Chamber and committees

I direct my question to either Lorraine McGrath or Gordon MacRae. It is on the lessons that have been learned in the past 18 months, during the pandemic. It is clear that a lot of work was done around homelessness, and we almost saw the end of people being on the streets at all for a period last year.

My question is quite broad. What lessons have we learned from that? Have we—local authorities, the third sector and the Scottish Government—regressed even since then? Have we learned those lessons, and are we now implementing that learning as we go forward? Perhaps Gordon MacRae can start, followed by Lorraine McGrath.

Yes.

I thank the minster for that answer, and I am grateful for the change. Although it may seem quite technical in its terminology, it will make a very big difference to many people who are applying, so I welcome it.

I put on record my thanks to your team, minister, for all the work that they have done on the regulations. They are technical, but they will be very important for the people applying. Again, I thank your team for that, and thank you for the changes that you have made.

The question is more about those who are moving on to ADP having to reapply, given that they are already on the system and have been identified as having a need that requires them to receive benefits.

I want to move on to two more technical areas, the first of which relates to the recommendation, which you have not accepted, that people receiving CDP be eligible for short-term assistance if they are moving on to ADP. Why have you said no to that? We have said—and rightly so—that we want to treat people with dignity, fairness and respect but, given that they are already in the system and have already proved that they need the assistance, those receiving CDP should be treated as transferring to ADP instead of as new claimants. Why are we making them go back and reapply? It seems to me that we are not treating people with the respect that we had hoped for.

I have a policy difference with you, minister, in that, for me, the way to resolve the issue would have been to give any child who was on DLA or PIP the winter heating allowance. They would not have to be on the highest rate. I think that I made that point in committee in the previous session of the Parliament.

If we are talking about heating your house, you often do that during the day. It is not often at night, when you are in bed and can have less heating on. The draft regulations still exclude children who are on the lower rate of DLA or not on the higher rate of PIP from getting the payment. Why are you doing that if we are trying to help people who have higher heating costs? They are vulnerable individuals as well. What is the policy intent behind that?

I want to pick up the same point as Pam Duncan-Glancy. Minister, it would be helpful if you could write to us with the timetable of when things are likely to come to the committee.

According to your letter, the regulations were not seen by any stakeholders. Is it correct that there was no consultation with stakeholders? I appreciate that the amendments are quite technical, but I just wanted to check whether that was the situation.

It is a missed opportunity.

On a technical point, you have removed a requirement to make the payment by 31 December. Why not either put in a later deadline or just meet the deadline of 31 December? Why is there a delay in making that payment?

I am grateful for that helpful explanation, minister.

I do not want to hold back the committee’s considerations for too long—I understand that this is quite technical stuff—but I am slightly unclear about a certain point. I know that there are different criteria for deciding whether someone gets DLA or PIP, but my understanding—perhaps you can help me by providing more information later—was that the criteria with regard to CDP and ADP would be the same. I did not appreciate that the criteria for the awards will be different, so I wonder whether you can explain the issue a bit further in a letter to me. As I said, I do not want to delay the committee’s considerations—obviously, we are going to agree to the motion today—but I wonder whether it would be possible to provide an explanation, just for my information.

My next question—you will be glad to hear that it will be my final one—relates to the use of the phrase “throughout the night” with regard to awards. I remember raising this issue when the proposals were originally brought forward, and I note that you have changed things back to what they were. I welcome that, but I have to wonder why it all happened in the first place. Did you make the change because of consultation, because it had been a simple drafting error or because of some great intervention by back-bench MSPs?

A yes/no answer might suffice for my next question. I am conscious that we now have the Scottish Government providing some benefits and the UK Government providing other benefits. That could mean that people have to go to two different websites, or perhaps a lot more than that. Would it be helpful for the people who you are working with to have one website that had all the benefits that they could apply for, so that they did not have to go through lots of different websites or fill in lots of different forms? If all the information was in one place, would that make benefit uptake more likely?