³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ

The UK Government controls a lot more levers that can change and affect taxation and services. It could have made a number of changes to taxation and services. I simply say once again that I would not have chosen to balance the books on the backs of disabled people.

I am afraid that I do not have that level of information in front of me. I would be happy to provide that in writing.

I will.

I am concerned about parents of disabled children and larger families, and those issues also have an impact on a number of ethnic minority families. I am trying to make a point about intersectionality—often, a family could fit into more than one priority family group. Although it is important that we look at policies that will have an impact on each priority family group, I am conscious that a number of families fit into different priority groups at the same time.

When looking at what can help a lone parent, we need to consider the impact that we can make through childcare policies, the support that we can provide if they are disabled and the impact that we can make through employability support. Schemes are being undertaken to assist parents with employability. That is an important part of the work that can be done, particularly with lone parents.

I stress that there are six priority groups, so our work on providing whole-family holistic support is exceptionally important. I am mindful of the lone parents whom I met on a recent visit. They required not just parental employability support but assistance for both themselves and their children on a number of different matters. It is important that we look at it that way if we are taking a more holistic approach to dealing with the challenges that an individual is facing. You made a point about employability support for lone parents in particular. That is exactly why further support is coming forward this year for parental employability support.

There are a number of areas there that the UK Government has responsibility for. However, if it chooses not to act on those, the Scottish Government can mitigate. We are already mitigating the effect of the bedroom tax and the benefit cap, and we will move to mitigate the effect of the two-child cap as well. Some of the other areas are reserved or are to do with the economic context, which the Scottish Government does not have any control over.

We try to carry on with work that can assist the UK Government—for example, a great deal of work has been undertaken by Dr Allan in relation to the social tariff. All that work has been fed to the UK Government and we hope that the UK Government will take it on. Even when we do not have direct control over something, we are doing the best we can to do the research and to do the work to assist the UK Government. I hope that it takes that work up, including, for example, in relation to the social tariff.

Indeed, and there is a challenge to ensure that the meals are nutritious but appealing so that children want to take them up. There is also a difference between the take-up at primary versus secondary school and so on.

It is important to look at who takes the free school meal offer up and, if they do not, why not. I am happy to provide further information, because you raise an important point about the usefulness of a policy and its impact on child poverty.

I will briefly touch on a number of areas. The focus for the delivery plans is based on robust evidence of what works, but there is also a recognition that no action in isolation will deliver the level of change that is required.

We have looked at the previous plans and into the future, and the focus for the next plan will remain on the three drivers of child poverty, which are income from employment, cost of living and income from social security and benefits in kind. Previous plans have been based on those three stools, and the same will be the case for the third delivery plan. My understanding from the evidence that the committee has received, and from the conversations that we have had with them directly, is that organisations such as the JRF, the Child Poverty Action Group and so on broadly agree that those are the three drivers that should be focused on.

The other area that we are very conscious of is the need to look at short, medium and longer-term aspects to try to break the cycle of poverty. We have talked about the six priority family groups, which will remain an important part of the work that we are doing.

I am keen that we take a gendered analysis to the work on the next delivery plan, recognising the importance of tackling poverty as it impacts on women and therefore on the family. That is an important piece of work, and a number of organisations, including the National Advisory Council for Women and Girls, Scottish Women’s Aid and others, have been keen that we undertake that type of gendered work. I again give the reassurance that we will do so.

I will point to some of the areas where is it is important to look at systemic change, which I have mentioned before, such as whole-family support and the expansion of fairer futures partnerships, where we are learning lessons from initial partnerships. A number of lessons have been learned from our policies, but there are also areas where we can say with confidence that the Scottish child payment is making an impact. The policy is making a difference and will be an important part of the work that we will continue to do.

The mitigation of the two-child cap will come up in the next financial year and will run into the next delivery plan. I make it clear that, should the UK Government change its mind and decide to scrap the two-child cap, the First Minister has already made his commitment that the money that is in the Scottish Government’s budget for the mitigation of the policy would be used on other measures to tackle child poverty.

I am conscious of the number of FOIs and parliamentary questions that you have had answered on this, Mr O’Kane. I think that it has been dealt with. To summarise, the Scottish Government’s position is that we took action when we gave up on the Labour UK Government taking that action, and we delivered it through the budget.

That question ties into a number of questions that members have asked about evidence gathering. I appreciate Liz Smith’s point that times have changed since I was at school, when I was in a separate meal queue and we all had our wee tickets. That was one of the worst examples of stigmatising young people, but we are not in that place now, with digital payment cards and so on. Given the way in which children interact and speak, we still have to take account of stigma about free school meals, but we can tackle some of those issues as technology improves. That is an important area, and I give that as an example of how we need to move forward.

We challenge ourselves in two ways, which I mentioned earlier. First, we do evaluation work over time to look at policies in the round. Secondly, and importantly, we speak directly to families about how the provision of services works for them. Too often, services—regardless of whether they are delivered by a public agency, the UK Government, the Scottish Government or a local authority—still require people to jump through too many hoops. There might be too many difficulties, or there might be stigma about asking for help. We combine qualitative work with quantitative work, and our evaluation strategies need to look at how things change over time. Technology helps in some areas, and it can challenge us to deliver services in a more cost-effective way than we would otherwise have delivered them.

We are also looking to make improvements in data sharing. We want local authorities, the Scottish Government and the DWP to be able to share data in a way that assists the delivery of a much more cost-effective and seamless service for people. The Scottish Government is keen to do—and is doing—a lot of work on data sharing across Government to see how it can impact on the cost-effectiveness of different policies and the delivery of better services.

You have mentioned an important area, convener, in relation to the work that can be undertaken, whether it is in a school or other settings in which there are already relationships between parents, carers and the service. Our requirement is to ensure that the services that we have are available where and when people need them.

I point to the work—which I mentioned briefly before—on the fairer futures partnerships. I went on an excellent visit to North Ayrshire recently, where we had the same type of discussion in a school setting about what can be provided by a trusted person with whom the parents already have a relationship. They can seek support on income maximisation or benefits, or wider support—in that school, they could have discussions about employability too, and the parent was then supported in several ways. That was all done in a trusted setting with trusted relationships that allowed some of the parents I met to move on to employment or to education and training on the route to employment. Those are the types of area that you touched on, convener, and they are part of the fairer futures partnerships work that is being expanded. That work and support are an important way to provide an alternative route out of poverty through employment, in a supportive fashion and without sanction.

I hope that they are reintroduced into the strategy. As well as calling on the UK Government to make changes in reserved areas, we are endeavouring to assist UK Government colleagues with our learning and with our experience of our policies. The Welsh Government is doing likewise in the areas in which it has undertaken work, so we can learn from each other. That is an important part of the strategy.

As well as making those calls, we are trying to assist with learning. Part of that involves our sharing information on our experience of the importance of targets and the challenges in reaching them. I do not know whether officials want to say a little more about the work that we are doing on that.