 I welcome this opportunity to update Parliament in progress towards the delivery of the Fair Start Scotland Employment Support Service, one of the first powers that was devolved under the 2016 Scotland Act. That is an important milestone for employment support here in Scotland. It is an opportunity to make employment services work differently and more effectively for the people of Scotland. The Scottish Government is already using new powers to deliver one-year transitional employment support services, and those are already helping unemployed people with health conditions and disabilities across the country to find work and to stay in work. Those services are providing a continuity of support while we progress towards delivering Fair Start Scotland from April 2018. We all understand the health, social and economic benefits from getting more people into good, rewarding and fair work. That is at heart of our ambitions for delivering inclusive economic growth. That ambition is laid out in our economic and labour market strategies and demonstrated through our commitment to the fair work agenda being promoted by the Fair Work Convention. That ambition is also writ through Fair Start Scotland as well. Today, following the conclusion of our rigorous and open procurement process, I can announce that we have signed contracts for up to five years to deliver Fair Start Scotland from April of next year. Fair Start Scotland will provide tailored, person-centred support to a minimum of 38,000 people who are further removed from the labour market and for whom work is a realistic prospect. Before I outline the successful bid, I thank all the organisations that have taken part in the process. Engaging in any procurement process requires a significant investment. I know that those who have secured those contracts will be pleased to others who feel that they have missed out. Every bid received showed the real commitment, dedication and desire of organisations in the public, private and third sectors to help to support people into work. I appreciate the work that all those involved have put into the process. In announcing who has been successful today, I am confident that we have been able to award contracts to a range of providers that have demonstrated strong collaborative proposals that would deliver our shared ambitions. Let me now outline the detail of the nine contracts that I am announcing today. The contract area 1 covers the city of Glasgow. The contract has been awarded to people plus group limited to be delivered in partnership with Remploy and third sector partners Momentum Skills and the Lenox partnership. The estimated value of the contract is £19.1 million. The contract area 2 covers the north and south Lanarkshire local authority areas. The contract has been awarded to Remploy Ltd to be delivered in partnership with third sector partners Enable Scotland and Roots to Work South. The estimated value of the contract is £12.6 million. The contract area 3 is Tayside and covers Perthton-Conross, Angus and Dundee. The contract has been awarded to Remploy Ltd to be delivered in partnership with third sector partners Rathbone Training and The Wisegroup. The estimated value of the contract is £7.3 million. The contract area 4 is Forth Valley and covers the Falkirk, Stirling and Cliquemannanshire local authority areas. The contract has been awarded to Falkirk Council to be delivered in partnership with public sector partners Cliquemannanshire Council, Stirling Council and NHS Forth Valley. The estimated value of the contract is £5 million. The contract area 5 is East and covers Edinburgh, Midlothian, East and West Lothian, Fife and the Borders. The contract has been awarded to StartScotland Ltd to be delivered in partnership with Working Links, Triage and the third sector partner Momentum Scotland. The estimated value of the contract is £21.3 million. The contract area 6 is South West and covers Dumfries and Galloway and the three Ayrshire local authority areas. The contract has been awarded to StartScotland Ltd to be delivered in partnership with Working Links and the third sector partners Rathbone Training, The Lenox partnership and The Wise Group. The estimated value of the contract is £10.1 million. The contract area 7 is North East and covers Aberdeen City and Aberdeenshire local authority areas. The contract has been awarded to third sector organisation Momentum Scotland to be delivered in partnership with LifeSkill Centres Ltd and Enterprise Mentoring Ltd. The contract will be delivered alongside third sector partners Enable Scotland, Aberdeen and Foyay and the Scottish Association for Mental Health. The estimated value of the contract is £5.6 million. The contract area 8 is Highlands and Islands and covers Argyllun Bute, Elin Siar, Highland, Murray, Orkney and Shelland. The contract has been awarded to People Plus Ltd. The contract will be delivered in partnership with the mixture of public, private and third sector partners of Argyllun Bute Council, LifeSkill Centres Ltd, Lochaber Hope, Momentum Scotland, Third Sector Hebrides and 2020 Clearview Ltd. The estimated value of the contract is £6.2 million. Finally, contract area 9 is West. The contract area covers East and West and Bartonshire, East and Renfrewshire, Inverclyde and Renfrewshire. The contract has been awarded to the third sector organisation The Wise Group and we have delivered in partnership with Working Links and third sector partners of the Scottish Association for Mental Health. The Lenox partnership enables Scotland and the Royal National Institute for the Blind. The estimated value of this contract is £8.8 million. Under the provisions that we have laid out, the contract for the West area was specifically reserved for supported businesses to bid into. This is the first time that we have exercised this power, demonstrating this Government's commitment to that sector. A supported business provides vital permanent employment for those disadvantaged in the labour market and we are determined to develop a more diverse delivery market for employment support through devolution. This is why, unlike previous approaches, we have used devolved powers to reserve one area for bids from supported businesses. Although The Wise Group has secured a specific contract under the reservation for supported businesses in the West area, we have also seen successful bids from a supported business in two other lots, Remploy in Lanarkshire and Tayside and involvement from both organisations in other areas as delivery partners, demonstrating the strength of that business model. We have evaluated the bids that we have received to secure best-quality and consistent provision across the whole of Scotland. We will rigorously perform and manage the service to ensure that this is delivered. This is crucial to helping us to ensure continuous improvement in the public services that we can offer people. We have listened in public consultation. We have listened in on-going stakeholder engagement. We have listened to the devolved employment services advisory group that has helped to shape, develop and test our devolved employability approach. I would to place on record my thanks to Professor Alan McGregor, the chair and to the third private and public sector members of that group. As we enter the delivery phase of Fair Start Scotland, I can confirm that I plan to develop that consultative approach further and to continue to listen to the diverse range of voices as we deliver Fair Start Scotland and a more aligned, wider employment support landscape. If Fair Start Scotland will see unprecedented levels of partnership delivery, the joint working that we will see between private, public and third sector delivery partners across Scotland will be a real strength of our new approach. That is not simply business as usual. We are taking a partnership approach in Scotland that will see more than half of provision delivered by supported business and by third sector and public sector bodies. It was Fair Start Scotland that has been designed nationally. All services will be delivered locally through new consortia and featuring a range of special providers to ensure that people receive the right type of support from them. We are taking a different approach to the UK Government by funding those services appropriately, committing an additional £20 million each year from our budget over and above the significantly reduced funding being provided by the UK Government. Today, I am laying out who will deliver our Fair Start Scotland programme through the contracts that have been awarded. Much more critical than that, we must remember that the delivery of the programme is about providing support to people who need it. Our vision for Fair Start Scotland is clear. We are using devolved powers to deliver a distinct and different approach to employment support in Scotland. Our approach is significantly different than previously seen in UK Government programmes. We are putting people at the centre of those services and treating them with dignity. Fair Start Scotland will have respect and fairness at its core, supporting people to achieve their full potential. We are listening to the views of people who rely on those services and we will continue to do so. We are better reflecting the reality of Scotland's geography, regional economies and population spread with nine contract areas, rather than simply lumping the whole of Scotland together as one contract package area, as has been the case under the UK Government. We are also delivering differently by ensuring that providers have committed to a wider fair work workforce and community benefits agenda as part of their bids, including paying the living wage and avoiding use of zero-hours contracts. Crucially, as the department has endorsed by overwhelming majority, Fair Start Scotland will be voluntary, working with unemployed people to encourage them to take the opportunity of support towards work, not threatening them with sanctions by the department for work and pensions. That is in keeping with our desire, through all of our new employability and social security powers, to treat people with dignity and respect. Our employment programmes are not about supporting organisations, sectors or institutions. They are above all about supporting people. People who deserve to be supported through a person-centred and tailored approach that meets their needs, people who deserve to be supported to achieve their full potential, people who deserve to be supported to enter work and retain a job, people who deserve to be treated with dignity, respect and fairness to get on life. Just as is the case with the approach by this Government to all its endeavours, people will be at the core of our approach to taking forward Fair Start Scotland. I welcome the devolution of employability programmes in the Smith commission, but I am puzzled by one thing. David Semple of the PCS Union at the Social Security Committee last week explained his union's absolute opposition to the involvement of the private sector in all devolved aspects of social security employability services included. He said that his union's opposition was not ideological but based on performance. None of the privatised employability contracts have had the same delivery outcomes as previous state-run programmes, but the minister knows that I do not agree with that, but I thought that Scottish ministers did. After all, Jeane Freeman has explained to loud applause in this chamber that devolved DLA PIP will not be administered by the private sector. Why has Jamie Hepburn signed contracts not only with the private sector but with one of the very companies that delivered the work programme in Scotland, a programme that the minister has previously condemned? Is this not a case of the SNP saying one thing and doing quite another? Let me begin by apologising for puzzling Professor Tomkins. That certainly was not my intention to be puzzled. It is symptomatic of the Conservative party's approach to those matters. I appreciate that Professor Tomkins is the Social Security spokesperson for the Conservatives in this place, but we are treating employment support rather differently. We are not treating it as part and parcel of the social security system. Clearly, there has to be interaction between those two systems, but we are treating our employment service as an opportunity to support people to get them into work and not to tie them into a manipulative unfair social security system that sanctions them at every term. In relation to the point that has been made, rather mean-spiritedly, I have to say by Professor Tomkins of my saying one thing and doing another. I remind him that, in creating a fairer Scotland employability support, a discussion paper, which was published on 6 July 2015, we set out to Scotland to develop a strong mixed economy employability provision with important contributions made by the public, private and third sectors in our consultation response, published on 22 March 2016. We said that we will work with suppliers to consider what support we can provide and encourage consortia approaches that reflect the existing mixed economy employability services in Scotland. The private provision and local authority and third sector delivery in this Parliament, in this very chamber, in a debate that we had on employment service on 5 October 2016. Professor Tomkins was here. I remember him being here. He clearly was not listening. I said that I intend to take that opportunity to deliver employment support services, building on our strengths in both the public and private sectors and local authority, third sector and specialist delivery. I reiterated that point at our employability summit on 23 November 2016. In print, in public and in Parliament, I have said that we delivered it across a range of suppliers. That is exactly what we are delivering. Yes, the third sector and supported business sector is a critical element of that as well. When you take into account all the contracts that we have awarded between the public, the third sector and supported businesses constitute a majority of the contracts that we have awarded today. Jackie Baillie to be followed by Ivan McKee. Can I thank the minister for an advanced copy of his statement and welcome the progress made with developing First Art Scotland? Like the Scottish Government, Labour is committed to a person-centred tailored approach that is voluntary and based on meeting individual needs. Can I ask the minister three questions? Firstly, and I am being very specific here, can he tell me what percentage of contract value has been awarded to the private sector and the percentage going solely to the third sector to establish if this meets the Government's ambition of a mixed market of support? Secondly, can he explain why he has copied the Tory Government's approach to the work programme with a payment-by-result system? The concern, of course, is that providers will focus on early wins and those closest to the labour market, leaving them with significant barriers without sufficient support. Finally, many will welcome five-year funding, but let me sound a note of caution. I would be interested to hear what opportunities there will be to refocus the contracts if they do not perform as required. Let me thank Jackie Baillie for her questions. In terms of the precise percentage of contract value, I am happy to follow up in writing, but what I can tell her today is that the specific division between the public sector—sorry, a big part of my third sector—and the private sector is roughly equivalent when you factor in the public sector-supported business is a clear majority. In relation to the latter points that you made about the opportunities to be flexible, I think that it was very clear when I was before the committee that I think that that is important. She will understand, of course, that there is only so much that contracts can do, but, yes, within that, there is the possibility to be flexible as circumstances arise and change, including looking at some of the referral criteria that can be referred into that programme. That is very important. It also speaks of our longer-term agenda of trying to better align the various offerings that we have for employability and employment support. In relation to her suggestion that we are copying the Tory model here, I have to refute that utterly. I will run down the range of ways that it is different between what has gone before and what we expect to happen with the working health programme. She says that she shares her ambition for a voluntary service. Our service is going to be voluntary. That has not been the case with the programme previously. It is not going to be the case with the programme that we see with the working health programme. In relation to the consistency of service, we have laid out very clearly a minimum expectation of providers that has not been the case with UK Government programmes in the past. It is not expected to be the case with the working health programme that the UK Government is going to be. Do not worry, Ms Baillie. I will come to payment by outcome, but I think that it is very important that I place on record why the suggestion that we are replicating the UK Government's approach is utter nonsense. Let me finish that and I will come to your last point. In relation to the working health programme going forward, we see that there is going to be the same approach by the UK Government that providers are setting their own standards. In relation to the length of support under the working health programme, we are seeing a reduction in the amount of time that a client or person may be supported, as was the case under the work programme. A reduction in the length of time that we will have up to two and a half years' support. We are embedding, in our approach, an individual placement and support service of those with mental health, severe and enduring mental ill health. I recall Bill Scott. It is indeed a list, Ms Baillie. Okay, minister, that is probably enough of the list in that case. Bill, let me just, if you do not mind, come by outcome is indeed part of our model. I think that that is important, but of course we are embedding an upfront fee. That was important. We heard that call clearly, though, with any employment programme, we do want to see people get into work. I think that, on that basis, it is important that we set expectations that they will. Thank you. Reminding the chamber of my role as parliamentary liaison officer to the cabinet secretary for the economy, can I ask how will the Government align their programmes with the existing health and social care support and what impact does the minister expect this to have on other public services? As I just alluded to a moment ago, integration and alignment of services is critically important for us as an administration. There will be that opportunity through the range of providers that we have put in place to begin that work. We have also announced a £2.5 million pot of funding that I have already made public for integration and alignment. That has set up 15 projects working across 13 local authority areas looking to better support people with mental health conditions, with a learning disability, with housing needs coming out of the justice system. I recognise inherently the need to support people in all aspects of their life and their journey towards employment. It is not going to be just as simple as focusing purely on employment skills. There will be issues that arise in a person's life. That is why the integration and alignment agenda is so important for us, and that is why we will be taking that opportunity through this programme. I will just emphasise that there are eight and a half minutes in the first three questions. There are nine more questioners, so if we can get through them. Dean Lockhart, to be followed by Alison Johnstone. The total value of the contracts announced today amount to £96 million. Can the minister explain what contractual and other assurances are in place to avoid a repeat of the cost and budget overruns that we have seen across many of the Government's programmes? I am very delighted that Dean Lockhart has got into the territory of the cost of this service, because one of the things that we have done is leveraged in additional revenue from the rest of our budget—£20 million per year—to make up for the significant cuts that his party and Government have sent to us as an administration through the devolution of the service. In relation to the assurances that he seeks, that is set out as a contractual provision. We will monitor those contracts very closely and carefully indeed. If it is an issue that any committee of this Parliament wants to ever ask me about, I will be happy to return to them or raise it in this Parliamentary Chamber. I will respond to any issue. Of course, what we have done today is to announce what the contracts are, and a copy of that detail will be available in the Scottish Parliament information centre, which I am sure that Mr Lockhart will run into immediately after we have finished the statement. The Scottish Government is a Scottish living wage employer. In answer to a question of mine, the minister answered that devolved employment services will support the Scottish Government's fair work ambitions, in particular by supporting individuals into sustained work, which offers a route out of poverty. Can I ask whether Fair Start Scotland will support the Scottish living wage and provide a route out of poverty by only paying providers when they place someone in employment that pays at least the Scottish living wage? The first point to make in relation to that, and Alison Johnstone is quite correct to point to the Government's ambitions for the living wage. The first thing that we have done is to take the opportunity through the awarding of those contracts to make sure that the providers themselves are paying their living wage to those who work for them as an organisation. On the agenda of getting people into employment, yes, we will be working with organisations very closely and encouraging them to take every step that they can to make sure that those who end up in employment at the end of that are remunerated adequately. Of course, our aspiration is that everyone in this country should pay paid the real living wage, and that will be no different with our approach to this agenda, as it will be with any other. I thank the minister for early sight of his statement. Many of the successful bidders and their consortium members for a number of the contract areas are the same organisations that are currently delivering the service. How will the Scottish Government guarantee to people that the services that they get will change for the better as a result of this process? Of course, it does occur to me that some of the problems that we have seen in the predecessor programmes were in place when Mr Cole Hamilton's party was in government. That is the fundamental point to make. Any organisation works to a policy set by the administration that has procured that service. Our model is very different, and I have laid out already very clearly in what sense it will be different from the one that went before it under the hands of the UK Government, not least that it will not compel people to take part. It will be a voluntary service, because I believe that we will get more out of people in that way. In that sense, I can assure Mr Cole Hamilton that there will be a significantly different approach under the contract. Just as there has been in this transition year, one of my great joys is going out to see those who have benefited by the programme that we have put in place this year, who inform me that it is remarkably drastically different and much superior to those programmes that they went through under the hands of the Department for Work and Pensions. The matter has been touched on briefly so far, but for further clarity and information, can the minister outline what opportunities there will be for collaboration with the third sector, both in the short term and in the future, in the delivery of the Fair Start Scotland support service? I thank Mr McPherson for that question, Presiding Officer. As I have already set out, the third sector is an important player in the contracts that I have announced today. In the immediate term, they are going to be getting on with the work that is involved in delivering this contract. In relation to other opportunities, I mentioned in my statement the need for continuous improvement. I will be looking to have a similar group in nature to the advisory group that was established that had third sector involvement through the third sector employability form. I want to see the third sector involved in that. Of course, through a range of specialist provision that has already been laid out in the contracts and the tenders that have been come in that have been successfully awarded contracts through, there is a range of third sector bodies laid out there to be subcontractors. As we go forward, if contractors require further specialist provision, they will be, I am sure, prevailing upon the third sector for that as well. Daniel Johnson to be followed by Fulton MacGregor. The minister mentioned in his statement that those contracts would be subject to rigorous performance management. Could he go into some more detail around that measurement regime and outlining how the contracts will be evaluated and how that information will be reported back to Parliament? As I have just alluded to, one of the things that we will of course be doing is making sure that we have that group in place to ensure continuous improvement. My officials will be rigorously assessing the efficacy of the contracts that we have been putting in place to see how effective they have been in reaching the numbers that we want to see. We want to see at least 38,000 people supported through the contracts that we have put in place. We are looking very closely to make sure that we are reaching that ambition. Of course, as the Parliament would expect, we will regularly publish statistics and make them available for the consumption of members of this Scottish Parliament and for the wider public to see just how we are doing in that regard. I am sure that I will be returning to answer questions about that in the future. Fulton MacGregor to be followed by Jamie Halcro Johnston. Can the minister expand a bit further on the rationale for the nine contract areas and what impact he expects those to have? Yes, I think that one of the things that we saw very clearly and heard very clearly was a concern that some of the manner in which the previous contracts had been procured did not reflect some of the geographies that we have here in Scotland. It was too large that it precluded a number of organisations from being able to bid. We have worked with a range of people involved and organisations involved in the delivery of a range of employability interventions, including local government. One of the things that we heard back was a preference from, for example, the Scottish local authority for economic development, who suggested that we should have eight areas. We looked at their proposition and thought that it was more or less right, but nine would be a better reflection on delivery. We were able to deliver to local circumstances. Of course, we were looking at that very closely to see again how effective that has been. When it comes round at the end of those contracts, depending on the direction that we want to take, we will look very closely to see how effective that approach has been. Jamie Halcro Johnston, to be followed by John Mason. The minister has already suggested that detailed outcomes data will be publicly available from all providers to ensure the effectiveness of each regional contract. Could he tell us what stages the data will be provided? I am not quite able to say that today, Presiding Officer. I have made very clear my commitment. It is on the record now that we will be providing that information. It will be regularly published, it will be regularly available, and I make that commitment. As soon as that becomes a confirmed position in terms of when we will make that information available, we will let everyone and every member of the Scottish Parliament know that. If I have further questions about that, I will be happy to respond to Mr Halcro Johnston or anyone else. Can the minister say anything about those who are currently receiving employment support and who might be a bit concerned about how the transition will work? It is an important question because we do not want anyone to be concerned. I can say very clearly to Mr Mason, the rest of the members in the chamber, and the wider public is that those who are benefiting by the transitional arrangements that have been put in this year, there is a period under which our new contracts are in place and they will continue to receive the support from the providers that have been put in place this year after the end of this financial year. There is that clear consistency of provision, so in that sense no one needs to be worried. Can the minister offer insight into how adequate provision was made for local specialised services to participate meaningfully in the procurement process in their own right? That was of critical importance for me in terms of allowing a wider range of suppliers. There was a significant piece of engagement over a long period of time to get to the position that we were in starting several years ago. We have engaged over a number of public events. We have engaged through the medium of the Scottish Government's website to make people aware of the opportunity. Through direct engagement, for example, one of the concerns that was expressed was about the length of time that we had for people to tender, which came from the third sector employability forum. Having heard that, for example, extended the period of time in which people could tender for the service. I have been very clear and responsive to that concern and done all that we could to ensure that specialised riders in local areas could participate and take part. Of course, I would observe that that is part of the reason that we put in place nine contract package areas. My clear view, if we were under the working health programme, is that Scotland would be right now very likely to have one contract package area, but it is still being administered by the Department for Work and Pensions, which would have given local organisations virtually no chance whatsoever of being able to tender. Can the minister confirm that those with a higher need who have not been supported by the previous DWP approach will be at the forefront of fair start Scotland? Yes, I can confirm that. We are operating a model by which there are three levels of support of intensivity, depending on the required support for that individual. That is why I have made the point that there are up to 30 months of support. That includes 18 months of pre-work support and up to 12 months of inward support, which is a significant advance on what was in place before and, again, what we expect to see in the working health programme. Yes, I am alive to the concern that those who need support most must have it, and that is why we are putting in place today's programme. Thank you very much. I thank the minister and all the members for their questions. That concludes our ministerial statement. The next item of business is a debate on motion 7, 9, 4, 6 in the name of Gordon Lindhurst on gender pay gap. I urge all members who wish to speak in this debate to press their requested speed buttons now.