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Cabinet secretary, current history teachers who marked the exam said that they were “confused and demoralised” and that those who were in charge of assessments have “effectively destroyed the subject”, and your colleague Fergus Ewing has said that the process has been “fatally flawed”.

I note where we are today and what has been investigated. You have a power to regulate procedures in the SQA. You said that you are happy enough and that we need to move on, but do you not consider that the questions have not been answered, that a lot of people will not want to be markers any longer and that a lot of people will not have confidence in the next history exam? What is angering pupils and parents is the fact that people who are going to sit the next exam will not have confidence in it. Do we actually need a new, independent investigation to look at the issue, and not an internal process?

I take on board what you said about the Welsh being involved, but the report has not cleared things up. I am not sure whether you think that time will mean that things move on and people will just have to live with it, but does this not show that there is a problem at the heart of the SQA? Are you taking advice from your colleagues who are not happy with the process?

I am hearing mixed opinions about whether we are stuck in a vacuum until the legislation is sorted. The Government might decide that legislation to establish a national social work agency could be part of the Promise bill. However, I looked at the Government’s web page on that today, and there are just a couple of photos about what it will look like and what work will be done.

The national social work agency is what is meant to be driving change. It is meant to set standards and then monitor how councils take forward the work. Are you saying that we do not really need that agency and that that work has been happening, or has it not been happening?

What would the trigger be? If a teacher contacts you tomorrow to say—

I thank the witnesses for joining us this afternoon. Confidence and trust in the exam system really matters, and the internal investigation has not restored that trust—we all need to admit that. In fact, I think that it has undermined trust even more. We see it all online—that the SQA is marking its own homework and the investigation is a whitewash. How do you move on from that? I put that question to the cabinet secretary first.

You have answered a lot of the questions that I was going to ask about workforce planning and so on, but I want to return to some of the issues that Jackie Dunbar raised in her line of questioning. Ben, you touched on the principles of good transition. In your opinion, how much of the Promise—you might want to give a percentage—is now being delivered?

I ask that because, as Willie Rennie said in the previous evidence session, we met young people back in 2020 who thought that it was a really good piece of work. We are now halfway through the time and they are becoming cynical about what it means. I am concerned that lessons have not been learned. For example, we have heard from young people about the removal of compulsory supervision orders at 16 to manage casework, which is still happening today. There still seem to be bad decisions and a lack of advocacy in the system. In relation to the Promise and the transition, how much is, in reality, now being delivered on the ground?

Ben, as I mentioned you, I will bring you in first. I know that it is a difficult question, but it is an important one.

I will continue on the same theme. Back in 2003, Angela Constance, the minister at the time, told the Scottish Association of Social Work conference that the Government aimed to establish a national agency and that it would be operational by 2025. Fraser McKinlay, you have said that you think that systemic barriers are getting in the way of delivery. If we are being completely honest, halfway through delivering the Promise, the necessary scaffolding of the workforce is not there, is it?

The plan to deliver the Promise keeps referencing the national care service, but, three weeks ago in the Parliament, the minister could not rule out ditching the care service, and I do not think that there will be a functioning NCS bill before the end of this parliamentary session. What is your view on that, with regard to all the promises around the workforce?

Okay—thank you for that.

Finally, has the Government explored the potential feasibility of local authorities having central teams to support the universal provision of outdoor education? Would the Government propose or support staffing around that if the bill is passed?

It is agreed service delivery through integration joint boards.

Regarding the 45 sports governing bodies, BBC Scotland undertook an inquiry into how many youth football coaches were working with children before they had received a PVG check. Is the Scottish Government confident that that has been rectified since 2017, and that no one will have been working with young people without having gone through a check?