 Good afternoon. I'm pleased to be convening this third meeting of this session between the convener's group and the First Minister. I'd like to welcome the First Minister to this meeting today and indeed members of the public. This session gives conveners the opportunity to question the First Minister about the programme for government from the perspective of the Parliament's committees. We need to finish, as you all know by around 1.55 am, as the chamber starts at 2pm. I know that you're all very disciplined. I'm looking at you all, and you're agreeing with me. That time is very tight, and therefore I'm going to allow five minutes for each convener and for the First Minister in the exchange. So it's a total of five minutes. Moving straight on, First Minister, do you want to make some opening remarks? No, in the interest of time, I'm happy to go straight into questions. Thank you very much. I call, first of all, Clare Adamson, convener of Social Security. Ms Adamson, please. Good afternoon, First Minister. As convener of the Social Security Committee, our committee's main focus has been on the child poverty bill and the current social security bill, which hopefully will be going through its stage 3 deliberations next week. As part of that, we have put on the face of the bill that social security is a role to play in reducing poverty. I would just like to have further insight on what the Government's programme will do to alleviate and hopefully eliminate child poverty in Scotland. First Minister, I absolutely agree that social security does have a role to play. That was one of the central comments that the independent commission on poverty and inequality made in its report to look to work in earnings, housing costs but also made the point that social security was an area where we had to make sure that our actions were contributing towards the alleviation of poverty and the reduction of the inequality gap. The Scottish Government's programme spans all areas of government when it comes to tackling poverty and reducing inequality. Some of the areas of government work that are not badged necessarily as anti-poverty are nevertheless all about tackling the long-term drivers of poverty and inequality, so that would include our work to expand childcare, to close the educational attainment gap, work to reduce the disability employment gap, the broad range of work that we are doing around the gender pay gap and gender inequality more generally, the work around health inequalities and increasingly today the work on adverse childhood experiences, recognising that many of the drivers of poverty and inequality later in life are actually rooted in the early experiences of children. All of that has a part to play, but specifically in terms of the immediate remit of your committee, the Child Poverty Act, which sets targets for 2030 with interim targets for 2023, making us now the only part of the UK that has binding statutory targets and the delivery plan that was published just before the parliamentary recess. Looking at those three areas, I spoke about that by tackling child poverty fund £50 million over the course of the Parliament. In addition, we have the range of work to mitigate welfare cuts coming from Westminster. That sees investment of about £100 million every year. The biggest element of that is the mitigation of the bedroom tax, and then the work—you mentioned the social security bill that hopefully will pass through Parliament next week—to design our own social security system that very much has respect, dignity and a determination to tackle poverty at its heart. That is a brief run-through. I can go into more detail in any aspect of that, but the point that I want to make is that our work to tackle poverty spans the short, immediate, medium and long term, because tackling the longer-term drivers of poverty is as important as mitigating its impacts—in fact, possibly more important than mitigating the impacts of poverty in the short term. Clare Adamson The Social Security Committee took evidence this week from Secretary of State. Although the social security bill and the powers that are coming to the Parliament are substantive and perhaps one of the biggest new set of powers that are coming to this area, there were questions about the roll-out of universal credit, particularly highlighting some of the research that has been done that could show that a one-parent family could be reduced to income by up to £2,380 per year. For a two-parent family, that could be nearly £1,000 a year. Obviously, things like the two-child limit on tax credits—when it was planned, universal credit was supposed to see no detriment to anyone in that, but what challenges do you see ahead for services in Scotland as universal credit is rolled out? Clare Adamson Enormous challenges to be blunt about it. I have very deep, profound concerns about the impact of the roll-out of universal credit. I do not think that the lessons from pilots are being sufficiently learned. I think that there are inherent flaws in the design of universal credit and in the whole mechanisms that lie behind the delivery of that. As a whole, the cuts that have still to come to social security provision at UK level are going to hit a significant number of people very hard and you have given some of the numbers that independent organisations have cited previously. That presents an immediate challenge for us. We saw that from the projections around child poverty or poverty generally that were published a few weeks ago. That is taking us in a direction around poverty that is the opposite of the direction to the one that we are trying to go in. It is a headwind that is making what we are trying to do so much more difficult. It raises questions that we hear all of the time in this Parliament about the extent to which the Scottish Government can mitigate cuts that are coming from the UK. While we have a definite role to play in using the powers that we have and the child poverty delivery plan, I spoke about one of the things that looks at is the idea of an income supplement, which we will do more work on over the next couple of years. While those are substantial powers that are being transferred and we are determined to use them, they account for something like 15 per cent of the total welfare budget. Even if we look at some of the limited powers that we have around making modifications to universal credit, that involves getting the DWP to agree and to implement those things. It makes the job that we are trying to do much more difficult, but I guess that it also makes the need for us to use those powers cleverly and imaginatively and to their full extent all the more important. That is what we are determined to do, but we should not pretend that we can mitigate every impact of the welfare cuts that are coming from UK level, because we cannot, until we get to a point where that entire budget is in our hands and we are not there yet or anywhere near it. The Scottish Government has not committed to updating our legislation law and introducing legislation to do so, which would help to clarify the boundaries of investigative journalism and tackle online abuse. Would the First Minister be supportive of the Justice Committee using the powers that Scottish Parliament committees have, but have been rarely used for the committee to introduce defamation as a committee bill? I do not think that it is for me to say whether the committee should do that or not. I certainly would have no objections and it is not for me to object to a committee wanting to bring forward its own bill. As the committee is aware, because I think there has been some interaction between the Government and the committee on this issue previously, the Scottish Law Commission has recently concluded a very thorough consideration around reforms to defamation law. The Government, as things stand just now, is considering the Scottish Law Commission report very carefully and we will hopefully, in the not too distant future, say whether we would intend as a Government to bring forward legislation or not. I think that it is important that we consider the law commission's report carefully. This is a sensitive area. It is an area where, for very understandable reasons, there are strong views and strong feelings, but there are areas in which there are differences of opinion. The serious harm test contained in the draft bill, for example, has attracted some criticism. There is an issue about whether there should be provision relating to defamation of the deceased and an issue around the correct length of a limitation period. Those are just some of the quite thorny issues that I think are important to get right. That is a consideration that the Scottish Government is going through. We will absolutely continue to talk to the committee so that you understand our views and intentions around this. If it comes to the point where the committee thinks that it is appropriate to introduce a committee bill, I am sure that that is something that will get proper consideration. Margaret Mitchell Yes. The committee has been quite keen to look at this legislation. When we have looked into the process, we have discovered that it really is quite complex and quite daunting. I wonder whether she would support looking at this to see if the process could be simplified, given that there are very few bills ever introduced by committees. Crucially, when she is looking at the legislative programme of the Government, would she factor in time to allow committees such as justice, which tends to be very heavily loaded with committee bills, to allow them to carry out this crucial function of our Scottish parliamentary point of view? Margaret Mitchell We have had this exchange before. When the Deputy Presiding Officer was chair of the Justice Committee, it is an issue that she raised regularly with us. It is obviously for committees to determine their own work programme. The Government, yes, we do try to consider the priorities of committees in considering our own legislative programme, but I think that in our last exchange at the convener session, we do not bring forward legislation just for the sake of it. The bills that the Government brings forward are brought forward for a purpose, because we consider them necessary. I suppose that the short answer is that we are always open to having a discussion. We have on-going discussions with committees about how to balance as well as we can. The Government demands on a committee's time in terms of our legislative programme and the priorities that committees have themselves to do inquiries or, indeed, to bring forward committee bills. As I understood—if I am wrong here, I understood the first part of your question as being about the complexity of the process of committee bills rather than necessarily the complexity of the defamation issue. Again, I am not sure whether that is necessarily for the Government to pronounce on, but if there are ways in which the Government can be helpful in looking at how committees can be better supported or enabled to bring forward legislation, I would say that we are open to that. However, as we all know, there will very quickly be sensitivities about the Government trying to encroach on the work called the procedures of committees. Thank you. I am convener of local government and communities. First Minister, the outcome of the Scottish Government's public sector pay policy creates an expectation as to what local government workers might receive. The Scottish Government's own pay policy states that it is to act as a benchmark for all major public sector workforce groups across Scotland. Given that the 2018-2019 Scottish Government pay policy is to award a 3 per cent increase to workers within its pay control airmen under 36,500, how will the Scottish Government seek to encourage at least a minimum 3 per cent pay award for those in the same income band within local government and monitor the progress that is being made? Again, I would open my answer to that by recognising that there is often a sensitivity here. Pay for local government employees is a matter for local councils and very often in this Parliament and elsewhere, the Government is sometimes unfairly, in my view, but no doubt others would say that fairly is criticised for seeking to intervene or interfere in decisions that are rightfully decisions of individual local councils. I will go on to make my substantive remarks and make that general point. When we set our own public sector pay policy, we recognise that that inevitably sets a benchmark for the rest of the public sector. We have recommended 3 per cent increases for staff under 36,500 and 2 per cent for those over, knowing that that is a benchmark that other parts of the public sector will be judged against. We have set that policy because we think that it is right that the 1 per cent cap is lifted, given the pressures on public sector workers over the past few years and particularly now that inflation is higher than it has been for some time. In terms of setting our budget, we took account of that when we set our budget and, particularly for the purposes of your question, the settlement for local government. Local government has a real-terms increase in its revenue budget in this financial year and the ability that has been used by local councils to increase the council tax by up to 3 per cent, which, of course, is less than the average increase elsewhere in the UK. Those two things together give councils extra revenue in this financial year of more than £200 million. Pay is one of the biggest inflationary pressures that councils face. The pay bill, I think, is about 60 per cent of the revenue budget of local government. That settlement—I obviously do not speak for COSLA here, but presumably that settlement has been part of what has enabled COSLA itself to set out a pay policy that is in line with the Scottish Government pay policy. Bob Doris? I am glad that you recognise pay as one of the significant pressures on local authorities in mentioning COSLA. I wonder if the Scottish Government would consider, in partnership with COSLA, more closely monitoring local authority staff' pay rates right across all 32 local authorities to map out where those disparities exist, as well as to better understand the potential financial impact of future Scottish Government pay policy benchmarks on local authorities going forward in future budget settlements. I am conscious of getting into territory where immediately some people—understandably, and I suspect that COSLA would be among them—would suggest that it is not for national central government to monitor the decisions of individual local authorities. On the other hand, I recognise the concerns that people will have if there are disparities. Different local authorities will perhaps reach different settlements with particular groups of staff. It is certainly something that we would be happy to discuss with COSLA and look to see whether there is work that we could do jointly to monitor might not be the best work to use in this context but to look at whether there is a consistency across all 32 local authorities or whether there is action that would encourage greater consistency. Bruce Crawford, convener of finance and constitution, Mr Crawford, please. Thank you. Gareth Rowden, First Minister, is the convener of the finance and constitution committee. You might understand that I am concerned about the timescale around issues to do with the EU withdrawal bill. I wonder if the First Minister could confirm that negotiations between the Scottish and UK Governments are still on-going in regard to the EU withdrawal bill, given that the UK Government requires consent from this Parliament. Given that the EU withdrawal bill is fast approaching the lesser stages of scrutiny in the lords, the UK Government has referred the Scottish-EU continuity bill, as I call it, to the Supreme Court, despite the overwhelming vote here on support of its passing. Can you update us on where those negotiations currently stand, please? I will do my best. You mentioned the referral to the Supreme Court that was announced by the UK Government yesterday. It is fair to say that I deeply regret that decision. I have heard over the past number of weeks since this Parliament passed the continuity bill. It described variously in the media as my bill or the SNP's bill. It was a bill that was passed by the overwhelming majority of members of this Parliament. It is the Scottish Parliament's continuity bill. It was done under emergency procedures, but it is fair to say that I am telling you something that you were very closely involved in. It had a very significant degree of scrutiny. The Westminster Government had a decision to make whether to respect the decision that the Scottish Parliament arrived at or not to respect it. Unfortunately, it opted not to refer to the Supreme Court. I mention that because it does have a bearing on the spirit of the negotiations that we are currently engaged in. To some extent, the UK Government is asking the Scottish Government and ultimately the Scottish Parliament to take on trust that the process of Brexit will not be used to ride roughshod over the powers of this Parliament. I do not think that it helps to build that trust when decisions taken by a clear majority in this Parliament referred to court in the way that we saw yesterday. I regret that, but I will put that to one side at the moment. In terms of the negotiations that they are on-going, they continue. I do not think that I am betraying any secrets when I say that time is getting short and the clock is ticking on this. We continue to talk. I think that progress is being made, but we are not there yet. Whether we will see enough progress to allow me as First Minister to recommend that the Parliament consents to the withdrawal bill is still an open question. I have been very clear that the issue of consent of this Parliament is fundamental, and it is a fundamental issue of principle, as far as I am concerned. What I will have to do when we get to the end of the negotiation and we have as far as we will go is judge whether this Parliament's powers—however benignly the UK Government might want to express all of that—will have to make a judgment. The Scottish Government will have to make a judgment about whether, ultimately, the powers of this Parliament could be constrained even for a limited period without the consent of this Parliament. I have been very clear that that is a key issue, and we are not yet at a point where we would be able to recommend agreement, but we continue to negotiate in good faith. First Minister, the Government wants me to make its mind up so, but so the Finance and Constitution Committee needs to get its mind up about its final report into whether to recommend consent on the withdrawal bill or not. I wonder if you could let us know what potentially might happen next, because timescales are important here in terms of how we, as a committee, come to a conclusion. What would your best advice be in regard to timescales in that regard? First Minister, I am not going to give you a specific date, because it is not within my ability to do that quite at this point. It is fair to say that we are reaching the end game of this, and we know that the stage of withdrawal bill is at in terms of being at report stage in the Lords, so we would probably, over the next couple of weeks, need to see this come to an agreement or not. We are talking now more days rather than weeks, but that is the kind of sphere that we are in. There have been further discussions this week. I think that there is an intention to have potentially a further meeting of the ministers dealing with this perhaps next week, although, to the best of my knowledge, when I came into this meeting, that has not been absolutely finalised yet, but we are definitely getting towards the end game. I genuinely hope that we can reach agreement, but, inevitably, when there are pretty fundamental issues of principle involved, the bar for agreement is not always easy to overcome. Even when lots of people on both sides are trying very hard to reach agreement, I hope that we can get there, but we are not there yet. Thank you very much, Deputy Presiding Officer. Obviously, the Public Petitions Committee is unusual in that it deals with a massive range of issues, and I do not intend asking a specific petition since that would be a test as much for your memory as mine. What is true—I have tried to look at some of the themes that come out from Public Petitions, bearing in mind that they are entirely driven by individuals and campaign groups who want to petition. There is a common theme about people feeling let down by the system and that the institutions that they try to get help from do not respond to them. I will be interested in your outlook on how you think that that can be addressed, but, most specifically, given 2018, as you know, the year of young people, I want to ask specifically about how the rights of children and young people have been reflected in the Public Petitions Committee over the past period. We have had a number of petitions across areas such as education, health and justice that raise issues that are fundamental about how the rights of children and young people are protected. There are some very tragic examples in the petition system currently, for example, about how young people access mental health services. First of all, do you have a response to this question about how we deal with systems that do not respond and how people are reduced to coming to something such as the petition committee? How do you, in Government, ensure that there is an assessment of the impact of anything that you do on the rights of children and young people? There is a lot of important stuff in that question, so I will try to, if I may, unpack it a little bit. The first thing to say is that, as Government, we pay very close attention to the petitions that come to the petitions committee, not just, obviously, we pay close attention to the individual issues that are brought forward, but, as you would expect, we pay close attention to the themes that are emerging from individual petitions. I do not want to give too many statistics, but, for example, if we look at all the petitions that have come forward in session 5 to date, three quarters of them relate to just four broad topical areas. Health and social care account for 40 per cent, followed by justice, about 16 per cent, environment and rural, 10 per cent, and transport, another 10 per cent. Children and young people would be the next in that list about 6 per cent, but, as you rightly say, a lot of the health petitions will be particularly around mental health, things that are particularly important to young people. We try to have an oversight of the themes so that we are not just responding to the individual issues, but picking up general patterns that are emerging and trying to deal with that systematically, where it is public bodies that are accountable to the Scottish Government, whether that is health boards or other public bodies. In terms of children and young people, in particular, this is the year of young people, and it is a theme that will go across all parts of government to try to see issues through the lens of a young person, even when there are issues that are not normally seen in that way. The petitions that have come forward to your committee are not the only way, but are one way, I think, of helping us to do that. Mental health—to use that example, because it is one that you raised—we know that, as mental health stigma reduces and demand increases, access to mental health services as well as mental health or mental ill health prevention is becoming more and more important. Both from petitions and from our other evidence, we know that that is a particular issue for young people. The prevention issue, certainly I know from the young people I speak to, is particularly important. I would not want to say that petitions are the only thing that allows us to assess and react in a way that is more systematic, but it is certainly an important part of that process. On the question of young people and mental health, I would ask you to look at a fear that has been expressed in our committee in evidence that, because of pressures on GPs, there is a possibility that young people do not get offered the other services that they might need before there may be an offer of a prescription. That is a highly sensitive issue and I am sure that you will be aware of it, but I would urge you to look at that. As a general point, it might be useful when the Public Petitioners Committee is looking to the Government for a response that there is specific information that is given around the impact of what it is doing around children and young people's rights. That would be helpful extra information to give to the committee. I am certainly happy to take that away as a specific suggestion. I appreciate that there will not always necessarily be a consensus of view on the subject matter of petitions, but I hope that your committee believes that the Government responds positively and proactively and in detail to requests for information. We will look at whether, almost routinely, we can add into a response on any petition a perspective from young people. It may be that it is not relevant on absolutely everything, but we will certainly take that away and look at how that is best done. On the mental health point, yes, I think that it is important that we and we are very aware of that as a risk. One of the things, without going off at a tangent here too much, that I am particularly keen to build into our approach to mental health is that, while yes, people who need appointments at GPs should get those appointments at GPs, but we have to get much more upstream to use that terminology with mental health so that it is not necessarily always the case that somebody presenting with a mental health issue has to go to a GP or another part of the formal health service. That is all about, and this is something that many members have raised, about getting more mental health prevention support into schools and other settings where young people find themselves. That is very much part of the mental health approach that we are keen to take. First Minister, can I explore with you the extent to which the advice of the UK Climate Change Committee is sought and followed by the Scottish Government in shaping climate change policy? The UK Committee on Climate Change is the statutory independent advisor to the Scottish Government. It was the 2009 act of this Parliament that established it as such. We would oblige to take into account the advice of the Committee on Climate Change and we do that. It will not be the only factor that we take into account when coming to decisions. Obviously, this is particularly pertinent and relevant just now as we come to what are not easy and actually finely balanced judgments about the extent to which we set targets in our next climate change bill. Obviously, we consulted on a target, the 90 per cent target, that the UK Committee on Climate Change said was at the outside edge of what was achievable. We are being pressed rightly and understandably by many organisations to go for net zero. Net zero is our aspiration, what we are thinking about carefully just now, given that when you put something in legislation you have to have a path to deliver it is the extent to which and the timescale in which that aspiration can be translated into legislation given some of the unique nature of the legislation that we have in Scotland. I anticipate that I was going with us because obviously the climate bill will be coming to my committee. I understand that you will not want to reveal what is in the bill and the decisions that you have taken around the target, but I wonder if we can maybe explore a little further how the Government is going to balance that expert opinion that you have had, which, as you say, suggests that a 90 per cent target is at the ambitious end of what is achievable, set against the understandable aspirations of the environmental lobby. How are you going to do that in practice? We are looking very carefully at that just now. If I can be very clear that my aspiration is the same as the environmental lobby, I want to see as get to a net zero position as quickly as possible. Some argue for that to be 2040, some 2050, some would argue probably earlier than 2040, but that is our position. The question is, because right now we could not credibly say that we can set out a pathway from here to there. Those in the environmental lobby would say, yes, but that should not stop you because the science and the technology is changing. I recognise that. I suppose that the difficult thing comes when you are translating that aspiration into binding legislation. Some other countries, for example, Sweden, are often held up as well. They have already committed to that. There are actually two points of difference between our legislation in Scotland and the approach that is taken by many other countries. There are very few countries that have binding statutory targets, like we do, and there are fewer stills that have binding annual targets. Our targets are actually very tough. We also only count domestic measures towards our targets. Other countries, often the ones that are sighted, will use international credits. We do not do that. If we are going to put something in law that we are on an annual basis measured against, we have to be able to look people in the eye and say, we know how we can deliver that. That is the process that we are going through just now. Obviously, the bill will be published soon before the summer recess. It is not an easy judgment, but the difference here is not in aspiration. It is just about the extent to which, and the timescale over which, that aspiration can be converted into binding annual targets. I think that you will be aware that the economy committee is undertaking an inquiry into the performance of the Scottish economy. One of the recurring themes that seems to rise in evidence arose again yesterday before the committee is the issue of the cluttered landscape when it comes to business support. If we think of the different schemes available, Scottish Enterprise High and Business Gateway, what can the Scottish Government do to ensure that alignment or a coherent set-up of business support is available to businesses? How can the Scottish Government bring this about quickly? The key thing that we have done, and is now getting under a way, of course, is the establishment of the strategic board. I paid close attention to the Fraser of Allander report just a few weeks ago. Certainly, having a streamlined landscape as possible is always something that we have sought to do. I guess, though, when you try to streamline a landscape, you quickly run into people, including, dare I say it, members of this Parliament who do not want you to streamline a particular organisation or particular strategy that they would rather you keep. It is easy to say, but, as we found out, if you remember in the early days of the process towards the strategic board, we wanted perhaps to go a little bit further, not to compromise the existence of high, for example, but to have a bit of a harder alignment between organisations. That was pretty strongly resisted across the Parliament. It is easy to say to a Government that those who say it have to be prepared to not just will the ends but sometimes will the means along the way. That is where it gets much more difficult. The strategic board, though, I think will do a lot to bring that strategic alignment. If we, if you look at spend on enterprise and skills in Scotland, it tops £2 billion a year, we need to make sure that we are getting maximum bangs for those bucks. The strategic board, which no resenior is chairing, is about making sure that all of those enterprise and skills agencies are not just in theory but actually moving in the right direction where there is an overall strategy. That will help significantly. I am absolutely sure that no resenior is the right person to drive that given her own experience, not least with the chambers of commerce more recently. Just looking at another area of the committee's remit energy, I think that probably we are all agreed that the renewable energy programme should be progressed. I want to ask the First Minister, do you agree that part of that has to be both national and local government working together to progress that? Getting to the point, if we look at the Inch Cape application called in by the Scottish Government before East Lothian Council could even take a view on it, does that show respect for local democracy and indeed does this build trust? A lot of people will say that it is not, and ultimately that may not be of assistance to the renewable energy strategy. I should first of all educate, as we know, as a life planning application, so I am not going to go too far into the detail of that. The planning minister set out in Parliament yesterday, though the reasons because of the potential strategic importance of that particular development is placed within national planning framework 3, why that call-in happened. Yes, I believe that, to answer your question, national and local government have to work together. Again, that comes down to, if we have a national strategic ambition, and we are talking here about renewables, we have to make sure that we are doing the things as a country that enable that ambition to be delivered. I was a BiFab yesterday. The Scottish Government worked really hard to get a deal in place that could give BiFab a bright future. However, whether BiFab has a bright future or not will not entirely, but in part depend on our ability to get some of those big renewable energy developments up and running into construction. There are always going to be tensions here, but that is why we have the national planning framework, and that is why we have issues that are seen as being of national importance. I should say, just as a final point in this, and the statistics bear me out on this, the Scottish Government uses its call-in powers under the planning legislation very sparingly. It is not something that we do lightly, it is not something that we overuse, we do that sparingly, and it is a part of the process that is there for that purpose. It is a bit like your first question. I should say that I know that this, to some extent, is the nature of opposition. If you want to pressure Governments to meet those big national objectives, as you should, there comes a point where you cannot always be opposing the things that are necessary to allow us to achieve those big national objectives, whether that is on streamlined in the landscape or some of the things that have to be done to allow us to meet the renewables potential that we have. Christina McKelvie, convener of equality and human rights. First Minister, you will be aware that the Equal and Human Rights Committee has looked at the issue of gypsy travellers over the past couple of years, and we know that they remain a marginalised group. Educational attainment and health inequalities and poverty all remain major issues. When we heard from young David Donaldson at committee on human rights day last year, he said that the discrimination that is faced by the gypsy traveller community is the last acceptable form of racism in Scotland. I know that you would agree with me that that is something that we do not want to countenance. How do we reassure David Donaldson and the other members of the gypsy traveller community that, for them, that form of racism will be a thing of the past? Can you tell me about some of the initiatives that your Government has taken in order to tackle that issue? It is an important issue, and I think that it is a remaining area of quite serious discrimination and disadvantage that flows from that discrimination that we really have a model obligation to tackle. The work that your committee is doing, I think, is important in that regard, continuing to draw attention to that. I know that the current human rights inquiry is looking specifically at the gypsy traveller community as part of that. I mean, we have got a range of work under way, and you will be familiar with much of that work. We have committed extra funding over the 2017-2020 period, £1.5 million to organisations that provide support to gypsy traveller communities. That includes, for example, a flexible learning programme, which is designed to meet the needs of gypsy travellers living on-sites. That, in fact, was one of the things that we announced in the child poverty delivery plan. We are also looking specifically at issues such as education, health and the disadvantage and inequalities that exist there. I think that there has been progress in that regard, but I would be one of the first to admit that there is work still to do. I think that, most centrally, the ministerial working group that has been established is chaired by Angela Constance, but it includes ministers from all areas that really touch on this issue. It is really important. The group has already held a meeting. I think that its second meeting is due to be held next month, when it has a particular focus on education. The young gypsy traveller that you mentioned in your question, David Donaldson, I believe is giving evidence to that group, so that will be an important opportunity. After education, the work plan of the group is to focus on employment and health, and it is intended to produce a report by June 2019, setting out some of the actions that we will take based on the review work that it has done. However, I think that the work that your committee is doing will continue to helpfully feed into the work that the Government is doing. Tina McKelvie. Thank you very much. The First Minister, one of the things that I picked up quite quickly was the flexible learning programme and how that can work. I am keen to know how the Government will work with local authorities in order to deliver that, but I am also keen to know that a very particular aspect of this is primary school children, gypsy traveller children, who then do not go to high school, and particular girls, and whether there will be anything in the flexible learning programme that will allow that continuation of education, which in most cases is what is most important in order to deal with some of the issues around about health inequalities and poverty and lifting people out of poverty and any better employment opportunities. I am just to give two quick responses to that. Through the flexible learning programme, working with local authorities is essential to that, given the primary role of local authorities in education provision. Your second point is fundamental. We see generally education as being one of the routes out of poverty in one of the ways in which we tackle inequality, and that has to apply to everybody and the particular issues that you have identified within the gypsy traveller community. As I said, the ministerial group is focusing on education at its next session. I am sure that the issue, particularly with girls continuing in education beyond primary school, will be one of the things that they are looking at, but I will from this meeting just make sure that that is very firmly on their agenda, and hopefully that process will allow us to focus on some of the actions that will help to tackle that particular issue. I call Claire Hockie, convener of standards procedures and public appointments. Ms Hockie, please. Thank you, First Minister, for joining us. As you will be aware, the standards committee is looking at some of the recommendations that came from the commission on parliamentary reform. I would like to see the Government's opinions specifically on some of the recommendations on members' bills. The commission concluded that there is scope for greater collaborative working between MSPs and the Government to take forward backbenchers legislative proposals. Do you agree with that conclusion? I agree that we should try to achieve greater collaboration between Government and members when members' bills are being contemplated. I think that there is fairly good collaboration already, so I do not think that this is an area where things are in need of radical overall haul. I am aware of the commission on parliamentary reform, the recommendation that it made to effectively remove the rule that says when the Government decides to legislate, then a member's bill would stop. I think that it is fair to say that I do not have really strong views on this, so I will be interested in the committee's deliberations. I suppose that the Government does not use that particularly often. In fact, the current Government has only done it twice, which is to step in and take over a member's bill. That is the occasion when the lobbying bill and the human trafficking bill, so it is not something that happens particularly often. It makes me think that, although I do not have really strong views on that, the commission recommendation is maybe a solution to searching for a problem that does not really exist, which makes me think that I am not absolutely convinced that there is an overwhelming case to take away that rule completely. It may be that there are some modifications that could be made to it. I do think that perhaps merits a bit of examination is around timescale. If the Government did say that we intend to legislate thereby taking away a member's right to take a bill, there should be some timescale in which the Government has to do it or not do it, in which case the member's bill would come back to the fore. I think that there are issues there that merit examination, but whether that is a fundamental problem in how the system is operating, I am not convinced that I have heard the evidence of that. If the Scottish Government does take on a legislative proposal that was first raised by a backbencher, how would it involve the member in the development of that bill? As I said, in the life of this Government, it has only happened twice. Maybe the members who first proposed those bills are better able to give a perspective on that than I am. From memory, that would be Neil Findlay and Jenny Marra. What we would seek to do and what I hope we did in those circumstances would be to continue to talk to the member in terms of the process of consultation, the process of agreeing the terms of the bill. It is not necessarily the case that there would be complete agreement there, but we would certainly seek to continue to involve the member as the consultation and the process of the bill developed. You have reminded me that I should have given Jenny Marra's apologies that she was unable to attend today, so that is now on the record. I call Graham Simpson, convener of delegated powers and law reform. I ask you a similar question in a previous meeting, but you might have an update for us at this time. I am looking for an update on the preparations for making the secondary legislation needed as a result of leaving the European Union. Can you give an indication of how many instruments will need to be made and whether they will all need to be laid before exit day? And how do you intend to balance the potential that there could be a mountain of work against your own programme of domestic legislation? It will be a mountain of work, and I would rather it was work that we were not having to do, because inevitably it will divert attention from things that Parliament might prefer to be doing. I am always slightly nervous when somebody says that I asked you this question at the last session, just in case I do not give you the same answer as I gave you at the last session. I am sure that conveners will understand this, but I cannot give you a specific answer to the question, because we do not yet know the precise terms on which the UK will leave the EU, we do not know what the future relationship is going to be, so there are some questions that remain to be answered that allow us to answer that question definitively. I can give you estimates and the estimates that we are working on. The UK Government estimates that between 800 and 1000 regulations will be needed in the UK Parliament, and the Scottish Government's current working assumption, but I would stress that it is our current working assumption that is subject to change, is that there will be around 300 instruments needed in the Scottish Parliament, but we are not going to be able to finalise that estimate until certain other things have completed. I am sure that you are aware of that. There is work already under way between the Government and parliamentary officials on drafting protocols that will ensure that there is clarity about what Brexit secondary legislation will be laid so that there is clarity as early as possible on the quantum, but this bit is just as important so that there is clarity as early as possible on how significant each of the different instruments are, so that that allows the committees to start to plan their work but also make sure that they are applying a proportionate level of scrutiny because it stands to reason that not every single regulation and piece of secondary legislation is going to be as significant as every other one, so I think that committees will want to apply scrutiny that is proportionate and based on the complexity or the significance of the instrument. I am sorry that I cannot give you definitive information on this, that is our current working assumption but we will continue to liaise very closely with the Parliament as that picture becomes clearer. That is actually very useful. It is a bit of good news for you. We are pleased to know that we yesterday agreed to write to Joe Fitzpatrick to commend him and Government officials for the lowest quarter on record of SSIs having no technical points raised on them. We very much hope that this trend will continue because it helps me sleep at night, but you may also want to know that the committee has had long running discussions with Mr Fitzpatrick and Derek Mackay on the need to consolidate the council tax reduction scheme. We want to make sure that the law is clear and accessible to everyone who needs to use it, but, in the case of those regulations, they have been amended 13 times, so they have become really increasingly complex. We think that there could now be a barrier to those who wish to use the law. Mr Mackay has become a bit of a pen friend to me. He said in February that the committee would be updated on ways forward for the scheme in the late summer, but he has not confirmed any particular date by which it may be consolidated. I wonder if he could commit to consolidating it and give me some timescale as to when that might happen. That was a question in two parts—a good bit and a bad bit. I am glad that you have noticed an improvement in the number of SSIs without flaws. We worked very hard on that, and I am sure that Dr Fitzpatrick will be delighted to receive your letter. I hope that it does not mean that he is asking for a promotion. I should put on the public record that he is not getting one at this stage. At this stage, I do not want to take all hope away from him. I know that this is a long-running discussion between the Government and your committee. If I can be as diplomatic as possible, I do not think that we entirely agree with the views of the committee on this, but Derek Mackay will continue to try to see if we can find some common ground. There have been two issues, as I understand it, recurring issues about the various regulations that we simply do not agree with, and the issue about consolidation. It is important to say that consolidation, although it may have some benefits, I do not deny that. It would not fundamentally change how the scheme works and it would not change how much of a council tax reduction somebody receives. The regulations are implemented by local authorities who are familiar with the regulations and the various amendments. The system operates effectively. There is no suggestion that the system is not working well. Even if we consolidate and we will continue to consider a way forward there, it is likely that the consolidated tax would almost immediately need updating, particularly as the new devolved benefits are established. I am not convinced—we are not convinced—that this is as big an issue as the committee quite legitimately thinks that it is, but we will continue to have that discussion and see if we can find an agreed way forward. At least he is smiling. I call Edward Mountain, convener of rural economy and connectivity, please. Good afternoon, First Minister. As you know, the Wreck Committee is currently involved in inquiry into agriculture, and in particular salmon farming, an industry that is vitally important to the Scottish economy in the same way that wild fisheries, in which I have a declared interest, are as well. The published Eclare report into the environmental impacts of salmon farms suggests that the status quo is not acceptable. Do you, in the Scottish Government, have a view on that published report? We are considering the environment committee's report very carefully. As you know, it concluded in its view that further development and expansion of aquaculture should be predicated on resolving what it considers to be some current environmental issues and, fundamentally, on the basis of a precautionary approach. It concluded that, in its view, the current consenting and regulatory framework was inadequate to address the environmental issues, so we are looking and considering carefully. We would argue that we do follow a precautionary approach already, but we are open to ways in which the regulatory and consenting system can be approved. It is important that we strike a balance. You alluded to the fact that aquaculture is hugely important to our economy. It is worth more than £600 million a year in gross value added to the Scottish economy. At last count, there are around 12,000 jobs that depend on aquaculture, so it is important that we support the industry to develop and to grow, but we must do that sustainably. It is an industry that depends on the environment, so we must make sure that it has due regard to sustainability and environmental protection. I hesitate to go off too much into the issue of sea lice, but that is obviously a particular issue here. There is a considerable amount of work that the industry itself has been doing there, but we will continue to consider the environment report. We will be very interested in the work that your committee is doing to review that and seek to work with industry to make sure that we get that balance right in the future. Thank you, First Minister. I think that the two key points that you picked up there are sustainability and the precautionary approach. Therefore, based on that, the continued expansion of salmon farming, which continues as we speak, before the Wreck Committee has completed its report, and you and the Government have had a chance, which you have said that you want to do, to consider both reports. Do you think that that is wise, precautionary and sustainable, or do you think that there should be a pause while the committee and the Government get a chance to come to the bottom of the problem? The world really stands still while reports are important, though they are under way. It is important that we build that precautionary principle into everything that is happening, and that is what we are seeking to do. I think that there is more that the aquaculture sector can do to better demonstrate its current progress on some key issues, and we do and we recognise that we need to look again at making sure that we have the balance right in terms of regulation. We are working with the sector, and we will work with agencies such as CEPA, as well as the external scientific bodies to pick up the pace of that work. There are a range of Scottish Government-funded initiatives, for example, such as the development of the Scottish Shelf model, which is important in that regard. It is a bit of balance. The environment is of huge importance in everything that we do, but particularly for a sector that depends on the health of our environment, it is particularly important. On the other side of that, there is enormous economic benefit from the sector, so those balances are not always straightforward. Given your interest in that area, those are not always easy balances to strike, but it is important that we continue the work that we are doing to get that right. Collegion McAlpine, convener of Culture, Tourism, European and External Relations, and that is a mouthful. Ms McAlpine. Thank you, and I am only going to concentrate on one aspect of my committee's work, which is culture. Good afternoon, First Minister. There were a size of relief all round when the Scottish Government came together with the private sector to find a funding package to save the Scottish Youth Theatre. You will be aware that the Scottish Youth Theatre was refused funding for the second time in Creative Scotland's regular funding process, and this time the regular funding process came under severe criticism, not least because some decisions were reversed without explanation. The chief executive of Creative Scotland and the former acting chair came before my committee and admitted that the process was flawed now, while, of course, it is absolutely correct that those decisions are taken independently of Government. Do you have a view on that process and how it has been dealt with? Obviously, I have views on it. If I can deal with the Scottish Youth Theatre issue first of all, the Scottish Youth Theatre did not have RFO funding, and that was the case in the past two years. It was not an organisation that lost its RFO funding. It did not succeed in its application, and there would be many, many organisations in that position who applied to be regularly funded organisations and did not succeed. Given the importance of the Scottish Youth Theatre, particularly in the year of young people, we were, and I articulated this at a session of FMQs a few weeks ago, determined to see whether we could get a package of funding together to allow it to continue its work while we work with them to try to help them to be more sustainable in the future. There have been views that are expressed about the Scottish Youth Theatre, which, while it does fantastic work, there is room for it to extend its reach and to be more accessible to more young people. The funding package that was put together by the Scottish Government and the private sector allows the breathing space for that to happen, and hopefully we will come out of the other end of that with a sustainable future for the Scottish Youth Theatre. In terms of the RFO process more generally, as you know, we increased the culture budget by 10 per cent. We put more than £6 million into the budget to compensate for the loss of lottery funding. That allowed Creative Scotland to fund, broadly speaking, the same number of organisations through the RFO process, which is not the only funding stream of Creative Scotland. Some came in for the first time, some dropped out, but the overall number is broadly the same. It is always going to be difficult for organisations that lose funding, and there are transitional arrangements in place. Obviously, Creative Scotland did reflect on some of the decisions that it made. It put some more funding into allowing organisations that had initially not got funding to be funded. In terms of my view, Creative Scotland is a process that is independent of ministers, and Parliament decided that. That is part of the legislation that underpins this, so ministers can intervene in these decisions. However, I would expect—I have indeed discussed the need for this directly with Creative Scotland as part of a routine meeting—to listen carefully to the views that have been expressed about the process. I think that they have said openly that they are thinking about that and looking ahead to how they improve that process over the longer term. Thank you very much for that. If I could go back to the youth arts funding in particular. At UK level, there is a national youth theatre that receives portfolio funding from the arts council England. We have various national companies that are funded in Scotland through various ad hoc funding streams. However, when SYT wrote to me, they told me that Creative Scotland said that there was no strategy for national youth performing companies. I wondered whether you thought that there should be in the same way that there is for our national companies such as Scottish Opera and Scottish Ballet. More broadly, I wonder if your view is on how the arts is treated for young people in comparison with sport, for example. In sport, we agree that every young person should be able to access it for their own wellbeing. However, we also agree that there are very talented young people—we will see that in commonwealth games—that we invest in through elite sport. However, when it comes to culture, we agree that everyone should have access to culture for their own wellbeing. Is there enough emphasis on the most talented young people who have the most potential? Perhaps we should look at that again and treat it in the same way as we treat sport? There are two questions in there. Firstly, the one about whether we should have youth national performance companies that are directly funded. I understand that, and I apologise to them if I am getting this wrong, that the Scottish Youth Theatre does not necessarily see that as an immediate solution to the position that we are in, but I think that over time it is something that we should think about and consider. Perhaps the process that we will go through with the Scottish Youth Theatre over the next year or so is an opportunity to do that as we try to find a sustainable future for them. Your second question. I am very sympathetic to that. Obviously, we have the time to shine programme through Creative Scotland. There is work on Derwage just now in terms of the refreshed youth arts strategy, which will publish in the not too distant future. We have also seen Creative Scotland establish traineeships for particularly talented young people, which I think is a step in the direction that you are talking about. Yes, a bit like sport, we want everybody to be able to be a passionate believer that participation in arts and culture for everybody is a really important part of the health and wellbeing of the country, as well as individuals. Of course, we also need to make sure that, in terms of the participants, the people that are providing, producing and performing the really talented people who are giving them the support that they made. I think that the traineeship programme that Creative Scotland has is perhaps a good foundation for looking at what more we can do there, too. I call Lewis MacDonald, the convener of health and sport. The Health and Sport Committee has been inquiring into governance of the NHS in Scotland, looking, for example, at issues of health board leadership and democratic accountability, and also at the development of new spheres of governance, for example at regional level and also locally at integration joint board level. I am sure that the First Minister will recognise that the current crisis at NHS Tayside has highlighted a number of those concerns very sharply, your loss of confidence, clearly, in the local leadership of that particular board, but also issues around accountability, around the relationship between non-executive and executive directors, and also, potentially, because your Government's response to that has involved other boards, whether that is implications for regionalisation as well. I am very interested, First Minister, to know what conclusions you have drawn for the governance of the wider NHS in Scotland. I would say two things that perhaps sound a bit contradictory, but they are not intended to. We must treat issues like that, which has developed and emerged in NHS Tayside really seriously. I hope that whatever political differences there might be in the chamber, there is an absolute recognition that the health secretary and the Government has treated that extremely seriously with the actions that were taken to renew and change the leadership of NHS Tayside. We should never be complacent when we see issues in one health board that they do not exist elsewhere, and that is why, if you take the issue around endowment funds, for example, the health secretary has gone through a process of asking all health boards to assure her that similar issues are not in other health boards or if they are what they are going to do about it. We are not complacent about that. On the other hand—I do not intend to sound contradictory—we equally should not assume that, because we have seen the issues in NHS Tayside, those issues will occur in other health boards. In my experience and some of this experience in past years was, as health secretary, the governance and the leadership in our health boards are very good and very strong. I think, though, that this is not just because of the NHS Tayside situation but, generally, because of—and you have mentioned some of us—the regionalisation of delivery of some services, the integration of health and social care, the general trends around delivery of healthcare. This is an appropriate time to look at governance for good positive reasons. I welcome the work that your committee is doing. I think that that will be very helpful to the Government in terms of making decisions for the future. You are, obviously, aware that we, in the tail end of last year, also commissioned a pilot review of corporate governance in NHS boards, which is being led by John Brown, who is the chair of Glasgow, who is now the interim chair at Tayside. That started in NHS Highland. It is expected that a report of that will publish before the summer recess. We are looking very closely at these issues of governance, how we make sure that governance in health boards is not just at the standard and quality that we expect for them to do their day-to-day job. We should hopefully take that for granted, but whether we have the governance in place that allows health boards working with other parts of the public sector to do some of the transformational work that is needed in the delivery of healthcare because of the demographic and other challenges that we are all aware of. I think that we are on the same page in terms of recognising that this is a critical time for examining issues around governance. I wonder in that context, given regionalisation and given the potential impact of the crisis at Tayside on other boards, what the First Minister's views or thoughts are in relation to the accountability of the delivery of those services at a regional level, given that the existing accountability structures are really designed for board-by-board responsibility to the public? Again, I speak from the past experience of being a health secretary here. The accountability in Shona Robison has demonstrated this in terms of an intervention in NHS Tayside. The accountability between health boards and government is very strong. Health secretaries have the ability under the 1978 act to exercise ministerial powers, and that is what the health secretary did last week. We have had some similar reason to think through this in the context of integration of health and social care. Of course, there we are dealing with the integration of health boards accountable to ministers and democratically elected local authorities. In terms of regionalisation, the building block of that is still individual health boards, and that accountability matters with regionalisation just as it does with services that are provided within individual health boards. Increasingly, we are thinking about whether there are changes required. My view—and it is not a view that everybody agrees with—I think that we need to allow regionalisation to evolve in the way that it is. I am not, because I think that it distracts a lot of people in the health service. I tend not to be of the view that we should go for hard-wired structural changes to embed that in a firmer way, which means that the health board continues to be the building block, so that link of accountability that we have just now continues to be the appropriate one. However, as those issues develop, that is something that we will learn and listen to the work of your committee to continue to consider. Mr Dornham, please. Good afternoon, First Minister. The Education and Skills Committee is looking at children's experience in poverty and how to support their attainment at schools. A number of submissions received in the inquiry highlight the valuable work community learning and development that workers undertake. That includes linking in with the work of schools through local authorities. Can I ask whether consideration has been given to how CLD workers' links to schools will change under the proposed education reforms? Will, for example, CLD practitioners require to approach individual schools to agree how to support children in these schools, or would they continue to work through local authorities? The first thing that I want to say is that CLD workers, in my view, will continue to be really important in providing support to schools. Right now, there is no consistent pattern across the country, either in terms of how CLD workers are employed, some are employed by local authorities, some are employed by voluntary organisations, nor is there a consistency in terms of the way in which they work. Some have got a capacity building function, others will work more directly with children and young people. In looking at how this will develop in line with the governance reforms in education, we should not make the mistake of thinking that there is a consistent arrangement in place just now. I think that the governance reforms that we are embarking on perhaps give us the opportunity to make that more consistent and more uniform. Obviously, at the heart of the education governance review is the notion of empowering individual schools and headteachers much more. Obviously, the pupil equity fund is providing the resources to allow headteachers to decide whether there is particular resource that they need to augment what they do. I think that CLD workers perhaps will have a more central role as a result of some of that. It is interesting to hear that response, because I was just going to come on to the pupil equity fund. We were talking about that today, how to target it and its impact was discussed during the session this morning. A number of examples of good practice, some less so. However, you clearly see the bringing of services into schools that are normally developed in the community. For example, youth workers and benefit services using the PEF money as being a positive way forward and something that we should be encouraging. The whole philosophy behind PEF is that we do not dictate to schools how they use the money. Clearly, there are resources there in terms of allowing headteachers to look at what works and the evidence base of that. However, I am very clear that we should support headteachers in using their judgment to decide how that money will make the biggest difference to the attainment of the young people in their schools. I said that in an FMQ session not that long ago. I have seen some examples with my own eyes of how PEF money is being used, but I guess that there would be some people who would raise an eyebrow and say that that is really appropriate. However, absolutely it is. If a headteacher can say that it contributes to the performance of a school—the example that I gave in the chamber was that a headteacher had taken some parents and children away for a weekend because he felt that that was improving the engagement of parents in the school and the attendance of the young people at the school. If a headteacher thinks that the use of the money is doing that, we should support them in that, because the whole purpose of it is to trust the professional judgment of headteachers and the teams that they have in place. One of the things that came up today was that some schools seem to be less well-placed to take advantage of the PEF money. Is there any suggestion of more information or support being made available to some of those schools to make sure that they know what is out there and how they can use that PEF money to the best of availability? I have not heard the evidence that you are talking about today, so I would be very interested to have a look at that. As you know, part of the purpose of the development of regional collaboratives is about making sure that professionals working in our schools have access to the best practice, the interventions that are evidence to work. It is not then that we dictate to schools which ones they should use. There is a focus, and John Swinney is working hard with the teaching profession on this, to make sure that those resources are available. Again, in my experience—I have not visited every school in the country, but the schools that I have visited or the headteachers that I have spoken to or some of the classroom teachers that I have spoken to, I think that there is a lot of innovation being applied to how PEF money is being used. Inevitably, as we get more years of experience of using PEF, we will get more of an evidence-based building up of what interventions are particularly impactful. I think that it is important that we gather that as we go forward. Thank you very much. That concludes questions. I wonder, First Minister, if you want to make any closing remarks. No, particularly. I am perhaps saying thank you for allowing me to get out alive. I am happy if there are any final questions, convener. I am looking at the clock. I see that we have got a few minutes. As nobody asks for an extra supplementary question, can I just say—I do not see him looking at me asking for one—thank you very much. I think that, apart from questioning you, First Minister, it reminds the public of the very crucial role of the committees in this Parliament. People tend to watch the excerpts on television and the more dramatic stuff, but the solid work of the committees that you hear today around this table really are to be commended in their independence, their scrutiny and, indeed, holding the Government to account. It is a timely reminder of the work of all the committees of this Parliament. We sometimes lose sight of that. I can thank all my colleagues for their questions and I thank the public for attending. I say to colleagues in the next meeting with the First Minister that we have decided to do it twice a year. It will either be in October or November. I now close this meeting. Thank you very much.