Chamber and committees

Thank you. That was very helpful. If any colleagues wish to come in at this stage, I ask them to please indicate, as others have already done so.

Absolutely—thank you.

Frazer Scott, if you come in at this stage, we can then quickly turn to Alastair after that. Please keep the answers tight, because I am keen to bring in Evelyn Tweed and Pam Duncan-Glancy for some quick questions before we wrap up.

Absolutely. Thank you, Alistair.

Robert, you were asked about local authority funding and what can be done around retrofitting.

Welcome to the 11th meeting in 2021 of the Social Justice and Social Security Committee. Apologies have been received from Natalie Don, and Evelyn Tweed is attending as her substitute.

The committee will take evidence on the proposed fuel poverty strategy, which was laid in Parliament on 9 November. The Parliament has 40 days to consider it before the Scottish Government publishes its finalised strategy. This morning, we will consider whether the proposed strategy would help to reduce fuel poverty in Scotland.

After the public meeting, the committee will have an informal session in which we will speak to people who are experiencing fuel poverty. The informal session has been co-ordinated by colleagues in our participation and communities team, supported by Tighean Innse Gall—TIG for short—Uist Council of Voluntary Organisations, Inclusion Scotland, Glasgow Disability Alliance, Changeworks and Firsthand Lothian. A note will be taken of the session and published on our website. The evidence that we receive today, in both the formal meeting and the informal evidence session, will be used to inform the committee’s letter on the proposed fuel poverty strategy to Michael Matheson, the Cabinet Secretary for Net Zero, Energy and Transport.

We understand that our colleagues on the Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee have invited the cabinet secretary to provide oral evidence on the proposed fuel poverty strategy. We will therefore ensure that that committee is kept informed of the evidence that we hear today.

I welcome Ariane Burgess MSP, who is the convener of the Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee. Fuel poverty is a cross-cutting issue, and we are pleased to have Ariane join our meeting. I also welcome Alastair Wilcox, senior policy officer at Citizens Advice Scotland; Robert Leslie, manager of Tackling Household Affordable Warmth Orkney; Elizabeth Leighton, director of the Existing Homes Alliance Scotland; and Frazer Scott, chief executive officer of Energy Action Scotland.

I invite colleagues to start posing questions. We are a wee bit tight for time—the meeting needs to finish before 10 o’clock—so I encourage colleagues to direct their questions to whichever witness they would like to answer them. Please keep questions and answers brief. The first questions are from Foysol Choudhury.

If it is okay, I will bring in Jeremy Balfour to ask his question and ask Frazer Scott to respond to it first.

Thank you very much to all the panel members; we have really appreciated your time this morning. As I mentioned, we need to wind things up, because the committee will now go into an informal session.

If there are any points that the witnesses feel they did not have the opportunity to raise, they are welcome to follow those up in writing to the committee. I will speak to colleagues after the meeting about any questions that they might have had but were not able to ask, and we can follow those up with the witnesses, if that is okay.

Our next meeting will be held on 2 December, when we will hear from Social Security Scotland.

Does Foysol Choudhury have another question?

How about on the next theme?

That has been helpful. How could the Scottish Government better target the winter fuel and cold weather payments? In particular, given your comment about the size of the investment in the winter fuel payment, what could be done to better target that?