Chamber and committees

Excellent—I will be quick.

On that final point, all the things that I outlined in relation to scrutiny—the assignment of ministerial responsibility, the laying before Parliament of the annual report, the review of plans, and the review of the strategy—will sharpen the focus to make sure that, if we are doing the right thing on the ground, we will know that we are, because we are asking people about it.

Excellent. I am glad to be on the front foot for a change.

They are doing that. I know that because the data on young people with additional support needs is broken down by large numbers of categories of impairment. So, organisations know who those children and young people are. I also think that it is not the case that teachers and schools do not know which pupils in their classes need the extra support and who could be considered a disabled person. They have very good relationships with them.

We know that young people in school have access to pastoral care teachers—they were called guidance teachers in my day—and that existing structures are in place to support them. For example, staff from Skills Development Scotland engage with special and state schools. There are existing structures, which should be treating all young people equally, including young disabled people, but the statistics show that they are not doing that yet. We are saying that the bill contains a mechanism to focus attention on and address some of that.

I reassure the committee that I have not closed my ears and eyes to a different perspective on finance. I say that on the basis of my earlier comment about the costs for local authorities. The last thing that anyone wants to do is land local authorities with duties that they do not have the financial support to back up, but I contend that such support is Government’s responsibility.

We must remember two comments. I contend that good transitions would be a form of good support, and the National Audit Office said that good support could save £1 million per person—I repeat: £1 million per person. Even if we take our estimate of the cost and COSLA’s estimate and the £5 million extra, we would only have to get it right for five people to make a longer-term saving for the state.

Secondly, the Law Society of Scotland said that

“the wider costs of inaction would be greater in comparison to the costs of implementation”.

It is in the context of those two statements that I approach the question of the financial memorandum.

I appreciate that question, and I recognise your passion for the subject. In fact, all the members from whom we have heard so far have that passion. I welcome the support and energy around the subject.

The implementation gap, which is one of the first matters that Ruth Maguire asked about, is crucial. We can all point to a lot of legislation that still needs to be implemented. I understand that. I see that and, when it comes to disabled people, I have seen it for decades. Justice and access to justice for disabled people are a serious concern. I will talk in a minute about the ways in which the bill addresses some of that and is enforceable.

I recognise the work that is being done on whether we need qualifications for additional support teachers and how we encourage good practice. There is also the awards system for schools that recognises good practice in education and the journey that young disabled people have travelled. All of that is on-going and should continue. The bill does not stop any of it.

I have seen, time and again—particularly when it comes to disabled people, but the same is true for all the different protected characteristics—that, if we leave improvement to accident and default, we end up defaulting to a situation in which society discriminates against and oppresses a large group of people: disabled people. We have to fix the process by design. We cannot leave it to accident any more, and that design, I believe, should involve looking at the various different bits of legislation that exist.

Ross Greer pointed out that the co-ordinated support plan is not the same as the transitions plan. It is not. It was developed for a different purpose. The bill is developed for a specific purpose, and it is about transition.

There are two points here. The first is whether the current legislative framework is right. I do not believe that it is, and neither do a number of organisations, including the Law Society of Scotland and the Children and Young People’s Commissioner Scotland, so we need to change that. That is what I am trying to do with the bill, but we always have to change practice because, as Graeme Dey pointed out, there is good practice in places, but there is also some pretty poor practice that we need to shine a light on and address. I contend that the bill sharpens the mind and the focus on that by putting it into legislation, being much clearer, and taking a one child, one plan approach.

Absolutely. That is the situation that disabled people face. I have a quotation from Audit Scotland that speaks to that. In a blog on transitions, it said:

“It’s distressing and frustrating that we repeatedly hear of the barriers that some families fight against to get the right support to help their child to learn. Too often, families are worn down by a prolonged search for the right support, and by having to manage a crisis that could have and should have been avoided.”

It went on to note:

“Councils provide support in different ways, with a wide variation in spending ... This partly reflects the different ways services are provided and the varying costs of supporting individuals—but”—

this point is crucial—

“may also reflect local decisions by councils to prioritise between a wide range of services.”

Therefore, Audit Scotland recognises the position of councils.

I should put on record that councils are in a horrific position right now—I in no way underestimate that. Now is not the time to get into the budget, because I could be here for another three hours if we were to touch on that. However, you hit the nail on the head when you made the point about councils really struggling to meet just their statutory responsibilities. I cannot tell you how often disabled people face the argument that “It’s not an obligation, so we don’t have to do it.” Social care is an example of that. Eligibility criteria get stripped back and stripped back until people are literally doing the only thing that they have to do, which is keep people alive. That is the situation that we are trying to avoid with the bill for transitions for young disabled people.

I have now met twice with COSLA.

I have met with a range of stakeholders and have done engagement on the bill right across Scotland. Members may have seen the roadshows that I did during the summer, which engaged people who work in the field and those who work for the Department for Work and Pensions and for Skills Development Scotland. I also met them separately from that engagement. During those roadshows, I met teachers, young disabled people and their families and carers.

I have carried out extensive engagement and have probably met most of the stakeholders that you would think should be engaged in the process. I am willing to meet anyone who believes that they have a stake in this and to discuss how best to make it work. I hope that this has come across to the committee: I want to make this work; I want to do the right thing; and I want to ensure that, for example, the financial memorandum is accurate. We have done that to the best of our ability. Bill Scott acknowledged that we would be prepared to discuss other numbers. We spent a lot of time coming to our conclusions. Our rationale is there.

That is how I approach stakeholder engagement. If people want to speak to us, I would be more than happy to speak to them, but I have already engaged with a large number of groups, including the Transitions Forum.

I suggest that scrutiny is part of the problem. It goes back to one of my earlier answers on having a minister with special responsibility for transitions, having the strategy lead in Parliament, and having a reporting period so that people know that there will be a point at which they can scrutinise the development of the process.

Right now, we do not have a strategy to address transitions. I know that the Government is producing one, and I welcome that, but we need it in legislation because we cannot just leave it in manifesto commitments that may or may not ever be enacted or that exist only while a certain well-intentioned, passionate member of the Cabinet drives it forward. We need to legislate. That is incredibly important.

There also needs to be an opportunity for people to hold ministers to account on that. That is what the bill would specifically provide. That does not exist in other pieces of legislation.

Forgive me for looking at my notes for this bit so that I get the sections right. Section 1, which is on the national transitions strategy, would provide a clear reference point to local authorities and other agencies. It says that the aims and objectives and outcomes need to be set out—those are important—as well as the actions that authorities will need to take to meet the aims that ministers think will be “necessary to improve transitions”. The effect of having something like that in legislation cannot be overestimated.

Section 4 says that local authorities and other agencies would have a statutory duty when exercising their functions to comply with the strategy. That is another point at which you would be able to scrutinise the way in which the plans were being developed.

Section 6 says that a member of the Government or a minister would be assigned responsibility for the act. We have changed the language in this version of the bill from the previous version to take into account some concerns of previous committees.

Section 9 says:

“A local authority must ensure that each disabled child or young person ... receives the care and support necessary to meet the needs ... in the ... plan.”

Section 14 says:

“The Scottish Ministers may issue guidance”

about transitions, and that local authorities and agencies “must have regard” to it.

Section 15 says:

“The Scottish Ministers may issue general or specific directions about ... plans”,

and section 16 would require ministers to lay before Parliament an annual report on progress.

All those things do not yet exist, but they would add the scrutiny that young disabled people and their families really need. People can come to me and to all of us as parliamentarians and say—we have all heard this—“I am tearing my hair out. My young person is leaving school next week and nothing is in place.” This morning, I heard exactly that story. Somebody with significant support needs is now stuck at home. They have already left school, and nothing is yet in place. They do not have an adult social worker in place.

People come to us, and we say that we will put pressure on. We do what we can—we write letters, we have meetings, and we call people. However, when we look at what duties and responsibilities people have, we see that they are not clear and that they are not as robust as those in the bill are. We need to change that.

That is the question that I am trying to answer with the bill. I point to what Bill Scott has just said in relation to modern apprentices, and I will add to the answer to Willie Rennie’s question, which I thank him for.

Right now, we could say, “This co-ordinated support plan was not put in place”—actually, given the statistics, we would be more likely to say, “There was no co-ordinated support plan.” We are still dealing with one person after another, each in an isolated situation. That means that we are constantly firefighting, and there is nothing that pulls all that work together.

The bill will do two things in that context. First, it will put on a statutory footing the need for a national strategy that looks at how we will address those issues. I have already made a comment about the purpose of and the need to do that. Secondly, it will give individual rights. It will do both things at the same time.

Nobody wants to be associated with not doing what is right for disabled people, and most people who work in that field set out every day to do the right thing and as much as they possibly can, but disabled people are constantly told, “That circumstance was a one-off” or “That happened only in this situation—it does not happen in all situations.” We really need to have a broader focus on that, as well. The strategy part of the bill suggests that.

I will finish on your final question, Stephanie. I am sorry—I am not suggesting that it was your final question. I am not chairing the meeting.

In a number of cases, what we suggest will be accurate. However, I have seen and acknowledge the SCLD’s evidence.

The approach to calculating the hours that will be needed to ascertain what sort of support people will need is based on decades of work with disabled people and their parents, and with disabled people’s organisations, including the SCLD. We have come to the best possible conclusion on the issue. Such things are always open to discussion—that is the purpose of parliamentary scrutiny, which is really important.

Thank you for your question. On your first point, I would expect nothing less than significant scrutiny from the committee, because we are talking about a bill that, I hope, will get on to the statute book at some point. If we put something into statute, we need to be absolutely sure about it. I have learned that—very much so—since becoming a member of the Parliament. I expect scrutiny and have prepared as best I can for your interrogation, which I think is the word that the convener used. Someone said to me earlier, “It will not be interrogation; it will be scrutiny”. Either way, I am here to answer your questions and I undertake to come back to the committee with further detail, particularly on the difference between COSLA’s estimates and ours.

There is no mechanism for us to replace the financial memorandum once it is laid before the Parliament, but we have met COSLA to talk about the financial memorandum.