The next item of business is our business debate on motion 3950, member's business debate in the name of Rhoda Grant, on triggers for loneliness. This debate will be concluded without any questions being put. I would like to ask those members who wish to speak in the debate to press their request to speak buttons now. I call on Rhoda Grant to open the debate. Miss Grant, seven minutes please. Thank you, Presiding Officer, and I'd like to thank all those who signed my motion for their support in bringing this debate to the chamber tonight. Can I also thank the co-op and the British Red Cross for their caught-in-a-bubble report highlighting the issues of loneliness, and it's this report that led to the debate tonight? It may seem strange to some that the co-op has been involved, but they have a rich history of community work. This is what makes co-operatives stand out. Scotland, Headquartered in Edinburgh currently supports hundreds of community groups across Scotland, including Childline. In 2015, the co-op asked its members to identify an issue that they wanted to pursue, and they voted to tackle loneliness and chose British Red Cross as their partner. The raised funds exceeding their £3.5 million target to tackle loneliness. Not only have they published their report, but they are also looking to develop projects, and there are five of those in Scotland, two in the Highlands and Islands region in Bray and in Inverness. I'd also like to thank the co-operative party and the many other organisations and individuals that took time to send briefings, or who wrote to me sharing their own experience. We all assume that loneliness is something that impacts an old age, usually due to bereavement or illness. However, the co-op in the bubble report looks at several different groups.  What surprised me was that some of those things could be seen as positive developments. The birth of a child, the freedom of retirement, for example, seemed positive, but they are also life changing. They can change your social circle and your identity.  Similarly, with retirement, it can be freedom, but many of us are defined by what we do. The report found that there were clear impacts of being lonely and those were biological, psychological and behavioural. While we understand the psychological and behavioural, it is not fully recognised that there are biological impacts on a person's health. The impact of loneliness can be linked to cardiovascular health risks, increased death rates, high blood pressure, signs of ageing, symptoms of depression and the risk of dementia, and at the extreme, it is linked to suicide. The report concluded that there was a lack of support available. There also appeared to be stages of loneliness, the disruption of a life changing event and the ability to adapt to that. They found that 79 per cent of people experienced loneliness at some point in their lives. We need to recognise the triggers and to ensure that there is advice and support available at key stages in life in order to avoid loneliness becoming extreme, for example, at the birth of a child. We need to look at the different stages when someone is lonely and provide support to overcome that. For example, lunch clubs and social outings for older people be frienders for those who cannot get out easily. When loneliness becomes chronic, then more organised interventions are required to address the harms that loneliness has caused, because it takes time to build confidence that there are many organisations that will help with that. We are getting better at recognising the triggers. Many employers recognise the need for transition into retirement now, helping their staff to adapt. With people moving to find work, the traditional family structures are no longer in place, leading to isolation and loneliness for old and young. Some people juggle supporting ageing parents with helping to bring up grandchildren, only to find that both roles can disappear from their lives at around the same time, leaving them a lack of purpose and empty days to fill. We all need to be needed to feel useful and to have a role to play. Be frienders in their summary report of their health and loneliness roadshow in 2015 concluded that there was a widespread perception among participants that any practice currently aimed at tackling loneliness happens mostly by chance. It goes on. Nor is there currently any formal commitment from local or national government to develop strategies or dedicate fund to reducing, let alone preventing, the alarming high levels of loneliness documented in the research. The Joe Cox commission was set up to examine ways of tackling loneliness. The commission was set up after the MP's death and is a fitting addition to the work that she started. She was passionate about tackling loneliness and she put it down to three issues, ageing population, changing family structures and to government policy of inadequate care services. There is a lack of support for the voluntary sector. They run many of the wonderful projects, some small, some local, other large and national organisations that try to do that. For example, Friendship Services in Inverness, the Narnshire Mentoring Service, part of Arthritis Care Scotland, the Lian Fund and Stornoway, providing support for young people with cystic fibrosis who are leaving home. Be frienders throughout all of Scotland, mother and baby and mother and toddler groups, carers support groups and many many more. The list is long. Volunteers given their time to care and support those facing loneliness and trying to fill the gaps that government has left. The Joe Cox commission has highlighted the need for people to be proactive. Its start to conversation campaign seeks to make us all part of the solution by taking time to speak to a neighbour or family member who is alone. We can also take it further. Caroline Abrams of Age UK said, a simple thing like saying hello or having a chat can brighten up another person's day. Sadly, the modern culture of Scotland does not encourage spontaneous conversations with strangers and most the pity because I think we all lose out. One of the things that I love about going door to door is the conversations that you have and they are not all about politics. You get a short insight into lives of some wonderfully colourful individuals. The voluntary groups that I have talked about are just an example and I am really sorry that I have missed so many because it shows the range of organisations. We are trying to meet the needs of people of all ages affected by loneliness. We need people in all walks of life to identify people at risk of loneliness and to signpost them to support before it impacts on their health. We also need government, local and national to play their part. We need to support those voluntary groups and help to coordinate efforts and identify where gaps exist. We need to look at the funding of services. Voluntary organisations tell us of the problems of planning and delivering services on a year-to-year funding basis. We need to give them more security. We also need to look at service provision for groups that are vulnerable to loneliness to make sure that every new mum is signposted to a playgroup, that every old person has access to social interaction. We also need to recognise that a five-minute care visit does nothing to alleviate loneliness and to recognise that social interaction is as important as being fed and raised. The voluntary sector is doing its bit. We need government to support them and we all need to play our part by starting a conversation. I move to the open debate speeches of four minutes, please. Colin Smyth by Maurice Corry. I echo the comments on thanking Rhoda Grant for securing this debate today. I know that she is very much a long-standing campaigner on an issue that really does touch so many lives in all her communities. Younger old, north or south, as Jo Cox herself said, loneliness does not discriminate. From the child bullied at school to a new mum to a pensioner who has outlived her husband or wife, the feeling of loneliness can hit any one of us at any time in our lives. As Rhoda Grant said, it is a key point that is trapped in a bubble report by the co-op in the British Red Cross, referred to in Rhoda Grant's motion, revealed. The report also revealed that over 9 million people in the UK across all adult ages are either always or often lonely. A survey by action for children found that 43 per cent of 17 to 25-year-olds who used their service had experienced problems with loneliness and less than half of that same group said that they felt loved. The report also reported that almost a quarter of parents surveyed said that they were always or often lonely. An aged Scotland, whose excellent Christmas campaign, No One Should Have No One at Christmas, revealed that almost 50,000 older people in Scotland face Christmas Day alone. With loneliness and isolation also a stacked reality for around 100,000 older people living in Scotland every day. As the co-op in the British Red Cross pointed out, the causes of that loneliness are complex. Rhoda Grant highlighted often that they are caused by a trigger, divorced, poor health, retirement or bereavement. Our community can also have an impact. For example, poor transport links in a rural area can add to a person's feeling of loneliness and isolation. The society that we live in today can be a driver with people working longer and living in a more anti-social way. As a result, the solutions can be equally complex in their variety. As the research by the co-op in the British Red Cross found, there is no one-size-all-fits approach to tackling loneliness. In the very short period of time that we have, I want to briefly focus on one group of older people, who are the Joe Cox commission today spotlight, and as a group with a greater risk of loneliness and isolation. In particular, I want to highlight the work of one organisation in my region and the lessons that we can take from that work in tackling loneliness. That organisation is called the Food Chain, one that I suspect is familiar to many members in the chamber. It was established in 1995 by a Labour Party stalwart, Jean Mundell, after a community survey of older people found many struggling with their weekly grocery shopping. A partnership of local shops and volunteers were formed to in effect carry out the shopping for older people and deliver it to their homes. The success of that service saw it expand beyond Dumfries, thanks to funding from the then Scottish Executive. By the time that Jean Sagley passed away in 2006, the service was operational right across Dumfries and Galloway. I recently had the privilege of joining Food Chain for the day, helping the amazing volunteers in their deliveries. I am delighted to see that, just beyond its 21st birthday, the Food Chain has expanded across Scotland into West Lothian, Stirland, Dundee, Glasgow, Renfisher and North Lanarkshire. As well as expanding its geography, it has also expanded its services, adding Food Chain extra and additional home support service and, more recently, a third service, Food Chain Friends. The award-winning befriending service will help those volunteers to experience isolation and loneliness through, for example, telephone contact, one-to-one home visits and group outings and activities. It is a simple concept, but we cannot underestimate the difference that it makes to the older people who the volunteer befrienders reach out to. Taking them out, simply having a chat on the phone or popping round for a coffee is a hugely positive impact on their wellbeing and happiness. It is work that, frankly, could be life-saving because we know that loneliness kills increases the risk of mortality by 10 per cent and has been likened to a 15-a-day smoking habit. It increases stress, anxiety and depression and doubles the risk of dementia. It manifests itself in physical health, raising blood pressure, contributing to heart disease, stroke and sometimes cancer. It can impact on our behaviour, reinforcing or exasperating problems such as alcohol misuse. The impact on health was recognised by the Parliament's Equal Opportunities Committee's excellent report into age and social isolation in 2015, which led to the Government's commitment of funding and also to a later issue. A later cross-party commitment to develop a national strategy. I hope that, when the minister sums up, she will be able to update the chamber on when we are likely to see that strategy. I also hope that she will give a commitment that providing greater support to the voluntary sector who deliver beefrending projects such as food train friends will be at the very heart of that strategy. First, I thank Rhoda Grant for bringing forward this most important debate this afternoon. Loneliness is indeed a very serious issue in society today, but because it is one that takes place behind closed doors, it is one that is sometimes totally ignored and it often doesn't receive the attention that it deserves. I would like to also say that I welcome the work done by the British Red Cross and the co-operative group in bringing forward their reports and also the launch of the Joe Cox commission on loneliness. The British Red Cross and the co-operative group have compiled an important piece of work in highlighting this issue and also informing on just how widespread this issue is right across the different parts of society we normally don't associate with in this issue of loneliness. The report highlights correctly that loneliness is something that anyone can feel as the report states that loneliness can happen across life stages, genders and backgrounds and is not solely connected with later life. The report is not only useful in that it gives the statistics of those who deal with loneliness but it also helps us to identify the types of support that people say they want, which tends to be face-to-face services. A classic example of that is the advances in medicine. In the case that I had to deal with recently in my role laterally as a chairman of IJB, the health board in Argym but, the advances in medicine had meant that it had reduced the amount of visits that nurses made to people in rural areas. Instead of attending to their needs twice a week, they were only going there once a week and that was me and they were only seeing that person once. That had a detrimental effect on those people's lives. That is something that good comes and sometimes bad comes out of it. An example of an organisation that I work with and doing great work providing these types of services is Legion Scotland, who offer a befriending service designed for veterans and their families of all ages right across the country. Those in the military community, both the service personnel themselves and their families as well, move around a lot and live in very different lifestyles to much of society. You can imagine that, when they leave the services, they can struggle as they do not share the same life experience of those who have not served in the forces. They also may not have the many ties to the local areas that they move into. They think that no one understands them, so you can imagine that that leads to loneliness for many. What Legion Scotland does, which I think is so important in combating loneliness, is that they have introduced veterans to other veterans so that they have someone in the local area to talk to and socialise with who has similar experiences to themselves. That is just one organisation that I know of and that I deal with. Many others are doing brilliant work but they do need more support. I think that the type of work that Legion Scotland does can be extended to other groups who are facing loneliness but are sometimes ignored when it comes to loneliness. For example, to young new mums, of those who have recently been divorced or separated, two of the groups highlighted in the report. To be able to have someone to speak to and talk to who is going through or who has gone through the same things as you is incredibly important. Knowing that you are not only going through the loneliness again and indeed yourself can bring great comfort to them. The other cause of action that the report highlighted was the smaller simple acts that we can teach to take combat loneliness in our society, which is just speaking to our neighbours, family and friends, just asking how they are. It is simple but they can have a massive effect and impact. That is one of the things that the Joe Cox commission wants to do, which is start a conversation. I hope that, as individuals and as members of this Parliament, we can lead the way and also set an example in helping society to fight loneliness. Thank you very much. I call Kenneth Gibson to be followed by Joan Lamont. First, I would like to congratulate Rhoda Grant on lodging this motion and for securing this debate on an issue that is so significant in contemporary Scotland. I am sure that everyone here in the chamber has experienced loneliness at some point in their lives. But what happens when loneliness becomes a chronic condition? We are all aware that there is a clear link between loneliness and poor mental health, with lonely individuals increasingly prone to depression and even suicide, once they have shown that lonely people have a 64 per cent greater chance of developing clinical dementia. However, let us not forget that loneliness can also affect physical health, with research showing that lacking social connections is damaging to our health with smoking 15 cigarettes per day. In fact, loneliness is associated with an increased risk of developing coronary heart disease, diabetes and strokes. That is obviously an impact on individuals. Society itself, both in terms of how compassionate we are as a society and more precisely the impact on our public services, as lonely individuals use more medication, have a higher instance of falls and increased risk factors for long-term care. When considering the facts that are leading to social isolation, it is easy to forget how many social connections we experience through something as simple as going to work, shing a smile with a fellow commuter, having a coffee with a colleague, even arguing with her boss. It is therefore understandable that a major life transition such as a bereavement, diagnosis of a serious health condition or retirement could trigger loneliness. Thankfully, we are now more aware than ever before about the effects and causes of loneliness, and that means that we are beginning to see effective, targeted action to support lonely individuals in our communities. We must celebrate the positive work that is taken by organisations such as the three towns and large OIR groups in my constituency. Those groups offer opportunities in retirement to over ffifties and build upon the skills and voluntary contributions of their members. They offer a wide range of activities from French licence to hill walking to ballroom dancing, enhancing the mental and physical wellbeing of all our members. To be even more effective, the grassroots community initiatives are supported by policy and action taken by the Scottish Government, which tackles social isolation at a national level. By developing partnerships between Scotland's public services and the third sector, we can design a cohesive strategy informed by the opinions of people who need our services most. We must also address the mistaking belief that loneliness is a problem that only touches the lives of older people. As the British Red Cross and Co-op report demonstrates, loneliness can affect anyone at any stage in life. In fact, a report by the Mental Health Foundation in 2010 found that loneliness was most common between the ages of 18 and 34. It is harder for that age group to seek support, as they are mostly tool to access youth services and to young for initiatives that are engaged with the elderly population. Isolation by smartphone and the internet is also a growing problem. Young disabled people, LGBT teens and those from ethnic minority backgrounds are also more likely to experience social isolation. Chronic and persistent bullying has been known to cause intense loneliness, reduced self-esteem and social anxiety in later life. Despite the myth of social media and the notion that we are all more connected than ever before, many of our young people are struggling to develop meaningful relationships and connections which allow them to feel supported and part of our community. That is why the Scottish Government is committed to training all teachers on equality to increase their confidence in tackling prejudice-based bullying. On 2017-18, we will also see spending on Scotland's mental health services exceed £1 billion for the first time. We can further develop those positive strategies by including young people in the dialogue surrounding social isolation and loneliness. I trust that the Scottish Government continues to recognise loneliness as a public health priority. I encourage everyone in Scotland to speak openly and honestly about mental health and support one another in our communities. Once again, I thank Rhoda Grant for bringing us a debate to the chamber. Mr Gibson called Joanne Lamont to be followed by Liam McArthur. I am happy to contribute to this very important debate. I would wish to declare an interest as a co-operative party member who is supported by the co-operative party as an MSP. I congratulate Rhoda Grant on securing the debate but also on the way in which she outlined the challenges that the report represents. I welcome the report by the co-operative group in British Red Cross, highlighting the important issue of loneliness. It speaks to something about the co-operative movement that its job is not simply to say how much it cares about things but to identify practical solutions. We know that, in polling, people identify the fear of loneliness in old age as a second only to the fear of dementia. It is something that troubles us all as we get older. What will life be like in our old age? Loneliness is part of that sense of concern. We know from our own experience and have spoken to other individuals the impact of loneliness and social isolation on people's health and wellbeing, on their very sense of themselves. It is not just that people are lonely but that it is hard to admit that you are lonely. It is somehow some deficit in yourself that you have not managed to organise your life in such a way that you have people around about you. I think that that sense of people's own feeling of not even wanting to ask for help, wanting to admit that the problem is part of the challenge that we face in wanting to address those questions. Because of that sense of failure that we all have felt at some point in our lives but we have failed to make that connection with others. It is important to highlight, as Kenneth Gibson highlighted, that loneliness is not just an issue for the elderly but significant life events can cause loneliness. Even at a point where you would imagine that that would be the last thing that someone would feel. Perhaps divorce, bereavement, people have become retired no longer in the workplace but young mums too, at the very point where they have a new wee person to look in their lives, can feel separate from others. People do not understand the challenges that they face. I think that that report is really important in highlighting that the recognition that it can be experienced in all sorts of places and times and that we should all be alive to that. The report also identifies some very practical things that can be done, recognising the role for employers in what they do to support their employees at times of stress and difficulty, whether it is bereavement or anything else. Such a practical thing, but the co-op group suggests that the funeral people should be reaching out to those who are bereaved and saying that there are support groups, there are folk that you may want to take comfort from and I think that others could perhaps draw on that as well. The issue is one of community cohesion. We know that there are churches, community groups and strong neighbourhoods where people look out for other people but there are people who are perhaps falling through the net. We want to celebrate the work of the third sector but also recognise that in tough financial times it is those groups that fall by the wayside. The lunch group takes somebody out to the library to make sure that they attend church. Those are the things that go by the board and that is why I believe that the short sightedness of targeting local government for cuts does work its way through in this process. Something as simple as reorganising the bus system to be more rational for the bus person, the person who owns the bus company, might mean that an elderly person will no longer go out and use the bus because it involves two journeys or three journeys rather than simply one and retreat and retreat from the organisations that might support them. I think that there is a question of awareness, there is a question of resources but it is also an understanding that within our community there are those who want to help but I believe that it is also essential that those groups are supported in the very important work that they do in addressing the whole question of loneliness and isolation. Fundamentally, it offers challenges to us all, simply as citizens and good neighbours, to make sure that we do our part to support those who may feel isolated and lonely and who they want of a kind word may continue to do so. Thank you very much. I call Liam McArthur. We follow by Alison Harris. Mr McArthur, please. Thank you very much, everybody, Presiding Officer. Can I join with others in congratulating Rhoda Grant on securing this afternoon's debate? I think that others have mentioned the impact of loneliness and social isolation on physical health but I think that Kenneth Gibson was particularly correct in focusing on the impacts particularly around mental health but I welcome the fact that Maureen Watt will be responding to the debate this evening. Can I also join others in thanking the Red Cross and co-op for their work in shining the light on this issue and demonstrating quite how complex an issue it is. It impacts at the individual level the change in circumstances that may arise from change in health, in work status or whatever that can trigger that social isolation at any stage. The community aspects of this, the withdrawal of services and I think that Johann Lam made a very valid point about the removal of transport links that I am very well aware of has an impact particularly in rural areas but not exclusively so. Some of the societal changes that I think again have been referred to that perhaps the assumption that people are better connected than they are for the risk of isolation is less than it might have been in the past which I think is indeed misplaced and all of that I think tends to show why it is that loneliness and social isolation does impact on so many individuals at all ages. That is not, as the report highlights, just an older person's issue nor is it, as I acknowledged earlier, simply a rural issue but I think as Rhoda Grant acknowledges in her motion. There are particular aspects to this in a rural context, certainly ones in an island context that I think are particularly difficult to address and perhaps need more nuanced and tailored solutions. I am particularly grateful to the big lottery fund for example for the investment of half a million pounds last year through the community's 21st century life programme for five years of funding through voluntary action in Orkney for the work that they do in befriending, something that has been referred to by a couple of colleagues earlier. This has had a massive impact not just on older members of the community in Orkney but right through the generations as well. Over the years it has grown, it has adapted and as a result of this funding can now be expanded. The impact that I have seen for myself in terms of individuals, families and wider communities has been nothing short of life changing. I think looking through the report as well, I think it also addresses the point that is made very forcibly in the report that what we need are solutions that are preventative, that are responsive and that are restorative and I think in all of those areas, the befriending service in Orkney and I think it will be very similar in other parts of the country, ticks all of those boxes, yes it can be preventative but even once problems have emerged it can be responsive to those. It can be restorative where some of those problems have maybe been embedded for some time and I think the benefit of the funding that has been provided last year and will last over the next five years is it is going to allow voluntary action in Orkney to take that service out to some of the smaller aisles who have been excluded from the service to date. Again, I think looking at the report, the principles of good support, they talk about providing a sense of purpose, it's local to individuals, it's free, it's face to face and it has wider benefits for the community and I think in all of those respects, again I think the befriending service is something to be highly commended. Can I again conclude by thanking Rhoda Grant for allowing this debate to take place, allowing the exposing of the complexities of the issue to be debated and I'm sure it's something that we will come back to many many times during the course of this Parliament. Thank you very much indeed. Thank you very much Alison Harris, we followed by Monica Lennon last week in the open debate, Ms Harris. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer, and thank you to Rhoda Grant for bringing this important topic forward for members' business. A recent study, as we've heard already, carried out by Richard Redcross and the co-op, produced some startling findings. Over 9 million people in the UK reported that they are often or always lonely. I know we've already heard some of this but I think it's very worth repeating. Loneliness can be the cause of numerous health issues such as depression and other mental health problems. It can increase the risk of cardiovascular health and dementia. Loneliness can also lead to types of problems that create a vicious cycle of poor diet, heavy drinking and increased smoking. Whilst feelings of loneliness can differ from person to person, so can the triggers and the effects. The report studied some of the key triggers that people today will claim with being lonely. Mobility issues, especially where there are poor transport links, can often mean that people find it hard to get out and meet other people, sometimes to the extent that they give up trying with drawing further into themselves. Children leaving home, something that myself and many of my friends can actually personally identify with, this transformation from a house with younger people, with friends coming and going to a quieter environment, though welcomed by some, has been found to trigger loneliness in others. The loss of a long-term partner, either through death or divorce, is a very common cause of loneliness for people in all ages. To spend your life with someone, sharing your daily routine and then finding you are now alone is something that I don't really want to imagine. I know many people discover that friends of the couple turn out to be friends of only one of the partners. This sudden loss of contact with people that they once considered friends also has shown to contribute to low self-esteem, which is another trigger for loneliness. The 21st century has brought about another unique set of reasons why people lose normal everyday interaction with other people. There has been a sharp rise in the number of people who choose to opt to work from home. No longer is it necessary to go to the office with the result that it is no longer necessary to commute. Stopping off to do shopping on the way home from work has now been replaced by the supermarket delivering straight to your door. Nowadays, we are spending so much time on the internet that it is not uncommon to hear of people within the same house sending each other electronic messages rather than interacting on a human level. I think that that is such a sad reflection of our modern day society. Loneliness, as we have heard, can affect all age groups, from the teenager who withdraws into the virtual reality of computer games to those on the edge of retirement. Many people count the days until they retire. Often it is an eagerly anticipated event, which gives them the long-awaited opportunity to spend more time with friends and family. However, for others, it may be the day that they lose contract with people and the routine that they have had for years has now disappeared. One man described the day of his retirement as the first day of his loneliness. Another had such a busy working life, his only friends, where actually his workmates. We are all individuals and we all react differently to all events. We are in an age when many people go to work, come home and they actually close the door. Clubs and societies have difficulty attracting new members and gone are the days of the community spirit that once existed in tenement blocks in small villages. Record numbers of people are now living alone and whilst, of course, not all are lonely, the potential for loneliness to grow is clearly there. It is sad that we now live in a society where people can feel isolated and alone. I close by once again thanking Rhoda Grant for bringing triggers for loneliness forward to this chamber for debate. I state for the record that I am also a member of the co-operative party. I would like to begin by thanking my colleague Rhoda Grant for bringing this issue to Parliament for debate, as well as the British Red Cross, the Scottish Co-op Party, Samaritan Scotland and Age Scotland for their helpful briefings that I have received. As we have heard, loneliness and social isolation can be a heavy burden for those who experience it and it can feel like it is an impossible barrier to overcome. As has been pointed out by members across the chamber, loneliness is a problem that is in the best interest of everyone to make sure that we tackle. I think that this debate is highly relevant because the research that is published by the British Red Cross and the co-op group shows that 86 per cent of people in Scotland agree that loneliness is a serious problem. We are only just beginning to understand that loneliness could have as negative an impact on our nation's health as a small king, as Colin Smyth pointed out, and carry stronger risk as obesity is a serious problem. We all know the serious challenges facing our national health service and public services over the next couple of decades, due to the increasing pressure on an ageing population and the impact of loneliness in old age threatens to be a looming public health crisis that must be addressed. As Mike Adamson, the chief executive of the British Red Cross states in the trapped and above all report, it is quite clear that loneliness and social isolation is a crisis that we cannot ignore causing untold misery and ultimately unnecessary pressure on hard-pressed statutory services. I welcome the growing attention and interest in dealing with this problem, especially the commitment from the Scottish Government to establish a national social isolation strategy. I also welcome calls from Samaritan Scotland to have called on the strategy to be cross-departmental and because of external organisations and agencies. I repeat my call to the Scottish Government to also include an evaluation of the suicide prevention strategy. As Colin Smyth pointed out, a one-size-fits-all approach won't do in this case. There are of course actions that we can all take as individuals doing what we can through small steps to reduce loneliness in our day-to-day lives. The tackle loneliness and isolation effectively support must also be given to organisations such as the third sector groups that Rhoda Grant has outlined, which deliver targeted support to those who need it, in particular to older people. I am fortunate enough to have an organisation like that in my area in central Scotland, which provides a fantastic befriending service to older people in South Lanarkshire. The Lightburn Elderly Association project, or LEAP, as it is known locally, is the hand-on project. As a service that relies on the dedication of volunteers to provide befriending for older people who are facing social isolation and makes a real difference to their lives by reducing that isolation, increasing their confidence, developing friendships and improving their overall mental wellbeing. A small gesture and a targeted intervention of a volunteer can have a transformative effect. One older person who has had the benefit of that service said, "...my volunteer encourages me to get out of the house for a wee walk and I'm trying to go a bit further every week. I really look forward to her visits and feel less isolated. This has made such a big difference to my life." Another said, "...coming to the men's group breaks up my day and alleviates my depression. I enjoy the great company and support of the volunteers and other men and sharing stories. I don't know what I would do without it." The focus on isolation among older people is, of course, important. As we have heard today from Kenneth Gibson and others, it is not just simply due to age that people can feel isolated. That has been recognised by the Joe Cox Foundation and other members. Covey befending is another organisation in my area of base in Hamilton. I recently met with Covey to discuss the excellent befending support that they do with young people and their families. One young person said, "...I can't believe I'm now going out again. I never thought I would want to go and do things but the support has built up my confidence and now I want to get my life back." I used to be a volunteer befender with Covey when I was a student at university, so I appreciate how rewarding it can be. I celebrate that work at every opportunity, so I'm grateful that tonight's debate and the forthcoming national action aimed at tackling loneliness will drive us all forward for that change. Thank you very much. Now I'll call her more reward to close to the Government. Minister, seven minutes are thereabouts, please. Thank you very much. I thank Rhoda Grant for bringing this important issue to the chamber this evening in the form of her motion and to thank all those who have contributed so well to this debate. There is undoubtedly an increasing awareness and recognition within our society of the importance of meaningful and sustainable social connections in relation to the health and wellbeing of individuals. The report caught in the bubble just adds more evidence to that increasing recognition. Some members will recall the good work of the last sessions equal opportunities committee into age and social isolation, which sought to really get under the issues that can lead to people becoming lonely or socially isolated. According to Age Scotland, that inquiry was the first of its kind in the world, surprisingly when you think about it, but a sign that the debate in Scotland is ahead of the curve on this as it is on so many other issues. When the inquiry's findings were published, I recall that there was really a significant amount of media interest around it, along with the recognition that social isolation and loneliness are some of the major public issues of our time. We also recognise the impact of the lack of social contact that can have on the health and wellbeing of individuals. The reality of that is felt across all spaces and sectors of society. Members contributing to the debate tonight have identified that there are so many different factors that can trigger loneliness in so many different peoples. That is why so many voluntary groups and groups that spring up sit in their communities. I do not quite have the doom and gloom attitude and perception that Alison Harris has. There are still many groups in our communities that help to prevent social isolation. Mother and toddler groups that came out of anti-natal classes just last week, I visited the Juno project in Sight Hill, which is for mums with post-natal depression. There are many groups that evolve in our communities. I agree with all her comments that she has made so far, as is indeed of other members in the debate. Does she recognise that cuts to local government budgets and local communities put the squeeze on third sector organisations that look to the public sector to try to get funding leveraged in to support people, such as daycare and loneliness? If the member just waited a minute, I would tell him what kind of support we are giving to the organisations that he mentioned. The inquiry that made a number of important recommendations, which the Scottish Government accepted, most importantly included in our manifesto a commitment to develop a national strategy to tackle social isolation and loneliness to seek to address those issues. My ministerial colleague Jeane Freeman is leading on that work and she has already had very constructive dialogue with a number of older people through various older people's organisations. She is currently going on to engage with younger people and other groups to develop the strategy and a draft for consultation will be published later this year. Alongside developing a strategy, we have already taken practical action. For this financial year, we introduced one year, half a million pound social isolation and loneliness fund, which focused on supporting grassroots community-based projects to tackle social isolation with a range of groups. 36 organisations were successful in gaining grants from the fund. Some excellent work has been taken forward and we will consider the learning gathered for this in future funding arrangements. More broadly, we have just rolled out three-year funding for equality organisations, many of whom do vital work in tackling those issues across Scotland's community. Our £20 million empowering communities fund is supporting community-led projects to tackle social isolation experienced by older people. We have also supported efforts to strengthen volunteering across Scotland, including £8 million of funding to our third sector interfaces, who, among other things, are tasked with volunteer development. I was pleased that Colin Smyth mentioned the food train and how it has expanded from Dumfries and Galloway as Minister for Public Health. I remember visiting the project in Dundee, where students, among others, are making meals for older people, particularly men who have been recently widowed, who perhaps have not been involved in the cooking beforehand. The way in which they appreciated that service and volunteering was impressive. Of course, I am sure that other members, such as me, have men's sheds in their area, which goes a long way to helping not just men but others. I am a regular visitor to the men's shed in my constituency in Port Lethan. Rhoda Grant's motion refers to the particular challenges that are faced in the Highlands and Islands, and she is absolutely right. It is vital for the forthcoming national strategy to recognise the challenges for those who live in remote and rural communities. Being able to get out and about is a major determinant of whether people are able to build and sustain social connections. I am sure that Rhoda Grant, who is coming from a rural area, knows how much people support each other in getting out and about and helping to get people to their shops and their shopping and taking them to appointments. However, it is important that we continue to support the concessionary travel scheme for older and disabled people and to have increased funding for more than £200 million in this financial year. Obviously, the support that is given to community bus projects is really important in that area, too. There is increasing recognition that to effectively tackle those issues could lead to a breakthrough in terms of building on our preventative approach. As Minister for Mental Health, I am deeply aware of the impacts that those issues have on mental health, which is why we are making very close connections with our mental health strategy and our work in social isolation. In terms of Liam McArthur's contribution, I think that the importance of our manifesto commitment to ask one to get help fast is really important. That might just be very low-level intervention in terms of peer support or putting people in touch with people and organisations. The preventing service that Liam McArthur described is really important, too. I think that there is broad consensus that addressing those issues is critical to improving public health and that people can live longer, healthier lives. We need to take a holistic look at the issues of social isolation and loneliness. That requires a range of interventions that create a platform for people to build meaningful and sustainable social connections. Since the inquiry, stakeholders have continued to champion this important agenda. Last month, for example, Voluntary Health Scotland hosted a seminar on the development of the strategy, which was very well attended. Next month, the Scottish Government will bring a range of stakeholders together to inform our thinking and tell us what they think needs to be reflected in the strategy. It is vital that the strategy is developed in partnership. It is really important for all of us, friends, neighbours, colleagues and human beings to, as many have said in this debate tonight, to just say hello and even a smile helps with preventing loneliness and social isolation.


Big thanks to Grubhub for sponsoring this video. Good evening, gamers. Good evening. I got a good crew of people. It's going to be me, Jason, Chris Melbourne, Crispy, Cooley, Berkey, Lexi, Julia, Brizzy, and Ashley. Initiate gamer mode. Yeah. Cool. Gamer mode. In launch. I hate myself. Dammit.  I know. I said that too. Hoo wee, hoo wee, hoo wee. Zooey mama, you know? Zooey mama. Thank you. So let's go from nav and then go down. That's what we'll do. That's what we'll do. Cooley, please don't kill me. Please don't kill me. Please don't kill me.  I haven't seen anything yet. I've seen nothing yet. Jason. Jason, no, don't kill me. I swear to God, Jason, if you kill me. Please. Jason, no. Jason, no. Oh my God. Jason. Jason, please. Jason. I thought that was me. I thought that was me. Oh my God, I was almost on download. I was at 100%. Not bear key. Sorry. It was a med. It was a med bay kill. Oh no. Right, right on the old flash one. I passed her as she walked in. Oh, you were just with me. There wasn't anyone in there. But I walked out and she walked in. I went from admin. I just peeked into admin to see if anyone was there. It was a med bay. Yeah. It's right on med bay platform. So it's going to be fresh or like cold. It was not either fresh or cold. Super cold for sure. It wasn't super cold because I saw her right before I crossed into top right. I know. I know for sure it's actually fresh because I might have seen someone pop out of a vent. How? Ooh. And why is that, babe? Do tell. They might have a little top hat and a red little body. Top hat. Oh, so white is a body. I see no top hats. Lexus or it's red. Yeah. Lexu, what's with that? Positive on that description. Oh, so. Because we were like, no, but where do you think you saw me vent? You came into security. I was walking up to go do my little reactor tasks. And I peeked my head. I was like, maybe there's someone in security, like body wise. And I just saw like a right out of the vent with little top hat. And I'm like, oh. And I just, I did not just see you because I was like, I don't want you to know that I saw you because I don't want you to kill me. So are you? I went into the reactor and it was called. And it was red. But it was red. It was not me. Are we voting for Lexi right now? I mean, I didn't vent. I'm not an impostor. Yeah, let's do it. Whatever. Let's go. I'll send it. Wait, well, we're sending this. There's got to be a point where we trust people's word. I trust Julia. I don't want to be. I mean, the thing is, I know Lexi, I know your arguments are always so much more sound, so I have to vote for you. I would be honest.  Oh, my Julia, good night. All right. Let's go. I just know Lexi's arguments. I'm like, she's always way more detailed. I feel like her outfit, by the way, Lexi. That was good. That was real good. So who was working alongside the mastermind, Lil Lexi? That's what we've got to figure out, gang. That's what we've got to figure out. Do I have Simon Says? I do. I'm never going to finish download ever. I know the feeling. I know the feeling. I've got Simon Says next, so please. So whoever the impostor is, they weren't happy about Julia getting rid of the other one, so Julia's dead. Oh, no. That makes sense. Chris, was it you? No. I was down to shoot. Yeah, I can tell you now it wasn't Chris, just from down to send it. He wouldn't have done that if it was his problem. True. That makes sense. So who didn't? Brissy, you didn't really say anything about that. About what? About the whole sending. Because a lot of us were like, yeah. No, I did. I absolutely did. I said, ooh, OK. I was one of the first people to vote. Listen, you're a really good voice actor, so I don't. You might be acting right now. You might be acting. I don't remember that actually happening. It's OK. She could be impersonating any of us. There was a lot of people.  It's pretty crazy. I can throw it back. No, I was very down to vote. I can throw it back. By what? Anyway. I haven't been on the left side the entire round, I don't think. I mean, we could just throw Chris out and still be safe just for a case. But I'm sorry. I know it's not. It's not Chris. It's not Chris. It's not Chris because because he he's pulse ended. Oh, I thought you just said it's not crispy talking about yourself. Oh, my God. Nice. Definitely not crispy. But I was with I was with Ashley and Cooley and storage like towards I was watching sure nobody murdered each other. It's very true that like I went away. Cooley and Chris could have definitely murdered each other in storage because it was at the bottom at the track. We were vibing. Yeah. We were all I'm going to get. I'm going to skip. Hmm. Yeah, I'm going to skip. It's only one imposter. We have one imposter left. A lot of people alive. We can do it. I think I think it's Ethan probably. Who put it on me? I'll send for Ethan. Even Ethan. Ethan said a lot of things about other people. I didn't say where he was though. No, yeah, that's true. But I also can you throw it back.   Oh, can I do it?    I always get afraid that a body's going to be found right as I'm finishing it because that's usually what happens. And then I have to restart it all over. All over. Yes. I see it, too. Yeah. Oh, I didn't see anything. I just finished right now. Hold on. Whoa, you didn't see that? You were just on cameras, weren't you? Yeah. How did you not see that body on the cameras? Wait, who's dead? Chris. Chris. Oh, damn, yeah. You must literally stay on the body. You want to see the kill. Or if you stay on the cams, you want to see the kill. Well, I went to do the button because I finished my last task, so I just wanted to stop the cool down. Oh, I thought you were running to report the body. Oh, no, I guess both work. But where? Wait, where on the cams did you see it? I think it's outside of Nav. The top right camera I think is Nav. Yeah, I think so, yeah. It was crispy. I kind of am thinking it's crispy, too. So when I got off cams, Chris B pretended to go to the panel to the right. No, no, no, no, I divert power. No, no, no, I divert power. He knows where it was. No, you're very wrong. You're very wrong. No, no, no, I divert it twice in a row.  I'm pretty sure it's crispy. All right, you're wrong. I voted for him. Oh, God. Guys, do you want to send it on Chris B then? Who was on the right side? You could full send me. Let me just actually figure out who it is first. Who was on the right side by now? I was on the left. I was with Ethan and Jason. OK. Brizzy, where were you? I was stuck on the card swiping forever. All right, so I can account for Ethan and Jason being on left side. That's all I got, though. I'm down to send Chris B, honestly. Sorry, Chris B. All right. I mean, we've already got one. Damn. Got one, so we can afford it, technically. Yeah, do we want to do it?  Let's just do it. Because it makes sense. And then Ethan's next, just for fun. Whoa. I know. Why am I next? I don't think Cooley could have gotten that kill, but maybe she did. I don't know. I don't know. I think it was Chris B. I think we got it. Shit. Oh, no. Are they actually going to throw me? What if it's Cooley? Oh, no. What if it's Cooley? Shit. Is that O2? Oh, no. Please. Please, Cooley. Please, please, please, please, please, please. Hmm. Did Cooley say that she finished her tasks or no? I don't remember. Yes. That's why she pressed the button. Cool. Duh!  They're never going to find my body, either. Press that button. Press that button. Oh, my God. I feel so bad. We only have one task left. I just saw the bar. We only have one task. Oh, no. Does anyone know who it is? I literally thought it was Ethan. Are you all done? I'm done with my tasks. I mean, listen. Do you want to finish your tasks, or do you want me to tell you who it is? I'll just tell us who it is. Who is it, Jason? I was busy. Woo-hoo! What? Why? No, it's not. Wait. Yes. Why would you say it's me? One, you were quiet a lot, and I was just wondering.  And then I saw you running. And I was like, oh, she's running towards the engine. And then I saw I was like, I'm running out of cams, so I don't die. And I saw you run in cams. And the only other person on that side was Ethan. And then I went to hit emergency. Oh, OK. And then it was off. Yes!  Coming in clutch. Well done. Hey there, sorry to interrupt. I just wanted to take a second to say a big, big thank you to Grubhub for sponsoring this video. If you don't already know about Grubhub, Grubhub is a fantastic way, especially in the year of 2020, to bring your favorite food to you. They go to different restaurants all around your area. They pick up the food. They bring it to you. 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But for now, let's get back to Among Us. I'll definitely say this. I've been voted out twice now for no reason, but I appreciate how full send everyone is tonight. Yeah. Good luck on Among Us. I've been getting all over with these imposters. The imposter runs, you know? And that's a bummer, because I'd like to kill people. I'd like to have some fun in the sun, not just doing chores all day, dude. Let's get a two out of the way. We're not. Oh, no. Dang it. Ashley, is this a self-report? Ethan, hold just shh. Uh-oh. OK, so the doors were closed and electrical. And I opened the door, and there was immediately Krispy's body, which makes me really sad, because it means that Krispy was desperately trying to escape. No, no. Was he by the door? Was he by the door or something? Who uses doors as traps? Because I have not figured that out yet. Does anyone hear, like, why are you using doors as traps? I've seen Kris do it quite a few times. I've just done it to me. Kris, what were you up to? It isn't me. I was in Med Bay doing my part. I can guarantee you it's 5,000% not lexie, because we had, like, the same path on the right side. Oh, thank you. You called Krispy, right?  Has anyone seen Jason? No. Well. Oh, Jason, no! Rest in peace, Jason and Krispy, pouring out for the homies. I haven't seen, like, anyone except for at the very beginning. I kind of went off on my own, which I know is super sus, but I'm being honest, so. Where on your own did you go off? She does her own thing. I do.  But, like, wait, where on your own did you go?  Then I went down, and I did trash at the very bottom of storage. And then I was going over to Electrical, because I got tasked in Electrical, and that's when it happened. Wait, Ashley, did you do anything else between the two of us? Excuse me? Pardon? You didn't pick an app? You went for it? Top and then trashed at the bottom immediately after? I think so. I'm drinking wine. Please give me a little leeway. It makes sense to do that, because once you do top trash, it's like, here's your arrow for bottom trash, and you're like, all right, I'll do that. Oh, my gosh, I always do my admin task on my way to bottom trash. I'm going to skip. Wait, who's the powerbottom? I miss that. Does anybody want to have a wine night among us sometime? Because that would be a response. I'm down. I would love it. Cool, sick. Do you want me to ring my dad? Ethan, we don't want to have a firebottom night. Please bring her down. Firebottom night among us and wine among us. But not together, that would be tragic. Please, God, no, not together. OK. Hi, Kooli. If Kooli kills me, I'll be really upset. OK, cool. Oh, Julia. Julia, no. Julia. Guys, we are blowing through these right now. So I've found this body in Combs. I'm right behind you. Okay, that was a body in comms and I walked with Chris as he discovered it So I don't think it was him unless he like did a lap. You know, what were you doing before that? I walked into reactor right as you guys There was a fix in a reactor.  I don't think it's Ethan Ethan was on cams I'm your voucher Ethan also Literally just ran past Lexi. I'm in storage right now doing gas I feel like I just saw her running to the right. So this has to be a warm body Did you skip nah, she probably voted for me because no So let me let me let me explain myself before everyone just throws here. I found this body in Communications, I think it's been here for a little bit. I think this was a kill someone got before reactor I just voted Chris the only reason that I voted Chris is because we were together the whole time Chris and I yeah And I think your cool down was happening or you didn't feel safe because Whenever Chris and I have played this game a lot and whenever somebody susses Chris. He's like, oh, well, you're about to throw and That's Didn't do this unless it was an old body though because I walked up as he discovered it. Mm-hmm Yeah, it could have been somebody else like he was in front of me But whenever people get That is true, but now you're pushing the blade I found this body. Why would I self-report in the shit? I was at the end Coolie came in Wait, why wouldn't you stop out here? We have to vote here Why wouldn't you self-report because Brizzy was behind you if he didn't report then obviously I report it cuz I saw it anyway Hmm I Hope it was Chris To feel really really bad if it wasn't Chris God why did that two wires take me 40 years to do Plus Plus did not kill me and that's my tasks, baby Let's go to cams Just chill over there. How did Berkey get there? How did Berkey get there? Is there a vent? That goes there is There is it's Berkey. It's Berkey. It has to be Berkey Berkey had to event it Berkey had to event it Okay, I have a question From the front in top reactor or not top reactor. Sorry top engine. Does that go into reactor? Yeah? I think so. I think so. Okay. I don't know it's Berkey because I was watching I was watching cams Hold on. Let me talk. I was watching cams and I saw Berkey go in the hallway from From med bay and I didn't see Berkey in the hallway right outside of security and then reactor was called I went into reactor and Berkey was already on the bottom reactor Yeah, cuz I ran there I was the first like literally once I got into reactor room reactor went off. I swear to you Yeah, but I was on I was on cams and so I didn't I didn't see you go go I trusted you this whole time, please. No Right before the last meeting was called I was doing med bay scan I was about to start it and Berkey was in there doing the little little whatever the hell thing on the wall called and As soon as the next session started Berkey got to the med bay again I don't think Berkey would fake going back to that task to redo it. I think Yeah, I would have done something else. So I I don't think so. I don't I don't think anyone's dead. I think anybody died So I have one task left. No, I think we were right you guys were right about Chris. I was wrong I think it I guess it was an old kill cuz he walked up to it with me. What do people have for tasks left? I'm all done. I'm done. I have one more task. I am finished now I have one somewhere in reactor If we were possibly wrong about Chris and we vote somebody out now we're So I think Ethan and Bear care good. I'm suspicious of Cooley. I don't I don't have much on It's not cool. There's no way It's busy are we voting breezy I'm sorry. I didn't do anything y'all you guys really send in it today Leave it for drama I Know I was like no not even I trusted him so much.  I was like if it's not Chris I'm gonna feel so bad Wait, wait y'all waited till oh I was dead now. I gotta be quiet All right, baby That's a real friend right there what I was saying What I was saying I was dead to talk about a wine night on Are you kidding me great meeting us? I have one thing that's kind of important I don't know how well it is because if imposters are really good unlike me I just know that I be lined it to card swipe with Ethan and bear key instantly and I feel like It's just a little less obvious when you're imposter to do that kind of stuff. So there we go That's like I say that's good. I don't For you Oh All right, all right, bye-bye Top of the fence Who happened which which vent where it's event in the back of electrical crispy is dead on the band Ask and I'm who fix lights by the way. I was the only one there and Not me I think I get vouched for Lexi here because she was in storage on the skin she came from like I think cafeteria admin on the Leaves task Listen, I can vouch for Lexi because she called a meeting for me in the beginning. So I was very nice Said they saw me in shields I did cool. He said that that was me That's yeah, that's true. Hmm. I mean the lights were out. So I didn't see anyone. I know but I was right next to you Did I see you Someone in shields, I don't know. I'll be honest. I got distracted because my shield thing looks like a I was an admin I saw Jason at the beginning of the round and nav He was there with him for a while. Someone else was there, but I can't remember who yeah I was just crossing through cafeteria trying to get towards I went down to shields and then I went past cons and then I got called I went into storage and then I went up to medbay and Then the body was held. Okay, Ethan. I have a question. So it's none of us. They killed them Did I see anybody near medbay no yeah, because I feel like it was a vent kill and the electrical goes to medbay I'm just curious I mean Did you just vote for me that wasn't actually me now, but I appreciate whoever did Don't you worry about a thing To worry about Oh boy, oh boy You know You know when you know you know.  No, I was gonna commend you well You can still hear me. You really don't do lights. You could go right past them Where was the body It's in and the upload and admin I was just an electrical and I saw Julia Ashley and I I Had left lights Yeah, Chris left the right side. Yeah, I'm gonna storage you to do Suspicious of Chris right now just because I saw them kind of leave at the same time I was gonna leave to and then I saw another group of people Jason left with us I thought Jason stay there with you. I left on my own No, that's what the imposter would say did not he um, I was I was with Ethan Ethan can vouch I was with him like the whole time What do you mean we were together I mean That could be double kills I stand watch so they can't do it Jason that's why I keep going in and out so they can't do murders But I mean I get that looks super sus, but that's what I'm doing And then I got real scared when I left and you followed me Don't vote because it's seven I think you know It's Julia What wait, why me? Because you've been quiet all game and you walked away from a body in medbay. It has to be you Cuz he was with me until this point and I basically just followed him to that body. Was it inside of medbay It was it was like at the top of medbay. I Swear to God. I did not see it was Ashley's body that you just reported. I didn't see it. I Mean it's it has to be you I think I I swear to God I had finished my medbay task already so I didn't walk. I didn't like go peek in or anything Where were you coming from then cafeteria? Huh, I don't know. I mean cool. You like How much cool event is killed and came back to security? I just don't see that as an option I think this is like if I invented you would have seen it. You're in security before me. Yeah, no I know Ethan. What's that? Why are you giggling over there? I'm not giggling Was I giggling? Yeah. Oh I didn't even notice that I was giggling I don't know what I was gonna say, but that's really funny. All right, so it's obviously Ethan and then maybe Julia Wait, wait, I actually I no longer think Ashley's gonna kill me. Was I actually giggling? Yes, what? Okay. Yeah, you're like Do you like giggle often when you when you think you got away with murder? Is that is that like you're telling me? I just don't think that I was giggling. So I think we have to do Julia here anyone anyone feel otherwise I feel like you're gaslighting me Chris. I don't think that I was giggling I you were either giggling or like breathing or eating like I don't know sometimes I make noises, but I just make noises. I don't know dude I know nothing so I don't know No Well, what are we gonna do Julia? I'm probably the throw. I'm sorry. I'm voting Julia. Just walk by the bar. Are we voting Julia? I mean, I feel like he's right. It's Julia. Oh, he's lying and it's Chris and Cooley. So No, I like I'm just cuz you guys are albine Also, you can't skip on five. I wasn't before him last time. You'd never skip on five. We lose. Oh, okay, we're right. I Have to get two kills There's no way. There's no way There's no way. I'm just I'm just Just It was cool right there Right there Right there Are you cuz red and pink look very much the same maybe Yeah, no, dude, I literally just saw Lexi do it. Okay.   That was incredible! I hope you watched as I floated in the space Ethan re-examining his strategy with maybe So funny!


We will be talking about self-interested agents and their interactions, so let's first speak about what we mean by self-interested agents. We don't mean necessarily that agents are adversarial or don't care about what happens to other agents. What we mean by that is that agents have opinions, have preferences. And so there's some description of the world, how the world could be, and in different descriptions the agents have different preferences and different utilities, as we'll say. And so what we mean by utility function is a mathematical measure that tells you how much the agent likes or does not like a given situation. It describes not only their attitude towards a definitive event, so for example tomorrow the temperature will be exactly 25 degrees centigrade, but in fact it will describe the preferences towards a distribution of such outcomes, so it really captures their attitude towards uncertainty about events. So for example, if I tell you that it will be 25 degrees with probability 0.7 and 24 degrees with probability 0.3, you might have an opinion about how much you like that versus some other distributions. And the decision theoretic approach, which is what underlies modern game theory, says that you're going to try to act in the way that maximizes your expected or average utility. And so this is a concept we need to get comfortable with and it's not obvious that one would want to use such an approach. So for example, we are going to look at a single dimension, so your preferences will all be on a scale. As we'll see, the scale is not that important, unlike probabilities, utilities don't have to lie in the 0.1 scale, but they will lie on a linear dimension and maybe that's inappropriate. For example, you might have some level of wealth and some degree of health and for a certain level of each one, you'll have some notion of well-being, but is it appropriate to put the two together and have a single scale? You might question that. Similarly, why is looking at the expected value, when you're looking at your uncertainty, why looking at the expected value an appropriate way to capture your attitude? And so these are not trivial statements and in fact are not tautological. They make a substantive claim, but there's a very long tradition and maybe the most famous references to Van Omen and Morgenstern's seminal book, which is really in some ways the introduction to modern-day game theory that derives the utility function from more basic assumptions one makes. And we won't go into that, but we just wanted to flag this issue as something that will underlie everything we say about game theory and which really underlies modern game theory.


Hello, everyone. Today I'm going to be talking about the principles of content layout. So I'm going to talk about some historical roles of layout and different things that you can do with your content to improve the readability for users and direct people to where you would like them to go. And I am Emily Nouveau, Diane Nova on Drupal.org, Twitter, everywhere. And I'm involved in the Layout Initiative in Drupal. And I got my start in both Drupal and Layout at the same time when I was a college student and worked as the Layout Editor for our university paper. And also began looking for solutions for our university paper website. And since then I've worked for different newspapers and worked on the Layout Initiative for Drupal to build out the Layout Builder that's now in Drupal 8. So sometimes content editors don't think of themselves as designers. And I'd like to say that most content editors are also designers and that you are creating content for someone to read and you need to be aware of every way in which that communicates. And part of that is also design, not just the words that are on the page and not just the images that are on the page, but how everything comes together. So here's a quote, how well we communicate is determined not by how well we say things, but by how well we are understood. And that's why design is important. People notice bad design. And inattentive design is bad design. So if you aren't paying attention to the things that you're doing, then it's just going to be bad as an end result. So here are some principles that are helpful to remember when working on your content and the resulting design and layout. So I'm going to go over each of these and give some historical examples of how they've been applied and then show a modern example of how that works on the web. So the first one is keep it simple. So you want to let your content breathe. So this is the album of Eight Leaves. And you can see that the writing is on the left. And you have plenty of white space between that and the imagery on the right. And you want to think of that whenever you're laying out your content. You want white space that lets the content that people are reading breathe and gives room so that they can really focus. This is a children's poetry book from the 1800s. And this shows white space but also shows repeating patterns. And patterns are helpful for readers to understand what they should be looking at. So if they have a pattern that can move them forward from the text to the imagery and then back again. So then don't overthink it. Sometimes the simplest layout and content design is just exactly what you think it would be. You don't have to complicate things. You can just put one little imagery to convey the important concept. So medium is a good example of a website that keeps it simple. They let things breathe. There's plenty of white space. They let the imagery stand on its own. They repeat patterns. And you can see that everything feels peaceful when looking at there. So the second principle, know your hierarchy. So if you have more important content, then make sure that you're considering the whole page in light of that. So if you start to get bogged down and making sure that you get everything that you want on the page, you don't necessarily accomplish your most important goals. And so it's important when you're working on any bit of content and layout to have in mind the main goal that you have. And we'll walk through some of these later how you can say, OK, this is my most important goal, then a secondary goal and tertiary goal. But you always want to know what you're trying to accomplish with any piece of content. And that's your hierarchy. So to successfully accomplish that, you can use your grid. So hopefully you have a grid. And knowing the ins and outs of it will help you. Because you can just fall back onto that grid at the end. You don't have to really think too hard about what you're doing if you can use your grid effectively. And also, you'll want to scale your content if you have your most important content. And it should be the thing that people are immediately drawn to on your page. So in this case, the World Geographic Atlas, they scaled the planets appropriately. And you can see the sun is really what draws your eye. And that pulls you in. And so if you have content that's very important, that can be the thing that pulls people in. And then you can use it in the same way that this does to lead people to the secondary content. So in this case, the sun pulls you in. And then that draws you in to seeing the secondary content as well. And make sure that everything is in its appropriate place. So in this case, this is a papyrus example from Egypt where they have this secondary bar that runs across many manuscripts. And that is kind of secondary content, the main content. And the reader knows where to expect that. It's always in the same place on every different manuscript. And so they know, OK, I will look at this secondary area if I'm looking for that content. So my most important content is in this main space. So being consistent and keeping everything in its place is an important thing to do for your layout. And so the New York Times effectively uses hierarchy by drawing attention to the center with the only space that really has color, that has depth. They draw immediate attention to their video. And they have their smaller articles with just the headlines. They have an effective hierarchy. There's a lot of thought that's gone into the hierarchy on this page, and you can see that. So the third principle, use symmetry. So symmetry is appealing to people. It's a comforting bit of structure and support. When people see something that's symmetrical, they feel calmer. They feel like they know what to expect. And so if you want to give people a sense of security and safety in a bit of content, then symmetry is helpful. Repetitiveness is helpful for calming. And if you want to really draw attention to something, that's when you can break away from the repetitiveness. So if you want to draw more attention to something, then you could have most of your content be more symmetrical. And the one component that isn't is going to draw people's eye. Symmetry is simple. And that helps people navigate through your site. So if you have a simple layout, then people will know what to expect and know where to go. And symmetry is a plan. So if you are not sure what you're doing, symmetry is a good plan to fall back on. And so this is an example where you just have the four column simple layout on mangaDB.com. And you know to expect each of these components. And it's used elsewhere throughout the site. So you have these little pieces of content. And you know that it will be consistent. And you can hop from one to the other easily. And then you should highlight differences. So if you have, say, an older building and you want to bring in something new, instead of trying to build something that matches that, you might build something that's completely different and in a completely different style. And people will appreciate that more than something that looks similar to what they were expecting that was nice. But not quite, say, good enough or not quite the same. If it looks like if you're using a certain font and you find something that's similar but not quite the same, that will bother people. Because something just seems a little off. But if you use a font that's very different, then it looks intentional and that's understandable. So you can use a different size. But make sure that it really stands out as a different size, that it's not just one or two points different. So in this case, the eye is drawn through the whole text, through this eye that goes next to it. And the text at the beginning is much larger. You can use a different color. And you'll want to use a very different color to highlight. It's not something close, but something that really stands out. And you can also use a different form. So that could be a different shape. That could be a different texture. That can be, if you mostly have text, that could even be adding some imagery in. That can be a different form to draw people's eye. And you want to be careful about how you use those differences to really focus in one place. So here, the difference of the video is also conveyed by it expanding past the text. And including these shapes that aren't used elsewhere in the content and color where the rest of the content is black and white. And so those differences really pull the reader in. And then finally, you can direct the eye. So it's helpful to direct your reader towards what they expect to be interesting. And there are certain clues that tell people that a certain area might be interesting to them. So eyes follow arrows. That's what we expect arrows to be for. So if you see an arrow and a bit of content like in Euclid's geometry here, you are directed to the right-hand content because you see these kind of arrow forms on the left. And you expect that you should look at the content to the right. And so an arrow, in this case, doesn't have to be an incredibly explicit arrow. But it's kind of a vague arrow shape. And that points people towards things. And you can use motion in the same way. And so eyes follow motion. So if we see that something is moving a certain way, it's kind of an innate human feeling that if something is moving a certain way, we should find out why, and we should follow it. And so in this example, you can see the birds moving across the page, and it directs the eye in that direction. And so if you have a page on the right, it's going to direct the reader to the right. And eyes follow eyes. So if you have content with photos of people and they're looking in a certain direction, people will be inclined to look in the direction that that person is looking. So in this case, you have the saint looking to the right. And then you have the moon looking down into the left. And then the people in the bottom left looking to the right. And then finally, it closes with the last person looking back to the left. And so this forms this composition that moves people's eyes along to each of the box. So if you want someone to say, look at your text on the right, then you can have a photo on the left that has a person looking to the right. And people will be more inclined to look to the right and read that content. And so this is an example of a photo looking to the right. And it's better to have that photo of the person looking to the right and looking at content that way to keep them focused on your page rather than looking to the left and off of the screen. So in summary, the five principles keep it simple. Know your hierarchy, use symmetry, highlight differences, and direct the eye. So we're going to hide some of those together and build out a page layout. And so to start, we have a couple of reference point landing pages. So we know that on this website, these other pages already exist. And we want to create a third page using some of the patterns used in these other pages. So in this case, this is a landing page on this site. And you can see that there's a pattern of a full width header. So we want to repeat patterns to keep things simple for people. And you can see that there's a highlight, a call to action with a bright color. So it's using color to pull people into the main thing that you want people to be interested in on that page. So in this case, you want everyone to be interested in this recipe. In our landing page that we're about to build, we may have a different goal. So we'll want to use the same pattern, but for our own goal. And then it has a symmetrical four column grid. And so that's something that we can consider when we're building out our page. Then for our second reference page, we have a featured recipe. And this is secondary content that we may want to direct people to through our landing page. So we may want to follow some of the same patterns that are in use here. So this has a large recipe image to focus the eye on to the most appetizing content and hopefully encourage them to create the recipe that's on this page and find it appealing. It has secondary images that are smaller because that's not the main goal of the page. So we can keep those in mind. So our goals for our landing page are to increase the interest in the newsletter, highlight our featured recipe, and direct readers to some other new content in that order. Since we know that our main goal is to direct people to our newsletter, that's going to fill our top space. And that's going to have the deepest color to pull people in. And it's going to contrast with most of the rest of the site, which is much lighter. So that contrast creates that difference that will pull people's interest in. And we're going to use the same pattern of the call to action that's a different color that's used on the other landing page. And we're going to use that same four column grid, except we're going to mix it up a little bit to create a difference to highlight our larger featured recipe. So we're going to make this use two of those four columns. And then we'll have the smaller secondary stories that were our third goal of the page. So in our hierarchy, these are the least important. And so they're going to be to the right and more out of the way. So putting it all together, this is how you would build out this page in Drupal 8 using Layout Builder. So going to add a landing page, this opens up Layout Builder. And you can add a section, which is essentially a row on the page. And we're going to start with the first content that came to mind. So we're going to add a three column section, which we have for the featured article and the secondary articles. And so this is going to give us our columns. And we're going to then add the content into each of these. And so adding a block. So here you have the search on the right-hand side where you can type in tags for the content. And then select the relevant content for you. And this is based on the Layout Builder that's currently in Drupal 8. And everything that you see in here is planned for 8.6. So then we're going to add our next bit of content. Same with the library. You can search. It's also going to be able to be used for creating new content. So you could create the new content in line for the article and then add it in. And then we're going to finally add our third piece. And so the nice part about sections is that it's really easy to reuse different layouts that you have and use them throughout your sites that you can easily build out your hierarchies or your symmetrical layouts. And we're going to add the remaining newsletter section. And that's going to be a single column section that goes full width. We've added it below as we're building it out. But the nice part about Layout Builder is that after you've added different sections, you can move them around. And so in this case, we can then move it back to the top after we've added it. And if you ended up deciding that your goals were changing for this content, then you could decide that your newsletter is now secondary importance, and you may move it down in the hierarchy and you don't have to create a new page for that. So here, when you click on the section, you'll see that you have a bar for moving to make it easy for you to move the content. Now we have our newsletter at the top. And we're going to add one final bit of interest to our featured content to make it stand out. And so that's accomplished by using settings on the block itself. So scrolling down to that. And the gear will take you to any extra settings for that content, which will open up in the right. And in this case, the extra settings that we have available are styles. And so we will change this from a plain style to a green. Now we have our page built out. So we just need to go to the top and save it. So we followed our patterns for our site. We have our full width header to draw someone's eye in. And then if they're interested in further content, we have featured our recipe. And we have our secondary recipes and features on the page. So that was building out a page and creating it in Layout Builder. And now I'm just wondering if anyone has any questions. Taking over the main content area is available. Right now there is not control of the header and footer regions or things like that, but main content. So those are blocks. That are content blocks, essentially inline content blocks. Going back to some of the principles, are there rules of thumb that guide us in a direction of choosing odd or even numbers of things, especially in columns like the sort of card display 3 versus 4? Yes. So any odd number is going to feel more dynamic and even numbers are going to feel more stable. So if you want a sense of stability for people, then you would use an even number and odd numbers will feel more exciting. So right now you can create a default layout for a certain content type. But if you have multiple kind of variants for content type, then that's something that's in the works. So that doesn't exist right now, but we have it in the plan. This might be a little bit outside scope, but going back to some of the principles of layout, you seem to be mostly focusing on a particular page and the content of that page. Do you have any examples or any comments on applying those layout principles to the navigation of the site or the structural elements of the site? I think some of the same rules can apply, keeping things clear and simple. You want fewer items in your navigation. A good role of thumb is to not have more than five items in your navigation. But this is mostly for content layout. I think for some inspiration in overall design, there's a book called Meg's Graphic Design History. That one is a wellspring of ideas for overall design history, if that's what you'd like. But that's mostly before web design. There are a bunch of different sites I use for looking at different websites, but none of them are springing to mind at the moment. You'll find that the more you start paying attention to design, the more you'll really see it everywhere. It's really fun to actually start noticing these things the more you start looking at them. Sure. I think in Facebook and Twitter, there are more tools, like applications. I think this is more useful if you're working on content and you're trying to get someone to really spend a lot of time reading and getting excited about the words that you have on the page. Each of those areas that had content can also be dynamic content. You could have a view there that showed the newest content coming in, and it can exist in the same place that you would have had a recipe. Yup, a view block. I think keeping the same principles in mind works. I think you'll probably have less use of symmetry because you don't have much space, but you'll have still ample use of white space.  So I think a lot of the same principles apply, but it definitely is harder for the phone. Yup, yup, so all of the columns that exist in Core, they automatically resize. So right now those columns for each row, they condense down on top of each other. So if you have three in one row, then the three will be on top of each other, and then the next section will be below that. But people are talking about what we could do to allow people to specify different layouts per different responsive breakpoints. So I think it depends on how it's done. It can feel to a person reading a bit like a person poking them, so it will draw the attention, but it might also irritate a reader, and so it kind of depends on how much you want to poke your reader while they're reading. Well, if no one else has any questions, I will let everyone go and get to dinner and things early because I know that's always a thing at DrupalCon.


In the United States of America, one of the biggest babyface things you can do is show some love for your country brother and that's something that pro wrestling does better than anyone else. And through the years, a few good men and the honorable anthems that flagged them have truly represented all that the home of the whopper has to offer. That being said, I'm Kevin Callis from Wrestling Behind The Themes and with apologies to all you foreign fanatics out there, let's all pledge allegiance to the top 10 most patriotically American entrance theme songs ever. It's time once again for everybody to come aboard the Ho-Train. Hacksaw, Jim Duggan's relentless patriotism and devotion to old glory certainly made him one of the all-time fan favorites during his wrestling career. Now this theme song, named after his trusty chunk of wood, doesn't exactly hold up to the greats that we'll cover throughout this list. However, Duggan was able to make this tune sound more patriotic than it normally would be because if you're going to scream USA at the top of your lungs, then that's got to count for something, right? Across between Captain America and a prehistoric caveman, the Hacksaw character was never the sharpest tool in the shed, but the fans loved him anyway. The winner of the very first Royal Rumble, Duggan was rarely in contention for any WWE championships, but that didn't bother the tough guy who was just proud to be an American. In the early days of Vince McMahon's national WWF expansion, he plucked brothers-in-law Barry Windham and Mike Rotundo to help him build a program around patriotism versus evil foreigners just in time for the inaugural WrestleMania. Dubbed the US Express, Windham and Rotundo were also only a handful of sports entertainers to have entrance music at the time, with Bruce Springsteen born in the USA helping to parade them into battle. Now if you investigate the boss's lyrics here, you'll find that this song is hardly the anthem for American Pride one would assume based on the title. It's actually a complex protest song, but we're not going to overthink it or bring politics into this, so basically, it just made the list. Now in this politically charged era that we live in, patriotism can have a dark side and we're not referring to Doug Gilbert's run as the Dark Patriot. Early debuting in the WWE as the All American American, Jack Swagger wasn't so much patriotic as he was a cocky, egotistical, varsity jock whose status as an elite collegiate athlete made him superior to everyone in every way. Later in his WWE career, Swagger's character would devolve into that of an anti-immigrant as he joined forces with Cesaro and their manager Zeb Coulter aka Dirty Dutch Mantel to form the Real Americans. Now their theme was a certifiable USA headbanger that helped get the We The People chant over like Rover, but nowadays the Jericho Appreciation Society member can thank his sports entertainment stablemate for officially burying the Real American gimmick and declaring We The People sucks thus tying a bow on the stumble and stagger of the WWE career of Jack Swagger. After such a tumultuous year playing an Iraqi sympathizer that led to real life threats against him and his family, Sergeant Slaughter sought forgiveness and a strong desire to get his country back through a series of emotional promos and vignettes. Now wrestling fans were more than happy to oblige and Sarge returned to his good guy roots, but being the bad guy took a lot out of him and he went on a much needed respite. After this hiatus, Slaughter returned to TV in 1997 with a new hardcore theme to boot when he assumed the role of WWE Commissioner where he was determined to try his best to control the chaos created by the newly formed faction D Generation X. The lone WCW entry on this list, former 6x6x6x world champion and 2xWWE Hall of Famer inductee Booker T's first gimmick in wrestling came from finding an old army hat while working in an abandoned self storage unit at around the time of the beginning of the Gulf War. The Booker Man would adopt the moniker of GI Bro, America's greatest hero. Years later, Booker reprised this role late in his WCW career and was given this mouth of the South Jimmy Heart produced theme which prominently features another Jimmy, that being a Jimi Hendrix-esque electric guitar version of the Star Spangled Banner being played amongst a fleet of helicopter propellers. Now this theme will surely fire you up and have you ready to take a grenade for the USNA, but it might also make you want to get to the CHAPA. This glorious entrance music that most associate with Kurt Angle was first used by the most generic patriotic wrestler of all time, hence his name, The Patriot. Heck, even Mr. America is a better name, but still, although the fans will always remember The Patriot, this theme song was leveled up just a year later when it was bestowed upon a legitimate NCAA wrestling champion and the only Olympic gold medalist in pro wrestling history led to the ring by the bombastic horns that introduce metal. When we liked this theme, we loved it. When we hated the theme, well it sucked. No matter how many times it was remixed, either way, the theme and Angle himself have both overcome adversity in true American underdog fashion.  From the moment that Hulkamania was born, when he defeated the Iron Sheik for the WWF title, Hulk Hogan was as much a symbol of America as the armed forces, Major League Baseball, and your mom's apple pie. Marching to the ring amidst the adulation of his Hulkamaniacs, often with old glory and toe, and the strains of Rick Derringer's real American blaring from arena sound systems, Hogan was a beacon of light for patriotism, so it was natural for him to feud with such foreign adversaries like Killer Khan, Kamala, the Ugandan Giant, and Yoko Zuna. With his 24-inch pythons and coked-up charisma, Hogan preached about working hard, saying your prayers and eating your vitamins. This mantra, plus his patriotic persona, firmly sculpted the Hulkster onto the Mount Rushmore of wrestling and as a fixture of American folklore. Composed in 1908 and as the official United States Army song, the caissons go rolling along, trumpeted, the arrival of another all-American good guy who the WWF desperately needed to defend our country's honor after Sergeant Slaughter left the company over a dispute surrounding his involvement with G.I. Joe. Corporal Kershner, a true son of America and a man with an outstanding military record as a real-life member of the Army's 82nd Airborne Division, is best remembered for his memorable rivalry with the hated Russian villain Nikolai Volkov that culminated in a flag match victory for Kershner at WrestleMania 2. Unfortunately, personal problems and a messy divorce caused the Corporal and this patriotic theme to roll along right out of the Fed after just one year. Perhaps no superstar was pushed so hard and so fast, then Lex Luger was after Hulk Hogan's WWF departure in 1993. Poised to pick up where the Hulkster left off, Luger arrived via helicopter to the deck of the USS Intrepid on America's birthday to body slam, well, basically hip-toss the 600-plus-pound heavyweight champion Yoko Zuna. Cementing himself as one of the good guys now, Luger became an American original, bathed in patriotic decor. He quickly embarked on the now infamous Lex Express nationwide tour traveling the country in a red, white and blue painted bus, shaking hands and kissing babies. Now although Luger did go on to become a co-winner of the 1994 Royal Rumble and co-made event WrestleMania 10, for all intents and purposes, the Lex Express had officially crashed and burned. And unfortunately, not even, stars and stripes forever. The feel-good, all-American, patriotic song could salvage the man that Vince McMahon had hoped would lead the WWF's new generation. For decades, Sergeant Slaughter has been the ultimate wrestling portrayal of the glory of the US armed forces. The Sarge and his chin are instantly recognizable American icons to wrestling fans. What not everyone knows is that Slaughter's initial WWF run was that of a brutal, bullying, drill instructor. Using this official hymn performed by the United States Marine Corps Band as an entrance theme, Sarge would scream at fans to stand and salute him, all the while referring to his outmatched opponents as scum, slime and maggots. Now this was nothing compared to the nuclear heat he generated when he sided with Saddam Hussein and the country of Iraq during the Gulf War in the early 90s. But still, some folks credit this tune as being one of the first pieces of entrance music ever used in pro wrestling. And now you are all dismissed.