Chamber and committees

I did not know that minutes had not been produced.

I do not think that we are planning further consultation, but, once the legislation is passed in the UK Parliament, we definitely need to pause and reflect on whether we will pursue the process with statutory underpinning or continue with our voluntary process as envisaged.

The fair work in social care approach was specifically brought in for Scotland, and, when we consulted the fair work group, it clearly liked the work that has been done so far. We will need to pause and reflect. I do not think that we need to consult too much more, and we have the mechanisms in place to ensure that we hear from the sector.

The UK Employment Rights Bill, as it is amended at the moment, includes provisions to establish a social care negotiating body, but we do not have to do that. We can choose not to implement that part of the legislation in Scotland, but we might find that it is more effective.

Yes. As we have illustrated with our answers, things are not quite agreed, although we are very close to agreement. I absolutely understand the frustration of people working in the sector that their terms, conditions and pay are not improving fast enough. That is the concern that was outlined to the committee last week. I agree—I would like to go further and faster. A number of limits are in place. We have just about managed to work out a mechanism that can help us to navigate what is a complex landscape. The other challenge will be finding the money, but we are keen to do that. We are committed and we have a track record.

You are absolutely correct that employment law is reserved. The bill is required to devolve some power to the Scottish ministers to make changes. We saw the bill coming on the horizon and recognised the opportunity to underpin much of the work that we have done on sectoral bargaining by seeking to extend the bill’s scope to Scotland.

When the bill was introduced, it was intended to be for England only. Scotland and Wales in particular were pretty keen for its scope to be extended. That will give us the option to regulate for negotiated fair pay agreements for the sector as an alternative to the voluntary process, which we think will be useful.

On your point about the reserved nature of employment law, the Scottish Government, much of civic Scotland and trade unions are all keen for employment law to be devolved. Under the mechanism that is in the bill, there is an issue that, despite the area being devolved, UK ministers will still have to consent. It is fair to say that we would have preferred not to have that. At the moment, relations are very positive with the UK Government, but there have been times in the recent past when we have had very different views on how we should proceed. Having to ask the UK Government for permission to implement fair work is not my choice.

We have negotiated a change to that. The arrangements were introduced in that way for England, but we and Wales are both keen on including children’s social care staff, and that will be the position in Scotland.

We can probably furnish you with some costs. I have spoken before about the on-going costs of the increase in employer national insurance contributions, which we think will cost social care in Scotland between £84 million and £100 million a year, every year, from now on. We are trying to regularly update people and help them to understand the situation, because some of the figures are enormous. We will gather some costings together and provide them to the committee.

There is a great deal of on-going work on fair work in the social care sector. We have overseen a significant increase in investment in social care, and specific workstreams of activity are well under way to progress actions to improve fair work in the adult social care sector. The workstreams are being taken forward in partnership with key stakeholders through the fair work in social care group.

Workstream 1 has enabled a minimum rate of pay of at least the real living wage for workers who are delivering direct care and commissioned social care services, as well as enabling annual uplifts to be delivered quickly into workers’ salaries.

Workstream 2 has developed a framework of proposed minimum terms and conditions, reflecting fair work principles and initial priority areas to be progressed. Due to budget constraints, we are currently unable to implement those proposed minimum standards.

Workstream 3 has developed an effective voice framework. The first phase of that delivery programme has been rolled out through a volunteer cohort of organisations from across the sector in Scotland. That will undergo a comprehensive evaluation before progressing to national deployment.

Through workstream 4, progress has been made on voluntary sectoral bargaining with key stakeholders. That work is complex, as there are more than 1,000 employers in the social care sector. Once developed and introduced, it will help to underpin improvements in pay and terms and conditions across the social care workforce.

Over the years, our track record in delivering at least the real living wage to people who are employed in social care has been strong. That has been possible to deliver because we have put in extra money. That policy of investing sufficient funding to ensure that everyone is paid at least the real living wage now costs between £900 million and £1 billion.

The workforce tells us that, if we were to bring in improvements on terms and conditions, its priorities would be maternity and paternity pay, as well as sickness pay. Yes—we would have to invest extra money to ensure that those changes were delivered into the system.

Absolutely. Unions are brilliant at providing professional leadership. We have a professional workforce in social care in Scotland, which is a slightly different approach from that in the rest of the UK. The situation in the rest of the UK has led to some of the narrative over the past few weeks around immigration. Keir Starmer talked about the social care workforce being low skilled, which I absolutely rail against.

Our workforce in Scotland is professional. Staff are regulated by and registered with the Scottish Social Services Council and are either qualified or working towards qualifications. A great deal of support is available to maintain the level of skill and increase pathways to progress in our social care sector. The situation is significantly different in England, which has perhaps led to some of the misunderstanding over the past few weeks.

As I have said clearly in the chamber, the announcement on immigration is potentially catastrophic for particular geographies, including Scotland’s rural areas, such as the ones that you and I represent. It is a result of a fundamental misunderstanding of the different approach to social care in Scotland.

The Scottish Government welcomes the introduction of the bill. I am positive about the part that we are discussing today in particular, which is a real step forward. We need to spend time working with the sector to bottom out whether people in Scotland would prefer the arrangement to be voluntary or to have a statutory underpinning. However, I am absolutely delighted that the legislative consent motion will give us both options—it does not mean that we will have to introduce one option over the other. We have done a great deal of work towards the voluntary arrangement—as I said, we are nearly there—and I do not want to lose the progress that we have made, but I absolutely want to have both options, and that is why I am recommending approval.