 A wych. Tech of Members to attend. Good morning. Welcome to the 10th meeting of Heal with Communes'andır will be attended in the Education, Children and Young People Committee in 2024. We have apologies this morning from Stephanie Callahan as well as Stuart McMillan will be attending in her place. Stuart will join us slightly later on. support for learning Scotland Act 2004 has been implemented and how it is working in practice some 20 years on. Today, we are going to hear from the cabinet secretary and her officials. We have been focusing on three themes throughout the inquiry, the implementation of the presumption of mainstreaming, the impact of Covid-19 on additional support for learning and the use of remedies as set out in the act. I welcome this morning Jenny Gilruth, the cabinet secretary for education and skills, Claire Henderson, team leader, supporting learners from the Scottish Government and Laura Meekle, head of the support and wellbeing unit at the Scottish Government. Good morning and welcome to all of you. I would now like to invite the cabinet secretary to make an opening statement. Cabinet secretary, you have up to three minutes. Thank you. Good morning. I welcome the opportunity to contribute to the committee's post-legislative inquiry on the additional support for learning act. We are now 20 years on since the introduction of the additional support for learning legislation and our education offer in Scotland looks in many ways radically different to that which existed back in 2004. For many young people and for their families, things have not progressed in the way that they should have, nor at the pace that they should have. I am acutely aware of what that means for young people and their families' experiences in Scotland's schools, particularly given the substantive increase in learners with additional support needs in recent years. Those young people are not an add-on, they are part of the inclusive nature of Scotland's education system, so we need a whole systems approach to better ensure that inclusivity is experienced by all. The review of additional support for learning, published by Angela Morgan back in 2020, primarily focused on the implementation of the 2004 act. That review concluded that there is no fundamental deficit in the principle and policy intention of the ASL legislation or the substantial guidance accompanying it. The challenge lies in translating that intention into practice. As members will know, the Scottish Government, in partnership with COSLA, responded to the Morgan review accepting all the recommendations. We set out a clear action plan detailing 76 actions to be taken at national and local level to address the challenges raised and to support the necessary shift in culture, leadership and values across our education system. We are currently halfway through that action plan, with 39 of the 76 actions marked as delivered. As my officials have indicated in writing to the committee, the next detailed progress report is due to publish in the coming weeks, and I look forward to engaging with members and indeed Parliament on the progress. The ASL project board is focused on reducing the fragmentation of ASL policy, and work has been undertaken to map how ASL policy links to wider education, health and social care policies to ensure that we work across boundaries to deliver better support. We are also undertaking a review of the external information that is shared on ASL policy through a range of different platforms to refresh content and to provide enhanced and consistent information across the system. Progress towards an inclusive leadership approach for ASL policy is under way, with ADES incorporating that initiative into their collaborative improvement programme. Education Scotland has also launched its inclusion, wellbeing and equality professional learning framework with direct input from the teaching profession. Our working group has also developed a professional learning framework for support staff, which includes a range of learning and development resources. Children and young people, parents and carers and the wider profession are all critical to the delivery of the improvement that we need to make. We continue to work in partnership with the young ambassadors for inclusion, the ASL network and parents, and carers representatives across our stakeholder groups. I want to put on the record the achievements of our pupils with additional support needs, which are many and varied. It is worth saying that the attainment gap between mainstream and special school pupils with ASN and with no ASN achieving one or more in that five equivalent by the time they leave school has reduced by more than half. It is important to recognise the success and also to be mindful of the wider educational landscape that I know the committee will be. Future education reform is going to affect all learners with additional support needs, just as it affects those who do not have an additional support need. Undoubtedly, as the committee has heard, the pandemic has also impacted on the pace of improvement, as it has on many other aspects of young people's lives. Before I conclude, I want to touch briefly on the statistics that were published yesterday from the Government, which included troubling new evidence in relation to attendance. Their absence is one of the range of post-pandemic challenges that are facing our schools. However, the data that was published yesterday again reinforces a renewed need for a drive across central and local government to ensure improved outcomes for all of our young people. We will continue to work in partnership to deliver the recommendations of the ASL action plan by March 2026, but fundamentally, as Angela Morgan stated in her review, we cannot continue to view additional support for learning as a minority area or in a separate silo within the framework of Scottish education. It is in that spirit that I look forward to any suggestions and any questions that committee members may have today. Thank you, cabinet secretary. I am going to move to questions from members now. The first kick-off this morning is Liam Kerr, please. Thank you, convener. Good morning, cabinet secretary. Over the last few weeks, the committee has heard really powerful testimony and a lot of detail on some of the challenges that are facing our people in this area. When you have reviewed the official reports of the report, is there anything specific that has jumped out as particularly concerning for you and that you intend to address almost like a first 100 days after our report comes out? Yes. First of all, I very much welcome the committee's inquiry, given that we are halfway through the ASL action plan. We will be updating that in the coming weeks, and we intend to learn from the outputs from the committee to inform that process. We have been a number of points that the committee has looked at that I have been considering in recent weeks. I want to touch on some of those, if I may, convener. Some of the evidence that the committee took in relation to funding of ASL, which was very important, particularly in relation to the commentary from Audit Scotland, who talked about the approach that is adopted at the current time, not just being a local authority question. When I think about ASN, we often think about it in an education silo, and it is for education budgets to mop up that need. It is not. We need to be more mindful of different budgetary requirements and how we can be more holistic in that provision, so that our young people are better supported. I know that point was also made, I think, by the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists, who talked about how we could do that more holistically and not having a fight over funding, which I am very mindful of, because that is about fundamentally how we can get it right for every child. If we use GURFEC as our measure, we need to better reflect that and how that funding works on the ground. I know that the committee has taken evidence from how that can be fragmented in relation to delivery. Those were two examples of things that jumped out at me in relation to funding in particular, but there were a number of other areas that the committee has heard from in relation to the design of school buildings, for example, and how that can impact on additional support needs. More broadly, the way in which the pandemic has changed our education system—and I am very mindful that, in the coming weeks, as the committee knows, I will need to formally respond to the Hayward review. We need to be mindful of the increase in additional support needs in that context, mindful of the challenges in relation to behaviour right now. The challenge right now, as Mr Kerr will know, is in relation to attendance. All of those factors, since Covid, have compounded. Fundamentally, to compare the legislation that passed back in 2004 to where we are now—a completely different educational offering. Therefore, as cabinet secretary, I am keen to hear the committee's use on the evidence that it has taken and that we can better reflect that in our updated ASL action plan, which we have made progress of, but I know that the committee will want to talk to some of the specifics on what that looks like in practice. I am grateful. Specifically on the budgetary requirements and silos and things, I think that it was a particularly interesting part of your answer there. That does need address, and I think that the committee will agree with that. But who has the responsibility here for driving that forward? You talked about the whole systems approach in your opening remarks. Who is going to lead that and who has the responsibility for addressing those issues? Is it the Scottish Government or is it going to be local authorities or indeed another body? It has got to be addressed in partnership, and that is why the additional support for learning action plan has been a joint endeavour between the Scottish Government and with COSLA. Much like our work in relation to behaviour, I should say that tomorrow, Osagribus will meet to talk about the issues associated with attendance. I know that the committee might want to look at that issue in more detail, because attendance across the country looks different in different parts of the country. I think that it is important to understand that local variation, which is why COSLA has to play a role in that. I accept that, as Cabinet Secretary, the Government needs to provide a leadership role, so in relation to additional support needs, that joint partnership working in relation to the ASL action plan is well understood. If the committee has different views on that, I am happy to listen to what those might be. That was quite succinct there, and I am hoping that Michelle Thompson is ready and online. First, I apologise that I cannot be in the room. I need to leave a little earlier, and I did not want to disturb the flow of the meeting. I want to ask a framing question, if you like, that will help to support some of the other questions coming later. We know that we have had increased inputs into the education system, generally average spend per pupil for primary and secondary, more classroom systems and so on, and yet we still have a perception of lack of support for pupils with ASN. I am very mindful, as you are, of the increased demand, but I would appreciate your reflections on why that perception persists despite the increased inputs over a long period of time. Michelle Thompson touches on a really important issue. I cannot, if the committee wishes, rehearse all the statistics that I have at my fingertips in relation to Government investment in education, but I think that the substantive point that the member makes is why, given that there is additionality in relation to spend per pupil and in relation to pupil support assistance, again data on which I published yesterday, why is the need so great? Part of it relates to the way that we measure additional support needs. The committee will be aware that we changed the way in which we measured additional support needs back in 2010, so that has led to some increase. There are other external factors driving an increase in relation to the number of additional support needs pupils at the current time. For example, just over 5 per cent is accounted for by EAL pupils, so that is helping to drive an increase in that space additionally, and there are wider factors for that increase that the committee may be aware of. As one headteacher put it to me, I think that I may have made this point to the committee previously last year. During the pandemic, when other services stepped back, schools stepped up, and school is now filling void that other services have historically filled. That is part of the growing feeling that the system is under and an ordinate amount of pressure, whereas in the past, even 10 or 15 years ago, schools were very focused on providing education. Our schools, and I know that the committee will know that, because members will spend a lot of time in their own constituencies visiting schools. Schools are providing services now, but 5 or 10 years ago they just did not provide. I think that part of the pressure is that broader approach of the role of school education or the school itself providing community support in some instances that it did not in the past. I thank you very much for that response, and I think that you fairly reflect the new environment post-pandemic, if you might. My follow-on question is, given that that perception of a lack of resources persists, and for a very good reason, have you set out what actions, as a result, are you going to be able to undertake so that people can start to see that things are in train and manage that perception? I think that there are a range of things that we can do in Government. I suppose that this goes back to some extent to the point that Mr Kerr was speaking about local, national. Where does responsibility sit? One of the things that we can do in Government is that we can ringfence, and the committee might want to push me on this point. Of course, in recent times, the Government has taken a principal stance in ringfencing teacher numbers and teacher funding because of that additional £145 million. The statistics that were published yesterday show an increase in relation to pupils' support assistance, because that additionality is also for pupils' support assistance. There are actions that Government can take essentially to protect funding for certain areas, and there might be others that disagree with that, but I think that that is really important in terms of yes, protecting inputs, but also outputs, because we know that if we have more staff in the system, we can help to improve outcomes for our children and young people. That is one of the actions that we can take more broadly, as I have alluded to in my opening commentary. The additional support for learning action plan tells a good story of progress that we have made. Lorna may want to talk to some of the specifics. We are not where we should be, part of that is because of the pandemic. However, we have been able to make key progress in a number of different areas, and it is important to recognise that. The final point is that I have mentioned educational reform today. The committee will know that, in the coming weeks and months, I will bring forward legislation on a range of new bodies that will exist to replace the current examinations body and Education Scotland with the inspection function coming out. I invite committee members to consider the role of the bodies in supporting our young people with additional support needs. I know that the committee has taken evidence, for example, in terms of the support that is available from Education Scotland at the current time. In the new post-pandemic educational world that we are living in with all those challenges, could that support be better provided? I think that there is opportunity through, for example, the Centre for Teaching Excellence to deliver some of that. I might bring Lorna in on some of the specifics of the ASL action plan. Absolutely. The Morgan review focused on what children and young people and parents and carers experiences were of additional support for learning, as Ms Gareth has already highlighted. We know that, in terms of achievement and attainment, there are improvements in that area, but the challenge remains that children and young people and their families are having challenging experiences in relation to additional support for learning. That is the fundamental focus of the Morgan review, but it is naturally the focus of our work on the ASL action plan specifically. The point about how we convey what it is that we are doing and the changes that we are seeking to make, purposefully, that is why ministers have asked us to report on a regular basis about the progress being made against the actions of the ASL action plan in a way that is very, very public in order to be accountable and to demonstrate that we are seeking to make that change. As I said, we can certainly comment specifically on actions if the committee wishes us to do so during the course of this morning, but I think that that might be helpful in terms of why it is that we are acting in the way that we are in relation to the action plan. I think that your approach to this this morning is good. It is difficult, it is really bad just now, I am really worried. Reading the written evidence, probably even more so than the oral evidence that we had, is pretty tough. A lot of people are really feeling it. Are you concerned that we are in danger of pitting pupils with additional support needs against other pupils because of the huge demands on teacher and assistance time that inevitably leads others to lose out? Are you worried about the atmosphere that has been created in the classroom with some losing out in a drive quite rightly to get inclusion? Are you concerned that that is happening? I take the member's point. I suppose the question that he asks is the presumption of mainstreaming the right approach. It is not so much. I am not asking that. I am just saying that I have one quote here, which is, this is from a teacher. Inclusion currently looks like whole classes being left with little to no support, while the teacher de-escalates situations and supports individuals to regulate. That touches over into the whole behaviour issues, but the two are quite closely connected. I am just worried that that situation is left to Fester could create more of a division. I think that there are undoubtedly challenges here, so that Mr Rennie touches on behaviour. Of course, the committee will know that there are strong links between additional support needs and challenges in relation to behaviour. We need to be mindful of that. We also need to be mindful that children with an additional support need are far more likely to be excluded. When we are meant to have an inclusive education system, I think that there is a challenge there. More broadly, the challenge in schools is well documented and he cites evidence from a teacher. I am sure that we all know teachers. I certainly do who would quote some of the challenge here. Fundamentally, supporting additional support needs is the responsibility of every teacher in Scotland. They should be trained and supported to respond to those young people. I think that there is a challenge there at the current time. I think that additional support needs, as a measure, sometimes can be quite monolithic, but if you delve into it, there are a range of different needs that sit behind that 37 per cent. I think that it is currently we have of young people with an additional support need. That measure sometimes covers things that underneath it might be low-level in terms of the additional support that is needed. I think that we should be mindful of that, too. The other thing to be mindful of is that many schools are supporting our children with additional support needs very well. I was thinking last week ahead of today's committee appearance about a school that I visited in Dundee, Cregy High School, who are doing some fantastic work with their pupil equity funding to support children with additional support needs. It is that holistic, inclusive approach that secondary school has adopted that is really changing outcomes for those young people. I accept the challenge, but I also know that there are some schools that are responding to that challenge differently. Perhaps there is a role here. Again, this is where I question the role in future of bodies such as Education Scotland to exemplify good practice but to share it across the board where there is challenge and there are opportunities as well. I think that pupil equity funding—we have examples of SAC funding being used to provide that additionality and to provide that support that is needed in schools. More broadly, there is a challenge here that I do not shy away from, but the alternative to that is to move away from the presumption mainstreaming. I do not think that anyone around the table this morning, convener, would be in favour of that from all that I have seen from the evidence that the committee has taken. Are you indicating that perhaps resources are part of it because you have identified a number of different funds? However, there is something beyond money that can change in schools to make things better. We know that. Why is that not being rolled out? Why is that not being embraced in the way that we want it? I think that the committee took evidence on that. It was focused on school culture, and I think that that is part of it—how you can support that holistic school culture. It goes back to the point that Michelle Thomson was making. Schools are dealing with lots of different things, so they have to raise attainment and look at our piece of stats. Those are the questions that committee members have been putting to me before Christmas. You have got to respond to attendance as well. We have got real challenges with persistent non-attendance, which I would like to come back to at some point, but we also need to support our children and young people. We were not very good at doing that historically. When I was at school not that long ago—although I will be 40 this year—many children with additional support needs would be removed from classes that I assign because they would be seen as a challenge and they would be put elsewhere. I worry that the current public debate is moving us back into that space. I do not think that that is where we want to go. I think that teachers want support. They need that wraparand provision. Part of that support is the investment that we have put into pupil support assistance. I am pleased that that has held this year. We have increased the number of pupil support assistance. I know that Mr Rennie might have a follow-up question on that in relation to the specialisms of staff, because I am mindful of that, too. I think that we have a strong and inclusive education system in Scotland. That was one of the strengths that came out of the national discussion that was published last year. It is something that we should celebrate, but I do not deny the tension here just now at the current time. Part of that we all need to reflect is post-pandemic. That malaise across the system, whether that be on attendance, attainment or additional support needs, is felt in a number of other jurisdictions. I know that the Welsh are struggling with very similar challenges and down south very similar. I know that it has got worse since the pandemic. There is no doubt about that, but it was there before. The stresses were being felt quite considerably before that. I suppose that my other question relates to where we draw that line and whether we are getting it right about who is in mainstream and who is in a specialist environment. Do you think that we have got the plan for the number and type of specialist places right? Do you think that that balance is appropriate and that we have got sufficient specialisms? Are you talking about specialist schools? Specialist environment, specialist schools and specialist places. Do you think that we have got that line in an appropriate place? I am looking at some of the evidence that the committee has taken on that. No, I am not convinced that we are at the current time. We need to reflect that in the ASL action plan update. Officials and I were discussing that earlier today and on Monday. Right now, we may come on to this convener in relation to the role of the tribunal. Patents often feel that they have to fight against the system to have their voices heard and to have their young person diagnosed, for example. I do not think that that reflects the intention of the 2004 act. We need to recalibrate that balance post-pandemic. Things have got more difficult. Undoubtedly, they were challenging before the pandemic. It has compounded, but I was struck by some of the evidence that the committee has taken on that, particularly in relation to the role of the tribunal. We will be mindful of that in response to the ASL action plan, but I am keen to hear the committee's recommendations on that. I was quite struck by the speech and language therapist representative, where he was saying that the current model is not working. He believes that, because as you quite rightly identified, additional support needs have a wide spectrum of things. You cannot expect teachers to know absolutely everything about every single specialism. You need experts to come in to help you with those pupils, but you gain knowledge from that. He was saying that their involvement in the class is much less than it used to be. Do you think that that is a specialist input from what you have seen is at the right level just now? It is difficult to say, because, as Mr Rennie will know, it will look different in his constituency than it might in other parts of the country. One of the things that I grapple with as education secretary is the variance across the system that we see school by school by local authority by local authority. It is quite difficult to give a monolithic answer to say that it is not good enough and that we need to improve it. I broadly support that, but let us get into some of the detail here. In some schools, there might be excellent speech and language provision. In other areas, there might have been reductions. We need to reflect back on government and ensure that, if that has been the decision of the local authority, where is the support for the children and young people? One of the things that I was struck by last year, and the committee will recall, we published data on speech and language delays in some of our youngest, so zero to two, and our poorest citizens from the lowest socioeconomic backgrounds. There are real challenges post-pandemic with those young people coming back into formal education, whether that is ELC and then progressing into primary school. I think that you touched on a really important point. What we have been able to do specifically in relation to speech and language is to put investment into education in Scotland. We have a team now that is working to support that at national level. They go out and they can provide that support that Mr Rennie speaks to, but there are so many of them. We need to upskill and support the profession, but we also need to recognise the role of local government. That goes to Mr Kerr's point as well. We cannot just be a Government-only endeavour. I really want COSLA to be part of building the new centre for teaching excellence. I want them to buy in it. I think that that could have an offer to the profession, but it could also give an offer, I think, to our young people with additional support needs. Thank you, Mr Rennie. Pam Duncan-Clancy, I think that you have got a supplementary in and around this theme. Thank you, convener. Good morning, Cabinet Secretary and good morning to your officials who have joined you. I just want to pick up on the point that you made earlier around parents. What we have seen as a committee is a system in distress, staff being overworked, pupils not attending, as you have alluded to, and parents feel they are never done fighting. Some quotes have said that it is heartbreaking, the waiting is so frustrating, it is a minefield, so many children and families are being failed, and I wish that those people making decisions could walk in my shoes. What would you say to those parents and families today that, although you have said that you have put additional resources in, what would you say to them when they say those things back? No parent should be having to fight for rights that their children are entitled to under the act, and they should have that support. That is my starting point. Remember, as well as being Cabinet Secretary, I am a constituency MSP, so I am sure that you all receive constituency correspondence on those issues. I know that I do in my local capacity, but at a national level, I would like to reflect some of the evidence that the committee took in relation to the role of the tribunal. I think that the tribunal should be the kind of backstop. That is the last place that we want parents to end up. They should not have to go there. There are a number of other remedies that are open to parents to consider in relation to how they can resolve challenges with their local authority on support for their child, so they can first of all make a complaint to the local authority. There is also the option of mediation, and finally the option of independent adjudication. Before getting to that tribunal stage, there are a number of interventions that can be taken, and I think that through the ASL action plan, there is opportunity for us to be clearer about those interventions, to make sure that parents know about those interventions, that they know about their rights and that they should not have to escalate as opposed to the tribunal, and we might come back to that. The action plan, though, I think will help to improve everyone's understanding, but we need to—and I should also say that there is, of course, the section 70 opportunity for parents and kids to escalate it to me. That is very, very rare that that would happen, but it is an option open to parents and carers. However, we do not want parents to have to go through that process because it is extraordinarily stressful. It is not good for the young person, either. Actually, it would be much better if we could resolve those issues at the local authority level. I will continue to work because on this, as I will do to a meeting with them tomorrow as part of the sagrobus work, and we will undoubtedly touch on the ASL action plan today. I apologise today. Cabinet Secretary, you spoke about that no one would disagree with the presumption of mainstreaming and in terms of that drive for inclusion. Again, you have just been mentioning the tribunal, but the tribunal in evidence to us has challenged that saying that an inclusive education for those who have additional support needs would be best served by the removal of a bias in favour of a particular type of education. I was quite struck by the evidence that the committee took from the tribunal president on that. Overall, I agree with the position that was set out. The legislation that was set out in relation to the presumption of mainstreaming predates ASL. Obviously, that enshrines in legislation the right to mainstream education for those with an additional support need. We published in 2019 revised guidance on the presumption to mainstream, and that guidance is very clear on the responsibilities for local authorities in weighing up their decision-making in relation to tribunals. However, if there is any doubt about the suitability of mainstream provision, it is really the role of the local authority to use that legislation to weigh up the measures. I was quite taken with the evidence that the committee took from the tribunal president, and I think that we would seek to engage with her directly on this, particularly in relation to updating the ASL act. I talked to Ms Duncan-Glancy about the range of options open to parents or carers before getting to that tribunal phase. It feels as though there is a waiting towards the tribunal phase at the current time, which is out of sync with where we should be in relation to that option. I think that I would be keen to engage with the tribunal president directly on this point. The ASL tribunal argued that the presumption of mainstreaming should not be grounds for refusing a placing request, but equally we heard from Matthew Cavanaugh, who was from a specialist school, who stated that it is often a specialist setting that would be best suited for that child. My case work is certainly around the placing request when the local authorities that are making decisions have not even met or engaged with the young person, so I was wondering what your thoughts might be around that. That is a matter for the local authority in question. I would reflect that I receive similar correspondence as an MSP on those issues. Part of the challenge here is the points that I was making to Ms Duncan-Glancy about the options that are open to parents and carers. It is worth saying that we fund advocacy services to help to work with parents to make them aware of their rights in this space, but I think that there is a bit of a cluttered landscape at the current time. I think that the ASL action plan will allow us to really pull together some of the advice for parents and carers so that they know what their rights are. Equally, we need to work with COSLA on this with local authorities because we do not want to get to that tribunal phase. There are a number of interventions that can be taken. Mediation, for example, is a really good way of resolving often some of the challenge here. It should not be that parents are having to escalate things to the tribunal process, causing them and their child a great deal of stress. We have also heard, or we are certainly aware of, some local authorities having growth that there are more specialist units or bases as some of them. They have all got different terminology for them within the mainstream schools. We have also heard about some of the challenges with the language that she used for people understanding. Do you think that the legislation is working, given how schools are evolving to include those new environments? I think that schools have evolved, and I know of a number of my constituency where there are DAS units, for example, and parents will opt to send their child to that school because they will presume that that school has better provision for their child. We need to be mindful of that at national level because local authorities are responding to local needs in relation to additional support needs, and they are putting in that specialist provision. Again, through the ASL action plan, there is an opportunity for us to work with them. I do not want to dictate to local authorities, but I see an opportunity for us to perhaps firm up some of the guidance here in relation to how that mainstream support might look. When I first started teaching a long time ago now, we used to have a department for support for learning, and we also had a behaviour support department. There was a completely different approach to supporting additional support needs. Over the course of a number of years, we have moved into ASM being included in how teachers support their children and young people, but we also need to recognise the role of pupil support assistance, be it behaviour support assistance or pupil support assistance, and that is why we protect that funding through the additionality that is currently being run. I suppose that if parents and carers are aware of what is happening in the development in those schools, there might be more understanding of the placing that they are. I think that the point that is made in relation to the understanding of different types of provision is very valid. The definition in the additional support for learning act of a special school includes a unit attached to a mainstream school. That might not be a very natural thing that any of us would—a conclusion that any of us would come to naturally without that specific understanding. I think that there are opportunities to confirm and clarify those things. We have an action under the ASL action plan, which is about improving information and communication. Part of that is about making sure that it is to improve that understanding. We do not want people to have that challenging time in understanding their rights and understanding how they access their rights. What does the system actually look like and who does what where? That is obviously very important for everyone to be able to have a shared understanding of that, and that is why we have that particular action on communication as well, which I hope will improve as we continue to work on communication through that plan. Thank you. Bill Kidnaw, please. Cabinet Secretary, thank you for your replies. They are very useful to us. I am going to have a wee ramble at the minute before I ask my question, if that is all right, because it is about the physical environment of education. You have already mentioned some elements of that. Three weeks ago, the committee explored how physical environments can contribute to inclusive education. I am going to have three wee quotes here, if you do not mind, from the panel that we had then. Susie Martin from the National Autistic Society of Scotland said that the trend towards super schools is potentially unhelpful and quite harmful, depending on what those super schools look like. The Government Law Centre submission said that it is perplexed as to why schools are becoming bigger, meaning that more sensory and social stimuli to navigate. Dr Lynn Binney of ADES told us that the design of buildings is often determined at local authority level through different approaches, perhaps involving professionals such as architects who might not always understand or know about the complex needs of the children that we see in the current system and project in the future of our buildings. Those are some of the quotes that we have had, which tend to suggest that the buildings that are replacing new-build schools and even in the existing estate, sometimes the learning environment can be damaging for pupils with additional support needs. We are just wondering how the Scottish Government is supporting, shall we say, local authorities to ensure that those schools will be suitable for all children? I looked at some of the evidence that the committee has taken on school design. I am pretty sympathetic to it. I am a Fife MSP and there are a number of large schools in the area of Fife that the local authority has decided. That is the kind of approach that they would like to educate, and I attended one of them. I think that Mr Rennie's constituency is very large schools—Madras and Bill Baxter—in my constituency, or just outside it, rather leaving mouth academy, which has brought two schools together and includes Fife College. We also have a big campus in Dumfermline, with two secondary schools going into it and Fife College. Some local authorities take this approach. Although Ms Martin used the description of super schools, that is not a description that we would use. I think that there are some schools in Scotland that are too big. I think that they are too big for our children with additional support needs, but I think that they are too big for our pupils and our staff will stop. What that means is that teachers do not get to know their children and young people in big schools. If you think about Fife in the geography of that little area of Scotland, lots of little towns and villages coming together in a huge school, children become lost. When we talk about challenges associated with behaviour, attainment, this is all about relationships and your teachers knowing their kids. I think that we need to get some further advice in relation to school design. I have asked officials for work on that via Scottish Children's Trust, who I think that the committee has also written to on that point. Of course, we work with local authorities primarily to give them funding to help because the buildings do not belong to us, they belong to local authorities. We have given local authorities a substantial amount of funding in recent years to help to improve the quality of the school estate. The design of the school estate often comes from local authorities, I think, as you heard from Addis. In my experience, some architects are mindful of local needs and they will engage with parents and carers. They are often engaged with young people about the things that they would like to see in their school. I suppose that I might add into the mix on that, and I do not think that the committee took evidence on that. I have had a parliamentary question on it from one Kenny Gibson not so long ago now. He raised a question with me around open plan classrooms. I think that it is worth well considering how that can contribute to challenges in relation to learning and additional support needs. I see in many of the visits that I undertake, open plan classrooms and sometimes it can work well. Often, for some young people, it is extremely difficult to concentrate in those environments. We need to be mindful of that when we are talking about challenges in other parts of our education system. I am very taken with the evidence that the committee has heard in relation to school design, and we will certainly take that back to our work with COSLA and the Scottish Children's Trust. Of course, we have just announced the phase 3 of LEAP funding that I announced in December, and we are working with the SFT on the next funding approach. I know that the committee has asked for a written update from the SFT, and I look forward to engaging with it on that, too. I think that that is an important point. Thank you very much. On the back of that, the way that—obviously, as you say—the Scottish Government supports the local authorities by providing them with the funding in order to build these schools and design them and develop them. As you say, they are then the local authorities' decision-making process, but does that mean that there is not any overarching approach to changing how these schools, which might not be beneficial to all the children, are designed? I might bring in Laura in relation to some of the opportunities here, but I think that more broadly Mr Kidd has asked the question about whether I can direct local authorities on how they build their schools. That is going to create a bit of tension, Mr Kidd, so that is probably a partnership approach, as most things that we do in education has to be working with COSLA. However, I think that the points that the committee has taken on on that are really important because school building and the design of a learning place can impact on entertainment, but particularly for children with additional support needs, it can be much more challenging for them. Where they learn is important, and I might bring in Laura just in relation to the code of practice. There are opportunities in relation to learning environment. There are four factors within the statutory code of practice that are highlighted as potentially giving rise to additional support needs in one of those is learning environment. Therefore, while we are doing our work under the ASL action plan to refresh the statutory guidance that is on-going at the moment, there are opportunities to draw the connections that Ms Gilruth has highlighted around the importance of design of learning environment in that document reflecting the sort of changing nature of children and young people's educational experiences in more recent times. We can certainly take that opportunity. A number of supplementary requests in on here. Can we go to Willie Rennie first, please? This has been quite a good session so far, so I am reluctant to go down this route. I am afraid that a predecessor, John Swinney, was insistent that the new high school in Benferman was a combined one between St Columbus and Woodmill and also included Fife College in the joint campus. I absolutely agree with your approach, but he drove that against some resistance locally. I am just wondering what has changed the policy on that, because he was for a one-stop shop combining places together. There was resistance. Why have we now changed the approach? I am fairly certain that Fife Council had an input into that process. It should have did, but John Swinney was insistent. I know that. I think that it is a partnership process. In my experience, it is not really the role of Government. It is not a change of policy. Here today, what I have said is that I have listened to the evidence taken from the committee in relation to additional support needs, and I think that we need to better reflect it in our practice. That might mean that we work with Scottish structures trust on providing clearer guidance on the issue in the future. I have named a number of schools, including those in Mr Rennie's constituency, one of which I attended, which I think are large schools. We need to be careful about how large schools meet the needs of a cohort of young people who are different from other children and need different support and therefore can often get lost in mainstream. We know that. How does that work in a much larger school, particularly when some of those young people have come from very small rural areas of the country? Is there no Scottish Government guidance on the design of school buildings? There is. It comes from the Scottish Futures Trust. It sets out a range of parameters in relation to school build design, and it works with local authorities on that. It also works with the passive house approach, so the schools are meant to be much more environmentally friendly. However, in my experience, it is for the SFT to work with a local authority on the design spec itself. I would have imagined that for public buildings equality impact assessments would be important. It might be helpful for me to add to this point that there is a specific duty to consider accessibility under the disability strategies and the Educational Records Act. There is guidance available, which is about ensuring accessibility of physical environment curriculum and information provided for disabled pupils. Obviously, those duties are focused on people with disabilities in the context that we work with. We would apply that more widely in relation to additional support for learning. There is guidance available on that specific point as well. The guidance is not just about the physical environment and physically accessing the building, but about learning. It is about the physical environment, curriculum and provision of information. It is already linked into the current code of practice, but it might be something that we will highlight. That would be quite troubling for the last number of years that have been building new schools that are not meeting the needs of learning for a policy of inclusion of all pupils. As has been indicated, we recognise that the design of schools has evolved over a number of years. The guidance that I am referring to relates to an earlier period of time. The statutory guidance that we have produced has already drawn those two things together. As has been alluded to, there is more that we can do in this space and we will seek to do that. We have spoken at Lent about new schools and how they might be adapted or changed in terms of the futures trust. In terms of our existing school estate, some of the buildings that are sometimes over a hundred years old and other ones that were built in the 60s and 70s, what support and guidance can be given to local authorities to make those facilities much more appropriate for those with additional support for learning needs? Government has supported local authorities to improve the quality of the school estate. Quite substantially, since 2007, we have improved it. I think that just about 60 per cent of schools were in good or satisfactory condition in 2007. Today, it is over 90 per cent. I am sorry, cabinet secretary. We heard from one of the unions that they spoke about that it is an ASL cupboard. That is what they have as their space. I do not understand that. I do not know the specifics of that example, but I am happy to look at that. If the trade union representative is able to share details with me, no child should be getting educated in a cupboard. In terms of the code of practice, there are specific guidance in relation to the suitability of school buildings that is set out. I mean, most of the sum schools are taking and repurposing spaces. I am trying to get down to make them the sort of the decompression zones or they are making their walls less rathly and crackly for sound. That sort of adaptation that you can make to make things, that is the avenue of probing around, cabinet secretary, apologies. No, and I think that that is set out in the code of practice at the current time. We have sought to update though, I should say, the code of practice. That will be coming. I think that that might help to give further clarity on that, because I think that the point that you are making, convener, in the range of ways in which schools and local authorities respond to additional support needs, they often repurpose classrooms and they might therefore seek to update the content of that classroom to meet the needs of their children and young people. Through the updated code of practice, there is perhaps opportunity for us to specify more so what that should look like, although it is, I should say, already in the code of practice at the current time. In the updated code of practice, is it your intention that you might look to address some of the issues that we heard from Sylvia Hockney about support staff who do not have rooms to take young people to and they are ending up having to provide them with support in stairwells or in some cases in cupboards? I think that that is something that we could look at within the code of practice. Of course, it depends on the school build that that member of staff is working in, but I think that that is something that we could specify in the code of practice in the updated version of it, and there is room for us to do so. Thank you very much for that. Liam Kerr, can I bring you back in now, please? Yes, thank you, convener. Cabinet Secretary, you talked about the statistics that came out yesterday, and one of the things that I think is particularly concerning is that they seem to suggest that there were only 137 behavioural support staff in the whole country. That is the lowest or the fewest since 2019. I think that they also said that 18 out of the 32 local authorities do not have any behavioural support staff. Cabinet Secretary, does that concern you? What is going on and what can be done? Yes, it does concern me. What I think is going on is the way in which local authorities measure those members of staff. We know that we have record numbers of pupil support assistants, and the data yesterday shows that increase. That is because of the ring fence fund that the Government provides. At the same time, Mr Kerr is right to allude to the challenge in relation to staff that are specified as behavioural support staff. I think that some of the challenge here is in the meaning of the job titles. It may very well be the case that a number of the pupil support assistants that we now have record numbers of in our schools are helping to support with challenges associated with behaviour. They might not have that in their job titles, but I think that that is part of the challenge. From memory, it is also something that the Education and Skills Committee and the previous Parliament looked at. Thank you for that. That is a really interesting point, because I take your point about the numbers of PSAs. However, it was a point that made earlier evidence to the committee in other sessions about whether we are asking our staff, in this case PSAs, to become more generalist or move away from specialists and loading more and more responsibility and, indeed, specialist responsibility on to other functions, such as PSAs. Do those statistics in your mind suggest that that is what is happening? In your view, is that the right direction to travel? I think that, undoubtedly, there has been movement. I think that the Government has recognised it, which is why we have protected this funding. It is worthwhile saying that we have been able to increase people's support assistants in the last year. However, the member makes an important point about specialists. I suppose that this goes back to some of the points that Mr Rennie was making at the start of the session about speech and language. There will always be a role for specialists in our schools. I think that we need to better understand that. Mr Greer might want to ask a supplementary on this. I know that he has a key interest in that, but there is something about how we can accredit and recognise people who work in those roles, because it is a specialism. I think that this catch-all term, people's support assistant, sometimes covers lots of different things. Historically, as I alluded to in my response to the convener, 20-odd years ago, we would have, certainly in secondary schools, specific teams of staff that we are tasked with responding to and supporting behaviour, and other teams of staff that dealt with support for learning. Those two roles, over the course of the last 20 years, have almost come together. Educational academics would probably argue that, as we heard at the behaviour summits, that is because we have now a broader understanding of additional support needs, and we accept that behaviour is part of that wider challenge. However, to the member's point, we need to better understand where the behaviour support is needed and where it is that additional pupil support is needed. Those are two different things. It is a matter for local authorities to identify where they need that support and what it should look like. I would hope that the published behaviour action plan in the next few weeks will help to give some more drive in relation to local authorities' opportunities to help to support better behaviour in their skills. Perhaps that looks at the issues that Mr Kerr is talking to. It would be pretty difficult for me, as cabinet secretary, to specify that they should have to employ a certain number of behaviour support assistants, but we do specify ring fencing around pupil support assistants. On that specialisation that you talked about then, what progress has been made in terms of developing career progression and pathways for teachers who want to specialise in additional support for learning and the accreditation for classroom assistance that you talked about? We have the role of the lead teacher, which I think the committee may have taken evidence on that was created back in 2021. The lead teacher role gives opportunities for staff to specialise and stay within mainstream provision too. For example, in additional support needs would be an opportunity for that. The GTCS has also undertaken further work in relation to accreditation on additional support needs. There are opportunities for staff to specify in that regard too, but more generally what I was trying to rehearse in my response to the convener earlier is that there used to be almost a staffing structure in secondary schools that looked to support, let's say, behaviour. That does not exist in the same way any more, it is much more supposed to Mr Kerr's point. It is a more general approach that looks at pupil support in the round. If staff want to specialise, they should be able to do so. The lead teacher role allows them to do that. It has not been as popular, I think, as we would have hoped, and it would be pretty pragmatic about that. There are a number of challenges there post Covid that staff might not be interested in that role or in specialising, but I think that I am keen to work with the teaching unions on how we can encourage that use of the lead teacher role, because that to me is the opportunity here. Just to add to what the cabinet secretary has said, I think that I will be aware of that in terms of the house agreement as well. There was a commitment to consider accreditation and qualification for additional support learning assistance. That work has been on-going. It has been slightly delayed, as you will be aware, but we are looking to publish the report on that in spring. A lot of engagement has gone in with pupil support assistance around what that would look like, how that would function, what the reality of that would be in practice and how it would achieve and access that process of accreditation and qualification. We can certainly bring that back for consideration, too, as one of the avenues for professional development. The data yesterday shows that, in 2013, there was one specialist support teacher for 40 pupils and that now there is one specialist support teacher for 89 pupils. The cabinet secretary has set out that there is an increase in support assistance. Is it the Government's specific policy to transfer the responsibilities of a specialist teacher and the terms and conditions that come with that on to pupil support assistance? If so, what will the cabinet secretary do about the terms and conditions that come with that? No, it is not the Government's policy. It is worth saying that the statistics that were published yesterday did show a slight increase in relation to teachers with ASN as our main subject. We need to be mindful that this will be a common theme of all of my evidence, as opposed to the committee today. Local authorities employ our teachers, not the Government. Here is the challenge, I suppose, that I put back to the member. Should it be for the Government to ring Fences funding, whether that be for teachers or for classroom assistance? Should it be for the Government to direct local authorities and say that that is where you should invest that additionality from Scottish Government? Local authorities right now are choosing to use that additionality to employ record numbers of pupil support assistance. I think that that is making a difference, but I do not take away from the role of specialist teachers. I hope that the member understands that. There is a challenge here because I do not employ our teachers. There are 392 fewer specialist teachers now than there were 10 years ago. I take the point about the ring fence and the point that the cabinet secretary will know that I have exercised on that particular issue, but I do not think that it is acceptable for the Government to say that we can ring fence it but then not put money into it. Local authorities are making really difficult decisions because of the settlement that they have. We now face a situation where, if the cabinet secretary is saying that pupil support assistance is going to be more the way that local authorities will go, I think that they are hugely valuable. Will the cabinet secretary now accept that pupil support assistance needs to have training and support to do their job, they need to have paying conditions that reflect the size and scale of the job as it has become, and that they also probably need some non-contact time to be able to do the training and risk assessment that is required in that role? I think that that was covered in the response from Claire, to Ross Greer and the Bute House commitment in relation to accreditation and support for pupil support assistance, which I accept. I think that we need to support training far better than we do at the current time. There is a disparate approach, I think that it is fair to say, across the country, and there are ways in which we are going to support that through that commitment. We would be keen to give an update to the committee. It should have been, of course, before the end of last year. Officials have been rather busy with a few other things, so we want to bring forward that important work. To Ms Duncan Glancy's point about additional support needs teachers, can we just remember that, since 2004, because of the act, the impetus has been on all teachers to provide a level of additional support needs? So all teachers in Scotland should be providing and do provide additional support needs to their pupils. They do that every day. There is still a role for specialists, but let us remember that, within that ring ffencing, it is not just about protecting pupil support assistance and increasing the numbers there. Local authorities have also chosen, in some instances, to use that additionality to employ specialist teachers. That is a decision that they have at their disposal. I suppose that the challenge here that Ms Duncan Glancy puts me, is it for government to direct them how many specialist teachers they wish to employ in their schools? Is it for government to ring ffence it? I think that it is important for government to take leadership on this. I accept the leadership role, and that is why we ring ffence funding for teacher numbers and for pupil support assistance. However, the specific of the question is around about specialism. In accepting responsibility, short of me directing local authorities, which I do not want to do, I am trying to see where the resolution is to this. Okay, thank you. Liam Kerr still wants to come back in. Yeah, I just thought it was a really good question from my colleague. I wonder, cabinet secretary, can you help me with something? On the point about local authorities being the employer and the lack of funds that our local authorities have and how the numbers are changing, what are the salaries, because I genuinely do not know off the top of my head, what are the salaries of a behaviour support assistant and a pupil support assistant? They will vary by local authority. I do not know them off the top of my head, nor do I have them in front of me, so they will vary by local authority. However, I do remember, I am looking at Mr Greer and Mr Rennie. In the previous Parliament, we looked at the issue in more detail and there were variants across the system. Would you mind getting that information in just to give us an idea? Yeah, I happen to do so. Do we collect that information? It would be a matter for local authorities, so we can share with you what we have at national level. I do not want to direct the committee, but it may be that the committee wishes to direct to causal on this matter, which I think might be more appropriate than the Government. Thank you very much for that discussion around that theme. Can I now bring in Bill Kidd? In evidence joint, given to us by inquire and my rights, my say, they said that they continue to hear about many of the long-term negative impacts following the pandemic. If you consider that there has been enough focus and investment to support children, particularly with their anxiety, to re-engage with learning following the pandemic and the isolation elements, etc. It took place due to that. I think more generally, and I know that the committee has taken evidence on this. We have seen a real uptick in relation to dysregulated behaviour. I spoke to some of the challenge in some of our youngest citizens, so speech and language delays. We see in the behaviour in Scottish school research that published in November some really challenging behaviour in some of our youngest citizens. Primary 4, age 8 are some real challenges with behaviour and relationships that we would not have seen before the pandemic. I do not think that we can say that Covid has not made a difference. It is compounded challenge that existed in the system prior to lockdown, however, because there was a challenge previously. We also see gaps in our children's learning. When we talk about comparing exam results from the past four years to those that existed before the pandemic, we need to be really careful. There are big gaps in our children's learning because they were not in school for extended periods of time. We all need to accept that. How the system responds to supporting our young people is really important. Prior to my time as cabinet secretary, the previous cabinet secretary worked to provide a package of support. I know two children and young people before the last examination round with SQA. We also looked at a number of ways in which we could support people online. I think that the committee might have taken evidence on that. East Scotland has been very important in that respect, providing digital opportunities. We also had the NELO offer via Education Scotland, which is very strong. The final point that I would touch on is the work that we have been able to do through the SAC programme with virtual head teachers who, in a number of parts of Scotland, are working with our care experience young people to support their learning but also to support attendance. We know that there are real anxieties in the system, and sometimes virtual head teachers have got to reach that traditional classroom-based or school-based head teachers might not have. We are looking at different ways of working to enhance and protect the outcomes for those young people who, during the pandemic, became disengaged from their learning. I have touched on evidence that the committee previously had in Parliament about evidence that was published down south in January from the Centre for Social Justice, which looked at the fade-link between home and family during the pandemic and how that is having a compounding effect on attendance. I hope that we will go back to that, but we have got real challenges just now on attendance. I encourage the committee to look at the local level data, the variance across the system, whereby we have a local authority in Scotland. Fifty per cent of young people in secondary are persistently not attending school. That means that they are missing 10 per cent in the school year. That is a significant amount of learning. You cannot hope to respond to challenges in relation to behaviour, attainment or attendance without having your young people in front of you. I think that the issues that Mr Kidd talks to are all intrinsically linked to post-pandemic. I will go on to hear Mr Kidd's views on whether or not that is working. I do not think that there is a magic wand week in way, but the system we are looking at new ways of working and the virtual head teachers is a good way of exemplifying some of that. This one is just a wee follow-up question, but it might prove to be a wee touch tricky on the basis that I would ask you what your and the Government's views are on the flexible or hybrid learning model that pupils could choose to learn from home or in school. Either pupils or their parents are both working together because it would sound from what you said there that your wish would be that more people would be attending school more often in order to socialise them better if nothing else, actually. It improves outcomes for young people if they are in school. That is quite important. I think that we need to be really mindful that the role of school and physically being present in school is an important factor. However, there are some young people who we know for attending school can be extraordinarily stressful for them, so there are a range of different ways in which we can support that provision. There has been a move to some level of online provision for some young people that might work, particularly for harder-to-reach young people. I gave the example of the virtual head teachers network engaging with care experience young people trying to ensure that they were engaging with school education and attending as well. Post-pandemic, that mixed-model approach, is used by e-school, for example, through qualifications that they are able to deliver. Quite often in that delivery model and certainly through NELO, young people might be in school and experiencing digital learning, and I think that that would be the preference. For some young people, coming into school is still extraordinarily challenging, but I have been in schools and primary schools where head teachers have used members of staff, perhaps the people's support assistant or others in their school community to engage directly with a young person in their family and have been able to, over the course of a number of weeks and sometimes months, encourage that person back into school. I think that that is always to the benefit of that young person. That is the best direction and thank you very much for that. Stuart McMillan, you want to come in on this as a supplementary. Welcome. Yes, thank you, convener. Good morning. Good morning, Government Secretary. Just following on from Bill Kidd's question, everyone would agree that attending school is the best option. If the hybrid model were to be considered and that still was not successful with some students, what would you think would be the next option to try to help young people? I am aware from one constituency of some young people who are just not engaging and just don't want to engage. I suppose, to reflect, we have always had a cohort of school reviewers. It is not a new feature of Scottish education that exists in most education systems. Fundamentally, the 1980 act sets out the expectation that children and young people should be in school. It is a legal requirement for them to be in school and I think that we should be mindful of that. However, there are ways in which local authorities can support young people, so to Mr Kidd's question, we can use virtual head teachers, we can use online approaches. There are outreach mechanisms. Some schools use their PEF funding to employ people to go to young people's doors to encourage them to attend school. That is sometimes part of the problem. There are a range of different mechanisms that schools have always used to engage young people in their education. I do not really see that as being a new feature. I suppose, post-pandemic, the real difference is the move to digital as an option. However, it should not really be the first preference option. Attending schools is the first preference. Ruth Maguire, can I come to yourself? Thank you, convener. Good morning. I suppose, sitting and listening to our discussions this morning, I am thinking about the parents and the young people that we took evidence from. First, when we were scrutinising Pam Duncan-Glancy's bill on transitions and the inquiry. A lot of stocks have been put on the ASL action plan as being the thing that will make a difference to children. Can we hear some examples of the positive difference that that has made for children and young people in all settings? I know that we have covered some of that in general terms, but I think that it is helpful. There are a number of different initiatives that are being taken forward through the action plan. Some are part of the way through, some are continuing to deliver. A good example, and you may have heard of that in your engagement, I think that you spoke to the Young Ambassadors, Inclusion Ambassadors, is that their success looks different award, which is an excellent mechanism that they have developed to celebrate the success of children and young people with an additional support need. It gives schools, both mainstream and specialist provisions an opportunity to highlight and emphasise the breadth and depth of attainment that people can achieve that is not necessarily recorded in our traditional stats that we might quote and look to within the system. It is a new award that has been in place a couple of years old, so it is reasonably new, but it is gaining in prominence and desire in terms of schools who are keen to consider that and use it as a way of supporting some of their children to recognise their attainment. It is one small step in the right direction for children and young people in terms of the impact but also raising the awareness among the broader school population about additional support for learning needs that is not solely focused on those with the additional need themselves. Is there anything else? I think that there are a number of actions that we have considered and completed during the course of the work that we have undertaken. One of the important parts of the SL action plan is that there is an overarching recommendation in relation to the Morgan review, which is about the engagement of children and young people as part of our work. Again, the ambassadors of inclusion engagement with our team in the establishment of the vision for what children and young people additional support needs want. Those young people were the people who created and produced that vision. We have published that vision. It sits alongside all of our work in terms of additional support for learning and in the action plan. It is central to our thinking of every single recommendation and action that we take under the action plan. That point about children and young people's engagement is absolutely at the core of the work that we do around all the implementation of the action plan. It is embedded throughout. We have given specific examples of actions that we take, but considering the needs of children and young people with additional support needs, that is very much part of our approach all the way through our work. If there are areas of the action plan that the committee thinks are missing, I would be happy to listen to those in the committee's final report. Of course, we are progressing our update on the actions that we will publish in the next few weeks, but I think that there is an opportunity for us to make sure that the action plan is actually driving the change that Mr Gware talked to. We have also discussed the challenges that families face in having to navigate systems and get what their children need. Is there an example in the ASL action plan of work that has improved communication and engagement between local authorities and families? I apologise. Pre-existing in the ASL action plan, we have established the enquire service. That service is there to provide advice, online information and very specific information about parents and carers rights. The code of practice that we have talked about, the statutory code of practice, the equivalent is the parents guide for children and young people. Children in Scotland, who are the managers of enquire, took the original code of practice and translated it into the parents guide for children and young people. There is a mirroring of the understanding of those two pieces of information. That pre-exists the ASL action plan. Our action in the ASL action plan is about ensuring that those communication methods are as effectively used as they can be. I think that you have heard evidence from parents and carers that they are not always able to, they are not connected to the information in the straightforward ways that they could be. About measuring the effectiveness of the prior, the enquire service that you mentioned. No, it is about enhance. We have that service. The action in the ASL action plan is the way that service is used, the way that we want it to be. Is there more that we can do to make that better? How do you measure the success of it? How do you know if it is working for parents? Because we have established that service, we collect information from that service about its engagement with parents and carers, how many people have accessed their website, how many parents and carers have used the helpline. All of that information is gathered in by us. Those figures? Yes, of course. I think that it is one of the things that we will update in the progress report in due course. To Mr MacGoras's point, it is quite cluttered landscape just now in relation to the support available to parents. One of the actions in the action plan is to simplify what that looks like, because it is a range that we have got. Let's talk the ASL service of support for children and young people. There is the enquire service, so I think that we need to pool this together so that we can signpost parents and make sure that they are getting the support that they need to prevent going back to the point that was made about the tribunal service, that escalation. Right now, there is a variety of different ways in which parents and young people can receive support, and it is not always that clear. I think that we can move to questions now from Ross Greer. I hope that we will dive in around that theme a little bit more. Thanks, convener. It segues very neatly into the theme. Cabinet Secretary, you have seen in previous evidence sessions that there has been a lot of focus on co-ordinated support plans, which colleagues will go into in more detail specifically. As part of that, there has been a lot of discussion around the range of plans that are available to young people—child's plans, individual learning plans, individual education plans, bespoke plans within local authorities, bespoke plans within schools, et cetera. I wonder if you could expand a bit more on what the Scottish Government's position would be on taking a more consistent and holistic approach to that, and specifically whether it is actually GERFIC compliant for a child to be in a position essential to what we are at the moment, where to get the co-ordinated support plan, you already have to have other plans in place, so you by default end up if you are a child in the position of getting a co-ordinated support plan, you actually have multiple plans, which to me would not be GERFIC compliant, because GERFIC is about having one coherent plan for each young person. In practice, the kids with the most complex needs have to have multiple plans to access or unlock the support that they require. In a moment, to Mr Greer's point, that follows from Ruth Maguire's point. It is extraordinarily confusing for young people as well as the range of different plans on offer. I suppose that it is worth rehearsing that the number of CSPs, as Mr Greer will know, has been steadily reducing over time. At the same time, we have seen a real increase in relation to the IEPs. Across the board, that shift to IEPs has happened quite organically. To the point that Mr Greer puts about GERFIC, it is an interesting one. The committee was also looking at the compliance of the UNCRC around some of our work here, too. Of course, that is something that we will seek to update the committee on in the action plan update. I am happy to take away the point on GERFIC unless Laura Watt wants to talk to that today. There are real challenges here at the current time in relation to the range of different plans that a young person might have, so we need to set out that more clearly in relation to the action plan with local authorities. If you were able to write to us about the GERFIC point, that would be really useful. On CSPs in particular, so the cabinet secretary has sat on this committee before where we have taken evidence on this and gone round the houses over and over again on the challenges for CSPs. Last week, we had quite a significant bit of evidence that was submitted to us by ADES and COSR representatives on the criteria for a CSP. The major barrier that they were finding was the requirement that a young person would need at least 12 months of intense support from multiple services, multiple agencies, however it is worded. What they were finding was young people who everybody agreed that they did need a CSP. We were unable to get one because that box could not be ticked as such. Is the Scottish Government open to revising the criteria for CSPs and the area of the 2004 act? We are open to revising the specifics on it, Alora, and I know what is to come in on that point. We did review access to CSPs in 2021 on the back of the Morgan review. The specific point about the criteria for co-ordinated support plans is that, as you have heard, the purpose of a co-ordinated support plan is to co-ordinate support from across multi-agencies and that support requires to be significant and long-term. It is a very high standard in terms of the number of children and young people who will meet those requirements. There is an opportunity to further clarify the part about multi-agency arrangements because the act is very specific in that it is the education authority exercising any of its functions, so that could be the social work function as well as the education function. There is provision of support from social work services that has to be significant and long-term. The fact that that has been provided does not mean that the criteria is not met. Therefore, there is an opportunity for us to clarify that even further. The place for us to do that, as we have already discussed this morning, is the code of practice. One of the points that was made in relation to that specifically was the example of mental health support and counsellors. When the act was originally drafted and up until quite recently, the vast majority of that support was provided outside of schools. Because of a recent and welcome Scottish Government decisions that were provided in schools, that creates a perverse issue. I wonder whether the extent to which the code of practice alone can address that. Given that, as you said, the act itself is really quite specific, which is a point of learning for future that maybe primary legislation should be a bit vaguer and more flexible to allow for adaptation. Are you confident that we will be able to address the issues that have been surfaced by the evidence that we have surfaced in the 2021 review through revising the code of practice alone when the underpinning legislation is so specific? We have already committed to strengthening the code of practice in this space. I know that that work has been on-going since the 2021 review. However, to Mr Greer's substantive point, he has asked me to commit to changing legislation today. I would seek to come back to him on that point. I said this on your logic to expect that before the end of this parliamentary term, given the wider legislative timetable, there is a challenge here if we have identified what seems like a very specific legislative problem that I think the code of practice could result in improvements on, but it will not address the fundamentals because you cannot use code of practice to rewrite the law. If I could write to the committee setting at a timescale on when we are going to strengthen the code of practice, of course, that is part of the review update, setting out our action. If the committee is minded that legislative changes are what is required, I will look at that with officials. Certainly much has moved on in terms of what schools are doing. You have said it yourself, Cabinet Secretary. The schools are now, they stepped up in the pandemic and they are continuing to do that. They are absorbing much of the services that were provided by health and social care partners in the past. That is almost giving a veto to some of those young people accessing CSPs. The world has moved on significantly since things have changed, so we are welcoming any sort of refresh or review that you might be able to do under the current abilities. Can I now bring in Pam Duncan Glancy, please? Thank you, Pam. Thank you, convener. It will not surprise the cabinet secretary to hear me say that I think that we do need to look at the legislation in terms of plans that are available. I made this point extensively during the passage of my transitions bill. It was highlighted a moment ago that individual plans are on the increase, but they of course do not have a statutory basis. Before I move on to my substantial question, does the cabinet secretary think that there is a need to put some of those plans on a statutory basis to help parents to have that right to redress? I think that that makes an interesting point. Of course, the difference between the two plans is quite important, because there may be far greater need associated with statutory plans than those that are not. The challenge is how you can measure that difference and still give parents the rights. The young people themselves have the opportunity. I do not know whether that is something that we have considered in the past, but I will review the predates of my time. There have been previous conversations around the balance of planning and the associated dispute resolution in relation to those plans. As Ms Gilruth has already indicated, there are a range of mechanisms available for dispute resolution. They are deliberately set out at different levels, and that is to reflect the different arrangements that are in place. Our policy view is that the tribunal is the ultimate in dispute resolution. There are a number of ways in which a person can end up taking a case before the tribunal. It does not necessarily only relate to planning, but there are vehicles attached to each of the levels to enable dispute resolution. That is why we are a bit concerned about the focus solely being on the tribunal and the need to make sure that all those dispute resolution mechanisms are understood. We will come into that in more detail. On the point about the committee being made aware that there are a range of services outwith education that are required in the Cabinet City Council, you have already highlighted that. You understand that there are a number of issues, such as speech and language therapy, CAMHS, counselling and social work services. All those things are required to be available around a young person. Is it your intention that education should be co-ordinating those services to support children with complex needs? I think that the reality is that education is co-ordinating those services right now, certainly from my own experience. I have not been in a school not that long ago. It was absolutely education who co-ordinated services. That could be really challenging for education, who are dealing with lots of other things in the day-to-day life of running a school. Should it be for education? No, it should be a shared joint endeavour. Some of the evidence that I alluded to at the start of the session from Audit Scotland talks about how you could have a much more funding approach that brought partners together. Right now, we have quite a disparate approach to that. Education is often leading the charge, because education has a young person in school quite often, and they are trying to build support around that person. They are trying to bring partners to the table, but I know that that can be really challenging. I am not clear that the sole responsibility should rest with education. I think that it should be a joint endeavour, particularly with health, given the number of health professionals who are involved in providing support to some of our most—our young people with their most challenging additional support needs. We need a wraparound system that does not lean on schools to the extent that they are under such burden to provide not just the kind of pulling together as services, but really the front-line provision. I think that pressure is often, if I may say so, as a former teacher granted. I think that pressure is often felt more so by education than by other services. What could you say about the reform and public sector reform in general that you think could help that? I think that there is an opportunity, undoubtedly, to the public sector reform. I think that some of the points that were made by Audit Scotland, and I think that—was it speech on language therapy? It was Royal College as well in this space, about parents should not be having to have this fight. I just think that that speaks to the heart of this, because we have built a system that, for example, we would see a senior teacher in a school having to pull partners together around support co-ordinated for a young person. We have got to put the young person at the centre of it. That is the ethos of GERFIC, so let's build the support around the young person and not be fighting over budget lines. The reality of where we are now is that that is often what happens, and I think that public sector reform will give us an opportunity to drive some of that work forward. We are already starting, I should say, cross-portfolio work with health in a number of different areas. Speech on language is a good example of it, but there are other opportunities for us to bring health to the table. For example, on attendance—I am happy to share details of that with the committee Education Scotland—we are working with Public Health Scotland just now on a number of head teachers on an approach to attendance that is rooted in a public health approach. I think that that is really interesting, because I think that health has got a huge role to play in tackling some of the challenges here. I agree. I think that it does. What we have heard in sessions, including from Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists, is that the more consultative approach, as colleagues have alluded to, has meant that professionals such as speech and language therapists or CAMHS professionals have had to give a bit of input to teachers who are then having to provide speech and language therapy to their pupils. In one case, we heard parents talk about how teachers had to give cognitive behavioural therapy to pupils because they were not enough psychologists to provide that intervention. In answer to one of my parliamentary questions, you have said that over the next three years the Government will invest in a new programme of work to build confidence and capacity for staff, working in early learning and childcare settings and joining up efforts across key public services. Is it now the Government's policy to have this consultative approach in schools and put more workload on teachers? What we have heard today in terms of the role of specialist staff have been quite clear that I see a really key role for them in providing support to the profession. I think that the points that the member makes are really important. I think that how we resource that is a challenge. I have given examples of ring fencing. The member may have other ideas, but I think that, more broadly, if we take a step back from where we are just now, this is about service delivery. How does the system, the whole system, not just schools, respond to a post-cap pandemic world? How does it deliver education? Right now, I do not think that our approach is working, and I think that that is why Public Sector Reform gives us an opportunity to tie budget lines together, to make sure that it is not education mopping up what should be a joint endeavour and to have more partnership working. It is not about pushing things on to classroom teachers, absolutely not. It very much does feel like that, and I know that that is what teachers have told us. Obviously, they have class sizes of 33. In a special school that is down, the average class size is six. Class sizes, work load, non-contact time, all of that has to be part of the solutions. I would like to hear the cabinet secretary say something about whether that will be included in the action plan going forward. However, my final point on the joined-upness of services is that we have one educational psychologist to about 650 pupils. We have a budget reduction in mental health of about £10 million. How can the cabinet secretary see all of that joined-up provision working in the way that she describes and not put an extra workload on teachers? It makes a number of points about workload and class sizes. I do not know if you want me to talk to all those things. I could be here until 12 o'clock, but let us not pretend that every teacher in Scotland is teaching in a class size of 33. That is absolutely not the case. If you teach a practical subject, for example, your class sizes will be capped at 20. Across Scotland, there will be a variety of different class sizes. Work load is an issue that I have been working with the teaching unions on, because I recognise the challenge here. Work load, again, is a monolithic term that you have to get into and understand what it is that we are talking about when we talk about workload. Incidentally, workload in Fife will look different to workload in Dundee because local authorities ask teachers to do different things. Let us be pragmatic when we talk about things genetically, such as workload. I know that teaching unions like to talk about those things, but we really need to make a difference and understand what it is that we mean. One of the things that we removed in terms of workload were the outcome and assessment standards. Mr Swinney said that some years ago, around qualifications, we are now looking at, and I know that the teaching unions are supportive of reintroducing a level of continuous assessment. The workload that is associated with that in terms of the new qualifications will need to be really carefully judged, particularly for secondary teachers. I will now segue on to Mr Duncan Glancy's substantive point, which I think was on mental health. We have a positive story to tell in relation to the counselling support that we have been able to provide in every secondary school in Scotland that did not use to exist, and it is now embedded. That is important, and it is not teachers that are delivering that support. That model is one that we can learn from. The question here, to go back to the original question, is how do we embed that substantive specialist provision where it is needed, and I accept that it is needed. I look forward to working with COSLA on that, because, to go back to Mr Kerr's point, it is about having a joint approach, because I, as Cabinet Secretary, cannot direct COSLA, but we need to take leadership at national level. I think that setting out expectations of the use of specialists is helpful in giving some of that direction, but working with COSLA, whether it be on behaviour, whether it be on attendance or in supporting additional support needs, is how we get change at local level. Ben Macpherson, thank you. Just on the points that Mr Greer made, the human rights bill might potentially be a vehicle for a prime legislative change on some of those matters, just thought that that might be of interest for the record. A general question to conclude, it is obvious that you really care about this issue and I know that, and I appreciate the difficult day of dealing with this and the challenge on resources. You said in your opening remarks about the Morgan review that all the recommendations on actions have been accepted, 39 have been delivered, and there is going to be an ESL plan update on the remaining outstanding actions to be delivered. So, when do we anticipate that response? How do we track progress? What further engagement is there going to be with COSLA? When this committee provides recommendations from our inquiry, are you open to having quarterly updates on progress, on those recommendations? You said that constituents write to you regularly and so do mine. What do we say to them about how we are moving forward? First of all, thank you for the offer of the human rights legislation as a vehicle perhaps to update the ESL act. Obviously, that will be a matter for members to consider. On your substantive question, Mr Macpherson, the ESL action plan is coming in the next few weeks. I, in discussion with officials at the committee, was mindful that you are probably about to produce your report in the next few weeks. I want to ensure that plan update listens to the outcomes from this. The time scales associated with that are, to some extent, in the committee's gift. I think that it is important that that action plan update listens to the committee. The last action plan update that we published was last year, and we will publish by March 26, the full commitment to the entirety of the action plan will be delivered by then. Throughout every year, since the action plan was committed to 18 months, there has been an update. Mr Macpherson asked about a quarterly, so it has not been quite as regular as quarterly. I can certainly speak to officials about what we can do to fill the gap between the next update and the 2026 final plan. I am sorry to add on to your question about the co-chair of the project board. We have a really clear partnership arrangement in place with them, so we are actually delivering the plan in partnership with them, Addis Education Scotland and a whole host of other key stakeholder members. We meet by monthly to discuss the action plan and to reassure the committee members that, while we are completing actions and they are turning green as we talk about them in the team, that does not mean that they are ticked off and that we do not revisit them, so we are very conscious about the cultural shift that we are trying to achieve and the fact that we need to sustain that. We revisit them at project board meetings, not all of them because there is a substantial number to consider, but we discuss them regularly to make sure that we are continuing to make progress, that we are starting to see those in bed. There are definitely opportunities to reflect on the progress that is being made at a more regular level. I just think that of all the information and feedback that we have received through this process and that we get it in our constituency caseload, how do we reassure those parents and those communities that we are making progress and do that collectively as a Parliament? I hope that the update that we will publish following the committee's report will be helpful to that end, but I speak to officials about that. Obviously, given that officials and I engage with the partnership boards more regularly than the committee does, it may be that we can send the committee updates every six months, for example, on the progress of that work. Just finally, in my experience, there are benefits of employers being engaged in all of that consideration. Powerful institutions in communities such as football clubs have a big difference that can be made from a collaborative approach beyond the school setting, which you emphasised, cabinet secretary, and I just want to reassure that the Government is open-minded and proactive in all that. Absolutely. I think that this has been a key theme of the committee's evidence that this cannot just be about education responding to the challenge here, so we need that partnership approach from a variety of different partners that I have touched on health today. However, I think that the point that the member makes about the importance of football clubs in local communities is a good one, in the debate that we had on behaviour a couple of weeks ago now. I think that it was in conservative time. Brian Whittle gave a very good speech to this end. It is obviously something that he is passionate about anyway. However, the role of sport in responding to some of the challenges post Covid is fascinating and I think that it is an opportunity for us to further pursue. I know that Mr McPherson has a constituency interest in this. I think that he has raised it with me in the chamber previously. You might get an invitation following. I look forward to it. I am very aware of what Mr McPherson Avenue was going down there, so I will leave that with him. Thank you specifically for that helpful comment about your ASP action plan update coming and co-ordinating with perhaps ours, but that is very helpful in terms of how we will move our work plan forward. Finally, I have a supplementary question from Willie Rennie. Although the tone and approach today has been very good, I think that you understand how serious this is. I think that it would be remiss of us not to express the anger and frustration that exists out there. What parents are really angry, teachers are giving up, they have had enough, they feel as if they are on the front line without adequate support, they really feel it. What was striking for me was the Scottish Children's Services Coalition remarks. They were hinting at the overall effectiveness of the policy, but they were also hinting about whether mainstreaming is working at all. However, they also then draw the correlation between poorer areas of the country, poorer neighbourhoods and the higher proportions of additional support needs. Something that came out in the absence stats yesterday was that the absence rates in poorer areas affects Government policy in so many different ways. If we are going to close the poverty-related attainment gap, if we are going to close inequalities, we are going to have to get to grips with additional support needs, not just for the sake of pupils but for the sake of the country as a whole and its performance. It is important that you understand that there is a lot of anger and frustration about why today's tone has been the right tone, because it has been serious. My original point is that I worry that those on the front line, whether they are parents, teachers or pupils, are the ones who are having to suffer with this when we have our policy that we like. However, if it is not working, they suffer, and I worry about the divisions that are created on the back of that. I wonder if you want to comment on the absence stats, children's services coalition or anything else on that, just so that people understand that you do get it. First, I will respond to the absence stats. I have mentioned this, convener, that the persistent absence stats are shocking. I invite the committee to interrogate those stats, as I have, because we see regional variation across the country in relation to attendance, but a cohort of young people not attending for up to 20 days of the school year think about the impact that it has on their educational outcomes. I am really concerned about that measure. We have not, as a Government, looked at that measure since 2014-15, so we added that measure in last year to give us more data to look at the real substantive problem. The Children's Commissioner in England produced really helpful advice at a report last year on the absence in England, and it contained a number of recommendations. I think that she has also quantified the cost of missing school in relation to academic attainment. Positive destinations for those young people are all bound up in our wider ambition, and GERFEC is part of it. I suppose that Mr Rennie is saying that we talked about that at the start. I still believe in mainstreaming, and I think that it is the right approach. I hear the anger and the challenge, and I am supposed to reassure Mr Rennie and the rest of the committee that one of the first things that I did when I was appointed Cabinet Secretary was going to speak to the teaching profession, and they said, we are not ready for those reports, we are not ready for reform, we need to work with you, we want to work with you, but we need to respond to the challenge right now. So I paused educational reform for a year. We will bring forward proposals on that in the coming weeks, but every step of the way, whether it is on reforming Education Scotland or the qualifications body or qualifications, our children with additional support needs have to be at the forefront of that. They are helistically part of our system, they are not that add-on that they might have been in 2004, and I think that when the act was first passed, that is where we were. They are part of our system, they are nearly, in some parts of Scotland, half of our pupils have an additional support need. So we have to get it right for them. Right now, I see and I hear the challenge and I commit to working with committee members, but also across Government, because this is not just about education. We need to leverage the power of other parts of Government, whether that be health, whether that be justice in a number of different areas to respond to the challenges post Covid. Briefly, Liam Kerr. That is an exact point, because I think that that is a really important question that Willie Rennie has posed. The attendance statistics will obviously be a function of much more than the education system. As an observation, there is a tendency to think very much in silos or to act very much in silos. You are quite right, cabinet secretary, we need to get away from that. I guess the question beg then is what interaction have you had on things like the attendance statistics with other portfolios, particularly in the light of that report that you mentioned from last year? On attendance specifically, I received weekly updates. There are fortnightly updates in relation to attendance. I think that in the first few weeks, and we have discussed this certainly in the chamber, convener, touched on the variants in relation to certain year groups after the pandemic. We were seeing dips in year groups that were transitioning during lockdown, whether that be the P7 or the BGE transition to senior phase. At that time, we were of the view that these young people had really important periods of their education disrupted and then found it very hard to re-engage with the system. Last year, I commissioned Education Scotland to undertake some further work on absence. They published national guidance on this, which the committee may be aware of on attendance in November. We then published further data in December, which showed that school absence across the board was at record low levels. I think that that is important for the committee to understand. This new measure that we have introduced is about persistent absence. That is 10 per cent in a school year of 190 days. Let's say 20 days a year, mist of education. It's a big chunk to lose out of your education. On engagement with other portfolios, I haven't specifically engaged with other portfolios on attendance, but I have on behaviour, for example, and on a number of other educational issues. I will be engaging with my colleagues on this issue because, of course, it isn't just about school. Thank you very much. I'd like to thank the cabinet secretary and her officials for their time this morning. That concludes the public part of our proceedings. The committee will now move into private to consider our final item on the agenda this morning. Thank you very much.