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If I could finish—

Perhaps I have pointed to the areas where we do not have robust evidence. Undoubtedly, there is a level of unmet need that we have not adequately quantified yet, because it is not in the system.

Absolutely. I have been very clear that we can quantify a good amount of the unmet need. Public Health Scotland already produces tables showing those who have been referred into the system and who are awaiting an assessment and those who have been assessed but who do not yet have their package, so we are absolutely certain about much of the unmet need. We have robust evidence on that. There is a very small proportion of the unmet need that I do not have robust evidence on yet, and perhaps I should not have focused on that.

Again, on the economic benefits, I have said that there are areas where this work is difficult. It is, for example, difficult to know how many unpaid carers are out there. In the business case, however, we have detailed the stuff for which we have a robust economic case. We have put in it that, in 2021-22, 236,000 people in Scotland were reportedly receiving social care support or services. We have made an assumption and said that if just 10 per cent of that group—that is, 23,600 people—experience a 0.1 point improvement in wellbeing because of the establishment of the NCS, for the reasons discussed in the business case, that could lead to a potential annual benefit of around £34 million at 2021 prices.

The business case also details that around 130,000 people were employed in the adult social care sector. If it is assumed that just 10 per cent of those people—13,000 carers—experience a 0.1 point improvement in their wellbeing on the life satisfaction scale from the establishment of the NCS, it might lead to a potential annual benefit of around £19 million at 2021 prices.

Therefore, I do not think that it is fair to say that we have not provided any economic detail; indeed, I think that we have provided really solid economic detail in the business case. However, I accept that we cannot be absolutely certain. Those are estimates; we have used calculations and formulas and have made a best guess at what we think that it will deliver, but I accept that there is uncertainty around that.

What I would state time and time again is that I am absolutely certain that this is the right thing to do. I am also certain that it will deliver economic benefits.

The first thing to say is that those are not direct costs from the bill. That is not our workforce, and those people will not be employed by us.

I ask Richard McCallum to come in on that, as that is his area of expertise.

Yes, but do you want that civil service workforce to continue to work on those issues or do you want to build a system in which they are dealt with better in the future?

The wider workforce is not directly employed by the Government—that is one of the challenges. For social work, for example, I think that the national social work agency is a jewel in the crown of the national care service. I agree that, for social work, work would need to be done to improve its status and the support that it gets in the national planning for that profession, regardless of the national care service. However, we need the primary legislation in order to bring the national social work agency into being and to fit it into the national care board so that it can have oversight of the system.

The national social work agency will deliver better support and mentorship for newly qualified social workers and better support and straightforward pathways for advanced practice. I just do not think that it is possible for individual local authorities, which employ social workers, to do that.

Yes. I was asked by The Times to provide a comment, on the back of some reporting of the committee’s meeting on Tuesday, on the figure of £3.9 billion. I quickly reiterated that that is not the cost that we anticipate of the bill for the national care service. That was a comparative figure that was an extrapolation over 10 years, on the original basis. We now have a significantly better understanding of costs. We produced that figure in order to aid the committee in its scrutiny of the bill but, of course, that is not the cost of the national care service in the form in which we intend to proceed with it.

Yes. However, there is uncertainty. People do not like change and uncertainty. There are many excellent groups that operate out there in our mixed market economy for accessing social care, and they have nothing to fear from the change. We are going to improve quality right across the board and improve the pay and conditions of people who work in social care. The change is to be welcomed, but I absolutely acknowledge that there is uncertainty and concern about how it will impact on individual businesses and individual charities.

As I have said, I regularly hear from and meet stakeholders to reassure them about the changes that are coming. Everybody agrees with the general principles of the bill—I have not yet met anyone who disagrees with them. We all want to move to a more effective, person-centred, human rights-based and high-quality social care system—nobody is arguing against that. However, there is undoubtedly a big and complex system at the moment with lots of touch points with other systems. It is a mixed market economy. I am working really hard at giving people reassurance during this period of change.

Do the officials want to do the sums away from committee and come back on that? [Laughter.]

We are working really hard on quantifying the costs and the economic benefits. For example, if we consider the impact on delayed discharges, we know that the conservative estimate of delayed discharge per year is about—