Chamber and committees

Good morning, everyone. Thank you for coming to do this work. I particularly want to ask for views on the impacts on the social rented sector, which has been mentioned a couple of times.

First, however, I would like to ask about the 1992 starting point in the bill. I think that that mirrors the UK Government’s legislation. Could the panel offer any views about why that should be the starting point for the 30-year timeframe in the bill? Is it fairly arbitrary, or does the problem with cladding materials only involve buildings constructed in the last 30 years? Do we have the intelligence or knowledge to be sure about that? Is it the panel’s view that there should not be an arbitrary starting point—for example, 1992—within legislation that applies in the UK?

Hi folks. I am the member of the Scottish Parliament for Kilmarnock and Irvine Valley.

I would like to hear from the builders around the table, but can I ask the question in another way? Supposing some of your stock had the same cladding on it that Grenfell had, are you telling me that you would still need to clarify the processes and so on to act immediately to remove that? Surely not. Surely, if you know that the material on any of your buildings is risky and should be removed, you can act without demanding further clarity. I have to say to you that constituents talk to me about this. It sounds as though we are hiding behind process issues rather than taking on board the action that needs to be taken when we know that it needs to be taken in many cases. Is that a fair or unfair assessment?

Okay. If that £244 million is the final outturn position, does it carry forward into next year’s budget, or do you lose it? That is what the public usually want to know.

I have a couple of questions about the consolidated accounts. First, on underspends and borrowing, you talked in your opening remarks, permanent secretary, about the current outturn position on underspend. When we got the Auditor General’s report, that was about £500 million, but I think that you mentioned that it was £244 million. Will you give us a brief explanation of how and why that has changed?

It is within the tolerance of what would be expected.

Thank you very much for that.

Permanent secretary, you wrote to the committee in order to talk to it about the whole-Government accounts and the big picture. The committee has always been interested in getting as broad and as wide a view as it can of every penny that the Government and its agencies spend. In your opening remarks, you told us a little bit about the progress that you have been making. You described phase 1 and phase 2. In phase 1, you have managed, as I understand it, to include spending from other bodies, including non-ministerial bodies and bodies that are funded from the budget. It is really welcome that we can see that.

I want to focus your attention on phase 2. You said in your letter that, because of our reliance on the UK Government’s whole-Government accounts picture, you have not made the progress that you wanted to make. You also said that you are in discussion with Audit Scotland about how to improve that situation in phase 2. I know that this is a very dry subject, but will you give the committee a flavour of what the problem is with our reliance on the UK Government’s whole-Government accounts and a little flavour of what you are trying to do to help us along that road?

Okay. That sounds very encouraging. I will leave it at that, convener.

Thanks for that, convener. Oracle is well established and trustworthy. I am just glad that the system is not called Horizon and it is not riddled with bugs that will end up putting people in jail. I think that it is important to put that on the record. It is very respected software and I look forward to seeing the developments with it.

Permanent secretary, I cannot let the opportunity pass to ask about Prestwick airport, which was mentioned earlier. As an Ayrshire MSP, I listened very carefully to what you and Mr Irwin said on the subject and I am assured that you are taking into account all the factors that are important for us, particularly in Ayrshire, in supporting the airport. The Government was right to step in in 2013 to save the airport and save thousands of jobs, which has kept the aerospace industry clearly established in that part of Scotland. It is a major strategic industry for Scotland as a whole.

One plea that I have is that, if we ever proceed to thinking about selling the airport, we ensure that all that activity is protected and retained, but also that we try to encourage further development of the passenger traffic at Prestwick. Many people in my part of the world—in Ayrshire—feel compelled to travel to Glasgow, Edinburgh or further afield when they would really prefer to use Prestwick if they are fortunate enough to fly off to places during the summer or whenever. The plea from my constituents and, I am sure, my Ayrshire colleagues is for that to be part of any deal.

The final area that we hoped to cover is general performance reporting. The Auditor General made some significant comments on that. In your opening remarks, you mentioned that performance reporting has to be part of mission-led Government that transforms services. However, the Auditor General said that the Government’s approach to public performance reporting needs to improve, and he mentioned a load of indicators in that regard. Will you give us a flavour, finally, of how that is improving? What will the value of the performance reporting framework look like to the public? How will the public be able to see improvements in performance right across the public sector?