Chamber and committees

I had a few other questions, convener, but they were about the role of other organisations, and Fiona Collie has covered that.

I thank our witnesses for their submissions, which have been very helpful. I will cover the theme of how to promote better take-up of carers allowance supplement.

You will all be aware that some carers are in receipt of universal credit. The full amount of any carers allowance that they receive is deducted pound for pound from their universal credit. It seems that because of that, some carers do not claim carers allowance, because they do not believe that they will gain financially from it. That perception is wrong, because in Scotland being in receipt of carers allowance means that you can also get carers allowance supplement. Are you aware of carers who have been deterred from claiming carers allowance supplement because of that perception? Can you comment on what you have done to tackle that perception? Is there a role for carers organisations in promoting take-up?

Good morning, minister. You will be aware that carers allowance pays the lowest amount of all the benefits that the DWP defines as earnings replacement benefits. For example, the personal allowance in jobseekers allowance is higher than carers allowance and the jobseekers allowance rate is different from the one that is used to calculate the level of carers allowance supplement.

Is the policy intention for CAS about topping up the amount received by low-income carers to the level of jobseekers allowance, or is it to give the CAS payment to all carers in Scotland who are on DWP earnings replacement benefits? You will be aware that a lot of carers have an underlying entitlement to CAS. What are the main barriers to CAS payments being made to those carers?

Aligning the carers allowance supplement with receipt of the DWP benefit, carers allowance, brings a lot of challenges, as you know. Getting usable information from the DWP on underlying entitlement to carers allowance is difficult. I note that the Glasgow City Health and Social Care Partnership’s submission to the consultation suggested that council tax reduction data could perhaps be used to identify low-income carers without relying on the DWP. Is that something that your officials have considered?

I am sure that the First Minister shares my concern about the high level of positive Covid-19 cases across East and West Dunbartonshire. Will she say what additional measures are being taken to tackle that worrying trend and address the challenges in areas with the highest prevalence of cases?

I very much welcome the agreement between the Scottish Government and the Scottish Green Party. This is a fundamental moment in the continued progression of devolution that will lead us to the normal status of independence. What benefits will the agreement bring to local authorities across Scotland?

With school pupils across West Dunbartonshire and East Dunbartonshire preparing for the new school term, will the First Minister outline what communications she or the Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills has had with unions and teacher and parent associations to ensure that there is a smooth transition for returning pupils and staff, so that they feel safe and supported?

I have no interests to declare.

The cabinet secretary will recognise that the United Kingdom Government’s two-child policy is a major driver of child poverty, and that even if the two-child policy did not exist, the UK benefit cap would still enforce that misery for many families. Does the cabinet secretary agree with me and organisations including the Child Poverty Action Group that both policies must go? What actions will the Scottish Government take to support families who are impacted by these draconian measures?

Thank you, Presiding Officer, and best wishes to you in your new role. I congratulate the cabinet secretary on her return to government, and I wish her well in her new post.

It is an immense honour to make my first speech in our Parliament. I thank the people of Clydebank and Milngavie and Bearsden North for putting their trust in me. It is truly humbling to become the MSP for the area where I was raised and still live, and it is a real motivation for me in trying to secure the best for my constituents. As this is my first speech, I take the opportunity to thank my campaign team for their considerable efforts and to thank my amazing partner, family and friends for their tremendous support. I know that they are aware of how much their backing means to me. I also put on record my respect for my predecessor, Gil Paterson, and thank him for everything that he achieved for my constituents.

It is a proud moment for me to become the first woman MSP for Clydebank and Milngavie and one who comes from a working-class background. We are going in the right direction to ensure that our Parliament starts to look like the Scotland that we are here to represent. My community rightly expects me, in going about my business here, to take a grown-up and co-operative approach to politics that will secure a better deal for those in greatest need, that recognises that many have been left behind and that puts securing a better way forward first.

To that approach, I bring real-life experience. Only last week, I was doing my last shift as a health and social care worker in the heart of my constituency—or, as my service users describe it, “living in the real world”. We must put that real-world experience at the heart of our efforts and must not be tempted to cut bits of it out because it does not support a particular political narrative.

Therefore, I say this: when I believe that the Scottish Government should be doing more to tackle poverty and injustice, I will say so; equally, if I think that our Parliament requires more powers to make real change, I will say so. To do anything else would be to let down our country and to fail to fully address the issues that are fuelling poverty and injustice.

In the real world, the biggest driver for child poverty is the inadequate levels of universal credit, the £20 uplift in which is to be removed, with the choice between a five-week wait and immediately going into debt with an advance payment; the two-child poverty policy and the need for the rape clause; and the benefit cap that denies families with children the basics, forcing them to use food banks and into poverty. I saw that in my work as a councillor and a volunteer at my local food bank. When you deliver food parcels, you see the real world that the war on welfare has helped to create; you see the poverty, the empty kitchen cupboards, the despair and misery in people’s eyes and children being held back by unavoidable poverty.

It is a crime that people are in that situation and we must have an honest ambition to bring it to an end, so let us get real about that. We cannot fully design a modern, compassionate system of social security when it is heavily shaped by a firefighting approach to UK Tory welfare cuts. We need the powers to end that approach and to design, instead, a system that is there for people when they need it, and which gives the respect and dignity that are essential if we are to tackle injustice and stigma.

Equally, the proposal to devolve employment policy to Scotland is significant, and it is backed by the Scottish Trades Union Congress in “The People’s Recovery: a Different Track for Scotland’s Economy”. Would it not be great if we in Scotland had the powers to end exploitative zero-hours contracts and fire-and-hire practices? As a Parliament, we cannot recognise that there are 83,000 people on zero-hours contracts one week, but not want the powers to do something about it the next. These are not the visions of the past; they are essential if we are to make such draconian policies a thing of the past.

As a new SNP MSP, I call on everyone here to put tribal politics aside and focus on the scale of what is needed now to end injustice and the misery that it is inflicting.