Meeting of the Parliament

Meeting date: Tuesday, January 14, 2014

Official Report 732KB pdf

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Topical Question Time

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Bedroom Tax (Mitigation)

1. To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to mitigate the effects of the so-called bedroom tax. (S4T-00561)

The Scottish Government has provided Scottish councils with £20 million this year and up to £20 million next year for discretionary housing payments to mitigate the impacts of the United Kingdom Government’s bedroom tax. That is the maximum that is permitted under the legal limit set by the UK Government.

We have also provided funding of £7.9 million to help front-line advice services to support people who are dealing with the bedroom tax, with £2.5 million being ring fenced for social landlords.

We will continue to make the case to the UK Government that concessions should be granted, for example an increase in the Scottish share of discretionary housing payments. However, there is only one solution: the Scottish Parliament should have control over welfare benefits. We could then scrap the bedroom tax altogether.

The minister said that the Government is mitigating the bedroom tax by up to—as it is legally allowed to—a maximum of £20 million. I am sure that she will be aware of the comments of the Scotland Office minister, David Mundell, that the Scottish Government is able to exempt everyone in Scotland who is affected by the bedroom tax. Therefore, the coalition Government is no longer just content with inflicting the bedroom tax on struggling families; it is now demanding that the Scottish Government clear up the coalition Government’s mess. I therefore agree with the minister; it would be useful were she to elaborate on the fact that only with independence can we do away with that dreaded tax.

I absolutely agree. I was absolutely shocked to read David Mundell’s comments. He is a member of the UK party that is in Government in Westminster and which is imposing the bedroom tax on the people of Scotland. He still supports that tax even when he discovers—as he should have a long time ago—the impact that it is having on our poorest people. He then suggests that we should make up for Westminster’s failings from our budget, which it has already cut. However, he does not tell us where that money will come from. One thing that is clear is that any money that we use in mitigation must come out of the devolved settlement, which is for housing, the police and the health service. He shows bare-faced gall. The Scottish Parliament does not have the powers to control welfare spending at the moment; the only way we can do that is to have control of the powers ourselves. That can, as I said, be achieved by voting yes in the referendum.

The minister will be aware that there is strong feeling across the Parliament against the bedroom tax. Given that the Government wants to do its part, and that Jackie Baillie has the requisite support for her member’s bill, will the minister intimate her Government’s support for that bill?

I have said on more than one occasion that we are mitigating the impact of the bedroom tax to the extent that we can; we have topped up discretionary housing payments to the legal limit. We have made it very clear what our views are on evictions and of separating out a specific group for eviction. However, that is only part of the issue. We now have the suggestion that housing benefit for the under-25s could be removed. It will just not be possible also to mitigate that. The only solution will be to vote yes in the referendum and to get rid of the bedroom tax entirely.

How much would it cost to mitigate additional welfare cuts if the Westminster Government extends the bedroom tax to include pensioners, as has been suggested by Julian Brazier MP? Beyond that, how much would it cost if his Government goes ahead with scrapping housing benefit for under-25s? Would not it be better to give this Parliament all the levers of power, so that all those inhumane policies could be scrapped?

I absolutely agree that the policies are inhumane. Removal of housing benefits from under-25s in Scotland could impact on 20,000 children. It would put more children into poverty, which I am sure none of us here wants. Removal of those benefits from the under-25s would cost £133 million a year. The Scottish Government does not have the money to mitigate the impacts to that extent. The cost of extending the policy also to pensioners would be unthinkable and mitigation would simply not be possible. I absolutely agree that we must deal with the matter head on and bring control over welfare to the Scottish Parliament, where we would stop any further cuts to the benefit system and repeal the bedroom tax altogether.

David Mundell is the second member of the UK Parliament who has said that it is possible for the Scottish Government to find the means and mechanism to mitigate the impact of the bedroom tax. Does he know something that the minister does not? Has she instructed her officials to do a full audit to consider whether there is a mechanism that could mitigate the impact now, rather than waiting for a vote in September?

The position is very clear. We know that Jenny Marra’s party is working with the Tories and that they want to pass the buck to the Scottish Government in order for it to deal with the matter out of the Scottish budget. However, I do not think that David Mundell understands that the Scotland Act 1998 expressly reserves welfare spending related to individuals’ housing costs.

It was a Labour Government that put the cap on discretionary housing payments; we have topped up payments as far as we can. I do not think that what Jenny Marra said will go anywhere, because we are doing what we can, within our powers. Neither Jenny Marra nor David Mundell nor anyone else has suggested from where in the Scottish budget the money would come—even if they were to come up with a mechanism that would provide more money. No one has come up with that.

The minister has, once again, in response to her back benchers, made specific commitments about what a Scottish Government could do in an independent Scotland. Will she give a commitment that those policies will be fully costed prior to the referendum in September?

All the policies of this Scottish Government are fully costed, and we have costed what we are doing with discretionary housing payments. We will take no lessons from Alex Johnstone and the Tories on budgets and costings.

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Dementia (Specialist Care)

2. To ask the Scottish Government how it plans to ensure more specialist care for care home residents with dementia. (S4T-00564)

Care homes increasingly provide specialist care for people with dementia. Last year, the Scottish Government set up a national task force on the future of residential care in Scotland, to examine the purpose and structure of residential care services that will meet the care needs of future generations and the increasing proportion of residents with dementia. The task force will shortly produce a report with recommendations, which will go out for consultation.

As part of the national dementia strategy, we continue to implement the promoting excellence dementia skills framework, to help services in all care settings meet the standards of care for dementia. That includes the training of more than 300 dementia ambassadors from the social services sector, many of whom have key roles in a range of activities to support dementia workforce development and training in care homes.

We know that there are people in care homes with moderate to advanced stages of dementia but who do not have a diagnosis. We are doing more to ensure that those people are identified and that those diagnosed on or after 1 April 2013 receive the benefits of the national post-diagnostic support commitment in a way that is meaningful to them given their particular care setting and stage of the illness.

The cabinet secretary will be aware of the recent figures from Scotland’s Care Inspectorate, which revealed that although 90 per cent of care home residents either have dementia or show signs of the illness, less than 12 per cent of Scotland’s care homes for older people are specialists in dementia care—that is despite the fact that the number of people with dementia in Scotland is expected to double in the 20 years between 2011 and 2031. If staff and facilities are better equipped to deal with the challenges of dementia sufferers, the task of caring for sufferers will be made easier. What is crucial is that the care that patients experience should be far more streamlined and dignified—

It is crucial that we get a question.

Does the cabinet secretary share my concern about the care imbalance for dementia sufferers? Will he say what further action he will take to close the care gap?

I think that the member is getting slightly mixed up in his interpretation of the Care Inspectorate’s figures. It is true that more than 900 care homes in Scotland specialise in services for older people, 106 of which provide only specialist dementia services. However, many of the other 800 homes provide services for dementia patients.

I accept that we need to estimate and evaluate the impact of dementia on the care sector and to ensure that services are provided—qualitatively and quantitatively—to meet the increasing need. As I said, the task force has been designed to do exactly that.

The cabinet secretary said that the task force’s report will be published “shortly”. The report was supposed to have been published in autumn 2013, and a strategy was to have been drawn up and consulted on over the winter, but that has not happened. He talked a good game last year, and now that he is under pressure from the press and Opposition MSPs he announces the delayed strategy. People who are suffering from dementia cannot delay the progression of their condition. Why has there been such a lengthy delay in the publication of the report?

I have never felt under pressure from Jim Hume or indeed any Liberal Democrat anywhere in the United Kingdom, on any subject whatever.

It is far better to take a bit longer to get the report right than to rush it out. A lot of research has been required, but the report will be published soon. We already have a dementia strategy that includes people in care homes and, as I said, we are already implementing a whole range of initiatives, including the 300 dementia ambassadors, to try to ensure that the skill levels that are required in the care sector are there.

What progress has been made on implementing a national commitment on the prescribing of pyschoactive medications in care homes for residents with dementia?

We asked the Royal Pharmaceutical Society and the faculty of the psychiatry of old age of the Royal College of Psychiatrists to lead an expert group in developing a national commitment on reducing the inappropriate prescribing of pyschoactive medications, excluding cognitive enhancers, in all care settings, including care homes. The final recommendation will be made to the Scottish Government in the first quarter of 2014. We expect that it will include action on key areas, such as the initiation and review of medication, and on ensuring that all pyschoactive medication is administered in accordance with the law.

Does the cabinet secretary agree that, although one of the key aims in “Scotland’s National Dementia Strategy 2013-2016” is to ensure that people with dementia who want to remain in their own home do so rather than staying in hospital or living in a care home, people who by necessity have to enter a care home should receive the same level of care that is afforded to others? Specifically, can he tell us what progress is being made on providing post-diagnostic support in the form of a named link worker for individuals in Scotland’s care homes and their families, so that individuals in those situations are equally cared for?

There are clearly changes in the profile of dementia patients, the stage at which they go into care homes, and how long they are in care homes for. The average length of stay in a care home used to be five, six, seven or eight years; now, a dementia patient is typically in a care home for the last two or three years of their life at most. Therefore, care is given at home for much longer than previously. I believe that there is scope to go further in trying to ensure that care at home remains the norm for as long as possible for dementia patients.

On the specialist services and support in care homes to which Nanette Milne referred, we intend that they should eventually be available in the right setting in all care homes for dementia patients, but that obviously requires a level of investment by both the Scottish Government and care home providers.