We move on to group 13. Release planning and through-care support, access to prescription drugs. I call amendment 86. In the name of Pauline McNeill. Grupped with amendments 87 and 88. Pauline McNeill, to move amendment 86 and speak to all amendments in the group. Thank you, Presiding Officer and speaking to amendment 86, 87 and 88. The criminal justice committee pursued a visit to the wise group where one of the issues that was raised with the committee was about through care in relation to prisoners who were leaving prison but did not always have the prescriptions that they needed on leaving. It could be vitally important because we think of all the reasons why people might falter or get into more trouble on leaving prison. It is making sure that they have the necessary drugs and in many cases it was reported to us that that was not happening. The committee has been in exchange with the prison service and we have made some progress here but it seems to me to be an opportunity to be more specific in legislation that it should be a mandatory requirement. Amendment 86 in section 2, panagraff, the definition of relevant general service after service, would insert specifically prescription services. In section 10, the provision of facilities of access to prescription drugs and amendment 88 would insert, through care support, a duty to report on access to prescription drugs. The Scottish ministers must, as soon as practically possible, at the end of the reporting period, prepare a report on the operation of section 34C during the reporting period and the report miss in particular, must include information on whether the individuals' follow-ins in section 34B7 have access to prescription drugs that they require for their physical and mental health and whether medical and prison services have sufficient resources to meet that demand. That is the aim of those amendments. I do not think that it is enough to have a simple exchange and to have warm words that, yes, ideally everybody wants this. As far as I am concerned, this is an absolute necessity that prisoners—for the same reasons that we have had in earlier debates about not having Friday releases, but trying to set up a system that gives prisoners ordinary release the best chance to reconstruct their lives, they should not be leaving prison without the prescription drugs. If the minister can give me anything in response to this, I would indicate that the Scottish Government would take a really strong view of this. I will not move it, but I really think that, as a Parliament, it is not too much to ask that the prison service and the NHS ensure that prisoners who have served a sentence on release into the community have the necessary prescription drugs that they need in order to live their lives. Pauli McNeill's amendments in various ways look to highlight the issue of continued supply of prescribed medication to prison leavers. I thank Pauli McNeill for raising this issue, and I agree that continued access to prescription medications is an important and essential part of the transition between custody and the community for prison leavers. That is why the bill includes provision that health partners must be consulted in the preparation of the through-care support standards. Those bodies must also comply with those standards in exercise and functions in relation to the provision of through-care support. That is in recognition that continued healthcare support, including access to medications and addiction support, is an essential part of through-care and release planning. It is not optional. Amendment 86 seeks to add prescription services to the existing definition of relevant general services in section 2 of the Community Justice Scotland Act 2016. I appreciate the intention of Mr McNeill's amendment, but I consider that it is unnecessary, given that the Community Justice Scotland Act 2016 already includes physical and mental health services and support in the definition of relevant general services. That definition therefore enables bodies engaging in through-care and release planning duties referred to in the bill to consider the provision of medication and other prescription services as part of the wider physical and mental health services to be provided. As such, it is not necessary to add specific reference to prescription services to the definition of relevant general services. Amendment 87 seeks to add the provision of and facilitation of access to prescription drugs to the definition of through-care support services within the bill. Once again, that is unnecessary, since the definition of through-care support in section 10 includes help to access. Thank you to the Cabinet Secretary for Given Way. Given what he has said about existing provisions, we are still finding that there are gaps in the delivery of the service. I acknowledge that simply passing this today might not necessarily fix that either, but surely we cannot simply rely on legislation in 2016, where it has shown to be that it is not happening in every case. There is one of what more could be done here. The point that Ms McNeill makes about practice is that I am responding to the specifics of her amendments and perhaps saying in a rather arcane manner that they are not required, because the provision already exists. What we are, of course, adding to the bill is that pre-release planning will not be optional. For the first time, pre-release planning duties are placed on other actors in the public sector. That is not just about justice social work in the Scottish Prison Service. It does include our health service, who have to be at the table, because they too, like the Scottish Prison Service and justice social work, have a duty of care. A duty of care means that people have a human right to their medication end of. I do not know how, more strongly and in an appropriate parliamentary fashion, I could actually put that fact in terms of how I certainly feel about it. I suppose that what I was saying to Ms McNeill is that her amendment 87, I consider unnecessary, and I am sorry to say this, since the definition of through-care support in section 10 includes help to access or make use of relevant general services as defined in the act, but carried forward into this legislation and that includes health services. Through-care support also includes help to access or make use of relevant specialist services, which provides further comfort that any necessary support can be provided under the existing drafting. Amendment 88 would require Scottish ministers to produce a report into the operation of section 34C, which requires various bodies to comply with the through-care standards. The report would have to include specific reference to whether individuals have access to prescriptions. I understand the intention of the amendment and I am bringing forward amendment 6061 and 64 today to require the Scottish ministers to report on the operation of part 2 of the act overall, therefore a requirement to report on the operation of this section in particular would create duplication. I do appreciate that Ms McNeill and the rest of the Justice Committee have taken a real strong interest in how individuals released from prison are supported to receive the prescription medication that they need. Members may be aware of the guidance that has been developed in recent months regarding the provision of medication and prescriptions to individuals at the point of their release from custody. That guidance has been developed by the prison healthcare network and circulated to prison healthcare providers. That guidance includes instructions on how individuals should be provided with a letter upon release, detailing their current medication, which can be presented to a community GP, and that on-release individuals are to be given medication or a suitable prescription for particular medications sufficient for 28 days after their release. On that basis, I would invite Ms McNeill not to move those amendments. I thank the cabinet secretary for the third answer, and what I felt was a strong statement that was made in relation to the fact that it is not optional and that it is a partnership arrangement on release. I hope that the cabinet secretary would not mind that. If I do not move, I will hold the cabinet secretary to that statement. The Justice Committee has been acknowledged really strongly about this. When we do visits, we do try to act on what we have heard. I know that other members feel strongly about that, too. On that basis, I am not going to move. Can I ask Polly McNeill to confirm that she seeks to withdraw amendment 86? I seek to withdraw amendment 86. Thank you, Ms McNeill. Does any member object? No member objects, and amendment 86 is withdrawn. We move to group 14, release planning. I call amendment 46 in the name of Audrey Nicholl, grouped with amendments 47, 48 and 49. Audrey Nicholl, to move amendment 46 and speak to all amendments in the group. The importance of well-planned support for people on release from prison was a theme that the Criminal Justice Committee heard about at length during our scrutiny of the bill. Indeed, in my constituency MSP role, I engaged with a number of stakeholders on release planning and on how provision around the process of release could be improved. That is why I welcome sections 9 and 10, which seek to start that release planning at an early point and will drive consistency in the provision of through-care support for people leaving prison. I am also clear that that will contribute towards keeping victims and people leaving prison safe. In our stage 1 report, the committee broadly welcomed those sections and we will be watching their implementation with great interest. Another theme that was raised during the scrutiny, in which I feel very strongly about, is the importance of supporting people who are released direct from court, usually following a period of remand. I understand in those circumstances release is difficult to anticipate and plan for and that makes accessing services extremely difficult for those individuals, rendering them on occasion extremely vulnerable. I recognise that section 9, as currently drafted, would cover the scenario, as it covers release planning for remand and sentenced prisoners. However, I want to make sure that the Scottish ministers and indeed Parliament have additional levers if further action is considered necessary to make improvements in this area. Therefore, I consider that the Scottish ministers should have the power to make further provision in this area if they need to, particularly in relation to supporting people released directly from court following a period of remand, given all that we now know about how challenging that is. That is why my amendments 46 and 47 provide ministers with a regulation making power to make further provision in this area should they need to, and why my amendments specifically reference the issue of release direct from court following time on remand. I believe that Parliament must have a role in scrutinising any future use of those powers, and that is why my amendment requires that those regulations making powers are subject to the affirmative procedure. I hope that those powers are not needed and that sections 9 and 10 work the way that they are intended. However, I feel that that additional power would be helpful to ensure that the outcomes that we all seek, reductions in re-offending and better outcomes for people who are leaving prison, are achieved. I move amendment 46 in my name. Presiding Officer, the importance of well-planned and holistic support for people who are leaving prison is a theme that has run through a lot of conversations that I have certainly had. In order to be successful, release planning must start from the beginning of a person's time in custody, regardless of the length of sentence or whether they are there or on remand. That is how we will help people to successfully resettle into their communities and their families, and that is how we will keep them and others safe, and that is what this bill aims to do. The release planning process introduced by this bill should lead to community-based services getting involved at an earlier point in a person's sentence and co-operating to the plan for a prisoner's release and support them through the prison gates and beyond. Section 9 of the bill intends to deliver all of those things. I believe that successful implementation of that section, along with through-care standards, will drive real and effective change. I welcome Audrey Nicholl's amendments 46 and 47, which provide Scottish ministers with regulation-making powers to make additional provision in this critical area with the approval of Parliament should we need it. I am particularly supportive of the specific reference in Ms Nicholl's amendment to those powers, providing the ability to make provision about the development, management and delivery of release plans for individuals released direct from court following remand. I am clear that the existing provision within section 9 would cover this group of people. However, recent discussions that I have had on the issue, including last week with leaders from the justice, health, local government, voluntary and housing sectors, have highlighted the challenges of providing effective support to people released in this way and the consequences when that support is not there. I would like to take this opportunity to thank Sandra Geddes for meeting with me at the request of Douglas Lumsden MSP, who spoke to me about the issue at a meeting that Mr Lumsden, who was also present, supported Sandra. Sandra's brother, Alan, was tragically murdered by an individual who had been released directly from court with no support package. I would like to recognise Sandra's courage and determination and continue to push for improvements in the way that people release direct from court are supported. I hope that the changes that we are bringing forward in this bill will go some way to achieve that. As I said at stage 2, I think that much of the answer to this lies in non-legislative solutions, and that was certainly the tone of the round-table discussion that I had last week. However, this is a difficult and it is a long-standing issue. I therefore think that it is prudent for ministers to have the ability to make additional provision should we need it to ensure that the release plan and duty operates in the way that it is intended, so that everyone leaves in prison, whether following remand or sentence, has their release planned for as much as possible. I therefore support amendments 46 and 47 by Audrey Nicholl. I will now turn to the amendments lodged in my name. Amendment 48 responds to an amendment lodged by Kate Clark and Jamie Greene at stage 2. Those amendments called for the Scottish ministers to publish guidance and standards applicable to the development of release planning in Scotland and to publicly consult on those. As I highlighted at stage 2, I was not persuaded of the need for standards in this area, as I felt that that would duplicate the through-care standards that ministers are required to develop under section 10 of this bill. I did, however, agree with the principle that guidance to underpin the delivery of this release plan and duty to ensure consistency in its application would be valuable. Amendment 48 provides for that guidance and amendment 49 is an associated technical amendment. Amendment 48 would require Scottish ministers to publish guidance on the application of the duty to engage with the development, management and delivery of a prisoner's release plans within a year of the section coming into force and before the duty itself is enacted. That will provide partners with clarity on their roles and responsibilities from the outset. In developing that guidance, ministers are required to consult with a number of named partners. That list includes a wide range of expertise, as members will note, including the victim support organisations, to make sure that victim safety issues are taken account of and drafting of the guidance. The named partners who must comply with the release plan and duty as set out in section 9 of the bill must, when doing so, have regard to that guidance. Do not sound so enthusiastic, cabinet secretary. I will try to make it as interesting and relevant as possible in that respect. I think that there was an issue at stage 2, which was clearly that we felt that there was a need to include victims' organisations in the consultation, but in doing so did not want to unduly assign any statutory duties to them to deliver through care. I think that that is a fine balance. I am hoping that this amendment does actually deliver that. Cabinet secretary. Yes, I suppose that there are two points to raise. We have to consult with victim support organisations in and around the guidance that I have just talked about. We have committed to the public consultation of through care standards once that they are in draft condition. That will be a full public consultation. In fact, I think that I will go on to talk about that in the next group. I just want to speak briefly to amendment 48. I want to thank the cabinet secretary for the meeting with myself and Sandra Gettis. Although I was disappointed that my amendment at stage 2 was not accepted, I genuinely welcomed the engagement and the spirit of which the Government amendment 48 is made today. As Sandra said in her meeting, we will be watching carefully how the through care and release services develop so that the despicable crime that happened to her brother Alan Gettis does not happen to anyone else. For Sandra, the search for answers on why her brother was murdered goes on as she campaigns still for a fatal accident inquiry into her brother's death. Amendment 48 to the bill may bring improvements to the release process. I welcome it and I look forward to the changes and the guidance that it will bring. I will be happy to contribute further as it comes to it. First of all, I am grateful to the cabinet secretary for her support of my amendments 46 and 47. I welcome the additional amendments moved by the cabinet secretary that provide comprehensive detail around the guidance set out in relation to release planning. I do not have anything further to add beyond the points that I set out earlier, so I move amendment 46. Amendment 46 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? The Parliament is agreed. I call amendment 47, in the name of Audrey Nicol, already debated with amendment 46. Audrey Nicol, to move or not move. Thank you. The question is that amendment 47 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? The Parliament is agreed. I call amendment 48, in the name of the cabinet secretary, already debated with amendment 46. Cabinet secretary, to move or not move. The question is that amendment 48 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? We are agreed. I call amendment 49, in the name of the cabinet secretary, already debated with amendment 46. Cabinet secretary, to move or not move. The question is that amendment 49 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? We are agreed. We move to group 15 through care support. I call amendment 50, in the name of the cabinet secretary, grouped with amendments as shown in the groupings. Cabinet secretary, to move amendment 50 and speak to all amendments in the group. The amendments in this group are all in my name and relate to the creation of minimum statutory standards of through care support. Amendment 50 changes the timescale for the first set of through care support standards to be published from one year to within two years of section 10 coming into force. I want to be absolutely clear that the reason for extending the statutory time period for this work is to allow for a significant period of consultation and joint development of these standards. A consultation requirement was set out in the bill at introduction and supplemented at stage 2 by the addition of victim support organisations, families and organisations such as the risk management authority to the list of required consultees. My other amendments in this group will require an additional public consultation, which must be open for a minimum of 12 weeks. Publishing the standards within the original timeframe of one year would therefore not allow for this extensive consultation to be carried out to the highest possible standard and incorporated into the standards. I want to get these standards right. That involves allowing time to properly listen to the stakeholders and communities affected. I have made clear that this is a priority issue for me and I will ensure that the development of the standards maintains momentum and is completed as soon as reasonably practicable. Amendment 57 requires the Scottish ministers publicly consult on a draft of the initial set of through-care support standards. The draft will have been developed in consultation with the partners named in section 10. The initial engagement with named partners and in development of a draft will include a review of existing practice and will explore the potentially different needs of different groups of people, for example those released direct from court. That was once again raised by Douglas Lumsden MSP and others on the criminal justice committee at stage 2. I know that this is an issue that many are very concerned about and I thank all members for contributing to this very important issue. Following this initial engagement, an open consultation on a set of draft standards will be undertaken. As mentioned, this public consultation will last a minimum of 12 weeks. The addition of the further public consultation allows communities and individuals who have been affected by through-care standards to have an opportunity to shape what they look like. This has been informed by Katie Clark's amendment 42 at stage 2 and by engagement with victim support organisations. At the conclusion of the public consultation, Scottish ministers will be required to publish an assessment of the responses and how they have been taken into account. My other amendments in this group ensure that the requirement to publicly consult applies only to the first set of through-care support standards. Scottish ministers, however, will not be prevented from conducting further public consultations on significant revisions to the standards. However, a full public consultation will not be required every time changes are made, for example if the standards are updated to reflect a change in another policy area such as housing. Scottish ministers will, however, be required to consult the name bodies in section 34b4 in respect to any revisions to the standards. Those standards will be vital to ensuring that through-care support is consistent and reflects best practice across the country. Ensuring the availability of high-quality through-care support will help people to reintegrate and work towards more positive outcomes after a period in custody. That, in turn, will reduce re-offendant and keep our communities safe. That is why it is essential that communities are engaged in the development of those standards and have sufficient time to engage meaningfully. I urge members to support my amendments 50 to 59 today. No other members have requested to speak. Perhaps the cabinet secretary would like to wind up at this point. I would not. The question is that amendment 50 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? Yes. We are agreed. I call amendments 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58 and 59, all in the name of the cabinet secretary and all previously debated. I invite the cabinet secretary to move amendments 51 to 59 on block. Does any member object to a single question? I ask Ms Clark to which amendment, in particular, the objection is. That being the case, we are objecting to 54, 58 and 59. That being the case, we will put those amendments individually. The question is that amendment 51 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? Yes. The question is that amendment 52 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? Yes. The question is that amendment 53 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? Yes. The question is that amendment 54 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? Yes. The question is that amendment 55 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? Yes. The Parliament is not agreed. We move to a vote, and members should cast their votes now. The vote is closed. The result of the vote on amendment 55, in the name of Angela Constance, is yes, 90. No, 20. There were no abstentions. The amendment is therefore not agreed. Sorry, I agreed. That's my fault. My apologies. It clearly is agreed. The question is that amendment 56 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? We are agreed. The question is that amendment 57 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? The question is that amendment 58 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? Yes. The Parliament is not agreed. We move to a vote, and members should cast their votes now. The vote is closed. The point of order, Jamie Greene. I would have voted yes. I can confirm your vote was recorded, Mr Greene. Thank you. The result of the vote on amendment 58, in the name of Angela Constance, is yes, 93. No, 18. There were no abstentions. The amendment is therefore agreed. The question is that amendment 59 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? The Parliament is not agreed. Therefore, we will move to a vote, and members should cast their votes now. The vote is closed. The result of the vote on amendment 59, in the name of Angela Constance, is yes, 92. No, 18. There were no abstentions. The amendment is therefore agreed. I call amendment 87 in the name of Pauline McNeill. Already debated with amendment 86. Sorry, Ms McNeill. I call amendment 89 in the name of Russell Finlay. Already arguments on amendment 75 to move or not move? I called amendment 90 in the name of Pauline McNeal, which already debated with amendment 75. Pauline McNeal to move or not move? Not moved. We moved to group 16, reports on operation of part 2. I call amendment 60 in the name of the cabinet secretary, grouped with amendments 61 and 64. 4 yn ysgolion, ddigon 500 gan ac yn ffordd biddy i'r ddedigon. Ysgolion wedi g Talentau Ysgolion ac ysgolion, mae broddai'r ddedigon Glock 94 sy'n gael eu ddysgu i'r ddd holistic arcaf fynd yn gyda'r arddod y ddedigon, pan mae gyd beithio i ddatgleu'r ddod amfodach, a ddod i'r ddod am ffodol i fynd i wneud i'r ddod y ddedigon. Mae gennych ffodol i gyd, oes mae'n ffordd prosecutors I agree that it will be important to review the impact of those provisions. That's why I committed to bringing forward a stage to the amendment to encompass all the various asks for reviews into different sections of part 2 to provide a more coherent picture. Amendment 60 delivers on that commitment. This amendment introduced a new section to the bill, which places a duty on Scottish ministers to report on the operation of part 2 of the act as a whole within a specified reporting period. That reporting period is five years after the bill receives royal assent and I would like to explain why that period has been specified. The provisions within part 2 will be commenced separately in an order and to a timescale agreed in discussion with our partners. We need time for these to be commenced and for resulting practice to bed in before the report can be meaningful. Amendment 64 in my name commences this new section on the day after royal assent. Amendment 60 has been drafted to be deliberately wide. Rather than listing every element that this report could cover, I wanted to have the flexibility so that we can cover as wide a range of issues as possible, not all of which may be clear until after implementation. I would intend that it would address the points covered in Katie Clark and Russell Finlay's stage 2 amendments and Pauline McNeill's amendment 8 to 8 debated today. That could, for example, include information on how the provisions in part 2 are operating for men and women leaving prison, information on release planning for relevant individuals and the provision of through-care support for remand and sentence prisoners. I would also like to highlight that my amendment requires Scottish ministers to consult with a range of partners in the development of this report. That was a priority for me and, in my view, it is a critical element of my amendment. As members will note, the list of consultees includes a range of expertise and perspectives. That includes bodies who have duties under part 2. It includes organisations such as the risk management authority for their expertise in relation to risk assessment and management. It includes third sector bodies providing through-care support and those who support families and children affected by imprisonment. Scottish ministers are also required to consult victim support organisations so that the perspective and views of victims are incorporated in the report. I am clear that we should be listening carefully to all those voices as part of this review. I turn now to amendment 61 lodged by Katie Clark. That amendment would require that the Scottish ministers review the impact of part 2 of the bill on the operation of multi-agency public protection arrangements within three years of royal assent and publish a report on that review. For a number of reasons I cannot support this amendment. Those are the same reasons why I couldn't support Katie Clark's almost identical amendment at stage 2. I am, of course, sympathetic to the broader public protection motivation here, if not the practical effect of this amendment. That amendment does not seem to take into account that the 2005 act already requires each map at area to carry out an annual review of the arrangements for that area and publish a report. The Scottish ministers can notify the MAPA partners of information which they wish them to include in their reports and the Scottish Government also produces an annual overview report of the arrangements. Those reports can at present make comment on relevant public protection matters and could provide a mechanism for reviewing the relevant impacts of the bill relevant to MAPA if necessary. Amendment 61 would require that our review considers changes to national guidance, ensuring a consistent approach across Scotland. Although consistency may be desirable in some areas of operation, MAPA regions can at present determine how they will operate at a local level so that amendment does not appear sufficiently nuanced in allowing such local difference. Consistency is driven currently through national guidance, which is regularly revised with partners to take account of new legislation, as well as changes in policy and effective practice. I therefore do not think that the reporting requirement that amendment 61 is workable or necessary, and I ask Ms Clark not to press it. I call Katie Clark to speak to amendment 61 and other amendments in the group. I will focus on amendment 61, which, as the cabinet secretary has indicated, relates to the multi-agency protection arrangements better known as MAPA. Those impose a duty on responsible authorities in a local authority area to establish arrangements for assessing and managing the risks imposed by certain categories of offenders. I lodged the amendment after the campaigner Linda MacDonald got in touch with me several months ago. She was brutally assaulted by the convicted murderer Robbie McIntosh in 2017 while walking her dog. The attack took place while Mr McIntosh had been out of Castle Huntley prison for a week ahead of a parole board meeting. He pled guilty to assault to severe injury, permanent disfigurement, permanent impairment and danger to life and attempted murder, and he received an order for lifelong restriction. Ms MacDonald must be commended for the grace and immense bravery that she has shown in light of the attack. She has been petitioning to drive change in the parole system to prevent dangerous offenders from being released without sufficient monitoring with her Justice for Linda campaign. Multi-agency meetings had begun taking place in relation to Mr McIntosh as early as 2016, but key management decisions were not recorded, nor no clear action plan was made. Despite eventually undergoing a risk of serious harm assessment, no risk management plan was put in place. In the period when Mr McIntosh was in home leave, the local policing team were not made aware that he was on home leave. Ms McIntosh has since received an apology from the Scottish Government and a review of the updated policy and guidance for risk management teams was completed in 2020. However, there is now scope to tighten legislation in this area. The amendment stipulates that level 3 mapper prisoners be monitored in the same way to equivalent offenders with regular chickens with police and justice social work. It requires ministers to review and report on the impact of part 2 of the act on mapper arrangements. That would require consideration as to whether changes on national guidance were required and on how mapper offenders were monitored after release from custody. As the cabinet secretary, that would ensure a consistent approach across Scotland. As the cabinet secretary, I moved the amendment at stage 2, and the cabinet secretary at that time argued that a timescale of one year, as initially suggested, would not be workable. I therefore amended the wording of the amendment to three years, and I am disappointed if the Scottish Government feels that they are not able to support the amendment this evening. I move stage 61, and I will press it to a vote. Briefly, I commend Ms Clark for bringing to the chamber the very powerful and personal testimony of her constituent. I did a layout earlier the reasons why we could not accept the amendment, and I am sorry that Ms Clark is disappointed. What she highlights is the importance of practice issues and accountability in the delivery of services. I am just very sorry that I do not think that her amendments add anything to that over and top of what already exists. However, I do very much take on board the issues that she raises and the importance of implementation practice and accountability at all levels of public services when it comes to public protection. The question is that amendment 60 be agreed to or we all agreed. I call amendment 61 in the name of Katie Clark, already debated with amendment 60. Katie Clark, to move or not move, the question is that amendment 61 be agreed to or we all agreed. The Parliament is not agreed. We will move to vote, and members should cast their votes now. The vote is closed. The result of the vote on amendment 61 in the name of Katie Clark is, yes, 49, no, 61. There were no abstentions, the amendment is therefore not agreed. I call amendment 62 in the name of the cabinet secretary, already debated with amendment 26. Cabinet secretary, to move or not move. The question is that amendment 62 be agreed to or we all agreed. I call amendment 63 in the name of the cabinet secretary, already debated with amendment 73. The question is that amendment 63 be agreed to or we all agreed. We are and I call amendment 64 in the name of the cabinet secretary, already debated with amendment 60. Cabinet secretary, to move or not move. The question is that amendment 64 be agreed to or we all agreed. We are agreed and I call amendment 65 in the name of Jamie Greene, already debated with amendment 42. Jamie Greene, to move or not move. I call amendment 66 in the name of Jamie Greene, already debated with amendment 42. Jamie Greene, to move or not move. That ends consideration of amendments. Thank you, Presiding Officer. I seek your guidance. We have heard a number of amendments tonight which were considered at stage 2, which were debated but then not moved once they have been debated. We have also heard about a number of amendments which were debated at stage 2, which were defeated and yet have returned at stage 3. We heard one amendment which had it been approved and it wasn't. We would have cost £59 million per year plus several hundred million pounds to construct a new prison had it been passed. Is it possible that you could provide any clarity on the criteria that are used for bringing back amendments that have been considered at stage 2 to stage 3? Thank you, Mr Brown. As members will be aware, the presiding officers do not normally give reason for selection. The criteria that are carefully applied are set out in the guidance on public bills, which is published on the Scottish Parliament website. The key issue is that the interests of all parties and individual MSPs continue to be reflected at stage 3. All members must have the opportunity to input to and influence legislation and to fully scrutinise the laws passed by our national parliament. At this point in the proceedings, I am required understanding orders to decide whether, in my view, any provision of the bill relates to a protected subject matter. That is whether it modifies the electoral system and franchise for Scottish parliamentary elections. In the case of the bill, in my view, no provision of the bail and release from custody Scotland bill relates to a protected subject matter. Therefore, the bill does not require a supermajority to be passed at stage 3. The next item of business is consideration of business motion 9622, in the name of George Adam, on behalf of the parliamentary bureau setting out a business programme. I call on George Adam to move the motion. Do we have Mr Adam's microphone, please? I call on Alexander Burnett to speak to and move amendment 9622.1. Thank you, Presiding Officer. I move the amendment in my name. I do not wish to keep MSPs here any longer than necessary. Unfortunately, though, next week, the Scottish Government is insisting on spending parliamentary time debating a fantasy constitution in a made-up independent Scotland. I remind the benches to my right that Scotland voted no to independence, and the UK Supreme Court unanimously proved that the Scottish Government was wrong. The Scottish National Party has to move on. We know that the Government likes to sneak out embarrassing announcements. We know that the Government likes to sneak out embarrassing announcements in the dying hours before recess, with two statements scheduled for after FMQs next week. My business motion amendment replaces Tuesday's independence debate with those two statements. It also inserts two more statements, one on Circularity Scotland, which has gone into administration under the SNP in Greens, and the other is an update on the agricultural bill. Although I note that a GIQ is lodged on this topic while we have been in the chamber today. Also snuck out, while we have been considering these amendments this evening, was a press release that Azulox will not be permitted for use in Scotland. We should have a proper ministerial statement on this policy announcement tomorrow, and I note that the Presiding Officer has repeatedly stated that announcements such as those should be made to the Parliament in the first instance. All of these matters are matters of importance to the people of Scotland, something that cannot be said of a proposed debate on Tuesday. I urge members to back my amendment at decision time. Those of us on this side and the SNP benches respect this Parliament and this institution, which is entirely different from those in the Conservative benches as well. Sometimes listening to Mr Burnett is like watching the movie, everything, everywhere, all at once, because there are snippets of reality there, but it is not quite right. Part of that reason is that sometimes I feel that when we have these conversations, he does not actually listen to what is going on. As always, Presiding Officer, I will try to be helpful. On the agricultural bill, we have already said that there will be an agricultural bill. The cabinet secretary has committed to introducing an agricultural bill this year. The bill will seek powers to deliver the published vision for agriculture and the findings of the consultation will be published shortly. On Circularity Scotland, the Minister for Circular Economy has been given three statements to Parliament in Scotland's deposit return scheme in the past two months and appeared before the net zero committee last week and answered a topical question on this very issue this week. It is my belief that there is more than a whiff of misogyny here as the Tories can suddenly find themselves concerned about the catastrophic decision made by their colleagues in Westminster, then they should raise those concerns with them instead of their grandstanding and stunts here in our chamber. On independence, Presiding Officer, we are bringing our proposals for a modern constitution for an independent Scotland to this Parliament to be debated by politicians who have been elected to represent the people in Scotland. This is Scotland's Parliament and this paper sets out an ambitious proposal to protect and enhance the rights of the people of Scotland. The Tories feel to think that the right of the people in Scotland is not an important thing, but unfortunately that may be the way the Tories think that is not the way we think here. This is the place to discuss the rights of the people in Scotland and this time more than anything is the time to discuss them. The Opposition frequently reminds us rightly that the Government is accountable to Parliament, and that is why we are bringing forward the debate to enable the Parliament to scrutinise and discuss those prospective papers. The Tories are running scared of having a debate because our proposition is to enable human rights at the very heart of civic Scotland, while the Tories look to scrap human rights at the UK level. Thank you. The question is that amendment 9622.1, in the name of Alexander Burnett, which seeks to amend business motion 9622, in the name of George Adam, on behalf of the parliamentary bureau setting out a business programme, be agreed. Are we all agreed? The Parliament is not agreed, therefore we move to a vote and members should cast their votes now. The vote is closed. Point of order, Michael Marra. Thank you, Presiding Officer. My device was not connected. We have voted yes. Thank you, Presiding Officer. My app did not connect, but I would have voted yes. Mr Briggs, can I ask you to repeat that? I am afraid that I did not catch that. My app did not connect. I would have voted yes. Thank you, Mr Briggs. We will ensure that it is recorded. Colleagues, the result of the vote on amendment 9622.1, in the name of Alexander Burnett, is yes, 48, no, 62. There were no abstentions. The amendment is therefore not agreed. The next question is that business motion 9622, in the name of George Adam, on behalf of the parliamentary bureau setting out a business programme, be agreed. Are we all agreed? The motion is therefore agreed. Members, I am going to take this vote on this occasion and this occasion only, and I am going to make it absolutely clear if we cannot hear here that members are objecting or agreeing to an amendment then. We will act accordingly. The question is that business motion 9622, in the name of George Adam, on behalf of the parliamentary bureau setting out a business programme, be agreed. Are we all agreed? Thank you. The Parliament is not agreed. Therefore, it will move to a vote and members should cast their votes now. The vote is closed. Point of order, Stephanie Callaghan. My app did not connect. I would have voted yes. Thank you, Ms Callaghan. We will ensure that it is recorded. Point of order, Marie McNair. My app would connect. I would have voted yes. Thank you. We will ensure that it is recorded. The result of the vote on motion 9622, in the name of George Adam, is yes, 81, no, 28. There were no abstentions. The motion is therefore agreed. The next item of business is consideration of three parliamentary bureau motions, and I asked George Adam on behalf of the parliamentary bureau to move motions 9623, on approval of an SSI, and 9624, 9625, on designation of a lead committee. The question on those motions will be put at decision time and there is one question to be put as a result of today's business. I propose to ask a single question on three parliamentary bureau motions. Does any member object? No member objects, therefore the final question is that motions 9623, on approval of an SSI, and 9624, 9625, on designation of a lead committee, in the name of George Adam, on behalf of the parliamentary bureau, will be agreed. Are we all agreed? The motions are therefore agreed, and that concludes decision time, and I close this meeting.


This is stock number 20J63. We are here at Summit Automotive in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin. You're new and used Jeep and Jeep Cherokee headquarters. Today we are checking out this brand new 2020 Jeep Cherokee Latitude Plus four-wheel drive with the V6 in blue shade pearl coat. This vehicle gets 271 horsepower and gets you 27 miles per gallon on the highway, 19 in the city. 22 miles per gallon average. You get the dual rear exhaust. This one has four options, the cold weather group, the blue shade pearl paint, and it gives you the V6, which is an option on these vehicles. So do a quick walk around here and then we'll get up close. It has Firestone destination LE tires. These are 225, 65, R17s, have kind of a highway or all-terrain tread on them. These 17-inch painted alloy rims. Blue shade pearl, PBF is the paint coat on that, same as the slate blue on the Grand Cherokees. LED headlamps, LED running lights, and LED fog lamps. You get these seven-slotted chrome-trimmed grille, the chrome-trimmed Jeep logo. This one has the cold weather group, like I said, which gives you the windshield wiper de-icers. That's what that is right there. So they don't ice up to your windshield. Has the enter and go system. We're going to take a look at the original window sticker here. Feel free to pause this at any time to check out exactly what the Latitude Plus package gives you standard on the left and the top here, and then the optional equipment, like I said, the blue shade pearl, the cold weather group, and the V6. Feel free to pause it so you can check out all that. 33-525 is your MSRP, 3-year 36 bumper-to-bumper, 5-year 60 powertrain, has an overall safety rating of 4 stars, but it's 4 and 5 stars up and down the board, and 27 highway, 19 city, for an average of 22. Has that all-weather floor mat, part of the cold weather group. Has the capless fuel fill, which is a really nice feature. They started doing that with the redesign here, and you can see it has the roof rails, which are nice. LED tail lamps, the dual rear exhaust with the chrome tips, the backup parking sensors, part of that blind spot and cross-path detection system on this vehicle. You get the chrome-trimmed Jeep logo, the 4x4 logo, and if you look real close, it says latitude plus on the latitude logo. It's the first time I've ever noticed that. Back storage area, lots of room back here. You get even more storage underneath here, and you get a spare tire and jack tools. This is a manual raise and close gate. Cherokee's been one of the most popular models in the Jeep lineup since they came out. I've actually owned three of them, loved every one of them. Has the blind spot and cross-path detection, the heated mirrors, the built-in directional signals.  Comes with the black, the latitude plus package gives you the black premium vinyl and cloth interior with the light blue stitching, which actually matches that blue shade really well. You get the power driver's seat with lumbar and factory all-weather floor mats, auto headlamps, and tilt and telescopic steering wheel. Power windows, power locks, power mirrors, and we'll hop inside and check out the speedometer here, which is a digital speedometer. You have a distance to empty and a current miles per gallon. You can change all those to whatever you want to read in the upper corners. Cold weather group gives you the heated leather-wrapped steering wheel, cruise controls on the right, Bluetooth and information center controls on the left, and audio controls on the back of the steering wheel. Comes with the 7-inch 4C radio, which gives you AM, FM, and Serious XM radio capabilities. The 4C gives you the Android Auto and Apple CarPlay capabilities, so you can project your cell phone screen to this screen. If you have Google Maps or Waze or one of those other navigation apps on your phone, you can project it to there, and then your car basically has navigation. Also you can do your climate control here. You can also do your heated seats and heated steering wheel buttons there, and you can also check out your backup camera without even having to put it in reverse. And those are dynamic grid lines, meaning that they turn as you turn the steering wheel to kind of show you where you're going to be headed if you're going backwards in the future. You can also do some different settings and everything. That's a different video on a tutorial of the radio.  If you like the more tactile buttons, you have the actual knobs for the volume, the actual knobs for the tuning, and the actual knob for the fan. You have your stability control, your start-stop capabilities. You can turn that off. Has the ActiveDrive 1 system, which gives you the select terrain, auto, snow, sports, sand, and mud. The 9-speed automatic transmission. You do get an AUX and a USB, and then a 12-volt DC PowerPoint. This one has the keyless entry and go system with the factory remote start. Your final piece to the cold weather group. Up here you just have some map lights. Nothing really special. Some lights in the ceiling for when you open the doors. Now we'll take a quick look at the back seats, and then we'll do a final walk around. Back seats have that mesh, premium vinyl, and cloth seats as well. You do get cup holders in the center console. Two of that. The latch child safety systems, all-weather formats back here. And you do get two USBs and two USB Cs. Kind of hard to see, but the USB Cs are on top, and then the USBs are on the bottom, PowerPoints.  You can just slide it right in. You get the blue stitching on the doors, and you do have the child safety locks there as well. Four-wheel disc brakes standard on the Cherokee, and we're going to do one more full walk around on the Jeep Cherokee. Once again, notice the LED headlamps, the LED running lights, the LED fog lights, very bright. And I would personally like to thank you for checking out the video today, and hopefully you learned a little bit about the Latitude Plus, got to see the vehicle in natural lighting, and have more confidence that you're purchasing the right vehicle for you. And to see more pictures of this Jeep or one of our other 450 new and used cars, trucks, SUVs, minivans, Wranglers, half tons, three-quarter tons, one tons, Cherokees, grand Cherokees, you name it, we got it. Go to our website, www.summitauto.com. Full pictures and descriptions of every single vehicle from two locations, all at summitauto.com. And if you'd like to check out more HD videos, you can go to youtube.com slash summitauto. Remember to like, subscribe, and share on this video and all the videos that you see there. In fact, in a second, you will see a link to subscribe to our YouTube channel on your left, a link to more Jeep and Jeep Cherokee videos like this one on your right. If you've not been to our website on the bottom link to this vehicle on our website, click those, check us out. And we really look forward to helping you with this brand new 2020 Jeep Cherokee Latitude Plus in blue shade pearl coat with the four wheel drive and the V6. Thanks again.


Welcome, everyone, to the International Archives Day panel that we're having here. It's hosted at San Jose State University School of Information. The title of our panel today is National Treasures, Preserving and Providing Access to Cultural Heritage. So a big thank you to SJSU School of Information for hosting the panel, and then also to the International Council on Archives for hosting International Archives Day. And as a quick reminder for social media if you'd like to post during this session on about this panel or about other events for International Archives Day, use hashtag IAD18 so that we can all catch up with each other and see what the conversation is. So in this panel discussion, we have researchers from the International Directory of National Archives or IDNA who are going to share insights from their research on archives around the world and the national treasures that those archives govern, preserve, and share. So I'm going to go ahead and introduce our panelists. I'm going to turn on my camera real quick to say hello. Hi there. So I'm Elise Donovan-Jones. I'm a recent graduate from the School of Information at San Jose State University. I got my MLIS as well as an advanced certificate in digital assets management. I'm also a virtual world librarian and the assistant director at the Community Virtual Library in Second Life. And before I graduated, I was a researcher for IDNA, the International Directory of National Archives, and I was also a researcher, a graduate research assistant for the InterParis Trust Project, which is another really great international project. And I'll introduce our other panelists. So first we have Tracy, Tracy Mitchell. She is from Los Angeles, California, and she has a bachelor's degree in history from UCLA. She's an MLIS student at SJSU's iSchool, and her focus is on archival practices. She hopes to apply her skills in an academic or special library setting. We also have Angie Conroe here with us. She has a bachelor's degree in anthropology from the University of Montana. And her interest is in genealogy and archival records, and that's something that inspired her to join the IDNA research team. And she is also currently an iSchool student at San Jose State University. And then our last panelist is Faiza Jahan-Shiri, and she is very passionate about saving world memories and preserving cultural heritage for future generations through providing universal access to worldwide national archives. So she also was one of the researchers for IDNA, and she also recently earned her MLIS from the School of Information. Okay, so I'm going to tell you a little bit about the International Directory of National Archives. That's where we got all of this information. We're all researchers for it. And so the directory, it's going to provide information about 195 countries who are recognized by the UN. And there's going to be three additional countries that we deemed worth including as separate countries because they have established national archives as well of their own. So that's Northern Ireland, Scotland, and Taiwan. Those are the three who they're not technically recognized by the United Nations as separate entities, but they have national archives. And so it's going to include history of the national archives of those countries, the 195 countries plus the additional three. With they'll have a brief history of the archives, some information about leadership and governance. So like who directs the archives, for example, how to contact and visit the archives and what types of materials are being held there. So that's just kind of a glimpse of the information that is reflected in the National Archives, the International Directory of National Archives publication. And it's going to be useful to archivists, historians, researchers, and institutions that are looking for information about National Archives and that might be interested in traveling to the archives. And it also will serve as a snapshot of the state of practices of National Archives today. We have images here of our editors for the IDNA, which Dr. Pat Franks who is also joining us today and Dr. Anthony Bernier, they're also SJSU faculty. And I have an image of the cover on this slide for the book. It's slated for publication mid-summer. It should be out before the Archives and Records Conference that the Society of American Archivists will be at, which is awesome. It'll be in August and D.C. is where that conference is. And also I just wanted to kind of mention that the images on this slide I got from our blog. So the IDNA project, idnaproject.org has a blog and let me go ahead and paste in. I'll go ahead and type it in for you. IDNAproject.org has a blog and we have a lot of the students that did research for it have written articles about their research. And so you can learn a lot more about it there as well. OK, so we'll go ahead and get started with the panel. We're going to start with these three main questions. We will ask each of our panelists the three questions and then they'll go ahead and they'll answer for us one at a time. And so the first person who will answer these questions is Angie. And I'm going to ask how does the National Archives that you researched for IDNA govern? How does it preserve memory and cultural heritage? And how does it provide access? So you can go ahead and answer for us, Angie. I'll go back to your slide. Thank you, Elise. The Danish National Archives operates under the Ministry of Culture in accordance with the National Archives Act number 1050. The archives fulfill five primary objectives. First, to ensure the preservation of records of historical value to the citizens and authorities. Second, to ensure the proper disposal of public records of no preservation value. Third, to make records available to citizens and authorities. Four, to guide citizens and authorities on how to use the records. And five, to carry out research and disseminate the knowledge of the research results. Preserving the collective memory of the Danes is fundamental to the mission and vision of the Danish National Archives. The National Archives supervise and mentor the state archives in order to ensure the proper storage of public data. And they oversee the transfer of files to the archives. This applies to government authorities, the Danish National Church, and can sometimes be applied to businesses or other organizations as well. The archives provide access in person through one of their four reading room locations. The physical archives consist of the state archives as well as four provincial archives with their main headquarters located in Copenhagen. The archives keep an electronic register of all visitors. Therefore, visitors must register to be given physical access. Upon arrival, visitors must also show photo ID and scan their Danish health insurance card. And for non-Danish visitors, a temporary guest card will be provided instead. In addition to physical access, the archives host a comprehensive digital infrastructure through their website. The National Archives online catalog called DAISY allows users to not only search the archives holdings, but also to pre-order documents for use in the reading rooms. All digital copies of records, which include parish records, census records, et cetera, are available through their archival online database. And they also host a Danish demographic database, which is helpful in searching for individuals or families across different sources. Great for genealogists. Online visitors can access these databases freely online without registering. However, if they want to order copies of records, such as ones that may have not been digitized yet, they would need to set up a user profile to do so. Thank you, Elise. Thanks, Angie, that's great. And I love that you mentioned genealogy and the types of records that are held because I know in some of the archives that I had studied, they explicitly stated that they did not hold those records. And so it's really interesting to see the way that different National Archives have different priorities and have different ways of preserving their nation's culture. So that's absolutely fascinating. So we'll go ahead and move on to Faiza. And Faiza, I'm gonna go ahead and ask you the same questions. How does the National Archives govern? How does it preserve memory and cultural heritage? And how does it provide access? You can go ahead, Faiza, when you're ready. Thank you, Elise. Hello, everyone. As you know, thanks to new advancement in digital technology, there is an increasing public awareness about cultural heritage preservation. And almost all world countries now pay special attention to their National Archives by means of implementing international standards for archives and records administration, joining international archives associations, collaborating with other countries' National Archives to provide universal access to archival materials and by sharing information about their national treasures to researchers and the general public. However, due to many factors such as access to technology, the economic or political factors, every National Archives organizational structure is different. Each of the countries I researched for the IDNA publication governs their archives uniquely different. Again, depending on the physical structure, access to technology, government policies, et cetera, they each have developed their own way to organize their archival records and preservation strategies or how they provide public access to the archives. For example, the organizational structure of the National Archives of Egypt with its amazing antiquity presents a far more complicated archive organization to govern compared to the United Arab Emirates Archives that is as modern and advanced as they come in this digital age. On the same level of complexity with Egypt, the Central Archives of Italy that occupies 110 kilometers of shelves over 20,000 square meters is governed systematically different throughout the total of 103 provincial archives that are located throughout Italy and then they're all linked to the Central Archives in Rome. But with all these differences, one common focus you can find among all National Archives is on their digitization projects and expanding their digitized holdings so that hundreds of rare manuscripts, maps, historic publications and documents be made available to global researchers. Thank you. Thank you, Faiza. Yes, that's wonderful. And I also, in my research, definitely the digitization that was a big deal and I noticed that there were a lot of places partnering with other countries to make sure that their items get digitized and so that it's absolutely fascinating. And we'll go ahead and move to Tracy who will answer the same questions and I'll go ahead and I'll reiterate them for everyone. So we have, how does the National Archives govern? How does the National Archives preserve memory and cultural heritage and how does it provide access? So go ahead, Tracy. Thank you, Elise. Today I'm talking about the Democratic Republic of Congo and their National Institute of Archives of Congo was established by a decree of judicial organization in 2015 and is a division of the Democratic Republic of Congo's Ministry of Culture and Arts. In its capacity as the technical and advisory body of archival activity, the repository organizes all documents and audio visual materials that are deemed to have historical, scientific, or cultural significance to the nation. The archive shares its facilities with the National Library in the capital city of Kinshasa and is responsible for the acquisition and conservation of materials, the drafting of preservation regulations and standards and the ongoing training and development of professional archivists. The archives themselves, the collection is classified chronologically. First, there are the archives of ancient realms and traditional empires, including the Kingdom of Congo, Luba and Cuba. Secondly, the archives of the independent state of Congo, which existed from 1885 to 1808. Thirdly, there are the archives of the institutions of the Belgian Congo from 1908 to 1960. Fourth is the 1960 archives of the Republican institutions. Then we have the archives of the Second Republic of Zaire. Sixth is the archives of the National Sovereign Conference, which occurred from 1991 to 1992. And finally, we have the archives of the institutions of the transition from 1990 to the present day. Even though the Democratic Republic of Congo is quite large, the archive is not classified by territory. And this is because three quarters of the collection, particularly items from the periods from 1885 to 1960 are just simple correspondence between the administrators of these territories. So it's not deemed necessary by the archive. In addition to preserving documents of value generated by governmental activities, the archive works with the government to promote good records management practices, encourage the adoption of standards throughout the government, and to provide for better protection of public and private archives. The archive also hosts public exhibits to increase awareness of Congo's history and the importance of retaining it. The archives works with other organizations to further define and set standards for the better preservation of the archive. For example, the Superior Council of Audiovisual Communication is the government body responsible for regulating media outlets in the country, such as newspapers, radio, and television. And the National Archive works together with that organization to promote the preservation of audio and visual media, which has proven to be a challenge since most media outlets there dispute the value of saving old newspapers or broadcasts. There's no official information regarding how to access records, but with the lack of a digital presence and the difficulties that I personally experienced with contacting the archive directly through email, this would indicate that the best means of access remains visiting the archive in person. I do wanna mention that the picture in the center there is of the directorous of the archive, Hermalinda Lanza, and she is there with David Leach, the secretary general of the ICA, excuse me, of the ICA, of which she's a longtime member. She's very active within the ICA, has been a proactive member of ICA's Africa program, and she's currently a member of the Forum for National Archivists. Thank you. Thanks, Tracy. I'm really glad that you mentioned the ICA, International Council on Archives, and that that was a helpful resource too. I know for quite a few of us in researching because a lot of places, even if they don't have a lot of information about their archives out there, many of them are active in ICA, and so I believe Tracy even joined ICA as part of her research for the International Directory of National Archives to be able to better communicate. So I'm really glad that you mentioned that because it was a great resource for us while we were doing our research for the IDNA. Okay, so we're gonna move on to the next portion of the panel where we have three topics that are a little bit more specific, that not only are they relevant to the theme of International Archives Day this year, but they also came up time and again while we were conducting research for IDNA. So the first topic is colonialism and post-colonialism, and I'm going to ask each of our researchers a more specific question about their countries and how colonialism has affected them. And so I'm going to start with Angie, and I'm gonna go ahead and move on to her slide. So Angie, you did a Denmark and the U.S. Virgin Islands was formerly the Danish West Indies. And so my question for you is how has colonialism affected archival management in the U.S. Virgin Islands? Thank you. Yes, so Denmark first successfully attempted to establish a colony in the West Indies in 1672. I'd like to note that at this point in time, Denmark's Royal Archive had already been in existence for 90 years. Even early on, diligent record keeping was practiced by colonial authorities both in the West Indies and in Denmark. The detailed records during this time period provide an invaluable resource for colonial life and slavery in the area. In 1997, the records of the Danish West Indies became part of the Memory of the World Register with UNESCO. As early as the mid-1800s, the Danes noted the challenge of preserving the documents of the colony. Shortly after the archives law of 1889, which established the Danish National Archives as the central archival authority, Denmark decided to begin transferring records from the islands back to Copenhagen despite opposition from local municipal offices. This was at least in part due to a lack of proper storage facilities and inclement weather, which was beginning to take its toll on the records. They began with entries created prior to 1848, so pre-emancipation. This transfer of records continued until 1902 with the second attempt to sell the islands to the United States. And the United States and Denmark did not end up striking a deal on the islands until 1916 during the midst of the First World War. And the islands officially exchanged hands in 1917. Although there was a clause in place regarding the transfer of archival records with the sale, the United States did not initially make the records a priority. In fact, the United States did not yet have a central archival authority in place, thus in 1919, after being petitioned by the Danish Historical Societies, Denmark sent an archivist to the Virgin Islands to negotiate bringing back some of the records to Denmark. The United States Navy, being the acting governing body in the Virgin Islands at the time, had more pressing issues, such as poor sanitation and public mortality to resolve and therefore allowed the Danish archivists to take whatever he felt necessary. It wasn't until after the National Archives and Records Administration was established in the 1930s that the United States sent their own archivists to examine the remaining records held in the Virgin Islands. The archivist also selected records to relocate to the National Archives in Washington, D.C. for safekeeping. Again, local municipal councils in the islands initially opposed the transfer of records, however they were persuaded otherwise. The United States continued to accession records from the Virgin Islands up until 1959, at which point, record keeping was then left to the local governments to manage. Both the Danish and American archivists had noted the poor condition of the archives on the islands, including lack of proper storage facilities, bug infestations and overall deterioration of the records. Thus, for nearly 100 years, between the mid-1800s and mid-1900s, both governments were concerned about the worsening condition of the records. So it's understandable that both archival authorities would want to properly store and preserve these documents. However, in doing so, the transfer of records to two different countries over the course of a century has essentially left the Virgin Islanders with little to no access to their own historical records. The arbitrary way in which the records were divided between the two countries also complicates matters. There's no clear timeframe or cutoff date for records kept by each country. And additionally, some collections are divided between the two governing bodies. As custodians of the records, both Denmark and the United States have a duty to make these documents available to the citizens of the islands in accordance with the treaty agreement, which acknowledges that the inhabitants have the right to obtain copies of the records. And coming up later, I'll be talking about what Denmark is currently doing to fulfill that obligation. Thank you. Thank you, Angie. So I'm gonna go ahead and move on to FISA, sorry. And FISA did a bit of work on quite a few countries, including Morocco. And so FISA, my question for you regarding colonialism is how does post-colonialism affect governance of records that were created during colonialism? Yeah, yes, Alice, thank you. Yeah, one of the national archives I researched for the IDNA Book Project was Morocco. The newly established National Archives of Morocco provides a great example of how the post-colonial Morocco is trying to build its national archives despite the effects of colonialism. For instance, it is interesting to know that even though the National Archives of Morocco was established in 2007, the formal operation began in 2011, the delay was due to the fact that only 40% of Moroccan national heritage documents stayed behind after French left Morocco in 1956. The National Archives of Morocco has been working on compiling all the records that belongs to this history, including records from the period of the French protectorate in Morocco that were taken by the French when they left in 1956. But this is no easy task since these precious documents which include military and diplomatic archives are scattered in various parts of France. Therefore, the archives of Morocco currently is primarily useful for historians studying the French protectorate. The archives though provide some guidance to researchers as to what sort of protectorate records remain in Morocco and which are housed in French archives. That's all I have on this subject. Thank you, Faiza. So I'm gonna go ahead and move on to Tracy who also has some interesting information about colonialization that she came across in her research and I actually, she did Africa and I did quite a few places in Africa also. And so it's very interesting the way that not only, I knew about a lot of the African information but the Virgin Islands also was very interesting. So Tracy, my question for you, you studied the Congo. So how has this, sorry, what effect has the repatriation of documents had on the national archives in the Congo? Well, an audit of the DRC's National Archive done by a scholar named Bob Billy Boteco in 2012 showed that the archive was in a really dire state at that time. While there were also internal factors at play, the history of the Belgian occupation of Congo and the subsequent repatriation of the bulk of the archival documents of that period are also a factor in the disorder experienced by the archive. In fact, that's why the building pictured in this slide is the Belgian National Archive in Belgium because this is where the majority of the existing documents regarding Congo's period of Belgian occupation reside. In 1885, King Leopold turned Congo into the world's only private colony and he declared himself proprietor. He was also responsible for regulating the management of the archives there through the office of the secretary general of the government. Upon his death in 1909, he declared that the state archives should be burned. It took eight days to destroy them all. This was an atypical choice for a ruler to make regarding the disposition of their legacy, but perhaps the fact that 10 million Congolese were murdered during his reign was a factor in his choice. In 1960, independence from Belgium was declared and Patrice Lumumba became the first prime minister of the New Democratic Republic. And up until that time, the administrative machinery of King Leopold II had done an efficient job of managing the archives. But with the change in leadership, Belgium launched a initiative dubbed Operation Archives and most all documents relating to the entire history of Belgian administration of affairs and Congo were moved to Belgium. This procedure had been developed earlier when Belgium left Indonesia and therefore because they were practiced, it was quite efficient. However, some documents were left behind and during the early years of the New Republic, responsibility was for maintaining these records shifted from one government agency to another. Of course, this meant that with each change, a different value was placed upon the items in the collection. The result is that over the years, many documents were destroyed. Sometimes it was done to erase the evidence of the horrific past that the DRC had experienced. Sometimes it was simply because the documents were deemed a dusty nuisance. After Prime Minister Lumumba was assassinated in 1999, the nation continued to go through many incarnations and during that period, government ministers who were caught up in the reshuffles often destroyed documents to hide indiscretions and competence or corruption. And even today, one of the obstacles facing Directorist Madam Lanza has been that the archive is associated with the preservation of government documents and therefore petty bureaucracy. It's difficult to convince the population which has dealt with so much turmoil for so many generations that the preservation of these records has a legitimate function. In turn, this has caused difficulties also in the recruiting and training of new archivists which has had a significant impact on the archive. Now, in many ways, we can contrast this with the DRC's sister nation across the river, the Republic of Congo, whose archive is literally across the river in Brazzaville. The French were not necessarily as fastidious about maintaining records during the period of occupation and left many documents behind when they exited the region. And these documents play a major role in their national archives today. While the government has also evolved over the years in the Republic of Congo, they've seen nothing like the chaos that has plagued the DRC. And on the whole, the Republic of Congo has more access to technology today, and the archive has been included in UNESCO proposals to fund research projects, which has been very helpful. Now, we all know that correlation is not causation, would be way overly simplistic to relate the state of a national archive to the state of a nation. However, the ICA's position on the matter of repatriation is that archives are the memory of nations and that the role that they play in helping a society forge its identity is crucial. At the very least, the disposition and repatriation of national archives is critical because the people with access to a record of the past, no matter how horrific it may be, have a better chance of making sense of that past. That's it. Thank you, Tracy, that was wonderful. We're gonna go ahead and move on to our next topic, which in a lot of ways ties into some of what we heard about, certainly in the Congo. Our next topic is disasters, not just natural disasters, but also man-made disasters. And so certainly war would fall under that. And also in our modern era, malware, any sort of hacking or other electronic issues certainly fall into disasters and disaster recovery. And that sort of thing. And so our, I have a question in this category for Faiza. And Faiza, can you talk about a few examples of national archives that were affected by natural and man-made disasters? Yes, of course. Thank you, Elise. A good example of how political factors can affect the very national archive, govern their records, would be the National Archives of Iran, which is in fact one of the seven oldest countries on earth. And it is home to the oldest tangible and intangible memories of human civilization. But unfortunately limiting government policies and international sanctions deprives the archives from the international publicity it deserves, prevents the archives from joining international associations and to participate in the ongoing international efforts to modernizing the government's preservation and access to national archives around the globe. Furthermore, the restricted governing policies deter international researchers to visit the archives. And to add more, what is extremely saddening to me is to see how the lack of proper governance of the archives over the past few decades has resulted in loss or illegal transfers of Iranian tangible and intangible national treasures. And I have three other examples from my research I can discuss here. The countries of Iraq, Afghanistan and Syria also provide great examples. These national archives present an example of how political and economic conditions, war and natural and man-made disaster can affect the way these national archives govern, preserve and provide access to their public records. For example, the Iraq National Archives was burned to the ground in 2003 and the sectarian violence and war on ISIS has caused a huge setback in the reconstruction efforts. Despite these setbacks, the Iraq National Archives has been able to recover about 40% of rare copies of the Ottoman era documents, but war and instability in Iraq continues to be detrimental to this progress. And also Afghanistan, Afghanistan National Archives present another example of how war, political and economic factors can affect the way the Afghanistan National Archives govern and preserve and provide access to some of the oldest and most beautiful miniatures and manuscripts in that region of the world. Also Syrian National Archives holds a rare and unique collection of documents and manuscripts and photographic images from the Ottoman era. But the current conditions in Syria won't allow for the archives to provide any type of access to these records. So those are the examples I could provide. Thanks. Thank you, Faiza. Our next topic is technology and this is also our final topic and Angie and Tracy will be giving us some information about this for their countries. And so I'm going to ask Angie first. She discussed the Virgin Islands for us and how they were previously the Danish West Indies and so this is in that vein. How is Denmark using technology to reconcile its responsibility to provide access to records from the former Danish West Indies? Well, in 2017, this marked the 100th anniversary of the sale of the Danish West Indies to the United States. To commemorate the occasion, the Danish National Archives spent four years preparing to bring original records from the colony online. The Danish National Archives acknowledging that these records have been largely inaccessible except to those able to research in Denmark wanted everyone to have access to the records regardless of their physical location. The National Archives hold approximately 1300 linear meters of material on the colony which about two thirds of that originated on the islands. More than 99% of the collection has been digitized which amounts to approximately five million digital images. The remainder of the collection is unfortunately in too poor of condition to be scanned. More than 150 volunteers around the globe have participated in transcribing and tagging these records to help make them easier to search both in Danish and in English. And more than 130,000 entries have been transcribed so far. The records officially became available on March 1st of 2017 through the project's website www.virgin-island-history.org. The site is complete with several detailed search guides which are also conveniently available in English to assist the researchers. In addition to searching the collection, the website provides a comprehensive history of the islands helping to contextualize the stories behind the records. Back to you Elise. Thank you Angie. I'm really glad you mentioned that the records are available in both English and in Danish. I think that's really, really is helpful for researchers as well. My next question and this is also the last question that I will be asking is for Tracy. So this is actually kind of a two-parter. First, I would like to know how has the state of technology affected archives in the Congo? And then what is the future outlook for technological advancement in the region? So how is it currently and what's the outlook? Well, unlike the National Center for Archives and Documentation in the Republic of Congo which has a website and its catalog listing is available online, the DRC's National Archive currently has no online finding aids or search engines available. There's no website, there's no social media presence and no digitized documents. This makes sense when one considers that the DRC has a human development index of 0.239 ranking at 171 out of 172 rated countries. The human development index was actually developed by the UN. It's a summary measure of average achievement and key dimensions of human development such as lifespan, access to education, standard of living. So needless to say, there's not a whole lot of technology available in the region. Very few people there use or have access to the internet. In fact, fewer than 10% of local businesses have websites at all to promote their services or goods. Mobile phones are available and their use is growing across the country and in fact it's one of the most widely used means of digital communication there. But because of these technological challenges, research institutes, universities and industries such as the archive are actually isolated from one another and therefore there's a lack of cooperation among these sectors. However, there is some rudimentary technology. People in urban areas do have televisions but radio is the main news source, particularly in rural areas, although not all parts of the country even have access to a radio signal. The reason for the popularity of radio is that there are over 400 local languages spoken within the nation, within the country. So local radios are able to communicate with people through their local language, provide local news and in fact have been involved significantly in this construction of peace among different tribes and things like that through special local programming. And that's why the archive does so much local outreach to try to unify the country in terms of getting behind the archive. As for the future, UNESCO is focusing on development in the region of improved access to digital radio technology while that seems like a pretty basic priority for them to have. The expectation is that by improving the access to digital radio technology, that'll serve as a gateway to the development of further and more sophisticated technology in the future. Currently, there are also plans to install a national optical cable system. This would improve telecommunications significantly. There's also a major telecom company in the region, Gillott, which had just announced that it'll be using Cisco to upgrade the POP system. This is definitely going to lead to improved communications between the different sectors of research and science and industry. And it will also simplify the ability to transmit digital documents. So the hope is that all of these improvements that are being projected will have a significantly positive impact on the archive of the DRC sooner rather than later. Thank you. Thank you, Tracy. And I'm really glad that you mentioned UNESCO, Faiza mentioned UNESCO earlier as well. And that's another organization similar to the ICA that was really helpful in my research. They've done a lot to help countries who aren't able to do a lot for themselves right now, both in digitization and just in preserving items. And so that was another great starting point for me when I was having trouble finding information about a country was to check out UNESCO's website because sometimes they would have big collections or they would be working with an institution in the country. So that was really helpful to mention that. And I'm gonna go ahead and we can move on to our question and answer portion. A huge thank you to everyone who came to participate. And I do have an image here again of the cover for the International Directory of National Archives, which will be out again, it should be before August of this year. If you want to learn more about the IDNA project, you can go to idnaproject.org. We have, I mentioned before, we have a blog there that a lot of the different researchers have put information up on some of the different stuff that they found they've uncovered while researching archives. I know I have one or two blog posts up there myself on information that I had found. And you can also contact Pat Franks, who again is here today, if you have additional questions about this panel or any questions that you ask but weren't answered today or that you just didn't get a chance to ask or perhaps if you're listening to the recording. So I'm gonna go ahead and stop for a moment and our participants, I believe you have the ability to take the mic. You can also go ahead and paste a question into chat. And same with the panelists, if you have any questions for each other, please feel free to chime in. While we're waiting, I actually have a question for Dr. Franks, if you want, you can either take the mic but you can also type into chat. I know that you as an editor have a really interesting perspective on the International Directory of Archives. And the different topics that we talked about here today. And I was just kind of curious if a lot of what we talked about today was reflected in what you have read of the International Directory of National Archives, if you saw similar patterns while you were reading. Again, it could just be a yes or no answer but I would love your insight on that. You know, I was listening to the presentations. I was wishing that we had each person who actually did research do a mini review of their own country. I found what was being presented today fascinating and different from what we're going to have in the directory. Much of it is similar, of course, but one of the things that I've noticed is that the state of the National Archives in each of these countries changes constantly that what we will reflect with our work here is the state of the National Archives at the time that the work was reviewed. We updated some right through this spring and I had a note from the publisher yesterday that they had sent the document off to printing, which means it will be out in mid-July for sure. And but at that time, what's going through my mind is that, oh, I wish that I could ask each one of you to do a presentation similar to what we had today. For example, the information about the communications, the state of communication technology in the DRC that Tracy shared was fascinating and that would not be something that we would include in the book. We were looking at technology status but we were not looking at the peripherals at the other communication facilities that might be available that are going to bring anything to those countries. So a lot of what was presented today was new to me as well and really fascinating. Oh, that's wonderful. Yes, I agree. That would be really fun to do a kind of write-up similar to what we did today on the different countries. And I do agree also on ICTs, those information communication technologies. I know in some of my research for InterParis Trust, the different project from this one, I had found Tracy had mentioned cell phones being a big deal in a lot of the third world countries, a lot of places in Africa. And I definitely saw that come up. And I see Faiza has raised her hand. Go ahead, Faiza. Yes, thank you. I don't know if probably Dr. Franks would be able to answer this or not at this time. My question is about the digital version of the IDNA book. Will that be something that we could look forward or know it's still too early? I don't have any word on that. I know that they had in the past put it out more as a PDF version similar to something you would read on your computer or on your e-reader, for example, but I don't have any specific information yet. So I'll share that with everybody through our email group when I get more information. Wonderful. And I'll bet that's something too that would probably, especially if we knew that it was coming out and actually for publication, I'll bet that would be on the website too. That's a good reason to... Exactly. Yeah, I think that you can follow it with RSS feed. I believe our blog especially. So if anybody wants to keep up, get updated that way, that's a really, really great way to stay up to date. I will, I'm gonna go ahead. I'd like to wait just for another minute to see if anyone else raises their hand or has any questions. Oh, I see Angela just typed one. Angela Osborn asks, do you have any online resources to suggest for those new to archival work? That's a great question. I actually do have a couple that I'm gonna, I'll paste in that, Faiza actually had recommended for, specifically for National Archives work and related to cultural heritage. So I'm gonna paste that in. But I will let, I don't know if anyone, any of our other panelists have one or two resources that they found really, really helpful for research. I'm guessing, is it for research or are you thinking Angela for actually working in an archives and conducting the work? For looking into other archives or for like hosting collections and things like that? Actually working in archives, okay. Yeah, that's something for the IDNA project, there might not be as much that we have because a lot of it involved us researching the organizational websites and things like that rather than going into actually learning the different resources. I've definitely taken some archival classes and I would highly recommend, I'm not sure if you're in the United States, SAA, the Society of American Archivists would be a big one, but there are other organizations like that and I'm gonna pull up those, some of the links that I have because that might be helpful. And Dr. Franks has a lot of records management certifications and is actually the head of the iSchools MARA program.  In the United States, I was just going to say the same thing you did, the Society of American Archives, do you belong to that? What they have is a terrific website and they provide training online as well as around the country and they have a glossary of terms, but they also have publications and their publications are very good. So take a look at the Society of American Archives. If you work in government, I also belong to Nagara. It's for government archivists and records managers and through Nagara, we have a lot of training for a, you'll see for a local government certificate which is not something you may need, but as part of that, there's training again online. The webinars are fantastic as well as training in different regions of the country that you might go to. So regional conferences more than anything, but it is Nagara. I was also thinking about the courses that Elise mentioned. We have our syllabi online. I don't have the link to that right now here, but if you take a look at some of the courses that have to do with preservations, digital curation, you'll see reading lists on the syllabi and the syllabi for every one of those courses is available online for each semester that we teach. There we go. Okay, Elise is so much faster with these links than I. Thank you. Go through the, yes, through the website and look for the syllabi and if you have a problem with that, you see my email there. You could just send me a note and I'll send you the direct link to those too. Oh, that's, okay. The second one is for the records conference this summer and it's going to be an excellent one because what you have there is a combination of several groups. So Nagara and SAA will both be there and I believe members of the Council of State Archives will be there as well. And it's in Washington, D.C. So it's sure to involves at least one reception at the National Archives. I know they usually do that. So it's a terrific conference to attend. Oh, you're welcome. Thanks, Pat. And I just got a reminder from Faiza to make sure that I posted the links that she had provided because I will go ahead and do that before we leave. Oh, thank you, Angie. Angie went ahead and posted the course syllabus links. So these two links that I just did, one is for UNESCO and actually, Faiza, since we have a couple minutes, if you'd like, you can go ahead and kind of introduce exactly what those links are if you're up for it, the two that I just posted into the chat. Oh, I have, I did not really go into details about these efforts by UNESCO and the IFLA, but that's okay because you can click on the links and read all about the stuff that we all talked about today. Thank you. And you heard about UNESCO, who funds special projects in archives. IFLA, IFLA is a library association as well. So mainly library information and archives information, that's a fantastic international organization and our school always has representatives at those conferences, annual conferences as well. Thanks, Pat and thanks, Faiza. So let's see, I'm looking through to make sure that there aren't any other hands raised. If there are any questions after noon and we have to end the session, we can still stay on for a few minutes to answer your question. But as Pat mentioned, you can always send her an email and please do feel free to visit ideadaproject.org. There are lots of great blog posts there of just kind of fun stuff that we found in our research. And then also it'll be a good way to get a kind of an overview of the project and of the people who researched on it, who contributed to it. And one of the things I wanted to point out is that there are blog posts of interviews of four of the national archivists. We had two representatives go to Mexico to a meeting of the ICAA in November and they interviewed four national archivists, I think from Australia, the UK, the UAE and Canada. So those are very interesting interviews to read as well.