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That is really useful, Simon. A lot of those interventions and the work with outside agencies have been funded in different places through the Scottish attainment challenge. I have a couple of questions about the reforms that have been undertaken. Many of the local authorities with the highest levels of multiple deprivation are losing up to 60 per cent of their Scottish attainment challenge funding. Dundee is losing 80 per cent of its Scottish attainment challenge funding. What do you believe the rationale to be behind that policy change?

I will push you a little on that. There has been a headline change to how the policy is delivered across Scotland. In Dundee, money from the Scottish attainment challenge currently supports 120 staff, and I believe that 25 of those staff are to be cut this year as a result of the cut. Over this parliamentary session, 80 per cent of the funding will be lost, which will affect about 100 members of staff who are working directly with the most deprived members of our community. Areas such as speech and language therapy, which we heard about earlier, are suffering immediate cuts. Did the Scottish Government suggest that approach to COSLA and did COSLA then agree to it on that basis? I do not understand the rationale for the shift. What is COSLA’s perspective?

I am sorry, cabinet secretary, but we cannot hear you.

There is a broad logic to that. You mentioned the international experience and the learning that has been lost, so I can understand that.

The budget was published on 9 December. Given the long-term concerns that you had had, what detailed representations did you make to the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and the Economy with regard to dealing with the impact on attainment of what had happened in our schools and the absence of learning? What resources did you ask for regarding the initiatives that you were putting in place? What argument were you making to colleagues to ensure that we could deal with the impacts?

But there is no more money per year.

Cabinet secretary, you have already acknowledged to the committee that that investment will take us back to the number of teachers that we had in 2008, if we can reach that. That is not even as many teachers as your Government first took on in 2007. The challenge that we face now is the greatest that we have ever faced.

We have very limited statistical evidence so far. I would like to see an awful lot more. Time and again, we have called for a focus on evidence. My question is how proportionate your response has been to the scale of the challenge. It does not seem to me as though, in your discussions with the finance secretary, you have been able to make or win the argument for more resource or for a more proportionate response to the challenge. Is that fair? The draft budget is a repetition of previous plans that do not really take into account the scale of the challenge that we face.

Perhaps it is just me. Apologies.

Therefore, contrary to what the First Minister announced yesterday, that is not funding for active ventilation in school but just an additional £5 million on top of the previous moneys that have been allocated, which the cabinet secretary said have resulted in very limited action. That is very disappointing and, frankly, completely contrary—

If I may speak, cabinet secretary.

It is very contrary to what the First Minister said yesterday. In December, Labour moved a motion, which SNP and Green colleagues voted against, to set out £30 million in total, which could have procured two HEPA filters for each classroom in Scotland. Is that not the kind of action that should be taken now? We are talking about the budget today. The cabinet secretary should recognise that—she should listen to the First Minister when she says in the chamber that it should happen—and argue for £30 million to be put in place in the budget in order to procure those filters.

I think that it would be useful to follow up on some of the issues around data, cabinet secretary. The only data that we have so far regarding the impact of the pandemic on attainment and school achievement are the deeply concerning figures that came out regarding primary school attainment levels. They show that attainment is at its lowest-ever level and that the gap between the poorest kids and the rest is at its widest ever. You would share those concerns, would you not?