Chamber and committees

One advantage of making legislation in the way that we are doing in this case is that, irrespective of the content of the bill, it puts a focus on the issues.

I was fortunate to meet representatives of The Usual Place in Dumfries, who attended an event that I was at last week. They provide confident leadership in disability. I am also familiar with Zest cafe in St Andrews. Lisa, who runs that organisation, has no time at all for employers who say that they cannot get enough people to work for their organisations. She employs people with learning difficulties and people from a variety of backgrounds and with different disabilities. She thinks that employers—not all of them, but quite a lot of them—are not educating themselves enough to understand the talent that is available among that cohort. What more can we do to educate employers on the assets that they are missing out on?

Whatever the merits or demerits of the bill, it has brought a focus on the issues, which is in itself helpful. I am struck by my encounters with constituents and organisations. I meet parents who are experts at championing their children’s rights, which they often do until quite late in life. They are brilliant at it, and they are ferocious. We need to draw more on their talents.

I am also struck by employers and organisations that I meet that are frustrated because other employers do not understand the full potential of this untapped resource. Rather than look at people as a burden, we can look at them as an opportunity for employers.

There is also an opportunity for the young people and for older people. Many of the people we are talking about live until quite old age, so we need to consider their lifelong opportunities. Do employers fully understand their potential? If not, what can we do to persuade them to understand it? That is for whoever would like to contribute. I will let you pick.

It seems that you do not understand why the rate has fallen. Why has the percentage gone down?

I will stop there, but I am really concerned that you do not know why that has happened. We really performed well—it was the golden nugget—and now the amount of funding is dropping. You have not given an explanation as to why, and I do not think that we are going to get one.

We are a third of the way through this session of the Parliament and seven years on from when the First Minister made a commitment to prioritise education. However, I would argue that the improvement has been marginal at best. I do not really want to trade stats, because we could be here all day if we did that, so let me be fair—I am always fair. The ACEL figures show that, in the past five years, the literacy attainment gap has been cut at primary level but we are seeing only a 1 per cent improvement, whereas, at level 3 in secondary, the gap has grown by almost 3 per cent. Are you satisfied with that situation?

Okay. My next question focuses on the pace of reform. The Parliament voted in 2017 or so to get rid of the Scottish Qualifications Authority and Education Scotland, and we will get the replacements in 2024, seven years later. Following the Stobart review and the OECD review of the transition from the broad general education to the senior phase and the two-term dash, we will get Louise Hayward’s report in May. I really want to know whether that will be a worked-up plan. Will it be ready to implement within this parliamentary session? How long will it take?

My question is about universities. What planning have you done in the event that China invades Taiwan, resulting in a reduction in the number of Chinese students coming to Scottish universities?

No—the question is about the performance of Scottish universities. What is your analysis of why the amount of funding has gone from 15 per cent of the UK research councils’ funding to 12 per cent?

No, no—what is your understanding of the reason for that?

My questions are on the same subject. I recognise all the figures about pay rates and the real living wage, but the differential is causing the challenge. We have all heard anecdotal evidence from private and voluntary sector nurseries that they are losing staff to council nurseries and to other sectors, because staff can get better jobs with better pay elsewhere. That is reducing capacity and having an impact on the flexibility and choice that were supposed to be available through the provision of 1,140 hours.

The minister is right about the fact that private nurseries have other sources of income, but those sources are shrinking, because the state contribution to their work is increasing. The impact that the cross-subsidy has is reducing.

I am alarmed at the thought that the private sector’s capacity will reduce massively because we have two tiers built into the pay system—that has been the design from the beginning. The situation cannot be turned around overnight, because the sum of money is significant, but is there a plan to bring pay rates in the PVI sector into line with those in council nurseries, so that people are not paid different wages for doing exactly the same job?