Chamber and committees

Good morning. My questions are about lived experience and participation. Can you say a wee bit more about how the lived experience hub supports people with direct experience? Does the hub help to assess those people’s progress and whether they are reporting greater choice and so on?

I am particularly interested in the forensic patients aspect. How are you hoping to get the Government involved in engaging with them?

Have you any plans to speed up that process?

My question is roughly in the same area, and it is a general one, but I will try to direct it to one person.

Naturally, I guess, the conversation so far has been pretty negative, but we should say that there is, I think, general consensus that we need some sort of reorganisation of public services and local government. I, too, have concerns about the reform agenda, but we must remember that the public perception might be different from the perception of those of us who are more involved, such as everyone who is round the table today. I say that because I have been quite surprised by the public reaction to the proposals. There is quite a lot of hope that things can be made better. That is coming from many of the constituents who I speak to, including a lot of local council workers. We need to be open to the huge possibilities.

How much of an influence will current councils have in the process? I pick up the feeling that they do not think that they will have much influence and that the path is already set. However, that is balanced out by the Government saying that it is open to discussions and wants to hear from everybody. I hope that councils will have a big say in how the process moves forward. I really hope that there will be an opportunity for my council, North Lanarkshire Council, to get involved in the process. Councils know our communities best. Do they feel that they will be involved in the process? How can we make that change?

To make things easier, I direct that question to Pippa Milne.

I declare an interest: I am registered with the Scottish Social Services Council.

I want to clarify that I think that the Scottish Government is talking a lot about child poverty; my point was more about the paternity leave aspect, and I apologise if I did not explain that properly. I think that we could do more. I remember visiting Aviva, which is based in, I think, Bishopbriggs. I visited with Rona Mackay, who was the MSP for the area at the time. Aviva has a great paternity leave policy of up to a year, so some businesses can obviously provide better paternity leave, despite the Government’s policy. I wonder whether we can do more on that, but I also take the minister’s point that it is not just on the Government but is for all of us to take that forward.

On public service reform, you have addressed most of the issues, cabinet secretary, but I want to go over this point again. Public service reform gives us a really good opportunity, but I share other members’ concerns, which Carol Mochan put well, that cuts or job losses—or whatever words we want to use—could disproportionately impact women and therefore children, and the Government has a target to eradicate child poverty. I know that you have touched on that and, to an extent, I am asking you to repeat yourself, but what safeguards is the Government putting in place ahead of the reform agenda to ensure that that will not be the case and to alleviate members’ fears and concerns?

I have a supplementary question on the point that Collette Stevenson made, and which the convener backed up, about council tax debt. Last week, we heard strong evidence about the impact of that, including how it

is a burden that mainly falls on women. The convener has already said that it would be good if that could be included in discussions about reform.

However, I also want to know—from the cabinet secretary or the minister—whether there have been any early talks about that and whether the Government has thoughts on that. A lot of the time, we talk about the issues around public service reform, but everybody knows that there are also opportunities. Is the Government talking about it as an opportunity to change the way that things are done in order to benefit people—mainly women—who have council tax debt?

Assuming that council tax remains as it is—which is a whole other debate that we will not get into just now—has the Government decided where responsibility for council tax will sit? Will it be with the regional authorities, or will it be a bit more local, or would it even go to the Scottish Government? Am I too early in asking that question?

I was going to come back in on childcare, but Holly Bruce and Meghan Gallagher have given that a good go. I have a couple of other questions that are not necessarily linked.

Minister, during the round-table meetings that we held before this evidence session, the committee heard about paternity leave and the impact that it has in other countries by lessening the burden on women. In the UK as a whole, we have a really bad paternity leave offer. It is a reserved matter, but, first, are you or any of your colleagues discussing that with UK Government colleagues in relation to tackling women’s and children’s poverty? Aside from conversations with the UK Government, is the Scottish Government doing anything on that now? In the 2016-21 session, I and others did a bit of work on the issue, and, although we did not have powers in that area, the Scottish Government was making a lot of the right noises. However, recently, we do not seem to be saying a lot about it, and I am not sure why. Does the Government talk about it, and, if so, what are those discussions and are there any plans afoot?

Thanks.