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In your submission to the committee of 7 March, you said that working groups on the future of air traffic control, particularly at Wick and Benbecula, were yet to be established. Has there been any progress on that? Would you like to see that happen? Is there a need for that?

Thank you for those answers. I am trying to establish an example on which there could be more rapid movement. Yesterday, there was a debate on the new national planning framework 4, and it was mentioned earlier that public engagement on planning can often be in the hostile context of a perceived threat. Has there been consideration of actions that the Parliament could take, perhaps through this committee or other committees, to advance the agenda of citizens assemblies or other approaches to deliberative democracy in relation to, for example, NPF4 and reform of the planning system? Is that a particular case that the committee could take cognisance of?

There is definitely merit from a social justice point of view in the petition’s proposed creation of a universal public good. It is also worth thinking about the fact that, although the issue is often talked about in terms of the cost of infrastructure and provision, increasingly, there are advances in community food growing and provision. Therefore, perhaps the issue needs to be considered in the wider context of communities’ food resilience.

There is an interesting project in Glasgow involving Locavore, which is a community food local enterprise. It has taken over parts of public parks to start growing produce that can be sold commercially and used for food justice projects through food pantry networks and so on. That can all be part of the picture, and there is perhaps a bigger piece of work that needs to be done about how we improve the supply of food in the local community. That could be part of the exercise, too—the approach could be part of a broader public good than simply being the mechanical exercise of providing catering for schools.

No problem. Just to—

Do any of the witnesses want to make any final points on the report’s implications for the Parliament? Is there anything that the committee should latch on to and take forward?

[Inaudible.]—indicative set of practical opportunities that we might be able to pursue. You said that you do not want to jump the gun in relation to what resourcing might look like, but have there been any indicative costings for the resources that will be necessary to support the work that you are proposing?

The recommendations are set out in summary and in detail in the report and cover two themes, which are

“developing a broad range of participation and democratic innovations”,

and

“using this system as a basis to establish routine use of Citizens’ Assemblies in Scotland”.

On the first theme, different time periods are specified. There are early foundational actions, actions in the current session of Parliament to May 2026 and longer-term ambitions for consideration. Obviously, we know the length of the current parliamentary session, but the other time periods are perhaps not so specific.

There are significant asks of the Scottish Government. For example, there is a requirement for a unit in the Scottish Government with responsibility for participation, which seems to be a response to the objective of providing an indication of the necessary resources—obviously, that will have to be led by Government.

There are also a number of recommendations that engage the Parliament specifically. For instance, there are the recommendations to

“Adopt values, principles and standards for institutionalising participatory and deliberative democracy in Scotland ... Support upcoming reviews and legislation to embed participation and deliberation across the system ... Consider the proposals of the Citizens’ Assembly on the Future of Scotland for new infrastructure associated with the Scottish Parliament ... Collaborate with local government, public services and Parliament to establish and agree a clear agenda setting guidelines for all Citizens’ Assemblies”

and to

“Connect to the Scottish Parliament Committee system for scrutiny of Citizens’ Assembly processes and recommendations”.

Bearing in mind the recommendations that engage the Parliament, how do the different categories and time periods relate to one another, and which are particularly time critical? What recommendation prioritisation took place in the group, and are there any critical recommendations that we should take particular note of? I open that

Sorry, convener.

Has the issue of equality between people with refugee status and asylum seekers been taken into consideration? Will any provisions be introduced to support people coming from Ukraine? There is a wider humanitarian crisis in our midst given the current asylum system. In Glasgow, we had the Park Inn tragedy with hotel accommodation. There is a hierarchy of people in the asylum system who are subject to different restrictions. What consideration has been given to ensuring that there is as much parity across the system as can be achieved under NRPF? Perhaps Alison Byrne can answer that.

I have no relevant interests to declare.