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I will say a little bit, convener, but perhaps my colleague the Minister for Public Health and Women’s Health can write to the committee with further details, because, as Mr O’Kane said, the matter does not fall within my remit. Certainly, the regulations to approve alkaline hydrolysis for use in Scotland are being developed, but as I said, they sit with another minister.

I know that the issue has been touched on and discussed by the cross-party group on funerals and bereavement, so there is clearly an interest in it, and I wish to see movement on it. However, if you will permit me, convener, I will ask my colleague to write to the committee on the matter.

Clearly, although there will be guidance that will give Social Security Scotland case managers the ability to assess matters, it is very important that we do not start listing what would and would not be exceptional, because, by definition, such things would not be exceptional.

I can perhaps give you some examples. In my opening remarks, I talked about disruption due to extreme weather or war; in other cases, people might require a funeral to be held within a certain timeframe, say, for religious reasons. Those are the types of situations in which the case managers will be able to refer to guidance. Of course, there will be an escalation route in the agency to ensure that decisions are taken at the right level and with the degree of sensitivity that is required in such circumstances.

The number of awards made outwith the UK is exceptionally small; currently, it is less than 1 per cent of all applications. That, in essence, means that the numbers are too small for the agency to provide data that would be considered robust. Because of that lack of robustness, which is required for official statistics, we currently have no plans to publish it.

However, the data can, and will be, gathered for internal use, and officials have already engaged with Social Security Scotland to ensure that the relevant data can be captured. Clearly, there will be internal analysis to measure the impact of the changes, with the gathering of the first data scheduled six months after the regulations come into force. Although the data is not robust enough for external publication, it will certainly be used internally, where it is already gathered.

Yes.

The issue of having the right data is one that the committee has discussed before. As I have said to the committee, there is an on-going process within Social Security Scotland to ensure that more and more data is provided as the system grows. As you would expect, the system within Social Security Scotland is being updated on a regular basis, and that updating is not just about readiness for a new benefit, but about improving the data that can be collected.

We take the issue very seriously. We know that there is more to do, and the work is on-going. We all want Social Security Scotland to gather the correct data that will allow us to identify how the money is being spent and what impact it is having.

That takes me to your first part of your question. That sort of work sits not just with Social Security Scotland or, indeed, with the Scottish Government; there are a number of ways in which we can look at outcomes and impact. For example, Professor Linda Bauld has recently done a piece of work on exactly that type of thing.

Data collection is key, and it requires us to continually build on what we have at the moment. After all, all of us—the Government and the committee—would like more data, and the impacts are being covered not only in some of the analysis undertaken by the Government in its statistical publications, but in the areas that Professor Bauld has looked at. I am sure that the committee is already aware of that work, but we would be happy to provide some examples in due course.

We do not believe that the changes will make it significantly more likely that people will apply for support for funerals outwith their local area. The internal analysis that has been undertaken estimates the increased cost to be around £80,000 per annum, so the difference is minimal. We are introducing the change to ensure that people are, in effect, not disadvantaged and can choose the location that is most suitable, even if it is not the closest to where the deceased lived. My answer, then, is no, we do not think that there will be much of a change and we think that the cost increase will be minimal.

Currently, we do not intend to publish information on funerals outwith the local area, and that is because the data held by Social Security Scotland is not detailed enough to do so at this stage. However, the agency will continue to review the matter as it develops future publications. We will keep it under active consideration.

We delivered a public consultation, which I referred to in my opening remarks. The time constraints that we faced and the practicalities of moving forward made that very difficult.

With respect, given the live legal proceedings, I will keep my remarks to those general considerations.

It was built for a universal benefit—that is what it is for.

The agency agreement works in one way and in one way only, and it is for the DWP to carry it out as it does for the rest of the UK. That has been the case all the way through. If there had been a great deal more time for us to get into nuanced discussions with the DWP, there might have been a way to do something different, but that would have been at a cost to the Scottish Government, and the DWP would have had to allow us to do it. That has never happened. There has never been an option to do that, and it certainly could not in any way, shape or form be negotiated at speed.