Absolutely. That is the situation that disabled people face. I have a quotation from Audit Scotland that speaks to that. In a blog on transitions, it said:

“It’s distressing and frustrating that we repeatedly hear of the barriers that some families fight against to get the right support to help their child to learn. Too often, families are worn down by a prolonged search for the right support, and by having to manage a crisis that could have and should have been avoided.”

It went on to note:

“Councils provide support in different ways, with a wide variation in spending ... This partly reflects the different ways services are provided and the varying costs of supporting individuals—but”—

this point is crucial—

“may also reflect local decisions by councils to prioritise between a wide range of services.”

Therefore, Audit Scotland recognises the position of councils.

I should put on record that councils are in a horrific position right now—I in no way underestimate that. Now is not the time to get into the budget, because I could be here for another three hours if we were to touch on that. However, you hit the nail on the head when you made the point about councils really struggling to meet just their statutory responsibilities. I cannot tell you how often disabled people face the argument that “It’s not an obligation, so we don’t have to do it.” Social care is an example of that. Eligibility criteria get stripped back and stripped back until people are literally doing the only thing that they have to do, which is keep people alive. That is the situation that we are trying to avoid with the bill for transitions for young disabled people.

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.

I would also like to put on record my thanks to the petitioner for drawing this really important issue to the attention of not just this committee but other committees and, indeed, the Parliament.

I am particularly concerned about the issues that have been raised about people who have been victims of, or witnesses to, crime and who felt unable to present what they had seen or experienced because of a lack of support to communicate in the way that they needed. It is really important that we do a bit of extra work before we close the petition.

I am keen that we explore what the Scottish Courts and Tribunals Service is doing, what Police Scotland’s understanding is and what local authorities are doing around the use of an appropriate adult in situations where a person needs support to communicate with the police.

Once we have established those lines of communication and enabled that work to continue, we will be in a position to say that we can close the petition. I feel that we need to do that little bit extra work and then we will get there.

Again, I would like to say thanks very much to the petitioner.

Thank you. I appreciate that, and it is what my supplementary point is about. We are going into far wider issues. When we spent a bit of time talking about it from one perspective, that was fine, but we are now told that it is not fine to do so from another perspective. I just want to raise that and say that these things, if they matter, matter from a much broader perspective than the one that was raised.

I can go straight into my next theme if that is helpful.

I am struggling a bit, if I am honest, because the child payment was announced a few years back and eligibility for that payment was clearly to be from 0 to 16. I appreciate that it was rolled out initially to under-sixes and then to over-sixes on 14 November last year, but that is something that the Government should have been planning for. I am not sure that I accept that it is fair to say that Social Security Scotland was overstretched because of a surprise payment. It was not really a surprise. It surely would have been in the making.

I take the point about this year not having that same pressure but, again, there are other benefits that are not rolled out yet in Social Security Scotland. Are we just going to keep seeing pressure on timescales? It feels as though there was not much planning for that. I suppose those were questions about the planning.

My final question is, when did you ask the DWP for the data? When the minister appeared at committee before Christmas, my understanding was that, if the data had been shared by 31 January, the payments would have been rolled out in a timely fashion as preferred. When did the Scottish Government ask the DWP to provide the data at the beginning of January?

Sorry, I am confused. How does it not relate?

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?

I appreciate that and I understand the case transfer point, which is why carers allowance is still being delivered by the DWP. I get that, but why was £139 chosen and not £174.40?

Good morning, minister and officials. Forty-four per cent of carers are in poverty. About 40 per cent of them have said that they are struggling to make ends meet and that they cannot afford essentials, 49 per cent are struggling to afford the cost of food and 37 per cent are in debt as a consequence of caring. The number of carers who have cut back on essentials since 2021 has almost doubled. Has the minister considered at this juncture doubling the carers allowance supplement?