Seòmar agus comataidhean

As we are talking about prevention, I will bring in Lorna Campbell to talk about the work that is being done in the local authority setting, particularly on financial resilience, and to touch on the points that Maggie Brünjes made about rent arrears and ensuring that people have financial resilience in order to avoid falling into homelessness. Lorna, will you touch on those areas from a local authority perspective, please?

You do not feel that SCOSS could provide that scrutiny or advice.

Do we have Gordon MacRae?

Thank you. There is a brief question from Miles Briggs, to be followed by Emma Roddick.

The technology will catch up. Do we have Gordon MacRae?

I think that there is a problem with microphone selection.

Who are you directing your questions to?

I thank all the witnesses for their time. We provided considerable latitude by extending the time for the session. It was interesting to hear from all of you and to get your insights in the area. That has certainly been of benefit to all members of our extended committee today—I thank Elena Whitham for joining us and for her contributions.

I appreciate everyone’s time and patience with some of the technical difficulties that we had—broadcasting colleagues used a very technical term when telling me that BlueJeans was “sticking” at some points. I thank the witnesses for their perseverance and broadcasting colleagues for ensuring that things went as smoothly as possible.

That concludes the public part of the meeting.

Under agenda item 2, the committee will take evidence on the statement of reasons that has been lodged to accompany the draft proposal for a Scottish employment injuries advisory council bill and decide whether it is satisfied with the reasons that the member in charge of the proposed bill has given for not reconsulting on the draft proposal. At this stage, the committee is not required to give its views on the contents of the proposed bill.

I welcome to the meeting the member in charge of the proposed bill, Mark Griffin MSP, and Mary Dinsdale, senior assistant clerk, from the Scottish Parliament’s non-Government bills unit.

I refer members to paper 1 and invite Mark Griffin to make a short opening statement.