Chamber and committees

If you look in the round at the broader qualifications set, which is not captured by the NIF, you will see a range of other qualifications. I am more than happy to share information on that, because it has been raised with me by School Leaders Scotland and the BOCSH group of headteachers. They pointed to the fact that the Government’s measurements are not telling an accurate story of the totality of our young people’s achievements. It causes me great concern that we are out of sync when gathering data to measure that progress. We cannot have the scenario that you have outlined, because it is not going to help young people with their educational progress.

As we have heard across the piece from my officials and from David Gregory from Education Scotland—who I see is leaning in—a number of the recommendations in the 2022 report were for local government. I observe that local government is not at the table today—that is within the committee’s gift—but we need local government to be part of the answer, which is why the education assurance board is important. Alison Taylor’s points about variance are also really key. There is variance across the country—it is not a flat picture in relation to the numbers that Ms Duncan-Glancy outlined. Some areas are better than others, even when extrapolating with regard to poverty, which causes me concern, so it is really important that there is targeted support.

Dave Gregory’s team is involved at the national level in the targeted support to authorities, particularly on the measurements that Ms Duncan-Glancy spoke about, so I will bring him in to talk about that.

Is the issue the availability of subjects?

Would you like Mr Gregory to come in on that?

We will then have parity across the group.

I am happy to do so.

That is an interesting point that links to Mr Briggs’s comment about health. I think that, when I did my teacher training at Clydebank high school, we had campus cops in 2007. I am trying to remember how they were funded. They were obviously not funded from SAC, but I do not know what the budget line was at the time.

I know that Mr Greer has strong views about headteachers using PEF for campus cops, but some of them will have contrary views and they are empowered to choose to bring in such interventions.

I do not think that we have an explicit measurement in relation to income groupings. I set out some progress in relation to positive destinations, and we have seen progress in our primary schools, but I would like faster progress—it needs to happen at pace. However, we cannot ignore the context that you highlight, Mr Kidd, with regard to the pandemic.

When we talk about the Scottish attainment challenge, we consider school education in Scotland quite narrowly. However, I draw members’ attention to the gaps that are already emerging among our youngest children. There are speech and language delays among zero to two-year-olds in some of our poorest communities. We track that data in terms of educational performance. We know that the outcomes for those young people, who were not necessarily exposed to health visitors during lockdown in the same way that they might have been otherwise, are being impacted as a result, so we need to think again about how we provide them with support to drive progress.

I am sorry—I see that Alison Taylor wants to come in.

Thank you, convener, and happy new year to you and to committee members.

As the First Minister outlined on Monday, this budget is rooted in delivery and hope, and it has been drafted in response to the views of a multitude of stakeholders across Scotland and to those of members from across the chamber.

The education and skills budget is no different. Mr Dey, Ms Don-Innes and I have listened intently to the views and asks of teachers, schools, local authorities, early learning and childcare providers, universities, colleges and the wider skills system. The draft budget for my portfolio for 2025-26 reflects those views and seeks to go some way towards addressing the challenges that we face across the education sector, particularly following the pandemic.

I will begin by setting out the resource and capital position for the portfolio. The education and skills resource budget has increased by £158 million, which is equivalent to a 3 per cent real-terms increase. In addition, overall capital and resource has increased by £116 million. For early years, we continue to invest in a high-quality funded early learning and childcare offer and our wider family support offer. Overall, the Scottish Government will invest more than £1 billion in high-quality funded ELC from next year.

The 2025-26 draft budget also provides an investment of £8 million in our six early adopter communities in Dundee, Inverclyde, Clackmannanshire, Glasgow, Fife and Shetland. The draft budget also includes funding to provide local authorities with an additional £9.7 million from 2025-26 to increase pay for early learning and childcare workers delivering funded childcare, so that they earn at least the real living wage from April, as well as ensuring that children’s social care staff employed in the private, voluntary and independent sector will also receive the real living wage.

The budget invests in our schools, teachers and support staff. It includes £186.5 million for councils to maintain teacher numbers, and it speaks to the asks made by local government as part of the biggest recorded settlement made to local government in Scotland.

The budget includes £29 million of additionality for additional support needs, including funding to support the recruitment and retention of the ASN workforce. I know that that issue is of interest to the committee, so I hope that members will welcome the steps that the Government is taking through this budget to provide more support for ASN.

That funding is part of a wider package and deal agreed with the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities. That deal is predicated on trust and will see the Scottish Government and COSLA working together to restore and maintain teacher numbers at 2023 levels, freeze learning hours and make meaningful progress in reducing teacher class contact time. Importantly, that deal also includes a provision for the creation of an educational assurance board, which will allow local and national Government to collaborate better on educational improvement, noting the legal responsibilities shared by both.

In addition, we continue with our investment of £1 billion in the Scottish attainment challenge over the course of this Parliament to support closing the poverty-related attainment gap, with £130 million in this budget earmarked for the pupil equity fund being allocated directly to head teachers for activities on the ground that will close the poverty-related attainment gap in their schools.

Committee members will note that the most recent statistics, from December, show that we now have the narrowest attainment gap ever recorded between the most and least disadvantaged pupils. That should be welcomed, as should the statistics showing that we have the highest levels of literacy and numeracy since records began.

Lastly, we remain committed to supporting a high-quality post-school education, research and skills system with more than £2 billion of investment in further education, higher education and skills. I am sure that the minister will say more about that. We have listened to the asks of the sector and have responded as best we can and with as much flexibility as possible in the current fiscal circumstances. That has included protecting funding for apprenticeships while, at the same time, increasing our core funding for both higher and further education. We also continue to protect free tuition, which means that, unlike students elsewhere in the UK, Scottish students studying in Scotland do not incur additional debt. We have sought, where possible, to respond to specific asks from the sectors and to provide the flexibility that I mentioned.

Like every cabinet secretary, I have been concerned by the United Kingdom Government’s decision to increase employer national insurance contributions, which will hit ELC providers, colleges and universities hardest within my portfolio. We are also still faced with an incredibly challenging fiscal context. Nonetheless, this is a budget that protects education spending throughout the lifetime of a child’s education.

I will finish there, but I look forward to discussing the budget settlement with the convener and committee members in more detail.

I am sorry, but the latest ACEL data statistics, which were published on 10 December, show that the gap between the proportion of primary pupils from the most and least deprived areas achieving expected levels in literacy has decreased to the lowest level on record. We will have to agree to disagree in that respect.

We are starting to see progress. Undoubtedly, progress has been affected by the pandemic. The schools data that the member cites shows progress on attainment compared with 2019. It is difficult to make comparisons with the exam results in some of the more recent years because of the different arrangements that were in place during the pandemic, but we are starting to see real progress.

The member also spoke about international league tables. It is worth pointing out that there has been an increase in funding in the budget because we are rejoining two of the international league tables that she mentions, which will provide greater clarity. The December 2023 programme for international student assessment—PISA—statistics, show that the post-pandemic picture in Scotland is similar to the position in other countries. Of course, the OECD described that edition of the PISA results as the Covid edition. We really need to be mindful of the impact that the pandemic has had. However, we are starting to see real progress in terms of that narrowing gap, and that is certainly to be welcomed.

I conclude by noting that the ACEL data is predicated on teacher judgment. We all trust Scotland’s teachers to make those judgments, and that is certainly to be welcomed, too.