Non-Surgical Procedures and Functions of Medical Reviewers (Scotland) Bill information: FOI release
Information request and response under the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002.
Information requested
You asked for the following information relates to the Non-Surgical Procedures and Functions of Medical Reviewers (Scotland) Bill:
1. EVIDENCE BASE
1.1 Please provide all written evidence, submissions, reports, research papers, safety data, and statistical analyses that were received by or commissioned by the Scottish Government and relied upon in developing the policy framework for SP Bill 77, from 1 January 2018 to the date of this request.
1.2 Please provide all recorded information the Scottish Government holds regarding the safety evidence base for the requirement that Group 2 and Group 3 non-surgical cosmetic procedures be carried out from permitted premises where a registered healthcare professional provides services - specifically, any comparative safety data between medically qualified and non-medically qualified aesthetic practitioners.
1.3 Please confirm whether the Scottish Government commissioned any independent safety research or academic review of the relative safety records of medically qualified versus non-medically qualified aesthetic practitioners prior to introducing SP Bill 77. If so, please provide copies. If not, please confirm that no such research was commissioned.
2. JCCP INVOLVEMENT
2.1 Please provide all correspondence, emails, meeting notes, minutes, briefing documents, and submissions between Scottish Government officials or ministers and the Joint Council for Cosmetic Practitioners (JCCP), its trustees, officers, or representatives, from 1 January 2018 to the date of this request, in relation to the regulation of non-surgical cosmetic procedures.
2.2 Please provide all recorded information about any meetings, roundtables, working groups, or advisory sessions attended by JCCP representatives in connection with the development of SP Bill 77, including dates, attendees, agendas, and minutes.
2.3 Please confirm whether any JCCP trustee, officer, or representative served on the reconvened Scottish Cosmetic Interventions Expert Group (SCIEG) from 2022 onwards. If so, please identify those individuals and their declared interests.
2.4 Please provide the full, unredacted minutes of all SCIEG meetings held from 2022 to the date of this request.
3. WHAT HAPPENS NEXT — IMPLEMENTATION
3.1 Please provide the Scottish Government's implementation timeline for SP Bill 77, including the expected dates for commencement of each provision, the making of subordinate regulations, and the establishment of the registration regime by Healthcare Improvement Scotland.
3.2 Please provide all recorded information about the content, scope, and timeline of the subordinate regulations that will be made under SP Bill 77, including any draft regulations, consultation plans, and ministerial directions issued to date.
3.3 Please provide all recorded information about transitional arrangements for currently practising independent non-medical aesthetic practitioners who will be unable to comply with the requirements of SP Bill 77, including any recognition of prior learning scheme, competence assessment pathway, or grace period.
3.4 Has the Scottish Government taken legal advice on the compatibility of SP Bill 77 with the UK Internal Market Act 2020? Please provide copies of that advice, or confirm the grounds for withholding it.
3.5 Has the Scottish Government taken legal advice on the compatibility of SP Bill 77 with Articles 1, 8, and 14 of the European Convention on Human Rights? Please provide copies of that advice, or confirm the grounds for withholding it.
4. EQUALITY AND IMPACT
4.1 Following the passage of SP Bill 77, has the Scottish Government taken any steps to address the finding in its own Island Communities Impact Assessment that the proposals may lead to a rise in underground or unregulated practices? If so, please provide details.
4.2 Has the Scottish Government conducted any further equality analysis following the passage of SP Bill 77 in light of the acknowledged clearly negative impact on women identified in the EQFSDIA of October 2025?
Response
I enclose a copy of some of the information you requested in response to request 1.2, 2.2, and 2.4.
Some of the information you have requested is available online. I have included a list of these in Annex A. Under section 25(1) of FOISA, we do not have to give you information which is already reasonably accessible to you. If, however, you do not have internet access to obtain this information from the website(s) listed, then please contact me again and I will send you a paper copy.
Some of the information in the documents I have provided is not in scope of the request you have made.
Exemptions under section 30(b)(i) and (ii) and 30(c) of FOISA apply to some of the information you have requested, where disclosure would, or would be likely to, inhibit substantially the free and frank provision of advice or exchange of views for the purpose of deliberation, or would prejudice substantially, or be likely to prejudice substantially, the effective conduct of public affairs. These exemptions are subject to the 'public interest test'. Therefore, taking account of all the circumstances of this case, we have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exemption. We recognise that there is some public interest in release because the information relates to the development of legislation. However, this is outweighed by the public interest in enabling officials to provide Ministers with full advice which will allow them to make robust decisions.
Exemption(s) under section 38(1)(b) of FOISA (personal information) apply to some of the information you have requested, relating to names and email addresses of individuals. This exemption is not subject to the 'public interest test', so we are not required to consider if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption.
While our aim is to provide information whenever possible, in regards to requests 1.1 and 2.1, the costs of locating, retrieving and providing the information requested would exceed the upper cost limit of £600.
- For 1.1 we have found over 3,500 documents and emails in our file storage systems which we would need to sift through to identify all those relating to each request and to exclude any duplicates. The Scottish Government has engaged extensively with a range of stakeholders during development of the Bill, including business owners, beauty industry representatives, healthcare professionals, environmental health officers and professional regulators to develop and refine our proposals, and as I am sure you can appreciate since 2018 this has generated a large amount of evidence and data.
- For 2.1 the searches carried out returned more responses than can be reviewed to provide the information you are seeking. This is because documents described may have been saved as part of, or following communications with JCCP, and because we would generally consider “communication” with an organisation to include a broad range of different exchanges. Therefore matters in scope for your request may have been saved as part of or alongside a very large number of unrelated emails and documents.
Under section 12 of FOISA public authorities are not required to comply with a request for information if the authority estimates that the cost of complying would exceed the upper cost limit, which is currently set at £600 by Regulations made under section 12.
You may, however, wish to consider reducing the scope of your request in order that the costs can be brought below £600. For example, you may be able to be more specific about the nature of the information you are looking for, as this would allow us to limit the searches that would require to be conducted. You may also find it helpful to look at the Scottish Information Commissioner's 'Tips for requesting information under FOI and the EIRs' on this website at: http://www.itspublicknowledge.info/YourRights/Tipsforrequesters.aspx.
This is a formal notice under section 17(1) of FOISA that the Scottish Government does not have the information relating to the following requests:
- 1.3: the Scottish Government has not commissioned any independent safety research or academic review of the relative safety records of medically qualified versus non-medically qualified aesthetic practitioners prior to introducing SP Bill 77. This is because, due to its unregulated nature, it would not be possible to identify a broad enough range of practitioners to enable such a study to be conducted reliably.
- 2.2: I have attached in Annex B a list of meetings with JCCP which we have found in our systems. These meetings were informal and as such do not have agendas, minutes of lists of attendees, although they will mainly have been attended by the Chair of JCCP and Scottish Government officials. I have been able to locate one note of a meeting held in December 2023, which I have included in the list of documents for release.
- 3.1, 3.2 and 3.3: The Scottish Government has not yet begun work on an implementation timeline, transitional arrangements or on any subordinate legislation under the Bill. The establishment of the registration regime will be a matter for Healthcare Improvement Scotland.
Finally in answer to your other questions:
2.3: Dr John Elder has served on the Scottish Cosmetic Interventions Expert Group since January, representing the British College of Aesthetic Medicine. Dr Elder is a trustee of JCCP but does not represent JCCP on the group.
3.4 and 3.5: we are unable to provide the information relating to these requests because an exemption under section 36(1) of FOISA (confidentiality in legal proceedings) applies to that information. This exemption is subject to the 'public interest test'. Therefore, taking account of all the circumstances of this case, we have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exemption. We acknowledge that this is an area of interest for a number of individuals, and release may inform public debate and increase awareness of these issues. However, this is outweighed by the strong public interest in maintaining the right to confidentiality of communications between legal advisers and clients, to ensure that Ministers and officials are able to receive legal advice in confidence, like any other public or private organisation.
4.1 and 4.2: the Scottish Government has not yet done any further work on these impact assessments following passage of the Bill on 17 March. However in relation to the Island Communities Impact Assessment, as stated therein, it would not be acceptable to have a situation where people in island and remote/rural mainland communities had less protection than people in other areas.
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Contact
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Central Correspondence Unit
Email: contactus@gov.scot
Phone: 0300 244 4000
The Scottish Government
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