 I would like to open this fifth meeting of the 2019 Social Security Committee meeting and I want everyone to turn their mobile phones off etc. This morning we have apologies from convener Bob Doris, and I would like to welcome Jenny Goldruth, who is attending as his substitute. I believe that Jenny is your third committee meeting this week, I think, I heard you say, but you are very welcome here at the Social Security Committee, but I do invite you to declare any interests that you might have. Thank you, convener, I have nothing to declare. Thank you very much. I end item 2, supporting legislation. We are taking evidence on the early years assistant to the best dark grants. I would like to welcome once again Cabinet Secretary to the Social Security Committee and her officials who are Dorothy Ogill, who is the best dark grant policy team lead, and Colin Brown, who is a solicitor there both from the Scottish Government. Cabinet Secretary, would you like to make a noting statement to the committee? Thank you, convener. Good morning. I am delighted to be here to assist the committee in its consideration of both sets of early years assistants, best start grants, Scotland amendment regulations 2019. The committee will be aware that we successfully introduced the best start grant pregnancy and baby payment in December last year. I am delighted to say that as of 31 January we had issued over £2.7 million of payments, more in just two months than the DWP did pay over the last year. One expectant first-time mum who received a pregnancy and baby payment has said, this payment is going to help a lot because having a newborn baby isn't cheap. We are both working and don't qualify for many benefits but are still on a low income. This substantial increase in support for expectant families and new babies shows what can be achieved if we take a different approach to social security. We have simplified the application process, promoted the new benefit and engaged with health and childcare professionals to help to maximise the take-up. Those two new sets of regulations will allow us to progress on to the next phase of delivery of the best start grant. The first set of regulations, if approved, will make amendments to the current best start grant regulations to clarify detail and ensure that they deliver the policy intent. The most significant changes are to make provision for a determination without an application where an award of a qualifying benefit follows an appeal and for the agency to correct an official error made in determination. The second set of regulations provides detailed eligibility rules relating to the best start grant early learning and school age payments and includes provision for eligibility, including residents, what assistance is available, the values of the payments and when to apply. The early learning and school age payments are set out in two new schedules so that the rules for each payment can be read separately, making them easier to understand. They follow the same structure for eligibility and have common elements with the pregnancy and baby payments. The new payments are simpler in that they have a flat rate and are paid to whoever meets the criteria for being responsible for a child. The timing of the windows for application has been designed to align with the life events and other policy interventions for children in the early years. The school age payment will launch on 3 June 2019 to ensure that applicants can access a payment in time for children who are starting school in August this year. We have linked to the provision in the Education Scotland Act 1980 to allow the timings for parents preparing for school and to allow us to promote take-up through schools. The early learning payment is not tied to a time of year but will also be introduced by summer 2019. We need to introduce the best start grant in a controlled way, ensuring that any changes being made to the system are implemented in a safe and secure manner and will announce the start date as soon as we can. Applications and applicants can apply from any time between their child reaching the age of two years and three years and six months. As we did in the run-up to the launch of the pregnancy and baby payment, we will undertake a co-ordinated communications campaign to get the message out that the new payments are there and to maximise uptake. I want to take the opportunity to highlight to the committee the significant process that has been so far and that delivery is on track for the two new payments to be introduced by summer 2019. I hope that that is useful to the committee in its consideration, and I am happy to take questions. I think that there are several questions, cabinet secretary. I will start with Mark Griffin. I just wonder if your department has any prediction for uptake, given the low limited experience of the uptake of the first round of payments for best start grant? That is, as you have quite rightly pointed out, going to be a very complex area because the payments are new, and the lessons that we have seen from best start grant means that it is very difficult to forecast for the pregnancy and baby payments. We have forecasts for the expenditure for best start grant as we set out in the budget, so the forecast for next year in total would be £12.4 million. That is the estimate for how much we are expected to pay out. Obviously, that is a demand-led expenditure and anyone who is eligible to apply will be given that payment, so that is one of the challenges that we have as we begin to take more demand-led payments on within social security that we must forecast to the best of our ability, but to recognise that that is not an exact science, as we have seen from the pregnancy and baby payments. I was just wondering whether you had an idea of the expected demand, given the likely bottleneck of when people would be applying for the particularly the school age payment with children starting school in August, with the application process opening up at the start of June. What has your experience been in terms of turnaround times for applications to give people comfort that an opening of the process in June is going to give people enough time to get their application in the process to get a payment before they need to start buying school clothes and equipment? I think that this is a very important point, and it goes back to the lessons learned from the pregnancy and baby payments, where we will make clear to people that the processing time may be longer than our steady-state processing time immediately after a benefit is launched if we see a take-up and a spike, as we did with pregnancy and baby payment. What we did demonstrate during the December-January peak was that the agency had a number of contingencies in place, so while the application processing time went up, it did not go up considerably, and the processes that were in place allowed still reasonably quick processing times. I am content with both what we have planned and the contingencies that are in place will allow us to be able to get through a spike, particularly learning the lessons that we have already done around what happened in December and January. I recognise that there will be a spike. That is one of the reasons why we have thought very carefully about not having the early years and the school age payment beginning on the same day, because that would further exacerbate that spike. We have looked to see what we can do to smooth that out and to ensure that there are a number of contingencies in place so that people can be reassured that the processing time will allow them to get that payment through before the school year starts. That depends on when they apply, but we are putting absolute effort into ensuring that that processing time can be dealt with adequately and very quickly. There is a nine-month window to apply. What are your department going to be saying to parents and guardians as to what the advised cut-off date would be from the start of the application opening up in June? What is the last foreseeable date that you would have advised parents and guardians to make an application to ensure that they get their payments in time for starting school? The application period closes in February of 2020, so people can apply after the school year begins. I do not think that we can say at this point when would be the last date that you would be able to apply to get your payment before school, because that will depend on how many applications we are getting in. What I can give a reassurance to the committee on is that the contingencies—what we are putting in place and then, in the background, the contingencies that are after that—we will absolutely endeavour to get through the applications as quickly as possible so that people can be encouraged to apply as early as possible and we will deal with that as quickly as we can. Thank you. You mentioned about advertising in schools, if I can ask as well, if it can be. Advertising in nurseries as well, because obviously not all the kids will be at school at that point. I think that we are trying to tie it into when people are applying and going through that process of registering for their school place. However, as we did with the pregnancy and baby payments, we will take a great deal of time of looking at every possible avenue and opportunity to make sure that we are getting into the schools, nurseries, the wider childminders and private providers. All of that will be exceptionally important. Members have particular areas that they would suggest that we would look at and would be happy to pick that up. However, we are determined to have that as our overall communications policy, as we have demonstrated with the pregnancy and baby payment. It was very successful, although obviously we will look to see if there is any lessons to learn and we will do similar but different for the two payments that are coming up. In terms of those with no records to public funds, the Scottish Government has said that it is seeking to persuade the Home Office that there are strong human rights reasons for not restricting access to the best start grant. With that in mind, has there been any progress to allow the best start grant to be paid out without affecting someone's immigration status? We have had some progress on that. Obviously, that relates to those who are under 18 and therefore applying for the best start grant not through a qualifying benefit but through that age. The Home Office has now said that that will not be considered and therefore that we can give out payments to those with no recourse for public funds for those types of payments. That is obviously a very small group. We have not had an application from someone in this area yet. It is a very small group but a very potentially vulnerable group of people that would be applying. It is good news that we will be able to do that for this particular benefit. We have not had written confirmation from the Home Office on that but once we do, we will be able to action that in due course. The first one is in regard to the issue of equal claims. Two individuals put in a claim, so the obvious one being the mother of a child and perhaps her parents, so the grandparents put one in. How will that be dealt with and will it be dealt with by guidance issued by yourself or by the new agency? In effect, what will happen if there are two claims that come in will be looked at at what claim came in first and that it will be the claim that came in first that will be processed. That will allow us to have a very clear understanding and a very transparent way of that decision being made. It is the first payment request that comes in and the first application that comes in. Can I just clarify that if sadly in pregnancy or later when a child dies or a baby dies, there are no repayments back, you do not have to repay that money at any point? Absolutely, no, no. In fact, I was just trying to look for that last night. Is that in the legislation or is it in regulations? I couldn't find myself last night just for clarification. I believe that that was in the first set of regulations that we looked through. In particular, when we were looking at the application process itself, there is a very specific area in the application process where a parent can still apply if there has been a still birth, because there is still an entitlement to that. That has been designed and we went through that process with the charities that support parents in that time, so we can make that as sympathetic and as understanding as possible. That has been a very specific case that we have looked at very carefully. On the application windows for the payments, obviously there are various application windows, so we have the nine and a half months for pregnancy and baby 12 months where there is kinship care or similar, 18 months for early learning and 9 months for school age. Was there any thought of trying to harmonise those? What was the rationale for having the different windows? There is a risk, potentially, of some confusion, particularly if someone assumes that the grants that they will apply for as a child gets older will have the same window. What were the thoughts around that to having different? We do endeavour to look and to challenge ourselves to see whether there should be termination over aspects of all the payments that are coming in, but sometimes it does not make sense to do that. For example, if it is over a kind of life circumstance, so applying for your early years payment, for example, that really does need to begin at 2 because of those that are entitled to their nursery place from the age of two, but it needs to go on for a large degree of time—a large window of time—for those who have not been eligible for a two-year-old place. So there needs to be a requirement for that to be larger. The school age window is specifically designed around that time when we will be looking to begin school and the parents will be registering a child for that. We do look carefully to see whether there can be termination so that there is a simplicity around the rules that we are applying, but sometimes that does not quite make sense and we feel that it would be detrimental and perhaps discourage people from applying if the windows are too small. Cabinet Secretary, there are a few things that I would like to clarify. We have two statutory instruments. I think that it is important that we try and get as much clarity around it as possible. All of us have dealt with welfare benefits system where things can get confusing for people who are applying. The cabinet secretary will also be aware that I have been pursuing the issue with your predecessor about automation of certain benefits, which I know you share the same view. My first question relates to that. I want to come on to the question of whether or not this benefit could be more automated, but I realise that it might be quite complex. To qualify for a best art grant payment, the applicant needs to receive certain low-income UK social security benefits such as universal credit. Could we have a bit more clarity about then what does that mean in reality? Who is eligible? Is it just those on universal credit or does it go beyond that? For the best start grant, there is a list of benefits where people can apply for the qualifying benefits. There is income support, income-based jobseekers allowance, income-related employment support allowance, pension credit, any tax credit, housing benefit and universal credit if the award is more than £0 in the month before or the month when the application is made. The aspects around universal credit are particularly important because, obviously, there are fluctuating incomes. One of the challenges with universal credit is that you may huff your payment going up and down, which is why we are doing it over the two months to be able to look at that. It is also important to stress that the award of more than £0 is in place unless you are at £0 because you are under a sanction, in which case we will look at what your payment would have been before the sanction. If you are being sanctioned and that is the only reason that you are at a £0 rating, you would still be able to apply for the best start grant, which is very welcome. On that list of benefits, do you think that there is any prospect of being able to automate any element of the grant based on that list? I really do appreciate your continuing interest in that. I am very sympathetic to look at what we can do in the future. Our first task is to get the system up and running, with a safe and secure transition to that benefit and for that to be working successfully. What we are putting in place at this point is, for example, when you apply for a pregnancy and baby payment, you will, in the future, be invited to apply for the early years payment and for your school age payment. That is not automated, I appreciate, but that is the type of aspects that we are looking to do as the system works at the moment. We can also take information around other siblings, for example, when somebody is applying for their pregnancy and baby payment, to see whether they should be encouraged to apply for a different type of payment, for example, early years payments for a sibling. That is what we are looking to do and are doing at the moment. As the service develops as it matures over the years, we will continue to look at further automation to see whether that is something that could be done and could be taken up for a best start grant. Automation is all about making the system as simple as possible, but I would like to understand that, given that there have been far more applications than you might have expected and so many successful applications, how has that been for the new body dealing with this? I am grateful to you for asking that question, because it gives me the opportunity to put on record my thanks to the staff at the agency who had a busier Christmas in New Year than they perhaps anticipated and running into January. They dealt with that in an extremely professional manner. The staff rose to the occasion and they know that they made a difference to people by processing those payments. There is a great deal of pride within the agency about how they dealt with that. That goes right from the client advisers all the way up. I am extremely grateful for the agency and for the wider social security directorate and how flexible they handled the situation. The staff were on—there was more over time, there was staff being deployed from other parts of the agency. For example, those on carers allowance supplement assisted with the best start. It really was a great test of the agency when it was still quite small in number, but I think that they proved themselves exceptionally capable to be able to deal with that. I think that they should take a great deal of pride of what happened and how that was dealt with over December and January. When we looked at the feedback that we were getting from clients, they felt that they had a very professional service and that they had a very good service from that, despite the fact that it was an exceptionally busy time. There is no script and never will be within our agency to rush people off the phone and they certainly felt that they got a very good service despite the fact that it was slightly busier than we all anticipated. Just for the purposes of completeness, I realised that there is a lot of complexity to the regulations. It strikes me that some of them might have to be revisited in the light of experience, but there are two issues outstanding. I am sure that it is contained in the regulations, so it would just be helpful for the record. Whether the requirement to make a new determination should cover those who gain eligibility through being awarded a backdating qualified bill as a result of mandatory reconsideration—as you know under the new social security act—there can be a redetermination and someone can be waiting for that, and then, of course, there might be an appeal following. Also, whether someone who has correctly refused a best art grant, I do not know if you want to deal with the first one because they are quite separate. I am happy to deal with that first, convener. That was something that we have looked at in response to stakeholder feedback. You are quite right to point out that when we have new benefits and new types of payments coming up, there will be lessons that we have learned. Certainly, the way that the Government is approaching this is that we are very open to stakeholders coming back and giving advice and suggestions on how the regulations could be improved, even if that is reasonably soon after the start date. I think that we should be open about that if it assists. The reason that that was done was because, obviously, when you are looking to appeal for the qualifying benefit, that could go over for a fair degree of time and push you over the time limit that we had currently within the regulations as they stand at the moment. That is not the same under a mandatory reconsideration. Obviously, the timescale for that is much, much smaller, so there is not felt that there is a need to mention that. It is not something that came back from the stakeholders that that is an issue, and that is particularly just to do with the length of time that an appeal will take when you compare that to the time that a mandatory reconsideration takes. So whether someone who was correctly refused a best start grant—let's assume that he was correctly refused—can a second application for the same type of best start grant payment for the same child because they start to receive a qualifying benefit? So if their circumstances change, if you like, and they start to receive a qualifying benefit, will still within the application window be eligible for the best start grant? Yes, they can make a second application in that case. That would be welcome, and we will ensure that that is within the letters that go out, for example, to make that clear to clients as well. One point really that I really welcome what has been said about the kind of approach that has been taken, which is this is the state's trying wanting to help and generally wanting to help, because experience of many people with benefits in the past has been a series of obstacles, and it is a thing that you have to discover for yourself. I remember a number of years ago as a councillor, there was a pension benefit application, which was 100 questions long, and it was a pension benefit, and the last question was, are you pregnant, I think? So sometimes people are quite cynical about the way the state goes about this, but the approach that you described, especially about the communications of making people aware of this, I think, is the right approach. But I suppose that my concern is about sustainability, and given the work that you have done on this, cabinet secretary, what is your feeling as to whether the approach that you are taking, both the ethos about trying to help and the benefits themselves, will be sustained? Is there general cross-party support, or do you like to see this being questioned in future? I would very much hope that there can be a great deal of cross-party support for this, just as we had for the bill now act that went through. I think that we can make an exceptional difference in the way that we are developing the social security and the difference that we will make. I will give one example of that, if I can convener. It is actually from Dr Allan's constituency where I visited last week, where I visited the citizens advice up there, and there was a lady who came in to seek the support to citizens advice, because she was frightened and concerned about phoning up for an application for a best start grant because of her previous experience with DWP. After she had heard how the conversation went and how supported the member of staff was at citizens advice, she then said that she was quite happy to carry out the further conversations herself and do that independently and pick up the phone to the agency because she understood that she would be supported and that it was a very different conversation. I know that that is one example, but it is a real testament to the difference that you can make, both in terms of therefore taking a pressure off citizens advice, because they are no longer having to support that lady because the service is delivering for the client directly. The difference is that you can make to a vulnerable client who perhaps had a great deal of anxiety about approaching a Government agency, and that is now gone, and that is the difference that we can make. That is so embedded in the agency because the client advises themselves to take great pride and to go on the extra mile for it, and I am absolutely determined that that can carry on without any problem at all. Thank you very much. That concludes the questions in which case I invite cabinet secretary to move the first motion. I am going to say what that is so that we are clear. It is S5M-15626 that the Social Security Committee recommends that the early years assistance best start grant Scotland's amendment number 1, regulation 2019, draft be approved. I would like to move the motion. Is the committee content to recommend approval of this instrument? Yes, we are agreed. Therefore, I invite the cabinet secretary to move the next motion, which is S5M-15629, that the Social Security Committee recommends that the early years assistance best start grant Scotland's amendment number 2, regulation 2019, draft be approved. Is the committee content to recommend approval of this instrument? We are. That is agreed. Thank you very much, cabinet secretary, for your attendance this morning and also thank you to your officials. I am going to suspend briefly before we go to the next item. We will reconvene at agenda item 4, still unsubordinate legislation, and the committee will take evidence on the funeral expense assistance in Scotland regulations 2019 in draft, which is subject to the affirmative procedure. I would like to welcome Lucy Carmichael, who is the funeral expense assistance and funeral poverty policy team leader. We have Colin Brown once again with us from the Scottish Government. Cabinet secretary, would you like to make an opening statement on the set of regulations? Arranging a funeral can be hard, and if a person is also struggling to pay for it, then that experience can be even more difficult. The committee will be aware from the evidence session held on 21 June 2018, as part of the consultation for those regulations, that many factors can impact on the cost of a funeral. Those include decisions about burial or cremation, the location of the funeral and the type of coffin, flowers and memorial service. I welcome this opportunity to highlight to the committee the significant difference that those regulations will provide for people on low income benefits in helping with the contribution towards funeral costs. We are making good progress in preparing to deliver funeral expense assistance and are on track to launch this summer. Our priority for funeral expense assistance is to ensure that people can continue to access the financial support that they need when arranging a funeral, while at the same time improving the support that is available based on the feedback that we have received. Those regulations, if approved, will put in place a benefit that is in keeping with our social security principles, investing around £2 million of additional Scottish Government funding each year on top of the resources that are transferred by the UK Government. That commitment will take annual spending to over £6 million in the first full year of operation. The regulations set out in detail the entitlement rules for funeral expense assistance. Those include provision for eligibility, what financial support is available and when to apply. Key improvements that we have made include designing the eligibility criteria so that it reaches as many of the groups identified by stakeholders as possible, and in doing so, we have widened eligibility by 40 per cent. That will support people who would otherwise receive no support at all from the current DWP funeral expenses payment. The substantial widening of eligibility shows what can be achieved if we take a different approach to social security. We are also simplifying our application process to make it clear who Scottish ministers would expect to be the nearest relative arranging the funeral in most cases, while at the same time retaining some flexibility with the application of nearest family member to ensure difficult family circumstances such as estrangement can be recognised on a case-by-case basis. Following the consultation on draft regulations, we have made further changes to our policy, including not requiring 16 and 17-year-olds to take responsibility for a funeral where another family member or friend wishes to organise the funeral and receive a payment. We have also decided to assess universal credit eligibility. Over a two-month period, I have ensured that people who have a zero award due to a sanction are eligible for assistance. Making all the changes that have been suggested to us is not affordable, however. We will be annually increasing the other experiences' flat rate element of the payment to take into account the impact of afflation from 2020-21 onwards, and that is something that the UK Government has not done for 16 years. The changes that we have made will mean that the payment process for funeral expense assistance will be simpler and more transparent than the current funeral expenses payment. In addition, we will continue to engage with key stakeholders to promote the assistance to maximise take-up and will undertake a co-ordinated communications campaign. Funeral expense assistance will foster dignity, fairness and respect by minimising intrusive questioning for clients where possible by making the most of existing sources of information to evidence applications. Our assistance has been built on modelling research and collaboration with stakeholders and engagement with users to provide a sound evidence base for our decision. I would like to recognise and thank the individuals and organisations that have helped to develop funeral expense assistance to this point, and I welcome the opportunity to assist the committee in its consideration of the funeral expense assistance Scotland Regulations 2019. I am happy to take questions. We heard earlier on, Jenny Gilruth raised the question about passported benefits in another context. I wonder what the Scottish Government can do about passported benefits in this situation. You have made clear that there are strong human reasons, as we have heard, when it comes to the best start scheme. Will, for instance, similar measures be taken to try to engage the home office to allow access for groups such as asylum seekers and other groups with no recourse to public funds when it comes to that particular benefit? The Scottish Government is keen to do anything that we can to assist those with no recourse for public funds. However, there is a challenge that, obviously, if we change the eligibility, the individual will be in breach of the immigration status, leading to potentially severe consequences. It is not something that, in any way, can be undertaken lightly. The difference between what has happened with the best start grant payments for groups that are now eligible, although they have no recourse to public funds, is very different from the funeral expense assistance. We considered that matter as we were looking at eligibility because of the great difference between BSG and funeral expense assistance that the home office would not apply the same recognition. We have to understand, as well, what has happened with the best start grant payment recognition from the home office is exceptionally unusual and was particularly in relation to very compelling arguments that we had around that particular case. Those are not the same under funeral expense assistance, and therefore, the home office would not grant the same eligibility for that. The only other point that I want to raise more generally is about take-up and what you are doing to engage people around the issue of take-up. It is very important with every single payment that we are taking on that there is a bespoke communications policy that is developed in conjunction with stakeholders. Because of the amount and the level of stakeholder engagement that we have had already, as those regulations have been developed, we are beginning to get an understanding about what that would involve, but we are still continuing to work with funeral directors. For example, registrars want the registration of a death. What we can do around Scottish Government publications around funeral poverty, funeral expenses, so all of that is being looked at. It is not determined yet and finalised yet, but we are taking very seriously. As I said, when in relation to the best start grant, if the committee has particular suggestions, requirements or any member feels that there is something that we need to be looking at at that, then there is absolutely the opportunity to still be able to input into that process. Again, just three questions of actual care in different areas. Just to follow on from my previous question around qualifying benefits. During my consultation, there were quite a few people responded to say that things, for example, like council tax reduction, maternity allowance, should be included to make it a wider available benefit. You have obviously decided not to go down that road. Why and how many people do you think are going to be excluded from getting this benefit because of the way that you have drawn up the criteria? We do have to make decisions around how we define low income, and that is done through the qualifying benefits that we have. The aspects that you have mentioned in particular for council tax reduction, the suggestion is that that would not particularly add that many people towards qualifying or not for the funeral expense assistance because they will be covered by the other qualifying benefits that we have. When it comes to maternity allowance, that is obviously not a means tested application, so therefore you would be getting people on higher incomes that would be part of that process. If we are being very targeted around this, which we are for, it is for people for low incomes, that it was not viewed as reasonable to extend that to something like maternity allowance that would include those that were not on a low income. There were reasons behind the decisions that we have taken around all of the eligibility, but I hope that that explains the two specific ones that Mr Balfour has mentioned. The second area, which is a wider issue for going forward, is the comment that you will cover reasonable funeral costs in regard to burial, cremation and all that. As we are aware, there is a mass variation across the 32 local authorities in regard to what is charged. Some areas, I think, are starting to use it as a way to earn income while others are much lower. I am just wanting to see clarification. Will you meet each local authority's cost for a burial or cremation, or does reasonable mean that you would only cover the average cost across a local authority in Scotland? Clearly, with such variation, there may well be people who would have to pay up a lot more if that makes sense. No, it does, and you are absolutely right to point to the fact that there are significant variations between local authorities when it comes to the cost of a burial or a cost of the cremation. That is something that has been looked at within the wider work, Ms Campbell's portfolio on funeral poverty and the guidance that was consulted on recently. That will be something that the Government will come back to. With reference to the specific question, it is the average burial or cremation cost in each area. It is not the average for the whole of Scotland, it is the average for that area. I hope that that clarifies what is relevant. One of the issues that has come out in the evidence that we took earlier on this was in regard to the application and then the procession of the application. Again, when someone dies, the undertaker takes that liability on board. If he or she is not guaranteed that money, that has caused issues around that. Just in regard to the procession of an application, have you set a timescale for the agency to be able to process that so that undertakers and families can have the confidence that they will either get the money or not get the money? The initial starting point is to make the eligibility on the application process much, much easier. I hope that that will be for families and for funeral directors a lot clearer whether a person will be likely eligible or not for the benefits, because part of the challenge was that it was so complex before. Obviously, that still requires people to apply and to get their payment. When we are looking at that, we have said that a completed application with all relevant evidence will be processed within 10 working days and that will hopefully assist the family and the funeral directors to have some reassurance around timeframes for that. The third aspect that I would point out to Finlay is the pre-application support that is available. It is not just that the agency does not want to hear about you until you are ready to fill in your application form, but it is what the agency can do if advice and assistance is required. Obviously, we are not making an imprinciple decision at that point, but if there is clarification that client advisers can make to a family directly or to those who are assisting with the burial, that will be of use in that process. On that point of eligibility criteria, on DWP figures suggest that around 32 per cent of people who apply for the UK funeral payment do not receive it. It is probably a very difficult time to have a refusal. I appreciate what the cabinet secretary is saying about pre-application support, because it would be good to move to a situation in which the eligibility was so clear that people did not apply where they were likely to be refused. What has been put in place to try to make that refusal as unlikely as possible, given the circumstances? That is an important point to try to make it as simple as possible. The reasons why people are refused is an unfortunate very good example of the poor data that we have around the system at present, about why people are refused and why those do not take place. One of the areas that we are working very closely with stakeholders on is what management information should the agency collect that would assist us in learning why people are being refused? Is it still a misunderstanding about eligibility or are there other factors? At the moment, we are not able to say that with any definitive understanding because of the type of data that is currently collected and the way in which it is collected by DWP. We are working very carefully with stakeholders to learn what information should we gather to further learn and adapt if there are particular reasons why there are refusals that we need to look very seriously at. You are absolutely right that if we can reduce the rate of refusal, we will reduce the stress, the anxiety and the process that a family is going through. It is a very difficult time already. When we took evidence earlier, we were made aware of the fact that a coffin was not considered an essential cost in the regulations. We were advised that a body would not be accepted without one. I wondered whether anyone has been looking as to why that is the case, because it would seem to be an essential cost. I am not aware of that particular evidence that came up, but I will, perhaps, rather than try to read the sheet that I have just been given, refer to Lucy to pick that one up. You are correct at the moment that a coffin is included in the £700 element of the DWP payment. That will continue to be the case under the process that we have set out. Looking at that, there is quite a lot of variation in terms of how much a coffin can cost. If we included it in the reasonable necessary cost but specified a particular coffin, we thought that that could attach a stigma to the benefit if you were only allowed particular options, so we did not want to do that. Does that help? I know that that is helpful. I am just interested in understanding the thinking behind that. As for the other side of Alison Johnstone's issue, I am concerned that people do not apply who would be accepted. I think that my granny, who was born in Venice but lived all the days in Edinburgh, had bought everything—ordered the cakes and the tea and specified which cakes were to be eaten as well. Many older people are very concerned and not going to provide a burden to people further on. I will go back to Alison's point about how she gets that information out there. You will be aware that there is almost an avalanche of adverts on TV just now encouraging older people either to use their pension entitlement or their equity in their house to make provision for funeral expenses and to play on the guilt about being a burden on others. In relation to how you put out what people are entitled to, have you thought—and you asked for suggestions—about the idea that it was very expensive but maybe not just in relation to the benefit but to other benefits of TV advertising to meet that kind of challenge? Not particularly TV advertising as such but what we do with every single benefit is to look at where that relevant demographic will be. For example, when we were looking at the pregnancy and baby payments, there was a decision to do outdoor advertising in areas that were very close to GP surgeries and hospitals because that is where you would be going to visit your midwife, for example, to take up. We look very specifically at each benefit and where is the best place to be able to get that message out. You point out absolutely correctly that there is a great deal of other information out there about how you can save for a funeral. Our challenge that we are absolutely ready to take on is how we get the information out there that there is this benefit because it is one of the ones that has the lowest awareness out there. If we can break that and ensure that people have a better understanding of that, we can take that burden and say quite rightly of people who feel that the onus is on them to save in their later years for this when there actually is Government assistance there for them. Michelle Ballantyne? Just a quick supplement to that. I would have thought that one of the ways to ensure that people know about it and get the help that they need it would be for undertakers themselves to be well educated on it to have forms there so that when they first sit down with the family one of the things they should be saying is are you aware there is a grant if you're eligible here's the details and at least allow the family to be told at that point and then to go away. So I just wonder if you've got any plans to make contact with all undertakers give them all the necessary information. Yes, that's very much all well under way and their in-effects assisting us with the information and how that would be best formatted and developed to allow them to have that as part of the process and we need to have an understanding about the types of conversations that are had and when it's the best time for that information to be made available but there's a great deal of co-operation that's already happened between Government and stakeholders particularly funeral directors and those involved to make sure because they also want to provide reassurance for those that are coming to them for the cost of a funeral and they will in some ways be maybe the first to spot an anxiety around costs and a concern around costs so we will absolutely be working very very closely to ensure that we do all we can. I think that the challenge that Mr Brown quite rightly points out is actually before that stage and actually providing reassurance for an elderly person directly that they don't have to save for a funeral. So that's why we have to look at it from all different angles and from every availability but I've been really heartened by the close work and relationship that we've had as these have progressed with funeral directors for example. Are you providing actual training, the getting training sessions or is it just writing out to them? Not training but we have, I mean I was at the stakeholder reference group on this I think just last month where they were having discussions on this very issue so with their industry bodies we were having that wider discussion and then just as we did for as you say the best start payments we will be having roadshows across the country to be able to then get that message out in different locales within Scotland as well. So we're working very carefully within the stakeholder reference group to develop that work and then once it's developed we'll obviously then take that out to a wider group at the relevant point and we need to be careful obviously of the timing of that because we don't want to confuse people, not the funeral directors but confuse people when the benefit will be starting and when the DWP one is still in place so we just need to be mindful of that but that work will be undertaken before the benefit goes live. Okay thank you. Just two final questions from me first is so the 10 day application processing time is obviously quite important and I wondered if cabinet secretary thought it should be in legislation a bit like the redetermination processing time rather than in guidance is there a case to kind of be built in braces on that one? Well this is an area where we have tried to be consistent with the other benefits so there's not a time for processing for example within the best start grant regulations and I suppose the challenge when you're looking at it is if you include a statutory processing time within the regulations what's the remedy? What would happen if that timescale wasn't met? It's different for a redetermination because you move directly to an appeal so it's what would be the benefit of having it there within regulation. What we have very clearly set out though is our determination to do that and to make that public and obviously that will be reported on and I'm sure the committee and others with an interest in this will keep a close watch an eye on whether we can you know whether we're delivering on that and any reasons why we're finding that challenging but certainly our determination is to fulfil that at this point. Yeah I mean arguably it's more important in this process because it's a funeral and the family needs to start to make arrangements and I'm sure you're only too familiar with the average cost of a funeral these days. It just occurred to me that so that the applicant makes the application that it's processed and they may be eligible for this payment at a flat rate of £700 pounds so that would go directly to the applicant in order to to contribute towards the cost of a funeral. Is there an option for that payment to go directly to funeral directors because you really have to start the process days within you know if you have something in the family who's deceased so and then they start to give you the costs at that point and I suppose it might be a bit of reassurance if someone could whenever that process happens at least make sure that that money is deducted and then they have to find the rest. Is there a case for saying what can that already happen? So a payment can be made directly to a funeral director if that's what the applicant wants and in many cases obviously they do want that because it's one less task for them to be involved at that time so that that can take place. Thank you very much. There are no further questions so I would like to invite the cabinet secretary to move the following motion, which is S5M-15627, that the Social Security Committee recommends that the funeral expense assistance Scotland regulations 2019 draft be approved. Is the committee content to recommend approval of this instrument? We are. Thank you, that is agreed. Finally, just to thank you cabinet secretary for spending the morning with us and obviously your officials for their contribution. Thank you very much. I'm going to suspend briefly to allow our guest to leave the room. Convened at agenda item 6, which is the public petition. I refer members to paper 3 and the petition by Dr Sarah Glyn. The petition calls on the Scottish Government to make more money available to mitigate the impact of the UK Government welfare cuts through reassessing spending priorities and bringing it more progressive taxation. The committee agreed at its meeting on 1 November 2018 to consider this petition again following the publication of the Scottish Government budget, part of the committee's pre-budget scrutiny. The committee wrote to the Scottish Government asking for the Scottish welfare fund to be increased to address growing pressures and need. For now, the Scottish Government has committed to maintain but not increase the funding for the Scottish welfare fund. I now invite the committee to consider the petition again and decide whether or not they wish to close the petition on the basis that the policy and expenditure considerations such as those raised in the petition are embedded in the work of the committee and were considered during the draft budget. Alternatively, I agree the reasons for keeping the petition open. Mark Griffin, I think that through the work that we have done, we have effectively agreed with the petitioner. We have asked the Scottish Government to make more money available to mitigate the impact of welfare cuts. We will specify the mechanism for doing that through the welfare fund. I would be content to close the petition on the proviso that we write to the petitioner to set out what we have done and to flag the petition with the Scottish Government and to restate the committee's view that the welfare fund should be increased to address that growing need. I think that the committee could close the petition on the grounds that we have already commented about the welfare fund. I would also offer one comment that maybe not all the committee would agree with, which is that, while I think that what we are saying about the welfare fund there is reasonable and what the petitioner is saying about that is reasonable, as a more general point, I do not think that this committee would endorse the idea that all cuts made to the social security system or in other reserved areas could be met by this Parliament from devolved resources. I saw a figure recently that suggested that the amount of money that is coming out of the benefit system in Scotland in the course of this Parliament is equivalent to what we spend in its entirety on Police Scotland. I think that the points in the petitioner are ones that I can understand. I think that the point that has just been made about closing it and the reasons for closing it are reasonable, but I just would want to offer an observation that, as a general principle, we cannot, as a Parliament, offer to make up for everything that Westminster takes away from us. Anyone else disagree, Alison? It is not so much a disagreement. I suppose that we are closing this petition when we have been unsuccessful. The Parliament has not been able to convince the Government to do so, but I take on board colleagues' comments. We have urged the Scottish Government, as the petitioner has requested, to make more money available, and they have said no, certainly not at the moment. I agree with the petitioner that we need a more progressive system of taxation, and my party has worked hard to try to alleviate cuts to local budgets. I suppose that one concern that I have is that universal credit is still rolling out, and so that is a changing picture. It could worsen. I think that we should certainly write to the petitioner and to the cabinet secretary, but ask the cabinet secretary to bear in mind that this is a changing picture that things could get worse and that we really need to keep an eye on this as a Parliament to make sure that this fund is getting close to meeting. Obviously, we want it to meet properly the need that is there. I had not seen this when it came to the committee. I have not only recently joined the committee, but just to give a couple of thoughts. First of all, I just think that there is a real kind of moral hazard here that if this Parliament continues and the Government continues to mitigate the bulk of the cuts that come from Westminster, there is no end to that, plus there is incentive on Westminster to cut further benefits, because we will be confident that devolved administrations in some cases will pick up the slack. That is just not sustainable. The other point that I would make is that we discussed the Scottish welfare fund when it was apparent that there was an underspend on that. I am not sure about the benefits of putting more money into a budget that is currently underspend unless, of course, you change the entitlement, which then pushes up the take-up and listen to it. I think that what I am more concerned about is whether the mitigation that is set just now is at £70 million for discretionary housing payments, about £600 on average, or more than £600 a year to those that have the bedroom tax mitigated. I am much more concerned that those things stay in place. In addition to writing to the Scottish Government, we should ask the party leaders if they committed to those mitigations staying in place in the long term, because that is much more of having that kind of comfort that those mitigations will be there. It is a more pressing concern, especially in the next two or three years to people. I am comfortable that we close it. I was actually on petitions when this petition was actually bought, so I actually heard the petition. There was a fairly unanimous agreement in the Petitions Committee to pass it on. It was not particularly evidence-based. It was quite emotive. Whilst I understand their reasoning and where they came from, I do not think that there is any mileage in it at present. I pick up what Keith Brown was saying, that we have clear evidence in terms of the current underspend on the fund, so there would be no reason to raise it at this point. I am content if he wants to write and just say that he wants to keep it in mind as we go along. I think that I am going to agree that we close the petition, but we obviously need to write to the petitioner. We could send a copy of the official report, but we could just reiterate the views around the table. I think that that would agree with everything. We actually specifically say in our report that the Scottish Parliament of our Completions should not mitigate every single change. We can refer that to our in-work poverty report. Beleg Halleson is a changing picture. I do not think that we should close the door on that, and I also agree with Keith Brown that there are significant arrangements put in place for the bedroom tax for mitigation, and those are important that those stay in place. We need to write to the petitioner. We could just send round the draft to everyone, just to see if all the points are covered. If we write to the Scottish Government, Mark Smith suggests to say the same thing, but would you agree to add in Halleson's point, which is a changing picture? Is there anyone? I would also appreciate the point that we have to have some idea about how sustainable politically this is, and the other parties should be saying if they intend to keep with this. We should know what the basis of that commitment is. I agree with all that has been said, but I would add that. I am sure that that is for manifestos come 2021. I think that that does verge on you are almost saying to people to commit to things before you have got your manner. I mean that every political party will put forward a programme of government for 2021 and beyond. I would have thought that that would be the appropriate place where people will outline their policies rather than necessarily issue by issue on a committee. Could you, if for the time being, stick to the content of the letter of what the committee wants to say first to the petitioner and to the Scottish Government? That is exactly the point that I am making. People need to know that if we as a committee are looking at the sustainability of the mitigations that are in place, that is vitally important information. I think that it is important to this committee to know what the commitments are to this and what the likely threats are to the mitigation that is already there. That is why I would push the point that we should find out from other parties who are committed to the mitigation and, if they are not, they can say so. I agree that we would like to stick to the mitigation. I am very happy with the situation in this moment. What I think is difficult for any political party to do at this stage is to say, what are we going to do beyond 2021? I think that all the parties have a position now. I do not think that the commission should be right to party leaders. I think that what you are suggesting is the committee's view that, trying to see what elements we can agree in the letter, that we would agree that the mitigation that is contained within the budget now is something that the committee would support to continue. Would that be fair? I do not think that that answers the question. I do not think that the people who put the petition in the first place are concerned about the level of mitigation that they are just now. It is also of concern to them that the level of mitigation, if it does not go higher, which is what they seek, does not go lower. I think that it is a really important point that people should not say. I am not sure whether it is the case, for example, from what Jeremy said, that there is a commitment to have the bedroom tax alleviated going forward. I am happy to take the kit because I am fairly new to this committee's view on it. I think that it will be a matter of quite importance, both to the petitioners and to this committee, to flush out who is committed to those things, who is committed to the mitigation that is there just now. I am happy to take other views. Is there a compromise somewhere in the letter that could make a reference to the sustainability of that going forward will depend on the commitment that is made by various parties, not just the Scottish Government, but a wording that could not write into party leaders, but basically something that says that the commitment to continue mitigating will depend on the commitments of all parties to make that happen? Who is to say what will happen to the benefit system in the future? Committing to mitigating something forever and a day is not necessarily relevant if the whole thing changed anyway. Bedroom tax stays in place. Will you remain committed to mitigating it in Scotland? If it does not stay in place, then obviously you cannot expect— There is no such thing as a bedroom tax, so I would not even go down that route. I think that we are not going to agree on anything if we cannot agree on a bedroom tax. Matthew Angol will answer your question as a compromise. I think that everybody appreciates—to all intends and purposes—the changing picture in any direction. We just do not know what that is going to be. Alison's suggestion is that there is a changing picture, whatever that means, and we would like the Scottish Government to keep an eye on that. However, I think that we are pretty all agreed, because we said in our report that we do not think that the Scottish Government should mitigate every single benefit change where there is a budget implication, but we all reserve our positions on what elements might be mitigated. We might have a slight difference of opinion on that, but I think that in the course of the event—we have the draft of letters, so there are some key points there. We will circulate the draft letter, then. We will try to stick to the consensus that exists, and we can take it further at another time. However, the committee is content to close the petition. I thank the petitioner for raising the issue with the committee. I will close formally the public session, Keith Brown. It was just a discussion that we had before, earlier, about— Yes, we can discuss that after we close the meeting formally.