Skip to main content
Loading…

Seòmar agus comataidhean

Official Report: search what was said in Parliament

The Official Report is a written record of public meetings of the Parliament and committees.  

Criathragan Hide all filters

Dates of parliamentary sessions
  1. Session 1: 12 May 1999 to 31 March 2003
  2. Session 2: 7 May 2003 to 2 April 2007
  3. Session 3: 9 May 2007 to 22 March 2011
  4. Session 4: 11 May 2011 to 23 March 2016
  5. Session 5: 12 May 2016 to 5 May 2021
  6. Current session: 12 May 2021 to 10 July 2025
Select which types of business to include


Select level of detail in results

Displaying 2881 contributions

|

Finance and Public Administration Committee

Subordinate Legislation

Meeting date: 7 November 2023

John Mason

It is reassuring that the error has been picked up, but it raises the wider question whether the UK Government is making more errors that we do not know about.

Finance and Public Administration Committee

Circular Economy (Scotland) Bill: Financial Memorandum

Meeting date: 7 November 2023

John Mason

That is right. I fully accept that design will help. However, some people have the attitude that they will drop litter in the street, because that is what guys do; they will not pick up their dog poo, because macho men do not do that; and they will not recycle, because that is not macho. Sadly, good design is not going to tackle that attitude. Somebody needs to go to the doors.

Finance and Public Administration Committee

Circular Economy (Scotland) Bill: Financial Memorandum

Meeting date: 7 November 2023

John Mason

Okay. Thanks.

Finance and Public Administration Committee

Subordinate Legislation

Meeting date: 7 November 2023

John Mason

Okay—that has clarified that.

Just to follow up on the convener’s point about reserves, I fully agree that we should use reserves and not leave money sitting. Will doing that put more pressure on future budgets, because it will be something that we cannot do again?

Finance and Public Administration Committee

Subordinate Legislation

Meeting date: 7 November 2023

John Mason

If we take Creative Scotland and Forestry and Land Scotland as examples, they are able to top up their budget from reserves at the moment. In future, however, you would either have to trim their budget or find more money from elsewhere to put back in.

Finance and Public Administration Committee

Subordinate Legislation

Meeting date: 7 November 2023

John Mason

The Scotland reserve, at the start of 2022-23, was approximately £699 million. All of that was then put into the budget but, at the end of the year, there was still £244 million put back into the reserve. Does it make any difference if we take everything out of the reserve and put some back in or if we instead take out just the net amount at the end of the year? Are those simply just different ways of doing things?

Finance and Public Administration Committee

Subordinate Legislation

Meeting date: 7 November 2023

John Mason

Okay, that is fair enough. The point has been made that the Ukraine resettlement costs have been higher in the current year than we had perhaps anticipated. Are those costs completely open-ended? In other words, is there still uncertainty?

Finance and Public Administration Committee

Subordinate Legislation

Meeting date: 7 November 2023

John Mason

Does that mean that, instead of there being a specific Ukraine cost in future, a bit more will be spent, for example, on housing, schools and the NHS?

Finance and Public Administration Committee

Subordinate Legislation

Meeting date: 7 November 2023

John Mason

I think that £46 million was taken from the colleges and universities budget because of the teachers’ pay settlement. Is that a one-off, or will it have repercussions for the future?

Finance and Public Administration Committee

Subordinate Legislation

Meeting date: 7 November 2023

John Mason

Okay. Finally, on Barnett consequentials, the paper states:

“The Guide also reports an additional £20.2 million arising from a ‘Home Office comparability factor error’”.

Can you tell us what that was?

12:00