Chamber and committees

I think that the OECD reported that, although, over a number of years, we have continued to say that there is room for improvement in Scottish education, we have a good foundation for Scottish indications. I will push back on the point that the OECD is critical of Scottish education, because I do not think that that is a fair reflection—

I think that we are seeing improvements in key areas—or we were, pre-pandemic. We have also seen good progress being made in general. For example, we now have a much more empowered system in which headteachers are much more knowledgeable and able to pick projects that work correctly for the schools; therefore, they feel that they can determine what is driven in their school.

We know that progress was made in some areas. We also know that there is more to do. I would point out again not just that the five-year evaluation report has shown good progress but that we have a record high proportion of school leavers entering positive destinations upon leaving school. While I absolutely accept that there is more to do, when we look at the school leaver destinations and the ACEL statistics that I read out, we see that there is progress, although it needs to be accelerated.

It is not the case.

Again, I point to the fact that we have seen an uplift in the PEF per pupil that is given to local authorities. We have established that this year.

An important area of work with local authorities relates to the fact that we allow money to roll on so that local authorities can blend it, but I point to the fact that, even if that—

Let me finish my point. Even if £6 million was not being used in education, a very substantial gap would still be left. There is not £43 million unallocated in my education portfolio. As with all these things, if the member thinks that I should be spending additional money, he should say where it should come from. Should it come from early years education? We removed core curriculum charges; should it come from that budget? Should I reduce the school clothing grant? The money all has to come from somewhere. With the greatest respect, I cannot just find £43 million of additional funding.

There was a discussion initially about how we could have a fair funding settlement. We then discussed with stakeholders what that fair funding settlement would look like right across Scotland. In the evidence that the committee has heard, one of the education directors—I think that it was the director from Inverclyde Council—said that she would, of course, have preferred to keep all the money, but she recognised that a fair funding settlement was required.

We discussed the impact of that, as the committee would expect, and that is one of the reasons why I made sure that a taper was in place to allow the changes in funding to be made not over one year, but over four.

I will reflect on a conference I was at only last week, at which I was asked by a teacher, in questions and answers, about the importance of taking a whole-child approach and the fact that it is impossible to—nor should we attempt to—look at education just by looking at attainment and not looking at children’s health and wellbeing. That is very important. Indeed, the feedback that I was receiving from teachers last week was about the importance of ensuring that we were look at health and wellbeing and other aspects.

We have more teachers now than we have had at any time since 2008. The ratio of pupils to teachers is at its lowest since 2009. There are more than 2,000 more teachers in Scotland’s schools than there were before the start of the pandemic and, of course, we have made additional commitments for the current parliamentary session. That shows that we are investing in teacher numbers, but it is not contradictory to say that, along with headteachers, parents and teachers, we should also look at how PEF should be spent to support those young people. That is a very clear part of the system.

Education Scotland is an agency of Government, so the responsibility absolutely lies with me as the cabinet secretary. However, Education Scotland played a very important role in the refreshed attainment challenge funding around both the support that is provided, but also the challenge where necessary.

Education Scotland is, as I am, keen to have a collaborative approach, but there needs to be a little bit of grit in the system where, for example, the work that Education Scotland has done with a local authority does not then deliver the types of progress that one might expect. It is the responsibility of local government to discuss that. There is a collaborative approach. There needs to be that grit in the system, but it is there only for a situation where the collaboration has not produced the changes that we would all like to see at the pace that we would like to see them.

Six months from now, we will have a fully refreshed system and we will have the stretch aims in place. We will be able to discuss those stretch aims, and not in the abstract. I will perhaps make it easier and just point to that, convener.