 I'll be cheering the committee until Bob Doris has completed his urgent business. I'd like to welcome the cabinet secretary and all the officials, once again, to the Social Security Committee. I'm going to begin by just asking a few questions about the resourcing of the programme. I'm just beginning with the comments that Audit Scotland has made. We're aware that there are 345 core staff that are required for the agency, but the agency has been routinely operating with 30 per cent of their posts unfilled. Obviously, that's a great concern to the committee. Given that the pressures on the agency are only going to increase going forward, Audit Scotland highlighted that there's a high risk of decline in morale and we may lose more staff, so my first question is how are we going to get a grip of the situation if the vacancy is as high as this? Given that, going forward, we need to make sure that we have the most experienced and skilled staff so that the agency can deliver ultimately the highest standards. You've thrown me slightly, convener, by not allowing an opening statement, but I'm content to go straight to questions. The staffing issue is a very important one that we take very seriously, both within the directorate and within the agency. If I can perhaps deal with the 30 per cent figure, which Audit Scotland pointed out, and explain how that was reached. In the programme, it basically reports that the number of posts filled against the percentage of posts that were filled at a point in time against the projected end-of-year target means that the Audit Scotland figure, as at December 2018, the month that we gave them the figure, we had in post 70 per cent of the staff that we thought we needed by March 2019. It didn't mean that we had only 70 per cent of the staff that we needed at that time. In fact, the only way that we could have reported zero vacancies, in essence, 100 per cent currently filled, would for us to have staff in post in December that we didn't need until March. It's important to establish why that figure was 30 per cent and it's because it was measuring in December against a projected requirement by March three months later. We have made improvements to the recruitment process as of mid-April. For example, the recruitment rate at that point was at 15 per cent for that month. We are continuing to ensure that we look at the numbers of staff that are required and ensure that we really keep a very close eye on our planning requirements and staffing requirements for that. I can deal directly also with the aspects around staff morale, both within the agency and within the programme. The staff survey results that have been published for social security Scotland had a very high response rate and were very positive. That certainly chimes with my experience of my time when I visit the agency. David Wallace may want to say more about morale and the fact that our staff are well looked after and well encouraged. Within the programme, I have discussed the 2018 people survey with the social security programme senior management. Cabinet Office advises that we cannot break down the core Scottish Government people results below a Scottish Government organisational level. However, I can absolutely say that there is nothing within the outcomes from the social security directorate that causes me any concern. I would not say that lightly, considering I am surrounded by people from the directorate at this point. Our results compare very well to other Scottish Government divisions. The programme indeed outperforms the Scottish Government average in a number of areas. Therefore, there is no issue with morale within the programme or within the agency. That is a challenging programme for people to work in. They are working exceptionally hard. I want to pay tribute to all the staff within the agency, within the programme and the wider directorate that have delivered a social security system one year on from the passage of the bill that they can all be rightly proud of the part that they have played. I do not know if David wants to see some more about the agency staff as well. I think that the majority of members have now been certainly to Dundee to see the operations on the ground. Just in terms of the start of that question, I would draw some distinction between the agency and the programme. At many levels, that is irrelevant. However, in terms of the agency, what we are looking to build is the operational delivery arm that will continue ever after delivering social security. The programme, by its nature, is a more transformational programme so that the staffing profile challenges are slightly different. Certainly in terms of the agency, and I do not think that Audit Scotland figure particularly uses that 30 per cent relation to the agency because I certainly would not recognise it. There are different challenges that we have in terms of building that up, but I would echo that those people engagement scores are phenomenally positive. 85 per cent are benchmarked against the entire civil service of the UK. 85 per cent for the agency puts us well towards the top of any indicators of that sense. The thing that keeps me awake is not that it is 85 per cent. It is actually how we maintain it as we start to grow, because it was measured at a particular point in time when we had just launched, so we had that buzz around about launch. However, there is nothing from an agency perspective that gives me concern in that figure. That is reassuring. Audit Scotland said that there is a high risk, so you are clearly saying that there is not a high risk. Is there a medium risk or a low risk? A high risk of staff leaving? Of decline in morale, Audit Scotland said that, given the pressures on the agency because at that time the 30 per cent figure, I know that you have clarified that in December that is dramatically different, which is pleasing to hear. I guess that statement is based on the 30 per cent, so you are really saying that there is a much lower risk of morale decline. I think that much of what the Audit Scotland report rightly pointed out is what would happen if we did nothing from moving from the original benefits, the wave 1 benefits to the disability assistance benefits. If we did nothing and we did not recognise the challenges that we had coming up with the more complex benefits, then clearly there would be an issue with staff morale, and clearly we would have a concern about the resources. However, as the report also points out, we are doing a lot to ensure that we are stepping up. We have always recognised that there is a difference between the benefits that we are initially delivering. There are one-off payments, for example the best start grant, compared to disability assistance and carers assistance. That has been very clear right from the start to the Government, and that is exactly why Audit Scotland has recognised that we are putting measures in place to recognise that. I suppose that I would draw the committee's attention to the work that is already on going before Audit Scotland reported to step up to the challenges. That is why I am content with the fact that we are doing a challenging programme, but the staff that we have are working exceptionally hard on being supported in that work. Audit Scotland also said that there is a reliance on temporary and contractor staff, causing difficulties because they are difficult to recruit and experience staff. The issue around contract staff is an interesting one. We pay a very close attention to it, and I will perhaps bring Lisa in at one point on that as well. There will be challenges around certain areas of a large public service delivery, and we are delivering the largest change since devolution around some key skills. That is the same within the public sector full stop around particular skills that we have. How do we deal with that? We grow our own in effect. We have a digital academy within the programme to ensure that we are developing skills within the Scottish Government, and we continue to ensure that we are developing our recruitment to target those specific skills when we have to bring people in. There are also points where, to be frank, it makes sense to have contracting staff rather than a permanent member of the civil service because there will be very specific skills that we only need for a very short period of time. It would make absolutely no financial sense to have that person on a permanent contract through the civil service rather than through a contract. We need to look at when it is sensible to have contractor staff, and that is the right thing to do. We also need to make sure that we have everything in place that is required to develop our own skills and to ensure that we are doing all that we can to compete in. What is quite an challenging recruitment market in some way? I do not know if Lisa wants to add a little bit to that as well. It is unusually high. We always anticipated a high level of contractors in the programme for all those reasons that the cabinet secretary has said around the skills and bringing people in at the right time. It is certainly about testing and things like that. You will bring them in at periods of time when we need them. To have permanent members of staff in those roles, it would be remiss of me to be paying them for a whole 12-month period when you do not need to. You just need to pay them for spells. We are doing the best that we can. We are doing a lot of round recruitment. When we have contractors in, we are doing succession planning with the people that we have in. We are training up our own people to touch on the point of round morale. I think that we have a great team delivering the social security. I know that some of you came to visitors to look at what we were doing and you will have seen for yourselves the dedication of the people and the teams in there. That helps. We invest a lot in our people. We invest a lot in the training and development. We are not just sitting back and waiting for things to happen. We are going forward and proactively getting the job done. Thank you very much. Before I hand back to the convener, I apologise to the cabinet secretary that you did not get your opening statement. What I would propose is that the end of the questioning will leave some time and you can cover any issues that you feel that were not covered. Thank you. My apologies to witnesses in those following the committee. I had to get to deal with an urgent matter. I know that Jeremy Balfour had been keen to come in on this line of questioning. I imagine that it was a line of questioning that I thought it was going to be before I walked out of the room, but Jeremy Balfour—yes. I think that it is, convener. Good morning, cabinet secretary and everyone else. I have two quick questions to follow up on what you said. You said that the audit Scotland figure for the number was November last year and the set date was April for this year. That you would reach 100 per cent. Did you reach that 100 per cent figure by April? The staff number was for December. We were benchmarking that against the March 2018. I do not have the current vacancy rate to hand, but that may be because the mid-April one would be the last one that I would have, so the monthly rate at mid-April was 15 per cent. However, I can get further details on that if we have a more recent up-to-date figure now that the point that we are in may does not allow me to do that, but if I can get it, it is not in the briefing, I will get it to the committee. That would be very helpful. I suppose that the other area that the audit Scotland picked up in regard to that, which had concerns for me, was around the whole IT cyber work area, which is obviously particularly around data protection. We are dealing with people's data here, and there is, again, maybe a lack of able to bring in recruitment around this area. I just suppose how are you going to address that? Is it simply that we do not pay enough unless it is a very competitive market in this area and we have to pay more? Is it a purely financial issue that the private sector can pay more than the Government? Or is there something else underneath that that is causing problems around the IT recruitment? I will bring Andy in on that point as well. We have a challenge in the public sector around what the public sector pays compared to what the private sector pays, but the Government is looking quite inevitably at what can be done with that to recognise a certain skill set. It would be fair to say that we are being as innovative as we can be to ensure that we are recognising the fact that there are certain individuals who have certain skill sets where there is a very small supply and a very large demand for those people. That makes it challenging on this area. Some of the areas that Jeremy Balford has mentioned are those key skills that are in very short supply. That is why the digital academy is very important, but it will not solve all our issues by any minor means, because we are looking also for very experienced people to come in as well. That is why it has to be that blend of the digital academy, the use of contractors where necessary are being as innovative as we can within the public sector remit to encourage people. Andy Watt wants to say something particular about the very niche skills that come under his remit. If I can pick up the two points, one is about the whole cyber protection and the protection of citizen data. All the work that we have done from the outset has been secured by designers at the forefront of what we do. Everything that we have been doing from the outset in 2017, we have been working closely with the National Cyber Security Centre. On the subject of skills, we have been quite successful in the past 12-18 months in bringing the right skills to market, in from the market, from a variety of sources, public sector and private sector. Have we got all the people we want to get first time? No, we have not. We have had to complement some of those permanent skills with some contractor skills, but our campaigns of recruitment are relentless. We have been continuously recruiting. We have had a lot of success in the past 12 months. As the cabinet secretary has referenced, we are looking at a number of measures and methods within the civil service pay structure and the pay supplements, working with the head of digital profession to bring some flexibility, which gives us more tools at the point of appointment and recruiting staff into the organisation. We face the same challenges as everybody else does in the cyber world. There are shorter skills, there are more people coming out of universities that have been taken by the financial service sector, the private sector, but equally the public sector and our own programme is proving quite an attraction to a number of people who want to come into our programme, because this is a once-in-lifton opportunity to develop your skills and be part of something important. I suppose that one final question around the matter would be okay. Obviously, Government policy and your predecessor had indicated to the committee on quite a number of occasions that all 11 benefits would be over to the agency by 2021. You have made that clear that that is not going to be the case. Is that because of the IT issues? Is that something that came up when you took over as cabinet secretary that you realised that those 11 benefits could not be delivered by the social security agency? Obviously, your predecessor made some very firm commitments to the committee that all 11 benefits would be delivered by 2021 by the agency, so that is clearly not happening. Is that an IT issue? If so, when did that become on to your radar? When did you make the decision, as cabinet secretary, that there would be a change at a U-turn in Government policy? Cabinet Secretary, that is a totally valid question to ask, but I know that you are a part of the pre-meat, Mr Balfour, and there is some quite detailed questioning as the meeting goes on in relation to waive 1 and waive 2 benefits and what commencement and delivery actually means. I just think that, as a courtesy of other members who want to explore some of that, I should make that point to the cabinet secretary as well before the cabinet secretary answers that, because others were here for the pre-meat and have got lines of questioning in relation to that. Thank you, convener. What I will draw Mr Balfour's attention to is the Audit Scotland report that says that we are delivering the programme at a fast pace, and to do so any faster would not be possible when our first priority is safe and secure transition. The committee often quotes Audit Scotland reports to the Government. I would suggest that you read all of the Audit Scotland report, particularly in the sections where it is saying that if your first priority is safe and secure transition, we are moving at as fast a pace as possible. The second point that I want to make is that we will take responsibility for all the benefits in April 2020. There is no change to the Scottish Government policy and our implementation of when we will take full responsibility for those benefits. How we will deliver those benefits was detailed within my statement at the end of February. I am presuming from the convener's remarks that there will be further questions on that that I will be happy to take later. Absolutely, Mr Balfour. There is a structure and focus to the questioning that we have planned and it is not fair to other members for you to then come in and explore that in a question at this point. I want to go back to the issue around staffing, except that the question around is now a 15 per cent vacancy. However, I want to ask how that relates with the original estimate of £118 million for the programme, whereas you have a budget of £77.8 million. Did that mean that you had to revise your staffing levels down at that point? That is a significant budget difference. In which case, if it was a downward version and then the 15 per cent vacancy, I suppose that this is not an attack. It is trying to understand because we all know that actually implementing any digital system is really hard work and does require an enormous amount of skills. Therefore, pressure can come to bear and I know quite a few that I have talked to the people working on it and they are struggling, not because they are not capable, not because they do not want to deliver it, but because simply the number of bodies working on it and the skills needed are tight. Do you have to revise the number of bodies and that 15 per cent is on top of that? We have workforce planning in place that will ensure that the right people are in position at the right time. If there are changes to when those people are coming on board, then that might vary the financial arrangements at a particular time. We will keep a close eye on the budget overall for staffing. However, if I am correct, we are talking about the staffing cost implementation. Is staffing cost overall correct? As I understand it, the programme had estimated that it needed £118 million in 2019-20 but was allocated £77.8 million in the budget. You must have had to cut some savings from your estimate of what you were doing. I can explain the different reasoning behind those figures. My apologies, I thought that we were talking about the implementation cost. The reasons why the numbers changed for the budget was simply because this is a very fast-paced programme, so you are looking at what your estimates are at the beginning of the summer and they are constantly refined. That is why, when you get to the point where the budget sign-off is done, there will be a different number because this is not a static project. We are not talking about we have had to cut money back or we have had to not employ staff or change the way that we are implementing programmes. The more you look at, the closer you get and the more you look at and refine the levels of budgets, the estimate for what was required for that changed. That is the reason why the numbers went down from the initial summer estimates to when the budget was signed off, because we constantly refine our budgets. If there is a requirement for any further expenditure, that will be dealt with in the spring budget revision. The programme will be delivered as it is required to do. The reason why the budget changed is because, as Audit Scotland pointed out, we need to constantly refine our budgets and narrow down and ensure that we are being as detailed as possible on that. I should also put on the record the committee of our chance to consider the Audit Scotland report in short order. We have a rolling programme of budget scrutiny where we will return to those kind of matters throughout the year. I am very brief supple about that, Michelle. You are saying that you had revised down the number of people you needed and the 15 per cent vacancy. Is that simply on that? I am saying that we revised our budget assessments overall, which is not just staff. It is the entire requirements of the programme. At the beginning of the summer, we assessed the entire programme requiring a certain pot of money. By the time we refined that down when the budgets required to be signed off, it was a lower case. We did not change the number of people that were required for the programme because of financial issues. We were refining what the programme required in terms of staffing, in terms of states, in terms of IT, and we refined the budget from that. Clearly, we will need to come back to that. We need to come back to that. It might be helpful for clarity. There is a chicken and egg thing going on here, if you will excuse the analogy. Did the needs of social security Scotland and staffing levels require to dictate the budget, or did the budget dictate the staffing levels? The needs of the social security programme dictated the budget, and the budget is set on what we are required to do to deliver the programme. I do not know, Lisa, if I can add a little bit of detail to that, so that I can assist. The other thing to remember is that we are letting contracts to supporters in our delivery of Waith 2. It is only when those bids come in and we evaluate those bids that we know the level of resourcing that the suppliers bring with them. We have let two contracts so far. We have got another big contract that is still in train that we will let, but we have to adjust our staffing figures to match against those contracts because, obviously, the contracts will bring different levels of resource with them. That is how we adjust and we have to change that over time. That is how the staffing figures have been adjusted. In the committee with a chance to return to this when we look at the Audit Scotland report, thank you for that. The next line of questioning is from Sheila Robinson. Good morning. The Audit Scotland report, which I know we are going to come back to in more detail, did make a comment that there is still a substantial amount of complex work requiring to deliver the remaining Waith 1 benefits by the end of 2019. I just want to turn to that. First of all, I have a couple of specific questions. The general question is what still needs to be put in place before the remaining Waith 1 benefits can launch. What are the main things that need to be put in place? Well, for the Waith 1 benefits, we have the staff within programme and within agency that we require to deliver the rest of Waith 1, so it is purely now the delivery of that. The aspects within programme and agency are all too scheduled and working well to ensure that we will deliver. The agency, for example, has the staff now required to deliver the rest of the Waith 1 benefits. That recruitment is planned to ensure that the people are in and trained effectively right from day one, so we are in a good position for the delivery of the rest of the Waith 1 benefits. The complex work that Audit Scotland refers to has really, by and large, been undertaken. It is now about the implementation of that. For Waith 1, we have a great deal of work to continue to be ready for the Waith 2 benefits, for disability assistance, for carers and so on. That work is also already on-going. For example, as Lisa has pointed out, we have two of the three major contracts that are required for Waith 2. I had the pleasure of sitting down with some of the staff who are working on the digital portal last week when I was down at Victoria Quay, so that work is already well-entrained. We have completed the discovery phase for all the disability assistance packages. That discovery phase is the first part of the agile model that we use and is exceptionally important, because it is about ensuring that we are gathering the information in and we are listening to people about what they need from the system. All of that has already been done for Waith 2. In essence, this year, while you will see the go live of a number of benefits—I just saw one last week for best start grant early learning—there is already a great deal of work that is well-entrained for the disability assistance and carers assistance. I believe that some of the members may have talked through some of the details of that with programme colleagues when they were down at Victoria Quay. I have a couple of specifics. Last year, the Government consulted on regulations and a code of practice on investigating fraud in the Scottish social security system, which I think closed in October last year. Have you got a date of when the Government intends to lay the regulations on investigations and offences relating to that? We have a public consultation that is now closed, and we will have independent analysis of that. We will make sure that the agency will publish interim operating guidance for investigations shortly, setting out what powers investigation officers can do using existing information gathering powers. We aim to lay the revised set of regulations and a code of practice for investigations in the Parliament before summer, with those in place well in advance of the initial waive to benefits. Have you got a specific start date for the funeral expenses payments? As I understand, the announcement is likely to be on the same day that the benefit is commenced, is that right? We haven't announced a specific date, but as I said in an earlier question, we are on track for delivery for summer 2019. I should tell the committee today as well. I will write to you formally, but the name for that assistance will be the funeral support payment. That will be the name that the benefit will go under. We are still on track for that summer 2019 delivery. Because that is a replacement to a DWP, although with 40 per cent extended eligibility, it is important that we work extensively with stakeholders to build that in. There will be prior notice given to stakeholders, and we work exceptionally closely with the DWP on those areas around that go live date to ensure that, for example, if you phone up the DWP on the very first day that we have went live, the DWP will also provide the correct advice to guide to Social Security Scotland. That work with DWP and the work with stakeholders is well in train, as it was in work very successfully for the best start pregnancy and baby payments. Those wave 1 benefits are, of course, the first real test of the Scottish Government and the Scottish Social Security system. I see from my notes here that the best start early learning payments are open for application on 29 April. Last month, could you update the committee on how that is going, Cabinet Secretary? It is going exceptionally well, convener. The analysis that we have had so far ensures that we know that the systems are working with the agency and that it might bring in David to talk about what it has felt like for the staff and how that has been delivered within that. In terms of figures, there have been more than 11,000 applications for best start grant that were received in the week following launch. That best start grant will include the pregnancy and baby payments as well. The first applicants for the early learning payment have received their payments already. David can remind me about what the average is now for a steady state for pregnancy and baby. It is around 100 per day of the initial ones. We can assume that the vast majority of the 11,000 applications for the best start grant have indeed been for the early learning payment, but we will cleave a close eye on that. Obviously, as our statistics become more robust, we can break the figures down to who we are applying and for which grant. It has gone very successfully, both from an operational perspective and from the fact that people have now received their first payments. I should remind the committee that that is a brand new payment that was not available within the previous schemes within the DWP. David, do you want to say a little bit about what it has been like on that? Just to echo the comments of the cabinet secretary, it has gone incredibly smoothly in terms of a launch of a benefit. Some of that is the reasons that we have already discussed around incremental building of capacity. When we reflect back on what we did in December with the first payments, we were not just paying our first benefit. We were having our case management system launched on the same day. We were having our client channels in terms of telephony opened on the same day. When we opened for best start pregnancy payments back in December, there was a whole raft of infrastructure that had to go live at that same point. For the recent launch of the early learning payments, we have had people in post for a period of time now. They are familiar with the systems, they are familiar with dealing with our client groups. All that capacity has been built up over time. The launch on 29 April, although we are sitting here only a week and a half gone from that, is incredibly smooth in terms of what it feels like on the ground. We see that difference from a second benefit launch of far easier to plan for it out in terms of how people feel about it, but with the same energy of making first payments as well. I am no doubt that we might touch on lessons learned and things at that later in the session, so I can say a little bit more about that. Hold on to that thought, because I have one final question, but it is not on that. That question might come up fairly shortly. My notes seem to be that there is an anticipation in the Scottish Jumps Committee throwing out the funeral expenses assistance or support grant, as it is going to be called by the end of the year, best start foods and the young carers grant by the end of this year. That is still a bit away, so there is a bit of flexibility around the launch date for that, but I see the best start grant for school payments opens for applications and dunes. That is an imminent deadline. Is that fully finalised? Are you confident that that will work well? Do you have any projections in uptake in relation to that? Yes, it is working well. There are no concerns from programme or from agency perspectives about the next delivery. Those are still challenging projects to land, and I want to pay tribute to all the staff who work particularly on that weekend, and the go live point is a particularly interesting time within social security, but they deliver it exceptionally well and with great professionalism within that. We are absolutely on track for that June delivery of the school age and for the funeral support payment within the summer and the young carers grant as well. All those projects at this point are on time and are giving me no concerns. By definition, households would rather have more money rather than less money, so those would be good things. However, how does the Scottish Government measure the impact of the additional money that individuals or households will be getting? It is a fairly confident assertion that this is a good thing to give if you like vulnerable income households additional support. However, how do you measure the impact rather than just saying that this will help below income or vulnerable households? There are two aspects of that. It is too early to be able to measure that at the moment, so I go with the anecdotal evidence that I pick up for when I am out speaking to individuals that are helping us to deliver those benefits. I was particularly struck by one lady that I spoke to in Glasgow, who talked about how she had been unable to take up a place for her child at nursery because she could not afford some of the necessities around outdoor wear and plumesoles and so on. That was the barrier for her to be able to take up a free place within her local nursery. At that point, she was luckily to be helped by a charity, but the payment that has been set up within early years, in the future, would give someone with those concerns as a family the reassurance that they can take the same opportunities as other young people would be able to take. Obviously, we will build on that anecdotal evidence within the work that is in my colleague Eileen Calmo's portfolio when we are talking about tackling child poverty, for example, to be able to see the difference that that makes. I think that that would be helpful to capture that in a structured fashion. I think that the committee would appreciate that. Mark Griffin, I want to ask how the experience of launching the carers allowance supplement and both payments so far of best dark grant is then informing your plans as we go forward to further benefits? We take very seriously the aspects around lessons learned. There has been a great deal of work that has gone into ensuring that we learn all those lessons. That has been work that is carried on not just within programme but also working very closely with the programme and agency together. At the end of the day, the programme hands over to the agency and needs to work seamlessly. It has also been important to point out that we have done joint lessons learned aspects with DWP. Indeed, I had the opportunity to have that presented to me in a joint presentation, which again shows how we are a joint programme with the DWP. Both are taking very seriously those lessons learned aspects. In terms of what we can reflect on from that, we do not just learn lessons from the carers allowance supplement and the best start grant, but we also have taken a lot of time to learn lessons from other public sector projects as well, both within the DWP and Scottish Government. I give some examples—colleagues may want to touch on other examples in particular, but I will give a couple examples of how we have dealt with the improvements. For example, there is a clear eligibility around residency criteria on the application form. There are a very significant number of applications that we were getting in for the best start grant that were not from people in Scotland. We therefore had to adapt that. We have taken a revised approach to our external communications planning, increasing capacity and capability, particularly in testing roles, for example in technical roles. The use of the model office, which has been complemented by Audit Scotland, has been an exceptionally positive one and one that we are continuing to build on. We take very seriously the lessons learned for a go live, but it is also inherently built into the programme to ensure that we are developing those lessons learned at a programme level, not just waiting for a go live point, but a continuous improvement. However, I wonder whether colleagues want to point on some other lessons learned that I have not touched on so far. As well as a couple of other lessons learned from the get-go, we did a lot of work around looking across Government, both in the private sector and the public sector, around good lessons learned for major programmes. Our initial investigations showed that anything that we do has to be based on what the customer wants. Again, for any of you guys that have visited us, you know that it is based on a lot of user research, we use the experience panels. One of the biggest things for us was actually making sure that we are delivering a service that actually meets the people of Scotland's needs, what they want, and building on that. One of the main things for me, yes, we did learn a lot from our go live weekends, so they can be quite challenging. However, again, we put improvements in place. We have a very robust information centre that we have controls in place, and our chief digital officer plays a very active role in managing us through go live, again, from the lessons learned that we learned from the carers allowance and best start grant. You touched on that figure of just how high the number of applications came from non-Scottish post codes, and I guess that is essentially a complement of how well publicised the payment was and how well the Government did in getting that message out. It was over 10 per cent of applications. Just what extent did that clog up the system as you launched that first payment, and what is the change now that makes that more streamlined and hopefully will take less staff time to process Scottish applications? It is as simple as ensuring that we live in Scotland, and that is being right at the start. It is not something that we clearly have to test eligibility, but it is perhaps not something that we thought we would have to really point that out astringently as we did. The 10 per cent figure, as you say, was higher than anticipated. Obviously, with a go live of a new type of benefit that we had put a great deal of work into encouraging take-up, you are going to get people applying who might not quite be eligible, who might not quite understand the eligibility, and that is one of the challenges as we develop new things to ensure that we are getting that communications right. That is one of the areas, as I said, that we are constantly trying to learn from, is how we make that more apparent right from the start. I do not know if David wants to pick up some of the comments around just the sheer level of applications that came in that were far higher than anyone anticipated, including Scottish Fiscal Commission forecasts that did not anticipate anything like the first couple of weeks. I know that I have done this a couple of times already, but I make no apology for doing so. Again, the agency staff who dealt with that were to be absolutely commended for how they picked up that, because it was a huge gargantuan effort to be able to deliver that. The times for delivering a payment were, of course, slightly longer than we would have liked. I hope that that is understandable, given the level of applications that we had in, but the staff dealt with it in a tremendous way. Again, I hope that the committee is reassured by the fact that the agency had contingency plans in place to ensure that it could pick up, even over a Christmas and New Year period, to be able to deal with the challenges on the application backlog. I would like to say just a little bit more on that. Linking those two things together, one of the big lessons learned, I think, for the agency and our advisory body was particularly interested in it was that profile of applications. After the December launch, we did a lot of work with our analysts around that profile. For the recent launch of the early learning payment, we were effectively, that profile was modelled into it, so that expectation that we would have a surge of applications in the early days and weeks and then it would tail off into normality. That is part of the reason why the April launch has been smooth, because that is effectively the profile of applications that we have been expecting. As the cabinet secretary was saying, again, in terms of people who are not resident in Scotland, that is something that we have had lots of conversations about how we can manage that better, some of it is communications, but as a direct result of that, the application now looks different. The correct decision was saying that we cannot stop people applying, legislatively we cannot stop people applying through the process, but the warning, as it were up front, about your likely chance of eligibility if you are applying from a non-Scottish postcode, is now front and centre of that application process. However, it demonstrates that we are able to take the feedback that we are getting on the ground and play that directly back into the system. Just again, building on that lessons learned from that very activity, so what we have done and what we did for the early years is we put in place more robust performance testing, so we tested the system for the unprecedented volumes. If we were to get unprecedented volumes in the future, then we have a system that can stand up to those volumes. For the early years, we put a throttle in our system, so again, if the volumes were so unprecedented that we did not know, we could control those into the system so that we could ensure that the system does not fall over. Why 13 per cent of best art applications took longer than 21 days to process? Is that purely down to the volume? Is that a figure that you would expect to come down over time? Part of it will be volume with the other aspect of it, although the system itself automatically can check for evidence whether a person is pregnant and so on through the register for the baby box. There will be some points, if that is not available, where we will require more information from the individual applicant. Again, I do not see that as a challenge if the cases are being held open for the right reason. The other alternatives that we could have done that might have made the figures look slightly better would be to close the application. You have not given us the right evidence, so we are not going to process it and your application is now closed, so you would have to reapply. However, we keep the application open and there is discussion with the applicant about what they are required to bring to be able to give us the right evidence. That is the other reason why a case may take longer, because we are attempting to assist the applicant to gather the evidence to ensure. For the vast majority of cases, that is not required, because it is automatic, but for the cases that it does, we make sure that we keep the application open and assist the client rather than closing them down. Finally, I just ask about any regional variance that has been on applications to best start, whether there are any areas of the country that are particularly high and perhaps other areas that might have been lower than expected? What is your view on the picture across the whole country? It is a really important point. We are very pleased with the take-up overall of best start grant, but that does not mean that we are just sitting back and congratulating ourselves on a programme that is well delivered. There are regional variations to the amount of applications that are coming in, or the applications that are coming in and then being processed to a payment. We see other regional variations in terms of that there are a lot of people that are applying that might not be eligible. All of that is getting looked at to ensure that we need to do more work around take-up in particular areas, if we have challenges in particular areas. The information that we have published last week on the regional variations was a very important and big starting point to allow us to be able to analyse it, tease that out and work with our local delivery leads to see what more can be done around local communications and so on to pick up those variances. The other aspect we will look at very closely is different demographics within a region to ensure that we are perhaps reaching difficult to reach parts of our community that may not usually seek the benefit payments that they are entitled to. Alison Johnstone, I am correct in saying that it was this theme that you are hoping to ask questions. To Alison Johnstone, I have a note for a supplementary for yourself. I would like to ask on that paper that was published last week, one of the other lessons learned was the need to build in contingency to financial planning. I would like to understand what has been done to ensure that financial planning is robust and to understand what progress has been made in improving the data that is available for making forecasts of demands, not only for best start grant, which we have been focused on this morning, but also for all the other Scottish benefits. On the aspect around forecasting initially, it is very difficult to forecast for new benefits in particular, so our analysts do tremendous work to forecast to the best of our abilities. Obviously, we receive the forecast from the Scottish Fiscal Commission, which we have to use for our budgetary analysis. The best start grant success will ensure that we might need to revise those forecasts up. I do not consider that a bad thing in the slightest, because we had anticipated greater take-up than perhaps the Fiscal Commission had. However, it is very challenging to forecast for a new benefit, a new payment and particularly when we are changing eligibility and how much we are attempting to encourage take-up. We will look at that closely. The Scottish Fiscal Commission is due, I think, in May to take out other forecasts on that as well. It is looking at that very seriously, too. I should stress the point that those are demand-led budgets, so if people apply and they are eligible, they will receive the money to which they are entitled. There is recognition going forward for this Parliament that we are taking on more and more demand-led budgets that are difficult to forecast. That will be challenging for both the Government and the Parliament as we analyse budgets in future years. I hope that that answers the question around the forecasting. In terms of finance, I will perhaps bring Kevin in a little bit to talk about the lessons learned that we have done within finance as well. That is obviously something that Audit Scotland did point to, but I go back to the point that, before Audit Scotland had reported, we had already commissioned an independent review of the finance team. We have ensured, for example, that we have separated the social security programme and the agency finance functions. Again, we recognise and we are taking that step change. We have recruited and have imposed finance team leaders, and we are ensuring that we have specific improvement activities that are planned and on-going to ensure that we look at any gaps that we still have. We are working very closely with Audit Scotland following on. Those are a flavour of what we have already put in place to deal with the step change that we are now looking at as we move to wave 2. I do not know if Kevin wants to touch on a little bit more of the detail now. I can add a bit more depth and colour to the cabinet secretary's answer there. For me, when it comes to our finance capability and enhancing our arrangements for wave 2, it comes down to people and process. We have already taken steps to enhance the people structure in the finance team, so we have experienced team leaders in the three key areas of financial planning, financial control and management reporting. Those team members will be developing our capability in those areas. As far as process is concerned, it is important to recognise that, on the programme, we are refreshing the programme business case for wave 2. We already have a number of project and product level business cases on the programme that supports investment decisions around IT and service design on an ongoing basis. To pick up on the point about contingency, in our business cases, when we are making investment decisions, we make sure that we apply the appropriate level of optimism bias as per the guidance in the HM Treasury green book to make sure that investment decisions are fully taken into account the uncertainties that they are in. As business cases and projects progress through the project lifecycle, we manage down the level of optimism bias as requirements become more certain. It is also important to note that this is an agile programme of delivery, and therefore there are inherent uncertainties around budgeting, but by working closely with colleagues on the programme, we can manage those in the usual way. I want to pick up on pulling together some of those threads around your CMS, because that is the core component of digital delivery. I understand that, when the contract was let to IBM, the idea was that there would be a phase transfer of those skills and that underpinning knowledge so that you could run it within the programme. However, at the time of the Audit Scotland report, that had not happened due to the resource shortages. That is obviously going to impact going forward if that does not happen because the CMS was pretty basic, was it not, when it started out and needs developing to deliver. I just wondered where you are with that and what lessons have been learned in the last year or so around that. I will let Andy pick up on that point, but can I absolutely say that the CMS system is not basic? It is absolutely fit for purpose. No, it has not started out as basic. It has started out as absolutely fit for purpose as required for Wave 1 benefits and is delivering well on that. It is the foundation to what we are delivering for Wave 2, but I do not want in any way for the committee to have the impression that this is not fit for purpose or does not do exactly what it needs to do for Wave 1. It does exactly what it needs to do for the benefits that we are delivering at the moment. It is one of the key areas that we will build on for Wave 2, but I will let Andy pick up on the detail point of that. On the subject of resources, the CMS system is a product that has been used elsewhere in the UK and in Europe and around the world. We have been recruiting skills in that space now for some 15 to 16 months. We are making steady progress in that area. We still have a mixture of contractor and permanent service in that space, but we continue to grow our capability. We are still working alongside IBM and we are gradually taking the back and forth from them on an on-going basis. We will continue to revisit our skills in light as we close out for Wave 1 and we are already modelling and increasing our capability as we look into Wave 2 because the product will be extended further for Wave 2, but at this stage, as with all skillsets in digital space, there is a challenge to recruit digital skills across the UK and across the globe. This has happened to be one of the niche areas, but we have not reached a point where we cannot find the skills and we are certainly doing an awful lot of work growing those skills internally in the civil service. We are doing some work with CodeClone, one of the Scottish Government's and joint public sector initiatives to bring some skills into the programme and into my division in the coming months. Do you anticipate that we will be able to take full control of the CMS in terms of its management and development going forward? I do. My aim is that my division will be able to move into the agency at some point in the future and that whole digital command will underpin age to operations. My view is that we will own the running of that CMS for the lifetime of the product. The software that underpins it is on a maintenance programme anyway, but in terms of the technical skills that we need to run it, our aim is that we will ultimately own the entire control of that solution. Right. Do you have any timetable for that? Until we close out way 2 and we have reached the end of the programme and we know exactly on all the benefits that are delivered and we know exactly what we need to take it into a steady state, our numbers are still quite fluid, but at the moment we are keeping up with demand from the programme in terms of what the programme and the suppliers need on the ground, and that current supplier is IBM for way 1. Thank you. Okay, but if you supplement your question, Keith Brown, my apologies to Jeremy Balfour. We need to move through the various themes that we are going to be asking questions on this morning, and we will run out of time. Keith Brown? I suppose that that kind of covers a number of areas, and it's about really context. We've had a quite entertaining view of people that never wanted this Parliament to have these powers complaining that they're not being used quickly enough, fairly regularly, which is interesting, but I just wonder in the context of, say, universal credit, and also a different scale. I mean, I think I first heard mention of it about 2011-12, and yet it's only rolled out, in fact it's still having major changes, but last year, compared to some of the benefits that you're now delivering, best start was mentioned earlier on. Can you just give us a bit of context on, you know, timing? It seems to me it's been done pretty quickly, although smaller benefits compared to some horrendous mistakes that we've made elsewhere. It's been interesting to know the context. What is very important that we do have context to hear to see what has been delivered within the period of time since the act was passed by the Parliament only a year ago and since the agency opened its doors on the beginning of September, it is also very important to recognise within that context, and we have alluded to it at different points, particularly from a question answered by David Wallace. We didn't just start an agency and deliver payments. What we did was establish the foundations for the delivery of the rest of the social security programme, so it's simply not just that we have delivered best start grant within a very short period of time. We're already saying that being exceptionally successful. We're moving forward with benefits this year that will ensure that by the end of 2019, we will be delivering seven benefits, so that's by the end of 2019. It's about 18 months after a bill was passed by this Parliament, and we're doing so at a pace that is challenging, which is a fast pace in which Audit Scotland says, is as fast as you can go if you want to hold very dearly to safe and secure, which of course we do. I take very seriously the lessons that we've got to learn from where projects have not gone well down south or elsewhere when unrealistic timeframes are set. The people who suffer from that and the politicians are the people who rely on those payments to come forward. That is why safe and secure is absolutely integral to everything that we do, because I will not risk the payments for some of our most vulnerable in society simply to push the programme faster than it can go. The context is very important, and that is the point of the fact that we have an agency that is up and running, and we have the systems that are in place that are the foundation for what we will go on before. We haven't just delivered, although I think that it is, what we have delivered within that year, but we've also set very strong foundations in place in terms of IT, in terms of fraud, in terms of the case management system. All of that has now been tested and are working successfully in standards in good stead as we build on them for Wave 2. You've mentioned some of the ways already that you've been co-operating with the UK Government of the DWP. I'm keen to know how that works in more detail. Obviously, Audit Scotland has been alluded to and Audit Scotland has said that you've done well to implement what you have implemented in time available, but it has also said that the programme and the agency will be reliant on the DWP for a number of years. I wonder if you could say a bit more about how that relationship works and what the challenges are. The DWP and the agency will be reliant on each other on-going because we share clients now. The simple fact that the matter is this joint programme, once the programme is complete, we will rely on the DWP and they will rely on us to be able to provide information and assistance to people in our own areas, but to ensure that, where we share clients, we do that effectively. I perhaps bring Lisa in to talk about some of the work on an on-going basis with DWP. I will have, as the committee knows, my fall-outs with the DWP in a number of policy areas, but on the programme and our work around the devolution of benefits, we have a very good working relationship with the DWP, particularly its devolved benefits team. The challenges sometimes come when we are dealing with the rest of the DWP because it is such a massive organisation that, clearly, not everybody's first priority in the DWP is the devolution of benefits. Sometimes we rely on the wider DWP and that might be where some of the challenges come. However, I go back to the point that, on a day-to-day basis, that work is going on exceptionally well and there are very good relationships with the programme and the agency now that it has gone live as well. I go back to the example that I gave earlier on when we did a joint lessons learned over best start grant. There were not two camps that sat there and tried to lay the blame for anything. There was an absolutely joint commitment to how we learn from this to go on forward to which everyone recognises are the more complex benefits. I hope that that gives the committee some flavour of how there is genuinely good working going on on a day-to-day basis, and, by our basis, most times, to ensure that that is going on. However, I do not have the least I want to talk about some of the teams that are set up and how that works in practice to again just give that a little bit reassurance about how, as I say, we will have our disagreements at a political level but at a development level for the programme. I think that it is going well. I would reiterate what the cabinet secretary is saying. We have joint project teams with DWP, we have joint plans, we have joint risks in terms of lessons learned, some of the things that we have been doing. I hate the word, but it is called pre-mortem. Before we have a go live, we work closely with DWP to see what might happen, what could go wrong, how are we going to fix that if something goes wrong, what does that joint working look like. The relationship official level and running themes throughout the teams are really strong. We have similar relationships in the IT space. This is not us in Scotland taking those benefits and then not having a relationship with DWP. We have to have an ongoing relationship. Our systems will continually need to talk to each other in the future, so it is absolutely essential that we maintain those relationships and keep working together well. If you hate the word pre-mortem, I believe that the target calls it anti-mortem. Can I ask about the relationships that you have described there? Obviously, you have a carers allowance agency agreement. What coming out of that will inform future agency agreements around other things? Are there things that you have learned from that process that you would want to inform future agency agreements? The agency agreement was put in place over the carers allowance to ensure that we got money into people's pockets as quickly as possible. If we had not done an agency agreement with the DWP, we would have had to wait to increase carers allowance until we had designed, built and went live on a system. The agency agreement was critical to ensuring that we could move very quickly. Indeed, it was the first thing that the agency did was to pay out towards carers, which was an important priority for the Government. When we are looking at agency agreements in particular, we will look to use them going forward. One of the underlying core principles of the agency agreements, which it is important to remember, is that the delivery costs are met. The costs of an agency agreement will affect the DWP's actual delivery costs. If we did not have an agency agreement with the DWP to pay carers allowance, the agency would have to have that delivery cost instead. It is prohibited that, from the DWP, we make a profit on agency agreements to ensure that we are getting fairness and value for money. The agency agreements will be a part of the way that we will deliver. It ensures that we have an incremental build-up to delivery. Again, that is something that is important to ensure safe and secure transition. Those are agency agreements that have been used not just by this administration but by previous administrations when the cases have arisen that they have been required and, indeed, by other devolved Governments elsewhere in the UK. Those are a normal part of Government. We will use them only when required and when it ensures that we will deliver on a wider commitment to a safe and secure transition on an incremental basis. Finally, perhaps something more specific. That is about universal credit and progress and discussions that you are having around some of the areas around the implementation of split payments and so on. I wonder if you have any comments on that. We are absolutely determined to deliver on split payments, but we are absolutely dependent on the DWP changing its IT systems to be able to do that. It is not something that I can ask the agency to do and get the programme to fix for me. This is something that must be delivered by the DWP because universal credit remains a reserved benefit, so it has to be done in that way. Where we have got to at this point is that we have worked through our policy proposals and are now working with the DWP to see what that will look like in reality to determine what changes they would require to make to their IT systems and what that will look like from then. We furnished the committee with the two policy proposals that we went to DWP with, that we asked them to do an option brazel on and to test out. We are working with the DWP to hopefully come to an agreement on where we feel that we are still absolutely achieving our policy requirement of split payments and that the DWP believes is implementable through their systems. Once we have reached that stage with the DWP, we will report back to the committee and to Parliament on how that is going. I cannot put a time frame on that at the moment because, again, it is a joint project, but officials are meeting regularly to work through that at this point. It is good to hear that there is a good working relationship with officials at a DWP level and a distinguish between policy decisions that are made by either Government or decisions that are made by the most senior echelons of DWP from time to time. Those at the coalface are doing the heavy lifting. I, like Jeremy Balfour, when I went to Victoria Key, were told by some of your officials, cabinet secretary, that some of the DWP systems are quite antiquated. It is not a case of a skills shortage. It is a case of the folk who develop those systems at that time who are no longer around. You have to teach a new generation of skilled individuals how those skills were in the late 70s and early 80s. It is that kind of context that you are working in. The reason why I mention that is because, on wave 2 benefits, there has to be a really close working relationship, particularly in relation to commitments in terms of disability assistance. Now, I have had reassurances in writing previously, cabinet secretary, from yourself in relation to disability assistance. I asked for them again from the First Minister yesterday at the convener's group meeting, and it seems like duplication, but I think that it is important, given how carefully those disability benefits are following progress at a Scottish level, that you put some of those aspects on the record again this morning. The position of the Scottish Government is that, by spring 2021, the final disability assistance benefit for those of working-age adults is that new claims will go through a Scottish social security system and assessment process. I am assuming that I am hoping that you confirm again today that that is on track. However, just as important is that, back to those DWP systems in talking to Social Security Scotland, that, as we hit spring 2021, anyone in DLA or PIP currently who looks if they are going to be invited to a reassessment process under DLA or PIP, that will trigger something between DWP systems and Social Security Scotland systems to say, no, that reassessment will not take place. Those individuals will migrate over to the new Scottish social security system, and whether or not there needs to be an assessment, we will put that to one side for a second. The important thing is that those individuals, our constituents who are looking at these developments, will be dealt with under a Scottish social security system from spring 2021 and not under a UK DWP system. I think that is the assurance that we are looking for. I will ask them again for a third time, because people keep asking me that it is important to get that information out of their cabinet secretary. I can confirm unsurprisingly that what the First Minister said at the convenience group was absolutely correct. We are on track with our delivery for new claims, but we are also taking very, very seriously our requirements around case transfer. We are looking within case transfer to ensure that we have some kind of key principles that underpin that case transfer process. One of the most obvious ones, certainly to the Government, but we are open to if there are other requirements as well, is anyone who is about to come up for a review or a reassessment that people will move over to the social security system up here in Scotland. That requires joint working with the DWP to ensure that there is a trigger of, rather than someone going for a review or an assessment, that trigger will be transferred up. The other aspect around the transfer, which I think is very, very important, is that we will keep the individual closely involved and informed in what is happening to their case, so that they will be told when their case will be transferred. That will be explained to them that does not involve a reapplication to a new benefit, as will be required for people moving on to universal credit, that we will transfer their case over and that they will then be told when that case transfer is complete. It is very, very important to realise that, as we talk about large numbers and how we do that on a technical aspect, that we are talking about people who have had very bad experiences of the benefit system in the past. That may be a time that will cause them concern. It is our responsibility to take that concern away on any anxiety and reassure them that they will be transferred and, in particular, to ensure that there is no reassessment from the DWP. I think that you are quite right, convener, and I would just highlight the point that dealing with the DWP system is challenging, because there is not actually one DWP system. There are many DWP systems that some talk to each other better than others, some have been around for longer than others, and that makes it exceptionally challenging because we are not trying to get the agency to link in to one DWP system, but we are, for some of the benefits in particular, getting the agency to link in to various DWP systems, some of which do not talk that well to each other. Never mind a brand new agency that we are establishing. That is a particular challenge. It is one that the DWP are very aware of as they go through, but it makes the process of this unpicking a little bit of the benefits system and putting it up in Scotland exceptionally more complicated than if you were to have a wholesale change in a benefits system. That is helpful. It is important that the Scottish Government keeps strong communication in relation to the progress in time table for disability assistance, because there are high expectations out there across Scotland. We could get a bit of detail in relation to some of the progress that has been made. What is the progress with the detailed design, development and testing for disability assistance for children and young people? We would pick that one, because that is going to be launched in just over a year's time. If you like that, that is the first target of the Scottish Government. Where is progress in relation to that? There is a great deal of progress that is already well under way. As I have said to the committee, two out of the three major contracts for WAV2 have already been let. I have referred to those who will be working on the digital portal. That is an important aspect of it, for example, because it is the first time that you will be able to apply for disability assistance online. That will go through exceptionally rigorous testing, as all our application forms and online applications do, to ensure that we are getting that right for the individual. The digital portal work is already well under way. When I met the team last week, we went through some of the information to ensure that we are picking up the right information in the right way, building on the lessons learned that we already have for WAV1. It is also important to stress, as I have already, that we have already done the discovery phases for all three benefits for disability assistance. That is absolutely integral, because learning the lessons from the way that other benefits have been brought in at a UK level, it is important that you find out what the system needs to do and what the people require of it before you begin building it. That does not mean that it is all set in stone, but it certainly gives you a far better starting point than not doing that. Those discovery phases are already complete for that, and that is given as a very good sound basis for moving on to the next phase of delivery. Obviously, the first one of those will be child daily. We would point out from an agency perspective that we have already looked and started recruitment for the decision makers for the initial disability assistance, which, as you point out, will be the children and young people. That gets to the beef of the line of questioning, because we want to make sure that the systems are okay, we want to make sure that there is migration of information, we want to make sure that the clever bits behind the scenes do what they have to do, but it is about the policy intent of the Scottish Government and the Scottish Social Security Service and the difference that it is supposed to make. I am aware that you have sent a series of position papers to this committee when you outlined the timetable for delivery of benefits, and one of those was in relation to terminal illness and the changes in relation to that. What progress have you been making in relation to developing clinical guidance for a session where there are terminal illness rules to apply? In other words, for that immediate and lifetime and long-term awards, other than under the current UK system, where there is a lot of deep dissatisfaction? There has been extensive consultation that has been on-going, and I know that it is an area where the committee showed a great deal of understandable interest as the bills went through. The aspect that we have got to at the moment is taking that overall consultation and discussion around the act and then moving on to how we develop that in practice. The chief medical officer established two groups to support that work. The short-life working group on terminal illness for disability assistance is responsible for developing the guidance for registered medical professionals to be able to make those clinical judgments about terminal illness. A reference group was established as well compromising wider stakeholders. That work then led to draft guidance, which went out to managed consultation. That consultation closed on 19 April. We will now move to a point where the responses to that will again be looked at by the CMO, the short-life working group, the reference group and so on, before we move to publishing the complete guidance. That will of course be well entrained by the time where we have to deliver the first disability assistance packages for children and young people. I anticipate a role for the committee in relation to being aware. We want to make sure that clinicians are confident in how to apply that guidance. We want to make sure that the wider society out there who were really pretty clear that things had to change and how decisions around benefits and terminal illnesses were made had to happen. We obviously want to assure ourselves that that is going well. When would this committee get a flavour? I welcome the information that you have laid out on how that process is happening, but when would this committee get to see a lot more detail in relation to that? Certainly when we get to the point of publishing the guidance, that will be made available to the committee. I am sure that the committee will take great interest in that. I would be happy to answer detailed questions at that point on that guidance in particular. I apologise, and other members want to come in. I think that I have a Keith Brown next, but there are some technical questions that we just have to ask around a couple of things as well in relation to this. Is there any further detail available for the policy to make an additional payment to carers of more than one disabled child from spring 2021, such as, for instance, the amount of payment and eligibility? Do we try to get that greater detail in relation to those wave 2 entitlements? Certainly. I cannot give detail at the moment on that, because we are working through that internally. It is one of the areas that we will have to work on very quickly, but it is a programme that works at pace, and therefore we are still working through the detail of that policy at the moment. However, it is absolutely our plan to deliver the additional payments to people who care for more than one disabled child for that to be on track for delivery in early 2021. We will, of course, provide the committee stakeholders with a wider interest on the detail of our thoughts on that in due course, once that is a point to be able to take that out to wider consultation. I will focus on that, because, of course, we want to look at the details of that and amend our work programme accordingly to make sure that we can do due diligence and scrutiny around that. Finally, if some people of pension age are to receive a DLA under the administration of the Social Security Scotland, what appeal rights—we will look at appeals processes before in this committee—what appeal rights provision for change of circumstances, terminal rules and rules will apply? We do not know. The hope from this committee is that the new system in Scotland will be more robust, more fair, more humane, more responsive—all of those things. That does not mean that everyone is always going to get a positive outcome when they go through assessment processes, so the appeals process has to be very robust, open transparent and supportive of those making appeals. What kind of update can you give us around that? We are absolutely committed to ensuring that those cases are transferred over smoothly for the clients involved. We are committed to honouring the current awards at the point of transfer and that no one in receipt of the DLA over age 65 will be worse off for the result of their case being transferred to Scotland. We will, of course, need to make provisions, for example, for changes of circumstances and appeal rights and ensure that they are applied consistently with other forms of disability assistance. We are also keen to ensure that people who are in receipt of DLA for the over 65 are regarded as terminally ill and who are not in receipt of the highest rates will receive higher awards from the point that they transferred to the Scottish Government. I understand from constituents who have been in touch with me that there is a draft guidelines that are out for consultation at the moment, particularly at the moment where the medical profession is. Will the committee be able to take evidence from you and your officials on the draft guidelines, or will they only be on the guidelines once they are about to be implemented? I think that there may well be input that the committee would want to give around the draft guidelines. I am just wondering when the consultation comes to the end, may time, so when would it be appropriate for the committee to be able to have you back to ask you on those things? I will certainly take that back and look at when that can be most usefully done. What perhaps might be useful is if we go past the point of the closure of the consultation and ensure that the short-life working group and the reference group have also had an opportunity to feed back on their thoughts. We are further down the line on those aspects, but I will be happy to get back to the committee on the finer details of if we have a time frame for when that would be, to be able to see where that would fit to allow the committee to do its workforce planning better. If that is agreeable to Jeremy Balfour, I will get back on the specifics on that point. That is a really important question, Jeremy Balfour. Essentially, I think that what you are saying is how can this committee—well, we want to speak things go very well, but how can this committee have a weather check on that before everything is signed, sealed and delivered so that we can have a point of influence? I think that that is the underlying point that has been made, which would be very helpful, Cabinet Secretary. Thank you, Keith Brown. Just very briefly, you mentioned before, Cabinet Secretary, about how the principles have been safe and secure underpin your approach. In your statement that you made recently to the chamber, you talked about being pragmatic about those things. I wonder if that is the underlying philosophy around the approach that you are taking to severe disabling allowance being a closed benefit, instead of assuming a power or exercising a power directly just for the sake of it? That is what underlies the approach of entering into an agency agreement to deliver this, given that it is a closed benefit. Is that what you are thinking? Certainly, that is a busy programme. Therefore, it is important that we prioritise the areas where those with lived experience of the system feel are the areas of greatest concern. The most obvious one for that would be around the application and reassessment process within disability assistance. It is not the only one, but it is certainly one of the major aspects around that. When we look at severe disabling allowance, there have been no calls for the Government to make changes to that. It is a closed benefit. It has been closed for a considerable amount of time, I think, from memory 18 years. It is a very small and declining number of people. We are talking about a small couple of thousand people on it. If those people thought that there was a requirement for change, of course we would take that on. It is not that it is a small number that is preventing us from doing it. It is more that there is no call for this Government to make any changes to it. We have a benefit that has been closed for some time. Indeed, it has been closed for new applicants since 2001. We have a benefit that no one is asking to make any changes to. We have another wave of benefits that people are asking us to make a great deal of changes to. The priority for me is that aspect. It is pragmatic to say and to be sensible about the fact that my priority is around where people want to see change. Now, I am not closed to looking at this. If material comes back from the disability assistance that does flush out—it has not done in the past, but if it does flush out people are looking for changes, then of course we will look at that. The reason that we are doing the longer-term agency agreement for severe disability allowance is because people are not asking for change. I will focus on the areas where people are looking for that change. Pauline McNeill It is a question again on wave 2 benefits. Cabinet Secretary will be aware that industrial injuries and disabled benefits are to be replaced with employment injury assistance starting what on 22. It is one of the benefits that the committee made aware of at the very beginning that a lot of the information is helped by paper, but I am sure that I was surprised about it. It is not available electronically, so that is going to be tricky, but more concerning is that the UK Government receives special advice and they have a panel, and they are saying that that panel is only going to be open to UK ministers. My questions are around what you are thinking about and the timescale for more detailed policy development. Would you try to do that in Scotland? Would you go back to UK ministers and say that you would be much better given a specialist advice if you could tap into what you are receiving? That is the benefit that sits in clinical storage, and that presents particular challenges because we are starting from scratch about a package to be able to deliver that. The other challenge with that benefit in particular is that there is a great deal that impacts on the benefit that stays reserved. Issues such as employment, insurance, occupational health and safety clearly prevent the Scottish Government from introducing any statutory changes in those areas. That is the context of what we are looking at. That is not a closed benefit, however, like the SDA, so we are looking to develop our own system up here in Scotland because it is a live benefit, but it will require the Government to deal with those complexities. I point out to one of those issues that, based on the Scotland Act, we cannot refer to the current expert committees on that. It will therefore take us a longer delivery time because we will have to tease out the complexities of that system. Once we get that process done, we can then look at whether we need to have a similar structure up here in Scotland or what is the best way of doing it. We need to get the policy right and to look at the changes that people are requiring and asking us to be made on that. I go back to the fact that that is very different because it is an area where people are looking for change, but there is not one voice that is looking for one particular area. We have different stakeholders asking for different changes. On that basis, it will be something that we will look to do up here in Scotland, but it will require us to work through those complexities and challenges before we make any changes to the system and before it is delivered by Social Security Scotland. Does that mean that expanding the scheme to include self-employed people would not be possible? I think that there are just absolute limitations because of the restrictions and the reserved nature of it. We are going to come up particularly on this benefit. There are other challenges on other benefits because they pass sport to reserved benefits. For this one in particular, the aspects on that do really come up against reserved areas very quickly. Self-employment being an example of where we have been asked to look for change but, under the current settlement, difficult to see how that would be possible. I am keen that we do the proper policy analysis to see where people's priorities are on that and to see what can be done and to attest that to the limit of what is possible under the current settlement. I am keen to do that. That will take more time for just because of those complexities. Essentially, you have three years to make a determination on that. If the UK Government will not open up its specialist advice panel to the Scottish Government, you would have to almost replicate what it has. Is that fair to say? If we are looking to run the benefit in the same type of way that it would require that, then, yes, we would have to look at a duplicate. The challenges do not go away in a couple of years' time, but it gives us the ability to work through those challenges very closely with colleagues down at Westminster, not just within the DWP but in wider areas, about how that could be done. Essentially, you need a solution in advance of 2022, so that you have a specialist panel or specialist information because of the complexity of the benefit that is applied. We do need a solution as quickly as possible for that. I do not see any other bids for questions at the moment. I wonder whether I could go back to the financial stuff for one moment and just to get some understanding. Obviously, as you said, we will deliver on all 11 benefits as of next year. If there was to be a change within the criteria for a benefit, particularly around the new paper or whatever name that is going to be called, that criteria meant more people were to get a benefit, that habit, at the moment. Is that covered under the agreement that is set up on my budget for 2020, or would that be extra money that the Scottish Government would have to find? If we are looking to make changes to the criteria around eligibility, for example, they would need to be found through the Scottish block grant that does not come from the transfer from Westminster, because those are changes that the Scottish Government has made. We will have to look at those changes again on a case-by-case basis to test out how much they will cost and to fit that within our budgets for the forthcoming years. It is an important aspect that we look at around that, because what may seem small changes to eligibility can add up to quite a substantial amount of money, just because of the sheer number of claimants that we will be taking forward for that. We will go back to the point that we were making earlier about continuously refining the budgets, not just on programme or on agency, but obviously on how much the benefits will cost to deliver. As we make those policy decisions, we will be upfront about the changes that that will require. If they infer any increased budgetary pressure, we will of course be transparent about that to Parliament and how we will deliver that. That is a very fine question. If the criteria stayed the same, but there was a greater uptake, maybe because it was better publicised or whatever, would that be covered or is that game, would that still have to be found out of the block grant? If I could answer that, under the block grant adjustments, Scottish policy changes would have to be found from the Scottish budget, we would get a population share of any increases at UK level. For example, when we are looking at the benefit take-up strategy, we need to very closely take into account, if we are encouraging take-up of benefits, that is the responsibility of the Scottish Government to deliver. I think that we are almost there, cabinet secretary. I am conscious of one final question, and as the deputy convener said, there may have been aspects of your remit that you wanted to put in the record and an open statement at the start, so we will give you that opportunity at the end. Just in terms of the workforce, the people who would deliver the system on the ground, we first visited David Wallace in the Social Security Scotland and Dundee. It seems like quite some time ago now. We were quite encouraged by the inclusive nature of seeking applicants to apply, not just to claim benefits but also to apply for positions within Social Security Scotland, so anyone who went online started to do an online application for a job but did not follow it through. If there was contact details there, Social Security Scotland would give them a call and say, look, you were thinking about applying for a job, is there a reason why you did not do that, so that was pretty good. Is that head count increases? Have you done an audit of how diverse that workforce is in terms of whether it is protected characteristics or whatever? How diverse is that workforce and how are you trying to encourage underrepresented groups to be part of that team? David Wallace picked up on some of the particular highlights from the recent insights that have been published this week on the diversity of the workforce. It is a very important point because we were determined to ensure that the workforce of the agency represented the wider public and the people who would be using the service. I am very pleased to see that what we have been putting in place to encourage wider recruitment is paying dividends. There are still areas where we want to see further improvement but the one that particularly struck me when we were discussing the statistics was around the number of people who are self-declaring as having been disabled or with a long-term condition. That is particularly important given our desire to have an agency that reflects the people of Scotland and the people that they will be serving. It does feel quite a long time ago that we had that conversation, but yesterday we published our first insights to our client group and to our workforce. On all those protected characteristics, we have been able to demonstrate that we are slightly above the Scottish working age population, whether it is for ethnicity, disability or sexual orientation. We are pleased that we are able to be above that baseline. We absolutely would not take that as where we would want to get to. We want to use that to continue to improve our recruitment selection and how we really start to continue those inroads. That is very much the first set of reports. We are working really closely with our analysts to try and follow through some of those. I think that the point that you are making is to follow through why people drop off and do not get through to work for the agency as much as those who do as well. I think that that is important, but I suppose that that is welcome news. If that initial analysis is showing that a bit above where other public agencies are in relation to this kind of thing, then hopefully you are doing something different within Social Security Scotland to make that happen. That must be an opportunity to share what you are doing differently in Social Security Scotland with other Scottish Governmental and partner agencies to have some of that greater diversity in the workforce as well. Will you be slightly distracted there? Will you be sharing the approach that Social Security Scotland has carried out with other Scottish Governmental agencies and with other partners to make sure that the diversity elsewhere in the public sector can be improved? Absolutely. We do that through Scottish Government HR as well, so we work really closely with them and there is learning on both sides. Equally, we absolutely would not claim that in some way we have a way of doing this that trumps everything else. It is about learning from others. I think that the point that people have seen when they have been in Dundee in particular drawing on the goodwill and expertise that exist within the stakeholder community, within the third sector, to try to reach out to people that we have not been able to reach before. I absolutely share the purpose of doing this for our own improvement, to continue that kind of journey and to share and learn from others as well. We are almost at the end of the evidence session. I will explore the next agenda item, Cabinet Secretary. I do not know if there is anything that you want to put on the record at this point. Not to this point, apart from one thing, it would be remiss of me to not point out that the other figures within those insights pointed to a 98 per cent and 100 per cent client satisfaction rate with the agency at this point. I think that that is a very positive note for me to end on. I suspect that you have been missing a trick, Cabinet Secretary, to put that on the record before the evidence session concluded this morning. I thank you, Cabinet Secretary, and your team of officials for prolonged supporting you in the evidence session this morning. We look forward to working with you as the wave 2 benefits roll out, but that concludes agenda item 2, and we will just suspend briefly at this stage. Welcome back, and we will move back slightly. We need to take agenda item 1, which we did not take earlier, which is the decision to take items in private. The committee has asked to agree that item 4, which was considered earlier in the meeting, and item 5, which is the consideration of a draft and a report to be taken in private, is the committee agreed to. With that whole hearted approval there, we shall move on. When I move to agenda item 3, which is still in public session on subordinate legislation, can I refer members to paper 2, not by the clerk? The committee has invited to consider the council tax reduction Scotland amendment 2, regulations 2019, SSI 2019 forward slash 1, 3, 3, which is subject to the negative procedure. Is the committee content to note this instrument? Just to get right in my head, this is relating to the council tax benefit withdrawal that happened a number of years ago. Council tax reduction and regulations were brought in order that that benefit would continue to be paid. Just to see if I got this right in my head. This is to try and make sure that, because of the later introduction of changes that the discretionary housing payments are not treated as that, this is basically about protecting people's rights under that. It must be useful—I mean, I think that we sort of get a bit of background of any more background of it, because I am new to the committee out of the zone. There is a policy note by just— The way you have explained it, Mr Brown, would also be my understanding having read the same policy note as yourself when I looked round to our clerk who would seem to think that that is an understanding also. I cannot really answer that question, I suppose, because it is my job to scrutinise this as well, rather than answer the questions on this. However, I suppose that if we want additional information on this, we can seek that from Spice. Let's just do that. However, I am assuming that that does not take away from merely noting the instrument at this stage and we can still get agreement on that. You are right, convener. I can go and check myself at Spice. I just wasn't aware of having not been involved in committees in consideration of SSIs for a number of years, that it was as perfunctory, if you like, because I thought that there would be a discussion, but if people understand that I had been involved in this previously. One last question, just if I could ask that, so this would not apply elsewhere in the UK, this is simply in Scotland that this benefit, if you like, has continued. I see nodding heads slightly unfair in the clerks, given that they are not here to give evidence to advise us, but the official report will show the nod. There are other schemes elsewhere. It has been drawn to my attention that we would not actually have to ask Spice for additional information on this. There is a more detailed briefing available, so we can make sure that that gets sent round the members. The important thing, though, is that we just formally agreed to note this so that we can move on at this point. Does that agree? Okay. Thank you very much. We do now move to agenda item 4, delivery of devolved benefits, which we have previously agreed to taking private when I move into private session.