 Good morning. Happy new year and welcome to the first meeting of the Social Justice and Social Security Committee for 2022. Apologies this morning have been received from Foisal Childry MSP. I would also like to welcome back Natalie Don, our deputy convener, who returns after a period of maternity leave. I would also like to thank Evelyn Tweed MSP for her significant contribution to our work as her substitute in that time. Thank you very much indeed, Evelyn. Our first item of business today is a decision to take item 4 in private. Are we all agreed? The next item on the agenda is an evidence session on the Scottish Government's budget 22-23, which was published on 9 December. We focused our pre-budget work on meeting the child poverty targets and received a response to our pre-budget letter on 9 December. I welcome to the meeting Shona Robison MSP, Cabinet Secretary for Social Justice, Housing and Local Government. Joining the Cabinet Secretary, we have Shona Leng, director for housing and social justice and Kevin Stevens, head of strategic and programme finance at the Scottish Government. Welcome to you all this morning. Thank you for joining us. I would like to invite the Cabinet Secretary to make an opening statement. Thanks very much, convener, and a happy new year to everyone. Thank you for the invitation to the committee today. I am supported by Shirley Lane and Kevin Stevens, as you will be aware. This is another challenging budget, perhaps the most fiscally challenging to date, but one where we have had to make choices and one where we are proud that we have chosen to back our national mission to tackle child poverty and to strengthen support available for families during the cost of living crisis. We have committed almost £200 million to support the doubling of the Scottish child payment to £20 from April 2022, immediately supporting 111,000 children under the age of six. We are committed to rolling out the Scottish child payment fully to under 16 by the end of 2022, backed by an investment of £197 million. In the meantime, we will continue to meet the cost of delivering bridging payments worth £520 in 2022 to around 150,000 children of school age. The investment underlines our commitment to delivering on our national mission, and we will publish our next four-year tackling child poverty delivery plan by the end of March. That will outline the cross-government action to put Scotland on a critical path to the target set. The Scottish child payment forms part of the £4 billion that we are committing in social security and welfare payments, which will go directly to over 1 million people in Scotland. That is money that will help low-income families with their living costs, support older people to heat their homes in winter and will enable disabled people to live full and independent lives. This summer, we will introduce adult disability payment, which will deliver approximately £1.95 billion of support for working-age disabled people. That brand new benefit will provide disabled people with a fundamentally different experience when applying for and receiving the support that they are entitled to. I am delighted to confirm the regulations for adult disability payment have been laid before Parliament, marking a significant milestone in the devolution of disability benefits. Convener, we are investing £530 million to deliver the devolved social security system in Scotland in 2022-23, ensuring a simplified, compassionate system that will treat everyone with dignity, fairness and respect and provide people with an improved experience. This winter, we will launch the low-income winter heating assistance, with a guaranteed annual payment of £50, which will benefit around 400,000 low-income households who are currently eligible for cold weather payments through an investment of £21 million. We are also investing £41 million, including local authority administration and the Scottish welfare fund, to provide essential help to the most vulnerable people in our communities. The budget recognises the important role that carers play in supporting those with disabilities or long-term conditions, with a further £315 million of funding for carers allowance and £42 million for carers allowance supplement. Within the budget, we are also making available £831 million for affordable housing, progressing our commitment to deliver 110,000 affordable energy-efficient homes across the next decade, of which at least 70 per cent will be available for social red and 10 per cent will be in our remote, rural and island communities. We are making a further £10 million available for our ending home. The other fund continues our investment of £100 million for transformation funding between 2018-19 and 2025-26. It supports the commitment that we made in programme for government to continue to invest more than £100 million to support front-line services and focus on prevention of violence against women and girls from school onward over the next three years. The figure includes the enhanced delivering equally safe fund, which we have increased by £12 million to £38 million, providing more than £28 million to support front-line services and £2 million for prevention over the next two years. In conclusion, that is very much a budget of choices and indeed a transitional budget, one where we sought to support our three strategic priorities of child poverty, climate challenge and Covid economic recovery, while progressing our resource spending review for the longer term that will start under way soon. I thank the committee for its pre-budget scrutiny and I look forward to your questions. I appreciate that introduction. I hope that colleagues who have not already indicated where they would like to ask a question can do so by typing R into the chat function as normal or sending me a message if they have a supplementary that they would like to ask. Before I turn to colleagues in turn, I have a few questions that I would like to raise. Obviously, we very much welcome the doubling of the Scottish child payment. It was called for by the committee in our pre-budget work. It will go a long way to reaching our child poverty targets. It was also very much welcomed by stakeholders and that that doubling will happen when Scottish child payment is fully rolled out to children up to 16 in December. I am concerned, however, by the minutes from the joint ministerial working group where UK ministers appear to suggest that they may not be able to meet the timetable for that delivery. That is of great concern. Can you please confirm whether you feel the roll-out and the doubling will still be deliverable by December? Thank you very much, convener. Let me respond to that in a little bit of detail, because it is an important point. Yes, I am confident, but it will take both Governments to help to deliver that. I will go on to say a little bit about why that is important. The Minister for Social Security and Local Government, Ben MacPherson, wrote to the minister, Chloe Smith, on 5 January, stressing the Scottish Government's commitment to rolling out Scottish child payment to under-16s by the end of 2022. He outlined the commitment of both Governments, the joint commitment and the on-going joint programme of work, stressing the risks involved in the DWP's approach and seeking further assurances around timescales. The Scottish Government made the Department of Work and Pensions aware of our Scottish child payment delivery intentions back in July 2019, following the finalisation of an impacting paper. There has been quite a bit of time, obviously, of notice to the DWP that this was our intention. There have been on-going negotiations between the Scottish Government and the DWP, trying to solve the data issues and a joint delivery plan. I am pleased to say that it is now in place. The DWP's project documentation from August 2019 includes a list of the high-level data requirements that the Scottish Government requires, plus assumptions and risks. In addition to the normal project management processes, the Scottish Government and DWP senior officials have committed to a series of additional assessments of progress against intended delivery at pre-agreed junctures from January to March. That is important, because if it becomes clear at one of the critical checkpoints that there is a risk to successful delivery, a joint assessment will be undertaken to mitigate the risk. As you are aware, there have been on-going negotiations between the Scottish Government and the DWP, trying to resolve the data issues. All I would say about that is that the Scottish Government's preferred solution has not been agreed. Therefore, we had to agree quite reluctantly to the DWP's preferred solution, which carries a higher risk. That is the reason that the Scottish Government sought a letter of comfort from the DWP, acknowledging the above to be the case. Our preference has consistently been to extend the existing systems that we have in place for the Scottish child payment, but the DWP's position is that it should be built on the DWP's new strategic solution. It carries a higher degree of risk, but we have mechanisms in place to monitor that. I am sure that that is something that we could keep the committee appraised of in terms of the progress that is being made around the resolution of the data solutions. In Blunt, we cannot do this without the data from the DWP. That is a critical part of being able to roll out the Scottish child payment by the end of this year, so that has to happen. I would be happy from our end to keep the committee appraised of progress. I thank you for that, cabinet secretary. I think that colleagues in the committee would share my concern in that area as well. I think that it would be helpful, not least because I am hopeful that we will have a UK Government minister coming before the committee soon if we could have sight of the correspondence that has been going back and forth between the two Governments. I hope that that is something that you can agree to. I am happy to share that correspondence. There is nothing to hide here. That is what I have just explained. We want to be absolutely transparent around this and to keep the committee updated. I am happy to share the correspondence. I am sure that, when you have the DWP minister in front of you, you will be able to ask some similar questions around this as well. I turn now to questions from colleagues starting with Pam Duncan Glancy, please, followed by Marie McNair. Thank you, convener, and good morning to the committee, the clerks and to the cabinet secretary. Thank you for joining us this morning, and thank you for setting out your vision and the budget itself. As it stands, only one in four children will benefit from the doubling of the Scottish child payment now. As you know, we support the doubling of the Scottish child payment. I think that most of Parliament does. We think that it also needs to be doubled again to meet the targets. However, as it stands, only one in four children are going to get that doubling, because the higher rate only applies to children under the age of five, for some of the reasons that you have just described. However, it still means that only one in four are going to get it. That means that hundreds of thousands of children on the Scottish child payment bridging payments—that is 170,000 people—will be left without the doubling of the payment as well, and 125,000 children do not access those bridging payments at all. Can the cabinet secretary tell us whether or not the Government will double the bridging payments, so that families who get the bridging payments will also get £20 a week? Can the cabinet secretary tell us a little bit more about some of the complexities with the data that she has just described? First, I reiterate what I said in my opening remarks that we have had a budget of choices where we have put a huge amount of money above and beyond the block grant money that is received for social security. I can go into that in more detail during the course of this session. The Scottish Fiscal Commission has recognised that the Scottish Government is putting a huge amount of money beyond that of the block grant into social security. That needs to be recognised in the context of the choices that we have had to make. We have made, as Pam Duncan Glancy has said, the commitment to double the Scottish child payment to £20 from April 2022, immediately benefiting 111,000 children under the age of six. We made it clear when we announced the introduction of the benefit that it will be extended to under-16s by the end of 2022. Subjects have just been outlining among the previous answer to the receipt of the necessary data from the DWP, at which point more than 400,000 children will be eligible for the £20 payment. As Pam Duncan Glancy mentioned, in advance of that, we are supporting as many school-age children and young people as possible through our bridging payments worth £520 in 2022. That was a response that was very innovative to make use of the data that local authorities have in delivering immediate support to around 150,000 children. The Scottish child payment remains the best way to provide the support to low-income families in the need. That is why we have acted to double the payment from April and that is why we will move as quickly as we can to roll it out by the end of the year. It is estimated that 60 per cent of children in poverty live in a household with a child under the age of six. That will target many families who are suffering from poverty, and they will benefit from the doubling from April 2022. The programme for government, which is committed by the end of the parliamentary term, the delivery of the increased value payment, will now be accelerated by four years. I hope that that is something that members will welcome. We are going as far as we can, as fast as we can, within the resources that we have. In relation to Pam Duncan-Glancy's second point, I have laid out in some detail some of the data issues that are at play here. I have tried to be as clear and transparent as I can that we did put forward our preferred data solution. That was a very protracted negotiation. The upshot is that we have had to, as I said reluctantly, agree to using the DWP's system, its new strategic solution. It is a bit higher risk because the DWP has yet to build and test the new strategic solution and we have not yet received the full design specification. That means that the Scottish trial payment team is having to start their development at risk, based on a set of assumptions with the acceptance that some rework is likely to be required once the full design specification has been shared with us. Having said that, in my answer to the convener, there is now a structure around monitoring progress here, with some trigger points of if there are concerns, ministerial involvement will happen very quickly. I am very happy to keep the committee informed. From our side, we are absolutely determined to get the roll-out commitment by the end of the year, but, as I said to the convener, we absolutely require the data from the DWP in order to do that. It is a joint two-government responsibility here, and it is important that every effort is made to make sure that those timescales are met. I have a short follow-up. I heard the cabinet secretary's response, but the cabinet secretary will be aware that the Scottish Labour Party has written to her to suggest ways that she could reach some of those three quarters of children who are not accessing the WNU's Scottish child payment. It would be helpful to hear either now or in the future as to why those suggestions would not work. I am not sure if I heard there that the bridging payments will be doubled, so it would be really good if I could get an answer on whether the bridging payments will be doubled. Lastly, on a slightly different approach, the Government has set out that this is a budget of priorities. It is unfortunate for the parental employability support for some priority groups. Specifically, young parents and disabled people have been reduced to £0, so can the cabinet secretary elaborate on the reasoning for that, given calls by organisations such as the Joseph Ramsey Foundation that target spending on measures to reduce child poverty for those groups? As I have set out, we have focused our doubling of the Scottish child payment in April to those children under the age of six, where we know that 60 per cent of households living in poverty will have the biggest impact. We are determined to meet the time frames of doubling the Scottish child payments to everyone by the end of the year. The bridging payments are that. They are a bridging payment to help families in the meantime, and the resources that we have put into social security go well and above beyond the block grant. However, we are within a fixed budget, and we have had to make those difficult choices in order to put money where it is going to be most effective. I have laid out why that is and the choices that we have made. The Labour Party's contributions and ideas for the budget will all be considered in the round by myself, by Kate Forbes and other cabinet secretaries. We are always looking for good ideas, but we have to make sure that they are affordable within a fixed budget, with all the pressures that are there with the reduction in the settlement from the UK Government. When you look at the Covid monies that have been removed, it is a tough settlement. Within that, as the Scottish Fiscal Commission has made the point, we are putting a huge amount of money that is projected to increase into social security and supporting low-income families well beyond the block grants that are contained in the block grant. Pam Duncan-Glancy talked about parental employability support, and I should say that we have the child poverty delivery plan, which we will bring forward in March, that will look across Government. Other organisations such as the Joseph Rowntree Foundation have said that although social security needs to do the heavy lifting, we cannot tackle child poverty just through social security alone. We have to look at other mechanisms, and we have been looking at other mechanisms across the whole of Government. On parental employability, we have committed £50 million of further investment for the Parental Employability Support Fund across 2022-24, with £5.8 million being available this year ahead of the wider investment in employability bills, including continued investment in both No-one Left Behind and Fair Start Scotland. We are aware that, due to the impact of the pandemic on local authority operations, including parental engagement in employability support, there have been some delays in the roll-out of the Parental Employability Support Fund. We have been supporting parental employability. In addition to that, we are also committing the first £50 million of the £500 million whole family wellbeing funding to be invested across this parliamentary term. The priority for that will be holistic whole family support. We have to look at the round of investment that will be made. When we bring forward the child poverty delivery plan, we will be able to see those investments across the whole of Government. That is before we include things such as early learning in childcare and the support for families. All that will help to impact and help us to get towards those child poverty targets. Unless Pam Duncan-Glancy has a further follow-up, I will move to Marie McNair, please. Thank you. Good morning, Cabinet Secretary, and happy new year. Thank you for taking your time to come along to the committee this morning. It is clear that there is always pressures on the Scottish budget. How much of the Scottish Government budget goes towards mitigating UK Government cuts on welfare? There are pressures on the Scottish Government budget, and difficult choices have to be made. We are continuing to mitigate the UK Government decisions on an on-going basis. That means that there is less money to go elsewhere, and that is a challenge. If we take the bedroom tax, for example, we have £80 million going into DHPs and discretionary housing payments. It would be much better if the bedroom tax had been scrapped, and then the £80 million that we are having to put into discretionary housing payments could be spent on other areas of spend and other priorities. Those are difficult choices. We cannot mitigate everything. It is just not possible to do that. Therefore, we will continue to do what we can to support those in low-income households as best we can. Certainly, that is something that we will continue to do. Compared with PIP, the cost of our adult disability payment will be higher in the Scottish Fiscal Commission when they gave evidence at the last committee. It suggests that it may be due to a more compassionate and dignified approach to claimants leading to an increase in take-up. Do you share that assessment and do you agree with me that it is something that you should welcome? I agree with that. It is clear that the Scottish Fiscal Commission is essentially projecting that because of the difference in approach to adult disability payment that more people will apply, the largest component of the divergence is the forecast on adult disability payment, where improvements to application, review and appeals processes will remove barriers to applying and are expected to result in more successful applications. They estimate overall additional spending of £37 million in 2022-23, rising to £527 million in 2026-27. Those costs represent the additional investment that they were making as a result of our approach to disability benefits. They do not receive any funding from block grant adjustments, but it is the right thing to do. We believe that it will look and feel a lot different for people who are on the disability benefits than it does at the moment. Part of our more humane approach includes the ending the use of the moralising private sector assessments and a more generous approach to terminal illness claims. Have you made any assessment on the financial impact of the very welcome approaches to making decisions on claims on ADP? I think that it is in the same area that I have just said that, because of the different assessment processes, the Scottish assessment criteria has been widely welcomed. In fact, I think that it was put forward to the Work and Pensions Committee at Westminster that the Scottish assessment criteria has been suggested to them as a good model to look at. That shows that it will be a very different experience and that, in turn, is likely to lead to, I think, more people claiming benefits that might have been put off. Obviously, people still need to meet the criteria, but I think that the look and feel of the benefit and the way that Social Security Scotland will operate will inevitably lead to more people applying. That is why the Scottish Fiscal Commission has made the assessment that it has made. Thank you very much, cabinet secretary, and Mairi McNeill. We've been here with your indulgence one further question, if that's okay. Just to increase some ADP take-up, we'll also see additional costs from the associated take-up of carers allowance and supplement. Is there still no movement at UK level in changing the level of carers allowance? No, not that we are aware of and, of course, we would always encourage the UK Government to do that. We are doing what we can to support carers and we are happy to go into that in a bit more detail at some point during the session, but we are doing what we can to support carers. We continue in relation to Mairi McNeill's earlier point about the mitigation. The Scottish Government has invested, in this last financial year, £114 million to directly mitigate the impact of UK Government policies through a mentioned discretionary housing payments but also the Scottish welfare fund. That investment is part of £367 million that has been invested over and above the block grant adjustment funding received from the UK Government to deliver financial support through social security. We continue to do what we can but we can't mitigate everything. The UK Government, whether it's on carers or other benefits, needs to step up to the plate because, otherwise, we are trying to do what we can to mitigate, but we can't mitigate everything. Thank you very much, cabinet secretary, and thank you, Mairi McNeill. Jeremy Balfour, please. Thank you, convener, and good morning, cabinet secretary, and happy new year to you. Just two or three questions, if I can, on the adult disability payment. Firstly, there seems to be a funding gap of around about £750 million that will be building up in the social security budget over this term of the Parliament. What are you doing in regard to that future proofing, and how do you see repayments being made by the Scottish Government? The Scottish Fiscal Commission acknowledged that there is a lot of uncertainty over the longer term trends that could impact on the overall fiscal position. Their forecast includes several benefits that have not yet launched using assumptions that will only be confirmed when out-turn data becomes available. The forthcoming resource spending review in answer to Jeremy Balfour's final point will allow us to take spending forecasts into account to determine funding requirements as we target public spending to where it delivers greatest benefits. However, I guess that I would make the point that we are making a significant investment, which is investment in people, and the money that we are investing in ADP and other benefits are about supporting low-income households, but it is about supporting people and helping people to have a better quality of life. We are taking the steps that we need through the resource spending review, but we certainly see that investment as a really important investment. Improving and making improvements to the application review and appeals process and removing barriers is something that would be welcomed across the Parliament. The experience that people will have of receiving adult disability payment will be very different from perhaps the experiences that they have had on previous benefits before. Jeremy Balfour, I am not quite sure how that is going to be paid for, but perhaps that is something that we will turn to in the next meeting. I am just wondering, just a small but important bit, at the moment, those who are on PIP and DRA receive a £10 Christmas extra payment from DWP. Will that be included in the new adult disability payment by Scottish Government? If so, how much will that cost, and will that be funded by the Barnett formula, or will that be extra money that the Scottish Government has to find? I might bring Kevin in on the specific about the extra Christmas payment, but I can go back to the point about how that will be paid for. I said to Jeremy Balfour that we will be looking at all the cost pressures in the spending review process. That is where we are able to look across the longer period of time to the pressures that will come into the budget, including social security, and that spending review will be where we are able to project and make adjustments in terms of the budgets going forward. That is the mechanism to ensure that the funding is there that requires to be. Maybe, if I could ask Kevin, I do not know if he is able to answer the extra Christmas payment question, and if not, we will write back to the Kevin's question. Thank you, cabinet secretary. The answer would be that, to the extent that any additional payments are paid to people in England and Wales, that would be in the block grant adjustment and that would flow through to Scotland. That money would be available for use by the Scottish Government as part of ADP. It is a straightforward answer that relates to how the block grant adjustments will operate. That is all, but I presume that, in my light of that, we can presume that the Scottish Government will pay the sector £10 in December this year. The final question is on this section, convener, is around those who are present on the DLA who have not been moved across to PIP. We took evidence from a number of groups that have shown that, because of the different criteria, there may well be people who are on the DLA who move across in the summer to PIP who will lose their benefit or will lose part of their benefit. Will the Scottish Government mitigate that in any way, or what work are you doing to let those in that situation be aware that there may be a change in regard to the amount of money that they are going to receive because of the new adult disability payment? I am certainly not aware that there is a cohort of people who would lose any benefit, but I might bring Kevin in on that. I am happy to write back to the committee on that in more detail. If anything, the criteria of ADP and people moving across is likely to, as I have laid out in my previous answers, be able to remain and be less likely to lose their entitlement. I am not quite sure where that has come from, but I am happy to look into that. I do not know whether Kevin has anything to add on the specifics of that. No, I do not have anything to add on the specifics, cabinet secretary. I am happy to write to the committee with more information on the specific question. Thank you very much, cabinet secretary. I would like to bring in Emma Roddick. I was looking at the details around ADP and wondered whether you could give us some more information on what happens if the UK Government changes the rules and if there is less money available through the fiscal framework. Sorry, that is always a concern because of the hybrid system and that any reduction of benefit spend by the UK Government will have a direct impact on the spend that is available here in Scotland. That has always been the case and it is one of the concerns and difficulties of the hybrid system. Emma Roddick will be aware and no doubt of the green paper that has been produced. There could well be a divergence of policy north and south of the border around disability benefits. At the moment, we do not know what that would mean in terms of the quantum that would be spent by the Department of Work and Pensions. If that increased, there would clearly be a positive benefit to the Scottish budget, but if it decreased, there would be a reduction. That would be extremely difficult, given that we have already gone above and beyond the money from the block grant and we have put additional Scottish Government money into social security. If that block grant was then to be reduced, that would clearly make our situation very difficult. That is one of the challenges with the current system and one that is a big concern. I am hearing from the cabinet secretary that this is one of the failings of having a hybrid social security system. Does she think that that highlights the failure of the devolution settlement overall and ultimately the need for more powers in Scotland? Emma Roddick will not get any argument from me about that. Clearly, it would be much easier if we had the entire social security for Scotland across all benefits devolved. It would be simple and straightforward compared to the hybrid system that we have. It would also allow us to join the dots far more across all those benefits. For example, on ADP, one of the issues around negotiation and the future with the review of ADP is about the impact on passported benefits. That will require an agreement with the UK Government to make sure that, if any future changes are made to ADP, that it does not impact on passported benefits. How much simpler it would be if we had all of those benefits under Scottish Government control? Therefore, the direction of travel would be decisions that could be made here in Scotland that are best meeting the needs of the population here. Thank you, cabinet secretary. Before I bring Pam Duncan-Glancy back in, on the issue of potential changes to UK disability benefits, you have mentioned the green paper and the potential challenges that that could pose regarding passporting if there are changes to Scottish benefits. What discussions have you had with UK ministers raising concerns that you have just highlighted around the green paper and potential merging for instance of assessment processes between universal credit and PIP and whether or not, in principle, the UK Government will agree to ADP diverging and still being a passporting benefit? Yes. We have raised the meetings that we have had with the previous minister and the current minister and Ben Macpherson. The Minister for Social Security has also raised those issues. We have also asked and flagged with them that, when we get to the review of ADP and clearly we have also agreed that the mobility descriptor element, the mobility element of the review will start earlier than the wider review of ADP. It is really important that we get agreement with the DWP at some point that the changes that we may wish to make at some point are not going to impact on passported benefits. We have put those markers down and said that we want to have further discussions with them. The DWP recognises that, but at this stage we do not have any agreement on passported benefits, but we have flagged it clearly as an issue that we will have to have much further more detailed discussions about. Thank you, cabinet secretary, for your answers so far. I think that people will find it quite frustrating that we are still sending 90 per cent of the social security budget back to the DWP to administer. It is quite unfair to say that it would just be simpler and better if we were not doing it ourselves, because I am not sure that that really is the case. On the point about unpaid carers allowance—obviously, the rate for carers allowance, you know—that in my own part I think that carers allowance needs to be wholly reformed. That is why we need to get moving on doing those things in Scotland for unpaid carers and disabled people. Bill Scott gave evidence to the committee a few weeks ago, where he said that, had the disabled people and unpaid carers who were asked about their opinion on what was a priority, known that safe and secure would mean that there would be no significant change to the eligibility for it or the amount of those payments until at least 2025, possibly 2026, which would be nearly 10 years after they were asked the question. They may indeed have prioritised something else. The question that I specifically have around some of that—I have one on carers allowance and one on PIP, if that is okay. When the carers allowance supplement bill came through the committee, carers told us how important it was that the carers allowance supplement had been doubled, and how important it is that that happens again in the future. The minister, when he attended, said that we did not need to write it into legislation that it would be doubled again until you had looked at carers assistance for unpaid carers assistance, but that, in fact, there would be regulation there and that it would allow the Government to double that payment through regulation if it was the will of the Parliament. We have not seen an indication of this in the budget, so does that mean that the Government has tied its own hands on that? Can carers expect to get a double payment of the carers allowance supplement again this year? I will come on to that in a second. Let me just address the point about administration costs. Pam Duncan-Glancy is correct to say that some of the administration of benefits is still handled by the DWP, but it is the policy decisions that we make here in Scotland. We have made some policy decisions that have been really important. The Scottish child payment brand new benefits support families. We are making major changes to the disability benefits in terms of the look and feel of those. We are bringing in additional support of command carers in a second. We are bringing in new supports such as the low-income winter heating assistance. The policy decisions and the money that goes into people's pockets here in Scotland are the important part. Even if the administration of those is some of which is still with the DWP and will transfer in time, it is the policy choices that we have made that are the most important. First of all, we recognise very much that the pandemic has identified a need for greater flexibility in how we support carers. The Government chose to pay a coronavirus carers allowance supplement in 2020, and we paid that again in 2021. We did that from a fixed budget, as I said during the session already. The additional £40 million invested in the two coronavirus carers allowance supplements this year and last is all from the Scottish Government budget, so we have had to make those choices. Although Pam Duncan Glancy has noted that there is no initial allocation being made for a further payment in 2022-23, we will keep that position under review as part of the on-going budget process. Importantly, we will take into consideration the circumstances of carers and the financial constraints that we have to be balanced and where we are in the process of recovering from the pandemic. I guess that I would just make this point. Whether it is on additional support for carers or more support in terms of the Scottish child payment or more support for local government, you cannot do everything on a fixed budget. You have to make choices. If more money is to go to Scottish child payment or more money above what we have already allocated, then it has to come from somewhere. I am happy to continue discussions if Pam Duncan Glancy or others want to come forward and suggest where that money should come from, then I am happy to have those discussions. However, we have tried to allocate where we can to support carers, and I could just say on unpaid carers. Today, in recognition of the needs of unpaid carers, we are announcing an additional £4 million to help organisations working with unpaid carers to put expanded services in place this winter, so in the here and now, because we recognise that they are under pressure and doing an incredible job. That is going to help local carers centres across Scotland to expand their vital support for carers, it is going to support young carers, it is going to expand the family fund support for breaks and it will provide money for well-being, support and services. We recognise the needs of carers and we are putting money into supporting them in the here and now, as well as the budget that is coming. On the carers allowance and the support for unpaid carers, I hear that, but unpaid carers have also consistently said that money through those routes and the additional support for respite is not actually cutting it for them. 82 per cent of carers have had no access to respite. Recently, 73 per cent of children and young people are still caring for a parent and have been unable to access respite support. In 2019, which is before the pandemic, less than a third of carers said their need for a break was considered, so it is about putting money in people's pockets and the doubling of the carers allowance supplement is something that the minister said when we asked him in committee about this, he said that we should not worry, that they felt that it was needed again and that we should not worry that the regulatory powers were there to do it, so I hope that the Government will look again at that. As Covid cases rise again, there will be undoubtedly much more pressure placed on unpaid carers. On adult disability payment, the cabinet secretary is quite right when it comes to the point about policy, and it is policy that people want the Government to change, not just administration. However, largely, the policy around eligibility and adequacy of those payments are the two areas that there is the most problem. It is that part of it that they are begging the Government to do something about it. At the time, when people who were getting enhanced mobility support were dropped onto the pit, the First Minister at the times said that people who get enhanced mobility support would lose up £3,000 a year. It is important, although that money is, to let us remember that, for people in those circumstances, that loss could take away more than pounds on pens. It could take away their very independence. The now First Minister at the time said that then. Do you think that the Government in Scotland is making the policy changes that it needs to add the disability payment to reflect the criticisms that the First Minister made then of personal independence payment, and have you used your powers fully to create a fairer system as disability benefits become fully devolved? The First Minister Let me try and be as brief as possible on what is a very complex issue, and to say some key things. First, the safe and secure transfer of people on benefits where they rely on the money to add up disability payment is critical. The committee is well aware of the view of SCOS and DeepBag, in terms of the need to make sure that people's payments are not jeopardised in any way. That is the first thing. The second thing is that there will be a lot of changes in terms of the way that people are treated, the way that they experience the system, and the look and feel that the Scottish assessment criteria has been widely welcomed. As I mentioned earlier, the Westminster committee has been given that by third sector organisations as a template for them to look at in terms of assessment criteria. Given the Scottish Fiscal Commissions projections of the increase in expenditure around adult disability payment, which suggests that more people will apply and more people will get the benefit, that will again be a major improvement and an area where more people will get the support that they require than they are at the moment. In recognition of some of the issues that Pam Duncan Glancy has raised, we have been clear right from the start that there is a need to review the adult disability payment. That has been held in for a year after the safe and secure transfer, but the mobility descriptor element of ADP would be turbocharged as part of the review, and that will start this year. However, as Pam Duncan Glancy recognises, as I know the committee does, the complexity of that involves the DWP. Any changes that we propose to make after the review and full involvement of stakeholders, as you would expect, we need to make sure that the DWP will not remove people's passported benefits, because the agreement with the DWP at the moment is on a like-for-like benefit. Although all the improvements will be made, it has to have an equivalent to be able to maintain those passporting benefits until we get agreement from the DWP. Any persuasion that can be put to the DWP—and I know if you have the minister in front of you from the DWP—will be some really important questions for them. We need to make sure that we have the scope to be able to make the changes that we would want to make. I have tried to condense what is a really complex area into some of the key issues that need to be considered here. Pam Duncan Glancy, would you like to come back in before I bring Marie McNeirran? Yes, I would with Erin Dalganes. I understand that there are complexities involved. I should declare an interest to someone who receives personal independence payment. I know the importance of the safe and secure transfer. I do not want the money to drop off and the mobility van not to be there, so I get the importance of that. Had you asked disabled people now, and unpaid carers now, what was most important? I think that they would also say that you need to consider eligibility and adequacy. The Cabinet Secretary characterised earlier that the 90 per cent funding that was going back to the DWP was on administration and that you were dealing with policy here in Scotland. What has just been described is that, in Scotland, we are changing the administrative process. Those changes are, for what I can tell, look to be positive, but we are still not changing any of the policies substantially. Given the complexities that the cabinet secretary has set out and that we understand and exist, the cabinet secretary can confirm that the review can begin before the safe and secure transfer on the policy work, not necessarily on building work of Social Security Scotland to make those payments but on the policy work that the social security team in the Scottish Government is doing so that there is plenty of time when we do not face the situation after the roll-out of the safe and secure transition that we might be facing in terms of the roll-out of the Scottish child payment, where, yet again, we face a delay because we have not been prepared. On that last point, we are prepared and we have signalled to the DWP back in the summer of 2019 our intention to double the Scottish child payment. There has been no lack of preparation on behalf of the Scottish Government. What we have had is a lack of agreement with the DWP about the data transfer. I explained in some detail in my initial answer to the convener about why we put forward a proposal that we thought was less risky and more straightforward. The DWP has not agreed that and wants to use its new system, which carries higher risk because it is a new system and needs to be built in. There has been no lack of preparation. I told the committee earlier about the review points to ensure that we are jointly responsible for making sure that the data transfer happens and that we can get the doubling of the Scottish child payment by the end of this year. There is no lack of preparation on the part of the Scottish Government. On the review of ADP, as I set out, the strategic review of ADP should take place once there is a safe and secure transfer. I also said earlier that we would have an earlier part of that review kicking off looking at the mobility descriptors, the mobility element, if you like, of the criteria. That will start this year. It will start more quickly in recognition of the concerns. The only point that I would make is that all of this is not all within our gift. Any changes that we propose to make have to have the certainty that they will not impact on passport and benefits. That is why, going forward, the response of the DWP to any proposed changes that are made is as important. On the policy issue, I would say that, if we were not making major changes to the look and feel and scope of the assessment criteria, I do not think that the Scottish Fiscal Commission would be projecting the big increase on ADP spend that they are projecting. They are projecting that increase for the very reason that there is likely to be improvements to the application review and appeals processes, which mean that more people will keep their benefit and more people will be likely to be entitled to it. We recently took evidence from a range of experts on that 20-metre rule. The evidence said that the 20-metre rule was introduced by Westminster Government to simply achieve cuts to the DWP budget. Will you welcome the cut being reversed at the UK level? Will that consequently have a positive impact on the Scottish Government budget of considering the 20-metre rule? Any changes that increase funding for social security at Westminster have a positive benefit on our budget, and, of course, as we talked about earlier, the reverse is also true. I would certainly encourage, as part of the green paper going forward, that the 20-metre rule would be reviewed. Having the DWP reviewing disability benefits from a positive point of view at the same time as we look to review ADP and ADP criteria would be very helpful if we could then reach a common understanding and agreement that would allow people who are on reserved benefits not to have those benefits put in jeopardy. If the direction of travel by the UK Government was to be more flexible and more generous around disability benefits, that would help the situation here in Scotland, both on the budgetary position but also on the scope of change of criteria, I would suggest. A brief statement that the best start grant and the best start foods are not being upgraded. Can you comment on that? Is that something that you will keep under review? In terms of the best start payments and the best start grants, we have agreed to make sure that they are upgraded. First, the best start grants and the best start payments form an important part of the support that is given to children and it is an important part of the overall package. We increased best start foods in August this year from 4.25 to 4.50, a rise exceeding the rate of inflation and providing a level of support more generous in other parts of the UK. We are also widening eligibility for best start foods later in the parliamentary term. We increased the best start grant in 2021 by 1 per cent, which technically doubled the rate of inflation. A two-child family will now receive £1,919 in their children's early years, £1,419 more than the Sure Start maternity grant equivalent. Of course, as I said earlier, the families receiving the best start grant and the best start foods will also benefit from the doubling of Scottish child payment from April. It is important to talk about big numbers. Big numbers do not always mean a lot to people, but when you take together with the best start grant and the best start foods, that together will provide a financial support package worth £8,400 for the time that an eligible family's first child turns six, a commitment to the most vulnerable children that are unparalleled across the UK. That brings it home to what this means for families. Finally, the child winter heating assistance is increasing by 5 per cent, and that is welcome, but it is higher than the rate of some other benefits. Can you comment on the reason for that? I am happy to. We have chosen to increase the child winter heating assistance by 5 per cent, which is above the rate of inflation. We wanted to do all that we can to help families of the most severely disabled children and young people who cope with rising energy costs. Those are rising energy costs are clearly a big concern and a big issue for people at the moment. That was the thinking behind that, and I think that that will be important for those in that procession. Is that all your questions on that area, Mairi McNeill? Yes, thank you. Cabinet Secretary, Mairi McNeill, there was looking at a range of social security areas that are obviously part of anti-poverty work that the Scottish Government is endeavouring on. As a committee, we have been keen to ensure that, across Government, there is a commitment to tackling poverty and that poverty is looked at in all areas of Government. Can you set out, in terms of the Scottish budget, how the Scottish Government is poverty-proofing in other areas alongside social security and what involvement you have had in those discussions? You make an important point. As I alluded to earlier on, looking at the budget and looking at the child poverty delivery plan for March, it has to be across Government. It cannot all be from my portfolio. That is why all Cabinet Secretaries were tasked with looking within their own budgets what more they can do to help us to meet those interim targets. We have a good track record. If you look back in 2020-21, we invested £2.5 billion to support low-income households. That was an increase of £540 million on the year before. The £978 million was targeted directly at children in low-income families. The estimates, including key investment in support, targeted at children, such as the winter hardship payment, the attainment Scotland funding, the people equity fund, the broader low-income support, such as the council tax reduction scheme, which amounts to about £351 million, the discretion to housing payments that I referred to earlier, the Scottish welfare fund. In the round, looking at 2022-23, the Scottish budget continues significant investment along those lines to tackle poverty, so more than £3.9 billion towards benefit expenditure. We have committed £831 million towards the delivery of affordable housing. As I said, £80 million investment to discretion to housing payments, the first £50 million of the whole family wellbeing fund, the £10 million for tackling child poverty fund, £200 million for the Scottish attainment challenge, £70 million to continue to fund the expansion of free lunches for children in primary 4 and 5 in special schools, and £22 million to provide meals during school holidays, and £65 million for employability support for those most impacted by Covid. Within the local government settlement, funding for mechanisms such as the Scottish welfare fund and others is quite a comprehensive package. There is always more that can be done, and we are keen to hear what more people think that we could be doing, but that has to be within the context of a fixed budget, where decisions such as that have to be made. We have prioritised support for low-income families. Before I bring in Miles Briggs, you touched on the potential role for local government, and I have heard other ministers describe the anti-poverty work as being a national mission, which I think is absolutely right. What more can local authorities, employers and all of us across society do to support the goal of bringing down child poverty in Scotland? It is not just the Scottish Government that needs to play its part, but the UK Government needs to play its part as well. We have talked about the mitigation that we have had to spend money on. As I said earlier, if the UK Government would start the bedroom tax, we would not have to spend £80 million on discretionary housing payments. That is money that could be spent elsewhere. On other bodies, councils are an important partner, and we have a partnership with the local government and a key priority to tackle child poverty. A lot of the money that we are talking about in terms of the attainment challenge and the early learning in childcare is a crucial element that is all rooted through local government. With our partners in local government, we will keep a firm focus on tackling child poverty and trying to wrap around families. If we take the six priority families, we need to get far closer to supporting families and to working with those families on what they need to make the difference. Whether that is the support that we have provided through social security and child payment is obviously important, but the employability programmes and the wraparound childcare for those families make the difference in being able to go and secure fair paid work and remove barriers that are there at the moment that prevent them from doing so. Looking at how we support them, a lot of that will come through the child poverty delivery plan that we will bring forward in March. Employers are really important because if we can get more employers paying the living wage and signing up to fair work, that helps to tackle child poverty. We know that decent paid work is still the key way out of child poverty for families. Employers have a really big job in making sure that they pay at least the living wage. We will explore many of those aspects as we go forward. We have been trying to engage with employers on what more they can do. There are some good examples of employers going the extra mile in support for their employees. We want to work with them as exemplars of what other employers can do to play their part. I wanted to ask a few questions on homelessness, which you touched on in your opening statement today. I wanted to ask specifically around rapid rehousing transition plans, which is the right approach, but will take significant resource to properly implement, especially here in my own city of Edinburgh. Can I ask what funding will be attached to the rapid rehousing transition plans, and will you be matching previous commitments on that? The rapid rehousing transition plans are a critical part of the affordable housing budget. It is important that we tackle temporary accommodation, an issue that the member has raised previously. If we take the rapid rehousing transition plans, they are absolutely critical in making sure that people are moved out of temporary accommodation as quickly as possible. Temporary accommodation provides an important safety net for people, so it is there for a reason, but people should not be in temporary accommodation any longer than they need to be and should be moved into settled accommodation as quickly as they can be. We have committed £53.5 million for rapid rehousing. Within that, housing first is funded to ensure that those with more complex needs are supported to move into their own tendencies. It is not just as we have talked many times about bricks and mortar, it is about the wraparand support to ensure that people are able to maintain a successful tendency. We need to look at supporting particular local authorities who have had more challenges. The City of Edinburgh clearly has a pressure on housing perhaps more so than in other local authorities. We recognise that, and we are trying to work with local authorities that are under particular pressure to come up with the solutions that they need to. Local authorities have been allocated an annual share of £23.5 million for homelessness prevention and response measures, and Edinburgh's allocation of that funding is £4.4 million. We will work with individual local authorities to try to help them to overcome some of the difficulties that they are facing. I think that, in your response to that, that would be a commitment to at least match previous funding commitments, but it is important that we see better transparency and monitoring around how that is spent. I want to move on to a question that I asked you in previous committee sessions with regard to the tackling homelessness budget. In your letter to the committee of 1 October, you said that £60 million was still to be allocated for this coming financial year. We have obviously got three or four months left, so I wondered how that had been allocated. As I said earlier, we have got the current five-year £50 million ending homelessness together fund, and we are happy to bring Shirley-Anne to answer the detail around that, but you can be assured that the funding that we are putting into homelessness prevention will all be allocated and will be used, as you would expect it to be used, in terms of making sure that we do not just tackle homelessness in terms of the rapid rehousing and the housing first, but we also prevent homelessness, and part of the work this year that will be new is the new homelessness prevention duty, which we will be expanding the duty and requirements that local authorities have, but we will also be expanding that to other parts of the public sector, because the best way of preventing homelessness is to get in early, and early prevention and that legislation and change will require all the public sector to ensure that they have a duty to highlight where they think that someone could potentially become homeless and then to do something about it. Perhaps I can bring Shirley-Anne just on the £16 million, if that is okay? I am afraid that I do not have the detail of that to hand, but I am happy to write back to you. I am really sorry. I cannot give you a full answer right this second. I do not want to waste the committee's time by attempting to do so, but I will come back to you on it. That would be helpful. I take it that money will be allocated before the end of the financial year, given that we are almost there. In political terms, there are four months to go. I think that it is important that finance is rolled over and lost for those organisations who are desperately wanting to make a difference and could access it. Finally, convener, I wanted to ask about advice services. We know that the cabinet secretary was at local government committee on Tuesday when we discussed the local government settlement. There were severe concerns expressed by Martin Booth, the director of finance from Glasgow City Council about where councils might need to make cuts. One of the concerns was around advice services. We have taken a lot of evidence as a committee about the importance of advice services being protected and supplied to some of the most vulnerable people in our society. Given the cuts that councils are expressing concerns about, how will that service be protected? First of all, on the homeless, no money will be lost. The money that is going to support homeless services is guaranteed. However it is paid, whenever it is paid, it certainly will not be lost. On a general point on the local government settlement, Miles Briggs is aware of the exchanges that we had with the local government committee. We have tried to ensure that local government gets a fair settlement in a very difficult fiscal financial environment. We recognise that the partnership that we have with local government is critical to delivering on many of the services relating to poverty. A lot of the money that we have talked about today will be routed through local government. I have mentioned a number already, whether that is discretionary housing payments, whether it is the Scottish welfare fund, all of which will support people who require the support. On advice services, we have made additional monies available for advice services. We would expect those services to be maintained. We recognise the role that the local government has in ensuring that people have access to the information that they need. That is, in addition, obviously to the work of our third sector partners in making sure that people are aware of the support that is available, including the national campaigns that are run to make people aware. Those are discussions that we will continue to have with local government, but the advice services are an important aspect of that. Miles Briggs has a supplementary answer to that question. I am not happy to come in later, convener. Miles, I will bring in Jeremy Balfour, please. I want to make two areas with you, cabinet secretary. First, I want to follow on from Miles Briggs's question. Around new housing, you and I appear in a BBC slot in regard to housing, particularly for those with disability, and the number of houses that have been built there. I wonder if you can tell us how much money has been allocated specifically for housing that will meet those, not only with physical disability but all forms of disability. What target are you looking to check in regard to the number of new houses that have been built that will have that feature built in? I am certainly happy to write to the committee with more detail on that, but the overall direction of travel is to make all homes barrier-free. There are standards for new housing that will help to deliver that. On retrofitting and adaptations, we have been supporting RSLs and local authorities to ensure that aids and adaptations are supported. The local needs assessment is important. Local authorities will also be reporting back on a regular basis to us on the levels of accessible housing in their areas. There is more that we need to do. I am struck by the media interview that I did on the back of a challenging case of someone with very complex needs. I am not sure that, at the moment, our systems provide for those who have particularly complex needs and need bespoke solutions. For those whose mobility can change over time, we have systems of aids and adaptations and changes that can be made to existing housing. With new stock, there are higher standards around accessibility and being barrier-free. However, there will still be people who have particular complex needs that require bespoke solutions. I am not sure that we have that quite right yet. One of the commitments that I have made is to, and I have asked the officials, to look at how we can do more in that space of helping to resolve those very complex cases and support local authorities and RSLs to do that. I am happy to come back to the committee with more information about that, if they find that helpful. I would be grateful if the cabinet secretary would come back to us. I think that you said you know me, but all new housing or all new developments will be disabled, disability, open for anyone with disability. Clearly, that cannot be the case, because in that case, every new flat block would have to have a lift in it. If you are buying a flat on the top floor and you have a wheelchair, you can only access that through a lift. When you come back to us, are you looking to set a target of a specific number of houses that will be accessible to those with disabilities? What conversations are you having with developers to say that, as we have the 25 per cent that have to be affordable, are you putting a percentage on the number of houses that have to be built, which are fully accessible to disabled, or are you leaving it to developers to make that decision? I welcome back to the committee with more detail on that. The point that I am making is that new standards are better at ensuring that, for people with mobility requirements, that they better meet their needs. The housing to 2040 is clearly a journey that is going to be over a longer timeframe of meeting higher standards. I want to get to the position that the housing to 2040 sets out. The end point and the vision at the end of that journey is that all homes should be barrio or free, particularly new homes. We are on a journey on that. I will come back to the committee with targets and timeframes along the way to housing to 2040, which can help to add a bit of detail on that. I look into bringing Pam Duncan-Glancy on the list. I have another area just to cover. In regard to third sector funding, Kate Forbes, in her budget statement back in December, I asked a question after that. She indicated that there would be a change that third sector funding would not be done on a yearly basis but on a three-year basis. I wonder if the cabinet secretary could update us what conversations are happening with the third sector, and when will that be implemented and how will it be implemented? It has been a long-term aim and I call quite rightly by the third sector to move to funding. We are keen to do that. We will be working with the third sector to make sure that we can move towards that, because it gives more certainty to the third sector. Obviously, funding to the third sector comes across the whole of government, not just from my portfolio. My portfolio has the core third sector funding, but the bulk of third sector funding comes from elsewhere across Government. It requires a cross-government agreement to move to that multi-year settlement. I am happy to keep the committee appraised of the progress that we make around those multi-year funding discussions. If I can just share a bit of clarification with the cabinet secretary, is it going to happen as of now or are you still discussing it as a Government to decide if it is going to happen? As I have mentioned on a few occasions, we will be entering into the resource spending review and that provides the opportunity on the platform to discuss all those things. It is not just the third sector that wants to move to multi-year settlements, but local government as well. We have already agreed with local government that we will start those discussions around coming to a multi-year, different fiscal framework, if you like. Therefore, there is a parallel discussion through the resource spending review that we would like to have with the third sector to move in that direction as well. I am done, thank you, convener. Thank you, convener. If I could just return to the local government funding. One of the questions that I have is about the Scottish welfare fund. I am quite worried about the Scottish welfare fund. We know that the repeat applications are being made to it, which suggest that people are learning from crisis to crisis, so it is not really meeting the underlying strategic and fundamental change that it is needed in terms of people's cost of living, but that there is also a significant postcode lottery in the Scottish welfare fund. During the pandemic, organisations have seen a much bigger increase in applications for their discretionary funds. That has been seen when you compare that to the applications to Scottish welfare funds that have not been applied for or delivered quite so often. I also know that sectors such as the creative industry and the hospitality industry really need some help now, and a number of people have saw reductions in their incomes. They could be helped, for example, through the Scottish welfare fund, but almost all of that budget for this year seems to have been spent already, which is barely halfway through the year ahead. Can the cabinet secretary set out when the review of the Scottish welfare fund will start? Will it include additional money for processing things such as the self-isolation support grant? Can he think that he would be able to promote the crisis grant part of that to the creative and hospitality industry so that people working in them can see that there is funding available if their income has dropped? Does the cabinet secretary think that the current budget for the Scottish welfare fund is sufficient? Let me try to answer those questions in turn. The Scottish welfare fund provides a vital safety net for people experiencing a financial crisis or needing help. Obviously, it cannot be a regular source of income for someone, but it can help in crisis situations. In 2022-23, we are going to be investing £41 million in the Scottish welfare fund. 45 per cent of crisis grant applications are made by people requiring help due to their benefits or income having already been spent. Local authorities are able to carry forward any underspend from previous year's budget, which means that the total available in the current financial year is £45 million. Last year, more than £49 million was paid out from the fund and more than 200,000 individual awards were made to low-income households. A number of councils add to the fund. In addition, £25 million of flexible funding is part of the £41 million winter fund that is available to support people experiencing financial insecurity. We recognise this winter that it will be tough because of rising costs. Therefore, that £25 million of flexible funding should help local authorities to meet their needs. The distribution of funds is based on the number of low-income benefit recipients in each local authority and has been agreed with COSLA. Any changes need to be made with COSLA. We committed to undertake a full independent review of the welfare fund to ensure that it works as well as possible across the country. It will look at issues such as funding, administration, promotion, take-up and accessibility. I can tell the committee that, following a competitive tendering exercise, a preferred contractor has been identified to undertake independent research, and we are finalising the contract with the organisation. I am happy to update the committee when that is done and the work begins. That is imminent. I expect the work to start by the end of the month and the final report expected by the end of this year. A key element is about gathering the views of applicants to the fund to hear what they have to say whether it is successful or not. A review advisory group has been established to provide oversight to the research process, and it will include membership from key organisations that you would expect. I hope that all of that helps to make sure that we address any issues that need to be addressed in terms of improving the welfare fund. Thank you, convener. I will make a short follow-up on that, and then I will move on to my final area of question. The Scottish welfare fund, as the cabinet secretary has said, is not a substitute for—or certainly should not be—a substitute for proper strategic support and a social security system that is there for people when they need it. However, the data shows that people are making repeated applications to the fund, which would suggest that they are moving from crisis to crisis, reflective of the poverty that they are in. It is likely that we need to do more to address the poverty that they are experiencing, but the £41 million that the cabinet secretary has set out—about £5 million of that is for administration leaving approximately £35.9 million, and £30 million of that has already been spent, and we are only seven months into the year. I ask again whether the cabinet secretary thinks that the budget is going to stretch what it needs to this year, given that a number of organisations and a number of people, particularly in the creative and hospitality industries, are going to see their incomes drop or have done in previous weeks as a result of the Old Macron variant. After that, the other question that I have, if it is all right, of this roll-in, is around the third sector. The cabinet secretary will be aware at the disappointment of organisations in the third sector, including Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations, about the £800 million cut to the £800,000 cut, nearly £1 million, to the fiscal budget for the third sector, which does sit in the cabinet secretary's portfolio. They have said that that will have significant impacts on the organisations that they represent's ability to do their job, but they have called it a severe blow. What does the term infrastructure costs cover? Will that translate to cuts in funding for vital community services, and does the cabinet secretary think that the third sector is getting enough money? Cabinet secretary, on the welfare fund and third sector budgets. On the welfare fund, as I tried to set out my initial answer, the total available in the current financial year—we need to talk about two different financial years, so the total available in the current financial year 2021-22 is £45 million, and although £49 million has paid out from the fund, councils add in to the funding, so councils swap up the welfare fund. We need to keep an eye on those things. I also said that we have put £25 million of flexible funding as part of the £41 million winter fund, in recognition of the demands on the funds that Pam Duncan Glancy has alluded to. We continue to work with COSLA on individual local authorities to monitor demand on the fund, and we will continue to do that. The review is obviously going forward in order to examine issues such as funding, administration, promotion, take-up and accessibility. Some local authorities appear to use the fund differently from others, and some have an overspend and some have an underspend, so the review will look at all those issues. In relation to the third sector funding, in addition to what I said already—I would just reiterate what I said already—the third sector funding in the main comes from across the whole of Government. I think that the SCBO itself had estimated that there was the third sector benefit from around £500 million in investment across the whole of the Scottish Government, and the amount within my portfolio is a relatively small part of that. We do not believe that there will be any immediate impacts on infrastructure bodies that are funded through the element within my portfolio. By identifying efficiencies and working across other portfolios, we do not believe that an individual organisation will lose more funding in the short term, and we would want to work on the multi-year funding that I talked about earlier on over the medium to longer term. Just to follow up on the point about the third sector funding, the SCBO highlighted in the written evidence to the committee ahead of the session that it may be perceived as a small cut to a budget, as you might have described in relation to the budget line that the cabinet secretary is responsible for. However, it has noted that it will weaken support for voluntary organisations and their volunteers across Scotland at a time of great uncertainty. Intermediary bodies are committed to supporting the Government, but they will not be able to do that if the funding cut is not reversed. Could the cabinet secretary set out whether or not the £800,000—nearly £1 million—cut will go ahead this year? First of all, I absolutely recognise the important role of the third sector. I reiterate that the major funding for the third sector does not come from my portfolio. The £500 million plus is across the whole of government. That could be the £25.8 million for next year. The adjustments can be managed through efficiencies and other portfolios supporting the third sector. We do not believe that it will have the impact that Pam Duncan Glancy has alluded to. We will work through those things and work with the third sector to make sure that that does not happen. As I said at the beginning, it is a really tough budget. We need to make sure that we drive efficiencies where we can, we need to avoid duplication and we need to make sure that every pound that is spent in the most efficient way that we can. The third sector is very efficient at spending the money that we provide, and we want to work with it to make sure that it continues to deliver what it is delivering. It is an absolutely core part of the Covid recovery programme going forward, and I give my commitment to supporting it to do that. I am looking to bring in Miles Briggs for the final set of questions, unless Pam Duncan Glancy has any further questions. No, I am all good. Miles Briggs, please. Thank you, convener. I wanted to ask a specific question with regards to the impact of any council tax increases that we are likely to see. The committee has heard from a number of sessions that council tax is often one of the driving forces of pushing people into poverty and not being able to pay those bills. The year before the pandemic, we know that the amount of council tax debt increased by 25 per cent to over £95 million. Cabinet Secretary, you have outlined some of the support that is available, but what is your personal opinion on the potential increase in council tax, given what we are seeing around energy prices, and what additional support can be given to councils to help to keep those increases as low as possible? In response to Miles Briggs, I would really just reiterate what I said to him when he asked us at the local government committee. First of all, it is obviously for local authorities to decide their council tax level. It is not for government to tell them what they should do in relation to their council tax setting. The second thing that I would say is that council tax levels are very much below those elsewhere in the UK, which is significantly lower, so we are starting from a lower baseline. We have the council tax reduction scheme where huge numbers of people are supported with their council tax to make sure that people are struggling and struggle with their council tax, which is supported through the council tax reduction scheme. I am happy to furnish the committee with the detail of that, but that is something that is available to an extent that is not available elsewhere. I recognise that Miles Briggs makes the point that we need to support people who are struggling with their council tax. The £130 pandemic payment was also paid to those in receipt of council tax reduction. If we take all those together as a package, the money that I have talked about throughout this session of supporting low-income households will be important as we face some of the rising living costs, whether that is food or fuel costs, but the package of measures and the funding that we are giving to low-income households will help to keep people's heads above water over the next few months. Miles Briggs. Thank you for that. The Scottish Government has previously talked to the council tax freeze and provided the resources to local authorities to meet that. All local authority leaders have expressed concern that they now face £371 million of cuts, and that will lead to those increases. Given all the pressures that we are seeing on household budgets, why has that resource not been provided to try to meet a freeze this year? We have tried to provide local government with a fair and affordable settlement within a really tough financial environment and a tough settlement from the UK Government. Out of that, we have tried to give local authorities a fair and affordable course settlement, but a lot of local government resource comes from other portfolio investments, whether that is childcare or education, which the member will be aware of. We feel that there is no money left over or no money down the back of the couch, so that money is all being allocated. We have tried to allocate money to local government at the same time, providing money for social security to double the Scottish child payment. All of that has to be weighed up in and around. If Miles Briggs believes that more money should be given to the local government core grant, he will have to tell us where that has to come from. Should it come from social security, from the additional money that has been recognised by the Scottish Fiscal Commission that we are putting into social security, if that money was instead to go to local government, that would be money that would not be going in to the pockets of people in low-income households. Those are all balanced decisions that have to be made out of a fixed budget. There is no magic money tree that can provide money that does not come from elsewhere. In balancing the budget and the budget discussions that will happen—I am sure that Miles Briggs could be part of those budget discussions with my colleague Kate Forbes—any movement in money has to be compensated from elsewhere. Those are the really difficult challenges that we will face over the next few weeks. I am keen to hear what other parties have to say and where they would shift money from one place to another. Miles Briggs, just finally, I wanted to ask—we know that during the pandemic a significant number of our fellow Scots have become carers and taken on a carer role, and in many cases that has been women in Scotland who have taken on those roles. Looking at the budget as a whole, where do you think that that works, for women in Scotland, to try to make sure that they can realise their potential and get back into employment, if that is what they want to be doing, and to support carers who are now taking on, in many cases, caring roles that local authorities previously were supporting. We have seen cut during the pandemic. I think that the first thing to say is to acknowledge that women have been hardest hit during the pandemic for all the reasons that we understand. That is why, during the pandemic, we have tried to support households because we know that that will disproportionately support women and families who are struggling. Whether that is through the pandemic support payments, whether it is through bridging payments, the Scottish child payment, whether it is through all the other supports that we have outlined during the course of this session, women will be a major beneficiary of that, particularly women with children in low-income households. In terms of carers, I have laid out earlier the additional support that we have given to carers over the past two years, and the support that we are giving to carers this year that is in the budget, and the additional support that I laid out, the unpaid carers support that I laid out earlier in terms of the additional £4 million here and now to support carers who are facing challenges, all of which will disproportionately benefit women. We recognise the burden that women have carried through the pandemic, and we want to do what we can to support them. We believe that, through the mechanisms that I have laid out previously, we have done our best to do that. Thank you, Cabinet Secretary. I believe that Miles Briggs completed his set of questions, and if there are no further questions from other colleagues, please leave me just to thank you, Cabinet Secretary, and your colleagues, Kevin Stevens and Shirley Lang, for your time this morning. It is greatly appreciated. I think that we have covered a significant amount of ground across what is a very wide portfolio, so I very much appreciate your time today. No doubt, we will hear from you shortly on the commitments that you have made to follow up in writing with some of the correspondence that you committed to providing and also some of the questions that you are looking to follow up in writing, so we look forward to hearing from you on those areas. Thank you very much indeed to you all for your time. Thank you, Cabinet Secretary. We now move to the third item on the agenda, where we will consider a negative SSI. Members are invited to consider the Social Security Administration and Tribunal Membership Scotland Act 2020, commencement number five, and transitional provisions regulations 2021. Colleagues will be aware that background to those regulations are outlined in paper three. Do members have any comments to make in relation to those regulations? I am not seeing anyone coming forward. Are colleagues content to note the instrument? Thank you very much indeed. That concludes the public part of this morning's meeting. Next week, the committee will take evidence from the minister on the child disability payment and disability assistance for children and young people regulations. I would now like to suspend the meeting and move to a private session. Colleagues should leave this meeting and enjoy the private session link that will be in your calendar. Thank you very much indeed, colleagues.