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Philip Whyte is the only other witness who has indicated to come in. If anyone else wants to come in, do not be shy. Put your hand up.

Philip, you were nodding a lot at what Ruth Boyle was saying. One thing that the economists said was that wealth taxes are complex and can take several years to implement. We are looking at the budget for 2024-25. Even assuming that we thought that wealth taxes were appropriate and could be implemented, what kind of time are we talking about and what can be done for the forthcoming tax year, which is the one that is staring us in the face now?

I have a few other things that I would like to ask about, but I want to let colleagues in, so I am just going to ask one more question, which is on an issue that we have not touched on yet: transparency.

João, I will stick with you. You said in your response that

“A more forthcoming approach from the Scottish Government to the publication of financial memoranda for the Committee’s scrutiny”

would be an improvement. I wonder whether you can talk about that, as that clearly has a direct impact on the committee’s work.

I am sorry—I was asking that question to Professor Bell.

The obvious one is the additional room supplement or bedroom tax. The Scottish Government has been mitigating that for years, but I do not see much transparency in that respect. That is just one thing that it is mitigating. What should it do to try to make that sort of thing more transparent in the budget?

Folks, we continue our evidence taking on the sustainability of Scotland’s finances with a round-table discussion. I welcome to the meeting Adam Stachura, head of policy and communications at Age Scotland; Dr Judith Turbyne, chief executive of Children in Scotland; Philip Whyte, director of the Institute for Public Policy Research Scotland; Stuart Hay, director of Living Streets Scotland; Ruth Boyle, policy and campaigns manager at the Poverty Alliance; Michael Kellet, director of strategy, governance and performance at Public Health Scotland; and Alastair Sim, director of Universities Scotland. I thank everyone for their written submissions.

Rather than my asking a whole load of different questions, I will ask only one, which will be to Ruth Boyle, to kick us off. Anyone who wants to comment on what Ruth has said, please let me know. We will buzz around the table so that everyone gets the maximum opportunity to speak. I will come in only as and when, which will not be very often. That will satisfy John Mason, because he is always moaning about how much I speak at these events.

Ruth, your very detailed and excellent submission is called “The case for fair tax reform in Scotland”. You will have heard some of what the economists said earlier in the meeting. In your submission, you say that it is important that

“critical national priorities cannot be sacrificed due to a lack of funds”.

You talk about

“new and improved forms of local taxation that target under-taxed wealth, as well as business and polluters.”

You call for

“a fundamental rethink, from scratch, of how the Income Tax system can be best designed”.

You call for a

“cross-party process to replace the current Council Tax”.

You call for “a local inheritance tax” and a “local payroll tax”.

The economists said that we have a small, finite group of people who pay a very high proportion of tax in Scotland, and they have real concerns about behavioural impact, for example, if we were to decide to go down the road of increasing taxes significantly. How can we deliver what the Poverty Alliance wants to deliver on its social policy? How can we fund those objectives, given the constraints that the economists presented to us, not only the fiscal gap that the Scottish Government has now but the impact on higher taxpayers should some of these policies be implemented? Higher taxpayers might leave Scotland, they might decide to work less or they might engage in more avoidance.

Thank you very much. That concludes questions from committee members.

I am going to ask one more question. Given the talk about increasing taxes, I think that the Government is going to play it safe and impose fiscal drag on us all, as both the Scottish and UK Governments did last year. Professor Heald has said that income tax rises are always popular among those who will not have to pay them, but when the SNP brought in the “Penny for Scotland” campaign, which added 1 per cent to the basic rate, our opinion poll rating went down from 48 per cent to an eventual 27 per cent. I was standing in the constituency with the highest unemployment in Scotland, and people who did not have a job denounced us for that, believe it or not, even although one would have thought that they would have benefited.

My question is on an issue that we have not touched on. Yesterday, it was announced that some pension funds, such as the Strathclyde Pension Fund, are so awash with money that they are going to reduce local government contributions by about two thirds over the next couple of years, which will be a wee boon to local authorities. Is there a possibility that the Scottish Government could tap into pension funds to fund some of its capital projects? João, do you want to have a go at that one?

I was thinking about such funding being used for housing, for example, for which there would be a return to a pension fund in the long term. I appreciate that although funds are there specifically to maximise income for their members, some pension funds, over recent years, have looked at whether investments are ethical—in tobacco or carbon-intensive industries, for example.

You can have that when you are the convener.

I was quite keen to have a freeport at Hunterston, in my constituency, so I will certainly support the motion. The reason for that is primarily that, if we do not get the jobs and investment in Scotland, those will simply move to south of the border. Teesside would be a major threat to jobs in this part of Scotland if it were not for the fact that Leith is one of the green ports.

Engagement is important. We have to take on board what the unions also said, which is that the City of Edinburgh Council is not engaging with them. That is a Labour-led local authority. Other political parties as well as the Scottish Government have to think more about engagement with trade unions and others.

However, I will support the motion for the pragmatic economic reason that the alternative would be a drain of jobs and money to elsewhere in the UK.

Minister, do you want to sum up before we go to the question?

At a time of static budgets, how difficult is it to disinvest in programmes or services in the public sector that are less effective, in order to invest in more effective services?