Seòmar agus comataidhean

Thank you. I pass to Paul O’Kane for the last line of questioning.

Jeremy, before you go further, Kevin Stewart has a supplementary question.

I am conscious of the time, and I have a quick question before we conclude.

Minister, what work, if any, has been done on stigma in relation to homelessness?

Yes.

Welcome back. We will now hold our first evidence session as part of our annual pre-budget scrutiny. Each year, the committee reviews potential considerations for the Scottish Government’s budget planning. This year, our focus is on how the Scottish Government’s approach to fair and efficient funding can support the on-going effectiveness of the third sector. During the summer, we ran a call for views and held workshops with third sector organisations to hear about the funding difficulties in the sector.

I welcome our first panel of witnesses. We have Sheghley Ogilvie, public affairs officer for the Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations; Sarah Latto, senior policy officer at Volunteer Scotland; Douglas Westwater, chair of Social Enterprise Scotland; Tim Frew, chief executive of YouthLink Scotland; and Ian Bruce, who is representing the Third Sector Interface Scotland Network. Thank you for accepting our invitation and for taking part in our call for views.

Before we start, I have a few points to mention about the format of the meeting. We have roughly an hour. Please wait until whoever is asking the question says your name before speaking. I ask everyone to keep their questions and answers as concise as possible. I now invite members to ask questions, starting with Roz McCall.

Please be brief.

Thank you. I now invite questions from Marie McNair, who is joining us remotely.

That is interesting. I do not know what experiences any of you have of getting on to a tender framework. In my previous role, I sat on Scotland Excel and looked at tender submissions that came through. One tick box—which I think someone alluded to—was that, in order to get through, organisations had to pay the living wage. Have any of you experience of that? I also want to ask about the reporting mechanisms for Scotland Excel when an organisation is on such a framework.

As you have mentioned the Cyrenians a couple of times, I note that Ewan Aitken from the Edinburgh Cyrenians has written to us to invite us to a cook school event. I look forward to hearing about the good work that the Cyrenians are doing on the prevention duties.

Thanks, minister. That was a good point, Kevin. It would be great if committee members could get an outline of the programme of engagement over the summer. As a committee, we will look again at whether we have time in our work programme to get you back in, minister, but I thank you for your offer and we look forward to seeing that document.