Meeting of the Parliament

Meeting date: Wednesday, February 22, 2017

Official Report 894KB pdf

---

Social Security

The next item of business is a statement by Jeane Freeman on the Scottish Government’s response to responses to its social security consultation. As the minister will take questions at the end of her statement, there should be no interventions or interruptions.

14:42  

Today marks the next important step in the Government’s work to build a new social security system in partnership with the people of Scotland. Today, we have published a comprehensive and independent analysis of the responses to the recent consultation on social security, together with an initial response from the Scottish Government.

I thank all the people and organisations that contributed directly to the consultation and the many more who participated in engagement events across Scotland. Throughout the consultation and since, I have listened to those with direct personal experience of the current benefits system—I have heard their experiences of its impact on them and their families and I have learned a great deal. I assure the Parliament that I will continue to listen to and learn from those who use the benefits system and those who work with them to provide vital support and help.

What has emerged is a rich seam of evidence—a solid foundation on which we can continue to build as we take each step towards having this new public service for our country. What is clear is the widespread support for our intention to build a fairer and more dignified social security system that is based on the understanding that social security is an investment that we make in ourselves and in each other. From the outset, we have said that we will build our social security system in partnership with the people of Scotland and in a fair and more inclusive way, and today I will set out the specific ways in which we will achieve that.

The right to social security is established in article 9 of the United Nations International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. That is our starting point—that social security is a human right. The consultation responses backed our commitment to a rights-based approach, which is a cornerstone of our vision for the new system and on which our core principles of fairness, dignity and respect will be grounded.

I am pleased to announce that the forthcoming social security bill will honour this great Scottish tradition by enshrining those core principles in the new system’s founding legislative framework. That is a clear statement of intent that we will from the outset embed a rights-based approach with dignity and respect in the Scottish system. Putting that in the bill will also provide a legislative mechanism for the people who interact with the new service to know exactly what to expect from application to advice, assessments and any necessary appeals.

We are committed to ensuring that this Government and all future Governments are held to account on delivering for the people of Scotland. We will introduce the bill in Parliament before the end of June, which will start the process of parliamentary scrutiny that will support us to shape, improve and pass the legislation that we need to set up our new social security system. The legislative framework—the bill and the secondary legislation that will flow from it—is the necessary foundation that will underpin our new system. I am sure that the Parliament will want to get that right and that it will take the time that it feels is necessary for scrutiny, evidence taking and reporting.

Respondents overwhelmingly endorsed the concept of a publicly accessible charter to communicate clearly what the public are entitled to expect from the Scottish system and to frame the culture and positive ethos of the new social security agency. I can announce that the requirement to prepare a charter will be in the bill, which will introduce a legislative requirement that reflects the core principles that I outlined and will place on ministers a series of statutory duties to periodically review and report on the delivery of our aim of creating a fairer and more inclusive system.

In that way, we will guarantee that the charter goes much further than being just warm words. It will be a central part of the new system that will in effect create a binding contract between the system and the ministers who are responsible for it and the people who use it. The charter will be refined continually as we learn and grow and will create an additional device for the Parliament and the public to scrutinise ministers and hold them to account for the delivery of a fairer and more inclusive rights-based system.

Scrutiny by the Parliament is a vital component of our democracy, and I believe that our intention to secure a rights-based approach through legislation and in the practical embodiment of the charter are vital. Scotland’s social security system will sit within the overarching social protections that the Parliament is responsible for. However, having learned the lessons from elsewhere, I believe that it is also important to ensure that there is independent scrutiny as we deliver a social security system for Scotland, and I confirm that we will enlist the support of objective experts to advise us on the most appropriate arrangement for the independent scrutiny of our new system’s overall performance.

I intend to further embed a rights-based approach by making good on our commitment that the people of Scotland will be our full design, development and delivery partners. To that end, in the coming weeks, I will make a detailed announcement on the launch of experience panels—an ambitious programme that will see us work in formal partnership with at least 2,000 individuals who have direct experience of the current system to design, build and refine a new and better model. The panels will build on the consultation and use that rich body of evidence while continuing and deepening engagement.

We have learned from what people have told us about how they want to be involved in helping to build a new and better system, and the panels will be involved throughout the design of the new service. I hope that the whole Parliament shares my enthusiasm for that progressive and innovative way of working and that all members will look for ways to support it in principle and in action.

The theme of collaboration with experts and with the public will be a common thread that runs through our entire programme of work, as it has been from the outset. An expert advisory group on disability and carers benefits will provide ministers with independent expert guidance in that crucial policy area, and I am delighted to announce that the group will be chaired by Dr Jim McCormick, who is an associate director of the Joseph Rowntree Foundation. I am sure that everyone in the Parliament will agree that his credentials for the role are impeccable, as they combine exceptional policy expertise with a genuine passion for fairness and equality. I am pleased that we will be able to reap the benefits of his advice and guidance and of the expertise and experience that the group as a whole will bring.

The consultation responses and the experience panels will play a key role in shaping the nature and structure of the new social security agency. We are paying close attention to the findings that face-to-face contact between those who are in receipt of benefits and agency employees is of key importance and that medical assessments are best done by professionals who understand the conditions of the people who they assess. Those examples demonstrate how collaboration and our core principles will meaningfully influence the delivery of services. Later in the spring, I expect to announce a preferred model that will be closely aligned to the views of the people of Scotland.

It is apparent from the consultation that advice and advocacy services will be crucial, and many respondents sensibly predicted an upsurge in demand as we transition to the new system. Many respondents also highlighted the importance of specialist advice for people with particular needs and the necessity for equal access to advice and support.

From the consultation, I know that advice services will play an important role in ensuring that our social security system delivers on its founding principles. That is why we will build on the findings and on our wider review of advice services, and we will work directly with our experience panels to develop the high-quality support that will be necessary.

Although we will do things in a different way, it is crucial that we also do things in a careful way. Our number 1 priority remains the safe and secure transition of 11 benefits for the 1.4 million people who rely on them. Those 11 benefits are worth just over £2.7 billion, which is equivalent to the cost of building two new Forth replacement crossings every year. The scale is such that we must design from scratch new technology that each week will process roughly the same number of payments as the Scottish Government currently makes in an entire year. We must ensure that our system works alongside the United Kingdom system so that no individual in Scotland falls through the gap between the systems or suffers because of the interaction of the two parallel systems. Our ambitions are high, but so are the stakes.

Members will be aware that the Scottish and UK Governments have stated their clear shared commitment to working together to deliver the implementation of the new powers. It is true that we and the UK Government come to the exercise with different ideological and political perspectives, and it was always realistic to expect that we would disagree at times. Our starting point is the Smith agreement, which is backed by the fiscal framework and the enduring settlement, each of which is clear that any additional income that is provided to a person as a result of our exercise of the new powers must not be offset by a reduction elsewhere in the UK benefit system.

There are two current areas of difficulty. We have committed to abolishing the bedroom tax at source and using our new powers over the housing element of universal credit, which might take some individuals’ benefit level over the UK-imposed benefit cap. We are clear that the individual should not be penalised in such a circumstance, and our straightforward, person-centred solution is for the benefit cap calculation not to include that element. So far, we have not been able to secure the UK Government’s agreement that that is how we will proceed.

Further, although the UK Government intends to remove housing benefit from 18 to 21-year-olds, we have committed to retaining it. We believe that there is a technical way in which both Governments can pursue their opposing commitments but, so far, the UK Government has not agreed.

Both areas matter, not only to us, as a Government that seeks to honour the commitments that we have made but, more important, to the many individuals who stand to gain or lose. We will therefore continue to pursue the issues with the UK Government, so that we can exercise our new powers to build a fairer, transparent and person-centred social security system.

There can be little doubt that the system to which we aspire can make an important difference to people’s lives. Only by listening to people who have experienced the benefits system, working with experts and putting in place a legislative framework and a robust infrastructure can we ensure that the new social security system that we are building will embody the modern, inclusive and progressive Scotland that we all wish to see. I am sure that the Parliament supports that important aim.

The minister will now take questions on the issues that were raised in her statement. I will try to get all members in and will allow 20 minutes for questions, after which we will move on to the next item of business.

I welcome the minister’s statement and thank her for early sight of it. I welcome the broad framework that she outlined—in particular, use of a charter to communicate clearly to the public what they are entitled to expect from our social security system. I also welcome what the minister had to say about independent scrutiny and experience panels.

The appointment of Dr Jim McCormick is good news. He will bring a wealth of experience and understanding to his new role, and the Scottish Conservatives wish him and his colleagues every success.

What was remarkable about the minister’s statement, however, was what was not in it. There was nothing about the design of disability benefits. There was nothing about when carers allowance will be raised to the level of jobseekers allowance, which the Scottish Conservatives called for in our manifesto last year. There was nothing about use of the top-up power. There was nothing about substance at all. If the minister wanted to give the impression that she is proceeding as slowly as possible, she succeeded.

I will put two specific questions to the minister. First, she talked about a rights-based approach and said:

“Social security is a human right.”

The right to effective judicial protection is also a human right. Will the rights-based approach that she advocates include the right of claimants to take legal action in the Scottish courts when they consider that their right to be treated with dignity, fairness and respect has not been honoured? Are they to be real rights, with sharp judicial teeth, or are they merely paper rights?

Secondly, the minister said nothing about localised delivery of social security. Will she clarify what she sees as being local authorities’ role in delivery of social security? Is the new agency to be yet another example of Scottish National Party top-down centralisation?

In our manifesto, we noted that integration of health and—

May I stop you there? I have warned members. You have asked your two questions.

I thank Mr Tomkins for his positive comments but—yet again—I am disappointed by the negative ones, because he knows much better than that. If we are serious—I most definitely am—about building and designing the system from the ground up, the point of having 2,000 volunteers on experience panels, the point of having an expert advisory committee and the point of having Dr McCormick chair the committee, is to use people’s information and evidence from the consultation to design the disabilities benefits, to deal with the substance of carers allowance and its criteria, and to deal with many other matters. I am serious about that; it is disappointing that the Conservatives are not.

On Mr Tomkins’s specific questions, this Government has a manifesto commitment, on which we were elected, to work to make human rights real. We will do that across Government, including in my portfolio.

On the involvement of local authorities, it is disappointing that Mr Tomkins did not hear me say that we will shortly announce our model for the social security agency, and it is disappointing that he did not hear me say that we will use evidence from the consultation, the experience panels and everything else that I talked about to guide us on the design of the best possible model.

This is not a centralising Government—[Laughter.] Conservative members may mock, but it was this Government that brought into being the Community Empowerment (Scotland) Act 2015, not the Conservatives in Scotland or their party’s Government in Westminster. Conservative members should not laugh or mock; they should pay attention, open their ears and hear what I am saying.

This will not be a centralising Government—we are not one now and we will not become one. We will work with local authorities and others in the community to ensure that our system is so much better than the one that we inherit from the UK Government.

I thank the minister for the advance copy of her statement. I also thank the organisations that, crucially, contributed to the consultation. It is disappointing, however, that on the day that those organisations have said that they are, having contributed so much, fighting for survival, the minister has said nothing to advance their understanding of how the devolved benefits will support the most vulnerable people in our society.

The minister mentioned two areas of difficulty with the commitments that the Government has made, but I note that those do not cover topping up carers allowance or split payments. Can the minister say when carers can expect to receive the top-up to carers allowance that is worth £600 a year, and when the Government plans to consult on regulations to introduce flexibility in universal credit to allow payments to be made to mothers in order to prevent their potentially being financially dependent on an abusive partner?

I think that Mr Griffin is conflating two issues: he is conflating issues that were raised at the gathering—a major event for our third sector partners—with what I said in my statement and what is in our consultation response.

In response to the issues that were raised by the organisations at the gathering, whose partnership and work we value greatly, I remind Mr Griffin that we have protected the equalities budget, we have introduced three-year funding and we continue to support those organisations. We value the contribution that they have made to our consultation and, indeed, the contribution that they will make to the development of Scotland’s social security system. They, too, will be directly involved in the experience panels, the expert groups and the other groups to which our consultation response refers.

On the two specific issues that Mr Griffin raises, he knows as well as I do our absolute commitment to introducing the increase in carers allowance. That was in our manifesto and we intend to introduce it as quickly as we can. He also knows that we are discussing implementation of that increase with the Department for Work and Pensions and that we are considering a range of options for how we might do that as soon as possible. I hope that he is assured that we will advise the Social Security Committee and Parliament as soon as we can, and I trust that he will take my word for it that we aim to do that as quickly as legislation and other technical matters allow.

It does not help—[Interruption.] Aside from sedentary comments from Conservatives, it does not help constantly to raise the issue in a manner that is designed to upset carers across Scotland and to diminish their confidence unnecessarily. Mr Griffin and his Labour Party colleagues should know much better than to do that. It is a shameful act, so they should be ashamed of themselves.

I have 11 members wanting to ask questions. I will say this more in hope than in expectation. Can I have brief questions and brief answers from the minister, please, so that all members who have taken the trouble to put their names down can be called?

I thank the minister for her statement. Social security is a human right that is based on article 9 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights—it is not something that we have made up.

The minister spoke about engagement. I know that—

I am sorry, Ms White, but I want you to set an example. I need a question, please.

Presiding Officer, I want to speak about the consultation, which set an example. It was a three-month consultation of ordinary citizens and key organisations. Can the minister indicate how the Government will continue to work with those ordinary people, who are on benefits, and with those key organisations, which will deliver what we hope will be a very good social security commitment?

Thank you, Ms White. I am sorry that you got the rough edge there, but I want us to proceed quickly.

I will bear in mind what you have said, Presiding Officer.

There are three specific ways to answer Ms White’s question. The 2,000 volunteers on our experience panels are individuals who have direct personal experience of the benefits system—specifically, the 11 benefits that we will be responsible for. The advisory organisations and groups that I have mentioned, not the least of which is the expert advisory group—we also have a carers group, a group on funeral benefits and groups on many other matters—will directly involve the organisations that represent those individuals. I have also committed to another round of personal meetings—as I did in the consultation exercise—with as many individuals as possible, as well as with the organisations that will facilitate the meetings.

Having listened to the minister’s statement, there is not much that I disagree with on creating a social security system that is based on fairness and inclusivity. However, when it came to the detail on new social welfare powers—namely, the personal independence payment and the disability living allowance—it is fair to say that the statement was fairly unsubstantial—

No. I want to question. I just want a question.

Will the minister indicate when we will hear more about those benefits and what they will look like?

I have already answered that in response to Mr Tomkins’s question, but I say again that how we design and deliver the benefits will be worked through with the experience panels and the expert group. I hope to be able to provide a little bit more information on how that will work when I appear at next week’s Social Security Committee meeting. I will continue to keep Parliament up to date.

I emphasise that I am serious about designing the system with the people of Scotland. I do not intend to do that in a darkened room, at speed, just in order to satisfy the political whims and opportunism of either the Conservative or the Labour Party Opposition.

I am sure that all fair-minded members will welcome today’s statement.

Could the minister—[Interruption.]

Sorry, Ms Maguire, but I cannot hear the question.

Could the minister set out whether analysis of the responses to the social security consultation puts the Scottish Government in a position where it is able to consider progressing the other universal credit flexibilities in the future, namely the use of individual payments—

We do not need examples.

The specific additional flexibility to which the member refers is, of course, the idea of split household payments. That issue was raised with us in the consultation not only by women’s organisations, including Engender, but by a number of organisations representing disabled people. We are considering the technical means by which we might do that in consultation with the DWP—it, too, is looking at a comparable payment—to see how we might be able to offer that flexibility in the current arrangements through the reserved benefit, which is universal credit.

The minister outlined two areas of difficulty in her statement. Will she give us an insight into exactly what the difficulties are? Are they technical or are they political? Why has she not been able to secure an agreement?

The minister will be aware that some claimants will be affected in April 2017. Given that she has chosen to come to the chamber with the information, rather than write to the committee, I think that we are entitled to know how the difficulties can be fixed, whether they are technical or political.

Thank you. You have made your point.

I raised the issue today in the chamber because on Monday, we had a meeting of the joint ministerial working group on welfare and it seemed appropriate to me to raise the two areas of difficulty at the earliest possible opportunity. I will, of course, go into more detail with the committee next week.

On housing benefit for 18 to 21-year-olds, the disagreement is about the technical means by which two Governments achieve their different objectives. We believe that there is a technical solution; the UK Government does not agree with us. We continue to pursue the matter. In fact, officials from both Governments are meeting today to look at whether we can reach agreement on the technical solution. If we cannot, we have proffered an alternative solution to the problem, because we are determined that 18 to 21-year-olds in Scotland will retain the right to housing benefit.

On the benefit cap and the abolition of the bedroom tax, what exactly the difficulty is—it lies with the UK Government—is not clear to us. The Smith commission, the fiscal framework and the enduring settlement were all crystal clear that when an individual receives additional income as a consequence of us exercising our devolved powers, that additional income should not count in the calculation of whether to impose the benefit cap determined by the UK Government. The simple, straightforward, person-centred way of dealing with that is to flag that individual’s case inside the payment system.

The UK Government appears to believe that that is not possible, but it has not yet explained to us why that is the case. Therefore, when we met on Monday we asked for a clear explanation—we have followed up that request in writing—so that we can determine what we might do next. The Parliament should be in no doubt that we are determined on two matters: we will abolish the bedroom tax at source; and we will ensure that not only the spirit, but the letter, of the agreements is honoured and upheld by the UK Government.

Billions of pounds’ worth of benefits go unclaimed every year because the excessively complicated system is, in many cases, simply too difficult to understand. Does the minister think that automatically considering an applicant for everything that they might be eligible for once they approach the system for help would be a way of combating that? How will the minister guarantee that those who require advocacy will receive it and, indeed, that they are even aware of the existence of that important service?

I agree with Ms Johnstone that, in a system that works well, an individual who, for whatever reason, knocks on its door should be counselled and advised on everything else that they might be entitled to. We have some good smaller-scale examples of that across the country, in areas where local authorities operate that practice. It is my intention that that is how our social security agency will work, which is why I have said that I believe it is important to put certain matters on the face of the bill to create the culture and the ethos of how our agency will work. The member is absolutely correct, and we will consider that issue in some detail.

On the question of advocacy, we have recently completed a review of Scottish Government-funded advice and support services across the country as a necessary first step in identifying what we need to do to ensure that comprehensive advice and information services—and, where necessary, advocacy support services—are available for individuals who seek to access their entitlement through our agency. We will take forward that work and will report back to the Social Security Committee and the Parliament in due course as we begin to put the system in place.

The experience panels and the experience of individuals, some of whom will have used advocacy services and some of whom will not have been able to access them, will be important to us as we seek to make sure that we design a comprehensive system.

I think that I will just manage to squeeze in Fulton MacGregor, Dean Lockhart and Alex Cole-Hamilton. I am sorry, but I will not be able to reach the other three members on the list.

How will the minister ensure that benefit claimants with mental health issues will be fully supported?

There are two important points to make. The first relates to the culture of the social security agency and the system that are set up. The second relates to the carrying out of assessments, where assessments are necessary: they must be conducted by people who have professional clinical expertise in the condition from which the individual concerned suffers. I think that that will result in a major step forward from the current experience of people in the UK system.

Our policy is to raise the carers allowance to the level of jobseekers allowance to support more than 60,000 carers in Scotland. We understand that the Scottish Government will follow our lead on that policy.

Question, please.

Can the minister therefore explain why that important change was not mentioned in a statement that was otherwise devoid of any substance?

I think that the member will find that it is mentioned in the consultation response that I referred to, which is being published even as we speak. This Government was elected on a manifesto that included a commitment to raise the carers allowance to the level of jobseekers allowance. I have already covered exactly what we are doing about that and how quickly I intend to pursue all the various options, which I intend to do before—where at all possible—our agency is up and running. I will advise the Social Security Committee of how we are proceeding with that in due course, as soon as I have that answer.

I welcome the remarks that the minister made in response to Ruth Maguire about the splitting of payments to protect families in which abusive relationships occur. What plans does her Government have to use its new powers to create a benefit that might help people with mental health problems to get back into employment?

I am sure that Mr Cole-Hamilton will have read the disability delivery plan, in which we made very clear the specific actions that we are taking, in conjunction with Mr Hepburn as Minister for Employability and Training in relation to employability. Those include actions that relate to the new employability programmes to assist individuals with a range of conditions to access not only employment but the UK access to work fund, which is little used. That route will help individuals secure employment and will help employers. I am happy to discuss that with Mr Cole-Hamilton further. That is the route by which we are undertaking that work.

I apologise to the three members who were not called. For the avoidance of doubt, I called three Government back-bench members and seven from the Opposition. I know that it is disappointing not to be called, but we have overrun.