 Welcome, everyone. Thank you all very much for travelling in this morning. Some from not too far distances, some from farther away distances, but thank you very much for coming in this morning to appear before the committee and give evidence to the committee also. Can I just remind everyone to turn off their mobile phones? It does interfere with the system and if we're able to even just be a bit of a foot away from the microphone, I'm told that it's much better for the recording system as well. We have two apologies this morning, Pauline McNeill and Mark Griffin. I'll just go straight on to agenda item 1, which is the work programme priorities. It's an evidence session, obviously, around table and this is the third final session that we'll have to gather the views of yourselves and other stakeholders and what the priorities for the committee in this particular piece of legislation are. I would like to basically ask the witnesses, could they introduce themselves in turn? I'm from the Public and Commercial Services Union. I'm Craig Smith from SAMH. I'm Eilodim Mignar from Scottish Refugee Council. I'm David Formstone from Social Work Scotland. John McArdle, black triangle campaign in defence of disability rights. Dave Moxham from the Scottish GUC. Andrew Jackson from the Scottish Federation of Housing Associations. Jim McCormack from the Trosevountry Foundation. Thank you very much. Before I do start and ask the first question, I would like to put on record that I'm in contact with the black triangle campaign in the context of a constituency matter, so I thought I'd put that on record at the moment. I'll just say the first question. In scrutinising the proposed legislation, what areas, if any, would you believe that this committee should prioritise and open that to the floor? For SAMH, we really welcome the prospect of the devolution of a limited aspect of the social security system in Scotland. The biggest priority for us would be the disability aspect, so there's a particular DLA and PIP. For scrutiny, we think that there's a real need for a radical change in how PIP has been delivered at the moment, particularly around the assessment process, the application process and the support that the climate has received for going through that process. We've done a lot of work with our service users in gathering evidence for our response to the on-going consultation for the social security bill. There's a lot of issues that are similar that came up over the years with welfare reform, with the ESA employment support allowance reforms, the work capability assessment, that the assessments for PIP are having a really long-term negative impact on people's mental health. They're really not addressing people's mental health or recognising the huge concentration on physical abilities rather than people's mental health and the impact that mental health is having on the functionality. There's a lack of support in the process. We've seen the impact that a really good welfare advocacy and welfare advice can have on helping people through that process, but there's still a backlog in that and barriers to accessing that. We've been involved in a really good pilot, funded by the Scottish Government through the Alliance, on providing dedicated welfare advocacy support to people going through the ESA process but also the PIP process. Unfortunately, that's no longer being funded after the pilot, but the results for that were excellent. People felt more confident, more able to express how they felt and express the impact that their health was having on them during the process and got better results for that. For that, there's less need for appeals. We know that the PIP process isn't working. If 60% of PIP appeals are successful for the claimant, there's huge issues there. I think that there's particular issues around people with mental health problems and fluctuating conditions and how that's not recognised through the system. I'll mention local housing allowance as a distinct area of benefit now. That is something up the hope that the committee would look into. We briefed on that and sent the committee papers around that. I have case studies that we're going to be sharing with MSPs more widely. I think that we've got one for everybody, but one member of this committee shows that some people will lose hundreds of pounds a month in their rent if they're in support and accommodation under the proposals. I think that that touches on a wider point about the way that the committee might choose to approach the Government's actions in terms of the devolved benefit system. The consultation document focuses heavily on the list of benefits that are being explicitly resolved. It asks for broad thoughts on what else might be done and how things like universal credit flexibilities might be used. If the Government starts from the point of dealing with exactly what's been given first and worrying about the other stuff later, it's in danger of creating a system that replicates the problems that the current system has, which is that it's had things tacked on to it willy nilly for decades, and that's why it's in such an awful mess. Whereas if the Government can be creative about thinking what it might start off with and begin to plan around some of those top-ups or perhaps new benefits from the off and give some serious thinking to that, it's going to save itself a lot of trouble in the long term. I'll give one practical example of that. The promise from the Department of Work and Pensions is that they will essentially, or at least their proposal at the moment, give a check to the Scottish Government and the Welsh Government to cover the shortfall created by their cap on local housing allowance for those who are in support of accommodation. That essentially creates basically a grant pot, and it's not clear who will apply for that, whether the landlord will apply for it or the tenant will apply for it. Because this measure won't be introduced until 2019, there's one line of thought that says, well, we've got plenty of time to work out what we're going to do about that if the Scottish Government, we and the Scottish Government, if we were to receive that check. But in fact that thinking needs to be done now, because there are a lot of problems with that approach, one of which is that the benefit system works on the basis of entitlement and money rises as need rises, whereas a grant pot is limited. But also tenants in support accommodation now know they're going, something is going to happen to their payments in three years time, but they don't know what, so that's extremely anxiety-creating for them. And also landlords who are thinking of building new or developing current support accommodation simply don't know whether what income is going to come from, what shape it's going to take. And when you're talking about building houses, three years isn't long enough time for them to go, it'll be all right. It's the kind of thing that will make them think we should wait and see. And if they wait and see until then, it makes it even longer. So if the Scottish Government starts thinking creatively about that now, that's going to help. And I think that applies to their approach to the benefit system more widely. Don't think about what Westminster is giving you. Think about what you could do with the current powers available. Okay, thanks. I think in terms of the priorities of the devolved powers, as PIP, disability benefits are the largest area, I would agree that that's the priority to look at initially. I mean, there are three kind of key areas of PIP that we'd think that you should focus on. One is around the rates of the benefits, given that there's only two payable rates, and it's essentially excluding and getting rid of the lower mobility rate, which we think needs to be looked at as a priority and it has an impact on mobility as a consequence. The other areas would be the quality in terms of the involvement of the private sector of the assessors in the way that they handle the assessments for the individuals involved. I'm sure that committee members have all got horror stories and cases from their constituents on that, but how that affects in terms of the decision making when that comes back to people working in the DWP looking at those decisions to get from assessment providers. That needs to be reviewed now. My belief is that the work should be brought back into the public sector, but also that the whole system needs to be reviewed to allow the staff processing the benefit to use and develop their skills and knowledge of the system, rather than just going on what an assessment provider says, which is the current situation. In terms of structure and staffing, structurally we believe that there needs to be a full choice in how claimants can access services both in terms of disability and health benefits, but across the board staffing. We strongly believe that it's a key area to look at. There needs to be adequate staffing. You might be aware that DWP has cut 30,000 staff since 2010, and that's not because the work has been dropping. It's the largest welfare reform in the history of the departments that have cut that number of staff. The adequate and fair treatment of staff needs to be considered as well, because the DWP is a hostile employer towards its staff. The other key area that needs to be looked at is what's not really included within the consultation questions, what the Scottish Government could do to mitigate the worst elements of welfare reform in either top-up benefits or reviewing what they can do to support claimants through the system. Thank you very much. The next one is Jim McCormack. Morning. I guess that my starting point is that the committee can really provide us a service by sharing a very bright light on the purposes behind the new powers and the scrutiny of government and how we are doing to hold firm to points around purpose. For example, are those powers designed to compensate for the extra costs of disability or notional lost earnings from being a carer? Are they there to prevent or to mitigate poverty and so on? It's really understanding and being clear about the purpose behind how the powers ought to be used. The second point is about universal credit, which Andrew has mentioned. This is the odd one in the powers because it's a shared power, a concurrent power in a sense. That means data sharing between tiers of government. It's really good, much better than we've seen so far, joint governmental scrutiny and working. It's really important. I agree with Andrew's point about not waiting. The universal credit is here now. We have already some full service sites in Scotland. DWP has a test and learn approach, so I think that we should be finding out as much as possible. Not just about impacts on rent and the housing aspect of it, but how can we start to model the right way of payment flexibility and payment sharing within households? We think that, for example, child benefit could be used as a gateway, a really simple gateway benefit for carers to be the default person of households to be paid universal credit. Let's test that. The final point is about powers that are already devolved to Scotland. For example, council tax reduction. I know that other committees are looking hard at reforms to council tax, but we already have the reduction scheme devolved. There's much more that we could do to improve working incentives to take the working poor out of the council tax burden that they currently have, so I encourage you not to forget that powers are already devolved as well as looking at when to come. We're surprised and convenient for you to know that we think that the committee in developing its work and the Government in developing its legislation needs to be highly mindful that we're developing a system within a context of work. The majority, the large proportion of people who will be claimants, will be working, will have recently worked or will be aspiring to work and therefore the Scottish Government's fair work agenda is absolutely vital to this. There's three aspects to that that I'd like to very briefly pick up on. The one is, I think it's widely recognised that a large proportion of employment in Scotland just now is precarious work. I met a woman last week at the age of 21, had had 22 different jobs and the number of interventions that she'd had with the benefit system during that period are amazing. I was frankly amazed that she was still sane, let alone seeking work. So the quality of work is really important. That's really important because we will be designing new employability schemes and those employability schemes have to have quality built into them. The worst possible outcome for people is to go into work and then in a very short period fall out of work again. The second aspect to available quality of work is retention. So there's a big burden on the public sector here but there's a big burden on private sector employers too to ensure that we have the best possible sickness management, the best possible support of policies in place and the best possible interaction between public sector agencies like the NHS and employers. The third one, and I think this is rarely spoken about, is quality of work for the people that deliver the service. One of our big aims here is to look at a simple service and a dignified service for the people that receive it. To be really deliver on that, the workers who work in that situation also need dignity and work and it has to be understood that in providing a dignified and a simple system it may not look quite the same from the other side. These workers, and I'm a veteran of public service reform as many people will be here and we often hear very warm words about the expertise of the front line worker being put to best effect. We need to find ways in developing this legislation where we actually listen to the people who are delivering the service and hopefully in doing so break down some of the barriers that we see in the benefits system where we see confrontation between the person that delivers the service and the person that receives it. David Forenston. Good morning. I think another general theme, perhaps echoing Jim's point about the purpose of benefits, I think we outline within our submission from Social Work Scotland some of our concerns, I suppose, and a plea for the retaining distinction between the devolved social security system of income maintenance and the wider social welfare system, including social work services. I think that it's absolutely understandable that the Scottish Government would wish to provide some added value from the new system so that it's more than is being delivered by DWP and that it talks in its consultation about outcomes as benefits being a springboard for people and absolutely they should be in terms of employment and other areas. I suppose our concern would be some of the contradictions that have grown up historically as Andrew was alluding to, which is some kind of really a confusion between care and empowerment and monetary benefits. DLA, pep talk about care components when often those benefits are not used to fund care. There's a fudging because many people pay a good proportion of those benefits into charges from local authorities for social work services. There's references to integration of devolved benefits or alignments with other services such as social work and social self-directed support. We would ask that that is at least unpicked before we go down that road that we would very much side with the views of disability organisations, which is that the primary purpose of benefits is tackling inequality. It's about income maintenance. It's providing for the additional costs of disability and it shouldn't be, from our point of view, sort of combined with any kind of wider social welfare functions. Not that social work doesn't have a function in redirecting people, in supporting people on benefits, helping them back into employment and that kind of thing, but we keep a clarity in terms of those two systems. To add to the point about the purpose and principles of social security system at Scottish Refugee Council, we strongly believe that that should sit within a human rights framework that Scotland has already obligations towards and to guarantee the dignity of people accessing social security, but also, as David Stipp mentioned, the condition of work of staff who will be delivering in this new system. When we talk about human rights approach, we mean human dignity, accessibility and equality. Evidence from our service of a three-year service that we published in June 2016 with Queen Margaret University, where 1,800 people accessed our service, showed the difficulty of accessing current DWP services for everybody, but especially for people who are new to this country, are new to any social security system and do not speak English. There's a heavy reliance on organisation like us to navigate those systems, so this needs to be taken into account. Our evidence has shown quite considerable delay in processing benefits, which leads to destitution. With the devolution of universal credit, we really hope that the Scottish Government will explore a more efficient process, the current timeline, where it's too long, and put people in destitution and serious financial hardship. That should again look back at the human rights framework, mitigating poverty and guaranteeing human dignity and should support that. For the universal credit payment, we also support options to have split payments between adults of the household to avoid issues around financial abuse. Again, a lot of families will have been through traumatic experience, which put a lot of strain on family life and family breakdowns do happen, and we need to manage that effectively. The other point that I wanted to make is about the personal independent payment, which at the moment refugees are excluded from because of a two-year residency criteria. CPAC has worn recently a very good court case for a refugee child to be entitled to disability living allowance, and the DWP has not appealed, which is the success of the case. We hope that with a devolution, PEP will become accessible to refugees. Many refugees who, as part of the Syrian Resetment programme, refugees are chosen to come to the UK and to Scotland because of additional vulnerability, which often includes disability. People who have been through the asylum process will also have other health issues that can be supported by personal independent payment. John McHadall, I think that following on from that, I think that the committee should look at all these issues through the lens of human rights. As it is well known, the UK special rapporteurs were here in Scotland last December to gather evidence because there is an ongoing investigation into the UK Government for Grave and Systematic Human Rights abuses of disabled people under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. At the time of the Scottish referendum, we were promised that there would be as near a system to federalism and home rule as possible. We made a submission to the Smith commission, which demanded that all powers over social security be remitted to the Scottish Government. That simply has not happened. Quite frankly, what we face, disabled people are facing right now, is the catastrophic impact of cuts to their social security through migration from DLA to PIP. Let's not forget that when George Osborne stood up in the House of Commons, he declared that there would be a 20 per cent reduction in the disability budget through PIP, so it was designed. The testing is as far away from evidence-based medicine as it is possible to get. It is underpinned by something called the biopsychosocial model of disability, which is completely unscientific and not worthy of being used in a social security system worthy of the name. It is the same system that underpins the Work Capability Assessment. It was imported from the United States. Unum Provident, who was called by the insurance commissioner of California, who told that they were operating disability denial factories when banned from 50 states and fined billions of dollars, advised the UK Government in drafting up the test. The Scottish Government must reject the underpinning of both those tests. It must speak out more forcefully about the number of people who have died and committed suicide after a Work Capability Assessment. We get reports from all over the UK that people go for a Work Capability Assessment and consequently lose their disability living allowance on the basis of the answers that they gave to the Work Capability Assessment. There is that knock-on effect. It is a gateway. I would like to say that, as regards the work programme, you are getting people who are disabled who are being found fit for work or put into the RAD group. That is happening more and more. The goalposts have been moved. Our campaign began in June 2010 when a man called Paul Reakey hung himself after a Work Capability Assessment in June 2010. We have been campaigning solidly since then to try to make the system safer. It was our campaign through our medical adviser, Dr Carty, of Leith, who put forward the motion to the British Medical Association that the Work Capability Assessment regime should be scrapped. With the immediate effect, this is in 2012 to be replaced by a rigorous and safe system that does not cause avoidable harm to some of the weakest and most vulnerable people in society. Since that was passed and became BMA policy, we have sought to get that implemented. The way in which we have done that is by trying to raise the existence of employment support allowance regulations 29 and 35, which give exceptional circumstances that, because of a person's physical and or mental impairment, there would be a substantial risk of harm to them. They should not be found fit for work or found to have limited capability for work. Unfortunately, because of an ampass on the contractual arrangements between the BMA and the DWP, our success has been limited and getting knowledge of these regulations put out there. There are local medical committees around the whole of the UK who are simply refusing to provide disabled people with the letters that they need to support their application. The DWP refuses to build into the system despite some assurances that they gave and also following a successful judicial review by the Mental Health Resistance Network that the WCA discriminates against people with mental health problems. None of this has been put into place, so we still have people now who are being wrongly found fit for work and who are committing suicide, and it's not just one or two people. One death is too many, but when we're getting stories of people committing suicide every other week and it's in the newspaper, we really need to speak up because these flagrant human rights abuses are taking place on Scottish soil today. I think that the Scottish Government must demand from the United Nations a copy of that report, which is only being sent to the UK Government. If human rights has devolved to Scotland, then our First Minister has a right to look at that. Absolutely take on board everything that you've said. I think that a number of us around here obviously have had cases that you're referring to also. Could I just say that, basically, you're talking about disabilities, physical and mental disabilities, and certainly, as a committee, we could write and ask for a copy of that report. I just wanted to ask you, we have Damien Greene coming to give evidence and, certainly, we could raise that specific with Damien Greene. Would that be okay just now because, obviously, I want to go round the table with others or do you want to make another salient point? Yeah, I would like to make a point. Okay, it's just obviously that the time is short and we'll be able to come in again. It's not a problem. Very, very briefly, the Black Triangle campaign has submitted a report to Police Scotland, which has been sent to the Procurator Fiscal's Office regarding the deaths of David Barre, Paul Donaghy and Misty E, whose case was documented by the Welfare Commission for Scotland. We believe that an offence has been committed at Scottish law, that a public official has willfully failed to carry out their duty. It's currently being looked at by the PF's office. I'd just like to say finally that, if disabled people cannot rely on the law to uphold their civil rights, then it's a very sad day for Scotland. We just hope that the, as part of the seven-year action plan for human rights in Scotland, that all public agencies will put human rights at the very heart of their decision making. Thank you very much. Good morning, everyone. I'd like to carry on from what John Cus-Jones and Helen from the PCS have very powerfully told us about the inhumanity of the current Westminster regime with regard to DLA and PIP. We've already had quite a bit of evidence with regard to that because one of the bizarre things that appears to be, and I'd like everyone to give me their ideas on it, is the fact that we were told by Bill Scott of Inclusion Scotland that 70 per cent of the old DLA system was done as a paper exercise effectively. Of that, only 1 per cent were found to be fraudulent, which is probably the least in the social security system in general. And then now we're in a situation where we have 95 per cent of them face-to-face interviews and the added pressure. And a lot of people dealing with the long-term conditions that effectively could end up, I can always use MS as an example, worrying stress will automatically give you an attack, and there's other conditions like that as well. But the cost of that is three and a half times the cost of what it was in the old system. My question is effectively, we have a system here where disabled people were effectively just a number as far as the chancellor was concerned. They were making cuts and that was it, and now we've got a system but we're finding it's more expensive and a private company is effectively making profit out of the misery of disabled people. As we keep talking about, I know that there are strong words in the Scottish Government using dignity and respect, but if people say that there's something radical that they can bring to the system, if we actually do bring dignity and respect to the system, it's a good start. I'm just wondering what some of the people, especially John and Helen, I've got to say with regards to what I've just discussed there as well. In terms of the involvement of the private sector in PIP, it did exist within DLA as well, but as you said, it was largely a paper exercise. You're right, it is face-to-face assessments. We experience our members just to remind the committee that we represent the vast majority of people working in the DWP, which is about 54,000 people in the UK. They experience a lot that they receive a form coming back from that assessment, which is a PA3 or PA4 to be technical, and that may not have enough information, then they have to send that back to the assessor to carry out the assessment again, not face-to-face but do the work, then come back to the individual who does the processing, which again is another cost, which is something that adds more time for the claim to go through, which is not fair on the individual claiming. It's surprising really that ATOS and CAPITA were given these contracts, given their history with the WCA, and John has given quite a few examples of the disastrous impact there for people claiming benefit, but people around the table will also be aware of the huge backlogs that happened when PIP was set-ups and times going on for 8 to 12 months. People were having to wait whilst that assessment took place. The other point to make in terms of assessments and the private sector as well is that when an individual makes a claim to personal independence payment and they want to provide additional evidence because they fear that assessment won't be adequate or fallen off, that they are required to pay for that medical evidence themselves, which again is going to have a detrimental impact on people with low income. As I said in my opening comments, our position is that this work should be bought back into the public sector. It's absolutely abhorrent that there are companies making a lot of money out of that and a lot of money out of people waiting and out of people's suffering. If there is to be an assessment system, that could be done within the public sector, within the NHS and then processed by people working for the Government. That's our experience from members working in the DWP and that's our position on that. Alison Whataburrath First of all, I don't think that it would be wise for anybody to comment on individual cases that are live in the Scottish criminal justice system in this forum, because we should let the criminal justice system do its work. However, I wanted to pick up on two points that were made by David Moxham and Jim McCormack in their earlier remarks. I was very struck by what David Moxham had to say about two things that he said. First, the importance of the quality of work in the devolution of employability schemes. We had a debate in the chamber yesterday afternoon about exactly that, the devolution of employability schemes, and a number of us talked about the importance of sustained job outcomes in good quality jobs. The question is, how can we design a devolved employability scheme? We all want that, irrespective of party, irrespective of background, we all want more people in work, we all want more sustained job outcomes and we all want more good quality employment. How do we achieve it? That's the first question. Second question. David Moxham was very struck by what you said about the importance of engaging with people, not only people who are reliant on those services that are being devolved. That's essential, but also on engaging with people who deliver the service. If you knew the extent to which the Scottish Government has been engaging with DWP staff in terms of the listening exercise that they are embarking on in preparation for as part of their social security consultation. Just to Jim, again, I was very struck by the powerful point that you made, Jim, about not overlooking the social security powers that are already fully devolved before Smith, before Scotland Act 2016, and in particular, thinking about council tax. I just wanted to say a bit more about the sorts of things that could be done but aren't being done in Scotland at the moment about what you called incentives to take the working poor out of council tax. We've came off in another track here because we're actually talking, you know, referring to what we've got so far. That's absolutely fine, Mr Tomkins. I would need to bring in Mr McArdle, because he wanted to reply directly to George Adams and Helen's question. John, did you want to reply to that, and then it's Alison Johnston and then... I'm going to reply to Mr Adams' question. Black Triangle campaign and our sister campaign in England disabled people against cuts signed a memorandum of understanding many years ago, not long after we began with PCS Union, to campaign jointly against the involvement of private, for-profit companies in the disability assessment regime. I think the consensus is absolutely unanimous across the whole disabled people's movement in the UK that they must go, not to mention the often criminal behaviour of the company's concerned, talking about Maximas, its history in the United States in the court system is absolutely appalling. So we don't want any of that. Last week I watched the proceedings from last week of this committee online. And somebody spoke about rights and responsibilities. I'd just like to say that that cuts both ways, because Government ministers, in particular the Secretary of State, has a legal responsibility to respond to Senior Coroner's prevention of further deaths report. So I'd just like to put that on the record, thank you. Alison Johnston, you're next Alison. Thank you, convener. I think a lot of the earlier discussion was about Sam H and the Scottish Refugee Council in your submission spoke about the need for advocacy. I think in your introduction this morning, Elodie, you sort of highlighted, not even just appealing benefits decisions or whatever, but being able to access the system in the first place. And I wonder if you have any views on how we make sure that people in Scotland are able to access a Scottish security system in an equitable and fairly straightforward way. Is it about greater investment? Do we have enough advocacy services at the moment? I'd be interested to hear your views. If I may convener, one thing that PCS highlighted in your suggestion is a welfare charter in your written submission. I just wonder what kind of rights you think a charter should include, because it may address some of the aspects of ensuring that people are treated with dignity and respect. Do you want to reply to that and Helen Flanagan in that specific? It's absolutely right. The need for advice, support and advocacy is just at the stage of making a benefit claim. In the holistic integration service, which we ran from May 2013 until June this year, we've got two and a half years of evidence of how people have been accessing the benefits system in Scotland. Initially, the service was designed to give more support to people who had higher support needs and to encourage people who speak English and understand the system to navigate the system on their own. What we found is that everybody needed us. That was quite striking. The main issue with new refugees is that when somebody is granted leave to remain in Scotland, they receive a biometric resident permit, which is their ID card. There is a protocol between the Home Office and the DWP to issue national insurance number. We've also evidence that that protocol is not functioning. As part of the Scottish Government's new Scott strategy for the refugee integration, we've been working closely with the DWP to review those processes. There is a recognition among statutory stakeholders that something needs to be done. The reason why I mentioned the national insurance number is that 80 per cent of refugees will claim job seekers allowance, which is a claim that is done online, but the system doesn't work if the person doesn't have a national insurance number. It's a 90 problem that is not being fixed. That is a practical issue that has massive consequences. People need to make a claim online on the phone, so somebody who may not speak English or have good English, but the welfare language is a different language, so people will struggle. The DWP is very compartmented with contact centre, benefit delivery centres, no way to have a face-to-face contact. Those processes are extremely difficult to navigate. There are complex questions about savings and shares and bank accounts abroad and everything that people are not simply understanding. We have to sit with people for an hour, an hour and a half phone call to make a benefit claim. Then there will be delays, because on average it will take at least 28 days to process a claim of job seekers allowance. By that time, the Home Office support will have stopped and we will assess people to access crisis grant from the Scottish welfare fund, which is a fund that is administered by Scottish Government and local authorities that is accessible via the intervention of third sector organisations. We are a recognised organisation to support people to claim crisis grant. The application process is a phone call or an online application, and there is no access to interpreters on the phone. These are the kind of resources that we talk about. To answer your question on are there enough advocacy services, it is a difficult one. I would be tempted to say not really. Offending stops in June. We are lucky to have secured further funding, but we have therefore been running a limited service in the summer, referring people to Citizens Advice Bureau, who could not cope. Helen Flanagan, do you want to come in on that particular one? Yes, and then Dave Mawksham and Jim Toon answer Adam Tomkins. Okay, I'll just try and be brief. The welfare charter concept that we refer to in our submission is something that we go into greater detail on in our response to the public consultation. We have PCS, Unite, Community, Represent, Unemployed Workers and the Unemployed Worker Centre's Combine. I've put together a welfare charter public document that sets out some ideas that the Scottish Government could look at and consider. In that, there are detailed submissions at the heart. It goes back to what we were talking about at the outset. At the heart of social security systems should be the desire to eradicate poverty and lift people out of poverty. In that should be clear rights for claimants. One of the concepts there would be a claimant's ombudsman, how claimants can get help through the system, but also the right to fair and decent work and not being pushed into precarious work as well. There is a DWP customer charter. I'm not sure that people are aware of that, but it isn't really something that is very strong or that individuals can rely on. We're talking about something much stronger, both for the Scottish Government and for people administering the system, but also for other people claiming the benefits. Craig, do you want to come in on that particular one, and then Dave Mock? It was just a quick point for Alison Johnson's question on advocacy. I suppose that our position is that there isn't enough advocacy support. We know from speaking to our service users that there's a huge backlog in accessing advocacy and welfare advice, but there are different models that you could do about that, and part of that is about resources, that need to be resourced. We know that, in mental health law, we have an automatic right to an advocate. That's something that should be considered around people engaging with the social security system and an automatic right to advocacy. Again, there would be a significant resource attached to that, but it goes back to my earlier submission. We know advocacy works and can make a real difference, so, as I was saying earlier, I was on the National Steering Group for the Alliance's welfare advocacy project, which was a dedicated welfare advocacy project that was funded by the Scottish Government and was delivered locally through four local advocacy projects, providing support to people through the work capability assessment and the PIP medical face-to-face assessment. The difference that was made to people's confidence going through that ability to speak with confidence and assessors behaviour as well was huge, and it made a big difference to the results and the need for appeals, but that's no longer being funded, which is a shame. I think that there's a need for investment in advocacy. Thank you, Alison. Sorry, my last little point in there was, obviously, that is part of a sticking plaster, too. The fundamental thing is getting the system right as well about face-to-face assessments. We wouldn't need such a demand in advocacy if we reduced the number of face-to-face assessments and there's a huge need to reduce them dramatically. As has been said before in evidence earlier, why 95-96 per cent of people who are applying for PIP are having to go through face-to-face assessments just does not make sense, particularly for people with long-term progressive conditions or significant conditions, including some significant severe and enduring mental health conditions? Thank you very much. Dave Mawkson, do you want to try to stop— I recall the questions. In my verse order, you asked our knowledge about the extent to which the Government might have shown willingness or begun to engage directly with those who deliver these key services. The answer to that is, and to be fair, at her instigation, we have had a preliminary discussion with the minister precisely in that area to look at what type of forums we can create, which will use some of the expertise of those who deliver on the ground. I'm bringing it together with those who are the claimants, those who actually experience that to see if we can get something positive coming from that. There really is no better way in public service, in my view, than to get the experience of the claimant, but then to get the experience of how that operates at the front line. You then asked me to redesign in five minutes an employability system for Scotland. Okay, thanks very much for that. I mean, just a couple of reflections on that. I mean, it has to be said, and we talk about resources a lot, then 8 million or 28 million with the Government's additional funding is not a lot of money to start with. I mean, international evidence, European evidence indicates that significant investment in people, which has the lasting outcome that is needed, is the most important thing. And we massively undervalue the cash value, and I don't like talking about cash value all the time, the cash value of that front-end investment, as long as that job sticks and as long as that job is suitable for the person. I think that there's an enhanced role for the public sector as an employer. I think that the public sector can do more to provide the safe places for people who are returning to work. I think that there's more the public sector can do to directly intervene. I'm a veteran, again, of the Future Jobs Fund, which was created by Alasdair Darling in the eye of the last recession, and of the many inadequate responses to that and particular crisis. One of the more adequate ones was the very clear aim of job creation, job creation to boost the economy and job creation to help people who are further away from the jobs market. I mean, just finally, and I suspect we'll probably take a different view as to the extent to which Government agencies should intervene in employment matters. We do have a whole range of agencies out there, whether it's fit note, whether it's access to work, and a whole range of agencies who, to some extent or other, take a view about the quality of work or adaptations that may need to be made for work. There's a very strong argument for looking at how that can be pulled together and made more coherent so that there's a genuine empowerment, if you like, of those who are providing the pathways back into work to make serious and clear recommendations about what sort of work needs to be provided, particularly for people who are on the long-term sick and going through occupational health rehabilitation. Jim McCormack, you wanted to answer specifically that question. Thank you. I'll add on your point, so just briefly on employment services, I think that there's lots of good quality international evidence from very different countries, for example in the Netherlands and Australia, of decentralised systems that progressively have much better at sustained job outcomes and progression. In Scotland, we should try and leapfrog the lessons of work programme, work choice and all that, and set a new high-level incentive for our services, which would be about earnings progression, not off-benefit, not six months in work, but are people attaining and moving on to high-quality training and the best possible wage that they can command for their skill level? That's a very ambitious long-term goal, but it's that kind of different purpose that helps to start shifting outcomes and it does need adequate resourcing, that's the kind of obvious point. On council tax reduction and rebating schemes, I think that it's really important in Scotland and Wales that we haven't gone down the route of localising schemes, so we have a great advantage in being able to have a coherent national scheme with local delivery. The problems are that take-up remains low, especially for older households. As an aside, we could probably almost end pension poverty if everyone was claiming the entitlements to which they were eligible. So take-up is a big issue, and the evidence is that take-up campaigns nicely don't work, local face-to-face, local media, and those are things that work much better for low-take-up groups. There's a question about adequacy and uprating. I don't think that we've had a proper debate in Scotland on what basis we uprate every financial year the adequacy of council tax rebating. Then there's a point about does our rebating take adequate account of additional costs, most clearly for households with people who have disabilities, perhaps with children. I think that the Scottish Government has a very welcome commitment to improve the rebating scheme for low-income families with children, but we could do much more around the taper rate, and that is the point about people moving into work. Council tax debt, legacy debt, gets chased down very quickly when people move into work. It often undermines work incentives, people are often carrying debts that they couldn't pay in the past. Looking at a fair form of withdrawing support as people start earning to maintain work incentives and a fair treatment of legacy debt, those are big responsibilities already within our powers in Scotland. I have a whole list of people. Some have just jumped in there on the specifics. Gordon, you want to come in on that specific, because you have been waiting a while to come in. Yes, in fact. Thank you, convener. It actually was a question for Dr Jim McCormack, and you've just touched on the question of work incentives. The constituents that I speak to who are unemployed claiming benefits and able to work want to work and usually don't have any difficulty with most of the things that people here have said today, but they want to see a system that works for them and that doesn't take away their ability to get into work when they can. That's what you've just been touching on. How important in the overall context do you think that maintaining work incentives is for those people? I'm not an expert in all this evidence, but there are certain groups in the population for whom the return on every hour of work is particularly important. There's very good evidence that single parents, for example. We know this for the last 20 years when employment rates have been rising. Every pound in penny earned that can be retained from work matters hugely in the work opportunities and decisions that those households are able to make. There are various things in this mix. I've mentioned local tax, rents and so on. High housing costs—not least in this city but in other parts of Scotland as well—can be the tipping point that undoes the calculation that says that you're better off in work. Most people—because for most people basic benefits are not very adequate—will be better off in work, all things being equal, but they're not equal. High housing costs and high childcare costs. Transport costs—it would be a very illogical decision to choose to commute to a very long distance for low-paid work because you're going to be worse off. I understand the nature of the local economy. I think that there's no route to inclusive growth in Scotland if it doesn't involve higher-quality work in the care sector, retail or hospitality, tourism, food and drink. Those are the growth sectors with the problem of low-pay high turnover. Although it's an issue for your other economy, your other committee—sorry, Gordon—around inclusive growth, I think that understanding the interface between those new powers and for those who are of working age and are able to work, understanding that trade-off is really important. A final point, a big thing that we can push on in Scotland, is really bearing down upon the costs that people face because solving poverty is not just about boosting incomes, it's about holding down the costs that low-income households face. Gordon, do you want to come back in on that one? No, I think that's answered. Does part of what you were talking about a local approach, I think that you're referring to, how does that come into this? Obviously, we can take a local approach in the sense of taking a Scottish approach with the new powers to at least some extent. Are you thinking in terms of locality beyond that to local council level? How would you see that developing? I guess that the starting point would be to understand. I'm addressing here in particular the position of low-income households, low-paid households, the working poor, who are half of all households in poverty. The nature of the work that they can feasibly access is almost always quite local. Understanding, in a typical local authority or city region, what do the powers look like around transport costs and regulation, around training, on-the-job high-quality training? How does the childcare market operate? Mapping those out quite locally, and there's a different question about where the powers lie, potentially. Understanding, what does the decision-making look like? What do the opportunities look like for people in those positions? Bestwill in the world in Governments and Parliaments aren't the best ones to understand those experiences, but the more we can drop on good evidence and good advocacy input from people who are in those positions. As a lot of the cities in the north of England are now starting to get their act together on doing, I think that we'll be in a much stronger position to make this stack up locally. I think that some of the points that have been made indicate that we don't want to end up in a system where the issues with the way that the DWP operate now migrate to the system because of the over-reliance on the current set-up by the Scottish Government when it's trying to implement this new system. I think that that's very important to recognise. I know that the Minister has spoken about 15 per cent versus 85 per cent devolved benefits and how difficult the transition is going to be, but I think that for the committee that the nuts and bolts of that will perhaps be something to pay close attention to because otherwise we'll end up in a situation where the principles are completely compromised by the operational aspects of the system. To pick up on Mr Tomkins' point, I think that there are many good examples within the third sector, certainly, I know more widely, but certainly within the housing association sector of employability schemes, where the nature of the interaction between those supporting people and the people who are looking for work is fundamentally different from some of the other schemes that have existed in the past, and I'd be happy to put members in touch with RSLs and others who operate these schemes. In Edinburgh, for example, Port of Leith, I know have a good one. To pick up on that, again, the point about advocacy, I think if we, to go back to my earlier point about a holistic system, if we begin to think about a system which involves things like advocacy and employability as part of the social security system, as opposed to thinking of them as adjuncts to a sort of rigid here's your money transactional system, which we may or may not fund depending on what cash we've got available or not, and start thinking about the fact that if Scotland's going to design a social security system based upon the principles that were outlined by Mr Neil prior to the election, it should and can encompass those things from the off rather than simply saying, let's take the DWP model and bash it about a bit and hopefully it will look a bit better and stick some stuff on the side, as opposed to starting almost with a blank sheet and saying, how can what the powers we're getting, how can the money we're getting contribute to the vision we have for a social security system when staff not a premise or more robustly staff not a premise, rather than thinking, as I say, how do we just fix what we're getting given. Ben Macpherson. Good morning all. There's been powerful comment about the conditionality and sanction regime around benefits in terms of for disabled people and other vulnerable groups, but I wanted to touch on two points, convener. Conditionality and sanctioning, first of all, in respect to the employability programmes, PCS notes quite powerfully in point 3 of their written evidence that we want to create up an employability programme that should be about support, not penalising people and I'd be interested to hear more comment on that point. Around that and the employability aspects of what we're considering, I just wanted to pick up on what Jim McCormack said about the interface of new powers and how we think about how those new powers integrated within the reserved matters and also pick up on what David Mockson said about security of employment and equality of employment moving beyond the social security system into work. I'd be interested to hear more comment around mitigating the claimants and customers coming up against the sort of cost that Jim McCormack mentioned. How important is quality work paid at a real living wage in a secure environment and how detrimental are things like, for example, zero hours contracts and other aspects of insecure work? Ben, I think that Helen had wanted to come in on that earlier. Then, Dave, did you want to come in? Thank you. In terms of the question around employability and the work programme and sanctioning, I think that it's reasonable to say that the work programme in the UK was a disaster and a huge waste of public funds. It didn't work for the vast majority of people who were put through the work programme. I think that 70 per cent returned to the DWP afterwards. Other data that we've got shows that between 2011 and 2014, only 3 per cent of the £1.5 million that referred to the work programme found lasting work, and only 18 per cent found at least three months or six months work from that. It also had high levels of sanctioning, so if you'd compare data for the same period that people were found to be five times more likely to be sanctioned than they were in one year alone in 2014, then they were to find a job from 2011 to 2014. It was ineffective, but there were high sanction levels with it. There's lots of other research and data that you could look at, which proves and establishes that sanction is in an effective way to get people into work. I think that that's largely agreed by many around this table, and we were pleased to see that that's something that the minister also said in her recent appearance at this committee. We would welcome the Scottish Government progressing what I think that they've already indicated as recently as yesterday in removing the conditionality from the employability side of things. It's a shame that the powers don't go further so that you couldn't look at removing conditionality and sanction from the employment system as a whole, but we think that that needs to be looked at. In a comment to me about the work programme, I was going to ask to come in about employability, because I think that that shows as well that using the private sector and third sector is an effective way of doing that. There's data to show that people would be more likely to have found work if they didn't have any support from the work programme at all. We believe that better employability system would be delivered by the public sector and the range of ways that could be done within job centres if they were better resourced and people were allowed to support people better. It could be delivered by Skills Development Scotland. There are whole ranges of options in that. I just wanted to comment very briefly on about DWP engagement, because there was a question, and given that we represent people who work there, I thought that it would be relevant for me to answer that. Dave Mockson was entirely correct that, from the Scottish ministers, we have had engagement as a union who represents people who work in DWP. However, you probably won't be surprised to hear that. From the other side, DWP has been very little engagement both with the union and with the staff working in DWP in the UK and in Scotland specifically. It's quite a worrying time for people who work for DWP because it's just so unclear to them what it means in terms of development. I think that, if you could look into that and encourage Noida to have powers over, DWP would be able to step up that. Dave, did you want to comment, Dave Mockson? Ben Macpherson raised that. With specific respect of employability in a labour market where there aren't enough jobs, with essentially a target-driven employability scheme, it's a bit of a seller's market. If you're one of those people, as Helen says, possibly in the private or voluntary sector and you're looking to hit your target, then there are disincentives to be flanked to check the quality of employment that you're placing somebody in. I won't go into detail here, but there should be some very clear benchmarks. Putting somebody from an employability programme into a zero-hours contract job makes little sense. It also makes sense to go a bit further than that and look at the general level of security of employment of hours and of wage relate, because the quality of that job is going to matter in terms of the likelihood of it being sustainable. Again, as I referred to earlier, there is an interventionist role for these employability schemes, which is why I think Helen makes a very good point that the direct sector shouldn't can play a key role in this. It's also why the public sector needs to look at itself as a provider of those jobs, because at least we do have certain provisions within the private sector, not always did to but generally did to in terms of security of employment in terms of wage rate and the rest of it. Now, some people might look and say, that's a bit unfair on the general public, who don't all have that particular level of security. We are looking at tailored solutions that are meant to be lasting. If they are tailored and if they are lasting, then being frank and going back to the money to saving for the public purse in the medium to long term is quite significant. Jim McCormack, did you want to come in there and then Ruth Maguire? On Ben Macpherson's question about quality of work, especially with low paid work, we know from our evidence from Oxfam's decent work programme in Scotland and others that people's expectations are often very modest. Of course, there is an aspiration to be paid a living wage, but beyond that, aspects of quality of work are quite small things like predictability about working hours. If you have been working on average 15 hours a week for the last year, then employers are willing to say, as a minimum, that we will guarantee you 15 hours work a week, rather than leave people not knowing from one week to the next or, following recession, lots of contracts go on from permanent to temporary and never switch back to permanent when they could in terms of how the business is doing. It is really important about the human resources function in companies, about middle managers, about spotting people who are poorly skilled but could benefit from progression support. We have come across workplaces in Scotland where staff are permanently locked out of training opportunities, for example, care homes that have permanent night shifts, and the training is always on during the daytime. There are things about rotas, shift patterns and predictability of hours. Just to make this even more complex, we need to take a sector-by-sector approach, because what this looks like in the care sector is different from retail, is different from the retail sector and so on. I think that there is no shortcut other than understanding what is happening within the wiring of those kinds of companies and those businesses and paying attention to what is happening in workplaces where staff do not have union protection. Finding other routes to employ voice, especially for low-paid workers. I appreciate all the written evidence and what we have heard this morning. It is very powerful. It is right that we focus so much on the people who are using the system and who need it, but I welcome a bit of focus on the staff who are having to deliver services. It is on that that I would like to explore. How do we rebuild trust in the system when we have it, both from the client's perspective and from the staff side as well? Anyone want to start off in that particular one? I think that, from the staff perspective, I think that there has to be a complete redesign in terms of how the agency would be structured. We look at the terms and conditions that are involved. We are pleased to hear the minister's idea about co-production. We are in discussion with civil servants about what that might mean and it is something that we are exploring so that staff have a key part in designing the system and the structures and how it would work in terms of the benefits themselves. I think that it will be difficult to address some of the cultural problems that arise from the DWP because it is only going to be partially devolved and, for the main of it, the front-facing side of the benefits system is still going to be under the DWP in the form of job centres and the majority of working-age benefits are reserved with the DWP. Where possible, having access to DWP front-facing officers would be a benefit, so having some kind of front-facing element of the social security agency. That does not mean setting up necessarily new workplaces. One thing that the DWP is looking at as part of its overall body of work at the minute is co-location. Some of that is arising because of mass office closures that are on the horizon from the DWP, but having a positive influence within a DWP workplace would be a start of that. For the main of it, it would be looking at the co-production, having that involvement in designing the system, ensuring that there are fair working conditions, adequate staffing and fair policies for people working within departments, because, as has been said before, you cannot really hope that you would have the users treated with dignity and respect if those delivering the services are also treated in that way. Dave Mawkson, Chris Smith, thank you very much. Just a really short observation, helping back to all of the discussions that we have had over the years about public service improvement and change, is that a confident workforce, by which I mean a workforce that is confident of their own security of employment and remuneration, is a far more positive participant in positive public sector change than somebody who is fighting about their job. It is just as simple as that. Chris Smith, you want to come in? It is really difficult to rebuild trust, but I think that there are a few things that can be done. In the recent research that we have been doing in focus groups of our service users, that was probably the key thing that came out, was just a complete lack of trust in the system, through a legacy of the work capability assessment and ESA process and now the PIP process. Crucial to it is, on the staff side, good training. We know that we are still hearing a lot about quite distressing experiences that people are having at that front line when accessing benefits or during assessments, really quite stigmatising experiences. Training has a huge role, particularly around disabilities and some of the specifics around mental health and helping someone when they are in crisis. I think that there is an opportunity with the new social security agency when it comes to try and really have a co-production approach, as Helen was saying, with staff but also with those using the services, disability groups, disability organisations and others, to try and build a different culture, because it is really cultural and that takes a long time to change. There is also something about managing expectations. We know that people who are receiving things like PIP or CARES allowance may well be receiving ESA through the DWP process and it is about really good quality information for claimants because it is a challenging time for people who have been through multiple reassessments, multiple changes in the welfare system for another change to be happening and change really does not need to happen but it needs to be communicated in an accessible and understandable way for people and with people having plenty of notice around any changes. Training is really key and co-production and really listening to the voices of people who are experiencing the system as it is. It is a challenging one. I think that it is not going to be overnight and there is a huge thing about managing expectations and understanding that people will be navigating two systems. Related to that, our wider point is the real need for good quality information sharing processes. That is something that came up strongly when we spoke to people around it. It was something that, when I was carrying out focus groups, I was a bit unsure how people would respond when we were asked how they would feel about public body sharing information about their health or some of their social care aspects to make a more informed judgment about a PIP claim to try and not have a face-to-face assessment. Overwhelming people were very keen that information is shared about them if that is with consent and in a legal context of data protection. That can be used in the trust building measure as well around trying to navigate the system to reduce the need for face-to-face assessments. It is a really good high quality information sharing but that is difficult to manage and needs to be done properly and legally. It is a difficulty, I suppose, but I am sure that we will get round it. I hope that it was very helpful about the data protection. John McArdle. We are keenly aware that the budget for the work programme was severely cut by about 85 per cent. We are also keenly aware that the block grant has been cut by 10 per cent. Obviously, ideally, what we are doing is we are trying to petition for mitigation of cuts and bridging arrangements to be put in place until the PIP is being operated by the Scottish Government. We would like to ask that. We think that it is a defining feature of our society in Scotland—how we look after people who are sick and disabled. We would just like to see that prioritised. We recognise the difficulty financially that that will pose, but I think that where there is a will, there is a way. In terms of what has been said here about advocacy and the importance of advocacy, for example, the citizens of the vice bureau in Leith is currently facing great difficulties. They are trying to raise £20,000 to stay open. It is absolutely critical that people get the advice that they need. We would love to see the establishment of a disability law service, or a hotline, where people who are having problems could be put in touch with agencies that can help them. We know that where people do have advocacy, that the likelihood of things having a good outcome is much, much higher. In terms of sanctions, we would like to see a complete end to sanctions. We believe that they are a violation of the fundamental human rights of individuals. It is a human right to be able to eat. As Ken Loach said, hunger is being used as a weapon. We are horrified to see, if I am not mistaken, that an instrument that is used to devolve power to Scotland imposed an obligation that says that the Scottish Government must not mitigate where a DWP sanction has been imposed. We would like to say that the sanctions regime is itself unlawful, we believe, under human rights legislation, because in the determination of an individual civil rights and obligations, there must be access under article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights, there should be access to an independently constituted tribunal. That does not happen under the present system. That needs to be challenged. I think that where people are sanctioned and have basically made destitute relying on food banks, the Government has every right to step in to protect people whose human rights have been breached in this manner. I would urge the Scottish Government to consult whether the Government's law is legal service at this issue. Finally, before I leave today, I am going to present this to you, convener. It is a book called Cash Not Care. It is by most due at our next women's royal air force veteran. The six years of work has gone into this. It is, I believe, the most authoritative account of what has gone on and a textbook example of what not to do with a social security system. I would recommend that every member of this committee gets a copy of this book by most student, because you will find it absolutely invaluable going forward in your work. Thank you very much, Mr Mercado. We do not usually get advertisements for it, but that is not a book. That is information that I will be very glad to read. George, you wanted to come in on a very small point, because I have another two speakers. I kind of frames everything that we are discussing here, especially with the work programme, in so much that 87 per cent of the budget has been cut. I was interested in what Helen said, the fact that the work programme has been a disaster. That is completely opposite of some of the members around this table that was mentioned in a debate in this place yesterday. Part of the reason that we were told led to believe that it was cut because it was so successful that people were in work and had moved forward. It is interesting for you and your members being at the coalface, and you are saying something entirely different from what the ruling Westminster Government is saying. George, what is your point? Jim wants to come in. Briefly and practically on your point about trust and co-location, just one thing that we are doing, which I think will hopefully be of interest, we are supporting a demonstration project in Glasgow. It is in Springburn and Parkhead. It is a co-location model that involves health centres and two job centres for the first time. It is a really simple model of bringing together, opening their doors to housing advice, debt advice, childcare and training supports, the kind of things that people need under one roof, so not referring people on to multiple agencies or come back next Tuesday morning when someone can see you. It is real time, it does crisis responding as well as giving people opportunities on to what they are looking for. The fact that DWP is supporting two job centres to be involved in it is potentially really significant and we can tell you more when we have got the results. Certainly the debate and the minister and others members have mentioned that we need to look at a much more holistic approach because obviously everyone has got an icon effect and I am very aware of that, particularly in the benefits system. Add to the question on how to build a system in which people have trust. I totally agree with what has been said already about it is going to take time. The first thing to think about is about clarity at the moment. The systems, whether it is the Scottish Welfare Fund or DWP system, are not clear for people. Taking the specific example of refugees, when they engage with the job centre they just see another Government official. They see a lot of similarities with the home office because they engage with the DWP every two weeks in the same way that they did with the home office. It is again another organisation that gives them money and if they do not go and sign the money is cut. It is an organisation that has a reputation of being punitive. Those are similarities. Refugees need time to understand what is the role of the DWP and in our work with the DWP this is something that we work on a lot. A work coach will need to explain what they are here for, what do they do, why is that purpose. Clarity is very important. All the points about co-location will also help because by bringing together different organisations which will avoid people to be ping-ponged to different places it simplifies the system. Advocacy, we talked about it, it is important that this is independent advocacy. However, there could be ways of working as well with third sector organisations, not necessarily to be in those places but that there is an easy access from those places. Again, to build trust is the principle of not being non-punitive and everybody has talked about sanctions so I will not dwell on that. The last point that I want to make is it is a system that needs to, and that is going to take time, needs to think of the diverse needs of the Scottish population. We heard about training and yes, training is necessary. We have been involved in delivering some training to DWP. Training is not enough. I have met the DWP staff who understand the issues. The next step is how do we make those changes applicable within the environment that they work on. We go back to the work environment and the system in place and the structure that DWP staff or benefit agency staff need to meet. Thank you very much. It has been very interesting. There are a lot of good questions and answers. I think that what has come out of it is that we need clarity and people to work together. In the case of the staff that I have met, as others have, DWP staff want to do their job and want to do it properly. They have hindered certain aspects of it and obviously we need to make sure that everyone works closely together in a holistic approach as well. I have not got enough time to get into some of the stuff that I wanted to raise but I am sure that it will come up eventually but we need to make sure that people are treated with dignity and respect. As Mr Macadol says, those horrific instances are not revisited again. I thank you all once again for your contributions that have been excellent. I will close the meeting just now for five minutes for the witnesses to move in a comfort break for the committee. Thank you.