 Good afternoon! The next item of business is a statement from Angela Constance on every child, every chance, Scotland's first tackling child poverty delivery plan, 2018-2022. The Cabinet Secretary will take questions after a statement, so if you wish to ask a question, please press your request to speak button now. Angela Constance I'm delighted to introduce to the chamber every child, every chance Scotland's tackling child poverty delivery plan for 2018-22. That is an important day for this Parliament. That plan is the first of three plans that will take us towards our ambitious 2030 eradicating child poverty targets, which this Parliament unanimously agreed in November last year. The consensus that we needed to set statutory targets to reduce and ultimately eradicate child poverty and take action required to meet them was important. It showed that no matter what part of the political spectrum we came from, we recognised deep-seated long-standing poverty in our country and the causes and consequences of it and that we wanted that to change. The plan could not be more timely. Last week's child poverty statistics showed that over the period 2014-17, 24 per cent of children were living in relative poverty after housing costs. Too often, the real damage behind research like this can get lost in numbers. We cannot forget that behind every statistic there is a child, a family and a community where life chances are being determined not by potential but by circumstance, and that is quite simply unacceptable. Under independent projections show that if we do not step up our action now, UK welfare cuts could drive more than 1 in 3 children in Scotland into poverty by 2030. That is not a future that I am prepared to accept. Yes, the projections are stark, but poverty is not inevitable. We, as a Parliament, agreed to take on this challenge when we voted unanimously to pass the Child Poverty Scotland Act 2017. We are building on strong foundations to continue to support families on low incomes, our commitment to the real living wage, free prescriptions, free school meals, the baby box and our massive investment in early learning and childcare and affordable housing reflect our determination to tackle poverty. As does the £100 million annual investment to offset the damage of UK welfare cuts, including fully mitigating the bedroom tax. Our challenge going forward is not just to mitigate UK Government cuts but to lift people out of poverty. Before discussing the detail of the plan, I would like to take a moment to thank all those who have contributed to its development. We consulted with people from across Scotland with direct experience of poverty, and perhaps most importantly, we engaged with parents and children themselves. Equality and poverty stakeholder groups and parliamentary committees also offered the wealth of their experience in various areas. Last year, we established the poverty and inequality commission so that our actions could be informed by independent expert knowledge. The commission's advice has been invaluable and we have taken full account of their recommendations. The commission suggested that the delivery plan should be clear how its proposed actions will support children from high-risk households. The plan focuses on families at most risk of poverty, who we have called priority families. These are lone parents, families with a disabled child or adult, young mothers, minority ethnic families, families with a child under one, and larger families with three or more children. Our plan also mirrors the advice of the commission and its structure, focusing firstly on actions to make progress on the three key drivers of child poverty. Firstly, work in earnings, secondly, costs of living, including housing costs, and thirdly, social security. Alongside the interventions that are aimed at the drivers of poverty, the plan also includes action to improve long-term outcomes and quality of life, another recommendation from the commission. Our aim is not simply to tackle family poverty now, but to prevent family poverty in the future. Our actions aim to equip children and young people living in poverty now with the skills, experiences and resilience so that they can avoid poverty in 2030 when they themselves may be parents. For example, we are investing £2 million in testing the innovative children's neighbourhood Scotland programme in an urban area, a small town and a rural community. The plan also provides £1.35 million new investment for the further education sector to support and scale up preventative approaches, helping to ensure that young people who have grown up in poverty have sustainable routes to positive destinations and therefore out of poverty. We will invest an initial £500,000 in a new-tailored community education programme on-site for gypsy traveller, preschool children and their families. The plan also sets out a range of collaborative cross-Scotland partnership actions recognising that Government cannot eradicate child poverty on its own. We are establishing a new £7.5 million innovation fund together with the Hunter Foundation. That joint investment will support new approaches to preventing and reducing child poverty. We are providing £500,000 for the healthier, wealthier children income maximisation approach. That will help to secure financial and practical support through healthcare settings across Scotland for pregnant women and families with children at risk of or experiencing poverty. Our interventions also tackle the key drivers of child poverty, starting with parents' work and earnings. Sustainable fair work is a long-term route out of poverty, so I am pleased to say that we will invest £12 million in a new support for parents employment, which will be developed alongside our national devolved employment service, Fair Start Scotland. That will support at least 38,000 people over three years and have positive impacts on around 7,000 children. Our actions in this section of the plan also include our intention to build a living wage nation, lifting at least 25,000 more people on to the living wage in the next three years. A new package of support for equality at work comprises new action on the gender pay gap, a new approach to employment that is developed with disabled people, new support for flexible working and increased funding for the Workplace Equality Fund. We will also take a range of action to help families with the everyday costs of living right now. We will work to introduce a new minimum amount for the school clothing grant, providing more money for school uniforms and sport kits. We will invest £1 million in delivering support for children's experience in food insecurity during school holidays, and we will provide new support for childcare after school and in the holidays, too. There will be a new focus on families and our warmer home Scotland programme, delivering an annual average saving of £350 off fuel bills. We will invest £3 million in a financial health check guarantee, helping low-income families to maximise their income and to get the best deals. We will provide £1 million for the Canadian UK's trust, affordable credit loan fund, increasing access to credit and reducing problems caused by insecure incomes. Finally, I want to turn to social security and the new powers, which give us new opportunities. Our new best start grant will provide children and low-income families with payments at key stages during their early years, a grant that will not put a cap on children. For a family of two children, that is an increase of up to £1400 more than they would get under the UK Government's current sure start maternity grant. We will provide more support to carers, establishing a new young carers grant from 2019, and from this year increasing the level of carers allowance, a 13 per cent rise for our carers. Over and above our existing social security programme, I can confirm today that we intend to introduce a new income supplement providing financial support to those families who need it most. Planning to introduce the supplement over the lifetime of this plan, we will take the analysis that is provided by the commission to the next stage. We will now consider the detail of such a supplement, the level at which it should be set and those at whom it should be targeted, in order to help lift the maximum number of children out of poverty. We will also identify a robust and viable delivery route to get the additional income to families. We will need to ensure that delivery costs are reasonable, complexity is minimised and that the impact on earnings and interactions with UK benefits are fully explored and understood. We will do this bearing in mind that our priority is the safe and secure transfer of the benefits to be delivered to this Parliament. We will not let down the 1.4 million people of Scotland relying on those benefits to be delivered to them by the end of this parliamentary term. We will provide an update on the first progress report due next year. The plan builds on the determination that we showed by bringing the Child Poverty Act of Parliament and gaining unanimous support. However, it is what happens next that is important now, as we work to deliver on the commitments that I have set out today. It means that a country where every child has every chance in life and meeting the child poverty targets means to transform in Scotland. In 2018, the year of young people, I commend this plan to Parliament. Thank you very much, cabinet secretary. We will now move to questions. I thank the cabinet secretary for her statement and for her advance side of it. There are some things within that statement that I am sure everyone in the chamber will welcome, but I have a couple of questions just to explore a bit further. There is one brief mention within her statement in regard to affordable housing. Would the cabinet secretary confirm that, at this present rate, the Government is going to miss its target in regard to affordable housing and that that is one of the key areas in regard to helping people out of poverty? Secondly, she will be aware that Audit Scotland reported this week that the Scottish National Party Government has not attempted to work out how much it is going to cost to bring the devolved social security system to Scotland. If ministers are caught out by those costs, the excess cash will have to come from her budget and affect priority families that she has been talking about. Can the cabinet secretary respond to the report and reveal what steps are to be made to ensure greater transparency and a better understanding of the overall implementation cost to help financial planning and decision making going forward? I am grateful to Mr Balfour for his questions on affordable housing and transparency around the work that we pursue around social security costs and I will come on to the point with respect to the Audit Scotland report. He seems to have his criticism of the Scottish Government, but I wonder if that implied criticism of the Scottish Government means that Mr Balfour is absolutely raging at his UK Tory Government. Given that 60 per cent of Scotland's spending decisions are still made in London, given that child poverty is rising across the UK—it is lower in Scotland—and given that the Joseph Rowntree Foundation says that the benefits freeze is the biggest driver of rising poverty in and out of work, and given that, by 2020, welfare spend in this country will be down by £4 million, I wonder why he has nothing to say about Theresa May and her lack of inaction about the burning injustices in this country. I expect very much and welcome to be held to account for our responsibilities and our decisions. I absolutely welcome that, but what is good for the goose has to be good for the gander. That was something that the Audit Scotland report touched upon, because the Audit Scotland report rightly highlighted that we have two social security systems in this country and how they interact is dependent on each other. Much of our progress will, indeed, be dependent on the DWP's co-operation with this Government. I have had at least one occasion to write to the Secretary of State to query that commitment to work with this Government, and I hope that I do not have to do that again. I very much welcome the Audit Scotland's recognition that you will see, if you read the Audit Scotland report, that good early progress has been made on social security and that we are well prepared in the remaining work that we have to do. We know that that is a critical year for our new social security system. Audit Scotland confirmed that we were, indeed, on time with wave 1 benefits, that we had good risk management procedures in place. Of course, the minister last week was making the announcement with regard to the Social Security Agency again on track Mr Balfour and that the first phase of recruitment has commenced. We, I believe, have bent over backwards to be transparent and to be proactive about the costs and about the emerging costs. Of course, we have a very detailed financial memorandum attached to the Minister's Social Security Bill. However, if members wish us to provide even more information, we are absolutely open to that. However, the minister and I have bent over backwards to proactively keep this Parliament and the committee in particular informed. I really reject, Mr Balfour, that you are suggesting that this Parliament and this Government will not meet our affordable housing targets, because the latest reports, including a report from Shelter Scotland and others, said that we are on track to meet our target of 50,000 affordable homes. It is my view, and it is just my view, that one of the reasons that in Scotland we have lower child poverty rates than elsewhere in the UK is because of our substantial investment over the past 10 years in affordable housing. However, we know that there is more to do, absolutely more to do, and we are up for that challenge. I appreciate that there is some political interchange, particularly in the opening remarks. Perhaps we can move to questions and answers from now on. Elaine Smith I thank the cabinet secretary for the early sight of this statement, and I agree that poverty is not inevitable. However, although the Tory's careless benefit cuts are, of course, plunging more children and working families into poverty, the Scottish Government cannot escape the responsibility after a decade in office, but unfortunately much of the statement seems to promise jam tomorrow. Can the cabinet secretary give more detail of how the Scottish Government's social security powers will be used to top up family benefits and boost incomes? I also note the mention of the Scottish Government's universal benefits. Therefore, with 230,000 children living in poverty right now and 1 in 3 Scottish children set to be plunged below the bread line over the next decade, will she now stop joining with the Tories to block Labour amendments on the £5 child benefit top-up and support this effective, simple-to-administer policy, which we know provides no disincentive to working families? Perhaps she could tell us why she's been ignoring organisations like Child Poverty Action Group, who say that it would be the most effective way for tackling child poverty right now to help to give every child every chance. I also note the investment of £1 million for school holiday hunger. Given that North Lanarkshire Council alone are investing half a million for that purpose, how can she be confident that that will cover the costs across Scotland? Finally, a decade on from the SNP manifesto promise of expanding universal free-school meals, will she now stop the stigma, feed all of our primary-aged children and by doing so help alleviate and work poverty? I will do my best to answer questions that are efficiently as possible. It is fair to say, when it comes to what we need to do to tackle child poverty, to end child poverty in Scotland, that is a complex matter. There are no silver bullets and there are certainly no 60-second sound bites. I would like to point Ms Smith to the independent and expert advice that we got from the Poverty and Inequality Commission that we all agreed to establish. We have an opportunity here to unite around that independent and expert advice. We also have an opportunity to unite around against the Tories at the UK Government and the devastation that their costs, as well as uniting around a call for more powers. If the Tories do not fix their broken system, surely we should be having control over it in this place to pursue some of the opportunities that we all so dearly wish. I know that Ms Smith is a powerful advocate for topping up child benefit. I absolutely understand the arguments for it. There is a benefit to the social age, to a universality, but, given the scale of the challenge, we have just published figures that, if we do not do things differently, we risk 38 per cent of children in Scotland growing up in relative poverty. The scale of the challenge is getting worse. Therefore, we need to look very closely at the independent and expert advice that points to better ways to lift more children out of poverty and make no mistake about it. The development of a new income supplement is a substantial undertaking that demonstrates our commitment to reach our ambitious targets to reduce and ultimately end child poverty. There is a range of detailed work that we now need to do. We will commence that work next year. The commission helpfully pointed to a package of reforms that, if we topped up child benefit, we would lift 20,000 children out of poverty for a cost of £360 million. It pointed to another package of measures that was indeed more targeted, where we would lift 45,000 children out of poverty. We intend to keep Parliament informed every step of the way in the development of a new income supplement. I want to take Parliament with us in this, because it is a substantial undertaking that will involve a substantial investment. We want to debate the detail of that. We want to debate how we get the best, most robust and reliable delivery route. Finally, we have expanded the fair food fund across peace. It is an important point that children go hungry in Scotland today. I find that an obscenity. I am answering those questions to the best endeavour for the members who are asking very detailed questions. We have expanded our fair food fund generally, and on top of that, there is additional funding to target holiday hunger in children and out-of-school care hunger for children. We will take that forward in partnership with local governments, but also in partnership with local third sector organisations that I know are doing so much great work on the ground. Half our time has gone in the first two questions, which were multi-closal answers. I say to all members—ten more members who wish to ask a question—don't give me any preamble. Just ask a question and we will get an answer. Does the minister agree that, if she is serious about combating deep-seated long-standing poverty in our country by addressing its causes and consequences, Scotland needs to create an environment that encourages business growth and job creation, and we need to ensure that our children have equal opportunity whatever their background by listening to headteachers' concerns around staff shortages when it comes to closing the attainment gap? I would say that the fundamentals of the Scottish economy is strong. It was part of the commission's advice about our endeavours to tackle child poverty and needs to have a very strong focus on the economy, as well as increasing wages and earnings. We know that productivity growth in Scotland is good. We know that employment is on the up. We know that we need to have an absolute focus on inclusive growth, which is about delivering growth and tackling inequalities. Of course, the biggest risk to economic growth just now is not from the UK Tory Government and its plans to drag us out of Brexit. I really hope that the member gets out and about over recess and the weeks and months to come to headteachers. I know that I continue to do that. I know that our massive investment of £750 million over the lifetime of this Parliament in the form of the attainment challenge fund is very welcome and is allowing headteachers to make flexible decisions based on the needs of their school. Clare Adamson, followed by Mark Griffin. As convener of the Social Security Committee, I am well aware of the work that both the Government and the committee need to do to ensure that all legislation and regulations are in place to ensure that the benefits can be delivered to the 1.4 million people who rely on them. Given the priority that the cabinet secretary and minister have already shown to those plans, can the cabinet secretary explain how the income supplement will fit into the delivery of social security in Scotland? The focus of this Government is indeed the safe and secure transfer of the living benefits that will transfer to the Scottish Parliament. We are establishing the new social security agency to ensure the delivery of the benefits over this parliamentary term. We know that we are making good progress and that will ensure that people continue to receive their benefit at the right time at the right amount. That is our top priority. We also want to get the income supplement right. The details around that are very important. We want to ensure that we effectively and efficiently reach the most people. We want to consider our options very carefully, as I indicated in earlier answers, to ensure that the investment that we make has a maximum impact on child poverty. We will be starting working on options for the income supplement this year, and we will provide an update in the 2019 progress report. Mark Griffin is filled by Christina McKelvie. The role of universal credit has been shambolic and roundly criticised by many members in the chamber. Can the cabinet secretary give an assurance to those priority families that the proposed new income supplement will not rely on or make use of that discredited system? Mr Griffin makes an important point. The evidence on the modelling from the Poverty and Inequality Commission showed an alternative way, other than topping up child benefit, to reach more children. What we have to do is to find the right delivery route to do that. We need to explore the universal credit options. We will do, but we are absolutely cognisant of how problematic universal credit is as a reserved benefit. We, at any moment, could have the rug pulled from under our feet. The roll-out has been shambolic. It has pushed people into poverty. The benefit itself has become discredited, although much needed for many vulnerable families. The final point is that this is not all in our gift. The DWP would need to agree to schedule any income supplement into their work schedule, and they would also charge us to do so on our behalf. The cabinet secretary will know that the Equal and Human Rights Committee has focused a lot of its work on gypsy traveller children. It was very welcome to see half a million pounds as an initial investment on community education, tailored community education on site for gypsy traveller preschool children. Will the cabinet secretary tell me how that will address the needs of gypsy traveller children in Scotland? We will invest an initial £500,000 to work directly with gypsy traveller families and other partners as part of a tailored community education programme that will be offered on site for families. It will be composed of three elements, especially tailored play and early learning opportunities for preschool children, on site and adult learning opportunities for parents and carers, work with older siblings who are of secondary school age but do not attend in school. We want those components to support children in early learning to help parents with their own literacy and numeracy and offer young people access to a range of different training and learning opportunities. It remains the case that gypsy traveller families are one of the most marginalised groups in our society, and this Government, with the support of this Parliament, is absolutely determined to change that. The member will be well aware of the work that I am leading with respect to the ministerial working group and how we intend to engage with the community, too. Based on the positive financial health and other impacts of the healthier, wealthier children's scheme in greater Glasgow and Clyde, what gains does the cabinet secretary envisage for families and what outcome does she seek from the national roll-out, with £500,000 worth of funding, off the successful scheme, a roll-out long called for and welcomed by the Scottish Greens? I know that Ms Johnson has been a very powerful advocate and champion of the healthier, wealthier scheme that has operated in the west of Scotland in terms of outcomes for families. It will ensure that families get better earlier advice, and it will help to ensure that many families at the end of the day get their entitlements to benefit or fuel poverty advice, and that will save them money or put more money into their pocket. I know that the cabinet secretary for health has recently replied to Ms Johnson that she is happy to meet her to provide more information, but we have made good progress. In particular, the work around the universal health health visiting pathways is particularly exciting, given that there is so much additional investment in health visitors that it will become the norm to be advising families what they are entitled to and signposting them to other services. That could be embedded in other children's services. Willie Rennie to be followed by Bob Doris. The Joseph Rowntree Foundation has drawn the connection between poor mental health and child poverty. I have looked through the plan today, but I cannot see any new investment in child mental health. Can the minister reassure me that there is new money coming into mental health today for children? Mr Rennie raises a very important point. There is a significant section of the plan that addresses mental health. There is a correlation between health inequalities and poverty. He will be well aware of the work undertaken by Ms Watt. The purpose of the plan is to demonstrate how we get more money into the pockets of families, how we reduce their living costs and, by improving people's income and security, we hope to support the work that is led by Ms Watt in terms of improving people's pockets and also by associating their mental health. It is important that, in terms of the new employment service that we are doing and the work that we are doing around homelessness, all of that is not looking at people as two-dimensional objects that we accept and want to work with people on the basis of their needs. That may be their mental health, their employment issues and ensuring that they get income maximisation. However, I would hope that, once Mr Rennie connects the work that is currently going on in mental health with the work that is going on to reduce child poverty, he will see that that will take us another step forward. Bob Doris is to be followed by Maurice Golden. The Scottish Government's ambition to tackle non-terrent time hunger aligns well with the new Glasgow city government's extension of free school moves to primary 4 and the new holiday hunger fund. Does the cabinet secretary agree that partnership working with councils and the third sector is vital to such success and will she meet with myself and council colleagues to discuss and explore that partnership working further? I am always delighted to meet members from any political party in this chamber and anybody who is working at a local level to tackle child poverty. As I said earlier, there is additional support in our fair food fund and we want to, in particular, join up some of the work in terms of improving out-of-school care, increasing the education on the extracurricular opportunities that children have and the many projects that are operating the length and breadth of Scotland to feed our children. There is additional money to address food poverty and I would hope that that would be welcomed. Maurice Golden is to be followed by Rona Mackay. Can the cabinet secretary describe how the Scottish Government intends to support low-income families struggling to cope with the rising cost of rent? I thank Mr Golden for that question. He will be well aware of our substantial investment in affordable housing. The social rented sector works very hard to keep rents affordable. There is some evidence that there is some rent inflation in the social sector and we want to work with housing providers, particularly as they build more houses, to find better ways to make more savings. We will see that detailed in the plan so that we can prevent rent inflation in the social sector. In terms of the private rented sector, we have legislation that was the biggest shake-up in the private rented sector for more than 30 years. However, in terms of rents, we continue to fully mitigate the bedroom tax, which ensures that people can remain in their homes before paying their rent and are not put at additional risk of homelessness. Because of the Tory's onslaught and people already struggling to make ends meet, we have seen a rise in child poverty in households in which someone works. What will that plan do to support parents in that position? The member is right that seven in 10 Scottish children in poverty live in a household where someone is actually in work, whereas one in 10 children in poverty live in a household where all the adults are unemployed. To focus, as others might do on other so-called causes, we need to have some caution about terms such as worklessness, for example, because the main drivers of poverty, as set out in the plan, are inadequate income from work, which is what the plan seeks to address with the powers that we have. The other driver of poverty is the high costs for essential goods and, of course, the continued UK Government welfare cuts. I am pleased to say that the delivery plan highlights the new £12 million programme for intensive key worker support, helping parents who have been out of the labour market to get back into work, but also, crucially, supporting those parents in low-paid jobs to stay in work and to progress their careers. Thank you very much, and that concludes our statement. I apologise to members who couldn't reach, but we need to move on to the next debate, which we are already eating into. I'll just take a few moments for members and the minister to change seats.