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As I said to the convener, if you look at education, health, social services and even things such as changing places toilets, you see that there is mass discrimination. I will be honest. As I think that I have said previously, I was born with a disability and, before I came into the Parliament, I thought that most disabled people’s experience had been my experience, which had been pretty positive. I went to a mainstream school, to mainstream further education and into mainstream work. I thought that that was most disabled people’s experience.

When I entered the Parliament and started hearing the stories about what the majority of disabled people face and what the majority of parents of disabled children face, I was horrified. I will be honest—I was naive in that regard. Until you start talking to people who have disabilities about how they struggle to get interviews for jobs, how they seem to be at the bottom of the list when it comes to social care or about how their packages are being cut, you do not realise. There is so much that disabled people or parents of disabled children can talk about.

To use a very basic example, in Edinburgh, we are very good at clearing the main roads for the buses, as they should be. However, that is no good to me on an icy day if I cannot get out of my house to the main street, and no one ever clears the side streets. Older people, people in a wheelchair or those with some form of disability that makes them more likely to slip are housebound for far longer than others. That voice has not been heard by us in the Parliament or by other bodies in Scotland.

Absolutely. I appreciate that £1 million or £1.5 million sounds like a lot of money, but in a £30 billion budget, it is not so much. When the Scottish Government was promoting the Hate Crime and Public Order (Scotland) Act 2021, it spent £400,000 or thereabouts on that. A third of the budget for a commissioner was spent, not on introducing that act, but simply advertising it on social media and through other forms of communication. The cost for the commissioner sounds like a lot of money, but it is not in real terms, and this is something that needs to happen.

Two weeks ago, we heard that, although the Government was going to commit £10 million to changing places toilets—that money has been promised for the past four to five years—that has now been taken away. If that had related to another protected characteristic, there would have been outrage in the Parliament, and people would have been emailing and writing to members. However, because it has happened to disabled people and, looking at it realistically, because of all the problems that they have, there has not been much of a campaign on the issue. However, that will be a massive blow to many people with disabilities.

The commissioner is an investment in relation to what the Government, local authorities and other public bodies do. We are setting this up over the long term; it is not just a one-year budget decision. I think that it is worth funding the commissioner until that review, if it ever takes place.

Good morning. I will start with funding, and specifically multiyear funding. From your experience in your different organisations, what is the benefit of multiyear funding? Are there any disadvantages to multiyear funding? You probably want it for 100 years but, realistically, what timescale are we looking at for multiyear funding? Is it two, three or five years? From your experience, what would work best? We will start with Judith Turbyne and work our way along the line of witnesses.

I will follow up on that briefly. Obviously the money itself is important, but is there, to a degree, a perception of work in the third sector that is based on the funding model? The Government guarantees funding for public bodies and public services for indefinite periods, so a doctor or someone who works in the Parliament knows that they are going to get paid, and have a job, next year, but that is not true for the third sector. Does that affect recruitment, because people do not want that lack of stability?

I see the problem that you are outlining, Rachel, but what is the solution? How do we get around that problem?

I want to address one other issue, convener.

As always, convener.

On the issue of Disclosure Scotland fees, you will be aware that the Scottish Government is consulting on whether the fee should now be paid by the individual or the charity rather than by the Scottish Government. What impact would that have on people volunteering or on the organisation?

Good morning, panel members. Thank you for making time to take our questions. What is the benefit of multiyear funding to organisations, and what are the obstacles at the moment to getting it?

I think that the convener was going to tell me off there. It is important that we get your views on the record, but could we keep the answers slightly briefer? Otherwise I will be told off by the convener once you all leave the room.

With regard to the letters about in-principle decisions, are we going back to what the situation was like before the pandemic? Is the situation something that disappeared during the pandemic and has come back, or are we talking about a longer period of time?