Welcome to the fourth meeting of the Covid-19 recovery committee in 2021. We have received apologies this morning from Jim Fairlie, MSP, who is unwell. The first agenda item this morning is a decision to take item 5 on the consideration of evidence to be heard in private. The committee is also invited to consider its work programme and selection of advisers in private at future meetings. Are members agreed? We are agreed to take agenda item number 5 in private. Moving on to agenda item number 2, vaccine certification. This morning, we are taking evidence from a range of stakeholders on vaccine certification. I would like to welcome to the meeting Neil Doncaster, chief executive, Scottish professional football league and member of the Scottish football's Covid-19 joint response group, Gavin Stevenson, the Scottish licensed trade association, and Dr Katrina McMillan, convener of the health and medical law sub-committee and the law society of Scotland. The Scottish Government has announced its intention to introduce a vaccine certification system on 1 September. The Scottish Government's intention is for the scheme to be put in place by 1 October. The purpose of today's meeting is to take evidence from stakeholders on the proposed scheme. Some of the details of the scheme are still to be worked out, so we intend to listen to your views and to feed them back to the Scottish ministers directly in our regular evidence sessions with them. Any issues that you raise today will inform our scrutiny on relevant legislation that is brought forward to give effect to the scheme. Your input today is very valuable to the committee. I wonder if I could start by asking the first question. I wonder if witnesses, if they could tell me what they think are the key issues for this committee to consider in scrutinising the implementation of the proposed scheme. Could I start with Dr Katrina McMillan? Thank you convener. Good morning and thank you for the opportunity to give evidence to the committee today. In managing and recovering the pandemic, we have to think about the management instead of the virus. In light of that, we understand that the Government proposes to bring the regulations forward for mandatory vaccination certification scheme on 1 October. I will briefly go over some of the key themes and issues that we have highlighted in our evidence. First, we note that the regulations for the proposed scheme are likely to be subjected to the made affirmative procedure. That has been necessitated by the pandemic, but any regulations must still be subject to appropriate scrutiny and review. Some of the areas of law that are engaged by the proposed scheme are uncertain in developing at the moment. When the nature and scope of the scheme becomes more apparent, so might the extent of the legalities that are engaged by that. A few things that we have touched on in our evidence. A vaccine certification scheme would potentially engage, for example, human rights law in a number of ways. Those need to be kept front and centre going forward. The necessity and proportionality of the measures that are taken here are key to any steps taken to certification and must be kept in mind when it comes to any proposed regular review. Any certification scheme must also be mindful of the quality and discrimination law and the groups that may be disproportionately affected by such a scheme, and further due to the sensitive nature of health data that may be processed by a scheme. It is also important to carefully consider the implications for privacy and data protection law. Generally, I want to say that the key to good lawmaking in this area is clarity, consistency and accountability, as it is with lawmaking in any area. There is some scope for uncertainty here, as we have noted. We have suggested that it is important that the scheme is very clear on definitions of key terms, such as nightclubs, in order to give certainty to both those acquiring certifications and the various sectors that are involved. I will leave it there for now. Good morning. From the Scottish Licence Trades Association's perspective, there are a number of potentially problematic issues that have not yet been worked through in terms of the scheme. As we are engaging with the Scottish Government and civil servants on those topics, it would be safe to say that the very tight timeline for implementation and the late notice in terms of the clarity of the scheme are likely to present some fairly material challenges. On the specific issues that we think would require further scrutiny, certainly the financial and economic impact of the scheme and the key differences between the scheme and those that have been applied in other countries would be a topic that is certainly raising some challenges. The definition of nightclubs and the scope of the types of premises that are to be included, the current working definition of that is being discussed by the Scottish Government at the moment, might include as many as 2,000 premises across Scotland, rather than just 100 or so of the genuine nightclubs. Market distortion and unfair competition, because no matter where a line is drawn, if we are including some types or some sections of hospitality premises and excluding others, it seems inevitable that there will be a significant movement of a proportion of customers from one type of premises to another. Discrimination and equity, clearly from the vaccine update data, we are able to see that there are significant differences in vaccination rates between different groups, both socioeconomic and ethnic groups in society. A potential outcome of the scheme is that business owners could be effectively asked to refuse entry to some groups of people at significantly higher rates than others. Resources and risks, we are aware that there is a severe staffing shortage throughout the hospitality sector, as in many other sectors, but the shortage is particularly acute with door stewards. As we are looking to control entry into premises, it is the case that the door steward resources simply do not exist to create any significant expansion of stewarding capability and capacity across the sector. Let us not forget that even if we just talk about the 100 nightclubs, we are potentially talking about a crowd equivalent to Ibrox or Hamden Park every Friday and Saturday night across those 100 venues. To magic up that stewarding capacity would be virtually impossible with 14 days notice. Finally, communication. I think that this goes back to definition. At the moment, the express communication from Scottish Government and the First Minister is that it will apply to nightclubs but not to wider hospitality. Given that the current definition would include the majority of late opening pubs and bars, certainly thousands of venues across Scotland, rather than just 100, there is a serious potential for miscommunication to cause very large issues the first few weeks of policy implementation, given that the majority of people will not expect and have anticipated their need to get a vaccine passport to get into a wide variety of premises types other than just nightclubs. I will leave that there for now and hopefully we can come back to some more detail later. Thank you. Thank you, Mr Stevenson. Can I now invite Neil Donkester? Thank you, convener. Good morning, everyone. It's a real privilege to be invited to give evidence to the Covid-19 recovery committee this morning. Now that Parliament has voted to introduce vaccine passports, my focus today will be all about the practical challenges that Scottish football faces in working with vaccine passports and hopefully to suggest ways in which vaccine passports can work in a practical, workable and pragmatic way. One of the contributors has already pointed to the very tight timescales involved in implementation in a couple of weeks' time. There is a real need for clubs to plan for what are potentially very dramatic effects to the way in which fans will enter Stadia. Our view is that if it is to apply to crowds of over 10,000—that should be 10,000—expected rather than potential crowds, it certainly seems clear that everyone accepts now that spot-checking is the way forward here. We believe that in phase 1, when clubs will be getting to grips with how this is rolling out, there shouldn't be any fixed percentages or numbers that clubs should have to spot-check. It is important that the introduction of vaccine passport-checking is carried out in such a way that there are no bottlenecks. If there is delays to fans getting into Stadia, there is clearly the potential for unhappiness among fans and tempers to be raised. We are keen to work with the Scottish Government to ensure that the introduction of vaccine passports can be done in a safe and measured way and letting clubs work with their local safety advisory groups to work out the details as to how their own spot-checking schemes will work for their own stadium infrastructure. Particularly given the huge variation in IT infrastructure across Stadia, we believe very strongly that a visual check is the way forward here so that stewards can visually check what passports are presented to them rather than any insistence on a particular type of technological check, which clearly, in the timescales concerned, would be untried and untested. Thank you, Mr Donkaster. Your feedback is appreciated. Now, I'll ask the members—can I invite Murdo to ask a question? Thank you, thank you, convener, and good morning to the witnesses. I wonder if I could start off by asking a question to Neil Donkaster in relation to the statement that he's just given. You mentioned that we are looking at a very short timescale. The first weekend that that will apply will be the weekend of the second of October, which gives effectively two weeks from now. How realistic is it, do you think, for clubs to be able to bring measures in to deal with this when we at the moment have seemingly very little clarity as to what exactly will be required of them? Thank you, Mr Fraser. I think that it's for that very reason that I'm suggesting that clubs be allowed to manage this in a way that works for them and their own stadia and can be carried out in a proportionate way. You're right, I think, to point to that first weekend where we've got Aberdeen against Celtic, Rangers against Hibernium. Those are big games with very large crowds expected, and it's really important that in the first weekend where there is implementation of vaccine passport checking, there is a light-touch approach adopted so that we minimise inconvenience and disruption and ensure that there's as far as possible a smooth flow of fans into stadia. That's why my strong suggestion is that clubs be allowed to introduce spot checking in a way that suits them and their stadia. Okay, thank you for that response. It occurs to me that whatever system is put in place, it will require significant additional resource to be put in by clubs, for example in terms of additional stewarding. That will not in itself be easy because the requirement to recruit additional stewards at short notice at a time when we have significant issues with the labour market may be a significant challenge in itself. Do you know of any discussions that have taken place about that aspect of how stewards might be found, how they might be trained and, specifically, are you aware of any assessment that has been done of the additional costs to clubs should those measures be required? Yes, I think that they are very good questions. In terms of stewarding, as has already been pointed out, there is a real shortage of security staff and stewards within the market. Creating an out-of-cord, which is the only realistic way that we believe of implementing such a spot checking scheme, will clearly require a great many more stewards. I have had discussions with a number of the clubs who would be involved. They believe that the costs purely in terms of stewarding and infrastructure will be upwards of £5,000 per game, and that is before any technology costs. At the moment, it is actually very difficult to put a figure on that. There are significant costs per game that all clubs will be affected by that. Wherever you have a crowd of likely to be over 10,000, any such game will involve Scottish FFA and SPFL games as well. Those games will require a large amount of additional stewards. At the moment, it is not clear how easy it will be to find the stewards. The only certainty is that there will be considerable additional costs. Clearly, we are in dialogue with Scottish Government officials as to what extent there may be support for those additional costs. I have been contacted by individuals living in England and Northern Ireland who have season tickets for Scottish clubs and would hope to be travelling to Scotland in two weeks' time to attend a football match. However, as I understand it, as we currently stand, there is no technology proposed that allows those who have certification from outside Scotland to be permitted to access Scottish events. Have you got any clarity around that issue, or do you have any sense of how that is going to resolve itself? I think that you are right. It is one of the many unanswered questions. It is not clear how any technology under development will work with existing clubs' IT infrastructure. That is another reason why, in our view, a visual check is the way forward here rather than a reliance on technology that will be untried and untested. Certainly, it is an introduction on the first of October. I like such approach. Stewart is conducting a visual check of what is presented to them by fans. It gives the best chance for a smooth roll-out and introduction of the scheme on the first of October. I invite John Mason. I have a few points that have been raised. I can start with Mr Stevenson. You were laying it on pretty thick that this is going to be so impossible to do. The reality is that loads of other countries have got vaccine passports. I think that Greece started there in July, France, Switzerland and many others. They seem to have managed it. What is the big problem here? One of the biggest concerns that we look at here is that, where other countries have implemented vaccine passports, they appear to have done it with a significantly longer lead-in time rather than only presenting the final details to the general public and businesses perhaps a few days or a week before it is expected to be implemented. In addition to that, certainly from the examples that we have looked at, the vaccine passport schemes in those countries have been nearly universal in terms of the scope of types of premises that people were expected to get a vaccine passport to get into. It would certainly be the case that we have not seen examples where there would be significant confusion created by premises type and such a limited applicability. If we look at the French scheme, a vaccine passport to get into a restaurant, to get a cup of coffee in a cafe, to get into museums, cultural heritage sites, it is essentially universal. If you wish to do anything, you have to get one. Of course, that leads to take up of vaccine passports across wider society very quickly and the message is very clear. The proposal that we have currently seen for Scottish Government could literally see every other premises on a high street in terms of hospitality in late night sectors, where nearly identical premises may or may not have to have a pass to get in, and where the general public at the moment has been told that you only need a pass to get into a nightclub, because we know that about 95 per cent of the public do not go to nightclubs on a regular basis. In fact, they would need it on the current proposals to get into a majority of pubs, bars and, indeed, even some cultural spaces, and that has simply not, at this point, been communicated. Those would be the two major differences. I take your point that the wider it is, in a sense, the simpler it is. I think that my understanding would be that the idea was to be quite narrow so that it would affect less people, but I take your point if it is wider. Would you argue that it would be better to take a timeline, say midnight, and say that anything that is open after midnight, serving alcohol, you should have to have a certificate, not just nightclubs but pubs or restaurants or anything else? That type of approach would potentially make things clearer in some regards, but it would also make things more confusing in other regards. From a practical consideration, where you have a premises that might open at lunchtime and remain open until three in the morning, and there are many premises that do, we call them hybrid venues, but they could start with a food offer during the day and turn into a cocktail bar early evening and, in fact, a proper nightclub later on at night. However, the challenge then becomes that, if you have 500 people in this premises at 7pm, if you had a cut-off point, would you just look to check vaccine passports after that time? If so, people would simply come in before it. If you had to have vaccine checks, passport checks at all hours for that premises, what would you do about the lunch crowd that may expect to show up and just have lunch and not think that they are going to a nightclub? There are a number of fundamental difficulties where we are trying to to have a policy that is not clearly defined and that is not universal in terms of managing customer expectations and the uptake of vaccine passports in the general public. Okay, I mean, I still wonder if you are slightly overstating the case. I mean, lots of restaurants I go to, they throw out all the younger kids at a certain time, nine o'clock or ten o'clock or something like that. So, I mean, I think that these things can be done. Perhaps I can move on to Mr Don Caster. I think that one of your arguments was that football is mainly outdoors and therefore you wouldn't need certificates, but are you accepting now that we are going to have them? I mean, presumably to get to the football stadium most people are in public transport and within the stadium there's a fair bit of inside space where people are eating and going to the toilet and that kind of thing. I think that we have to be pragmatic and Parliament has now voted that vaccine passports will be introduced from 1 October and my focus is on ensuring that whatever has to be put in place by clubs and Scottish FA and ourselves is workable, practical and pragmatic and ultimately proportionate to the issues at hand. So, my focus is on ensuring that on 1 October and that weekend when we have the first games, those fans who come to those large games are not going to be unduly inconvenienced, there won't be bottlenecks and clubs are given the space and time to better system in is when we'd last had a cordon at a Scottish, now to a cordon at a Scottish football stadium was at Hamden Park for the Euros, but that was with months of planning to allow the physical infrastructure to be built and stewards to be recruited and a lot of test events beforehand to ensure that everything went smoothly. In this circumstance where clubs are having to, I believe that certainly one of the clubs that we've spoken to is only meeting with its local safety advisory group today with that group unable to furnish the club with details of what is required. Clearly, in the very short space of time that we have between now and 1 October, the clubs, ourselves, Police Scotland and the local safety advisory groups will need to work together to ensure that what is put in place is proportionate. A light touch approach for phase 1 of the introduction of the scheme seems the right way forward. Thank you. One football fan suggested to me that if he's a season ticket holder then there could be a one-off check with his vaccine for the whole season, and then he wouldn't have to be checked on up a second time. Is that kind of thing feasible? No, in most cases you'll see that physical cards, whether it be season books or tickets, can be passed from fan to fan, so it's very hard to see how that would work. It's also the case that a lot of the fans turning up to matches will not have smartphones, they may not even have a mobile phone, and we need to ensure that this system works for everyone attending games. We have an audience that is quite mature and many of them won't have the technology to enable them to show an app on a smartphone, so a visual check of whatever evidence it is that a fan brings by where the spot check is a proportionate way to introduce the scheme. Thanks for that. You were suggesting a visual check, but would that not make it even easier for somebody to just copy a QR code or that kind of thing? The point was made that you couldn't check between the passport of the certificate and the ticket for the game. Is that the case? So somebody could just copy and a lot of people use the same certificate? That's one of the concerns that exists around the introduction of any scheme. We need to ensure that we have a scheme, clearly the scheme is designed to encourage take-up of the vaccine amongst the Scottish population. Our priority is to ensure that whatever is put in place doesn't lead to bottlenecks outside the stadium. We have overwhelmingly brilliant, passionate fans, but it's inevitable that with literally tens of thousands of fans walking up to the stadium in the minutes before kick-off, it's very easy for those bottlenecks to be created if you're creating an out-of-cordon. We need to ensure that what we're not doing is inflaming tensions in the minutes before kick-off. Sadly, I'm a passionate fan, but my club does not get 10,000 fans, so there we go. Finally, for yourself, the question of spot-checking, I think you said that you didn't want a fixed percentage. Can you give any suggestion if it was spot-checking what kind of percentage of fans would be checked? That should be a matter of discussion between the club-concerned and the local safety advisory group. Those are the specialists who I have a good understanding of the stadium infrastructure. Police Scotland will be part of each local safety advisory group, and together with the club, they'll be best placed to put in place whatever percentages or numbers are deemed appropriate. My strong view is that, in phase 1 of the scheme, where we're rolling it out literally within a couple of weeks' time, we have a light-touch approach and enable clubs to let the system bed in. We create the incentive that the Scottish Government clearly wants to create for more people to take up the vaccine, but without creating a higher risk of problems at turnstiles. Thank you very much. I could move to the Law Society with Dr McMillan. I was interested in your paper and the whole concept of discrimination, and you suggested that there had been a case—I'm not even trying to pronounce it, but it involves the Czech Republic—where the courts had said that it was not discrimination and that it was legal to have passports or certificates or something along those lines. I think that that has particularly affected children. On the other hand, you are raising the point that it could be discrimination under the Equality Act, because certain groups have not been vaccinated. Can you tell us where you are with that, or is the law changing? Are we really uncertain? Yes, as I highlighted before, the law in this area is definitely evolving, and it has especially done so this year, with that case coming out of the Czech Republic. Unfortunately, there is not a categorical answer here, but, as we mentioned in our report, it is uncertain whether things such as anti-vaccine beliefs would be considered as a protected characteristic under the act. We note that, in other contexts, things such as vegetarianism have not been considered as protected in an employment context, but things such as ethical veganism have been considered as protected. Of course, we now know from that Czech Republic case that a critical stance to vaccination does not amount to a breach of rights under article 9, which is freedom of thought, belief and expression. The reason that we raise it also is that, again, while the extent to which regulations will engage equalities law is not clear, it is of note that certain groups who have lower vaccine uptake are protected by the Equality Act and, thus, may disproportionately be affected by the regulations. From a health point of view, we have got the same certain parts of the population who are not vaccinated are at greater risk. There is a good purpose, but you are saying that, despite the good purpose of encouraging people to get vaccinated, that could fall foul of some of the Equality Act. Yes, I think that there is potential there, but, as I said, the law is very much in developments and process at the moment. From a legal point of view, it would be tidier, neater and better if we just closed all the football stadia and closed everything at midnight, because that would be fair and treat everybody equally. From a legal perspective, that would be a better thing to do. I am not sure whether that is the case. I cannot give a categorical answer on that right now, but let me take that back to my colleagues. I thank you all that. Can I invite other members, Alex Rowley? I could ask Dr McMillan and, in terms of the way that the legislation is being brought forward, are you satisfied that the Government has set out very clearly the evidence, the science that sits behind what it is proposing, given that the public administration and constitutional affairs committee at Westminster concluded when they looked at this from the UK Government perspective that the scientific evidence was not there and that such a major step should require primary legislation. Are you satisfied, given that this has been rushed through, the Parliament was divided along political lines, are you satisfied that the evidence has been provided? Any schemes such as those require a basis in clear evidence. Any interference with things such as human rights or equality law should be no more than absolutely necessary. It is worth noting that it is potentially viable and less restrictive alternatives are not part of the proposed scheme, such as evidence of a negative test. As we mentioned in our response, clarification as to why those alternatives have been excluded would be welcome. Do you understand very clearly, do you believe that it is clear to the public what the objective of this legislation is, what it is that the Government thinks it is going to achieve? Is it clear that how it will measure the outcomes that it is trying to achieve, and have it brought forward the scientific evidence to back that up to demonstrate that this is the best way forward to achieve what it is, if you understand what it is trying to achieve? Yes. It is clear from what I have seen so far what is trying to be achieved by this scheme, and I understand that, because of the rapid implementation of the scheme, there are several key things such as definition times that need to be ironed out. As a lawyer, I cannot speak necessarily to the quality of evidence given however. I just assumed that a law society would want to ensure that legislation going through this Parliament was absolutely clear, supported by evidence and going through the most appropriate route. For example, if the Government comes back in two weeks' time and says that we are going to extend it, are we satisfied that it has gone through the correct measures? Was the House of Commons Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee correct when it said that the scientific evidence is not there for this step and that it needs to go through primary legislation so that it can be properly scrutinised and understood by the public? Yes. To be clear, we absolutely support that any legislation needs to be clear and supported by evidence and go through the proper procedures. If it is the case that there is not proper evidence, then that is something that is an issue that needs to be discussed further. As to the other panel members, are you clear what it is that the Government expects to achieve from this? Is it the case that, in both the industries that you represent, football matches over 10,000, which I assume there is about four in Scotland, and the night clubs, is there a problem there? Is your understanding what the Government is going to try to achieve? Do you believe that that has been supported by evidence that those specific sectors were, if you like, large spreaders and that there was a clear risk there? I am very happy to answer that. It certainly seems to be the case that, in an outdoor setting, and clearly football stadiums are outdoor settings, there is considerably less risk of transmission. As I have said already, my focus is on now dealing with the practical realities of the Parliament having effectively passed the introduction of vaccine passports from 1 October and our focus in the Scottish FFA, the SPFL, each cinch premiership club. All of us want to play a part in supporting the Scottish Government to ensure that the introduction of vaccine passports on 1 October is successful in driving greater take-up of the vaccine and helping the country to tackle the pandemic. I welcome back to Gavin Stevenson, but on that, Mr Donkaster, has the Scottish Professional League looked at, if the objective here is to encourage particularly younger people to take the vaccine, should you not be looking at being on the front foot and having discussions with your club about how clubs can do that? Is it the case, for example, that there are football players who have been prominent in refusing to get the vaccine, or is it the case that clubs could do more to support? Is this the best way for the football association in Scotland to see uptake of their fans, or is there other ways that you could have worked with the Government to try and achieve the same objective? Our football clubs have been very vocal about the benefits of vaccination, and clubs and players have worked together to get as many of the players and staff, backroom staff, as vaccinated as possible. A number of our clubs have had pop-up vaccination centres at their stadium, and throughout the whole pandemic, Scottish Football is very proud of the way in which we have partnered with the Scottish Government to play our part in tackling the pandemic. We all want to move forward to a situation in which we are not having to worry about vaccination and rates in hospital, and football has a key part to playing that. We believe that we are a strong partner to the Government in helping to tackle the pandemic. Do you accept that the evidence is there that shows that football matches in particular are a serious risk? The First Minister said that it was looking at this option or going into much more restrictive, like just cancelling the games, closing it down. Do you accept that? I think that the principle of vaccination passports is one that has been debated widely, and it is not one for me to comment on. As I said at the outset, my focus is on ensuring that whatever is put in place is practical, workable, pragmatic and proportionate. We certainly hope, on behalf of Scottish Football, that the detail that does emerge from all this enables clubs to implement vaccine passports from 1 October in a way that causes the minimum fuss and interference for fans, turning up at games, but helps the Scottish Government to achieve its objectives. Has Scottish Football had the opportunity to contribute? I asked you earlier whether clubs, I mean footballers or role models, has clubs had a discussion around this? Is this, you accept that the law is being passed, but is clubs, because it could be other clubs next week, 6,000 or 4,000 fans? Is there a better way? Have you had that discussion among football clubs? We do not simply just always accept, especially if there are questions over the evidence. Is there better ways that we can reach young people, and does football have a role to play in that? I can understand those who wish to continue to debate the principles behind the introduction of vaccine passports, but my focus is on looking forward, and on behalf of the game of football in Scotland, to ensure that what we have in place works well from 1 October. We understand the Government's objectives. We want to work with the Government to ensure that what is introduced is proportionate. It is widely accepted that spot checking is the way forward. What we are looking to do is to work with the Government and for the clubs to help to be part of the solution, although it is not causing unnecessary inconvenience and bottlenecks at Stadia from 1 October. Are we any closer to knowing what a clear definition of a night club is, and how are the preparations and discussions going with the Government to have that introduced? I think that defining a night club is clearly challenging, because there is no legal definition in law or in licensing of what a night club is. I think that we all would like to think that we know what a night club is, and in fact there will be 100 or so venues that identify as night clubs in Scotland. When you start to extract the characteristics that are easily definable of those premises types, you find that those same characteristics also apply to as many as 2,000 other premises of different types. Communicating that is very challenging. In terms of our engagement with the Scottish Government, it would be fair to say that there has been extensive engagement on that topic, but I am not sure that I would go so far as to say that that engagement amounts to meaningful consultation. We are obviously very keen to support Scottish Government's aims to increase vaccination uptake and to operate our venues as safely as possible. We would note that there are already significant mitigations in place in Scotland, in relation to baseline measures that are not necessarily the case everywhere in the UK. We have not seen any evidence and certainly no recent evidence around the risks posed by night clubs. Particularly, we have not seen any studies presented that show the current risk of transmission within night clubs with the current baseline measures and mitigations that are already in place in Scotland at the moment. That evidence might exist, but it certainly has not been presented to us if it does. I would also note that there are some very common misconceptions that have been repeated by people within Scottish Government, so specifically Cabinet Secretary for Health on radio a couple of times now, as noted that he thought that night clubs had poor ventilation or had challenging circumstances with regard to ventilation. It would be fair to say that large night clubs probably have some of the best ventilation systems of any premises type in Scotland simply because of the nature of their business. They invest heavily in ensuring customer comfort, which involves, frankly, putting a lot of fresh air through those premises. We would be very happy to demonstrate that to anybody from the public health teams and arrange for them to visit those premises and inspect and discuss the ventilation measures that are already in place. In terms of the evidence, we are not convinced that vaccine passports are a proportionate measure to take at this time. We think that, for our sector particularly, they come with some unintended consequences that might be virtually impossible to overcome and might, in fact, be counterproductive in terms of achieving Scottish Government's aims. Can I ask, in terms of the licensing trade more generally and the measures that are already in place, is there clarity across the licensing trade? For example, a few weeks ago I was in a restaurant and it was very clear that you went in and wore a mask. There were signs telling you that you were able to clock in with your phone to the app and register for test and protect. However, I have been in a couple of bars where there was none of that whatsoever. There seems to be, and it is not just licensing trade on public transport in other areas. One of my concerns is that we have all the other measures of social distancing, face coverings and so on that seem to be on weaning a bit in terms of being implemented. Do you find that, and is there clear guidance, and is there the support for publicans out there to ensure that the other laws that are meant to be helpful are doing so? With any public health measure or with any request of the public to behave in a certain way, there will always be varying levels of compliance across a variety of settings. You mentioned their public transport. I have certainly been on public transport on occasions where virtually everybody was wearing a face covering and I have also been on public transport where virtually nobody was wearing a face covering. There will be levels of variation in any setting. Certainly, from our experience, there has certainly been a good effort throughout the hospitality sector to comply. However, it is also the case that in some settings it might be easier to observe that type of compliance than in others. For example, there are currently the 3D exemptions to wearing a face covering within hospitality, so that is drinking, dining and dancing. That is allowed under the guidance that customers would not have to wear a face covering when engaging in those three activities. In some premises types, you will find that the vast majority of customers would be standing and drinking, so they would not be observed to wear a face cover. In other premises types, such as a cafe or a restaurant, patrons would, in fact, be seated and eating a meal. If they were not doing that, when they got up, they would then put on a face covering, so that might be more easily observable. Broadly, the messaging from the Scottish Government on the topic of baseline measures has been fairly clear. There has been good communication through the trade bodies to the sector to try and get that message out as widely as possible. Just finally, I think that you are absolutely right, unlike the football association, you are absolutely right to continue to make the arguments. That is not a question of just accepting things, but on the actual license trade itself, on the recovery, how is the trade recovering and are we getting back to the pre-Covid levels in terms of jobs? I assume that you will overcome the passport stuff quite easily, but are there bigger challenges in the trade itself post-Covid? It would be fair to say that the license trade in general, other than possibly aviation, was the hardest-hit sector last 18 months. Those are mostly, in Scotland, locally owned small businesses that have had either zero income for a significant period of time, and then when they could open under restrictions, on average, they took less income than the amount that would be required to break even, so they were trading at a loss for most of their time open under restrictions. That varied across the different subsets of hospitality, so a restaurant that normally closed at 11pm and was able to trade broadly, as it normally would, might in fact have been able to break even. A late-night premises or a nightclub that had to reduce its capacities by 50 per cent or 75 per cent because of all-seated drinking was unable to break even even when it was allowed to open during the restricted periods. The cumulative impact of that is that, on average, from the surveys that we have done across our membership, small business owners have taken on a huge amount of debt just to survive the pandemic and to keep their staff employed and to keep their rent paid and the business afloat. For the smallest of pubs and bars, the numbers that we are getting back indicate that those small business owners have taken on debt roughly equivalent to three years' worth of profits in normal times. In other words, they would have to work for three years for free just to pay that money back. In cash terms, it will vary by the turnover and size of the premises, but your typical small pub or restaurant is likely somewhere between £60,000 and £80,000 in debt just now. For the larger high-street premises or nightclubs, that is over £150,000 per premises. Those venues will need a clear run without restriction and without any type of Government intervention that reduces their turnover or capacity. They will need a clear run for years to be able to stay afloat and survive and pay down that debt. Hence our immense concern at the approach that is being considered here that could have very serious impact on the attendance of people within those premises and the turnover that those premises can achieve. If I were to say that those businesses, by and large, are in a precarious financial position, would probably be quite a dramatic understatement. They are really just not in a position to survive having any kind of shock to their income stream and cash flow. The way that this policy is currently being considered, that type of shock at the moment seems almost inevitable, so we would certainly ask for a much greater degree of flexibility and a much greater engagement and meaningful consultation with the sector to find work-arounds for those problems, rather than just having a policy that has been decided before all of the implications have been fully thought through, posed on us in just 14 days. Can I just make members aware that we will have the opportunity to ask scientific-based evidence questions in the next session with the medical experts? Thank you, convener, and good morning to the panel. I start with asking questions to Dr McMillan. If I may, this may be a bit slamming the stable door after the horse was bolted, but I think that the concern within the Parliament is that this policy has had a lack of scrutiny in the way that it has been rushed through. Given that emergency Covid legislation was properly scrutinised within the Parliament in a very short space of time, I wonder if Dr McMillan would suggest that primary legislation should have been the route to bring vaccine passport legislation into Parliament. I cannot figure your categorical answer to that either, I am afraid. We have noted, however, that the procedure through which the scheme is going to be brought has reduced the opportunity for scrutiny of all of the proposed legislation. This procedure often comes with less pre-legislative consultation than normal. That is often required in order to know with clarity the nature and scope of any proposed scheme. Things that we have noted, for example, because of the complexity and detail of definitions that are required, are meanings, for example, in terms of exemptions and certification that are likely to not be finalised until very close to time. With regard to that, it is essential that regulations remain subject to appropriate review. The Scottish Government proposals indicate that regulations will be imposed a legal obligation on the person responsible for operating the business, and that they must take all reasonable measures to restrict the entry only to those who are fully vaccinated. From a legal perspective, how do you define reasonable measures, given that the venues that we are discussing are so wide and varied? I think that you are quite right to ask that question, and at the moment I would say that it is very unclear as to what reasonable measures might look like, and I think that that is something that needs to be clarified as soon as possible for people that run venues. Thank you. I move on to Mr Don Caster. During your evidence session, you were suggesting that your preference in the first wave would be to have spot checks to put less of a pressure on obviously the stewarding, etc., and to put what needs to be in place. Given that the Government's position currently is that it will be a digital initiative and that it will have to have the ability to read QR codes, what is the cost implication in that to the clubs? It will not just affect the big clubs because, of course, when the big clubs visit the smaller clubs, they will inevitably have greater than 10,000 crowds. Is there a disparity there? Is there an inequality there, if you like, in terms of the ability to put those measures in place? Thank you, Mr Whittle. I think that you are right to point to the technological challenges that clubs have varying infrastructure. It is not clear to what extent any app may be compatible with existing systems, and there would clearly be a need for costly infrastructure development at potentially all of the stadium affected. It will be many more than a small handful of grounds, as you have pointed out, because when the bigger attendants' clubs visit, capacity can go over 10,000 in addition to relevant Scottish Cup and Premier Sports Cup. There is a need to look very carefully at the infrastructure and, realistically, to have clubs have that infrastructure in place and tested and compatible with any app by 1 October. That is unrealistic. That is entirely the reason why I said earlier that, in my view, the pragmatic and proportionate way to introduce vaccine passport checking would be by way of spot checking but by way of the visual check initially to let clubs let the system bed in and to enable any infrastructure development in terms of IT to be fully tested before implemented. What we absolutely have to avoid is IT infrastructure not working as it is intended to when tens of thousands of fans turn up to the stadium and we have bottlenecks. A week or so ago, in the Hamilton Park Scotland against Moldova, when the technology was working but because it was unfamiliar to a number of those who attended, even in relation to small numbers, because you had a bottleneck you had frustration and unhappy fans. It is for that reason that, initially, a visual check in our view is the way forward. That was certainly the view of the SRU when it contributed yesterday to the round table discussion on the issue. By all means, our view is to look at infrastructure development from an IT point of view, but, initially, let's get any system in place using visual checks so that it can be light touch and ensure a minimum of disruption. Presumably, given what you have just said, you would agree with me that any reduction in flow of fans into a ground leaves a potential for unrest and security issues outside the ground. It is inevitable that, where you get queues, particularly with tens of thousands of fans turning up relatively late—that is a traditional football thing to do—is to turn up in the minutes before kick-off. Part of that is because fans are unable to get a drink at Scottish Football Stadium, unlike their counterparts across Europe. There is often a large amount of fans who turn up in the minutes before kick-off. Any reduction in flow rates through turnstiles is clearly something that we have to be very careful about. Exactly for the reasons that I have identified, I like such approach by spot-checking and letting the system bed in with a minimum of disruption. We think that that is the proportionate and reasonable way forward. I move on to Mr Stevenson. Given that he is new representing a wide variety of venues, the ability to read or the technology that is required to read QR codes will be problematic to many of the venues that he represents. The cost implication along with that is one of the few to put that perhaps comment on that. In many ways, for the larger venues that we represent, we have quite similar problems in terms of trying to process people through an entry point. As I mentioned earlier, we could easily have 40,000 or 50,000 people entering across 100 night clubs. Every Friday and Saturday night, and those customers expecting to get into that venue for a queue of perhaps 500 people to move through that entry in a period of between 30 and 45 minutes. Any technology that is required to do it would have to be extremely quick. If we were, for example, to add just 30 seconds to a queue of 500 people, we would be looking at an additional 250 minutes—over four hours—of queue time being generated. Clearly, we could look to front-run the queue by adding additional staffing, but, as has been noted, there is simply no staffing to be had anywhere in the market. Within two weeks, it would be essentially impossible to obtain that additional level of staffing. We would certainly endorse—albeit if we have wider concerns about other issues of the policy—a pragmatic approach to implementation if it is to be pushed through. Things such as spot checks or phased implementation to allow a lot of those practical matters to be resolved without harming businesses in the short term would be very welcome. You represent a sector where many people who are going out do not just stay in the one venue, so they require multiple access across many vacant venues. Do you agree with me that that potentially creates an inequality between venues that require a passport and those that do not require a passport, and that will become a deciding factor in where people who are going out decide to go? Is there potential for those who are currently classed as nightclubs to decide that they are not nightclubs? That is an absolutely massive concern. It is one of the fundamental flaws in the current proposal that it is incredibly difficult to overcome unless it is made universal across all premises. The inequality that you discuss is very clear that that is unfair competition. It is a Government intervention that creates a distortion in the market. No matter what the definition of nightclubs that you use—whether you include 200 premises or 2000—that market distortion will be created at some point, at some place in the market. You might have people that would go to a nightclub that instead choose to go to a hybrid venue if those hybrid venues are not included. If you include the hybrid venues, people might choose to go to a large pub instead, because they know that they can get in there without a vaccine passport or a student union. No matter where the line is drawn, we will create market distortions and there will be businesses on one side of that line that, in effect, artificially prosper and businesses on the other side of that line that, in effect, lose a substantial portion of attendance and turnover and that it may, in fact, put them out of business. It would very likely put many out of them. That is a challenge that there is no easy way to overcome. Just one final question to Mr Stevenson and then to the same question to Mr Doncaster. I asked Dr McMillan earlier on about the legal obligation to take all reasonable measures. Given that there is a potential for the venue to commit an offence here, can I ask how the industry was involved in developing the idea of what reasonable measures constitute and what is your understanding of reasonable measures? In short, we were not involved in any discussion to date around what all reasonable measures would involve. There has been no discussion in any depth of what that would cover or entail. It is unclear to us at this point if we are required to have a physical person on every door into every premises during all its hours of operation checking on entry or whether, perhaps, if a group comes in and one person goes to the bar and orders, does that then mean that another member of staff has to go around every table checking every individual's vaccine passport? If not that, is there going to be an automated system at a door that people have to check in much as they do with track and trace and the owners will be on the customer? We literally have no idea which of those options—and there is a huge differential in cost and resource between those options—is that Scottish Government is proposing. There has been no consultation on that. I am Mr Don Caster to respond to that question as well, please. Thank you. Since the announcement that vaccine passport checks would have to be carried out from the 1st of October, we have been engaging with Scottish Government officials. Obviously, we took part in a round table meeting yesterday and, obviously, my attendance here today, set out what we believe would be reasonable and proportionate, particularly in the timescales that are concerned. It is well understood and well accepted that spot checking is the proportionate and reasonable way in which vaccine passport checking can be carried out. As I hope that I have made clear this morning, a light-touch approach to it in the first phase of implementation would be reasonable and sensible and would enable systems to bed in without causing the arms that are potentially going to take place if we have a more rigid system that creates bottlenecks outside of Stadia. The track and trace queue codes that are already in place in restaurants are the bars and night clubs that are used as people gain entry. Obviously, bars, night clubs and restaurants all sit within hospitality and they will all have those posters on display at every entry point and often at tables and at bars as well, with customers being reminded to check in. However, it is certainly not across all of hospitality. It is not the case that every hospitality premises would currently have a doorman refusing to let people in at every entrance until they had managed that process for them. There would not be the resource or staffing across the sector to do that. I have a question for Katrina McMillan. It is really a follow-up to one of the questions that John Mason was asking earlier about ethical objections to vaccination passports. I have certainly had correspondence from one constituent who has a religious objection to vaccination. I think that there are some religious groups who are in that position. I wonder if you have any views on the human rights aspects of vaccination passports in that context, given that religious belief is, I believe, a protected characteristic. Yes. You were quite right that freedom of religion is protected by article 9 of the Convention on Human Rights. It is also protected in the Equalities Act. As I have mentioned in the report that we submitted, however, those are qualified rights. On the question of whether human rights are infringed generally when it comes to vaccine certification, it depends on the context in which those measures are introduced and the extent to which those measures are extended. Where rights are qualified rights under the convention, they may be restricted in order to achieve illegitimate aim, as long as they are necessary and proportionate. As we mentioned earlier, the Czech Republic case held that it was necessary and proportionate to respect access to schools for those who had not been vaccinated. Thank you. That is very helpful. Thank you. Can I ask if any other members have any other questions? I thank witnesses for their evidence today and giving us their time this morning. It has been very informative. If witnesses would like to raise any further evidence with the committee, they can do so in writing and the clerks will be happy to liaise with you about how to do that. I will now suspend to allow a change over of witnesses. Members are advised that there will be time to have a short comfort break during the suspension of up to five minutes. Thank you. I suspend the meeting. We will now move on to take evidence on the latest ministerial statement of Covid-19. Coronavirus extension and expiry Scotland Act 2021 reports to the Scottish Parliament and subordinate legislation. I welcome John Sweeney, Deputy First Minister and Cabinet Secretary for Covid Recovery, Elizabeth Blair, team leader, Covid coordination, governance and decision making, and Professor Jason Leitch, national clinical director from the Scottish Government. Thank you for your attendance this morning. Deputy First Minister, would you like to make any remarks before we move to questions? Thank you, convener. I would like to make a brief opening statement in advance of the questioning from the committee. I welcome the opportunity to update the committee on the measures that have been taken to ensure the necessary parliamentary oversight of the on-going response to the pandemic that has been undertaken in relation to the recent updates that have been given to Parliament by the First Minister and also in the report that I highlighted to the committee on my last appearance. As the First Minister set out in her statement to Parliament on Tuesday, we have not made any change to the current Covid regulations, although work is continuing to prepare legislation for Covid certification. The figures that the First Minister set out on Tuesday clearly indicate the surge in cases that we have seen during the summer has caused a sharp rise in the number of people in hospital and is also leading to a significant number of deaths. However, there are signs that the surge has been levelling off and that cases may now even be slightly falling. While the number of cases in older age groups, people above the age of 45, is still rising slightly, in all of those age groups, the rate at which cases have grown has slowed during the last week. The context helps to explain why the cabinet decided not to impose any further restrictions. I am grateful to everyone, to all organisations, businesses and individuals who have taken extra care in recent weeks to try to stop the current spike in infection. Cabinet secretaries continue to engage with representatives from business, the public sector and wider civic society to reinforce those messages. As the university and college term begins, we have been working closely with universities, colleges and the wider sector to make the return as safe as possible. We continue to work with local authorities to make schools, childcare centres and early learning premises as safe as is possible. We will continue to require secondary school pupils to wear face coverings, along with maintaining other current mitigations in schools at least until the October holidays. As we set out last, earlier in the week by the Government, we will also amend some of our guidance on contact tracing in schools to ensure that everyone has a clear understanding of the process. On the matter of vaccinations for young people, the First Minister announced that the chief medical officers took a broad view of the benefits and risks of vaccination and have recommended that 12 to 15-year-olds should be offered one dose of the Pfizer vaccine. Their advice has been since broadly endorsed by the Royal College of Pediatrics and Child Health. The Government will implement their recommendation as soon as possible and will provide further information shortly to health boards and, of course, to parents, carers and young people. The First Minister also set out our approach to booster vaccines. Booster vaccines will be offered to all adults over 50, to front-line health and care workers and to younger adults with certain health conditions, to younger adults with health conditions that put them at higher risk and adult household contacts of people with suppressed immune systems. The final point about vaccination that I would like to highlight, and I know that members have heard from stakeholders this morning on this point, relates to Covid certification. Parliament last week voted in favour of the proposal that the eligible people should be required to show proof of vaccination before they enter certain specified venues such as nightclubs or before they attend certain large-scale events. We are now working with businesses, events organisers and sports governing bodies to finalise the detail of the proposal and to publish sector-specific guidance. We believe that it is a proportionate measure that can reduce transmission in some settings, can encourage take-up of the vaccine and which may help certain events and venues to continue to operate even when Covid rates are high. Moving on now to matters of legislation, at my last appearance before the committee, I explained that the Government's report on the coronavirus extension and expiry Scotland act 2021 was to be laid before Parliament on Friday 3 September. This report fulfills our requirement in sections 5 and 7 of that act to lay a one-off report before the Scottish Parliament one month after the act received royal assent. The report gives effect to duties in the extension and expiry act for Scottish ministers to report on its response to the Covid-19 pandemic, including measures relating to the holding of marriage ceremonies in civil partnerships, support for businesses and a range of other policy areas, including social security support available for carers, support available to persons who are required to self-isolate for a reason relating to coronavirus, social care services and fiscal fines. There is, of course, a particular statutory instrument on the agenda, which we will come to later in the agenda, but I'm very happy to answer questions from the committee. Thank you, Deputy First Minister. If I may start asking my first question, in discussions with local clubs and the late night sector and just the previous session that we had before this one, it's become evident that, when the system is up and running, it needs to be working for businesses and the general public. We know that people who have had the vaccinations out with Scotland and overseas may have difficulty at this time accessing the scheme, and I've also been made aware of a large backlog of second vaccinations that have not been updated on the NHS portal. With that in mind and the roll-out of the scheme due to take place in under two weeks, can I ask if there is any flexibility with the hard start date, or a more phased approach can be considered to iron out these teathing issues? It's absolutely vital that the scheme that we put in place is able to work effectively, so the practical issues that you have raised, convener, and fairly raised are issues that we are addressing as part of the development of the necessary technology to enable that to be possible. It's important to say that the basic position for the implementation of the scheme is very strong. The availability of data in relation to vaccination records, the relationship of those vaccination records to individuals, is very strong indeed. The demonstrations that I have seen of the technology give me a very high level of confidence about the platform in which we are operating. There has to be an acceptance, and we addressed those questions with Mr Mason at one of the previous sessions. There will be examples where the data doesn't correspond exactly. We have to work with our suppliers and the technology companies that we are working with to make sure that we address those issues as expeditiously as we can. In relation to implementation, the Government takes the view that the scheme needs to be up and running on 1 October because of the necessity of it contributing towards the efforts to suppress the virus—the rationale of urgency that we have to apply. In our briefing document that we set out, we indicated that the implementation would be found on the application of reasonable measures to be taken to put that into effect, and, obviously, our guidance will endeavour to address that very point. I'm not sure that Jason Leitch wants to add anything to me about what I've said about the specifics on the vaccination records. I think that the point that you made about two things. The vast majority of the population are vaccinated—that's the first thing to celebrate. Passports are therefore more possible. The vast majority of the records are good. On the day that we launched QR codes—what's that? Two weeks ago now—200,000 people downloaded their vaccine record that day. The fundamentals are working, but you're right. My inbox, I'm sure, like yours, has two particular scenarios. One is that I was vaccinated overseas, therefore how does that work? Or that I was vaccinated in the UK in two different countries. How does that work? We have mechanisms in place to correct that. I had a colleague yesterday who had exactly that scenario—one call fixed. Other people have a slight challenge with maiden names on ID and married names on vaccine records, for instance. Those things are being fixed on an individual basis as fast as we possibly can. The fundamental tech is intact and working, and we have to catch up with some of those slightly more complex cases. Thank you, convener. Good morning, cabinet secretary and panel. Can I start by following up on that point from the convener? I have certainly been contacted by individuals who, for example, have seasoned tickets for football clubs in Scotland, but they live in England or Northern Ireland and are facing a situation in just two weeks' time where they will have to produce vaccine certification. However, as I understand it, the system is not currently there that would permit them to access their football clubs. Is that being resolved? Will it be resolved in time? The work is under way to do that. As Professor Leitch has said, there will be individual circumstances that may need a level of manual intervention to make sure that we resolve them for individuals. The encouragement that I would set out at this stage is for people to engage with those practical mechanisms to resolve those issues if they are in that situation. The Mr Fraser has highlighted that they may have had a vaccine in a different jurisdiction, and they need to resolve the implications of that for the vaccine certificate. I encourage people to engage in that. Obviously, as time goes on, we will be able to refine further the systems to make sure that they are all speaking to each other effectively on a common travel area basis, which will avoid the degree of manual intervention that we have highlighted. The steps that are required to resolve those questions are able to be delivered, so I will provide that reassurance at this stage. I will press you on that point. When individuals have contacted me to say that they have been on the Scottish Government website, the information says that work is being done to resolve the issue, but there is no signposting—at least, they have told me—that there is no signposting of the exact steps that they need to take to resolve the issue. Can you provide some clarity? That would be through the NHS informed helpline. There are a number of scenarios that are crossing over here. Your fundamental scenario is non-Scotish residents, some of whom are overseas, with season tickets to Scottish games or wanting to come to a Scottish music festival. That is not Scots vaccinated in different places—that is the Northern Island Ferries coming to the Rangers Celtic Games, for example. We will have to recognise overseas vaccinations to a point. There are some technical challenges in there about where you were vaccinated, which vaccine was used, etc. However, in the common travel area, the vaccine records will be transferable, so those individuals will have to have vaccine evidence from their country. That will probably, at this stage, be paper copy, and that will be acceptable. Eventually, as the Deputy First Minister said, the common travel area will have one vaccine record that will be transferable and the WHO is working on one for the world. That will get easier. The EU has a green tick system that is becoming more and more spread—Italy, France and Spain—using that system. Eventually, those systems will all talk to one another, I would anticipate. Just now they do not. If you are from Belfast and you are coming to Ibrox or Celtic Park, you will have to bring a paper record of your vaccination. It will be helpful to get that on the record. We heard in evidence a short time ago from Neil Doncaster, who raised a number of practical issues around implementation. One of the issues is the practicality of stewarding at football grounds. As everybody knows, there are issues in the labour market at the moment trying to recruit the level of stewarding that would be required to make the system credible. That is a real challenge for clubs, notwithstanding the cost implications. Has the Scottish Government not reached a view yet on whether spot checks would seem to be sufficient or what other practical engagement and guidance has been given to clubs about how that can be set up in the next two weeks? The first thing that I would say is that the point that Mr Fraser raises, which Neil Doncaster expressed this morning, is at the time of the reasonable point. We are aware of the labour market challenges that are visible to all of us. The challenges about availability of stewards are well documented, so I do not, in any way, shape or form dispute that point. Hence, the rationale in the Government's paper that we published last week, where we indicated that there was a necessity for organisers to take reasonable measures and there was likely to be a proportionate approach in different settings between a crowd of 200 versus a crowd of 60,000. We envisaged that there would have to be differential approaches. Those are the questions that we are working through in detail with football authorities, principally, because they will be the ones with the big crowds that will be affected. There will be other events and sectors that will be affected as well to have that proportionate approach. What we are trying to do here is to encourage a climate where vaccine uptake is understood to be a significant protection for the country against the spread of the virus. The more we can do, even though it may not be a check of absolutely everybody that attends a football game, the more we can do, the more we make these events safer and more or less likely to be the places in which the virus is transmitted, the more we are contributing to the suppression of the virus. We are actively involved in discussions with the football authorities and other players on those questions. There is likely to be a proportionate approach taken in that respect, as we highlighted in the paper last week. Obviously, as we indicated, there will be guidance that supports that information that is available to relevant parties. Thank you. It is one more question that I can convene on a slightly different issue in relation to vaccination certification. This came from a constituent who emailed me this week, who says that he downloaded his record of vaccination and was able to change every element on the certificate that he sent me. He sent me a copy of a download and changed all the information. Even the QR codes that he was able to remove large sections off. Is this an issue? How robust is the security around this? It will only ever be a small minority of the population who would seek, hopefully, to try and amend their vaccination certification, but how robust are the mechanisms to make sure that this is not becoming a widespread problem? I accept that, in a pdf document, it is possible for somebody to change names and text. If one was to change one's QR code, one would not get into the football match, because the QR code would not work, it would not scan, it would not be valid. Somebody might want to play around with the shading or the details of the QR code, but it will be pointless, because it will not get them into the game, because it will not work. That one mystifies me a little bit, but certainly the QR code, which is the element of this, which is the bit that has to be absolutely robust, cannot be tampered with to give it effect, is how I would answer it. If members do not mind, I will go in reverse already this time, so I invite Brian Whittle. Thank you, convener. Good morning. I ask this question in the last evidence session around giving the potential of venues that might be committing offence if they do not take all reasonable measures. What involvement the industry has affected in this particular case, what they were in developing, what constitutes a reasonable measure, and I think that Gamestay's team has in particular suggested that they had not been consulted at all on this. To make this work properly, all venues will have to understand what constitutes a reasonable measure and such a wide variety of potential venues. There are two elements to that question. The first is engagement, and the second is what is reasonable measures. On engagement, I appreciate that this is being done quickly, but there has been an awful lot of stuff that has had to be done around Covid, which has been done quickly because of the nature of the situation that we face. The rationale for us acting quickly in this respect is twofold. First, we face a very high level of case numbers. The point has been made to Parliament before that if we had had case numbers of the type that we have just now, although they are slightly lower than they have been, if we had had these case numbers a year ago, then we would be in lockdown. Thankfully, the vaccine is providing us with a huge amount of protection against that, but we still have very high levels of case load, and that is flowing through into levels of hospitalisation that are resulting in well-documented pressures on the national health service and all its constituent parts. There is a need for us to act swiftly to try to suppress the virus. That is the nature of urgency around engagement. The second point is that we have had a range of discussions. The First Minister and I were involved in a session just the other day with a variety of stakeholders. There are certainly representatives of the hospitality sector involved in that. I cannot recall off the top of my head if Mr Stevenson was involved because there were a large number of participants, but there were hospitality representatives involved. Jason Leitch and the French Secretary have been involved in similar discussions with other sectors, and our officials are involved in dialogue to understand some of those practical issues. We are actively involved in those discussions to make sure that we hear the practical issues and that we can shape the guidance that will be applied to ensure that there is a clear understanding of what is envisaged in this process. That comes on to what are reasonable measures. That is a concept where we can only help organisations by providing the necessary context, detail and information that allows them to form that view about reasonable measures. Having listened to the evidence that was provided by the stakeholders that you have heard from this morning, there is quite clearly a willingness to do that, to be engaged in the implementation of such a scheme. What they were appealing for was essentially an understanding that there may be steps that they have to take to get all reasonable measures in place, and I certainly give the assurance that the Government is very much listening to that message and that argument as we formulate the guidance. The issue here is that not only have we got to form an opinion around the definition of what reasonable measures are, we also have to implement that all within two weeks. You will understand their concerns given, as I suggest, that there is the potential for an offence to be committed here. I understand that, but all of those organisations will, to some extent, be carrying out some form of, in an organised event or venue, they will be carrying out some form of checking of individuals coming in, whether it is ticket checks or ticket purchases or whatever. What we are asking to be done here is for another element, which, with the assistance of technology, should not provide a significant burden to that process to be applied to provide an extra layer of public safety and security from the spread of the virus. That is what we are asking organisations to be involved in. We will provide the necessary guidance that sets out what we consider to be reasonable measures to undertake such an endeavour, but, of course, in formulating that, we will continue to discuss that with the relevant sectors. I was just discussing with Neil Donkastor that all clubs will need to implement vaccine passport checks because, even in the smaller clubs, when the bigger clubs visit, it was the potential to take the crowd beyond 10,000. Cabinet Secretary, you would recognise that there is a varying ability to be able to finance that, and one of Neil Donkastor's suggestions was that, initially, in phase 1, it would be more practical to instigate sport checks as the technology is being introduced. Is that something that the Government has considered? The first point is that, although I quite appreciate that crowd size varies significantly around the country, there are some venues that quite simply cannot accommodate more than 10,000 supporters, so it does not matter how many supporters are ranger or something to bring along. There is only a certain number of people who can get into the crowd into the ground, so there are limiting factors. The Minister for Parliamentary Business was telling me before I came in today that St Myryn can accommodate only 8,000, so there are limitations. The second point is on the issue of sport checks. That is a valid issue. As I indicated in my answer to Mr Fraser a moment ago, the Government envisaged a proportionate approach in larger crowd settings in the paper that we published last Thursday, so there is undoubtedly the possibility of that approach being taken. I think that you need to have a word with your colleague, because I think that the rules from Premier League is that all clubs have to have a 10,000-year stadium before they can accommodate more than 10,000. I have learned something new today, so I thank the cabinet secretary for correcting me. I have just one more question. The hospitality industry in the early normal indicates that there is potential inequality here, because people will choose venues based on whether they will need to produce vaccine passports. On a night out, there is often a multi-venue visit there. Do you recognise that as a potential inequality in terms of where people will choose to have a night out? I recognise that point. It is a point that is material to the definition of a night club. One of the points that has been put to me by representatives of the night club sector is that, if one was to look at venue A, which, for arguments sake, closes at one o'clock, and venue B closes at four o'clock, they all involve music, dancing and the availability of alcohol. There are two different propositions, because they are closing at three o'clock. They are really quite different propositions. Closing at midnight could be a long night that you have been out since the early evening. If you are out until three o'clock in the morning, it is a very different proposition. However, if you look at those two venues, there may not be enough to distinguish them. That is one of the issues that we are wrestling with and discussing with the sector to make sure that we do not create a situation where there is disadvantage because of the way in which the definition is constructed. It is an issue that we are looking at very carefully to try to resolve that. I hear what the Deputy First Minister says about a proportionate approach, and I think that it would have to be proportionate, because I am not sure in the timescales that you have given that it could be anything else. However, I could ask specifically a few questions. One in terms of vaccine take-up, Professor Leitch says that vaccine take-up is really good. Can you therefore say what an up-to-date position is on vaccine take-up and what work is being done and where have you identified that there are specific problems? What can the analysis have been done of where there is not the same vaccine take-up? For example, it has been suggested that people feel lower socioeconomic backgrounds is one area. Young people generally, although I saw that the figures recently given for St Andrews University where people returning were way way above anything that I had expected in terms of take-up. It is not all young people. It is suggesting that people feel certain ethnic backgrounds, ethnic communities or refugees or asylum seekers. Where is it that we have those issues? Is the Government approach one of starting to target to ask the question of why lower take-up is in certain areas or communities? I think that being able to get a response on that but also being able to see something in writing that sets out the approach would be quite useful. Those are all very significant issues. I will talk through some of the vaccine uptake points and I will perhaps rely on Professor Leitch for just some of the very specific detail, but I will talk through the headline direction. I will come on to some of the very legitimate points that Mr Rowley raises about particular groups and what efforts are taken to try to increase uptake. The first thing that I would say at the outset is that vaccine uptake has been very, very good and very high. For example, in a routine flu vaccine programme pre-Covid, the uptake level would be of the order of perhaps 65 to 70 per cent. In the over 40s cohort, the level of double vaccination is significantly in excess of 65 per cent. Indeed, it may be over 80 now. It depends on where you cut it. The worst is 91 per cent in the 40s to 49s. Everybody over 40s is above 90 per cent. Compared to normal vaccination programmes, that is really high uptake over 40s. Over 30 to 39 and 18 to 29 have been at lower levels, but Professor Leitch can now give me the specifics. The 18 to 29s have not been as available because we did not start them until much later. They are now at 76 per cent of first doses and 60 per cent of second doses, so three quarters have taken up the offer of vaccination and catching up. The 30 to 39-year-olds are at 83 per cent and 73 per cent respectively. The 16 and 17-year-olds have been open for two weeks. The 16 and 17-year-olds have had a first dose at 65 per cent. It is astonishing. The general picture on vaccination is encouraging. The numbers that Professor Leitch has shared about the 16 and 17-year-olds are an indication of real enthusiasm to come forward. I take this opportunity, convener, to pay tribute to a lot of the school community who have done a tremendous amount of work to encourage and young people themselves to exercise in tremendous leadership. I saw the senior pupils from all the perth city schools, for example, involved in a venture in my constituency, during the ice rink vaccination centre, promoting that to their peers. They are very, very successful. That is probably the best communication that you can get, frankly, to encourage that uptake. The general position is encouraging, but we have weaknesses, comparatively speaking, among younger people in the under-30s. We have challenges in some areas of the country in terms of areas that suffer socioeconomic deprivation and in beam communities. The Government has looked carefully with health boards at the very practical deployment of services and vaccine opportunities to make sure that we try to counter that. Mr Rowley will be familiar with the situation in his locality. His health board will have been offering various drop-in opportunities at different places to try to address that. A lot of that is focused on localities, where we know there to be a weakness. In a voluntary vaccination programme, that becomes—we cannot oblige people to take up the opportunity. We can maximise the possibility, we can maximise the availability, but we cannot oblige. I would assure the committee that on vaccine uptake of two things. The first is that we should be very pleased at how much progress has been made, and it is a tribute to the vaccinators around the country who have worked incredibly hard. Secondly, we are taking focused measures to try to boost uptake where we possibly can. You have heard the numbers, so I will not redo them. There are three groups that are more challenging than the average, although there are exceptions in those groups and in the average. The young, the socially deprived and then some special cause groups who are particularly vaccine sceptic. For instance, the Polish community is particularly vaccine sceptic, because a lot of their information comes from Poland, the most vaccine sceptic country in the world. You have to adjust your communication and your access for each of those populations. We have tactics mechanisms to do that. You need to do three things. You need to make it available as accessible as you possibly can. You need to adapt your communication to the group that you are looking at. The 52-year-old guy talking to the 16-year-olds does not really work for them, but if I can help the young scott panel to be prepared with the information, the young scott panel of young people can then help with that in the schools and in the further education colleges. You have to have access, so we have opened as much as we can mobile vaccination units in the further education colleges, in car parks and everywhere. My sister works at Glasgow City College. They had little choice, frankly, but they opened for a morning. There are 200 people in four hours who came through and were coming back. You have to make it accessible and communicate. The other thing that we should not spend too long on is that you have to deal with misinformation. As you go down the age groups, misinformation becomes more of a problem because of social media and their access to that misinformation. All you can do is try to use trusted voices and get the correct information out. MSPs are part of that mechanism for you to help us in that environment with fighting against that misinformation. I think that misinformation is a concern and certainly I speak out, but I saw the First Minister last week speak out and I thought, thank goodness, because I think that we now need to be less mamby-pamby with these people and actually start to take on some of the issues that the misinformation that they are spreading. Can I switch into a different subject? Can I ask how the discussions are going, in particular where the retail and transport sectors are around the current laws and the existing laws? I have raised this before, but shop workers in a number of different shops, when I speak to them, tell me that management within those shops does not see their role as enforcing anything to do with wearing face coverings. Therefore, you can go into some of those shops that are Scottish chain shops, where the staff are wearing the mask, and less and less people. It is the case, if less and less people abide by those rules, eventually the rules become pretty pointless because of the majority view. What discussions are you having with Amad? I once before mentioned to Mr Swinney that it was Audi that had the green light system, so some retailers had really good systems in place and still would approach somebody about a mask, but it is clear that there are others who are not, and shop workers are being left vulnerable. I would like to reassure Mr Rowley on the efforts to pursue it, because I agree 100 per cent with the importance of the point that is being raised here. I saw a social media message from a clinician just the other day who was tip to toe in PPE. It looked unbearably uncomfortable with this heavy-duty clinical face mask on, and the message that he put out with it was, if all you are moaning about is wearing a face mask to go to the shops, come and stand where I have been standing for a minute. His point, I thought, was made perfectly. Wearing a face covering is the least that we can ask somebody to do to make sure that they are taking precautions to stop the spread of the virus. All those baseline measures wear face coverings, observe physical distancing where you can, follow all of the cough etiquette and hand hygiene, all those things. Those steps will interrupt the spread of the virus, so it is really important that we reinforce those. The cabinet discussed this issue about three weeks ago, and there was a general frustration that, post 9 August, there was a bit of a sense of relaxation of those baseline measures. We took a number of steps that we deputed cabinet secretaries to intensify stakeholder discussion, to get on the phone to supermarkets, retailers, transport companies, universities and colleges, and members of the cabinet did it themselves, along with our officials, to have those conversations. Two weeks ago, I convened a stakeholder discussion of about 170 organisations on that, representatives of the retail sector, all the supermarket chains, transport companies, educational institutions, local authorities, a whole variety of different business organisations and trade unions, to reinforce the importance of the application of those baseline measures. In a conversation like that, where you have a range of different stakeholders, you will have some stakeholders who are pressing strong arguments that are very supportive of what the Government is doing. For example, trade union representatives on that call were delighted with the degree to which they were reinforcing the message, because they are concerned about the wellbeing of their members, understandably. That was a really helpful call, and I think that it strengthened the attitude towards application of baseline measures. The First Minister and I convened a follow-up call on Tuesday with much the same cast list, and there was quite a bit of feedback from the retail sector that they felt that the messaging from the Government of turning up the heat on this question of following baseline measures had actually helped in the retail environment. Ministers have undertaken specific communications supporting retail workers and encouraging members of the public to be respectful of retail workers to ensure that, if they are asked to wear a face covering by a retail employee, they should be doing so. I hope that the combination of that reinforcement of the baseline measures may be contributing in part to the tempering of the level of infection that we have in society today, because, as the First Minister reported to Parliament on Tuesday, we are this week in a better place than we were last week and the week before. I assure Mr Rowley that we intend to have no let-up in encouraging and motivating organisations to follow those baseline measures. I think that most organisations accept the importance of that, because they can see that if we do not do that, we might have to do other things, which they will like even less. Just finally, this morning, I read the front pages of the record on the Scotsman, and there are horror stories about ambulances and people not getting them. That is a real life story, but how prepared are we for this winter? Even before Covid, the NHS struggled, as we all know, in many different forums. The NHS struggled, given the pandemic, people are out and about, so we would expect others to look etc. How prepared are we and should the public be concerned about getting through this winter? The winter preparations started some time ago to make sure that we were in a position to be ready for the pressures that inevitably come on to the health service during autumn and winter. That is why, frankly, the Government is taking some of the steps that we are taking. I accept that they are not the most popular measures that we have ever taken, but they have to be taken to try to suppress the prevalence of the virus. I do not have today's numbers in front of me, but on Tuesday, we had 1,064 people in hospital with Covid. That is a very high level of admission to Covid. Cabinet sees modelling on a regular basis of what might happen if we do not suppress levels of the virus, because the levels of the virus translates into levels of hospitalisation. It may be a different ratio back in the early part of the pandemic, about 13 per cent of people who had positive tests for Covid were hospitalised. Now, it is around about 2 to 3 per cent. However, the difference is that the level of the virus is much, much higher than it was of positive tests and much higher today than it was 12 months ago. That translates into more people, which puts more pressure on the national health service. Of course, the national health service, in addition to that, is undertaking two other aspects of its work. It is providing the normal emergency care that is necessary, in which some of the news articles that Mr Rowley has raised contain very alarming circumstances and totally unacceptable circumstances. The national health service is also dealing with routine elective work, which has been slowed up or paused entirely because of Covid. The national health service is under phenomenal pressure, so the bit that we can do in advance of winter is to suppress the levels of Covid to reduce the amount of hospitalisation to try to relieve some of the pressure on the national health service. That will work across all aspects of the health service, whether it is the ambience sector or acute admissions or elective care. There are huge pressures on the national health service. Winter preparations have been made and continue to be made. We have more people available to work in our national health service, but there will be challenges with the level of Covid that we have in our society today. I am just conscious of time. From my understanding, quite a few other countries have used vaccine certificates already, and so presumably we can learn from them. For example, I understand that Greece announced theirs on 28 May, and they had a big uptake in vaccines during June before the certificates started in July. At the previous session, I do not know if you saw it, but Mr Donkastar was arguing that we should be more like France than just have vaccine certificates everywhere, and then it would be simple and everyone would understand it. Can you say anything about what we have learned from other countries' experiences? We have learned that vaccine certification can fuel vaccine uptake. We have seen in the short period since we announced the likelihood of vaccine certificates that there has been an increase in uptake in certain groups, so there has been learning that we have taken from there. There is obviously a debate to be had about how extensive vaccine certificates should be applied. The Government is crystal clear in its view that we will never apply these for any eligibility in relation to public services, so that is not going to be considered. However, there is a legitimate argument that we are not pursuing it at this stage for vaccine certificates to be extended across a wider range of facilities. We would want to avoid that, but some of my response to this flows from my response to Mr Rowley a moment ago is that we have to be taking all reasonable steps to suppress the virus, to protect the national health service and, ideally, to enable us to avoid further restrictions that could have greater impact on society as a whole, and we want to avoid those if we possibly can do them. Can I ask Mr Leitch about other countries' experiences? I can partly deflect it, which I have very good at doing to the politicians who have to actually make these choices. The public health advice is fairly binary here. It is not complex. Vaccinated is better than unvaccinated in pretty much every context. This room included it. I would be more comfortable in this room if everybody in this room were vaccinated. I imagine that you would, too. That would be true in a nightclub, in a sports area and in my house. Therefore, it becomes a political judgment about what you do with that information and in what sense you do breadth and content of Covid certifications. Countries are making different choices. Israel were first with a green pass that included testing previous infection and vaccination. New York, most recently, was doing a version of that. Other parts of Europe were Scottish politicians on advice from public health advisers. Remember that there is also an economic advisers sitting beside them. Social policy advisers made a choice to do this as the initial phase of Covid certification. I think that there are arguments to go broader, to go narrower, to change the content, to keep the content the same. In the end, those are judgments. However, the fundamental public health message here is to get vaccinated. The certificate does two things. It makes the location safer and it incentivises people to get vaccinated. From a public health perspective, it is a little bit of a no-brainer. I understand that the complexity of the implementation is a entirely different thing, not a public health thing. Can I ask about exemptions? I have a constituent who has a range of health problems. From what I understand, our GP and clinicians have not yet decided whether it is wise for her to get the vaccine or not, so that is purely a medical decision. Where does that leave someone like her? Do we just press the clinicians to make a decision on that? Is she going to be restricted from where she can go? There are two different points in there. The question of whether that lady should be vaccinated is an exclusively clinical matter. There is nothing that I will ever say that will intrude on that decision-making. It is entirely proper and these are, in some circumstances, very, very difficult judgments. The estimate is that fewer than 1 in 1,000 people, 0.1 per cent, cannot be vaccinated for medical reasons. It is a very small number of people. Therefore, that perhaps demonstrates the difficulty of clinical judgment that has to be applied there. I would not seek to intrude on that argument. The second point is what are the implications of non-vaccination for a vaccination certification scheme. In my view, we have to make sure that the vaccination certification scheme enables that individual not to be disadvantaged in accessing venues if they choose to be unvaccinated to access venues. If somebody is unvaccinated for entirely legitimate and proper clinically assessed medical reasons but still wants to go and see their favourite football club playing, I do not think that they should be disadvantaged from doing so. If, in their judgment, they wish to go to see their favourite football club playing, they should be unvaccinated. There is an implication of that for other members of society, but it is a limited risk and exposure. It is a fundamentally judgment for that individual. We have to make sure that the vaccination certification scheme does not anyway disadvantage or discriminate against that individual. The one in a thousand is from global research. It is about right, we do not know if it is higher or lower. The two big groups in there are end-of-life care and act of chemotherapy for serious cancer, not all chemotherapy. Those two groups of individuals are unlikely to be in big groups going to these venues. It is not impossible that you might have end-of-life care people wanting to go and see their favourite football match, of course, and we would have to make allowance for that. Clinical exemptions are very rare for vaccination. It is such a safe procedure that, even in the sick, it is often the right thing to do. Clinicians will make those choices and we have given advice that we will put that in place, what it will look like, and the scheme will have to allow for those clinical exemptions. Again, they are rare. On a slightly different point, as I understand it, the regulations are going to be brought in quite late on and it will still be made affirmative procedures. Is it not possible to bring the regulations forward a little bit so that we can approve them before the end of September? I will continue to consider that point. The nature of the necessity of having the regulations on the statute book by 1 October and the necessary drafting time that has to go in to make sure that the discussion and dialogue with stakeholders and the drafting time and processing time that is required indicate to me that the made affirmative procedure feels like the most likely way in which we will bring those forward. I will continue to consider that point. I mean, just as an extension to that, if the hospital numbers fell dramatically over the next fortnight, would we just forget about certificates? I don't think so for the reasons that Mr Rowley indicated in his question about the challenges that we face over winter that we might just be, you know, in that scenario, we might be just coming back round to the issue in three weeks' time. I think that I would draw on the contents of the United Kingdom Government's plan B, which includes vaccine certification, because I think that they have an eye on the winter problems and challenges that they will face. My final one, if I may convene her, some of the previous witnesses were talking about the expense of having the apps and checking people as they went in. I mean, my experience as a Clyde supporter, as people I think know, is that my season ticket is on an app, they check it when I walk in, no problem, it's just on their own phones, there doesn't seem to be an issue with it. What is your response on that point about the cost to businesses? I very much agree with the point that you have made in relation to the technology. This is routine technology that is widely available, it will be available through free downloadable apps for individuals and also for those undertaking the checking. It has been designed to be within the firmament of the technology that we are all accustomed to using nowadays. That concludes our consideration of the agenda item, and I thank the Deputy First Minister and his officials for their time today. I now move on to the third agenda item, which is consideration on the motion on the made affirmative instrument considered during the previous agenda item. Deputy First Minister, would you like to make any further remarks on the SSI before we take the motion? If I could just place on the record that this SSI amended the health protection coronavirus requirements Scotland regulations 2021, which came into force on Monday the 90th of August 2021. Those regulations, which came into force on 3 September, made a minor amendment to enable performers to perform or rehearse for a performance without face coverings in situations in which distancing or partitioning is not possible. For clarity, the exemption will apply as long as there is either a partition or a distance of at least one metre between performers and other people, including the audience, but that does not include people who are performing or rehearsing with the performers or assisting with the performers or rehearsal. That is a lab place on the record. Thank you, Deputy First Minister. I now invite you to move S6M-01048. Thank you. Does any member wish to speak on this motion before I put the question? I note that no member has indicated that they wish to speak, so I will now put the question on the motion. The question is that motion S6M-01048 be agreed to. Do members agree? Yes. The motion is agreed to. The committee will publish a report to the Parliament setting out our decision on the statutory instrument that is considered at this meeting in due course. That concludes our consideration of this agenda item and our time with the Deputy First Minister. I would like to thank the Deputy First Minister and his supporting officials for their attendance this morning. The committee's next meeting will be on 23 September, when we will continue to take evidence on vaccine certification. We will also take evidence from the Cabinet Secretary for Net Zero Energy and Transport on the ministerial statement on Covid-19 and subordinate legislation. That concludes the public part of our meeting this morning, and I suspend the meeting to allow the witnesses to leave.