 Rhaid gennych am y fawr 15, mae'w gwaith cwmói alw, yn 2018, y Agent. Felly wrth gwybod, maent i chi i'n edrych ar gyfer ddweudau mewn, ac i chi, gyda'r newid i fawr, o garfod diolch, cael ddweud yn ddigwelwch i'n gwybodaeth. Agent 1 yna ddweud i gynhyrchu i pawb i'w bryf o'ch i'w bryf uhr, a'r cwmio ddweud i gynhyrchu i'r pwyntgyrchio oedden A3, angen combination number four and five, which are private papers from the clerk, are taken in private, as the committee agreed. Agenda item two is an evidence session on passport should benefits. We welcome to the Rob Gowins policy officer from Citizens Advice Scotland. Michael McMarhan campaigns in policy manager disability agenda Scotland. Bill Scott, director of policy inclusion Scotland. I thank you very much for your written submissions for today's meeting. If I could open up questions today, just by asking whether you consider that, at some point, devolved benefits should continue to be linked to the set of reserved social security issues, what you think about going forward, about the link between social security reserved benefits and the current passported benefits in Scotland? I think, in general, the link between social security benefits, whether they're reserved or devolved and passported benefits is important. In many cases, it serves as a good proxy for low income that somebody would be in need of them and does prevent the need for a further means test for people. I think there's going to be some complexities, but there already would be complexities from having passported benefits that can be delivered by local authorities, by the Scottish Government based on UK Government reserved benefits, some are delivered by other agencies such as the warm home discount and BT basic. It may present complexities, but there are already complexities in the system. I think that you very much agree with Rob that the link is a decent, if imperfect, proxy for poverty and low income, as well as disability. Of course, with the evolutionary most disability benefits to Scotland, if there are some complexities in that area, they could be ironed out at a Scottish level, but certainly in terms of low income benefits like free school meals, I don't think that there's a better proxy at the moment. I agree that there is a complexity regardless of who owns the initial benefit. No passported benefit will ever come completely without some criteria being affected, and that's a given. What we would like to see regardless of what the passported benefit is linked to would be clarity on what purpose the passported benefit would have, what would the purpose be, so if the committee, the Parliament or the Government could ensure that, whether it's to try and address low income or poverty, whether it's just to provide assistance to people who require assistance because of disability or whatever, or both, I think that clarity around that would be helpful in ensuring that whatever passported benefits are delivered, whatever they're connected to, wouldn't be the major issue. I wonder if I could just, as a supplementary, ask about the recent court case down south about people in higher-level disability who are now to receive a back payment that is being delayed. My understanding is that, although they will eventually, after the summer, receive a back payment for the disability, they are not being compensated for the loss of the passported benefits. I wonder if you knew how many people in Scotland had been affected by that situation or if you had an idea of what the loss of earnings could be for someone affected by it? It's really difficult at the moment to tell exactly how many will be impacted by that because the DWP is conducting a troll through all the cases to identify at the moment who may have been affected by that decision. Potentially up to 220,000 people are affected at a UK level, and that would translate roughly into around 21,000, 22,000 in Scotland, because there's a higher proportion of disabled people in Scotland than throughout the rest of the UK. It could be quite a large number of people who are unable to access passported benefits at the moment. It was actually a point that we raised earlier in submissions several years ago and was addressed in terms of concessionary travel that a lot of people are transferring across from disability living allowance to personal independence payment. They are the ones who are currently going through this troll. It was a very large proportion of those who have affected health mental health issues, learning difficulties, autism and so on. They've been disproportionately impacted by that. Luckily, some of those issues were addressed in concessionary travel in terms of granting people with a long-term mental health condition and with learning difficulties at least limited rights to concessionary travel based on their condition. We'd like to see that slightly broadened to take care of that in the future, because at the moment it depends on whether the person is actually receiving mental health treatment and travelling to that, but they retain the concessionary travel regardless of whether the journey is to the mental health treatment or not. It is also for somebody with a learning disability that they are required to travel to see a support worker. We do not think that that is right and fair, but if the support worker travels to see them, they then do not get concessionary travel. As I say, a large number, we would expect several thousand to have probably missed out on that passported benefit in the meantime. Okay. Does anyone else want to comment on that one? That's fine. I'm going to bring in Ruth Maguire. Thanks, convener. Good morning, panel. I'd like to ask you about passporting from universal credit. We've also gathered your written evidence, but for the record here, just your reflection on whether passported benefits should be available to everybody in receipt of universal credit or whether they should all have income thresholds and just anything that you want to say about those thresholds. A one-parent family Scotland described them as arbitrary, so I'm interested to hear your opinion. There's certainly universal credit presents a challenge for assessing at what point somebody's income would qualify for a passported benefit because a lot of the existing passported benefits would be based on the legacy benefit system where it would be for particular purposes if somebody was out of work due to ill health. Then everyone on that benefit could qualify because universal credit takes in six of the existing benefits, then income thresholds have been set. We set out in our evidence that there's a range of different incomes that have been set from everyone on universal credit qualifying, in the case of the best start grant, funeral payments to £610 a month for free school meals, £1,250 a month for help with prison visiting costs, £435 for help with NHS costs and NHS vouchers, and in the current reserved healthy start scheme £408, so it's not entirely, people might be on universal credit and qualifying for a whole range of different benefits at different times. If there was a more consistent threshold that would be helpful in terms of being able to work out easily what passported benefits support somebody might be entitled to, and I think the other issue that we'd raised around this is because unlike the legacy benefits there's no physical award letter printed off for universal credit, then authorities need to consider what evidence they would take of someone's universal credit award, for instance some local authorities have taken to a print out of someone's online journal instead of an award letter. In an ideal world there would be some automated information sharing element to that and that's something that we would be in favour of as well. For us a major concern is the threshold being set that create cliff edges that people fall, income can end because of minor changes in their circumstances and to avoid those scenarios is a real emphasis that we would like to see on the system. The setting of arbitrary levels can always be contested but you can look to see where you can avoid major problems for low income families in ensuring that there's no cliff edges for them to fall off because of minor changes. Do you think that the thresholds are set correctly at the moment or do you think they need to change? I think that it's too low for free school meals for example. At the moment it's set around 16 hours, 17 hours on minimum wage and for a lone parent they could be required to work up to 25 hours on paying off having a benefit sanction if they don't take up the extra hours offered. But to give a concrete example of the cliff edge and I would admit that this is a rough back of the envelope calculation so if somebody works out more exactly fair enough but based on some of the figures supplied by CPAG alone parent with four children all of school age who did increase their hours from 16 hours to 25 hours would actually be worse off after the increase in hours so although their earnings would rise by about £3,000 a year because of the clawback from universal credit about two thirds of that and then the additional school meal cost which could have over £400 a year for each child would actually be worse off and you know even for a three child family they're barely better off over over the entire year and I think that that has implications. I mean we had more deaths than births in Scotland over the winter months this year and that you know causes me and should cause everybody in this room who's older quite a bit of concern because you know it's not just immigration that can cause a population to grow it's also the birth rate and we seem to be penalising families who have more than two children at the moment and yet we could be dependent on those children as tax payers and care providers, NHS staff, teachers etc in the future so you know these large families just now who are being penalised people seeing that are going to avoid that complication if they can and reduce probably the birth rate even further and we're going to face real problems in a generation from now but you know definitely these cliff edges need to be addressed and I think you know I would prefer to see universal credit as a passport to free school meals for all children in those families because the retention of universal credit by for example a family with a disabled child or a disabled parent who's on a higher income you know from earnings is because of the extra cost to disability so they're getting more money from the state because the state recognises that they you know they're penalised by these additional costs and then the state is taking that money back through school meals charges or hospital visits or whatever so you know if we can't abolish you know the thresholds at all I think we really do need to seriously look at them and standardise them at a higher level than is currently the case because I think they are penalising a lot of low-income families thank you that's interesting I think that comes back to the point about the clarity of what the passported benefit what all benefits are for as well doesn't it thank you thank you thank you my questions are really probably to start off with you Rob if that's okay and it's around your submission which I find interesting reading and in particular I just wanted to get a wee bit more information on your views around the new Scottish disability benefits and mobility and you suggest that there's an argument that those who aren't on the high-rate PIP mobility should still be entitled to an award of a car could you explain a bit more about how that would work and any caution behind that so that was it was basically that was a suggestion that came out of some consultation that we've we've done with CAB advisors and clients since the the transition from from DLA to PIP there's been a large number of people who have who've lost access to the the mobility scheme because they haven't receiving the top mobility rate of PIP whereas they were they were in in DLA and this is this has caused a number of issues for people in particularly in rural areas where where they might not have the access to public transport to get them where where they want to go and it can it can cause a real barrier for people's ability to to get around one of the the suggestions that we have made is that it it might be that that somebody pays something extra towards the cost of mobility in some cases if if they're on a lower lower rate of lower rate of mobility to give more people access to the the mobility scheme which is which is very popular and I think that I think that that we've seen that sort of clients really really appreciate the the benefits it can it can bring but I think in the main we would we would be keen with the the new disability benefits to to change the to change the the qualifying conditions for for receiving the enhanced mobility component to being able to walk walk less than than 20 meters which is similar to the threshold in in DLA which i think is a sort of a fairer fairer assessment of of somebody's mobility needs which would lead then qualify qualify someone for for the mobility scheme and I think you also argue that in your paper I suggest that at the moment you can't get a mobility scheme or you can't get a high rate pip if you're over 65 with that cut off again you're suggesting in your submission I think I read was that actually that arbitrary date should be removed and anyone of any age should get or be at least be able to apply for that and again have you got any costings of how much that would cost to do? It shouldn't cost anything to do it. I think what Cass are arguing is that the mobility scheme is opened up to people who are on lower potentially lower rate mobility pip and are unable to walk 50 meters which was the old test for higher rate mobility in DLA because in Scotland around according to projections which look by the way to be pretty accurate at the moment around 46, 47,000 people will lose entitlement to higher rate of mobility when transferred from DLA to personal independence payment so there are very large proportion of people who are currently entitled who are going to lose that entitlement almost 50 per cent. Now what they do at the moment is they lease cars from the mobility scheme so they pay for them. There is no public subsidy as such it's the benefits that pay for the leasing of the car so if you opened up eligibility to apply to lease a car it would still be benefit at least but you might then have to top that up with payments potentially from earnings potentially from other benefits and a lot of disabled people would like to be able to do that as we would older disabled people who only qualify for attendance allowance because their impairment the onset of their impairment or the decrease in their mobility happens after the 65 when they're only able to claim attendance allowance. My mother's one of those people. My mother qualifies for the highest rate of attendance allowance but can't lease a mobility vehicle so it's what she would do would be to use her attendance allowance payment to pay for the leasing of a vehicle rather than to pay for taxies and things like that. You're not suggesting then that people who are over 65 should be allowed to apply for the mobility component of PIP. All you're saying is that they take the benefit that they're entitled to already and rather than use it for you say taxes or for care or whatever they use that to then use it to go towards the car and that would be true for those who are presumably on the different the low rate of PIP for care rather than just using it to then buy into that scheme as well. Is that correct? I'm not necessarily arguing against extending PIP into over 65 but what I'm saying even under the current system the restriction on eligibility restricts older disabled people from being able to exercise rights that younger disabled people of working age can do. I just think that a lot of older people would like that ability to lease a car because it is now, without town shopping centres etc, it's so much more difficult to access shops unless you have that, especially if my mum's had two knee replacement operations and has got arthritis in her spine. It's incredibly difficult for her to get across the shops 200 yards away, so it's something that a lot of older disabled people would like is to see eligibility to be able to lease extended to them. I think that's helpful because that clarifies a bit what I've misread. Just a couple of very quick questions. Is there a point that you built in regard to those who have lost the car because of the change in regulations? Do you have figures of those who have now got the car, particularly those perhaps with mental health issues who were never entitled to it before because they could never get in? Has there been any work done to know how many more people have now got the car who are affected by mental health issues who weren't entitled to VODLA? No, and again that's partially because of that decision last year. Because that decision essentially said that people who needed to be accompanied on most of their journeys could qualify for the higher rate of pit, the review will change the figures quite considerably because, as it stood, around 34 per cent of people with mental health issues lost all entitlement to pit altogether, including any mobility award that they had, so that will change quite dramatically after that sifting has been conducted and after those backdated awards have been made. Of course, you're right, some people have benefited, but overall it's around 46-47 per cent have lost their car because they've either lost entitlement altogether or they've been awarded mobility at the lower rate, so there have definitely been a few gainers, but overall it's nearly half who have lost out. My final question on a slightly different area, clearly we are going to end up in regard to possibly different regulations for a lot of those benefits that have been devolved compared to those in England and Wales. In regard to passporting, do we accept that those different regulations and rules apply and how do you think that that would work in practice for assessments, particularly the relationship between DWP and the new agency? Have you got concerns that DWP are working with one rules, Scottish is in, they are working with different rules and they miss each other and how do you think that that can be dealt with at an early stage? All the new regulations have still to be made in Scotland, obviously, around assessments. One of the amendments, I'm glad to say that it was accepted, is that people not necessarily need to prove that they cannot walk, for example if they are amputees, because that would seem an unnecessary assessment now that that amendment was made to what is now the Social Security Act. I think that there could well be differences between the two schemes, but as we are not taking administrative control for at least another three years, as far as I understand, I think that there is time to sort out any complexities that might arise in the system and differences. I would certainly be argued for differences in Scotland compared with the situation in England and Wales, but we will have to see what can be afforded as much as what we would like to see as a disabled people's organisation. Does anyone else want to go on to that? I think that it is probably something that we considered when setting the eligibility criteria and the regulations for the new disability benefits, but it would be within the gift of the Scottish Government and the Scottish Parliament to set those for other past budget benefits, such as blue badges and concessionary travel. Those are within the powers of the Scottish Parliament, so there is scope for it to be looked at and to make sure that that nobody falls through the cracks without it crossing over into reserve territory. There are a number of working groups that are already established and are throwing up those types of issues, so there is ample time to identify those problems and to ensure that people get the opportunity to work to address any issues that are coming forward. It is going to take willingness on the part of officials and the politicians, but that is their task, and they should be held to account to ensure that that is the way we move forward. I am presuming that that is something that is historically to do with age of state benefit eligibility. Do you know if there are any plans to change that, since the Waspie women in particular are now waiting until they are slightly older than that before they are eligible for a state pension? The confusing thing is that the 65 is not the barrier. It is whether you applied for a disability benefit before you were 65 or after you were 65. Anybody who has claimed disability living allowance before they were 65 and got the higher rate entitlement then and carried that over into their retirement retains the ability to lease a mobility vehicle, but somebody who, as I say, acquires an impairment or their condition deteriorates after they are 65 and they only then apply or they only then realise they can apply, they can only claim attendance allowance and therefore they lose out. As you say, they may look at that 65 threshold in the future and move it upwards in line with their retirement age. It would seem sensible to me that they did so, but there are also arguments, as Jeremy has already alluded to, that it seems unfair on the older generation that they cannot get an award for mobility simply on the basis of the age when they apply. As a declaration that I am in the seat of PIP myself, just for a declaration at the start. I would like to follow up a couple of those issues on the issue of attendance allowance, which does not have a mobility component and therefore does not passport to the blue badge scheme and to mobility. It seems to me that some of that should be reviewed. Our predecessor committee, aged concern and a submission to the welfare reform committee, our predecessor, said that they have been unable to find any published official rationale for why that was the case, that attendance allowance does not have that mobility component and DLA and PIP do, and they went on to say, this situation seems to imply that older people who have a disability somehow have less need to move around or less need for financial support to allow them to do so than those who experienced disability earlier. That is manifestly discriminatory. It means that the age of a person when they become disabled determines the support available, not the severity of the disability itself. Is that an understanding that you have? Do you think that we really need to be reviewing some of the criteria? It does seem a bit arbitrary and random. I think that the cut off age for attendance allowance is something that CAB clients will often find unfair because they have become disabled after the age of 65 that they do not necessarily qualify for any mobility support. I think that the arguments that I have heard for having that there are a broadly cost-based and to do in some cases with the effects of the ageing process, but there are many people whose disability is not necessarily connected to the ageing process. For instance, a client whose wife could not qualify for the mobility scheme because she received attendance allowance, but she had recently had both legs amputated, which is not necessarily related to the ageing process. I think that it is definitely something that we think should be looked at as part of developing the new disability assistance and whether there should be mobility support for people over 65 as well as those under 65. Is that a view shared by other witnesses? That argument still stands. I think that this is an ample opportunity to do the type of review that you are calling for. There are a lot of anomalies in the system historical, which have been identified over a period of time. Sometimes when you start to unpick things, it can lead to unintended consequences, but that does not mean that you could not have a look to see whether the changes that are being asked for because of perceived anomalies would not have opportunity costs. If people are restricted from movement for whatever circumstances, that can lead to on-going difficulties, which will have a cost on health services and social services. Therefore, by maximising the ability for people to get out and about, could, in the longer run, have more cost implications than providing the support that was necessary at the time out of keeping people active and keeping them mobile? I suppose that with disability assistance coming online in the next few years, it seems like an ideal opportunity to get this right, to revisit how mobility is assessed and to ensure that everyone who needs access gets it. As I said earlier, we are creating a society in which it is increasingly vital that people have means of transport, yet bus usage is falling, particularly in rural areas. It is becoming harder for people to live that, whether they are older or disabled people. That has cost implications for people in the central belt, because people will tend to move to where they can still access services. We could look at further depopulation in rural areas that are caused by that. There are all sorts of things that we need to think through as a society about how we address those issues, particularly because Scotland is much more rural than the rest of the UK. I am sorry, convener. Thank you very much. Good morning, panel. Just on that point, Alison Johnstone used the word opportunities. This morning, we went through a number of different aspects, particularly missing out on passported benefits due to not receiving the qualifying benefit and issues around whether individuals are in receipt of universal credit. Is there anything that you have not managed to touch on so far that you see as an opportunity with the Social Security Act's implementation that would be beneficial to addressing the issue of passporting rights? I think that there are a few issues that could be improved about the system, particularly information sharing. In some ways, automating the process of being able to apply would be helpful to the degree of allowing information to be shared to pre-populate an application form, for instance. I think there are issues that we would also encourage a range of ways to apply for passported benefits, in the case of a number of local authorities that have moved to a digital by default system, which has meant that the only way to apply for blue badges and free school meals is online, which presents a barrier to a large number of people. It is not necessarily that it could be done without the devolution of benefits, but it is certainly something that we would like to see looked at and people being given a range of ways to apply. It is also potential to use the new online system to automatically award passported benefits to certain people, for example the blue badge or concessionary travel, without having to go through a separate application process. You apply and if you are awarded at the rate that entitles you to those, or you have the condition, because for concessionary travel several conditions such as Parkinson's and visual impairment etc, where you can get automatic entitlement to concessionary travel, where it could be just awarded by the new agency without the person having to go through that. That would increase take-up, reduce costs for people who really do not need those additional costs, and you will essentially help to alleviate poverty because we each barrier that people have to overcome, and it is not just learning to disabled people that have problems with online usage. Older disabled people again, a very large proportion of them do not use the internet at all, so applying for a blue badge becomes very difficult, which it needn't be. I think that there are definitely potentials there. The other thing, I think that the working pensions committee at Westminster just completed a report on motability, and what they've pointed out is that currently there are three agencies involved in the motability scheme, if you're not aware. There's a private company, Motability Operations, and then there are two charities, one called Motability and one called Ten Year Anniversary Trust. Collectively, they operate the motability scheme, but they're all supposedly separate legal entities, except the private company denies its profits to the charities, which is a nice arrangement. Currently, the Motability Operations side of the private company is sitting with something like £2.4 billion in reserves, and that is a 300 per cent increase on the level of reserves held in 2008. The potential is there for that company to offer the leases at reduced rate and reduce the level of reserves in that way, but it doesn't want to do so, and yet it has very, very little risk because the payments are coming from the social security system, so they're guaranteed as long as the person is in receipt of the benefit. Despite the low-level risk, they've got very high-level reserves in comparison to the value of the cars that lease, so I don't know that that isn't necessarily within your power to do something about it, but certainly something I would like to see you raising with your colleagues at Westminster, that if the lease cost could be reduced, then many more disabled people would be able to afford to lease their vehicles, and therefore, again, we would begin to address some of the issues about your transportation in a modern society. I think there may also be opportunities, and it's not necessarily about the new system, but an opportunity because of the new system coming into operation, that we start to address one of the biggest bug barriers that affects many people who work with people with disabilities, and that's the postcode lottery that occurs in delivery of services. If it's possible to have criteria set across the country, but still retain flexibility at a local level, then that system would be ideal, but what really creates difficulty is when you have nationally set criteria, but the charges at different local authority levels are different for people with the same disabilities. That creates a lot of problems, so I think there are opportunities to look at trying to reduce, if not eradicate completely, the extent of the postcode lottery that affects people in terms of charges and income disparities between one local authority area and another. Can you just give me an example of that, for instance? Motability? Sorry, the blue card. In some areas there's no charge for a blue card, in other areas there is a charge, so if you happen to live in one local authority area and you qualify for the blue card, the blue badge, then that's great for you, but in another area you have to pay for it. Your disability in the area that you get it for nothing may be less than in the area where you have to pay for it, so that these disparities create a lot of annoyance if nothing else. When people are looking at these types of systems, there's an inherent unfairness in some of the systems, and they could be addressed. There's an opportunity now to look at that and work with local authority colleagues to ensure that, when criteria are set across the country, that although trying to retain as much flexibility as possible, that flexibility should be towards trying to produce more services for the money available rather than saying, well, in this area we're going to charge you for that service, whereas in another area you're not going to be charged for it. It's the school clothing grant, which the Parliament and the Government have taken action on. The school clothing grant is really important to a lot of low-income families, and standardising the level of that grant is a big step forward, but the qualifying criteria vary from local authority to local authority. Again, in one local authority, somebody on universal credit might get it, and in another one, they don't. Again, for those families, it's no use that the grant is now standardised at £100 if you can't get access to it. National qualifying criteria, but local flexibility in some ways and in the way that it's delivered, that's what we'd like to see. You wanted a quick supplementary, Mr Bowie. I suppose that it's just that sort of continual wrestle and acknowledging the specific things that you've raised are a problem. What does national criteria, but local flexibility, look like? I suppose that it's just trying to understand. I hope that work is under way to standardise in terms of the school clothing grant, because I know that some local authorities had it at a lower level, so that they could provide it to more people, for example. That's a local choice. What does nationally set but locally flexible look like? It would be helpful to have an example, because it just feels like it's a continual. With that one in particular, the local authority might, for example, be able, because it becomes a bulk buyer, to negotiate preferential rate for the school uniform purchase, with a particular provider or set of providers, so that it gets more banks for its box. That would be helpful as well. That's an example of how a local authority could use its purchasing power through the school clothing grant system to have a certain amount of local flexibility in delivering it. In relation to free school meals and the school clothing grant, free school meals might be an example of where the entitlement is set nationally, but the delivery is done locally and can be done in a range of different ways. With the new minimum threshold for the school clothing grant, it might be an example of that, because there would be nothing, as I understand, to prevent local authorities from paying a higher school clothing grant if they wanted to do so. For instance, if there were local circumstances where the cost of school clothing, school uniforms locally was higher or there were particular particular needs to do so, or even if they wanted to make it higher, the point about the eligibility criteria for school clothing grants is one that does need to be looked at. It can vary quite noticeably between local authorities. Most use the same criteria as free school meals. In some, it's more people qualify, but in some, fewer people would qualify for a school clothing grant than free school meals, so that might be something that would get what an acceptable minimum level for qualifying for the school clothing grant, as well as the level of the grant that might be, whilst keeping it locally delivered. Mr Adam. I'm particularly interested in what Bill I'm going back to, what Jeremy Balfour and Alison Johnson was talking about, when you talked about the motability scheme, and they have more flexibility. I know that it's a charity, and the first question would be does Westminster actually have any sway over it as a charity in order to create that flexibility that you're looking for? According to the charity, no, because all charities have to be completely independent of political influence in that way, but, according to the DWP's own minister, they do have a certain sway over it. When it was realised that it would be a large proportion of people losing their higher rate mobility or when they were transferred across to personal independence payment, there were exchanges and meetings between the charity and the minister's office, where a transitional protection scheme was eventually devised, where there was some compensation for those who were losing the higher rate in the form of a cash payment that compensated them for the loss of the vehicle, almost, and that they could buy back the vehicle if it was a certain age, etc. There was a compensation scheme involved, and it definitely involved meetings and correspondence between the minister's office and the charity. Whatever the charity says, there was definitely some influence. Although there is no public funding in the normal sense of the word—not a grant going to the charity or anything—all the funds come from the public source. If it wants to continue to operate, it is a monopoly provider because nobody else is allowed to compete with them for the contract to provide mobility vehicles. It gets tax concessions due to that, both for VAT and vehicle insurance, which are worth about £800 million a year, quite considerable tax concessions. Given all that, there is some way of influencing how it goes about its business, I would say, as a charity and as a provider. I hope that the minister will address that. I am interested in the point of view that, in a previous life, I used to work in that industry and effectively it was in fleet, in particular in the largest fleet in the country. It used to be when I was working at 80 per cent of the market was fleet, but it is now 50-50. At that time, it still is the largest fleet. Effectively, it is the largest fleet in the UK, and it can negotiate with manufacturers. That is why I find your idea about flexibility intriguing and the idea of possibly extending it and making people have to use the scheme as a way to get a vehicle, but they would pay extra, but it would not be anywhere near as much as they were going out of Joe Vlog's office seat. It still was part of the scheme of continually paying it and not necessarily putting any more financial strain on the benefit system, but making a huge difference to somebody's life and the mobility as well. It is something that can be done. With that buying power alone, which you quite rightly say, most manufacturers use it as a way for market share to get their numbers up. It is considerable. As you know, because you have worked in the industry as well, the second-hand vehicles have a considerable influence on the cost of the second-hand vehicles throughout the rest of the country. The Scottish Government could use its bargaining power because it will be in control of the new benefits to negotiate with the mobility charity, not unduly influence, but hopefully influence in some ways, about eligibility criteria. As you say, it would open up cheaper vehicles to a larger number of people. Potentially it would have quite great benefits in terms of access to health services, other local services, retail, etc. It seems like something worth doing and using that power to negotiate a better deal. It is the first time I have heard my previous experience in life has been any use in this job. The first one was a point of clarification of interest because I was not aware of it, but you referred to the massive reserve that you think the mobility private company is holding. What does that reserve equate to in terms of their monthly operating costs? How many months are they holding? Do you know? I think that it is something like twice the operating cost. It is a two-year annual running cost, so it is way above the requirements of the strategy. It is way above any requirements. Because of the crash in 2008, they were exposed to some risk in the second-hand car market. There was about a 20 per cent loss in vehicle value. The reserves then coped with that more than sufficiently. They were only around £568 million. I would say that the scope for them to use more of their profit, which they are currently putting into reserves, to reduce the cost of vehicles, which would benefit a very large number of people, which is £659,000 still on the scheme at the moment. You are widening it. You could benefit potentially over a million people and still maintain an adequate level of profit. That takes me nicely into my next question, which is around—you mentioned earlier that one of the complex issues around this is affordability, that, although we would all like to answer everybody's queries, the reality is that there comes a point where decisions have to be made. You then also referred to, I think it was Michael, around the issue around spend to save. You referenced that, actually, if we get it right in terms of what we spend and what we give in benefits, we can save a lot of money down the line. How well do you think we are equipped in Scotland to actually look at that in terms of targeting our benefits effectively so that, actually, we make real changes both in poverty and in impact on, say, the NHS or future opportunities for children? How good do you think we are? Have we got those baselines? Can we make that kind of effective decision or are we slightly wallowing in terms of just trying to be nice, if you like? I think there are enough organisations, university research bodies who look at that type of thing. Certainly in a previous lifetime I experienced on the finance committee in this Parliament a lot of advice and information from organisations who do look at that type of issue and can look at cost benefit analysis in terms of social services and social provision and can make very positive suggestions as to how things can be improved. Within the health services, there are those types of analysis that are taking place on a regular basis. I think that you have the way with all that. Certainly, if it seems to be lacking in any way, I am sure that this Parliament can find ways of identifying resources to try to identify the types of information that would allow good policy decisions to be made on the basis of facts and information. I cannot in terms of mobility because the research has not been done. In terms of free school meals, it has. Where universal provision was provided in pilot areas, children's level of attainment increased by two months over their peers in schools where there was no universal provision. Is this at primary school level? Yes, at primary school level. Two months ahead of their peers in primary school. That is partly why, increasingly, primary is one, two and three in Scotland is universal provision. It also improved the health, but the most marked improvements were among children from the lowest income households. If we have an attainment challenge and we want to address it, we will address the needs of those low-income children and, again, to go back to something that I bring up regularly, according to the new policy institute, 49 per cent of all children living in poverty are either disabled children or the children with disabled parents. It is very similar levels for children with low-income parents. If we can address their needs in terms of attainment through something like this, we address child poverty, attainment levels and health issues. Again, factoring in that for the rest of somebody's life, not having osteoporosis when you are a pensioner relieves the care burden. There are all sorts of benefits that we can gain from universal provision or, if not universal, based on a good low-income proxy. One of the things that struck me over the years—I was giving evidence to the finance committee a long time ago and did not see the changes that we thought we would clearly evidence would make a difference—is that joined up thinking? Free school meals work really well at primary level. When you get to secondary level, a lot of the youngsters are going down the street and they do not want to be isolated or alienated. They want to be with their mates and they want to go down the street with everybody else and therefore do not always use their free school meal, which is a real problem. The same thing that you talked about earlier about school uniforms. We could do better by people by using the power of buying, but freedom of choice about where you buy your uniform etc. means that that dissipates that ability to use that power. I wondered how much you have looked at or thought about how policy needs to join up to make universal benefits more effective and where there are benefits that maybe are not universal and that we do not stigmatise people who are on them and who really need them and should be using them. The issue of stigma is very important. I know that local authorities have done quite a bit of work around how they can reduce the stigma associated with free school meals, for instance, making sure that if there are vouchers that they are all the same colour, it is a fairly simple change, but one that can make a big difference to avoid people feeling stigmatised and not claiming the support that they are entitled to. I know that a number of organisations have done a lot of work around this. They need the poverty alliance and some of the organisations that are due to appear on the next panel. It is definitely something that does need to be carefully considered both when designing benefits, but also in how they are delivered to make sure that if they are targeted that they can be done so in a way that does not urge stigma, because we know from our experience that that can lead to people not claiming all the support that they are entitled to. It is something that is very important. I also have to bear in mind that there is sometimes a stigma attached with not having that service available. A young person with a learning difficulty at a primary school may have difficulty in counting out change to pay for their school meal, so you balance that against what potential stigma there might be in having the free school meal. There has always got to be balances taken into account, and that is why I think that the starting point would be to extend those services widely and universally, as it is possible to do. Definitely, stigma is still an issue. If you look at entitlement rates and take-up rates, there is quite a close alignment so that if there is a very high entitlement level in an area of multiple deprivation, there will also be a high take-up rate, because there is little stigma attached because everybody is doing it. Whereas in schools where there is much more mixed intake and there is a lower level entitlement, there is much lower take-up rate because the stigma attached to it is much higher. Those are issues that we really need to address. As Rob said, some of them are simple. Other ones are more complex to address, and you are right. The culture is to go out and go to Greggs or the chippy van or the burger van, etc. Workers do that as well. People do what they see their older parents and older brothers and sisters do. Again, if we want to get back to a healthier eating culture, we need to address some of those issues, but it is not just to do with entitlement. It is to do with the culture and food culture that we want to foster in our society. The committee has been looking at automation, which has been mentioned today. We have got the passport in as an entitlement, but then it is getting people to take up on how they access that entitlement being an issue. You mentioned data sharing with regard to universal credit, and there is not anything as simple as a letter to say that I am on universal credit that you can take elsewhere. Do you have any other example of those pinch points for data sharing that could inform us going forward? The main pinch point would be where data is held by different authorities, so universal credit would be held by the DWP. Passport benefits are administered by local authorities or by the Scottish Government. I know that it is something that has been looked at in the context of the social security bill and the regulations for the new benefits. That is something that might want to be considered, whether there are data sharing agreements to make it easier for people to receive benefits without needing to make an additional application, or if there is, then making it as simple as yes, I would like to receive the benefits that it has already been established that I am entitled to. There are some local authorities who have previously done some work with their housing benefit and council tax reduction records to see who might be entitled to preschool meals and school clothing grants. That sort of work is particularly positive, so that the information that is held is used to make sure that people can receive all the support that they are entitled to. If there are no further questions, I thank you all for your attendance this morning and I will suspend briefly for three or four minutes. I would like to welcome our next panel of witnesses. We have Anne Baldock, Financial Inclusion Team Leader, One Parent Family Scotland, Mike Daly, Solicitor, Advocate and Principal Solicitor for Government Law Centre and Hannah McCulloch, Policy and Parliamentary Officer, Child Poverty Action Group Scotland, and a very warm welcome to committee this morning. I thank you again for submissions prior to today's meeting. I would just like to open with a similar question to what was given to the first panel. I think that you were all here to see that evidence session was whether you think that that link between what are reserved social security benefits and devolved benefits is tenable going forward and whether you believe that there should be any changes to that. I work for the child poverty action group and our key concern is addressing child poverty in Scotland. That is clearly a concern of the Parliament as well, given the cross-party support for the child poverty act. Passported entitlement provides a useful proxy to identify the right families, and it also has the potential to simplify what can be a complex process and to reduce administrative costs and, most importantly, boost take-up of what are really important entitlements, particularly for families on the lowest incomes. There has been progress over the last few years in relation to Scotland in terms of trying to simplify the landscape going forward in relation to best start grants, for instance. I think that we need to continue to build on that progress I think that the key concerns going forward in terms of that link between reserved benefits and devolved passported benefits is obviously that the passporting benefits are the right ones and they identify the right people. The people that are entitled to those passporting benefits are able to access them reliably, and that is obviously a big concern in relation to universal credit. I can certainly come back and add more detail in relation to our concerns about universal credit as a reliable passporting benefit. Secondly, we are concerned that there is an additional requirement on top of a passporting benefit. For instance, the earnings threshold in relation to free school meals is fair, set at the right level and does not exclude families that could really benefit and did previously benefit from some of those passported benefits. I will chance to come back on a universal credit. Mr Daley, you want to attend now? Yes, thank you convener and good morning. Government law centre's position is that I think that we have a really unique opportunity in Scotland now to enhance and improve the accessibility of passported benefits. We think that access should be streamlined, it should be automated where possible to improve the experience of the person who is receiving those benefits. We think that that then helps to maximise take-up, which is so important. It reduces administration and bureaucracy and the cost, so it is good for public bodies too. It reduces waiting times, eliminates mistakes and ultimately, I think that this is the key thing, is that it gives people dignity. You do not have to tell your story every time you want to apply for something. I hope that we get an opportunity to come on to how we can really use this opportunity to do some radical things in Scotland. Our thoughts are having the new Scottish Social Security Agency, having the ability to do proactive. We heard earlier from the witnesses the idea that, if you receive a particular benefit, it could open the door to everything else for you. That would be a wonderful thing if Scotland could have such a progressive, proactive system whereby you do not have to fill in lots of paperwork online or make phone calls. You do one of those things and everything opens up for you. I believe very strongly that the link should be maintained. People who are applying for passported benefits face having to try and find out what passport benefits are available. There are all the different rules around the threshold, and they are doing this at a time when there may be facing quite difficult situations, for example child disability. We think that, if there was a streamlined point of award, as fellow witnesses have already said, if it could be streamlined so that only award of benefit is then automatically awarded the appropriate passported benefits, where applicable, because not all passported benefits can be delivered at that point, and where it cannot be delivered automatically. The award letter should include those passported benefits that you are entitled to, and that is all that you need to do to claim it. Passported benefits supplement basic benefits, which have been frozen for the last couple of years by the national government. It is important to recognise the increase in real costs of services that those passported benefits cover. We have a unique opportunity to look at the levels of those passported benefits and how it affects across the country. There is such a wide difference in a lot of the benefits that are passported, for example, as everybody has already been talking about. The clothing grant and free school meals, the clothing grants and the criteria for them can be different across the country, especially around teenagers who are applying for their EMA. Some councils, if they claim the EMA, their parents cannot get the clothing grant, and other councils do, they get both. We would like to see a conformity so that that links up with what is happening between the two, the DWP and the new Scottish Social Security. Ms McGuire, you had questions around universal credit previously. Thank you, convener. I am sorry, because I am not going to have to listen to the same questions again. I will try to re-jig it a little bit so that it is not too dull. Good morning, panel. You have heard the first panel raise some of their concerns around passporting from universal credit, so just be interested to hear your reflections. We had one example of where the thresholds can mean that it is a bit of a cliff edge for families, and potentially a disincentive to work more hours rather than to have full sum. I am just over to you to hear what you want to say. I think that there are two separate issues. The first one is universal credit, as the passporting benefit, and the second is the earning threshold, so I will try to address them separately. In terms of universal credit being a passporting benefit, in many ways it is a good indicator of households in need. There has been an income calculation in terms of identifying which families are low income and require additional resources, but there are real difficulties with it as well, particularly in practice in how that process of using it as a passporting benefit works. In terms of evidencing entitlement, for instance, it was raised earlier in the session, but in relation to tax credits, for instance, a person in receipt of tax credits would receive an awards letter that detailed very clearly their income and their entitlement, their lightly entitlement in the coming year. That was a tangible thing that could be produced to establish entitlement, and it is not the same with universal credit, where entitlement is the details of that are on an online journal, and they tend to relate to your entitlement in the last month. It is not a projection of what you will be entitled to over the coming year, so that has the potential to cause difficulties in relation to free school meals, for instance, because, if your income is fluctuating at all, your entitlement to universal credit will also fluctuate from month to month, so you might find yourself in a situation where you are in a zero-hours contract, for instance, and you worked a lot in the preceding month. In the month that you go to apply for free school meals, you do not have entitlement to universal credit because it just happened to get more hours the preceding month. That can create practical problems. The other important aspect of universal credit is that we know that it is mired in administrative problems and errors and delays. One in five people who apply for universal credit will not get it at the end of the five-week period that they are supposed to. If that period falls when you are applying for free school meals, you might find yourself having difficulty establishing your entitlement. As well as the delays, we have case evidence of people who should be entitled to universal credit. Students in particular circumstances, for instance, who are just told to blanket no, are not entitled. Errors of that kind will have a knock-on impact if there is no flexibility around universal credit being the sort of be-all and end-all passporting benefit. I can talk about the income threshold, but I may become back to that if you want to. The Government Law Centre would certainly support CPEG's position. Our fundamental position is that universal credit is ultimately flawed and is a source of misery for people across Scotland and the UK. It would be wonderful if it was to be scrapped. It is a source in itself of a multitude of problems. The best that we can do in Scotland is to mitigate those problems. We believe in universality as a principle. We have talked about free school meals. I remember that we drafted the free school meals bill back in 2000. Other witnesses have talked about the problems with stigma. There are certain things such as child benefit free school meals that, if they become universal, you solve all those problems. Anybody who is in receipt of universal credit should be eligible for free school meals. We could do things that are quite progressive like that. The Scottish Government has already been flexible and progressive. The position in terms of council tax reductions has reduced the ability for local authorities to estimate when somebody has a fluctuating income on universal credit. We need more of that approach, but ultimately the difficulty that we have with universal credit, if we are absolutely candid, is that it is creating problems that we are constantly trying to mitigate in Scotland. I would heartedly agree with what both Mike, Hannah and the previous speakers have all said. Universal credit in itself causes problems for single parents. Single parents will be in a group that is particularly badly affected by the changes to universal credit, especially young loan parents, who will no longer receive the higher rate of personal allowance under universal credit, which drops right away their income by £23, £24 a week. On top of that, they have then got to try and work their way through the mire of passported benefits. Anything that can be done to make it an across-the-board award for people on universal credit, for both people in work and out-of-work, would be welcome, and it would make a huge difference to single parents. We have the opportunity at this time to be able to look at doing that. We have done quite a lot of work with the Government on the early years assessment, and it has been great to see the amount of work that has been put into design in a system that is easy to access and looking at who needs the assessment and what is the best way to deliver it. We would like to see that with passported benefits as it goes on. The problems with universal credit, as Mike was saying, are varied and numerous, but there are problems around the amount of time that it takes to claim in the initial assessment. Proving identity is also a big problem and can be an on-going problem. There has been research—I do not have the exact figures, but there has been research—to say that a lot of universal credit claims have been pushed back because of the need to prove identity. A lot of lone parents, for example, do not have either a passport or a driving licence, so they have no form. During that time, that is when they do not have the entitlement to universal credit. Under the benefit cap, the existing benefit cap for housing costs will leave £50 award so that they can claim discretionary housing payment. The benefit cap under universal credit goes right the way through and goes right down. There are a lot of problems with universal credit, adding to that to the different thresholds that I was talking about around people that are claiming what was tax credits. It is just making it even more complex. We would really support the Scottish Government putting a system in that is automated, is simple and the thresholds are across the board. Just to be clear, do you believe that the income thresholds are not set correctly at the moment for passporting of benefits? No, I think that they are too low. Other panel members have any reflections on the income thresholds? Yes, I think that they are set low. The welfare rights workers at CPAG have identified groups that would be excluded that are potentially vulnerable and very much in need of the passported benefits by the, in relation to free school meals, the 610 earnings threshold. For instance, someone who is receiving statutory maternity pay receives about £145 a week that works out over a monthly period of £629 a month, so they would not be entitled to free school meals. That would be someone on maternity leave that might have young children at school, very much in need of financial assistance, but just missing the entitlement. I think that wider problems with the thresholds are, as was said in the last session, arbitrary, because at least with universal credit, the amount of universal credit for the most part that you get is based upon your circumstances, so how many children you have is taken into account, again for the most part, and their particular needs. Whereas, when you just have a set income earnings threshold, that is the same regardless of whether you have one child or whether you have five children, so it really is arbitrary and it is a very low rate at which to set a cliff edge. Again, there is always going to be a cliff edge of some sort unless our preferred option would be universal entitlement, but in absence of that, there is always going to be a cliff edge, but at least when the cliff edge is the end of your entitlement to universal credit, that is a relatively high point in terms of income. You should not be facing that threshold in my opinion when you are working 16 hours a week and not wanting to take on an extra hour in case you lose your entitlement to free school meals. I would just briefly say that I agree with Hannah and Anne, but I think that we need to bear in mind that with that kind of austerity economic policies that we have had, where social security benefits other than some pension once have been frozen, people's day-to-day living costs have been going up exponentially. Utility bills, fuel goes up 5, 10 per cent, 15 per cent, all of that has been happening. The pounds have been devalued by about 15 per cent because of Brexit. We are an island nation, we import. People's costs of living have been going up and up and up, and yet, in terms of those thresholds, they are set quite low. We have to certainly revise those. One of the major issues with passporting is that someone can lose entitlement to a benefit if they have the claim for the benefit from which they were passported, rejected and, in CPAC's submission, you suggest in your written evidence a safety net approach that provides an alternative route to access passported benefits to ensure that individuals do not lose out on those benefits because of problems with the benefit that provided the passported entitlement. I would be grateful if you could expand on what you mean by that safety net approach, and I would like to hear from the other witnesses to their views on that. There are a few circumstances in which that might be useful and a few ways in which it might be done. In terms of the problems that I mentioned with fluctuating entitlements universal credit and therefore fluctuating entitlement to passported benefits, there are a few approaches that have been taken to provide a bit of a safety net. In Highland, for instance, my understanding is that a family can receive free school meals for a period of eight weeks while they are waiting for a decision to be made in relation to universal credit, so where there is a delay, that bridge is gapped, sort of more comprehensive approaches, I suppose, in relation to free school meals in England and Wales. If you were eligible for free school meals in March this year, you would not lose that entitlement until March 2022. Regardless of how your universal credit fluctuates, you know that you will not lose free school meals, so that provides a real security for families. Another area in which there has been flexibility is around council tax reduction. I am not a welfare rights worker, so I can come back with more detail in writing, but around council tax reduction my understanding is that regulations allow decision makers to make an estimate of income, which is based on universal credit entitlement, but is not stuck hard and fast to it. If there seems to have been a mistake or there has been a lot of fluctuation, so if a person's income is very high one month and they are not entitled to universal credit, my understanding is that this part of the council tax regulations would allow decision makers to use a bit of discretion and a bit of common sense around what that person's income actually is. Having that space to not take universal credit entitlement as gospel could be really important in making sure that people do not arbitrarily fall off from being entitled. I would certainly agree with the idea of a safety net. If the Scottish Social Security Agency could produce some national guidance that could help those bodies that are issuing passport benefits, I suppose that I am thinking of the idea of transition in people's lives. People who are wanting to get on in life and get into work, the reality is that you have to wait a month, let's say, before you get paid. You have got that transitional period that Hannah has talked about where it might be quite tough for a number of weeks before you can get everything running smoothly. If we were to have some sort of national approach that recognises transition in life when you lose a passported benefit, it does not mean that immediately you do not need it any more. It means that you need to have that until that period, whether it is weeks or whatever, that you are then actually okay. I think that that would be extremely valuable if we had an approach across Scotland to do that. I certainly agree. As Hannah was saying, the idea that they use for the council tax reduction is a very good model of how that works. When somebody comes off some benefits, there is a run-on of housing benefit and council tax reduction for a short period of time. The entitlement to passported benefits, if it was also included in that, would act as a buffer just for those transitions where people are having to wait four weeks to be paid to four weeks, but would need to have the universal credit recalculated because of the entitlement to childcare, etc. During that period, if there was a buffer zone or any transition, it would make a big difference. It sounds as if we have opportunities here to improve the system. I would like to discuss the issue of national administration, because there is a very large number of passported benefits and they are administered by various organisations. For example, the Scottish legal aid board administers passporting to legal aid in Transport Scotland, assesses your eligibility for concessionary travel. For benefits with national criteria, do you think that it would make sense to administer those centrally through the new Scottish Social Security Agency? I think that there is an attraction to that. If we look at, say, passported benefits, as you said, in terms of legal aid, the various local government NHS Scotland, Transport Scotland, it wouldn't be wonderful if the Scottish Social Security Agency could have, through its IT system, the ability to enable all those other passported benefits to kick in. If you have the DWP in terms of UK benefits, it would also be wonderful if there could be some sort of arrangement with the DWP to make that happen for everything. I suspect that that would take some time, but we do have some time anyway. All of those things, if you think about it, now that we have this opportunity—and it doesn't come along very often—why don't we design the system to fit the individual consumer, the individual person, so that it makes things as easy as possible? I think that the benefit to public bodies in local government is that it actually streamlines their whole administration process. There's a lot of opportunity here not just to improve the experience of the individual receiving passported benefits, but to streamline the whole of the system in terms of all the different organisations involved. Given the focus that we had on independent advocacy through the passage of the Social Security Bill, it would make sense if that independent advocate was dealing with one form at one time that led to—otherwise, it just seems remarkably inefficient, potentially, if we keep asking people to fill in different forms at different times. I don't think that we necessarily have a position on who is delivering the benefits. I think that it's all about the experience of the individual and if there's a way to ensure minimum entitlement, automation, where possible, and support with claims. It's less important to us who is doing that, as long as from the perspective of the person using the system it's straightforward. I also think that there's an opportunity in relation to how accessing these passported benefits can feed a person into the wider system and information advice. We know, for instance, that with best art grants, families will be able to access those at the point of a child being born, at the point of that child starting nursery, and at the point of that child starting school. That might be a way to use contact with universal services at those points, as a way to direct people through to information advice and wider entitlements. There is an element of that contact with that local contact with people, perhaps serving a purpose as well. If there is a conformity and it's a case of whatever your award is, you've got your passported benefits here, it's straight through, it's streamlined, there's a connection obviously between the two different systems. It's going to make it easier for people that are applying for these benefits, it's going to make it easier for people that have to advise and support people who are maybe then having to put in appeals, whatever. Anything that can streamline it, make it easier, has to be welcomed. It would also be welcome if any applications for passported benefits is made on different platforms. Universal credit can only be accessed through a web-based system. Single parents can have particular difficulties in getting access to digital forms, so if it could be made that there's different ways of applying for the one benefit that's going to cover everything and it's administered at the one place, it has to be a big improvement. I just wanted to pick up very quickly on a point that you were making about national conformity and whether it comes through and that's it, you're entitled and everybody gets that same entitlement. I was just thinking as it was being said about transport. When I live up a valley where there was no public transport whatsoever and it wouldn't matter how far you could walk, you couldn't access anything without having a car, so so much ability for example would be really important in that instance, but then I've got friends who can walk out their door and there's literally a bus stop outside the door and they can get to anywhere very easily. I was wondering therefore if you're talking about national conformity and local flexibility, how you marry that because if it comes through as a national conformity, my worry is that those who need it the most might find themselves getting less than they need and those who don't need it quite as much are getting slightly more than they need and therefore nobody's quite winning and I think this is something we're going to really wrangle with over the next two, three years is how you build that fairness into the system so that people are getting what they actually need. I think you're right that ultimately everything has to be paid for so everything has to be costed and it is ultimately a matter for policy to say that these are the parameters that we set, I mean give a law centre's position as we should set the parameters as wide as possible because that works in terms of take up and prevention. In terms of your specific point, I think we do need to give for example local government discretion but I would suggest that the discretion should be to go over and above what we accept as a minimum level safety net if you like across the country because one of the problems we have is this kind of postcode lottery so for example Scottish welfare fund administered by local authorities varies from time to time during the year in terms of pressures on budgets whether you can get a crisis grant or not. Now whatever we can do to try and make that more consistent would be helpful but I mean I take your overall point which is at the end of the day everything has a cost but it was about need actually rather than cost it's about making marrying need so that what you're getting is what you need rather than a sort of everybody gets that regardless of where they are. Yeah I mean I suppose we're not talking about universality when it comes to passport benefits I mean there are there are a criteria and I think by their very very nature that in order to get passport benefits you have to be on a particularly low level of income so I think I'm not quite sure that the issues about the need is problematic given that by definition to access these things you have to have the need. There's a level of need I suppose my example was that business for example with transport that yes you know everybody's got that level of need if you like but if you live if you live miles from any public transport and therefore there is little on option and and even your taxi allowance if you like would be used up incredibly quickly compared to if you you live in the centre of a city where you can easily access and everything's relatively close to you and you can easily access. I mean that's an argument so the need is very different say in motability type access yes but we're kind of going on and perhaps to the need for better public infrastructure in terms of transport and perhaps you know nationalising the provision of transport. I'll let you move on. My question was on summer align so it's been answered thank you. Mr MacPherson. Just very briefly Mr Daly I wondered if there's anything more you wanted to say about legal aid just given the nature of your work. I think the position in terms of legal aid in Scotland is not perfect it's we have a soft cap but it certainly in terms of the passporting position for those in receipt of certain benefits it is a fairly simple streamline process where you don't have to fill in a complicated financial form too to the Scottish legal aid board so I think that actually works really well but I don't want to necessarily stray on to talking about legal aid in the generality but certainly in terms of this committee's interest in terms of passporting I think it works really well. Good to have that clarification. Thank you. Just one last one this is a curiosity question to some degree. Mr Daly you said in your evidence that you would completely scrap universal credit that didn't work in your opinion but you also said that it's not working for one in five so the implication being that for 80% it's you know as good as any other system what's working if you like. So what is it you want if you don't want a universal you know one application into the system are you wanting to go back to separate applications for all different things I'm just curious as to how you perceive it should look. Oh well I mean I mean we've been talking about one application process to access a range of different things so I'm not quite sure that the question you pose is necessarily the correct premise in terms of passporting. I think one of the key difficulties in the design of universal credit has been that it's been used as an opportunity to actually do very regressive things so it's not just about for example the idea of I mean because universal credit as a concept is actually a wonderful concept you know let's have a single process for for social security but the reality is that's not what happened with universal credit and one of the big concerns that we have at governor law centre is the way that social security benefits are administered by a DWP is they get things wrong all the time and they do things incredibly humanely in terms of the assessment for for example for medical evidence so for example some of the figures are about 90% of mandatory reconsiderations so where people challenge the decision of the DWP 90% are overturned in terms of mandatory reconsiderations when it comes to appealing to the first tier tribunal 60% of appeals are successful so what that tells you is we've created a system where the DWP get it wrong all the time exclude people from what they're entitled to and create misery that's why we've got an opportunity to do something absolutely different answer the question as to what but i'll leave that with you can mr adam here supplementary in the back of what mike just said there because that is that is the debate we're having that's what we need to be looking at is the way we have this opportunity it will be difficult there are challenges data everything else that we're going to have to share with DWP and everyone else but benefits systems been looking for this one-stop shop this holy it's almost the holy grail of the benefits system for decades and this is probably the first time of a chance to relax pause and keep maybe a look at ways of delivering it and you know i'm kind of backing what mike's saying here is it not just the case that we should be looking at ways to try and make this work but it is extremely difficult because there are so many challenges out there with the DWP with data in particular you know even some of the benefits we're getting some of it's even manually based at the benefits that the Scottish Government will be getting you know so that sharing that and getting that over is going to be a major challenge for us as well i mean i completely agree and i mean to get philosophical if i can i think the law is itself when we design the law when the law is passed by parliament or at Westminster it's a manifestation of political choices and those manifestations are often quite discriminatory we don't want to give help or resources to this group of people and i think the social security system of the UK has done that and it's got progressively more and more discriminatory against groups of people women having more than x number of children so the opportunity we have in Scotland is to start the whole process from thinking about the human being and how could we do the very best for that individual and you're absolutely right it is complicated and there is no sort of easy solution but if we start with that premise which i think is what we're doing in scotland then that's going to create a much better system than we currently have further questions cannot i thank you all for your attendance committee this morning it's been extremely helpful for our deliberations and i will suspend briefly for two minutes thank you