Social Justice and Social Security Committee

Meeting date: Thursday, February 23, 2023

Official Report 571KB pdf

---

Social Security (Additional Payments) (No 2) Bill

The next item is a legislative consent motion on the UK Parliament’s Social Security (Additional Payments) (No 2) Bill.

I welcome back Ben Macpherson MSP, the Minister for Social Security and Local Government, and I welcome the officials who are joining us remotely: Susan Soutar, reserved benefits policy manager, Scottish Government; and Kayleigh Blair, solicitor, Scottish Government.

Minister, I understand that you would like to make a short opening statement.

Thank you, convener and colleagues, for the opportunity to discuss with you this legislative consent motion on the Social Security (Additional Payments) (No 2) Bill. The bill was introduced by the UK Government on 7 February to provide further payments to support people through the cost of living crisis. That is extra support and we welcome it.

The help that is available includes £900 in extra cost of living payments for those on means-tested benefits, which will be paid in three stages over the 2023-24 financial year. Those in receipt of non-means-tested disability benefits include people who receive child disability payment or adult disability payment from Social Security Scotland, and they will receive a disability cost of living payment of £150. That payment will be made in summer 2023. Our analysis suggests that around 750,000 households in Scotland will receive the means-tested additional payment, and around 680,000 individuals will receive the disability additional payment.

It is the UK Government’s view that the provisions of its bill are reserved and it has therefore not requested the Scottish Parliament’s consent to the bill. However, the Scottish Government’s view is that the bill relates to devolved matters. It is my view that the payments are provided to individuals who have a short-term need for financial support to avoid a risk to their wellbeing and that that can be legislated for within the legislative competence of the Scottish Parliament. That is why it is necessary to lodge a legislative consent motion, although the UK Government has not requested one. In doing so, we will ensure that the devolution settlement is properly respected and, more importantly, that a precedent for overriding the devolution settlement is not established.

The alternative to a legislative consent motion would be to pass legislation in the Scottish Parliament on an extremely truncated timescale in order to match the UK Government’s timetable and ensure that payments are made when intended. The legislation would need to come into force by the end of March.

The UK Government bill will apply to the entirety of the UK. As a result, it is my view that introducing legislation in the Scottish Parliament is not necessary or proportionate. Instead, the most prudent course of action is to provide legislative consent to the provisions in the UK bill. That will support the payments while ensuring that the devolution settlement is properly respected.

I welcome the opportunity to take any questions as part of your consideration of the LCM.

I invite questions from members.

Thank you for setting out the Government’s position on the cost of living payments and the legislative consent motion. If it is the view of the Scottish Government that it is within the legislative competence of the Scottish Parliament to pass legislation to provide payments to people in Scotland as set out in the bill, why has it not done so?

As I have referenced before, we first need to deliver adult disability payment, which of course was nationally rolled out on 29 August 2022, and complete the case transfer process for individuals on personal independence payment and disability living allowance for working adults in Scotland to adult disability payment, which is under way. We need to undertake that process. Once everyone is in the Scottish system, we will consider matters for the future, which also relates to why we are consulting on adult disability payment. That consultation is live.

I appreciate that answer. The question, though, is not so much about adult disability payment and benefits that are currently being delivered. It is about why, if the Scottish Government believes in paying a one-off payment in times of hardship, as you have just described in relation to clause 7 of the UK bill, it has not done that.

10:30  

We need to undertake case transfer first.

I do not understand why. The Scottish Government has data on which people are on low incomes in Scotland. We have that through various mechanisms, including from local authorities. If the Scottish Government believes that this legislation impinges on devolved legislation, it accepts that there is a responsibility in devolved legislation to make payments to people in times of hardship. My question is, why have you not done that?

We provide additional support in Scotland that is not available elsewhere in the UK through child winter heating assistance, for example, which we introduced. Initiatives have been undertaken to provide extra support. We talked about carers allowance supplement in connection with the set of regulations that we just considered. Of course, there are further considerations through future primary legislation when we will be able to consider what we wish to do as a Parliament as we continue to develop Scotland’s social security system. However, when it comes to adult disability payment, the focus has been on the safe and secure delivery of our new payment, adult disability payment, which was introduced nationally from 29 August, and undertaking case transfer safely and securely.

I appreciate that. Child winter heating assistance, the Scottish child payment and the benefits that you have referred to are all steady-state benefits; they are not benefits that are paid only because we are in a cost of living crisis, like the ones that are in the legislation that the LCM relates to. That is the point that I am getting at. Why, if it is in the devolved competence of the Scottish Parliament and the Scottish Government to do so, has the Government not given cost of living payments to these groups of people?

That would require a piece of primary legislation to have been passed by this Parliament. It would have required additional financial resource to be found within a restricted budget. Of course, where we have been able to allocate additional resource using already established mechanisms, we have done so. We have provided additional support where we can and we also passed a bill in order to be able to pay carers allowance supplement in 2021. We also introduced the Scottish child payment from 2019 to 2021 initially for under-sixes and then rolled it out fully to under-16s. We have used existing mechanisms and created new ones to provide additional support, but primary legislation would be required for what Pam Duncan-Glancy refers to.

Susan Soutar, do you want to come in on anything further on that point?

I think that you have covered everything in terms of the additional support that is being provided by the Scottish Government and the fact that these are UK Government payments. It would obviously be more effective and more cost effective for them to come from a single source, which is the UK Government in this instance. Scottish Government officials are working closely with DWP officials to ensure that the payments go out to Scottish clients.

I call Jeremy Balfour.

I have no question, but I refer again to the interest that I noted under a previous item.

Thank you.

I declare an interest as well. I am in receipt of personal independence payment. Sorry—I did not mention that earlier.

Thank you for putting that on the record.

I thank the minister and officials for taking part in this meeting to help inform our report on the LCM, which we will publish shortly. We will now move into private session.

10:34 Meeting continued in private until 10:39.