usability testing is all about like for me exposing the problems and exposing what works really well for users and understanding why. Research is not really like that so they're just different tools it's like it's like saying is a hammer better than a screwdriver depends on the thing you're trying to find out. So one thing I get asked a lot about is people like the idea of research they know it's important it's like flossing everyone knows you should do it but they know don't know how how does someone start getting into doing research like if they know next to nothing about it. If you're thinking about your product as you're sort of developing it at that stage of research then it's just great to get people using it for the tasks that you're planning it for so even if that's friends family even if that's people in the office it's just great to get your product exposed to people like that so that you can watch what happens and in usability testing we're really looking for the problems for people fall into and what works well for them and why it works well for them and so having anybody go through your product you will see those things as they as they work through over time you'd want to you know start testing with a broader range of users and get out of those kind of biases that come in with friends and family but to start off and gain confidence and start small it's a great place to start so when you talk about usability testing is there anything and the biases is there anything specific that you're supposed to look for so you've designed your app you've given it to your friends or family is there any like I suppose like golden rules of things to look out for or is it not really work like that yeah well what you make sure you do is kind of set up the tasks that you want to be watching for so basically you have people go through the tasks and they speak out loud as they do it often depending on what you're testing for and so you'll be identifying your sort of most critical user journeys usually and have them walk through that and often it's something like some language you use we call that content you know the words you've got on the button or where you've positioned something that just don't make sense for most other people it totally made sense for you in your design work or your or development work but it doesn't work for other people and so you're looking for that and you've got them speaking out loud so you can really understand kind of why they're coming at things in certain ways and that's the value of usability testing you know as opposed to looking at data from logs or something you really understanding the why of why they they get into certain situations where they can't move forward or certain flows work really really well I mean is there like a scale of research so like usability testing feels like it's like the midpoint of a product like that but is there like a before and after because I know there's also the debates of user groups that you have where you're asking questions or surveys I mean is how would you say is like the cycle of doing research what was the first thing you would you recommend before even building the thing or maybe when you've got early stages yeah so right at the beginning we tend to do what we call foundational research that's when we're really understanding the domain we might use also you know secondary research and see what else other people have done but we might also do foundational research often it involves more sort of field research techniques going out to where people are doing that activity that you're interested in supporting in your product so field visits doing observational work contextual inquiry is a particular technique where you're with the person throughout the day and asking kind of questions as you go along to really understand why they do certain things in their environment so that's the whole like foundational research stage at some point you might want to understand sort of broad representations of data you might do survey work I'd always recommend doing some sort of qualitative work to begin with whether that's you know your contextual inquiry your interviews so especially for surveys so that you've got the range of results that you would want to ask for a particular survey question if you come back and you've asked this kind of closed-ended question with different question answers next to it but you've missed a couple of really significant things out then you're you're there's real problems with your survey so doing that qualitative work to begin with is really really helpful and then you referred to I think you were meaning probably focus groups yeah sometimes get a bad rap yeah so focus groups aren't used that much in user research occasionally I've used them and it's really been more for my benefit of finding out a domain I kind of haven't used them for rigorous you know representative data but conducting a focus group helps me understand like these are all the important topics that matter to people within this domain and then I can go forward and do my other techniques so it's more about boosting your own knowledge rather than finding information out about that's how I've used them so you have like this kind of always versus mentality in tech but I mean do you think there is a better way of research whether qualitative or quantitative or are these is that like a pointless thing to be asking that it's really about using those to just get a better understanding of the problem that you're trying to solve so is one better than the other in your opinion or is that it doesn't really work like that they're actually very complimentary and you need both so when it comes to the stage of doing usability testing oftentimes we might when we're really into sort of initial use of the product or we've got it out there to to beta test us or we've already launched and we're doing studies then then you can collect logs data logs data is like really very very useful you can see where people are dropping off on a page for example and why they're not converting for example but you can't necessarily always understand why and so partnering that with usability testing is really valuable so that we can really understand the why and that's you know our quantitative data has you know huge numbers in it or large numbers as large as we can get and the data is as representative as we can get we really are very concerned about that in usability testing it's not so much of a requirement to make sure that your participants are truly representative of the population because you're looking for pain points and you're trying to understand the why it is that people have these problems so that you understand their mental model and you avoid designing in that way again yeah i know one criticism of usability testing especially like we say sometimes a sweet spot is between five and eight people right is that enough like to really solve the problems you're trying to solve or is it not usability testing is not really like that it's like it's like you're not comparing it to say like surveys where you're doing a hundred people that use a bit of specific pain points that's exactly right so in surveys you have to be really sure that you're getting as good as a sample as you can as as representative of you can of the population that's of interest to you and there's various sampling techniques to do that correctly otherwise there's going to be problems with your survey as we've often seen in voting and polling and that kind of thing with usability testing we're doing something else quite quite different really we're using usability testing to understand what problems people have with the design as they go through as they try and complete their task and so what happens is often you see you start seeing the same problems again and again and you really learn that you know oh this is kind of a problem from everyone in fact there can be problems that you see right at the beginning of running your studies say after even one or two people and you're like yes of course you know i should have seen that of course people think of it in that way and of course they're dropping off at this point and you don't need many many people to prove that and so you tend to find after five or eight then you've seen the majority of the problems if you you've probably seen 80 percent of the problems if you carry on testing you will see more problems over time but you'll have caught all the main ones in the first five to eight and it will be definitely diminishing returns on that so say i'm designing a product is there a point where i'll pivot in the research so like say we've done two tests on an app or website these really obvious problems the UI is not obvious or whatever comes up do you stop and say right we're going to adjust the UI and the design thing and carry on testing again or does that muddy the waters i mean is it okay to do that yeah no it's totally okay to do that and that's actually a form of testing called write usability testing and there we schedule two or three people to come in and then we have a break like half a day or a day where the team get together and talk about what they've seen and how they can adjust it and then you'll get two to three more people come in and do the same again and iterate on it and it's it's a great idea really because you don't really want to or need to see kind of five six users all you know fall into the same problem if you all agree as a team that that problem exists and needs fixing there are other problems where you know you're not sure somebody somebody you know goes one way and somebody else goes another and it's really there might be a few different mental models out there and you kind of have to see how it goes over time to see what what the main issues are and what your team feels need fixing but certainly um there's another good reason to do it as well that those obvious ones that you really want to fix might be sort of hiding other problems that wouldn't be exposed if you didn't fix those ones during the course of the flow okay the other thing um I remember you you did the research project called the 25 principles I have to say somebody's known as the gov principle web web first we did web and then we did app and we did a whole set on retail and I remember speaking with you it's like uh it's almost like my mind just was blown when you talked about you do a pre-study before the study to test to see whether the study is actually good I mean that kind of like of course you do um could you explain a bit about like what um is it called a pre-study or pilot study right it's called pilot study and so for usability testing we um yeah exactly like you say we're testing the test we want to make sure that um the different tasks that we ask people sort of lining up properly and make sense for them we want to make sure that those flows work as we think we should at the time in in the product um it's absolutely crucial to do pilot testing beforehand yeah and you can do that with all techniques of user research so there are many techniques that we haven't also talked about uh diary studies as something that's sometimes done we can test the questions that we're asking people in the diary study even surveys it's important to test your survey instrument out first and we often do what we call cognitive pre-testing which will sit down with someone and go through the questions and make sure the questions mean to them what we think they mean yeah um so just even going back to the beginning so you want to test you've done some test with your family what's the next thing I mean is there do you really at that point need to get a good researcher to help you plan these things or is there something that small teams and startups can do now like professionally to test their yeah um well there's absolutely you can do it google ventures puts out some good um guides for doing usability testing and different sorts of user research testing so that's a good place to look for how to do this from a startup perspective uh you know as a user researcher I personally don't think companies uh hire user researchers early enough in order to get that kind of foundational research done and really understand the space really need to be thinking about doing that hire earlier than we're doing it now what tends to happen in companies is that people hire eventually they realize that they can't do design without a designer so they hire a designer and then the designer says all right it's hard for me to do design without the research findings and to really understand the context I'm working in so that's the kind of like pattern it tends to happen in it would be nice from my perspective if it worked the other way around but that's not to say that you know people shouldn't be doing user testing themselves obviously you can get better it's not particularly advocated that you should work with family and friends it's just a good way to get started and you will find issues with your product but um it's better to uh try although you're not aiming for in five to eight people a representative sample of the population you do want to try and get the same sort of people that you that are you you're aiming your product for so if you're creating a a music app for teenagers then it'd be great to test on teenagers that are the sort of target users for your product it's also important to test for demographic as well like in terms of the way users will behave in india will be very different to where they behave in america right right and they're under different sort of constraints and different different contexts and different conditions with you know the kinds of phones they use um the different um connectivity they have all those kind of cultural things which may be like how they response to ui and whatever yeah and how is there is it just basically you need to get out in the field i mean i think one thing people do is they test too much in front of their computer when they're they're you know amazing mac book or amazing wi-fi connection but like how do you really empathize because i think research is more about empathizing with the person you're trying to design for right right absolutely and so i think you know we need to take account of the technological constraints that we just talked about you know making sure that we're if we're aiming for those kind of markets that we're potentially i know in india we have a lot better connectivity nowadays but in certain parts of the world there's a lot of the world that's still on 2g connections so taking those kind of considerations into account is important but also you're right that the the cultural and different contextual factors can be really important so what if you're testing for um users preferences over to a design so if you've got two separate things how do you know you're testing for the right things or the person's opinion and what are they or preferences they have yeah that's a really tricky one i think that you know i'm not greatly in favor of testing uh using usability testing for preferences because it's such a small sample potentially the sample might be biased if you asked with eight different people you might come up with different preferences especially if you were just adding up the numbers i'm really not in favor of that because it has those problems you know usability testing isn't really for that purpose so i'm not uh against asking about preferences in order to understand why people have those preferences i think that can be really useful in usability studies so understanding you know that they need particular things say in maps when they're navigating they need particular landmarks yeah that's really really interesting but you know just like trying to collect raw numbers about they prefer design a rather than design b they prefer blue to red i mean is that and people lie right when you ask them questions they might tell you what you they think you want to know absolutely so this is why i'm much more into like understanding them completing a task and understanding like what works for them and what doesn't work for them about completing that tasks it's really all about getting that deeper understanding in usability studies so yeah don't add up the numbers for preferences like but use that um to understand why the particular design is preferred over another one and what we can do for future designs to make it more useful for people and it's really understand the context rather than the personal opinion of yes well that's right yeah that's right and understanding why their context leads to that view i try as much as possible to avoid black magic and like whenever i'm reviewing any code that any of the designers on my team are writing we like try and avoid anything that's maybe it's a little hack and it makes it slightly more performant but the truth is like if we want to evolve the material design system we need to be able to build on top of the code and each layer of that code matters


This video is brought to you in part by our user-supported Vitamix blog, Life is No Yoke. Go to lifeisnoyoke.com to learn more. What you sipping on? The kids don't know I made it, so they won't miss it. Hi, guys, it's Shalva with Life is No Yoke. Today, we are making three high-protein recipes for picky eaters, and we're going to start with our PB&J shake. I am using a cup of unsweetened almond milk. You can do plain. You can do vanilla. This one's plain. I'm using a scoop of protein powder. We use vanilla plant-based protein powder. Lots of different options out there for protein powders, but that's the one that we choose. We're adding a tablespoon of flaxseed, which has some added protein in it, as well. And flax is one of those sneaky ingredients that you can put in something, and it doesn't change the flavor at all. Our kids basically have flax sneakily in everything that they eat, and they have no idea unless they make it with me, and then they know. We're using, ooh, drippy. A tablespoon of peanut butter. It's the peanut butter and jelly shake, so you want it to taste like peanut butter. You can obviously use more nut butter. Both Lenny and I were like, is the recipe really only one tablespoon? We probably would put more in, but it tastes delicious with just one, but obviously feel free to go ham on the nut butter if you want to. And then what makes it jelly-ish is the frozen berries. So I've got frozen, half a cup of frozen blueberries, half a cup of frozen strawberries. I'm gonna put the frozen ingredients on the top, like I do with all of my Vitamix blends. When I'm blending up a smoothie, I wanna do liquid, anything else, and then hard frozen ingredients on the top. So that's how you load up a blender container. And I don't need any ice because I've got frozen ingredients. This is gonna make one 16-ounce smoothie. So if your picky eater is a grown-up, they would drink the whole container full. If your picky eater is a small child, we usually split this in two and do two eight-ounce servings for the kids. This is one of those blenders that is stealth, one of the best deals out there. This blender blends the same as the whole Ascent series, the 82500, the 83500, but has a much smaller price tags. Ventress 1200, V1200 is the way to get a Vitamix for about 300 bucks. All right, so I would say most blenders can blend a smoothie, like even the one that your grandma passed down to you and has been sitting in your cabinet for ever. Like that should be able to handle a smoothie. I'm gonna show you how the V1200 can also make things hot and show you that it can do more than smoothies, but it did make my smoothie just like a juice bar quality and blended it all up. When you're making a smoothie that has protein powder in it, you wanna make sure that you're blending enough that it doesn't taste chalky, like a picky eater is not gonna drink something chalky. And a good life hack for making a protein shake in general, not taste chalky, is adding some rolled oats, like raw rolled oats, and that kinda cuts down on the chalkiness. This one I don't think needs it, but if you have a picky eater that's a texture person, that could help. So this is our peanut butter and jelly shake, PB&J shake. It's chock full of extra protein, but even more importantly, it tastes absolutely delicious, like a peanut butter and jelly sandwich in a cup. So this is one of those that my kids request all the time. And I bring these in the car for when I pick them up from daycare or from school. Does anyone else take on mom tax out of their kids drinks all the time? So good. All right, so here's like a cool, pretty picture of the peanut butter and jelly shake, protein shake. If you wanna get really cute, you can line the cup with peanut butter. My kids love that when they're having this at home. This is one of the recipes in our pain in the mouth cookbook. If you are interested in this, ask your orthodontist and they can get you a copy, pain in the mouth cookbook. Lots of other good recipes in here too. Soups, things that you can eat when you can't chew. All right, we are back for our cashew queso. This is one of our most popular recipes by far. We keep these ingredients in our pantry at all times. We make it at least once a week. You will find it in our fridge. All three of our kids love it. It is packed with protein because it's basically made with nuts and it is delicious and plant-based without knowing or caring that it's plant-based. We do use this as a snack, a high protein snack. We often serve it for a full meal with a lot of accoutrements. But if we're just looking for a quick snack, it's always a yes from our family. This is one that our picky eaters that are grown-ups in our family also really enjoy. So keep that in mind. The only thing that you're gonna do is use less crushed red pepper for those picky eaters. I don't know any picky eaters that like spicy food. That's like part of it, like no spicies. So the ingredients for my cashew queso. Not my cashew queso, the cashew queso. Lenny actually came up with this recipe of all things. A cup of almond milk. If you don't have almond milk, you can do water and just add like a handful of more almonds. And then we're using cashews obviously because the name is cashew queso. And you're gonna use a half a cup of cashews.  Last time I used full cashews, but you can see cashew pieces are just like chunks of cashews. They're much less beautiful than the kind you'd get like in a mixed nut bowl. But they're a dollar less a pound. So they're a good buy. We get ours at Trader Joe's, I'm sure they're available in other places. Half a cup of almonds. These are raw almonds. Like unsalted, unroasted raw almonds, raw cashews, same thing. It will taste different if you don't use raw. It's important. And then the secret to making stuff taste cheesy is our nutritional yeast. You can find this at any, like this is Trader Joe's, so they obviously have it. I know Whole Foods carries it, any health food store. And I think even like regular grocery stores now carry it. It gives everything that's plant-based a cheesy flavor. So I used a fourth of a cup of that. Again, I'm loading everything into my Vitamix container. This is the V1200, the Venturist. We use the A3500 every day. It like lives on our counter. That's the best of the best. We do this for a living. So that's what you'll see us using. If we didn't do this for a living, this is probably the model that we would have. I was talking to Lenny earlier about how like you wouldn't walk into a used car or a car lot and be like, give me the best possible car that you have with all the bells and whistles unless you can do that in which case you go. But most of us can't do that. And you would go in and you would talk to the car dealer about what your family needs at this juncture in your life, what you can afford, how many miles you're gonna put on it, what you're using it for. And the best nicest with all the bells and whistles is not always the right answer for everyone. So the Venturist is a really good answer for people that are looking to get into the Vitamix family. They wanna blend. They want that like really good high quality restaurant style blend. But they can't right now get the best of the best of the best. This is the way to get into the Vitamix family and have that same blend quality for much, much less. This is one that we would happily give to our family and friends. And because it works great and it's an awesome, awesome, awesome blender. So no, I said all that. The next ingredient is red pepper. The red pepper is what's gonna give it its color and the flavor. Like it has kind of like a, it's hard to describe. How would you describe the flavor that a red pepper? I don't know. It helps make this dip taste as it is supposed to. It's not a skippable ingredient. And then I'm gonna use garlic powder, a half a teaspoon. Can you use fresh garlic? Yes, of course you can. We're just trying to make it easy for you. And then any onion-based powder. This one is 21 Season Salute from Trader Joe's. What am I like doing a Trader Joe's ad right now? It's onion-based basically and you want one teaspoon of that. And then you're gonna do one and a half teaspoons of salt. Ooh, new salt. You can all watch me try to figure out how to open it. That was like the easiest thing I've ever opened. I thought I was gonna struggle in front of all of you. Okay, so I used all my salt up in the Middle Eastern video from a couple weeks ago. One and a half teaspoons of salt and then a couple of shakes of red pepper. Remember that I said not to put too much of this in for your picky eaters? But it does still kind of bring out the flavor without tasting spicy so you still do want to use a little bit. And if you're making it for yourself, lots more, it's delish. Okay, so this is our cashew queso. We've got almond milk, nutritional yeast, a bunch of spices, red pepper, almonds and cashews. The almonds and cashews are what make this a high protein snack for after school. Does nutritional yeast have any protein in it? Three grams for one tablespoon. We used a fourth of a cup. So there's some extra protein in the nutritional yeast as well. So on a blender that has programs, you can choose the soup setting to blend this up and that's five or six minutes and it will use friction to break up all the ingredients and heat it using the soup setting. This on the V1200, I'm going to set it like a microwave.  And I'm gonna set it to five and a half minutes because that's about how long the soup setting runs. And then I'm just gonna turn it up to 10 which is exactly what the soup setting does. It's just one button to push as opposed to holding it down for, you know, I'm inconveniencing myself minorly to get the exact same thing. And it's gonna do the same thing. It's gonna use friction. It's gonna use the same amount of horsepower to break up these ingredients and you'll see the surprise at the end when it heats it up in here for me. So we're ready to go. I'm gonna go. What I love about those timers is that I just walked away and prepped all the stuff that I was gonna serve that with and I knew that I wasn't gonna leave this. Many things that I start cooking I forget about and this I can't forget about. So remember I said when I open the top it's gonna make. That's my favorite part. That's never gonna get old for me. It's like the wow factor. So now I've got hot, cheesy queso dip that my picky eater is gonna happily eat for a snack. Look at that pour. So good. So, it was so good until that minute. Our kids eat these like this. They have celery, carrots, mostly chips, obviously. These are delicious like blue corn chips but obviously you can also use just regular tortilla chips if your picky eater is very, very picky about what they wanna dip in here. But this is warm and chock full of protein and it keeps really well in the fridge. So this is one of those things we keep in the fridge and then we like warm it up and re-serve it for snacks throughout the week. So you guys remember that I said that this is something that we do for a living. So I serve my kids queso for work and because they're hungry, Lenny and I have been doing this for 10 years. Lenny for 10, me for a little less. But we have a website that basically teaches you how to use your Vitamix, what to make in your Vitamix, how to live a lifestyle that uses your Vitamix. We've got 10 years of information available to you. If you've got a question, we probably have the answer and if it's not answered, reach out to us and we'll answer it. This is what we do. So if you wanna support our work, go to our website and buy through us. And if you already have a Vitamix, tell your friends and family when they eat our delicious queso dip, tell them who sent you, who told you about this delicious queso dip and how they can get their own Vitamix so that they can make it themselves through us. That would be greatly appreciated. All right, so I am just putting the rest of the queso away for the rest of the weak snacks. Ooh, did I pick the right size container? Don't you love it when you pick the absolute best size container? I'm using this red spatula to scrape out everything under the blade and along the base. We'll link this out. This is like a really helpful tool if you're making thicker blends like nut butters and stuff.  This did too good of a job. Not gonna make it and not eat it. You guys don't need to watch me try it but I am gonna eat it. Still my favorite after probably eight years, nine years. All right, so I just ran a quick cleaning cycle. I just filled up about a third of the way with warm water and added soap. I rinsed out the container first because queso was a little bit sticky but that is how I clean the Vitamix container. I do it right after I make a recipe and then it cleans super easily. I know it's clean, easy peasy. All right, so we've got one more high protein snack. We're gonna make a muffin, a blender muffin, that uses oats as one of the protein sources and my kids are gonna be very excited that we're making these today because I'm gonna bring them to school because I drank their whole protein shake. I'm not kidding, I really did just drink their whole protein shake. So it's a good thing we had another pick up from school snack on the schedule, which is muffins. So we'll be right back with those. Okay, we lost audio there for a minute so I'm gonna catch you up on what we have in the blender. We're baking blender muffins. We've got almond milk, maple syrup, a banana, rolled oats, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon, vanilla, I think that's it. Peanut butter, did I say peanut butter? We blended it up for like 30 seconds. We're gonna put it into a greased pan after we mix in the chalky chips which is something that your picky eaters are going to need in their banana cinnamon muffins. Oh, cinnamon because it just makes them that much easier to palette for people that are picky. So I'm putting about a fourth of a cup of chocolate chips in. These are mini chocolate chips because they're mini muffins and then I'm just gonna stir in my hand because I don't want to blend them up otherwise they'd be like mildly chocolate flavored muffins and that wouldn't be very exciting. So I'm using a mini muffin tin that I greased if you are a whole food plant based person or you don't wanna use extra oil for some reason you can always line it with mini muffin papers. So I'm filling them pretty high. They do rise really well but I like the way that they look really high up. I tried them, filling them just like two thirds of the way and they weren't as like full looking and pretty. So these are one of those things that I like to pack in a Tupperware and bring in the car for school pickup and my kids each eat two or three of them and it's like fun that they get more than one. Like if it was a big muffin, they're like less excited about one big muffin than two or three small muffins. By the way, this is making time for health's blender recipe. We will put the recipe itself on our site and we'll, we've made this a handful of times and we'll probably start kind of editing it to our family's needs but the original recipe that she posted will live on our site so you'll be able to see it there. All right, so I filled my mini muffin tray. I'm gonna put it in the oven. I need to watch the time because the recipe itself calls for like normal size muffins. So we'll watch it but I think it's gonna take nine to like 11 minutes. So we'll set a nine minute timer and we'll see what happens. All right, so they've been in for 10 minutes and I'm gonna take them out and let them cool a little bit in the muffin tin. They'll keep cooking for just another minute. Got crunchy top, so that's good. So remember these have rolled oats and peanut butter in them so they pack a little bit of a protein punch. If you are a picky eater that is an adult, you can always make these in like normal muffin size instead of like gnome sizing. All right, I gotta try one of these. I always make sure there's enough for me too. Delicious. Thanks for watching. We'll see you in the next one. Yum.


f how the nations of the United Kingdom operate together to rewrite the devolution settlement and impose UK-wide frameworks in devolved areas without consent. I finished where I started. There are disagreements about the rights and wrongs, the risks and benefits, the pros and cons of Brexit. There are always have been and these will continue. This debate is about the cross-party agreement inside and outside the chamber that we have a responsibility as members of the Scottish Parliament to represent and further the interests of Scotland, and we will not sign away that responsibility, no matter how temporarily. Thank you. I call Joan McAlpine to be called by Mike Rumbles. I think that Bruce Crawford, MSP, hit the nail on the head today when he asked the Scottish Conservatives whose side are you on. He generously conceded in his speech that Scottish Conservatives were now supporters of this Parliament having been on the wrong side of the campaign to establish it in 1997. That campaign resulted in a 74 per cent yes vote to reconvene this Scottish Parliament, something that it is worth reflecting on when you consider the destruction that has been wrought on this country and indeed the whole UK with a 52 per cent leave vote across the UK as a whole. Jackson Carlaw was deserving of Mr Crawford's generosity. In his speech, he said that he wanted the two Governments to reach an agreement. Although the tone of his speech was very conciliatory and measured, it concerned me that he equated the desire that the devolved Governments should consent to the intervention in their power. He suggested that that was the equivalent of a veto. To describe consent as a veto is to quote the word in a barrier of hostility in my view. I could not help but note that Michelle Ballantyne MSP also used the word veto today when her and I conducted an interview with ITV border this morning. That suggests to me that the concern expressed by Alec Neill is that there is a very hostile briefing emanating from the UK Conservatives, which is deeply confrontational to devolution is somewhere out there now. I do not think that Jackson Carlaw for a moment is hostile to devolution or this Parliament. As a member of the Culture, Tourism, Europe and External Relations Committee, he signed up to our Brexit reports conclusion, which I quoted before, but I make no apologies for quoting again. That conclusion said, we believe that any power currently a competence of the EU that is to be repatriated after Brexit and which is not currently listed in schedule 5 of the Scotland Act 1998 should be fully devolved alongside a funding mechanism resulting in no detriment to Scotland. Of course, this has not happened and the Scottish Conservatives, yes? Michelle Ballantyne, you were saying very clearly that you don't think that consent constitutes a veto. If the Scottish Parliament or the Northern Irish Parliament or the Welsh Parliament did not give consent to something, what do you call that? Joan McElfane? I call that not giving consent. I want to turn to the justification that the Scottish Conservatives have brought forward to justify this act of vandalism against this Parliament. They repeatedly suggest that only by staging the power grab can they ensure that free trade continues across the UK itself. As the minister, Michael Russell, said to the chamber last week, there is no single market in the UK as the UK Government has presented it. There is a uniform market that we all trade together, but we have different arrangements when those are required and when the powers of this Parliament or those of the Welsh assembly make that necessary. As the minister noticed, there is considerable diversity in the UK right now. There are corporation taxes in Northern Ireland and income and property taxes here, the ban on fracking here, minimum alcohol pricing and, critically, our refusal to open up the Scottish NHS to market principles as in England. The European single market that the Tories are set on leaving has a single set of rules that are interpreted and enforced by member states with the European Court of Justice as the final arbiter. It allows divergences, so long as states fit into the overall structure trade can be maintained. The Scottish Government considers that there are likely to be fields where its policy will be, at least immediately following UK withdrawal, voluntarily to maintain regulatory alignment with EU rules. That will mean choosing to keep pace with developments in a particular field of regulation after UK withdrawal. If the UK chooses otherwise, we would be allowed to do that. The EU single market gives a huge amount of flexibility to Parliament, such as this one, while allowing for fair and free trade across the borders of various member states. That is a critically important point. The EU single market has an entire set of institutions and bodies dedicated to its maintenance, bodies that are jointly controlled by its members. There is currently no mechanism like that in the UK. If the JMC process is a mechanism, goodness help us all, because that has clearly not delivered anything like respect for the devolved settlement. That is why we are facing the dilemmas that we do now. We must now construct a series of frameworks to govern how we can make law. Central to this will either be this bill or one from the UK Government. Thus far, the UK Government has had many warm words, which are welcome but little concrete action, and this Parliament's constitution committee concluded unanimously that clause 11 was incompatible with the devolution settlement, yet it still stands. It is obvious that many of the areas that are currently controlled by the EU have the potential to be viewed very differently by the Scottish Government and the UK Government in absolute terms and in interpretation. One pertinent example is the cultivation of GMOs. That is regulated at EU level under the deliberate release directive and from 2015 has been possible to restrict the cultivation of such crops. We in Scotland enjoy the benefits of that and have, along with 19 member states, ended the cultivation of GMOs here in Scotland. The Welsh and the Northern Irish Governments joined us though England did not. Where will we stand post Brexit? I wish I or frankly am afraid that you must conclude. Thank you. No, you must conclude. You must conclude. Please sit down. I call Mike Rumbles, please. Several members in this debate have made much about protecting the powers of our Parliament in this bill. That is indeed the intention of the bill and that is why I will be supporting the general principles in the stage 1 vote tonight. However, our job as MSPs is to scrutinise the detail of the bill. After all, the devil is always in the detail and oh boy is there a devil in this detail. We should be protecting the powers of our Parliament. Section 13 takes real power away from our young Parliament and delivers it. It delivers it to ministers. I just quote 1. Regulations in the subsection 1 may make any provision that could be made by an act of the Scottish Parliament. I cannot believe that it is protecting the powers of our Parliament by giving ministers this power for up to 15 years to create, for instance, new public authorities, with MSPs with us being only allowed to say yes or no. Section 13 undermines the powers of this Parliament, and it fundamentally shifts powers from Parliament to ministers. Could I ask genuinely all those MSPs who have said in this debate that this bill is about protecting the powers of our Scottish Parliament? If you have not already done so—and I hope that most of us have, but I am sure that if you have not already done so, please read section 13 in full, and unless section 13 is removed from the bill in stages 2 or 3—and I will certainly be putting down amendments if other people do not—those MSPs, such as myself and others, who are genuinely concerned about protecting the powers of the Parliament, will not be able to vote in stage 3. I will, but if I have time— I am grateful to Mike Rumbles for giving way it. Neither he nor I wish this Brexit crisis to come about, but we recognise the extraordinary job of legislative heavy lifting that will be required if we are, in fact, taken out of the European Union. Is it his view that that can be done entirely with primary legislation and not with order-making powers at all? Briefly, Mr Rumbles. No, it can be done with both. What we mustn't see over the next 15 years is our powers of primary legislation being taken away, and that's the whole point of section 15. It's 15. Read the bill properly. We can only say yes or no, if our goodness sake. Five and five and five is 15. Like many speakers in the debate, I sympathise with the view that it's regrettable that we're here this afternoon having to consider this legislation. Essentially, as many have pointed out, it's a result of failure to resolve the issues around the EU withdrawal bill, specifically clause 11. There's a general view in the Parliament that powers coming from the EU that relate to the Scottish Parliament should reside in the Scottish Parliament. It's that issue that's been of debate around the EU withdrawal bill. Regrettably, because of internal differences in the Conservative Party, that issue has not been able to be resolved. As Neil Findlay pointed out, going back to before the turn of the year, we heard a number of statements from Conservative politicians in Scotland that this issue could be resolved and that they would work constructively to bring amendments. However, when the time came on 10 January, that passed without any amendments being tabled. That's precipitated the crisis that we see today. From that point of view, the devolution settlement was under threat and the purpose of bringing forward this legislation from the Government is to protect that devolution settlement. From that point of view, we will support those general principles. However, I did have a rice mile to the number of SNP-backed benchars who have made speeches, you know, being champions of devolution. It was only this time last year that we debated having a second independence referendum and the speeches from those benches were about ripping up that devolution settlement. There were a number of issues that came out during the course of the debate. Obviously, one of the challenges here is legislative competence and the fact that we have a different view from the Presiding Officer's legal advice to that from the Lord Advocate, who has issued his certificate in support of the Government's position. Listening to some of the speeches across the chamber, people were picking what legal advice stood for their political argument. Christina McKelvie favoured the Lord Advocate's position and Rachael Hamilton favoured the Presiding Officer's position. As MSPs, it puts us in an uncharted territory and it puts us in a difficult position, because this is the first time that we have had a position in which the Presiding Officer has not issued—with the exception of Sandra White's bill—a certificate of legislative competence. Obviously, it is serious that his view is different from the Lord Advocate's view. I think that it is important that we try to resolve that issue during this process. We do not want to end up in a position in which we are in the course. From that point of view, as Neil Bibby pointed out, I know that it is not the normal position of either the Presiding Officer or the Government to publish legal advice. However, in that instance, given the gravity of the situation, I think that both the Presiding Officer and the Government should consider the publication of that legal advice. Clare Baker was right to point out the challenges around scrutiny and transparency. It is already clear from this debate that this is complex legislation and there are going to be a lot of amendments coming forward at stage 2. The deadline for stage 2 amendments is Friday, and then we are going to be here on stage 2 next Tuesday, which is only six days away. That truncated process is something that is of real concern. I added to that the fact that there have been repeated calls during this debate, and the different committees that Mr Russell has attended to publish to 25 areas, whether there is a disagreement between the Scottish Government and the UK Government as to what powers should be passed to the Scottish Parliament. It is difficult for parliamentarians to formulate appropriate amendments when there are areas that are central to the debate that are not fully transparent and before us as MSPs. I thank James Kelly for taking the intervention, but I am sure that James Kelly would agree with me that no MSP should have been surprised that there was a possibility of a continuity bill coming forward to the chamber because of the actions and inactions of the UK Government. No, I made that point, but now that we are in the process as parliamentarians, there is a real challenge as to how we work our way through those issues. If we stick to the timetable over the next two weeks, there are issues around legislative competence. There are serious challenges around scrutiny and transparency. We have heard from different members—Mike Rumbles has raised concerns about the regulations passed to ministers in relation to section 13, and there are concerns that there is too much power in the hands of ministers. Similarly, Patrick Harvie spoke about section 17 and consent in relation to subordinate legislation. There is also the issue about retained EU law that Graham Simpson raised and the potential that that will undermine legal certainty. I know that the minister has said that he is committed to addressing this, but section 28 and the ambiguity around the exit day definition is one that also has to be addressed. In summing up, the bill presents real difficult challenges for the Parliament, as I said, around legislative competence, scrutiny and some of the issues. I think that, listening to the debate, I agree with what Alex Neil and Neil Findlay said, that there is a real challenge here for the Tories to resolve their internal differences and to help to come up with a solution to that. Otherwise, we are in a position where, as parliamentarians, we have to navigate a very difficult parliamentary process, which there are legal issues around. We could end up, even if the bill was passed, with it being in the hands of the courts. That is something that nobody wants. We want a resolution that retains devolved powers where they should be in the Scottish Parliament. At stage 1, we are generally used to a consensual discussion here in the chamber. At stage 1, it is, of course, the stage where usually parties attempt to avoid head-on confrontation as they agree or tend to agree on the general principles of the bill, simply to allow it to be scrutinised in more detail at stages 2 and 3, where the technical specifics of our amendments are debated. Not today, Presiding Officer, we will be voting against this at stage 1. Let me begin with the subject of legislative competence. This is a bill that you, Presiding Officer, have deemed to be beyond the competence of this legislature, and yet you have been ignored by the Scottish Government, who charge on regardless. For the first time in the history of this Parliament, the significance of this should be lost on no one. The devolution settlement is enshrined in the Scotland Act 1998. That act is a remarkable, historic document. It is the act that gave birth to this place, this institution, this Parliament, and Tom Arthur and Bruce Crawford talked about it. I agree with them in terms of the special nature of that act, although I disagree with them about many of the conclusions that they drew. However, the architects of that legislation, who carefully designed it, who understood the nuances of devolution and who calibrated the delicate balance between reserved and devolved authority, and the sensitivities involved, created something of wonder. It is not perfect—no act is—but it has led to remarkably little litigation and legal controversy. The concept of legislative competence is paramount to that. Section 29 of the act says that the Scottish Parliament Act is not law, as far as any provision is outside competence. The Supreme Court has said that this lies at the heart of the scheme of devolution to which the act gives effect. Anything outside competence is not law—a simple, basic, raw fact. As we all know, the act provides for you to give your ruling on legislative competence. Yes, I will. Given the context of his remarks, whether he would like to remark on the comments by Lord Hope, the former deputy president of the Supreme Court, who said that the EU withdrawal bill had a touch of cromwell about it. Donald Cameron. The members of those benches have been on record as saying that clause 11 is not fit for purpose, and I do not dispute that at all. In terms of the act, the act expressly provides for you to give your ruling on competence—it does not merely provide—it mandates its compulsory. You shall give your view. Why should you give your view, Presiding Officer? Is it a courtesy, a mere convention, or could it be that legislators saw the need for the leader of this Parliament, the person elected by us all, to head up this institution, the Presiding Officer, to be the guardian of what this Parliament legislates upon? According to the Supreme Court, those sections are designed to ensure that the Scottish Parliament confines itself to the defined areas of competence. Section 31 is entitled Scrutiny of Bills. It could not be plainer. Your ruling on legislative competence is about scrutiny. It is about examining and auditing the legislation that is introduced here. Presiding Officer, you are the gatekeeper. Last week, unequivocally and explicitly, you stated that the bill falls outside legislative competence. Yet, the Government plows on regardless, turning the Scotland Act on its head by obstinately persisting with the bill in a way that is both unnecessary and unprecedented. Bruce Crawford. Will the member also accept that the architects of the Scotland Act were clever enough to make sure that, in the design of the Scotland Act, it was also the capacity of the Government of the day to submit a bill for discussion in Parliament, despite a ruling from the Presiding Officer that was out of competence? That is the situation that we are in in reality today. The explanatory notes to the act say that it is something that this Parliament should take into account during the passage of a bill that you describe. The Lord Advocate can set out the legal views of the Government, as he did last week. There is absolutely no procedural requirement for him to do so, unprecedented again. However, not content with those new departures, the Scottish Government goes further and goes faster. Last week, we are told that this is to be emergency legislation going against the grain of every emergency bill passed so far. That remains a disgrace with every other party here, complicit in that decision and landing us with this farcical timetable to consider fundamental legislation on the constitution in the space of a mere three days. Labour and the Lib Dems piously expressed concern today, but they voted for it and for this timetable. We have heard complaints from the SNP before about not having enough time to read the Brexit impact papers. We have heard complaints that the House of Commons has not had time to debate amendments on the UK bill. Any complaints about a three-day timetable for one of the most radical constitutional bills before this Parliament? Not a whisper from the SNP benches. This is not respecting the devolution settlement, it is discrediting it. This is not defending the Scottish Parliament, it is attacking its very foundations. I would like to turn to the bill in its detail. The Scottish Government's very own policy memorandum says that it will add complexity and present serious, logistical challenges. A bill where no formal consultation was possible prior to its introduction. However, if there was a need for consultation, this is it. If there was a need for detailed evidence, oral or written, from professional bodies, from the third sector, from the vast array of people and members of the public who could be affected, this is it. There are serious concerns that the bill goes beyond that of the UK bill. On the matter of the Charter of Fundamental Rights, the bill incorporates it directly into Scots law as it applies to devolved matters while it is accepted from incorporation by the UK bill. The Law Society of Scotland argued that, where the bill takes a fundamentally different approach, the Scottish Government should be permissive with suggestions to improve or clarify the bill as it passes through the Parliament. I hope that it has taken note of that. Alex Neil Can I ask him the core question at the heart of where the Tory party is? What today is Tory party policy? Is it still to transfer the outstanding 25 powers back to this Parliament or to keep them in Westminster? What is your party policy? I will come to that in a moment. Alex Neil The Law Society of Scotland noted that the bill introduces new categories of law such as retained devolved EU law, which may make it more difficult to be certain about the law. The spice briefing on section 4 talks about it being not being clear which rights will be captured by that section. Section 13 of the bill has been mentioned before. It provides powers to the ministers to make regulations to ensure that where appropriate Scots law and devolved areas can continue to keep pace with EU law after the UK has left the European Union. There is currently no comparable clause in the UK bill. The 15-year nature of one of the subsections is of grave concern. Mike Rumbles is absolutely right that it undermines this Parliament. All of those points—I am sure that others will come to them in the later stages of the bill— point to the fact that the bill does not complement or coincide with the UK bill. It is something quite different and has to be acknowledged. It assesses all the makings of a constitutional and legal minefield. I can sense every lawyer in the land rubbing their hands in glee. So many issues, Presiding Officer, so little time. On the subject of time, the real tragedy—this is what Jackson Carlaw was right about—is the timing of the bill. Negotiations are at a crucial, delicate stage. The two Governments are close to agreement, but with an enormous, important issue to determine. At this sensitive moment, at the very moment when maintaining trust between Governments is at its most critical, what happens out of nowhere the SNP gives us this bill? Alex Neil, to answer your point, everyone agreed that clause 11 was unfit for purpose. Everyone accepted the need for common frameworks. Everyone accepted that everyone was striving to reach an agreement, and the bill drives a coach and horses through that today. The UK Government has made a big concession in relation to the immediate devolution of powers. This was a major move towards the SNP. It marks a substantive change in position. The SNP faces a choice. Either it can focus on these discussions in good faith, which are coming to a head, or it can continue to play games with the constitution. There we have it, Presiding Officer. A bill outwith our powers. A Presiding Officer defied and a Parliament stripped of time to adequately scrutinise this legislation. What a mess. On these benches, we will have no truck with the SNP's gameplay. We will oppose this irresponsible lawmaking. We will support a sensible deal on Brexit that brings more powers back to Scotland. Above all else, we will oppose this wretched wrecking bill at decision time. I call on the minister, Michael Russell, to wind up the debate. Thank you, Presiding Officer. I am conscious of a number of themes that have emerged this afternoon. I want to treat them carefully, but I often start with a quotation. It is from John Mahaffey, the UK ambassador to Ireland in the second world war. He said—I think that he is rather riley at one stage—that, looking at Ireland and the difficulties it had and the language that was used, phrases make history here. It also happens to be the title of a very good book of Irish political quotations. What John Mahaffey meant was that he had to be careful in difficult circumstances. He had to make sure that he did not make those circumstances worse and that he tried to use accurate and careful language to describe where he was in order that he might make some progress. I say that because I am concerned that the language that has come particularly from the Tory front bench today and also from some of the back benches. I want to just make clear the difficulties that are being caused by that and the inaccuracy that is within it. Ruth Davidson said over the weekend in an interview on television that I was on a subsequent interviewer. However, I was in a snowstorm with Davidson. I think that I was indoors during the interview. She said that the SNP Government had rammed through emergency legislation. This chamber voted 86 to 27 in a democratic vote. You cannot use those words accurately. Secondly, Rachel Hamilton said that rushed legislation was always bad legislation and pointed to the example of the land reform bill. I was on the committee of the land reform bill. There were two years of consultation and then nine months between introduction and royal assent. I understand that Rachel Hamilton does not like the land reform bill. She does not like land reform like many of those sitting round her. They feel threatened by land reform. I wonder why, but the reality is that that was not a rushed piece of legislation. We have seen other examples. Adam Tomkins' account of this morning's meeting of the committee in the evidence of the law society could be challenged at the very least. It would be challenged simply by looking at the video of that evidence being given, because there was a very constructive discussion on a whole range of issues. However, there was also other evidence given. It was not simply the law society turning up and saying, you know, woe is me. There were many discussions. Let us take, for example, section 5 on general principles and the charter. The bill has made clear steps to improve the position in the UK bill keeping the charter in Scots law. Indeed, in other evidence, in exactly that same session, Professor Eileen McHarg clearly pointed out that effective remedies to the problems that were raised by Professor Tomkins are within the bill. Presenting those issues in the accurate way is extremely important. I suppose that the nadir that we got to, although I regret Donald Cameron's use of language, the word disgrace, the description of the Liberal Democrats as pious, does not help us to try to discuss this carefully. The nadir was, of course, Mr Golden, who used a word illegal, who used the word wildcat legislation, strangely enough, words that occurred in a press release from Mr Cameron earlier today. Clearly, there has been some collusion on the choice of words. That is not illegal. The legislation creates exactly the circumstances and anticipates the circumstances that we are in. There are remedies for those circumstances. I think that it is really important to make that point clear. Freesies do make history. If we are going to debate and discuss in what are difficult times, resolution that we have to find, let us try and do so with a level of accuracy rather than what we have heard this afternoon. If we are going to do it, let us also not mis-tell our history. Of course, we have all took different positions at various times and the Constitutional Convention, and all of us did different things. Mr Arthur was too young to vote in the 1997 referendum. I ran the SNP campaign, but I also ran it jointly with Andy Miles and the Liberal Democrats and Jack McConnell from Labour. There was, of course, a working together in the yes campaign. Let us move on to the key question, which is not what we necessarily did in those referendae. Let us talk a little about the key question of what we would do now. That is the point that Bruce Crawford raised very importantly. What would we do now? Do we put the interests of devolution that devolves settlement in the forefront of our minds, or do we put something else at the forefront of our mind, whether it be shouting, in the case of Professor Tomkins, or party advantage? Let us look at that carefully. Now let me turn to some of the issues of detail before I come to the point that I want to conclude on. On the issues of detail, I am, and I have made that clear from the very beginning of this process, I will go on making it clear, open to discussion, debate and, of course, the bill is open to amendment, as I have indicated to Mr Rumbles at the start of this and make it clear here. And if there are defects in any of the clauses that members are passionate about and clearly Mr Rumbles is passionate about clause 13, then amendments can be brought forward and discussed in the normal way. And indeed, and I again pay tribute to the bureau and to all those who are involved, we have a system developed which will allow that to happen and I hope that it will happen well. But I am also happy to argue for section 13. I have to say that the wording is directly drawn from the existing provisions in the EU law in the European Communities Act 1972, and I really have to make progress on this, I'm sorry. Therefore, we believe that that power continues to be appropriate in certain circumstances, but if we have to define those circumstances more closely, if there have to be constraints upon those circumstances that the chamber wishes to see, that's an entirely legitimate aspiration to bring forward those amendments and let us debate and discuss them, and I hope that we will. And there are a range of other issues raised today which can be addressed either in evidence at stage 2 or in the willingness that I have shown to discuss this with any individual member or any group or even to be addressed at stage 3. So we have a whole range of ways of dealing with the detail of the bill and we should do so using accurate language and with a determination that no matter the views of people whether or not we should be here, that we try and get the best legislation possible. But the heart of this issue, Presiding Officer, is this. It came in two succeeding speeches this afternoon. It came from Mr Carlaw and Alec Neill. I commend both of them, though I disagree with Mr Carlaw, and I agree with Alec Neill, but I commend both of those speeches. I fear that Jackson Carlaw might even unwittingly have taken us back in this debate rather than us forward, whereas Alec Neill has tried to take us forward. He will recognise that this is the case of Respikey Prospeke, something that he himself talks about often in the motto of his old school. Kate Forbes and Neil Findlay made exactly the same point. Tomorrow we will have to address the substantive issue of whether we can get an agreement. If the UK Government has dug themselves into a position where they cannot accept the basic principle—and Kate Forbes made it—not to sign away our responsibilities, Mark Drakeford made it and she quoted Mark Drakeford in this. If the UK Government has determined not to do that, then there cannot be an agreement. However, as Alec Neill has indicated, there is the possibility of finding in the middle there some way in which we can accept the devolved settlement, which is the devolved settlement. It cannot be wished away. If the UK Government wished to alter the devolved settlement, it must come with primary legislation to alter the devolved settlement. However, if there is some way to do so and Alec Neill has indicated some of those moves, then it can be found. I was concerned with Adam Tomkins' presentation of the issue of the Sewell convention. It had eerie echoes of Jacob Rees-Mogg on the Irish border, blaming the issue on the Irish border on the EU, not on the Brexiteers. Now, let me make it absolutely clear that the Sewell convention should apply and should go on applying. Nobody in this chamber, I hope, believes otherwise. If there is any attempt to argue, as appeared to be the case, that in some sense we had sold the pass on the Sewell convention, let me put that to one side now. Let me put that firmly and cleaning. Don't blame the victim for the crime. The reality of this situation is that the Sewell convention applies and should go on, and it would be an extreme step. The type of step, I hope, is not to be anticipated by Mr Carlawney's speech. It would be an extreme step if what was to happen was that convention was to be abandoned by the UK Government. Mr Tomkins simply keeps shouting. I have tried to indicate that that is the inappropriate way to deal with those issues. The appropriate way to deal with those issues is to have the type of debate that he was involved in this morning, where there was constructive debate in the committee. I don't know what he had for his lunch, but clearly it didn't agree with him. Now, let me finish by simply saying this. I will go into tomorrow's discussions in London, as I know Mark Drakeford will, and I spoke to him at lunchtime today—hopeful, positive and purposeful. However, we will be judged in the end by the chambers to which we report, and the judgment will come on that key issue, as Kate Forbes indicated to it. Have we made sure that we stand up for and do not trade away the responsibilities and rights of this Parliament, or have we found some weakness within ourselves that does not allow us to do it? I believe that we should stand up for the rights of this Parliament, because that is standing up for the rights of the people of Scotland. However, I go in to negotiate. It is absolutely determined to try and find a way to get in agreement. Thank you. That concludes our stage 1 debate. The next item of business is consideration of motion 10784, in the name of Derek Mackay, on a financial resolution for the UK withdrawal from the European Union legal continuity Scotland Bill. I would call on Derek Mackay to move the motion. Firmily moved. Thank you very much. The next item of business is consideration of business motion 10838, in the name of Joe Fitzpatrick and behalf of the bureau setting out a business programme. I would call on Joe Fitzpatrick to move motion 108838. Firmily moved. Can I ask if any member wishes to speak against this motion? No, in that case, the question is that motion 108838 be agreed. Are we all agreed? Thank you very much. We come now to decision time. The first question is that motion 10817, in the name of Michael Russell, on the UK withdrawal from the European Union legal continuity Scotland Bill at stage 1 be agreed. Are we all agreed? Thank you very much. We are not agreed. We will move to our division and members may cast their votes now. The result of the vote on motion 10817, in the name of Michael Russell, is yes 94, no 30, there were no abstentions, the motion is therefore agreed. I would just point out that because this is an emergency bill procedure and the Parliament has agreed to the general principles of the bill, stage 2 amendments should be lodged by 2 pm this Friday, that is Friday 9 March at 2 pm. The next question is that motion 10784, in the name of Derek Mackay, on a financial resolution for the continuity bill be agreed. Are we all agreed? Thank you very much. We are not agreed. We will move to our division again and members may cast their votes now. The result of the vote on motion 10784, in the name of Derek Mackay, is yes 94, no 30, there were no abstentions, the motion is therefore agreed. That concludes decision time. We will move now to members' business in the name of Stuart Stevenson on electronic and internet voting. We will just take a few moments for members and ministers to change seats.


All right, question here from Jason on how do we set a recurring item or recurring event or item in Todoist. So this is for those of you using Todoist, I'll just quickly share my screen here. What I do, it's what that's one of the beautiful things about Todoist you can say, you know, let's say I'm like, you know, clean garage, and I can do as simple as every year. And it automatically puts into red, meaning it's going to, it's telling me, hey, we have, we have recognized a particular recurring, you know, period, or, and if I click on it, it'll get rid of the recurring period. If I just wanted to say every year, but it's still due today. I could also say clean garage next Friday, you know, next Friday, and it'll know next Friday, not this Friday, but the following Friday. I could also say clean garage every third Friday, it'll be smart enough to know okay basically the third Friday of every month you're going to clean the garage right. The other thing I love doing sometimes is every with the exclamation mark every other every three days. Okay, with the exclamation mark means, please recur this for three days, when I have completed it. Because if I say every three days, I can still change this to, let's say I'm going to change this to tomorrow. Okay, whoops, every three days. Sorry. What once it's actually, let me do this again. Every three days. Okay. Let me get rid of this every every three days. Okay, it is, it is, it is correctly done. It is correctly done. So if I click on this date thing, it tells me that it's every three days but it's actually scheduled for tomorrow it's very clever like that meaning it already knows I wanted to recur on a recurring basis, but it knows that I postponed it to tomorrow. And then if I if I go to clean garage. Okay. And if I say I've completed it today. See if I check the box. I'm saying that I completed it today. It'll now put it as Thursday. Because it's every three days, every with an exclamation mark gives me. I could put it to three days from the day of my completion, rather than from a particular strict, you know, day. I could also do things like clean garage.  So that's one of the great things anyway so let me know if that helps and if you have any other questions about it. All right so yeah follow up question.  So, if that's the case Jason I would still keep the the automated thing on but I would simply click December because then it's like okay I've cleared this, you know, you're telling to do is don't schedule it that way. I've cleared it it's called the December project.  So, so basically, you can simply do it by clicking on the schedule button. And if the schedule button says today or whatever you can still click on it and change whatever is there. So, yeah, Jason I guess you turn it off in the settings I didn't know you could turn it off. But you turn it off in settings now you can turn it back on if you want to, or you can still keep it off and just click on the schedule or click on whatever's today or tomorrow whatever date that is to, to change it. So, a little bit to do with geekery for those of you who are curious about it and want to try it out. Jason. So I'm just wondering once, if you have a recurring reminder let's say it's every Wednesday, and you click the little circle to say I completed this task, will it. It will still remind you every Wednesday, or only if you use the explanation point I wasn't following. Right, right. So clean garage every Wednesday. Okay, every Wednesday, I'm just going to say and then I'm going to press enter. And I'm doing a search for clean garage so automatically already showed up. Remember this one is every exclamation three days, and this one is every Wednesday now look look what happens. If I click on clean garage. Okay, I've just completed it again today and it says George you completed it today but you told us you want every three days so we're going to keep keep it on Thursday because today's Monday. Three days from now is Thursday now check this out if I say, if I clean the garage every Wednesday I'm going to click click it off now. So it's September 29 now it's like okay so following Wednesday then, because you've already done it for this round. Does that make sense. Now let's say I'm done cleaning my garage forever.  So now it's like I'm, they won't ever remind me ever again. I'm going to complete forever for both these because I don't need to, I probably should, I probably should have one golfing garage but you know I'm going to complete forever for this so. Yep. So I hope that helps.


It is a great pleasure to introduce Dr. Alwin Lim. This is truly the highlight of my career in terms of teaching and mentoring graduate students. Alwin is somebody who would have succeeded, who would have finished an excellent dissertation and have gotten a job at a top institution. Under anyone's guidance, I was just lucky to have him. I was at the right place at the right time to have him as my very first graduate student advisor. Well, I chose Michigan from a graduate program, essentially because we have one of the country's best programs in economic sociology. And that's the topic that I study. So the faculty in the Department of Sociology that do work in organizations in economic sociology are literally the best in the field. And that's why I decided to come to Michigan. Well, the culture of sociologists in general and especially Department of Sociology here in Michigan is usually one that encourages people to work together. So it's either collaborative work. And I think in the Department of Sociology, I had a lot of very close friends. And I think the Department of Culture really encourages people to support one another emotionally. To get through the program and to complete work, that's academic work, that's a really high caliber. Well, completing the dissertation, especially receiving this award for my dissertation, has been very touching for me and my family members. I am what you would call a first generation college student. And not being an American, having been in the United States for the very first time in my life and spending a very long period of my life with sacrifices for members of my family, and then later being what I would call personally successful at finishing my dissertation and obtaining this award for my dissertation has been particularly touching for me and for my family members as well. Having been back in Michigan for a while, it's really great to be back. It's looking at the buildings and the people and never realized that I would actually miss this place that much.