Chamber and committees

The staff survey responses indicate that some staff find the internal redetermination process quite complicated. How is the organisation responding to that feedback?

What would improve the call waiting and processing times?

My question is on theme 2. Are you concerned that the approach that you want to take might undermine the shared care of children?

I am pleased to speak in this important members’ business debate to mark the international day of persons with disabilities. I congratulate Pam Duncan-Glancy on securing the debate. As one of her colleagues on the Social Justice and Social Security Committee, I see at first hand her determination to ensure that the needs of disabled people are listened to.

The debate allows us to show our cross-party support for this annual event. The theme this year is fighting for rights in the post-Covid era, which I welcome. As a member of the Parliament’s Social Justice and Social Security Committee, the theme reminds me of the evidence that we recently received from the Glasgow Disability Alliance, which is clear that the pandemic has supercharged the inequalities that disabled people face and created new inequalities. Glasgow Disability Alliance correctly points out that listening to the voices of disabled people will be vital to ensuring that the recovery leaves no one behind. Therefore, the debate gives us all the opportunity to say that we hear that message and that we will listen to disabled people as we make our decisions. I am supportive of that approach, and it is my long-standing view that disabled people massively enhance our country and should be involved in shaping its future.

My view has been positively enhanced by my volunteer work with adults with additional support needs, which began in my teenage years, and by my employment as a support worker in the heart of my constituency. I draw members’ attention to my entry in the members’ register of interests on my previous employment.

As MSPs, we owe a big thank you to Inclusion Scotland for the excellent briefing that it produced for the debate. The briefing is clear that disabled people have been the hardest hit by Covid-19. It stresses that disabled people want to move forward and not back, that they want to do so as leaders and full participants, and that they want to help to create a more inclusive future. This Parliament must unite in agreement with that approach.

We have made good progress on the dignity, fairness and respect agenda as we redesign social security. The redesign has, rightly, involved disabled people, whose experiences are vital if we are to avoid, in the future, the failures of the past. For example, we have vehemently rejected the use of private sector assessments and the harsh conditionality regime that has been at the heart of the Westminster disability benefit system for many years. Once we have had the safe transfer of cases from the Department for Work and Pensions to Social Security Scotland, we will continue with the much-needed redesign.

Unfortunately, the harsh assessment regime remains for universal credit and legacy benefits. Benefit sanction levels have crept up again since sanctions were suspended during the pandemic. We must continue to call that out and not let disabled people in Scotland be subjected to a two-tier system of social security.

However, it is not just in social security that we must listen to disabled people; we must take the same approach in making decisions across the whole range of services that we provide in Scotland. In health and social care, education, housing, transport and our green recovery, we must listen to the voices of those who can help us shape a way out of the pandemic that is fair and just and leaves no one behind.

I take this opportunity to thank all the groups in my constituency that support and are led by disabled people. There is a really strong community spirit across Clydebank, Bearsden and Milngavie, and I promise that I will continue to be on their side in this Parliament.

I think that a lot more discussion of the petition is required. I did not see the views of the teaching unions in the documents, so I suggest that we invite the unions along to give evidence or ask them for written submissions.

No, I am okay. I am in agreement with the rest of you.

Thank you, convener. I declare that I am a councillor at West Dunbartonshire Council.

The witnesses have welcomed the approach of increasing green space and improving access to it. In relation to access to green space, women’s safety is important. Do the witnesses have views on how safety can be maximised? Are there any examples of good practice in that regard?

Good morning, panel, and thank you for your time this morning.

My questions are for Gavin Macleod. I was interested to read in your submission about reduced participation in volunteering by disabled people because of the potential impact on their benefits; you have referred to that again this morning. Can you say a bit more about that and tell us about experiences of which you have been made aware?

Secondly, with disability benefits being transferred to Scotland, do you plan to look, with the Scottish Government and Social Security Scotland, at the barriers that exist? Unfortunately, responsibility for universal credit and capability assessments remains with the Department for Work and Pensions.

This winter, households face a perfect storm, with rising energy bills and the £20 cut to universal credit. What support has the Scottish Government provided to families who have been struggling financially throughout the pandemic; what further support will be provided this winter; and what impact will the doubling of the Scottish child payment have on low-income families?