Chamber and committees

I can give an example. We were at the University of Dundee and talked to life sciences people who told us that folk can earn twice as much in other parts of the world but come to Scotland because it is a nice place to live with good quality of life and where house prices are not too high. I know that people have talked about the increase in council tax but, on average, it is around £700 less than it would be for an equivalent band D property in England.

We seem to hear that nobody will want to come and invest here if we put tax up by 0.1 per cent. Professor David Bell raised the issue of loss aversion, which means that you could give someone £100 and they would just shrug their shoulders but, if you took £100 away from them, it would be the end of civilisation. Loss aversion is an issue.

My apologies. Would you like to make your own contribution to respond to my point about the balance between investing in the social contract—as the Government might call it—and having higher levels of tax?

I am sorry, but is the issue not that people want others to pay higher taxes, rather than to pay higher taxes themselves? It is the easiest thing in the world to ask people who are not earning much whether they think that those who are earning a lot should pay higher taxes, but we are looking at how that would impact on the Scottish budget and the Scottish economy.

An argument could be made for having a plethora of commissioners for a number of areas, in order to have a specific relationship or an overview of one specific area. However, it is surely the role of MSPs and parliamentary committees to scrutinise that, backed up by the huge number of civil servants that we have. It is more about emphasising the importance of the national performance framework within the Scottish Government to ensure that it gets the appropriate scrutiny and so on that it requires. Spending £1.5 million or £2 million on an extra commissioner with all the associated back office costs is £1.5 million or £2 million that you cannot spend on, for example, front-line public services.

As many as that?

It is on the third page of your submission, in the second paragraph.

Right, okay.

Good morning, and welcome to the 26th meeting in 2024 of the Finance and Public Administration Committee. We have apologies from John Mason this morning.

Our first agenda item is a round-table discussion on managing Scotland’s public finances, a strategic approach, as part of our pre-budget scrutiny. I welcome to the meeting Allan Faulds, senior policy officer, Health and Social Care Alliance Scotland, which is known as the ALLIANCE; Alice Telfer, head of business policy and public sector, Institute of Chartered Accountants Scotland; Euan Lochhead, architect and retrofit co-ordinator, North East Scotland Retrofit Hub; Lewis Ryder-Jones, advocacy advisor, Oxfam Scotland; Michael Kellet, director of strategy, governance and performance, Public Health Scotland; David Melhuish, director, Scottish Property Federation; and Heather Williams, training lead and member of the women’s economic empowerment project, Scottish Women’s Budget Group. Unfortunately, Dave Moxham, deputy general secretary, Scottish Trades Union Congress, who was due to participate, is no longer able to attend.

Thank you all for your written submissions, which gave me a very enjoyable Saturday and Sunday of reading. We have around 90 minutes for this session. If witnesses would like to be brought into the discussion at any point, please indicate to the clerks and then I will call you. It is not a case of my just asking various questions of individuals. I am hoping for—as it says on the tin—a round-table discussion. As Allan Faulds already knows, I will put my first question to him, and then anyone who wants to come in should let me know. I will take people in the order that I see them indicate. I hope that we will get quite an informed discussion.

I will, if things start getting stuck, move on the discussion. Topics wise, we will go from taxation and growing the tax base to public service reform, potential behavioural response and capital expenditure, just as it says on the tin. I will try to involve every person who has given a submission on a topic as often as possible—that is, as often as you wish to come in.

Allan Faulds, in your written response to the first question in our consultation about the Scottish Government and its priorities, you said that you are quite happy with its priorities of eradicating child poverty, tackling the climate emergency and improving public services. However, you said:

“we believe that the priority of ‘growing the economy’ represents a step backwards in the Scottish Government’s approach to the economy.”

Given your submission and your reference to increasing public expenditure in a number of areas, how you can square that circle?

I turn to Allan Faulds.

Alison?

I think that you would have an uphill struggle convincing the voters of that. I have to be honest.