Chamber and committees

Thank you.

Thank you, minister.

I thank the minister and his officials for joining us this morning. I will briefly suspend the meeting while we change the panel of witnesses.

Our next item of business is an evidence session as part of the committee’s pre-budget scrutiny work. The purpose of this session is to inform the committee’s pre-budget scrutiny with the aim of influencing the budget before spending priorities for the next financial year are set out. The focus of today’s session is support for women in business. I refer members to papers 2 and 3.

I welcome Ruth Boyle, who is policy and parliamentary manager at Close the Gap, and Carolyn Currie, who is chief executive of Women’s Enterprise Scotland. Thank you for joining us this morning.

As I said, this session is about our pre-budget scrutiny. We had a statement from the Government last week, or two weeks ago, about proposed changes to the budget. We are expecting a more substantive statement after the recess. I come to Ruth Boyle first. I am interested in your views on the decisions that have been made. I recognise that we are in a very tight financial situation and that the Government chose to spend money in areas that will in some cases benefit women. The Scottish child payment went up; that is positive. However, there was also the £53 million cut to employability services. We got a letter from the minister just last week that describes the money as money that would have been focused on support for parents. The letter refers to activity in employability that would bring it up

“to scale and enhance available support for parents this year.”

I recognise that we are in a tight financial situation, but do you have an understanding of what the impact of that might be? Where would you like to see the focus on employability services if we are looking at the statement that will come after recess?

Mr Beattie, a number of members are interested in this area of questioning. Once I have let them in, you can indicate to me if there is something that you wish to come back in on.

I have a question for Jennifer Henderson that follows on from Mr Beattie’s questions—it is on the bespoke timeframe. You said that the period could be 36, 37 or 38 days—just over 35 days—but the website suggests a timeframe of six months for complex cases. What is meant by a bespoke timeframe? Is there a limit set on that?

I want to raise a couple of issues before we conclude, so I will come back to you, if that is okay.

The original target for completion of the land register was 2024. I think that the last time you spoke to us, you spoke about the difference between completion and functional completion. Is there a date for actual completion?

Issues around voluntary registration have been raised with us. Voluntary registration is a key part of achieving functional or completed registration. Concern has been expressed about the time that it has taken for voluntary registrations to be completed.

Another issue is excluded categories. I think that SPICe contacted you to look for some clarity on what the excluded categories are and what percentage of the overall land mass is covered by them.

What is the target? Are we aiming for full completion and closure of the sasine register or only functional completion? Do we have a date for full voluntary registrations and information on the time that it has taken for those to be completed? Can we have some more detail on the percentage of excluded categories?

Do the keeper-induced registrations mainly focus on local authorities? You also mentioned large landed estates.

Okay. Thank you. That brings us to the end of this morning’s evidence session. I thank Jennifer Henderson and Christopher Kerr for joining us.

Good morning and welcome to the 19th meeting in 2022 of the Economy and Fair Work Committee. I have apologies from Gordon MacDonald, and I welcome John Mason who is attending in his place as committee substitute.

Our first item of business is a decision on taking in private items 3 and 4. Are members content to take those items in private?

Members indicated agreement.

Ms Chapman, do you mind if I move on?