Hansard

I thank all the members who participated in the debate. The response has been positive, even from the wrinklies and the smoothie—wherever he is.

The bill provides an opportunity to change the lives of children and young people in Scotland. I welcome the minister's comments, her support for the bill and her commitment to children's rights.

I will deal with the issues that Fiona McLeod raised about individual investigations. Throughout the Education, Culture and Sport Committee's inquiry, the issue of individual investigations arose. Even young people were clear that if a children's commissioner spent his or her time simply dealing with individual investigations, they would be unable to do the important work that they will need to do.

It is clear that the commissioner must act within the Scottish Parliament's remit, but the commissioner might occasionally need to comment on reserved issues, if they are incidental to work in which the commissioner is involved.

The Education, Culture and Sport Committee took evidence from several agencies. Statutory and voluntary organisations welcomed the establishment of a children's commissioner. More important, the committee took evidence from children and young people—some of whom are in the public gallery—through seminars, participation events, video links and even a video.

Young people made strong representations on the need for a young person's champion—a tsar, ombudswoman, ombudsman or commissioner. Regardless of the commissioner's title, the three principles of consultation, participation and accessibility should underlie everything that the commissioner does. The commissioner should have a particular remit to engage with children who are vulnerable or who might not be involved in consultation exercises—those kids whom people talk about but whose voices are seldom heard.

Children and young people should be involved and they should know what the commissioner does and how to make contact. As some of the young people who contributed to the committee's inquiry suggested, the commissioner should be in touch with young people and should be someone with whom young people can be in touch.

The commissioner's work will support and enhance the excellent work that statutory and voluntary agencies perform. The minister is correct to say that the commissioner's role will build on the networks and develop co-operative ways of working with relevant agencies.

The bill will establish a significant new office for children and young people in Scotland. The children's commissioner will work to ensure that policy makers and service providers prioritise the interests of children and young people. One of the commissioner's core functions, as set out in section 4 of our bill, is to

"keep under review the law, policy and practice relating to … children and young people with a view to assessing the adequacy and effectiveness of such law, policy and practice".

The office of the commissioner will be new and unique. As we have heard from all the debate's participants, it will be unique in several ways. Those include its coverage of all children and young people, which will provide a focus for co-ordinating and promoting children and young people's rights, and its ability to develop an overview of issues that pertain to children and young people's rights. I do not think that the commissioner could do the job that they will set out to do if they had to deal solely or primarily with investigations of individual cases.

Children will inform the work that is to be undertaken and its prioritisation. As Karen Gillon stated, no other single agency has the same combination of breadth of remit, independence and statutory status. The commissioner will be informed by the views of children and young people and will represent their views to the Parliament, the Executive and others. As Irene McGugan said, the commissioner will have a clear duty to engage actively with young people. The commissioner will also develop networks and consider imaginative ways of ensuring accessibility.

Finally, as Karen Gillon has done, I thank all those who were involved in supporting the bill. I also thank voluntary organisations such as Save the Children for their role in developing a participation process; the Scottish Parliament information centre for its excellent research; the committee's wonderful clerks; the non-Executive bills unit; all the committee members who worked on the bill from the start, including Fiona McLeod; and all the people who worked on the bill and the participation events to pull things together. I particularly thank Jackie Baillie and Irene McGugan for their hard work in progressing this important legislation.

The bill is an excellent example of cross-party co-operation. It is also a good example of how a minister can work closely with a committee. We thank Cathy Jamieson for her support. The bill will give children and young people a voice. As I said in September:

"The proposal is an idea whose time has come."

The bill will put Scotland at the cutting edge in the struggle to improve children's rights. I commend it to the Parliament.