Chamber and committees

Would it require primary legislation to run a pilot? There is a section in the bill on electoral pilots, so would the bill give the Government the power to carry out a pilot on randomised ballots at a later date?

Come and visit, minister.

I have one more question if there is time, convener. I am not sighted on the questions that committee members are going to ask, so if another member is asking this question, I will just leave it. It is in relation to randomised ballot papers at elections.

That is kind of you, convener. You can tell that I was previously a member of the committee, as you have asked me to be short.

Minister, as you know, I have raised in Parliament—and I have met you to talk about—concerns over voter education and the parts of the country in which there is a prevalence of spoiled papers. I mention specifically the Canal ward in my constituency. I have been working with councillors Allan Gow and Jacqueline McLaren because, at the most recent council elections, that ward had the highest number of spoiled papers in Scotland, at three times the national average. The votes were accidentally spoiled by multiple voting for two or three candidates from the same party.

I am keen for the Electoral Commission to step forward not just when there is an election but all year round. I put it to you that the bill could be a vehicle for putting some form of statutory duty on the Electoral Commission to do some of that voter education, targeted locally. Might the bill remain a vehicle for achieving some of those ambitions?

That is encouraging, minister.

Convener, I would like to clarify something. In the bill, I noticed part 5 on increased democratic engagement and part 8 on the Electoral Commission. At this stage, has the Government thought about where an amendment might best sit? Clearly, away from this committee, we will work diligently to agree a suitable amendment, but do you have any initial thoughts?

Because of time constraints, I will not ask other witnesses whether that happens more often, but if it does, the committee would be quite keen to hear about it. If employers wait until they have vacancies before they ask you, “How can a disabled person fit this role?”, they might have already created a job that is not suitable for someone who faces additional barriers to—sorry for the clumsy expression—mainstream employment.

I will pursue my final question with Elizabeth Baird. Employers might be close to having a business case to employ maybe another 1 or 1.5 employees, irrespective of whether those people have disabilities. It is a fine line and there is a tipping point if you go into recruitment and are not expanding your number of employees. I think that Ms Baird talked about wage subsidies earlier. Could you give a little bit of clarity about where those wage subsidies come from and what role the DWP has in that?

A lot of people seeking employment will be on employment and support allowance. I know that they can keep some of the ESA if they are in employment for under 16 hours a week, but there must surely be a business model in which we can get people into long-term well-paid jobs and off ESA. That way, the taxpayer will be a winner, the DWP will be a winner and, more importantly, the person with the disability will be a winner. Community jobs Scotland, for example, was very good at doing that kind of thing. Can you say anything about where wage subsidies play a part? Are there opportunities for them to do more?

I would love to hear more, but I know that we are pressed for time and I will not ask any more questions. Thank you very much.

I know that we are pressed for time, so I will try to be brief. I have two brief questions.

The first goes back to comments that Elizabeth Baird made about supporting employers to take on people living with disabilities. That can, of course, happen when vacancies arise, but it could also be possible to say to a large employer, “Let us look at your set-up as an employer. Where could there be positions that would be suitable for someone with disabilities?” Does that second thing happen? Could you say a bit more about that?

I am not trying to get at an issue that is not there; I am thinking about an opportunity. Was there a proactive partnership with DWP? Would that be beneficial in the future?

That is helpful. I do not think that that is an admission; it is just the reality of the world that we live in across parties and across Governments. My colleagues spoke about the fair fares review, and one of your officials, Bettina Sizeland, also mentioned it. I spoke in the debate without a motion and I thought that that was an excellent way to find out where the Parliament stands on an issue, so that we are not boxed in by party positions. During the debate, I made the point that, in Glasgow or Strathclyde, there is already a degree of integration and there are a variety of platforms—for example, the old zone card still exists and there are multicompany bus tickets. I made the case that Glasgow would be well placed to be part of an integrated ticketing pilot as well as a flat fare pilot, which is also being considered, and that those pilots should integrate bus and rail.