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I will continue to consider that, but the necessity of having the regulations on the statute book by 1 October and having time for discussions and dialogue with stakeholders, and the required time for drafting and processing, suggest to me that it will be most likely that we will use the made affirmative procedure. However, as I have said, I will continue to consider the matter.

I do not think that we would, for the reasons that Mr Rowley suggested in his question about the challenges that we face over winter. In that scenario, we might be coming back round to the issue in three weeks’ time. To reinforce that point, I draw on the contents of the United Kingdom Government’s plan B, which includes vaccination certification; I think that it has an eye on the winter problems and the challenges that it will face.

I agree very much with the point that you made about the technology, Mr Mason. It is routine technology that is widely available through free downloadable apps for individuals and for those who undertake checking. It has been designed to be within the firmament of the technology that we are all accustomed to using nowadays.

The winter preparations started some time ago in order to ensure that we are ready for the pressures that are inevitably put on the health service during autumn and winter. Frankly, that is why the Government is taking some of the steps that we are taking. I accept that they are not the most popular measures that we have ever taken, but they have to be taken in order to try to suppress the prevalence of the virus.

I do not have today’s numbers in front of me, but on Tuesday we had 1,064 people in hospital with Covid, which is a very high number of admissions to hospital because of Covid. The Cabinet regularly sees modelling of what might happen if we do not suppress levels of the virus. Those levels translate into levels of hospitalisation.

There might now be a different ratio. Back in the early part of the pandemic, about 13 per cent of people who had positive tests for Covid were hospitalised; now, it is about 2 per cent to 3 per cent. The difference is that the level of positive tests is much higher today than it was 12 months ago, which translates into more people, which puts more pressure on the national health service.

In addition to that, the national health service is undertaking two other aspects of work. It is providing the normal emergency care that is necessary—Mr Rowley mentioned news articles about very alarming and totally unacceptable circumstances—and it is dealing with routine elective work, which had been slowed up or paused entirely because of Covid. Therefore, the national health service is under phenomenal pressure. What we can do in advance of the winter is suppress levels of Covid in order to reduce the number of hospitalisations and to relieve some of the pressure. That will work across all aspects of the health service, whether it is ambulance services, acute admissions or elective care.

There are huge pressures on the national health service. Winter preparations have been and continue to be made—we have more people available to work in our national health service—but there will be challenges resulting from the level of Covid in our society.

The general picture on vaccination is therefore encouraging. The numbers relating to 16 and 17-year-olds, which Professor Leitch has shared, are an indication of real enthusiasm to come forward. I pay tribute to the school community, which has done tremendous work to encourage young people, and to young people themselves, who have exercised tremendous leadership. For example, I saw senior pupils from all the Perth city schools, who were involved in a venture in my constituency at the Dewars ice rink vaccination centre, promoting that to their peers. That was very successful. That is probably the best communication that there can be to encourage uptake.

The general position is encouraging but, comparatively speaking, we have weaknesses among younger people—the under-30s—and we have challenges in some areas of the country that suffer from socioeconomic deprivation, and in black and minority ethnic communities. The Government has looked carefully with health boards at the practical deployment of services and vaccination opportunities in order to ensure that we try to counter those. Mr Rowley will be familiar with the situation in his locality. His health board will have been offering various drop-in opportunities at different places to try to address that.

A lot of the approach is focused on localities in which we know that there are weaknesses. However, we cannot oblige people to take up the opportunities in a voluntary vaccination programme. We can maximise the possibilities and availability, but we cannot oblige people.

I assure the committee of two things. The first is that we should be pleased by how much progress has been made. It is a tribute to the vaccinators around the country, who have worked incredibly hard. The second is that we are taking focused measures to boost uptake where we possibly can.

It is vital that the scheme that we put in place is able to work effectively, and we are addressing the issues that you have fairly raised as part of the development of the necessary technology to enable that.

The basic position for implementing the scheme is very strong, as are the availability of the data in vaccination records and the relationship of those records to individuals. The demonstrations that I have seen of the technology give me a very high level of confidence about the platform on which we are operating. Of course, there will be occasions when the data do not correspond exactly and we have to work with the suppliers and technology companies that we are working with to address those issues as expeditiously as we can. We addressed those matters with Mr Mason at a previous meeting.

As for implementation, the Government takes the view that the scheme needs to be up and running on 1 October because of its necessity in contributing towards the efforts to suppress the virus. That is the rationale behind our urgency in this matter, but in our briefing document on the proposals we indicate that implementation will be founded on the application of “reasonable measures” to put that into effect. Obviously, our guidance will endeavour to address that point, too.

I am not sure whether Jason Leitch wishes to add anything to what I have said about the specific issue of vaccination records.

They would do that through the NHS Inform helpline, but perhaps Jason Leitch can provide some detail.

I agree 100 per cent about the importance of the matter, and I can reassure you that we are making efforts to pursue it.

The other day, I saw a social media message in which a clinician shared a photograph of himself dressed head to toe in personal protective equipment, wearing a heavy-duty clinical face mask. It looked unbearably uncomfortable. The message that he set alongside the picture was, essentially, “If all you’re moaning about is wearing a face mask to go to the shops, come and stand where I’ve been standing for a minute.” I think that that made the point perfectly. Wearing a face covering is the least that we can ask people to do to ensure that they are taking precautions to stop spread of the virus.

All the baseline measures—wearing a face covering, observing physical distancing where possible, coughing etiquette, hand-hygiene procedures and so on—will interrupt spread of the virus, so it is important that we reinforce the messages on them.

About three weeks ago, the Cabinet discussed the issue. General frustration was expressed that, after 9 August, there had been a sense that there could be relaxation of those baseline measures.

We therefore took a number of steps. We deputised cabinet secretaries to intensify stakeholder discussion—basically, to get on the phone to supermarkets, retailers, transport companies, universities and colleges. Members of the Cabinet did that, along with their officials, in order to have those conversations.

Then, two weeks ago, I convened a stakeholder discussion involving about 170 organisations, including representatives of the retail sector and all the supermarket chains, transport companies, education institutions, local authorities, business organisations and trade unions. The aim of that was to reinforce the importance of application of the baseline measures. Of course, in such a conversation involving a range of stakeholders, some will be pressing strong arguments that are supportive of what the Government is doing. For example, I was delighted with the degree to which the trade union representatives on the call reinforced the message. They are, understandably, concerned about the wellbeing of their members. It was a helpful call that strengthened the attitude to application of baseline measures.

On Tuesday, the First Minister and I convened a follow-up call that included much the same cast list. There was quite a bit of feedback from the retail sector that the messaging from the Government about turning up the heat on following baseline measures had helped in the retail environment. Ministers have undertaken specific communications to support retail workers and to encourage members of the public to be respectful of those workers by ensuring that they wear a face covering if they are asked to do so by a retail employee.

I hope that that reinforcement of the baseline measures is contributing in part to the tempering of the level of infection in society. As the First Minister reported to Parliament on Tuesday, we are in a better place than we were last week and the week before.

I assure Mr Rowley that we intend to have no let-up in encouraging and motivating organisations to follow the baseline measures. I think that most organisations accept the importance of that, because they can see that, if we do not do it, we might have to do other things that they will like even less.

The work is under way to do that. As Professor Leitch has said, individual circumstances might need a level of manual intervention to resolve the issue for individuals. At this stage, if people are in the situation that Mr Fraser has highlighted, whereby they have had a vaccine in a different jurisdiction and need to resolve the implications of that for their vaccination certification, I encourage them to engage in the practical mechanisms to resolve those issues. Obviously, as time goes on, we will be able refine further the systems in the common travel area so that they all speak to each other effectively, which will avoid the degree of manual intervention that we have highlighted. I reassure people that the steps that are required to resolve those issues are able to be taken.

I am familiar with that issue. There have been many discussions about that point. Much of that is driven by the systems of which we are a part, through operating on a UK-wide basis. The ability to have some flexibility is being assessed as part of addressing the concerns raised by the airline industry.