Chamber and committees

Ms Cook, on the idea of having a debate about tax, would small businesses prefer to pay more tax and rates and get better road surfaces, street lighting and hospitals and more police, or would they prefer to drop domestic rates and other tax and have poorer services? Is that a debate that we can have?

I think that it was suggested in one of the papers that we should have a discussion on tax and spending. I very much agree that we should because there has been public thinking—in Scotland and the UK—that we want lower taxes and better public services, and I feel that there is a tension there. Is it possible to have that kind of debate with the wider public sector, or even your sector?

Can you explain what you mean by “tax base”, for those who do not understand the term?

I will start with hospitality. Ms Maclean indicated that the sector is struggling. Does the situation vary geographically? It seems to me that, in Edinburgh, hotel prices are quite high, which indicates that there is a lot of demand. Last September, I could fairly easily get a hotel for a night for less than £100. I could not find one this September for less than £100, and some of them are not fancy hotels. Is the situation patchy around the country? I presume that we do not need to support hotels in Edinburgh.

I have just booked in Aberdeen at £60.

That is good.

The committee also looks at public sector reform. It has been suggested that there are too many public bodies and that we have a cluttered landscape. Are there too many public bodies? Is the landscape too cluttered? I put that to each of you. Obviously, your answers will reflect the sectors that you are representing.

You agree with Sandy Begbie.

Okay, so we will learn more about that in due course; that is great.

The minister wrote to me on 16 June, when I was in my temporary role as convener of the committee, and mentioned working

“on policies to support improvement in the delivery of social care support that are not reliant on the NCS legislation”.

Has the split between what we can do now and what we need the legislation to do changed—or is it in the process of changing—so that we are less reliant on the bill and could do more without it?

One of the quotes that the convener used earlier was from your letter from July, which talked about “consistency of outcomes”. I presume that that is one of the main aims. Sometimes, there is a bit of tension between consistency of outcomes nationally and doing things locally, which you have just referred to, and I wonder how that will impact on costs. For example, in the Highlands, distances are greater, so if somebody is going to visit a person at home, that will take longer. It is also further to get to hospital, which is a different issue. However, by contrast, in Glasgow, there is sometimes a feeling that people have to be in greater need to get an intervention than is the case in other authorities, just because the overall need is so huge.

At the moment, COSLA and the councils get their funding through a formula. Will the national care service override that formula? Will finances be targeted at areas of greater need? How will that work?

I stay on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, and it still costs more than £100.