Seòmar agus comataidhean

Any further information that the committee could get on that would be appreciated, minister.

Do members want to make any contributions?

Absolutely.

Good morning, and welcome to the 27th meeting in 2022 of the Social Justice and Social Security Committee.

Our main item of business is consideration of a draft statutory instrument. The Scottish Government advises that the draft regulations will make changes to the best start foods regulations, best start grant regulations and Scottish child payment regulations, which set out the rules and eligibility criteria for best start foods, the best start grant and the Scottish child payment.

I welcome Ben Macpherson MSP, the Minister for Social Security and Local Government, who joins us remotely, and his officials, who also join us remotely. We have Nicola Birrell, who is best start grant and best start foods policy manager with the Scottish Government; Karen Clyde, who is a solicitor with the Scottish Government; Janet Richardson, who is deputy director for client services delivery with Social Security Scotland; and Merlin Kemp, who is the Scottish child payment team leader at the Scottish Government.

The instrument has been laid under affirmative procedure, which means that Parliament must approve it before it comes into force. Following this evidence session, under the next agenda item the committee will be invited to consider a motion to approve the instrument. I remind everyone that the officials can speak during this agenda item but not in the debate that follows.

I invite the minister to make a short opening statement.

Thank you very much for your statement, minister. We will move to questions. As always, we will direct our questions to you, but you can bring in your officials when you want to.

The first questions are from my colleague Jeremy Balfour.

I will just follow up on that, then I will ask another question.

We have a task and finish working group, but sometimes there is the task of the policy intention and then there is how something is finished and what impact it has. I am keen to look at the impact assessment that has been published, but I am concerned about the other end of the process and about double-checking in, say, six months’ time that we have understood the consequences as they apply to those groups who often experience the sharpest impact of poverty and inequality. I would like to get an assurance that the Scottish Government will seek to report back on that.

Good morning. We have discussed already the fact that we have a lot of data gaps. I hope that a housing bill will help us to sort that out.

With regard to social justice in particular, we know that the individuals who are bearing the worst of the cost crisis tend to be women, people with disabilities and people from black and minority ethnic communities. How do we ensure that we collect the data that we need in order to understand the impact of the intervention? I hear people calling it a sticking plaster, but in emergency situations a sticking plaster is often all that we can apply. How do we ensure that those who need it most will benefit from the policy, given that we do not generally collect disaggregated gender data and that we do not always understand intersectionality with regard to how policies are applied?

The tenant grant fund and discretionary housing payments have been mentioned. How do we ensure that the Scottish welfare fund is applied effectively? Who collects data, and how do we ensure that we get the intended outcome? That question is for Rhiannon Sims, Emma Saunders and Caroline Crawley. I am interested in the perspective of tenants in your organisations.

With regard to best practice, many local authorities and RSLs across the country engage actively in buy-back, specifically of properties that were formerly social lets, to bolster the number of affordable homes. An agreement that that already happens and that such an approach should be supported over this six-month period would be helpful.

I welcome you and your officials to the meeting, minister. I will start with the question that I asked the first panel. As the convener of the Social Justice and Social Security Committee, I have always been keenly aware of the fact that we do not always have a gendered analysis and disaggregated data, specifically on issues around poverty, inequality and the housing sector in its totality.

We know that those in the most extreme poverty are disproportionately women, lone parents, people from black and minority ethnic backgrounds and those who are disabled, and the intention of this policy is to act swiftly to assist people in that situation. How do we monitor both the policy intention and the policy outcome? That is not always captured, and we see that as a gap.

As for the measures that are in place to support the policy—the extension to the tenant grant fund, the extension to how discretionary housing payments can be used and the Scottish welfare fund, which councils administer—how can we ensure that we collect the data on who is accessing those measures, how the decisions are made and what impact they have?

My next question arises from an ask from Shelter and other organisations and relates to provisions in the bill to allow for the sale of a property when landlords are in specific financial difficulties. How can the Scottish Government support landlords and, indeed, registered social landlords to buy back homes, so that we can protect tenants in situ? That would give everyone involved a level of comfort.