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The SPS has a trauma-informed approach to female offenders. The 2019 model of custody for women recognises that

“women who have suffered some type of physical or emotional trauma are often hyper-aware of possible danger”,

and that survivors of trauma may find it “difficult to trust others”. If you are putting male-bodied trans women into the female estate, how do you reconcile that with looking after the women who are already in prison?

The Scottish Government announced in June 2023 that it planned to

“take over”

national

“responsibility for skills planning”

and that there would be

“A new national model of public funding for all colleges and universities, as well as apprenticeships and training”.

Will you tell us more about your plans for that?

Putting out the response that you accept the recommendations is one thing, but we want to see the timeline for their implementation. To what extent will the various planned changes address the sector’s challenges and their potential impacts on college staff, college students—disadvantaged ones, in particular—and communities, particularly rural communities and those in which there are high levels of deprivation?

I still do not quite understand what “demand-led” programmes are.

The Minister for Higher and Further Education announced on 5 December that

“Arrangements to deliver funding support for learners beyond school”

are

“to be simplified”.

He also confirmed that the Scottish Government intends

“to streamline funding for colleges, universities and apprenticeships”

and he announced that an

“independent review of Community Learning & Development … will run … until June 2024”

to

“examine the extent to which CLD is delivering positive outcomes for some of Scotland’s most vulnerable learners and marginalised groups.”

You said in your statement that the minister has accepted everything and is moving forward. There have been lots of reports, but when will we see firm plans on a piece of paper with timelines for when everything will be implemented? We hear about the pressure that the colleges and universities that provide further and higher education are under. They have to do everything on a yearly basis with budget constraints. What is the Government doing to try to get something on paper so that colleges and universities can move forward and get the reforms that they need in a timely fashion?

On resources, I have just one budget question. The 2023-24 budget was first announced in December 2022, and the budget for higher and further education has now been cut by £102 million. Initially, there was a £20 million cut for universities and a £26 million cut for colleges. More recently, there was a £26 million cut to pay for pay rises for teachers, and there was another £56 million cut from demand-led courses. When we are talking about the fact that we are struggling for money, £56 million is quite a significant figure for an underspend. What are “demand-led courses”? What was the impact on them?

That is fine. Thank you.

Do you anticipate that the setting up of the court will cause further delays in the judicial system?

Is that what you meant when you said in your report that

“The specialist court would have access to a much wider pool of venues than currently available to the High Court.”?

You were talking about using all the courts that are available to us.

Are you talking about staff resource? Is it staff resource that you do not have enough of?