Welcome and good morning to the fourth meeting of the Equal Opportunities Committee in 2016. Can I make the usual request if you are going to use electronic devices that you have them on silent so that they do not interfere with committee proceedings today? Agenda item 1 is to take agenda item 3 in private. Are committee members content to do this? Excellent, thank you very much. Agenda item 2 is us moving on to the proposals and ideas for our work programme. As you can see, we have a very large round table today. We've done this before, so we managed it quite well the last time. A few house rules. If you want to come in, catch my eye, I'll put you on a wee list and I'll try and group things where people have maybe got conversations going on so that we can make it a bit more free flown. The same for committee members. If you want to come in to ask a question, please do the same. We'll try and co-ordinate things through me and get as good a flow of conversation as we possibly can. I thank you all for coming along this morning, for contributing to the committee this morning and for some of the written evidence that you've already given as we really value your thoughts and your feelings about the committee's work programme and where we should go from here. We've got a lot of opportunities to investigate and expand and do good things with the work that we're doing, but we can only do that with your help, so we're really grateful for that. I want to go around the table so that we can introduce ourselves in the normal fashion. I'm Christina McKelvie. I'm the convener of the committee. I'm Gary Chris. I'm the head of policy and communications at the Scottish Refugee Council. Good morning everyone. My name is Alex Cole-Hamilton. I'm the vice convener of the committee. Hello, I'm Derek Young. I'm a senior policy officer with Age Scotland, the national charity representing older people and promoting their rights and interests. Good morning. My name is Jamie O'Neill. I'm the projects manager at Roshney, which is based in Glasgow. Hello, I'm Janice McDonnell, the chief officer with the Scottish Council in Deafness, a membership-based organisation encompassing all sorts of communication issues. Jamie Shmcoffiak from 1 in 5, a campaign to increase political participation and representation of disabled people. Good morning. My name is Jeremy Balfour. I'm an MSP for the Lovians. Hi, I'm Matt Lancashire, my director for Employ Scotland and we support disabled people in so-sustained work. Hello, I'm Tim Hopkins from the Equality Network, which is a national lesbian gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex organisation in Scotland. Hi, I'm Annie Wells. I'm the MSP for Glasgow. Good morning. I'm Danny Boyle. I'm the parliamentary and policy officer for race equality in Tirmidry, Bemis. I'm Willie Coffey, MSP for Cymarnock and the Irvine Valley. I'm Carol Yurt from the Jimmie Reed Foundation, an independent think tank that embraces all politics. I'm Emma Rich. I'm the director of Engender, which waxes in Scotland on women's social, economic and political equality. Good morning, everyone. I'm Mary Feeney. I'm an MSP for West Scotland. Good morning. My name is Siky Wan. I'm the member of the Scottish Youth Parliament for Glasgow Shetleston, where the democratically elected voice of young people across Scotland. Good morning. I'm Megan Crawford. I'm chair of the Scottish Secular Society and we advocate for the separation of religion from the state. Good morning. I'm David Torrance, MSP, Kirkcaldy constituency. Good morning. My name is Ian Burkhamas Lister, but I'm here as convener of the Law Society's Occult and Diversity Committee. As you see, a lot of interesting and interested people around the table to hear from and we're very, very keen to hear from you, but before I kick off with a first question, we had an informal breakfast this morning with some of your service users and you were very, very kindly brought some of the service users along and we managed to hear some of their concerns and their ideas this morning. I say we're really, really grateful for everyone who took part in that this morning. Sometimes in an informal setting, we get to hear the real stuff, but hopefully you'll feel confident enough after having the informal breakfast and a chance to meet us that you'll be able to talk about the real stuff on the record too, because it will be really helpful. Really, I think that my opening question would be, we've obviously got some new powers coming to the Scottish Parliament. We're looking to expand and investigate how we can use those to the best of our ability to ensure that we inform policy and make lives better for people, because that's what we want to do. We all know that fairness doesn't actually sometimes mean equality and if we can get the two things right, it makes a difference to people's lives. Really, what we want to do is hear from you. We're all in listening mode this morning and that's essentially my opening question. What is the big issue for you and how do you think we can resolve it? Ah, Carol. The journey lead foundation is very keen that the committee uses the full range of its powers on human rights to ensure that the public sector in Scotland complies with the Human Rights Act, its duties under section 6 of the Human Rights Act, and given that we know that there are at least 10,000 public bodies in Scotland, that could have very quickly a huge impact if human rights remain streamed across staff training in terms of service design and delivery, informing decisions about funding. Crucially, the power of the public pound is used to reward private sector companies through the procurement process if they comply with human rights. That would mean that companies that have been proven to be blacklisting would not be rewarded with multi-million or multi-million or multi-billion pound contracts, that companies that pay decent wages and ensure that human rights to an adequate standard of living are rewarded through public contracts. There are a lot of powers that the committee can use and we would urge the committee to do so. One of the things that we have—there is an emerging theme—is the UN concluding observations on our international obligations and how we can use some of that as a road map. That came through very clearly with the evidence that we took at the last round table. I wonder if anybody has any thoughts on how we can use that, Alex. Thank you, convener. I should declare an interest as well in that I am a former convener of the Scottish Alliance for Children's Rights, also known as Together. I would like to ask Carol just to expand on her point about the use of the new powers coming to the Scottish Parliament. In respect of—you mentioned in particular blacklisting in building firms as an example of denial of human rights—is there anything other than the concluding observations? Is there an audit of where we are failing in our obligations to various human rights treaties, particularly across public bodies? I think that these are global challenges about ensuring that the public sector fulfil their human rights obligations. In fact, just last month, the UN had a day of general discussion around how the public sector can do more to deliver on human rights obligations. Those are common themes. You talked about the concluding observations. That sets out a very realistic road map about what the public sector in Scotland can do. There is also a universal periodic review. 132 recommendations were made in respect of the UK in 2012. There is very little evidence that they are explicitly talked about in health boards, local authorities and housing associations. It is not to say that they are not complying, but we need to have the language of human rights used, and we need to have even just little things such as acknowledging that human rights matter in housing, health, social work and children's rights. There is also the issue about people asserting their rights because the UN, through concluding observations, has identified that people have a real difficulty in enforcing their rights in relation to the public service. You do not have rights until you know about them, so people do not really know about their human rights. You can go on to a local authority website and see a button about freedom of information, about data protection, but you do not necessarily see a section about human rights. There are all sorts of little things that can be done in staff training. There are all sorts of recommendations around staff training. The UN has got lots of packs of information and training kits that can be used. We are not short of concluding observations or universal periodic review. Of course, there are also the UN's guiding principles on business and human rights. The UK coalition Government in 2013 published the first national action plan on business and human rights for the UK. That would deal with things like procurement so that it would reward companies that comply with human rights. The UK Government updated that in May 2016, which was very welcome. In Scotland, we could actually deliver that UK action plan, but what we have decided to do is do our own, and that is not yet published. Another issue for the committee could perhaps be to take up when the Scottish national action plan on business and human rights is going to be developed to participate in that, how transparent the process is, so that there are all sorts of ways that we can influence the public sector and the private sector in respect of human rights. Alex, do you want to come back? No, just to say thank you for that. From your reflection, the discussions that we have had as a committee to almost use the concluding observations of the various UN reports would be a good road map for the committee in terms of what we need to fix. Yes, but the UN has produced guidance and it says that it is not just the concluding observations to look at. You look at, for example, a special rapporteur in housing, and she visited Scotland. It was covered in the daily record when she produced a report, so you need to look at what the special rapporteur on that has done, look at the UPR, look at the UN guiding principles in business and human rights, and you need to hoover them all up because the danger of treating them in isolation is that you elevate some human rights over others, and they are all interdependent. There is no hierarchy and we will collectively benefit if each other's human rights are respected. Emma. Thanks very much, convener. If I could pick up on a point made by Jatin Haria from CRER at the last session, engender was one of the signatories to a letter expressing some concerns around the expansion of the remit of this committee to incorporate human rights, which was principally predicated on the question of capacity and the concerns that, in fact, some UN committees had already expressed about the way that some protected characteristics were vanishing into a broader qualities agenda and the capacity challenges of sustaining focus on all of the important work that we are doing. We were also hopeful that the Scottish Parliament could consider some of the international models of how parliaments can engage with the question of human rights, and there are a variety of approaches that different parliaments have taken. Having said all of that, engender is very enthusiastic about human rights. We have, for over a decade, been using international obligations and participating in UN processes in order to advance and promote women's human rights. The concluding observations raise both a challenge for this committee and for the Scottish Parliament as well as a possibility. One of the key challenges that we would see—and I agree with everything Carol has said about not only using concluding observations—is that there are currently 900 outstanding concluding observations that have been put to the UK Government, many of which have not been written with devolution context in mind. As a Scottish NGO, we have struggled in engaging with UN committees in what are very abbreviated and hasty processes to fully explain and explicate the devolution context and to set out what are reserved questions and what are devolved questions. Those challenges are very strongly reflected in what comes down in the concluding observations. I suppose that a challenge for the committee will be how to unpick what is intended for Scotland and perhaps what is not intended. An example of that is that, in its recent set of concluding observations, CEDOR, the Women's Rights Committee, said that we should have a UK-wide strategy on violence against women. The convener and others will know that, in fact, because powers to address violence against women are entirely devolved, except for questions of immigration and asylum to Scotland, that that is a very impractical and potentially unwelcome suggestion for the violence against women and women sector. There is a need to tease out what is meant and intended, but there are possibilities for using those. I am particularly minded of something that Alistair Pringle said in the same session about concerns around the public sector equality duty, its efficacy in driving substantive change within the public sector, which is a concern that the CEDOR committee itself identified. There are undoubtedly overlaps and interleavings between our human rights concerns and equalities concerns, and the concluding obs present a real opportunity. However, I urge the committee to be mindful of the challenge of processing 900 outstanding concerns and potentially contemplating the interrelationship between those and the Scottish national action plan on human rights, which many, if not most, of the organisations around this table will have heftily been involved with. I agree with you. We have had this conversation on a few occasions as well. For this committee, what we are trying to tease out right now is where can we find a route of something that would be meaningful for us to do, and that is one of the emerging themes. I suspect that, along the way, when things are as complicated as that, we will have to take expert advice on how to navigate some of that. That is maybe where we will come back to some of your organisations to help us with that, because we would not want to just get mired down in 900 concludings observations and spend the next five years caught there and not actually achieving very much. How do we focus in on the things that maybe we can push forward and get some expert advice on the things where we need to understand a bit more? We are pretty mindful of that, so thank you, but we will keep talking. Thank you very much. Good morning, committee. Good morning, colleagues. I think that the answers from both Carol and Emma are quite indicative of the broad range of issues that are now going to come into play in terms of the broadening of the committee's remit from equal ops to equality in human rights. That is not to say that the equal ops committee should not have been cognisant of its human rights obligations anyway. I think that what we are touching upon here is that the committee will have to be very clear on how that is going to pragmatically be taken forward, given the extent to which this is quite a significant broad area. We, as BEMIS, would agree that UN concluding observations and the 900 recommendations and the multitude of issues that are raised should absolutely be used to enhance and encourage the committee's ability to advocate on behalf of the equalities issues, which are represented around the table. However, it is incredibly important that, when we are discussing issues around UN concluding observations for the communities that we work with directly—technical papers around UN concluding observations or any raft of treaties do not necessarily penetrate into the grassroots community organisations. What we have, particularly from a race equality perspective, is domestically led, grassroots led policy and strategy papers, which are live documents at the moment, one of which was launched just prior to the dissolution of the previous Parliament. I am aware also that this committee will have inherited the work of the previous equal ops committee around race ethnicity employment. We have the race equality framework, which has brought together 19 or 20 years of practice in relation to race equality in Scotland. That is where we can really see the recommendations around substantive change and how we can take that forward. It has a raft of recommendations, not just that race equality is the premise of the Equal Opportunities Committee, or BEMIS, or SEMVO, or CRER, or any of the groups that we work with, but is the responsibility of all of the public sector agencies in Scotland. Again, we have domestic legislation via the public sector equality duties and so on and so forth, which should give gravitas to that argument, which at the moment has been identified by EHRC and others. It is not necessarily as robust as it could possibly be. The link to the question that you gave about how we link up the domestic agenda and the international treaties is to look at the intermediary bodies and the communities represented here, because there is a wealth of grassroots practical suggestions about how we take things through. That should be the route of driving things forward, and it should be enhanced by the recommendations of international treaties and so on and so forth, but I would condend it that that is our initial standpoint, because the evidence in the work exists at the moment. I absolutely agree with you. Yesterday morning, I was part of the team that launched the Joseph Rowntree Foundation Ethnicity and Poverty Report, and a big chunk of that was about employment and access to employment under employment. We had Abdul Bastani, who I know many of you will know very well. It was nice to see him. I had seen him for many years. He is now a qualified, he has got a degree in accountancy but can't get a full-time job. Why is that? He got all ays, he has a distinction and he has a degree, so why is that? That is the barrier that we faced there, and that was identified very clearly yesterday. That report and the chief executive and a few others have now met with the Scottish Government on some of the findings from that, and you are absolutely right. It is those things that inform how we do, what we need to do, especially in order to get it right, because if we don't get it right, it affects people's lives, and that is what matters here. It is very mindful of your contribution. The equality network is very much in favour of the committee extending its remit to cover human rights as well as equality. We would think of those two things as not the same but as overlapping sets, if you like. Unfortunately, that means that the committee's workload is inevitably going to substantially increase as a result of expanding the remit. To pick up on something that Emma Llywodd alluded to, the international human rights treaty obligations do not cover all of the equality strands, and LGBTI equality has certainly less been gained by sexual equality has been a very difficult one at UN level because of some countries being very much opposed to any action on it. That is why it is very important that you keep your focus on the equality strands as well as human rights and somehow see how you can make those two things work together. I agree with Danny that there's a wealth of information already available and expertise. I'm very grateful that you've called us all here together. If I had to mention one thing which I think would help progress on equalities across Scotland for the whole of the public sector, it would be to do better engagement with communities and for public bodies to engage with equalities communities on our own terms in places that are accessible for people to get to at times when it's accessible for people to get there. Actually, to go out and ask people what are your priorities rather than give us an answer to question X, so engagement is vital. Thank you, Janice. Quite a good point for me to come in. I think that we would agree. We are a bit late to the table in terms of human rights. We've taken a while to process equalities. It takes longer for things in the deaf sector to be worked through because the communications are a barrier. I would also like to see when we're doing engagement and taking things forward that inclusive communications is cross-cutting not just in the disability world. We've argued for a cross-cutting theme in the disability action plan but I would argue that it needs to be a cross-cutting theme in everything that we do because we're often not included in things that we're not in the room. If we are in the room, we can't hear what's going on and it takes us away well to catch up and then we ask a question and everybody else has moved on. I would think that the way that we engage is also going to be pretty critical if we're going to be trying to take things through in a more reasonable and a fair way in the future. That was a fair comment. Derek Mackay. Age Scotland didn't cosign the letter that Emma referred to but I had some of the same concerns about the remit question. I think that we would give a cautious welcome to the proposed expansion of the remit. There are certainly positive reasons to do it, firstly, because of the opportunity of showing the linkage between, as Carol referred to, a human rights culture embedding the idea that human rights aren't just legally enforceable instruments but they are to try and affect the mindset and behaviour of people who are acting in a public capacity. Also, for very practical reasons, we know that human rights are going to be a key feature of the next parliamentary term. There would have to be a lead committee dealing with a legislative consent motion on a UK human rights bill anyway, so it makes some sort of sense setting that out in advance. Where we do have concerns, obviously, is the capacity issue that's been raised. It's probably still wise to note that human rights issues are probably still going to arise before other committees as well. The Health and Sport Committee, for example, will be looking at the way that health and social care integration happens, and obviously rights in care is going to be a key theme. It probably makes sense for that committee to look at that issue in depth as we deal with implementation, understanding how self-directed support is being implemented and so on, so it wouldn't necessarily be the case that this committee becomes the sole repository of human rights discussions even if it develops a better focus and a greater level of expertise, which would all be very welcome. It makes sense that I should never speak after Tim Hopkins because he says many of the things that I would wish to say, but I'm not myself familiar with the 900 concluding observations that the UN have made. I apologise for that. If I had to hazard a guess, I would suggest that they probably don't focus to a great degree on ageing, because ageing is another area such as LGBTI that isn't really covered to an enormous degree in international human rights instruments, particularly at UN level, but it is one of the protected characteristics. It is part of the equality framework that we deal with domestically. One of the reasons why we had some concerns that Emma's articulated is because there was a hope among some equality organisations that protect characteristics, particularly those that struggle to get as much attention, might have the ability to have a bit of devoted attention through the next parliamentary term and the work of this committee. As long as there are opportunities to continue to do that and the committee is willing to think about its capacity and try to accommodate the extra responsibilities with the existing ones, then we would welcome it in that context. I thank you for that. We are looking at different and innovative ways that we can do, maybe less long, big, deep inquiries and more short, sharp, lots of letter writing, lots of different ways that maybe we can gather the evidence that we need, so that we can produce something quite quickly as well and be much more responsive rather than some of the things that I said this morning about a long inquiry, but the time that you have published in the report, the impetus has gone and the opportunities have gone as well, so we are looking at all of that and including it looking at how the committee is supported via the Parliament as well, because all of the committees of this Parliament have all got additional powers, so there is a bit of a conversation now going on probably amongst all of the committee conveners about the support that committees will need in order to just cope with the additional issues that are coming forward, whether it is social security or tax or human rights or some of the other things that we are all having expanded remits on. Of course, the big elephant in the room is Brexit and how that will have an impact on some of the rights and the responsibilities and the freedoms that we currently enjoy and maybe how they will be impacted as well. There is a lot on the agenda, but we are looking at innovative ways in order to address all of that. If you have got any ideas on how to do that, please share. The Scottish Parliament is very supportive of the added remit of human rights under the committee's responsibilities, but the committee needs to ensure that, like Janice and Tim, engagement is at the top of its agenda. The appropriate groups that are affected by all the changes need to be engaged with. For example, Brexit, as I just mentioned, the European and External Affairs Committee's initial report on the referendum on young people and children were not mentioned at all, despite the fact that the younger generation will be the ones that are feeling the long-term changes the most. As well as that, the rights impact assessments as well, there needs to be a lot of work done on that. A lot of the times, for example, the Transport Committee recently passed a piece of legislation that affects the pricing of transport. There was no rights impact assessment done on that because it felt that it would not affect young people, despite the fact that young people take transport like everyone else. The committee needs to make sure that all the appropriate people are involved in the conversations that affect them. I have the motivation now to make sure that everything that happens in this place is filtered through a rights agenda. I have a real hobby horse about equality impact assessments and how well they are done. That is a conversation that I have been having for a while, and I am certainly very mindful of what that means. If that does not get done right at that early stage, it does not work for anybody, but we are very mindful of that. I am really grateful for the work that the Scottish Youth Parliament has done. We have got some ideas on how to engage you in some of the work that we are taking forward, so we will come back to you on that. David, do you want to come in here? No, I thought somebody had given me a wee wave. Sorry, Tim. I just wanted to pick up on the point about EQIAs. For us, one of the big, big problems with EQIAs is that sometimes people seem to think that you need hard data to base your EQIA on, but there is not hard, if you like, representative data available for all of the equality constituencies. Some of the equality constituencies are quite small, and you are never going to get that kind of data through things like, for example, the Scottish Health Survey. It is really important to recognise the value of qualitative information. That is information that you can get through engaging with communities on the ground. Information that they get, for example, through doing surveys. Surveys are self-selecting, so they are never going to be as hard as you get, for example, from the census. Nevertheless, you can get really, really important information about what is happening to equality communities through that softer, more qualitative way of engaging and finding out things on the ground. I think that that is really important. In relation to that, if you will forgive me, I will make one more point about the census. At the moment, the two equality strands out of the protected characteristics that do not feature in the census at all are sexual orientation and gender identity. We have been calling for 10 years for sexual orientation to be added as a question to the census. It is something that will be coming up over the next five years, so I hope that it is something that the committee will keep an eye on over the next three or four years, as that decision is made, about the questions that should be in the census in 2021. There is a whole host of equalities issues around the LGBTI community. I think that we have a number of members in the committee who have interests, and we have been pushing forward some of those agendas. Matt, do you want to come in and tell us a wee bit about the work that you do? We are employing some of them, because you have got some ways of resolving some of the challenges that we all face. Jamie, I wonder if you could come in in the back of Matt and reinforce where your campaign has gone and some of the achievements that it has made as well? Yes, sure, absolutely. I suppose that it is more of the practicalities of all this, I suppose, and what it means to people, particularly disabled people, to find employment. If we are currently in luck at Scotland right now, I haven't got the exact figures, so I apologise for that. I am sure that we can find them, but around where there is a huge disability gap in terms of people with disabilities who are employed and those without a disability employed as well, it is 40 per cent for disabled people, 80 per cent for non-disabled people around about that. If you break that down even further to those who are learning difficulties or learning disabilities, it is under 10 per cent. Obviously, we know that that is not good enough, all of us know that that is not good enough, and we need to change that gap. We need to restrict and narrow that gap going forward, and to do that, we need services that support disabled people into employment, into fair work, but we also need to change the mindset of employers around the issues to take on a disabled person. It is not an issue, it is actually supported and disabled to do work, it increases productivity, it reduces absence and leave in their businesses, and to a business person or a private company or any type of company, that is only a good thing. We need to start using those messages about the power of various different groups, particularly disabled people, to employers about how we reduce that gap going forward, but we also need to support disabled people who might be at risk of losing their job. Yesterday, I heard some Scottish Government figures around 30,000 or 40,000 people lose their job because of a health condition or disability each year, and that might be due to do with age, it might be due to do with a health condition on setting that can happen to any of us at any given time for whatever reason. How we support people in that respect, maintain their job, retain their job and progress their job, I think that one of the key practicalities or key issues for this committee moving forward is to give it some focus around disability, and I think that disability gap is the key area. If you can put something on your work programme going forward about how we reduce that, I think that that would really support disabled people going forward. I think that there is a wee bit around modern apprenticeships. We know the struggles with modern apprenticeships in Scotland that it has a very low rate of people that take up a modern apprenticeship with a disability. That is something that, as an employer, we are committed to looking at through the certificate of work readiness that provides a certificate for people with disabilities to move on to modern apprenticeships that we provide currently. We would like to see things like that expanded. We would also like to support more thinking around how we move young disabled people into modern apprenticeships in Scotland as well. I think that that fits with raising the attainment part as well in Scotland.  Essentially, what is the point of all this, if we are an employer or others around the table, is that we spend 70 per cent of our time at work. It is a reflection of our communities, a reflection of ourselves and of us right now. We want a broad range of people working with different employers, but we also want them to work in fair employment. That is a key, too, how we encourage organisations and Government to support our work agenda going forward for disabled people. The Scottish Government is currently doing some work on its fairer Scotland programme, which is something that has come across my radar in the past few days, which is something that we should be focusing on in our work. Jamie Coveyac, do you want to come in now? Yes, thanks, convener. Following on from what Matt said and some of the points that Janice mentioned earlier, one-in-five does not necessarily have a view on how the committee organises itself, but accessibility is the most important thing for the disabled community so that we can feel part of what is going forward in what will be a significant change over the next few years in terms of equal opportunities and human rights. That is not just regarding the output that the committee puts to people to access, whether that is in BSL format, in Braille and particularly in easy read for people with learning disabilities, but also the accessibility of the committee not restricting itself to Edinburgh, trying to reach out to communities because transport and travel is a particular difficulty, so if the committee would be able to hold some of their meetings in accessible venues in other parts of the country, that would certainly encourage disabled people to become part and understand more of what the committee is going to be doing going forward. We are very aware of that, and we are just on time at the right point, Jeremy. I want to go back to the questions that Matthew made or the points that he made. I have a couple of questions about that. Firstly, are there certain disabilities that have more difficulty getting into employment than others, or are there hidden disabilities that perhaps we as a committee are not aware of? Secondly, are things getting better in Scotland in regard to employment for disability or worse? Are there any figures on that? Are there any kind of findings around that? I will take the last one first. I think that it has remained unchanged. It floats around that 40 per cent, and it has done for a number of years. I think that we have seen a recent improvement. I cannot really give you a reason why for that, because I do not think that there is one. I just think that maybe there has been more sustained effort within the sector or the employability sector to change that and more focus on disability in recent months and years. In terms of the types of disability, I think that, right from the off, people learning disabilities really struggle to find work. It is under 10 per cent of people learning disabilities right now working in Scotland, which is poor, is it not? We as a community and we as an employee want to improve that. I am sure that people across the committee want to do that as well, and Scottish Government too. We are very much supportive of this committee and the work that it can do around that. It needs that focus. Likewise, people with learning difficulties, again, are very low in terms of the number of people that are employed. I think that there is some concentrated work that we can do there, but again, 40 per cent out of 80 per cent is still low with people with a broad range of different disabilities from mental health to other hidden disabilities as well. I think that when you translate a lot what was said earlier down to the level where we want to go, we want to change those types of figures. We want to move more disabled people into work. We want to have a broad range of people working in the workplace. I think that that shows your communities and Scottish communities quite well. It shows the vast array of people that can work. It creates more keys of communities. It is as simple as that. A couple of things just to come in on from the Law Society's perspective. The first thing is that, with the expanded remit of the committee, I suppose that in this may be a personal view that my concern is that there is a bit of a possibility that human rights becomes the overriding agenda. There is already a lot of jurisprudence out there about human rights. It is a much more understood area of law and its regulation than equal opportunities are, and I would want to make sure that the committee did not… Because human rights underpins everything, and it has already been said that all the committees will have that as their remit. However, the jurisprudence on equality issues is not as strong as the human rights one, so I think that the committee has to make sure that the equality issues remain a focus. I will pick up a point on what Matthew is saying there. One of the things that we are very concerned about, for example, is tribunal fees. In the employment tribunal cases, because since fees came in, the number of discrimination cases has nosedived. Part of the reason for that is because most discrimination cases are brought by people who are still in work, so they are not on benefits, so they do not get remission from the fees, so they have to pay the fees. They are very often people who are at the low end of the pay scale, so £1,200 is a huge amount of money for them, so employers know that there is a very strong likelihood that those people will not actually pursue their claims, and that is why disabled people who have any of the protected characteristics are at a disadvantage in the workplace, and that is the kind of thing that is being missed. Potentially, the human rights issue might overshadow that, and I think that it is very important for the committee not to let that happen. That would be my view. I have spoken on many occasions about tribunal fees, and I think that we have managed to secure committing for the Scottish Government at the minute that they have got control over that. They are going to drop tribunal fees, and I am sure that there are many faces and heads around this room that are no going to let them drop it. We are on it, basically. Carol, I could see you interacting a wee bit there, and I thought that maybe you would want to come back. I think that this is just a fascinating discussion that we are having, and it is great to hear that so many folk are involved in human rights around the table, and I think that it would be great if that was reflected more in the ordinary delivery of public services in Scotland. Just to come back to the point that the Law Society has just made, the right to an effective remedy is our fundamental human right, which is included in the European Convention on Human Rights. We should not really be trying to distinguish between what is an equality issue and what is a human rights issue. Human rights underpins the rights that we all want to enjoy. It defines the values and the practice of our society. Secondly, in respect of the concluding observations, the complex devolution settlement for the UK is one that is really quite challenging for the United Nations and has been raised a number of times in the concluding observations. Most recently, in August, when the committee produced its concluding observations on UK compliance with a convention on the elimination of racial discrimination, it said that, notwithstanding the devolution settlement, it was the UK Government that is a signatory to the UN convention. Therefore, its recommendations were targeted at the UK Government, and then it would be up to the devolved administrations to deliver them as these all fit. I think that it is important to remember and to interpret the concluding observations in that spirit. The third thing that I wanted to come back on about the employment is a real danger that we start mentalising issues. For me, just like the right and effective remedy, the UN guiding principles on business and human rights should be the overarching framework for how the Scottish Government and the Scottish Parliament expect private sector and public sector companies to do business. That would therefore tackle the disability issues, the discrimination issues, communication accessibility and empowerment issues. I also was responding to your request for some guidance on how to take matters forward, and I have two specific recommendations that are actually in the Jimmie Reed Foundation's paper on human rights. The first is that, given that the Scottish Parliament has had to make statements on all bills when they have been produced about the human rights implications, there are therefore lots of statements about human rights and how the impact on bills and legislation and practice and services in Scotland should all be hoovered up into one database, which MSPs and clerks and staff across all committees can refer to. The one caveat that I would say is that those statements are perhaps not as fulsome as what they should be. It has been a sore issue in the past that particularly civil society have not had access to the legal opinions on what human rights implications there are to bills. On the basis that under freedom of information rules it would harm internal conduct of business and also its legal advice, which is not included under freedom of information. However, notwithstanding that, I still think that that could be a very useful database. Secondly, in our paper, we refer to the Charter of Rights in the State of Victoria. The whole point of that Charter of Rights, taken forward by a devolved Parliament, was to focus on the public sector delivery of human rights. It was understood to be wanting somewhat. Eight years later, there has been a review and 52 recommendations made on how the charter could be more effective. I think that quite a number of those recommendations resonate with the situation in Scotland too, although we do not necessarily have the same sort of charter of rights. We still get the Human Rights Act and we still have high-level political commitments to international human rights treaties, so I would commend them to you. I have inherited the squeaky chair today. I will take this opportunity to get myself comfortable. It was just to take span slightly on Jeremy's question from a race equality perspective. I was at the JRF event yesterday and met Jeremy just prior to it. The direct question he asked is if you can have one single priority from a race equality perspective for the common parliamentary session, what would it be? I instantaneously touched upon the issue around employment, because we know quite clearly that there are issues around under representation across the board and various employment strands to ethnic and cultural minority communities. I would urge the committee to be bold in its dot process in terms of its advocacy and what it is identifying as some of the key areas that it is going to look into. At the moment, we can tell you quite clearly that the evidence is there that there are issues around discrimination and under representation. Let us not go through that process again, particularly for the communities that we are working with just to rhyme off what they have been involved in in the past six to twelve months. Fairer Scotland, Race Equality Framework, Joseph Rowntree Foundation, Race Ethneticity and Employment Review and the same issues are coming up again and again and again. There will eventually be a frustration and a fatigue if we do not see some progress in that. Organisations such as Bemis and other race equality intermediaries will be working with the Scottish Government and other partners around the race equality framework, but that is a significant document. We would hope that the committee structure would have the ability to think outside the box in that regard, and Carol touched upon earlier the issue about procurement. Procurement came up yesterday also at the JRF meeting. We have been talking about procurement in a race equality context from a Bemis perspective for a while now. What has procurement got to do with race equality? In terms of representative employment and in terms of the current economic situation, Scotland finds itself in its everything to do with race equality and its everything to do with disability equality and so on and so forth. At the moment, particularly in the public sector, 32 local authorities are under representation of staff and structures across the board of ethnic and cultural minority communities, but we are about to move into a period of further local authority recruitment freeze. We are not necessarily going to see a major increase in representation there in the coming period. Where is our money getting spent? Our money is getting spent. The public expenditure is getting spent in procurement, national infrastructure, local infrastructure. We would say that that has to be looked at. Tim has touched upon the issue about equality and the HRC. We have touched on equality as a product, so we do an EQIA and we get an outcome. That is fine when, quite clearly, that is not fit in the bill that there is an issue here about equality as a process. It is something that has to continually build and develop and it is issues like procurement where we are spending money, where that process has to start now. It is not an arbitrary social context pledge that we do not necessarily see any outcomes from, but the use of positive action measures around apprenticeships, representation and the nature of the workforce and where the contracts are being given to. Some of that is about how the technicalities of the procurement process work, but it is also about the systematic way in which procurement works, which works via the procurement hubs mechanism, which does not necessarily only have a potential disadvantage for people from ethnic and cultural minorities who are locked out of the process. However, if we are talking about the buzzwords around equitable, sustainable and representative economic development, in some of our rural communities they are locked out of the procurement hub process because a roof needs to be fixed in Aberdeenshire and it comes into the central procurement hub and the local community there are not involved in fixing that particular aspect of it. There are systematic issues around that model, which we have to review and we also have to give it a much more stringent focus from an equality perspective. I would hope that the committee, with its extended remit, particularly being cognisant of economic, social and cultural rights, would look at it stringently and do it for the enhancement of the key issues that are being identified. One of the innovations that we are going to do is not to have big-length inquiries when lots of organisations have already done that work and we can just learn from the work that they have produced already. That was part of some of the work that we did with Joseph Rowntree yesterday. I have Emma and then I have two members that want to come in. Thanks very much, convener. Just to pick up on Carol's point about international obligations and the question of the UK as a unitary state, as Engenders tried to read some of the mood music coming from various UN committees, which, as members will know, operate quite independently, there are different approaches being taken by different committees. CEDAW, in our estimation, was trying to reach beyond the idea of the UK as a unitary state into the question of what Scotland should be doing on various things, including the modern apprenticeship programme, which others have mentioned as a key issue of concern. The Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights was taking almost the opposite point, I think, in a bit of frustration, because Northern Ireland did not participate in that process. They were concerned that, if Northern Ireland's civil servants and ministers did not appear, that that did not mean that they should not therefore take action. There is a lot going on within the UN system. I suppose that I would offer Engenders support to committee members who want to tap into our knowledge and try to unpick some of that, because it can be quite a daunting process practically to try and get underneath. I do see real opportunities for this committee in making some bold choices that equivalent structures in Westminster perhaps have not, where there has been a bit of a disappointing silence in response to some of the sets of concluding observations that have come forward, but also other regional instruments. Carol mentioned the experience in Victoria. I think that something that we have discussed a lot at the cross-party group on violence against women has been the Istanbul Convention, which is a Council of Europe instrument on violence against women. The CEDAW Committee were of the view that Scotland could commit to implement this while not being able to ratify it as not being a state in and of itself, and that that would have real impact in terms of the delivery of responses to violence against women that would integrate extremely well with Scotland's violence against women strategy equally safe, which is taking a very bold approach, linking violence against women to women's inequality and therefore placing it squarely within the purview of this committee. Allister Pringle and others at previous session mentioned the question of sexualised and sexist bullying of girls in schools, and I think that if Engender was going to pick a couple of things that we would really urge the committee to focus one of your short, sharp processes on, it would be that question. Currently, there is no data gathered on the experience of girls, sexist and sexualised bullying. We are aware from other survey data that sexual harassment, sexual assault and rape even are occurring within schools in the UK and would really dearly love to know what is happening in Scotland so that we can then intervene to ensure that girls do not experience education in a toxic and hostile environment. Other things we would really like to see the committee focus on are the question of the public sector equality duty and the extent to which equality impact assessment is functioning at all to make change. The EHRC is reviewing the duty this year and we think that the committee could usefully echo or parallel that work. I think that the question of modern apprenticeships has been really well rehearsed by this committee in previous iterations, but we now have the Skills Development Scotland's Equality Action Plan focused specifically on modern apprenticeships and that is looking at disability, race and gender. We are at the very early stages of taking substantive action on the most pernicious of questions of how to open up that programme to a wider variety of Scotland's younger people, and I think that the committee could usefully scrutinise that plan and the extent to which that is making change happen as well. Excellent, thank you. Of course, we have seen the report from the EIS that we were both at in the summer on the issues in schools, and myself and Margaret Mitchell launched the standing safe programme for universities last week, and there is a debate in this place later today on that very subject. It is all very topical and cross-party support on how we move forward with lots of those things. We are very keen to do that. Mary, I have got you next, and then Alex. Thank you, and I thank everyone for their contributions and comments this morning. I think that it has been a really useful session. I am not quite sure how we are going to find the time to do all of this, but we will endeavour to do that. I wonder if I might move things on slightly. I wanted to ask a specific question of Gary, and it is in relation to the policy work that you do within the Scottish Refugee Council. I wonder if you could give us a bit of an update on almost the changing landscape of the nature of the work that you do. I am thinking specifically in relation to all the human rights stuff, but you have Brexit on the horizon as well. An update on what you think our priority should be in relation to the work that you do? Well, thanks for that question. Those were the things that I was starting to think about. I do not really want to make any further comments on the broad focus of the committee, because all those comments have been very helpful in terms of framing the work. I suppose that one of the things in preparation for this was thinking of the coming five years, and as has been mentioned, Brexit is the human rights act. Brexit should not affect our international obligations to refugees under the refugee convention, but, obviously, it has influenced, I think, UK attitudes towards migrants and refugees, which is obviously a key concern to us. I suppose that, looking forward positively, we have seen refugees arrive in Scotland in all areas of Scotland, which is to be really welcomed in relation to local authorities stepping forward, and we hope that that would continue. However, all of those areas are areas that have not received refugees before, and, although I think that the initial welcome has been good, we do need to really consider the long-term integration of people arriving across Scotland in all of our communities. I suppose that a concern to us has been the awareness of refugee rights in Scotland, what are their rights in relation to devolved competencies, and what are their rights in relation to reserved competencies. A large part of our work for many years has been trying to resolve some of that confusion. We have stated to the Scottish Government that it should maybe be bold and go back to Emma's point about looking at international obligations under CEDAW, looking at the international obligations under the refugee convention, and, although it cannot ratify that, it can look at seeking to embed what those are in Scotland, and look at developing national standards. That is a bit of a concern to us, because wherever you arrive in Scotland, you should be entitled to a fair entitlement to public services. That will be of particular concern to refugees who are arriving without status. For example, we have heard of separate children in the news. We want local authorities to come forward to welcome separated children, but we need to ensure that the services there need legal representation, guardianship and so on, so that their rights in the longer term can be insured. I think that those are the broad picture, but the question of what is reserved and devolved is going to come up even more in relation to the Immigration Act. A big concern is around local authorities' ability to conduct human rights assessments for those who have no recourse to public funds. What are their responsibilities compared to the reserved powers? The Immigration Act is going to remove support from families who have been seeking asylum, and that will cause more confusion to local authorities about what they should do in relation to those families. We have already witnessed destitution, and we are going to witness that even more. I think that a specific piece of work around local authorities' understanding of the rights of those who have no recourse to public funds would be very welcome. Meru, do you want to come back? No, no, that's fine. That's a very thorough explanation. Thank you. I have been reflecting about the fundamental disconnect that is apparent between political rhetoric and reality on the ground. We have heard that time and again in the excellent presentations that we have heard from stakeholders around the table today. In particular, with regard to Matt's description of difficulties for people with disabilities in the employment sector, I reflect always to come back to this example of, in 2011, a significant local authority set itself the target in its single outcome of agreement of helping 217 to 25-year-olds with disabilities into employment. The following year, it reported on that outcome and had to admit that it had only succeeded in getting 11 into employment. That is a metric just to define how problematic that is. I want to throw a question to the wider group as to whether, if we accept that there are all those concluding obs where Scotland is still failing in its obligations to human rights and inequalities, whether incorporation, where it is legally competent for Scotland to do so, of some of those treaties, is perhaps the way forward? Jamie, do you want to come in? I don't know if you can answer some of that point in your contribution as well. I will try. What I would suggest is that we consider how it is for minority ethnic communities in Scotland. Anything that is done in the Parliament and how that affects the reality on the ground and how families and people are living their everyday lives in Scotland, I do not think that we have done enough learning. Scotland is constantly introducing new communities across the nationally. Gary spoke about some of the refugee communities, but we have new migrant communities that have now settled in Glasgow for the last few years. There are issues that do not seem to be addressed. We have other company miners that have come from seeking asylum. There is a whole range of issues about how we are supporting them, not just to get their immigration status or to get their housing or to get their health in order. How they are being welcomed in Scotland and how they are learning about being a citizen of Scotland or how they are socially fitting in, because afterwards a lot of unaccompanied miners will be supported until they are 18 or 19. What then happens afterwards? Are they giving keys to a flat and left on their own? Are they getting employment or having to go through the Home Office rules and report every week when the Home Office tries to detain and deport them? There are a whole lot of issues that we still need to learn about. A lot of the work that I am doing just now is focused on radicalisation and how we create safe spaces for young people to discuss issues that they want to discuss rather than pushing those issues underground and forcing young people to go online to speak openly or to speak to God knows who that is going to influence their perspective. There are a lot of issues around women and how being from a minority ethnic community is an additional barrier in a lot of the sense and we still need to talk about employment. We need to look at jobs that are suitable and culturally suitable for women. I do not think that we have done enough of that. There is also a lot of work that we want to do in supporting families and understanding child rights and what they can expect from institutions that are looking after their children. A lot of the work that any project in Roshney does asks them to focus in free areas. The institution that we are working with, the families in the community and the children and young people, is that we need to start having conversations with children at a younger age. We find that there are a lot of young people and children and young people that are sitting in households watching things in the news, hearing their parents or older brothers and sisters talk about things, but there is no way for them to talk and they generate their opinions based on everyone else around them. We do a lot of work in faith organisations, not just in mosques, but we do a lot of work in mosques. We are about to launch a guidance book for organisations that are looking after their children and young people and the idea of that is to introduce child protection policies and introduce how you should legally look after a child. We also do a lot of work with what we call unregistered groups. A family that wants their child to learn the Quran will pay the neighbour that speaks Arabic £20 to teach them every week. If you have 10 kids within a living room environment and there is no child protection guidance or policies, those are the groups that we want to get into and encourage people to start forming some sort of difficulty, start becoming registered and start finding institutions that will support them. There is a lot that I can probably go on and talk about. Usually I focus on one subject to go on to talk on, but I like all organisations to consider additional barriers for minority ethnic communities. I used to be an MSYP for Glasgow Anizans, so I welcome security here, but I also start having more conversations with children and young people and learn from them and give them opportunities to come and speak in the same way that we would do with every other sort of equality group. Thanks, Jamie. You have brought an element into the discussion this morning that we had not touched on some of the issues around religious freedom and responsibility. I am very conscious of the fact that you have not managed to get your say in yet, but I thought maybe that would be a good place for you to start. Is that okay? Absolutely, yes. With the Scottish Secular Society, we advocate for equal footing for all beliefs and none, as well as addressing the mandatory privileged positions that religion has in Scottish law. Our main concerns this year have been looking at the endemic inequality and the ignoring of rights of children either passively or actively in the education sector. Chief of that would be the mandatory appointment of church representatives on our local authority education committees. What we found is that a lot of people are not even aware that these mandatory appointees are there. Every local authority education committee must have three appointees appointed by the church independent of any voting system. There is really almost no regulation on it after that. Some of the appointees are for life, some of them are cycled out annually by annually. The important thing is that these nominees are involved in every level of decision making in their local authority. At the time, there are 32 education committees and these religious representatives hold the power, the balance of power, and 19 of them. They circumvent the democratic elected system and we feel that considering that the majority of the Scottish people have reported in the last survey as having no religion, and that actually covered the majority of people under 40, which implies probably many parents with children in school that maybe this time of the church don't necessarily reflect the interests of the people, both locally and nationally. We would like this to be looked at and addressed. From the society's point of view, we feel that the religious reps maybe need to move from the mandatory to something more in the system of being co-opted in, not that they should be removed because if the local constituents want religious representatives, they should be allowed to vote them on and ask for them there, but there should be that accountability as well. As well, we have been watching, we consider education and access to education a right, and this is a right that comes from our shared humanity and citizenship, not necessarily our membership within a particular group. We are very weary about the political wisdom behind the arrangements whereby all taxpayers must pay into a system, the school system, but only some of the taxpayers get to enjoy that school system, which means the schools are allowed to weed out students by their baptisms, weed out educators by their religious affiliations, and when we're speaking education, we're speaking about, we're not speaking about religion in a nutshell, we're speaking about the rights to education, so we would like, what we're noticing, and I probably am going to reflect what many have said, I know Tim had said this earlier, we're running into a lot of people who don't realize this is the case, and I think they don't realize this is the case because there's no feet on the ground, there aren't people there actually talking to the ones involved, they're sitting removed, and it happens, but we would like to see more proactive efforts when it comes to these mandatory religious representatives and policies within the education system. Another very clear area that we're going to have to take a bit of time and ponder and concentrate on as well, but thank you for that. Suckey, I think you wanted to come in, and I don't know if you've got an answer to Alex's question. I was wanting to just bring up some of the points that Jamie made there. Thank you for bringing up Scottish Youth Parliament, I think it goes without saying that I'm in full support of bringing young people on to the table in discussions, but in terms of what Jamie has mentioned about learning and having open spaces and safe spaces for young people to talk about issues that affect them, I think there's a big wasted opportunity in terms of the PSHE curriculum. The Equal Opportunities Committee faces this sort of important responsibility in terms of working with the education and life skills committee to ensure that equalities are promoted across the board. The PSHE curriculum, I think about 79 per cent of the young people that we surveyed in our lead the way constitution, that's about 70,000 young people that we spoke with across Scotland, they feel that the PSHE curriculum needs changing and needs to represent the sort of big issues that are affecting young people today in terms of sexual relationships, in terms of consent, in terms of mental health, in terms of all these different issues, but they're not in the curriculum right now. There's a big massive opportunity for the Government to engage with young people, they have one hour a week with these young people where they can sit and they have essentially a safe space where they can talk about all the things that affect them, but it's been wasted on things like teen pregnancy, gang crime and things that are prevalent, but they're not the big issues that are affecting us right now, and I think that we need to take a step back and we need to look at the curriculum and we need to make sure that young people are involved in the facilitation of the design of the curriculum and in the delivery of the curriculum itself, so I think that the committee needs to work with all the other committees and making sure that the qualities are promoted across the board in all opportunities. I've got an 18-year-old who has lamented laboriously over the past two years about what a wasted hour a week is, so there's a members debate here next week on mental health education and you might hear some things from people on that as well, but again, it's something that we will be very interested in and mindful on, especially that young voice, we need to hear it. We've got less than five minutes left and I've got both Emma and Carol want to come back in and I'm wondering, will it answer some excellent, answer some of, if Alex won't go away disappointed, so Carol, do you want to go first on Emma? Okay, in respect of incorporation, obviously I instinctively think that it's a great idea, but my real concern is that we've had the Human Rights Act since 1998 and there's a contradiction as to whether or not it's just been ignored by the public sector or whether they are subtly delivering it, so subtle that sometimes people don't know what's happening. I think that if you're going to invest a lot of time and energy, I'm thinking really what I'm hearing around here and from my experience it should be human rights happening in local places where it makes a difference to people's lives and rather than the kind of big high level incorporation issues, I think it would gobble up time and energy. I also want to just emphasise that we have a big problem with human rights perception because they don't happen in local places, because people don't understand what human rights are. In Scotland, the Scottish Government commissioned an opinion poll in last year, results published in November 2015, and it said that one in five Scots say that human rights are for minority groups only and two in five Scots say that they have no bearing in their everyday life. I think that's shocking because the whole point of human rights is that we're treated equally, that we're supposed to have fairness and understanding about dignity, fairness, respect, equality. That's lacking from our culture and I think we have to look at practical ways to make human rights add value to people's everyday lives. Earlier you had the opportunity to meet Stuart Merchant who's sitting here today. He's a blacklisted worker, completely unfairly. This is a really endemic problem. We have a body of evidence already that this is an endemic problem because the UK Parliament published its report in March 2015 on blacklisting. We've talked about procurement, public procurement today as a way to improve private sector business responsibilities and respect of human rights. It's really important that we choose issues to invest the time and energy that will make a difference to people's lives. Blacklisting has been horrendously impacted on people's lives and we really need to use the full powers of human rights to make a difference to private sector behaviour because it makes a difference to people's everyday lives. I think that one thing that pricked our ears up was the Scottish version, the SNAP's business and human rights piece of work. I think that we'll be looking for that from the Scottish Government as well and take forward some of that. Emma, you've got the final word. Thank you. I think that I would absolutely take Carol's points that you don't want more legislation that is not implemented appropriately and for which access to justice is beyond the reach of individuals. Having said that, the UN committees that we've been before have been emphatic that justice ability or the lack thereof is a major gap in the realisation of human rights and we have called for the incorporation of CEDAW into Scots law on that basis that currently there are rights for women that are not being realised and not interrogated through the current system. I was very quick there, Jamie. You've got a minute. Jeremy kindly put forward a motion regarding disability equality training, which the Presiding Officer is going to work towards. I would just like to implore that all the members and this committee reinforce that all the MSPs attend that for equality training for disability people. We hear you. Derek, 30 seconds. If the committee is looking for cross-sectional, short, sharp inquiries to look at, I'd suggest digital exclusion because older people, people with learning disabilities, people who, for whom English is not their first language, all of them are probably disproportionately affected by the increasing drive to move public services towards being online only. We're seeing this with sheltered housing applications in Edinburgh, for example, online only. I know it's reserved but the universal credit system in Muscleborough is now being rolled out as a full online service and there will be increasing pressure among public authorities to try and restrain their costs and they'll see online as a way of doing that. There are, obviously, ways in which we can support people but we should all consider those who find it impractical or unfair to be able to push in that direction. Brilliant point to end on, actually. I thank you all very, very much this morning for your points, I think. To get them so concise and straightforward has been very, very helpful indeed. This is not just a one-off as far as our communication with you and our relationship with you. We want to build on those relationships and hear the ideas that you've got and how we can take forward the pieces of work that we've got. Every member of the committee is open to influence, experience and persuasion but only in a good way. I thank you all very much for your attendance. Keep in touch with us all and I will move the committee into private.


Nothing warms my heart more than watching fascist fight, and today two of the most influential bigots in the country who both repopularized old tropes about LGBTQ plus people have turned on each other and they are now publicly spatting, but it gets even better because they're both also being dog piled by the other's fans, which is only further fanning the flames between the two of them. Now I'm talking about Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and stochastic terrorist Chaya Rychik of Libs of TikTok, and it all started when Rychik made this post about Florida where she shared a news story about three undocumented immigrants that allegedly assayed a woman in a car, and asserts that Florida, quote, apparently allows undocumented immigrants to obtain driver's licenses, which isn't true by the way, hence why she was community noted. Now Ron DeSantis seemingly took that as a slate against him and he called her out for it on Twitter, writing, quote, Libs of TikTok got community noted for lying about Florida law, which not only prohibits undocumented immigrants from getting driver's licenses, but also prohibits recognition of licenses issued to undocumented immigrants from other states. Truth shouldn't be a casualty of attempts to generate clicks and engagement form.   We know it's not DeSantis himself. Out of all the people to go at, why Libs of TikTok? If she made a mistake it will come out in the community note. It was clearly an honest mistake. There's no need for a personal attack. Chaya issued multiple statements clarifying her remarks. Ron, I've always supported you as governor, but you went overboard accusing Libs of TikTok of engagement farming. People make mistakes. Have you ever made a mistake? Perhaps, perhaps like running against Trump? Got him. Yikes. This is a really bad look for you, Ron. Posts like these are examples of why he's not the GOP nominee folks. I like his policies, but he doesn't get it. This is a private message to Libs of TikTok, not a public battle. This feels personal against Chaya. You really don't want to get back in the good graces of MAGA, do you? You're already on thin ice with Republicans, Ronnie Boy. Might not want to pick fights with people who are infinitely more popular than you. Now there were a lot of other replies telling him to apologize and some got pretty nasty like these where he was called a tiny D and they even accused his wife of exaggerating her cancer. In fact, the dog pile was so overwhelming as Ari Drennan explains that DeSantis's press team is dutifully noting the flood of belligerent comments that follow an inaccurate Libs of TikTok post, a trend that mainstream journalists and misinformation researchers have been reporting on for years now. And in his posts about Rychik DeSantis's press secretary shared additional examples aside from the harassment of people reaching out in earnest asking if it's true that undocumented immigrants can obtain driver's licenses in Florida and adds, this is something our comms team will be dealing with in perpetuity. That's another false narrative that will never go away all for clicks doubling down on the grifter accusation. Now another defense of Rychik from her supporters is that she later clarified under her original post that Florida actually doesn't allow undocumented immigrants to obtain driver's licenses and I think that she was probably finding that out in real time and she blamed the ones that were able to get licenses on awoke state attorney. The problem was she never deleted the original tweet and the clarification was made more than an hour after the fact and to make matters worse the clarification only got a fraction of the views as her first tweet that went viral and as a result millions of people now think that DeSantis doesn't hate immigrants as much as he actually does in reality which is why he was so pissed because he doesn't want people to think that he's compassionate or would be kind to immigrants in any way and now she put out that myth and he's pissed. But Chaya responded directly to DeSantis and it's clear that she was utterly gutted that her idol basically called her a liar and a grifter but she defended herself and has a perfectly reasonable excuse in my opinion that's very very convincing. So her excuse is that she wasn't actually lying she was being sarcastic I'm not joking about this. She writes the last thing I ever thought I'd be doing on a Wednesday afternoon is defending myself against Ron DeSantis. I made a sarcastic comment this is so unreal I made a sarcastic comment about Florida apparently allowing undocumented immigrants to get driver's licenses because a woke state attorney literally told an undocumented immigrant to get a license. I clarified twice in the subsequent posts that Florida law doesn't allow undocumented immigrants to get licenses and demanded accountability from the state attorney who was trying to subvert Florida law. These corrections were made hours before DeSantis attacked me and hours before the community note was published. Now the governor who I've only ever congratulated for his wins and have never attacked is publicly attacking me calling me a liar and a grifter just wow I she's distraught guys I understand DeSantis wanting to correct the record and this post could have been a correction championing Florida's incredible record on undocumented immigration instead it turned into a personal attack for the record I think DeSantis is a good governor have publicly said this and still stand by it this personal attack from him is disappointing so sad her feelings were hurt so she is trying to take the high road here and she's not mad she's just disappointed. Copenseed Chaya Copenseed now in response to that unnecessarily long post she ended up getting a taste of her own medicine because Ron DeSantis' supporters decided to dogpile on her this is all too funny so they responded saying just delete the false post I just made a sarcastic comment no you didn't you lied you got called out now you are playing the victim textbook maga you aren't some hero you are a social media influencer who does this for money true Chaya you made a false accusation against someone on your own side he offered you a place to live when you were doxxed and you use false allegations to defame his governance a simple apology would have sufficed just delete the post you made a false accusation and whether you intended to or not it is seen as clickbait we appreciate your work but humble yourself and delete the post you weren't being sarcastic and you aren't the victim here Chaya I respect so much of what you do but just own this and move on how can it be a personal attack when you're not a personal account and somebody also shared this comic of her shoveling shit which is humorous now what you saw was just a small taste of the backlash that she received but both camps are still pissed because Rychik's fans are mad that DeSantis never acknowledged her clarification and DeSantis' fans are mad that she left the original tweet up so suffice to say this bridge is burned and this is significant because Rychik's viral posts about groomers in the LGBTQ plus community that are teachers is what inspired Florida's don't say gay law but on the subject of don't say gay there was another L this week for these two fascists because as the AP reports the law has been completely defanged as part of a settlement reached between the state and those affected by it they report quote the main thing the settlement does is clarify a law that was purposefully vague so it could be used as a weapon to discriminate said Joe Saunders senior political director at Equality Florida and a former state lawmaker a key point of clarity is how the law applies to classroom instruction as opposed to mere discussion or mention of a topic anywhere on school grounds he listed some things that will change now books featuring LGBTQ plus characters were removed from school libraries in one county those books must now be returned but depending on the content of the book a teacher might not be able to say read it aloud in class anti bullying programs that had been ditched because they addressed anti LGBTQ plus bullying can resume teachers in a county that once allowed them to designate their classrooms as LGBTQ plus safe spaces with a sticker on the door were required to peel them off now the stickers can return one valedictorian was forced to censor a commencement speech in which he mentioned he was gay that kind of censorship would no longer be allowed lawyers advise teachers in one county that they shouldn't talk with students about LGBTQ plus issues or if they were in a same sex relationship even put family photos on their desks those photos can now come out of the closet also some after school gay straight alliances canceled meetings or went underground because most are advised by teachers some of whom worried about being punished those are now clearly allowed quote what the settlement now makes clear is that students can say gay in florida schools that students can say trans in schools and not have to deal with censorship from the weaponized vagueness of the law saunders said in an interview tuesday in other words the don't say gay era is officially over in florida and you absolutely love to see it now what's funny is that desantis is still taking this settlement as a victory since the law technically remains on the books which is true but that vagueness is specifically what had a chilling effect on speech so with the law now being clarified as part of this settlement none of that is legal meaning that you can say gay again and the law it exists but it lacks teeth and even though classroom instruction is technically banned i mean that was never happening in the first place but what this did was chill speech when it comes to just general discussions about lgbtq plus issues so that way a teacher could be punished if for example they have a picture of their spouse of the same sex on the desk or if for example a kid has two mommies or two daddies and another kid asks about that well the teacher doesn't just have to like zip their lips they can say yeah you know some kids have two mommies two daddies families are different and side note all of the draconian anti lgbtq plus laws that republicans have been cooking up in west virginia as of late were defeated this week or i should say most of them were defeated earned in the morning reports that a total of 20 anti lgbtq plus laws were defeated so you know it's been a really bad week for bigots and now on top of all of these political defeats the pioneers of the modern day hate crusade against lgbtq plus people are publicly fighting with each other and now their little minions are going to bat as well their butting heads so sad so sad to see i feel so bad for all of them thoughts and prayers uh hope you all make up so soon i'm just kidding of course uh keep fighting let them fight i think this is great the more they fight the better and i hope that their fans continue to uh dog pile because that only makes them hate the other more and permanently severs this alliance so uh you love to see it i'm gay i'm transgender


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