Chamber and committees

Okay. Let us leave that question there.

It was interesting to hear you agree with the Conservative member of the committee earlier about the impact of the budget on poverty and inequality. You must surely be aware that the Scottish Government spends £594 million on mitigating the effects of cuts that have been imposed by the United Kingdom Government. Among the standout items in that sum are discretionary housing payments, on which £83 million is still spent by the Scottish Government to make up for cuts by the UK Government. Do you recognise that that continuing investment by the Scottish Government makes a significant impact in reducing poverty and inequality in Scotland?

I am talking about quite a substantial cherry to pick. That is £594 million that would otherwise not be spent. Some of that money is targeted towards the poorest and most vulnerable people in Scotland. Does Unison not recognise that continuing to do that is a worthwhile investment by the Scottish Government to try to alleviate the worst impacts that have been brought about by decisions taken by the UK Government?

Good morning to both cabinet secretaries. The COSLA spokesperson who we heard from earlier was gracious enough to acknowledge that the overall settlement is £12.5 billion, which is a real-terms increase of £600 million and the equivalent of a 5 per cent increase. There has been a lot of debate on that during this session.

My first question is for Kate Forbes and is on the methodology. That was discussed earlier, so I hope that she does not mind. My good friend and colleague Miles Briggs said that Edinburgh is hard done by through the settlement, but Edinburgh is getting more of a percentage uplift than, for example, East Ayrshire, Inverclyde, Glasgow and Dundee. Is population one of the factors in the methodology, so that if an authority loses substantial numbers of its population, its overall allocation diminishes? Do you recognise that such local authorities still have to deliver by and large the same level of service to a diminishing level of population, and it is very difficult for them to do that? Will you consider that issue in any further review of the model for awarding cash to local government?

Okay. Thank you.

I would like to ask the question that I tried to ask the Unison representative earlier, on the total settlement. I think that Councillor Macgregor would be the best person to answer.

Do you recognise the independent figures from SPICe that we have in our papers, which show that the settlement is increasing to £12.5 billion, which represents a real-terms increase of £603 million, or 5.1 per cent? We can argue about whether it is enough, whether we could do more or whether more is needed, but do you at least recognise those independent figures as being accurate?

It is worth making the point, so that we can have that discussion. By any stretch of the imagination, if some authorities are getting a bigger settlement than authorities such as East Ayrshire, Inverclyde, Dundee and Glasgow, where poverty and inequality are probably much higher than in those other authorities, that surely has to call into question whether the modelling is weighted correctly or appropriately for the circumstances.

I will leave that question for a future discussion and will move on to my second question, which is also for Kate Forbes. In the previous evidence session, the representative of Unison said that the budget does nothing to tackle inequalities in Scotland. Can you give a direct response to that and outline for the committee how the budget tackles poverty and inequality?

Thank you for your fair response to the overall figures in the settlement, which are in black and white and have been independently produced by SPICe. I appreciate your response.

On ring fencing and so on, Johanna Baxter said that 80 per cent of North Ayrshire Council’s budget is controlled by the Scottish Government, but our papers say that the Scottish Government has said that 92 per cent of funding to local government is controlled by local councils. There is a huge difference there, and the truth probably lies in between.

There are shared priorities all over the place, as you said yourself. Is it not a little unfair of some representatives to say that it is all Scottish Government diktat, when—at the end of the day—it is mostly about shared priorities?

I have a couple of questions that deal with broader antisocial behaviour issues. We have heard evidence that we already have powers to deal with antisocial behaviour. However, we also heard from a City of Edinburgh Council official that existing powers for dealing with antisocial behaviour do not really fit the short-term lets sector, as those are more about dealing with long-term behaviours. There is a balance of views on the issue, cabinet secretary. What is your view? Why do you think that a licensing scheme would offer us a better solution than a registration scheme?

Could you or your legal colleague clarify a matter for me, should the scheme comes into use? If a person is refused a licence or loses their licence, would it be a criminal offence for them to continue to operate a short-term let? I know of some cases in which complaints were made to City of Edinburgh Council about antisocial behaviour but nothing prevented the operator from continuing to operate under those circumstances. Is there a legal advantage to the licensing scheme that would assist us if such problems arose?

The evidence that we heard from Police Scotland was pretty compelling. Members would do well to listen to that advice and also to what we heard last week from councils. We must be able to deal effectively with some of the issues that are impacting local people. There should be no fear whatsoever from operators about complying with a licensing scheme.

The scheme will also help us to establish, drive up and maintain standards across the sector so that responsible operators are not disadvantaged by those who might prefer to operate in the absence of regulation. I support the proposal.