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Is it not incredible that an authority that abolished poindings and warrant sales should then get a visit from a minister to congratulate it for improving its council tax collection rate?
With all due respect to Danny Kelly, I do not think that the councillors in Helensburgh would fully understand that culture. We have 26 islands in the Lorne, mid-Argyll, Kintyre and Islay area.
Amendment 24, by agreement, withdrawn. Amendments 25 and 26 not moved. Amendment 51, in the name of Maureen Macmillan, is grouped with amendments 52, 1, 53, 2, 3, 27, 4, 54, 81, 82, 13 to 15, 46 and 16.
The committee's—or the Parliament's—legal powers to require witnesses or documents come under sections 23 to 26 of the Scotland Act 1998. The later sections are supplementary.
I do not want to hypothesise that, if the number of people receiving direct payments went up by X we would increase local authorities' funding by Y. We regard it as an area that will grow and in which some transitional costs will have to be met in order to establish the expertise and support networks and to make the services available.
In our written evidence, we suggested that Scotland will have to make a decision about the value of social inclusion and of having community groups do X, Y and Z when that could be done more cheaply by the local authority or a private contractor.
In my short time on the committee, I have voiced my view that we spend a lot of time saying that the pressure in the system is because committee X is driving Y or because the Executive is driving X.