Meeting of the Parliament 26 March 2024
I, too, will keep my remarks short, because we have now heard from most of my fellow members of the Equalities, Human Rights and Civil Justice Committee and we are all just going to say the same thing about some of the stuff that we have listened to.
For clarity, the ruling was a result of the judicial review that was brought by For Women Scotland. In response, the Scottish Government has brought forward this amendment bill. We were a bit disappointed by the length of time that it took to introduce the bill, but we listened to the cabinet secretary’s comments in committee and we understand. As Paul O’Kane said, maybe we need to look at how legislation can change and move forward so that—as everyone has said—we do not have to introduce a stand-alone bill just to apply a small technical fix to existing legislation.
We have to look carefully at the Gender Representation on Public Boards (Scotland) Act 2018, which the bill will change, to make sure that, when we talk about gender, we are careful and we listen to judicial reviews—to what the courts say.
I am just looking at my notes to see whether I have anything to add that no one else has said.
There are impassioned views on gender across the political spectrum, and we must be sure to listen to all sides of the argument. On this occasion, I confirm that Scottish Conservatives will vote for the amendment bill.