 Good morning, and welcome everyone to the 32nd meeting of local government committees committee in 2017. Remind everyone present to turn off mobile phones and his meeting papers are provided in a digital format. Tablets may be used by members during the meeting. We've got a full house today, no apologies been received. I'm going to move to agenda item 1, which is the decision on taking business in private. The committee will decide whether consideration of its response to the finance and constitution committee on the draft budget 2018-2019 should be taken in private at future meetings. Are we agreed? Yes. Thank you. We've moved to agenda item 2, which is draft budget 2018-2019. The committee will take evidence of the Scottish Government's draft budget 2018-2019. I welcome Derek Mackay, Cabinet Secretary for Finance and the Constitution, and Kevin Stewart, Minister for Local Government and Housing, Bill Stitt, Team Leader, Revenue and Capital, Mary Ann Barker, Non-Dimestic Rates Group Secretary, Brad Gilbert, Head of Financial Innovation Unit and Angus McLeod, Head of Tackling Fuel Poverty Unit. I hope that I get everyone's titles accurately there. Welcome everyone for coming along to either scrutiny of the draft budget. Can I invite opening statements from both the Cabinet Secretary and the Minister at this stage? I don't know who's going first. Cabinet Secretary. Thanks, convener. I welcome this opportunity to discuss the Government's spending priorities with you and hear the views of the committee. As I made clear to Parliament, the 2018-19 budget is being delivered under the most challenging of circumstances. It is because of this that the Scottish Parliament is proposing to use the powers of the Parliament to build a fairer Scotland, invest in our public services and support business to develop and thrive. Local authorities are our key partners in delivering the vital services that the people of Scotland expect and deserve, which is why I have treated local government very fairly in providing a total settlement of over £10.5 billion. Within this total, I have been able to protect the resource budget in cash terms and increase their capital budget in real terms, which will result in a total increase in local authority core funding of £94 million. The Scottish Government is proposing to use its tax-raising powers, and if local government increases their council tax by 3%, they will raise an additional £77 million, also securing a real-terms increase in local government spending on services again next year. On non-domestic rates, I believe we now offer what is the most attractive rates package in the UK, the number one budget ask of business was to cap the inflation re-rise in the poundage at CPI rather than RPI, and my draft budget I propose to deliver on that policy. I also propose a package of reliefs worth an estimated £720 million next year, including small business bonus, which we have agreed to review as recommended by Barclay. The draft budget also includes a number of Scotland-only measures to cement Scotland as the best place to do business, and that includes nursery relief and the creation of a growth accelerator. I hand over to Mr Stewart. Thank you. Despite tough public expenditure conditions driven by Westminster, we have managed to secure further significant investment for housing, including our ambitious affordable housing supply and energy efficiency programmes. Our draft budget for 2018-19 shows our commitment to delivering on these with an increase to the more homes budget while maintaining the fuel, poverty and energy efficiency budget at its current level. I would like to take each of these in turn, starting with how we are increasing the capital spending on housing supply. The budget document notes that the total spend on more homes will be increased by 24 per cent to £723 million. All of the £523 million more homes capital funding will be directly invested in the affordable housing supply programme, chiefly for social housing, together with the £92 million budget for TMDF, which sits in the local government budget line. The total capital investment will be £615 million. This is a £144 million increase on the equivalent figure for 2017-18, and will enable councils and housing associations to increase the momentum needed to accelerate the pace of delivery. We have also allocated £141 million of financial transactions to the affordable programme, which means that the total budget for affordable housing in 2018-19 will be £756 million. This is the most powerful way to invest in housing supply for a fairer Scotland. Turning now to improving energy efficiency, our focus continues to be on reducing overall energy costs for Scottish consumers by improving energy efficiency in homes where we can. Next year we will allocate again £114 million to tackle this and improve the energy efficiency of our homes. This investment demonstrates our long-term commitment to address the challenges of climate change and also the inequality of fuel poverty in our society. We will deliver on that through our existing and developing fuel poverty programme, which offers a package of support to help those who are struggling to pay their energy bills and keep themselves warm. Finally, I want to turn to the important matter of our ongoing work to tackle homelessness. The homelessness and rough sleeping action group have already identified the immediate actions needed to tackle rough sleeping this winter, which we are implementing right now. By late spring 2018, they will be providing recommended longer-term actions to end rough sleeping, transform the use of temporary accommodation and move to end homelessness. In our programme for government, we committed £50 million to the ending homelessness together fund over the next five years, with the first £10 million set out in this draft budget statement. I look forward to the further recommendations of the action group early next year, and to take forward a lasting change and improvement to ensure everyone has a safe and stable home. Overall, despite the tough public expenditure conditions, we will still provide significant investment, meeting our commitments to building more affordable homes, improving energy efficiency and ending homelessness. I thank you for those opening statements. I think that it is only fair initially to put on record our thanks for additional transparency and information in relation to this budget. This committee last year asked for more information at the point that the Scottish Government budget was published, so we could clearly read over between headline figures in the Scottish Government draft budget and various funding streams to local government. I think that it is reasonable to say that that has been provided. It will help this committee with our scrutiny, and it will certainly help SPICE in relation to preparing support for this morning's session. That is welcome. Of course, the more numbers you get, the quicker you get them. It does not change the annual perennial debate over whether local government has sufficient funding or not. A reasonable opening question is, how would the Scottish Government ministers respond to criticism from local authorities and others that there is still not enough money in the pot to fund local government services? We might drill down some of those numbers in a second, but how would you respond to those criticisms that have been made? Thanks, convener. I would say that it is a fair settlement, and bearing in mind that we have had a real-terms reduction to our resource funding, and we have many priorities within the Scottish Government, but working with our partners is true to say that they were forecasting a much worse settlement and to be preparing for having far less resource than this draft budget proposes. I do believe that the settlement that we have outlined is fair. If I can describe the negotiations that I have with COSLA that represent all 32 local authorities, and I welcome the fact that it now represents 32 out of 32 local authorities, they have described that on-going engagement as positive and constructive. In outlining the proposed settlement to them, I know that they recognise that it is better than they were expecting. I believe that it gives sufficient resources for them to be able to deliver quality public services, but they have their own fiscal lever of council tax and can increase that up to 3 per cent. That would generate £77 million, which, if they used, would take their overall resources into real terms as well. I look forward to further engagement with local authorities. Thank you, cabinet secretary. COSLA has given us some supplementary evidence following the publishing of the budget, but one of the things that COSLA does is predicate inflation running at 3 per cent, so it applies a 3 per cent deflator, whereas the Scottish Government understands that it has a deflator of 1.56 per cent. That makes quite a big difference in terms of whether the £77 million additional monies that could be raised by council tax bring local authorities into a real-terms increase or a real-terms cut. Can I ask why there would be such a difference in those figures and why the Scottish Government, when, would be accurate? Bill Stick might cover the inflationary analysis. Of course, there are different ways that you can measure inflation, and we believe, in terms of the services that they provide, that this is the appropriate measure, but Bill Stick can say more. We use the HM Treasury-approved GDP deflators. They take into account different things, but they more clearly reflect what is happening in Government rather than the outside world. Do you want to elaborate on that any more? We can provide more information on the factors that lie behind the inflation statistics that are used, if you wish. I am also just wondering. One of the benefits of having additional information at the early stage is when Governments, but also COSLA, for example, put out their position to talk about what they would apply that deflator to. For example, COSLA's latest briefing for this committee in relation to the budget would apply that deflator. It would appear to overall Scottish Government funding for local government at table 10.20, which would include matters such as £121.9 million for city deals, Clyde Gateway, home efficiency programmes, regeneration capital grant funding, a lot of capital funding in the other would apply a deflator to. Does the Scottish Government take the view that all aspects of total spend should be viewed in that context, or should some have a deflator applied to it and not others? Bill can cover the specific issue, but in relation to some of the specific funds that we arrive at by way of a deal to local government and city deals is a good example, which sets out a negotiation between UK Government and Scottish Government, local authorities as well, and there may be other partners involved in city deals where the figure that we arrive at is essentially a deal. So city deals like other elements, potentially of capital expenditure as well, is the cost of providing that, and an inflationary increase might not be relevant, because if you take city deals, the budget line for that's roughly doubled. The reason for that is more deals have been signed up to. So I suppose analysing everything with the same stick would not be appropriate. The real terms increase that the Cabinet Secretary was mentioning was on the local government settlement itself. As part of the committee's request, we have listed in the table 10.20 all the other local government money that's not part of the core settlement, so none of those capital or revenue items have been included in our calculation of a real terms increase on the local government settlement. That is helpful, because I think that COSLA would appear to be taking a different approach. Another approach that COSLA are taking is specific commitments contained within the Scottish Government budget, which I know we'll all welcome, and I just want to read from their briefing, including money for early years and childcare expansion to 1,440 hours, early learning and childcare expansion to 600 hours, 66 million for health and social care, not ring-fenced, and 24 million for additional 1 per cent for teachers pay. COSLA have costed a variety of commitments within the Scottish Government commitments that we're seeking local government to deliver, and they've costed those, they've not said where they've got each figure to cost them from, but they're totaling that to be £153 million, which they're presenting as an additional burden on local authorities for services that maybe we would expect local authorities to be delivering in making progress on anyway. Has there been discussions between COSLA and the Scottish Government in relation to what requires additional funding, what's appropriate to ring-fenced and what they should just get on and do? That's a fair question, convener, and I think it reflects some of the complexities of the local government settlement. Many of our priorities and our services are joint. Their partnership priorities, so if you take childcare, it's delivered largely by local authorities. They are key partners in that. Health and social care integration, by definition, is a partnership approach. In the budget negotiations I would have with COSLA, they are interesting quantum, i.e. the total resource that it will have. They're interesting in a range of other pressures and particularly interesting in those pressures that they would take the view that are government-inspired pressures. All of that leads to negotiations. If you take the teacher's pay settlement, for them to be able to deliver on that, then they saw extra government support. In the 2018-19 financial settlement, I've described the overall settlement of flat cash essentially for resource and an increase in capital. Recognising again that there's a lot of areas in which there's partnership working on with local authorities. I mean, housing is absolutely critical. Local authorities are a key partner in that. City deals absolutely as well. Within resource, those figures that you mentioned, convener, are the areas where we've engaged with local authorities. If you take health and social care integration, I specifically ask local authorities what is the figure that assists you with your health and social care integration pressures? What is the sum and the sum that's been allocated within the settlement reflects the ask to the Scottish Government? As does the teacher's pay support and the expansion of early learning and childcare. Those are some key elements of ask from local government to recognise their pressures built within the settlement. I suppose what local government was really concerned about was that if they had an overall reduction in the quantum and as I say, many councils were forecasting for 3%. In fact, a reduction, that's about £300 million or more, plus dealing with extra pressures on top of that, they felt would leave them in a more vulnerable position. That's why, through the course of the negotiations with COSLA, we've been able to make sure there's resource within the settlement to be able to support those pressures. I'm going to read it out because I want to make sure that I capture it correctly. COSLA's view is that there is a £153 million revenue reduction to the core 2018-19 settlement. To calculate this, we have simply taken the Scottish Government flashcast position, flatcast position, and highlighted the new burdens that have been confirmed would be fully funded for local government. Our view is that if these items are funded, then there is a reduction to the core settlement and that's where they think at their £153 million is the Scottish Government position that they're just wrong then. What would the Scottish Government view be of that? It would be their interpretation. I would say again that areas like childcare, it's this Parliament that will be legislating to increase provision. We want to make sure that local authorities are resourced to do that. If you take some of the investment in childcare, you'll be able to get the funding and improving nurseries to enhance their capacity to get to the 140 hours. I suppose my point around interpretation is that this is real money, this is real cash, it's sustaining that which local government has. I know that it's challenging times for public services and I know that local authorities will be feeling pressures, but those were the areas of negotiation where the Scottish Government was asked to recognise the partnership approach and put that sum in. Local authorities, for the purpose of their briefings, are wanting to improve their quantum and I understand that, want to describe it as not core money, that's up to them. What I'm saying is that it's real cash, it's investing in partnership priorities, there are figures that we've discussed with local authorities and I, of course, now write to the 32 local authorities and ask for their agreement to deliver on commitments and whether they accept the settlement. They will say it's not core money, I say it's for partnership priorities and you've touched upon them, convener. Primarily around early learning and childcare and health and social care integration as well. I suppose finally before I move to colleagues to develop this further, you mentioned that local authorities were preparing for a very different settlement. What settlement do you think local authorities were preparing for and what's changed? I'd obviously engage with directors of finance. I met a number of council leaders over the course of the last few months. I regularly meet COSLA leadership teams. They were expecting, may be informed by others, but certainly their assumption was about 3% reduction. That would be a £300 million cash reduction on settlement. So, if you like, £300 million less than the figure that they have now received in the settlement is essentially 0% reduction. They were forecasting, preparing for, and many councils published options for saving with that in mind. Now, there'd be a range. Of course, there's always a range. It's forecasting, it's assumptions of anywhere between a 2% reduction and somewhere as low or high, depending on your point of view. It's a 5%, a £500 million reduction. That was because of the view that maybe commentators have taken that the Government wouldn't have used our tax powers, but the Government was investing in manifesto commitments in a fashion that they arrived at that reduction figure. That's not the figure that I'm proposing in the settlement. It's far more positive than any local authority in the country was predicting. I'm not dismissing that it's challenging for those delivering public services. There's increasing expectation and demand on our public services. They will face, as you say, further challenges because of on-going austerity as well, welfare reform and so on. I think that it's a very fair settlement in that context. I don't think that it's unreasonable for the Government to earmark and ring fence resources where we believe it's a priority. One good example of that, challenged by those who don't believe in ring fencing, is the pupil equity fund, £120 million. The evidence is that it's being spent directly on that, which will help tackle the attainment gap. It's ensured that hundreds more teachers have been employed, and hopefully will make a difference in outcomes and attainment. There's just an example of how ring fencing, whilst in principle not might sit comfortably with all of us in many regards, works. I thought I'd call rightly, cabinet secretary. I think I remember both Cawsland Units and coming to the committee lamenting ring fencing. It's interesting that you mentioned the pupil equity fund because we specifically said, do they agree with ring fencing? No, they didn't, but we specifically asked them whether they would take money away from that. There was no comment really to be made, so there's an interesting dynamic there between what is and isn't appropriate to ring fencing, which the committee might return to, but we'll allow others in to develop some of the arguments here, and our deputy convener wants to follow up on some of this. Thanks very much, convener, and thank you, cabinet secretary and minister, for joining us this morning. Cabinet secretary, just to explore this slightly, it's not just Cawsla, but also the STUC, and I'm just going to quote them in the briefing that they put out, have said, Scottish Government may have received a real-terms cut from Westminster, but it still received cash terms an increase of £188 million. Local government, however, can expect worse treatment from the Scottish Government as their cash terms budget is frozen. So the STUC are also expressing concerns about real-terms cuts to local government. Have you responded to their concerns yet? Again, over the course of the last couple of months, as Elaine Smith would expect of me, a number of stakeholders, including the STUC, and they raised a number of matters with me, not just local government. They would be trade unions to be concerned about a range of issues, not least public sector pay policy as well. They engage very constructively in the tax debate. That's a key feature this year to ensure that we went from real-terms reduction in resource to be able to invest in real-terms growth. Principally, that was towards the national health service, because, yes, there's demand, yes, there's a need for that, but there's no doubt that the NHS is a very precious service. So too are local authority services, but local authorities also have the ability to raise the council tax as well, and that would increase their income and the resources that they have available. So we have to make choices and set out our priorities, and I think we've done so in the budget in a very fair way, whilst also ensuring that there's economic growth so that we can have future revenues to continue to invest in our public services. So as I say, STUC raised a number of matters, such as pay policy overall, investment or public services, the discussion on tax and local government too, but obviously the Government, and therefore the Parliament has to make choices. Local government, of course, will campaign for more resource. They always have, they always will. I did so when I was a council leader as well. It's to be expected, but I think in the context of reductions that we've faced, local government has been treated fairly. Thanks, Cabinet Secretary. Thanks, convener, if I could just continue briefly. Yes. Of course choices do have to be made unless you see going to make that point about the Scottish Government's revenue, raising powers and the briefing and the choices that can be made, but if we look at local government specifically and the NHS, then a lot of the services that are provided in local government, there's an interconnection there, because many of those services would take pressure off the NHS if they were fully funded and properly provided, so I think that we just have to recognise that. Cabinet Secretary, you talked about pay policy, which again is another issue that has been raised, and looking back at the COSLA paper, the additional dispute that you may be having about the reduction to the core or not reduction to the core, one of those issues is the teachers' pay settlement. What Eunice in Scotland has pointed out is that the teachers are directly employed by local councils, so they negotiate their pay through COSLA. However, they feel there's some confusion because if the Scottish Government is taking action with regard to teachers' pay, then why can't the Scottish Government then apply that approach to ensure adequate pay funding for all public sector workers now? I appreciate that the Scottish Government has, of course, lifted the pay cap for certain workers in the public sector, but the point that Unison would be making is that the Scottish Government lifting of that doesn't then apply to many workers that are low paid in the local government sector. I can just correct one thing that Elaine Smith has said specifically. Teachers' pay isn't dealt with just through COSLA, so it's tripartite arrangements with the Scottish Government as well. That's very specific arrangements around teachers' pay. I think it's fair that when the Government engages in that, they think about the overall resource that local government has to be able to pay. Ultimately, it's the employer, of course, of teachers. The Scottish Government should engage constructively in that. You would see that as the key difference then to the point that Unison is asking about the teacher situation and the situation of the other local government workers. I think there is a clear difference where the Scottish Government is part of the tripartite negotiating arrangements around pay for an element of the workforce being teachers and to be able to secure a satisfactory deal with the workforce local government asked for more resource. Yes, because we are part of the negotiating around the teachers' pay deal, I think that's different from other categories of staff over which Government doesn't really have a say as to what the pay policy would be for local government and many would argue shouldn't have a say outwith teachers because of the very specific nature of the tripartite arrangements and that framework. For overall Scottish Government pay policy, I say out pay policy that covers all those working within our control and any elements within that as well. Elaine Smith will be very aware of. It will be around health. There is also an independent pay review that may return with a different proposition to my pay policy and I said, well at least match that. All of this of course contextualises what local government might do with a pay award. Frankly, of course local government said to me, be mindful of what you do and pay because it will give us issues of consistency. But it is a matter for local authorities as to where they set any pay increase and any change on what they were modelling for. Cosly may say as they have done through briefings one thing, I haven't seen much detail on this yet but I've seen at least one council leader publicly say that the settlement that they are receiving will now allow them to match government pay policy. That's one leader albeit but it was co-leader of I think a five council just from memory. I just make that point that it's of you and knowing that the settlement is better than they were anticipating knowing that they would have faced pressure for a pay-up lift, then I think they're in a reasonable place. Okay, thanks cabinet secretary because you obviously make the point that it does raise aspirations amongst other public sector workers if there's promises made to one sector and perhaps others feel they might miss out. On the record about that? If I can just make the point though it's absolutely not for me to instruct local authorities where to set a pay settlement. When it's happened in the past there's been industrial disputes and government doesn't ordinarily give a view on what any pay settlement should be but I think the context is that we have recognised the cost of inflation on household budgets but we also want to sustain and protect public sector workers and in our pay policy it's been just as in our tax policy our pay policy has been more progressive as well no compulsory redundancies and support for those that have lower pay are key features of our policy and I would imagine that is not alien concepts to local government but I appreciate they now have to negotiate with their own workforce and I would argue with a better settlement than they had been expecting one that's fair and one that gives flexibility. Another element of the deal and I'm happy to share the correspondence with the committee but it's still live with cause like the moment is increasing flexibility within the settlement around some of the flexibilities that local government was looking for just to make the point that they have a bit more room for manoeuvre than arguably they had in previous years. I want to get through this morning. Minister I promise at some point we've all got on to housing a bit before we get there but we will do Alexander Stewart. Thank you, convener. One of the biggest issues facing local authority delivery of health and social care that has been identified have the Scottish Government done any evaluation or assessment carried out by the government themselves to ascertain the ability of the integrated joint boards maintaining the services under the pressures they have constraints they have in the cuts. There's actually increased resources for health and social care not a reduction and to be fair to local authorities they have invested more as has the Scottish Government. So there is an element of the settlement of £66 million investment in social care coming from the Scottish Government to local authorities. That's roughly what local government asked me for that's where the negotiations got to to some that they felt would address their pressures. As to the further clinical or demand aspects that would be a question for the health secretary but certainly in the fiscal and the finance negotiations I've had with local government we know there's increasing pressures and it goes back to Elaine Smith's point that if we have more infrastructure at a community level that is good and helpful for acute. Integration has generally been a good thing for the resources following the patient rather than the bureaucracy so all of that's good but the allocation I've given within the proposed settlement meets the ask that I ultimately got from local authorities. Yes there's increasing demand on the service and that's why there's increasing support and flexibility. The partnership working has certainly been a huge advantage to the whole aspect of the whole government and social and you rightly identify that there will still be pressures going forward and there will still be burdens on the service but at the end of the day there is still an opportunity for development going forward and I think that maybe the money you have given may cover the situation at this stage but as we progress with an aging population and all the aspects that have to be participated in that process I think it will still be a massive problem. Do you not agree with that? I certainly agree with the point that the changing demography is a challenge that the increasing pressure and expectations on the service are a challenge. I have reflected on the fact that we want care workers to be properly supported financially and that's why the living wage delivery was so important as well but yes further transformation in the health service has to be delivered and social care and that's why it's a twin track approach of investment and transformation. Closer joint working between health and social care is absolutely valuable and important. This is the right direction of travel and extra resources have been allocated and I entirely appreciate the point from Alexander Stewart around further resources may well be required in future. I just make the gentle reminder to Alexander Stewart as a conservative that if I had followed the Tories tax plans I'd be looking for £501 million worth of cuts from across the public sector not growth in the budget which is essentially what most parts of the public service will receive. You talk about a sort of fair deal Cabinet Secretary you know within my own region and you've touched on that I mean Mid Scotland in 5 I mean Tayside in 5 was seeing a cut of 23 million across in my own Council of Perth and Conross is getting the most severe of 5.4 million so how do you reckon that is a fair deal? In terms of what numbers is Mr Stewart referring to exactly? Well there's been information coming out in the press today my own authority my own person can also are looking at a 2.3 cut 5.4 million pound that's what they're indicating they're going to receive under the settlement situation today and as I say Tayside in 5 are looking at a 23 million pound reduction on day-to-day services. I don't recognise those numbers and I'm happy to recognise that we've made much progress in transparency and simplicity that's a bit of a contradiction in terms of local government finance albeit but we've been able to give more information than before real terms in terms of cash freeze for resource real terms in capital we are we've circulated figures to local authorities I don't recognise those numbers it may well be that local authorities are presenting what they believe to be their pressures overall but we have got a significant sum still to be allocated and can you be familiar with the annual occurrence of portfolios having sums that are then transferred to local authorities but once the portfolio is in a position to determine how that's distributed and sometimes that's engagement with COSLA as well so when that total resource is distributed local authorities will essentially have the reflection of that overall you know cash freeze in terms of resource and then increasing capital I should say one other thing that local authorities specifically ask me for as much convergence as possible and the distribution of resources so that no council got to say more or less so there's a convergence as well which tries to ensure fairness for each local authority within the overall settlement so I don't recognise those numbers and I've certainly I'll re-provide to the committee council by council the settlement figures we propose whilst recognising there's a further sum to be distributed to local authorities which will counter those figures that Mr Stewart told me he read in the press but looking at the summary we've had from SPICE they recognise that there is a total revenue has fallen by 0.2.7 which they talk about £157.3 million cabinet secretary so that figure is there as a total revenue reduction that goes back to the very first point that the convener was making around I have described the partnership priorities around teachers pay, investment in social care, the expansion of early learning childcare surely all of that is partnership priorities with local government so that's real cash, real resource going to local authorities and is part of the settlement if you discount that yes you arrive at a different figure I include it because it's real cash going to local authorities simple as that Can I just more pop on that question from Alexander Stewart you mentioned other monies that were still to be and individual local authority settlements and obviously there's a budget line there for integrated joint boards I think the global amount that will be transferred in is clear but obviously the amount to each individual local authority is not so our local authorities flying blind a little bit in relation to how much money will eventually go in there and could you give an example of other portfolios where you'd anticipate those monies going in that would be quite helpful for the committee Sure, the total figure is about £10.5 billion and I think the yet to be distributed sums about £200 million Bill Stewart will give you more detail on that so I think that gives you a sense of a great deal of certainty the reason we put the circular out in the fashion that we do a budget last week is to consult with local authorities they may come back with an anomaly an inaccuracy, a misunderstanding whatever it happens to be so we won't have that as a settled figure that gives us the opportunity to consult with local authorities and then we return with the actual finance order that the local government is expected to receive if Parliament doesn't support it then that the money isn't issued but we return for the local government finance order Bill, can you give an example that you've asked for? A portfolio that distributes It's all within the £10.5 billion total and we distribute as much as has been agreed with COSLA on the needs-based formula so examples of sums not yet agreed or distributed is the early years expansion for example because it's only coming to the fore now there's a meeting set up for early January to agree the distribution of the early years expansion and that will be included in the local government finance order similarly with discretionary housing payments COSLA wanted a review of the distribution mechanism so that's going to the same meeting which will be agreed criminal justice social work which was around finance grant and is now part of the overall settlement looking at the distribution of it and as normal teachers induction scheme that's not distributed towards the end of the year because we need to find out how many teachers have been inducted coming back to the point that Mr Stewart on Perth and Kinross when looking at a like with like example the 2018-19 of the amounts that have been distributed it's 27,000 lower than it was in the current year so with some of these other sums it's likely to be an increase rather than a reduction okay and then just briefly so in table 10.13 under other sources to support the £355 million in the draft budget for health and social care integration which we anticipate will be transferred to integrated joint boards the local authorities effectively know what share of that will get now well that's for the for the actual health and social care integration boards so that's money that the local government doesn't need to put into the boards now what I mean is that the local authorities know what each board is getting so has there been a breakdown yet of that 355? not as far as I'm aware but the health officials will be writing to the integration boards okay now that is helpful sometimes local authorities over the last year and this year will come to the committee and they will include monies they have to spend which does include integration joint board monies and sometimes they won't include it so it's just obviously Mr Stewart has got a line of questioning about monies that his local authority has and what's unclear is whether that includes IGB monies and we're just trying to get a bit of clarity around that all these sums I've just mentioned exclude that money just to make one point just because it's a helpful one some people may read in the press members may read in the press a figure from their local authority of reduction but that might be what the local authority has assumed is a figure before because that's what we've been experiencing in the last few weeks the assumptions from local authorities and what the reduction they thought would be and therefore their planning assumption as opposed to what this settlement actually proposes for local government so there is a difference between what councils thought they might get and put in the public domain and what we propose to supply Okay, thank you Jenny Gilruth Just to actually highlight that point cabinet secretary we have quite a frankly bizarre situation in Fife at the moment you might have heard some of David Ross's comments he said last week if we raise pay for some workers through proposed tax changes it will mean cutting other services and probably losing other jobs but then yesterday David Alexander the SNP co-leader in which he is in administration with said actually Fife council would be fine and that as in the case of Cheikhler as we've already highlighted this morning the council would be creating jobs so it's a bit of a disconnect going on I think on the front line but with regard to service redesign do you have a view with regard to councils charging for services which might previously have been free so for example in Fife the council introduced charges on a Sunday to offset budgetary pressures So that's a Jenny Gilruth's quite a controversial question again it wouldn't necessarily be appropriate for a minister to set out what local authorities should do with individual charging regimes but it is another fiscal lever that local authorities have not particularly substantial of course they have council tax as well but they are the main funding source of course for local authorities is grant support revenue support grant so we wouldn't normally express a view on individual charges of individual local authorities but it is entirely up to them There has been a suggestion in previous sessions that councils will need to strip back their services and just allow for the provision of front line services and I know again in Fife under the previous Labour administration they took the decision to close 16 libraries not a front line service did impact upon the poorest and the most vulnerable does the Government monitor how services are provided across the country in terms of how they are impacting upon the most vulnerable We've had the Scottish Government has essentially single outcome agreements so we have an agreement with local authorities on a partnership approach what we are trying to achieve what the outcomes for a local area of course the main audit agencies look at performance of local authorities using resources You've touched on leisure and culture I would make the point the local authority that I live in in Renfrewshire had huge cultural aspirations dashed by the not getting this city a culture but their culture plans are going on anyway so they've still been investing in facilities and they'll still be delivering events I'd just use that as an anecdote a point around core services being delivered but councils can still choose to do that which is important to them in the area but broadly speaking it's a single outcome agreement between Government and all community plan partners but the audit agencies look at the performance of local authorities how they're performing how they're meeting their statutory indicators and then at a national level we have Scotland performs that looks at overall national performance so there's a range of ways that councils performance and delivery is monitored Thank you Okay Graham Simpson Thank you I'm a little bit confused I must be honest is it your position that now council will have to make any cuts I mean that's for local authorities to determine it's my position local government has got a fair settlement and as I say it's far better than was forecast I think the negotiations have gone well with COSLA in that they've raised a number of asks and I've been able to support them in that particular pressure points Will local authorities have to continue to make efficiencies yes they will they actually have a target of approximately 3% every year they write to me every year to confirm that they've been meeting their efficiency targets and I have also recognised that these are challenging time for all our public services whilst expectations rise but we as a government are proposing to use our tax powers to ensure that we can adequately resource our public services and local authorities also have that ability in relation to council tax enhanced council tax as well because we've increased the multiplier for the higher value homes as well so I know Mr Simpson will want to use some prejorative language but I do think it's a fair settlement Will it require tough choices? Of course it will Of course it will, we've had tough choices to making government as well but essentially I think it's a good deal for local government It's not prejorative language to say that councils have to make cuts which you've just confirmed I want to move on to another subject Can you tell us what advice the Scottish Government has been given regarding the potential normally in giving profit making private nurseries a tax break you mentioned that in your opening statement when nurseries in independent schools which are charities and which assist the Scottish Government and councils with the provision of additional places for three and four year olds would be ineligible for the same tax break Of course the recommendations stem from the Barclay report into non-domestic rates how we can use it more effectively I think the position on nurseries in giving 100% rates relief supports the Government policy in expanding early learning and childcare so it's a supportive policy and it was a recommendation of Barclay that I was happy to accept and we haven't distinguished between private and council run nurseries If we want to improve the quality of nursery provision then we will have to invest in it so there's a direct investment around training, capacity and placements that resource in infrastructure also but the rates relief will support all nurseries as well so that was a clear recommendation of Barclay and we intended to see it through In relation to independent schools the recommendation from Barclay was to remove rates relief from all independent schools it was all of them but what I've decided to do following the engagement and reflection is ensure that within that special schools special independent schools and those with a very specialist nature continue to have that rates relief and that's the distinction in independent schools it is proposed don't continue to enjoy that rates relief however it doesn't change the charitable status I've seen some press coverage to suggest that it changes the charitable status we don't believe that it does and it's also been suggested that we can't separate out the two and I believe that we can so there will be forthcoming secondary legislation in due course but there is plenty time to prepare for that as well in terms of the difference for independent schools but for nurseries we are proposing a quicker implementation so that they can enjoy the rates relief earlier sounds like you maybe didn't take any advice relating to my first question but looking at the independent schools sector can you tell me what analysis you did of the potential knock-on effect to the state sector of introducing non-domestic rates to the independent sector but if I can probe a bit further I thought I gave quite a comprehensive answer on the difference between a nursery and an independent mainstream school so I'm took I apologize for stopping there of course you must continue to answer this question and of course you want to answer the question that's fine Mr Simpson is how this would impact on the local government financial settlement and knock-on consequences on services given that we are doing budget scrutiny given the degree of latitude which is exactly what my question is I have engaged with independent schools I've looked at the evidence that's applied to me when I got the Barclay recommendation to a lift rates relief for independent schools a number of recommendations very swiftly and I said there were some that required further reflection engagement and consultation and that was one so I would object to any suggestion that I didn't engage in the subject I have fully explored the information that was presented to me there was officials meetings as well I have come to the view that in terms of independent schools if you look at the total income for independent schools the change and status for non-domestic rates shouldn't have a disproportionate effect on the financial running of those schools and the information I have seen suggests that there won't be a mass exodus from independent mainstream schools to state schools therefore there should not be massive extra expenditure to those education authorities that might have more pupils I say this is the right thing to do in terms of independent schools and it doesn't affect their charitable status but it has been put to me that some independent schools may well change their a bursary support for those that might not otherwise be able to afford to go to independent schools I actually think that all children deserve the best education and that's why we've put more resource into education but I don't think there will be a disproportionate effect I think that the sums involved in non-domestic rates can be absorbed by those schools The reason I asked the question is because fees could be increased and that could mean that some pupils leave that sector and go into the state sector I spoke to the Scottish Council of Independent Schools they say that up to 1 in 10 pupils may leave that sector and that could be thousands of pupils going into the state sector so that has an impact on council budgets and I merely ask did you do any analysis around that Yes of course I say for the third time I looked at the evidence that was presented to me by independent schools by their representative organisations and direct meetings I had and meetings we had with officials the cost to an independent school of non-domestic rates I say again that it shouldn't have a disproportionate impact and in terms of fees I suspect on the other inflationary increases that independent schools have had the figure of 10% I don't recognise is a likely shift from independent schools to state schools I can tell you also that it has been put to me that many people would take a very dim view if independent schools became arguably more elitist because they had to pay non-domestic rates which, incidentally, puts them in the same league as council schools You can ask a subject on a different topic Andy Wightman Thanks very much Cabinet Secretary Just a few clarifications We've had a briefing from Spice and we, certainly, as the convener said welcome the greater sort of transparency in the numbers this year I take it that you broadly agree with the numbers in Spice there's no issues you have with any of those numbers Broadly agree with the numbers it's a matter of interpretation of whether you count what I allocate as cash in a settlement as part of the settlement or not I would argue there is but I'm not objecting broadly to the numbers in that area Another sort of detailed question arises from when we had the Accounts Commission about the uprating in council tax the uplift in the top bands Last year that was given directly to the council within which that arose Can I just clarify that this year that's being distributed through the normal formula? The same applies as last year which is that every council keeps every penny in council tax that is raised in the area so that multiplier stays in the pot for local authorities to use The council tax the council tax receipts form part of the formula Last year the uplift in the top four bands was if you like ring fenced for the councils in which they arose and was not subject to the formula I'm just asking whether this year it will be Distributional aspect We raised that with our joint settlement and distribution group and agreed that we would revert back to the previous equalisation process It was left separately in 1718 because of the question about how it was to be funded I understand that, that's very helpful Thanks very much There's a continuing debate around ring fencing obviously You mentioned you have some partnership working and you have monies allocated within resource for that and you have other monies that are out with and I think most of us would accept that however one describes at ring fencing or not is appropriate in certain circumstances I've got a meeting with the education cabinet secretary to raise a question of the legacy from 2008 on some of that previous ring fencing it's a good example of it with the specialist music schools it was obviously an issue with the city of Edinburgh music school Edinburgh wanted to close it but because that ring fencing had gone it's very unclear and whether that money because it falls within the general settlement is still for that purpose or not Have you got any plans to review how some of that legacy that was at ring fencing that was then taken into the settlement in 2008 could be clarified particularly in those areas like specialist schools which are still in existence some of those previous ring fencing funds are no longer applicable I remember that period very well because I was a local authority leader at the time and welcomed the direction of travel the short answer to the question is that I have no immediate plans to review as Mr Whitman has described legacy elements of the grant settlement that said every year local authorities through COSLA negotiate with me and raise areas of where they might want more flexibility or different asks so we still have that engagement every year but I have no immediate plans to review the historic elements of the settlement Moving on to non-domestic rates in terms of the draft budget for 2018-19 the net the overall impact of policy proposals is an additional £28 million according to the Scottish Fiscal Commission £164 from income tax policy but a lot of that is reduced by the changes to non-domestic rates regimes particularly the business growth accelerator and the switch to CPI what economic impact assessment has been made of the business growth accelerator and what economic impact is that likely to have The workings around that the growth accelerator specifically was a recommendation from Barclay to use our existing powers to try and stimulate growth within the business community it had been described there isn't a figure that says this amount of intervention equals this amount of economic growth but the evidence that was received by the business organisations and I think that's why the panel would have recommended this took the view that it was very difficult for businesses who maybe wanted to invest in their property premises to do so without having a chance to raise some revenue so the view around that was if there was a bit of respite or period of grace as it is a period of a year then that would allow businesses to have a bit of time to raise revenue following their improvement, their expansion or whatever it happens to be and in terms of business growth that contrasts very favourably with south of the border or anywhere else in the UK for that matter that there is that not immediate buoyancy if you like that immediate cost of improving your premises and the view of a business was excuse me that would be a stimulant to the economy a stimulant to those who want to invest in their properties and give a bit of support and ultimately would pay for itself because of the extra investment that it would bring in support and the task of the Scottish Visual Commission have judged that apart from the changes to public sector pay policy their judgement is that the policies in the budget are not of a large enough magnitude to have a significant aggregate impact on the Scottish economy so we'll leave it there on the small business bonus scheme what's the cost of the small business bonus scheme in terms of revenue foregone Mary Ann, have you got that? I think it's around about £230 million next year If I'm incorrect I will issue an email letting you know the up-to-date figure I understand that you've taken the Barclay review recommendation to review that when are you going to review it how's that going to be done? The timescale was set out and the implementation plan was The review of the small business bonus will commence in the new year I was looking at a letter that cabinet secretary wrote that properties are coming in to the valuation role the shootings and sportings there's 10,300 of them with a total rateable value of around £16 million but in analysis that was published in a freedom of information request and indeed is freely available from the Scottish Accessors website in any event or so properties 10,174 are valued at less than 15,000 and a mere 72 are above 15,000 so the idea of getting £4 or £5 or £6 million yield when virtually 99.9% of these are eligible of small business relief seems a bit strange and you have people like Mohammed Bin Rashid who won't be paying any tax at all because of the small business bonus scheme does that seem fair? I think it's quite hard for me to talk about any individual I don't know the gentleman or his tax affairs or or any of the background I'm happy to look into any details to see how we're applying small business bonus if you think it is fair I can double check those numbers in terms of that but what small businesses may be able to do of course is apply to small business bonus scheme but it does only apply up to state aid limits and there are only so many properties that a proprietor could have small business bonus on I am loath to give a view on any individuals to say business affairs I can also clarify that the assessors still have a few thousand properties we believe to go on to the valuation roles and simply just because your rateable value is under 15,000 if you have other properties you cannot be eligible for small business bonus and that's not always apparent from the valuation roles I can also correct my small business bonus cost it's actually £2.35 million next year as the forecast cost That was not bad That was quite close Okay that's helpful I'll leave it there at the conscious of time Before we take Mr Gibson for our final question in this area and I'm sure the members are primed to ask lots of questions on housing can I just check something that I'm meant to ask at the start of the local government funding formula in terms of what money is going to which local authority and what quantities and what the methodologies used are as we know and everyone talks about changing it and then everyone says it's too difficult let's leave it as it is Has the Scottish Government made an assessment of how various ring fencing of priorities may have influenced the overall direction of money I'll give an example If you look at the balance multiplier I'm delighted to hear that those monies will now be redistributed in the normal way rather than retained by local authorities Personally I think that's the right thing to do You've got Perth monies going direct to schools but on a needs-based assessment based on free school meals entitlement so there's various monies going to local authorities now with slightly different distribution models At some point will the Scottish Government think about taking a step back taking stock of that and seeing if that has maybe made a more progressive use of monies a more targeted use of monies or what the balance is Well convener your opening remarks about how it's so complex was so fair and accurate that most folk don't want to bother with the complexity of a whole sales systematic review of distribution and therefore don't want us to bother I think that 32 out of 32 council leaders can come up with a formula that suits their council better but this is done through partnership with local government There's a distribution and settlement group where we engage with local authorities on how we're distributing new funds or if there's a proposal to change funds that we embark on in a partnership fashion Sometimes it's quite appropriate for funds to be specifically needs-based and then other times it might be proportionate and appropriate to just have a share on some other mechanism whether it's population or whatever it happens to be After you go through the distribution formula with all the various indicators in it it arrives at a number that each local authority should get and then I set what's called the floor which essentially realigns and brings closer to a point of convergence so all that work in debate takes you to a point where we still have ultimately convergence around what a council may actually receive which is a matter for Scottish Government not necessarily local government and that's why we engage through the circular as proposed last week on the local government settlement but there are no immediate plans to change the overall formula if we would engage positively if local authorities want me to do it but COSLA would have to approach me I suppose and say we want you to look at the formula again Every time it's been tried, convener I know you'll be very familiar with this it just comes up with a lot of money spent on a lot of consultants and each council argues for the position that suits it best rural versus urban island versus mainland east versus west deprivation versus super sparsity I could go on which ultimately means I have no great desire to revisit the overall distribution formula Perhaps I didn't articulate the question the way I meant to cabinet secretary I'm suggesting that the variety of ring ffencing using different methodologies for giving monies to local authorities separate from how the revenue grant is distributed may have had an impact on how monies are directed to different parts of the country in a positive way because we should be progressive and we should be redistributing I'm just wondering if that will be looked at at any point cabinet secretary We're always, convener, I entirely get the point we always look at the outcomes for local authorities when we're allocating resources to a global picture as well and sometimes it's very specific needs base or a pot for a specific function then they should spend it on that thing I think a really good example of that would be the housing money which we'll now come on to a substantial uplift to invest in housing is a good example of where there's a specific need, a specific investment on local authorities should get on and allocate and spend those resources with partners It will now be in Mr Gibson's hands whether we move on to housing at this point there's no theme of questioning Questions, convener, thanks but there's a couple of areas that I haven't been covered such as capital I should probably apologise to the minister in the scheduling of this session we should have got the minister to come in me by an hour or so later so my apologies for that for not identifying that as an opportunity to get you away through some other matters Mr Gibson Thanks very much, convener First of all I would say that Labour council group leaders 10.5 years ago tried to look at a new funding model but given that it would have cost North Ayrshire £5.1 million a year, it was simply abandoned, understandably Time to small business bonus scheme is it not the case that a lot of women might talk about £235 million in revenue perhaps lost through supporting that scheme that the Federation of Small Businesses said at the height of the recession one in six small businesses went bust without the small business bonus scheme and therefore what it does is keep people working and therefore helps to revenue streams of the Scottish Government Yes, I do believe that is the case in a certain position of the Federation of Small Businesses who have said that it has been a lifeline to many small businesses and ensures that we've got a competitive package of business rates relief we've got to give people reasons to live, work and invest in Scotland and one example is a paisley cafe that I visited when they essentially went from paying business rates to thresholds for small business bonus they didn't pay any business rates and how they used that saving was to employ a new member of staff and she was delighted to be working there so many businesses use it to employ staff to invest in their premises but it has absolutely been a lifeline during quite turbulent economic times Okay, thank you Now you probably share my astonishment the crocodile tears of the Conservative members on the committee about the cuts to local government Can you tell us what the difference the reduction in local government funding has been as a percentage in Scotland relative to England where their party has been in power over the last decade? I'm using my memory here that it was roughly an equivalent analysis I had seen for a previous question about in a comparable figure the level of reduction in real terms to English local authorities was about four or five fold of any real terms reduction that Scottish authorities had faced Thank you for that We talked at the beginning about the Hermagis Treasury deflator and I'm just wondering how relevant it is to use that deflator when we'll get different circumstances here in Scotland, for example the UK is not lifting the 1% pay cap but we've signalled that we actually are quite clearly and it is so that's a question I'd like to ask but the follow up to that really is it appropriate to apply the eight sorry, how will councils be able to deliver expectations on salary given the disproportionate number of workers earning £30,000 or less so looking at the deflator in terms of real inflation which we know is 3% and then how will councils be able to deliver the salary expectations given the policy of no compulsory redundancies as well which squeezes things somewhat for councils I'm happy for Bill to return to the deflator issue but from what I've seen and what I know of local authorities they knew there would be a degree of pressure on them to essentially move on pay now what they do with the negotiations with trade unions will be a matter for them but I just put it in the context of councils making efficiencies councils having a better settlement than they expected that I think they'll be able to arrive at a fair settlement for their workforce but I don't set that but I acknowledge that in the Scottish Government lifting the pay cap creates a culture of expectation around what local authorities may be able to do as well but it will be a matter for them and I certainly think that they've got far more room for manoeuvre in a pay award than they would have done if they got a £300 million reduction in the scenario if I had to find £501 million from front line public services if I followed the Tories tax plans but that's not what I'm following therefore the settlement for public services and local government is fair within that on the deflator on the deflator point again just to say that it's used by HM treasurer it's used by the Scottish Government central finance so it seems strange for the local government to use a different number just in the process of trying to for clarification we use the same number so that everything can be looked at in the same light there's a reflect inflation which is what we're actually dealing with I can't tell HM treasurer that it does at both that's why I'm going to write to the convener with the explanation of why they use it To make a further helpful point the Scottish Fiscal Commissions is strengthening its position in growing it may be in the fullness of time they'll be able to provide more analysis in such matters with the way they build up the forecast is built up from Scottish economic circumstances rather than top down a perspective of what might be coming from a UK level down so maybe there's further analysis that will be helpful in future OK convener it's a while since inflation has been 1.56% but I'll just go on to capital cos I realise you won't move on to housing I notice that in the price figures the settlement thanks partly to the Tories to an £11 million cut in the resource varies from a 0.1% reduction in mid-loathing to a 4% reduction of Gail and Bute and the average is 1.8% for Scotland but in capital things are quite different I'm just wondering if you can explain that in North Easter Council my area an area where I'm pleased to see we don't have any independent schools the capital reduction is some 94.2% but in the Borders it's increasing by 42% so there seems to be colossal differences in terms of next year's capital allocation whereas the revenue allocation is very steady I'm just wondering why there are these huge variations across Scotland in particular obviously for North Ayrshire I like to it's these huge swings that are to do with the flooding money obviously if a local authority doesn't spend the flooding allocation in one year it'll get it the next and therefore there have been some we go out to each local authority each year to ask them what they spent, what their plans are for the following year and we make adjustments there's a figure of 42 million each year guaranteed for the flooding programme and we have to move that around between the local authorities to ensure that all local authorities have got sufficient to be able to carry their programme forward so there are some slippages there are some overestimations so in this case North Ayrshire they have sufficient money at the moment without giving them any additional from the flooding allocation into 18-19 As long as you bear in mind that the Gannett Valley flood prevention programme is going to be coming forward for funding pretty soon Thanks very much I suspect that the cabinet secretary won't want to comment on that specific scheme That shameless bid for funding Absolutely It always shows you're right We've always wanted to housing minister so Yes Mr Heitman, you want to open up on housing Yes, by all means Thanks very much important welcome resources for housing We I think we're looking at two back at comments that the First Minister had made during the S&P party conference about if you don't use all your allocation we'll take it back the balance and give it to someone who can Obviously we've got ambitious housing targets I'm just concerned that statements like that send the wrong signal to local authorities Some of who may be facing quite challenges in assembling land and all the rest of it may be having to work over slightly longer timescales Can you give us an assurance that local authority has to deliver housing can be delivered and there won't be any arbitrary clawing back of allocations Convenor, I've made it very clear from the start of all of this that if local authorities don't use resource then we will recirculate the resource We have said to local authorities all along that they should build in slippage to their plans to ensure that they can maximise what is allocated to them and the resource planning assumption One of the things that I must ensure is the best use of the resource that is available to us over the course of this Parliament There are certain local authorities who have been somewhat slower than others to get things off the ground If they are unable to spend that resource we will give it to authorities that are further along the way However, as I've said previously to this committee I have a determination to ensure that this housing programme benefits the whole of Scotland rural, urban, highland, border, island I want everyone to benefit but local authorities themselves need to ensure that they are planning guarantees over the next three years takes account of the money that is allocated to them and makes sure that they are able to do that job of work to spend that money which should include slippage just in case some things don't go to plan Thank you We had some evidence from a lecture that they need to look again at how the affordable housing investment programme works in particular remote and rural communities but there are special needs In light of what you just said about planning over the next three years would you be open to where other parties to be willing or political parties to be willing sending signals about a longer term commitments on funding beyond the lifetime of this Parliament which obviously you couldn't commit to on paper but would be a political commitment that would allow some authorities who want to do planning on slightly longer timescales and have particular difficulties with access to land and rural areas et cetera to be able to plan for delivery in four or five years time In terms of moving on after this Parliament as Mr Wightman knows the Government itself can make those commitments I'm willing to talk to all parties about all issues as members around the table know so if Mr Wightman and others want to talk to us about the future I'm more than willing to have those discussions In terms of the elatio comments around about rural housing and housing for special needs first of all in terms of rural and island housing we've put in place the £25 million rural housing fund and the £5 million island housing fund recognising the differences that there are there In terms of the affordable housing programme I've said to this committee and to all stakeholders that there are points where we recognise that there needs to be flexibilities and that folk should talk to my housing officials on the ground It is the case that in certain places the subsidy level available to make the inroads that are required and we have recognised that and that's why there has been additional subsidy allowed for the likes of the new houses of a ferry of mull award winning of a ferry one in the first ever surfhousing awards the other week The same goes for other rural and island island housings where we recognise that the subsidy that is provided is not going to do the business in those areas My officials on the ground will continue to talk to folk around about those flexibilities I'll actually know that because they've heard me say that at the joint delivery group which they are members of In terms of housing particularly housing for disabled people we've made a clear in a fairer Scotland for disabled people our delivery plan that we will be flexible in our approach in terms of housing delivery I think I've said to this committee before but I repeat it again if a project requires additional funding of the flexibility in place to look at that convener, I should also say that all of that these bills in terms of housing for special purposes all of that should fit in with the local authorities housing needs and demands assessment around about what the requirements for their area excuse me convener actually are what I would say to the committee is that over the last period of time I have made a number of visits throughout the country to look at housing which is wheelchair accessible and has made a huge difference to people's lives in places like Dundee, Inverness Glasgow we will not we will not stymie that by arguing about subsidy we will talk about the flexibilities and making those homes a reality just one final very brief question on the housing there is an increase in the financial transactions funding in this budget I'm just wondering what information you can provide about how any of that will be used for housing I think we'll be able to provide more information on the excuse me sorry in the Scottish bill fund at the beginning of next year I turn to the cabinet secretary when I answer that because obviously it's his decisions around about that but we mustn't lose sight of the capital that's been allocated to housing as traditional capital as people understand it's a significant uplift for the resource planning assumptions and that's what will help to deliver the 50,000 houses financial transactions may be able to assist where there has been helped by schemes or potentially how I'm proposing to use some of it around capitalising the national investment bank or other where there may be other ways we can support housing growth by using financial transactions but the 50,000 affordable homes target is being delivered by traditional capital and just to repeat what I said in my opening statement the affordable housing figure for this year is £756 million and that is part of the £1.754 billion of resource planning assumptions that were given to local authorities over the past three years I said earlier that this gives them stability and security around about planning over the peace in order for them to help us to meet our target and he certainly didn't lose his voice when he was asking for the money and I certainly didn't lose my voice at that point Excellent OK Mr Whiteman Can I just clearly to me in manifesto commitments housing was always going to be the big winner I mean any budget line that's got 22% increasing budgets pretty spectacular I think I'm just stating obvious in relation to that is what we're actually scrutinising is not that budget line it's the delivery is what we're scrutinising however there is one that's still pretty minimal in relation to adaptions which I think I've really lost my notes but I think that's a 10 million cash flap settlement and when you compare that to the mammoth budget for the affordable housing investment programme and you look at health and social care integration funds sitting beside that and we have heard stories of backlogs for adaptions needing to be done you start to think there's got to be a bit more clever way of using that system because there should be more than that £10 million available within existing resources because if they're not then the suggestion is we have to find more resources for that I suppose so what would the minister's view be in relation to the huge budget for meeting our joint housing ambitions but a 10 million cash flap settlement for adaptions convener the public bodies joint working act 2015 delegated powers and responsibilities and budgets in respects of adaptions to integrated joint boards and they have to produce a housing contribution statement as part of their strategic plans so the 10 million pounds which we have made available again this year for registered social landlords is above the monies that should be provided by integrated joint boards in order to provide the adaptations that people actually need convener the committee is probably aware we put in place an adaptations working group which looked excuse me at what was going on in a number of areas across the country that the recommendations from that group have crossed my desk just recently and I intend to meet my officials in the new year to see how we can ensure that the recommendations from that working group are actually rolled out and that work will include work with senior staff within health and social care partnerships on the preventative benefits of investing in a well-functioning and resourced adaptation service I think that they have got to recognise their responsibilities many integrated joint boards are doing well in this regard others not so well but we are committed to implementing the recommendations of the adaptations working group and the evaluation of the adapting for change test sites that I spoke about earlier and as I say we have continued with that £10 million budget for registered social landlords over the course of this year okay that's helpful can I just check then last year would it have been assumed that integrated joint boards would hopefully have also made a contribution to that particular budget line and if that was the case are figures available for what if you were to multiply what the 32 joint boards put in and if we were to add it to that £10 million what the national spend might be on adaptations that might not be numbers that I fully appreciate men's that might not be numbers that are collected but you'd understand why as a committee we'd be keen to get a hold of that kind of information to get a trend or pattern and more importantly see what the outcomes are those are numbers that I don't have to hand I don't know how easy it would be to gather up those numbers from integrated joint boards what I will do convener is I will attempt to try and get those numbers for you and will write to the committee but I would reiterate you know the public bodies joint working at 2015 passed the responsibility over this to integrated joint boards we have put in an amount of effort in terms of the work of the adaptations working group and that adapting for changed test sites that we put in place I'm willing to share all of that information with you convener and as I say that I intend to meet with my officials at the beginning of the new year to look at how we can improve the work that's going on in integrated joint boards I think that would be really helpful minister I know there's a balance to be struck between getting the data to provide our committee to be able to scrutinise the spend on that and the bureaucracy created and collecting some of that data and there's always a balance to be struck I'm aware of that but with £355 million in the draft budget going to integrate into the joint board and just trying to track that crossover between what is a £10 million adaptions budget direct from the Scottish Government but what is actually other funds from the Scottish Government to integrated joint boards which there's an expectation will all be spent in the same area I think our committee would be keen to track some of that information over time I suspect the first couple of figures might outturns me not illuminate very much but over time I think we'd get a sense of where things are going on that and what kind of information you could provide in that area minister would be greatly received Graham Simpson I'm kind of loath to ask Mr Stewart a question I do You didn't go back with me However I just wanted to clarify something from earlier on, convener when Mr Gibson accused myself and Alexander Stewart of shedding crocodile tears I can assure Mr Gibson Can I ask you to ask a question to the minister I'm concerned for the future of the Government I'm sure Mr Simpson when you were making good points about private schools, about tax breaks that are going away from them there was other members in this committee who would like to use pejorative language in relation to that area, we didn't we said nothing, we gave you several questions to the cabinet secretary on that can I ask you to ask a question Mr Simpson I thought you might be uncomfortable with that convener I'm uncomfortable with inconsistent chaining Ask the question if you want to ask one The Scottish Government pledged to spend more than half a billion pounds on energy efficiency over four years so that would be an average of 125 million a year but the current year spend is 114 million and the draft budget freezes that seems to be a disconnect there to me between spending and commitment I wonder if you could explain why you've not increased it convener our aim is to still spend half a billion pounds over the four year period we have spent a billion pounds in energy efficiency since 2009 and I look to my left 2009 am I right in that 2009 convener and as Mr Simpson is aware from answers that I gave to Mr Wightman last week we will lay out more detail on all of this as we move forward with the as we produce the Scotland's energy efficiency programme route map and as we move on to the warm homes which will be introduced this year we are on track to spend that half a billion pounds we will have spent by the end of this Parliament a billion pounds in energy efficiency since 2009 I'm not going to put Mr Stewart through any more I'm very kind apparently Mr Gibson doesn't have the same qualms he's made a big for a question to catch my eye if they also wish to ask questions I know the day Mr Wieners got a couple as well thank you thank you very much Mr Stewart's paying the price of a nasty habit can I just ask one question Mr Stewart COSLA have said that and I quote we continue to have concerns around the difference in grants subsidy level available per unit to councils and RSLs overall these levels currently stand at 57K per unit for councils and 70K per unit for RSLs given the huge increase in support for housing where there's now room to provide additional funding to local authorities so that they can get more of their own council housing plans on track convener I don't intend to open up the can of worms around about renegotiating subsidy levels the levels were set at the beginning of 2016 after much debate that added some £14,000 per unit to the subsidy at that point in time and the reasoning for the differentials is the committee is well aware is that local authorities can borrow at much cheaper rates than housing associations can so that is the reasoning for that differential I think that if I were to open up the can of worms of trying to renegotiate subsidy again, which I'm not but if I did we would probably spend more time arguing about what those subsidies should be rather than getting on with the job of delivering houses across Scotland as I've already explained to the committee on a number of issues I'm willing to be flexible and my officials on the ground who have the most conversations with local authorities and housing associations are aware that I want that flexibility to be in place those flexibilities if we've already gone over include some higher rates for islands and very rural communities for wheelchair accessible housing and for housing with much more bedrooms than average where again the need can be shown that that's necessary so rather than open up a can of worms I'd rather be flexible and have the constant discussion rather than a rami about what new rates should be thank you okay Alexander Stewart thank you very much welcome the increase in the housing budget money I think that is a part from us all but in the past we have struggled at times to spend the full amount of money in 15-16 I think there was a 16% underspend of about 74 million so can I maybe ask what the processes and procedures that are in place to ensure that as much of the housing budget will be spent and that we try and avoid as much as possible I will do everything possible to spend every penny I don't recognise the figure that Mr Stewart gave there in terms of last year's budget what I would say is there was some of underspend or it was deemed to be underspend in last year's budget the vast bulk of that was receipts that we did not expect to get off the top of my head I can't remember exactly what the figure is around about those receipts if the committee is interested I can pass that figure to you thank you okay Elaine Smith thanks very much thanks for your patient wait minister can I just ask you it was a follow-up to the line of question that was taken with you just a practical question when we look at new house building by the private companies they seem to be building into that the ability to adapt easily and relatively cheaply and so a lot of the issues with adaptations at the moment is trying to adapt existing house and stock that perhaps isn't as easily adapted so would be are you aware if with all of the new building that's going on and the welcome new building in both council and the rest of the public sector are you aware if that is being taken on board that houses are being built to a standard that would be more easily adaptable in future convener in terms of the affordable housing programme the last figure that I have shows that 94% of the houses being delivered were classed is houses for varying need in other words housing that could be readily adaptable beyond that convener Ms Smith mentioned the private sector and while building standards officials are particularly busy at this moment in time in light of the tragedy at Grenfell and Co and all of the work that we've gone on one of the things which we're looking at in the near future at my request is building standards and it's the part it can play in dealing with housing for varying needs in the private sector the committee can be absolutely assured that I will continue to monitor all of this very closely 94% is a good figure as far as I'm concerned I would like to drive that up further in terms of meeting our obligations in terms of the demographic change that is taking place and also the obligations that we spell out in the disability action plan Ms Smith is quite correct that a number of houses are not easily adaptable but what I've found from my own constituency cases over the past while where there's a will there's a way sometimes in getting this absolutely right and I think that what we need to do is to make sure that common sense applies to a number of the things that are going on out there and that's why we will look at what the adaptations working group recommendations say and look at the tests that we've carried out in parts of the country to try and ensure that we get the best practice that's going on in certain places right across the board because I've anecdotally had examples of folk living in very similar accommodation but in different places where in one case it's been easy to adapt and in another place where they've said it's not quite easy to adapt thanks very much convener and obviously the minister knows that the committee have been taking a big interest in building standards recently a lot of time I suppose we've spent talking about the strand of disability with regard to housing but I wonder if I could just ask you maybe to comment a bit further on the other equality considerations that have been taken into account in developing the housing budget for example look at age age doesn't just cover older people although important though that is but it also covers younger people so could I just ask for some general comments minister on equality considerations in the housing section of the budget? The equality assessment of the budget is presented in the equality budget statement which has been published every year since 2009 alongside the Scottish draft budget itself and that's a systematic approach in terms of assessing the equality impact of policy proposals and the impact that those proposals have on various groups beyond that convener in terms of the formulation of the local housing strategies housing needs and demand assessment flowing into the local housing strategy flowing into the strategic housing investment programme that local housing strategy aspect all local authorities should be looking at the equality's impact at that stage of the process beyond that as the committee is very well aware I will be doing my now traditional Christmas thing of looking at the strategic housing investment programmes over the course of these holidays they were delivered to my desk last night I'm going to have chocolate in strategic housing investment programmes convener and I will be going through them as I did last year with a fine tooth comb to look exactly what has been taken into account in terms of needs of disabled people in those strategic housing investment plans I think the latest figure that I have seen is that some 12% of new starts are housing for special needs I will clarify that figure in writing to the committee because that is off the top of my head but if memory serves me well that's 12% but I will send that detail on to the committee Thank you minister and I'm sure I will look forward to hearing from you in due course about your deliberations over the festive break Can I just ask the cabinet secretary a similar question that the minister commented on how the equality impact assessment is produced every year for the draft budget so could I ask Dr Mackay a similar question about this year's statement but also given this produced every year do you have any comment on areas that have been identified where improvements have had to be made over the years with the impact assessment I think that part of it is in relation to the engagement that I have building up to the budget that that's important and also analysing our policies what difference can it make how is it addressing equalities and if I can give you just one example beyond the equality budget statement in determining our tax proposition we thought about what does that mean by way of progressivity, inequality gender as well more women are lower paid than men for example so all of that features in the decisions we've taken and income tax of course is such a big fiscal lever that it was right that we look at the impacts on households and the categorisation to understand the impact of our decisions and that good practice all stems back from an approach on equality's budgeting what's the difference of investment we're making what's the intended consequences what might be the unintended consequences and it's now a range of good engagement and also essentially analysing what our policies can do has got us into a place that I think government and officials for that matter think about impacts in a more holistic way but I just say that good practice, that approach on investment of expenditure is significant and also how we raise revenue as well we absolutely had that as a key plank of our thinking and income tax so I use that as a live current example of how we've deployed thinking on decisions that we make okay, thank you okay, any more questions okay, there will be no bids for questions can I I suppose I should say first of all minister thank you for test-faring through the Lurgy I think we've both got the Lurgy but we've survived that is afflicting you and nothing gets me in the Christmas but knowing that you're reading 32 different strategic housing investment plans from local authority so thank you for getting all of us in the festive spirit minister, but thank you to both yourself and the cabinet secretary and your wider team for the evidence this morning there's additional information you want to provide we would appreciate that in helping to do our budget scrutiny and deliberations so thank you everyone that ends its agenda item and we'll suspend briefly before we move to the next agenda item thank you when I move to agenda item 3 which is common good property and funds and the committee will take evidence from Craig Beach Aberdein City Council Andrew Ferguson Five Council and the Society of Local Authority Lawyers and Administrators in Scotland Dr Lindsay Neill, former chair Selkirk and District Community Council and Paul Nevin who is appearing in behalf of Alasdair McGeachan I apologise if I pronounced that wrong Paul worked very closely with Alasdair in relation to written evidence that's been submitted so thank you very much for coming along to give evidence to us today I believe everyone's got some short opening remarks to make so I don't know if we just go from my left to right Mr Beach do you want to go first okay hello everyone I'm Craig Beach I'm the property team leader within legal services at Aberdein City Council I'm actually relatively new to common good and all the other aspects as I only joined a local authority from private practice and an oil and gas history as well in February 2016 so suffice to say it's certainly been a hot topic since I joined it's something that in any of our client services in relation to land and property assets it's a key question if they're looking to sell or lease an asset is this going to be subject to common good so it's an integral part of what myself and my team of five solicitors and three paralegals have to deal with on generally a day to day basis so I'm looking forward to listening to and contributing to today's discussion thank you very much Mr Ferguson thanks convener in the interest of speed I've nothing really to add I'm happy just to take questions that's my kind of opening statement no pressure Dr Neil none at all none thank you very much I will be brief I hope to be able to illuminate further the question of ownership of common good and suggest practical measures whereby that can be achieved easily secondly I've always wanted to democratise the common good and restore to the community some control over their common good and I would be willing to answer questions on that one of course and I should just add that I'm here representing William Telfer Bill Telfer who couldn't be here today and I know what he would want to say and the only other thing is a question that hasn't really been addressed is whether local authorities should be charging common good funds for the work that they do which is governed by the 1973 Local Government Act so that's all I will illuminate on any of those questions thank you I'm hoping that members are listening and scribbling notes on those very specific points I've made there Dr Neil Paul now thank you convener as you said I'm appearing for Alasdair McKeckin who's submission was in his private capacity so I'm also representing his view cos I work very closely with him in the area of common good I've been with the local authority for over 10 years I'm happy to give my own personal view what I believe to be the view of our members as I say it what I believe the Murray local public's view is all three of which are sometimes at odds with each other and three possible options for change of common good going forward thank you very much everyone and absolutely on the money brief statement so that's very very appreciated and we'll move to our first question which is Andy Wightman convener and thanks to you all for coming in this morning I'm obviously common good's a long standing issue I think it was first raised in Parliament in the first year of its Parliament's existence and has had limited but ad hoc attention since then so I mean I think committee is very grateful for all the written evidence that's come in we just with timing and scheduling we haven't been able to get round to an oral session to deal with that until just now but I suppose what I'm keen to hear from you and you don't all need to contribute on this if you don't wish to because there will be further questions what are the key issues around the legal framework surrounding common good in terms of its ownership and administration that you think Parliament should pay some attention to and give some idea about the kind of consequences of the legal framework as it stands just now which are less than optimal so the current legal framework is it fit for purpose I suppose is my question I saw a flash of eye contact with Mr Nevin there so let's take you first Well I think the current legal framework creates a special status for this small area of property and funds which represents less than 1% loosely speaking of council assets and the legal framework has led to a disproportionately complicated administration of common good assets in that the cost of administrating them generally far outweighs excuse me the value of the asset is being dealt with if you compare it to for example to leasing industrial premises the amount of legal time and resources, council resources used to do that is quite small compared to the value of the rental income for example when you deal with a common good asset you have a small parcel of ground the resources to go into identifying it whether it's alienable or whether it's inalienable all of those legal issues that are very difficult and time consuming are disproportionate to the value of the transaction that of course does not take account of the value placed on it by the inhabitants of the former boroughs who see more than economic value they see local historical interest and educational things that perhaps don't have a monetary value don't feel under pressure to Dr Neil okay yes I think there's an awful lot of time wasted on trying to decide what constitutes common good property and what does not and if I can remind you of what I said in my written submission there was a very clear court case in 2003 involving Wilson against Inverclyde Council when three judges at the inner house of the court of session made very clear judgments based on what had been said in a 1944 case that Mr Ferguson will be familiar with because it's mentioned in his book and it is so clear in its judgment which they all agreed on that you don't have to havor and fight about what is common good and what isn't there are going to be some exceptions and what I would propose to try and sort them out is a greater involvement of local people in the management of a local common good and these questions could be argued, discussed and decided at a much lower level than involving the entire council and all its staff and what not an expensive chasing of documents in one thing or another Okay, thank you Mr Ferguson did you like to add? Yes, thank you convener I mean, I think I'm broadly in agreement with Dr Neil and Mr Nevin on this as Mr Wightman says this common good issue has come up again and again it does involve a disproportionate amount of time I think in terms of definitions as I say in my submission there are two issues, one is what isn't common good as Dr Neil said the other one is this very abstruse and academic definition around what's alienable what's not alienable that matters because it means the local authority has to go to court or doesn't have to go to court so I've put in some recommendations in my submission for basically doing a wave of the second of those definitions so that there should be a simple transparent process for when local authorities want to do something it's about consultation it's about involvement with the local community but making that simple and straightforward so that everybody's clear what these properties can be dealt with and really just I know what Dr Neil says about the case law but the problem is that the case law is always capable of great interpretation and great fun for lawyers but actually doesn't move things forward that much so I think in terms of the consequence that the current legal framework is not perfect I think probably some straightforward legislation putting in a definition putting in a simplified disposal process which involves proper consultation might be the way forward because at the moment it does take up a disproportionate amount of time and obviously you spent some time in relation to finance this morning and local government finance the areas where which deal with common good in local authorities are the back-office functions and we all know what happens to back-office functions in the current budget climate they get squeezed more than the front line services so it's not as if the resources to deal with these types of issues are growing Mr Feige again don't feel obliged to add to that if you feel it's been suitably covered that's okay do you want to add anything? Yeah I'd just like to add I always try to look at things from the perspective of obviously working at local authority the people that we serve and also our client services they're looking to run and deal with and manage the assets as best they can and just to reiterate that my colleagues are Dr Neill Mr Neill and Mr Ferguson there's now been a raft of case law lots of judicial commentary on the previous law and I think this is maybe a great opportunity to try and codify several of the judicial authorities and to include it within the community empowerment related legislation because we're talking about the consultation of the community bodies when we decide whether to alienate common good land so if we have everything what is common good and that's in the statute book and then how it can be disposed of and then linking it to the consultation that we're trying to introduce through the new 2015 act then all that would be a great a great step forward Can you survive with what you follow up with some of that? Thanks very much indeed for that Law Society of Scotland basically says in response to the question about whether the rules to define common good or adequate they basically say no Alistair McKechn evidence no as well there's an interesting comment from Neil King who I understand is a retired solicitor and he said I can't emphasise strongly enough that merely codifying the common rules in statute won't make the uncertainties go away because we still need to investigate every case on its merits and it's that that's often quite challenging and indeed leaves a lot of land abandoned and not being used because people can never get round to it and on the flip side of that ties up a lot of time even here in Parliament with the Portobello school bill that went through last year that was as a consequence of a dispute raised by residents who claimed the land was common good City of Edinburgh Council accepted that it was common good that question was never put to a court I suggest that had it been put to a court they'd have probably found it wasn't this Parliament had to go to an awful lot of bother passing a specific piece of legislation just to allow a school to be made so Neil King goes on to say that he says the only way to make these problems go away is to have a definitive register in other words the definition of what is and what isn't common good is based on case law but in statute becomes whether it's in a register or not and obviously there need to be some time allowed to make sure that everything that people wanted to get on was on but at a certain point in time if it wasn't on it that by statute would not be common good I mean is that the kind of because I know there's various solutions suggested in here would that be the kind of approach that might help clarity in the future I'll keep Mr Neven first then talk to you that doesn't form the basis of Mr McCaggan's submission that I'm talking to but I did read the submission and I think it's an excellent idea to codify to define as Mr Betts said to codify a definition of common good doesn't solve the problem there's still going to be argument so if you have a code that says if it wasn't bought for a statutory purpose it isn't in a trust and it was formerly owned by a borough council then it will be common good that might be your definition but you then have to evidence that and that's where the difficulty is if you have a register on it's not common good end of story that is your solution or certainly a solution but getting to the point that that register is complete will have involved lots of cases with the land tribunal etc etc there will be cost and time I think Mr King suggests 10 years until it's closed but then again we recognise that completing the land register of Scotland is going to take 10 years so 10 years is a short time when you consider how long this has been a problem I think it's certainly it's not one of the solutions that I would talk to but it certainly would be a solution whether it would be accepted by the public because there will be on-going argument you know but if there was an end date it could definitely work okay Dr Neil thank you yes I agree with that there should be a sufficient time 10 years, 5 years whatever for that to be compiled but to use as the basis the inner house ruling is the start point and anything that falls outside or is in dispute could be disposed of at a local level which is why I advocate increasing the number of local people involved in the common good administration and you would get free people free service from them and it wouldn't cost the cost as it does today in investigating these things we've done it in Selkirk already and it worked okay so get a register have a cut-off date how do other witnesses feel about that I mean I suppose having a register will help and the consultation in terms of the 2059 act will help in thrashing out some of the arguments that people have about particular properties I suppose in the end of the day a judgment call will have to be taken on some properties and it's really whether there's then an acceptance that well that's the decision and we can move on or whether it just goes around in a big circle and starts again I mean one thing I was going to say was the community empowerment legislation is a great opportunity for communities to take things on and I suppose maybe say this come from Glenrothes rather than an old burrow but there are these issues about the way councils use assets more widely and I think the community empowerment legislation will help to tackle some of that and I wouldn't want common good to end up being shunted into a corner of that because it's obviously people have strong feelings about common good property and are proud of the burrows heritage but it's not the complete picture So Mr Wightman, we left with cut-off dates then it's been the big issue rather than the register because that's going to happen It's the confirmation of the register that if it's not done in two, three years whatever you dictate then that is the register fixed then I suppose Dr Neil apologies Mr Wightman, there's a general principle we could say 30 years 29 years and six months time there's still going to be chunks of land out there people are disputing over it's the principle of a cut-off date irrespective of when it's set and that there appears I'm just trying to get a sense from the witnesses whether everyone accepts that there should be a cut-off date I'll take Mr Beach first Sorry, I'll take Mr Beach first Yeah, I think that with all of these things, if you don't set cut-off dates then it just rolls on and on and there's no focus and no targets so I do agree with that principle what is difficult is that especially for the larger local authorities such as Aberdeen City we have several thousand individual titles that would have to be examined some will be obviously common good but there are others which you have to delve into not only the title deeds but council minutes from the 1800s and 1900s checked with archivists and to do that with relatively slim with a slim legal team in the face of the current budget restrictions and resource and cost cutting that's going on through all the local authorities putting a early target date will make it extremely difficult for a number of the authorities to realistically achieve that target I know that this is a different topic but the completion of the land register there's already pressure from the Government for public land to be registered by 2019 so adding a further burden of common good register is going to put even more strain on our authority and our departments that's obviously timescale and resources before other witnesses come in I'm conscious this is Mr Whiteman's line of questioning so maybe just pass it back to Mr Whiteman Just one final question for our colleagues and that's the question about management Dr Neil you talked about what's going on in Selkirk I mean in general terms given that the 1973 act provisions were put in place to protect common good in response to pressure from town councils who wanted some protection for these assets and got those in the 1973 act Do you think in general terms there's a place for allowing local communities to regain ownership of these assets if they so wish and on the specific point of the community empowerment we do have a problem with for example the asset transfer provisions which allow asset transfer requests to be made but there's at least two authorities I know where those asset transfer discussions have begun where it relates to common good property and they've said well we're going to have to go to the court so in other words the community empowerment act is not helping or rather common good law is getting in the way of the intent of that particular provision of the community empowerment act If I could respond to that I think if it's devolved to a local area you're going to get people volunteering to help with the established councillors and between them they can sort out what is common good and what isn't if they don't agree then presumably it falls back to the council hands but in that way with a cut out date you will get a register and if people don't make a case for it to be common good during that time with the input of equal numbers of elected councillors and local people so that nobody can bulldoze anybody else then that's it you get the register done end of story Let's see Mr Ferris and then we'll go to Mr Lee Very quickly to endorse Mr Whiteman's comment about the asset transfer request that is a point that I picked up in my submission I think if you are going to legislate in common good that would be something that I would do to tie the two together so that there's no doubt if there is an asset transfer request you don't then have to go through the provisions of section 75 to 73 Mr Leven wants to come in back to your convening your point about the close date for the register I entirely agree there should be a date that's not just what you were saying I believe Mr Whiteman you were talking about whether that list is a definitive legal definition of what is and isn't common good and I would agree it would be a more useful register if it was and the turn to your comments regarding local management of common good that would be what I would say is the second in my own personal view the second choice solution a good solution to transfer to local trusts or to community councils or to people with local knowledge the disadvantage of that of course remains what are you transferring what is the common good that you're transferring you're still stuck with the whole what is common good Mr Stewart you've already talked about the financial burdens that are faced with local authorities in keeping the records of common good and then we've also then touched on the community empowerment act but do you believe that the community empowerment act will give that help and guidance in improving record keeping and do we still maintain that the financial burden is going to be quite heavy for the council local authority Mr Ferguson the provisions of the act in setting up a register are perfectly signed and they're there to be done you've heard from my local authority colleagues it will be a big job to do once it's done it shouldn't be that difficult but having Fife having gone through that on a kind of voluntary basis before it is a massive input of resources at the start once it's there it's not huge but there is a big lump of work to be done and because of the constraint that councils are facing do you believe that that is reasonable to expect them to do all that or will they put it to the back burner because it's not seen as a major priority I think the issue is timescale how long are you going to give us to do it frankly a couple of questions myself, other members have questions if they could indicate to myself how you're going to speak to councils we'll do this because one way is to have a 10 years time have a cut-off date but local authority I assume will troll through assets that the council owns that they suspect actually in practice is common good lands and properties so as they go through an area by definition of not putting some land on a common good register they're effectively saying that's not common good to be done before an artificial cut-off date so is there a potential phased approach to this by local authorities where different geographical zones of each local authority could be if you like zoned as we'll track this zone next work out what should or shouldn't be common good transfer everything into a common good register that they see as appropriate and then at that point it's deemed everything else within that area would not be common good do we have to do this in a big bang cut-off date for 10 years time or could we do this incrementally just a thought it could be done incrementally but in order to simplify the whole process and avoid further argument discussion and so on if you do it in a manner of having a cut-off date and involvement of local people a lot of the administrative work are unnecessary because local people will then have had an opportunity to claim what is common good and if it isn't on the register at the end of that time period then it doesn't belong to the common good end of story that's what I'm trying to get across okay, that's a fair point Mr Naven I think your suggestion is a good one I think a phased approach you could perhaps take we all know within our local authority areas we've got, I think in the case of Murray we've got 11 former burras burras hard for an ordinary Irish man to say that word actually and we know that some have got more common good than others, we already know this and so if you did a phased approach you could take a former burra area say for six months or one year and that way your suggestion would make it more bite-sized and you'd perhaps have a better focus and it would be more manageable and less likely to get put on the we don't have to do this for another nine years, let's leave it until the 10th year before we start and then come to successor committee and tell them we don't have enough time, resources or expertise in a local authority area to deliver it, which would maybe be my concern one of the requirements would be good quality community consultation because you can decide as a local authority that land is a risen common good whatever that's it process would be which would involve community engagement but in some areas community councils are a lot more vibrant and active than other areas there are natural campaigners in some communities but not in other communities where is the incentive for local authorities to do really good quality community engagement and what should that look like and the flip might be is there a self-interest for some local authorities to have some lands not appear in the common good register and if there's a conflict there how could that be resolved this is not my area so if that question doesn't stack up my apologies just having looked at the papers before me Dr Neil there is still a residual knowledge within communities as to what belongs to the common good and what doesn't and if there were things that were questioned they could be looked at I think the point being that if things do not get questioned and the deadline occurs then fair enough it's not common good I suppose but where there is no I mean something could be sitting in common good I mean I'm thinking of GlenConard GlenConard park in my constituency where I think that the whole friends of GlenConard park has over that to the city lapses this year and I think it will revert back to the city to a wider developmental plans we've got a local regeneration group there that is quite focusing what that land should or shouldn't be used for and will be very attentive to that there's local housing associations there's a variety of others but there'll be lands elsewhere where that skill set just doesn't exist or it's decades later it's a distant memory of people what land was or wasn't used for it's how do we ensure local authority is in proper community engagement in relation to that because something could be held in common good but community might be completely unaware of it it may not be on their radar so any more thoughts on how we do that community engagement Mr Ferguson I think I mean there is a a really positive outcome for local authorities consulting properly with the local communities because I totally agree with Dr Neil particularly in the bigger local authorities with the change over staff over the years and everything else nobody knows their own local area in fact there are 26 former borys and even if you've been as long in local authority as I have it's often only a particular area of the centre of life in my case that you know quite well whereas the people in the local communities generally do have a lot of the history and so on so there can be really positive outcomes from consulting properly I'm not quite sure obviously guidance can help us with how you should carry out a consultation there's an awful lot of work being done on what a good consultation would look like in other context so I don't think that in itself should be that difficult I think that the case you mentioned in other cases where a community has strong feelings about a particular asset common good is sometimes part of the answer or the equation but the community empowerment powers now give communities greater power to take things into their own hands if that's what they want to do so I think again it's part of a wider landscape okay thank you Dr Neil yes I was only going to remind those who don't know that in 1907 I think it was Lloyd George I went through every property in the land and assigned ownership to it and one can find maps of these things one can get them from West Register house and you can actually track what was once upon a time common good so you're not going to suddenly emerge with things that are not on that map we've done a good proportion of this and it can be done elsewhere so you've got a point in time when common good property can be identified okay any other comments or thoughts on that Mr Neven yes convener I think you asked a question I don't know if we answered was it, was there any advantage to a local authority not finding an asset to be common good and I think the honest answer has to be yes because if we find an asset as common good particularly if it's an alienable common good then we have to go to the court to change its use or to sell it and also if we do sell it we being the council that money, the proceeds, the free proceeds must go into a common good account with the special status that that holds and not into general coffers I would hope however that local authority lawyers who deal with the definitions of common good are not working on that basis but there would be it would be advantageous to the council if it wasn't common good and in terms of the consultation I think you've got a difficulty because you have as you said yourself you've got some borough councils borough council areas that have got very involved inhabitants who know lots about the local history and are very interested in common good and would engage in consultation you've got others who don't and as you say the common good could be missed so perhaps as part of a consultation you actually have to start with education in those boroughs to raise the awareness in those boroughs of what common good is and could be in that particular area before you hope to get buy-in meaningful buy-in to a consultation and I suspect that's where the tension comes from and I don't mean this in a bad way to local authorities but once you raise that awareness you create a demand and an aspiration and a bureaucracy and a time consumption for local authorities to manage all of that if you've got no one really responding to a statutory consultation period but then you leaflet a whole area, you knock a few doors you get a public meeting and twenty folk come along you effectively then get community activism that might men challenge some of the actions of the local authority so it's just where the incentive and disincentive sit in relation to that I'm not saying, I'll continue to ask questions but I'm not saying any bits from members to ask questions I'll take Elaine Smith and then Andy Wightman Thanks very much, convener It's actually a specific question for Mr Ferguson Apologise, I think that I've lost my voice in your submission you talk about disposal and it's something that Mr Nevin just mentioned there about disputes and you say that actually it could be a simply procedure I think is what you're getting at and one of those could be for a land tribunal could you just expand a bit more on that for us please Thank you Yes, in terms of disposal at the moment either a council decides it's not that part of the common good which needs court approval in which case it goes through the usual internal either committee or delegated processes and the property is disposed of there is obviously still an obligation to consult with the community but it's fairly straightforward if not then at the moment there's the option of either going to the sheriff or going to the court of session and I mentioned in my submission the pros and cons of that neither of them are really that accessible for the communities unless just as the convener said they are thoroughly organised and focused community group that are used to taking on these kind of things so to my view really the issues the legal issue if such a case does come up are pretty straightforward is what's in the best interests of the community that's what it comes down to and I don't really see why that needs a highly paid sheriff even to decide that and if there was a lower tribunal which could deal with that and deal with it more efficiently then I would have thought it's the best interests of both the community and the council really just to try and de-legalise it a bit I wonder if any of the rest of the panel have a few on that Mr Beach The Aberdeen City Council is considering a court petition in relation to property of the nearest gardens at the heart of the city centre and clearly the proposals that they intend have been widely it's already gone through full council and approvals being made to go ahead but we have had to spend several thousand pounds on a court council opinion just to confirm that we should go for a petition and then we're going to have to do all the petition work when it's clearly going to benefit the citizens of Aberdeen what is being proposed and it's going to involve a lease of part of the recreational ground for basically coffee shops and retail so it's going to benefit the community it's unlikely that as Mr Ferguson is saying do we have to have a highly paid sheriff to decide on what should just be common sense so I would just confirm or support what Mr Ferguson has said Had the risk of keeping common good complicated I would say that we'd have to reflect a recent experience we've had in Murray Council where we applied to the court, the sheriff court to release an alienable common good in this case a former borough chambers which are really special common good and it was pretty painless it was a summary application to the sheriff it was dealt with quickly and I think it was done well because there was a very very good consultation and there were no objections so much as I would like to say it not having to go to the sheriff court there are experiences where it's pretty straight forward it's not that hard I was only going to add you mentioned where you base this thing on the community council or what now community councils are generally attended by elected district councillors for the area and it would be a simple thing of tacking a management committee on to the end of a community council meeting it would not involve additional staff of the local authority so I do not foresee that there are big expenses involved and staff costs in order to carry out a democratisation of the common good back to a local area Could I just pick up at that point, Mr Neil because the other issue that I was interested that you raise and to do with legalities as well is the issue of the live borders I wonder if you could which I think you're saying that there are no local people from the borough on this live border so maybe you could talk us through that Yes, the management of common good fund should be done by people from the local area either councillors or whatever the live borders is a separate organisation which is not governed by common good law and there are no representatives or there are not defined representatives from each area of the common good that they have taken over part of it it's a mishmash and it does not conform with what the original dictats of the common good law were particularly the 1491 81 one which is delightfully simple Thank you Our deputy could have been an expert in the 1491 common good law but we won't press her further because she'll only get embarrassed I mean obviously in the borders you have a tradition of common ridings and all the rest of it and you have quite some large areas of land held in the common good and in Selkirk you've done a lot of work improving the administration and management of the common good but obviously in Edinburgh, Glasgow Aberdeenys are big cities I'm just wondering how management could be placed in the hands of local people when in effect in the city of Edinburgh for example you don't have Selkirk Town Council and more so naturally there's a sense in which you want to take back control if you like to Selkirk rather leave it as the bigger entity so I'm just wondering if there are any comments on how we might improve the administration in the cities which still do have a unitary authority They have localised community councils don't they in Edinburgh? Yes I mean they're probably about 20 or so local community councils If it's based on them they identify what is common good and what isn't and they will have the attendance of presumably their local councillors elected councillors so it would be an easy thing to tack the discussion of the common good on to the end of a community council meeting on the beginning of On the question of disposals obviously this is one of the most complicated areas and leads to petitions to the court and I think we're talking about alienation disposal and appropriation the difference between inalienable and alienable Mr Ferrick, I think you're the author of a book on this topic know all too well these definitions themselves are not entirely agreed yet I'm just wondering as part of any reform should we and you've hinted at this already be looking to simplify the process of how we decide whether for example a park in Edinburgh should be used for a school which involves an appropriation whether a long lease of 50 years should be given to our business for a bit of land by the river Clyde whether a former city chamber should be sold to somebody else whether all those processes should be subject to a much simpler no less transparent but much simpler procedure so people are not faced with grappling with the complex legal questions about is this an alienation is it a disposal yes in short yes I think all of these issues are terribly interesting if you want to write a book about them but actually to an extent I do think why should the community not have just as much input into something which turns out to be on the alienable side of the fence as the inalienable ones obviously the really key ones like form of burra chambers are but you know in the end of the day they're all part of the common good just to come back if I could about your point about the cities I mean I think that is a good point because whilst yes you can have a localised community council dealing with a particular asset in their part of Edinburgh for example it all ends up one pot one fund so without wanting to speak from a city colleagues that there is an issue there how you have input from all the smaller parts of quite a big community obviously in the case of the cities okay thanks and I'm just wondering about you know where do we go from here I mean is it your view that Parliament needs to do something further on this question or is this kind of iterative every five years we do a little tweak to definitions and a tweak to the disposal regime adequate any questions or what could change and how could we do it I would like to change section 104 and add local people to the same number as elected councillors so that there is some equality in the management the local management of common good that at the moment it's just any member of a body that is approved for it but there should be a number put on it any other suggestions for what you would like to change put things back to the policy makers for what we could do differently Mr Nevan abolish common good absolutely abolish common good create parity with ordinary council assets allow the normal democratic process that we all work within and unitary authorities to call to account councils who sell land or don't sell land or lease land or don't sell land it's a hangover from the past it's our cake it's historically interesting I love working with it I've enjoyed working with it for the last 10 years but it is not modern government it really isn't it does kind of leave out evidence session in a very odd place given we're talking about cut off dates in common good registers but very challenging yes I'll let you back in Mr Nevan I maybe wouldn't quite go so far as abolishing cos I don't think you're going to do that you're not going to get a lot of votes doing that to be quite frank with you but I do think simplify do away with all these archaic distinctions between alienable and inalienable create a simpler process for local authorities in terms of disposal and align it with the rest of community empowerment so that communities are involved in the decision making that's I think what I would suggest you should be looking for in your policy formation okay, I'll take in the second doctor do you want to give others a chance to come in and the second doctor Neil Craig-Reach did you want to add something? yeah, just a short piece to add sorry, I lost what I was going to say does Parliament need to act or can we just leave things drifting we can come back to the doctor if you want to kind of respond to that that's fine Mr.Reach doctor Neil will take you first and I'll come back to Mr.Reach do you want to add that if you abolish common good you will get a riot immediately in Hoik and I don't think that's a very good thing just wondering if anyone's represent Hoik we can move next business then Mr.Reach sorry about that it was just to say that really we do want to simplify it to have a set procedure for common good mainly in terms of the disposal appropriation of it and the fact is the current wording in the 1973 act says if a question arises I mean Mr Ferguson has written a chapter of his book about that very question so if we could just somehow get it more simplified then it would really help everyone okay, do you want to I've got a brief question at the end Mr. Whiteman, you want to follow up on that my question I'm sorry, Mr. Apologies Mr. Nevin wanted to then to put me right here, sorry Andy no it's okay, it's okay I suppose my question is that this issue has come up in Parliament every on average three to four years and it's always been kind of putting a too difficult pile because Parliament has got a lot of business to get through every committees and all the rest of it what urgency do you think do you think Parliament needs to act soon and in this session because this committee needs to come to some view as to what to do with this and we could easily just sit after this in private session and agree that actually this is all a bit too difficult but it's not really a priority so I wanted to get some sense of the priority you think should be attached to reform in this area and if it is about simplification whether that shouldn't be too complicated a job, notwithstanding that there will be arguments about how simple, ultimately abolish is a total simply argument Mr Leven short of abolishing which I have to agree with Mr Ferguson may not get you votes certainly not in Huyke apparently we must avoid riots at all costs I fully agree however I would agree with my colleagues that definitions of alienability another difficult word for an ordinary Irish man to say should be abolished all that nonsense should just go it's got no place in modern law but also what this committee could recommend and it could be done as a quick fix and it's already been discussed is to make the register legally definitive it's an easy thing to do and it won't be without dispute but it still involves all your consultation it allows bringing the local community with you but we're going to spend time and resources that you've heard my colleagues saying and I agree entirely will cost us a lot in local authority to create a list that is still going to be disputed because common good is just a controversial area and it always will be but if you have a list and a cut-off date and you say if it's on it is, if it's not it isn't that is a simple thing that could be done in this parliament and would lead to perhaps us not coming back for maybe five or six years this time abolish it will never come back welcome back anytime we're still living doctor new never mind the abolition question I think we should bring in 102 and 104 as soon as possible and if possible extend 104 to include more people who could act locally in the management of local common good and I agree with all the things about getting a registry can I just ask, sorry, when you say bring in 102, do you mean highlight the terms or what do you mean by bring in 102 understand what you're saying about 104 yes but what do you mean by 102 I'm agreeing about getting you know deciding what constitutes common good fund property okay, right but again just for coming to the end of our evidence session clarity under the community empowerment Scotland act 2015 102 establishes a common good register but the issue just to be right is it's not a definitive register just because something's not on it doesn't mean it's not common good you might get an extra degree of protection if it's on it but even then witnesses seem to be arguing for a more streamlined process by which that land could still be disposed of for community benefit anyway so it might be a degree of additional protection and Mr Neven was pointing out that it's maybe an inequality in having greater protections for some public asset land and not others which is why Mr Neven was saying abolished a lot in a list of reasonable protections and processes for disposing of all community asset land I don't want to just have captured the situation accurate there Mr Neven I think you've got it right on convener the other thing I would say is we've had common good registers before the borough council's had common good registers and as Mr Ferguson says in his book and I agree with him entirely just because something is on a common good register from an old borough council does not mean that it's common good we're now creating registers again in the 21st century they haven't been definitive in the past they're not going to be definitive today so would the question for our committee to ask would be whether it's in the common good or not in the common good register that's a key question final question moving us away a little bit from what we were talking about this committee is about to look at planning legislation one of the key things within planning legislation is to have local development plans every 10 years is supposed to every 5 years that seems a huge opportunity if we are going to have a list of these things to start doing audits and looking at so I'm just wondering if you think that should focus the mind on the base that the drive seems to be to have these lists in the first place but also within that there's the provisions to promote local place plans by communities and again I'm just wondering whatever local place plans are being pursued by communities whether there should be an obligation on the local authority at that point to an audit of land within the boundary of that area to assure itself what is and isn't common good for communities to do this separate from the big bang approach again so I'm wondering where planning legislation that we are just about to look at in this Parliament if there's opportunities there in relation to some of that any thoughts Mr Ferguson I mean I hadn't thought about the planning bill but the provisions of the planning bill and doing stretching the LDPs to 10 years and so on and the whole idea of place making that does sit well with common good assets and I'm not sure how you tie it together but yes it is part of the wider picture of a local authority with the communities looking at how things are put together and where common good assets sit with all of that and really looking at them and saying what's the best use for this let's not put it in the too hard pile anymore let's look at it as part of our overall plan for these communities so I agree with that I mean I think just to go back briefly to Mr Wightman's last question yes there have been one or two nips and tucks to legislation about common good over the years and you do have weightier things to talk about frankly I would suggest to the committee have a look at what you think can be done to simplify things this time round and then leave it be I mean I think that Mr Nevin will bring you in before we draw in fact I'll bring you in Mr Nevin but I'll just signpost everyone else if you have a final opportunity for any closing remarks just kind of marshal your thoughts just now and I'll give you the opportunity if you wish but I don't know about the rest of the committee but my take home message is actually it's not about whether something's in a common good register or planning legislation it's about how communities shape the assets in their area and can mold and shape the type of communities that they want and how land is used irrespective of whether in 1907 a Prime Minister decided to point that a bit a land and say that is or that isn't common good or you on that or you don't on that not sure how democratic that process is was back then compared to the democratic standards where communities shaping the environment in which they live so that would be my take home message from that if you think I've got that wrong please tell me I've got it wrong when you do your final comments but Mr Nevin will let you go first I was just going to say about the local plan idea like Mr Ferguson I hadn't thought about it but it would certainly be it's certainly a good idea and also it might have the benefit you get more community engagement because communities can see that they're talking about what's going to happen in the reasonably immediate future to their area in terms of schools housing etc so those who engage with the consultation on the local plan are more likely they're more likely to be more of them and therefore if they're also dealing with common good issues you're going to catch those that otherwise otherwise may not involve themselves in a purely common good consultation okay thank you and given the left to right at the opening comments let's go from right to left for any closing comments remarks to Dr Neil yes thank you very much as far as introducing the act is concerned there is still a chance for the minister to direct how it should be implemented under 103 and there are and also in 105 so there are opportunities to actually find the act once it's through so I would advocate getting it through as fast as possible and regarding the 107 map that would only identify to people what had been common good land and very often these are parcels of land or whatever which are overlooked today so it has that value okay thank you very much Andrew Ferguson really helped me shape my own thinking on where I would suggest you go with this and it is about common good being part of a wider agenda of place making I think that's a very good phrase to use the register will help to flush out difficulties and once local authorities have that register that's fine it'll be there and people can access it and it won't end all the arguments but at least it'll set some sort of thing in place but in the end of the day the really crucial thing is about community involvement and as I said earlier that to me is part of a wider landscape of community empowerment communities getting involved through the planning bill that comes to pass through the community empowerment legislation in deciding what happens to particular assets and that goes beyond butter boundaries as well that happens in other communities too okay thank you very much Mr Reach yeah just my closing remarks would just be that as we maybe just teased out towards the end of the discussion that the community empowerment Scotland act and common good and the history of common good aren't just sitting perfectly together right now we've seen that with even though you know the Parliament's legislator regarding community empowerment and asset transfers to the idea so that the communities could take back control of certain public buildings not being used properly but then they may come into the hit the buffers with a common good query so the best thing I think would be to try and align ourselves better and tidy up the common good legislation and just sorry one further thing we've got to remember that the common good and the law protecting common good was generally there to stop misappropriation of funds by councils in history but I think time has moved on now that there's a lot of legislation that's controls financial regulations control councils they have to get the best value for all the assets they have so moving not quite abolishing common good but let's have a look at it as soon as possible okay can I thank all four witnesses this morning sorry if you're waiting before we started the evidence session hopefully you've got something of it I think we'll go back and read the official report and see where we take from where we go next as a committee but thank you very much so that ends agenda item 3 and we now move to agenda item 4 which is previously agreed to taking private so thank you very much thank you