Seòmar agus comataidhean

My question follows on from Marie McNair’s earlier question and is about whether the redetermination process should remain or whether individuals who are appealing should go straight to the Scottish Courts and Tribunals Service. It is fair to say that we had conflicting evidence from third sector and advice groups on that. Some people thought that it was vital that the redetermination process stayed and others thought that it got in the way. The sector was not speaking with one voice on the issue.

I was wondering, however, whether redeterminations could be run in tandem with the tribunals service. Let me say what I mean by that. If there were no redeterminations and if things went straight to a tribunal, I think that, pretty quickly, Social Security Scotland would do a very quick review of any application to ensure that it got it right in the first place and a lot of applications to the tribunal would never get there anyway.

Is it possible to have a hybrid system, and might the Government think about that? I am not saying that that idea is well thought out or that there are not lots of potential unintended consequences, but we are progressing this proposed legislation and I was wondering whether a hybrid system is possible. Is that something that the Government could consider?

Thank you for the opportunity, convener.

It was good to hear from those seeking to be commissioners and the new chair informally before this meeting. I have just a brief observation to make. I was struck by the diverse mix of candidates, who range from people in academia and policy research to people involved at the coalface of planning, service delivery, working daily on the ground with young people and families to tackle poverty and people with direct lived experience. We want our commissioners to have that diverse range of skills and experiences, to be a critical friend of Government and to be fiercely independent. From what I heard this morning, I am enthused by the candidates who will, I hope, take up those roles.

My goodness, cabinet secretary. Do you mean that I have got the Government to move within seconds, if it is not affirmative? That is a first.

To double check, does that mean that the system might mirror the DWP route but that there will not necessarily be an agency agreement?

That was the clarity that witnesses wanted, so they will welcome that. Convener, my other questions are not related to this theme, and I do not know whether there is any time for them.

Can I just check the facts, for completeness? I understand that resources are an issue, convener, as is providing detailed feedback for everyone. However, a sample exercise could quite easily be done on, say, 50 or 100 unsuccessful bidders—I apologise; I do not know what an appropriate number would be—over a period of time in order to find out whether they reapply. Some kind of data analysis could be done. What I was asking is whether that has been considered. If not, would it be considered?

I find that encouraging. I am not part of these deliberations, but I would just say that, as the committee concludes this particular post-legislative scrutiny, I am sensing a frustration that, in the committees that I sit on, we are always thinking about what is next, rather than the good work that has taken place up to this date. However, that is just what politicians do.

You have mentioned burdens on businesses. I get that, but we also have to think about what the right thing to do is and to support businesses in doing it, instead of using terms such as “burdens on businesses”. If we are to have a proper partnership across portfolios, we have to enable businesses to see the value in doing the right thing, instead of our talking about it in terms of burdens. Maybe the language has to be changed a little bit.

I have another question. We know that public bodies report annually on all this, and we know that there are strategies, but the committee has heard that, quite often, there is an inconsistency in the way in which the aims contained in those reports and strategies are linked to outcomes in reality. I did not know—though I do now—that there was an annual synthesis report that pulls together some of that stuff. Does the minister recognise those inconsistencies? What efforts have been made to address them?

Is my point about aims in strategies and reports not necessarily being linked to actual outcomes something that the Government is aware of? The committee will want to know whether that is a systemic or an anecdotal thing. How real is it?

I am sure that the committee would welcome further details of that in writing. I do not want to take up more of the committee’s time with this line of questioning, but there is a tension between there being a definition and there being flexibility and the definition being interpreted differently by public bodies. I do not want to make something of something that is not there, so some clarity through correspondence might be quite helpful.