The Official Report is a written record of public meetings of the Parliament and committees.
The Official Report search offers lots of different ways to find the information you’re looking for. The search is used as a professional tool by researchers and third-party organisations. It is also used by members of the public who may have less parliamentary awareness. This means it needs to provide the ability to run complex searches, and the ability to browse reports or perform a simple keyword search.
The web version of the Official Report has three different views:
Depending on the kind of search you want to do, one of these views will be the best option. The default view is to show the report for each meeting of Parliament or a committee. For a simple keyword search, the results will be shown by item of business.
When you choose to search by a particular MSP, the results returned will show each spoken contribution in Parliament or a committee, ordered by date with the most recent contributions first. This will usually return a lot of results, but you can refine your search by keyword, date and/or by meeting (committee or Chamber business).
We’ve chosen to display the entirety of each MSP’s contribution in the search results. This is intended to reduce the number of times that users need to click into an actual report to get the information that they’re looking for, but in some cases it can lead to very short contributions (“Yes.”) or very long ones (Ministerial statements, for example.) We’ll keep this under review and get feedback from users on whether this approach best meets their needs.
There are two types of keyword search:
If you select an MSP’s name from the dropdown menu, and add a phrase in quotation marks to the keyword field, then the search will return only examples of when the MSP said those exact words. You can further refine this search by adding a date range or selecting a particular committee or Meeting of the Parliament.
It’s also possible to run basic Boolean searches. For example:
There are two ways of searching by date.
You can either use the Start date and End date options to run a search across a particular date range. For example, you may know that a particular subject was discussed at some point in the last few weeks and choose a date range to reflect that.
Alternatively, you can use one of the pre-defined date ranges under “Select a time period”. These are:
If you search by an individual session, the list of łÉČËżěĘÖ and committees will automatically update to show only the łÉČËżěĘÖ and committees which were current during that session. For example, if you select Session 1 you will be show a list of łÉČËżěĘÖ and committees from Session 1.
If you add a custom date range which crosses more than one session of Parliament, the lists of łÉČËżěĘÖ and committees will update to show the information that was current at that time.
All Official Reports of meetings in the Debating Chamber of the Scottish Parliament.
All Official Reports of public meetings of committees.
Displaying 930 contributions
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee (Virtual)
Meeting date: 11 January 2022
Kate Forbes
I have another meeting with my counterpart in the UK Government in the next few weeks—in fact, it might be this week. I think that it is. I apologise; it has been brought forward because of omicron. Covid consequentials are one of the most frequently raised issues on my agenda for meetings with the UK Government, so I will again talk about the need to cover them.
Off the top of my head, I cannot think of any budget that has been immune to the impact of Covid. Whether it is justice remobilisation or the need to remobilise hospitals and wider social care services, Covid has an impact right across the board. Nonetheless, we have a budget from which Covid consequentials have been stripped out. Over the past two years, they have amounted to about ÂŁ14 billion. Last year, it was about ÂŁ4 billion. That money will not be available but we still need to absorb the costs of Covid because we cannot wish it away. That means that Covid is clearly a priority, so we rightly have to meet the costs of it, but that puts pressure on other things that we want to do. That is how I frame the matter.
One of the last things that I did in the past financial year, just before purdah started, was to allocate an additional £275 million of Covid consequentials to local government, over and above the £259 million—if memory serves—of Covid consequentials in the settlement for local government. A considerable amount of funding was allocated to help local authorities with Covid pressures.
However, those payments were clearly one-off Covid consequentials in the same way that Covid consequentials are one-off payments for us, which makes it harder for local government—in the same way that it makes it harder for us—to deal with the on-going costs of Covid without additional funding to deal with it.
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee (Virtual)
Meeting date: 11 January 2022
Kate Forbes
Will I answer that one?
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee (Virtual)
Meeting date: 11 January 2022
Kate Forbes
I will resist setting out any expectations, because that completely flies in the face of giving local authorities discretion. However, on average, a 1 per cent increase in council tax raises about ÂŁ30 million, so 3 per cent would raise about ÂŁ90 million, which is what we used to fund the freeze last year. That is the kind of ballpark figure that you are talking about when you reference 3 per cent.
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee (Virtual)
Meeting date: 11 January 2022
Kate Forbes
It is good to join you this morning, convener. I appreciate that you have had a long evidence session already this morning, and that the Deputy First Minister and Cabinet Secretary for Covid Recovery provided you late last year with a detailed written response to a range of questions, so I will keep my opening comments fairly brief.
11:15I will start with a comment that you will not be hearing for the first time, but I need to be clear at the outset: this project has been hugely challenging. The Scottish Fiscal Commission, which is the key forecasting body, states in its economic and fiscal forecasts report:
“Overall the Scottish Budget in 2022-23 is 2.6 per cent lower than in 2021-22, after accounting for inflation the reduction is 5.2 per cent.”
It is against that backdrop that we are discussing the local government budget this morning.
Our budget has had a laser-like focus on three key challenges: tackling child poverty, climate change and economic recovery. We are endeavouring, in the budget, to strike a balance that will, with limited resources, ensure parity of funding across sectors. The budget that has been published for next year confirms that even in the face of the significant economic uncertainty that has been caused by the pandemic, we are providing councils with—among other things—a real-terms increase of more than 5 per cent to their overall budgets for our shared priorities for the coming year. Local authorities have been key partners with the Government—perhaps never more so than during the pandemic, as we tackled it together to protect communities, businesses and public services. They will clearly play an important leadership role, as we move forward.
I recognise the importance of planning as part of the process. Our transformation of the planning system will help both to streamline the system and to free up resources to enable the good-quality development that we will need in the future. To support that, we will introduce new fees regulations that will help to ensure that applicants, rather than the taxpayer, cover the costs of processing planning applications. We are also investing in digital transformation of the planning system. I mention that because I know that it has been raised in the past.
I will stop now and hand over to my colleague, Shona Robison, who will say more about the settlement in relation to her portfolio.
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee (Virtual)
Meeting date: 11 January 2022
Kate Forbes
Prior to publication of my budget this year, and in previous years, I have met Gail Macgregor regularly. I cannot remember the details off the top of my head, but there were probably three or four intensive meetings in the immediate run-up to the budget. I meet Gail regularly to talk more generally, but in those meetings I had very intensive conversations with her in order to get a full understanding of the pressures that are facing local authorities—I do not dispute that there are pressures—and to understand our shared commitments.
Sometimes, during the yearly debates, as the convener understandably put it, we lose sight of the fact that many commitments are shared by COSLA and the Scottish Government. I say COSLA because it is the body that represents all local authorities—each local authority will have slightly different nuances.
The other thing that we have done this year, which is unusual, is that Shona Robison and I have between us endeavoured, over the past two months, to meet every single local authority—their chief executives and local authority leaders—to make sure that we have a handle on their local circumstances. Although COSLA will, understandably and rightly, present a blanket approach for local authorities, we wanted to ensure that we also understand the challenges that are faced in each area, so the invitation to meet went out to local authorities. I cannot recall precisely how many I have met and how many Shona Robison has met.
We have endeavoured to get the high-level view from COSLA and to get into the detail of each local authority area. The challenges that Inverclyde Council faces are different from those that Moray Council faces, and those are different from the challenges that Glasgow City Council faces. The conversations that we have had hugely informed our budget. A lot of financial commitments might not be taken into account in the annual debate about core budgets.
There are two issues that I hear about regularly from individual local authorities and from COSLA. The first relates to the challenges around social care, which is why we have significantly increased social care funding. Incidentally, I point out that I have tried to ensure that consequential funding for health and social care has gone to local authorities precisely because I know of the social care pressures that they have cited.
The second issue is income inequality and the fact that the pandemic has exacerbated the challenges that are faced by the most vulnerable people in society, which is why we are rolling out free school meals further, in collaboration with local authorities.
I do not want to speak for COSLA, but I think that it and individual local authorities would agree that the two examples that I have cited are important shared commitments, which is why they have been prioritised as part of the overall local government settlement.
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee (Virtual)
Meeting date: 11 January 2022
Kate Forbes
That is in this year’s budget, which is fundamentally different from next year’s budget.
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee (Virtual)
Meeting date: 11 January 2022
Kate Forbes
My answer is that the First Minister has not declined the invitation. Rather than me disputing the characterisation of the letter of response, it would be easier for me to share it with the committee, so that the committee can read it.
Local government leaders wrote to the First Minister and me, and I responded, as I have responsibility for local government finance. The letter of response states clearly that I look forward to meeting the COSLA presidential team on, I believe, 20 January. If I have got that date wrong, I will correct the record. I am happy to share the response, if that is permitted.
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee (Virtual)
Meeting date: 11 January 2022
Kate Forbes
That is probably one of the most pertinent questions, right now. The committee will know that, alongside the budget that we published in December, we published our consultation for the spending review. That review will, as the convener has referenced, provide certainty for all parts of the public sector on what their budgets will look like for the next three to four years.
I am conscious that when it comes to long-term reform and prudent use of public finances, being able to plan longer than annually is absolutely essential. We had already taken steps to do that on a capital basis last year, but with the UK Government spending review having been published on 27 October, we can now proceed.
The key is that the consultation process should be as engaging as possible; I do not want the review to be a Government document that is published without input from our partners. I have already had a number of conversations with COSLA’s finance spokesperson, Gail Macgregor, on how we can ensure—notwithstanding some of the uncertainties that face local government in the light of changing personnel, situations with elections and so forth—that over the next six months we engage considerably with local government through my relationship with her.
The other part to consider, which was referenced by the previous witnesses, is that we have been in long-standing discussions on building a fiscal framework for local government. The letter to COSLA that was published alongside the budget confirms our commitment to undertaking intensive collaborative work on that framework. It is unfortunate, but understandable, that a lot of local government and Scottish Government time has been consumed by the mission to deal with Covid. I hope that that intensive work on a framework will allow for more flexibilities and more empowerment for local government officers to make decisions that are best suited to their local authority areas.
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee (Virtual)
Meeting date: 11 January 2022
Kate Forbes
I question the basis for your figures. I do not recognise those figures. I will go back to my opening comments. In fact, do not use my words—use the words of the Scottish Fiscal Commission, which has said:
“Overall the Scottish Budget ... is 2.6 per cent lower”
next year than it is this year, and that,
“after accounting for inflation the reduction is 5.2 per cent.”
At the same time, I have protected in cash terms the local government core budget as well as delivering a 5 per cent increase to the overall settlement. I question Miles Briggs’s figures, as they are not entirely consistent with what the Scottish Fiscal Commission has said.
Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee (Virtual)
Meeting date: 11 January 2022
Kate Forbes
I appreciate that there is a lot of experience and expertise around the committee when it comes to local government—I have said so when I have been in front of the committee previously. Elena Whitham has extensive experience of local government.
I will take a brief step back from the question to say that nobody disputes that the budget is hugely challenging overall. In the light of those challenges, I made a conscious decision to identify three priorities that we could really get behind and focus on and in which we could maximise our efforts.
As I said in my opening remarks, the first priority is child poverty, because the pandemic has had a hugely detrimental impact on some of the most vulnerable people in society. The second priority is continuing to tackle Covid, because—despite the fact that there were no Covid consequentials—Covid is clearly still with us, and that effort goes hand in hand with economic recovery. The third priority is tackling climate change and helping us to shift our investment in that regard.
How does the local government budget come into that? We cannot achieve any of those three aims without local government—of that there is no doubt. Local government is not only a valued partner rhetorically; I engage with local authorities and rely on them, and I work with them every day—certainly, my teams do.
The local government settlement in the budget can be characterised in two ways. First, the core budget is protected in cash terms. I understand that inflation is having a significant impact on all budget lines, but I cannot inflation proof any budget line when inflation is running at 5 per cent or more, because the overall budget that I receive is not inflation proofed.
Secondly, there is real-terms growth to the overall settlement. I have referenced certain elements, but I will just note that there is ÂŁ68.2 million for child payment bridging payments, an additional ÂŁ64 million of resource and ÂŁ30 million of capital to facilitate the expansion of free school meals, ÂŁ353.9 million for health and social care integration and ÂŁ200 million on top of that from health and social care consequentials.
All of that goes towards the three big objectives. I think that people in local government would identify that education and social care are parts of their core remit and would therefore agree that it is fair to say that providing support for teachers and social care helps. However, I do not and will never dispute that these are challenging times. I have huge respect for local government leaders who, like me, have to make difficult decisions in order to reach a balanced position and invest in their priorities.