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PE2051, on improving the processes for protecting children and young people from traumatic incidents, was lodged by Dianne Youngson. The petition calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to establish a consistent and transparent reporting mechanism for incidents that affect the health of pupils in schools; to review and improve the existing guidelines for schools in dealing with at-risk pupils; to place in law the monitoring of reporting mechanisms, with ultimate responsibility being placed with the Scottish ministers and local authorities; and to reform the exclusions procedure to include consideration of whether exclusions may cause further harm.

On reporting and monitoring, the SPICe briefing notes that all schools and local authorities are expected to use the bullying and equalities module in the SEEMiS information system to record and monitor bullying incidents. However, Education Scotland’s review found that the module is challenging to use and that national guidance is not being fully implemented, which leads to inconsistencies.

The submission from the Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills highlights the getting it right for every child approach and, in particular, the role of a child’s named person. She has also highlighted the counselling services that are in place throughout secondary schools, which are available for children who are 10 years old and over.

On exclusions, the 2017 national guidance is noted. That guidance states that exclusion should be used as a last resort and should be a proportionate response where there is no appropriate alternative, with the wellbeing of the individual being a key consideration.

Last year, the Scottish Government held a series of summits on relationships and behaviour in schools. The cabinet secretary provided an update on that work to Parliament in November and announced that a joint action plan will be developed to address the issues that had been raised. In that statement, the cabinet secretary also encouraged more accurate recording of all incidents of inappropriate, abusive or violent behaviour in schools.

In view of the information that is before us, do members have any comments or suggestions for action?

We will therefore keep the petition open and seek the information as set out by Mr Torrance.

That is also a perfectly reasonable suggestion to make. We will take forward the petition, mindful of all the suggestions that colleagues have made.

I wonder who we should write to. What relevant dog agency might we take views from?

No. Okay. We can do that, too.

Good morning and welcome to the second meeting in 2024 of the Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee.

The first item on the agenda is one for colleagues, and it is a decision on taking business in private. Do members agree to take in private item 5, which is consideration of the evidence that we are about to hear from the cabinet secretary and others as well as the evidence that we will hear in relation to whistleblowers, and item 6, which is consideration of our work programme?

Members indicated agreement.

I want to start with a question that I put to Mr Galbraith last week, and he will, no doubt, want to reassure me in the same soporific tones with which he sought to reassure me last time.

First of all, this is not an issue that I have been directly involved with; indeed, as the member for Eastwood, I have to say that it is not the first thing that is of concern to my constituents, and it is not, as it is for some, my particular field of expertise. However, I read through the narrative, and here I come to the point that I tried to explain to Mr Galbraith. What I saw in that narrative was that, even though there was an acceptance of the challenges associated with all of this, there was still a consistency of commitment and policy objective with regard to delivering the A9 by 2025, both privately and publicly, from the moment the project was announced until somewhere around 2018 when—as I found on reading the papers—a vagueness started to come in.

I have never been able to quite understand the genesis of that. It is not clear to me whether it was those involved in the delivery of the project who thought that something was not going to happen and that they needed to start thinking about different funding streams and operational approaches—none of this was shared with the public, by the way; it was all happening internally—or whether ministers themselves were leading all of this.

Last week, Grahame Barn said that he thought that the target became unachievable

“because the political will to provide the funding required to do the job just was not there when required.”—[Official Report, Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee, 24 January 2024; c 4.]

I want to try to understand this. Given that the Parliament and the public only became aware much later that we were not achieving the target, I would like to know what happened. How did it become apparent to ministers that the challenges that had been identified might mean that there would be a delay, and who then tried to drive things forward by looking at whether there were different ways of doing it? Did it come from the top down or the bottom up?

To be fair to Mr Galbraith, he was halfway through his response, Mr Ewing, so I will allow him to finish.

A couple of questions arise from what I have heard. On the £3.7 billion, there is a funding trail in the pile of documents that we have received. At one point, figures as high as £6.25 billion were identified in relation to the project. Can you explain why you are confident about the figure of £3.7 billion? Is that a comprehensive figure, or did the allusion to £6.25 billion in papers that we received include other considerations? Have those disappeared, or do they continue to sit alongside the £3.7 billion?

I am not sure that they are at an all-time high; they are at a relative high.

Thank you, cabinet secretary. Before I conclude, is there anything further that you or your colleagues feel that we have not touched on that you had come along expecting to reveal to us today?