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In my statement, which is the next item of business, I will outline the publicity that there has been on the issue and, indeed, the awareness that is out there. I will cover that in some detail.

We have put £1.5 million into care and repair and the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service to support homeowners who might have struggled to put those appliances in place. From the most recent figures, I think that around 2,000 people have been supported in one way or another through the care and repair service, but I will go into more detail on that in my statement.

As I said earlier, the Scottish house condition survey collects information on homes and minimum standards for housing. The legislation will add adequate provision of fire alarms to that minimum standard, so that future iterations of the survey will collect data on compliance with that element of housing standards.

The key issue is that the safety of such people will not be as enhanced as that of those who have interlinked fire safety devices. We know, because the experts have told us, that having such devices could save lives. Therefore, I would have thought that the message from all of us, first and foremost, would be that people should comply as quickly as they can.

However, the member is right—there are no penalties, as such, for non-compliance. Local authorities have a duty to ensure compliance, but they will not do that by knocking on people’s doors. That said, we are expecting people, as home owners, to make this a priority and to put the installation of such fire alarms above other things.

We understand that there are issues that will mean that people will require to have more time to have such devices installed. In response to a number of questions, I have explained what reasonable excuses, or reasonable reasons for needing more time, would be. The message to people is that they should do it as quickly as they can, because it could be life saving for them and their families.

I ask the member to remember what we are talking about here. We are talking about the installation of devices that the experts have told us could potentially save lives. I would have thought that that would have been the overriding concern and priority for every member of the Parliament.

On insurance, I could not have been clearer about what the ABI has said. It is a requirement to have working fire alarms. However, it does not specify the standards for those. It has been clear—that is what industry has told us. However, at the end of the day, everybody should make sure that they get in touch with their own insurance company if they have concerns.

I would have thought that some members—whether Graham Simpson or anyone else—would at least have welcomed the fact that this measure could potentially save lives. I find it extraordinary that members seem to be against these measures being brought in. I would hope that, in their communication with constituents, the first part of their communication is to reiterate the importance of complying, because this could be a lifesaving measure. That is what I would ask them all to do. The information that I will provide after the statement will help them to ensure that they provide that accurate information to their constituents.

The legislation delivers on our commitment to effectively regulate short-term lets. We recognise the important role that short-term lets play as a source of flexible and responsive accommodation for tourists and workers, which brings many benefits to hosts, visitors and our economy. However, when this work started in 2018, it was in response to the significant concerns of residents and communities across Scotland—particularly in Miles Briggs’s area, I should add—about the impact that the increase in short-term lets was having on their areas, with regard to local housing supply, noise and antisocial behaviours.

The issue was not just an urban or rural one, as was shown in correspondence and throughout our consultations. We heard from residents across the country, from Ayr to Applecross, from the Trossachs to North Berwick and from Skye to St Andrews. Constituents regularly asked members of the Scottish Parliament what action the Government was taking to address the issue, while we were taking the time to gather the evidence and hear the views of people and stakeholders so that we could agree on the form that such action would take.

I am pleased that we have responded to those concerns with the clear action on which members will vote tonight.

As I have set out, we have focused our doubling of the Scottish child payment in April on children under the age of six. We know that that will affect 60 per cent of households who are living in poverty, so it will have the biggest impact.

We are determined to meet the timeframe for doubling the Scottish child payment to everyone by the end of the year. The bridging payment is just that—it is a payment to help families in the meantime. The resources that we have put into social security go well beyond the block grant. However, we have a fixed budget and we have had to make difficult choices in order to put money where it will be most effective. I have laid out why that is and the choices that we have made.

The Labour Party’s contributions and ideas for the budget will all be considered in the round by me, Kate Forbes and other cabinet secretaries. We are always looking for good ideas, but we have to make sure that they are affordable within a fixed budget, with all of the pressures that come with the reduction in the settlement from the UK Government. When we look at the Covid moneys that have been removed, we can see that it is a tough settlement. Within that, as the Scottish Fiscal Commission has said, we are putting a huge amount of money, which is projected to increase, into social security and support for low-income families that is well beyond the money that is contained in the block grant.

Pam Duncan-Glancy talked about parental employability support. In March, we will bring forward the tackling child poverty delivery plan, which will look across government. As organisations such as the Joseph Rowntree Foundation have said, although social security needs to do the heavy lifting, poverty and child poverty cannot be tackled through social security alone; other mechanisms must be looked at, and we have been doing that across government.

We have committed £15 million of further investment for the parental employability support fund across 2022 to 2024. This year, £5.8 million is available, ahead of the wider investment in employability and skills and including continued investment in both the no one left behind approach and the fair start Scotland programme.

We are aware that, due to the impact of the pandemic on local authority operations, including parental engagement and employability support, there have been some delays in the roll-out of the parental employability support fund. We have been supporting parental employability. In addition, we are also committing the first £50 million of the £500 million whole family wellbeing fund that is to be invested across this parliamentary session. The priority for that will be holistic whole-family support.

You have to look at the investment that will be made in the round. When we bring forward the tackling child poverty delivery plan, you will be able to see those investments across government. That is before we include things such early learning and childcare and support for families. All of that will help to make an impact and get us towards the child poverty targets.

Rapid rehousing transition plans are a critical part of the affordable housing budget. It is really important that we tackle temporary accommodation, which is an issue that the member has raised previously. Rapid rehousing transition plans are critical to making sure that people are moved out of temporary accommodation as quickly as possible. Temporary accommodation provides an important safety net for people, so it is there for a reason, but people should not be in temporary accommodation for any longer than they need to be there. They should be moved into settled accommodation as quickly as they can be.

We have committed £53.5 million for rapid rehousing. Within that, the housing first approach is also funded to ensure that those with more complex needs are supported to move into their own tenancies. As we have discussed many times, it is not just about bricks and mortar. It is about wraparound support to ensure that people are able to maintain a successful tenancy.

We need to look at supporting particular local authorities that have had more challenges. The City of Edinburgh Council clearly has pressures on housing, and perhaps more so than other local authorities. We recognise that and we are trying to work with local authorities that are under particular pressure to come up with the solutions that they need. Local authorities have been allocated an annual share of £23.5 million for homelessness prevention and response measures, and Edinburgh’s allocation of that funding is £4.4 million. We will work with individual local authorities to try to help them to overcome some of the difficulties that they are facing.

As I said earlier, we have the current five-year £50 million ending homelessness together fund. I am happy to bring in Shirley Laing to answer on the detail, but you can be assured that the funding that we are putting into homelessness prevention will all be allocated and used, as you would expect, to make sure that we do not just tackle homelessness with rapid rehousing and housing first, but prevent homelessness.

A new part of the work this year is the homelessness prevention duty. We will be expanding the duty and the requirements on local authorities, but also extending that to other parts of the public sector. The best way of preventing homelessness is early prevention, and that legislative provision and change will require all parts of the public sector to highlight where they think that someone could become homeless and then to do something about it.

I will bring in Shirley Laing on the £16 million.

The Scottish Fiscal Commission acknowledged that there is a lot of uncertainty over the longer-term trends, which could impact on the overall fiscal position. Its forecast includes several benefits that have not yet launched and uses assumptions that will be confirmed only when outturn data becomes available.

To answer Jeremy Balfour’s final point, the forthcoming resource spending review will allow us to take spending forecasts into account in determining funding requirements as we target public spending to where it delivers greatest benefits.

We are making a significant investment—it is an investment in people. The money that we are investing in ADP and other benefits is about supporting low-income households; it is about supporting people and helping them to have a better quality of life. We are taking the steps that we need to take through the resource spending review, but we certainly see the investment that we are making as a very important investment in making improvements to the application, review and appeals processes and removing barriers. I would have thought that that would be welcomed across the Parliament. The experience that people will have of the adult disability payment will be very different from their experience of previous benefits.

I might bring in Kevin Stevens on the specifics of the extra Christmas payment, but I will go back to the point about how it will be paid for.

I said to Jeremy Balfour that we will be looking at all the cost pressures within the spending review process, where we will be able to look across the longer period to the pressures that will come into the budget, including for social security. That is where we will be able to project and make adjustments in the budget going forward. That mechanism allows us to ensure that the required funding is there.

Is Kevin Stevens able to answer the question about the extra Christmas payment? If not, we will write back to the committee.