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We need to show how desirable it is to work in local government and how it is, in a number of fields, a rewarding career path to take. We have lost that a bit, but COSLA and a range of partners are making a huge effort to highlight where there are real opportunities, particularly for young people, to progress to those careers and to have a sense of pride in what they are delivering for wider society.

No. The statistics have been published. The latest statistics, which were published on 12 September, show that there has been a very slight increase in staff numbers for local government over the past year. That might be due, in part, to some of the additional things that local government is doing—early learning provision, for example—so you would expect to see an increase.

The statistics across public services have been published, and it might be useful to share those with the committee.

They were published on 12 September. They cover the NHS, for example, where there has been a significant increase, as we would expect. In the devolved civil service, there has been a slight decrease. There has been a very slight increase in the figure for local government, but it is pretty flat.

Both things can be true, because, as Councillor Hagmann indicated, individuals’ experiences in an area where there have been difficulties with recruitment due to Brexit or shifts in ways of working can make it feel as though there has been a cut, because there has been a reduction in staff in a particular area.

The figures that are published are overall figures, as is appropriate, but the experience on the ground for someone in an area where there has been a shift of people away might suggest that there has been a reduction. I do not think that anybody is coming to you with untruths; they are just expressing what they are seeing on the ground, which, as Councillor Hagmann said, might vary.

The numbers are slightly up.

The points that Mr Arthur made on engagement with the wider community and getting people involved are really important, but ultimately, it is the responsibility of the community planning partnerships to identify the measures that they need to use in order to assess whether the work that they are doing and their partnerships are having an effect.

From the Scottish Government’s perspective, we do not currently commission research to look at the impact that community planning partnerships have in the round; that would be a difficult exercise to take forward. It would be difficult to measure some of the positive aspects of community planning partnerships.

The most important thing about the 2015 act was that it put those partnerships on a statutory footing, whereas previously they were not. That is a good thing. When we measure how effective our actions are, it is important that the partners who have responsibility make sure that they measure outcomes appropriately, so that we can assess not whether the partnership is working but whether the actions that the partnership is taking and driving forward have an impact on communities.

It says something that the first part of your question was about those marginalised communities. It is sometimes easy to say that we are doing all this amazing work, because all the people around the table are connected, but often it is the people who are not around the table who most need the support of the community planning partnership.

That is why we need to continually assess in order to make sure that we do that correctly and, if we see particular gaps, that we look at how we will address them. We know that there was a particular gap was in relation to Gypsy and Traveller communities, and we have now taken action to make sure that we now know how to, and have the tools to, engage meaningfully with those communities on their terms, not on our terms. Such engagement is not on the terms of a particular part of a partnership, the Scottish Government or even this committee, but on those communities’ terms.

First, the new deal goes much wider than the Verity house agreement; the Verity house agreement is one of the planks of the new deal, but the two are not the same. A lot of work is ongoing with local government to deliver the new deal, and the Verity house agreement is an important partnership agreement between the two spheres of government—the Scottish Government and local government partners. The Scottish Government and COSLA recognise the important role of community planning partnerships within that. It is important to note that that is central to the agreement between the Scottish Government and local government.

There was a question about the Verity house agreement. The main point in relation to that is the commitment to the conclusion of the local governance review and the recognition that it needs to be completed in this parliamentary session.

Part 7 gives ministers power to make regulations to facilitate supporter involvement and to give fans rights in a number of areas. The Scottish Government held a consultation on that in 2016, and no action has been taken since. The matter sits within the portfolio of the Minister for Social Care, Mental Wellbeing and Sport. If colleagues are okay with this suggestion, maybe you could ask her to give you a written update on the Government’s views in light of the responses to the 2016 consultation.