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Again, I challenge that narrative. We are not centralising social care across Scotland. I was very clear about that when I went to Shetland. We were really impressed by the level of integration that is being achieved there and the work that is going on between the NHS and the local authority to ensure that a cohesive package of social care is available. I joked with them, saying, “Maybe what we’ll do is pick up the Shetland way and roll that out across Scotland; rather than us coming and imposing the Edinburgh way on Shetland, we’ll take the Shetland way and roll it out all over Scotland.”

However, even in the room at that time, we recognised that, while there are things that Shetland is doing excellently, there are things that it needs national support with. That is where we want to make the difference.

An example is information sharing. A little bit of primary legislation is required to make that easier. When we engage with people with lived experience, we hear that they are tired of telling their stories again and again to everyone whom they meet in the system. The ability to share information safely and appropriately within the system needs to be unlocked centrally, by central Government. We can do that, and it will enable better local delivery.

There are things that we can do to help. Another thing that we talked about was the challenge of recruiting professional social workers in Shetland. There are definitely things that we can do nationally to support that and make it easier to recruit and train by taking away some of the barriers to entry to training that exist in places such as Shetland.

I am keen to hear what the challenges are in every local area and to see what we can do nationally to unlock them. I am not interested in micromanaging from Edinburgh the entirety of social care all over the country. I have said that time and again.

I live in the rural west Highlands. Social care in Ullapool, where I live, looks very different from social care in Inverness, but both are within NHS Highland. Even within local authorities, if they are to be responsive to the needs of their communities, their geographies and the situations that they face in terms of labour shortages, they will have to be flexible in how they deliver. We are keen to create a system that supports that and empowers people while maintaining national standards. There should be a clear expectation that, wherever people are in the country, they know the standards and the quality of services that they can expect to access, even though services might look a little different, depending on where they are accessed.

Sectoral bargaining is probably the toughest area to deliver and a lot of work is going on in that regard. Usually, it is fairly straightforward once you define the sector, but even defining the sector has proved to be difficult in this sphere. It is very complex, and the way in which care operates in Scotland is pretty complex.

Generally, in sectoral bargaining, there is discussion between a group of employees and an employer or two. Clearly, there are multiple employers in social care. Government also has an interest, because we provide a lot of the money to pay for commissioned places and to increase wages. As a result, more people are around the table than there would normally be in a straightforward case of sectoral bargaining.

We are getting into the detail of it now, though. On the recommendation of some of the trade unions that we work with, we have approached a couple of academics and involved them to help us to unlock the discussions and make progress. I am reasonably confident that we will make progress on sectoral bargaining, which will be crucial to the delivery of fair work in the future.

One of the challenges that the Scottish Government has is that we do not have control over employment law. We would like to see many changes in the employment of social care staff in the sector, but we do not have the power to intervene directly. Ethical commissioning gives us some power to ensure that, where we use public money, staff are treated well. That is an important part of what we hope to achieve with the national care service.

When I think about the change that we are trying to make, the two groups of people whom I have in mind, day in and day out, are the people who access care—from whom I hear every day about just how difficult that can be—and the people who work in social care. I am pretty confident that ethical commissioning gives us a tool with which to improve their pay and conditions, to hear their voice and to build fair work principles into the procurement process.

Donna Bell, do you want to say a little bit more about that?

A lot of work is being done. Obviously, the delivery of £12 an hour is key, and I think that it will help, but it is not everything. As well as improving pay, work is going on across the board to improve conditions, focusing initially on maternity leave and sick pay—that is one of the fair work strands. Work is also going on with the Scottish Social Services Council and NHS Education for Scotland to provide educational opportunities to support the social care workforce so that, when people come into it, they feel well supported, know what they need to do, and have clear pathways to improve and to further careers, should they wish to study and move on.

As I say, a great deal of work is going on across the board, and not all of it requires primary legislation to happen—we can deliver some of it without primary legislation. A transformative change is required if we are to achieve one of the things that I hope we will achieve, which is an increase in the status of social care. I would love it if, in Scotland, we were talking about social care not just as something that helps the NHS when it is in trouble or harms the NHS when it is not functioning right, but as something that is valued in its own right and for its inherent ability to change people’s lives.

Social care totally transforms the lives of people who can access it, and it transforms their families’ lives. Day in and day out, I meet carers who are stretched to the limit trying to cope with the situations that they are in. An effective social care system takes the burden off families and it contributes to communities and to the economy. We talk a lot about the cost of social care, but we do not talk quite so much about its value. I am determined to move the conversation on to the value. On a very regular basis, I meet people who are struggling to work because of their caring responsibilities. If we get social care working right, it will have an impact on the economy. If we can articulate that better, we will stop thinking quite so much about the cost and start recognising the value, which is what we do with the NHS.

It is going on things such as increased wages. We have drastically increased the amount of money that people who are working in social care get paid. In the past couple of years, they have had a 14 per cent wage rise. That is one clear improvement that will be felt by everyone who is working in social care. People who work in social care in Scotland are now paid more than their counterparts all over the United Kingdom.

There is more to be done, but that sets us on a clear path, and I expect to do more of that.

Yes, because we have a mixed market.

Yes.

I would challenge that narrative. We are not treading water. This is the second time that I have been in front of this committee to explain exactly the level of work that is going on across the country.

We paused and then worked very hard with partners, local government, trade unions and people with lived experience to try to find a way forward. You will be aware that we were pretty much in a situation in which we could not move forward because the level of opposition to the bill was so great. Therefore, I am really pleased that we have achieved consensus and that we are moving forward now.

I think that, last week, we provided the Finance and Public Administration Committee with costs for the bill so far. If you check the papers for that meeting, you will be able to see exactly how much spending there has been on the bill at each stage.

That is a good question. There is a lot of work and a lot of evidence there—perhaps there is almost too much, and people are finding it hard to navigate the volume of information. We can reflect on how to communicate. We have specific forums where we meet, hear from and talk to people with lived experience. We also have on-going engagement with trade unions, which has been vital to improving communication. When I first came into post, a number of people were concerned about things that just were not correct. Correcting those myths has been an important part of the work that has been done during the pause.

We have a social media programme, which is a really rich way to bring the information to life. As members, we all love reading, and we read a lot for our work, but it can be tough for Joe Bloggs to read through pages and pages of information in somewhat dense text. There are “Voices of Care” videos that bring to life different aspects that we are working on. I recommend that people have a look at those, as they really bring to life what we are trying to achieve.

Donna, do you have a longer-term view than I do? It is still a framework bill, so we expect the detail to be in the secondary legislation.