Image source, bbc

Community Safety and Legal Affairs Minister Annabelle Ewing says both heathboards have publicly committed to support for victims of sexual assault.

Ms Ewing says the government is assisting with funding.

Ms Todd asks if the minister can provide more information on the practical support available.

Ms Ewing says the government is providing £76,000 for training for doctors in dealing with victims.

Image source, Science Photo Library

In January we reported that some rape victims in the Northern Isles do not report it because they have to travel to the mainland without washing for forensic examination, it has been claimed.

Rape Crisis Scotland is calling for specialist facilities to be made available in Orkney and Shetland.

Support workers say it would spare victims the ordeal of travelling by boat or plane under police escort.

The Scottish government said forensic facilities were being reviewed.

SNP MSP Maree Todd asks what progress has been made towards the provision of local forensic medical examinations for victims of sexual crimes in Orkney and Shetland.

Image source, PA/Getty Images/ Scottish Parliament

MSPs ask ministers general questions.

First up this afternoon we have general questions.

Nicola Sturgeon will then be quizzed by opposition MSPs during first minister's questions.

Image source, PA/Scottish Parliament/Getty Images

Tory MSP Rachael Hamilton will then lead this afternoon's member's debate on the 25th Anniversary of the Borders.

After a break Justice Secretary Michael Matheson will give a ministerial statement on community justice.

The government will then lead a debate on Scotland's Food and Drink Strategy before decision time.

Committee convener Joan McAlipine thanks the witnesses and moves the committee into private session.

Tory MSP Rachael Hamilton asks if the position paper has been drafted deliberately because the UK government does not want to give much away in their negotiating position.

Professor Sir David Edward says the position paper has been written by people who do not want to listen to the experts.

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Professor Sir David Edward says someone described the UK position paper as "an undergraduate essay that would have failed".

Michael Clancy from the Law Society of Scotland says the role of intergovernmental relationships is a key one.

Mr Clancy says the GMC is where the Scottish government can make its point most cogently.

Peter Seller from the Faculty of Advocates says the deal will have to have a transition.

Mr Seller says if it is a deal where the UK asks for more time to work through the "nitty-gritty" then that will need agreement from the other member states.

Image source, European Commission

The UK is negotiating its exit from the European Union after the country voted to leave in a referendum in June 2016.

As it stands, the UK will depart the EU on 30 March 2019 but the terms of its withdrawal and the nature of its future relationship with the EU are yet to be decided. So what is being discussed and by whom?

Click here for the all singing, all dancing quick guide to the crucial Brexit negotiations.

SNP MSP Richard Lochhead asks if it is possible that the UK may be able to negotiate access to the single market while the European Court of Justice has no jurisdiction.

Professor Sir David Edward says it is completely wrong to assume that the ECJ has jurisdiction in the UK,

Sir David says if we want to have the same playing field it is reasonable for others to say that we will need to play by the same rules.

It is a "dream" to say that we want our own rules, "It is just absurd," he says.

Image source, AFP

The next round of Brexit talks has been postponed by a week to "allow more time for consultation".

The fourth round of UK-EU negotiations, due to begin on 18 September, will start on the 25th instead.

The government said a short delay "would give negotiators the flexibility to make progress".

There had been been speculation that the talks could be moved to accommodate a major speech by Prime Minister Theresa May on the issue of Europe.

"The UK and the European Commission have today jointly agreed to start the fourth round of negotiations on September 25," the Department for Exiting the European Union said in a statement.

"Both sides settled on the date after discussions between senior officials in recognition that more time for consultation would give negotiators the flexibility to make progress in the September round."

Michel Barnier, the EU's chief negotiator, has emphasised the need to be flexible while also warning that the "clock is ticking" if an agreement is to be reached by the time the UK is scheduled to leave at the end of March 2019.

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Professor Sir David Edward says this is a more complex situation than the UK government seems to realise.

Laura Dunlop QC from the Faculty of Advocates says pending cases and generally dealt with and this does not change midway through.

Ms Dunlop says new cases are governed by new rules.

She says there will be disputes that have not yet become cases which, it may be fair to say, should come under the law as it stands at the moment.

The government's bid to extract the UK from EU law in time for Brexit has passed its first parliamentary test.

MPs backed the EU Withdrawal Bill by 326 votes to 290 despite critics warning that it represented a "power grab" by ministers.

The bill, which will end the supremacy of EU law in the UK, now moves onto its next parliamentary stage.

Ministers sought to reassure MPs by considering calls for safeguards over their use of new powers.

Prime Minister Theresa May welcomed the Commons vote in the early hours of Tuesday morning, saying the bill offered "certainty and clarity" - but Labour described it as an "affront to parliamentary democracy".

Seven Labour MPs defied Jeremy Corbyn's order to oppose the bill - Ronnie Campbell, Frank Field, Kate Hoey, Kelvin Hopkins, John Mann, Dennis Skinner and Graham Stringer. No Conservatives voted against it.

Having cleared the second reading stage, the bill will now face more attempts to change it with MPs, including several senior Conservative backbenchers, publishing a proposed 157 amendments, covering 59 pages.

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Michael Clancy from the Law Society of Scotland says the purpose of the UK position paper is not to provide answers but to provide options.

Mr Clancy says the latest edition of the joint technical note shows that there is significant difficulty.

I do not underestimate how difficult this is for the negotiating bodies," he says.

Laura Dunlop QC from the Faculty of Advocates says there should be consistency and the function of the ECJ (European Court of Justice) is to ensure that.

Peter Seller from the Faculty of Advocates says the ECJ role is to ensure uniform application of the 28 member states.

Michael Clancy from the Law Society of Scotland says the ECJ is there to provide that certainty.

Professor Sir David Edward says the British courts have to know what law they are going to apply.

That is what the European Court of Justice does he says.

Sir David says there are questions of extreme complication that are not addressed at all in the UK position paper.

Professor Sir David Edward says, in dealing with other countries, any dispute would need to be capable of judicial discourse.

Sir David says when he was a judge, a lady of Spanish nationality studied in Newcastle and then began a job in Paris before applying to a position to Madrid.

He says she was refused that position because she did not have a Spanish certificate and that was required as an agreement between the employer's authorities and staff associations.

He says this job was refused not because of law but because of an agreement between the employer authorities and staff association.

Sir David says employers will still want to send their employees to other countries to work following Brexit and those employees will want to live there with their families.

He says some of those will be caught up in bureaucratic rules and some won't.

"It is not just about trade disputes," he says.

The Scottish government will not ask Holyrood to give consent to the EU Withdrawal Bill in its current form.

Brexit minister Mike Russell told MSPs that the legislation posed a threat to the founding principles of devolution.

The Scottish government said there will be no consent motion for MSPs to vote on "at this time", and it will instead seek to amend the bill.

The UK government has insisted that Holyrood will see "significant" new powers devolved after Brexit.

Talks between the two governments over post-Brexit powers for Scotland ended in stalemate in August, although more are expected to be scheduled.

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