Seòmar agus comataidhean

I will keep my substantive questions until later, convener.

Good morning to the panel—I am checking; it is still morning. I am intrigued by something that you said, and I also want to pick your brains on another point.

It is widely expected that if bail is unopposed it will be granted, and that if bail is opposed and the prosecution seeks to maintain such opposition, the judge has a protocol and a process to follow. Is it your understanding or belief that opposition to bail is being overused? By that I mean the following. Clearly, bail is being opposed for good reason, based on the information that is available to the Crown and the prosecution. Why are we seeking to resolve the problem by limiting the judge’s discretion in the scenario where bail is opposed, rather than by educating the Crown on the parameters that it should use to oppose bail? There are two sides to the coin, but which is the better way to address the issue?

Thank you. I appreciate that other members want to ask questions, convener.

The question is, though, how do you resolve those issues? The question that faces us all is whether there should be a centralised approach of removing power, authority and, probably, funding from the current structure in which services are delivered locally by local authorities through ring-fenced grant budgets from the Scottish Government and giving it to some form of nationalised service. We need to consider the implications of that.

It is still very unclear where the money will flow from, where it will be diverted to and which cohort of people will deliver the service. You talk a lot about lived experience, but I get the impression that we are not listening to the lived experience of front-line social workers, who are telling us, and have given us evidence that, to quote one Aberdeen city health and social care partnership,

“it is leadership not structure that is the most important.”

COSLA is concerned that removing justice social work from local authority responsibility will impede multi-agency working with other local authorities. A local approach is the best one, because those services are best managed and delivered locally.

There is a concern that nationalisation will result in, effectively, a privatisation of the service, whereby work that is currently being done by people who are paid and employed by the public sector will be outsourced through a national procurement process to a third party—perhaps a commercial or private one. Is that a genuine risk?

In that case, I am happy to give way to other members. If possible, I would then like to come back with a summary of what I would like to say.

I am all for ministerial accountability, but that does not address any of the practical questions that have been put to the committee to which we do not have answers. It seems that no one has answers to practical questions such as whether all the social workers who are currently employed by local authorities will be transferred, under the Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) Regulations, to some form of other Government agency. All those things remain known unknowns.

Given that we have issues with retention and churn in the social work sector and massive problems with resource to deliver local services, it is unclear how any of what you describe will address the clear current shortfalls.

Before you come on to that point, I will respond to the financial issues regarding the bill. At the end of the day, in all this, money talks. You will be acutely aware of what I think was a highly critical, and unanimous, report from the Finance and Public Administration Committee on the weakness of the financial memorandum to the NCS bill.

Will the money follow from the current status quo of grant funding to local authorities and be redistributed to another agency or body, or will it continue to flow as is, with—as you said—only the lines of accountability changing?

And stress—there is a huge amount of stress.

I am sure that you look forward to it. I commend to you watching the video of that evidence session. I went into the meeting with a very open mind, but, having sat through the evidence from Social Work Scotland, COSLA, Unison and members of health and social care partnerships, it was difficult to come away with any sense of positivity about the potential inclusion of community justice in the proposed national care service. A number of criticisms were made about consultation prior to the publication of the bill, which I do not think have been addressed, and a number of valid concerns were raised about the structure of what any such integration might look like, particularly around people, funding, structures, leadership and so on. I appreciate that you have not watched that evidence session, but, without having seen it, I am sure that you will understand what some of those criticisms might be. Will you respond to them?

That is not the Scottish Government.

Good morning. Minister, did you follow the evidence session that the committee held on 23 November?

Before I comment, may I ask what we will be asked to do procedurally? That might affect what I say next, if that makes sense.