Chamber and committees

That is not a term that I have ever used or one that I have heard since I came into the job in March. I have heard it spoken about, but not by people who manage the sites.

There is a lot of positivity. There are challenges, but there are also many opportunities. It is about how we use those opportunities to give people a sense of their place in their own communities and to put Scotland on the international stage.

In my opening remarks, I mentioned how Scotland is viewed. Everybody knows Edinburgh castle, Stirling castle and the Wallace monument—the iconic places—but some people do not know what is on their own doorstep. Working with local people is important for that.

I do not hear that there should be managed decline. The attitude is very positive, and there are opportunities to raise awareness of what is happening on all the sites and to use them as exemplars.

Tantallon castle is a tangible example of that. When I was there, we talked about repairs that had been done in the past and the methods that were used to make those repairs, which involved quite a rough-looking cement. The sandstone around the cement had degraded and worn away, and big chunks of cement were sticking out. That was being looked at. That did not seem to me to be managed decline; it seemed to be about securing the site for the future and using it to the best of our abilities.

The engagement of a data analyst on 13 November is the answer to your question. There was recognition that there is lots of data, but there are issues about how it ties together and can be used to focus resources, time and energy, or to show that there is a gap that needs to be filled. HES will monitor that and report to the Government and to the committee: you have the role of being a monitoring body, and you do it very well.

Another issue is who is included and how we create inclusive environments. One aspect of that is about making physical assets accessible. You will have noticed that all the websites and all the plans and updates that we have published are available in easy read, Gaelic and other formats in order to increase inclusion. That is perhaps where some of the data gaps exist, in as much as it is easy to see a physical barrier, but it is not easy to see the non-physical barriers and to know how to tackle them.

I put a lot of stock in the new person who is doing the data analysis. When I was equalities minister, I would have been unable to move forward with many actions that I took without underpinning data and knowing what it told us about where the gaps were and how to resolve them. I look forward to hearing the first update from that person, but we should let him get his feet under the table, as he has only been there a few weeks.

I can come in on that particular point.

You heard Ms Haughey say in her opening remarks that there are two areas of the bill that we are currently working with. We absolutely welcome the intention. I think that we are all on the same page in that we want to make life better.

There is already a bit of a cluttered landscape when it comes to other pieces of legislation. We have the Education (Additional Support for Learning) (Scotland) Act 2004 and the Social Care (Self-directed Support) (Scotland) Act 2013 as well as the refreshed GIRFEC. We have a bit of a cluttered landscape. The bill has allowed us to step back, look at that landscape and see the areas where we need to do some work to pull everything together into one tangible process. I think that a plan would be too siloed, if I can use that term.

We were already working on two areas of the bill that we picked up on. We can see the merit of all that, but the landscape is a bit cluttered, and we need to tidy it up.

That point is spot on. We know of a lot of things that are available across the whole of Scotland, but we will always talk to somebody who will say, “I didn’t know about that.” The pathfinder work that we are doing, and the work that we and this committee—and, indeed, the bill—are doing to raise awareness, is really important in all this.

Your own work in that regard is also important, because you have just raised the issue of independent living fund grants on the public record, so a lot of folk will now realise that those are available. There is obviously a role for Government as well in ensuring that people know that the fund is available and what types of things they can use it for, which can be diverse and exciting. That can add extra diversity to someone’s life, which may have previously been more prescripted because of their disability. It can give them a bit of freedom.

I will take that point away and have a look at how we can incorporate raising awareness of funds and other such support as part of the next steps.

I have a quick update on the work around the Equality Act 2010, which presents nine protected characteristics. I work closely on the intersections of all those characteristics, because people generally have not one defined characteristic but a collection of them. It is about where those characteristics intersect and where we find the deepest inequalities. That is one aspect of the act’s provisions that we are considering as we move the work forward.

One of the issues that we are tackling is that the definition of disabilities in the 2010 act is pretty wide, and it is pretty wide in the transitions bill as well. Some people will be happy to self-identify in the characteristic that they have, but others will not—young people sometimes do not want to do that. Pam Duncan-Glancy has a bit of work to do in the bill to define a bit more closely who would be accessing the plans, services and so on.

You will know from your professional background, Ms Stewart, that teachers generally do not wait for a diagnosis or a self-declaration to understand that a young person is struggling and therefore to put support measures in place—that excellent work is already going on in schools—but we need to ensure that there is a better definition that is understandable to all professionals.

It comes back to the point that I made to Ross Greer earlier about how important the plan is. It can be used across multiple sectors, and the young person is then supported through their whole journey instead of just through one part of it.

The definition of disabilities in the Equality Act 2010 is pretty wide.

Yes. We have seen the issue of a professional in one local authority saying, “Well, I’ve got this”, and another in another local authority or in an organisation saying, “Well, I’ve got something different.” It was really important to fund the development work so that the passport could go on to the resources hub because that standardises it, in a way; in particular, it makes it available to all professionals in educational settings, so that it can address some of those needs.

That is obviously a key aspect, including in further and higher education. The Scottish Funding Council, in particular, has developed a national equality outcomes framework to address some of the most persistent inequalities, especially in further and higher education institutions. Those institutions were asked to consider and report on that as part of the 2021 to 2025 public sector equality duty reporting cycle; we have asked them to do that piece of work and come back to us.

Disability is a protected characteristic, so whatever organisation or public authority someone is liaising or working with, it should be ensuring that that work is being done. The protected characteristics duty should always be included in that work, so that, rather than it being a tick-box exercise at the end of a process, it is an intrinsic part of the process. That is where the national equality outcomes come into play, particularly around disabled students.

Institutions need to give us some indication of both intention and success in terms of how they are improving mental health outcomes and general conditions, as well as other aspects. That is one key area for a young person transitioning into the adult world, whether into further or higher education, where there is a specific duty in place and a reporting cycle on which institutions have to report back to us. We use all of that data to look at where the key inequalities are in order to tackle those directly.

We would be happy to look at that.

One of the things that we are often accused of in Government is sitting in our silos and not working across Government when it comes to issues such as the one that we are discussing. One of the great benefits of the role that I have is that I get to work across the whole of Government. It makes sense to address transitions in a joint approach, because the bill is not the only piece of work that is going on to support people with disabilities.

We have an on-going refresh of our work on a fairer Scotland for disabled people, as well as the proposals to incorporate the UNCRPD into Scots law. There are a number of areas of work, including the review of the public sector equality duty, which places specific duties on local authorities and other public authorities to ensure that people’s rights are respected. There are other key pieces of work alongside the work on transitions to underpin the rights when it comes to good transition. That is why it is important that both of us are with you today.

Again, that is a difficult, although very relevant, point. That is where some of the partnership work with those organisations is key. Some young people disappear off into their lives and do not want to be tracked or monitored. When we work closely with those organisations, we are able to do some monitoring and ensure that the young person is getting the opportunities that they want to access, but within a protective environment.

Out in the world of employment, there is great support available, but it is difficult to track. If a young person is being supported by their trade union, for instance, or by a trade union learning programme or another agency that provides support, it is really difficult to track their progress. Some of them do not want to come back to tell us, either. It is about the element of choice and getting the balance right between having the information and data that we need in order to do that monitoring and not overly intruding in somebody’s life as they move into the big world.