I will speak to amendments 145 and 146, in my name, which I was asked to lodge by Children’s Hospices Across Scotland. The amendments seek to ensure that, if Scotland legislates for assisted dying, the legislation explicitly recognises the unique complexities that are faced by young people who are under the age of 25 and living with prognostic uncertainty and fluctuating conditions.

Although the bill applies to adults, the Parliament has already acknowledged that many young adults—particularly those with serious or life-limiting conditions—continue to receive care in paediatric or transitional environments, including the service that is provided by CHAS. Those young people often have different cognitive, social and clinical development compared to older adults. Without tailored safeguards, there is a risk that assessments could be inconsistent or unsafe.

We know that such protections are needed because evidence that was submitted throughout stages 1 and 2 made it clear that assessing capacity in young adults with complex conditions is highly specialised and requires advanced clinical knowledge. Coercion can be more difficult to detect where communication relies heavily on family or carers, and diagnoses in that age group often fluctuate, making terminal illness harder to determine with confidence. Those are not routine clinical judgments; they carry significant ethical weight and irreversible consequences, which requires a robust, nationally consistent framework.

Amendment 145 would require the Scottish Government to set specific rules about the “training, qualifications and experience” that doctors need when assessing young adults who are under 25 and living with prognostic uncertainty or fluctuating conditions. It would ensure that such regulations provide equivalent safety to existing national frameworks that recognise reduced cognitive maturity in people under 25, such as is the case with the Scottish sentencing guidelines. Justice sentencing acknowledges that young people who are under 25 are more vulnerable, more susceptible to influence, less able to weigh complex risks and more likely to enter harmful relationships.

That directly mirrors CHAS’s concern that young people may be more vulnerable to coercion or self-duress when they face life-limiting illness, especially during such a difficult time in their life as when they transition from child to adult services and when much of the support that they rely on falls away.

Amendment 146 seeks to strengthen the clinical framework. It states that regulations must include a method such as certification for doctors to verify that they have the appropriate training and experience to carry out the roles that are specified by the bill. It should not just be assumed that a doctor is qualified; there needs to be a formal system to show that they meet the required standard to ensure patient and workforce safety.

I also support amendment 147, in the name of Miles Briggs, which would strengthen assessments, safeguarding and support in the bill for young people who are under 25.

All that said, the central difficulty with the amendments is that the Scottish Government believes that many of them are not legislatively competent. However, those are the amendments that would provide reassurance. When he comes to speak, will the cabinet secretary give an on-the-record commitment from the Scottish Government that the provisions in the amendments will all be included in the section 104 agreement? If he cannot do that, what assurances do we actually have?

Neil Gray:[Made a request to intervene.]