Fyelod ydych i ymgrif Lithu o diolch yn 2018 gan Ffrancfarn ei dwyllfa'r cysylltu? Rhywrch i'r ddigel iawn i ddych yn ddau am ychydigau siarad, ac i gael ei dwybrai ffordd yn dydigig yn gossipau. Felly yn ddigel i ddymiadau cymdeithasol. O'r unrhyw ymddangas iawn yn ogyrch yn ddefnyddio eu pethau yn rhai ffordd yn cymdeithasol o rhai ffordd. Ac rwy'n fan y gallm gydagfannaeth. Mae rhaid i gael. The second item on our agenda is to take evidence on the UK trade bill from Graham Kemp, the St Andrew's TTP action group, Liz Murray, the head of the Scottish campaign's global justice now, Daphne Velistari, the link advocacy manager for Scottish environment link and clear slipper, who is the political affairs manager at NFU Scotland. I very warmly welcome all of our witnesses to our proceedings this morning. I just want to ask a very general question to get the process under way, just in order to provide some context for the session. I just wonder if you could outline what your principal concerns are around the trade bill for your own organisations in terms, for instance, of environmental, agricultural, environmental issues, also in terms of accountability and transparency. In addition, I'd appreciate it if you could give us your views on the restrictions the bill places on Scottish ministers and how you view the potential implications for the bill for devolved settlement from your own organisational perspective. That would be very helpful. Who would like to kick this session off? Claire, you are volunteering. Thank you very much. Thank you and thanks for inviting me to be here today. The trade bill, as far as we understood it, is intended to be a procedural bill that will deal with the issue of transitioning the EU's trade agreements to UK arrangements, so therefore it is procedural in nature. However, we are very concerned as a first principal that we do not want the nature of its passing to set a precedent for the passage of future trade deals in terms of consult consultation with the devolved administrations. For us, the key thing is maintaining trade that is transparent and inclusive, and, in doing so, it takes a formal, consultative or possibly a consent approach to trade with both the devolved administrations and stakeholders as well who are the experts. We welcome the fact that the trade sets out that they are wanting to try and keep the UK legal framework as consistent as possible with the EU. That is important to begin with because it sets a level of consistency. We also welcome the UK Government's promise to set up trade remedies and disputes framework, which I think will be important for protecting producers who are trading. However, we do question certain elements within the bill, the outlines that they want to try to maintain very high standards of consumer protection, animal welfare and environmental protection. However, I am unsure how that then fits in with some of the dialogue that we have seen coming out of DIT in recent weeks and months as regards the lowering of tariffs and, therefore, the lowering of standards that we have here in Scotland and in the UK. Finally, just to kick things off, the bill allows the UK Parliament to make changes to domestic legislation to fulfil obligations arising from future trade agreements by secondary legislation. We have had a discussion in the committee already about the implications of that through the withdrawal bill. The concerns are exactly the same, particularly if changes to legislation that are done by secondary instruments are to things such as non-tariff barriers. That would be extremely concerning for our sector, because high standards are absolutely paramount. That is the first principle. A little bit of background will explain some of the views that I have. Our organisation is a town gown one in St Andrews involving students and members of the public. It started about four years ago when the first indications of TTIP became available. We were very concerned about the secrecy element to that. There seemed to be very little role for devolved assemblies in deciding what was going on in those agreements. Our concern then switched to SETA as it was more imminent. There are some aspects of what is present in SETA that seem to us to be potentially detrimental to Scotland in particular. We are looking at it from a Scottish perspective. The main criticisms that we would have of the trade bill as it stands at present is that it seems to cut away the influence of Scotland over matters that are done slightly differently in Scotland. There is a danger in our view that the trade bill would undercut those areas. It is simply the lack of information and the lack of influence of the public in the way that the trade deals are set up. I am happy to provide some comments. Thank you for the invitation for today. In terms of the Scottish Environment Link, we are approaching the UK trade bill from an environmental point of view. In general, there is some concern about pre-trade agreements in general that, if not properly managed and considered, there might be damaging effects of the environment, that might lead to the regulatory regression and effects of our global footprint as a country. In the context of the UK trade bill, we would like to see some changes made that put environmental protections on the face of the bill so that there is certainty that there will be no changes to our domestic legislation to fit future trade agreements. I would echo some of the points that have been made already in terms of the role of Parliament and scrutinising and having oversight of trade agreements over the last few years. Because of our membership to the EU, those trade agreements have been negotiated at the EU level with the participation of the European Parliament and elected MEPs. I think that we need to be revisiting our domestic structures in that respect and also taking into account devolution with some sort of proposals that have already been put in place by the Welsh Government that they have been proposed already. What is worrying in terms of the UK trade bill is that, again, very much like the withdrawal bill, it includes a number of delegated powers, which, to our reading of the bill, would also allow for the review of primary legislation to make future trade agreements or existing trade agreements that will have to be renegotiated and come to bear. We understand that the UK Government wanted to limit the scope of the current UK trade bill to the existing trade agreements that would have to be renegotiated or adapted so that they function as the UK exits the EU and that there might be a separate policy coming about how the UK Government will trade future trade agreements. However, we think that there is an urgency that the current bill seeks to address that already because, according to the transition deal that we have with the EU, the UK Government will be already able to negotiate future and new trade agreements. I think that I will stop now. I think that I am going to echo what some of the others have said as well. Firstly, by saying thank you for having me here today. I am here on behalf of Global Justice now, but we are also a part of the Trade Justice Scotland coalition, which was set up in 2015 as part of the campaign against TTIP, so 27 organisations from some of the biggest trade unions, Unison, Unite, STUC, campaigning organisations and local activist groups. We have been working together now since 2015. We have started out with a concern about TTIP and CETA and this new wave of trade deals that are going beyond tariffs and quotas and into the realm of public policy space and into the realm of democratic decision making. To all of you, our asks are slightly changing some of the rules of governance or global governance almost. With the trade bill in particular, we would question the assumption about the transfer of deals, so that the deals that the EU currently has with third party are just being cut and pasted. Having listened to some of the evidence that was given in the trade bill committee down in Westminster, there were others saying that they felt it very unlikely that it would be a simple cut and paste and that, for a variety of reasons, those trade deals would get opened up to renegotiation on a variety of things. We have seen it reported in our evidence. We have seen it reported from trade representatives from other countries who have been involved in those deals that they would want to look again at agricultural quotas and subsidies and various other things. We feel that for this bill the issue of parliamentary scrutiny is as important as it would be in any future trade bills, because, as I said, there is an urgency and there is a precedent that needs setting in this bill to have parliamentary scrutiny. That should be at Westminster, obviously, but we also believe that the devolved administration should have a role in parliamentary scrutiny. We made some specific suggestions in our evidence, including a joint ministerial committee and some sort of committee process here—a legal right for the US MSPs to be able to see texts as they are negotiated and some sort of vote on a final or perhaps using the LCM process for the final text. There are a number of places where we feel that the devolved administration should absolutely be involved from the setting of the mandate and agreeing that if there are any changes to the mandate through to the agreement of the final trade deals. The reason that the devolved administration should be involved or the Scottish Parliament in this case is because of the scope and the extent of trade deals like TTIP. We have no reason to believe that the UK Government would not be using TTIP as some sort of template, for example for a trade deal with the US. Scotland has regularly passed legislation that is stronger in areas than other parts of the UK. Banning, smoking in public places was done here before it was done in the rest of the UK. There is the extent of moratorium on fracking, GM crops. We have a different approach here to public services, so that is for us where the impact of those trade deals and the extensiveness of those that mean that we feel that it is really important that the Scottish Parliament and MSPs have a say. Thank you. Good morning, everyone, and thanks for being with us. This is clearly a set of issues that is going to be quite challenging for the devolution settlement going forward. I wonder if I could go back to basics on the devolution settlement and find out if we all agree on at least the starting point, if not on the destination. Would the members of the panel agree with the proposition that international relations, international treaty making and the making of international trade agreements are matters that are reserved to Westminster? We all agreed that international trade in the future must respect the devolution settlement, but respecting the devolution settlement means respecting that which is reserved to Westminster, as well as respecting that which is devolved to Holyrood or indeed to Cardiff Bay. My first question is, do you agree with the proposition that international trade is a matter that is reserved under our constitutional law to Westminster? You are looking at me. When you are looking at me, all of you. End of this, you should feel free to answer, but Liz, if you want to, just to kick off. Yes. I have heard you ask every witness so far the same question, so I assume you know the answer. I know what my answer is. I am interested in your answer. You just want views. Well, yes, trade is reserved, but, as we have heard, the whole issue of Brexit is a test of the institutions of devolution and the fact that these trade deals, in a way that perhaps many previous trade deals have not, have now a wider impact. The UK has something new to negotiate trade deals for the UK because we have been part of the EU before. We do not yet have a proper process for that, so here is a chance to do that. It may have some implications and some difficulties in terms of devolution, but I think it is important. Is there any dissent from this view that international trade is reserved to Westminster, but the content of modern international trade agreements and international trade treaties may touch on, made more than touch on, devolved issues? Is that the view that every member of the panel would take? Erty your experience as a lawyer, I am not a lawyer, I am just an ordinary member of the public. You have still got a view, so our job is to have a view of this. My view on the law is tempered by what I think it should be rather than what it actually is. I will defer to your much greater experience in this area, but even allowing that does not preclude the fact that there should be proper consultation and agreement between all the constituent nations of the United Kingdom. We have been told that we are equal partners in the union, and that would mean to my understanding of it that we should have more than just a say, but our views should be taken into account in future trade deals, because there are a number of areas, and Liz has touched on some of them, where Scotland does things differently. There is talk of retaining some of the powers coming back from Brussels in Westminster in order to create common frameworks. Our view is that there is a danger to Scotland's distinct identity from a unilateral imposition of common frameworks. Although I have to accept your view on it, I am sure that it is absolutely correct. There are ways of doing it, and the trade bill does not, in my view, give enough say to the devolved assemblies. Daphne, you want to comment on that at this stage? Just a really small point, and it is just on the point of common frameworks that you just raised there. I do agree that those areas are reserved to Westminster, but what the bill is doing is setting up a new, but setting the groundwork for a new trading framework that we will operate after we leave the EU. It comes back to the points that we have raised in previous evidence to the committee about commonly agreeing those frameworks and the nature in which it is done. For us, it would not be about saying that, about redevolving those powers, it is just about the nature in which you find common agreement. What I would also add is that my understanding is that the EU Parliament will be able to vote on new trade deals that the EU strikes. However, what the bill does is takes away that step in terms of having the parliamentary scrutiny aspect as well, which is an important step to miss. Daphne? I just wanted to add something very quickly. In terms of international obligations, you are quite right that the UK is negotiating those, but when it comes to the implementation, as far as devolved matters are concerned, it is the devolved Governments and the sort of parliaments that have this. Insofar as new and existing trading arrangements impact our ability to meet international obligations, you could argue that there is a bit of an overlap or an area that we would need to at least consider the implications. This is our particular concern. If new and existing trade arrangements are going to be changed in a way that potentially impacts our ability to adopt future environmental legislation to protect nature and climate or to perhaps regress on some of these environmental commitments, that is where you see some overlap in some of the issues that need to be concerned. That is very helpful. The deference is flattering, but please do not defer to me. I am asking you these questions because I am genuinely interested in your responses to them. I already know what I think, but I want my thoughts to be informed by your evidence. I asked in that question whether you accept that international trade being reserved is the starting point. Clearly, the force of your evidence is that even if it is the starting point, it is not the end point, it is not the whole of the story. It is more complicated than that. The issue is how we construct in the devolved United Kingdom institutions, organisations, ways of doing business, ways of making policy, ways of implementing policy, which respect the devolution settlement in terms of understanding that we are talking essentially about reserve policy, whilst also understanding that the making of this reserve policy might directly impact on matters that are devolved in Scotland, Wales and perhaps also in Northern Ireland. One of the many organisations that has been looking quite carefully at this and it is a puzzle, it is a conundrum, it is not going to be straightforward in my view to get this right, but one of the organisations that has long expertise in this and has been looking at it for a long time and recently published what I thought was quite an interesting report on it is the Institute for Government, which is based in London. I wonder if you agree with one of the recommendations or conclusions that was made by the Institute for Government in its most recent report on this, which is to say this, that UK-wide legislation will provide greater certainty for businesses and third-country trading partners either by setting legally enforceable outcomes or through detailed regulations and that when it comes to areas that are likely to be important features of future trade relationships, UK-wide legislation would reassure international partners that the UK is going to meet what it calls its side of the bargain. There is quite strong evidence from the IFG, from the Institute for Government, that trade legislation is and should be a matter for UK-wide legislation and not for separate legislation in each of the component nations of the anti-kingdom. To what extent do you agree with those recommendations from the IFG? I would not agree with that. I think that if you take it just as you read it and I have not read the report and when you get to my age, your short-term memory begins to fail a little bit, so I may not recall exactly what you said just now. However, it does not seem to accept that the different nations, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland have different practices in some areas, and that must be in our view respected so that it is not possible to get a UK-wide policy on all issues that would be covered by a trade deal. Our experience with SETA in particular showed that there were some areas where the UK Government did not seem to be taking into account important differences that occur in Scotland. For example, the question of geographical indicators and products of designated origin are proportionately more important to Scotland than they are to the rest of the United Kingdom. Some of that 15 to 18 per cent of the 70-odd GIs and perios that are recognised in the UK by the European Union are in Scotland, so proportionately it is more important to Scotland than the rest of the country. However, the UK in negotiating SETA did not think to protect any of those at all, none in England and none in Scotland. There was absolutely nothing in the list that they presented. The NHS is something that is always brought out as well. SETA operates in our view as a very dangerous approach, the negative list, in which, if you want something protected against liberalisation or privatisation, it has to appear on an X1 to the SETA agreement. In that an X1, under the health and veterinary services section, there is no mention of Scotland or Scottish. Those words do not appear. That prompted us to ask if our MSP, Mark Ruskell, would ask a question on this, and he did in the Scottish Parliament. The answer that came from Keith Brown was that they had taken legal advice and know that the Scottish NHS was not protected under SETA, so that there are areas like that, and there are perhaps two other examples that could be quoted, where the UK Government does not seem to be taking account of the differences in Scotland, and that is evidence, if you like, that there is a danger in excluding the devolved assemblies from having a say in the negotiating mandate and having a say in what eventually appears. The trade deal would be at a UK level, like it is at an EU level at the moment, but we are concerned about the process of arriving at and agreeing that trade deal. That is where the devolved Scottish Parliament needs to be a role, with some very specific things. For example, a general ministerial committee that reaches consensus on the negotiating mandate and a negotiator from each of the devolved areas of Scotland on the negotiating team for a trade deal, the ability for members of the Scottish Parliament to be, as I said, given a legal right to see the negotiating text along the way, and a role in scrutinising those and recommending changes. There would be a similar process going on in Westminster, and that mirrors, in some ways, the EU's scrutiny committee, a role for civil society, but even though it is perhaps imperfect, there is a legislative consent motion process, as well, once the negotiations are completed. The Scottish Parliament absolutely needs to be able to look at and raise issues around any impacts that a trade deal might have on its own powers and the impacts in Scotland. We think that there should be a five-year review period in trade deals as well. The Scottish Parliament should get involvement in that in order to assess the impact that it is having here, if necessary, to propose changes or to recommend to the UK Parliament that the UK withdraws from a trade deal. There are suggestions. They may not all be absolutely possible, but that is what we would suggest. There needs to be a really comprehensive process along the way to ensure that the Scottish Parliament has not just to say but more of a role than just to say. I would echo Lizis's points on the process and the involvement from devolved parliaments. The one thing that I think is very important to highlight is that, if we are talking about the same report that was funded by RSPB and WWF, the report concluded that the Brexit process has highlighted some changes that we need to make in the institutions that support devolution. I think that that goes back to our mechanisms and the process that is fit for purpose. That takes us back to the JMC process, the involvement of parliaments. I appreciate that there is a whole host of recommendations coming out from the report, and they should be looked at altogether. I think that the report is a really helpful addition to the debate. I have read what I can of it, but I take the point that you make in the report. A UK-wide framework on something like trade is important. It will be set at UK-wide structures. However, it is about setting a level playing field but then allowing certain aspects to play different rules of the game. As much as it does say, it is important to have common standards across. It then goes on to say that, when legislation is required, it should be passed with consent, keeping amendments to the devolution settlements to a minimum. When legislation is not required, it should bring in a form of concordat, protocol or memoranda of understanding between the four nations. It goes back to the point that I made about the nature in which you find common agreement is extremely important. The example of the JMC has been raised. We would agree that that needs some real teeth to allow the four parts of the UK to feel that they have been consulted and given agreement to these fundamental issues. That is very helpful. I was going to ask one final question, but you have already anticipated it. The final question was going to be to make exactly the point that Clare has just made, which is that the IFG says that, where such UK legislation is made, it should be made with consent. The question was going to be, do you think that using that LCM process, that legislative consent mechanism process that we have and that we have had for 20 years, is sufficient to protect what you identify as the distinct interests of Scotland in this process? Liz has already answered that question very fully with a whole series of reasons why she thinks that it is not on its own sufficient. It is necessary, but not sufficient. That is very helpful. Ivan, I know that you wanted to get into international comparisons, but because the issue of scrutiny is already in the discussion, I think that we should probably go there first. Patrick Stewart I think that the starting point should be an acknowledgement that international trade is reserved. It seems to me that that might be slightly beside the point. The constitution is reserved yet there is a constraint on the UK Government in its use of that reserved power. It is not allowed to change the devolved competencies without the consent of the devolved parliaments. Similarly, the use of a reserved power on trade, it seems to me, should be seen in the same light. There should be a constraint on the use of that reserved power if it affects devolved competencies, which, as Liz Murray has argued, a lot of the modern trade agreements do and will. I wonder if you would agree with another recommendation from the Institute for Government that in coordinating UK-wide international negotiations, the UK should look to international examples, particularly the involvement of the Canadian provinces in the negotiations between the EU and Canada. Is that a model that would satisfy the needs that you are talking about? What is the opportunity for democratic engagement, not just by parliamentarians but by members of the public and other organisations, in the absence of such an arrangement? The model in Canada with the provinces seems a very sensible one, particularly from the point of view of making the negotiations smoother from both sides. I believe that it was the EU that requested that the provinces were involved. They were involved at an early stage and along the way. Some of the recommendations that we have made is based on what we have seen and read and heard about what has happened in Canada. What was the second part of the question? If the bill was to go through as it stands, the Parliament will be asked if we are going to give legislative consent. If we were to give that and the bill was to go through as it stands, what are the opportunities that would exist? To what extent is there any space or scope for democratic engagement, either by parliamentarians or by members of the public and other organisations? My understanding is very little. At the moment, the way that trade deals is so ratified in the UK is through the use of the Ponsonby rule. It has not been ratified yet through the UK Parliament, but where the text is laid before Parliament for 21 days, MPs can raise a question or an objection that has to be responded to by the Government. That does not change what happens. That initiates another 21 days, during which time you can raise an objection or question and you can go on until one side gives up. I do not know exactly what the outcome of that is likely to be, but the UK has not negotiated its own trade deals all this time. Even as part of an EU process of negotiating EU trade deals, that is not good enough, we think. There is no role at all for the public, and there is only that very limited role for MPs. Even within the current system, it is not good enough. The UK will be negotiating deals on its own, so now is the time to change that. At a lower level of scrutiny in democratic engagement, that happens at the European Parliament, for example, in relation to the debates that are to be placed on Tetech. Losing that aspect of it will be a long way behind. It is really not a radical ask for MPs, at the very least, to have much more saying for there to be some public scrutiny. There are many examples of where that happens, with the Danish Parliament, with a lot of their international policy that goes through the Parliament in some detail and has public consultation. That is not a radical ask. In principle, it is not expecting or wanting the devolved administrations to have a say. Let us make sure that the question is answered. Can we get the others to answer the first one? Sure. Let us make sure that we get all that. If you want to contribute, are you happy with the contribution from Liz? I am first. You are happy with that? Okay, when you go Patrick. Well, just one specific aspect to this to the NFU in particular, as a Scottish aspect of a wider UK body, one aspect of this debate is about the devolved administrations, the devolved parliaments and that level of devolved input, where trade agreements would impact on devolved competencies. Another aspect is the democratic principle in general. Is beyond the NFU Scotland, expressing the same concerns around democratic scrutiny, irrespective of the devolved issue, what is that wider engagement that is coming from your perspective on the scrutiny aspects of the trade bill and the agreements that would be negotiated under it? Well, we are a separate organisation from the English and Welsh NFU. We are sisters, but we are not part of the same. I beg your pardon. No, no, just a point of clarification in case there was any confusion. But we do speak with them very regularly and we are almost on the same page on a whole range of issues, but sometimes there are areas of difference. I spoke to my counterparts there yesterday in preparation for this session. For them, as I said in my opening remarks, they do see this as a procedural bill, but they have raised the same concerns that I have about the lack of parliamentary scrutiny, particularly because clearly our concern is trade and agri-food products and with them being perishable in nature and the fact that they can't turn farming on and off overnight, they're worried about any sort of impact that could lead to trade flows being disrupted. They have in evidence to DIT and to parliamentary committees raised a concern about lack of devolved input as well, which is welcome as far as we're concerned. So we're in a very similar place. Just if I can just answer the question that you raised about the Canadian example, and I have to be completely honest, it's not something that we have spent a huge amount of time examining just purely because of resource constraints, but I suppose one thing that I would, what does slightly concern me, is about introducing as much as scrutiny and democratic engagement is extremely important and we are keen to see that instilled within the process. We are worried about instilling another layer in which trade deals or trade in the future might have to go through. I'm just thinking in terms of the practical nature of when you're importing or exporting, you need things like export certification, official vets, customs arrangements, and I would just worry about it becoming another layer in which there could be divergence between the UK and Scotland and other parts of the UK which could then disrupt trade flows. I think that another point that Adam Tomkins was making from the point of view of the interests of those taking part in international trade, UK-wide regulations and legislation would be beneficial. That seems to be very clearly an argument for staying inside the single market and doing away with the fragmentation that Brexit creates altogether. Yeah. We were clear from the outset that we would have preferred to stay within the single market and the customs union as a matter of record. That makes a great deal of sense. We are, we are. Thanks very much, Bruce. It's just to continue with this theme about transparency and accountability. We live in strange times indeed that we're having to make a case to someone to give us the opportunity to scrutinise things and to hold things to account. Do you fear that we're in danger of repeating the mistakes of the TETAP process with this bill, where, as there was a huge public concern about it right across the European Union, not just in the UK about the lack of transparency and engagement by the parliaments and the public in this kind of process? Do you agree with that, that we're potentially at risk of repeating that mistake and give us one or two examples of how we should resolve it? Because it's not just a Scottish issue, there's no scrutiny and accountability at the UK level either, as I understand it. First, do you agree with that? And secondly, how can we make this a better process? The concern that first got us interested in TETAP and then in CETA, we couldn't believe that those negotiations were done in secret and even MEPs and MPs and MSPs had no idea as to what was going on. As part of our process, we went to Brussels to lobby our MEPs there. We took a delegation down to Westminster to speak to MPs there and we've attended debates in the Scottish Parliament and asked our local representatives to raise questions on that. The risk of seeming obsequious, the best response has come from the Scottish Parliament. This is really in comparison to the other two, a very open, engaging and friendly institution, which has been a big help in elucidating what goes on. However, I think that the premise of your question is correct. The example of what has happened very recently with CETA is a good example of that. The Secretary of State for International Trade promised before the European Scrutiny Committee that there would be a debate on the floor of the house on CETA. That was in November 2016 or thereabouts and it never happened. The only debate that occurred subsequent to that was a small committee that met in the committee room exactly at the same time as the main body of the Parliament was debating the article 50. The chances of that getting any publicity or even much interest was minimal. It just seemed to us that this was being snuck through on the quiet and there was no debate on this. As far as I'm aware, before the CETA bill was published, there was no information available to the public before it was put online the previous year. I think that there is a danger that there will continue to be a lack of scrutiny of trade deals. I just want to add that T-Tip is perhaps an example of how not to do a trade deal. It speaks to transparency, the involvement of stakeholders and so on. I think that if we look at the current trade bill, which of course talks about existing trade agreements, it does not talk about how we will conduct those in the future, which is very worrying, as I mentioned in my introductory remarks, given that as of April next year the UK will be able to negotiate new trade agreements and we will have no idea about how that is going to happen by the existing sort of limited domestic mechanisms. I think that what is quite important is to look also at the T-Tip in the context of the regulatory divergence that it would have created. I think that looking at the US system, for instance, on environmental protections, food safety, we are in a different space. Just a few weeks ago, the Scottish Parliament voted in favour, unanimously, on maintaining EU environmental principles with the precautionary principle at the heart of those. We know that the US regulatory systems do not operate on the basis of the same principles. Looking forward to future trade agreements, we need to already know that those should not be used as an argument for diluting standards, for going back on environmental commitments. Again, if you look at the current UK trade bill, it allows for primary legislation to be changed so that we can continue with those existing retrofitted trade agreements with third countries, which is very worrying. Looking at the trade bill, we would want some amendments made to ensure that this does not happen. Any non-technical amendments to existing trade deals should be properly scrutinised and, in our view, should be accompanied by a sustainability impact assessment that looks at the social, economic and environmental implications. We think that this is a commitment that needs to be taken forward when conducting new trade deals. We would be looking for a much more robust process in conducting those with Parliament. Definitely a Westminster setting and voting on the terms of the mandate for the UK Government to negotiate trade deals for there to be a public consultation, for Parliament to have a final vote to reject or agree on the negotiated deal, and throughout the course of the negotiations for the trade committee at the UK level select trade committee to be commenting and feeding back on the negotiations. Again, Liz mentioned some very important considerations in terms of the role of devolved Governments and Parliaments. We would like to see at each stage of the process to assess how Scottish Parliament and Government can be implicated. If we look at CETA, the concerns that were raised on the side of Belgium happened at very late in the process. We would want to avoid a situation where we are about to finalise and conclude a trade agreement and something comes up at that final stage. We would want to have those issues raised and flagged up front. If politicians ignore that, they are daft. They will be asking for trouble another time in the future. Everyone was taken aback with the amount of public opposition across 3.5 million people signing a petition across Europe on that issue. In Berlin, 250,000 people marched against TTIP. In this country, where we do not have such big marches often, we had tens of thousands of people in London marching on that. The public understood what it was. Even though there were technical issues, the public understood that they could absolutely see the injustice in the lack of transparency but the problems with those deals as well. That lesson needs to be learned. The trade bill offers an opportunity to do that. We could amend the trade bill to allow—if we are saying that we need impact assessments, which we are looking at different sectors and different parts of the country, then based on that there should be a public consultation at that early stage. As part of that, you have to make proper efforts to reach out to, in particular, the sectors of society that are going to be impacted. That is where the impact assessments will help to do that. The outcome of that consultation has to be taken into account in making a decision as to whether that trade deal should even go ahead or how in the negotiations should then be shaped. We would also suggest setting up a civil society consultation body for trade deals, but with civil society deciding itself who should be included in that. From the point of view of you guys as MSPs and MPs, another reason why you need to be involved in the process is so that you can engage with your own constituents. When they come and ask you what about farming or what about the food labelling or whatever they are or what about the NHS and this trade deal, you can answer them not just by saying, well, we'll try and find out about it or whatever. You know that you've got something in more detail and something with more substance that you can go back to them with. Willie Coffey, thank you. We've discussed parliamentary scrutiny and it's already mentioned the possible role of joint ministerial committees in terms of trade. The GMB trade union, and I should declare on my member the GMB, has said that they were interested by the suggestion of the Welsh administration for a UK council of ministers of the nations and believe that if the structure was developed to assure transparency in scrutiny, it could lend itself well to development of future UK trade policy. Can you agree with the GMB, have you considered the Welsh administration's proposals in that regard? It sounds a good idea, provided that any such council has teeth, has the ability to make its views acted on and is not just something that can be ignored. We would agree that something that we've been considering for quite some time would work well across a whole range of issues, for us the important thing being future agricultural policy frameworks, but the suggestion of possibly introducing some sort of qualified majority voting system has been mooted and we would be interested in that. A further suggestion, which I think my colleagues at the Scottish Westgate Association have put on the table, is a mechanism that I believe actually operates in America, but there's basically a statutory requirement to consult stakeholders on new trade deals where they will impact those sectors. For example, if it's a trade deal with the US and the issue of home-wontreated beef is on the table, then the NFU and NFUS would have a formal consultative role within the process of that trade deal before it's signed off, which I thought was quite an interesting idea. I'm going to continue in this area because a number of mentioned issues to do with negotiations. Did you have a question in this area as well? Why come in procurement? Right, okay. Ash, I think that the particular role of the Government in negotiations in this area you were concerned about. I was interested in what role the panel thought that the Scottish Government should have in negotiations, but I think that some of that was covered in response to Adam Tomkins' question at the start. I just want to drill down a little bit into how I see it would go if things went a little bit further down in the process. If, with the potential for investor protection clauses in future trade deals, it means that Scotland would have, in Les Murray's written submissions words, inextricably be linked to any trade deal signed by the UK that Scotland would be in that position, where they would be fully impacted by that. That being the case, we've mentioned, or the panel have mentioned, a number of procedures and structures that could be put in place. We've just spoken about the Joint Ministerial Committee on Trade, which is being set up. The committee has looked at intergovernmental relations across the UK on a number of occasions already, and we have taken evidence previously that the JMC process, as it currently stands, doesn't work that well. I suppose that we would be continuing down that road. I'm seeking the panel's view that, if there was something like a JMC for trade set up, and we're in a position where they're negotiating these trade deals and the Scottish Government feels that the trade deal that's on the table that the UK Government has put forward is not good for Scotland and it doesn't protect Scotland's unique position or Scotland's interests, and there was a disagreement there. Do you think that it's enough for Scotland just to use Claire Slipper's words when they're fed into the process, or do you think that the UK Government should be able to proceed with that trade deal if the Scottish Government didn't give consent to it? We shouldn't be able to proceed. We have been told that we're an equal part of the union, and that that should be treated as such. For the Scottish Government to be able to refer to the Parliament, actually rather than acting, in the same way that we want the UK Government to have to refer to the UK Parliament over these trade deals and for MPs to have a say, then I would want whatever position the Scottish Government took to come from the Parliament or be authenticated, authorised or whatever by the Parliament. I don't think that I'm qualified to answer whether the Scottish Parliament should have a say. I think that the Parliament should be able to give its consent or withhold its consent, particularly on the areas of a trade deal that are impacted on the devolved powers that it has that are impacted. I don't have the expertise—the legislative consent motion process is what exists at the moment, and it's not perfect, but I don't have the expertise to suggest what, if you were trying to make something better, how to do that. I'm not sure if I can offer a solution, but the Welsh Government's approach was that James C type of council of ministers should also be created for reserved matters, which again speaks to the fact that there might be some overlap. Perhaps looking at it from an environmental point of view, if there is a trade agreement on the table that impacts on environmental legislation in Scotland, we would like to see a role for the Scottish Government and the Parliament in that. Again, that speaks to the overlap, so that convention comes in to play there again, but we would want potential discrepancies and issues to be fleshed out up front, so there would need to be some sort of mechanism that allows for that. We've developed some ideas about how that could function at Westminster, but we would want to look at how it could potentially apply to the Scottish Parliament. I think that I haven't had questions about what international examples could be used to help us through some of this process before I move on to other areas. Exactly. I thank the panel for coming along and talking to us this morning. It was exactly that. I know that some of you have put in your submission some examples from the United States. We've talked about Canada, so we've scutted round it. I'd be interested to get any input that you want to make or any thoughts that you have on what we can learn from other countries that have sub-national legislatures, such as a federal system or whatever system, and how they operate in this environment with respect to the trade deals that are made at a national level and what input or ability to direct those or influence those that exist at the sub-national level internationally. I haven't really got very much to add to what I've already said and what was in our evidence was the Canadian example and then the Belgian example and then the US, which has been mentioned as well. In Germany, there's an interaction between the lender and the national government. On the issue of Wallonia, which obviously there's a different federal setup in Belgium, but the principle that it showed was that by allowing some say for the regional governments, they were able to respond. They actually had an 18-month inquiry into CETA before they put in their objection. They had an impact assessment done and what they did was in response to what their constituents were saying and what their farmers were saying, and their farmers were worried about the competition from angry business in Canada. They were allowed that regional government to respond to its local concerns and to the concerns of its constituents, which is really, if we're talking about a democratic process of transparency and all that kind of thing, that's an example of really what it is that we're talking about. Through the processes that they had, the Belgian government was able to refer that back to get some changes made and they've also referred the whole ISDS thing to the European Court of Justice. On that, we would say that the ISDS shouldn't be included in these trade deals. I know that the Scottish Government, or Nicola Sturgeon, has certainly said that she wouldn't support trade agreements that have that in, or that they shouldn't be in those trade agreements. That could be quite a sticking point and test the kind of thing that you were just asking about, Ash. I'm giving you a very secure to answer, but I think that it reinforces the principle of the need for more devolved decision making on these trade deals so that the concerns of constituents and parts of society and the economy that are going to be impacted to be properly taken into account. I suppose what we're saying is that, yes, there are some solid examples there that work perfectly well that we could learn from and we could use substantial parts of to influence the way we should operate. We'll get into some specific areas now. That's been quite a general discussion about the frameworks. Alexander, on the name, I want to talk about areas in agriculture in particular, Alexander. Thank you, convener. I can't note my register of interests around farming. I think that we all recognise the importance of agricultural trade and the importance of a good trade deal. There's been much negativity on the ability to get such a deal, but a little focus on the importance of such a deal for other countries—I'm thinking of Ireland in particular—and sector specificity in this edition of Farm North East, the volume of French maize that makes its way into the whisky industry. I just wondered what work or discussions NFU Scotland had had. What was the likelihood of you producing a similar document to the one that you did, steps to change on agriculture policy? In terms of the work that we've done, we've been working closely with the Agriculture and Horticultural Development Board, which has produced a really interesting series of papers that look at different sexual opinions on what sort of trade we should be aiming for in the EU and internationally after we leave the EU. We don't actually have that sort of technical expertise in the house, but what the HDB has produced is a really fascinating insight into what areas might want a more protectionist stance and what others might want to be very ambitious in terms of the international outlook. The truth is that it very much varies between different commodities, and I think that the concerns are generally the same across the board, although there's clearly certain areas of emphasis in Scotland that might not have in the rest of the UK, I'm thinking of the Scottish beef as one example. That's something really key that we need to try and protect and ensure that we have geographical indications included very strongly within any future trade agreement with international partners. We haven't got a document like that in the running, but we are very much aware of the issues and very keen to try and strike up a dialogue with the Department for International Trade, but I will be honest and say that we're getting very little to know engagement back from them at the current time, and I think that my colleagues in the NFU share the same concern. Primarily, I presume, because the focus has been on getting the procedural aspects of the trade bill through first of all, but I think that it's very key that that department starts to look at different sectors and what they might want and need, because, as I said earlier, it can't turn farming on and off and the uncertainty isn't helping confidence in the industry at the current time, it's fair to say. Thank you, convener. Good morning, everybody. I'm interested in tariffs and trade and issues around agriculture and protected geographical indications for our products in Scotland. I was reading the QMS briefing that says that beef production alone makes up some 27 per cent of total farm output and trading livestock and meat to destinations outside Scotland is fundamental to the long-term sustainability of the Scottish red meat industry. With the QMS briefing and the other briefing that I have, which is the Agriculture and Horticultural Development Board briefing, there's lots of evidence out there that says that WTO options are not what we want, especially with whisky and beef and sheep and everything like that, but I'm just curious about obviously the NFU said that we want to, the best option would be part of the customs union single market access, but how concerned are you about PGI status of our food and drink industry and protecting our industry? It's £14.4 billion annually as a turnover for food and drink, 119,000 jobs, it's not just the jobs, it's the supply chain, it's all of that, so interested in your comments around those issues. I mean, in a word to ask how concerned we are about protecting the PGI status and the sort of integrity of the food and drinks industry, the answer would be very concerned. I think particularly there's been a sort of growing narrative in recent months about a no deal Brexit and that sort of thing is extremely unhelpful. I think any sort of indication that we might unilaterally lower tariffs across the board and just kind of import and export on a world commodity market is just an absolute no go area for our industry because we export on provenance on extremely high standards on the kind of the rolling hills in the USP that that brings to our products. That means that we cannot be a player on a sort of stack at high and sell at low commodity basis, so we know what we can work to and what we can achieve, but that will come at a cost as well. But so long as we're supported by governments to produce that food to that high standard and the cost that it comes at, then we can do that, but we can't be undermined by anything substandard coming in from elsewhere. On the PGI point, we were very concerned to see after the ratification of the recent CETA deal and I think in other deals as well, notably with Japan, that PGIs weren't included within those deals. When we looked into it with deaf or colleagues, the answer that we got back was essentially that they just forgot to include a schedule of PGIs within the text, which does not instill confidence in you before the process is moving forward. We've addressed that issue, we can hopefully move forward and they are very much aware now that it's an important area for Scotland to focus on, but that is just one example of where things could go drastically wrong for our industry if things aren't—the whole industry view isn't taken into account. One of the reasons that we feel that it's really, really important to set a precedent for parliamentary scrutiny in this trade bill is because of future—if there's another trade bill for future trade deals, it's easier to get that into that. One of the concerns, if we're looking back at TTIP as well, is that we need to be really aware of his trade deals between the UK and the US. We know that Liam Fox is already—or there's discussions going on already at a high level with the US on the one hand and then, on the other hand, when we look at the US Trade Representative just published their foreign trade barriers report for 2018, which is a very heavy-weighty document, 500 pages or so, but in that they list things relating to the EU that they see as trade barriers. For now, we include ourselves there, but we can assume that some of those things would be the same when we're negotiating as the UK. You were asking about GIs and what they wrote in that was, with respect to geographical indications, the United States remains troubled with the EU system that provides overbroad protection of GIs, adversely impacting the protection of US trademarks and market access for the US. There's also listed in relation to labelling, so there's areas where they believe that barriers to trade are labelling, which tells customers where different ingredients are from, nutritional labelling, prohibitions on hormone beef in the use of rectopamine, prohibitions on food from cloned animals, the slow approval of GM crops, prohibitions on GM foods and biotech seeds, prohibitions on chlorine chicken and other meat washed with microbial rinses, too lower limit on, I forget the technical name, white blood cells in milk, prohibitions on chemical flavourings, prohibitions on live cow exports, there's a long list, and the GIs mentioned again later on. We already know the difference in standards, but we could expect that there will be some serious pressure during a negotiation between the UK and the US, for example. Our position is not an anti-American position at all, but there are other countries in the UK where we're doing trade deals with where we would have concerns about human rights, for example. That's another reason, I guess, why we feel that it's really important that elected politicians have a say in those trade deals and that it's not something that the UK Government does using its prerogative powers and without a set, without reference to the Parliament. I forgot to mention, convener. I've got one that we suck. I am the CAB sex parliamentary liaison officer for rural economies, so I forgot to say that earlier. The Canadian trade deal started out with 26.5 per cent on beef as a tariff, and it took 10 years to negotiate that to a zero, so that's a long time to negotiate trade deals. Confirmers sustain 10 years of 25 per cent tariffs if they're exporting. My other thoughts were about somatic cell counts, which is what you're talking about, issues around sanitary and phytosanitary measures that are used to protect human, animal and plant life or health. So, technical barriers are often deemed necessary for environmental protection, safety, national security or consumer information. Those are the non-tariff barriers that you were talking earlier about, Claire, which don't have tariffs, but they're really, really important that we get the right trade deals when we're talking about the health of humans and plants and animals when we're negotiating the trade deals. Just on your second point there, this is one of the reasons why we've consistently said that we want to be in some form of our customs union with the EU, because it would mean that we would have been maintaining a standard of production and not allowing stuff in that doesn't maintain those high levels and doesn't allow us to be undercut by all of that. So, particularly for the red meat industry, when you're talking about home and treated beef and this sort of thing, that's particularly important. On the tariffs with Canada, my limited understanding would be that, as that trade deal has now been struck, what we'll try and do is essentially cut and paste the terms of that into UK law so that we won't have to be paying tariffs to import or export at the current time, but it clearly could be an implication for any future international trade deal that we strike on our own and would be something that we'd be keen to avoid, but we'll have to wait and see. This is an area that I've not got a great deal of expertise in. I've got to concede. Claire or somebody to please explain to me in the PGI system that is currently there. How do we come to an agreement on what should be as protected that has a PGI status? What's the process? I'm getting the feeling that people are concerned. The current process is obviously working to a reasonable degree. What's the worry for the future that the process cannot continue to operate successfully, just so that I can understand that? What a PGI does is essentially give assurance status to a product. Store-away black pudding, for example, can only be produced there and to certain specifications, and loss of that PGI through any future trade deal would basically mean that anybody else could produce a similar product and stick a label on it saying that it's produced in a store-away, so it's therefore taking away our provenance, taking away our unique product that we can then go to other markets with. In terms of the process of how they are agreed, I'm probably exposing my own ignorance, but it's a EU-wide recognised system and that PGI's are put on to schedules of any international trade deals so that that international partner then can't implicate or replicate, but it's important because there's PGI's on things like Scotch beef, Scotch whisky. It's the process, so I'm assuming then, and again this is coming from a position of ignorance, that in these circumstances, whether it's Scotch beef or black pudding from the store-away, that the UK Government is the one who is supporting that process through the EU to get those PGI's put in place? Why would the UK Government therefore, in future, decide not to have that same level of standard? I need to get some of that on the record, because that's obviously, we'd have an impact on any trade deal. It may be something they have to trade off as part of the negotiations, for example, and we saw, Graham, you might know more about this than me, but with CETA they were very reluctant to list, the UK was very reluctant to list the PGI's, France listed, I don't know how many but a lot. There's 120 odd PGI's listed throughout Europe and there's zero from the United Kingdom. So we have some evidence that the UK Government is not a priority, and actually there's quotes from Liam Fox saying that it's not a priority for this Government, and that's not to say they might not change or future governments would change. Sorry, did I cut a crochet, Emma? No, but it's an important point to make, because I think America is already making issues around whisky and single malt Scotch is actually a brand that is so important for our industry, and there's a big difference between a three-year-old Tennessee whisky that's corn made compared to a 12-year-old in a barrel on the island of Islay, so I think a distinction like that is what needs to be made. That's helpful for my understanding up to speed a bit more. Murdo, I think you... It's important to reinforce the point that a large part of the food and drink industry in Scotland is based on the fact that Scotland is equated with quality, and things like PGIs and PDOs are ways of reinforcing that and stopping that being diluted. That is a big market, and it's down just to the perception that people have of Scotland and the environmental aspects that lead to good quality ingredients that come from this country. Anything that undermines that will undermine this kind of brand image in Scotland is an important one in certain areas, but you guys wouldn't know more about that. I'll let you in on another matter. Just to say that, in all of these discussions, we need to take into account whether the UK wants to have a very close trading relationship with the EU, because that will come in and factor in some of those considerations. We already know that the EU will not accept a robust and close free trade agreement with the UK unless some of the standards are maintained and they're talking about the inclusion of a non-regression principle, which means that there needs to be common ground on competition, state aid, guarantees against tax dumping, social standards and environmental standards. Again, close trade deal with the EU comes with a package of measures that we need to adhere to. How does that impact the possibility of getting other trade agreements that we need to consider? As we leave the EU, we will no longer be bound by EU procurement rules. However, we will still be partied to the Government's procurement agreement. Clause 1 of the trade bill is a clear statement of intent that the UK will be partied to the GPA. There are also provisions in the bill that are empowering the Scottish Government to give effect to GPA requirements using secondary legislation. I wonder if any of you have a view on the Government procurement agreement and its power on Scottish ministers to implement it. I have to admit that it is not an area that I know a huge amount about, so I can come back to the committee to evidence my arguments in due course if I need to. My colleagues at the NFU have said that they welcome the fact that the part of the GPA will remain, but are pushing UK Government to ensure that the Government's buying standards regulations are incorporated into any future procurement agreements with the Crown commercial services. Those adhere to greener public procurement rules, which allow more local procurement. That is something that we would also heavily support. I can look into it a bit further and come back to the committee in writing, but that could be possibly something for the Scottish Government to also look at. Do you have any thoughts on that? With what Claire is saying, in present times, it is important to think of the environmental consequences of completely open procurement. Buying local or supporting local businesses is something that should be encouraged. I do not know to what extent the general procurement agreement makes that difficult, but if it does, I would be against it. It is very important to support our local economies as far as possible, from the environmental consideration but also from the social consideration. Thank you for that response. One of the criticisms that was made very often of the current procurement regime that we have in the UK, which is set in the EU framework, is that it prevents us from doing just that. Do you agree with that? Well, I do not know enough about it. I will take your word for it that it prevents us. That is the criticism that is often made. As long as Claire Slipper was nodding her head. We would agree that, in an ideal world, we would like to see possibly mandatory targets for levels of local procurement when it comes to foodstuffs and public services. That is something that we would aspire to. Out of the EU, perhaps that is something that we might be able to consider a bit more seriously. I think that James had a question in this area as well. Just to build on that, I wonder if the panel thinks that there should be a facility to vary the procurement arrangements where they affect devolved areas, particularly where Scottish bodies are involved in procuring under the remit of the trade agreement. To give a practical example, the view that the Scottish Parliament took was that public bodies should mandate the payment of the real love and wage. Should we be building in an ability on this trade bill to allow the Scottish Parliament to vary the arrangements in relation to specific trade bills, if it wanted to mandate the payment of the love and wage where the trade involved procurement from Scottish public bodies? I would agree with that. It is a shame that it would have to be mandated. Organisations should be doing that anyway. I do not have a great level of expertise on this, but that sounds like a very sensible way of going about things. Neil, did you still have something that has been covered? To follow up briefly, I get the sense that there is an agreement broadly across the panel that the policy that James Kelly was talking about there would be a good one, but the question is at what level in the UK should it be imposed. If the chance for more local, sustainable and ethical procurement is one of the few silver linings to the whole situation, does the panel agree that it would be perverse for that potential freedom to be closed down and have the UK imposed the same constraints on Scottish and local authority procurement decisions that should be made locally rather than imposed with the same restrictions at the UK level? I think that wherever possible, buying locally and supporting local businesses should be encouraged. Making should be made at a local level as well? To my mind, now you are thinking that that follows on. To do that properly, the decision has to be made at a local level. It would be very important to ensure that you have the results that you wanted. I am not sure whether I have a view here or there. As I have said, I am not an expert, but procurement is an issue that is dealt with by the Scottish Parliament at the current time. Obviously, we would want that to stay that way. It would depend on the issue of the products being procured as to the level at which, whether it is Scottish Parliament or local authority or wherever that decision was taken, I do not have a particular view. Daphne, have you got any views? I was probably going to agree with Claire that we have not looked at the issue in great detail, but the one thing that I would clarify is that, in any discussions that we have had regarding joint frameworks at the UK level, we have always wanted the possibility for devolved Governments and countries to take those further in terms of ambition, so if that could be worked in that context. I very much welcome the contribution that was made by our panel today. That brings us to the end of the proceedings, as far as the public part of the process is concerned. Can I briefly mention that I am sorry that I should have said before I asked my first question that my register of members' interests shows that I am a member of Friends of the Earth, which is part of both the environment link and the trade justice coalition, and I should have said that at the start. No worry. It is on the record now, so thank you for doing that. You are safe. So, I agree that the start of the meeting will take the next item in private, and I thank our witnesses for their contribution. I now close this public part of the meeting.


This is the reason why people care about social media. This is why people care about how many likes they get. This is the reason why people care about how many followers they have, how many comments they have. Opinions don't matter at all. 99% of the opinions that come into you, you can just throw them out. Today, we're going to be talking about other people's opinions and how to take advice from other people depending on who they are. And so the question is not to take advice or not to take advice or not to take advice. The question is really more than anything else. Whose opinions actually matter to you and whose opinions actually don't? If you're in a situation right now where you have been basing your entire life off of everybody's opinion of you, you're probably not in the position that you want to be in life. And so it's really important to think about the people that give you advice and then look at where their life is and see if there's somebody that you want to take advice from. And so that's what we're going to talk about. We're going to talk about how to not care about other people's opinions and how to take advice from people who actually matter. And let's take a step back before we talk about that. Let's talk about why we care as humans so much about fitting in, why we care about other people's opinions so much, and how if we allow ourselves to be held back by those opinions, we're never going to have the life that we want to. So why do we care about other people's opinions in the first place? The thing that you have to realize is we are tribal beings. If you go back 100,000 years, it was impossible for us to survive without the tribe. We had to have the tribe around us. It was necessary for us to survive, for us to hunt, for us to take care of the children, for us to gather food and have shelter, all of that stuff. It was necessary. We had to fit in in order to survive. Now 100,000 years ago, if you did not fit in with your tribe and you were pushed out of the tribe, you would die.  The difference now though is if you don't fit in with anybody, death is not attached to that. You can still pay your bills. You can still feed yourself. You can still have food, water, shelter, clothing, all of that, if you don't fit in with society. And that's the beautiful thing is you can now be your own sovereign being that does whatever the hell that you want to, as long as you're not hurting other people. You know, it doesn't matter as I always say, you guys all know her, Nancy and accounting. It doesn't matter what she thinks about you.  It doesn't matter of anything. If you're like, you know what? I want to start a podcast, but I'm so worried about what Nancy and accounting is going to think of me.  Who cares about what Nancy and accounting thinks of you? Is she someone that you want to take advice from? But there's still that part of our brain that's like, oh, but I want to fit in, but I want to fit in. And so there is nature of how we actually are. And we've got to be aware of that. And then there's reality in 2021, 2022, 2023, and so on and so forth of what actually matters. This is the reason why people care about social media. This is why people care about how many likes they get. This is the reason why people care about how many followers they have, how many comments they have, where if somebody posts a picture and it doesn't get the response that they want to right away, what they're like, oh my God, I got to delete it because clearly I'm not being accepted for what I post. This is why social media can be such a a addicting, but also traumatic thing for some people is because we literally have that part of our brain that is just looking for other people's exceptions. We want to be liked, like let's be real, we want to be liked. We want to fit in in some sort of way. And the problem with that, and there's a really great phrase that Jim Carrey says, is he says, your need for acceptance can make you invisible in this world. And if you fit in, you're going to be invisible. Think about every great person that you look up to. It could be LeBron James, it could be Oprah, it could be The Rock, Will Smith, Elon Musk, it could be any of those people. It could be many different people. It could be some of the spiritual leaders.  None of these people actually fit in. And so there's a part of us that wants to fit in, but then we look at these great leaders and the people that we look up to and we're like, well, they're not like anybody else.  Every great person in society that you look up to is an outlier in some sort of way. And so the last thing that you should want to do is fit in with everybody else. So let's start off by understanding that.  But if you look around at all of society and you're like, yeah, I don't want that. And if you're listening to this podcast, you probably don't want that. Well, then we should actually know nature wants me to fit in, but I don't want to fit in. So I'm going to have to fight against a little bit of nature on my side to be able to create the life that I want to. The thing that's really interesting about it as well is that we want to be accepted. But if we don't do anything amazing in this world, we're not ever going to stand out. But if we want to do something amazing in this world, you will get haters. And this is one thing that really holds people back from creating the business that they want for the social media that they want, the following that they want, going and speaking on stage, whatever, starting a podcast, a YouTube station, creating the jewelry company that they want, is that if you stand out, if you are an outlier, you will naturally start to get haters. And one of the things that I know that's down in Australia, someone, the phrases that they say is tall poppy syndrome. If you look at a field of poppies and one of them is standing up higher than all the other ones, it's got to be cut down. It's tall poppy syndrome. And so society sometimes will look at that person that is standing out, that is doing something amazing and naturally talk about that person. If you're doing something amazing, you're going to have a lot of people that love you, just so you know, it's like 99% of people love you, but that 1% will hate you in some sort of way. If you try to do anything out of the ordinary, you will have haters in some sort of way. And sadly, you just have to accept that that's just the way that the world is. But you can't let that 1% or below 1% of people hold you back from stepping into what it is that you want.    So if they see you doing something amazing and then they look at their lives and they're like, I'm not doing anything amazing.  And so it gives them this momentary sense of self-worth. And so that's just something that you have to realize is number one, you don't want to fit in.  They want to bring you down because it'll give them a momentary sense of self-worth because their self-worth is so low that the only way that they can make themselves feel better is to try to bring you down. But it's not about being loved by everyone. It's about knowing whose opinions matter and whose opinions don't matter. And that's what we're going to really dive into today is whose opinions matter and whose opinions don't. And so it'll be really good if you're not driving your car, if you have a pen and paper, is pause me if you need to and make a list of people in your life that you're really close to whose opinions actually matter to you. Make a list. And what would you take their advice for? So say for instance, your mom is on the list because you really love her advice. But your mom's never grown a business. You're not going to take business advice from your mom. Maybe your parents have a great relationship. Maybe you take relationship advice from your mom and dad. But if they work a job and they hate their job and then you want to go start a business and they're like, no, no, no, don't start a business because there's too much going on in the world. It's too scary. And they tell you that it's not a good business idea. Why the hell would you take business advice from them? And so it's about knowing who you will take advice from and making that short list. It shouldn't be a big list. My list is literally only three people in this world whose advice I take, three. And then realizing what you would take their advice for. So you have to think about that. And if you need to pause me in order to do it, pause me, write those people down, make the list that you need to. But the three people who are on my list, I know would never steer me in the wrong directions. They are not jealous of me in any sort of way. They want me to win. They want the best for me. Whenever I have something that's amazing that happens in my life, I call them up and they celebrate with me and they're as truly, truly as excited about my success as I am. That's how excited that they are. So who are those people in your life? Who are the people that want you to win? Who are the people that you know, no matter what they want the best for you? That's the list of people that we want to find out. We want to write them down. And then next to their name, write down what you really love about them and what you would take advice from them on. So once again, your parents, maybe they've never started a business for, but they have a great relationship. Well, yeah, you could take relationship advice. Maybe they've been great parents. You can take parental advice from them. But as far as business advice, not so much. You know, if you have a friend that's your friend that really wants you to succeed and they're in business, but they're severely overweight, maybe you're not going to take, you know, fitness advice or health advice from them. And so you just got to kind of think of, who do you go to and then what do you go to them for so that you can start to realize, okay, the most important people in my life, they do have certain things that I'm going to take advice from them on and they do have other things that I'm not going to take advice from them on. If somebody says something negative to me, if somebody is trying to bring me down, if somebody is trying to poke holes in my successes, they're just not on my list. I don't even give it time. If they say something to me, if I'm like, hey, I've got this idea and I just happen to say it in passing and they tell me why it's a bad idea. Like for instance, if I have a friend who has never started a business before and I have this business idea and they're like, no, that would never work, I'm not going to listen to them. Just because of the fact that it's, it doesn't, the two of those things don't coincide. They don't go together. Someone who doesn't run a successful business, giving me business advice doesn't make any sense. Let's talk about other people's advice because the thing that's interesting about is people love to give advice. They love to give unsolicited advice too. So people love to just pop up out of nowhere and be like, hey, this is what you should do. Hey, this is what you shouldn't do. They love to give their two cents. Do you know why it's called two cents? Because that's all it's worth. It's not worth anything else besides two cents. And you have to pay attention to who these people are. So I'll give you an example of what I mean. The first example that I gave was your mother, right? You have certain things that you'll go to or for, but if you have a business idea, you're not going to go to your, your mom for business advice. If you have a friend who is your broker's friend and they always talk about how they don't have money and they always talk about how poor they are and they try to give you a relation, they try to give you financial advice, you're probably not going to listen to them if they are trying to tell you about the stock market or they're trying to tell you about crypto, but if you were to go into their bank account and it's got $97 in it, they're probably not the best person to listen to. If you have one friend though that's made $500,000 this year off of crypto, do you think you should ask that person for crypto advice or some financial advice? Yeah, maybe. Maybe they'd be smart to ask because that person clearly has something that's working. If you have a friend, as I said, who's really overweight and they try to tell you what foods to eat or they try to tell you how to work out, they're probably not the best person to go to for that advice. But if you have a friend who isn't really great shape and you not even talking about like ripped or anything, but they just, they just glow, they're healthy, their skin looks good. Everything looks good about them. They have so much energy and they try to give you some health advice. That'd probably be somebody who would be good to listen to. If you have a friend who's ruined every relationship that they've been in and blame it on how it's always the guy or it's always the girl and it's never their own fault, it's probably not the best person to listen to for relationship advice. If you have a friend who runs a, who's a CEO of a $10 million company, they'd probably be a really good person to ask business advice. Hey, I've got this business idea. Can I run it by you? And you can run that business idea by him. But let's say he's got a business that's doing $10 million a year. He's a great person to go to for business. But if his relationship with his wife is in shambles and his kids freaking hate him, he's probably not the best person to ask for relationship advice. Or if he gives you unsolicited relationship advice, he's probably not the best person to listen to. And if his kids hate him and he's trying to tell you about how to raise kids, probably not the best person to listen to. And so you've got to start looking at these people. And if you could find somebody who's got multiple of these pillars, like their fitness is on point, their business is on point, their relationship is on point, their parenting is on point, they're a really good person to get to help you with all of the different pillars in your life. And so what you want to find out is, who are these people? What are you going to go to them for?  And you want to say, okay, if I'm looking into the next year, these are the pillars of my life that I want to improve on most. I want to improve in my health. I want to improve my finances. I want to take my business to the next level. I want to deepen my relationship with my significant other. And I want to become a better parent. Okay, if those are your pillars that you want to work off of, who can you go to for each of those things? And so it's, this is, people always ask like, how can I find mentors? There's so many mentors that are around you. You know, if you have somebody that, they don't have to have a hundred million dollar a year of business, but they have a great relationship and they're great parents, that is somebody that can be an amazing mentor for you with what they're good at, which is how to be a great parent and how to develop a great marriage or relationship. And so what you do is, you start to find the pillars of your life that matter to you to the most in the next year, two years, five years. And then you go, who already exists in my life that could be mentors for me in this situation? And then if you find some holes, maybe say, okay, well, I don't really have anybody in my life who is really killing it on the fitness side. They're not really killing it on the health side. Okay, well then, can you make it your mission to go and find those people who can become your mentors, whether it's a free mentor or whether it's a paid mentor? I think free mentors are great. I think paid mentors are great. I even think they're even better in most cases. And so it's about finding the pillars of your life, figuring out who can be your mentors in those pillars, finding the people who already exist in your life, whose advice you truly actually want to take, and then finding out exactly what advice you want to take from them on. And the easiest way to do this is to look at somebody and then ask yourself, with this advice that they're giving me, would I want to trade places with them? So if somebody's giving me financial advice, do I want to trade places with them financially? Okay, someone's giving me health advice. Do I want to trade places with them with health? If someone's giving me parenting advice, do I want to trade places with them as far as being a parent? If someone's giving me business advice, do I want to trade places with them with our businesses? And if somebody's answer is yes, then that's the person that you want to take advice from. But if the answer to that is no, then I don't want to take their advice to heart in any sort of way. So once again, if somebody's giving me fitness advice and health advice, but I'm looking at them and I'm like, I don't want their body, well then I'm not going to listen to what they tell me to do. If someone's giving me financial advice and I look at them and I'm like, I don't want their bank account, well then I'm not going to take advice from them. I appreciate it. I appreciate them wanting to help me because that's all people want to do is they actually do want to help. But you have to realize who do you want to take advice from in all of these different categories. And there's nothing wrong with someone giving you advice, but you have to be very, very smart about whose advice you take and whose advice you don't.  The only ones that matter, the ones that want you to succeed and what they are good at. And then filling the holes of your pillars of your life and finding the best mentors that you possibly can. Anybody who gives you advice outside of that circle of influence does not matter to you in taking advice. Move on. Say, hey, thanks so much for that piece of advice on finances. Thank you. And then just whatever they told you, throw it inside the trash and don't pay attention to it because all that really matters is that you're taking advice from people who you want to trade places with in this position that you are giving, getting advice from. And so the important thing is to realize opinions don't matter at all. 99% of the opinions that come into you you can just throw them out. But there's 1% of opinions who actually truly matter. Find those people. Stay as close to them as you possibly can. Go to them when you need help. Be okay with asking for help. And when they give you advice on the thing that you want to learn from them, take it. Implement it to your life as fast as possible and you will see all of the important pillars of your life start to change massively. Click right here and watch this video as well. That was the best money I've ever spent by far. I'm never not working with a mentor again.