Chamber and committees

Section 14 of the Social Security (Scotland) Bill provides Scottish Ministers with the powers to set and vary the rates of Disability Assistance, in regulations. This includes varying the rates in line with inflation.

The budget for the activity being carried out in 2017 to promote uptake of Carer's Allowance among young carers in Scotland is £20,000 + VAT.

The campaign webpage, www.young.scot/youngcarers - was viewed more than 2,000 times between 12 June and 2 July 2017.

A breakdown of reach and engagement by social media channels is published in the answer to question S5W-09796 on 17 July 2017. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at: http://www.parliament.scot/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx.

Carer’s Allowance is currently reserved to the UK Government, and is administered by the Department for Work and Pensions. Information on applications is not held by the Scottish Government. We will review DWP’s information when it is published in due course.

Effectiveness of the Young Carer’s benefit take-up activity is being measured by social media reach.

A breakdown of reach and engagement by social media channels is published in the answer to question S5W-09796 on 17 July 2017. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at: http://www.parliament.scot/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx.

The audience for this activity was young carers in Scotland. There are an estimated 49,000 young carers in Scotland, of whom more than 7,000 are estimated to be eligible for Carer’s Allowance. The campaign’s reach and performance is in the following table. The campaign was delivered by Young Scot and the figures cover the period of Carers' Week, 12-18 June.

The Scottish Government’s Social Security Twitter account, launched on the first day of the Young Carers Benefit Take Up campaign, achieved reach of 27,165.

Note these figures cover Young Scot and Scottish Government social media channels only. They do not include the reach of stakeholders and partners who posted supporting content.

The Young Carers activity was created with input from the Scottish Government’s Social Security Directorate, Health and Social Care Directorate, Scottish Government Marketing, Young Scot, Carers Scotland and Carer’s Trust Scotland.

The Scottish Government has not conducted an audit of the concessionary travel for carers provided by (a) it and (b) local government.

The National Concessionary Travel Scheme does not contain an eligibility criterion for carers. As a result we do not conduct audits on how many carers benefit from the Scheme.

The Scottish Government does not hold any information on concessionary travel for carers provided by local authorities.

On 29 March 2017 my officials confirmed to the Public Petitions Committee that the Scottish Government is not considering including carers in the National Concessionary Travel Scheme. This was in response to Petition PE01632 which is currently before the Committee.

However, there is a range of support available to carers in Scotland funded by the Scottish Government and local authorities.

Although the National Concessionary Travel Scheme does not contain specific eligibility criteria for carers, eligible disabled people can apply for a companion concessionary travel card which allows the card holder and a companion (who may be a carer) to travel together free of charge for the same bus journey.

In addition, a substantial number of carers qualify for free bus travel under the National Concessionary Travel Scheme because they are aged 60 or over. Younger carers may also benefit from the National Concessionary Travel Scheme for Young People, which provides discounts on bus and rail travel for all young people living in Scotland aged 16 to 18 and full time volunteers up to age 25.

A targeted campaign to promote Carer's Allowance to 16 – 24 year olds ran during Carers Week 2017 (12 – 18 June).

Material to encourage benefit take up amongst young carers will continue to be promoted on the Young Scot website.

The current disability employment gap is 39.9 percentage points. 41.7% of disabled people (Equality Act defined) are in employment compared to 81.5% of non-disabled people.

Our commitment to halve the disability employment gap is long term and challenging. We recognise we cannot achieve this alone. Change is required across all levels of Scottish society to enable more disabled people to enter and sustain employment.

In the coming months we will engage with partners across Scotland and we will work closely with them to develop a plan which we intend to publish in due course.