 It is item 4 on the meeting of the social security committee. Does that matter? Can I remind everyone to turn off their mobile phones, because it does appear with the recording of the meeting. First item item 1 is the decision in taking business in private. You are happy to take item one in private? Yes. It is item 4 and it has been corrected by the clerks. Thank you very much. Gwendaeth cerddur yn gyfrifysgwrs, Mae yng Nghymru yn gweithugwyr, yn eich cyfrifysgwr â'r gwir oedd yn gwneud gynhyrchu'r Ysgrifen? Gwendaeth Cerddur yn gweithio hwn, oedd yn gweithio'r cyfrifysgwr, First Minister, Iwn David Sengan-unini, a'r McVey. Mae'n cyfrifysgwr fel yna samarwynau gwaith ar eich cyfrifysgwrn. Majd Sarách a chai gondol. unmengedag, convener and members, the committee is aware that the budget document shows an £80 million allocation to be allocated in the course of 2017-18 from the Scottish Government's budget held in the financial and constitution portfolio relating to the SC 2016 implementation to support ar gdyfodol ar IOG. Allocating the money in-year will enable our cabinet to respond flexibly to the needs of a complicated policy area. Normal in-year budget management arrangements mean that allocations and adjustments can be made in-year in response to pressures, although ensuring that financial plans are scrutinised and controlled appropriately. The £80 million figure and the arrangements wrth ddweud y cwnghau yma yn 2017-18, drwy dod i'r cyfrifwyr sydd y Sgwtlannu Llywodraeth yn y wwwwfyrrawrtyngol cyfrifwyr ac yw yw ymgyrch o'i'r fawr o'r cyfrifwyr yw Llywodraeth 2016 yw'r cyfrifwyr yw'r cyfrifwyr. Mae cyfrifwyr o'r cyfrifwyr o'r cyfrifwyr sydd yn yn ei hynny i gandduriau yn y ddalol i gweithio i gyd, ac mae'n dda i gilydd y cyfrifwyr yma the biggest single challenge any Scottish Government has faced since devolution. We are doing something that a Scottish Government has never done before, building a public service, a new public service, our social security system entirely from scratch. That means that we need skills and expertise that we haven't needed before. To bring the information on the pages of the budget statement alive, I think that it might help if we think about the particular groups of people with particular experience and skills that we need to bring together so that we can deliver this large and complex programme of work. As we have consistently said, build our social security system from the ground up. The committee is aware of our plans to recruit over 2,000 volunteers from across Scotland, people with real, lived experience of the current benefit system, who will work with us over the long term and help us to make the right improvements and the right changes to our new system. The process of finding and recruiting those volunteers begins in January. Alongside our experience panels, we also need some recognised and respected expert knowledge, guidance and leadership from outwith the Scottish Government. We will convene the disability and carers benefits expert advisory group in the new year, and they will work with us, giving us the benefit of their considerable range of expertise to advise and guide us as we go forward. We will continue our engagement with benefit and welfare advisers, with particular practical knowledge of the current system and its interconnections across benefits. Finally, of course, we need civil servants, but civil servants with new skills and expertise that the Scottish Government has not previously possessed, or at least not to the extent that we need it now. As we build our new system, our policy teams, operational teams, user researchers, change management teams and developers will work closely together. They will test and build technology to ensure that it meets users' needs and our new policies, sharing early versions of technology with the people who will need to use it to allow for constant improvement and development. We will need the right technology in place to ensure that information is shared appropriately and held securely, that the overall design and architecture of our system is safe, and that the detailed exchange of information about individuals works as intended, which means that we need people with the technical expertise to design, build and assure this. They will draw on lessons learned from other major IT projects and on work by Audit Scotland on areas where IT projects in the past have gone wrong. To get that right, some of our internal work needs to be structured differently, and we will need those new staff with their new skills to manage that effectively. It helps to remember that the amount of money to be paid out by our new social security system, £2.7 billion per year, is equivalent to the cost of building two new fourth replacement crossings every year, forever. With everything that is up and running, the IT and payment systems that we have to design, develop and build will process a number of payments each week that is roughly equivalent to the total number of payments that are currently made by the Scottish Government each year. We must not lose sight either of the role that DWP will play in all of that, because delivering our new social security system, our IT development and our data sharing arrangements will not simply depend on what we do, it will also depend on what the DWP does. We must remember that the Scottish and UK Governments are coming at the central question of what is our social security system there to achieve from different perspectives. For the UK Government, social security or welfare, as they term it, is a key driver to get people into work with conditions attached criteria to be met and budgets to be cut. For us too, there is an important connection between how our social security system supports people to enter into employment, but it is also, and importantly, there to provide support to any one of us who needs it when we need it. It is a service for people, an investment that we make collectively in ourselves and in each other, like our investment in the national health service, there against current and future need for each and every one of us. Now that the DWP and the Scottish Government are operating in an increasingly shared space, those different perspectives have to rub along together. While there is undoubtedly goodwill and a lot of determination to make this work on both sides, there will still be occasions when both Governments are looking at the same thing—a problem, an issue or a policy—and seeing a different solution. That is not only about tackling issues to do with complex IT systems and data sharing arrangements, where we have governance arrangements in place to support our IT projects and former processes to provide go-no-go decisions based on our confidence that the technology will work. It is also about tackling issues to do with conflicting policies, priorities or points of view and having the right governance in place for that. The committee is cited on our discussions at the joint ministerial working group on welfare, which is the forum where the kind of complex issues can be discussed, differences aired and decisions taken. There is also the joint extrecer committee to provide oversight on financial matters. There are arrangements in place to support discussion, negotiation and resolution in order that both sides can come to an agreement and we will, no doubt, need to make use of those at some stage as we go forward. All of that is there to deliver one overriding objective—the safe and secure transfer of vital payments and support benefits. From the committee's work so far and building on the work of the Last Parliament, I am sure that members understand why no one outside this committee room is banging on the door, demanding that we move more quickly and why everyone is urging us to go carefully to ensure that no one slips through the cracks. We need a safe and secure approach, which recognises the complexities, the risks and the potential pitfalls. We are not only learning from previous IT programmes, but we are also learning from DWP programme failures. Like the roll-out of universal credit, it began in 2012 with a four-year plan for completion, then extended to 2017 and now delayed again to 2022, 10 years from its start date, or PIP, which was due to be fully rolled out this year and is now delayed until 2019. We will not be setting deadlines to suit political pressures, we will set our timetable to meet our objective of the safe and secure transfer of benefits and our consistently stated commitment to deliver the 11 devolved benefits by the end of this parliamentary term. Our budget arrangements for 2017-18 support this approach and I trust that members will agree that it is the right approach to take. My thanks to you convener for the opportunity to make that opening statement and I am of course very happy to take questions and to hear members' views. Thank you very much minister and I hear what you say. I just want to open the discussion up when you mention about the differing approaches and obviously the Scottish welfare fund is something that has been set up and evidence that we have heard from various groups, particularly local authorities is that this is becoming greater than was anticipated, people are using it even more and particularly now even in regards to larger families due to the UT government to child policy. Looks like families with more than two children may lose up to £2,780 per year and obviously groups and local authorities are very concerned that the pressure that is being put on the Scottish welfare fund is increasing. I ask you minister in regards to that particular issue if you agree that the pressure on the Scottish welfare fund is increasing and if so will the minister look to increasing the budget in real terms for the Scottish welfare fund and also are there any plans to expand the circumstances that people can claim for crisis grants under the fund? Of course as you will know convener but perhaps not other new members of the committee, we set up the fund in 2012 with a £9.2 million amount allocated to it and have since then subsequently increased it significantly at a total level of £38 million. We have protected that fund in the current budget. I am aware from our discussions with colleagues who administer that fund in local authorities across Scotland for us under our guidance that there is potentially an emerging pressure on the fund in those areas where universal credit is subject to full roll-out. We are seeing some peak in that. Whether or not that will be a continuing pattern or whether it is at this point a feature of some of the initial difficulties that DWP are encountering in the roll-out of universal credit is not entirely clear and we continue to discuss that matter with them and look with them and with colleagues in local authorities to resolve those initial difficulties. On the two-child policy, convener is aware that I have written to Lord Freud expressing our significant disagreement with that approach. It is an approach that we will not replicate when we introduce our new benefit, the best start grant, where we will not place a limit on the number of children in a family that we are prepared to support. Over the piece, we will continue to monitor the Scottish welfare fund and the demand on it. I have to say, though, that it is perhaps going to be something that I am going to have to keep repeating this morning, that it is not possible for this Government to mitigate against all of the detrimental impacts of the UK Government's approach to welfare and the cuts that they are making. It is not possible and arguably it is not the role of this Government to plaster over the cuts that the UK Government is making. We do our very best, with more than £100 million of mitigation, to try and hold back the very worst effects on families and individuals of those cuts. All that is doing is using Scottish Government funds, Scottish citizens funds, to stand still and not allowing us to use those resources perhaps more effectively to move forward. Thank you very much minister. I appreciate your honesty in being up front in that regard. Obviously, I mentioned the increase in the Scottish welfare fund. It has been suggested that perhaps for more people to be able to know about the Scottish welfare fund, perhaps we should have advisers, as you mentioned, 2000 volunteers that are coming on stream to perhaps be in food banks, that is what was suggested to us by the Trussell Trust. Would you be interested in looking at something like that, that people perhaps do not know about the Scottish welfare fund, that people would be there to advise them to be able to access it? I have had that discussion with the Trussell Trust. We will begin our benefits take-up campaign early in 2017. It will be a campaign that we will run for the full time of this Parliament, though of course, because there is a great deal of work to do. We need to work with local authorities in terms of the responsibility that they have to undertake income maximisation discussions with individuals that they are working with, perhaps through the welfare fund in terms of individuals making contact with them or in other means. There are a number of very interesting initiatives across the country about how they can provide effective welfare advice and support to individuals where they are. For example, there are a number of projects running across the country locating welfare advisers and that kind of support in our healthcare service, in primary care. The Trussell Fund's point about the use of food banks, and we are looking at all of that as we go forward, not only in terms of our strategy on food poverty and sustainable food, but also in how we look at the delivery of the social security service and the advice services and support services that need to go alongside that. Ruth Maguire, do you want to come in on that particular answer? Thank you, convener. Just quickly on the topic of take-up, some of the entitlements that are coming to us on the sheer start and the funeral payment have got really quite a low take-up at the moment. I know that we spoke about that in the chamber debate on funeral poverty. I would just like to hear your reflections on what can be done about that. Is there an impact on the budget that the Scottish Government will receive to then have responsibility for those payments? Of course, the primary point of running the benefits campaign and all members have made the point to us that the support that they are doing as a Government and meeting that commitment in our manifesto is to secure for individuals the maximum financial support that they are entitled to. You are, of course, right that some of the benefits that will be devolved to us in particular the take-up rate is very low. Young carers is another area in terms of 16 to 24-year-olds, as well as funeral payment and others. I have been promised by my officials a significant degree of recess reading, one part of which is the proposition on the benefits campaign and the advice on how we will overall approach that and specifically where we will start and what we will start to do. I will be reading that over the Christmas break and we will come back with some decisions made on that and make sure that the committee is aware of those and the Parliament more widely. The other key thing to say in that is that this is not going to be one of those bells and whistles adverts everywhere benefits take-up campaigns because, for me, my previous experience before my current role is that such campaigns do not land very effectively. You have to target people where they are on the basis on which they come towards a public service, whichever public service that might be, and try at that point to engage them in thinking about what additional financial support they might be entitled to and the key word is entitlement because that helps people to overcome their reluctance, oftentimes particularly in areas of funeral payments and young carers and elsewhere, their reluctance to appear to be looking for something that they somehow feel, and this is, of course, a wider discussion that we could have, they somehow feel that they are not due or that they will be considered that they are trying to sponge in some way. We need to overcome that in the overall campaign and look at how we phase it and land it in order to get to the right folks at the right time. I will be looking at that over this Christmas recess and early in the new year we will be making some decisions and communicating to this committee and other members about how we intend to take that campaign forward. Mark Griffin? No, it was Mark Griffin, so I think it was Mark Griffin. Thanks, Premier Morning Minister. I understand the Government's thinking around the £80 million reserve for a new year's spend that I can ask. If you are able to give the committee any early indication as to whether any of that £80 million fund will be used to meet any of the commitments that the Government has made on any of the devolved powers, and I'm thinking about increasing carers allowance or upgrading of benefits? One of the areas that we will make some initial spend, of course, is in the benefits take-up campaign. In terms of using our top-up powers for carers allowance or introducing our new benefit, which is the best start grant, we are a little too early in the day at this point in December for me to be able to say, yes, we will be doing that next year or no, we won't. The most important thing that we have to do next year, of course—well, one of the many important things that we have to do next year—is bring legislation to the Parliament draft legislation, which will give us the legislative platform on which to exercise those powers. In advance of that, there will be a commencement order at Westminster, which then allows us to bring the legislation to the Parliament. That legislation will bring to, of course, as it does a financial memorandum, where some more detail on the financial requirements that we have will be set out, but all of that will come together in the next year and certainly before we enter the summer recess. The Social Security Bill is mentioned in the budget that describes the setting out of the framework for a fairer system. There are a number of issues there. One of them is the reform of assessments for disability benefits. We have had exchanges in the chamber about that as well. I wonder if the Government has come to a conclusion on assessments as to what involvement there would be or, hopefully, would not be from the private sector? Overall, on what the need might be for assessment at all and for how many—in particular in relation to disability benefits, so that we are clear about the ones that will be devolved to us—one other part of my Christmas reading is the independent analysis of the over 500 consultation responses and the draft response from us as a Government to that independent analysis. Again, we will publish that and advise the Parliament of both at the start of the next session at the beginning of the year. To a degree, our thinking on the overall assessment process, the need for it, the demand that we might have in terms of numbers and what it should look like, ought to be quite rightly informed by that consultation exercise and will be further tested through the experience panels that I mentioned in my opening statement. However, with particular reference to your specific question about the involvement of private sector in any assessment exercise or process, of course, the private sector currently has a DWP contract to deliver that work in Scotland. That contract is due to end, but my colleagues will correct me if I am wrong in this in 2018 or 2019. I have written to the DWP asking them not to exercise the one-year extension to that contract, which is built into the contract that you can extend it for a year without having to re-contract. I have written to them asking them not to do that because those kinds of decisions should sit with the Scottish Government. I am on record elsewhere as saying that I remain to be convinced that a social security system that is founded on the principles of dignity, fairness and respect and that every intention will make those values come alive and everything it does. How that system can be served by any other organisation whose principal proposition is to make commercial profit. I am not criticising those private sector organisations for that. That is the nature of who they are in their business, but I am not myself convinced that those two approaches are comfortably aligned with each other. Ben Macpherson, do you want to come in in that particular one? Thank you, convener. It is in relation to the new powers. For reference, a few months ago, I celebrated the 25th anniversary of the Rock Trust, a fantastic youth homelessness organisation based in Edinburgh, and we celebrated that here. That organisation was set up 25 years ago to alleviate youth homelessness because of reductions in housing benefit support for young people. I was particularly interested to know whether the Scottish Government still intends to restore entitlement to housing benefit support for 18 to 21-year-olds and how many people you estimate will be impacted by the unhelpful UK Government policy to remove that entitlement to that group of people. How the restoration of housing benefit for that group will impact the budget for 2017-18, and what powers will be used to achieve the restoration of that? That is our manifesto commitment. We have no intention of stepping back from that commitment. We currently have an on-going discussion with ministerial colleagues at Westminster on the approach that they are taking on that and how that impacts or not on our ability to meet our manifesto commitment easily. As you know, they have announced a number of exemptions to their intended policy, which, of course, is very welcome. However, they are approaching how they intend to implement their policy using a particular set of regulations, and we have a disagreement with them on that. We think that there is an alternative set of regulations that could be used that would allow them to do what they want to do, as they are perfectly entitled to, as the UK Government, but it would also allow us to fulfil our manifesto commitment, as we are perfectly entitled to do as the Scottish Government. That discussion continues. I have written to Carolyn Knox, the minister, concerned on two occasions. We had a meeting on 12 December and had that discussion among other areas. We have exchanged a second set of letters. I know that the cabinet secretary has had an initial discussion with Mr Mundell on that matter, too. We will continue to have those discussions to see if we can resolve the issues around how we implement our manifesto commitment. The question is not whether we will. It is really about how we can go about doing this. In terms of the numbers involved, we need to do a little bit more work now or to calculate what it means in terms of the UK Government's exemption list—what that does to the numbers in Scotland—and what that work is currently going on. Gordon Lindhurst, you want to come in on that particular subject and then add him to it. Well, thank you, convener. Good morning, minister. When we are talking about timelines in relation to the new powers coming into force, I just want to ask about the Fair of Scotland action plan commits to a financial health check service with an older people strand—something that may be of particular relevance to older people in Brun Lothian—the area that I represent. What I am interested in is whether you can give a date as to when that will be brought into action, because there is no, as I understand it, details of when that is planned to be implemented. Of course, the financial health check for older people is very relevant to older people across Scotland in all our respective constituencies. There is a responsibility on local authorities to undertake financial health checks and support for those who come into contact with them, as I said earlier, and we will be discussing with local authorities how they can increase the work that they do in that area. With respect to the overall financial health check, it links into our benefit take-up campaign, and that will be part and parcel of what we will be advising ourselves and the Parliament of in the new year. We are also looking, because another area of my responsibilities is for older people, and I have had some initial discussions with SOPA and with the Scottish Pensioners Forum and others about a range of work that we might do now in a more coherent way to support older people across Scotland, and part of that is about the financial support that they receive. There is an emerging issue, of course, coming from those groups with respect to women and the pension changes that are affecting women, including myself, of a particular age range and years of birth. There are a number of issues to look at with respect to the overall financial situation of older people across Scotland, and the support that this Government can offer to them and also can work with others to provide them. Thank you. It is, of course, a matter that is relevant to older people across Scotland, as you rightly pointed out. You mentioned local councils, and just in light of the fact that the budget line has been reduced in this area from £8 million to, or is intended to, reduced from £8 million to £6.9 million in 2017-18 against the background of an increased budget for the Scottish Government. Do you view that as being an area that it is more the responsibility of local councils to deliver on this rather than the Scottish Government? Of course, Mr Llynt Arstur and I are going to disagree on those figures. Are we not? Quite significantly. In answer to your particular question, no, I do not think that it is an area of greater responsibility for local authorities than it is for the Scottish Government. I think that it is actually an area of responsibility of UK Government, Scottish Government and local authorities. Part of our difficulty and, indeed, the difficulty that our colleagues and local authorities face is at times mitigating the impact of UK Government decisions. The particular instance that I referred to with respect to that fairly large group of women affected by pension changes, of course, is a case in point. It is a responsibility of all tiers of Government to ensure that individuals receive the maximum entitlement that they have to financial support. George Adam, do you want to give in that particular point? Yes, it was just to come on in the back of what Mr Llynt Arstur had already said. You have already said this yourself, minister, that the actual safe transfer of the powers is probably the biggest challenge since the evolution itself. Is it not the case that the challenge is such? I want you to talk in very practical terms, very day one, when we have to get to stage where people are expecting their money and their bank accounts for all the various benefits. That is what we must keep in mind when we are discussing this. That is the end game with the whole scenario. There is not a big red button that we press, and magically everything works out. Is it not the case that you have numerous data for claimants and numerous DWP computers? You mentioned about the IT, and we have to make sure that we get that 100 per cent right. We need to learn from mistakes that have been made in Government in the past with those things, and there is also the fact that some of it is manually based as well. If I was you, I would physically want to be in that room to make sure that I got all that information in case somebody's details fell off the top of a file somewhere. It is a huge responsibility to try and make sure that we get all that detail. It would probably be easier to get 100 per cent of the powers as opposed to just the 15, but picking at it this way is making it extremely difficult for us to make sure that we get that right, because the most important part is that, come that day, the money that it lands in the claimants' bank account. Absolutely the case. That is our overriding primary objective. By the end of this parliamentary session, we are delivering 11 devolved benefits at the right amount to the right people on the right day. Yes, Mr Adams is absolutely correct in terms of the complexity of doing that before setting aside any improvements, changes or alterations that we might want to make to the system or to the individual benefits themselves. I think that I have raised with the committee before, but it bears repetition that, for example, cold weather payments rest on 11 different IT systems inside DWP, all of which have to work together simply to give us the basic data of the individuals in Scotland who are entitled currently to that payment. Industrial injuries and severe disablement benefit is a paper-based system, so there are a significant number of brown folders somewhere inside DWP, 20 odd thousand plus of which will carry a Scottish postcode, and those files have to be extracted. The postcodes have to be found. The files extracted again simply for us to know who in Scotland is entitled to that benefit so that we can then input into our system their names, addresses, bank details and the level of support that they are entitled to receive. Those tasks on their own are labour intensive and require checking and constant re-checking and so on, because what we cannot have is individuals at the point where we are delivering those benefits who do not receive what they are entitled to because the data we do not have the data. DWP is very keen to make sure that they get that right. We are very keen that they get that right, too, but it is quite a labour intensive task. I wonder how that affects the budget in relation to the question that was asked, if that would add extra cost to the budget or would that come from the DWP? Those elements of the cost are factored into our thinking, both at the DWP end and at our end, about exactly how much work and by whom needs to be done. Although, I think that I have said before, but again I think that it bears repetition, you need to go right back to the Smith commission, where the Smith commission's reference to all of this, that takes us to where we are now, was but a few paragraphs. After that came the fiscal framework, a bit more detail around those few paragraphs and the enduring settlement. However, the work that the DWP and my colleagues in the Scottish Government have been doing over the piece since then and continue to do, of course, as you might expect, begins to reveal additional complexities and areas of activity that are required that could never have been foreseen at the point of the Smith commission. It is an area that both DWP and ourselves keep under review, but, as best as we know it at this point, we have been able to take account of those matters in our thinking. However, it does not mean that other issues might not arise that will produce additional pressures that we will have to then look at with Cabinet colleagues and Mr Mackay, in particular. I do not know if that will happen or not, but it is perfectly sensible to say that we should be alert to the fact that it might. A few short paragraphs of the Smith commission agreement, perhaps, but a few short paragraphs that were very difficult to write. I take you back to the numbers and ask you to, I hope, reasonably quick questions about different aspects of the numbers and then a question about prioritisation. First quick question about the numbers. You mentioned in your opening remarks, minister, the £80 million that sits in the finance and constitution budget for Scotland Act 2016, non-tax implementation. How much of that do you anticipate to be spent in connection with social security? Is it 100 per cent of that £80 million that will be in social security, or is it some lesser number than that? That is the first question about the numbers. The second is just to make sure that I have understood correctly the massive difference between the 2016-17 draft budget number for social security and the actual budget number, the former being £74.3 million and the latter being £1.4 million. Just to make sure that I have understood correctly, that does not mean that the money was not spent. It means that by the time of the actual budget, the money had already been transferred to local authorities to spend. I will come back on a prioritisation question in a minute, if I may. The answer to your first question is that the £80 million is for all the powers, so not exclusively for social security. That is why I made reference to the cabinet's ability, as we go through the year, to respond to pressures and requirements as we identify them and allocate from within that £80 million. The question was how much of that money do you anticipate being spent on social security and how much on other aspects of Scotland's 2016 implementation? It is not possible for me to give you a specific figure at this point. I believe that I am back before the committee at some point in February or early March, and at that stage we may have more information. However, I cannot say exactly how much of that £80 million we might require is because we are still working through the consultation responses and the specific elements of the timetable that we have to meet to allow us to understand the numbers of additional resources that we might need in terms of those groups of people that I talked about, as well as other matters that the convener referred to in the joint work with DWP. How did you arrive at the £80 million figure? Colleagues looked overall, not just in social security but in terms of the other portfolios that relate to that in the additional powers, at what the most reasonable estimate would be of what we would require over the course of a year, and that is where the figure comes from. The second figure, the move from £74.3 million to £1.4 million? Yes, your understanding is correct. Thank you very much. The question about prioritisation. On page 86 of the budget document, there is what is to my mind the very welcome news that the Scottish Government plans to invest more than £75 million in regeneration activity that stimulates inclusive economic growth, tackles inequality to disadvantaged communities, etc. It is about two thirds of the way down. I hope that I am very interested in the relationship between social security spending and other aspects of spending that are essential to an effective anti-poverty strategy. I wonder if you could tell the committee anything about the Scottish Government's thinking and your thinking about the relationship between that sort of spending that is talked about on page 86, which you might call preventive spending. The Christie commission and the idea of preventive spending is introduced on the following page. The relationship between that kind of spending and the kind of spending that you need in the social security system itself, how do you assess the appropriate balance between the £75 million of investment and regeneration that we see on the one hand with the social security entitlement expenditure that you have been talking about so far this morning? Well, I have not been talking about the social security entitlement expenditure. That is what I mean when I talk about the £80 million. You are talking about the overall delivery of the 11 devolved benefits and the connection between that. Is there any way in which you can help us to understand your thinking about the relationship between spending on what I would call the underlying causes of poverty, which include the absence of regeneration, including deprived communities and all of that, and the relationship between spending on that and spending on social security itself? Well, I think that there is a really strong connection between the two, because if we provide individuals with adequate financial support through a social security system, then of course they are using that support to spend in their local communities. They are also using that support if we look at individuals who are entitled to the disability benefits, they are to support the additional costs that they incur because of their ill health or their disability. In many instances, that support can mean the difference for them between taking up opportunities for employment or not. Again, that has a key connection with local community regeneration as well as the positive impacts that it can make in their own lives. We will not be able to make the kind of impact in that particular area that we might wish to, because employment support alone will not be in our hands, but we will be able, I think, to provide significant support to those individuals in terms of the disability benefits that we will be responsible for that alleviate at least some of the financial pressure that they might otherwise face. As you and I know, Mr Tomkins, our relatively privileged position that we have in terms of the financial resources that we individually have at our disposal allow us to look at opportunities to plan ahead and, indeed, to spend money. Financial support through a social security system gives individuals the minimum opportunity to do something similar, but it also helps them to look at employment opportunities if they exist. That is something that they are able to do not only in terms of their physical and other capacities but in terms of their other responsibilities. For example, carers allowance. Currently, of course, we want to increase it to the same level of jobseekers allowance, and we will do that. However, I also want to look at some of the current restrictions within carers allowance that reduce the amount of time that individuals can use in their daily life to pursue further or higher education, to look at part-time employment, because it seems to me only right that individuals should be able to pursue a life of their own as well as meeting the caring responsibilities that they have taken on for which we are all greatly in their debt. I think that there is work that we can do in the social security system to assist individuals to have some measure of financial stability. It will never be more than the minimum, but some measure of financial stability and security allows them to look at what other opportunities might be available to them. Of course, the work of my colleague, Mr Hepburn, in the devolved employment programmes, as well as the overall work in here that you refer to, is all part of trying to maximise economic growth and equality of opportunity across the country. I have some questions about your priorities in relation to child poverty. The committee can obviously see the many pressures on the budget, but since we are going to be dealing with the child poverty bill in the not-too-distant future, I thought it would be quite important to try and get your current thinking on the record. If I could begin with asking you what estimates have been made by the Government on the impact of the draft budget on child poverty levels, if any? As you know, there is an equality statement that goes alongside the draft budget, and that statement highlights a number of the positive measures in the budget that will impact on child poverty, including the commitment to increase childcare, the commitment that relates directly to my responsibility in social security, to introduce the new best start grant and the work on educational maintenance allowances. That equality impact statement, if you like, begins to point to some of the areas where the budget itself should have a positive effect on child poverty. However, the overall approach is to recognise that whatever this Government or previous Governments have done to try to tackle child poverty, although it has been effective to a degree, it has not been sufficiently effective. That is why the consultation that my colleague Ms Constance has just completed on child poverty and the bill that she will introduce shortly, which will come separately from her to this committee, looks to specific actions and resources that will target the most difficult areas in terms of child poverty to try to secure a major shift and reduction in the numbers. Just follow up from that. You mentioned a couple of areas that I presume are some of your spending priorities, but I just wanted to be clear what you were saying in relation to the budget as what you regard as the most important areas for spending priorities in relation to reducing child poverty. That area is more for Ms Constance than it is obviously for myself. It is the area that she is leading on, but clearly in terms of the budget and the resources that the budget allocates, the two main areas are the increase in the provision of childcare and the commitment on the attainment gap. Given the number of portfolios that probably feed into the reducing child poverty, what are the ministers that you currently work with across portfolios on the child poverty issue? It is an important point. There is an element in the bill that will come forward, which is placing a statutory duty on Scottish ministers in terms of the draft bill of the work that they are doing to reduce child poverty and to report on that. The main other portfolios that would be involved here are, of course, education and health, but areas under Mr Brown's remit in terms of economy and fair work. Can I ask what thought in the process of putting the budget together was given to topping up child benefit? Your previous appearance before us at the end of September, you said that you were giving consideration to the child poverty action group's proposal to increase child benefit by £5 a week, so it would be useful to know what consideration was given to that and what the outcome was. It is a matter still under consideration. Of course, it sits overall in the consultation on child poverty and the results of that consultation and will sure form part of the committee's scrutiny on the child poverty bill that is brought forward, which will be introducing specific targets, as well as the duty that I mentioned. There are a number of perfectly legitimate and entirely understandable demands being placed before us for additional resources across a range of benefits. Child poverty is one such area. The top option child benefit is around £250 million, which would be the additional cost. There are others with respect to mitigating the impact of UK Government changes on employment support allowance, another £65 million or so. Obviously, people are concerned about the benefit cap and the significant increase in the numbers of people in Scotland who will be affected by that cap introduced in early November. It is a very difficult number to figure to estimate. The Conservative estimates are between £6 million and £11 million for mitigation in that area. You can begin to see before we even look at impacting the effects on universal credit or local housing allowance application to the social sector. There is a totting up of significant proportions here in terms of what people, as I say, understandably and perfectly legitimately want us to consider doing. We need to consider all of those in a reflective and sensible way against a situation where, over the piece, the Scottish budget has been reduced by about 9.2 per cent. There are clearly competing demands and pressures on that budget. We are in a situation with this portfolio where we have managed to protect very many of the critical spending lines in it. We will look at the proposition on child benefit in the round when we are looking at the strategy and the bill that comes forward. I have to say that there is an argument that applying a top-up on child benefit to all those who are currently in receipt of child benefit is not necessarily the best use of that level of resource to specifically target the issue of child poverty that we are talking about. In the overall frame of the approach that Ms Constance is taking, we are looking at where we need to target activity and resource in order to secure a significant shift in the levels of child poverty in Scotland. All those discussions and reflections continue and I am sure that the committee will return to that with the cabinet secretary. I thank you for that comprehensive response. I might touch on another area, convener. We had a fair amount of discussion this morning about the need to mitigate some of the worst impacts of decisions that are made in another Parliament. The discretionary housing payment budget is £57.9 million and £47 million, if that has been earmacked for bedroom tax mitigation. You might be aware that the Scottish Federation of Housing Associations raised concerns when they were giving evidence to the committee that the proposed discretionary housing payment budget will not be sufficient to counteract UK welfare reforms in the next year. I wonder whether you had any comment to make in that area. It is entirely the case that the Association are correct to counter the effect of infill of all UK welfare reforms on people in Scotland. Not only takes us through that list that I just briefly ran through of the £65 million between £6 million and £11 million, £256 million plus plus, but significantly more. There are two arguments there. First of all, the Government's capacity in a situation, as I have said, where our overall budget has over the years been significantly decreased by that 9.2 per cent. The balance of decisions that the Government has to make between mitigating the worst effects and impacts of decisions made by another Government from the perfectly correct approach and demands that are about investing in order to secure economic growth, protecting our health service, supporting our schools and our justice system and our local authorities and their services, is a very difficult balance to strike. One where in the current circumstances it is not possible for this Government to mitigate all the impacts of decisions made by a UK Government. There is an additional argument to that, which I touched on, which is about whether it is the best use of Scottish Government funds from citizens in Scotland to constantly put sticking plasters on the cuts imposed by decisions made by another Government. That is a separate and very connected argument, but the bottom line is that it is not possible to do all those things. If that £47 million is not sufficient, will local authorities be expected to draw on the remaining £10.7 million of that discretionary housing payment budget? We arrive at those figures from our understanding of previous issues and our discussions with local authorities. If it looks like there would be a greater demand in mitigating the full effects of the bedroom tax—a very clear commitment that we have been delivering on for some time now—two things happen. Obviously, we are in continuing discussions with local authorities on that. We have a look at the data and then we consider what we might do. We have in the past, where that has been the case, provided additional resources in order not to require local authorities to draw on that other element of the fund. That simply is a difficult thing to do, but in this instance, should that happen, in this coming financial year or in the financial year to which the budget relates, we would go through the same exercise. At this point, it is not possible for me to say that we definitely would or we definitely would not simply point you to the fact that we have in the past. Minister, you mentioned in your opening statement the significant delays to full roll-out of universal credit. There are also delays with the personal independence payment and, for sake of balance, probably say that the Scottish Government has some experience of delayed payments as well. It is obviously a hugely complex undertaking. How can you learn from the mistakes of both the Scottish Government in terms of CAP and that of the UK Government, the delays that they have seen with universal credit and PIP? On the payment delays that arise from IT systems and IT system failures, there is a very active exercise going on inside Scottish Government that looks at the lessons that have been learned, which are very detailed, not only audit Scotland but internal reviews of those, and looks at applying them to the system design and delivery that we will have for social security. That work has begun only this week. I was taken through some of the initial look at what kind of a payment system we need, what does it need to do, how has it been tested so far, what more, what now is the next stage. A number of steps have been introduced across Scottish Government around the process for the design, build and test of IT systems that draw on those lessons to be learned from Scottish Government previous programmes and others, for example, in other agencies and elsewhere. I have a group of clever people, but with a very practical approach, who are beginning that work early and running that testing and designing. Of course, the experience panels will have a role to play in due course in all of that, to look at what we are producing in terms of how easy it is for a potential user to access and provide the data that is being looked for, and the more-than-one platforms in which we should be able to offer the user interaction with the agency and the system. On the IT payment system, those lessons are very well embedded in the thinking, the design and the planning, and the testing and retesting will be constant for the next significant period. On the other questions around delays in programme delivery, which were not exclusively around IT systems, there is a very interesting document produced by the Institute of Governance around universal credit, which I recommend that any politician should read. It takes you through an analysis of some of the core difficulties that have been experienced in the roll-out of universal credit. One of the jump-out lessons, if you like, for me is about setting unrealistic timescales in order to get yourself through a difficult circumstance in a parliamentary chamber, in practical terms and in terms of assurance and testing cannot be delivered. Individuals are forced to try to rush things in order to meet that politician-set timeframe, and matters do not proceed very well. There are other important lessons in how you marry policy to delivery. In a very practical sense, it will, in our instance, affect 1.4 million people. I recommend it to anyone to read it. It is not quite—I would not call it a page turner—and it does not have a happy ending, but it is very instructive and useful. That is what I meant when I said, you know, learning from those who have gone before, if you like, to try to make sure that we get our system right. I do think that the involvement of those 2,000 volunteers in that experience panel will be of significant positive impact to the work that we are doing. Thanks. I do not really have a follow-up. I suppose that it is those 1.4 million folk that are in my mind, so it is good to hear that we have learned lessons. As you say, we will be cognisant of the complexity of it and not set unrealistic targets. Can I perhaps ask possibly a very simple question, but it might not be a simple answer? You mentioned in the comments there about unrealistic timescales, and obviously because of the budget and the constraints with the autumn statement, we have not had a great deal of time to actually look over budget figures. I think that that goes for all committees, not just our committee. My very simple question, which might not be a very simple answer, is the areas that we have discussed today in regard to the budget that has been set for Social Security Committee, even though it is working along with other committees, education and so on. Will you say that there will be changes to that budget, or will the budget be sufficient to deliver what we are looking to deliver as a social security system based on dignity and respect, per saying that it comes in 2017, 2018 or even 2019? Are you referring to the £80 million and our call on that £80 million? Yes, I am confident that we have that overall expectation right. It is worth reminding ourselves that this is a stage process that we are going through. In future years, there may be greater demand that we will place on the implementation element of the budget as we go through all the various steps. At this point, bearing in mind that next year our role will be to draft and deliver a draft bill to this Parliament with the financial memorandum. In the course of about 12 months, we will go through all its key stages to make decisions from the stage 2 option appraisal on the shape and nature of the Social Security Agency and to begin to set up the experience panels, the expert advisory group, and to continue the work on the basis of the analysis of the consultation responses on how we will deliver a social security system in Scotland and what improvements it is there possible for us to make in the timeframe of this parliamentary term, and which ones we want to signal that we believe should be made thereafter. If we hold that timetable in our head or the steps that we have to go through, it is clearly in our head and I think that it is fair for me to say that at this stage I am comfortable. It is an observation about this process, but I would like your comments on it. Budget processes are always difficult, especially when they are done at this speed. We are where we are. I am trying to work out, because we have to have a discussion after this and we have to comment on this. As you have said, there are a number of areas that the Government needs to look at that mitigate things done in another Parliament, but there is a very long list, which I am sure that you are aware of. Discussionary housing payments from 18 to 21, the bedroom tax, possibilities on the pension issue, council tax reduction, creation of new benefits and so on. What concerns me as an individual member trying to scrutin, I cannot really see what this budget is really going to look like. I cannot see at the moment where the space is for us to see what we think is what we are entitled to do. That priority is wrong and that this priority is the right one. At the moment, I do not think that the committee is in a position to say that, because everything is under consideration. I totally understand why that is the case. I just wondered whether you could give us maybe some indication about what your thoughts are about when that would begin to materialise, or is it so tied up with the creation of the new system that we are not going to see it. I am sure that, for the purposes of people who are reading their report, it is also important for members of the general public to have a general and clear understanding of where we are going in the budget. I completely understand why you are asking that. In your issues, I would probably ask the same question. Some of what you mentioned is already clearly in the budget. The mitigation of the bedroom tax is not a new commitment, it is a continuing commitment, and the amount that we believe is required to do that is there in the budget—the draft budget. Ms Johnson and I have already had an exchange about the rest of the budget in which that sits and what may be required of it. We have a number of commitments as a Government from our manifesto that we will deliver. That includes support for the reinstatement of housing support for 18 to 21-year-olds, the introduction of the new benefit being the best start grant, using our top-up powers in terms of carers allowance, extending fuel payments to families with severely disabled children and so on. Let us take the bedroom tax and put it to one side because it sits already in the budget, it is a continuing commitment and the amount is there. The other areas that you have touched on, some of which I have just gone through, are our manifesto commitments that we will deliver on, and others that are pressures that are coming from other organisations and other parties, perfectly legitimately, requiring us or asking us to consider using resources to mitigate the impact of decisions that are made in the UK Government with respect to child poverty or other benefit changes and so on. We have to consider as we go forward. What I have said before to the committee is that, while I am crystal clear that I will not rush the set-up and delivery of the agency and those benefits, we have had discussions in the chamber and elsewhere around the split between a legislative and executive competence and the very sound rationale for that. I have also said that we are currently considering which of the manifesto commitments that we currently have, for example, on carers allowance or on the 18 to 21-year-olds housing benefit. We can introduce in advance of the Scottish Government taking full control over the full delivery of all 11 benefits. We will, as we are sure about what we may be able to do there or, indeed, what we are not able to do, then the committee will be advised of that and the wider parliamentary chamber will be advised of that. I say it like that not because we have made up our minds somewhere and I just do not want to tell you, but because it is complex, because there are obviously resource issues, but in addition there are issues around if we want to bring forward the delivery of a manifesto commitment, who will deliver that? It would have to be the DWP in advance of our own delivery mechanism being fully tested up and running. Do they believe that they have the capacity, the actual capacity in their systems to do that? What additional cost to them do they believe that that would incur, which, of course, they would charge to us? There are a number of factors that need to be talked through and bottomed out before I can reach those kind of decisions. That is what I mean when I say that it is complex and it is not something that you can easily say, yes, we will do it and we will do it then or no, we will not and we will not do it till. All that work is continuing because, as I am sure you are, Ms McNeill, I am keen to introduce improvements and meet our manifesto commitments as quickly as I can, but I have to balance that desire to make those improvements to what I believe will make a difference to individuals in Scotland with a careful consideration about the best use of resources and about confidence or not, assurance or not, in delivery capacity at the hands of another organisation. I would like to go back to the £80 million budget for the Scotland Act of Implementation. On the level 4 figures that we have received, the budget is described as Scotland Act of Implementation, brackets, social security, so it was my understanding that that £80 million in its entirety was on implementation of new powers that fall under the remit of this committee and social security. You have said that that fund covers the entirety of the non-tax Scotland Act of Implementation, so can I just clarify just for the benefit of the committee how much of that £80 million will come under our remit and which other departments then have a call on that £80 million if they need it? My understanding is that both the Crown Estate and Employment Support has a call on that £80 million and clearly my understanding of it and the information that you have before you differs, so the best I can do, convener, if Mr Griffiths is content, is to undertake today to clarify that position and return to you today with my specific answer, but my understanding is that I gave you it before and obviously that is different from the information that you have. Minister, is it not the case that part of the complexities that you are dealing with, which, as you said in your opening statements, is tackling issues while there are conflicting policies? You have got the UK Government's policies and the Scottish Government's policies. We heard from Sheffield Hallam and they said that the whole of the cuts from UK Gov would actually be £2 billion by 2020. Is that not part of the complexity, is that not part of the difficulty that you are trying to deliver for the people of Scotland when you have a Government that has policies that are totally diametrically opposed to the ones that you are trying to implement here? Well, yes. It is a part of the complexity that we have two Governments and they both legitimately have different political perspectives on what they are trying to do and they are both duly elected as Governments. I think that I referred to that in my frustrapeons before this committee. The way that you deal with it is to be really straightforward in recognising that there are those political differences. Neither Damian Greene nor I are ever going to join hands and completely agree on those matters, and that is fair enough. What we have to do is try and ensure that we keep political disagreements clear for what they are and do not allow those political disagreements to interfere in the detailed work that our respective set of officials have to do. Now, there may be occasions and we are not there at this point and it may not arise where the UK Government takes a decision that we believe fundamentally impacts on our ability to do to meet our democratic mandate as a Scottish Government and at that point we will have to have the kind of political discussion that we have in those circumstances. We have got a process for all of that, which is the joint ministerial working group on welfare, and indeed there may even be an occasion where that disagreement cannot be resolved there, but we are not there yet and we may not be at any point. I think that it is fair to say that both Ms Constance and myself and our other ministerial colleagues from the Scottish Government and Mr Greene and his colleagues from the UK Government want to do the very best that we can to not get to that point. Along the way, we have to find ways by which, although we might look at the same thing and see a different solution, as I said, we can nonetheless find ways to both be able to deliver what we want to deliver. That is the work that has begun, it is going well, there is a lot of goodwill behind it, but I think that it would be unrealistic not to say naive to think that we will never get to a point where there will be major political discrements and it will be how we resolve those issues that we can. Thank you very much minister, that is questions and thank you very much for your answers, per se, as well. Have a very merry Christmas and enjoy your Christmas reading and I am sure that we will enjoy ours also. I close this session and move into private session.