sharing best practice; and improving the quality of slavery and human trafficking statements.

I am happy to report the significant progress that has been made in implementation of the strategy one year on from publication. That has been achieved through joint work by the Scottish Government, COSLA, Police Scotland, support organisations, businesses and a wide range of other bodies, and it will have a positive impact on victims and on efforts to combat trafficking both in Scotland and further afield.

That is good progress, but there is much more to do. The report sets out key priorities for the next year, which include developing communication channels to raise awareness and trust among victims, and further work to engage and support businesses in tackling trafficking. We will also make progress on the outstanding provisions in the 2015 act. On the duty to notify, an implementation trial is under way with the City of Edinburgh Council and we are looking to establish a further trial with other relevant bodies. We are also working to ensure that the digital platform that is currently being developed for the UK national referral mechanism will work with the duty to notify in Scotland. On independent child trafficking guardians, we plan to consult in the autumn on proposed roles and responsibilities, and the existing Scottish guardianship service will continue to work until the new statutory arrangements are in place.

A further progress report will be published one year from now, in line with the commitment that is set out in the strategy.

The cabinet secretary will now take questions on the issues raised in his statement. I intend to allow around 20 minutes for questions, and then we will move on to the next item of business.

I thank the cabinet secretary for providing advance sight of his statement. He asserted at the outset that

“human trafficking is a terrible crime and an appalling abuse of human rights.”

Conservative MSPs have no hesitation in agreeing with that, and we endorse his choice of words.

The problems that the legislation and the report seek to address are a scourge on society. Therefore, any attempt to forensically analyse and address human trafficking, and to rescue victims from it, is hugely welcome. I welcome the progress that has been made but, as the cabinet secretary said, there is more to do.

The cabinet secretary said that he will “make progress” on the outstanding provisions in the 2015 act—those being the duty on public authorities to notify and the provision of independent child trafficking guardians. Those steps are crucial and we cannot afford any unwarranted delay. I push the cabinet secretary to provide further detail on his target date for the commencement of those provisions.

The report makes several positive references to security and law enforcement across the UK, such as the development of a joint digital platform for the national referral mechanism and the duty to notify. Indeed, intelligence sharing is a key outcome in the strategy. Does the cabinet secretary agree that, in order to tackle the evil of human trafficking, it is vital that cross-border co-operation continues seamlessly, and that anything that could disrupt that collaboration must be avoided?

I am grateful for Liam Kerr’s comments. Let me address the specific issues that he has raised.

In my statement, I mentioned our plans on the duty to notify. A pilot is in place with the City of Edinburgh Council, and it has been in operation for several months. There are some issues around the number of cases that have come from the existing pilot, and we are looking to conduct another pilot with a different agency—potentially, Border Force—to ensure that the duty to notify operates effectively. The purpose of that work through the pilots is to ensure that the system operates effectively and is being utilised properly.

Alongside that, we are working with the Home Office on the new digital platform to gather information and ensure that we have a single dataset. The information that we gather through the duty to notify will also be submitted to the system that gathers data from the national referral mechanism. There have been some delays with the procurement of that digital platform, which has had an impact on taking forward some of the work. However, we are working closely with the Home Office to ensure that we make progress.

I would like to have made more progress on independent guardians than we have done. We intend to have a consultation in autumn specifically to get clarity on roles and responsibilities, so that there is no uncertainty between the role of local authorities and the role of the independent guardian.

Liam Kerr mentioned intelligence sharing. Currently, we have very effective intelligence sharing to tackle serious and organised crime and human trafficking. I agree that we should ensure that no unnecessary barriers get in the way of the sharing of data and intelligence, as and when appropriate.

However, the member will be aware that Brexit is one of the biggest risks that we face in intelligence sharing. We are about to lose our full membership of Europol, which is one of the main hubs for the sharing of such information across all 28 European Union states. Alongside that, we will potentially lose access to the Schengen information system II—SIS II—which, again, allows us to identify markers relating to individuals who might be moving around Europe and whom the police might want to apprehend. As I set out in our report, there are real risks to security and justice matters if we lose access to European intelligence and information. There has been a lack of engagement from the Home Office on the matter. It is simply unacceptable that we are creating such risks and are making so little progress.

I agree with Liam Kerr’s comments on intelligence sharing. I ask him to use his good offices in the Conservative Party to ensure that the Home Office and the UK Government engage with us properly on such issues, to ensure that there are no gaps once we have left the EU.

I thank the cabinet secretary for prior sight of his statement. Most importantly, I fully agree that human trafficking is an appalling abuse of human rights.

I welcome the report, which is an extremely useful update on the progress that is being made on this vital issue. It is important that it sets out the work that still needs to be done. The strength of any strategy is in the degree to which it can measure progress and identify areas for improvement. What are the most critical steps in improving our capacity and capability to identify those who have been trafficked and those who seek to perpetrate such acts?

I note the sharp increase in the number of people who have been identified as victims of human trafficking this year. Given the hidden nature of human trafficking, what does the minister believe the overall scale of it is in Scotland? Can he give a sense of the number of those who are being identified as having been trafficked?

Like Daniel Johnson, I think that the strategy and the annual report are important elements of ensuring that we continue to look at the progress that we are making and identify the issues that we need to address. The benefit of having the annual report and a ministerial statement on it—which is my choice—is that it makes us continually challenge ourselves that we are doing everything possible to tackle an appalling crime. Many of us recognise that that crime is often hidden and not fully recognised.

Daniel Johnson asks me to identify a couple of key areas in which there is risk and in which we need to make further progress in identifying people who may be being trafficked or who may be in slavery or servitude. More progress needs to be made on the national referral mechanism. Currently, the timeline for the consideration of cases is too long. There are delays in the system and it needs to improve. I have already taken up that matter with the Home Office in order to seek improvements to the system, and we will continue to press the Home Office to see what further progress can be made on the issue. I recognise that it is causing undue delays and anxiety and that it needs to be addressed.

The other potential barrier is a lack of awareness. There should be greater recognition of the risks of trafficking. It is telling that the first two convictions under our new legislation were to do with domestic servitude and individuals being held in slavery or forced labour. That demonstrates that we are talking about something that is taking place on our own doorstep. We need to recognise that. It is not just about people being trafficked into the country; we are talking about something that can take place here, on a domestic level. Greater public awareness and better understanding across all public and private agencies are critical.

As Daniel Johnson highlighted, we have sought an increase in reporting. There was a 38 per cent increase in the number of cases that were referred to the national referral mechanism in 2017. However, I suspect that that is just the tip of the iceberg and that a significant number of cases still go unidentified. That is why we need to remain vigilant and continually challenge our approaches, so that we do everything that we can to identify individuals who may have been trafficked or who may be in forced labour.

The two opening questions were fairly detailed and the answers were fairly long. There are quite a few questions to get through, so I ask that questions and answers be succinct.

The trafficking of women and girls for sexual exploitation is increasingly recognised as a global human rights crisis. Intelligence suggests that organised crime groups are involved in sexual exploitation to a greater degree than they are in other forms of slavery. Does the progress report acknowledge that that is a problem? What more can the Government do to combat that?

Ash Denham is correct in identifying that organised crime groups can often be involved in human trafficking for the purpose of sexual exploitation. That is very clear in several sections of the annual report. Ash Denham should look at action area 3 in the report. On page 33, there is a specific reference to the

“increased focus on commercial sexual exploitation”

and the multi-agency work that is being pursued in that field.

OCGs will often be involved in not only human trafficking but other forms of illegal activity. Ash Denham can be assured that Police Scotland gives considerable attention to that area. Sexual exploitation is often a part of the work of those organisations, and it will continue to be a key focus of our enforcement and prevention work.

The cabinet secretary has stated that the 63 trafficked children who were identified in Scotland this year likely represent only the tip of the iceberg. Building trust with trafficked and sexually exploited young people is key to aiding disclosure. Will the cabinet secretary therefore meet voluntary organisations and charities such as Addaction, which has a proven record in Glasgow and South Lanarkshire of building that trust and identifying those young people in cases in which statutory organisations have failed? Further, can he confirm—

I think that that is enough, Ms Mitchell.

The member will be aware that the provisions for supporting children who have been identified as being trafficked involves our child protection arrangements, which are delivered by local authorities, and the Scottish guardianship provision. If the member sends me further information about particular organisations, I will be more than happy to engage with her in that regard.

The award-winning Scottish guardianship service provides support to refugee children who are alone or separated from their families. The cabinet secretary will know that the hostile environment policy of the Home Office makes it difficult for children without an independent advocate to navigate the complex system. Can the cabinet secretary therefore give us an update on the eligibility criteria for trafficked children in Scotland and say how they can access an independent advocate through the guardianship service?

As I mentioned, the Scottish guardianship service will continue to be in place until the independent guardianship arrangements have been implemented. Part of the purpose of the consultation that we are undertaking in the autumn is to allow us to be clear about the role and responsibilities of the independent guardian.

I have no doubt that the cross-party group on human trafficking—of which Christina McKelvie is a long-standing member—will be interested in feeding in to that consultation exercise to ensure that the independent guardian system addresses the concerns that she has just highlighted.

Further to Christina McKelvie’s question, when will the provision in the 2015 act, which gives unaccompanied children access to an independent guardian, be implemented? It has been two and a half years and we are still waiting.

As I said, I would have liked us to have made further progress on that issue. However, the Scottish guardianship programme is in place at the moment and will continue. This autumn, when the consultation process has been completed, we will be in a position to roll out the independent guardian system. Although I cannot give Rhoda Grant a specific date for that, I assure her that I want it to happen sooner rather than later. However, I want to get the system right, working in partnership with local authorities, before we start rolling it out.

I welcome this important update from the cabinet secretary. Does he agree that, in order for the Scottish Government to successfully implement policies to significantly reduce human trafficking and give justice to the victims, this Parliament must have full control over immigration policy, which would allow victims the choice to remain here, in Scotland, and not face deportation as a result of the United Kingdom Government’s fixation on a hard Brexit?

Some organisations that are working with individuals who have been identified as being trafficked have raised with me the challenges that those individuals can face due to the overlap with the immigration system. The way in which the Home Office is dealing with some cases of human trafficking remains a concern for me and, in my view, there continues to be a mismatch in how the two systems operate.

As is known, I am in favour of immigration matters being the responsibility of this Parliament. We will continue to press the UK Government, and the Home Office in particular, to ensure that the immigration system operates more sympathetically to, and with greater understanding of, victims of trafficking and the challenges that they face.

The cabinet secretary might be aware of the case of my constituent Duc Nguyen, who was a victim of human trafficking and human slavery and was forced to work on a cannabis farm. As a result of that, he was arrested, imprisoned and, despite being a victim of that crime, was faced with imminent deportation just this week. He was taken off the plane as a result of the pressure of thousands of his supporters, and we hope that he will be returned to Glasgow.

What redress can the Scottish Government give to those who are criminalised in our justice system as a result of their experience of being victims of human trafficking and forced labour? Will the Scottish Government lend its support in the case of Duc Nguyen?

I am aware of the case and the issues that the member raises.

For individuals who have been forced into labour or servitude or who have been trafficked, there is scope for compensation to be provided through the Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority. There is also the possibility for the court to set down that compensation should be paid to an individual.

The member will recognise that our scope to redress aspects of asylum and immigration is very limited, given that responsibilities in those matters lie elsewhere. Nevertheless, I assure him that, in our approach to the organisations that we support, such as TARA and Migrant Help, which often engage with individuals who have been exploited or trafficked, we allow organisations scope to provide support for individuals that goes wider than that for which we provide funding. We recognise that organisations often need to offer support that goes beyond the specific support that we fund, and we assist them with that as and when we can, in recognition of the wider issues that need to be addressed when individuals experience the kinds of difficulty to which the member refers.

Four more members want to ask a question. If members are aware of the short time that we have, I might get them all in.

I thank the cabinet secretary for early sight of his statement. I welcome the report and associate myself with his comments about our collective abhorrence of human trafficking.

The cabinet secretary is aware that the Liberal Democrats fought for the introduction of independent child trafficking guardians and stronger identification and referral processes. Will he say what policy developments are stalling the implementation of the provision and which organisations he thinks should be able to make a referral to appoint a guardian for a child?

As I said to Rhoda Grant, the principal piece of work that we need to do in relation to implementation is the consultation on the role and responsibilities of the independent guardian. A key part of that work will be to secure agreement with COSLA, given its clear responsibility for child protection matters. I am determined that, when we have completed the work, in the autumn, we should do everything that we can to put independent guardianship arrangements in place.

I recognise the frustrations of Liam McArthur and other members about the progress that has been made to date. Nevertheless, when we have completed that work and secured assurances from local authorities about how the arrangements will work, we will be in a position to finalise the matter. The work will include looking at who can make referrals and on what terms.

What is the Scottish Government’s position on victims of trafficking being granted compensation? The minister knows that my constituency has seen one of the worst cases of labour exploitation.

The provision for compensation in the Scottish criminal justice system is operated by the Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority, to which we provide funding for Scottish cases. Someone can make an application to the authority on the basis of a person having been convicted or acquitted of an offence that relates to the legislation that underpins the strategy. Over and above that, there is scope for sentencers—sheriffs and judges—to direct that compensation be paid to victims. That can be done at the discretion of the judge or sheriff at the time of sentencing.

The work that has been undertaken to raise awareness is welcome. Will the cabinet secretary tell members what further types of action will be taken to improve awareness of the problem of human trafficking?

As I said in my statement, and as the member is aware, we have had a public information campaign and we have provided a suite of materials to ensure that individuals have access to information about trafficking. That work will continue.

We will consider what further media and public information campaigns are appropriate and would heighten awareness of the issues. The work that we are doing through the corporate group that we have established is intended to ensure that the private sector plays its part, particularly in the context of forced labour. We are keen to expand that work, and the work that we will pursue over the coming year in that regard is a key measure in the annual report.

Victims of human trafficking are particularly vulnerable to being sexually exploited. Can the cabinet secretary describe the action that the Scottish Government is taking to tackle commercial sexual exploitation?

The Scottish Government is opposed to all forms of violence against women, and a key part of our equally safe strategy, which has been taken forward by my colleague Angela Constance, is to do everything that we can to reduce the harm that is caused by sexual exploitation. A key part of the work that is being done to address the issue is taking place through the multi-agency working group, which is identifying what further measures can be taken to reduce the risk and harm that is associated with sexual exploitation. That work will begin in the coming months.

The next item of business is a statement by Fergus Ewing, on an update on the work of the National Council of Rural Advisers. The cabinet secretary will take questions at the end of his statement.

In January last year, Parliament agreed to establish

“an independent group involving relevant stakeholders to provide advice as to the principles and policies that should underpin options for appropriate rural support beyond 2020”.—[Official Report, 19 January 2017; c 115.]

The National Council of Rural Advisers was duly established, with 14 individual members drawn from a variety of backgrounds and appointed on the basis of their expertise in operating and supporting rural enterprise. It was important to me that we appointed as many women as men; their voices and experiences are often, wrongly, absent from rural policy debate. It was also important to me that a number of younger people were also involved. Our approach was embodied in the appointment of co-chairs in Alison Milne and Lorne Crerar.

The national council was asked to provide advice for the Government on the implications of Brexit for rural Scotland, as well as recommendations on future rural policy and support. The paper that was produced last November largely confirmed what we knew—the implications will be far reaching and extremely challenging, particularly through the loss of people and skills, and continued membership of the single market and customs union is the least damaging Brexit outcome.

That finding is reinforced in the discussion paper that was published on Tuesday. I agree whole-heartedly with the national council’s conclusion that

“Brexit weighs heavily on the future of our industries.”

The paper also makes clear that rural Scotland is capable of building on its inherent resilience and creativity to overcome such barriers and challenges. As the national council puts it,

“with the right focus and energy we can achieve a new rural economic strategy which puts people at its heart.”

One of the core strengths of the national council’s approach has been that willingness, through 11 rural thinks workshops around Scotland and engagement with stakeholder organisations, to listen closely to others. That process, backed by the evidence, suggests that there are strong and resolute foundations on which to drive forward Scotland’s rural economy.

Research produced by the Scottish Government to better understand the rural economy shows that the strongest economic growth in Scotland between 2007 and 2015 was not in urban areas but in what is termed mainly rural areas, with strong growth in the value of goods and services also in island and remote rural areas. The national council challenges us to produce a better way of measuring economic growth in rural areas, and it is a challenge that I readily accept.

The national council’s call for a defined and ambitious strategy for Scotland’s rural economy that

“develops natural and human capital, competitiveness, robust infrastructure and social inclusion”

is compelling.

The national council’s discussion paper identifies three key themes for that strategy: vision, people and infrastructure. The vision on which such a strategy is based must accentuate the many positives and strengths in the rural economy as well as acknowledge the barriers and address the challenges. I particularly welcome the focus on inclusive growth, tackling inequalities in the rural labour market and creating quality job opportunities. That is key to attracting people to move or return to live and work in rural Scotland and to developing the talents of those who live and work there currently. Through the Scottish Government’s current Scotland is now campaign, we will continue to do all that we can to make clear that Scotland is a positive and inclusive country and that, for example, migrant workers are welcome to make their lives here and contribute to our rural economy.

Rural Scotland needs people to stay on the land and in our remote communities in order to thrive, and, as the national council has uncovered, the best people to lead rural Scotland are the people who live there already. That is why this Government is already investing in their skills and talents. We core fund Scotland’s Rural College, the University of the Highlands and Islands and all its associated colleges, the University of Glasgow’s Crichton campus in Dumfries and the University of the West of Scotland’s campus in Ayr, as well as providing rural campuses with a £9 million rural premium. The 21 regional action groups for developing the young workforce cover all of rural Scotland; we have introduced a rural supplement to training providers delivering modern apprenticeships in remote and rural areas; and we have funded almost 1,400 modern apprenticeship new starts in land-based frameworks over the past three years

The third theme that matters is infrastructure or, as one rural thinks participant put it, multilevel connectivity. This Government is already working hard to create the physical infrastructure that Scotland’s rural economy needs. We are making the biggest public sector investment of any Government in the United Kingdom in broadband, providing £600 million to deliver access to superfast broadband to 100 per cent of homes and businesses by the end of 2021. The reaching 100—R100—programme prioritises the most remote and rural areas of Scotland that currently have the least access to broadband connectivity. We are building more than 50,000 new homes, with £25 million specifically dedicated to housing in rural and island communities; and, just this weekend, we committed to creating a further 3,000 homes through the building Scotland fund. We are creating Scotland’s first dualled, electric highway on the A9; the Aberdeen bypass will be completed later this year; we will undertake a feasibility study into improvements to the A75; and we continue to provide support to Highlands and Islands airports and lifeline ferry services.

Through the food processing and marketing contract since 2015, grants have been made to invest in the supply chain infrastructure for rural businesses, like the £4.5 million grant that was announced during a visit that I made last week for ABP Food Group to develop further its facilities in Perth. We are also investing in communities’ own capacities by transferring assets to local communities from the national forest estate, including the three projects that were announced just yesterday; investing in fisheries local action groups in coastal communities; seeking to support more women into farming through the women in agriculture task force; and providing over £71 million to Highlands and Islands Enterprise to provide economic development support and establish a new enterprise agency for the south of Scotland.

I accept the need to ensure that rural areas enjoy the same opportunities and access to services as urban areas, and that we need more streamlined and cohesive support mechanisms to better help businesses. What we support in the rural economy in the future, and how we do that, must reflect the Government’s aspirations and objectives but also be informed by real evidence of what the public value, as the agriculture champions state. As one recent rural thinks participant put it,

“policy is driven by people”.

I can announce that the work of the National Council of Rural Advisers will continue over the summer with a consultation on nine key questions arising from the key themes in the discussion paper. That consultation, which opened on Tuesday, marks the start of the rural civic conversation called for by the agriculture champions. The NCRA will use the information gathered, alongside evidence already collected, to refine its recommendations, and I anticipate that its work will be complete in the autumn.

The NCRA and its 14 members have already made a significant contribution to our discourse on the future needs and interests of Scotland’s rural economy. I have found them to be insightful and willing to challenge, questioning the status quo and generating fresh ideas. I thank them all for what they have achieved to date and for their enormous effort and contribution to the task. Our continuing to support their work over the summer will allow them to complete their deliberations and produce comprehensive recommendations that will help to create the vibrant, sustainable and inclusive rural economy that we all wish to see.

I thank the cabinet secretary for sight of his statement and refer members to my entry in the register of members’ interests. I welcome the work of the National Council of Rural Advisers, which has identified many of the challenges that rural Scotland already recognises. Many highlanders—and, indeed, the cabinet secretary, I am sure—will take huge issue with the suggestion on page 16 of the report that Urquhart castle is in the Kyle of Lochalsh. We both know that it is not.

The report contains no hint of a strategy or policy, which the cabinet secretary suggested only last week there would be, so I ask how long it will take to get one. There will be a six-week consultation, followed by a six-week period to analyse the responses and probably six weeks for the cabinet secretary to consider that analysis; if we are generous to the cabinet secretary, there will be at least another 16 weeks to come up with a policy. That is eight and a half months in total, from today, to draft a rural strategy, so we probably will not hear any ideas from the Government until February 2019. Frankly, that is too long. When will the cabinet secretary have a plan? When will he stop dithering and start to deliver a plan for our farmers and the rural economy?

I am pleased, I guess, that Mr Mountain welcomed the work that the NCRA has done, although that was the end of any positive content in his remarks. It would behove the Scottish Conservative Party to recognise that the 14 individual council members have no political perspective but, rather, the viewpoint and perspective of those who have contributed enormously to the rural economy in Scotland and whose efforts should therefore be appreciated. I also point out that the NCRA is a group that I was asked—indeed, instructed—by the Parliament to appoint. Therefore, it seems churlish to say that we should pre-empt the work that Parliament has asked us to do by ignoring the council’s work and recommendations, which will be forthcoming in the autumn.

I assure Edward Mountain that we shall respond to the final report when we receive it, as well as to the report of the agriculture champions, which we received last week. It is really rather negative of Mr Mountain to ignore completely the offering that is produced in this excellent discussion paper. Some of the people who produced it are here today listening—just bear that in mind. It is an excellent paper, with the slogan,

“together we can, together we will”.

That is a positive slogan and perhaps that is why the Scottish Tories are not keen on it, since the three main activities that they appear to be interested in are nit picking, nat bashing and power grabbing.

I thank the cabinet secretary for advance sight of his statement and I thank the National Council of Rural Advisers for the work that it has done on its very positive and important report.

To those of us who represent and live in rural areas, the questions that the report asks were familiar and I have to say that they reflect the disappointing progress that has been made in building strong, sustainable rural communities over the past decade—even without the challenges that we face with Brexit.

The cabinet secretary said that he particularly welcomes the focus on inclusive growth, but the reality is that not one but two Government economic strategies have given commitments to regional equity but have failed to deliver it, as low pay is still rife across rural Scotland.

The report highlights the digital divide, whereby the roll-out of fibre broadband in recent years has left—and still leaves—many rural communities behind.

There are omissions in the report and the cabinet secretary’s response to it. There is no mention of the utter scandal of rural poverty and there is not enough emphasis on the value of our natural environment. Tackling poverty and protecting our environment must be key principles at the heart of agriculture and rural support post-Brexit. I ask again whether the cabinet secretary will give us an exact timetable for when the Government will set out a shared vision of what Scotland wants that post-common agricultural policy support to look like and take that case to the UK Government, instead of waiting for the UK Government to tell us what to think. In other words, once again, when will the Scottish Government stop waiting and start leading when it comes to supporting our rural communities?

I am pleased that Colin Smyth acknowledges the good work that the advisers have done—that is genuine and welcome.

On the timescale, I confirm what I have already made clear: the final report from the NCRA will be available in the autumn. We will consider it and then we will respond in detail to it, along with the work of the champions.

Members should bear in mind that this is a consultation document. We want to hear what the public have to say. [Interruption.] There is lots of heckling and negativity coming from the Conservatives, as per the norm. On the positive side, the 127 people who took part in the 11 rural thinks meetings throughout Scotland—that was a huge commitment by those people, which I would have thought would have been welcomed—said that they want policy to be made by listening to people. We will listen to the people and then make the policy, not devise policy without listening to them, particularly given that Parliament asked us to do that.

I do not accept the premises of the assertions that Mr Smyth made. We are doing a considerable amount of work, as I said to the Rural Economy and Connectivity Committee last week, to prepare policy making in the future. Of course that is a serious task. However, until such time as we know what the budget, tariffs and costs will be, it is impossible for anyone to produce a plan with figures and clarity. I assure all members that we are dealing with all these matters on a daily basis and I hope to say more about that relatively soon.

I remind the chamber that I am the parliamentary liaison officer to the cabinet secretary.

I welcome the report and its central recommendation to create a rural economic strategy and agree absolutely that people living and working in rural Scotland need to be involved in policy making. How will the civic conversation that is being launched with this consultation ensure that women’s voices and the views of young people are heard and listened to?

That will be an important part of the response. We are very keen to hear from females and young people in rural Scotland. Emma Harper is aware of the women in agriculture task force, which I co-chair with Joyce Campbell. It is addressing specifically some of the gender inequality issues, which, as this discussion document highlights, are quite extreme in parts of rural Scotland. The disparity between the median female and median male earnings is particularly stark in some parts of rural Scotland. We will encourage people throughout rural Scotland to respond to the consultation and submit their views, and I hope and expect that they will. We want to hear what they have to say, study it carefully and take it into account when we move forward.

I declare an interest as a partner in an agricultural business.

Here we are, a whole year after the council was formed, and this is all we have: a document with no answers, only questions. Frankly, it is very disappointing.

The cabinet secretary mentioned just a few seconds ago that he has no idea about budgets. Let me tell him that in the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs document “Health and Harmony”, it states categorically that funding for pillar 1 and pillar 2 farm support will be delivered at the same rate until at least 2022. Therefore, I ask again: when is the cabinet secretary going to give us any positive ideas for our rural economy and start to deliver a plan for our farmers’ future?

First, I must, I am afraid, correct Mr Chapman. It is not correct to say that the Scottish Government has received assurances that pillar 2 payments, beyond those contracts that have been entered into prior to Brexit day, will be honoured. No such commitment has been made, as Mr Chapman should know, so his assertion that that is the case is in fact incorrect. It follows, therefore, that the conclusions he draws from that are also, sadly, wrong.

Secondly, and perhaps more important, because we have gone over all this ground ad infinitum—we have spent endless hours of parliamentary proceedings going over the same old negative moaning and whining from the Conservatives—what is really disappointing is Mr Chapman’s assertion that there is nothing positive in this report. Either he has not read it or he is unwilling to hear what it says.

There is a whole series of recommendations in the report about how rural Scotland can go forward. The emphasis, though, is on looking at the successful ventures that are created by businesses in rural Scotland. It is about looking at the positives and the opportunities to see how we can help people achieve even more by addressing the three strands: the vision, the people and the infrastructure. I set out in my opening statement many ways in which the Scottish Government is doing that and I am not going to repeat them now, the Presiding Officer will be pleased to hear.

This is an excellent, positive report and I am really quite shocked to hear Mr Chapman’s incorrect and quite insulting characterisation of it.

If anything demonstrates the damaging impacts of Brexit that the report has highlighted, it is the issue of migrant workers being able to continue to contribute to our rural businesses and the wider economy.

Does the cabinet secretary agree that the Tories have an utter brass neck to be carping about the time that is being taken to deliver the rural strategy when they have had two years—two years—since the Brexit vote to address worries over access to seasonal workers and have done nothing?

I agree, and the National Council of Rural Advisers confirmed that migrant workers make an enormous positive contribution to this country. Mr Dey obviously represents Angus growers; on visits that I have made to Angus, I have spoken to many of the migrant workers and many of them are genuinely concerned about whether they will be welcome here. That is quite an appalling predicament to put people in. It is unsavoury.

Of course, we did not vote for Brexit in Scotland anyway, did we? No, we did not. [Interruption.] The Conservatives are laughing—I do not think that it is very funny. I point out once again that Mr Gove, when he spoke to the National Farmers Union south of the border earlier this year, said that there would be a scheme and that it would be introduced relatively quickly thereafter. It has not been. I have asked him about that at meetings and I am afraid that that scheme has not been introduced.

Rather than berate us about something that is not a devolved responsibility, why do the Conservative MSPs not join with us in saying that this Parliament should have the power to deal with these matters, because plainly, the UK Government has got no appetite or intent to do so?

The cabinet secretary alluded to the gender pay gap. The report says:

“Women living in remote rural Scotland have the lowest annual income of any group, and the largest median gender pay gap at £5,076 when comparing annual median wages. This means that in remote rural Scotland women earn 17% less on an annual average than men.”

That is down in part to seasonal, part-time and low-paid work, as well as falling public sector employment. The cabinet secretary says that he is committed to tackling inequalities. What action will he take to tackle the gender pay gap?

That was, indeed, the section of the NCRA report to which I alluded, so I am pleased that Rhoda Grant has identified it. It is useful that we have the benefit of the report so that we can see the situations that we need to address. There are many things that we need to do to address pay inequality. The Government is doing a great many of them because they cover a range of issues—childcare, employment and access to opportunities and training, as well as transport. We are committed across all the Government’s responsibilities to doing what we can to tackle those matters more fairly and to doing our best to reduce the inequality gap over time.

I welcome the report as a starting point in the conversation, although there are more holes in it than a block of Swiss cheese. There is no mention of the environment, which underpins our rural economy, of the future of Scotland’s rural development policy or of issues that affect people in rural areas, such as access to childcare. In spite of the uncertainty over Brexit, the Welsh Assembly has produced a vision for rural support post-Brexit. When will we see the Scottish Government’s vision for rural support and the SRDP post-Brexit?

It is a bit unfair to say that the work of the NCRA does not recognise those things. I am aware that it does and, if the member looks at its interim recommendations from last November, he will find that it has done so in many respects.

I welcome the contribution from the member and his party to the consultation. I hope that there is a good response to it. I assure him that the NCRA is absolutely committed to the twin imperatives of agriculture: producing food and tending to the landscape in an environmentally friendly fashion. That is an extremely important element of the approach that the Scottish Government has taken and will continue to take.

I have repeatedly made it clear that my vision for the rural economy is to use our natural assets to best advantage, to—as far as farming is concerned—ensure the primacy of producing high-quality food in a way that is sympathetic to our landscape and to use our people, who are the best resource of all. I have made that clear on countless occasions and will continue to do so. However, I am particularly pleased that the NCRA has produced a vision that is entirely aligned with the one that we have already set out.

The question is vision. Will the cabinet secretary tell us what his vision is for the future of Scottish agricultural financial support post-Brexit, without criticising the UK Government, which we can all do?

I have already set out in response to Mr Ruskell an abbreviated version of the vision that I see and will continue to see for rural Scotland. I want the financial support for rural Scotland to continue to be provided at the level that all the Brexiteers promised during the Brexit campaign, which is currently £500 million.

I also want to be paid back to Scotland the £160 million that was intended for Scottish farmers but was siphoned off by the UK Treasury under Conservative leadership—with, as I recall, a bit of help from the Liberals; I point out to Mr Rumbles that it was during Mr Alexander’s term in the Treasury. I want that money back for the Scottish rural community. It was intended for Scottish farmers. We now have the ridiculous situation that, next year, the amount per hectare in financial support for Scotland will be the lowest in any European Union country or state. That is what happens if we allow the Conservatives to run Scotland.

There are still six members who wish to ask a question, but there are only two minutes left.

I draw members’ attention to my agricultural holding and the fact that I will be a R100 beneficiary.

In connection to that, I wonder whether, when looking at the contracts for R100, preference will be given to those with future proofing so that, when the backhaul is eventually upgraded, we can have 300 megabits per second and 1 gigabit per second delivery to rural locations, thus enabling us to have an advantage over urban areas where presently we have a disadvantage.

Mr Stevenson makes a good point. The answer is yes. The way in which the contract is being taken forward in the procurement stage is to anticipate the future need and desire to move from superfast to ultrafast broadband. My understanding is that the use of fibre enables that process to take place; therefore, that forms part of our thinking. Although we cannot mandate one technology over another because of state aid rules, encouraging bids for the tender that reference the extent to which achievements will be reached by provision of fibre rather than other methodologies—precisely because of the point that Mr Stevenson makes—and scoring the tender accordingly will empower those in rural Scotland, perhaps in some cases to an even greater extent than urban dwellers, as it means that they will have ultrafast broadband in years to come.

The cabinet secretary talks about improving connectivity in Scotland’s rural communities, but the reality is that a catalogue of recent failures on the CalMac network has left many island communities far from connected. CalMac admits that there is zero resilience, no additional capacity and a significant risk of further breakdown this summer. What does the cabinet secretary have to say to those communities, which have been so badly let down in recent months? Will he tell members today what immediate steps have been taken to ensure that ferry services to every island in Scotland will be safeguarded this summer?

I am not quite sure what that has to do with the National Council of Rural Advisers. It is a little bit insulting that members choose to ask anything on any topic that they wish, instead of addressing the good work that those individuals have done. It is really quite insulting and I cannot recall anything quite like it, but there we are—that is the Conservatives for you.

To answer Jamie Greene’s question, we have of course provided resources to CalMac in terms of the tender that has allowed it to expand. We are providing extra vessels and we have dealt with difficult situations that have arisen. The difficulties are partly due to the problems of successes such as the growing economies of the islands, growing tourism, growing populations and the road equivalent tariff leading to more people choosing to use the ferries. Those are the problems of success—the Scottish Conservatives would not know much about that.

There are four members who still wish to get in, but I am afraid that we have run out of time. I remind members to keep their questions short and ministers to keep their replies equally succinct, so that we can get through more questions in the allocated time.

The next item of business is a debate on motion S5M-12730, in the name of Clare Haughey, on the Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee’s sexual harassment and inappropriate conduct inquiry. I invite members who wish to speak in the debate to press their request-to-speak buttons. I call Clare Haughey to speak to and move the motion on behalf of the Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee.

In opening the debate on the SPPA Committee’s inquiry into sexual harassment and inappropriate conduct, I thank everyone who came to give oral evidence or submitted written evidence. I will explain the backdrop to our work, then outline some of the committee’s key findings.

A little over six months ago, we entered a new era. Sexual harassment in the workplace was suddenly front and centre of people’s consciousness, and this workplace was no exception. Recent months have seen significant changes in attitudes, and it appears that society is now beginning to catch up with a long-standing issue.

The SPPA Committee has responsibility for the conduct of members of the Scottish Parliament through our oversight and application of “The Code of Conduct for Members of the Scottish Parliament”. While being mindful of the Parliament’s status as a role model for other workplaces in Scotland, we quickly launched an inquiry that aimed to determine whether current arrangements for dealing with sexual harassment in Parliament were adequate and, if not, what needed to change.

At this point, I thank Daniel Johnson. Having raised the issue with the committee and called for an inquiry, Mr Johnson then resigned his place on the committee in the interest of promoting gender balance.

We are not the only ones who are moving swiftly to address the issue, so our report pays tribute to the rapid response of the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body in launching its telephone helpline, which provided a route through which anyone who was affected could seek advice and support. That was rapidly followed by a sexual harassment and sexist behaviour survey of all workers at Holyrood and out in regional and constituency offices, which aimed to ascertain the scale of any problem and to gather views and ideas about how people would wish it to be tackled.

The corporate body has established a joint working group to consider and agree any actions that need to be taken on a joint or individual basis between the Parliament and the political parties, in the light of the survey. In our report, we have asked that the joint working group review the evidence that was provided to the committee during its inquiry, because it included many detailed suggestions about what a good reporting and investigation regime should look like.

As part of our inquiry, we looked at the results of the survey and were very disappointed to discover worryingly low levels of confidence in the Parliament’s policies and reporting procedures. We found it unacceptable that a person who was affected by such misconduct would decide against making a complaint because of lack of faith in the organisation’s processes. Putting in place the right complaints regime was clearly a high priority.

The Parliament is a diverse workplace: MSPs, party staff, Parliament staff, journalists and a range of contractors all share the same workplace. The committee’s remit extends only to the conduct of MSPs, and our recommendations sit alongside the work of the SPCB, political parties and other employers who have workers in Parliament.

The Parliament’s workplace diversity means that there is no one-size-fits-all policy that would prevent and address sexual harassment in the Parliament. That leads me to one of the key findings of the committee’s inquiry. We recommend that a central policy on sexual harassment be created to apply to all campus users regardless of their employment status. We recommended that that central policy, which is to be developed by the joint working group, include as a starting point a zero tolerance statement, and definitions and examples of behaviours that constitute sexual harassment. It is very encouraging that the joint working group issued a zero tolerance statement earlier this week that sets out what the institution means by “zero tolerance” and how that will be upheld in practice.

The staff survey also revealed chronic underreporting of undesirable behaviours; indeed, the most common reported response to experiencing sexual harassment or sexist behaviour was to do nothing. Although a central policy on sexual harassment ought to give people greater confidence in reporting systems, we discovered that that is not the only barrier that prevents people from reporting misconduct. It appears that many individuals who are affected by harassment do not report it because of fears about career impact. In the survey, that was, disturbingly, the most cited reason for not reporting misconduct. That has to change. It cannot be the case that the victims of harassment feel unable to speak out because of fears about job security, promotion prospects, or other more subtle outcomes, such as being ostracised or excluded by colleagues if they make a complaint.

This is not an easy issue to tackle. We recommend that new policies on sexual harassment state clearly that the consequences for anyone who reports misconduct will be minimised, and that safeguarding and protection of the person who reports misconduct is clearly set out in the policies.

Staff who work for MSPs are in a particularly exposed position. Their jobs and livelihoods are on the line if the MSP who employs them is removed or if working relationships break down. The small size of MSP staff teams also means that it is virtually impossible to make a complaint confidentially. Our report asks that special consideration be given to finding solutions to protect staff who are in that vulnerable position.

Perpetrators of the behaviour have relied on the silence of their victims for too long. Change is coming, and Parliament’s policies and processes must accelerate that change.

Many people whom we heard from during the inquiry called for mandatory training for all campus users as a way to encourage culture change. I understand that mandatory training might raise some eyebrows. It is generally assumed that men are the perpetrators of sexual harassment, but it is important to look more closely at the issue. The purpose of training on sexual harassment is not only to make potential perpetrators aware of their behaviour; it is also essential for all managers, so that they are in a position to support their staff to access support and redress.

It is also important that we are all aware of where the lines are drawn on unacceptable behaviour, so that we can call it out or report it when we see it. That is called bystander intervention. Although the incidence of sexual harassment that is perpetrated by women against men appears to be lower than that by men against women, the survey revealed that women do harass men. It serves no one to deny or underplay that fact. Our recommendation stopped short of insisting that training for all staff should be mandatory, but we think that there is a strong argument for including all campus users in training.

In my remaining time, I would like briefly to introduce some matters that arose during the committee’s inquiry, and which require further more detailed scrutiny because they have far-reaching constitutional implications. We intend to give those issues more detailed scrutiny in the future, and this debate will inform our considerations.

The first suggestion is that an independent body or figure be established to provide a single reporting, support and advocacy point of contact, with the possibility that the body or figure will have responsibility for sanctioning MSPs. We recognise that practical, legal and constitutional issues would need to be addressed before such a function could be established, but we find the concept to be worthy of further consideration.

We also looked at the possibility of an ultimate sanction for MSPs. In most workplaces, gross misconduct would result in dismissal, but elected members can be removed from office only in a narrow set of circumstances. We concluded that a process of recall or dismissal for actions that amount to gross misconduct is worthy of exploration. We are very mindful of the practical and constitutional implications.

Finally, we looked at whether a process of suspension could be applied to MSPs, pending an inquiry into misconduct. We accepted that the consequences of a suspension for an elected member could be more serious than they would be for people who are employed in other capacities, and although we uphold the idea that MSPs should be held to the same standard, we recognise that careful thought would have to be given to such circumstances.

The committee looks forward to returning to those thornier issues in some detail once we have heard responses to our report, including the views that are expressed in this debate. I commend the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body and the joint working group on their rapid response to the issue of sexual harassment and sexist behaviour. I know that a great deal of work is taking place. It is very encouraging to see outputs already emerging, with more promised. I commend the committee’s report to Parliament, and I look forward to hearing members’ views.

I move,

That the Parliament notes the Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee’s 4th Report 2018 (Session 5), Sexual harassment and inappropriate conduct (SP Paper 340).

I propose to keep my contribution to the debate relatively short. The subject matter of the committee’s report is of interest to everyone, but its content clearly focuses on the operations of the Parliament. The Government’s views on sexual harassment are already known, and, like the SPPA Committee, the Government is keen for as many members as possible to have an opportunity to express their views on the report’s content.

The Government fully supports the committee inquiry into sexual harassment and inappropriate behaviour in the Scottish Parliament. Sexual harassment and abuse in any form, whether in the workplace, the home or elsewhere in society, are completely reprehensible and cannot be tolerated. Everyone has the right to work and live their life free from abuse, harassment and intimidation. The Scottish Parliament should exemplify those principles and demonstrate the value of operating as a modern and inclusive organisation.

Parliamentary rules and practices should be fair, sensitive and supportive for everyone. It is unacceptable for any individual to be discouraged from working in, or engaging with the Scottish Parliament.

The same principle clearly applies to the Scottish Government. The First Minister has led calls for anyone who has experienced sexual harassment to report it. In February, the new “Scottish Ministerial Code: 2018 edition” included additional references to ministerial standards of conduct.

The permanent secretary has also reviewed and strengthened Scottish Government policies and procedures to deal with sexual harassment. Government staff are encouraged to share concerns about culture or behaviour. The permanent secretary has also taken steps to ensure that Government staff are aware of and understand the sources of support that are available to them, including a confidential sounding board.

A wider review of our fairness at work policies is also on-going. It will include revising the Government’s standards of behaviour in the workplace and considering what support is needed for leaders, managers and individuals to help them to understand the standards and ensure that the standards are applied in their contexts.

I welcome the committee’s approach to conducting its inquiry. The remit highlighted the many factors that require careful consideration. First, we need to assess the current framework concerning the conduct of MSPs in the context of sexual harassment. The committee report has already flagged potential changes to the MSP code of conduct in order to reflect the need for such very personal matters to be handled with due sensitivity. Secondly, we must recognise the role of political parties and how they handle allegations of misconduct that are made against their members. Thirdly, we need to consider the cultural and societal dimension.

The report notes that remedial activity goes beyond the boundary of parliamentary standards and extends to the behaviours that are encouraged and expected of the people who work on the parliamentary campus, and to how Parliament operates day to day. That brings me to the responsibilities of the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body. The Parliament has already made moves to improve the gender balance of the SPCB. That is a welcome first step and one that should be beneficial to shaping any future reforms.

The report seeks to inform the on-going work of the Parliament’s joint working group and the Scottish Government supports its recommendations. I also note and welcome that, earlier this week, the joint working group published a statement on zero tolerance, together with an indication of other activities that it proposes to implement in the future. The Government endorses the constructive approach to such important issues.

Today’s debate also allows gathering of views, as the committee and Parliament continue to take the inquiry forward. The Government will work with you, Presiding Officer, and with all parties to achieve a consensual outcome as to how best to make the Scottish Parliament a zero tolerance workplace.

I look forward to hearing the views of other members.

Following on from the words of our convener, Claire Haughey, I welcome the committee’s work on this important subject and the spirit in which my fellow committee members have approached our inquiry. The committee received a significant body of evidence and I extend my thanks to the clerking team for pulling it all together and to all those who wrote to us and attended evidence sessions.

The Scottish Parliament is an unusual workplace. Within the walls of the building, we have 129 separate-but-linked employers, hundreds of people employed through different teams within the corporate body, thousands of other individuals who come through the Parliament on business every year, as well as other visitors and constituents. When constituency and regional offices are factored in, the work of the Parliament stretches the length and breadth of Scotland.

From the beginning of our inquiry, the influence of stories in the press was clear. Against that background, it was important that the corporate body moved quickly, establishing the joint working group to ensure trust and confidence in the Parliament’s institutions. It is also welcome that the SPCB established the sexual harassment and sexist behaviour survey, which has provided the committee with an evidence base on which to structure our deliberations. The findings of the survey were significant. Based on a 62 percent response rate, a fifth of staff members reported experiencing inappropriate behaviours—that figure rose to 30 percent among women staff members.

We have heard it said repeatedly that the Scottish Parliament should aspire to be a model for other workplaces in Scotland but, sadly, when it comes to tackling inappropriate behaviour, we have fallen short of that in the past. Early in the inquiry, the committee recognised that there were few shortcuts here. Other legislatures in the United Kingdom and abroad are wrestling with similar questions and have seen similar problems arise. There has been no perfect example for the Parliament to replicate, although there has been some useful learning from elsewhere.

Despite its distinctiveness, the Parliament shares some similar challenges with other employers. For example, we have heard from a number of organisations about the barriers that employees experience in reporting inappropriate conduct. The regrettable conclusion is that, in virtually all sectors, the majority of inappropriate behaviour in the workplace goes unreported. While tackling barriers that are common to all workplaces, we must not ignore the additional problems that the structures of the Parliament can create. It was therefore welcome that the committee agreed on a point of principle that MSPs should not be seen as having any form of unequal protection from answering accusations that are made against them.

The survey showed that, in 45 per cent of cases, individuals reported an MSP as responsible for the inappropriate behaviour that was directed at them. By comparison, in 40 per cent of cases a member of the parliamentary staff was perceived as responsible, and in 20 per cent of cases a member of MSP staff was. Given the relative numbers in each category, that should concern us all.

How we ensure that complaints are reported and heard is of course key to the work of the inquiry. Our findings were that there is a

“lack of confidence in the Parliament’s policies and reporting procedures”

that requires urgent work. The committee has been clear that no one should be deterred from making a complaint because the structures that we have in place make it complicated or challenging for their complaint to be heard.

As a result, we have proposed a single complaint route for employees who are victims of inappropriate behaviour. We want existing institutional barriers to reporting improper conduct to be broken down. The committee recommends that that should be achieved through the means of an independent body, and we have left open the further question of that body having some role in sanctioning such conduct. We look to the joint working group to consider and agree steps before the Parliament considers the matter again.

The question of sanctions remains a significant one for the Parliament as a whole. The committee has recognised the limitations of the sanctions that can be taken against MSPs who are found to have behaved improperly, short of depending on the criminal justice system. The additional sanctions that we reflected on in the report would be significant innovations in relation to the accountability of members of the Parliament. The question of whether those should be considered is rightly one not just for the committee but for the Parliament as a whole.

There are also areas for political parties that are represented in the chamber to consider. We were told that a key reason given by staff not to pursue complaints is fear of a negative impact on their careers. That leaves MSP staff in particular with a level of vulnerability in the workplace. Our recommendations set out the need for joint work between parties and the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body. We have suggested looking towards having mechanisms in place to redeploy staff where relationships have broken down with their MSP employer or where an MSP has left office over their conduct.

The committee has also welcomed the joint working group’s consideration of the culture of the Parliament as a workplace. This building is, after all, one of Scotland’s largest employment sites. Driving cultural change is one way of ensuring that prevention, rather than simply remedial action, is at the heart of the changes that we make in future. The provision of effective staff training on harassment and inappropriate behaviour is just one way that we can make a difference.

The committee’s work and the conclusions in our report are in many ways an interim step. I have covered some of the many bodies that are involved in the way in which behaviour in this building is regulated and how complaints are heard. It is important that all the organisations within that mix take account of the findings and the work of the joint working group. The Parliament has a responsibility to the people who work here. No one should be the victim of harassment or inappropriate behaviour in the workplace and no one who is employed in the building should feel that they cannot report improper behaviour that is directed at them. To make that a reality, the Parliament needs to change.

I advise members that I, too, am a member of the joint working group on sexual harassment. I put on record my thanks to the officers who are working on that group and to Emma Ritch from Engender, who is supporting and giving advice to it.

Initially, I was disappointed with the committee’s report, because I expected to see some leadership from it. It feels to me like an interim report to instigate a debate that might shine a light on the more difficult issues, rather than a finished piece of work. Many of the recommendations refer issues back to the joint working group, and I am sure that we will take on those challenges and work with the committee.

We need to recognise that the Scottish Parliament is not an ordinary workplace. Within the administration of Parliament, there is a workplace with normal hierarchies. However, MSPs are elected by the people and answer to them only every five years. MSPs employ their own staff, and there is no parliamentary or party locus in the management of those staff. Just because someone is a good politician and is able to win votes does not mean that they are a good manager.

Any human resources issue could be problematic, but that is particularly true with something as sensitive as sexual harassment. If a member of an MSP’s staff is being sexually harassed by their employer, they have nowhere to turn. Making a complaint to their employer is impossible if that employer is already abusing the balance of power in their relationship. If they make a complaint to their MSP’s party, again, there is no recourse for them and no alternative employment—there is only a disciplinary process for their employer.

People need to work so, because no alternative employment is available, they will keep quiet. When the behaviour becomes too bad, they will try to find another job. We are talking about people’s livelihoods, and few people are financially secure enough to risk that. I was therefore disappointed that the Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee did not make recommendations on those issues.

We need to look at how an MSP can be brought to book for unacceptable behaviour. I know that that is challenging and that there have to be checks and balances in any system to ensure that it is not abused for party advantage. However, it is untenable that there is not a system that can hold MSPs to account and address unacceptable behaviour. That cannot simply be left to a party because, when such allegations are made, normal practice would be to suspend a member from the party, pending investigation. However, they cannot be suspended from Parliament, so we need a system that can remove an MSP from Parliament in extreme circumstances. Currently, that can happen only if they are given a custodial sentence.

Any system needs to be balanced with our democracy. The people elect a representative and therefore they need to have a role in deselecting that person. Somewhere between the MSP and the electorate, there needs to be an investigatory process that is above party politics and cannot be used as a vendetta—a process that the electorate can trust and use as its basis for decision making. Sadly, the committee shied away from that, which is a decision that needs to be made by politicians.

We are all vulnerable to personal attack. Although the public do not believe that we have reputations to protect, we all know that reputational damage can be devastating. Therefore, we need a system that protects elected members from spurious attack while holding them to account when they do wrong.

We also need a system to support our staff. Within Parliament, staff can be moved around and offered a different workplace when an investigation is on-going and the perpetrator is not suspended. That cannot happen with MSP staff if the offender is their boss. The MSP can be suspended from their party, pending investigation, but they cannot be suspended from Parliament. Therefore, the staff member is likely to have to continue to work with them. It is likely that the stress of that will lead to long-term sick leave but, again, that is not acceptable treatment of a victim. We need a mechanism whereby a staff member can be transferred to another employer if a problem occurs. Worry for their livelihood should not be the driving factor in a person’s decision on whether to make a complaint. Being abused should not spell the end of a career. We need to protect the people who are often the first point of contact for our constituents.

Added to that, we need to encourage all staff to join a trade union, so that they have an organisation behind them that will support and guide them if they are subject to abuse. Within parties, we also have a responsibility to protect staff. We need to understand that party structures can also bring their own issues. There can be feelings of loyalty and allegiance. Therefore, concerns about feelings of betrayal from reporting one of their own might put off MSP staff from making formal complaints about members of their own party. They might also be worried that they will be excluded from not only parliamentary working but local party events and campaigns outwith Parliament.

Those things have to be into account when reporting frameworks are being created in the Parliament. We need to reassure staff that their complaints will be taken seriously and that we will do everything in our power to protect them.

The working group can now look at those issues and, indeed, the many more issues that we are currently working on to change the culture and build a zero tolerance approach to harassment in the Parliament.

The debate has been quite instructive so far, and there have been wise contributions from all sides.

Trying to change the culture of conduct in the Parliament is a very difficult subject. In the early days, when we initially heard about the problems at Westminster, there was a degree of complacency. We thought that we were above all that. However, the survey clearly shows that we are not and that there are significant problems here. One in five have witnessed or experienced a problem; one in three women have; and 45 per cent of those cases involved MSPs. That shows that we have as much of a problem as the other institutions have, and we have an equal responsibility and duty to try to resolve those issues.

I do not doubt that those issues are difficult and challenging. We are in an odd workplace. There are 129-plus employers, and we all have our own standards and ways of working. MSPs should not be above everyone else—that should not happen—but it must be recognised that we can no longer tolerate being unable to police ourselves. I will not name individuals, but we cannot have repeated cases of MSPs frankly embarrassing the Parliament and causing considerable disrepute for it. Therefore, we need a mechanism for change.

A mechanism for recall has been introduced at Westminster. I recognise that it might not have dealt with the problems that we have faced in the particular circumstances, but at least people there have stepped up and come up with a mechanism with a variety of thresholds and barriers that need to be overcome before action can be taken. Ultimately, MSPs are employees of the voters, and the voters should have the final say.

I fear political motivation in disciplining particular MSPs and I fear the consequences of that. I recognise that an independent process and an independent investigator would assist in ensuring that the process is above party politics. An independent process may be fine, but we might find that, in 10 years’ time, it is not robust enough in order to avoid party politics—

Mr Rennie will be aware that the Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee considered several arguments relating to that and concluded that, in considering any mechanism for ultimate sanction—dismissal or the equivalent—we should remember the aims at the start of the report, which include

“encouraging reporting ... providing greater clarity about the procedures”

and

“providing some consistency with regard to sanctions”.

Has Mr Rennie given any further thought to how recall mechanisms could be made to achieve those objectives as opposed to putting them at risk?

I understand what Patrick Harvie says, and I want to ensure that any victims are protected, as well. Perhaps subjecting them to a recall process would be a factor that we would have to consider. We also want consistency and we want the Parliament to lead in addressing sexual harassment. All those factors are challenges.

We are ultimately employees of the voters, so they must be part of the equation. Perhaps anonymity could be a factor in the system in order to protect individuals.

We will find flaws in every system. We will find flaws in the Parliament doing things by itself and in the public having a say in the process. The problem is that, if we find flaws in everything, we will end up doing nothing and we will be back in the same position yet again in a few years’ time.

We need to push the boat out and consider things that are perhaps outside our comfort zone, because we have to send a message to MSPs in the future who might think that they are above the law and above the behaviour that would be expected of other employers and can carry on as they have before. We have to change the equation and ensure that they will fear the consequences, that there are sanctions, and that we can throw them out of the Parliament if we have the desire to do so in order that they do not do things again.

There must be an independent process, and having some kind of recall system might be necessary. It is not acceptable for us to carry on as we are just now. We need to change the culture. Sometimes, writing policies does not change a thing. What changes things is the threat, the sanction and the possibility that someone might lose their job at the end of the process. That is what we must be aiming for, because the status quo is unacceptable and has to change.

We move to the open debate—speeches of around four minutes, please.

As a member of the Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee, I thank my fellow committee members—current and previous—and place on record my thanks to the clerks, researchers and everyone who took time to give oral and written evidence to the committee.

It is important to state that the piece of work that we are discussing represents not an end but a beginning. I say that particularly in response to Rhoda Grant’s comments, which were well made. The committee had to balance the need to make recommendations and acknowledge the seriousness and gravity of the issue and the implications that some reforms could have with the need to survey the views of all members of this Parliament. Although the report is not published as an interim report, it can be understood as a stimulus to further conversation and debate, and it makes clear that the committee is willing to revisit the issues in the light of this debate and the work of the joint working group.

The report makes a series of recommendations that represent low-hanging fruit—policy changes that can be implemented in fairly short order—and I welcome the joint working group’s publication of a zero tolerance policy. That represents the start, and there is clearly support across the chamber for training, which, as has been highlighted previously, is important not only for changing cultural attitudes but for ensuring that MSPs, as employers, are equipped with the required skills.

A key issue that arose was the need for a simplified reporting process. The reporting landscape is incredibly complicated, as the committee heard time and time again. That is a consequence of the various relationships that exist in this Parliament—between MSP and MSP; between an MSP and a member of their staff; between an MSP and a member of another MSP’s staff; and between an MSP and a member of staff who is employed by the group. There are also the relationships with the staff who are employed by the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body. Clearly, that complicated landscape is one of the barriers to reporting at the moment. Establishing a single point of contact and a single portal in a simplified process is absolutely essential.

One of the issues that arose from that situation was one of competence and the question of whether someone who pursued a case could be confident that it would result in action being taken. Inevitably, that led to the question of there being an ultimate sanction involving suspension or recall. None of the options is without problems but, indeed, none is without merit.

On the issue of recall, as has been said, there is the potential for what might be a sensitive issue, in relation to which there is a need for anonymity, becoming politicised and publicised. On the issue of suspension for the purpose of investigation, there would be challenges with regard to the perception of that suspension. In a normal employment scenario, a suspension enables the facts to be established and evidence to be provided for a report. In the context of our place of work, suspension could be interpreted as a form of punishment.

There is also the issue of having an ultimate sanction for acts of gross misconduct that currently fall short of the threshold of criminality, which is something that we must explore. I will make two comments about the ultimate sanction in that regard. First, in considering the possibility of disqualifying MSPs for gross misconduct, we cannot look at sexual harassment in isolation but must consider broader areas of gross misconduct. Secondly, under the current arrangements, as I understand them, there is parity between what disqualifies someone from being a candidate and what disqualifies someone from being an MSP—that is, a custodial sentence in excess of a year or insolvency. Again, we would have to investigate that. If we regulated to provide that an MSP could be dismissed for gross misconduct, would we want to prohibit someone from standing as a candidate for the Parliament if they had been dismissed from a workplace for gross misconduct?

My final comment is addressed to Rhoda Grant. This is not an end but a beginning, as I said, and it is important that all members have an opportunity to contribute. I am sure that the committee will reflect on that.

Sexual harassment in all its forms is completely unacceptable and must not be tolerated under any circumstances. We all acknowledge that. It is the responsibility of members of this Parliament to set the highest standards, to which others must rise.

It is clear, however, from the parliamentary survey, that this Parliament has fallen well short of the standards that are expected of it. The survey makes for worrying and sobering reading. Many people wanted to tell their stories. Victims wanted to be heard, but it appears that they were terrified that they might jeopardise their careers if they told their stories.

Of the 1,000 individuals who responded to the survey, one in five said that they had experienced some form of sexual harassment. Women were significantly more likely to have encountered some kind of sexual harassment or sexist behaviour, with three in 10 women reporting experience of such behaviour.

The Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee’s report on the topic also gives cause for concern. I had the privilege of being a member of the committee—I am no longer a member—and was involved in some of the evidence sessions. I thank the individuals and organisations who told us how they were tackling the issue and talked about how individuals had come forward to tell their stories. That was important.

The committee said that

“Under-reporting of sexual harassment appears to be endemic”,

and went on to say that

“the most common response to experiencing sexual harassment or sexist behaviour was to do nothing.”

Individuals felt that there was no point in doing anything because they would not be believed or they would jeopardise their careers or lifestyles. That has to change. The current reporting procedures and policies are, quite simply, not fit for purpose.

Does the member think that this is a problem for all small employers, or is it a particular problem when an MSP is the employer?

We heard evidence that it happens across the piece, but the committee found that our circumstances and situation might make us more vulnerable to the issue because individuals work closely with us. We must therefore be alive to what happens in this environment.

It is important that victims of sexual harassment feel able to report such conduct. That was not the case here; individuals felt that they would not do that, given the possibility of redundancy and losing their career.

The committee suggested in its report that consideration should be given to the establishment of an independent advisory body. I would welcome that, as such a body would make a difference and would give individuals the opportunity to come forward to report misconduct.

The establishment of the Scottish Parliament’s joint working group on sexual harassment is a positive step for the Parliament and political parties. I also welcome the statement on zero tolerance that the Presiding Officer, the chief executive and party leaders released this week. A zero tolerance approach is exactly the right one for this Parliament to adopt as we seek to set an example for Scotland.

We must set that example. We must ensure that there is training. Inaction is not an option. We need a change in the culture and attitudes. Sexual harassment in the workplace is wrong. We must ensure that it is rooted out of public life, and we should report every case.

I do not flatter myself that anyone remembers my leader’s speeches to Labour conferences back in those halcyon days. In fact, I am not sure that I remember them, although the First Minister quoted one at Richard Leonard a few weeks ago, so maybe someone was listening after all.

However, I do recall one speech in which I announced to a somewhat taken aback Labour conference that I had a new woman in my life—Lucy, my first grandchild, then just born, now eight. I tried to describe the world and the Scotland that I wanted Lucy to grow up in—equal, caring, prosperous, fair and safe—and how I believed that we could achieve that.

I argued that it was to the programme and policies of this Parliament, of which I am proud, that we must look to deliver that for her. I did not say it explicitly that day but, believe me, I want Lucy to live without facing sexism—everyday or systematic—and I want her and every woman in this country to live without fear of sexual harassment. It is, therefore, imperative that we eradicate those things from this institution, which should symbolise, set the standard for and shape by law and example the country that we want to see. We rightly expect the Scottish Parliament to set an example to the nation that is based around reason, integrity and service.

That is why the survey that the SPCB conducted is so worrying. One member of staff facing harassment is one too many, but for one in five respondents and one in three women to have experienced such behaviour is absolutely unacceptable. It is clear that we are falling short.

What links instances of sexual harassment across workplaces and society is the power relationships between people and their abuse. My goodness—is this not a veritable palace of power relationships, both formal and informal? We have different types of employment and staff in this institution, but all are centred around the work of MSPs. Indeed, the survey highlighted that fears surrounding career progression, which is often within the gift of an MSP, is a key reason why victims of harassment do not feel that they can come forward.

As we have heard, there is the added factor of political parties having their own different systems for reporting, as well the increased media and public scrutiny of complaints that many victims feel might compromise their confidentiality and lose them their right to anonymity.

It is not just about MSP staff, of course. Staff who are employed to provide parliamentary services of all kinds also face an unequal dynamic with MSPs as well as being part of a hierarchical system of line management in the SPCB. The survey clearly showed that victims of harassment lack faith that they will be taken seriously and that the process will check the power of an elected member.

There is also an incorrect presumption that the responsibility for harassment sits solely with the perpetrator. Sexual harassment often involves not just the perpetrator and the victim but the complicity of bystanders. It is up to us all to stand up, call it out and report such behaviour. It is up to us all to call out everyday sexism, no matter how apparently trivial, and not just serious harassment, because the one leads to the legitimisation of the other and they are both wrong.

Willie Rennie is right to say that only a fair and consistent process with real consequences, no matter how hard that is for us, will drive a culture change. The report marks progress, and there are good recommendations on trade union involvement and the call for a no tolerance approach, which are all very well. However, at the end of these procedures, victims must feel that there will be no tolerance and that there will be consequences for perpetrators, regardless of their seniority.

I welcome the report, but Rhoda Grant is right in saying that we see must the concrete proposals.

Before I go on to the substantive part of my speech, I remind everyone that not only women but men can be victims of sexual harassment and that, for example, a man can be harassed by a man, and a woman can be harassed by a woman. We should not generalise in those areas and we should also recognise the particular circumstances that non-binary people might find themselves in.

I thank the Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee for its report, which I welcome as an exceptional piece of work. Having served as that committee’s convener, I know that it will have approached the report in a measured manner. Both Tom Arthur and the committee convener, Ms Haughey, have outlined how complex the situation is. As has been mentioned, there are many different types of relationship in the Scottish Parliament’s working arrangements, which has made the inquiry quite difficult. I remind members that the Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee is responsible for the “Code of Conduct for Members of the Scottish Parliament” and that the committee must work in conjunction with the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body to look at the wider implications and the way forward.

The SPCB should be congratulated on actioning the sexual harassment and sexist behaviour survey. Many members, including Iain Gray, have talked about how shocking some of the survey results are, but one of the joint working group’s recommendations is that progress should be monitored to ensure that there is culture change and improvement, and the survey will be an important benchmark. I thank colleagues across the chamber, including Ms Grant, who have taken time to be in the joint working group and have committed to continuing that work.

The confidential phone line, which was established very quickly, is a way forward. I welcome the development, although it is just the start for what has been described as the requirement for a streamlined reporting process, which is another of the report’s welcome recommendations. I also welcome the recognition of the need for counselling and therapy for those who are initiating or going through a complaint process.

The report refers to “campus users”, which reminds us that the Parliament is about not just this building but our constituency offices and that wider community. Everything that we do about the working arrangements in the Parliament building in relation to this issue should be equally valid for the working arrangements in our constituency offices.

I am interested in the suggestion of having an independent body in this area. I have not come to a conclusion about the best way forward in terms of sanctions, but that has to come from the joint working group and the Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee. I am sure that that is something that we will debate.

I am getting a nod from the Presiding Officer to wind up, so I will refer finally to the report’s recommendation on education. I know that colleagues have shied away from the word “mandatory” in that regard, but I will quote Richard Feynman, the Nobel physicist, who is a great hero of mine and whom I have quoted many times in the chamber—

I am sorry, but it has to be the quickest quote in living memory because I want to get more members in.

Richard Feynman said:

“I’m smart enough to know that I’m dumb.”

We all need to embrace that point and take the opportunity to learn.

I, too, thank the Parliament for its work to eradicate sexual harassment and inappropriate conduct from not only the Scottish Parliament but workplaces across Scotland. Sexual harassment can happen in all kinds of workplaces and at any level. The person responsible for the harassment might be a work colleague, a manager, a customer, someone making deliveries or someone connected in some way to where we work.

Harassment is usually experienced by women and perpetrated by men, but it can also be the other way around and it may involve people of the same sex. It can be difficult for someone to know what to do about it, especially if their job or prospects are being threatened. People may worry that they will not be taken seriously, or that complaining about the harassment will have negative consequences. There may remain circumstances in which employees feel unable to raise a complaint of sexual harassment; however, technology is now being used effectively to support people in a way that helps them to feel safe to report it.

All employers are responsible for the health, safety and welfare of their employees at work. They are also usually responsible in law for the actions of their employees at work. As soon as employers are aware of unwanted behaviour from anyone connected with the workplace, they should take action to stop it and also to prevent it from happening again. However, I appreciate the problems that that creates when employers are the perpetrators. In any work environment, if someone is experiencing sexual harassment, their employer should take what they say seriously, investigate it, and find a solution that is consistent with their health, safety and welfare at work. Employers should deal with complaints fairly and promptly and treat them confidentially. Employers should also make sure that their employees are not victimised in any way for making a complaint.

I read not long ago that

“The Equality and Human Rights Commission has written to Chairs of the FTSE 100 saying it will take legal action where there is evidence of systemic failing in preventing, or dealing with, sexual harassment. In the wake of the Hollywood and Westminster sexual harassment scandals, and the #MeToo campaign, the Commission has written to the Chairs of the FTSE 100 and other leading employers to remind them of their legal responsibility for the safety and dignity of their employees in ordinary workplaces across the country. The letter explains that, where the Commission discovers evidence of systemic failings, it will consider exercising its enforcement powers, this could include undertaking investigations into organisations which it suspects may be failing to take reasonable steps to protect employees.”

Sexual harassment is rife across all our industries. We accept it far too easily, in terms of the culture that we live in, but accountability lies with leadership. Everyone is entitled to a workplace that is free from harassment and discrimination. As a society, we have turned a blind eye for too long: enough is enough and now is the time to act. Culture change will not happen overnight, but I feel that there is a definite shift in attitudes towards being much more aware of sexual harassment, and that it will now no longer be tolerated.

As a Parliament, we need to encourage people to report sexual harassment, and we need mechanisms that address the significant barriers to raising issues in order to stamp it out, not only here in Parliament, but in every place of employment.

As so many other people have mentioned, I too was struck by one sentence in the introduction to the Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee’s report. I wholly agree with the sentence, which reads:

“The Scottish Parliament should aspire to be a model for other workplaces”.

Parliament is, of course, not immune from all the types of harassment that other workplaces suffer from. We know that for a fact, but we differ in one key respect from civic workplaces. That difference is that, if harassment is perpetrated by one of our elected members, they cannot be dismissed as the final consequence of a disciplinary procedure.

Where does that leave victims? It is tremendously difficult for someone to come forward about sexual harassment, particularly by someone who has power over them. Even with improvements in reporting systems and procedures, in this workplace a person could come forward, go through a process that is a tremendous strain on the most resilient of souls, tell strangers the most intimate details of their experiences and still be faced with an unsatisfactory conclusion, even if their complaint is upheld. If the complaint is against an elected member, and even if that member is disciplined by their own party and admits their harassment, they can still continue to be an MSP with access to constituency offices, parliamentary buildings and resources. In short, the victim will be likely to come into contact with their harasser.

There are strict regulations on the breach of standards that would lead to a member being forced out of office, and we all know them. Perhaps those need to be looked at again. The report is the start of a wider discussion on the matter, but it certainly offers no conclusion on what is a very difficult matter. The people of our constituency recruit us, and only they can sack us: not Parliament, and not a group of specially chosen people who sit on an independent body and have no relationship to a member’s constituency.

However, the Parliament has a duty of care to those who work here. If a person is found to be a victim, is it right that they are forced into a situation where they can be in physical proximity to the perpetrator? Of course it is not. However, the idea of having a board of people who can overturn an election result is also problematic, as Tom Arthur said.

We need a discussion about what additional sanctions on a perpetrator there can be and what operational procedures we can put in place that could protect a victim from having contact with his or her harasser. How we do that while still giving equal representation to that constituency or region is no small matter, but I am glad that there will be on-going work on that.

As with most things, prevention is better than cure. Political parties that choose candidates for election have the ultimate responsibility. Their procedures and vetting and their internal disciplinary mechanisms—or the lack of them—should not be Parliament’s mess to clean up. All parties should have a zero tolerance approach to sexual harassment, robust and comprehensive training for potential candidates and a reporting system that equals, if not betters, the reasonable recommendations made in this report. I want to see political parties dealing with complaints in the way that any well-run workplace would, not sweeping them under the carpet and putting party reputation ahead of justice for victims. If they do the latter, they are failing the electorate that puts its trust in them and are saddling a constituency or region with a person who has hidden their true self from their colleagues and their constituents. They damage our party, our Parliament and the reputation of those of us who conduct ourselves professionally.

Sexual harassment is happening across the party divide. No party is immune. I say with respect that some are dealing with it and some are not. The recommendations in the report are right and proper. I agree with almost all of them, but we should not leave Parliament to be the cure when prevention is in the hands of all parties in this chamber.

I call Mike Rumbles, who is the last speaker in the open debate. We will then move to the closing speeches—that is fair warning.

I, too, believe that this is a very good report and I thank the committee for all its work on our behalf.

A standards debate should be free of partisan party politics and I am glad that that has been the case this afternoon and that everyone has given their individual views—I will do the same. I say for the benefit of members who are not aware of this that I was the first convener of the Standards Committee back in 1999 at the very outset of our Parliament. I am proud of the fact that I was the member in charge of the very first committee bill of the Parliament, which set up an independent commissioner to investigate complaints against MSPs. I, and my committee, worked for many months to get that right.

I will comment on the section in the report headed “Sanctions for MSPs” and on the independent investigator. The committee recognises that there is a mechanism for the removal of an MSP for a serious breach of the law that results in a prison sentence of one year or more. In my opinion, such convictions and sentences are quite rightly in the hands of the courts. I would like to see the removal of an MSP as a result of their receiving any length of prison sentence; in this case, the one-year barrier is wrong and an MSP who is imprisoned should not remain an MSP.

However, paragraph 81 of the report states:

“Dismissal for serious offences is a feature of conventional employment arrangements, but there is no mechanism to remove an elected member from office for such misconduct”.

We must remember that, in law, parliamentarians are not employees. The committee itself states in paragraph 85 of its report:

“removing an elected member without reference to the electorate cuts across the principles of democracy.”

As to the issue of recall, we really must think through the practicalities. I notice the diplomatic absence of my party leader when I say that, with the greatest of respect to him, this is a point on which I disagree with him. I cannot possibly see how the process could operate in the Scottish Parliament when we have regional members who are elected by proportional representation. If anyone could explain in practical terms how we could recall regional MSPs, who are elected on the basis of PR, I would be willing to listen, but I cannot see how the practicalities of it would work.

On the issue of an independent investigator—which I know something about—my committee took a great deal of time to get that right, recognising that it was important to have a complaint investigated independently of MSPs. I had the unfortunate task of investigating the first major complaint, along with my committee, and we knew that that approach was wrong. It is absolutely right to have an independent investigator, but it should not be the job of such a person to sanction anyone. The investigator should put in a report of their independent findings to the SPPA Committee for further action. That is clearly the right way to approach this.

As MSPs, we all come to the chamber honoured to represent our constituents. We welcome individual constituents, school groups and community groups to Holyrood, and we hold up the building as a democratic institution that we are very proud of.

From that point of view, the statistics in the sexual harassment survey were absolutely shocking and worrying. The fact that 20 per cent of those surveyed had experienced either sexist behaviour or sexual harassment is just completely unacceptable in Scotland’s Parliament. Also, the fact that there were five times more cases involving women than men indicates that, in parts of this building, there is still too much of a male-dominated culture, which has to be eradicated.

One of the really worrying points that Jamie Halcro Johnston pointed out is that nearly half—45 per cent—of the instances of sexual harassment involved MSPs. The Parliament as an institution needs to take a close look at itself. Added to that, the real worry—as the committee brought out—is the lack of confidence in making complaints. As Clare Haughey pointed out, that leads to really low reporting of cases of sexual harassment or sexist behaviour.

There are a number of reasons for that. As Tom Arthur pointed out, we have a myriad of policies across the Parliament and individual political parties can have their own policies. One of the problems with political parties investigating complaints is that when they investigate any complaint, not just sexual harassment complaints, there is an element of trying to manage and minimise the fallout from the complaint. That is not good enough in this situation. We need a proper process that people can have confidence in. To do that, a central policy that sits above and is a higher priority than political parties’ policies would help. As the committee report also discussed, the use of an independent investigator would give people more confidence.

The other problem that Rhoda Grant and Gillian Martin brought out is that people who are employed by MSPs may have a real worry that making a complaint could have an effect on their career. One of the ideas that the committee discussed is whether staff could be reallocated by the corporate body in instances where complaints have been made. That suggestion is worthy of consideration.

As Willie Rennie pointed out, the status quo is not good enough. There is a lot of work to do by the review group and I am glad that Engender is involved in that. However, if we are to achieve Iain Gray’s ambition that his granddaughter will grow up to have a life without sexual harassment, we need to show leadership as a Parliament, not just to eradicate such behaviour here but so that the culture in the country will change as well and we can rid the country of sexual harassment and sexist behaviour.

I place on record the fact that I am a member of the joint working group and add my thanks to the clerks for the large amount of work that they are doing behind the scenes.

To tackle sexual harassment, we must first be able to recognise it. Willie Rennie rightly identified that as a complex problem. We start off by thinking that it is really simple and then, as the working group has discovered, the more we discuss and consider it, the more complex we realise that it is. That is why the formation of the joint working group, the work of the committee and the publication of the report were and are important.

Acts of sexual harassment are power plays. The behaviour tends to be dominating and, often, humiliating. Iain Gray beautifully described this place as a “palace of power relationships”. I will take that home with me and have a wee think about it, as it is quite a good description.

Members across the chamber agree that the levels of sexual harassment that we found in the survey are not acceptable. However, it is worrying that the most common response of people who experienced sexual harassment was to do nothing. On top of that, nearly one third of respondents had witnessed harassment or sexism and, again, one of the most common responses was to do nothing.

The Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee’s report showed that underreporting is endemic in the majority of institutions, and the Parliament is clearly no exception. However, Alison Harris astutely noted that it can often be difficult for someone to know what to do and who to turn to when they experience harassment, especially if they feel that it might compromise their job prospects. That serves to highlight why having new mechanisms for reporting it is important. I hope that that will allow the Parliament to begin to rectify its record.

As my colleague Rhoda Grant indicated, the joint working group has already published its statement of zero tolerance. I hope that that is the beginning of moving towards a better environment and experience in the Parliament. The new reporting procedures that we are working on will, I hope, allow for independent, confidential channels for complaints that will balance anonymity with transparency and fairness.

We must remember that the issue is not the intention of an action or comment, as that might be entirely without malice. The importance of what somebody does often lies in the unintended consequences of their actions and how others perceive them. If the recipient feels degraded and intimidated, the action must be taken extremely seriously to ensure that it cannot happen again. However, that does not necessarily mean persecuting the individual, who perhaps did not realise that their behaviour was having that effect.

That brings me to training. We all need to become more aware of, and more alert to, the feelings and perspectives of others, so training has an extremely important role. Should it be mandatory? Lack of training should certainly not be an adequate defence.

As Alexander Stewart stressed, the Parliament should set standards to which we expect others to rise. Inaction was not an option; therefore, I am glad that the working group and the committee have been able to move quickly to establish new measures for the elimination of sexual harassment. Nevertheless, for a complainant to feel truly confident in reporting harassment of any sort, they need to feel confident that action can and will be taken. As Jamie Halcro Johnston, Clare Haughey and Rhoda Grant all said, there is still a gap in holding MSPs to account fairly and effectively.

I take Tom Arthur’s point that the report and the work that is being done should be considered as a start—an interim stage, not an end. There are still a number of items that we will have to explore in detail and on which we will have to consider the evidence. The clash between Patrick Harvie and Willie Rennie highlighted that. There are things on which we should take action that seem simple on the surface but that we find are complicated when we start to get into the detail.

We need to remember that we are in positions of power and, as a result, have a responsibility to lead by example. I hope that, over the next few months, we will show that we can do that.

I am grateful to have the chance to close the debate on behalf of the committee. I once again thank everyone who participated in and supported the committee’s work, whether our clerking team or those who gave evidence to us. Also, all MSPs owe thanks to the members of corporate body staff and MSP staff who are participating in the Parliament’s wider work to address the issue.

I will not be able to respond to every issue that has been raised in the time that is available to me, as there is a great deal of complexity to many of those issues.

Michelle Ballantyne, Jamie Halcro Johnston and Gillian Martin were among many members who talked about the barriers to reporting. We need to get right the procedures for how we deal with incidents of sexual harassment, but, if we do not challenge and overcome the barriers to reporting in the first instance, that will not be enough.

Gillian Martin ended her argument by saying that we should not simply leave it to Parliament, as political parties also have a responsibility. As parties, we have a responsibility, but we also have to remember the issue of the cluttered landscape that was described by our convener, Clare Haughey, as well as by Jamie Halcro Johnston and other members. There is a cluttered landscape of employers and potential relationships, and we must avoid fragmentation in how individual cases are dealt with. If Parliament is unable to address matters under the code of conduct—for example, because information is held elsewhere—there is still the problem of the cluttered landscape, which leads us to the argument for a central policy in Parliament across all the different employers.

Iain Gray touched on an extremely important point in that regard. He said that it is not merely a case of having the right policies but of all of us taking responsibility. Although I agree with members who said that the perpetrators are not exclusively men—Clare Adamson reminded us to place the issue in the context of the gender spectrum, not the gender binary—as a society, we must recognise that there is a particular problem with men. There is a problem with men’s attitudes, behaviour and sense of sexual entitlement as well as their failure to take responsibility, often dismissing things as locker-room talk, as it has been described elsewhere. Iain Gray is absolutely right in saying that, if we do not call out and challenge the behaviour that we see in others around us, we, too, fail to accept responsibility.

Rhoda Grant recognised that, in the context of all those aspects, there is a need for a clear system for holding MSPs to account. It is easy to say “a clear system”, but today’s debate—in particular, some of the arguments around whether a recall mechanism is appropriate—has demonstrated that there are complexities in defining what a clear system can be. Michelle Ballantyne described my discussion with Willie Rennie as a clash, but I hope that it did not feel like that, as there is a serious debate to be had about the wider arguments for a recall system and its place in a democratic process.

The Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee was clear that that was beyond its remit and the remit of the inquiry, but the wider political arguments for a system of recall will, no doubt, be played out. Our concern, and the concern in some of the external evidence that we heard during the inquiry, is whether that would be consistent with giving people who wished to make a complaint clarity about how their complaint would be dealt with and ensuring confidentiality for those who wished to make a complaint as well as providing consistency in the sanctions that were applied.

It is quite clear to me that the first-past-the-post system would be a good system of recall. However, looking at the practicalities for regional MSPs such as myself and Patrick Harvie, how could we have a system of recall that was based on proportional representation? How would that work?

I cannot speak for the committee as a whole on that subject, as we have not reached a conclusion. We have considered the complexity of the issue, and it is one that needs to be thought about.

We are also talking about what has been described as an ultimate sanction that is comparable to dismissal for gross misconduct in other employment settings. We must recognise that, although recall is one way of achieving that, it is not necessarily the only way. There is already a threshold for dismissal from office as an MSP, and it currently lies with the courts. That is another way of thinking about the problem.

That issue, along with the principle that MSPs should not enjoy or be seen to enjoy a higher level of protection from investigation or sanction than people who are employed in other capacities and the question of suspension formed a set of issues that we wanted Parliament to debate to inform our future work.

I am aware that there are those who do not feel able to report their experiences. They include the person who works here who wrote to me recently:

“The MSP ... approached me in the parliamentary office of my employer and made ... graphic comments about my appearance, what he was keen to do to me once I had agreed to go for a drink with him off campus.”

He acted in that way

“on a number of occasions”.

The person who wrote to me said:

“I discussed this situation with a colleague who had worked for a ... MSP since 1999 and was told to forget that it had happened and that ‘it’s just the way he is.’ I mentioned it to my own employer who just raised their eyebrows and said that the MSP was well known to be a ‘bit of a chancer’ with younger women.”

Every single one of us—the committee and members across the Parliament—should be united in saying that we all need to take responsibility for challenging that culture. We need to challenge the status quo and change such attitudes and behaviours—every single one of us needs to take responsibility for that.

The Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee is committed to continuing this work. As Tom Arthur said, this is by no means the end of a process; it is the beginning of one.

On a point of order, Presiding Officer. Today, before First Minister’s questions, as is customary, we were asked to welcome a guest to the chamber: Andriy Parubiy, the speaker of the Ukrainian Parliament. Mr Parubiy was a founding member of the Social-National Party of Ukraine—a far right fascist party. It based its formation on Hitler’s Nazis and it accepted only ethnic Ukrainians as members. It was a party that practised social nationalism and used Nazi symbols to promote its ideology. It merged with other nationalist parties to form the Svoboda party, said by the European Union to be a racist party, and he controlled that far-right organisation’s paramilitary wing.

Presiding Officer, can you advise whether someone researches and vets those who come here as guests? Has any thought gone into providing members with information on who we are being invited to acknowledge, prior to your invitation to us to welcome them? Have any politicians or foreign dignitaries who have sought to come to the Parliament been refused? Will you look at the processes around the invitation and reception of guests so that members know who they are being asked to welcome into this democratic institution?

I thank Mr Findlay for letting me know in advance that he intended to raise a point of order. I note the comments that Mr Findlay has made, and he is able to pursue these matters though his business manager. However, I draw his and other members’ attention to the fact that it is my role as Presiding Officer to welcome speakers, heads of Government, commissioners and ambassadors to the Scottish Parliament on their behalf.

On a point of order, Presiding Officer. That is exactly the point. Members do not know who they are being asked to acknowledge in the Parliament. This is a very dangerous precedent to set, because who knows who the next person to come through the door will be? We do not have prior knowledge of who these individuals are. We do not know and cannot research their history before the moment when you ask us to welcome them into this democratic institution. I would prefer to know it the next time I am invited to welcome a racist, fascist Nazi to the Parliament.

I think that Mr Findlay has made his point. As far as I am aware—I will confirm this—members are informed, or it is certainly detailed in advance when we have visitors to the Parliament. I stress that, when we have a speaker representing another Parliament or somebody representing another country, it is expected that we welcome them to the Parliament.

There is one question to be put as a result of today’s business. The question is, that motion S5M-12730, in the name of Clare Haughey, on the sexual harassment and inappropriate conduct inquiry, be agreed to.

Motion agreed to,

That the Parliament notes the Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee’s 4th Report 2018 (Session 5), Sexual harassment and inappropriate conduct (SP Paper 340).