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Thank you very much.

A couple of weeks ago, the committee had a round-table session with various representatives of public sector organisations. A point that came up during the discussion was that a number of bodies that were represented around the table had expressed an interest in the Scottish Government’s potential pilot of a four-day week. I say this with the significant caveat that this is by no means the universal position of trade unions that represent workers in the public sector, but a number of public sector workers in Scotland and local union representatives in various public agencies have expressed an interest in that to me, partly in recognition of the fact that they know that pay rises in line with inflation across the board in the public sector are not affordable right now. Although they are, obviously, interested in maximising the pay offer that is made to their members, they are expressing increasingly significant interest in other changes to terms and conditions that might be beneficial to workers. Do you have an update on the progress on the four-day working week pilot?

It has been mentioned already that NHS Ayrshire and Arran has been running at a deficit since 2017, but quite a lot of progress was made in closing that deficit between 2017 and the start of the pandemic, when everything went out the window somewhat. How did you manage that year-on-year reduction in the deficit over that three-year period before the pandemic financial years?

Thanks very much.

On a different note—and moving away from that particular table—I heard at the start of the session Francis Breedon make a comment about the north-east no longer being as much of a drag on the Scotland-wide income growth figures over the next couple of years. When the committee took evidence—late last year, I think—on regional differences in income growth, we found that the really stark difference was between the east and the west of the country. That was reflected in the population figures, too, with all local authorities on the east coast projected to grow and Argyll and Bute and Inverclyde having the most significant decrease. How much of that regional data are you able to draw on for the purposes of this projection?

My final question is on the availability of data. I realise that this might be straying somewhat outside your remit, but I would be interested to hear your thoughts on this matter.

Obviously, you have access to significant amounts of public data that are not in the public domain, but when you look at some of the independent tax proposals that have been put together—for example, the paper commissioned by the Scottish Trades Union Congress—you see a significant difference between the additional revenue that the STUC says will come from some of its proposals versus what is in the ready reckoners. Do you think that there is enough information in the public domain to aid a healthy public debate on the issue? After all, it creates a bit of tension if the STUC says that putting 2p on the top rate will raise an additional £200 million and the ready reckoners say that that will be essentially net neutral.

One would have expected a significant initial spike in the child disability payment as we transition away from what was a relatively hostile system under the Department for Work and Pensions towards the deliberately more generous system under Social Security Scotland but, according to the same table, the child disability payment is projected to continue to rise quite significantly. I understand why that would be the case for the adult disability payment, given that our adult population is becoming more ill as a result of a number of factors, but is the same driver behind the situation with the child disability payment or is it something else?

I apologise if I missed this in your answers to Michael Marra’s questions about digital enhancement, but are you able to quantify the financial savings from upgrades? For example, do you know how much the bed management and patient tracking system that you mentioned has saved you? I am interested to know how much you would expect to save from such an upgrade—not that it is all about the money, obviously.

Your submission mentions opportunities for collaboration, particularly with local authorities when it comes to property and estates. Do you have any examples of where such collaboration has worked well to increase efficiency?

How much of the reduction in the number of eligible children is a result of the reduction in the overall population versus the relative socioeconomic situation with regard to children? I think that, over the five-year period covered in the paper, we are looking at a drop of something like 25,000 children in the primary school roll.

I have a couple of questions about the calculations on social security spend in figure 5.3, which is on page 81 of your report. I would appreciate a little bit more information.

Part of the theory of the Scottish child payment is that, if we give families more income, we create the stability for them to find themselves in a better financial situation in which they do not require the payment. The calculations that you have in the figure show a dip over the next couple of years but that then slowing down over the last couple of years in the cycle. Will you explain a little bit about that tailing off in the decrease?