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Paul Sweeney strayed into the area that I was looking to talk about, which is longer-term sustainability and ensuring that there is collaboration, which we heard from the previous panel is key. Caroline Cameron touched on carers, which I also wanted to make sure that we touched on. I want to ensure that, when we talk about collaboration, we are not just talking about the IJB, the council and the health board but also recognise that the third sector, the voluntary sector and unpaid carers are important parts of the system.

How do we ensure that we are collaborating in a joined-up way? The pressures that the system is facing are only going to get more challenging as the population gets older and has more complex needs. I would be grateful if you could answer briefly.

Maybe Sharon Wearing can answer my other question. We have talked a lot about finances for long-term sustainability, but the other side of that is workforce planning and the challenges with that. The services were really impacted by Brexit. Are we getting over that and managing to start recruiting or is it still a real challenge that we are unable to have the full range of people who want to work?

Sharon, you mentioned IJBs using reserves. What is the state of reserves across IJBs? What kind of money has built up that has not been used from previous years?

Thank you, convener. I am pleased to be on the committee and I have no relevant interests to declare.

Morning, convener. I, too, have no relevant interests to declare.

I would be pleased to nominate Ruth Maguire.

Some of those points are absolutely right. What are the outcomes that we are trying to achieve? They are better education and better destinations for young people. The question is how we get there. It will be no surprise to hear me say that the Scottish Government is committed to supporting recruitment of teachers. We are providing local authorities with £145.5 million to protect teacher numbers. Our ambition is clear—it is to close the poverty-related attainment gap.

That is an example of an area of shared responsibility, which is why the work on the outcomes and accountability framework to go alongside the fiscal framework is so important. That work is on-going. In the Verity house agreement, there are specific areas of funding. There is £145.5 million in local government settlements to protect teacher numbers. That is a policy decision of the Scottish Government; I am not sure that I have heard any of the Opposition parties articulating a desire to reduce teacher numbers.

We need to look at the issue. We will make progress by working on the accountability and outcomes framework so that we all have the assurances that we need that the policies, particularly those that are shared between the Scottish Government, the Parliament and councils across Scotland, can move forward in a way that works for everyone.

I will ask Ian Storrie to come in, but, in general terms, I suggest that that is exactly the kind of analysis that we need to get away from, as it looks at the inputs, which does not help. We are doing things differently. Across local authorities, there is some amazing innovation in the way in which things are happening, and sometimes a piece of work can help many of the outcomes. We need to look at outcomes. I hope that the fiscal framework, with an accountability and assurance framework alongside it, will get us to the point at which, across local government and wider public services, we can focus on what is making a difference for communities in Scotland. Looking at the way that we did stuff 10 years ago, when we do not do any of it in the same way, is not a real comparison.

We all have roles to play in that. We want to look at outcomes, but often we find ourselves instead going back to the inputs, whether they be the finance or numbers of X or Y. As a Parliament, as a Government and as a society, we need to find a way of shifting our analysis on to what will make the difference. A number of on-going pilots should help us in that respect. The Government cannot do that in isolation—neither can local government or the health service. We need to work in partnership right across the system.

As Ian Storrie said, the Government is putting significant funding into supporting some big-ticket items and work that, I hope, will be preventative in the future. One huge example of that is the Scottish child payment.

We have to do that. That is why the three principles in the Verity house agreement are key to our moving forward, and why it was crucial for them to be agreed across all the parties. After all, preventative work is not for the here and now but for the long term, so we all need to buy into it.

Politically, there has been buy-in to the principles. Clearly, there are differences in views about how we will take things forward, but we all come from different parties, so there is an understanding that there will be differences in political views in certain areas. However, as far as the basic principles are concerned, there appears to be universal agreement across the Scottish political spectrum.