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We are very conscious of that issue. The SFC analysis looked at some of that, but I suspect that it will do more. It looked at some behavioural changes, and we have been cognisant of that in relation to the Scottish child payment. We consider any research or evidence that suggests that there will be a cliff edge.

Bear in mind that the two-child cap is a penalty on families with more than two kids, which means that the universal credit system does not at the moment recognise the costs of children beyond two children. We believe that that is—

The tax strategy looked at whether there was scope, although not in the short term, to get additional powers, through agreement with the UK Government, on wealth taxes, for example. It also looked at working with the Scottish Land Commission on the issue of land—I know that that has been of interest to the committee previously—which could include consideration of a carbon land tax. However, that will not happen in the short term and will not raise revenue in this session of Parliament.

As I highlighted, our tax revenues are very strong but our issues include the complexities of the fiscal framework in relation to net gain compared with the rest of the UK and some of the constraints on things that we might want to do, such as boosting the economy through migration.

Earlier, I set out other levers that we are looking at for fiscal sustainability. I set out seven areas that we are exploring in order to contain costs and prioritise our funding. More detail on that will be set out in the fiscal sustainability plan, alongside the medium-term financial strategy, in the spring. We recognise that areas such as the workforce, reform, prioritisation of front-line services, the public sector landscape and support for back-room functions all offer opportunities to create the headroom to ensure that our resources are spent on our priorities.

Colleagues in various councils are doing their best to deliver services of the highest quality for their citizens. The Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills wanted to make sure that there is stability in teacher numbers, so we have agreed with COSLA that the £145 million funding uplift, plus the additional money for additional support needs, will enable stabilisation of teaching figures at 2023 levels. Some councils are already beyond that, and councils that are below that level will require to make the investment to bring numbers up to the standard.

I am not going to focus on one particular council’s issue. I will look at it, but you are giving me quite a lot of detail—

In some areas, a policy clearly sits in the policy area to which the money is allocated, but delivery will be through local government. For example, the free school meals policy sits with education and the direction of mental health support policy sits with health, but delivery of those policies is a matter for local government. We would not necessarily want 32 local authorities to decide what the policy around mental health interventions should be, because the expertise sits within health. Likewise, with free school meals policy, what is to be delivered in terms of the structure, the costings and the requirements sits with education, and local government, working in partnership, has agreed to deliver it. I could go through a list of other polices and rehearse that position.

Page 40 sets out the list of those policies. That is transparent.

There is an impact, particularly on welfare. Somewhere in my folder I have the figures for the mitigation of discretionary housing payments, for example, and of other welfare policies. The figures are substantial. I think that the most recent figure was £140 million—I will see whether we can find it. That money could otherwise be used for other policy areas, but we feel very strongly that, in the absence of any UK Government action, we should prioritise spend in order to tackle child poverty and to meet the statutory child poverty targets. We have taken action on the bedroom tax and on child poverty, but there are substantial costs. I am sure that we will come on to the two-child cap, which is a mitigation that will largely come out of the 2026-27 budget.

Are you talking about the 2026-27 budget in relation to the two-child cap?

First of all, the First Minister was quite right to say that. We have never shied away from independence being our key objective and from saying that we think that the constitutional arrangements of the country would be better served by decisions being made by the people who live and work here, in Scotland. I do not think that that is contentious.

The funding that is set out in the budget includes all the priorities that I have outlined in Parliament—the front-line services and so on. The mention of money in the BANS papers—the “Building a New Scotland” series—was by civil servants working in Angus Robertson’s team. They do many other things as well; those civil servants work on a number of other objectives, and they happened to produce the BANS series. Some conclusions were made around the culmination of the BANS series and the production thereafter, but there is not a line in the budget that says “Spend on independence.”

The figure is above inflation, which I hope is recognised. In the case of many of the pay negotiations that I have been involved in over the years, the actual number is one part of the pay policy equation, and it is often part of a package of reforms that include doing things differently and other non-pay benefits. For example, for the civil service, the configuration of the working week was of most importance, and that has a value. Other parts of the public sector will have different priorities at different times.

The run-up to an election year can bring its own flavour, but our pay policy is slightly higher than that of the UK Government, which has landed on 2.8 per cent. What the pay review bodies come up with remains to be seen. That was very much a driver last year, and I hope that they have taken cognisance of the evidence of progress to date. On average, Scottish pay rates are in excess of those in the rest of the UK, and I hope that that starting point and the investment that has already been made will be recognised by the staff side and unions.

Okay.