Seòmar agus comataidhean

I thank the witnesses for attending today. You have mentioned this already, but I want to dig a wee bit deeper into your expedite service. I note for the record that the success rate for approvals for the service was, in 2020-21, 52 per cent and, in 2021-22, 49 per cent, with a jump in 2022-23 to 77 per cent, which is obviously good. I want to explore the reasons for that jump. Was it the result of more purchasing power—or, if you like, volume throughput? It would also be useful to understand whether you have changed the criteria for expediting cases.

It is interesting to hear that you exercise judgment in those cases. A couple of the examples that you give do not appear to fit into the three criteria that you set out—I am not having a pop; you are clearly exercising judgment. Is it fair to say that, at this point, the criteria for expedition are still developing as you get more data on and understanding of particular issues?

Do you have any data that will allow you to say whether the expedition process being more fully realised will eventually feed into your ability to start to target the backlog? You have mentioned that some are historical cases that people are saying you need to crack on with. Have you explored that link?

You will have seen the letter from Mr Keith Robertson, which I will have to refer to, as he refers to me and the question that I asked last time. I will just put it on the record. I said:

“For the record, then, you are saying that if solicitors who lodged cases in 2017 come to you with a request to expedite, because of the time that they have already taken, you will agree to that.”—[Official Report, Economy and Fair Work Committee, 7 September 2022; c 18.]

The answer that you gave to that was, “Yes—100 per cent.” However, Mr Robertson asserts:

“This is quite simply untrue. Length of time since submission is not and never has been accepted by RoS as grounds for expedition.”

Can you clear that up? Is he correct or incorrect? What exactly is the position?

I suppose, though, that that takes you into delay territory. I am thinking about an example in which there has been a delay because there has been a change of circumstances with a solicitor or a client. Will a client always be able to draw on the necessary data required to meet your criteria to have the case expedited after that length of delay? I am thinking of an example from 2017.

You lead me on to a wider point, which is that it is difficult for ordinary members of the public to understand the complexity of the fiscal framework and its implications. I appreciate that most members of the public find it hard to understand that there is a direct impact on tax take by limiting the Scottish Government’s borrowing powers to pay for capex projects.

Perhaps a wider area is that people understand that limits on immigration mean that fewer people are paying tax. Are you considering how we make it clear to people that although we agree that there is an issue with the breadth of our tax base—everybody agrees with that—there are standard levers that you might want to pull to increase it? It is probably not mentioned in the report, but can you see that a differentiated immigration policy, fundamentally to increase the tax base, should be part of your discussions with the UK Government?

You will be aware that the committee is looking at public sector review, spending and so on, in the light of rolling back from the resource spending review. I note your three key missions, part of which will involve looking at public bodies and public sector reform. To what extent are you open to thinking ambitiously about that?

Part of my private worry is that agencies may look simply at efficiencies—although I suspect that a lot of them have been doing that for years, due to public sector constraints. We had an interesting comment that perhaps the bolder and more ambitious projects would need to be mandated by the Government. My simple question is, are you going to be able to have a level of ambition in what you look at? I appreciate that such projects have a cost in themselves and are very complex and time consuming. I do not negate that. I want to get a sense of whether it is about more than efficiencies.

Good morning, cabinet secretary. Thank you for joining us. One of the things that the committee discussed with the Scottish Fiscal Commission at last week’s meeting was the 14 per cent cut in capital expenditure from 2023-24 to 2028-29. I asked the SFC for clarification on the possible implications of that in relation to limiting our ability to invest. Traditionally, economists say that you should invest when your economy is not doing so well. The clear point that emerged was that capital expenditure has a direct impact on productivity. We know that there is a massive issue with productivity in the UK and, because of those limitations, there is an issue with productivity in Scotland. Have you been able to model that diminution of productivity? It does not seem to be understood that lower productivity leads to a lower tax take and that a lower tax take leads to less money being available to spend for public services. I do not know whether, behind the scenes, you or some of your officials are able to model that, because a 14 per cent cut in real terms will have a direct flow-through to the tax take available to spend on vital public services.

Thanks for that clarification. Given the autonomy of all the different boards, the Centre for Sustainable Delivery was designed to stop NHS boards working as autonomous units. Is it your experience that it does that?

Yes.