Chamber and committees

Do you have a view on that, Mark?

Do you have any fears about slippage in relation to cost? For example, it was indicated that the programme business case would be provided in the autumn, but we have not seen those figures yet, and they might or might not be available. Is it a worry that there might be slippage in cost and that the whole delivery might be delayed?

On the list that Douglas Lumsden touched on, the Audit Scotland written submission states:

“There are a number of costs associated with the measures set out in the Bill that have yet be assessed. The Scottish Government has recognised this providing a broad description of the anticipated cost and the difficulty in assessing it at this stage.”

It then lists the areas where information has not been provided, including on the cost of care boards, transition costs for local authorities and health boards, VAT, pension scheme arrangements, the extent of potential changes to capital investment maintenance and the cost of the health and social care information scheme. Should any of those have been included in the financial memorandum at this stage, or was the Scottish Government right on what was included?

I thank the witnesses for their excellent contributions. The committee will continue our evidence taking on the financial memorandum next week, when we will hear from Kevin Stewart, the Minister for Mental Wellbeing and Social Care.

That concludes the public part of today’s meeting. The next item on our agenda, which will be discussed in private, is consideration of a proposed contingent liability.

Yes, it does. I will follow on from that and move things on a wee bit. Your submission says:

“The ALLIANCE ... supports Volunteer Scotland’s calls to ensure that volunteers—while a valuable asset to the health and social care landscape—are not expected to substitute for paid care provision.”

Is there any indication that that is being considered?

I will let colleagues come in in a minute or two. Although I have given you quite a barrage of questions, there are huge areas that we have not touched on. I will ask one more question to Ralph Roberts, Mark Taylor and Emma Congreve, and then I will open up the session. Ralph, the potential for efficiency savings has been spoken about but, in your written submission, you said that

“it would be difficult to find additional efficiency savings”.

If those cannot be found, must the Scottish Government make a commitment to meet the cost, or should the cost be shared? Do you hope that efficiency savings can somehow be found? If so, where could they possibly be found?

It does—thank you.

Mark, you commented that paragraph 51 of the financial memorandum

“provides details of the components of core management costs assessed, but the subsequent analysis does not provide any information against these headings.”

What level of cost could we be talking about?

Emma, you say in your submission:

“The creation of an electronic integrated health and social care record is in the legislation, but no costing has been produced. The reason given is that the work is at a too early stage to estimate costs, but it will be provided in the Programme business case due in Autumn 2022.”

We are now in the autumn. Have you been advised as to when those figures will be provided, if they have not been provided already?

Ralph, you state in your submission:

“The purpose of creating the NCS is to improve the delivery of community health and social care together. The clear definition of community health is not evident within the Bill and therefore it is significantly more challenging to understand the financial implications on services and costs.”

What impact might that have?

That concludes questions from members. I have a few to wind up with.

The first is a follow-up to Douglas Lumsden’s point. The briefing by the Scottish Parliament information centre says:

“The stated purpose of the Bill is to improve the quality and consistency of social services in Scotland.”

From our discussion today, it seems like you are using a sledgehammer to crack a nut. Surely, if there are issues of consistency and quality, as you have just touched on in your answer to Douglas, they should be addressed directly. Who has the problems of quality and consistency? Name and shame them. Would it not be easier just to impose duties to ensure that they raise their standards to the level of those who are doing best? I would be happy for you to name them, too.

As Michelle Thomson pointed out, it seems to be a monumental risk to have a bill of this nature, with all the financial implications, because a few service deliverers are not up to scratch.