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I welcome amendment 15 in the name of the minister, which extends the provision to spent convictions. It makes perfect sense. I also welcome her suggestion that we look at amendment 74 and broaden the scope of offences to be disclosed. Indeed, she has identified the most obvious offences—wilful fire raising or offences of that nature. Jamie Greene talked about offences related to more general antisocial behaviour and violence, and off the top of my head, I would suggest convictions related to football or violence against emergency service workers, which currently do not have to be disclosed or considered. I welcome the move in that respect, and there is work to be done on the matter.

Ultimately, this is about creating a system that is not only fair but robust and which, as Fulton MacGregor suggested, does not deter people who are perfectly entitled to hold a licence or are legitimate licence holders. Nevertheless, offences that common sense would suggest would be of concern should be considered.

Amendment 79 is pretty straightforward. The purpose of seeking to limit the duration of the licence to two years is that, to be frank, five years is too long. It could be open to abuse and encourage stockpiling or black-market behaviour by a licence holder. Furthermore, much can happen with an individual in five years, whereas two years seems like a reasonable length of time to have a licence. One year might be considered prohibitive but, if the licence is to cover bonfire night, it could do so over two years.

A line must be drawn in the sand somewhere and I will be curious to know how the period of five years was arrived at. It might be that there is a good reason or some proper research has been done that came up with that figure, or it might be that someone somewhere just decided that it is a good number. I would be happy to hear the minister’s response to that.

The number of amendments in the group might suggest that a lot of talking is required, but that belies the fact that most of them would pretty much do the same thing.

I will start with amendment 62, which relates to the maximum prison sentence for illegally buying, acquiring or possessing fireworks, and amendment 63, which relates to the maximum fine. In much the same vein, amendments 64 and 65 relate to the particular offence of doing so without a licence; amendments 85 and 86 relate to the offence of making a false statement to get a licence; amendments 87 and 88 relate to the offence of producing a false licence or other document; amendments 91 and 92 relate to the offence of buying fireworks for, or giving them to, under-18s; amendments 94 and 95 relate to the offence of supplying fireworks outwith the proposed 37 designated dates; amendments 99 and 100 relate to the offence of using fireworks outwith the proposed 57 designated dates; amendments 110 and 111 relate to the offence of using fireworks in firework control zones in breach of the terms laid out; amendments 118 and 119 relate to the offence of possessing pyrotechnics after going to an event; and amendments 124 and 125 relate to the offence of giving false information to trading standards.

I will speak to amendment 126 later, as it is the only one in the group that is slightly different. In the other amendments that I have referred to, the first number relates to the maximum prison sentence for each offence and the second relates to the maximum fine. The bill states that the maximum prison sentence can be six months and the maximum fine can be £5,000 but, in my amendments, I seek to raise the maximum prison sentence to 12 months and the maximum fine to £10,000. I am not saying that the amendment sets out the correct sentence to be applied—we have no crystal ball that shows each and every case that will come before a sheriff down the line—but we think that it is very important for the judiciary to have the power of discretion on that matter. It seems unlikely that many of those offences will result in people being imprisoned for 12 months but, as we cannot foresee all the circumstances, it seems logical to give the judiciary that power.

Proposed subsection (3)(g) in Jamie Greene’s amendment 59 names the Animal Health and Welfare (Scotland) Act 2006. One of the single biggest issues that we have all heard about is that of fireworks causing distress to animals, whether domestic pets or agricultural animals.

I have a useful recent, real-world example that backs up Jamie Greene’s point. It relates to a farmer who came to one of my surgeries. He had had problems with a local hotel setting off fireworks and causing his cattle severe distress. He had lost calves to the trauma and some of the animals had escaped on to roads and so on. I say that to show the real cost to individuals of the misuse of fireworks.

He wanted to know whether there was existing legislation that made knowingly causing distress to animals illegal, which led to our coming across a public warning issued by the Scottish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals one year ago on fireworks night. It cited the Animal Health and Welfare (Scotland) Act 2006 and stated that it is an offence if a person causes any “unnecessary suffering” to captive or domestic animals and

“the person knew, or ought reasonably to have known”

that it would do that. That seemed pretty clear.

I then sought advice from the Scottish Parliament information centre on two elements: one, whether that interpretation was indeed correct and, two, whether there had been any such prosecutions over the past five years and, if so, how many. Eventually, the Scottish Government provided SPICe with information and, long story short, to the best of the Government’s knowledge it seems that no fireworks-related prosecutions were brought under the relevant section of the 2006 act.

Furthermore, the Government went on to say that it would be an offence if an animal was “intentionally” harmed by fireworks. The addition of the word “intentionally” seems slightly less certain than, and perhaps even at odds with, the SSPCA’s position on “knowingly” causing harm.

In the meantime, the farmer reached out to the National Farmers Union of Scotland, which told him that, as far as it was concerned, the SSPCA’s interpretation is correct and that knowingly causing distress is an offence.

The point that I am trying to make is that it took a great deal of time and effort from an individual, me and SPICe to establish that there is an act that appears to do something helpful in relation to a fundamental problem that this bill seeks to address, but that does not appear to be being used. To go back to Pauline McNeill’s point, if we pass legislation that ends up going much the same way and not being utilised by the police and the Crown, it is at risk of simply becoming legal clutter, for want of a better phrase.

Jamie Greene said that prosecution rates in relation to the number of recorded incidents is “pitiful” and I agree. In addition to that, the frustration that I as a new member have had on this committee is that even just getting that data from the relevant public bodies has been extremely difficult. I use the 2006 act as an example, but I assume that much the same could be said about all those other bits of legislation. I would be very interested in the minister’s response to all those points.

That makes sense, but that provision is entirely dependent on the people selling fireworks being honest and declaring what they are sending, which cannot be guaranteed. Therefore, I go back to the point that amendment 61 would put the onus on the buyer.

We have four and a half minutes left. I will bring in Jamie Greene. Over to you, Jamie.

The other witnesses can respond very briefly.

Sure. I think that ACC Smith would like to comment.

I want to go back to Pauline McNeill’s original question about the significant rise in the number of young girls in particular falling victim to stuff online. I will turn first to Joanne Smith from NSPCC Scotland. From memory, your organisation has a very useful website for parents of young people who might have concerns. Will you expand a bit on the scale of the threat and what can be done to help to protect children?

Bex Smith is keen to answer that.