Chamber and committees

Thank you very much for that question. I know that you have a keen interest in the subject and that you are passionate about the rights of young disabled people, and I thank you for the work that you have done on it so far.

The questions that you asked are key. I know that the committee has been looking at the detail of the bill, and I thank it for the work that it has done on the bill. I have looked, but I have not seen another piece of legislation that has done this: at every point in the bill where there is mention of a regulation or a duty on a body, or reference to the development of a strategy or a plan, there is also a provision, almost in the same clause, that says “and must consult”, and that requires the young person and their family to be involved.

Various sections of the bill—sections 7, 11 and 12—cover the issue of ensuring that a person-centred approach is taken. In fact, that is what is most important about the bill. Earlier, I talked about people not wanting to be project managers in their own lives or in the lives of the young people whom they love and care for. It is not that young disabled people want to devolve all responsibility and step aside; it is that they want to spend time thinking about where they want to go, who they want to be and what they want to be. That involves thinking about whether they want to end up in the destination that has been proposed and whether that destination is positive. As an aside, I think that there is a bigger conversation to be had about how we define positive destinations, not just for young disabled people but for all young people in Scotland.

The focus needs to be on those kind of questions, rather than on whether someone has contacted social work and let them know that, in a couple of years’ time, the person might need self-directed support to be put in place or whether someone has had a look at what kind of accommodation or housing will be available if the person goes to college or university. Those are transactional questions about managing a project, as I described. They are not questions such as, “Where do I want to go when I grow up? Do I want to go on a college course?”

I do not want to be disparaging, but I am sure that you have heard in evidence that, in some situations, because of the aspirations that other people have—a plethora of data and research shows that non-disabled people sometimes have lower expectations of disabled people than they themselves have, and I earlier gave a statistic about people’s aspirations being beaten down almost—young disabled people end up being parked on certain courses that they might not want to be on.

That might be because, at the last minute, we rush to find a destination of any description—positive or otherwise, to be honest. What I have heard from people when I have spoken to them about the legislation is that everything is decided far too late. People are often faced with a situation whereby a young person is going to leave school, maybe in a matter of weeks, and they ask, “What are we going to do? We will have to do something. Right, here’s a college course. You can definitely go and do that life skills course,” or whatever.

I am not suggesting that those courses are not appropriate for some people—of course, they are—but we should not end up in a situation in which, because we do not have much time, we are almost panic placing people into situations that are not really positive destinations—they are just destinations.

The bill will bring in that planning process in a more streamlined fashion, starting at an earlier point, giving people a responsibility to get round the table and having somebody outwith the family as the person who makes sure that people have done the bit that they are supposed to do, have phoned the person they said they would phone and have been in touch with whoever. That is important, because it allows the family to focus on what the destination is.

I think that I said that I have met with COSLA, not that I have not—

The outcome was as Bill Scott described: there is a departure when it comes to agreement on the figures. I want to assure you—and I go back to my comments about the National Audit Office and the Law Society—

That is an interesting point. I have had to submit a parliamentary question to try to get that information, because the level 4 information in the budget does not detail specific funding for that. It is difficult for me to tell what is being spent on the transitions of young disabled people and how much the strategy will have behind it. That is the kind of question that is really important.

The costs associated with the bill must be specifically related to the framework that it is putting in place. The financial memorandum specifically details a lot of that in a way that I have not necessarily seen in some Government budgets, because it goes into a significant level of detail. All of us, in our various committees, have just scrutinised the Government’s budget, and it is fair to say that it has been a difficult process. I contend that, because the figures in our financial memorandum are contingent on a given number of people, which relates to a number of hours and, therefore, the costs, it details the rationale for the costs in a way that some Government bills have not done.

No, I do not think that we should wait. In my opening statement, I said that the data that the committee is aware of—young disabled people are three times more likely to end up not in education, employment or training—was the same in 2008, when Inclusion Scotland wrote the briefing that I have in front of me. The data was probably the same prior to that, too.

Disabled people are consistently told, “This next strategy will be the thing. You do not need this in legislation.” I remember that from working on policy when I worked in the area. There was a constant refrain of “The next thing will do it,” but it has not done it yet. Here we are, almost 20 years since we started to work together in the field—I am sorry, Bill; I said that I would not out that number—and the rights of young disabled people still do not deliver the fighting chance that they need. Therefore, I do not think that we should wait for the strategy.

How long does the committee think that disabled people should wait? What does it think is the right timescale to say whether the strategy is or is not working? Right now, there are disabled people in communities who are about to leave school or have already left school with no plan. They cannot wait for the Government’s strategy, which is not yet published.

I fully acknowledge that the Government has committed to that strategy, and I fully believe that it will be published. I take the ministers at their word, but those disabled people cannot wait for that. I urge the committee to consider that question and say how long it thinks that it is acceptable to wait and see whether that strategy works.

I have now met twice with COSLA.

I have met with a range of stakeholders and have done engagement on the bill right across Scotland. Members may have seen the roadshows that I did during the summer, which engaged people who work in the field and those who work for the Department for Work and Pensions and for Skills Development Scotland. I also met them separately from that engagement. During those roadshows, I met teachers, young disabled people and their families and carers.

I have carried out extensive engagement and have probably met most of the stakeholders that you would think should be engaged in the process. I am willing to meet anyone who believes that they have a stake in this and to discuss how best to make it work. I hope that this has come across to the committee: I want to make this work; I want to do the right thing; and I want to ensure that, for example, the financial memorandum is accurate. We have done that to the best of our ability. Bill Scott acknowledged that we would be prepared to discuss other numbers. We spent a lot of time coming to our conclusions. Our rationale is there.

That is how I approach stakeholder engagement. If people want to speak to us, I would be more than happy to speak to them, but I have already engaged with a large number of groups, including the Transitions Forum.

Yes, absolutely, and I thank Graeme Dey for saying that. There is a much bigger picture here. I hope that, through bills that will come to the Parliament, including the incorporation bill at some point, along with a national care service, we can start to look at what needs to change in all those areas, because Graeme Dey is right—so much needs to change.

Fundamentally, what we do not have in legislation is a right for children and young people to have a transitions plan from the age of 14 that follows them through to the age of 26 or beyond. There are regulation-making powers in the bill to do that. It is about focusing on what they need in order to give them a fighting chance at a future, and that is just not there right now. Ruth Maguire highlighted the implementation gap, but I am not surprised that there is an implementation gap, because the existing legislation is not directing professionals and it is not focused on this particular group of people. It is leaving professionals unclear about what their duties are, and it does not include that element of accountability so that young disabled people can hold those people to account.

I have learned a lot since coming to Parliament, in May 2021, and I think that this has probably been the steepest learning curve of my life. One of the things I have learned is that nothing sharpens a minister’s mind more than having to get on their feet in the chamber and talk about something that they have done. Over the past decade—over the past two decades, even—Bill Scott and I have worked together on similar issues. He and I have worked together for a long time—I will not embarrass him by suggesting how long, but it has been a while—and we have constantly been told, “This guidance will do it. This is the bit that will work. This strategy will work. Just focus on what doesn’t work and change that little bit.” However, I am sorry to say that the bit that does not work is the bit that the bill is trying to address. It is about giving disabled people an opportunity—a right in statute to have a plan that gives them a fighting chance at a future.

I will add to that before Stephen Kerr comes back in. Schools and the structures around young disabled people now are probably contending with that exact question. For example, everyone can see that I am a disabled person, so there is no hiding—not that I would ever want to do that, actually; I am proud of my identity. However, with impairments that you cannot see, there is always the question of how we know someone is a disabled person.

Schools are already asking those questions, because they have to identify the young people in order to work with them. There are various mechanisms that they can use to do that. They can ask what support people need and they can look at whether a diagnosis is in place. Of course, that gets us into waiting times, which is a whole other question, and it goes back to Graeme Dey’s point about the number of current problems and how we will address them. Ultimately, that will need to be looked at.

Therefore, those questions are not new as a result of the definition that we use in the bill. The purpose of the definition in the bill is to put a focus specifically on people who have that protected characteristic, in recognition of the fact that they are significantly oppressed and discriminated against.

Excellent—I will be quick.

On that final point, all the things that I outlined in relation to scrutiny—the assignment of ministerial responsibility, the laying before Parliament of the annual report, the review of plans, and the review of the strategy—will sharpen the focus to make sure that, if we are doing the right thing on the ground, we will know that we are, because we are asking people about it.

We know that young people in school have access to pastoral care teachers—they were called guidance teachers in my day—and that existing structures are in place to support them. For example, staff from Skills Development Scotland engage with special and state schools. There are existing structures, which should be treating all young people equally, including young disabled people, but the statistics show that they are not doing that yet. We are saying that the bill contains a mechanism to focus attention on and address some of that.

I reassure the committee that I have not closed my ears and eyes to a different perspective on finance. I say that on the basis of my earlier comment about the costs for local authorities. The last thing that anyone wants to do is land local authorities with duties that they do not have the financial support to back up, but I contend that such support is Government’s responsibility.

We must remember two comments. I contend that good transitions would be a form of good support, and the National Audit Office said that good support could save £1 million per person—I repeat: £1 million per person. Even if we take our estimate of the cost and COSLA’s estimate and the £5 million extra, we would only have to get it right for five people to make a longer-term saving for the state.

Secondly, the Law Society of Scotland said that

“the wider costs of inaction would be greater in comparison to the costs of implementation”.

It is in the context of those two statements that I approach the question of the financial memorandum.