Chamber and committees

I will not continue, as colleagues are keen to come in.

Property costs.

Thank you for that clarification.

I thank our witnesses for their evidence today. We will be continuing with our budget scrutiny, but first we will have a five-minute break until 10.25.

Thank you very much for that very helpful opening statement.

You have said again that there will be a 10 per cent reduction in capital over the next five years, but the Scottish Fiscal Commission has said that it will be a 20 per cent reduction. In chapter 1 of the budget document, “Scottish Budget: 2024-25”, it is stated on page 5:

“SFC analysis shows that by 2028-29 our total capital funding is set to fall by 20 per cent in real terms in comparison to 2023-24.”

Do you accept that it is a 20 per cent rather than a 10 per cent reduction?

I go back to the point that it is about transparency when you are putting together these budgets. It looks as if that is a decision that has been made by the Scottish Government. We can look at UK AME, but there are all these other figures on top of it. It looks almost as if that is a figure that you have to play with. Should that not be separated out from the Scottish budget to give a much more rational and reasonable view of it, and so that we can make appropriate comparisons?

There are still many areas to cover, and I know that colleagues will want to dip their toes into them, so I open up the session.

Is that for MSP staff cost provision?

I do not understand why it will cost £100,000 in staff time to upgrade the Official Report or the Business Bulletin. Frankly, I do not understand why the tasks are necessary but, to me, you are talking about £100,000 as if it is nothing when it is a lot of money to work on something like upgrading the Business Bulletin.

We are going to have an evidence session with the Deputy First Minister, which will probably last more than two hours, in which we will discuss how those in lots of areas of Scottish Government responsibility will have to deal with just that issue. The corporate body seems somewhat out of kilter with that.

The staff pay budget is to increase by 7.7 per cent. What is the differential between basic pay going up and what might be called grade inflation? We have the same number of staff—I understand that there have not been many additions and that last year’s increase in staff numbers has been consolidated. Where are we on that?

I absolutely agree. I remember that, when Jim Eadie was in the office next to me, he had a mountain made up of every Official Report that had been published since he had been elected. It is an invaluable resource, and I commend you for ensuring that members get it every day. I know that, when the new website was introduced, we were still able to access the Official Report on the old website. It is very important, and it is also important to cross-check what people have said in previous debates. I am just not sure why it needs to be updated. However, we will move on.

Inevitably, the last thing that I want to talk about is the issue of office-holders. You have talked about a 10 per cent increase, which is very significant given that other areas of the Scottish budget are under severe pressure. When you look at the eight office-holders in some detail, the 10 per cent increase hides a multitude of sins. For example, if we look at staffing costs, we see that the salary of the Scottish Public Sector Ombudsman is up 12.8 per cent; that of the Scottish Information Commissioner is up 9.8 per cent; that of the Commissioner for Children and Young People in Scotland is up 17.5 per cent; that of the Scottish Human Rights Commissioner is up 11 per cent; and that of the Commissioner for Ethical Standards in Public Life in Scotland—who I remember had a big jump last year, too—is up 14.2 per cent. The budget of the Standards Commissioner for Scotland is up 13.2 per cent and that of the Biometrics Commissioner is up 16.3 per cent, while the Electoral Commission is up only 4 per cent.

Jackson Carlaw has already talked about the SPCB’s careful scrutiny of that and has mentioned, for example, the increasing functions of the ombudsman. However, the ombudsman’s staff budget is now more than £6 million, which is the equivalent of the staff budget of 40 MSPs. I am not convinced that the office of the Scottish Public Sector Ombudsman does the work of 40 MSP offices. In fact, I would be shocked if it did, given the amount of work that comes into my office and, I am sure, the offices of many other MSPs. How can those colossal increases in salary for all but the Electoral Commission be justified at this difficult time?