Chamber and committees

Yes. I am good with that—thank you. When I join the meeting online, I sometimes miss a few things.

When discussing theme 1, the minister talked about uprating the £50 payment. Is there any planned framework for that or—[Inaudible.]—winter heating payments? The minister talked about that when Mr Balfour asked his question. Is there any plan to uprate that payment?

I will wait for the budget report.

Yesterday, the BBC reported a slowdown in recruitment in the games sector in Scotland as it responds to the cost of living crisis and economic uncertainty. Given Scotland’s historic place in the industry, has the minister had discussions with the sector about the support that it needs to continue growing and realise its full economic potential?

I pay tribute to the committee members and staff for their work in producing the report, which covers a very wide range of issues across Scottish society, under the umbrella of health inequalities. I also thank the witnesses who gave evidence to the committee, to allow it to develop the report on such an important subject.

I will focus my attention on the very welcome recommendation from the committee to treat the elimination of poverty as a public health measure. As a member of the Social Justice and Social Security Committee, I am grateful that the health committee considered our recent reports as part of its report. The report introduces itself with a history of the failed actions to reduce health inequalities in Scotland.

I am glad that the committee clearly lays out the gravity of the health inequalities that are faced in Scotland, because we do not do ourselves any favours by sugar-coating the situation. As Scottish parliamentarians, it is incumbent on all of us to find a way to tackle the distinct problem that we face.

To that end, as a co-convener of the cross-party group on improving Scotland’s health, I am grateful to colleagues from the CPGs on diabetes, heart and circulatory diseases, lung health and stroke for agreeing to participate in a joint inquiry into non-communicable diseases.

I am also grateful to the British Heart Foundation for supporting that work. Although NCDs are only one aspect of the health inequalities in Scotland, I am hopeful that by pooling the resources of our CPGs, we will be able to come up with recommendations to help the situation.

These inequalities are close to home. In 2018, a report found that a boy born that year in Muirhouse or West Pilton had a life expectancy that was 13 years shorter than that of a boy born in neighbouring Cramond. That is shocking, and it was so before Covid-19, which the committee’s report tells us has made health inequalities considerably worse across the board.

The most recent report from the National Records of Scotland shows that in the past 10 years, improvements in life expectancy have stalled and, most recently, have started to reverse. That reverse is put down to Covid, but the stall was not. Decreases in deaths from heart disease have slowed; deaths from drugs have risen. It is important for us all to find ways to halt and reverse those trends and to improve life expectancy in Scotland. Perhaps greater use of organisations such as the fantastic Pilton Community Health Project, which is a community wellbeing programme in north Edinburgh, can bring to bear local expertise where it might help.

The committee makes clear that, sadly, there is no magic bullet to fix those issues. It will take systemic change across a variety of systems. For example, the report highlights the way that systemic racism creates poverty, and we know that poverty leads to poorer lifelong outcomes.

In 2020, Hannah Lawrence produced a comprehensive report for Edinburgh & Lothians Regional Equality Council—ELREC—which detailed the barriers of poverty and inequality for ethnic minorities in Scotland. I draw members’ attention to my entry in the register of members’ interests—I am co-chair of ELREC.

Ethnic minorities in Scotland often face multiple overlapping disadvantages that cannot be fixed by any single initiative. As I said earlier, it is incumbent on us all to work towards fixing those problems. I thank the committee for guiding us in that work.

National Records of Scotland recently released statistics that showed that 250 homeless individuals died in Scotland last year. Ahead of the Scottish budget on Thursday, what assessment has the Scottish Government made of the impact of on-going cuts to councils’ budgets on their ability to provide services that aim to alleviate those tragedies?

To ask the Scottish Government, after Scotland experienced its coldest night of the year with temperatures as low as minus 15.6°C, what action it is taking to ensure that homeless individuals have access to safe, warm housing during this winter period. (S6T-01046)

The Scottish Government’s response to the Covid-19 pandemic included accommodating in hotels and other single-room accommodation people who had been sleeping rough. Under its “Ending Homelessness Together” action plan, will the Scottish Government make similar provision for weather crises such as cold spells, and prioritise the transition to settled accommodation after such crises?

The First Minister will be aware of the tragic death of Awaab Ishak in Rochdale due to mouldy housing. Currently, I have constituents contacting me with concerns about issues with mould in substandard temporary housing that could cause a similar threat to human life, with small children being particularly at risk. The issue seems alarmingly common across local authority boundaries in a variety of housing stock. What is the Scottish Government doing to ensure that similar tragedies do not happen in Scotland?

That is a debate for another day, but, in my view, we need to treat everyone equally.

Rachael Hamilton highlighted some of the human rights abuses around the world, but when even the British Government starts ignoring international law that it does not like and it starts tinkering with treaties and saying that some rights are more universal than others, what example does that set? The Tories are eroding our ability to be taken seriously.

I turn back to the motion. Scottish Labour agrees with its points about the rights in the Human Rights Act 1998 and the Scotland Act 1998. As my colleagues have noted, those are good pieces of Labour legislation. However, we encourage the Scottish Government to bring back to Parliament the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (Incorporation) (Scotland) Bill, so that those rights can be enshrined in Scottish legislation as well.

My colleague—