Chamber and committees

I am giving active consideration to that, but the member is quite right to point to the challenges. The current system is literally based on paper sitting in a large warehouse—even if we wanted to lift and shift Scottish cases from that paper-based system, it is not set up to enable us to do that. The system is untouched and quite archaic in the way in which it is currently administered, which is a real challenge.

The committee will be well aware of the costs of the devolution programme for social security and would be right to question me on them. Inevitably, there would be more cost involved in providing a benefit up here when we are not able in any way to lift and shift the information from a digital programme down south. Devolving the benefit presents us with great challenges, and we therefore need to be cognisant of the cost of that and what that would mean. That is why I am looking carefully at how it could be done. We need to look at the cost not just of the benefit but of the implementation. That can be approached in several ways, but, as I said, it would not be without cost.

I am giving consideration to the matter, but, at this point, I am unable to provide the committee with a date when any consultation would go live.

This is an important area, and the fact that it is a cross-cutting area of Government is demonstrated by how many ministers you have had along today—indeed, you could have had more ministers along, although I am not suggesting on behalf of other ministers that you should do that. [Laughter.] The point about how we ensure that we co-ordinate that work and facilitate its implementation is a serious one. It is also important that we ensure that we prioritise work on child poverty across Government.

I will give a couple of examples, and if Mr O’Kane would like further detail, I can provide it. We have a programme board at official level across Government, which looks at the key action points in “Best Start, Bright Futures: Tackling Child Poverty Delivery Plan 2022 to 2026”. That board reports regularly on implementation challenges and opportunities that arise to see what more can be done and when.

I will also chair a ministerial group across Government to ensure that ministers have oversight of that work, and our intention is for that to meet quarterly. That is on top of what the programme board is already looking at, in order to make sure that we work together. You would expect us to have regular discussions on key areas when we meet bilaterally and when we meet in Cabinet, but we are keen to have the ability to take a step back and have real-time discussions across ministerial portfolios.

We have a number of evaluation strategies that look at the impact of what is happening and provide further analysis of whether change in portfolios is required. Those are some of the aspects of the programme board. I hope that that gives Mr O’Kane a flavour of what is going on, but if he would like further detail, Julie Humphreys and I can furnish him with that.

We will absolutely not. Whether that should be done was never even considered when we looked to introduce the Scottish child payment, because it is an inherently unjust way of delivering a benefit. Members will know from their constituency mailbags that our constituents’ life circumstances can change in the blink of an eye. To suggest that we should use the benefit system to, in some way, punish people who have three, four or more children is deeply disappointing, particularly when we see the number of families who have more children that are in poverty. That is exactly why those families are one of our priority areas. We would never even consider that, given the impact that it has on families in Scotland.

I will add Mr Doris’s requests to the long list of suggestions for how I could spend money that is currently already fully committed in the social justice portfolio and across Government.

We are keen to work on that area, because I think that it will benefit the Government, too. We have done a little bit of that, and I have no doubt that we will do more of it when we come to our budget scrutiny, given the many asks that are made of Government and the many challenges that the Government faces in delivering on those asks. Such considerations are not just financial but practical with regard to how long it will take to implement a policy, whether primary or secondary legislation will be required or, indeed, whether changes to the agency’s social security system will be required. We are very thoughtful about such things.

I would think that a great deal is already being published. I would be happy for Julie Humphreys to come in, as the work that we do around this annually is really important.

It is an area of great concern. The levels of homelessness and the number of families in temporary accommodation are a particular concern. That is why the Government established a temporary accommodation task and finish group, which set out some actions for the Government to take. We have responded to that—I gave some examples in relation to the £60 million that was made available this year to support the national acquisition plan and to ensure that we work with social landlords to deliver a new programme of stock management. We see that working very successfully in particular local authorities, although it is not being used to the same extent right across the 32 council areas. Every council will have its own stock management process and policies, but, where that policy has made a clear impact, it serves as an example of local government and national Government working together to share good practice.

We will continue with the affordable housing supply programme, and we are working with particular local authorities that have hotspots—as Mr Balfour mentioned. Edinburgh is a key example. We are working with the local authority and asking about the specific support solutions that it would wish to see in place. Clearly, we have to work in the financial context that we are all in, but we are working at the national level and with particular local authorities where either there is good practice or there are specific housing needs. The Minister for Housing is meeting housing conveners and many others from local authorities to take that work forward with each local authority that requires it.

The First Minister has made it clear, as cabinet secretaries do regularly, that we are in a challenging financial time and context, and, as a Government, we need to take that very seriously. Our medium-term financial strategy set out some of the challenges of, for example, sustained high inflation caused by the economic shocks that Scotland has faced. Inevitably, that has had an impact, so, yes, tough decisions will have to be made.

I will give an example of the context that we are in. As I think I mentioned in my introductory remarks, the block grant funding was 4.8 per cent lower in real terms at the time that this budget was set than it was in 2021-22. Therefore, clearly, there has been an impact on national Government because of the mini-budget, Brexit and austerity, which present us with that challenge.

Now that we have that context ahead of us, the First Minister has laid out for stakeholders how we can best use our resources, and we are trying hard to do that. I touched on some of the work that goes on in Government to ensure that we analyse how we are using the finances that we have in the right way through the best start, bright futures programme board, the ministerial group and so on to constantly check that we are using the money in the most effective way possible.

That will be on the minds of all cabinet secretaries as we move forward in the budget process to see what stakeholders are asking us to do and what we can do within the budget. That will require us to take tough decisions across Government. I cannot go into those today, as we are at the foothills of the budget process for next year, but that context will be live for us throughout the process.

Thank you, convener, and good morning. I am grateful to the committee for inviting me and my ministerial colleagues to give evidence today.

Tackling poverty and protecting people from harm is one of three critical and interdependent missions for the Government. As the First Minister stated last week, it is clear that economic growth goes hand-in-hand with tackling poverty. Our programme for government commits to increasing the pay of up to 100,000 social care and childcare staff, to rolling out universal free school meals for all pupils in primaries six and seven, starting with those children in receipt of the Scottish child payment, and to introducing a pilot for the removal of ScotRail peak-time fares.

Driving forward action at greater pace and scale to meet our ambitious targets remains at the heart of work across all portfolios. However, the harm that has been inflicted by the United Kingdom Government’s austerity-driven policies and the on-going cost of the union crisis is making our job considerably harder. If the UK Government reversed key welfare reforms that were introduced in 2015, it would help to lift 70,000 people, including 30,000 children, out of poverty this year and put £780 million back into the pockets of low-income households.

“Best Start, Bright Futures: Tackling Child Poverty Delivery Plan 2022-2026” outlines the wide-ranging actions that the Government and our partners will take to reduce child poverty in Scotland. Increasing incomes from work and earnings is an important aspect of our overall approach. That is why we remain committed to scaling the reach and effectiveness of our devolved employability services to enable low-income parents to enter, sustain and progress in employment, and have made £108 million available for the delivery of employability services this year.

We have also set clear priorities for the reform of post-school education in order to deliver a lifelong education, research and skills system that enables everyone to fulfil their potential. It is deeply frustrating that employment law remains a reserved matter in the hands of the Conservative Government—a view that is shared by trade unions across the United Kingdom, which this week backed calls for employment law to be devolved to the Scottish Parliament.

Despite that, we have set out a number of wide-ranging actions in our refreshed “Fair Work Action Plan: Becoming a leading Fair Work Nation by 2025”, which was published in December last year and is aimed at tackling labour market inequalities. We are committed to working with businesses to address Scotland’s labour market participation challenges, starting with a focus on health and the needs of parents, particularly those in the six priority groups, in order to help to reduce child poverty.

We know that high-quality affordable and accessible childcare plays a critical role in supporting employment and the economy. Scotland already has the most generous childcare offer anywhere in the UK, supporting families and helping to give children the best possible start in life. Our programme for government sets out ambitious commitments to delivering a significant expansion of targeted childcare provision that is focused on tackling child poverty and supporting more parents to take up or sustain employment.

We also understand that a sustainable exit from poverty will never be just about securing and retaining a job, and that is why we are taking much wider action to tackle poverty. That includes continued investment to deliver more affordable homes; our commitment to transforming how family support is delivered, with a focus on shifting towards early intervention and prevention, supported by the whole family wellbeing fund; and our continued investment in, for example, our game-changing Scottish child payment, which has put more than £350 million into the pockets of low-income families since it was launched in February 2021.

The way in which actions are delivered is key to the plan’s success. The creation of the tackling child poverty programme board, supplemented by the formation of a new ministerial group on the implementation of “Best Start, Bright Futures”, will ensure robust governance and co-ordinated implementation.

We are delivering in the most challenging circumstances, with our block grant funding 4.8 per cent lower in real terms than it was in 2021-22 at the time that this budget was set. Over the past five financial years, we have mitigated £711 million-worth of Tory cuts, including the bedroom tax, the freeze on local housing allowance and the benefit cap, through activities such as discretionary housing payments and the Scottish welfare fund.

Our action is making a difference: modelling estimates that 90,000 fewer children will live in relative and absolute poverty this year as a result of this Government’s policies, with poverty levels 9 percentage points lower than they would have been otherwise. That includes lifting an estimated 50,000 children out of relative poverty through the Scottish child payment.

However, we know that there is more to do, so we will continue to do everything within the scope of the powers and the limited budget that we have to tackle poverty and support those who are in greatest need, strengthening that support where we can.

I very much welcome the committee’s inquiry and the opportunity for my ministerial colleagues and I to answer your questions, and I look forward to your conclusions and recommendations in due course.

I will start and Neil Gray can follow with more detail.

We have been looking carefully at the parental transition fund, and we are keen to move forward with it. However, as has been stated, a question that was answered recently showed that, despite our work with stakeholders and others to see what could be done in that area, given the devolved settlement and the implications of the interactions that the fund would have with the tax and benefits system, it became clear that it would not be possible to deliver the parental transition fund as we originally envisaged.

That is clearly disappointing, but I am satisfied that we have worked with stakeholders to test that to the limits. We need to find other ways that we can do it within the powers that we have. I am conscious, with all these policies, that we never want to do anything that jeopardises somebody’s current benefit entitlement, such as by providing money through such a fund. Given the challenges, we will look at what more can be done on the issue in other ways.

I will add that we welcome the changes that the Chancellor has announced on universal credit, although there are still real challenges with the awareness of the changes and how they are working in practice, so we are keeping a close eye on that issue. Both we as a Government and stakeholders have been asking for the changes for some time. Now that we are into the implementation stage, we need to see whether the changes are genuinely making the difference that we had hoped for. I am sure that Neil Gray will have more to say about that.

That is an interesting point. Given his vast experience on this and previous social security committees, Mr Balfour will know that we had to use our powers in a different way for the job start payment for exactly the reasons of some of the limitations that I have talked about. The concern is how long it takes, because it requires legislation in Westminster. Even if we were to find agreement and a way forward on that, it would take a considerable time for such legislation to go through. We saw that with some of the challenges around establishing the job start payment.

When faced with such barriers, it is imperative that the Government looks at what could be done more quickly, which is why we have moved to see what more can be done to support parents into employment through the employability work that Neil Gray has discussed. Creating a new benefit has not been ruled out for the future, but given the urgency of the issue, I certainly would not be content to wait, so we have not done work on that. It is more about what we can do now rather than at some theoretical point in the future, but it could still, of course, be looked at.