Equalities and Human Rights Committee

Meeting date: Thursday, February 20, 2020

Official Report 597KB pdf

---

Budget Scrutiny 2020-21

Our third item of business is an evidence session on the Scottish Government’s budget for 2020-21, in which we will hear from the Minister for Older People and Equalities, Christina McKelvie. Good morning, minister, and welcome. Also present are Sean Stronach, joint head, and Emma Harvey, performance manager, of the Scottish Government’s equality unit. I thank all our witnesses for being with us this morning.

I invite the minister to make opening remarks if she wishes to do so, for up to five minutes.

I thank the committee for the invitation to appear before it to consider its scrutiny of the Government’s draft budget for 2020-21.

I look forward to addressing the committee’s questions. I am sure that they will be many and varied, but I especially welcome those on the budget for my portfolio. This budget has seen the largest single increase in the equalities line, which takes it to its highest-ever level, £30.2 million. I hope that the committee will agree that that demonstrates the Government’s commitment to delivering equality and human rights for the people of Scotland.

My 2020-21 budget will continue to promote equality and human rights through investment in organisations that work to achieve equality for women and girls, including important work on preventing gender-based violence. It will also remove barriers to positive ageing and will strengthen community engagement. Further, the budget will support the cross-cutting work that is being done to deliver on the recommendations of two major reports from the national advisory council on women and girls and from the very ambitious national task force on human rights leadership. Both of those important groups are providing leadership and challenge to the Government and society. We must be in a position to respond positively, to listen and to make better policy that improves the lives of people across Scotland. I am sure that we can all agree with those ambitions.

My aim is to ensure that we continue firmly to embed equality and human rights across the whole of the Scottish Government’s work. As the committee will be aware, a whole range of our activity supports the mainstreaming of equality and human rights.

The equality and fairer Scotland budget statement is now an integral part of the Scottish Government’s budget process, which is very welcome. I am sure that committee members will recall that, when I sat on their side of the table, I agitated for that to be the case. This year, we have integrated the fairer Scotland duty assessment into the equality budget statement. Each portfolio chapter examines the impact of budget decisions on people and places that are experiencing socioeconomic disadvantage. That responds to our legal duties to assess the equality and fairer Scotland impacts of our tax and spending decisions.

The Government is also going further. Last month, responding to a recommendation by her national advisory council for women and girls, the First Minister announced the establishment of a new directorate for equality, inclusion and human rights in the Scottish Government. The new directorate will help to raise the status of equalities and human rights across the Scottish Government’s work and it will help to ensure that we have more capacity to embed a greater regard for equality and human rights across all areas of Government, from the very beginning to the very end.

I welcome the fact that the committee chose to look at equality and human rights through the lens of the third sector in its pre-budget scrutiny. The third sector is a key partner in the work that I do. To increase equality and make sure that we have a fairer Scotland, it is essential that national and local government work together with the public sector and alongside our very valued third sector, as well as the private sector. The need for partnership working to ensure that we all drive forward the same targets to reduce inequalities is what has driven the decision to increase the budget, which is in line with the committee’s recommendation. That will also continue to be our guiding principle as we make decisions on how the budget will be deployed and how we spend the money.

The majority of the budget line for my portfolio supports the third sector equality infrastructure and builds the capacity of organisations that support equality and human rights. There are various organisations across every protected characteristic. I note that the committee welcomed our move to three-year funding in 2017, and I remain absolutely committed to that principle.

The main equalities funding streams can be broadly split into two areas: one that supports the violence against women and girls sector, and another that supports the broader equality and human rights sector. The funding under those streams comes to an end in the summer, so we have been working very hard to look at how we can organise the funding more effectively. I will shortly announce the details, but I am pleased to confirm that we are in agreement with the committee about the principles of that funding. There are three main parts to that. First, it should continue to provide multiyear funding. Secondly, it should ensure sufficient time and support for the application process. I think that that is key, and it is also key to the third aspect, which is that it should support partnership working and fair work principles.

There is now an ability to do much more partnership working across public bodies and the third sector as well as other bodies. It will be important to provide the right support in order to do that and we need to make sure that we get that right. The committee’s scrutiny raised important questions about how budget decisions are driven by the national performance framework, as you will know.

The NPF is not just the Scottish Government’s framework; it is Scotland’s framework and it closely ties into our responsibilities as set out in United Nations treaties and the sustainable development goals. It sets us the challenge of working together to create a more successful country with opportunities for all of Scotland to flourish through increased wellbeing and sustainable and inclusive economic growth.

That means that the Scottish Government is putting equality and human rights at the heart of our policy making and delivery, because it is not just about making the policy; it is also about creating the outcomes. As we develop our future funding criteria, I am very clear about the need to ensure that they link absolutely clearly with the national performance framework.

Without a commitment to equality and human rights across Government, we cannot achieve the NPF outcomes, or ensure that we are living those values. The NPF states:

“We are a society which treats all our people with kindness, dignity and compassion”.

I thank the committee for the opportunity to make an opening statement and I look forward to your questions.

Good morning. The committee recognises the 21 per cent real-terms increase in the equalities budget—that is very welcome.

I will loosely use some of the Government’s six key questions to ask when making a budget decision, which the Government set out in a document last year. Perhaps you can answer some of those questions yourself. Can you tell us in granular detail how your budget decisions will impact on individuals in our society?

There are lots of areas. The framework of the equalities work that I am doing in the Government looks at protected characteristics under the Equality Act 2010 and more widely. When I make any decision, I always imagine a human face and consider the person or group that that decision will have an impact on, or how we can make a difference to them. I consider that at the beginning of any decision-making process.

There are a lot of examples—for instance, the work that we are doing on the equally safe programme to prevent violence against women and the work that we are doing with the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex community. We are doing work to tackle gender inequality and issues that face older people, such as ageism and social isolation and loneliness. We have also done work on the Gypsy Traveller action plan, which Alex Cole-Hamilton helped with.

When I make any decision, I imagine the real people who would be affected.

The overarching focus of the budget is in line with the outcomes of the national performance framework, which state that people should

“Respect, protect and fulfil human rights and live free from discrimination”.

It is a very lofty aim, but it is noble and we all agree that it is incredibly important. Unless I see human faces when I make decisions, we will not get the outcomes that we want.

Our approach to equalities and human rights is that we want the values to be embedded across the whole of the Government. One very welcome development is that we have formulated a mainstreaming team with the additional money that we received in the budget. The team is led by Jenny Kemp, who many members will know from her work with Zero Tolerance and in other areas—we have all crossed paths. Jenny and her team are looking at how we can use the public sector equality duty more effectively and mainstream it across the Government. All the decisions that are being made in the Government have to be made with that human face in mind and seen through the lens of our commitment to ending inequality and discrimination.

On how the impact of budget decisions will be evaluated, I am considering how we can realign all the current funding streams to the new ones that are coming up. An announcement will be made on that very soon. They will be much more closely aligned to the national performance framework indicators, which will allow us to measure against the outcomes. In that way, I will not only see the human outcome—although that is most important to me—but see at a granular level in data form where we are making progress.

Thank you, minister. You have swept up one of my subsequent questions. I welcome your very comprehensive answer.

An obvious disconnect exists when realising human rights in our society. The Scottish Government can put money and policy behind them but, ultimately, the deliverers of human rights are in our communities and in our local authorities. We have, rightly, restricted the ability to compel local authorities to act in a certain way. How will the minister ensure that the enhanced investment will make human rights real at a local level and that that will be done in a spirit of partnership with our local authority colleagues?

As I mentioned in my opening remarks, I have been looking at the ability to do more partnership working. The ability to do that has always been there in the Government, but maybe the drive and opportunities were not.

When organisations apply for the new funding, when it becomes available, they will be given some freedom. There will be three-year awards that will allow some protection and sustainability for the work that they are doing and give them confidence in knowing that they are funded for the next three years. Within that, there is the ability to do partnership working. Some of the partnership working that we do is with the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities. I spend a lot of time working with my COSLA counterparts, Councillors Elena Whittam and Kelly Parry, on a number of areas. They co-chair on much of the work that we are doing. Kelly Parry co-chairs the equally safe joint strategic board, along with me. She also co-chairs the implementation group on social isolation and loneliness. Elena Whittam has been a key partner in the Gypsy Traveller action plan and in the continued actions in that area and in the scrutiny of that work.

The budget has allowed me to focus some hard cash—quite serious money—into creating some additional posts in COSLA in order to realise all of the national performance framework’s outcomes. In the Gypsy and Traveller action plan, I built in a six-month report-back scheme to ensure that we are making progress on it. In order for that work to happen, we need to have someone who is dedicated to doing it. We therefore funded a post in COSLA to do the scrutiny work. It is the same across the board, because we have posts that are funded via our violence against women and girls work and our equally safe work.

10:15  

Alex Cole-Hamilton is absolutely right that, for a lot of people, the delivery mechanism and where they will go to seek support will be local authorities. However, it will be local authorities working in partnership with other organisations. For instance, some of the work that we are doing on the Female Genital Mutilation (Protection and Guidance) (Scotland) Bill right now requires a lot of specialist input, so we are working with the Multi-Cultural Family Base down in Leith, Saheliya and other organisations that give that type of support.

Some of the work that we do for the people who we hope to support is quite specialised and needs a lot of sensitivity. That partnership work that I do across the board with all those partners, whether they be in public authorities, the third sector or the wider community, is incredibly important because these decisions—to get back to Alex Cole-Hamilton’s question—have to be made locally and be influential locally.

We must have that very clear link to those organisations to take the work forward. An example is the implementation group for social isolation and loneliness. I have asked stakeholders to fill that group and tell me what we should spend the money on, and they are coming back with some amazing and innovative ideas. It is therefore about Government giving away some of its power to local people and organisations and saying, “Let’s see how we can home in on where we need to make a difference here.” That is where local partnership is incredibly important.

Obviously, it is good to see some budget lines go up, but there are also some that go down. Is the minister concerned about the reduction to the third sector budget line, given in particular that the committee had recommended that it increase?

The third sector budget line is a very specific line that affects Ms Campbell’s portfolio. I am sure that I can alert her to come back to you on some of the specifics of that. However, you will know that the third sector is funded from portfolios across the Government. I cannot answer for every minister and cabinet secretary about where they have that commitment, but there is a very clear commitment to the third sector across the Government. On your specific point, I will get Ms Campbell to respond to you on the detail behind the decision on the third sector budget line.

That would be helpful. I recognise and I hope that you would recognise—your earlier comments suggest that you do—how integral the third sector is to delivering human rights. Again, I highlight the role that local authorities also play in that. I know that their budgets are very tight. Certainly, my local authority is raising concerns about its ability to fund a number of services that support vulnerable people in our communities.

Obviously, it is good in headline terms to see the specific equalities budget go up, but I worry that there is a potential for equalities to be the first area in other budgets that people want to cut. Sometimes it is the most vulnerable who are forgotten about. Is that something that you have been pushing across the Government ahead of the budget?

It is something that I am very mindful of as well. To respond to your question and that of your colleague Alex Cole-Hamilton, you are right that the issue is how we could mainstream across Government portfolios if we did not have equalities principles attached to everything that we do. Our equality unit and mainstreaming team are taking up that big piece of work.

One of the guiding principles for me around the partnership working ability that we have now built into funding streams is about doing work to address challenges in all portfolio budgets. I welcome having an uplift in my budget, but it is very unusual to have that, and there will be some envy about it. We are being asked to deliver much more and we are asking our partners to deliver more as well. One of the key elements in allowing a partnership approach to that funding is about addressing some local issues. All portfolio budgets are pressured, but we should all recognise that that local partnership work is key. Funding posts in COSLA is part of that. Instead of placing additional pressures on our colleagues in COSLA and in the wider local government area, we hope to support them with the partnership work.

The third sector has raised a specific concern about social care being particularly vulnerable when it comes to local government budget pressures. Is there more that you or the Scottish Government as a whole can do to ensure that that vital sector is well supported?

I have heard that concern. Yesterday, I heard many concerns about the impact that the new immigration system will have. Quite rightly, Donald Macaskill had a lot to say about that. Social care workers have been described as low skilled, but, having spent the six years before I became an MSP training social care workers, I know that they are not low-skilled people. On top of the pressures that are already on budgets, it is pretty bad and unacceptable to have social care workers’ professionalism described as low skilled.

Social care work comes under my colleague Jeane Freeman’s portfolio, and I am happy to ensure that she comes back to the committee with specifics on the massive amount of money that is being spent. At a community council meeting on Monday night, I spent some time with the health and social care partnership in my area. People were very positive about their work, because having a partnership between health and social care has made a huge difference. Total resource spending in the health and sport portfolio is now £14.8 billion, which is a huge amount of money, and there is huge demand for it. I am happy to ask Jeane Freeman to provide some of the detail, if that would help.

The points about yesterday’s announcement aside, these issues are of long standing. Making political points about immigration will not help the existing workforce and providers in my area, who feel undervalued not because of how their job is described but because of how much they are paid for their work. They are under huge pressure. Often, care workers spend most of their day driving between visits, for which they do not get properly paid. There are a lot of pre-existing issues. There are legitimate questions about the future of immigration, but that does not get away from the fundamental issues that have existed for a long time in the social care sector in Scotland. I do not want that point to get lost.

We should remember that social care workers in Scotland get paid the living wage, which is very different from what happens in other parts of the UK. Value is placed on the work that they do. Is it enough? Maybe not, but we absolutely value our social care workers. We cannot get away from the point that decisions that are made elsewhere have an impact on social care workers’ ability to do their job and on how their work is valued. It is up to us to ensure that we value their work. As a former social care worker trainer, I can say that there will never be circumstances in which I will describe a social care worker as low skilled.

I certainly think that social care is treated poorly compared with healthcare.

In relation to local authority decisions, has further thought been given to giving the third sector voting rights on integration joint boards? Would that ensure that the social care sector was more respected?

Again, the decisions of integration joint boards and how they work are matters for the health secretary, and I am happy to ensure that she comes back to the committee on that issue. One of the challenges with my portfolio is the cross-cutting nature of my job in relation to equalities, human rights and older people and the fact that I do not have responsibility for delivery of some of the relevant services—my job would be massive if I did. My job is to influence, so that we take decisions on the basis of equalities and human rights. That involves paying people better, our work through the carer positive scheme and all the things that make people feel valued at work and that they are doing a good job, which is incredibly important.

It is clear from the work that the committee has done that there is a legitimate argument that, if the third sector does not have a vote on decisions that are taken by IJBs, it will have less of a say and will be treated differently from other partners. Do you recognise that that arrangement does not fully respect the role that the third sector plays?

I am not sure of the detail of that, so I will get Ms Freeman to get back to you. If I were to answer that question, I would be pulling things out of the back of my head, which might not be appropriate. I can get you the detailed information on that.

Did you not look at the point that we made about that in our report?

There are areas of the committee’s report that are not covered by my budget area. My budget area is the equalities and human rights budget; it does not extend to how social care is delivered.

We have a response from the Scottish Government on that point, which we can recirculate.

Fulton, do you have a supplementary question?

Yes. It relates to the discussion between the minister and Oliver Mundell about immigration. I am glad that—

If your question is about immigration rather than the budget, I might bring in other colleagues who have questions about the budget, because we are quite short of time. Is your question specifically about the budget?

Yes, it is specifically about the budget. I am glad that the issue of immigration was raised. I find the situation that we face quite frightening, and I think that it will have a massive impact on the budget.

Obviously, the UK Government’s announcement was made only yesterday, but do you know whether the Scottish Government has done any analysis—this might be another department’s area of responsibility—of the potential consequences for the Scottish Government’s budget of the UK Government’s immigration policy?

My honest answer is that I am not sure; I will find that out for you. I can only give you my gut reaction. Yesterday, the Minister for Public Finance and Migration, Ben Macpherson, said on telly that he had found out about the UK Government’s policy through a news release, that it had not been discussed with the Scottish Government and that no contribution from the Scottish Government had been sought. There is an analysis of the economic impact of the Scottish Government’s visa scheme proposal, which is worth looking at in the context of current budgets, but, as far as I am aware, Mr Macpherson had no contact from the UK Government about its policy and saw the press release only when it went out.

I want to bring us back to the job in hand. We have half an hour left for scrutinising the budget.

Let us return to the issue of funding cycles. The move from one-year to three-year funding is welcome. In a previous answer, you talked about the protection and sustainability that three-year funding provides. I absolutely agree, but I would like you to put a bit more flesh on the bones of that. Can you give us some practical examples of the difference that the move in the funding cycle has made to third sector organisations?

Three-year funding provides proper security. I used to run a project that was funded by the European social fund and, every year, we had to issue 90-day notices, because we did not know whether our funding would end. That meant that we would work for only about 10 months of the year, because the other two months were spent preparing to receive funding. These days, 45-day notices have to be issued, but the process is just as unpalatable as it was then.

The move to three-year funding streams has been warmly welcomed, and I know that other parts of Government are looking at that. As a back bencher and when I was the convener of the committee, I pushed for three-year funding for a long time. We have now had the first cycle of three-year funding, from 2017 to 2020, and we are evaluating the benefits and the pitfalls of that. When there is a three-year funding cycle with a set amount of money, it can sometimes be the case that there is not enough flex, so we are looking to enable that flex.

However, it is amazing that organisations such as Rape Crisis Scotland and Women’s Aid now have the security to project forward for three years, which helps them to bring about the change that they want to achieve. We all know that cultural change is a generational thing, and more three-year funding cycles will allow such work to be embedded. The greatest benefit of that approach to funding is that it makes people feel secure enough to settle down and have the confidence to move forward over the coming three years, safe in the knowledge that the money will come into their bank accounts and enable them to deliver the transformational change that we want to see.

10:30  

I absolutely agree with everything that you have said.

The committee has had a number of external engagements and has met a number of third sector organisations, with which we have had discussions about the funding cycle. Although they agree that the move from a one-year to a three-year funding cycle is good, we have heard concerns that, despite the move to three-year funding, they still have to justify the funding on a yearly basis and give a projection of what they will do for the next two years. In theory, they have moved from a one-year to a three-year funding cycle, but they are concerned that, in practical terms, they are doing the same thing annually. Do you recognise that? If it is happening, will you remedy it?

There is a balance to be struck. We want to track positive progress and see that the money is being spent on what organisations told us it would be spent on and is making a difference. We must balance the need to monitor and audit with not imposing onerous reporting mechanisms. I will have a look at that.

We have been looking at the situation, because there are about five funding streams across the equalities portfolio, which I am trying to consolidate into something more rational—possibly just two funding streams. The funding stream for dealing with violence against women, which will be announced soon, will show you the work that is being done.

We have not done that in isolation; we have spoken to the same stakeholders that you have had conversations with, because we value their front-line experience. The last thing that we want to do is create burdensome or bureaucratic processes, because those cost money and mean that the funding is not being spent on delivering the front-line outcomes that we want to see. We are mindful of the issue, and we have applied what we have learned from third-sector organisations and charities that have supported us with their comments. If there is any other work that you think we can do, I am happy to look at that.

It would be helpful if you could, because real concerns were raised about the fact that there is still a responsibility to go through the process annually.

There is, so that we can monitor and audit to ensure that public money is spent appropriately, but we will try to strike a better balance.

You said that other parts of Government are looking at how they use their funding cycles. Do you see all departments of Government moving to a three-year funding cycle in the future?

I do not know. That might not be appropriate in some cases—for example, if a department wants to run a quick, one-year, project. It is about having sustainability, confidence and security but also about having flexibility and opportunity. Over the past three years, we have found emerging issues after all of the budget has already been committed, which has meant that we have had to go back and chap the finance minister’s door, or we have needed to re-prioritise. Over the past 18 months, I have continuously re-prioritised within my portfolio in order to squeeze out pennies to respond to issues that have flared up. Most recently, the issue has been post-Brexit race relations and hate crime.

Have you had discussions with public bodies about how they use funding cycles?

That conversation is on-going. Much of our work is done in partnership, and we want to get better at partnership working. I cannot speak for COSLA and other organisations, but there is a drive to build more funding security into the system. Many organisations have a varied funding pot that comes from lots of different areas, and some of the national lottery funding is changing or ending, which is creating pressures, too. So, the pressure on an organisation does not always come from the ending of our funding or local government funding; sometimes, it comes from another part of its funding basket being under pressure. We are mindful of that. We want organisations to be secure and sustainable as well as to achieve the outcomes that we want to see.

I am aware that different ministers are responsible for different budget lines, but the equalities portfolio cuts across a range of other portfolios and the committee has not yet requested the attendance of any other minister, so I am afraid that you are the Scottish Government’s sole representative here today. Fortunately, I know that you would be the last person to want to operate in a departmental silo.

I want to ask some questions about equalities and human rights vis-à-vis third sector funding. It is welcome that the equalities budget line has increased—you may want to say more about what you intend to do with your extra money—but is there not a danger that, in giving with one hand, we are taking away with the other, which may have an impact on the work that you are trying to do? Alternatively, you may feel that your increase compensates for a decrease elsewhere—I do not know.

Also, you said earlier that the third sector budget line represents only a small proportion of the overall funding that is available to the third sector, but how small is it in comparison with the overall cake that is available? What is the added value of the third sector fund if it is only a small part of the overall funds that are available?

I believe that the change in that specific funding line is about 1 per cent, which is a tiny amount compared with what is being spent across the board.

Are you saying that the third sector budget line accounts for 1 per cent of the funding that is available to the third sector overall?

Yes, and the change is a similar percentage.

Is the 1 per cent reduction in the third sector fund a cash decrease or a real-terms decrease?

I will pass that question to Emma Harvey, because she is the person who does all the detailed money stuff.

It sits in Ms Campbell’s portfolio, but our understanding is that it is a real-terms decrease that is due to one of the funding streams within that pot coming to a natural end. We would need to get some information for you on the details of which funding stream that is.

My question was about the percentage decrease. What is the percentage decrease, and is it a decrease in real terms or in cash terms?

In cash terms, I think that it is a £300,000 decrease in that budget line of almost £25 million, so it is a relatively small decrease. As I said, it is due to one of the funding streams coming to an end.

Okay. Will you remind me of the increase in Ms McKelvie’s budget in cash terms and in real terms?

It is just over 21 per cent, which is about £5.5 million.

Thank you. What is the added value of the third sector funding line, given that it represents 1 per cent of the overall cake?

I am not sure that I could put a figure on that, but the funding line supports the infrastructure for the third sector—things such as the third sector interfaces and the Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations. It is less about the individual projects and budget lines.

Are the third sector interfaces funded according to population or are standard payments made to the 32 interfaces?

I am afraid that I cannot give you the detail on that, but we can get it and provide it to the committee.

Okay. The committee has heard a lot of evidence, particularly from smaller organisations, about the competitive nature of the funding environment and how that can sometimes undermine co-operation and cause smaller organisations to feel somewhat disadvantaged. What is within the Scottish Government’s gift to support collaboration and, in particular, help smaller organisations to win more contracts and grants?

You will not be surprised to hear that that competitiveness and the application process have probably been raised with me by everyone who has ever been funded by the Scottish Government. Sometimes, people need to apply to numerous different funding pots. That is why I have looked at how we can streamline the five funding pots that I have a bit better, link the application process much more closely to the national performance framework outcomes and get more money to the front line.

The ability to create partnership funding bids has always been there, but people did not take advantage of it. Some of the work that we are doing with our partners—those who are currently funded as well as those who are interested in being funded in the future—is about how we can support them in the application process. Officials have been gathering all the information that they need to do that. That is a key issue.

Interestingly, one of the ideas that the social isolation and loneliness implementation group came up with involved a number of small organisations partnering with a local authority to deliver something. That is pretty unheard of and quite innovative, considering the pressures that everybody is facing. That work is being undertaken now.

There is a lot of learning out there, because many organisations, including some of the bigger organisations, do collaborative funding bids. We need to apply that learning to smaller organisations. For instance, Age Scotland might have a social isolation project, but the delivery mechanism for it might be a wee local organisation that already does work in that particular area. We need to think about how we can bring such organisations together as partners to access that funding, rather than being in competition for it.

Is there a role here for the third sector interfaces, which are funded via the third sector fund, in facilitating such partnership and collaboration and leveraging in other funding and opportunities, in particular for small organisations? What are the Scottish ministers doing to ensure that the funding that they give to third sector interfaces delivers on those opportunities at a local level for smaller organisations?

You have touched on the crux of why I cannot sit in a silo. The work that I need to undertake with Ms Campbell around the work on the third sector that she does, as the budget holder for that bigger pot of money, is on how to bring about additionality and greater inclusion.

You are right in what you said about third sector interfaces. I have a great one in my local area that knows all the organisations, including tiny wee one-person organisations. We need to bring those people together in a much more collaborative fashion, instead of saying, “Here’s a pot of money,” which everybody then wrestles for. We need to be more thoughtful about that.

It is a question of looking at what can be delivered, what needs to be delivered and what demand people have been experiencing. The only people who can tell us that are those who are on the front line. That is why the TSIs and others that do such networking work for all the organisations are incredibly important.

With regard to the main point of your question, I will look at what we are doing at the moment in conversation with Ms Campbell and how we can do more work in that area, which is a perfect example of how the influence of the equality team’s work across other portfolios can really make a difference and provide additionality.

Minister, in your opening remarks, you mentioned the national performance framework. The committee would be interested to hear of any examples that you can share with us of occasions when evidence or information in the NPF has caused you to take a different decision in your budget or to change things. You spoke about reprioritising.

Do you have an example of what you are thinking of?

No—I was hoping to be given one. I suppose that I am asking you to make the national performance framework real by giving an example of how the information and evidence that are contained in it are used.

We do that in lots of ways. We have a piece of work coming up soon in the race equality sector in relation to the UN decade for recognising people of African descent. We are about to look at funding projects to do some of that work.

Although some of that work is about the UN decade, some of it relates to the background of the flare-ups that we have had over the past couple of years to do with race and race equality and the rise in race-related hate crime. Much of the work that will be done by the projects that we are hoping to fund will be about how we raise profile and how we understand, for example, the genesis of racism in the slave economy—I do not like calling it “the slave trade”, even though that is the normal parlance—and the impact that that has had on racism now, especially that involving the African community. We are working closely on that with some of our main partner organisations.

10:45  

That links in clearly with the national performance framework. We want a country that is free from discrimination and that upholds human rights. I see the link with the NPF, which is incredibly important to me. That is one pillar. The other pillar is how we end that discrimination and ensure that young people and people of African descent who currently live in Scotland have better life chances and can go about their everyday business.

Our work on the Gypsy Traveller action plan is a perfect example of how lots of talk needs to be followed by action. Accommodation was the pivotal issue for Gypsy Travellers, and employment, welfare, health, education and participation in community outcomes cut across every portfolio. In the joint ministerial committee, we quickly realised that institutional racism and the fact that Gypsy Travellers were invisible in policy were a perfect example of the work that we needed to do to change outcomes for that community right across the board. That tied in clearly with the national performance framework outcome of ending discrimination and increasing equality for a discrete group of people.

I am incredibly proud of the Gypsy Traveller action plan, and I will be even more proud of it when it starts to create real changes in outcomes. Mary Fee is nodding; I know that we share the same ambition. There will be a six-month review soon, and I hope to see a real difference there. There is also the new post in the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities.

The hard data in the national performance framework outcomes is incredibly important, as it allows us to map the process. I want those in the Gypsy Traveller community to come back to me and say, “I can see a difference there. That’s made a difference to my family and my life.” We always have to think about the human face. Maybe Davie and Charlotte Donaldson and others will be able to tell the committee that they have seen a difference. That is incredibly important.

The Gypsy Traveller action plan framework applies to a small but valued part of Scotland’s community. We need to think about how we can scale up that approach across the whole of Government for all the other equalities action that we need to take. I can give the committee loads of examples, but I know that you are short of time.

Good morning, minister. I want to go over the role of advocacy organisations. Third sector advocacy organisations have a role in holding public bodies to account, especially in respect of achieving better outcomes for groups that have equality needs or require support to access their rights. Is there a risk of conflict if advocacy organisations are funded by those public bodies?

I have talked a lot about partnership working with the third sector and advocacy organisations, their work, and the important role that they play in scrutinising the Government and holding us to account. I see many of the advocacy organisations as our critical friends. They often challenge us, but we see that their role involves doing work that needs to be done to end inequalities across Scotland. They are key partners in that work, so funding them is incredibly important. However, just because they get money from us does not mean that they do what we want them to do and say what we want them to say. They certainly do not do that. They hold us to very high standards in their scrutiny, which is right, because we can make progress only by ensuring that what we do, what difference that makes, what outcomes we achieve and whether those are positive ones are always under review.

Finally, I want to ask about the human rights indicator’s influence over local decisions. Since 2007, performance on that has fallen. What information is the Government collecting to understand why that is the case? It would be interesting to hear about that.

Obviously, my role involves mainstreaming across the whole of Government. The Minister for Local Government, Housing and Planning, Kevin Stewart, has responsibility for that work in local government. I have worked closely with him on a number of areas, including accessible housing, the Gypsy Traveller action plan, how we can work closely with COSLA and local government, violence against women and barring orders. I have a close working relationship with him, and he is responsible for that indicator. I want to make sure that I am not taking responsibility for other ministers’ work. That is what mainstreaming involves. Responsibility has to be taken.

We are doing work across Government with our leaders forum to ensure that there are leaders in every portfolio area who take up the work around that indicator. I am sure that Mr Stewart can respond to the committee specifically on the impact that that indicator has had and the changes that are being made.

Thank you very much for joining us, minister. We will now move into private session.

10:51 Meeting continued in private until 11:15.