Chamber and committees

Thank you very much for those remarks. We now turn to questions from members. We have a few themes to explore, the first of which is how the updated forecasts compare with the December forecasts. Thank you for setting the scene.

The first questions will be asked by my colleague Paul McLennan, who will be followed by Jeremy Balfour.

That was a very good answer at the end; it is incumbent upon us to find those other people and get them to come and help us scrutinise those plans.

Thank you very much, all three of you, for coming along and giving your evidence. I will briefly suspend the meeting for a changeover of panels.

Of course, I will go to Jeremy Balfour first and then I will come back to you.

Apologies—I see that you were just typing that in the chat box.

Finally, Pam Duncan-Glancy, do you have a further question?

I thank the minister and the officials who have joined us online today.

That concludes the public part of this morning’s meeting. At next week’s meeting we will hear from the Cabinet Secretary for Social Justice, Housing and Local Government and the Minister for Public Finance, Planning and Community Wealth in our final evidence session on our low income and debt inquiry.

I will go back to Emma Roddick and then Jeremy Balfour.

Our next item of business is an evidence session on the Scottish Fiscal Commission’s social security spending forecasts. I welcome our witnesses from the Scottish Fiscal Commission, who are all in the room with us: Dame Susan Rice is the chair of the commission, Professor David Ulph is a commissioner and Claire Murdoch is the head of social security and public funding for the commission. Good morning.

I would like to thank Dame Susan Rice for her leadership of the Scottish Fiscal Commission, as we note that her term of office is coming to an end. It has been a pleasure to work with her. The commission’s forecasts are integral to the committee’s ability to scrutinise the Scottish Government’s spending on social security.

I invite you to make a few opening remarks.

We move on to questions about indicative forecasts. The deputy convener will start us off.

I pass over to Paul McLennan, to be followed by Foysol Choudhury, who is online.