 The next site of business is a member's business debate on motion 7056, in the name of Alec Rowley, on support for citizens advice Scotland's call to stop accelerated roll-out of universal credit. This debate will be concluded without any questions being put. With those members who wish to speak in the debate, please press the request to speak buttons now, and I call Alec Rowley. Mr Rowley, seven minutes are there abouts please. Thank you, Presiding Officer. I want to thank everyone who supported the motion that allowed this debate to take place today. I bring this motion here today to build the support of the Scottish Parliament behind the call from Citizens Advice Scotland, supported by much of Civic Scotland to halt the roll-out of universal credit and address the issues of concern. My point is quite straightforward. Why would any Government in a civilised society continue to roll out a new policy that they know is going to hurt tens of thousands of people, drive people into debt, to rely on charity to feed themselves and result in even more people in our country being driven into poverty? This cannot be right, and it is not right, and the Tory party must think again. Listen to Civic Scotland and stop this roll-out. I raise this motion here for debate today after visiting various community organisations across Scotland, where I heard first hand the direct experience of people and what people are having to deal with, where the roll-out of universal credit has taken place. I not only heard the issues that people are facing but the increasing problems that organisations are having in trying to help people cope with this roll-out. Citizens Advice Scotland published a briefing in July calling for a halt to the accelerated roll-out of universal credit. On the back of this, I wrote to the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, as well as every MP in the country, asking them to support the call made by Citizens Advice Scotland. Every party and organisation that wants to help to alleviate poverty should work together to ensure that people do not suffer as a result of this roll-out of universal credit. The motion that we are debating here today highlights the problems that Citizens Advice Scotland has found in the pilot roll-out areas. On top of that, only last week, 25 Scottish third sector organisations published a joint letter calling for the roll-out of universal credit to be halted. This week, we have seen an intervention from the Church of Scotland and drawn attention to the experience that people were seeing in churches across Scotland. It is clear to everyone that something is needing to be done to resolve those issues. That would seem everyone, apart from the Tories, who seem to be burying their heads in the sand and are in complete denial of the facts. Alongside the letters that I wrote to every MP in the country, I also wrote to Ruth Davidson urging her to lend her support to the calls made by Citizens Advice Scotland. Sadly, I have never heard back from her. I would appeal to the Tories in Scotland, to Ruth Davidson's party, to get behind Civic Scotland and call for the roll-out of universal credit to be halted until those issues can be addressed. I received a response from the UK minister. The minister for employment wrote back, claiming that the Government does not agree with the conclusions of Citizens Advice research. The minister went on and I quote, "...the report is based on evidence from a self-selecting group of people." This is just another classic example of the Tories' denying that a problem exists as they continue to attack those least able to defend themselves and in the process drive up poverty in our country. The fact is that there has been a 15 per cent increase in renter years and an 87 per cent increase in crisis grants and a massive increase in food bank use in areas where universal credit has been rolled out. It is not right to simply ignore this. One of the biggest problems that we have heard in our time and time again with universal credit is the six-week waiting period at the start of the claim before payment. This is one of the things that is driving the increase in renter years and food bank relines. What was the Government's response to this? The minister said in his letter to me, many people coming to universal credit will have a wage from their previous job to cover their expenses until they get their first payment. How out of touch is that Tory Government? They are driving people into poverty, forcing people to rely on charity to feed themselves, and they simply assume that people will have enough in their savings to cover their expenses for six weeks. They are wrong. Indeed, Citizens Advice Scotland published research earlier this year, showing that 22 per cent of the public have no savings to fall back on, while a further 24 per cent had less than two months' income. This just goes to show yet again how much the Tories do not understand what day-to-day life is like for so many people in our country. Unless the delay period for payments is fixed, there is a huge risk of driving individuals and families further into poverty. The Government should not be defending those issues, but instead recognise the problems that they are causing and commit to fixing them before they cause even bigger problems further down the line. It is clear that the system is deeply flawed and that we must work together to address that. I repeat that no Government should inflict something on its citizens that is going to do more damage than good. No Government should push people further into poverty. No Government should be so arrogant to ignore the concerns that are raised by individuals, organisations and communities the length and breadth of our country until we find a solution to the problems found in universal credit. I urge everyone in this Parliament to support the calls to halt the accelerated roll-out. A couple of housekeeping issues if you intend to be called to speak, you must press your request to speak button. A couple of members have not done that. I have 12 members wishing to speak and I am minded to accept a motion without notice under roll 18.14.3 to extend the debate by up to 30 minutes. I am pleased to move that motion. It is encouraging that so many people are taking involved in what is such a serious issue. The question is that the debate be extended by up to 30 minutes. Are we all agreed? That is agreed. I therefore call Christina McKelvie to be followed by Jeremy Balfour. Thank you very much to Alex Rowley for bringing this debate to the chamber. The debate that I believe is timely and also imperative, timely because my constituents, the people of Hamilton-Lark-Collins-Stonehouse, who live within South Lanarkshire Council, are the next local authority to receive the full roll-out of universal credit. I make no mistake, the reason why this debate is imperative is because this botched roll-out is detrimentally affecting lives and that is just pure and simple. We are seeing people, not claimants, not customers, not service users, people, human beings, going for up to seven weeks without any form of welfare from the Government. Seven weeks, potentially without food, without electricity or other power, without sustenance and the list goes on and on and on. I put that bit in my speech this morning before I heard some news just about two hours ago from the selfless volunteers that I know very well at the Hamilton and District Food Bank, the true heroes of the front line of defending people from Tory reform. They have advised me that they know of people who came to see them today waiting 12 weeks for any form of welfare as a result of the universal credit change-over. Twelve weeks, three months, let that sink in. Imagine that that was you or a family member. Essentially, what this roll-out has achieved, Presiding Officer, is a Tory-engineered, systematic shutdown of any form of life for the deserving poor, as they would put it. Those who have the immense misfortune to find themselves in times of trouble but are met with a desolate silence from the UK Government, a bit like Ruth Davidson's answer to Mr Rowley's letter. It wreaks of callous and cruel nature that has become synonymous with this Conservative Government. Since the partial introduction phase of universal credit within South Lanarkshire, my constituents have faced a complete myriad of problems from significant delays in their payments, forcing hundreds into arrears, hunger and destitution, to an incomprehensible help system, what a laugh help system whereby people are unable to contact a universal credit processing centre to resolve any of the issues. Whilst we hurtle at breakneck speed into the ever-growing digital economy, we cannot leave behind those people who brought us here. We cannot leave behind those who are lacking the technical, online literacy needs to complete the deliberately—and I mean deliberately complicated—DWP forms. That is not hyperbole, but they are designed to be complex. They seek to exclude the vulnerable, the needy and the hopeless. They aim to divide and cause unnecessary hassle for those who somehow have the audacity to make a claim from this Government. The evidence is there and it cannot be ignored. Within the two authorities in Scotland that have the most experience of the full service, East Lothian and Highlands, approximately 82 per cent in the receipt of universal credit are in arrears. This decision has real consequences. For South Lanarkshire, to the tune of £4 million, this is the amount that they have had to put aside to mitigate the costs of the roll-out. An absolute chronic waste of resources, that money could have been added to schools, houses, health, infrastructure—anything that you want, all just to deal with a Government who wants to demonise those at risk. The risk to the safety of the well-being of women and children and, regrettably, children who will go hungry because this Tory Government insists on continuing their failed attempts, just let that sink in. Instead of heeding the warnings from CAB, from all the charities, local authorities and welfare rights organisations and listening to those who matter—the people on universal credit—the Tories will continue to make children hungry to put their welfare in jeopardy. I, for one, will not allow the Tory pursuit of ideological welfare reform to jeopardise any of my constituents. Once again, I thank Alex Rowley for bringing this very important debate to Parliament. I call Jeremy Balford. We have followed by Pauline McNeill. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I apologise firstly to you and to the Minister and to the rest of the chamber. Unfortunately, I have to leave early now with the extended debate, as I have been called to give evidence to the Edinburgh family inquiry this afternoon. The scale of change of welfare over the last three years has been dramatic, of which universal credit is one of the most significant and ambitious. I suspect that one thing that we can all agree upon within the chamber this afternoon is that the current benefit system is extremely complex and claimants are entitled to different benefits from different agencies, housing benefit from local authorities, other benefits from HMRC and so on. So, there is a wide support for the principle underlying universal credit, which simplifies social security by replacing a complex and chaotic system which has damaged people, held them back in dependency and trapped their life for generations. The best way to help people improve their lives is to get them into work, to give them a purpose and to allow them to earn money. The universal credit allows that to happen and will, in time, allow people faster and quicker than the previous system. Eastlothian was the first local authority in Scotland to go for the full service in March 2016. Last year, I had the pleasure to visit a job centre where universal credit is changing the way that the job centre works. It is a simpler administration that is freeing up staff to meet people face-to-face employment outcomes that matter most. Sorry, I do not have time. I saw the way that job centre staff embrace their role— The member is not taking intervention. As a work coach, how that was transforming the whole relationship with claimants. The digital take-up of universal credit, again, is a success story. With 99 per cent of new claimants made online, which will mean that, in the long run, the service is more expedient and user-friendly. Overall, 82 per cent of universal credit customers reported that they were satisfied or very satisfied with the service, and the figures show that it is working in practice. Claimants are spending twice as much time looking for a job under the old system, and they are moving into work faster, with 113 people moving into work under universal credit for every 100 who are doing so under the pre-existing system. When any new system is introduced, especially one that is as ambitious as universal credit, there are going to be operational difficulties. Citizen vice Scotland is concerned and rightly so at the most vulnerable citizens, but we must make sure that that does not stop what is happening on the ground and that the success story, often for individualised, is forgotten in propaganda from the other parties within this chamber. In East Lorien, the DWP are holding surgeries across the country every week to provide the digital support to claimants. I accept that, for many people, the concept of having to do all reforms online is intimidating, but that has been mitigated directly by people who can drop in no appointment and given face-to-face advice to do that. Universal credit is a single monthly payment, but, as we all know, the Scottish universal credit remains reserved to the Westminster Government. The Scotland Act 2016 gave the Scottish Government the power to vary housing costs, elements for people, rent in the homes and to author payment arrangements. We took evidence this morning in the social security meeting. I therefore support the role of universal credit. I now call Pauline McNeill to be followed by Rona Mackay, Ms McNeill. Indeed, universal credit was to be a new, flexible system, all the things that Jeremy Balfour talks about. No wonder that Jeremy Balfour will not take an intervention on that, because, if your eyes were open to this, you would see that the objective that was aimed at for universal credit is far from where we are now. Universal credit roll-out is an unmitigated disaster. It is before your very eyes what more proof do you need. We have discussed many times in this chamber the six-week waiting period alone. As Alex Rowley said in his opening remarks, it is an absolute nonsense that any one of us could survive without their salaries for six weeks. Never mind, no income for six weeks. Even if the Government were prepared to fix the six-week problem, I would have some respect for the opposite benches, but they are just continuing regardless of that. However, make no mistake, if there is no change and addressing of the problems of universal credit, it will have deep implications for Scotland, because we already have discussed in this Parliament the poverty levels. I will read out some of the statistics in Musselborough, where the universal credit roll-out started. The reference to food banks is now the highest north of the border, when that is not a coincidence. I went to Musselborough as part of the Social Security Committee's inquiry. I sat next to a gentleman who was using a very small smartphone to try and do his form filling. When they make the calls to try and sort the issues that they are having, they are charged for it. You could not make it up. The effect of the six-week waiting period for a first universal credit payment can be serious and, as I said, lead to food bank referrals. It is causing mental health issues, and it is causing rent arrears, and it is causing eviction. The navigation online system, in theory, would be a good one. If everybody was online, then that would be fine, but there is still a high percentage of claimants, and in fact, ordinary Scots, who do not get access to an online system. Countries have pointed out that universal credit rules force homeless families to be put up in short-term bed-and-breakfast-style lodgings to wait six weeks to qualify for rent support. Something that they say is incompatible with the laws that require counsel to move those families on to more suitable accommodation within six weeks. Also, when they go to register for benefits, homeless people who are often in temporary accommodation, be that hospital, hostel or bed-and-breakfast accommodation, do not state that they are homeless as often they are rough sleeping and they are put on to the wrong housing benefit, causing them to receive underpayments. The Chartered Institute of Housing in Scotland has warned that the new universal credit to date has led to tenants finding it increasingly difficult to pay their rents on time. It is such an obvious thing, an obvious failure about the system. The welfare reform impact in a recent report published by Housemart Consultancy Group showed that the average rent arrears debt of a universal credit claimant was £618 compared to a non-universal credit arrears of £131. What more evidence do you need? It is a serious issue that we must get some action on. That cannot continue. It is deeply unjust and it will cause deep-rooted problems in Scotland for the sake of making some changes that are obvious to make for the system to be, the kind of system that was designed to be. I thank Alex Rowley for bringing this important and necessary debate to the chamber. The world's universal credit are misleading and cruel. They give the illusion of something for everyone but the reality is anything but. The universal credit introduced by the Tory Government at Westminster is merely a euphemism for more Tory austerity. It is the continuation of the attack on our poorest citizens as part of the wider destruction of the UK social security system, the same attack on the welfare state that has been called a human catastrophe for disabled people by the UN. Let me remind the chamber what has happened in this attack so far. The Tories have cut £30 a week from disability benefit employment support allowance, hitting those unable to work. They have implemented the hated two-child tax credit limit, which takes money from low-income mothers and fathers who desperately need it. They have removed the family element of working tax credits, again hitting low-income parents hard. Young people aged 18 to 21 have been locked out of housing benefit, that is just some of the measures taken. The universal credit has got off to a terrible start, and it has to be radically extended this autumn. This extension must be delayed. As a former board member of the Eastern Barchonshire Citizens Advice Bureau, I was all too aware of the fears of the bureau staff before the implementation of the system. Those hard-working staff are in the front line and could foresee the misery that it would cause to so many people who are already struggling to make ends meet every day. Sadly, their fears have been realised. With universal credit, benefits are paid in a lump sum, leaving many recipients unable to budget and increasing their risk of homelessness, food and fuel poverty. Eastern Barchonshire is one of the five bureaux piloting the so-called full-service universal credit. In those areas, there has been a 15 per cent rise in rent arrears compared to a national decrease of 2 per cent. There has been a lot of statistics mentioned today, but I think that they are worth repeating. Facing out of disability tax credit means that over 110 disabled people who are in work are at risk of losing up to £40 a week in disability tax credits. An 87 per cent increase in crisis grant issues compared to a national increase of 9 per cent. Two of the bureaux have seen a 40 per cent and 70 per cent increase in food bank advice compared to a national increase of 3 per cent. As we have discussed, 39 per cent had waited more than six weeks, which is deemed acceptable by the Tories, who evidently expect people to live in fresh air to receive their first payment. The fact that the application can only be made online makes the process even more shambolic. Disabled people are the group in society that are least likely to have internet access. It is estimated that 35 per cent of disabled people do not have access to the internet compared to over 90 per cent of the non-disabled population. Put simply, people are sinking further into deprivation thanks to a roll-out riddled with error and the roll-out must be paused until key problems are addressed. No organisation would go ahead with a scheme that has failed so badly in a trial, but, as ever, the Tories will plough on with their disastrous policy regardless of the human cost. Universal credit is emblematic of the bitter and cruel treatment of people under this UK Tory Government. Thankfully, the Scottish Government's approach to shaping our own social security system could not be more different, even with the limited powers that we are receiving. In the name of humanity, will the Tories admit that this system is a disaster and stop the roll-out? To err is human, but to compound a mistake is simply madness? I call Alison Johnstone to be followed by Clare Adamson, Ms Johnstone, please. I would like to thank Alex Rowley for securing this important debate today. We have heard much about the botched roll-out of universal credit, and my constituents in Musselboro will know about the problems that have been caused better than anyone as Musselboro was one of the first areas where universal credit was tested. During the Social Security Committee's investigations into universal credit earlier this year, we heard and met universal credit recipients in Musselboro of health conditions that had worsened because of the stress of not knowing whether or not they could pay the rent. We heard from others having to make endless numbers of calls on expensive phone lines waiting anxiously for a callback that never came due to the call volume staff were experiencing, perhaps. Some told members that they had to leave their jobs precisely the opposite impact universal credit seeks, because payment delays meant that they couldn't afford to pay for childcare. East Lothian Council has been faced with significantly increased demand for emergency payments, with applications for Scottish welfare fund crisis grants being 20 per cent above what would be expected, and some universal credit recipients simply can't afford to pay the rent. In 2016-17, there was a 12 per cent increase in council tenant rent areas across the board, but for universal credit claimants the figure was almost double at 22 per cent. Issues with the implementation of universal credit and associated IT gremlins are only part of a much bigger problem. My constituents and people across the country are suffering not only because the roll-out is being botched, but because a whole raft of welfare cuts are secreted within universal credit, and so moving on to universal credit for many recipients means having to get by with less support than they might have received previously, as well as having to deal with some of the teathing problems that we have heard from colleagues today. Research by the independent office for budget responsibility shows that by 2020, universal credit will have taken about £3.1 billion out of the pockets of some of our poorest families, and that figure does not include the benefit freeze that will apply to universal credit. Sheffield-Hallum University suggests that that will take another £300 million in Scotland, and families with children will be the worst hit. A report from the child poverty action group and the Institute for Public Policy Research suggests that two parent families with children will be worse off by an average of £960 a year in 2020, compared with the income that they could have expected in the absence of cuts to universal credit, and single-parent families by a staggering £2,380 on average. Those claims are not only made by the child poverty action group. I would add that this analysis is shared by the independent office for budget responsibility, which has said that universal credit is now, and I am quoting, less generous on average than the tax credits and benefits systems that it replaces. In light of that, it seems like a very cruel joke indeed that the white paper that launched universal credit claimed, and I quote again, no one will experience a reduction in the benefit that they receive as a result of the introduction of universal credit. The white paper also promised that 900,000 people, including 350,000 children, would be lifted out of poverty. CPag claims that the opposite is the case, with universal credit putting around 1 million children across the UK into poverty. No wonder the UK Government no longer makes those claims and has repeatedly not responded to requests for a poverty impact assessment. I am closing, Presiding Officer. I would just like to close by saying that Greens have previously called for the UK Government to listen to the experience of universal credit recipients and improve it. In the light of those calls raised by Citizens Advice Scotland and many other third sector organisations and parties, it is clearly time to take action and halt the roll-out until the problems around universal credit are resolved. I thank Alex Rowley for bringing this debate to the chamber floor today. In the previous session of this Parliament, I had the privilege of serving as the deputy convener of the then welfare reform committee. In my duties, I contributed to a number of reports and investigations into welfare reform. I contributed to the United Nations investigation into the effect and disabled people of welfare reform. We know now that the United Nations has said that this will be a humanitarian catastrophe visited in the people of the UK by their Government. In the face of the information that we have had from all the third sector organisations from CAB, those who signed the declaration asking for universal credit not to be rolled out, I cannot understand why the Tory benches cannot recognise what is happening in their own country. In 2015, I visited the pilots in the Highland to investigate how well universal credit was being rolled out there. We had a series of panels, including a DWP panel, which we were able to ask questions of. My overimpression at the time was that it was a fraught with manual intervention process. It gave great concern about the sustainability and rolling out across the country. It had found fixes to problems, but the council and the third sector organisations involved said that those were no way scalable, which gave them great concern for the roll-out of universal credit. The rural aspects of universal credit were raised. Transport time expends issues for interview times. Something that was already raised by Pauline McNeill among others this afternoon was the digital exclusion of people and the inability to access the internet to apply for credit. The seasonal fluctuating nature of some of the employment in the rural's constituencies was also a concern. It reported that 80 to 90 per cent of those on universal credit were in renter airs, compared with 12 to 15 per cent of those not. The average rent of airs for non-UC tenants was £200. For universal claimant credits, it was over £1,000. For those in temporary accommodation, it was £2,100. The universal credit claimants were potentially in airs from the minute to the apply because of the five-week period in Highland, but we have heard of 12-week delays this afternoon in the chamber. The DWP had no idea of the impact that that could have on landlords. If nothing else, the Tories would be on the side of the landlords and the entrepreneurs. They had no idea that housing benefit payments would cause an issue, because they no longer had direct payments to landlords. In chaotic lifestyle situations, where people moved accommodation, the landlord might in fact receive no payment whatsoever. Those things have been well rehearsed this afternoon. Many of the issues have already been raised by my colleagues. In 2015, they were known about for the Tory benches to continue to deny this human catastrophe facing the citizens of our country. I am going to call it out for what it is. They are picking the pockets of the Scottish people because we are mitigating for this disaster. Hundreds of millions of pounds have been mentioned by the First Minister at questions this morning. They are picking the pockets of the health service, they are picking the pockets of the education system, they are picking the pockets of every person in this chamber today—our friends, our families, our neighbours. Please wake up and call the disaster out for what it is. Thank you, Presiding Officer. I rise in support of the motion, and I should start by apologising for leaving earlier. I have to chair a meeting of a patients group that did not anticipate the extension of the debate. I often speak hyperbole in this place about the various responsibilities that we discharge as decision makers both in this Parliament and in Westminster, but the safety net that we provide for those who, for whatever reason, cannot provide for themselves should be the measure of any civilised society. My party has a proud history in the genesis and introduction of the welfare state in the early days of the 20th century with the First State pension under Lloyd George and in the 1940s under that great Liberal William Beverage, who was the catalyst for the advent of social security when he identified the original giant evils, as he describes them, of ignorance, idleness, swallow, want and disease. It is a failure of progress if you strip out that antiquated language that many of those evils still hold sway in our society today. We should remember that, until this decade and since its introduction, the systems of welfare in this country had not undergone significant reform despite generations of incremental modification. Welfare reform itself was something sought by poverty campaigners, third sector organisations and academics for decades, so that we could dispense with unneeded red tape and inject much-needed social mobility into the system. It fell to my party in its period of coalition government to co-preside over this much-needed redesign. However, I would have had different bedfellows in that task. There are elements of that system that now underpin the process that I take no pride in at all and aspects of the new systems that I still find shameful. Nevertheless, I am glad that we were there, for I dread to think of the welfare system that our Conservative partners would have designed unencumbered. We all saw the measure of the ideological compass behind Conservative social policy in that ill-fated manifesto that was published by Theresa May in the spring. Today, we debate the flagship aspect of welfare reform agenda, the roll-out of universal credit. I support the motion today. It does not suggest that we tear up welfare reform or even jump the universal credit, but it does speak to the human cost of the inadequacies of its roll-out. A large undertaking such as this may well have been expected to have teething problems, but the difficulties in the areas of Scotland where it has started go far beyond that, where people are switching over to the universal credit, have had to endure a six-weight weight and more before receiving their first payment. That is intolerable in 2017 and a material risk to that person's wellbeing and that of their family. Put simply, Presiding Officer, it is pushing families into crisis. Citizens Advice Scotland, as we have heard, has reports of many clients resorting to emergency stopgaps such as food banks, crisis grants and food parcels, while others are going into significant rent careers. I rise in support of the calls of my colleagues on the Labour benches for the Parliament to support their total halt in any further roll-out of the new system of universal credit until those areas have been given light to in this debate have been properly addressed. It makes no sense to plough on regardless, ignoring the huge impact on vulnerable families that has resulted from crucial payment delays, with 25 different stakeholders all backing the call to stop the process. We, as a Parliament, must surely listen. The accelerated roll-out that is due in October must be delayed to prevent any more people being pushed into financial crisis unnecessarily. Thank you very much. I call Sandra White to be followed by Neil Findlay. Ms White, please. Thank you very much, Presiding Officer. I want to thank Alec Rowley and I very much welcome the opportunity to contribute in this debate. Thank you very much for lodging the motion and giving us an opportunity to call the Tories out for what they are. I know that Jeremy Balfour had to leave and understand that. With all due respect to Jeremy Balfour, who joined the Social Security Committee this morning, and as a convener, I welcome him there. Words fail me for what Jeremy Balfour said compared to the evidence that we received—not just I but the Social Security Committee—at the Edinburgh Job Centre. What everyone here has said, a member of the committee and otherwise, is absolutely true. Obviously, it must have been one thing. It certainly wasn't the treatment or the way that Jeremy Balfour saw it, the way that he apparently sees universal credit. We were taking evidence from various people and it's already been mentioned. I don't want to go over the whole thing, but, after we were finished during the evidence, a lady burst into tears. She had just received a text on her mobile phone to tell her that her money had been cut. I just mentioned the fact that those mobile phones seemed like tags because every single day they had to fill in their diary. A summary, as Pauline McNeill had already said, had to be put in what time did you do that, what time did you do that, how many jobs did you look for, what time did you go, where were those jobs? It was like a tag on those people. Many of those people were very vulnerable and absolutely were even worse, as you can imagine, with this over their heads every single day. That lady burst into tears while we were speaking to the Musselborough Job Centre. That's the reality of universal credit. I'm not going to go over everything that everyone has said, but the absolute reality of weeks and weeks, 12 weeks in some cases, the fact that you have no money, you can't pay your rent, you can't pay your utility bills, you can't buy food, you can't even go anywhere, and this is supposed to be a civilised society, and this universal credit is supposed to be, according to Jeremy Balfour, the best thing since, what will we say, sliced bread. It's absolutely the opposite. People we spoke to have said, yes, we need simplification in the social security system, and they didn't too much welcome to open arms, but we're prepared to look at it and work with it, but what's happened is an absolute diabolical mess, and it needs to be stopped now. That's why I've signed up with various other organisations, individuals, to stop and halt the roll-out of universal credit. I mean this literally killing people, and we need to stop that. People who are vulnerable, people who are disabled, people with mental health problems, it's literally killing them, because it's such a bad system at the moment with the roll-out. I do appeal, and there are a few Tories there, because they're the only ones who seem to think that it's great. I appeal to them, please stop the roll-out of this joint with the rest of this Parliament, all the parties here, and admit that it's a mess and it's killing people. Thank you very much, Presiding Officer. Thank you, Ms White. I call Neil Findlay to be followed by Marie Todd. Mr Findlay, please. Thanks, Presiding Officer, and I have to leave after my speech. I thank Alex Rowley for bringing this vital debate to Parliament. I see today that we see the Tory party adopting the exact same practice as they practiced in the rape clause debate. One tokenistic speaker they have today for them, told to come here and sit by their whips, unwilling to take part in the debate. And where's Tomkins? Where is he? Where's the social security spokesperson who's supposed to be here defending this disgraceful policy? He's off three jobs, Tomkins, not even here to defend the policy, and yet they lecture vulnerable and poor people about the benefits of universal credit. What an utter disgrace they are. I wholeheartedly support the anti-poverty organisations in their call to the UK Government to pause the roll-out universal credit until all of these problems have been resolved. Given the impact that is having on my constituents across the Lothians and the impact that will continue to have if it's not stopped, how that will impact on up to 600,000 Scots? Most people, most normal people are a job loss, a relationship breakdown, or an accident, or a diagnosis away from the benefits system. I've been in that position many times in my life. Not all of the people out there are privileged like those to be on £60,000 a year. Not all of them have the opportunity to have two or three jobs or inherited wealth to sustain them. However, that is not a discussion about other people, it's about everyone in our society who may at some time rely on that increasingly worn safety net. Citizens advice and others are rightly calling for a freeze to this policy so that those issues can be addressed. The impact of those new rules and policies relating to the administration of universal credit are causing, as everybody knows, apart from the Tories dire problems for claimants. How can people possibly wait six weeks for their first payment? That is a lifetime if you are having to sign on for benefit. As a former housing officer, I know the worry and strain that Scots and tenants are impacting on their mental health, their physical health, their wellbeing, causing anxiety, depression and hardship, and in some cases, as people mentioned, people taking their own lives. If we see crisis grants up 87 per cent and food bank use up 70 per cent, how can anyone tell us that that is a system that is working? How can you tell us that? It just makes no sense whatsoever. I commend the Scottish Government for writing to the UK Government calling for a halt to this service. Unsurprisingly, that call went unheeded by the really caring, compassionate Tories. The SNP Government stated that it will continue to press that case. I hope that it does, and I hope that all of the rest of us continue to press that case. However, more needs to be done and CPI and others have suggested some way forward. Was that report last week from the United Nations Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disability on the UK Government's performance on how it deals with disabled people should be—I do not care which party you are in—but surely you have the self-respect to see that that is absolutely shameful treatment to all of the people in our communities who have disabilities. That is just absolutely incredible that you cannot even bring yourself to say that that is disgraceful. I thought some of the people in those benches had more self-respect than that. That Parliament will continue and must continue to apply pressure on the Tories. I support the call by CPI and others for greater investment in discretionary housing payments to alleviate some of those difficulties and whether such additional investment might be required for a longer period so that we can get a longer term solution. We need to increase the capacity on advice services and all that they do in order to help the most vulnerable people. I can either use the powers that we have here to help people and continue to argue with the Tory Government or we can do nothing while the poorest people in our society suffer even more. I thank you for bringing forward this really important matter for debate. I welcome the joint letter and the cross-party support that it has received and I hope that it will finally make the UK Government take notice of the devastating impact that universal credit is having on people. Although, given the response of the one Conservative member who has contributed to the debate so far today, I do not feel too optimistic. As members will be aware, universal credit is already operational in the Highlands. It was piloted in Inverness and it now covers the whole of Highland Council area. Because of the problems that we encountered in Highland and in the other pilot areas, Angela Constance already called for the UK Government to halt the roll-out back in March to absolutely no avail. It is yet another example of the UK Government not listening to the people of the Highlands and not listening to the people of Scotland. As others have said in the debate, one of the main problems is that new claimants have to wait up to six weeks before having their first payment and longer in some circumstances. I know that it is difficult for people in privileged positions who come from wealthy backgrounds to understand, but most ordinary people cannot manage to survive for six weeks with no income. Lengthly delays are resulting in tenants building up rent arrears and being pushed to seek crisis or hardship payments and turning to food banks. Myself and my colleague Drew Henry MP have been campaigning for many months to have the roll-out of full service of universal credit halted. Earlier this year we invited Jeane Freeman, the Minister for Social Security in Scotland, to a round-table meeting in Inverness so that she could listen first hand to the evidence of harm. We heard the story of a pregnant woman who was forced to travel to Aberdeen so that she could get a national insurance number before she could claim any money. We heard the story of lots of people with poor digital skills and connectivity struggling with no money. We heard how housing associations find themselves in the unenviable position of having to pursue tenants through the courts at huge public expense for debt that is not of the client's own making. We heard directly from staff who worked in the council, who worked in cab, in housing associations, all describing the distress that they feel at being unable to help those people. The removal of implicit consent means that they can no longer act on behalf of their clients. The client, that vulnerable person, has to navigate this impossible system on their own. The most powerful testimony that we heard at that meeting was from Macmillan CAB. They help people who are terminally ill to put their affairs in order before they die. Those folk have a limited amount of time, and they spend the last months of their lives worrying and navigating an impossible system. Any politician worth their salt would look at this Dickensian policy with its colossal design flaws and realise that it has to be halted. The UK Government must accept that the roll-out is not working and halt it until issues are resolved. How many more people have to suffer? I call Annie Wells, to be followed by Ruth Maguire and Ms Maguire will last speaker in the open debate. Ms Wells, please. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer and to Alex Rowley for bringing this debate to Parliament today. According to the latest statistics, an estimated 54,000 people in Scotland are claiming universal credit. Universal credit was designed to ease the transition from welfare into work. It was designed to reflect people's earnings and changes in their income month on month and to reflect people's wage frequency, whether that is weekly, fortnightly or monthly. No one disputes that welfare should encourage people to work and that it should make sense for people to move to keep more money as they work and earn more. That means responding to changing circumstances. If work is to pay, welfare payments obviously need to adapt to pay. In turn, that means some form of assessment. The waiting period at the start of universal credit claim is a consequence of that. The assessment period is the month in which income first assessed starts within a week of a claim. There are significant exemptions to that. Anyone claiming universal credit due to a break-up, anyone with a terminal illness, a young person leaving care, a victim of domestic abuse and more. The first payments are made within seven days of the assessment period ending. Once someone is on the system, or if they have claimed universal credit or a range of benefits recently, they do not face the wait again. I completely appreciate and empathise with those who wait up to six weeks for a first payment, a period of time that most would struggle to synchronise with common payments of bills month by month. I am pleased to see that Lord Freud has indicated that, as the system rolls out, the wait should be decreased, which we should all support. I would welcome the DWP looking at further ways to reduce the time between the claim and payment. I am certain that the welfare secretary, David Gauke, will be answering direct questions on his when he meets the lead signatory of the letter penned by Westminster MPs last month, Laura Pidcock, now that Parliament is returned. We have to recognise, though, that a response of welfare system that recognises individual circumstances needs some form of assessment and that that is a question of the best way to implement the system, not a question of the fundamental principles of the system. Universal credit is easing the transition from welfare to work. Claimants are now spending twice as much time looking for a job as under the old system, and 113 people are moving into work on our universal credit for every 100 who are doing so under the pre-existing system. In accordance with the Joseph Rowntree Foundation report, work provides a best route out of poverty, and we know from the latest ONS figures that the UK employment rate has now dropped to a 42-year low in three months to June 2017, with the employment rate rising to an all-time high of 75.1 per cent. I would like to end today with making a final point regarding the original purpose of universal credit in redesigning and simplifying a notoriously complex welfare system of the UK. That was moved welcomed by opposition parties at the time of its creation, and I do not believe that the support has moved away from the basic principle. During its early roll-out, opposition parties were even quick to criticise the UK Government for not rolling it out fast enough. I would again express my empathy for those who are waiting up to six weeks for payment and welcome any changes that the DWP can introduce to decrease this time period. When it comes to the basic principles behind universal credit, however, we should not forget what we originally set out to achieve on a cross-party basis. The principle of rolling several benefits into one to create one simpler benefit remains a good one to work towards, something that I am sure we will still agree on. I thank Alex Rowley for bringing this vital topic to the chamber. Here we are, back from recess and debating the horrors of Tory welfare policy. There have been several occasions relating to social security where I have thought that the Tories could sink no lower. The UN condemning its welfare reform is being engraved and systematic violation of disabled people's rights was one of them. However, then we had the child cap and the rape clause, and now we have the UN describing the Tory Government as having created a human catastrophe for disabled people. A human catastrophe. If you look up from your phones and let that sink in for a minute, maybe, each time I have thought that they could sink no lower, they have surpassed themselves, so I am not going to say that again today, because if I have learned anything over the past year, anything today, then that there is no limits to the depths of Tory callousness and Tory arrogance when it comes to this topic. When they are told about the damage that their policies are causing and they have been consistently and repeatedly, they dismiss the evidence and the concerns presented to them out of hand. When in November 2016 the UN first condemned their policies as being in systematic violation of disabled people's rights, the Tory Government said that the report was patronising and offensive and that Britain was a world leader in disability rights and equality. When the social security committee heard disturbing evidence from groups such as the Black Triangle campaign, as well as from trusted MSP colleagues about vulnerable individuals committing suicide as a result of distressing work capability assessments, the Tory secretary of state in attendance said that he found it unfortunate that the issue was being politicised and that he disagreed with the analysis presented. When MSPs from across this chamber, with the exception of the Tory benches, united to condemn the horrific Tory 2 child cap and rape clause, this Parliament's voice was dismissed by a Tory MSP as nationalist grievance stoking. When the UN recently described the UK Government as having created a human catastrophe for disabled people, the Tory response was to remind that the UN Committee on the Rights of the Persons with Disabilities that the UK is a recognised world leader in disability rights and equality. I don't think so. So when it comes to social security for the Tories, trusted disability charities are wrong, respected MSP colleagues are wrong, this Parliament is wrong, the United Nations is wrong. Last week, 25 Scottish third sector organisations published a joint letter calling for the roll-out of universal credit to be halted. Will the Tory Government listen to them? Perhaps our colleagues on the Tory benches today can tell us who they will listen to and not just who their Government will listen to, but when? How bad does it have to get before the Tories act? There is a real danger at this stage that we are running out of words to express our horror at the damage being done by those Tory welfare policies. Where on earth do we go from human catastrophe? We could be generous for a second and acknowledge the well-meaning thinking behind universal credit, aimed at simplifying the process and helping people into work. However, the contrast between the stated intentions of universal credit and its reality on the ground could not be more stark. As the evidence for the damage that it is causing mounts, I have to doubt the Tories' sincerity. If they want their stated intentions to be believed and they have to act immediately and pause the roll-out of universal credit, they must listen to the evidence being presented to them and they must act on the issues going forward. That will not undo the severe damage that has already been done, damage for which there can be no apologies great enough, but it would prevent further avoidable damage from taking place. Continued failure to act would not only be astoundingly arrogant but also willfully harmful. For a Government whose role is to care for its citizens, that would be unforgivable. I call on Dean Freeman to close for the Government Minister. Seven minutes are there about, please. Thank you very much, Presiding Officer, and I too thank Mr Rowley for bringing this important debate to the chamber. I express to my gratitude to the 25 third sector organisations who have already been mentioned to Citizens Advice Scotland and Citizens Advice England and Wales to the Church of Scotland for all the work that they are doing to try and press the case for the UK Government to halt the roll-out of universal credit until the problems are fixed. I make the point that all of that is based on evidence. It is not political posturing, it is evidence—evidence firsthand, personal, direct experience, dealing with real people, facing real hardship, seeing an increased use of food banks as a consequence of the problems with universal credit, an increased use of emergency aid like the Scottish welfare fund, where what a pity, Mr Balfour, is not here to counter his stats on customer satisfaction in East Lothian, a 35 per cent rise in crisis grant applications directly as a result of the introduction of universal credit full roll-out. Coming from, as members have said, Mr Rowley and others have said, the six-week wait, producing an increase in rent arrears and rising debt before people even begin to try and deal with some of the situations that they are addressing. That is not about how well people manage their money, it is not either about how work is where people should be directed towards, 38 per cent of people receiving universal credit are in work and are experiencing these very problems. That is about enforced anxiety, enforced debt, enforced poverty and enforced misery, enforced by a UK Government. To Mr Balfour, I have to say this. That description of how well universal credit is doing, utter beggars belief, it is jaw-dropping in its simplicity and its refusal to acknowledge what is actually going on. When Citizens Advice Bureau, which was one of the organisations that welcomed the initial policy intent to simplify the social security system, when that very organisation that still supports the approach to simplify the social security system, tells you that you have to halt the way in which you are doing it because it has all that evidence of hardship, you ought to listen. To Ms Wells, I am grateful to you for reading out the DWP's PR notice, but your empathy and sympathy does not help to address the problems of increased poverty, increased rent arrears, increased hardship, the manner of roll-out of universal credit and some of the fundamental policy components in it are causing to people the length and breadth of this country. I am very grateful indeed to Mr Finlay, it is a pity he is not here, I hope that he reads this. I am very grateful to him for calling out what is clearly the strategy of the Scottish Conservatives, which to sit on those benches when they are confronted by a debate about a UK Government policy that is indefensible, to choose to speak and utterly ignore the points that are being raised and otherwise to sit silent. Let me tell you this, when you sit silent you collude with the problems, when you refuse to address them you collude with those problems and we will never ever let you off that hook. The UK Government is not listening, it is, as Mary Todd said in March, my colleague Angela Constance wrote to the Secretary of State, outlining in detail the problems of the roll-out of universal credit and asking him to pause it and fix those problems. In return, we received a five-page letter extolling its virtues. There is no rationale for, in the face of all the evidence, all the experience north and south of the border for not pausing and fixing this system. We are forced to conclude that the only reason can be utter contempt for the damage that is being done, arrogance about believing that you are always right and a failure, an unwillingness to admit the sheer incompetence involved in this roll-out. We have that unique combination of contempt, arrogance and incompetence and let that be the final say on what this UK Government is all about when it comes to social security. Yes, we have limited powers in this Parliament and we will use them, but the DWP will charge us for that privilege. Those limited powers offering that choice on rent payment direct to landlords, on fortnightly payments will be introduced, but we do not have the powers to deal with the most damaging aspects of universal credit, no powers to deal with the fundamental flaws. Social security should be there for all of us to help us and not trip us up. Our approach in this Parliament shared, I believe, across this chamber, except by the Conservative benches, is a rights-based social security system, recognising that it is an investment in all of us, as again Mr Finlay said, and recognising that it is there to provide help and support. That is why our First Minister in the programme for government has said that we will publish evidence-paced papers making the case for extending the powers of this Parliament in key areas, including social security, because if ever we needed evidence to demonstrate that we need to take those powers away from the UK Government and bring them in to this Parliament, which on the whole, with some exceptions, demonstrates compassion and humanity and an understanding about what social security is about, then the roll-out of universal credit, the tin here that is thrown constantly by the UK Government and the Conservatives on those benches, is a demonstration of the need to do that. I support this motion. I support the call on the UK Government to listen, to dial back the arrogance, to pay attention to their own incompetence, to halt the roll-out and fix their broken system. I say again to Conservative members in this Parliament, either properly argue for a system that is fundamentally flawed, that causes hardship, that causes misery, either properly argue in support of that or stop colluding with it by your silence, by your false empathy and by your failure to take your own Government to account. Thank you. That concludes the debate. Nice to spend this meeting of Parliament.