 Good morning and welcome to the 28th meeting in 2023 with the Finance and Public Administration Committee. We have apologies from Deputy convener Michael Marra whose substitute today is former committee stalwart Daniel Johnson and welcome back to the committee today. The first item on our agenda is to take evidence from the Minister for Green Skills, Circular Economy and Biodiversity on the Circular Economy Scotland Bill financial memorandum and I intend to alert up to 75 minutes for this evidence session. The minister is joined today by Scottish Government officials Jenny Gardner, head of circular economy unit, Janet McVeigh, head of zero waste unit, Alexander Quayle, team leader, recycling and Gareth Heavyside's circular economy team leader. I welcome our witnesses to the meeting and invite the minister to make a short opening statement. Thank you for the opportunity to speak with you today. The Circular Economy Bill will establish the legislative framework to support Scotland's transition to a zero waste and circular economy, significantly increase reuse and recycling rates and modernise and improve waste and recycling services. The bill takes powers to give ministers and local authorities the tools they need to achieve our ambitions for a circular economy. Those represent a package of new powers and responsibilities that will be underpinned by support and investment such as the £70 million recycling improvement fund. That bill done over £1 billion of funding provided through the former strategic waste fund between 2008 and 2022 to assist local authorities in the implementation of a zero waste plan. At the heart of many of the provisions in this bill is the recognition that co-design, based on the principles of the Verity House agreement and the new deal for business, will be central to delivering the transformation that we need to see. Regulations made under those enabling powers in the bill will be subject to further consultation, parliamentary scrutiny and impact assessments, including business regulatory impact assessments. As a result, the financial minimum random provides strategic level cost and benefit data. That will be refined as part of on-going work with local authorities and householders, businesses and other stakeholders, through, for example, the development of the waste routes map. The bill is necessarily narrow in the topics that it covers. It sits in the space where the Scottish Government needs new powers to take action between powers that are reserved and matters that are devolved where we have already taken powers. Legislation is, of course, only part of the solution. A wide range of other measures are in train. Alongside the circular economy bill, we are developing our circular economy and waste route map, which will provide strategic direction for how we will deliver our system-wide comprehensive vision for sustainable resource use and Scotland's circular economy to 2030. An updated draft route map will be published later in 2023 for further consultation and will be finalised in 2024. Extended producer responsibility for packaging, which we are introducing alongside other UK Governments, will require producers to pay local authorities the full net cost of operating an efficient and effective household packaging collection service. That will provide substantial funding to local authorities, estimated at £1.2 billion per annum across the UK. I will finish by underlining that building a more circular economy is an environmental imperative, but it is also an economic opportunity for Scotland. It opens up new market opportunities, improves productivity, increases self-sufficiency and provides local employment opportunities. Thank you very much for that very helpful opening statement. I have already scribbled down a huge number of notes from the comments that you have made, because it would help if I could read my writing. That might make life a little bit easier. First of all, I will start by referring to some of the evidence that we received in a couple of weeks. You will obviously be familiar with that. On the evidence that we took, which was from the local authorities of Dundee, South Lanarkshire and West Lothian, it is fair to say that they are not enamoured, not so much with the direction of travel. In terms of policy, they are definitely on board. It is the issue that this committee is concerned about, and that is finance, obviously, in how that will be funded. For example, the first person to give evidence was Dundee City Council, and they are opening comment. The first thing that they said was that there is insufficient financial detail. The £70 million that was referred to is not sufficient for all of Scotland. The finances that are being made available do not take into account the real cost of running those particular infrastructure facilities, and additional facilities and additional resources will be required to manage those facilities, and that is not being taken into account. The Dundee City Council does not want to say that its view is that the costs are underestimated in the tune of about 50 per cent. The £70 million should be more like £140 million. How would you respond to those concerns? I absolutely understand that councils have concerns about future planning. We are all looking ahead and knowing that budgets are tight and that we need to make this just transition to net zero. In response to that, the main point with the bill is that this is very much a framework bill. This is the start of a journey for us to go on, to bring our recycling rates and our reuse rates up to the levels that we know we can and that we need to do for net zero. Convenier, you are absolutely correct. Councils are on board with the journey that we need to go on. We have committed—I have committed—in writing and, again, through the Verity House process to co-designing with councils. Each of the provisions in this bill will then have underneath it detailed policies to be brought forward. For example, on the charges for single-use items, at this time we are looking at an enabling framework to allow the Scottish Government and the Parliament to bring forward this kind of legislation, but exactly what items, how they would be managed, exactly how those charges would be collected and implemented, exactly what benefits and savings for litter and waste management those would bring to local authorities are to be developed in detail with local authorities as we move forward. As the recent discussions about, for example, single-use vapes have brought to our attention, these matters can come up quite quickly and they need to be handled quite urgently. We cannot see down the line exactly all the different ways that this framework may be used. What we have got today is the costs for strategically looking at the framework and some indicative costs of some of the initial policies that we intend to bring forward with this framework. Of course, local authorities want to be able to plan ahead. We produced a report just last week talking about the importance of forward planning. They feel, and certainly the evidence that they gave to us, which you will be aware of, they do not feel that they can do that if they do not have commitments in terms of the resources that they require will be made available. Their view is that co-design, and I quote from Cusmy Gwerth of Sirlanicshire, is where we want to be, close quotes, but there has to be the resources to actually deliver that. She among the others who are giving evidence just said, I'm sorry, the money just isn't going to be there to deliver that. For example, if you look at enforcement officers, the costs that are in the financial memorandum relative to what she thinks are the real costs are only about half what they suggested the real cost of enforcement would be. In terms of things like the littering fines, the suggestion of the financial memorandum that 100 per cent of those will be collected, there's no resemblance to the 10 to 15 per cent that they think will actually be collected based on their own experience. Indeed, through fiscal fines local authorities get nothing back at all. How do you address the points that were made two weeks ago by our witnesses in terms of some of those very cogent issues? I absolutely understand that both businesses and local authorities need certainty going forward. That is why we've committed to that co-design process. Of course, I cannot second guess what the outcome of that process may be, but those would be developed over many months following that co-design process after which they would have the opportunity to come through Parliament, whether that is through an SSI affirmative procedure or a negative procedure, so that they can have scrutiny. For each specific policy that would be brought forward, all those details would be worked through and developed with the councils, businesses and indeed with householders, so that there would be clarity for each particular policy as that comes through. We will definitely be working with the councils to deliver those outcomes. That is not something that is going to be imposed centrally. As for the enforcement cost, as we go through the financial memorandum in detail, we can look at which of those provisions allow councils to increase their fixed penalty notices, for example, so that it gives councils more opportunities to balance out their costs. However, all of the enforcement costs, particularly for local authorities, is at the discretion of the local authority as to how much they wish to spend on enforcement versus the benefits that they might receive from that enforcement. For example, on the household requirements for waste, that is around contamination of the recycling stream. Those powers that the bill would allow is for the councils to use should they decide to do that. That is that there is no requirement for them to enforce in any particular way, but they may decide that their recyclet is becoming so contaminated that they are losing money because they are then having to pay for that to go to incineration or they are having to pay for it to go to landfill or they are not able to sell that recyclet at its full value. The money that they are losing would make it worth their while to enforce more firmly, but that is entirely a calculation for local authorities to make the decision on. However, they cannot take those decisions if they have not got the resources to implement it regardless of what they may wish to do. We want to do what the Government suggests, but we cannot squeeze a quarter of a pint into a pint pot. The bottom line is that the resources are not being made. Will the Scottish Government fully fund the bill? Is it in a nutshell? The outcomes of the bill are a framework bill, which allows us to start the journey, for example, down the route of imposing charges on single-use plastics. I cannot predict all the items down the line that the Parliament and Government may wish to impose on those charges in terms of getting industry to report on the waste that they are producing and the surpluses that they are producing. We are looking at starting with food waste, but down the line, the Parliament may choose to look at other sectors and industries. The bill is the start of a journey, and each of those provisions provides for taking specific policy actions down the line in line with councils. Hold on a second. If you are taking actions, the costings have to be realistic. The point is that the local government is saying that the costings are not realistic. Therefore, even if they agree to take things forward to the end degree, that is what they want to do. I mean, nobody wants to have contaminated waste. Everyone wants to maximise recycling. That is a given right across the Parliament, but it has to be fundable. One of the things that, because each local authority is different than Dee, for example, talks about half their tenant, half their citizens living in flatted properties, enforcement is extremely difficult, behavioural change is extremely difficult, and the cost of educating people is extremely difficult if we are going to get the behavioural change that we actually want long-term. They have said that they are putting huge amounts of money in, but they are still not able to reach recycling targets in the new additional resources. I know that it is a framework bill. We know that there is going to be co-design. We know that there is going to be secondary legislation. However, will the Government make a commitment up front that, if your partners and local government prove their at-house whatever goes down the road, they will be funded? They are quite reluctant to go down the road to local authorities if they think that they will not be resourced to do it. It is one thing to say that it is up to them to do this or that, but they can do it if they have not got the money. That is why they want a commitment from the Government that they will be funded. Realistic funding is not airy-fairy. You will collect 100 per cent of fines when that has never happened and never will happen. It has to be realistic. That is our consensus about the financial memorandum, whether it is realistic. The evidence that we have at the moment suggests that there are elements in that that are not realistic, such as the examples that I have given already. Thank you, convener. I know that the members understand that, as a framework bill, that sets out strategic intentions and strategic actions, and therefore the costs in the financial memorandum are also at that level. At the detailed level of policy implementation, there will be another full set of business regulatory impact assessments around that for Parliament to scrutinise, but because those are part of co-development processes. From what the convener is saying, I think that maybe some of the concern is specifically around the code for local authorities and the household requirements. That seems to be what you were alluding to. On paragraph 48 of the financial memorandum, there is an indicative cost given there of £88.4 million, which is an estimate that the Zero Waste Scotland has created and the paragraph details how that estimate was reached, which would bring all of our local authorities to align with the existing code of practice, for example. That is a reasonable indicative figure of what investment is required in Scotland in order to move us substantially in that direction. I think that that is quite a good indicative figure. £88.4 million is comparable to the £70 million that we have invested through the recycling improvement fund, and the difference there then divided through local authorities is a relatively modest amount for local authorities. You can see that the level of investment is proportionate to the changes that we are looking for. I will move on a wee bit from that to the co-design area, because you have emphasised a number of times the importance of co-design. I have already pointed out that the local government is keen on the co-design element of it, but there still are one or two issues in relation to that. For example, Charlie Devine of Dundee said, I think that co-design at this level would be really difficult and it would probably lengthen the process considerably. Co-design can be as big and as complicated as you want to make it, and there is a real fear that what will happen is that we will be still discussing the secondary legislation co-design many months into the future. Kirsten McGuire of South Lanarkshire said, It is pretty difficult to attribute costs, we do not have a full picture, we do not know what the secondary legislation will like, what form the legislation will take or what form the EPR scheme will take. Even with co-design, there are considerable concerns that we could be good down a rabbit hole with no clear ending. When will the co-design process be concluded around July to conclude that in order that we can get some of the positive aspects of what the bill is intending to achieve up and running? Is it the only possible opportunity? The bill brings forward, I think that I have just counted 11 provisions, and several of those have underneath them provisions for bringing policy forward. There will be separate co-design processes for different elements. For example, under the single use charges, the initial policy that we are looking to bring forward there is a charge for single use cups. That development process for developing that with businesses, householders and local authorities is a separate process from the process for developing, for example, a common code of practice for local authorities and waste, which would be separate to developing targets or separate to developing the reporting for waste and so on. The bill has many provisions. There is not going to be one single co-design process. As we bring forward each of those policies under the bill, they will have their own timescale. Those, I believe, would be enumerated in more detail in the Roots map, but maybe one of my colleagues can elaborate on that. On the co-design timing, particularly in the comment from Dundee Council about the fear that they will still be discussing it for years, it is helpful for the committee to know two stages to co-design. The first is to agree with local authorities and other stakeholders how we will deliver the co-design. That part of the process we are looking at concluding in the first half of 2024. The intention would be that that will set parameters for the co-design that follows, so that we avoid a co-design process that does not have a definite end to it, so that we can provide local authorities and other stakeholders with certainty about the timeline that that will take. The co-design itself for the new household co-design practice is approximately a year, but it will depend on the outcome of determining the co-design process with local authorities and stakeholders before we can say roughly how long that will be. One of the issues that came up in questioning from myself by Dundee was regarding co-design, not just between local authorities and the Scottish Government, but it also said that it is also about co-designing with the market. How would that work? I can give an example of a provision that is on the reporting of waste and surplus goods, because that is looking at putting a burden on businesses to report on their waste, an obligation to report on their waste and surpluses that would need to be developed with businesses. That provision is already undertaken voluntarily by many businesses, including Tesco, Hovis, Unilever and Ikea. There are already industry examples of good practice, where large businesses report on their waste and surplus. Tesco has certainly called for all businesses in their industry to do the same. By engaging with those businesses that already undertake this work and engage with other businesses in the space, we can develop what we think is industry best practice to support those. That is part of the process for bringing forward that provision on the reporting of waste. I am happy to dive into any of the other provisions that the convener is interested in. One thing that you mentioned in your opening speech was that £1.2 billion is expected to be brought in through the EPR. A concern that came up from our witnesses was how that would be distributed to local authorities. For example, that is a UK provision, so how would Scottish local authorities gain from that? What would be the mechanism? Obviously, one of the things that he wants to know is certainty about that for forward planning purposes. Extended producer responsibility for packaging, which I am afraid does not roll beautifully off the tongue but is a groundbreaking provision that is being brought in at the UK level, is a polluter pays scheme. The idea at the simplest level is that all producers of packaging will pay fees to a scheme administrator. That will be a UK-wide scheme administrator. They will pay fees to the scheme administrator who will then take those fees and allocate them to local authorities all over the UK so that those local authorities can run efficient and effective household packaging collection services. Those are matters that are still very much in discussion, which I have been pushing for and I understand that the discussions are going well. That process of allocation needs to be transparent. It needs to take into account the geographic nature of regions, for example the additional challenges that lower density population regions, islands and rural areas have, needs to be taken into account. Each council is getting a fair allocation of that. My understanding of the process so far is that that has been accepted by the four nations and that the allocation of that funding will go directly from the scheme administrator to local authorities. That is my understanding of the state of those discussions, that that is the case. I am, of course, very keen that that money is additional money, and that is the conversations that I have had with my ministerial counterparts in the UK and the other nations. Of course, if we are asking councils to do more, they need that additionality so that they can implement that. I think that that would be very helpful. I think that that is something that they would look forward to providing. It is indeed additionality. I mean, when we go back to the financial memorandum, though local authorities are still expressing some concerns. For example, Charlie Divine of Dundee said, we need a lot more information. He said that the financial memorandum is really helpful because it gives us much more scope, but we have to think that at the moment it is not the finished article that we could give to Parliament to consider, and Kirsten McGuire backed up by saying that there is too much uncertainty and there is not enough detail behind things at the moment. So, I think that when it comes to framework bills, when we are trying to scrutinise, we are trying to work with what we actually have in front of us, which is the financial memorandum, as are local authorities. However, the problem that we have is, and you are not the only minister to come before us on the framework bill, is that we just see the can being kicked down the road a wee bit. Co-design in secondary legislation sounds great on paper, but if local authorities are looking to invest in recycling facilities, for example, they need to know when to do that, and they need to know what they are going to be recycling when, what is going to be included, what is not going to be included. If they are going to have to enforce legislation, they need to be able to plan ahead on how they are going to be able to fund that. The difficulty they have is that this financial memorandum does not appear to actually do that. For example, Chris McGuire says again quite a bit is missing from the costs we are looking at in terms of, for example, another aspect is communication. What local authorities have to spend to communicate those changes to the people that live in their areas? This bill is certainly looking ahead. In no way are we standing still at the moment that local authorities are doing a lot of work. There is a voluntary code of practice in place for Scottish local authorities. Every local authority has signed up to that to reach a certain standard of recycling, but at present only one third of local authorities are actually adhering to that standard. Our local authorities are already on a journey. They already have a destination that they are looking for. What the bill puts in place is provisions for the next step beyond that again. Local authorities know where they are going in terms of meeting that existing code of practice. They have the recycling improvement fund, which nearly all local authorities have had money about. They are working very hard to move towards that. The bill is the very early days of looking ahead at the next stage, at bringing recycling and waste management and resource management in Scotland up to a more European standard, more in line with what Wales is doing. Councils know where they are in the near term, and this is just the starting line for how we get to that next step. That is why this co-design is so important. All of that stuff with this bill will be able to start and get into those detailed conversations so that each of the specific provisions—whether that is charging for coffee cups, whether that is implementing new powers for enforcement around littering—means that councils will have each of those as they come forward. I understand the challenge that the committee has in scrutinising a bill that has so many provisions in it, of course, and I am happy to dive into any particular provision that the convener would like to look at. I will let colleagues in in a wee minute. You have said that they know basically where they are going, but they do not know where they are going. For example, Jim Jack of West Lothian said, I am concerned about the future, what the journey will continue to look like for waste services, our ability to be light enough on our feet and whether we will be funded to achieve what we need to achieve. They do not feel as if they know where they are going. Kirsten McGuire said of South Lanarkshire, until we are not of service, we will not look like we will not know what we are applying for funding for. They are in a cleft stick in that they are looking for additional resources to deliver this bill, but they are not really sure, because it seems to be a moveable feast to what they are actually applying for money for. Kirsten McGuire also said that if glass had been included in the scheme, there would have been an opportunity for us to make some efficiencies, because glass is about 6 per cent of the material that we collect in our container bin, which is for glass, plastics and cans. A lot of them obviously had been geared up with regard to the deposit return scheme. That has obviously been changed significantly. I have to say that, although you are telling us that things seem to be going well, we are not really receiving that in terms of the witnesses that are actually giving us feedback through our scrutiny. I understand that, convener. Moving toward the existing code of practice is absolutely a journey that councils have been on. Looking ahead, we absolutely need to go through that co-design process. It is one of the challenges of co-design that one has to wait for the outcome of that process. Within the financial memorandum, we have given some illustrative examples of where we would like to start, with the single-use coffee cup charge, with looking at food waste in particular on food reporting, and where we know that that is the provision that we intend to work with initially. We have provided funding around those initiatives. I guess that the open question is, after those initial initiatives, how would all of us collectively like to move forward after food waste is reported on what other sectors are interested in? I know that members in Parliament have talked to me about textile waste and construction waste and so on. Those are all things that we could then take forward after we have done that. We have presented in the financial memorandum all the information that we have about how we are going to start the journey strategically and specific provisions where we already know them. A piece of legislation—I think that we will want to move forward on it—but some of the local authorities are a bit more cautious than others, I would suggest. One of the things that has been emphasised is, should one size fit all—if one size does not fit all, how do you ensure that we do not move at the pace of the slowest caravan and we do actually get some of the changes that we want to see? We do have great disparity at the minute between how our local authorities implement recycling. Some of our local authorities are excellent and have very high recycling rates. Some have lesser for a whole variety of reasons. Part of the provisions—again, the member is referring largely to the code of practice element of the bill—is to help to have that standardised experience. One of the wonderful things about Scandinavian countries is that they have very standardised recycling, which helps the consumer to understand what it is that they are to do and helps them to do the right thing. I know in Scandinavian countries whether they are at home, at work or at the train station, for example, it is the same colour bin for paper, the same colour bin for plastics, the same colour bin for food waste. All of that helps, for example, with communications. It helps to get that recycling level up through that standardisation. That is something that we may, as part of the co-design, develop with councils. Is that standard across the country so that the user experiences it in a better way, in an easier way? At the moment, some councils do glass, some councils have different colours and different symbols. Standardising that across the country, if that is what the co-design process develops, would make councils' lives easier and open up opportunities for perhaps bulk purchasing of bins or other savings that might be useful to councils. The whole intention of the co-design is to make life easier for councils and to have that input. We all recognise that different communities have different geographic challenges, different housing stock challenges, and that we absolutely need to take into account all of that during that co-design process, which is why councils absolutely need to be involved in every step of that as we go forward. That came up during the termation that raised the issue of different coloured bins. People moved from one local authority to another and they do not realise that bins have changed and all the rest of it. You say that that may develop from co-design, but it is Government's role not to provide some leadership. That is what we want to see Scotland look like in terms of recycling five years and trying to channel local authorities in a certain direction. Co-design to me sounds great, but it also sounds kind of woolly. It sounds like, where are we going to end up? Should the Government not provide leadership on us? Those framework bills appear to me to be something of a cop-out, frankly. We have also seen it in the national care service and financial memorandum as well. People want to know that when you elect a Government on a manifesto, they are going to deliver that manifesto. It is all very cuddly having everyone in the big tent and all that, but it seems to me that it just takes a lot longer to get anywhere and you do not even know at the start of the process where you are going to end up. Where we need to end up and the outcomes are very clear in terms of the targets. That is both the national targets and the circular economy targets and the targets for local authorities. The vision here is that we know that we need to get to a certain level of reuse, recycling to hit our net zero targets, putting those targets in place and then having that co-design process to say, right, we collectively, all of us as a nation, as local authorities, we want to achieve these things. How do we best do that? That is where the co-design piece comes in. The leadership piece comes in on the targets. We know that we have to hit net zero. We know that that means certain recycling rates. Then it is up to us to work with councils how that is best achieved because that does indeed look quite different in a tenement in Edinburgh than it does on a remote island. The first colleague to come in will be Michelle to be followed by Liz. Good morning. I asked a question of last week's panel, which was on a scale of zero to ten, where zero is no confidence and ten is complete confidence. What number would you give in terms of confidence to this FM? Same question for you, minister. What specific number between zero and ten in terms of confidence would you give this FM? I think that I have confidence in this FM because it is a strategic one. The bill being a framework bill is a strategic one. For the avoidance of doubt, 10, you are saying that the costs given in this FM will be the final costs to the Scottish Government and to taxpayers of implementing this. Indeed, because it is a strategic level. Within the FM, the assumptions that are made are very clear as well as the kind of ranges that we are looking at. Most of the provisions of this bill are about setting up frameworks, developing process and legislation. The costs there are as indicative and as accurate as we can possibly make them for those things. You are making an argument when you say, as indicative as we can make them for a framework bill by logic. Following that logic, they cannot be very accurate at all because it is a framework bill that you have emphasised in the estimate. That concerns me greatly where we see estimates, and I appreciate the complexity. I absolutely do. However, our job as a committee is just to scrutinise the FM. In some respects, we almost need to set aside the policy and the excitement that is generated by the policy and the change. Our job is to look at the FM. As it stands at the moment, you have already heard from the convener concerns being expressed by our representatives last week. Indeed, in answer to that question, it was Kirsty Maguire from South Lanarkshire Council gave her confidence level a four and someone else said a five because they were reflecting that they do not know the final cost. Just looking at the FM, we can, as it stands, have really simply no idea as to the final costs of implementing this policy. In fact, it is fair to say in any project that you never know the final cost until it is done. That is just a statement of fact. I am trying to establish the confidence level given that you, in all your previous evidence to the convener, have set out exactly how we cannot know and the mitigations that you are going to take place with that in terms of co-design. Having explained that, how confident are you now that the FM represents the final cost to the Scottish Government and the taxpayer? The question is what final of the member means. The provision of the bill, for example, on charging for single-use items, is an enabling power that the Parliament could use again and again and again. We do not know when the next product, such as a single-use vape, might be invented. We do not know what that might be. That could be 30 years from now. You are describing a benefit, not a cost. All of that would require development. The costs outlined in the bill include the development of those policies, the engagement that is required for those policies, as well as enforcement costs down the line. The framework bill sets in place that we can develop those things for the next single-use vapour, the thing that comes out. There is not a final day in which that will be finished. Moving to a circular economy is going to be a journey that we will always be on. That takes us on the next step by creating those enabling powers. The financial memorandum shows you the funding for the next step, which is the horizon that we can see and the step that we are taking. Every step, after that, and the details of that, will be that, as each piece of regulation is brought through Parliament, it will have impact assessments that will be scrutinised as each piece goes through. I think that the convener has made that, if that is going through secondary legislation, and, for example, an affirmative procedure by no way could be considered scrutiny, that means automatically even going through lead committees. For example, I had a situation with the Children's Care and Justice Bill, where the recent evidence session was all about costs, because exactly the same issue had occurred. There had been a framework bill, and the detail of the cost was starting to come through and was going through the Education and Young People's Committee. I am saying here that I personally cannot have any confidence in the FN when we have fully disclosed estimates that are quite vague because of where you are in the process, and I understand why that is the case. We have witnesses from local councils saying, well, actually, frankly, we don't know. Then we have mitigations in there, some ranges, seven times higher. Just to frame it, I imagine if you were going to build your own house and you went to the bank and said, I think I want to borrow £250,000, but actually might be £1.75 million, and I'll let you know once I've been through all the various stages. The bank would say, I don't think so, they would be looking for considerably more detail. So why, given that tightness when we've got critical fiscal constraints, do you think it's acceptable for us, as a finance committee, to sign off in an FN where, frankly, we have no clue and setting aside the policy? I'm just talking about the financial scrutiny element. We have no clue and I personally find extremely difficult to have the right level of confidence because there's so many variances, seven times variance in some ranges is unbelievable. This is the challenge around a framework bill that we're putting in place the structures and taking that initial step of enabling powers. We're not detailing within this bill how those might be used. That will go through secondary legislation, as the member rightly points out. I mean, I myself have been involved in secondary legislation through committee recently, that generated quite substantial debate, even using a negative procedure. I spent quite a lengthy session in front of the committee answering questions about that. It also then went for discussion in the chamber as well. Depending on how members interact with that secondary legislation, there can be extensive scrutiny of that, if members of the Parliament decide that that is needed. Those powers are there, as those will be brought forward. I've got a list in front of me, for example, restrictions on unsold goods will come through on an affirmative procedure and so on. Each piece of that will then have its chance to be scrutinised, but not by the finance committee. We are gathered, as MSPs, because it's fair to say that all of us have some background or experience in finance. I don't think that anyone would claim to be experts. We have some experience, and we've been selected to represent that. Once it's out into general committees, we lose that. If we agree that, given that it's a framework bill, we can't have the confidence that we need an AFM, but there will be further scrutiny. Do you then share my concerns that the further scrutiny will be much wider secondary legislation by its very definition will not focus exclusively on the costs, although they may be involved in that? Do you then have any worries that it will lead to less control over costs as we go through the parliamentary processes? No, I don't have worry that that leads to less control over costs. I think that it leads to a more specific and detailed certainty around those costs. If I was to set out now, for example, what we think we would do for something that's five years down the road, then you would be right to say, you know what, I don't think that you can stand up to those numbers. However, as that bill puts us across the starting line, we can take each project, for example, single-use cups, and dial into that and look at exactly what those costs are going to be. Now, because we'll be co-developing those, the costs will emerge as different options emerge. For example, we all know, we have experience of the plastic bag charge. The way that that has been implemented is for businesses alone to do that. Isn't something that local authorities are involved in implementing? Businesses can recoup their full cost that they feel that they need to do from that charge and then they give the rest away according to the rules of that. That is an example of a version of that implementation that has almost no cost to local authorities on that, because the cost has been managed in a specific way. However, you could have implemented that charge in a totally different way. You could have implemented it such that there were costs. So, as we develop these policies, there are substantially different options on the table, hence the range. That is why when we go through that co-design process, it may be that local authorities will say, yes, we want to be involved in this one, we will incur costs, or they may say, no, let's leave that one with business, and that's where the costs will be. If I were to specify that's where the inaccuracy would come in, what I need to be accurate and say, look, these are the strategic costs to put in place the strategic bill, and we will get into the specific costs of each policy at the correct time. I understand that. It's basically a phasing approach, and I've seen that a multitude of times in my previous life. I understand how that works, but, again, I return to the point that this is a finance committee. After you're away today, that's it. It's away from the finance committee unless we ask you, as a committee, to come back without an updated financial memorandum. That's away from the finance committee who has responsibility for ensuring that the costs are understood. Just to follow on that, given that we agree you're taking a phasing approach, have you or how many meetings have you had with the Deputy First Minister to outline that, actually, as we go through year on year, we don't know. Nor can we have any proper sense of what the costs are until we reach that point. Does she know, in her capacity as finance secretary as well as Deputy First Minister, that, year on year, for the next few years, she has no idea about the costs of this bill? Oh, and we can add that to the national care service and the children's care and justice bill. If I were her, I'd be quite nervous about that. If I were in charge of controlling the costs, I'd want to know what's coming down the track or if there's a good sense of them. How many meetings have you had with her? I have not had a meeting on that subject, of course. All the paperwork, including the financial memorandum, are shared with ministerial colleagues so that they can see what is coming down the line. Because this is a process of development, each of those specific costs for any particular policy will come down the way and will be scrutinised at the appropriate time and following the appropriate process. As I keep coming back to the example of the charging for the single-use cups, because we have this excellent example of the plastic bag charge, that is the kind of provision that we're looking at here. That charge doesn't incur costs for local authorities except around some enforcement. The actual implementation sits with businesses who are allowed to recoup the costs from that. There's everything from capital investment through things like the recycling improvement fund, which of course is part of budget negotiations, and all the way down to measures that can be implemented substantially outwith Government expenditure. Because of that range, because this bill covers that range, it needs to be each of those pieces that is brought in for scrutiny. That, of course, is exactly the process that will be followed. I understand that. You're describing an enabling bill. You've used the term framework bill and strategic level costs. I get all of that. Last week's question is, how do you know that we're going to get value for money? I think that the reason that we know that there's value for money here is because of the opportunities that are being unlocked. We know at that moment, just to give some examples, that contamination of our waste stream costs local authorities money. We know that litter on the streets costs them collection charges. We know that businesses are producing perfectly good goods that are going straight to landfill and incineration. During a cost of living crisis, we know that perfectly good food is being sent to incineration and landfill instead of getting into people's mouths. I think that one of the numbers that I've got is that for every 1 per cent that we invest in enforcement around a food waste, every £1 we invest in reducing food waste, we get £250 worth of benefit for our local communities. That means that we're not only preventing that waste for the businesses involved but we're making sure that that product, that perfectly good food that maybe had a bad label put on it or something, is getting into hungry mouths. The benefits to not only reaching net zero, but to making sure that goods within our society materials get used, especially by people who need them, is an immeasurable good. I'm so glad that we're able to bring that forward. Just to say that the saving from cups is estimated at £453,000 a year, compared to the overall cost of that, I think that that's a relatively modest figure. Good morning, minister. May I follow on from Michelle Thomson's line of questioning, which I think is very important? Can I just read to you what standing order says about financial memorandum? That it must set out the best estimates of the cost savings and changes to revenues to which the provisions of the bill will give rise and an indication of the margins of uncertainty in such estimates. The financial memorandum must also include best estimates of the timescales over which such cost savings and changes to revenues would be expected to rise. You've put on record this morning that you think that this financial memorandum is 10 out of 10 when it comes to confidence. Are you absolutely confident in relation to the timescales that you're setting out that that is correct? It's correct with the best estimates and the best information that we've got. I mean, the assumptions in the financial memorandum are spelled out. We are providing the committee with the best information that we can possibly have available. I'm asking the question, minister, because Mr Cwyle, when he answered the question about some detail about the possible timescales, there is a big question about the on-going co-design of the policies. It is very clear from the evidence that we've taken so far that local authorities are not at all confident that the extent of the co-design is either certain or in terms of the timescales is very clear. Why do you have 10 out of 10 confidence in the financial memorandum? Because the financial memorandum sets out how we're going to do those things, for example, as my colleague has said, Alex has said that the first step to the co-design process is to agree what that process is. We know that that process is going to take some time and be working with local authorities. That is all set out in good faith that we are providing the best information that we have at this moment. I am certain that we are providing you with the best information that we've got at this time. With respect, minister, just to put it out in good faith isn't enough. As Michelle Thomson has rightly said, it is our duty and responsibility in this committee to be very rigorous in the scrutiny that we adopt on the financial memorandum. We have seen, as she cited two other bills in this Parliament, the national care service and the children and the justice bill, where the co-design process, which I can understand why it's important that good policy making is based on co-design with the stakeholders, is obviously working in collaboration with the Government. I absolutely get that. However, if that co-design process is extended, almost indefinitely, as far as I can see in this case, then it is almost impossible for us to scrutinise the final numbers of a financial memorandum. Do you accept that? I absolutely accept that. We are all looking at the best numbers that we can with the information that we have available to us now. I know that that information is the best information that we can provide you now. If situations change in the future, as Michelle Thomson has said, the committee is obviously welcome to invite me back. I would be happy to give an updated financial memorandum and to look at that if the situation changes further down the line. That is our best information that we have now, so that is what I am providing to the committee. The memorandum is clear about what assumptions are involved in that. The co-design process means that the outcomes of that will be developed through the process. That is exactly what a co-design should do. Why is it, minister, that if you are making the point that you have 10 out of 10 commitment on the confidence that the witnesses from whom we have taken evidence are saying four or five, why is there that discrepancy? What has gone wrong there? The discrepancy is understanding what the difference is between a framework bill and the provisions that will follow on from that framework. Sorry, do they not understand that this is a framework bill? I think that a lot of people want to know what they are looking at the detail of the policy. For example, what exactly are we looking at at the code of practice for local authorities? What exactly are we expecting from local authorities in terms of targets? Which single-use items and how will those charges look? We do not have that information. That is part of the co-development process to get there. So, when people are saying that they are uncertain about this, I would interpret that as meaning they want to know the detail of exactly what the code of practice will look like. I want to know that, too, but that will be the outcome of that co-design process. The logic, minister, of what you are saying is that if you have 10 out of 10 confidence in this, you feel that that degree of certainty and clarity is there. We have witnesses who are saying that that is not the case. What I am asking is why you think that there is this discrepancy in the degree of confidence in the financial memorandum. That is a very serious concern to this committee because it is our job to scrutinise that. Therefore, can I ask again why you think that there is that discrepancy? As I have said, I am confident that the financial memorandum lays out the strategic costs, as it intends to do. Where there may be some uncertainty is where people want to know the detailed costs of the following on secondary legislation, which, of course, we do not have that information because that has yet to be developed. Therefore, if there is that discrepancy, it is because I would assume that local authorities and businesses and so on are looking for the detail that will come with that secondary legislation, but it is not part of this bill. My final point, minister, is that do you accept that because that detail is not there, our job is pretty well impossible? I mean that detail cannot be there as part of a framework bill. That is not really the nature of the enabling bill, but that detail will be presented through that secondary legislation and will undergo all that parliamentary scrutiny. Okay, thank you. I would just like to return to the issues that were brought up initially by the convener and the Recycling Improvement Fund and what is going to be expected by local authorities through the code of practice. Some local authorities made the point that about two-thirds of the improvement fund has already been distributed, but they obviously do not yet know what requirements are going to be placed on them through the code of practice. I wonder if you could speak to that a little bit, minister, about what conditions Government has attached to the improvement fund and how you expect the eventual code of practice to reflect the priorities that have already been set through distributing a not insignificant amount of money already? Absolutely. We already have a voluntary code of practice for local authorities in Scotland, which every local authority in Scotland has signed up to. That is what local authorities are working towards. Indeed, that £1 billion of money that was invested from the Scottish Government to local authorities, in addition to the Recycling Improvement Fund, which is around £70 million, is working towards that voluntary code of practice. However, at this time, only about a third of local authorities are complying with that voluntary code of practice. As a direction of travel, all local authorities are moving toward that code of practice, so that is a well understood code that local authorities are moving toward. We know that the investment has been helping local authorities in that direction. That code of practice, although it is good and it is not going to enable Scotland to reach our waste targets, there will be some need to upgrade that. It will be the existing code of practice plus. That plus is what the co-design process needs to involve. That plus also unlocks enormous opportunities for us. For example, textile recycling is something that most local authorities do not look at, but textiles are very valuable materials. I have been hearing from charities who work in the space where people steal textiles because they are so valuable. If that becomes part of the plus that local authorities agree on, there are some financial opportunities there—revenue-raising opportunities for councils around producing good-quality textile recycling. There are also other opportunities that are not covered in that existing code, for example the collection of pox tubs and trays and films. Those are materials that are again hugely valuable. If they can be collected in quantity and kept clean and sorted, there is money to be made in that. With that plus, we will need to come to that discussion about how any additional provisions over and above the existing code of practice not only reduce litter, reduce waste, help us to reach net zero, but also ensure that we unlock those opportunities. If a council can say, I can produce x amount of this kind of recyclet and it is going to be clean and sorted to this standard, investors will come in and they will say, right, I will, if you can produce that reliably, I will invest in your site, which will create jobs and put in recycling plants. Those are the kind of business opportunities that we would hope to unlock with this. Is the Government's position then that the money that is not yet being distributed either through Recycle Improvement Fund or other capital investment for local authorities, that will be sufficient for the plus, the additional layer that you are talking about? The money that has been invested in so far should be sufficient to meet the existing voluntary code of practice, although most local authorities are not meeting it to talk about why in a moment. However, the money that is still to be distributed will be sufficient to meet the additional infrastructure requirements on local authorities. We do not know what that plus looks like, so that is going to be part of the co-design process. As I said earlier in this session, I am trying to find it in my notes, the section on co-de-practice is roughly proportionate, so we estimate that to bring all local authorities in line with the existing co-de-practice that we cost about £88.4 million, that is Zero Waste Scotland's estimate. The Recycle Improvement Fund is £70 million, so there are proportionate estimates and some amount of that money from local authorities budgets themselves, which we know they allocate. To bring us in line with the existing co-de-practice, the capital investment and so on, it is broadly in line with that. That plus is going to need more, and that is where we need to look at both the benefits from that, whatever may come after the Recycling Improvement Fund can be discussed, but also things like the extended producer responsibility for packaging, which represents another source of funding. All the pieces of what that plus looks like are really at the starting point with that, both in terms of what those plus look like, what the opportunities are and what the funding might look like. I would like to look specifically at the costs for local authorities around the household waste provisions. There is a lot of bit to speak here. The financial memorandum estimates that the reckoning is to be two full-time equivalent members of staff for enforcement per 150,000 people. Some of the local authorities have fed back, take issue both with the financial costs associated with those two FTE positions and the two per 150,000 ratio. What is usually the case with the financial memorandums that we look at is that the national Government has an interest in seeking to minimise costs associated with that. The local government, often if you are cynical about it, has an interest in overestimating the costs because it wants to try to get their hands on as much money as possible for perfectly legitimate reasons. It is the job of the committee to figure out who is right or where the point in the middle is. Could you explain in a little bit more detail the thinking behind both the cash terms estimate for two FTEs, because local authorities believe that it would be more than that, but also why the two per 150,000 ratio and how you believe that balances out across local authorities ranging from high-density urban areas to remote rural and island communities? I will start and then I will hand over to colleagues for the detail on that. With all the enforcement provisions, there is always a discretionary element where the local authority can decide how much enforcement is appropriate for them. For example, on the household requirement space where we are looking at contamination of recyclet, what the bill does is provide local authorities with new tools and new fixed penalty notices to enable them to help people comply with that recycling so that it does not become contaminated. That is not only a source of revenue, but that is a choice that they can make a business case. If they are losing money through contaminated recycling because they either have to sort it or then pay for it to go to incineration, they may choose to up their enforcement costs. A lot of this is discretionary on how the local authority wishes to do that, but I will hand over to colleagues for detail. On the 150,000—two officers per 150,000 of the population, that is based on a best estimate because we did not have data that was robust enough to account for regional variation on that. Those costs are zero waste Scotland estimates based on average local authority costs for enforcement officers, but they will not reflect the exact costs and they might not reflect those at the higher end of the range, which is the evidence that you have heard. In the development of the secondary regulation, data on costs that are encouraged for each notice and for enforcement can be reviewed, so there is an opportunity there as well to set out the examples, typical thresholds for the penalties, and that should give a better picture of the costs to local authorities. Just to confirm, those costs are based on actual existing costs for other forms of enforcement that local authorities already carry out. Obviously, it is an average, so some local authorities will spend less, some will spend more, but that is based on existing costs in similar areas of enforcement. That is what the estimate is based on. Zero waste Scotland estimates of average local authority costs for enforcement. The last point around the fixed penalty notices for littering and the point that local authorities make around cost recovery is that, as I pointed out a few moments ago, the FFM assumes that 100 per cent of fines will be paid. Some local authorities are saying that it is only 10 to 15 per cent. Again, I am interested if you could speak to that a little bit more, but specifically what conversations you have had with local authorities about why the payment rate for the existing fixed penalty notice system is so low, because to me that seems... I mean, nobody would expect 100 per cent, so it would be interesting why 100 per cent is in the FFM, but 10 to 15 per cent does seem remarkably low. Presumably, there are some specific barriers in place there that the Government would want to help local authorities to remove. Just taking a step back again, this is the provision that will establish the new civil penalty regime for littering from vehicle, which has been supported for a long time by range of stakeholders, so that will introduce again a par for other detail and subsequent regulations. On your questions about how the costs were informed, there was a discussion with networks, including local authorities, to get a sense of costs. We did refer to that in the financial memo, but, as we have noted, costs to enforcement do vary across local authorities. Again, we cannot say with certainty what the number of penalties issued would be, but we have given an illustrative assumption based on around 500 penalty notices being issued, taking account of what we know about historic levels of penalties for littering and the assumption that roadside litter is about 4 per cent of tonnage. On the cost, we have given an indicative cost based on advice from at least one of our expert local authorities in our litter manager network of an average cost of dealing with the penalty, but, in terms of the assumptions of 100 per cent of those penalties being recovered, going back to when we were deliberating with the financial memo, it did not feel appropriate to assume that a penalty should be paid by the recipient, but we recognise, and the litter and flight having strategy has absolutely recognised that this is a really strong theme, that we know that there is strong evidence that there is barriers to effective enforcement, and that is a big focus of the new strategy that was published in June. We have commissioned some further research with partners to understand what those barriers are. We know that local authorities would suggest, potentially in some areas, that resource can be a constraint. We know that that is obviously one of the issues in terms of having sufficient officers to enforce the penalties, but we will know that that is a big focus of our work through the strategy to understand what some of the barriers are to effective enforcement. Again, the purpose of this enabling provision is to respond to strong calls from stakeholders to plug a gap, to level us up with arrangements in England and Wales. We know that littering from vehicles is a problematic area, and it is very hard under the existing FPN regime to identify the instigator. It is provided a civil regime that will provide greater flexibility to effectively enforce what is currently quite a problematic area and a big gap in our enforcement. Again, we will continue to work on the costings. Further discussions with the local authorities and other agencies are already under way on that and the other enforcement provisions in the bill. We have, through our strategy, now got very effective, on-going lines of engagement with local authorities and the other enforcement bodies, so those will continue to refine in terms of the detailed costs and estimates. The other thing that we will be doing through the strategy is an effect to strengthen the data around litter and fly tipping. It is a problematic area. As our data improves, we hope—and through some of the trials on litter cam technology, for example—to get much better data on the scale of the problem. Except for the reasons that the minister has set out, those are our best available estimates at a point of time, and they have drawn on some engagement with some of the local authorities through our existing networks. I will check the time scale for the research that you mentioned and how that will feed into the strategy. The challenge that we have is to completely understand why the Government would not want to concede that fines are not being paid—that is totally understandable—but fines are not being paid. The financial memorandum works on the assumption that they are. What we need to take into account is, while the additional measures that you are developing that the research will, hopefully, inform that the strategy will deliver on, that will help local authorities to increase the payment rate, while they will be in place in time for those additional effects to notice powers coming into place. If not, clearly we are definitely not going to get close to the 100 per cent payment, so it would be good just to understand the time scale a little bit more for that. I will certainly be able to come back with specific advice on the publication timeline. That is not something I can do today, but we can come back to it, but it is something that has been set in train. The general point would be that our efforts to strengthen enforcement and to support effective enforcement is going to be an on-going process. We can certainly, in terms of the detailed design and delivery of this provision, continue to take account of the evidence that is available to us at this moment of time. It is important again to see the delivering from vehicle provision in the context of the wider focus on enforcement through other bill provisions, but also through our existing strategies. That is again focused on primary powers, and we already have a wide range of work in training through the strategy. It is absolutely something that we can continue to keep the committee cited on. It is perhaps worth making the point on the co-design methodology. We could continue to offer any further information on that. We have a further meeting this afternoon with COSLA, Solaas and other local authority representatives to really be kick-starting that process. I accept that it is not defined for the reasons that Alex have said. We are co-designing the co-design methodology, but we will be able to provide more information as that takes shape, including the timescales. I have one final question about SIPA, if that is time, convener. Just moving from local authorities to SIPA and its enforcement on preventing the destruction of unsold goods, the range there is between £13,000 to £200,000 cost for SIPA around enforcement. What scope is there for cost recovery for SIPA? I imagine that, given the discussion that has been around proportionality of enforcement, it is primarily going to be aimed at very large businesses producing huge amounts of goods, selling huge amounts of goods and potentially destroying large amounts of their goods that they do not sell. Is there the scope for SIPA to be able to recover some of the costs from those businesses through financial penalties in that area? In terms of how those are going to be, we can absolutely look at that. When those provisions are being developed, we are going to be looking at what products—how many of the products we deal with and what businesses—absolutely can be part of that conversation. Is understanding what cost recovery might look like? I am just a bit of a story. The 100 per cent collection figure should be based on the fact that people should pay fines. People should not break the law in the first place, but we have to deal with reality. There has been quite a lot of area covered already, so I will start off by touching on some of that. You seem to suggest that it would be financially advantageous for councils to enforce or encourage or educate and get better recycling and that that would cover their costs in some way. However, the reality in the grounds is that it is not happening. It is certainly in parts of Glasgow. I live in the greater Easter house area. I think that there is a mixture of things. Some people do not know what they should put in the bins, so they put plastic bags in the blue bins, which I understand should not be happening. In tenements, we only have a green bin and a blue bin, so that is either plastic cans, paper and the green bins and everything else. The garden waste goes on the green bins, the food waste goes on the green bins and the glass goes on the green bins because most people do not have cars to take it to the recycling centre. In all my experience, I have never seen a leaflet or someone coming to the door and just trying to educate or encourage. I know that that is happening elsewhere. We heard from West Lothian that they are doing that. They go around the doors. Maybe it is happening when I am here, but I have certainly not seen them. Maybe they do it on Tuesdays. It seems to me that Glasgow is very tight for money. If Glasgow thought that it could make money out of encouraging people to recycle better, it would. Clearly, it is going to cost them a lot more money to get the recycling rates up. Do you at least accept that it is not cost-neutral? Yes, absolutely. There is going to need to be investment. I am just having a look here at Glasgow and how much money we have got. They have had £21 million through the recycling improvement fund. The member is absolutely correct that there needs to be especially investment in infrastructure to enable this. That is absolutely clear. That is why we have the recycling improvement fund and that is why we invested over £1 billion through the strategic waste fund between 2008 and 2022. There is an interesting point, though, and that is around the design of recycling systems to make things easier. I know that one of the recycling fund improvements in Edinburgh, because I also live in Tenement land, where we have big bins in the streets, is to change the design of the bin lids to make it so that it is more obvious what type of material needs to go in. That is something that East Lothian does. It has some very clever trucks there that, when you put recycling in, it is easy to put the right kind of recycling in and more difficult to put the wrong kind in. Those design improvements that can be led do make a big difference to this decontamination. Some of it is fairly cutting-edge research about how people interact with recycling systems. Sometimes giving people information is not enough. You need to make it easy for them to do the right thing. If it is difficult to get the big black bin bag into the recycling bin, people will not do it. They will put the recycling in properly. A lot of what I would like to work towards, particularly the code of practice, is that common good design. Where councils across Scotland are getting good results, we can share that knowledge with other councils so that we can share that knowledge and work together to have the best type of recycling that we have. It is not just about investment, and that is one of the challenges that we have seen through that investment in the strategic waste fund. Although it was over £1 billion, it did not bring us up to the kind of recycling rates that we would have hoped for. More is needed. That is why some of the provisions in the bill, for example, around targets and the code design process, which will allow that information sharing, are also needed. It is not something that you can just throw money at. It needs that design element as well. That is right. I fully accept that design will help. There is an attitude among some people that they will drop litter in the street because that is what guys do. They will not pick up their dog poo because that is what macho men do. They will not recycle because that is just not macho. There is a whole attitude thing there among some people. I am not quite sure—I do not think that your design, I am afraid, is going to tackle that. Somebody needs to go to the doors. Things around litter, for example, are a provision for littering from vehicles. I think that is a good example of tackling the kind of culture that you are looking at there. The research shows that it is one in seven people admitted to Churchill Insurance that they had littered from a vehicle. That is clearly a very high proportion of people. One of the challenges that we have at the moment is that it is very difficult to enforce littering from vehicle provisions because the current legislation requires that you go after the vehicle owner. This circular economy bill proposes that we change that legislation to allow a much broader enforcement of that, a much more effective enforcement of that. The intention is that that would then act as a deterrent effect, because we know that if people get caught and even if they find a relatively small amount that that has a deterrent effect. All of these things together, better design, more effective enforcement will help to move that dial along. The vehicle littering, I was going to ask you about, is 68,000 pounds per council on average. I believe that that is one official. I also believe that vehicle littering is taking place every three seconds. Will that one person really make a difference? What about cameras? What about whatever? Yes, absolutely. Those are powers to allow councils more enforcement powers. It will bring us into line with what is available in England and Wales. Our councils are currently fairly limited in what they can do with littering from vehicles. That will increase that provision. You are absolutely right that it can be very difficult to identify littering for vehicles. We currently have a pilot programme going on litter cam technology, using cameras on the trunk road network to understand how we can identify people who are committing these sorts of offences. We can move that forward. We have some examples from Bradford Council, where they installed CCTV cameras that cost them £16,000 and were issued over three months the same amount of penalties as what the system costs to install. There can be absolutely advantages to councils once they have the powers to use cameras to collect fines from offenders. I am afraid that I remain sceptical about the £68,000, but I will move on. We talked about recycling bins being more consistent across the country. I think that, particularly in Glasgow, where there are a lot of other local authorities within very close distances, where people have family members across boundaries and the colours of the bins are different. You suggested that that might be possible going forward, but we asked Mr Devine from Dundee about that. He said that the cost would be considerable, which sounded a little bit scary. If a lot of councils, like 31 councils, have to change their colour schemes, that will be very expensive. We have not started that co-design process. That might be an outcome that councils decide that they would like to go for. The process for getting to something like that would be through that co-design process that councils would need to decide that that was where they wanted to get to. Then, of course, we would have to come up with a plan for how councils would get to that point. I cannot anticipate what might come out of that co-design process. Probably ties in with what colleagues have said earlier about what might come down the road later on. Moving on to something else, it is under the section for disposal of unsold consumer goods in the financial memorandum. In paragraph 12, it talks about the cost at a minimum level, which would be £30,000 per year. However, if there was a more proactive regime, it would be £200,000 a year. I think that most of us would quite like a proactive regime in a number of areas that we have just been discussing. When it comes to the financial memorandum, it is the minimum £30,000 on page 5, which is included. Rather than going partway to being proactive, why would that be? Those are provisions that we would probably add to over time. Initially, we would be starting—we need to still develop this process and then get it started. I can see that initially we would probably start with estimating a low enforcement level as companies come into compliance. As more items are added to the scheme and more businesses are added to the scheme as things went on in future years, you can imagine that that might increase. There is some really interesting data around the provision around the reuse of items. We have, for example, in France. France has been doing this and they have imposed restrictions on clothing, cosmetics, hygiene products and electrical items. Amazon has a charity that deals with those sorts of items. They have delivered over 500,000 of goods worth £10 million to families in need. Part of these provisions, although the idea is to work with businesses so that they comply with these, but there is an overall benefit to society here of making sure not only that we are not wasting resources, valuable materials that go into these products, but that we are helping where these products are in safe and good working order getting to people who really need them, both during a cost of living crisis, but to do that sort of wider benefit to society rather than letting these things go to waste. There is a kind of a looking at in the big picture as well as understanding that this would be a provision that ramped up over time. I am totally supportive of what you are trying to do there, so that is absolutely great. I do not know if you know what is cost in France, if they had to put in. I do actually wonder if this is not a kind of thing that you need to front load it, that you would put quite a lot of money and resource in at the beginning and then get people's thinking changing, including Amazon and individuals. The costs would reduce over time, but will it not need a higher upfront cost? The member is talking about costs for communication and development of the process, so the costs in the financial memorandum specifically look at enforcement, but I am sure that the member is correct that in order to implement such a scheme successfully it would need communications and so forth upfront, and that would be determined by the scale of the scheme and the businesses involved. Thank you very much, convener, although I am slightly nervous given the billing that I got at the beginning describing me as a stalwart, so I feel that I have something to live up to. I was just wondering if I could just clarify a couple of points based on the answers given this morning. First of all, it is correct to say that we do not know what the full cost will be because that is subject to co-design. For what is more, we do not have a detailed co-design process or timetable in place. Are both of those things correct? Are there many provisions of the bill? I assume that you are referring specifically to the code of practice for local authorities, or do you mean more generally? Across the full scope of the bill, we do not know what the full cost will be that derived from it because that is subject to co-design. Well, and subject to additional provisions being added over many years. Once those enabling powers are in place—for example, we have already discussed the single-use vapes, how quickly, only in the last couple of years, has that a new product, and that if we had those sorts of products being developed in the future, we would then need to react to those products. That bill would put in place our enabling powers to allow us to react to those kind of products coming up in the future, but, of course, we cannot anticipate that. On that narrow question, we do not know yet because we cannot know yet the full cost is correct. Just to clarify, we also do not know the process that will be used to arrive at that co-design and, therefore, the total cost. That has not been set out yet, is that correct? Right. As an enabling bill, this just sets us at the starting line of being able to start that process. So the plans are not yet in the public domain about how that design process works, is that correct? No, because, as my colleague Alex has pointed out, the first step of the co-design is to design the co-design process. In a number of answers that you have given minister, you have also said that essentially this legislation will enable Parliament to look at the detail of this when it comes forward in the second realisation. Would you also acknowledge that the second realisation by its very nature is a process by which Parliament delegates its authority and its powers to ministers? Furthermore, the second realisation does not have the same ability to scrutinise and look at detail and critically amend legislation when those are coming forward. Would you acknowledge that actually the second realisation gives Parliament less ability to scrutinise rather than more? It is more about, I think, a proportionate level of scrutiny. With things like any number of single-use items—cups, vapes, plastic bags—one can imagine that requiring primary legislation for each of those individual products would not only be burdensome on parliamentary time but would mean that we would not be able to react as quickly. That would take a great deal of time and that would mean that that potential pollution and the problem would be lasting for many years as primary legislation was brought. Having in secondary legislation allows Parliament to not only be nimble in reacting to new products that come online but it allows the level of scrutiny that committees and members of Parliament deal with. In all due respect, you are here representing the Government and it is for Parliament to decide whether it is going to have sufficient level of power. I think that you are conflating Parliament and Government powers. In terms of the nimblness, I accept that that might well enable Government to be more nimble—the Scottish Government—but it does not necessarily enable Parliament to be more nimble because Parliament, by definition, for that nimblness, has less ability to scrutinise. Indeed, part of the reason that it takes more time for primary legislation is because we might have more ability and a greater length of time to look at the detail that secondary legislation does not have because, essentially, in your words, it is more nimble but it is for Government. Is that not correct? The provisions of the bill enable us to start this journey of looking at all the pieces that we need to put into place. If one was to take all the pieces through primary legislation, even parliamentary time, it would not be proportionate to what is being brought in. We already have very good models for a lot of what is happening here. We have a voluntary code of practice, and bringing into legislation a more mandatory code of practice is a logical next step where we are all familiar with the plastic bag charge and bringing in a cup charge. The level of scrutiny needs to be appropriate to the changes that are being brought, which is why those detailed things were proposing to be as secondary legislation. A scrutiny of secondary legislation can be as in depth to some degree that committees and members wish. We have had very good recent examples of even negative statutory instruments that underwent detailed scrutiny and committee and so on. We cannot amend. You understand that fundamental principle that we cannot amend and it is a single-stage process. They will have gone through the co-design process as well, which will be transparent and will have had the input from the stakeholders as part of that process. Even on your own terms, what I struggle to understand with this—I quite agree that you do not want individual bits of legislation for individual items or processes. I totally also understand the need for co-design. You have got to get the detail right, but what I struggle to understand with is why that co-design cannot happen prior to legislation. By all means, why not do that co-design and bring forward legislation in stages to deal with things in packaging them up together? For example, dealing with single-use items, putting the coffee cup measures in conjunction with measures for plastic carrier bags and following the consultation and co-design. Indeed, that is not a risk given the complexity. Given that what we are seeking to do is to ensure that we can recoup the full cost of recycling and the waste that is incurred. That is inherently complicated. If you take forward this in a piecemeal way with legislation without the degree of interrogation, the three-stage parliamentary process, is there not a danger that we get that wrong? So just to clarify, why can't we do the co-design first prior to legislation and do you not accept that in terms—if detail is important—is it not better to have more scrutiny rather than less? I think that the correct process for bringing forth legislation of this complexity is to first enable, as this bill does, to start that conversation. If one does not do that, you end up in a situation where you are asking councils and businesses to invest what is going to be a substantial amount of time to undertake to develop legislation that may never get through Parliament. It may not happen. That would be the wrong way around to do it, because you are asking to design a process that we do not even have powers to implement. You would be sitting in a committee very much less. You are asking councils to develop something that you do not even know that you are going to have the powers to implement. We must understand that we have these enabling powers so that we can then say to councils that we have the powers to implement this. You can have that certainty and let us work on the detail together. If you had it the other way around, you could do a whole lot of work without those powers in place. How would you prioritise that work? I would say that your answer almost demonstrates my point. At the moment, we do not know how that will fit together. We do not know whether the co-design might come forward with things that would require different powers and different abilities. The point of scrutiny is to look whether the correct powers are in place, the correct procedures, the correct fiscal measures in order to support the policy intent and the outcomes legislation. The point being is that you can look at it as a discrete package. You do not make it up as you go along. What I also fundamentally fail to understand is why doing the co-design first so that those things can be explored and local authorities can set out what powers they need and what financial considerations they need so that you can ensure that the legislation is in place to make sure that it works. Why not just do that co-design first, up front, front-loaded prior to bringing forward legislation? I do not understand that. With about 11 provisions in the bill that I counted out this morning, each of those provisions or many of those provisions will require co-design going forward. If we were to do co-design on single-use cups on other products that we do not even know about yet on different industries in terms of reporting, I think that the member is trying to imagine that we would then have primary legislation on each of those provisions going forward, or you cannot bring any legislation until you have done the co-design on all of those. That is not a sensible process. The sensible process is to set out what our intentions are. We have these targets to meet. We are going to enable these kinds of powers, and then we work on the detail for each of them. We are going to get reporting on food waste. We have had these conversations, but members have suggested that we do textiles next, or construction next, so that we can then go down that path knowing how these processes work. There are, of course, examples in other countries about how these regulations might look and might be implemented. We can give an idea today, and I have given several examples of the kind of things that we would bring forward with the bill. The point is that you need to have this framework in place to then hang those details off of. If you did the details first, you would end up with very cumbersome, very specific primary legislation, which you then would have to do all over again for every new product that you wanted to add to that. I would suggest that it is up to the Government to bring forward legislation that works, not legislation that it does not. I would also direct the minister towards the official report after this where I very clearly said that co-design could arrive at packages of measures to legislate together, so she might want to do that. Felly, is this not a bit of a Shakespeare in love approach to Government? In that film where Jeffrey Rush, his character, was frequently asked how on earth he was going to bring it off, deliver the play, and he said, I don't know, it's a mystery. Is that not a little bit of the case with this, where we've got a big plan, but we don't really know how it's going to be delivered? That's absolutely not the case. The legislation is only one piece of what we're doing here. Within the route map, our waste route map, it has all the provision that we're looking at, and that includes matters around education, including matters around design, including matters around investment, including matters around research and development. Legislation is only one part of that, and as I outlined in my opening statement, this bill is specifically now, it sits in a very specific place between powers that we already have devolved in Scotland to do things. For example, as far as I'm aware, we do not need any new powers to deal with a potential ban on single use vapes. We already have those powers, for example, and powers which are absolutely not devolved, so we would not be able to bring in something like extended producer responsibility for packaging in Scotland, because that's not a devolved matter. So this bill is specifically now in taking powers, enabling powers to start work on legislation and provisions that fit within our devolution settlement for a very specific purpose, and that is to help us on our journey to net zero, reduce waste, and unlock these business opportunities for local authorities, but also for the business community. So these powers in this bill are to unlock those. Now, once we know what those provisions are and how we can do them, then we can target them very specifically on some very urgent matters. You'll see from the financial memorandum how much handling disposable cup waste costs councils, we can all be outraged that perfectly good food and perfectly good clothing is being sent to landfill and incineration instead of to those who desperately need it. This bill unlocks us to be able to take those things forward, and it is the right and effective way to do that, that we unlock those, take that enabling powers, and then use them to target those specific areas of needs efficiently and nimbly and proportionately. A stall indeed, we want you back. Thanks very much to the minister and to colleagues. Just briefly before I answer my questions, as far as I'm aware, it's not exactly a great endorsement for the powers that you believe that you may or may not have. I mean, in terms of weights, I would hope you'd be a little bit more sure than as far as I'm aware. Also, just at the points that Daniel Johnson raised and your response to them, perhaps if some of that detail had been done before on DRS, we may not have seen the complete birth that it ended up. So have lessons not been learned from that, and some of that work, some of that engagement done with stakeholders, including businesses, surely that would be of benefit. I just wanted to ask, firstly, what assessment has been done on the economic benefits of the secularity bill? We see in front of us the financial memorandum that outlines for each particular provision which, with the costs and the potential benefits, in terms of the overall economic benefits. Of course, I can enumerate to the member about the urgency of reaching net zero, the overall intention about reducing waste in our society, so those inefficiencies where resources go together. I'm sorry about the economic benefits. But those are economic benefits when a business is wasting materials, that that is, of course, a cost to that business. But it's also a cost to society when, as a society, we are using the planet's resources to produce goods that actually don't go to benefit anybody. So there is a larger case to be made here that, by a circular economy, which is the point of this, is an economy that doesn't have waste that is efficient, so that all of our resources are put to best use. And these provisions together, as I say, they fit within a larger scope of work with the route map work that the UK Government is doing. These are all designed to improve that economic case to reduce that inefficiency in the system. I mean, given that you've suggested, and a big picture, economic benefits rather than perhaps you know, more of a kind of financial figure in terms of, you know, why isn't there more detail on the economic cost to businesses, particularly small businesses, in the FM? This is exactly the point that we've been discussing, which is about the framework, for example. I mean, we look at the example of the plastic bag charge. With that charge, businesses are allowed to recoup from that charge their costs for that charge. Now it may be that if we did a single-use cup charge, it might be managed along those lines or it might be managed differently. So because that has not been developed yet, that to that level of detail, we don't have that information available. But the information, you're able to say this will have great economic wider benefits in terms of recycling and in terms of wastage, but you can't be more specific in terms of the, you know, the potential cost to businesses. Well, that's the difference between, this is a strategic bill, which absolutely we're setting out our strategic intentions here to reduce waste, to improve opportunities in recycling, to be able to create jobs in that circular economy. That is absolutely our strategic intention and this bill is a strategic one. The specific pieces of policy implementation will be part of that secondary legislation and indeed work on our route map and so forth as we go forward. So specific provisions, like the reporting of waste from a specific industry, say cosmetics industry, the details of that will be developed with that industry. That's exactly the point. At this point, this is strategic level and therefore we put in strategic level implications. Thanks for that. I mean, do you recognise, I mean particularly given the experiences that many within the drink sector, the hospitality sector will have had with DRS, talk of we will work with these sectors, we will work with key sectors, which, you know, certainly they would argue did not happen enough in that. Do you recognise that there may be some concern that, you know, there are going to be additional costs placed on these sectors who are already recovering from one of the pandemic, two fallout from the DRS and the investment they had to make? Do you recognise that there'll be concerns that this is just another kind of open book on kind of costs that they might have to meet and something and, you know, what confidence can you give them that actually this really is going to be of benefit to them? I mean, that's a really good question because a lot of the overall principle of moving to a circular economy is moving to a polluter pays model, because as previously discussed here, a lot of these materials are produced by companies that then have to be cleaned up at the expense of local authorities, whether that's sent to incineration or landfill, whether that is picked off the street is litter, what that has to be handled. So, as we move to a polluter pays model, for example, with the extended producer responsibility, which is a UK wide thing, businesses will need to pay into that extended producer responsibility model so that we have the funding for local authorities to deal with that. You can't tell them how much they're going to pay and, as I say, many have already had to pay an investment from DRS. So, you know, you're looking to certain sum sectors that are going to have to pay again, the moment that you're not able to tell them what they're going to have to pay? Because those things are being developed, so the extended producer responsibility is being developed at a UK wide led by the UK Government and they are engaging with businesses on how they would like to develop that scheme. Now, there is a principle that we wouldn't double charge businesses, so where businesses are, for example, once the UK wide deposit return scheme gets going, businesses who have those sorts of packaging would do their consumer responsibility bit under or producer responsibility bit under deposit return scheme. They wouldn't be double charged with EPR. In fact, my understanding is that for some businesses, a deposit return scheme will cost them substantially less than what they might be getting charged under extended producer responsibility for packaging, so that will drive businesses to want to get the deposit return scheme up and going. This is absolutely a big shift in our society from having public funds cleaning up our environment to making sure that private interests are also, that the polluter pays is also doing the case. But there's a big point here, which I think I'm grateful to the member for raising, and that is this is also about incentivising businesses to become more efficient, to choose to use packaging that is easier to recycle. At the moment, there's no sort of penalty or advantage that a business might just go, I'll use this not very recyclable material, but once extended producer responsibility for packaging comes in, the amount of fee that they will be charged will depend on how recyclable their material is, so that will incentivise businesses to change their practices. The reporting, the provision in this bill about reporting on sectoral waste and surplus, that has been shown where businesses do that to implement them. It does help them focus on reducing waste and overall reduces their costs. So this is part of a big shift in our economy to both that polluter pays model, but also to efficiency savings. We can absolutely drill down into each provision of the bill as the member wishes so that we can talk about specific ones. I mean, I would be very interested to speak to a lot of businesses, many of whom certainly in certain sectors are struggling at the moment, and every penny counts and every pound counts being lechared on efficiency from the Scottish Government is going to be interesting. Can I just move very quickly, because I'm conscious of time. I was just wondering what conversations or what role I suppose the minister sees for the Scottish National Investment Bank in supporting perhaps some of the infrastructure work that needs to be done. I mean, I don't have a particular vision for that at all. That is with the Scottish National Investment Bank to decide on what they are going to invest in, so I don't have a particular vision for that. Have you had any conversations with them at all? No, they are completely independent of the Scottish Government. Obviously, I understand that, but obviously they had a role within DRS and public money was invested in that. At the moment, you're not aware of any projected role for them within this. No and nor would it be appropriate to me in terms of the relationship between the Scottish National Investment Bank and I believe you're alluding to Circularity Scotland, which was a private business. That was between them and it wasn't. The Scottish Government was not involved in that. Just to finish off, minister, I know that it's been a long session so far, but it's just to refer to a couple of points that you've made yourself in the evidence you've given. For example, you've referred in response to myself and to Ross to the £88.4 million that Zero Waste Scotland estimates that the cost will be to enable all 32 Scottish local authorities to align with the existing code of practice. With regard to that paragraph 48, the deputy convener asked witnesses if they were aware of any discussions between colleagues in their local authorities in Zero Waste Scotland or the Scottish Government about where the figure has come from, has that detail been set out, and both Charlie Devine, Ovedon D and Kirsten McGuire of South Lanarkshire just said no. Although that figure has been set out, there doesn't seem to be any understanding from our local authority colleagues as to where that figure has come from, so I'm just wondering if you can explain how Zero Waste Scotland came up with that figure, given the fact that they don't appear to have engaged with our local authority colleagues in producing it. Absolutely, so this was a result of work by Zero Waste Scotland, which Alex can give us some more detail on. I've been engaged with local authorities on a continual basis, so their figure of £88.4 million reflects a number of households in local authorities that would need to have a change in order for all households in every local authority in Scotland to become compliant with the existing code of practice. The £88.4 million is made up of three aspects, so firstly there's containers, so there's the bins that you would need in order to be compliant. It wasn't about the detail of the paragraph, it was just that because we've been talking about co-design and co-operation with local authorities, it was just a concern that they seemed to not be aware of where those figures came from, so there's clearly a communication issue with regard to that, I would suggest. The other thing that I was going to ask about was in terms of numbers, was the £70 million allocated for recycling improvement fund. We were told of that £70 million, £53 million has been allocated to 17 local authorities, which means that 15 local authorities have not received an allocation of the remaining £17 million, but in response to John Mason, he said that £21 million has been allocated to Glasgow, which is 30 per cent of the fund for an urban area, which has got 10 per cent of Scotland's population. If the figures are right, only 32 millions went to 16 local authorities, so it does seem quite disproportionate. Is there a reason for that? Applications to the recycling improvement fund are made by local authorities, so a local authority will develop an initiative, what they are proposing, which comes to the board who establishes the fund, who works with the local authority to establish whether it will achieve the outcomes that we need, because naturally we need to hit our net zero targets, how feasible is the timescale and so on, and then the board does give me advice on whether they feel that the application, the process is one that we should award. The challenge with Glasgow, of course, is that because it is our largest city or that the impact of recycling in Scotland is largely affected by what we do in Glasgow. If we get recycling in Glasgow right, we impact our national targets, so that is why it is important that we get recycling in Glasgow right. The proportion of the recycling improvement fund, and indeed we did have discussions around that because I wanted to understand exactly why that was worth doing, is because it has that impact at a national level. To meet our net zero targets, we have to make sure that money is being spent most effectively to reduce our emissions and to reduce our recycling, and that was the right place for it to go to achieve that result. I commend Glasgow for its ambition in securing 30 per cent of the fund, but it means that we have only £17 million left for 15 other local authorities. Will the Scottish Government be looking to top up that fund significantly, given that other local authorities are still looking at what the impact of the legislation might be and where they need to spend money to be able to deliver more efficiently and effectively their recycling targets? We will certainly be intending to allocate the remainder of the fund as efficiently and effectively as possible, but we would need to have discussions about what might be followed on funding from the after-act fund. I just extend that some local authorities may have missed a vote. Ms McVie, I thought that you wanted to come in here on this, sorry? Yes, just again to support and slightly expand on what the minister has said there, so in terms of the recycling improvement fund, again just for clarity, the programme board that oversees that and makes recommendations includes representatives from COSLA, SOLAS, as well as Zewis, Scotland and SEPA, the Scottish Government. In the future, again, that comes back to the point that the minister was making earlier in terms of the co-design process with local authorities that will seek to co-design what good looks like as well as what it will deliver, including infrastructure. We very much see what comes next. Potentially, the minister has recognised the need for on-going support potential investment. That will be part of the considerations through the co-design process. Just for clarity on the Zewis Scotland figure, again, that is informed by Zewis Scotland's experience of supporting other local authorities to align with the code, so that is where they get their information from. It is an estimate, it is a projection, it is not an exact figure. Minister, you said in response to Michelle Thomson that you would be happy to give an updated financial memorandum. I wrote that down as a word for word quote. If you now believe, following this evidence session, that you should go away and update the financial memorandum as it has been presented to us? No, I am content with the financial memorandum that has been presented. The context of the question from Michelle Thomson, I believe, was that if there was more detail down the line as we developed, I am always happy to come back to this committee. This is the best information that we have at this time, but obviously I am at the committee's disposal. Should you wish me to come if the situation changes and it requires an update, but this is the best information that is available at this time, appropriate to the bill? Thank you for that clarification. I want to thank you and your colleagues for the evidence that you have given today. It has been very helpful for the committee's deliberations. We will, of course, look at the matter further and deliberate in private session in future to produce a report. In the meantime, we will now take a short break to allow a change over our witnesses. We will be back at 25 past 11. Today is an evidence session with the minutes of our community wealth and public finance on the Budget Scotland Act 2023 amendment regulations 2023, and I intend to allow up to now for this evidence session. The minister is joined today by Scottish Government official Craig Meadment, senior finance manager and Neil Caldwell corporate treasurer. I welcome witnesses to the meeting. Before I invite the minister to make a short opening statement, I just like to apologise that the last session overrun by more than 30 minutes. I certainly hope that this one will not do likewise. I apologise to the minister and his officials. Over to you, minister, with your opening statement. Thank you very much, convener, and good morning to the committee. As the committee can appreciate, we continue to face challenging economic circumstances. Continued inflationary pressures, particularly around public sector pay, are putting real pressure on the Scottish budget. Given those circumstances, tough choices have to be made around how we prioritise spending to meet those pressures and support priority areas. Those challenges are not unique to the Scottish Government. Other devolved Governments and departments across the UK are struggling with those same issues. The autumn budget revision reflects our response to those challenges. The funding changes increased the budget by £361.3 million. Those changes include providing £265 million to local government to support pay deals, £50 million to health, £44 million to police pensions and £30 million to the Ukrainian resettlement. To help fund those areas, it has been necessary to prioritise budgets. The technical, whitehall and internal transfers are presented in the document in the usual way. Some of those technical adjustments, in particular IFRS 16, get to the heart of discussions around budget presentation transparency. I welcome the dialogue that the committee has recently had with my officials and the recent correspondence on this with the Deputy First Minister. We are considering this in the context of the 2024-25 Scottish budget. The support and document to the autumn budget revision and the finance update prepared by my officials reflects some of those discussions and provides further background on the net changes. I am happy to conclude and answer any questions that the committee may have. I thank you for that helpful, as always, opening statement, minister. When we look at the top-line figures, I think that what is interesting is that although the addition is around £361 million, which is about 0.6 per cent of the total budget, once again we see considerable movement within portfolio. There has been a difference between, as you have said, over the years policy, intention and delivery. If we look, for example, at health and social care, we have seen a movement from about £1,059.6 million into other portfolios. There are detailed explanations. I am heartened by the information that the minister can, to any official extent, provide on that. Compared to how it used to be, the information provided is obviously very extensive. When we look at movements of such scale in year, would it not be better that the funds were baselined into the areas in which they end up in terms of delivery? Clearly, many of those movements appear to happen almost on an annualised basis. It almost seems as if, when the policy intention is created, there is a real mismatch between that and, ultimately, delivery. How would you comment on that? I think that, convener, those are fair and reasonable points. I have previously set out at committee the rationale for that approach, which you touched on in your question. What I can say is that, in the context of the discussions that the officials have been having with the committee, we are considering how weak—to meet the ambitions of improved transparency—we are considering those points in detail as part of our deliberations ahead of the budget for the forthcoming financial year. That is something that is under active consideration as well, and it is also something that is taken in the context of the Verity House agreement as well, given that, of course, there are a number of transfers that take place to local government. That is a very much a live issue with which we are giving active consideration to. Clearly, we would not want to do anything unintentionally harm transparency, but I think that the points that you make are fair and we are giving consideration of how we can do that and how that will inform the presentation of the forthcoming budget. Was it the key transparency that you have delivered that means that we are not going to spend any huge amounts of time? I would have done otherwise asking why this amount went here and went there, because you have actually provided some detailed explanations on many of them, but there are one or two areas that still cause concern. I am going to ask you something again, which I have asked in the past. For example, there is a £44 million that has been provided to an additional £44 million to police pensions to help fund a gap between the budget provided at the start of the year and current forecast of costs. Now, I asked something very similar to what I am going to ask now last year, which is demand-led, but surely at the beginning of the year, when you know how many police officers are likely to retire, you know, give or take a million here or there maybe, you know that there should be a much more, it shouldn't have to be that kind of divergence of some £44 million from the initial sum. Can I ask what the, how much is now paid in police pensions, because that gives a better picture of what the percentage differential might actually be? I think that it's an important point. What I would say is firstly, as I've said previously, the nature of these budgets is that they are demand-led, as you highlight, and volatile, given the flexibilities that exist around retirement options. That's why it's historically been something that we have sought to manage in the year. I would note that, in this particular instance, it is just police pensions where a transfer is taking place. With regard to the total allocated to date for police pensions, it's £335 million, £400,000. Yes, so £44 million has got a substantial percentage of that then, so that's why one asks why that can't be envisaged at the start of the financial year, because, you know, as I said, if it was a million here or there, you might think, okay, fair enough, but it just seems a significant amount, and one would have thought that when the budget was being drawn up, that could have been predicted, and therefore we wouldn't have to have this kind of portfolio transfer that we're witnessing just now. I think that it's a fair point, and it's something that we are giving further consideration to. Clearly, the devolved pensions differ from some of the other ways in which pensions are handled through any lines, for instance, but, in this case, we're seeking to manage in-year. We will give further consideration and reflection how we can refine our forecasting to hopefully move to a position where we can have a number at outset much closer to out-turn, but, given the volatile demand-led nature of these particular lines, there is a need to manage it in-year. However, I think that the points that you make are fair and reasonable, and I'm happy to give further consideration to how we can refine our forecasting in that area. I think that colleges around the table want to dig into some of the figures. I'm just going to touch on a couple of them, especially given the fact that I overdid it in the last session, I suppose. I folk a chance to claw some time back. In rural affairs landform and islands action, I'm not going to add any detail other than the fact that the portfolio has been reduced by £31 million as part of the budget revision, and you give some context to that. However, you've also talked about services, for example, for agriculture support, being repro-filled in future years with no loss funding, but why does that change have to take place in the first place? On the agricultural reform line, there has been further development of business case and assessment of multi-year plans, and that has identified scope for reduced spending on the programme of activity in this financial year. We have identified an opportunity for funding to be returned to the centre. As I touched on in my opening remark, we face an overall very challenging economic set of circumstances. I do not know if there is any more detail that you want to provide overall on the portfolio. Just to make the point that that is a specific £4 million reduction in the agriculture and reform programme line, and the £31 million includes additional amounts that I can provide some detail on. There are a few different lines that make that up, so I can touch on that. There is £6 million in that that relates to Forestry and Land Scotland, where it has been able to utilise its reserves and use that funding from reserves and return that to the centre in the current year, and that will be realigned with multi-year financial planning. There is demand-led elements to those savings, as the minister has touched on. Scottish Forestry has a £3 million reduction in funding there, because the forecasts are lower than I previously anticipated. The larger amounts, there are £14 million coming out of the combination of cap pillar 1 and agri-environmental and agricultural reform, which relates to funding that has been returned to the centre, because forecasts are lower than I previously anticipated. However, there is a commitment to return those amounts back to the rural portfolio in future financial years. It is just a profile point. Is there a reason why the rural portfolio does not get additional funding on other aspects of it, rather than being returned in future years? Is it because of pressing needs elsewhere? Exactly. It is to fund the significant amounts that have gone to other areas as part of the budget revision. On using reserves, we have also heard that with regard to Creative Scotland. Is it now the Scottish Government's position that, as we go forward, it will be looking at reserves across the public sector to see where they can be utilised to optimise spending in the next year? What you are saying is a reflection of the very challenging fiscal environment that we are in. You made reference to Creative Scotland. We have committed to reinstate that funding in future years. As a broader commitment that the First Minister has made to increase spending and culture in the creative sector by £100 million over the next five years, although we do not want to find ourselves in a situation as challenging as it is, we have a priority to ensure that we are able to fully fund our priorities to meet demands that emerge in years, such as public sector pay settlements, and to ensure that we are in the position to balance the budget. I find it intriguing that so many areas appear to have reserves in the first place. Is there any assessment of what the quantity is of those reserves across the portfolios that the Scottish Government manages? I am not able to speak in any detail of anything that you would want to comment on. I did not know, for example, that Forestry was sitting on reserves, for example. Creative Scotland, before it was announced by the cabinet secretary in the chamber, seems a bit odd to me. It does vary by organisation. It depends on the classification of what that organisation is, whether it can hold reserves or not. We do not figure off the top of my head of any total quantum of reserves. We have spoken about local government reserves at infinitum over the years, but it has never really been an area that we have covered, and I do not believe in other areas. It would be quite interesting if we could have a response on what the level of reserves is across the portfolios that the Scottish Government manages. Marine Scotland says that it has been able to surrender. Disappointing word. £2 million of budget following savings exercise involving enhanced recruitment controls, maximising income and continuing focus on delivering operational efficiencies. However, I have to say that someone with two islands in the constituency and a large seaboard has concerns that Marine Scotland does not have enough resources to ensure that we are able to ensure that our fisheries are effectively and efficiently managed. We have also taken into account the conservation, because when there are breaches, given the example that it now takes on one constituency, Marine Scotland has to be called upon. Over the years, there has been concern that there is not enough resources in Marine Scotland for that, so I am just wondering why it has felt that £2 million should be removed. I would just highlight how that £2 million has been generated. There has been a delivery of greater income streams through higher marine licensing fees. There has also been an increased number of shared service arrangements and collaborative working as part of that range of efficiency measures. There have been a number of ways in which that has been generated. More generally, the decisions that we are having to take are part of the budget revision process, reflecting the changes that have taken place in the year. Indeed, the context in which all budget decisions will have to be taken, not just for the Scottish Government but for the other devolved administrations as well, is one that is incredibly challenging, among the most challenging, since the reconvening of this Parliament nearly a quarter of a century ago. It does mean that we have to take difficult decisions, and that is to ensure, as I said before, that we can deliver on our key priority areas and meet the demands that emerge in the year that we have touched on and ensure that we are in a position to, again, as we consistently have previously, deliver a balanced budget. In terms of internal transfers and baselines, which were touched on earlier on, in paragraph 40, in section A5, it says, that the majority of internal transfers are moving budgets from the policy lead area based on policy accountability official level to appropriate delivery body, and that was asked earlier on. However, how do we know which ones are being transferred because of policy accountability, or not? It does not seem to say in terms of that. We have a list of the significant budget internal transfers between portfolios, but it does not say which ones are being moved because of either policy or delivery. It just says that it is one or the other and that they are being moved. Would it not be more helpful if that was clarified? The combination of both policy and delivery, as you highlight, and sometimes those areas of distinction are perhaps not as clear. I do not know if there is anything that you would like to add in terms of some detail. In terms of the quantum of value, a lot of the delivery of the internal transfers or the budget that is moving from one area to another is because local government is the delivery body. In almost all of those examples, you could pretty much say that local government is the delivery body, but the policy ownership, if you like, from a Scottish Government perspective, sits in another portfolio. In those cases, it is usually a healthier education. That is why I made a reference in terms of our consideration of the presentation of the budget and why we have to take cognisance of Verity House as well. Again, that is what I mentioned earlier on. It is important that, if those are going to be regular occurrences, they will probably be baselined into those portfolios in the first place. Just on the technical adjustments, I know that there is not going to be any issue with regard to the actual amount that has been made that we are able to spend in each portfolio, but what you have said is that it is likely that the IFRS 16 figures will be baselined into the 24-25 budget, meaning a direct comparison to starting budgets are not possible. One of the issues that the committee has been concerned about is that, when we have a punching duty show at stage 1 and stage 3 of the budget, people talk about different figures. Obviously, we in the SNP benches will denounce the evil Conservative Government for slashing our budgets and the Conservatives will stand up and talk about how incredibly generous that same Government is by laving us with ever greater record sums. Would it not be easier if we were able to try to put together a more, as we have asked for, figures in relation to out turns, which enable us all to be able to talk, to sing from the same hymn sheet at least in terms of the figures that we are arguing over? I very much welcome that. This is a shared endeavour to try to ensure that we have as much transparency as possible and that we can have consistency of the messaging and understanding of what the numbers actually say and a substantive debate can take place on whether or not the allocations are aligned with people's priorities. Transparency is a priority for us. The IFRS 16 issue does throw a particular example of the challenges that it can be posed in that context. I am conscious that there is a need to ensure with transparency that we get the balance right because an overprovision of information, while well intentioned, can add to complexity and can make this more challenging to be understood and comprehended more widely. Similarly, insufficient information being provided clearly presents a challenge on transparency. We are trying to ensure that we can present the figures in a way that they can be intuitively and innately grasped in a way that is fair and representative, but I recognise as a complex to there. I do not know whether you might be able to say something just with regard to some of the particular challenges that are posed around the IFRS 16 technical adjustments and issues around presentation and transparency. There is a three-year transition period for IFRS 16 next year as the last one, so the 24-25 budget will have the IFRS 16 figures embedded into the baselines, which means prior your figures will be restated, which means that comparatives will show reductions year on year purely because a lot of the leases that were capitalised on the balance sheet in 2022-23 will be reflected in that year. We have put some figures in the section C of the guide to demonstrate that. You will see that £879 million is the 22-23 impact, whereas the impact in 22-23-24 is £479 million. However, that is just capitalising leases that were previously not capitalised under before IFRS 16 was implemented. The transitional period on that means that IFRS 16 changes are covered in budgetary terms by treasury during this transition period, but that will come to an end after 24-25. I think that we might want to ask further questions specifically on that in the weeks and months ahead, so that we can get clarification on that ahead. Indeed, the wider Parliament can get a grip on what that actually means. I think that that would be an important process for us. On the capital borrowing, my last question before opening out to colleagues is that I would like to try and hog the session, as I sometimes do. Resource borrowing costs are down, and I am just in capital borrowing costs are down. I am just wondering how, specifically in capital borrowing costs, given that interest rates have went up, why we could reduce capital borrowing costs? I mean, one of the things that came out of our sustainability report was that the UK Government will cut our capital allocation over the next five years by some 16 per cent in real terms. It appears to me that one would have thought that the Scottish Government would seek to maximise its capital spend, wherever possible, given the need to invest in physical infrastructure, digital infrastructure and so on. Why has this happened and what is the reasoning behind the Government's move on in terms of capital? First, I would want to be clear that we do seek to maximise our capital spend and realise that it is fundamental to taking forward economic growth in supporting innovation and development. What our capital borrowing powers afford us is one of the limited flexibilities that we have under the devolved fiscal arrangements, and decisions around capital borrowing are taken very late in the day. That means that we can have the most up-to-date position reflecting the most recent in-year budget position. As we would recognise with capital projects, there can be slippage and delay for a range of reasons outwith any individual organisations or, indeed, the Government's control, but we might be able to provide a bit more detail on some of that decision-making process, if you want to add anything, Neil. On one point to give an example of what the minister said, a lot of the profiling tends to be late in the year, which explains why you can get some late in material underspends late in the year. Capital borrowing is the only flex malaria of the capital budget. The borrowing policy allows for that to be reflected. For example, the full allowance is the old capital borrowing policy as per the May MTFS. Everyone seems to be whispering all of us. I don't know if I'm the only one that notices that. It's quite difficult for everyone to hear. You can speak up, minister, on your own, Neil, just a wee bit. I was talking about the capital borrowing policy under the previous MTFS. What it's looking at is about £250 million, which was the ffiscally sustainable level under the old fiscal framework limits. It's designed to allow for a level of attrition, and the late underspends materialise. The point that the minister makes is that if late underspends materialise and borrowing is reduced, there's no spending power lost on the assumption that borrowing can be re-profiled into future years. The policy is designed to be flexible because it's one of the few flexibilities in the capital budget. So it's to ensure that Scotland doesn't lose any money in terms of its expenditure overall, is that correct? Okay, thank you for that clarification. Okay, I'm now going to open up the session to colleagues, and the first to ask questions will be returning stall Daniel to be followed by my join. I'm not used to all of this lavish praise, convener. I really just want to follow up on a couple of points that were just discussed in question, particularly around transparency. I'm always struck by the fact that essentially the discussion and debate around budget time is always at level 3 and level 4, and yet the actual budget bill is essentially at level 1. Critically, when you look at the out-turn, that's by and large specified at level 1. Just in terms of transparency—and I fully take on board your point around over-provision can be a problem, and I also don't want to call us officials panic about lots more work—but is there a case to explore whether an out-turn could be specified at a greater level of detail? Ultimately, I take a very basic point of principle that, when you're setting a budget, you need to look at how you performed against last year's budget, and the importance and the level of scrutiny is really at that level 3 and level 4. Do you think that there's a case to be made to look at the rate at which we can report back at that level in terms of out-turn? That was a very well-crafted question, because you probably anticipated many of my answers in your preamble. Certainly, we wish to be able to provide as much information as possible. We have to recognise that it was a need for proportionality, and I appreciate you recognising the points of the potential unintended consequences of over-provision. We are looking at other provisions of transparency around the co-fog classifications, for example. I'm quite keen to ensure that we are able to provide information that is as useful as possible for Parliament and the wider public. In terms of the level of detail that we can go into, can you touch on where we are currently with our provision on out-turn? I would need to double-check. On the provisional out-turn, it's at the high-level information. I think that we do go into more detail in the accounts, but that's obviously prepared on a different basis. There can be trouble comparing Scottish budgetary bases to treasury budget bases, and that's a quite important factor, especially because the Scottish Government accounts are prepared against the spring budget revision totality, and the differences there are very different to what our out-turn versus budget is on a treasury basis, which is ultimately what matters for what's left in the Scotland reserve at the end of the year. I think that that's the case. I would need to double-check the precise level of detail that we go into the accounts, but it is at a lower level. It would be helpful if the committee is of one mind in terms of a view as regards to what level of detail it would like to be provided with regard to the reference to what we provide already. We are very happy to have that discussion and engagement. What I would say just very frankly is that the classic exchanges, Opposition parties, as a sort of convener illudici, must do X, Y and Z, and the Government turn around some justification and say, well, where does it come from? Until you have that complete level of clarity about how things, especially at that level, below level 1, actually are flowing through and how they pan out. It's actually kind of difficult to have that conversation. I think it would improve the level of debate. The level you get to, I think, is for further discussion, but I just sort of make that observation. You mentioned that I prefigured some of your response. You prefigured my next question about cofog, so I'm glad that that is continuing to be there. I think I just want to ask one last clarification question. We just had a brief exchange there about capital borrowing regimes, and obviously in recent weeks there's been some discussion about the issuing of bonds. I think that is interesting, but just for the sake of clarity, because I think some quarters people's minds have been racing ahead of themselves, my understanding is that that would fall within the limits of the fiscal framework. I think that it's probably worth just us all being very clear that this isn't extra money that can be raised, this was all within the fiscal framework and would be a source as an alternative to the other sources of capital borrowing that are available to the Scottish Government. Is that a useful clarification? John Toffol by Liz Just to pick up some other points, if I may, the DPLR committee raised a few points, I think, three on the papers. One, it says that regulation 2B of the instrument amends the amount specified for the Scottish Parliament corporate body but replaces the existing figure with the same figure. The Scottish Government advised that the insertion of an unchanged figure was unintentional but the figure remains correct. Can you explain what that means? That was just highlighted to SJLD as a figure that was changing when it hadn't changed, there should have been no inclusion of that figure, it was just an error. The commentary more than the actual figure, there was a problem right, okay, let's clarify that. I mean, just to follow up the convener's point about reserves, I mean, I actually fully agree that we should use reserves and not just leave money sitting there, but will it put more pressure on future budgets because that will be something we can't do again? I think it's an important point. It's recognising that reserves are there for a purpose, it gives those particular bodies which have that facility a degree of flexibility, which is commensurate with their particular roles and responsibilities. I think we do recognise though that in the financial situation that we find ourselves currently, there is that facility available there which allows us and assist us to manage the overall budget position, but, of course, implicit in your argument, a continuous use of reserves and depleting them would clearly be a cause for concern. They are there for a purpose, there will be no logic and rationale behind that facility being available. What we have set out here and some of the specific items that we have discussed with an agency and its reserves are a reflection of the particular circumstances that we find ourselves in presently. If we take Creative Scotland and Forestry and Land Scotland as examples, they are able to top up their budget from reserves at the moment, but, in future, either we would have to trim their budget or find more money elsewhere to put back in. As a made reference with Creative Scotland, we have committed to that reinstatement that we have not been able to provide in the autumn budget revision. Moving on, the Scotland reserve, at the start of 2022-23, was approximately £699 million. All of that was put into the budget and then at the end of the year, there were still £244 million put back into the reserve. Does it make any difference if we take the whole thing out and put some back in or just we take out the net amount at the end of the year? Is that just purely a different way of doing things? The way in terms of how the reserve operates, it is a facility to allow us to carry forward underspends from one year of financial year to the next financial year, and the nature of underspends as it can emerge very late in the day. We saw particular examples during the pandemic, where there were funding announcements and there just simply was not the means to deliver on that expenditure prior to the 1st of April, so the reserve provides that facility. I hope that we have set out in some detail the sources of funding for the reserve. I do not know, Neil, if you want to give some more detail. After the fact, there is no difference, but in terms of fiscal management over the course of a year, there is a bit of a difference because by drawing the reserve down in totality, you leave the maximum space in the reserve for the end of the year, especially as the minister talks about during Covid, where there was really significant volumes of funding changes late in the financial year. It was important to ensure that you had that full capacity there, so if you do not draw down the reserve, you are limiting your own capacity to absorb that. Okay, fair enough. The points made that the Ukraine resettlement costs have been more expensive in the current year than we had perhaps anticipated. Is that completely open-ended? Is there still uncertainty going forward, in other words? Well, the nature of it being a demand-led scheme, of course, we have seen a significant popularity of the super sponsor scheme in Scotland as of early October. Some 25,000 displaced people from Ukraine have arrived in the UK with sponsorship from an individual in Scotland, or from the Scottish Government, 20,000 of them under the super sponsor scheme. The additional funding takes total funding for this year up to an excessive £100 million, which combined with the funding provided last year, totals over £300 million to date. However, as the recent position paper published in partnership with COSLA and the Scottish Refugee Council set out, we are now in a position of pivoting from that emergence to respond to a longer-term holistic approach going forward. What would that mean for the finances that it is a longer-term holistic approach? We are also working with partners who continue to engage with COSLA. We will continue to monitor what the situation is in-year and, based on their understanding today, decisions will be taken at the budget in terms of allocations for the next financial year, but we remain absolutely committed to ensuring that we support those who have come from Ukraine to Scotland. Does that mean that, instead of being a specific Ukraine cost in future, it would be a bit more on housing costs, a bit more on school costs, a bit more on the NHS? There was a recognition of that need for the dedicated provision of support for people who are rebuilding their lives and providing that support around, for example, gaining employment, accessing public services, including benefits and indeed accessing long-term housing. We have continued commitment to working in partnership with local government in the Fudd sector to provide that support. There was £46 million taken from the colleges and universities budget to support the increased teachers pay settlement. Is that a one-off or does that have repercussions for the future? We are not in a position to commit to reinstating that funding. We will consider the needs of the SFC as part of the budget process and that funding allocation will be set out as part of the budget announcement. The guide also reports an additional £20.2 million arising from a home office comparability factor error. I was wondering if you could tell us what that was. That goes back to the spending review. I think that it was a £21.22 million, which means that we had been receiving a life-saving word due, and that is an error that has been rectified. I do not know if anyone wants to add, Craig. It is just in terms of the mechanics of it, so at the time the spending review is set, any increase in the home office department will budget from the UK and will feed into our block grant. That is quite straightforward if you are in something like education or justice, where the figure is used as the entirety. It is a 100 per cent comparability factor. We consider the entirety of the increase of the block of their budget and we get a population share of that. Conversely, we have a 0 per cent comparability factor and we get nothing. That is quite straightforward. The percentage used in the home office is about 74.1 per cent, which is a previous percentage used. There is a degree where some of the matters are devolved. What transpired was the slightly outdated percentage that has been used. 74.1 per cent should have been around 80 to 83 per cent, so there was an additional amount due that has been funded. Partly there was an amount in the previous SBR, as well as the ABR, and it will be reflected in the next year's budget as well as the final component of the spending review period. It has just been an error in the calculation use. That is reassuring that that error has been picked up. It will raise the wider question as the UK Government is making more errors that we do not know about. Those checks go back and forward in terms of making sure that those figures are correct and that they are highlighted and discussed at the official level to make sure that everything is consistent and correct. Okay, thank you very much. At least it was in our favour. Minister, you rightly said in your opening statement about the uplift in the teachers' pay settlement and how that is a very important and understandable commitment in the financial landscape that you have to deal with. Could I just ask for some clarification? I refer to table A21 when you talk about gross funding changes. Can I just ask that the figures that we have in front of us here are ones that are for the 2022-23 budget commitments on that? Yes. And what are the implications for the next budget of obviously the uplift that teachers and indeed known teaching staff have had? What are the implications going forward for those pay settlements for the budget? Those are settlements that have been agreed and we have committed to going forward. With regard to future rounds of negotiation, they will of course take place in the usual way through the joint committee, but we have worked constructively to ensure that we can support these pay settlements. They have, as I think the committee appreciates, necessitated taking some quite challenging decisions, but it does demonstrate the Government's commitment to the teaching profession. Indeed, overall we welcome that commitment, but you are right, it has led to some very difficult decisions and obviously the potential for more difficult decisions coming down the line for the commitments for future budgets. It is obviously a very large part of the budgetary negotiations and I was just wondering if you feel that that pressure is going to be there for the foreseeable future. Well, I think we have sought to support public sector pay in a way that is commensurate with the scale of the challenge that we face with the inflation of pressures. Thankfully, we have seen some signs of inflation beginning to fall and that will clearly create a different economic and fiscal context for future rounds of negotiations. However, I agree entirely with what is implicit in your question, Ms Smith. That has created exceptional pressures in the year and, of course, those pressures have to be carried forward and that is something that we are giving very careful consideration to in setting out our spending plans for the next financial year. In previous committee sessions, and you know that we are doing some work about public sector reform, we have discussed a previous Scottish Government commitment to ensure that the size of the public sector is roughly what it was at pre-Covid. Is that still the intention of Government policy for that to be the case? We are not taking an approach to setting exact numbers or particular targets. The clear focus has been able to deliver it. We recognise the need to go and deliver services more efficiently. That means more shared services, more collaboration, working across administrative and organisational boundaries. That also means looking at the disposition of our estate as well. All of those factors are at play, but the key to that as well is real focus on delivery and ensuring that our public services are not just delivering services to meet the needs of people but are very much focused on preventing the agenda. I recognise the committee's interest in medium-to-long-term fiscal sustainability. Yes, opportunities to increase revenue, whether that be through tax or medium-term economic growth, are going to be key. We know that we cannot meet that demand simply from increased revenue alone. It has to be about preventing that demand, avoiding the risk of failure demand emerging. Looking at how we reform our public services is not just to meet the fiscal challenges that we face in the here and now, but to deliver a more efficient and effective service that is focused on the preventative agenda that is key. In terms of embracing that approach, there is not one where we are setting ourselves definite numbers around headcounts, but rather focused on those particular priorities and ensuring that we have a workforce that can meet that particular requirement. I have two other points of clarification. There is money being taken away from the Scottish Funding Council. Can I ask why that decision was made and where that is being reallocated? I do not have it in front of me. I cannot remember what the actual number was. It was for the Scottish Funding Council that there was a reduction in the money that is being paid with the Scottish Funding Council. Was this the money for colleges and education? Yes. I touch on that in my answer to Mr Mason. We are not in a position to commit to reinstating that money. We will assess the needs of the SFC as part of our budget setting process. Sorry, I heard your answer. I was just asking why you made that decision. That decision was to support the teachers pay settlement. All of it? The position is fully allocated in the budget revision. By definition, everything that was returned to the centre is supporting everything else that is in the autumn budget revision. You will see in the funding tables that we provided in the document that there is no unallocated funding. In terms of the return to the centre, there is no unallocated funding, as Neil said, and that overall position is supporting everything that is set out in terms of allocations, but clearly the majority of funding that is allocated within the ABR is to support local government pay, including the teachers pay settlement. Sticking with the education and skills portfolio, am I correct in thinking that some pupil equity funding money has been returned to the centre? There has been a reprofiling, but there is no loss of spend on the front line. It is just a reprofiling across the years. I do not know if I can take it if you want. Are you in a position to tell us about that reprofiling? Find it. If you have not got it in your fingertips, you can get back to us on that. I would be happy to get back to you on it and provide some more detail. As I would want to stress, as part of that reprofiling is the flexibility that we have given to local government, there is no loss of spend on the front line. My final question is on the statement by the First Minister about the £300 million extra being allocated to the national health service, as I understand it, three years of £100 million in each successive budget. Are you able to see where that money is coming from? It will be a future year's budget, and it will be set out as part of the budget process. Of course, we are still in a position right now to see the autumn statement and forecast, etc. ahead of setting our own budget, so it will be taken as part of that process overall. Was there anything that you were wanting to add, Neil? Thank you very much. Good morning. I will draw attention to my register of interests as a partner in a farming business member of NFUS, etc. The money that the convener mentioned earlier, the £31 million for rural affairs, taken out of the rural affairs budget, I just confirm that money was ring-fedced for agricultural use, rural affairs use. In terms of the money that the savings have been set out to support the overall fiscal position, there were particular items that we identified that are, for example, the Marine Scotland line in conversation, where we looked at some of the detail. There are other areas where the overall budget has been maintained, for example, through the use of reserves. There are other areas where there are reduced forecasts associated, and then there are other areas where funding will be deferred but will be used and filled for future years. I do not know, Craig, if you can provide some more just to the specific detail on the ring-fencing point. The amounts that are surrendered are not ring-fedced, so there is ring-fedced funding that goes to the rural portfolio. We provide additional funding on top of that, and it is part of those amounts that have been returned to the centre as part of the budget revision. There is £14 million of the 31, which would relate to what is sometimes grouped as ring-fedced funding, but that is supplemented by additional funding from out-with-the-ring-fenced. The money, the 31 million, is being re-prioritised. Can you say where it is being re-prioritised to? As I said, the money goes to the centre, and in terms of what has been reallocated to that, it is set out within the ABR document. For example, there is the resource that I have touched on for local government, which is the £30 million support for Ukraine, but the resource that we save goes to the centre and is reallocated. Is there anything that you want to add, Craig? No, just the point that was made before, that all funding is just about every allocated as part of the revision, so it has all come into the centre and then been utilised for the pay offers for the Ukraine amounts that the minister touched on. I do not know if you are able to say what kind of internal discussions or consultation happen with your Government colleagues about that. Obviously, the 31 million coming out of a rural affairs budget is money that is intended to be used for agriculture, rural communities, et cetera. That is a significant sum that, as somebody who lives in and represents as part of a rural community, would be very welcome in a lot of the sectors in those areas. How do those discussions happen? What I would want to say firstly is that, whether it is a dedicated rural affairs land reform and islands portfolio, the interests of rural affairs are supported across a range of portfolios that we would recognise. Instead, in areas that we have sought to be more effective in getting money out of the door earlier on basic payment schemes, greening advances, et cetera. In terms of the decision making process, clearly when we have a set of circumstances as we have faced in this financial year and indeed in the previous financial year, we have to look for opportunities to generate efficiencies that can be returned to the centre to support the in-year fiscal positions, particularly when we have emerging pressures, such as in public sector pay. While the particular example that we are considering here is on regards to the rural affairs and land reform and islands portfolio, across Government there will be opportunities to look at for savings to be generated, and sometimes that can mean the refacing or refrofiling of particular budget lines. The aim of doing that is to generate that revenue internally to support the budget position in the year to meet challenges. For example, when you have a demand-led scheme where demand is not as forecast, then there is a source of revenue that can be redeployed where there is slippage perhaps in a capital project. Again, there is that opportunity for redeployment and that is a continuous on-going process as part of the in-year budget management process. Do you have anything to add to that, Neil? This money itself, the source, the original source, how is that linked to the uplift from the BU review? I am sorry, I missed the last part. Is that associated money coming from the uplift from the BU review or looked into the BU review with that be right or? I do not think that it is directly related in this case. The BU review funding is part of the broader ring-fenced culture funding. One of the things that I would say is that it is historically talked to us before, but the budget recovery that is provided for the schemes that are associated with ring-fencing is higher than the ring-fencing threshold and has been throughout the year. Despite the reprofiling, the terms of the ring-fencing have been met. When would you hope that this money would be returned to the portfolio? The decisions will be taken as part of the budget process. There is a guarantee that that money will be returned. We have made that commitment. Just a very quick last point. There were technical adjustments in the expenditure limit budget for rail services in relation to the sleeper service of £5 million. Can you give more details on that? Is it related to the move into public ownership? That is a technical matter. I am going to ask Graeme if he wants to comment. That is a recurring adjustment that has happened in the last three financial years, where a prepayment relating to the sleeper has been unwound, so it is more from the accounting perspective than anything else. I am going back to the police pensions thing. The minister said that it was demand-led, and that it would have been more of volatility. To what extent is there an overhang from Covid where we saw more people choosing to retire as a realisation that there was a life out there? In other words, do you have any sense on the extent to which it will continue, or the extent to which it was on and off? You might not know the answer to that. I am not in a position to give a detailed answer, but I will ask my officials at the SPPA to contribute towards the response of the committee to see if they can shed any light. The reason that I am asking is that, if that looks like that, something will continue, because you are right, there is more flexibility in terms of the way in which people will take their pensions. It would be useful to know that, and it does not just apply to the police scheme. I know that you have already agreed to write to us with what reserves are in place. It would also be useful for me to understand the rules around agencies that are able to gather or not gather reserves, as you pointed out, and whether there is any policy thinking about that. I think that most of us in this committee are pretty comfortable with agencies being required to use reserves where we are there, where we have got this fiscal tightness, but I am interested in things like SNP, when it does eventually move into profit. I personally think that we want them to be able to keep their reserves, because that is how we are going to get to the scale. That would be useful, so just a bit of meat on the bones for that. The third point is to thank your contribution today. I personally want to recognise the extra effort that has gone to this, and I find it very heartening in the finance committee. I know that does not happen very often, but I thank you very much for that. I suppose that you speak internally to your colleagues, because our session just now contrasts with the kind of rigor and the discipline that we have with our earlier session, where we had an FM in front of us, where that was what made us run over time. I think that the committee felt that we did not have a sufficient level of rigor given that the estimates. I appreciate that. It would be nice if we could square that circle a bit from the actuals, which that represents. I know that that can only be accurate at actuals, but we have quite a fluid position, increasingly with FMs coming through the committee of where estimates. Thank you. I will make sure that the points that you have highlighted are reflected in the correspondence. I very much want to put in record my thanks to the committee for their constructive engagement. I express my thanks to the officials as well for the work that has been undertaken to get us to a position where we have taken the financial update forward. This is clearly a process for our event, and we will always be keen for feedback to ensure that we can present information as transparently as possible. As I say, this is part of an on-going discussion in a process of refinements, but I am very grateful for the committee's input. I will ensure that the points that you have highlighted with regard to financial memoranda are related to relevant officials and ministerial colleagues. Thank you. Just one more from me, and it goes back to the issue of reserves. We know that the Scottish Reserve is about 1.1 per cent of the budget. We know that local government is recommended that they have about 3 per cent of their annual expenditure on reserves, although many have below that. Some have higher than that for historic reasons, Shetland, for example. However, what I was intrigued by over recent weeks is that when it was revealed that Creative Scotland appeared to the reserve of £17 million against a £66 million Government award, which was reduced by £6.6 million, that is about a quarter of its annual reserve. I am not sure what the £6 million represents in terms of forestry, but I wonder whether the Scottish Government has any particular guidelines on what the level of reserves should be. We are talking about dipping into those reserves as it appears to have happened both in terms of Creative Scotland and forestry. If that is not going well, then there surely has to be a set of guidelines, if there are, and I am sure there are. It would be interesting to see whether or not, and to hear from you what your view is of what that reserve should really be looking at. If Scotland reserves 1.1 per cent, why is Creative Scotland at a 25 per cent level of reserve relative to the award? What are we actually looking at? There has to be some level of consistency surely across a public sector. If your permission can be made of what I would be happy to do in the touches on the points that Mr Mason was raising, it is to respond to those points in detail in writing, but if there is a chance to further discussions with officials and look at the matter in some detail myself. I think that it is an important point at the committee that raises and I think that it warrants a more substantive response from something extemporised by me at this stage in the session. I absolutely agree with that. I am sure that colleagues would feel that that would be very helpful. I want to thank you for the evidence that you have given. We are now going to move on to agenda item 3, which involves formal consideration of the motion on the instrument. I invite the minister to speak to and move motion S6M-10683, that the Finance and Public Administration Committee recommends that the budget Scotland Act 2020-23 amend regulations 2020-23 draft be approved. We have no members wish to speak and thank you. I now put the question on the motion, which is that motion S6M-10683 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? Members are all agreed. I would like to thank the minister and his officials for their evidence today. We will publish a short report to the Parliament, setting out a decision on the draft regulations due course. That concludes the public part of today's meeting. The next item on our agenda, which will be discussed in private, is consideration of a work programme. We now move into private session. I will have a two-minute recess while the official report and ministerial and official guests leave.