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I am not at the point of having a concern. I think that we need to take the UK Government at its word when it says that it also wishes to take action to tackle child poverty. Clearly, the quickest and cleanest way for that to be done would be for the UK Government to scrap the two-child cap. However, if it does not do that, I am keen for us to work together to see what would be the quickest way that we could have that data in place.

I would not point to it being a concern at this point, because those discussions are at very early stages. We have had a good working relationship on the devolution of social security, under previous UK Governments and the current one, and I hope that those relationships will allow the Governments to work together.

I appreciate that a great deal of work goes on at the DWP, and that the devolution of benefits is but one part of that. The DWP will have other priorities in relation to work that is being done on its system. That is a matter of fact. It is an exceptionally large and complex system.

We will therefore have to have a discussion about how that is prioritised. However, given that there is a UK Government child poverty task force, I hope that those discussions will be fruitful. I will of course keep Parliament updated.

I note that one of the reasons why the work in the next financial year—for which we have just set the budget—is exceptionally important is that it will build the system to allow us to deliver that mitigation. The work that will take place in the next financial year is vital, and the quicker that we can get that work done, the quicker we can deliver that.

The decision was taken following discussions in Government and was part of the budget that was announced yesterday.

We keep criteria under review. In the past year, there has been a change to the criteria for the best start foods benefit. From memory, as a result of that change, an additional 20,000 pregnant women and young children were brought into eligibility for that payment. Part of the reason for that change was to enable us to look at our five family payments—the Scottish child payment, best start foods and the best start grants—in a more joined-up way, which allows for further automation. We already automate the best start grants payments, for example, so people who receive the Scottish child payment do not need to apply for those grants separately.

That is the type of work that we are already undertaking in Social Security Scotland. Any changes to eligibility mean that either we have to increase eligibility, which is a decision that we need to make as part of the budget process, or—I am sure that Mr Doris would not want us to do this—we need to restrict eligibility so that the eligibility for everything is the same. On that basis, those decisions have to be made as part of the budget process.

We can have automation or the sharing of data so that, even if eligibility is different for different payments, we can use data to support the ease of a person’s journey from one qualifying benefit to another. Therefore, there are different ways of looking at this, and in the reasonably short life so far of Social Security Scotland, we have increased automation and data sharing in order to assist with both of those.

Again, it is about ensuring that all levels of government work together. There are devolved areas on which the Scottish Government has a focus, but perhaps the delivery is at a local authority level, such as education, and there are a myriad of different ways in which employability schemes work, for example. We need to ensure that the national mission and the national policy also fit with what needs to work at a local level. We might—indeed, we should—have different variations of that across different councils.

Those are perhaps some of the more challenging areas, but we are seeing a great deal of progress. The work that is being done by the pathfinder initiatives in Glasgow and Dundee, for example, and the work that has been going on in Clackmannanshire show that those linkages are working effectively. We are developing that further with the fairer futures partnerships, and we hope to see that build with even more councils coming in. That is real development that we want to continue.

Working out how we can best support one another is challenging and there is a lot to learn, but that is exactly why we had the pathfinders and are now moving forward with the partnerships.

The timing in relation to the Scottish Fiscal Commission has been laid out by the Fiscal Commission itself, and I note its remarks on the matter.

Clearly, the two-child benefit cap has been on the Scottish Government’s mind for some time, and our policy position has been exceptionally clear for many years that we believe that it should be taken away at source. We had hoped that that would happen with the change in the UK Government, but it did not. Therefore, in the run-up to the budget this year, the Scottish Government had discussions about how that could be done. Mr O’Kane will be aware of when we told the Scottish Fiscal Commission about that.

There is a distinction to be made between modelling the impact and modelling what we estimate can be achieved by any policy. I believe that robust analysis has been undertaken.

It is estimated that the Scottish child payment alone will keep 60,000 children out of relative poverty in 2024-25, although we will have to wait until we have the 2024-25 statistics to be able to see what the actual poverty rates are. Modelling has been done of the impact that we believe that our policies will have, based on our analysis, but there will be a time lag before the data on child poverty becomes available. Certainly, I am satisfied that the figures that are produced through modelling estimates are based on a range of assumptions, and that the process that allows the Government to model the impact of our policies is robust and transparent. It is important that we carry out modelling work to look at the impact of policies that we will undertake and to evaluate what difference they will make.

The full impact of the Scottish child payment on poverty levels that we already have data on is not yet clear, because that detail is still working its way through the data set. The benefit is making a difference on the ground, but the data that will allow us to determine the poverty levels in 2024-25 has not yet been published. At this point, our modelling enables us to estimate how many children will be kept out of poverty as a result of a range of measures, the Scottish child payment being just one of them.

It is a challenge for all of us to make sure that we have the correct data in front of us so that we can see the impact of our policies. I know that the committee has taken evidence and considered the importance of data in previous inquiries.

We are working actively with the DWP on that issue. The Scottish Government has been paying for a 100 per cent boost to the family resources survey’s Scottish sample since 2002, to try to improve that work. Sample sizes for many large population surveys are being affected by falling response rates—that is happening not just for the FRS but more widely, and we are looking at what can be done to mitigate that.

Analysts in the Scottish Government have also been working with the DWP since the Scottish child payment was included in the FRS questionnaire, to ensure that receipt of the Scottish child payment is accurately reflected in the data for eligible households in 2023-24.

So, work is on-going to improve the quality of the FRS data, and not only by the Scottish Government. As Mr O’Kane suggests, we are all keen to make sure that that data is as robust as possible. I hope that I can give him some reassurance that there is active and on-going consideration of the issue.

The data source for the statistics on the statutory targets cannot be disaggregated at a local level, but other work can be undertaken.

The Scottish Government has been working with the national partners group to look at the range of data that is available. The Scottish household survey provides breakdowns by local authority. Data from the DWP, HMRC and the children in low-income families survey are also valuable resources. Work is being undertaken through the child poverty practice accelerator fund, to look at what data could be used and how it could be used more effectively. That Scottish Government fund also assists various local authorities to look at different data sets and models, to see how they can be brought together. It goes back to the point that was raised earlier about the need for good practice to be shared across local authorities.

I take a very different view of that. We do not have a deficit; the Scottish Government cannot run a budget in deficit, as we must balance our budget every year. We have taken political choices to invest in social security. We have made a £1.1 billion investment in addition to our block grant adjustment, and just under half a billion pounds of that is for the Scottish child payment. Additional support is also provided by benefits such as the young carer grant that are not available elsewhere in the United Kingdom. We have made those important investments. Clearly, in preparation for every budget, we have to look at the choices that the Government has taken to support low-income families, carers and disabled people, and we must ensure that, overall, we have a balanced budget. I disagree with Jeremy Balfour’s use of the word “deficit”; I would call it an investment.

It is difficult to think what we could have done had the act not been in place, because it has been in place for so long and is so integral to the way in which we work. As the committee has heard from other witnesses, it has driven a greater focus for delivery and increased investment in that area, at both national and local level. The ability to have that focus on delivery and accountability has assisted collaborative working across the Scottish Government and with local government, third sector partners, health boards and so on, with a shared understanding of the national mission.

Clearly, a number of policies have come from that. I mentioned the Scottish child payment. We also have our focus on the no one left behind approach, through employability, which has been part of the work of Government right across our different portfolios, to see what could be done—particularly with reference to the six priority family types.

Although it is difficult to know what things would have been like had the act not been in place, its being in place has allowed us to continue that focus and drive, and it has made it easier for people to hold the Government and other agencies to account.