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I thank everyone for their contributions this morning. What is coming across is a sense that the approach needs to be evidence led and that we need to take our time with it. Necessity may be the mother of invention, but we want to take time to learn from the experience of the past 18 months.

I will touch on two points. On digital exclusion, I agree with what has been said about ensuring that people have the right support. My concern is that we often end up with a two-tier system, even within a digital offering. People who do not have access to the internet sometimes cannot do audiovisual participation and end up participating via a phone, which is not always the best option, particularly—Karen Wylie alluded to this—in relation to children’s hearings and family courts, in which the issues that are discussed are very emotive and can be very stressful and challenging for people. Participation on a phone can often mean that it is difficult to read people’s tones or get a sense of what support someone might need. In addition, if someone is being supported by an advocate or legal counsel, it can often be hard in a digital setting for that relationship to be well established and for the person to get the right support. There are certainly things that need to be looked at to ensure that there is parity of access, even within digital offerings.

Ruth Crawford touched on the public’s access to the courts and how, where appropriate, members of the public can ensure that they can be present, if they choose to be. Obviously, our public galleries at Holyrood have been empty for the duration of the pandemic, but we broadcast all the public meetings of the Parliament via the website through Scottish Parliament TV. The difference is that we have not quite reached all court proceedings being digitally available or available in live time. I am keen to understand how we can protect the right of the public to be present in court if there is a move to a digital setting.

I am currently a serving councillor. We have a strange process if a member of the public wants to join the meeting. They have to request to do so prior to the meeting and be let into the system that we use, otherwise they have to watch it after the live event on YouTube. We need to look at such issues so that we protect people’s fundamental right to be present.

I want to follow up on the point about how local government has worked across the piece to drill down into people’s experiences and what services they require. I am interested in the work and recommendations of Professor Bruce Guthrie, at the University of Edinburgh, in this area—in particular, the idea that we can use NHS data, such as unique addresses, to understand whether people are living in sheltered housing or a care home, or in a care-at-home scenario.

I am keen to understand how we ensure that, in the national care service, we still get good-quality, localised data and information about a person. That helps us to see the bigger picture with regard to housing mix, housing need and requirements in an individual area, whether it is rural or urban, and other such issues.

The point is well made that the approach cannot be one size fits all and that we need to look at varying aspects. NHS England operates an app that covers all the things that Chaloner Chute mentioned, such as GP appointments, prescriptions and Covid status. What are we learning from that? That has been in place for a period—why do we not have an equivalent? Does Jim Miller or anyone else know anything about that?

Thank you for that comprehensive answer. Following on from that, I have two questions. How will we use the data that we hope to bring on stream to chart somebody’s journey through health and social care? A person might present to their GP but then go elsewhere, or might feel that it is appropriate to present at an accident and emergency department. There is a discussion at the moment about where presentations happen. How will we link the data to look at people’s journeys?

Secondly, how will we chart unmet needs? Some people are not having their needs met in the most appropriate place. I ask in particular in relation to digital formats, which people are using more and more.

Good morning. Witnesses have already touched on the necessity during Covid to upscale and move forward what we are doing in relation to digital. Obviously, NHS 24 has had a key role in developing many of the services, and it is fair to say that, within that, there has been a degree of quick movement and upscaling of projects that were already planned.

I want to get a sense of Jim Miller’s reflections on what has worked well and what has been challenging. In my experience, certain applications have worked better than others and have needed refining and testing. Jim, can you kick off with your reflections on that issue?

Your assessment is fair. There is a sense that there were challenges in relation to getting things up and running initially—for example, on proof of vaccination, which took a while to come on stream in a digital format.

You make an interesting point about that younger cohort. However, my sense from my inbox is that it goes across age ranges—people have a real desire to have things in one place, such as in one app, particularly when it comes to their vaccination status. There have certainly been issues around where people can book vaccinations and so on. Covid has brought all that to fore.

There is ambition to bring those seams together and to have that one-digital-door approach. More broadly, it is also about how we access services. The question is how we bring all the parts of that together. Is there an ambition to have a one-door app that would allow us to access our medical records if we require them and also to use services? That might be Jim Miller’s bailiwick.

Good morning. Obviously, primary care is very much in focus at the moment, particularly in the context of the pandemic. However, it is fair to say that there has, over many years, been commentary that the data in relation to primary care, and an understanding of who is using primary care and where the trends are, have not always been good or available enough. As an overview, will the witnesses outline what information about primary care activity and demand is currently publicly available?

I am verbose if nothing else, minister.

The point has been made about accountability. We have had structural change already in social care with the introduction of integration joint boards and seven years, I think, of work on the integration of health and social care that has not yet been well analysed.

Local authorities are concerned about the changes that are proposed to accountability, because it will move to ministers rather than being with them. It would be helpful for the committee to understand what discussion is going on with local authorities about their role. COSLA has been critical of the proposal, so it would be useful if the minister could explain what discussions he is having before we get to the publication of a bill.

I appreciate that the minister touched on suicide prevention in his earlier answers, which were very informative. Currently, Scotland has an increasing suicide rate. When we take that as a comparator across the UK, we see that our rate is higher than those in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. Are we engaging with other parts of the United Kingdom to understand their experience and what has been done in them? How can we share best practice? Notwithstanding the work that is already being done, I think that we can learn from other people.