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Thank you—I appreciate that.

Could I just—

Good morning, cabinet secretary, and good morning to your colleagues. You must have heard the discussions last week and, possibly, those earlier today about the debt issue that was faced by some councils in England. The question for us around this table is whether there is a risk that Scottish local authorities could face a similar situation. What are your views on that?

The big difference between down south and here was the complete collapse of the external Audit Commission there. The audit function as a whole did not appear to function in some of the councils that have been mentioned. Members discussed that last week, but I believe that we have a strong internal and external audit function in Scotland, which is principally led by Audit Scotland, but which can be found in council departments, too.

The worry for the public when they hear such stories is whether something similar could happen in Scotland, but the drift of the conversation has been that it is unlikely to happen here, because of the protections that we have to guard against that and the measures that you have described, Jamie. Is that a fair comment?

Okay.

The Accounts Commission reported that

“the lack of transparency ... makes it difficult to draw firm conclusions on councils’ planned use of reserves.”

Would you share that view, and would you encourage councils to be a bit clearer about what they plan to do? Reserves are listed in various categories, which we found difficult to follow.

My questions were alluding to how we encourage more employers to participate in the principle of fair work, which is great, as, I am sure, colleagues agree.

Could I ask a couple of questions more about the survey itself? Do we know whether the questions that led to the results about Scotland’s relative positions were aimed at staff or the employers? How do we know whose perspective we see here in this data?

One of the key principles is about respect in the workplace. I am looking at the aggregate table from your report, which is in the papers that we have. It seems to break down respect into two categories: workplace non-fatal injuries and work-related ill health and disease. The key principles talk about things such as wellbeing and dignified treatment. I am curious. How do we measure that? I suggest to you that you can measure that only by asking staff what they think and whether they are treated with respect in their jobs. Is that captured in this data?

What about the wider position on a public-facing accreditation framework?

Good morning. I would like to ask a few questions about the attitudes of employers and staff to the issues that we are discussing.

Firstly, are you getting a sense, or did the researchers get a sense, that Scottish employers are engaging with the principle of fair work much more these days? Is the engagement accelerating? Is there quite broad participation? Did the researchers ask that?