Seòmar agus comataidhean

The housing budget has had a particularly serious reduction. You have mentioned one set of figures, but we must work with what we have in front of us. Page 53 of the budget document shows that the more homes budget has decreased from £740.1 million in 2022-23 to £564.6 million in 2023-24 and £375.8 million in 2024-25. That is almost a halving of that budget over two years at a time of a housing emergency.

We know that, at the same time, the Scottish Government has made very significant capital investments in other areas. For example, there has been a 12.4 per cent increase for Police Scotland and a 49 per cent increase for digital connectivity; I will mention one or two other increases in a moment when we move on to discuss other areas.

Why has that choice been made? The Scottish Government has quite rightly said that it is a matter of choices. I find it wearisome that no one other than the Scottish Government really makes choices. Everyone says that there should be more money for everything and no reductions in anything. We are in a situation in which capital is decreasing—that is just a fact of life—but why has housing in particular had such a dunt, relative to other areas of the Scottish budget?

For our second evidence session on the 2024-25 Scottish budget, I welcome to the meeting the Deputy First Minister and Cabinet Secretary for Finance, Shona Robison, who is joined by Scottish Government officials. Dr Alison Cumming is director of budget and public spending; Ellen Leaver is deputy director, local government and analytical services; and Dr Andrew Scott is director of tax and revenues.

We have just over two hours for this session. Before I open up the discussion, I invite Ms Robison to make a short opening statement.

Transparency is fundamental. We cannot be comparing apples with pears. We need to have confidence in what we are looking at when we are making comparisons.

One of the issues raised by a number of people who have given evidence to the committee, particularly on our pre-budget report, was the need to grow the tax base. It is fair to say that there is a level of disappointment with some of the decisions that have been made. I will ask about some of those decisions. In the wellbeing economy and fair work budget, there is a 15 per cent reduction to £348.7 million in the enterprise, trade and investment budget. You have already touched on the Scottish National Investment Bank; its budget is down 28 per cent. At a time when we need to grow the tax base, improve productivity and create economic growth and when we need to provide the tax revenues to pay for so much else, why have decisions been made to reduce the enterprise budgets?

We want to look at these figures three-dimensionally rather than two-dimensionally wherever possible.

I will go back to the issue of choices. You talked about protecting the NHS, and its resource is up 4.3 per cent. The resource for police is up by 5.6 per cent and support for ferry services is—I am pleased to say—up by 23.3 per cent. The figure has gone up in a number of areas, but how did you decide on those percentages? Why did you decide on, for example, 4.3 per cent for the NHS but 5.6 per cent for policing? What was the decision making behind that?

They are not as positive as they would be if you had bought a bottle of whisky for the raffle, John.

I call Michelle Thomson, to be followed by Michael Marra.

So the £3 million that was spent on the website wisnae enough tae actually deliver a quality website. Is that what you are trying to say?

I am still not sure why those things are obsolete. What is it that they do not deliver that they need to deliver? With the bulletin, for example—I mean, it is just a Business Bulletin.

Sorry—I meant this year.

I will touch on two further points, the first of which is IT. When I look at IT, alarm bells ring, given the £3 million that was, in my view, squandered on a not-particularly-great alleged improvement to our website and which we have discussed at some length in previous years.

I see that improving the Business Bulletin is going to cost some £300,000 to £500,000, which seems to me a rather large and excessive amount of money. [Interruption.] I am sorry—it is the Official Report project that is going to cost £300,000 to £500,000, while the Business Bulletin will cost £245,000 to £370,000. I am struggling to understand the demand for those changes and why they are going to cost so much. The Windows 10 replacement in 1,600 devices seems to be costing £143,000 to £396,000, which looks almost modest when you think about the work involved. I am trying to get my head around why the changes to the Official Report and the Business Bulletin are so expensive.

It is also reasonable to ask where else in the budget the money would come from to reverse that reduction. After all, we are scrutinising the Scottish budget. You have made a valid point about the council tax, and we might agree or disagree on that, but I am not seeing anything here about what should be done with capital. All you are saying is, “Oh, we should reverse that cut.” Maybe we should, but where should the money come from to do that?