Chamber and committees

In your evidence when you previously came before us, there was, I suppose, a focus on the need to pick up the pace and deliver this, and there was a lot of talk about percentage delivery in the different schemes. Part of the concern for the committee was that you seemed focused on delivering those percentages—perhaps the simple cases, as you put it, that required much less time to be dedicated to them, with some more complex cases pushed further down the road. Is that how the process is working? Are you trying to get the numbers up at the expense of those for whom the calculations are more complex?

You have also set out in the evidence that you have come back to us with that, with some of the perhaps more complex cases, there might be prioritisation of those facing medical, or end-of-life, issues. Those sorts of things characterise what comes into my inbox, and I also have people coming up to me in the street to tell me about the challenges that they are facing as a result of this.

Can you tell the committee, and put on record, how you are managing that process? Can people indicate to your agency that they, or their partner, might have cancer, say, and that the situation needs to be dealt with? I can give you a few cases where that has happened. How can those people get a decision more quickly and have some options so that they get what they deserve, and what they are entitled to, at the end of their lives?

I am sure that colleagues will want to pursue some of those issues.

I come to the issue of the return of the ability to make predictions, which I raised with you at your previous evidence session. Dr Pathirana said:

“in the next two years, we will definitely be able to move back to the place that we were in before, where we are able to provide people with statements when they request them.”—[Official Report, Finance and Public Administration Committee, 2 December 2025; c 22.]

That is a huge issue for people across Scotland.

I thank the witnesses for their evidence so far and for coming back to the committee. I will refer to some cases, but that is to illustrate the issues rather than to seek a particular remedy, and they will all be anonymised.

Since your previous appearance, in common with colleagues round the table, I have received a large volume of correspondence, not just from my region but from across the country. Dr Pathirana, you said at the start that you wanted to thank scheme members for their patience. I always think of patience as a choice, and you would have to recognise that those people do not have a choice. What I would recognise is anger. Among some of them, there is resignation, but there is certainly anger. Do you recognise that they do not have a choice and that “patience” is perhaps not the correct word?

They can.

I am sorry, Dr Pathirana, but for these people, it is not separate. It is about how much money they will have when they are in those circumstances. It might be a separate pathway to you and your organisation, but my question to you is whether we are going to get that decision more quickly. I am afraid that it is you who is conflating the different issues in your answer to Oliver Mundell and your answer to my question. What I am asking is this: can somebody in those situations get a quicker decision? It sounds to me that you are saying that they cannot.

Can you set out to MSPs, in writing, the process for accessing that expedited pathway?

That is a fair point. I hear that. However, I want to get your observations on the use of ScotWind generally. It strikes me that this has been quite a useful thing for the Scottish Government, as it essentially means that you have had a second cash reserve. I wonder how replicable some of that is, because it was essentially a windfall payment that created the situation; it was constrained by the politics, in essence. There is always pressure for you to run to the full extent of your actual reserve, whereas, because this second reserve has a different nominal purpose, it allows you to then draw it back and say that there is an imperative to pay it back in.

When we are reflecting on the conduct of the fiscal framework and the ability to do something about it, this has proven to be something that is quite useful for the Scottish Government in managing its finances, has it not?

You mentioned the ScotWind money; £50 million was allocated from ScotWind in 2026-27, so it sounds as though you imagine that that money would then be put back in.

I will stick with health. Last week, the Institute for Fiscal Studies published a report entitled “Public service spending and performance in Scotland”, which pointed out that health spend is 2 per cent higher in Scotland than in England, down from 4 per cent higher in 2019-20 and 11 per cent higher in 2010-11. The spending gap has shrunk since 2010-11 as a result of the decisions that your Government has taken. To me, that goes back to the question of purpose. You are right to highlight that the spending review shows the allocation of the money that is available, which is set out in the broader spending review. However, given that we are seeing outcomes such as a real lack of productivity in our Scottish health service and neighbourhoods in Scotland having lower life expectancy than equivalent areas in England, is there not a lack of purpose in your spending review? What do you want to change? What does the Government want to do and what direction do you think should be taken?