The Scottish Government publishes a spending budget each year. Parliamentary committees seek to influence the development of the budget by exploring key issues and sharing their findings with the Government.

This year, the Committee has chosen to focus on the issue of disability benefit spending.

Spending on disability benefits

The Scottish Government’s main devolved disability benefit is the Adult Disability Payment. Spending on this benefit is forecast to increase from £3,845 million in 2026-27 to £5,308 million in 2030-31.

Around 95% of this spending is matched by funding from the UK Government. The amount of funding is tied to spending on the UK Government’s primary disability benefit, Personal Independence Payment.

If UK spending on Personal Independence Payment changes, the funding which comes from the UK Government would change too. This would have implications for how the Scottish Government funds Adult Disability Payment.

What does the Committee want to know?

In recent years there has been an increase in the number of people receiving disability benefits across the UK.

The Committee would like to understand:

• why disability benefit caseload has increased across the UK
• the extent to which, and reasons why, trends are different in Scotland
• what changes to UK Government welfare policy would mean for the Scottish Budget

The Committee will share its findings with the Scottish Government ahead of this year’s Scottish Budget.