Chamber and committees

That is the best direction. Thank you.

I thank the cabinet secretary for her replies, which will be very useful to us.

Before I ask my question, I am going to have a wee ramble about the physical environment of education, if that is all right. You have already mentioned some elements of that, cabinet secretary, but I would point out that, three weeks ago, the committee explored how physical environments can contribute to inclusive education. On that note, I want to give you three wee quotes from some of our witnesses, if you do not mind. Suzi Martin of the National Autistic Society Scotland said:

“The trend towards superschools is potentially unhelpful and quite harmful, depending on what those superschools look like.”—[Official Report, Education, Children and Young People Committee, 28 February 2024; c 19.]

In its submission, the Govan Law Centre said:

“it perplexes us as to why schools are becoming bigger, meaning more sensory and social stimuli to navigate”,

while Dr Lynne Binnie of ADES told us:

“The design of buildings is often determined at local authority level through different approaches, perhaps involving professionals such as architects, who might not always understand or know about the complex needs of the children we see in the current system and project in the future of our buildings.”—[Official Report, Education, Children and Young People Committee, 13 March 2024; c 54-5.]

Those are some of the views that we have heard, and they tend to suggest that, in the buildings that are replacing new-build schools—and even in those in the existing estate—the learning environment can be damaging for pupils with additional support needs. How is the Scottish Government supporting local authorities to ensure that those schools are suitable for all children?

Thank you. I know—I speak on behalf of everyone in saying this—that the drafting errors that we see tend to be relatively minor, but they can have an influence if they are not corrected, so it is useful that you go back and correct them for us.

Minister, your officials provide our committee and the subject committees with helpful weekly updates on the instruments that are expected to be laid in the following two weeks. I mean it when I say that they are helpful because otherwise we would not know what we are doing. Can you provide an indication of the anticipated volume of the SSIs that are likely to be laid between now and the summer, and of the expected lead committees?

That would be very helpful, thank you. The committee appreciates the forward looks that you provide, which help us a lot. Given that some of the SSIs are much longer and more complex than others, it is particularly useful to this committee, as well as to subject committees, to be given as much advance notice as possible of large and complex instruments or large packages of instruments. Do you know whether there are any such instruments—other than the one that we know of—or sets of instruments in the pipeline, and are you able to keep us updated on their progress?

Thank you very much.

Thank you for that. You say that you are not seeing much coming forward between now and the summer. Is that right?

That is a good, positive attitude to have. Thank you very much.

Thank you, convener. I will try to make sense.

We have been told that spend per pupil in mainstream settings is increasing. How do you square that with the common perception among many people—this has been covered a wee bit already—that resources for children with complex needs are diminishing?

That is very positive.