Seòmar agus comataidhean

Thank you for expressing your willingness to come back to us. I appreciate that and I know that others on the committee would appreciate regular engagement with you.

Following on from Fiona Hyslop and Colin Beattie’s points earlier, I appreciate that it is early days but I am interested in exploring the challenges that you face in meeting the strategic objectives. There will be a limit to the life of some of those projects, and challenges in relation to them. What do you need to overcome those challenges?

My next question is linked to that, although it deals with a slightly separate matter. Given the overarching purpose of the bank and its strategic objectives, it is clear that good examples of sustainable development are offered by the bank, but those projects—some more notably than others—could have negative social and/or environmental consequences. In your longer-term thinking about the life cycle of a project and the consequences thereafter, do you consider circular economy spin-offs or building in the initial aims across the full lifetime of the project?

Pauline, could I bring you in to answer the question on the physical and mental consequences for disabled people and for the people around them?

I want to follow up on the topic that you both started to explore with Alexander Stewart—financial security—but from the point of view of education and training. Jenny Miller spoke about the poverty trap and people not having access to a range of employment options or having to curtail their paid work because of caring responsibilities. There is also the issue of people curtailing other opportunities, such as skills development, training and education opportunities. I ask Jenny Miller and then Pauline Nolan to say a little more about the impacts on access to education, skills and training that carers and disabled people experienced during the pandemic.

No, Jenny, that is really helpful. Thank you. You mentioned empathetic employment and the adaptations that employers need to think about. Inclusion is good for everybody, not just the people for whom it is designed.

Pauline, do you want to comment on the question as well? You talked earlier about the need for people to feel fulfilled and feel that they are able to do something that they want to do and not just be stuck indoors at home. How have the people you work with and you support felt through the pandemic?

Thank you—that is really helpful.

We have got a lot of work to do, and a lot of culture change to get on with. Thank you, convener; I will leave it there.

Good morning, Pauline and Jenny, and thank you very much for joining us and for your opening remarks. The statements and testimonies that you have given us are very powerful.

Jenny, I will come to you first. I am interested in exploring some of the physical and mental consequences of the pandemic for people’s wellbeing. You talked about deterioration in physical and mental wellbeing. Can you say a bit more about the health impacts that you saw in the carers whom you support?

Thank you for that information. To build on Michelle Thomson’s questions, I too, in reading your annual report, picked up on the phrase

“updating legacy IT systems and evolving our IT estate onto a long-term sustainable basis.”

You talked about the two sets of contractors that you currently have: those who are working on the new systems that you are developing, who will not be needed in the long term; and the “keeping the show on the road” folk, whom you want to bring in-house as ROS employees. I understand that, and I take on board your comments to Michelle Thomson.

I am interested in the updating process. From what you have said, and from what I have read in the documentation, that has been going on for a while. How are you managing that process alongside the aspects that Claire Baker asked about—the actual work of ROS and managing the arrears? How do you see the balance of risk and resource allocation between those two aspects?

Thinking about the longer term, I note that you talked about bringing down the cost of contractors in the future. In mapping, certain things can change very quickly. Are you certain that you will have resources available when you need them? I am thinking about the skills and expertise that you may not want to keep in-house, but for which you will need contractors in the future. How is that playing out in your mapping for future financing and resourcing?

Thank you for your opening remarks. I have a couple of questions about safeguards.

You talked about, and listed quite clearly, the safeguards to prevent unlawful sharing of data. Given what has been in the media recently about the Post Office scandal and the incorrect data and software malfunction that led to many convictions, what safeguards are in place to ensure that the data that is stored and shared is correct in the first place? As an extension of the safeguards, what opportunities will there be for debtors to know who has that data, when that data is shared, how long it is kept and whether they can challenge that?

Thank you very much.

Convener, I have finished my questions, but I know that Farah Farzana, Trishna Singh and Joy Lewis want to come in. Is it okay if I bring Farah in?