Edrych Liam McArthur. Genial, mae'n fywch yn ei wneud am y naeth. Mae r espaidwyr hwn iawn. Mae'n yn wneud am fy ffrindwyr oherwydd, mae rhydwng i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i fynd i eu llwyntannu Ffarrawr Cymraeg gan gweinidol, trwy gweinidol i'r Ffarrawr Cymraeg, byn 2025. Felly mae'n ddod oedd â gweinidol i'r ffarrawr cysylltol gan gweinidol. In that debate, a year ago, I committed to leading the publication of a fair work action plan, setting out how this government and our partners will take forward a range of measures to embed the principles of fair work in our society. Presiding Officer, I'm pleased to be able to confirm to Parliament that our action plan was published on the 27th of February. In pulling together our fair work action plan, we have sought to work with others—the fair work convention, the STUC, business in the community of Scotland and individual businesses and organisations. I want to thank them for their support and assistance. The evidence is clear that fair work is good for workers, good for business and good for Scotland. For workers, fair work brings increased security, better physical health and greater psychological wellbeing. For business, it provides a platform to ensure a more engaged and committed workforce. Workers who have got challenges and opportunities, solve problems, offer insight and ideas for business improvement and create value. Fair work can also drive productivity gains, release and tap potential and inspire innovation. It adds value to jobs and business and creates a stronger, more sustainable and inclusive economy. At today's debate, it offers us the opportunity to reflect on the progress that we have made in our journey but also the distance that we must yet travel. We established the fair work convention in 2015 to offer us independent advice. We have endorsed the vision set out in the framework for fair work to be better in workplaces across Scotland by 2025, building the five dimensions that they have identified as to what that constitutes. Work that offers effective voice, opportunity, security, fulfilment and respect. Willie Rennie I agree with all the minister's ambitions on that, but can he tell us why progress to get businesses to sign up to the business pledge has been so slow?  Why is that? I am going to come to the business pledge. I recognise that not enough businesses have signed up to it. That is why we committed to refreshing the business pledge. I will come to that a little later, because that was part of the work of this action plan. Fair work balances the rights and responsibilities of employers and workers and work that generates benefits for individuals, organisations and society. Decent pay is, of course, fundamental to fair work. We were the first Government in the UK to become an accredited living wage employer. Our support in promoting the real living wage, funding the poverty allowance to take forward a range of activity, has seen more than 25,000 people in Scotland having an increase in pay to at least the living wage through the living wage accreditation scheme. It has seen us achieve our ambition of 1,000 scots-based accredited living wage employers with currently over 1,300 in Scotland. It sees us as the best performing of all four UK countries in terms of our proportion of the workforce paid at least the real living wage. Still, we must do more. There remains too many in our working population paid less than that level. We will continue to work with and fund the poverty alliance to further increase the number of people employed who are paid at least the real living wage by at least a further 25,000 over the period 2021. We will target low-paid sectors, and we will work to create more living wage places, following Dundee's lead, as our first living wage city announced just last week. We will also provide funding to neighbour-adult social care workers to be paid the real living wage. The Fair Work convention continues to provide Scottish ministers with expert advice and recommendations most recently through their report on fair work in the social care sector in Scotland. The Government welcomes the convention's activity and its report. Our action plan sets out that we will work with partners to consider and respond to the recommendations that it lays out to ensure that fair work is embedded in the delivery of social care services, including the procurement process. We are making progress in other areas. We collaborated with the Scottish Trade Union Congress to publish the severe weather charter. We have developed statutory guidance and best practice on fair work in public procurement. We have developed a fair work agreement between Scottish ministers and civil service trade unions. At 22 projects, we received support through our Workplace Equality Fund, which delivers employer-led innovative solutions to overcome workforce inequality. We will expand that fund this coming year to enable businesses with innovative ideas to embed the dimensions of the fair work framework in their workplaces. We will continue to call on the UK Government to respond to the challenge of creating a fair work environment. From introducing the trade union act to blocking the private member's bill that Stuart MacDonald MP brought forward seeking to ban unpaid work trials, the UK Government has demonstrated that we cannot rely on them on the fair work agenda. As we lay out in our action plan, we will continue to make the strong case that they need to go further, to put fair work at the centre of labour market policy. Presiding Officer, just as I recognise that we have made progress but face challenge, so too do I recognise that we must work with others to listen and learn. Along with the fair work convention, I will host an international fair work summit later this year. I want this to be an opportunity to spotlight what Scotland is achieving but also to learn from elsewhere and share best practice. In the coming weeks, I will invite all parties in this Parliament to participate in a fair work round table so that we can collectively identify actions to ensure that fair work is embedded in Scotland's workplaces by 2025. Our fair work action plan will not sit fixed in time. It will evolve to respond to changes to our economy and our society. I want to hear from others in that process of development, and I commit to Parliament to pursue the fair work agenda in an inclusive way. Presiding Officer, many employers already demonstrate fair work. They must build on this and convey the compelling case for fair work to get every employer in Scotland fully behind our effort. To help employers, the Scottish Government will introduce a new benchmarking tool that will identify practical steps to help to progress their fair work journey. We will work with small and micro employers to develop a new online service to access guidance, support and tools to help to adopt fairer practices. As part of our activity and drawing together our action plan, we have engaged extensively with employers over the past year, including to review the Scottish business pledge. We have responded to business feedback more clearly and more clearly aligned the pledge to our fair work agenda. It retains payment of the real living wage as a core commitment and includes environmental impact for the first time. As I have set out to Willie Rennie, I want to see more businesses taking our pledge. That is why we are creating a new business-led learning network to better support businesses to achieve the business pledge. Through our action plan, we have set out our determination that all public investment promotes fair work. Through our new fair work first approach, which was announced by the First Minister in October last year, we will make full use of the Scottish Government's financial powers. By the end of this session, we will attach fair work criteria to as many funding streams, business support grants and public contracts as we can. At this level, we will drive investment in skills and training, no inappropriate use of zeroes contracts, action to tackle the gender pay gap, genuine workforce engagement, including with trade unions and payment of the real living wage. Nail Findlay. I welcome what the minister said, but can I advise why the Government rejected such proposals when they were put forward by Labour during the passage of the previous public procurement bill? Jamie Hepburn. I find that an extraordinary intervention right now from a party whose leader, just this weekend, stood up and said that he now supports the devolution of employment law to this place, something that this party has long called for, long campaigned for, and he now stands there and makes virtue of the fact that his party is calling for it when they stood square against it when we had the Smith commission process. So we all have records. We can stand behind Mr Findlay. I think that the point that we should make and the point that I will hope to work forward from on a collective, inclusive basis is how we move forward in that regard. I welcome the Labour Party's movement on the devolution of employment law. What we will do is work with Scottish Enterprise to pilot fair work first, starting with regional selective assistance grants awarded from next month. Those are some of the actions that we will take to continue to promote our fair work agenda. We will work with business organisations, with individual employers and workers, with the fair work convention and our trade union partners, and with all parties in this parliament to keep Scotland at the forefront of progressive policy thinking and action. We will continue to listen, respond and support organisations at various stages of their fair work journey. We will work to build a fair work movement and to put fair work at the heart of the Scottish approach to growing the economy. That is the aim of our fair work action plan, which I commend to this Parliament and beyond. People should be treated fairly in the workplace. Taking up a job, our laws recognise that employees have certain rights, rights that are in inalienable, rights that cannot be waived or simply signed away in an agreement brought about by unfair or unequal bargaining positions. We have long recognised the need to enforce employment rights, and they have often reflected some of the most fundamental rights that individuals have in our society. In the past, those battles were fought on indentured servitude, the conditions in the factories equal pay and disability discrimination. For some, the question was about the most basic right of all, to come home safely from work at the end of the day. Across many of those areas, there are still examples to be found of bad practice and progress to be made. As the labour market and working practices have changed, there are new challenges for building fairness in the workplace. We must translate the principles beyond our employment rights into circumstances that are quite different from when those principles were first envisaged. Members will be aware that the UK Government has been looking into this area and published the similarly named good work plan at the end of last year. I am hopeful that ministers in this Parliament will have been having discussions with the UK Government on the potential for co-operation, because, as the Scottish Government's action plan acknowledges, collaboration, engagement and influence will be key to furthering its objectives. It is important, too, that solid links are built with business and that the Scottish Government uses its influence to persuade employers of the benefits that fair working conditions provide. As we have recently marked International Women's Day, it is worth reflecting on some of the issues that persist around gender in the workplace. Across the UK, we are seeing gender pay gap that is at its lowest level in decades. Despite those achievements, the present position is simply and straightforwardly not good enough. It is important that Governments at all levels continue to encourage employers to look at pay differentials and take action against their gender-based disadvantage. In too many occupations, however, we are still seeing occupational segregation, including in areas such as high-paying STEM jobs. Unfortunately, gender segregation in employment begins at an early age. When it comes to subject choice, we see stark contrast that continues through education. In colleges, in apprenticeships and in universities, even in new schemes such as foundation apprenticeships, the old gendered subject choices have been allowed to filter through. Another area that we have to tackle is the barriers to returning to work following a pregnancy. As the action plan recognises, the Scottish Government has introduced its women's returners programme. In regard to the programme, as with others, evidence and data gathering are vital. We should be able to say clearly what impact Government interventions are having on the labour market and, as clearly as possible, what those interventions are, where those interventions are working. In publishing the fair work action plan, the Scottish Government acknowledged that it will form part of a suite of labour market action plans that include disability, employment delivery plan, the gender pay action plan and the future skills action plan. I have spoken a little about the gender pay gap, but it is worth considering those other areas, too. As our economy changes more rapidly, a proper focus on reskilling and life-long learning will be essential. In terms of employment for people with disabilities, there has been good progress in this area across the UK for some years now. However, our ambitions should be nothing short of transformative. Far too many people with disabilities have found themselves excluded from the labour market and from fulfilling their ambitions. There is certainly a large body of strategic direction. We must be sure that we can judge its effectiveness. The action plan suggests that a set of indicators will be crafted and that annual reports on progress will be provided, beginning in March 2020. That is all positive, but those indicators must be carefully crafted, thorough and useful in determining the success or failure of individual interventions. Neil Findlay I am talking about the rights of disabled people. I wonder if we would reflect on his Government's treatment of disabled people, particularly through the benefits system and the horrific impact on people claiming universal credit and other benefits. Jamie Halcro Johnston I thank the member for that intervention. As the member will be aware, there are now more disabled people working than there have been before. Every time the same questions come from the Labour benches, every time the same answers are given. One area that we can monitor effectively has been the considerable increase in employment levels both here and in Scotland and across the UK to unprecedented historic highs. Fair work must, by necessity, start with work. Access to employment should underpin the Scottish Government's commitment to building a fair work nation if it is to be successful. With that in mind, skills and employability are key, as are specific schemes such as Fair Start Scotland. Again, the need to monitor their effectiveness and impact is no less important. Another welcome feature of our labour market has been the increase in levels of pay in the last year, firmly ahead of inflation. After disappointing growth following the 2008 financial crash, our good signs are that we are re-entering positive real-terms growth on a consistent basis. At the lower end of the pay spectrum, the national living wage has been significant. The IFS recognised in its report last year that hourly wage growth has been 10 per cent for the lowest-paid workers in comparison to lower growth at the medium. At its core, however, the basis of sustainable growth in earnings must be an increase in productivity. The action plan notes its view that fair work can have a role to play in that. The conclusions of the Fraser of Allander Institute in 2016 on fair work and productivity cover much of the territory. Equally, those measures must be coupled with actions to encourage business growth, entrepreneurship and innovation. How the fair work agenda translates to small and medium-sized enterprises will be important. It is often in the sector that we have seen the slowest response to change, given the increased pressures. Encouraging fair growth, I am sure, will be welcomed across the change, but it must keep pace with the developments in the labour market and the workplace. There is a need to ensure that interventions that are made by the Scottish Government in the labour market are both effective and can be seen as effective. I move the amendment in my name. I remind members of my register of interests. Let me begin by commending the Scottish Government. Their recent agreement with the three civil service unions is welcome. It recognises the role of collective bargaining, offers a commitment to the living wage and to the principles of flexible work-in and to a diverse workforce. It commits the Government to check-off and the protection of trade union facility times. That is a fair work agreement that is welcome. However, the overall fair work action plan, which we are debating this afternoon, is by comparison timid, lacking ambition and a sense of urgency. I am sure that those working women and men on building sites across Scotland, all those industrious people working long hours in factories and offices, the length and breadth of the country and the workers, the young workers especially, contracted on zero hours in shops and bars on every high street in the land. I am sure that they will have rejoiced when they heard the news in the minister's press release that, as a result of his action plan, a new benchmarking tool is now available and that a refreshed business pledge is to be adopted and that a more tailored approach is the new norm. I bet those workers cannot wait. I bet they cannot wait for the real living wage to be rolled out to another 25,000 people over the next three years, still leaving 450,000 people working on poverty pay in Scotland. It was also claimed in the minister's press release and those were the words attributed to him, so I assume that those are the words that he spoke, that many employers are already championing the dimensions of fair work. How many have signed up to the Scottish Government's business pledge? When I checked last night, it was 601. There are over 108,000 private sector employers in Scotland. In other words, only 0.5 per cent of Scotland's employers have signed up to the Scottish Government's business pledge. That is not a mark of success, it is a 99 per cent rate of failure. Michelle Ballantyne agree with me that just because a business has not signed up to this pledge does not mean that it is enacting its contents. Richard Leonard Yes, but this is a specific goal of the Government. To get businesses to sign up to them and the fact that only a half a percentage point of them have is, in my view, a sign of failure. Worse than that, the Scottish Government makes clear in this action plan that it wants to stick with the current approach, that it wants to, in its own words, retain the light touch. When it comes to employment standards, the working women and men of Scotland are not looking for a Scottish Government with a light touch. They are looking for one with a firm and a principal touch, one that is prepared to use the leverage that it has, a Government that is prepared to say that if you are not a living wage employer, if you operate exploitative zero hours contracts, if you deploy tax avoidance, like those umbrella companies so rife in the construction industry, that you will not win public procurement contracts and you will not receive governmental support. Of course, we recognise that the action plan promises to make awards of regional selective assistance dependent on adherence to a set of fair work measures from the start of the next financial year. We welcome that, of course, we welcome that. We have been calling for it for years, but the corollary of this is this. Why is the Government prepared, therefore, to continue to offer other funds and other business support to employers across Scotland that pay below the living wage, which continue to operate zero hours contracts and which do not fulfil their legal duties under the Equality Act. Why is it prepared to keep on paying those companies for up to two more years? Yes, I will give way. Jamie Hepburn As much as I am thoroughly enjoying Richard Leonard's dissemination of all the woes and strife that exists in Scotland right now, there was an invitation to each and every party in this Parliament to come together to discuss the basis of what we set in the action plan, to come together to further the fair work agenda. I have not heard one idea yet, will he have any by the time he accepts that invitation? Richard Leonard Well, I hope that my remarks are a contribution to the discussion about how we take this forward, because the truth is that the landscape of public procurement under the SNP's watch is scarred with unfair work practices. Look at the care sector. Just a few weeks ago, Silverline Care, with six-care homes in Scotland, funded largely from the public purse, moved to derecognise the GMB. Look at the building of the new Dumfries and Galloway Royal Infirmary, where laying a rock refused to allow trading in organisation on the site, let alone any kind of collective agreement. The same company is following the same practices on the Edinburgh St James development, which the First Minister, back then the Cabinet Secretary for Infrastructure, Investment and Cities hailed as innovative, which would, in her words, stimulate growth in the short term and lay the foundations for long-term success. But that is not quite the picture that United has painted for me. They say that, on this contract, laying a rock do not support the policy of the Scottish Government's fair work vision of effective voice. They steadfastly refuse to allow the union to speak to members freely within the welfare facilities on the site. Equally, they do not recognise collective bargaining arrangements or trade union organisations through stewards reps, etc. This is a publicly funded project with Scottish Government money in it, so let me end where I began. It is to the Government's credit that it has struck a fair work agreement with the civil service trade unions. However, if, on a construction site, just a few yards from its St Andrew's house headquarters, on a Government-funded public project, there is a denial of basic employment rights—basic human rights, I would argue—then the Scottish Government is clearly failing in its duty to the people and in its obligation to use all the powers that it has opened to it, which is why I move the amendment in my name. I now call Alison Johnstone to speak to and move amendment 16257.2 for up to six minutes, please. Thank you, Presiding Officer. The Fraser of Allander Institute defines fair work as work that offers effective voice, opportunity, security, fulfilment and respect. Those benefits underpin one another. Employees who can make their voice heard are more likely to feel fulfilled by their work and respected in the workplace. The research institute is clear that fair work leads to better quality and more fulfilling jobs. That is why I am pleased to welcome the publication of the Government's fair work action plan as the next step in the process of creating fair working conditions for all in Scotland. We certainly have to keep moving forward in a time when zero-hours contracts are prevalent amongst the younger generation—we will not exclusively found amongst our young people—and where some employers remain resistant to paying the real living wage. It remains the case that a woman's earnings over her lifetime are likely to be markedly lower than her male colleagues. The UK has the ninth highest gender pay gap of OECD countries. The gap between the average earnings of women and the average earnings of men is a shocking 16.5 per cent. You can do better. That is compared with a gap of just 5.7 per cent in Denmark, 7.2 per cent in New Zealand. It is clear that, while the Government is making progress on the fair work agenda, I am sure that we would all agree that there is still much more to be done. Everyone deserves to be paid a wage that lifts them out of poverty, and no one should be paid less because of their gender. Greens have persistently called for Government business support services, including grants and loans, to apply ethical criteria such as the payment of the real living wage, no use of exploitative contracts, union recognition and no tax avoidance or use of tax havens. Our 2016 manifesto pledged that Greens would campaign to make business support available only to those companies who plan to pay the real living wage, to avoid zero hours contracts, to recognise trade unions, to reduce the gap between the highest and lowest paid, to pay women and men equally and to be environmentally responsible. Indeed, we were pleased that the Government backed our amendment calling for such conditions to be set during a similar debate in May 2017. I am pleased that that has now been incorporated into the fair work action plan. The fair work first programme will place a new set of criteria for businesses to meet when applying for Government grants and business support. The plan states that employers will be asked to commit to investment in skills and training, to taking action, to close the gender pay gap, to pay the real living wage and to enhance workforce engagement to be eligible for that Government business support. In the past, the Scottish Government has been resistant to our calls to place additional ethical criteria on business grants and loans, preferring the approach of paving the high road by rewarding good behaviour of businesses rather than blocking the low road taken by the poorly behaving businesses. However, that approach is limited. Yes, there will always be those businesses who genuinely want to do the right thing and might just need a bit of help to make it financially viable. For example, how to build those initial costs of a living wage policy into their financial planning. However, there will always be those who will find it beneficial to push exploitation as far as they can get away with and regulation and enforcement will be needed to steer them on to the high path. I would like to think that, when they are steered on to that high path, they too will be convinced of the benefits of such practice. Limiting our focus to only incentivising good behaviour on the part of employers will not help us to create the conditions of fair work across our economy. We recognise that the Scottish Government does not have control over all the policy levers as regulation of employment remains reserved. The attachment of fair work standards to Government-funded grants, loans and businesses is a very important step that we have been calling for over years. The Green amendment welcomes us progress, but it goes further. It asks once again that we take a wider look at our economy, moving beyond the ideological fixation of delivering economic growth. We do have to look at non-growth wellbeing factors such as health, such as job security. I will expand on those in my closing remarks. As for the other amendments today, I welcome Labour's calls that we should look at how fair work conditions can be improved through procurement processes, but so long as we do not have full control over Scotland's economy, we cannot progress this. It would also be unreasonable not to recognise the positive steps that have been taken on strengthening the fair work agenda in this latest action plan. We agree with Labour on the need to go further and faster, but we want to see the commitment to achieving fair work standards by 2025 remain in the final motion. The Conservative site the UK's good work action plan in its amendment, there are some positive developments in it. It does represent a failure to use the ill powers of regulation and enforcement that the UK Government has available, but this Government does not. It also comes from a Government that has introduced its scam national living wage, which is significantly below the real living wage and which only applies to older workers. Thus increasing the exploitation of younger workers, so that Greens will not be supporting the amendment. I look forward to hearing from colleagues across the chamber as the debate progresses. Lest I misheard, I do not think that you moved your amendment, Ms Johnson. I moved the amendment of my name, Presiding Officer. I will call Willie Rennie for up to six minutes, please. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I find it difficult to concentrate on this debate this afternoon, although the UK Parliament is utterly paralysed. The Prime Minister's deal is clearly stone dead and uncertainty continues to damage our economy, with no end in sight to that uncertainty. The case for the British people to have the final say on a Brexit deal can hardly be stronger. I understand his thoughts or elsewhere. Wouldn't it be great given what we are discussing today? If the people of the UK did have a say, and we had a general election, we had a Labour Government coming in that would implement an agenda that would address many of the issues that we are addressing today. I commend Neil Findlay for his cheek intervention, but we support the general aims of the fair work agenda for the Scottish Government. Who can be against greater security for workers, decent wages and a greater voice for those workers? Liberal Democrats believe that it is the workers that are a key to the success of any business. Treat them well and they will treat businesses well. Maximising the talents of our people and ensuring that everyone participates in the economic success of our country is the route to that greater success. We support the real living wage and the pressure on companies to pay that real living wage has created a virtuous circle of decent wages among competitors for a limited pool of good workers. Members will be aware that I had been encouraging Amazon to pay the proper living wage for some time. I communicated with them through the media, but also in person visiting the fulfilment centre in Dunfermline on a number of occasions. I am pleased to see that Amazon has responded and is paying increased wage levels. I have received reports of the knock-on effects too. Businesses in Fife who compete for good workers have now responded and are paying increased wage levels too, otherwise they would lose workers to Amazon. I would also pressurise the Scottish Government on that too. I would argue that Amazon and companies such as Amazon should not receive government grants if they fail to pay the real living wage. I am pleased to see that the Government has responded positively to that as well, with the First Minister's comments quite recently. I picked up from the minister in his opening remarks about some of the detail about how that will be implemented. Although I was disappointed to see that it was just a pilot, I am concerned that it might be a limited pool of companies that that might affect. I would like to know in the summing up from the minister or maybe to take an intervention now exactly what the extent of the pilot will be. Jamie Hepburn. Just for the absolute purpose of clarity, this is not a pilot. This is the beginning of the rolling out of the fair work first principles. We have said that we will start with original selective assistance, and then we work forwards from there, so it is not a pilot. Willie Rennie. I will stand corrected if I thought that the minister had said pilot in his introductory remarks, but he still did not say exactly how many businesses in the first instance that this will cover, because the fear is that this will take some time to be implemented, and I am concerned that the minister does not move fast enough, because we did plague the Government for some time to move on this, and they resisted doing so. He must forgive me for being a little bit sceptical about how fast he is going to move on this. The House of Commons Work and Pensions Committee found that employment significantly reduces the chances of re-offending, but that only 50 per cent of employers would consider employing someone who has come out of prison. I would encourage the minister to perhaps include something for ex-prisoners in the business pledge in the future to make sure that we are maximising the potential of ex-prisoners to our economy. The business pledge is commendable, but I do question the impact that it is having on business practice in Scotland. With only 500 businesses signed up, the impact is pretty limited. The minister has failed to persuade more than 99 per cent of Scottish businesses to sign up, and of the 25 largest businesses in Scotland, most have not been convinced of its worth. Here are some who the Government has not got on board. Scottish Widows, RBS, Bank of Scotland, Scottish Power, Aegon, William Grantonson, Chivas Group, The Weir Group, Aggreco, Life Technologies, Arnold Clark, Chevron North Sea, Stagecoach, Tesco Bank—the list goes on and on of major businesses in Scotland who have not been convinced by Jamie Hepburn and his business pledge. I want to know why that is. Why has the minister been incapable of getting the top 25 businesses alone to sign up to the business pledge? Business Insider is clear who the top 25 businesses are. I want to know whether the business minister has been to see those businesses, whether he is encouraging them to sign up, and what are the reasons why they have not signed up to the pledge. The business pledge has been around for some years now, so the Government has got very few excuses. Having a conference and getting cross-party talks is no cover for the Government's incapability of finding a solution to that. The business pledge needs to be much more successful if we are to make sure that businesses across Scotland are engaging in the fair work action plan or the actually worthy principles that the minister set out at the beginning. However, there is no point in having a fair work action plan if nobody is going to take part in the action plan, if nobody is going to step up and say that we are going to improve the conditions of our workers in those companies. Twenty-five companies, the biggest companies in Scotland, have not signed up to the pledge. Why is that? The minister needs to explain it in his summing up. We now move to the open debate and speeches of absolutely no more than six minutes. We have very little time in hand. I call Annabelle Ewing to be followed by Bill Bowman. I am pleased to have been called to speak in this debate today on the important subject of fair work and more specifically on the Scottish Government's recently published fair work action plan. As we have heard, the plan sets forth a number of key action points to be implemented to ensure that the goal of Scotland being a fair work nation by 2025 is indeed achieved. Quite rightly, the plan envisages close collaboration with employers, employees and trade unions, all of whose input and collaboration will be vital in ensuring that Scotland becomes a fair work nation. The genesis of that ambition can be seen in the establishment by the Scottish Government of the Fair Work Convention back in April 2015. The Fair Work Convention is independent of government and acts as an advisory body to government. It is co-chaired by Professor Patricia Findlay and by Graham Smith, General Secretary of the STUC. The convention has already done, in my view, a power of work in pushing the agenda forward. Indeed, it published its framework in 2016. In that framework document, it set forth its vision that by 2025 people in Scotland would have a world-leading working life where fair work indeed drives forward success, ensures wellbeing and prosperity for individual workers, benefits employers and organisations and indeed is a benefit for society as a whole. I will take an intervention. James Kelly Annabelle Ewing for taking the intervention. In terms of the aspiration of being a fair work nation, how do you feel about the prospect of achieving the Scottish Government's target of 30,000 more people earning the living wage? There are still going to be 450,000 people not being paid the living wage. Surely that is not consistent with a fair work nation ideal?  Annabelle Ewing. What I can say to the members is that, if the Labour Party had not blocked the devolution of employment powers to this Parliament, already the workers who have lost out as a direct result of the Labour Party's intransigence would have seen their position improved. More recently, the fair work convention under 2 can enquire into fair work in social care, and its support was published towards the end of February this year. Important concerns were raised about working terms and conditions, and recommendations have been made to ensure that our vital workers in the care sector are treated… Excuse me, Mr Ewing. It is very, very rude when someone is speaking to have cross-bench conversations going on. I know that the minister is currently reflecting on the report from the fair work convention in social care, and I look forward to receiving his response. I hope that it is a positive response, and that it is a response in the early course from the Scottish Government, because I would say that our social care workers are heroines and, indeed, for those men in the care sector heroes. They deserve to be treated better. Indeed, social care workers in my constituency of Coutinbeath and across Scotland will wish to know that the Scottish Government continues to have their back just as it did when it ensured the payment of the living wage to those care workers with a relationship with local authorities. As far as the fair work action plan itself is concerned, important action points have been set forth, including, importantly, a commitment indeed to increase the number of people who are paid the real living wage through the powers that we have, which are through, basically, encouragement and collaboration and partnership working, not the substantial powers of employment that every other normal country would take for granted. We would be able to do so much more for the benefit of its workforce. However, a lot of good work has been done, and, of course, there is always more to do. The Scottish Government will continue its important partnership working with the poverty alliance to see the number of those receiving the real living wage in Scotland boosted. Other commitments include the development of a fair work framework, benchmarking tool, which will help to guide employers to assess their current practices and to see what more they can do. Indeed, the Scottish business pledge, which has been mentioned by some members, a review of its operation was carried out in 2018, and the recommendations set forth reflect the look at how it was operating practice. Obviously, more needs to be done, but I suggest gently that it would be incumbent on all of us, individually as MSPs, to do what we could to advance the fair work agenda for workers in our constituencies and across Scotland. The number of signatures stands at around 600, and I am sure that, if we all put our hands to the wheel, we could see that figure rise considerably. At the end of the day, the message to get across to business is that treating your workforce properly is not only the right thing to do, it is also the smart thing to do in order that that business can achieve its potential. I believe that that message is starting to get across, but we all can do so much more. Other key action points, including creating a new online fair work service for small and micro employers so that they can access more easily the support and guidance that they may need, supporting trade unions to embed fair work in the workplace and encouraging the inclusion of a collective disputes procedure in construction contracts. Alongside the fair work action plan, it is important to mention the gender pay gap action plan, where we see some 50 recommendations that will be required to be taken forward, including, importantly, a women's returners programme to help those who have had a career break, a really innovative approach to trying to get those women back into work and looking also at flexible working practices, another important area for particularly women in the workplace. In conclusion, a lot of work is going on across the piece, and I give credit to the Scottish Government for indeed driving this important agenda forward. As I say, it is being driven in the main by collaboration and encouragement, because this Parliament does not have powers over employment law. However, if this Parliament did have such powers, how much more progress could be made over a much shorter period? Just imagine how much easier my job would be if everyone would keep to six minutes. Bill Bowman, followed by John Mason. I welcome the chance to speak in this debate. I am sure that there is broad consensus across the chamber on the importance of fair work. However, we may not all agree that the fair work action plan is precisely the right way in which to do that. Nicola Sturgeon announced that, by the end of this Parliament, the Scottish Government will extend the application of fair work criteria, including investment in skills and training, no exploitative zero hours contracts, action on gender pay, genuine workforce engagement, including trade unions, and payment of the real living wage. The framework defines fair work as work that offers effective voice, respect, security, opportunity and fulfilment. It balances the rights and responsibilities of employers and workers and can generate benefits for individuals, organisations and society. However, there is no single accreditation that reflects fair work in its entirety, and public bodies and suppliers can support effective fair work practices without being accredited to any of those schemes. Over the past three years, about 600 businesses—that is the highest number that we have had mentioned in the chamber today—have committed to the business pledge, which celebrates companies that boost productivity and competitiveness through fair work values. In response to feedback from businesses, the reinvigorated business pledge retains payment of the living wage as a core commitment, while offering a more tailored approach to meet the individual business needs. As the minister has mentioned, Dundee has become the first city in the UK to be awarded recognition for a plan to become a living wage city. Over 50 Dundee employers, including Dundee City Council, Explore Dundee, DC Thomson and the Dundee and Angus Chamber of Commerce, have voluntarily committed to ensure that all their staff and subcontracted staff receive a real living wage. I agree that, as responsible employers, we need to look at the impact of the living wage and do all we can to assess the implications and solutions. As the chamber is aware, Dundee has many industrial and construction-based employers in the city, which are affected by issues of fair work procurement and competitive supply. The Scottish Government believes that contractors who go beyond minimum legal requirements by adopting fair work practices will increase innovation, improve workplace outcomes and business performance and can positively influence the delivery of a public contract. However, it is important to keep in mind that there may still be those who seek the cheapest solutions to problems. Those can include cutting costs in the procurement stage of construction, which can cause problems, which last the lifetime of a building and which can have an adverse effect on companies in Dundee, such as if they miss contracts due to having charged slightly more in order to comply and pay the living wage. Dundee's ambition to be a living wage city is very much a statement of intent. Looking to double the number of workers covered by the Scottish living wage over the next three years, the economic benefits of change must make a difference to everyone. However, this is not necessarily the case. Only last week I exposed the SNP for failing to help to get older Dundee workers into new jobs following the collapse of large local employers such as Michelin McGill's. I questioned the fairness of the Scottish Government's plans to only offer jobs grants to people aged 16 to 24-year-old following such large job losses in Dundee. Dundee has a highest proportion of residents aged over 50 claiming out-of-work benefits, although it also has a lowest employment rate in Scotland overall. A living wage is all well and good, but when there are so many people who are out of work and therefore would not qualify for a living wage, there needs to be an emphasis on helping to get people back into work and not solely on improving conditions for those who have a job already. The living wage employers already accredited in Dundee and covered the equivalent of a quarter of all the workers in the city. However, the SNP administration leader admitted himself that there is still more work to be done to encourage more employers to sign up. I welcome the general principles underpinning the fair work action plan, however it is not enough to fix the underlying problems without getting people into work as a standalone plan. The UK unemployment rate has not been lower than it is now, not since December 1974. In addition, since 2010, more than £4 million of the lowest-paid workers across the UK have received a higher and fairer share of their take-home pay by being lifted out of tax altogether and having the right to keep more of their hard-earned money thanks to Conservative Governments. That is not the case in Scotland. Work is in Scotland of the lowest wage growth in the UK and the lowest disposable incomes, but they are paying the highest levels of income tax in the UK. The SNP are also including increasing council tax and are trying to hit our hard-hit working population with additional taxes such as the car park tax. The minister states in the forward of the fair work action plan, we want Scotland to be the best place to live, work, invest and do business. If that were the case, then the starting point would be to take an illegal indiref to off the table and stick with the internationally recognised pound as a currency and address some of the hard economic realities that the country is facing. John Mason, followed by Neil Findlay. Thank you very much, Presiding Officer. I am delighted to be able to speak today on the fair work action plan following on the previous debate in this chamber, which was on Thursday afternoon on the International Women's Day. It seems to me that there is a clear link between the two. We focused last week on fair treatment for women and today on fairer treatment for all staff. Since Thursday's debate, I had the opportunity to visit a local business on Friday as part of Scottish apprenticeship week. There we discussed the lack of women in a number of trades. Yesterday I was at Glasgow Caledonia University, where they are also having a big push to change some of the gender stereotypes, and, for example, encouraging more men into nursing with their programme at GCU men are nurses too. We are not specifically focused on the gender pay gap today, but it is mentioned in the action plan, and I am glad to see it mentioned in the summary. Publishing gender pay gap information has been a step in the right direction, but requiring employers to publish a gender pay gap action plan would definitely be a further step forward. I think that we are seeing some of the more gentle side of the Conservatives today, but we know the realities that they have resisted that kind of change. I do not believe that we can achieve real progress on fair work generally if we do not deal with the unfair treatment of women in the workplace. One of the other points that we discussed when I was at Caledonia University yesterday and that they are keen to stress is the importance of ethos, both for themselves as an organisation, but we also talked, for example, about Social Security Scotland and the importance that it should have a different ethos from the DWP. That can have huge ramifications throughout wider society, but it applies to other organisations as well. I note in the overview of actions the point about instilling a fair work ethos in our future workforce and business leaders. Ethos is not an easy commodity to create or even to measure, but I do believe that it is hugely important. If we have the right ethos, we may not need to worry so much about all the detailed rules and regulations. Moving on to organisations having a flexible mindset, I think that sometimes small employers can be nervous about increased regulation, for example enforcing flexibility. A small shop or a small office, and in fact that includes ourselves who generally run small offices, which needs to open, say, nine to five for the sake of its customers, may feel it is little room to be flexible on staff working hours. We have discussed this in my office and we have found that if there is willingness to come and go on both sides, we can come up with solutions such as a shorter lunch hour and allowing somebody to leave early on one day each week. That allows constituents to still have the same service that they need of maximum opening hours for my office. I think that we have to get the balance right between being fair to customers or constituents who provide our income on the one hand but also being fair to staff who work for us at the same time. Therefore, I very much welcome the commitment in the action plan to develop support during 2019 for small and micro employers. It seems to me that, just as the Government and the public sector should set a good example, so should we as Parliament and as MSPs. I might just say in passing that sometimes there does seem to be quite a rigid top-down approach within Parliament so that even though MSPs are individual employers and with very different constituencies, there does seem to be a one-size-fits-all imposed. For example, the maximum hours or the working hours for a full-time employee has been imposed at 35 hours. I am sure that that was for good reasons and I am sure that it should also protect MSP staff from exploitation. However, I do think that there needs to be a balance between imposing rigid rules and encouraging that positive ethos that I mentioned earlier and allowing and encouraging both employers and employees to have a bit of flexibility and to discuss what is best for their individual situations. I mean, another situation was holidays where the Parliament contract suggests when the holidays have to be taken. Moving on to the Labour amendment and in particular its emphasis on the real living wage, which Labour speakers have already mentioned, I think that most of us here support a real living wage, a wage that ordinary people can actually live on. However, it does strike me that Labour is very indirect in its approach in that it is looking for all sorts of devices that we might use to ensure that the real living wage happens but without being able to enforce it, for example, using the procurement process and Scottish Futures Trust, and I am broadly in support of those. However, we have debated that approach at length before and clearly there is a legal tightrope to walk with European competition rules not allowing the mandating of such a non-statutory wage level in the procurement process. I wonder why Labour would not just support full devolution of the statutory minimum wage. It must know that there would be an all-probability agreement in this Parliament for the statutory minimum wage. In this Parliament for the statutory minimum wage, to be brought up to the level of the living wage, why is it then that they want the real powers to stay in London and just mitigate round the edges? I certainly welcome the commitment that grants from Scottish Enterprise will have a fair work criteria attached. I think that we have felt in the past on the economy committee that Scottish Enterprise and others were very focused on attracting investment in jobs but did not give enough emphasis to wage levels, inclusive employment etc. In conclusion, I very much support this action plan. We need to realise that we are in a long-term battle for fair work, and there are a few easy solutions, but I hope that we are all committed to making progress. Scotland's social division is growing across. We see poverty increasing in the gap between the rich and poor expander. For the first time in decades, life expectancy falls. Social divides are the consequence of economic inequality and imbalance of power between workers whose labour creates the wealth of the nation and those who hold shares and or speculate on the businesses that employ them or who own them. At the weekend, Richard Leonard rightly called for the devolution of employment law, but with a key caveat that we deploy a floor that means that no Scottish Government could fall below what the UK Government does. That is exactly right and would protect Scottish workers from any Scottish Government that sought to downgrade workers' rights. We do not have to wait until the devolution of powers to act in many areas that we can act now. Mr Hepburn asked if we would provide some ideas. Let me run through a few for him. We could implement a living wage for all public contracts, including those run by arms-length companies, because contract law is devolved, but it requires the political will to do so. I asked the minister why the Government opposed that during the passage of the public procurement bill, and, like the famous two-runny sketchy, he answered a different question. Maybe he could answer that question now, apparently not. The point has been made that there are strict confines within which we can operate under EU law, but Mr Finlay will understand and recognise that we have laid down significant statutory guidance and regulations to embed fair work in procurement. No other Government has done that. He must surely welcome that. He mentions that he cannot do it because of EU law, and yet the Government claims that it can do it when it implements it in social care. If it can do it in social care, why can we not do it across the peace? We could refuse to give contracts to companies that fail to recognise trade unions, because unionised workplaces are happier, safer, more productive and fairer. We could end the use of umbrella companies in public sector contracts, and those involved in the Scottish Future Trust, because umbrella companies rip off workers, they rip off the taxpayer, and we should insist on direct employment rather than bogus self-employment. The Government has done very little, if anything, on bogus self-employment on its own projects. We could stop main contractors ripping off subcontractors in public sector contracts, such as the case of Vaughan engineering in my region, forced to close after 60 years with the loss of 300 jobs because of the outrageous behaviour of a main contractor. We could insist that trade unions get access to organised projects financed by public money, such as could have happened on the Dumfries hospital, but the trade unions were told to stay off. We could refuse to give contracts to those who have blacklisted workers, such as we could have done at the V&N Dundee, had the Government followed its own guidance and yet ignored it on that contract. We could end the outsourcing and privatisation racket, which saw the likes of Carellian fail, leaving jobs unfinished and thousands out of work. We could insist on apprenticeships and training being a condition of contract and that a training officer is employed in major contracts. That was offered on the Queensferry crossing but was not enacted. We could regulate electricians and I have had the discussion with Mr Hepburn on that and the discussions that we had were positive. I think that that would protect the trade, avoid consumers being ripped off and promote good health and safety, and I look forward to significant progress on that. We could put fair work conditions on the award of all grants to companies such as Cayam and introduce conditionality on the small business bonus, with employers who advanced the fair work agenda rewarded. We could legislate for collective bargaining, not just to promote it. We could end the use of zero hours contracts and public contracts in the public sector, including in colleges and universities. We could expand the number of employees registered as living wage employers out of 340,000 registered businesses. Only 1,300 are living wage employers and only 600 have signed the business pledge. We have a massive way to go on that. We are only scratching at the surface. We could accept the request by Scottish Care and Unison to implement collective bargaining. When I chaired the health committee, we had both sides of the sector asking for to implement collective bargaining. When I asked the then health secretary, Shona Robison, why they would not do it, she said that we have never been asked. That is pretty pathetic. We should do that because there is a crisis in social care and employment crisis there, and both sides believe that collective bargaining is a way to resolve that. We could end the cuts to Scotland's councils that have seen 40,000 jobs lost. We could end the cuts to Scotland's colleges and deliver promises on lecturers' pay. We could bring the railways back into public ownership and ban the dumping of human waste on tracks that workers have to deal with. There is no cost. We let the contract expire and we break ScotRail's contract, which is an absolute disaster, Mr Lyle. The Parliament could unanimously support Clare Baker's corporate homicide bill to hold directors accountable for decisions that cause the death of their employees. We could stop giving public money to companies that systematically avoid paying their taxes. We could recognise and act on the mental health crisis, especially in services and jobs where stress levels are high, providing access to counselling. We could end the exploitation of workers, especially young workers, with the Government exposing those who are exploiting staff like the cases that have been unearthed by better than zero. Those are all things that we could do. I hope that the minister has enough ideas there for him to take forward. I welcome the debate and the actions, including the fair work action plan. I also welcome the Scottish Government's decision to instigate the plan, but more importantly, the collaborative approach that has been taken in delivering it. The amendment in Richard Leonard's name states that it is not bold enough in its ambitions. The Labour Party in Scotland is perfectly entitled to hold that view, but for a party that was in power in Scotland for eight years, powered in Westminster for 13 years and led various councils for decades that led to equal pay claims aplenty. It is a bit rich to cry the crocodile tears at this stage. However, the first stage in redemption is for an organisation to admit that it has a problem. If that is its admission, it might manage to put together some type of coherent message at some point in the very distant future. Neil Findlay, since he is on that theme, might be that Mr McMillan will apologise for his own party's MPs not turning up when the UK Parliament voted to introduce the minimum wage. Maybe he will take his opportunity to apologise for that. Stuart McMillan I think that Neil Findlay needs to look at his own party, first of all, because it is certainly something that clearly he does not want to admit that his party actually has her problems and still does have many problems. Clearly, that is why they will be in third place in this Parliament for many, many decades to come. While more can always be done, whether it is in this issue or health services or human rights and the fact of every aspect of life, it is important to acknowledge that hard work and steps have been deployed to deliver that plan. It is also important to recognise, as the minister said earlier, that employment law is still reserved to the Westminster Parliament, so this Scottish Government is trying to do a job with one hand tied behind its back. I want Scotland to be the best place to live, to work, to be invested in, to do business but also in terms of leisure activities. We live in a wonderful country, but the full potential of our outputs has still to be achieved, but that is about that continual improvement. I welcome the Scottish Government's motion, and in particular the following part. That is the aspect of the endorsement of the actions that it commits the Scottish Government to. It is absolutely crucial to appreciate that, for the action plan to be successful, the full range of partners need to play their part. That is where the fair work convention, the partnership between businesses, trade unions, the public sector and academics, was so important. The fair work framework that was published in 2016 creates that definition of fair work as work that offers all individuals an effective voice, opportunity, security, fulfilment and respect. I would not imagine anybody in the chamber, or in Scotland, to be against that definition. I believe that Scotland is making strides in fair work, and I will certainly underpin our economic success, as well as the wellbeing and prosperity of our people, our communities and business, but what is not to like about that? Many MSPs are already living wage accredited employers. There are 14 accredited employers in my constituency, but I am quite sure that there will be many more who have not yet obtained the accreditation, but they are delivering upon what a living wage employer means. Of the 14 in the Inverclyde local authority area, we have got three private sector, three charity, two transport, two housing, one care, one local authority and also one arts and culture. I am pleased that Inverclyde is playing its part in obtaining accreditation with the 1,000 target that has already been exceeded to more than 1,300. It is clear that businesses recognise the importance of being a living wage employer. Certainly some MSPs today have been quite critical on the fact that there are 1,300. That 1,300 is a third of what was going on across the UK, and the Living Wage Foundation has praised what is going on in Scotland. It is about rich MSPs to talk Scotland down when Scotland is delivering way beyond its percentage share within the UK. It is surely incumbent on all of us to encourage more businesses in our areas to sign up to become living wage employers. I am also delighted that there are 601 businesses who have signed up to the Scottish Business Pledge. I admit and acknowledge that more needs to be done in this area as well. That is where, once again, MSPs have got a role to play to encourage businesses in their areas, their constituencies and regions to play their part to make their communities better. I am equally delighted that the Scottish Government has introduced statutory guidance on addressing fair work practices, including the real living wage, procurement and supporting best practice guidance, and the toolkit. I will also close the gap that MSPs have sent in their briefing, highlighting some aspects that they have sent in their briefing. There is one part of the briefing that I thought was really enlightening. That is the aspect of the unpaid care. The action plan states that one in seven Scots are unpaid carers, and many carers give up work because the job of juggling their work and caring responsibilities simply becomes too much. The minister spoke in his opening contribution regarding learning lessons when he spoke of the fair work summit that is going to be taking place later on. However, I am sure that the minister, although he has been interested in the reports in the media this morning regarding the implementation of the carers Scotland Act 2016, and that money has been spent inconsistently by councils since the Act came into force last year. Clearly, carers have enough challenges to contend with, and I will conclude with that. Michelle Ballantyne, followed by Richard Lyle. Before I commence, I refer members to my register of interest as a business owner and employer. I have no doubt that everyone participating in this debate accepts that fair work helps to deliver sustainable and inclusive growth. Certainly, as an employer, I would absolutely commend some of the things in the action report, but I think that as businesses listening to this kind of debate, they could be forgiven for disengaging with some of this. At the end of the day, this is not about whether you have a sign on your door that accredits you with some scheme. It is about how you treat your employees, how you operate your business and, in doing so, how you improve your position in your marketplace. I think that we need to be careful not to forget that businesses themselves drive what they do in their businesses, not the labels that the Government puts on them. We have already held quite a lot of contributions to that effect, and I am going to try not to repeat some of the things that we have heard already today, but I want to touch on a couple of areas that I want to explore that have come up for me in the last couple of weeks. However, I will start by saying that I do welcome the plan. There is quite a lot in there. A lot of it is wood and needs to be padded out a bit with actions, but I want to hear the Minister's thoughts on a couple of things that I am going to talk about now. The first is that we learned at the start of this month that the Scottish Government's flagship work programme, Fair Start Scotland, is failing to meet the Scottish Government's targets. The work programme was devolved to the Scottish Parliament in 2016, and I do believe that it was a chance to create a bold new tailored programme optimised for Scotland. I hope therefore that the Minister will share my concern that almost half of referred job seekers are not accessing Fair Start Scotland. Although I accept that those individuals can often be those who struggle to engage with the world of work and the steps to enter the workforce, it compares poorly to the current reserved UK programme, where 75 per cent of all the individuals referred have started the scheme. The SNP has set a target of 38,000 people to pass through Fair Start Scotland in three years. The trajectory is that if things continue on their current path, they will fall short of that target by 10,000 participants. Clearly, to develop a fair work economy, the engagement needs to be active between employers, employees and government policy. I will be looking forward to some retort on that. You can give it now if you like. I wonder if Ms Ballantyne would think that part of a fair work agenda would be compelling people to take part in such a programme that is a threat of being sanctioned and losing benefit entitlement, as was the case under the watch of the Department for Work and Pensions. That is a slightly conflated question. I think that what you are trying to do is to get people to engage proactively with a fair start work programme. Clearly, at the moment, it is only having a 50 per cent success rate. What I am looking for from you is how you think we can improve that, because that is the really important thing. Government policy impacts on the quality of the workforce coming forward for employers. That is the second part that I want to ask about today or get your thoughts on today. As an employer, when we are looking for good quality employees and employees that can contribute to a business and improve a business's output, which in turn allows the business to afford better conditions, better wages, etc. Today, in the news again, evidence was given to the education committee by Professor James Scott, highlighting Scottish Government figures showing that the proportion of levers with no exam passes has risen from 1.5 per cent in 2012-13, the year before the current curriculum was bought in, to 2.3 per cent last year, and the figure has more than quadruple from 1 per cent to 4.5 per cent in Dumfries and Galloway and surged to 3.7 per cent in Midlothian. I am quite concerned then that, if the Scottish National Party wants Scotland to be a prosperous world-leading country—which, of course, is not just you who wants that, I think that everybody in this chamber is looking for that—you must be able to revitalise the economy. The first step on that road is to ensure that we have the workforce that Scotland needs. I would like your thoughts on that. If we do not start with a good baseline of youngsters coming out of school with decent qualifications—or some qualifications, which is the problem that we seem to have at the moment—it is difficult for businesses to then be looking to pay more, have better conditions, and they will be looking outside. I think that our youngsters lose out. The third big point that I want to talk about is the role that older people have to play breathing life into Scotland's economy. We learned yesterday from census-wide Scotland that one in three Scots fear that they will have to continue working to make ends meet. Not only that, more than half of Scots do not have any plans to financially support themselves in retirement, instead relying on the state pension. Many people will have to keep working after 65. In fact, half of older people over that age are still working, and we need to support and utilise their skills. Scotland has a huge wealth of older talent that is ready to be unlocked, but, nevertheless, it seems to be underutilised. I know that my colleague Bill Bowman touched on that earlier today. In recent weeks, I have been hearing myself from employment professionals across the borders. Many older people want to work, but they are sometimes struggling to find a place in the labour market that is increasingly youth-orientated but would nevertheless benefit from their experience. There are many projects in place to help young people to develop and to get into work, such as the job grant or the modern apprenticeship scheme. Have you given any thoughts on what about the same opportunities for older people? I will wind up there with four or three things for you to answer, but I would be grateful for them. I welcome the opportunity to contribute to the Scottish Government's debate on fair work action plan. When I was campaigning for election as a constituency MSP for Erdingsson and Belsill, I made my campaign focus on the issue of what I called jobs. Recognising the absolute need to work to support an environment in a local area that created jobs, brought an investment, delivered opportunities to deliver skills, develop skills with our young people in particular. One such example of a business that is doing that is saltire heating systems in my constituency. I visited them just last week for apprentice week and had the chance to hear from young workers about their plans for the future, what they thought about their opportunities and their vision. Naturally, jobs, jobs, jobs are only one element of ensuring that good working practice gets created. With jobs, jobs, jobs should always come fairness and equality. That is what I believe the Scottish SNP Government is working hard to deliver. I welcome the publication of the fair work action plan and endorse the action that it commits the Scottish Government to do. In doing so, I recognise and share the vision for Scotland to be a fair work nation by 2025. We will do so by recognising the important and vital role that employers and trade unions have in creating fairer workplaces and by acknowledging also the crucial work of fair work in developing sustainable and inclusive growth. I believe that the SNP and the Scottish Government are clear. We want Scotland to be the best place to live, work, invest and do business. Our plan delivers on that ambition. Fair work is the foundation for that plan. Indeed, a prerequisite for it to happen is a sustainable way. What is fair work? That is a question that many ask. In order to deliver it, we must establish what it looks like. The Fair Work Convention, a partnership of businesses, trade unions and public sector, academics based at the University of Strachly, published its framework in 2016. It defines its fair work as, work that offers all individuals an effective voice, opportunity, security, fulfilment and respect. That is fair work in a nutshell. We on this bench believe that Scotland can make strides in fair work that will underpin our economic success, as well as the wellbeing and the prosperity of our people, communities and business. Fair work has been an important part of Scotland's Scottish Government inclusive growth agenda. From the publication by the Scottish Government of its Fair Work Action Plan on 27 February, it sets out the Government's plans for Scotland to be a world-reading fair work nation by 2025, as I have highlighted. It rightly includes a range of measures to support employers to embed fairer working practices. While more can be done, we should recognise some of the fantastic progress that has been made so far, including meeting and exceeding our target of 1,000 Scots-based living wage accredited employers now over 1,300. I am proud that many of my colleagues here and I here in this Parliament are showing leadership on this issue. Introducing statutory guidance on addressing fair work practices, including the real living wage, procurement and supporting best practice guidance and toolkit, and introducing the workplace equality fund to deliver employer-led innovation solutions to overcome workplace inequality. Introducing the women's returners programmes to assist women to re-enter the workplace following a clear break. Establishing a care positive scheme to encourage flexible fair and supportive policies to support carers in the workplace. Promoting development of flexible workplaces through continual funding for family flexible working Scotland. Presiding officer, I could go on and on, but this short list demonstrates quite effective layer record on working to equalise great affair and equitable approach to work. It is important to recognise that all of this is being done within the context of employment law being reserved to the UK Government. The SNP Government in Scotland is doing all that it can with the powers available to promote fair work practices. As with so many issues, this is our record with devolution. Imagine the potential that we could have to deliver our great nation with the powers of independence. No, I do not have time. The SNP Government is not only one for resting on its laurels and more can and will be done. I note that there are many plans to fulfil collaboration with the Fair Work Convention to organise and host an international fair work summit in 2019-20. The summit will showcase Scotland's approach to fair work on international stage, making connections across a fair work movement in Scotland, the UK and Europe. The Government's approach to delivering fair work is built on collaboration, engagement and using our wider powers and policies to accept strategic influence. The bank government's action plan seeks to deliver fair work to a diverse and inclusive workforce. In many proposed actions, highlight current and planned work of the Scottish Government and stakeholders, including the STUC fair work convention, the poverty oil alliance to address challenges to deliver fair work in specific sectors. The Scottish Government, I believe, will extend the workplace equality fund to align with the fair work first commitment, contentive support, strong trade unions, promote collective bargaining, promote fair work in the collaborative economy, and take forward actions that are related to the fair work convention, social work report. Increase the number of people employed who are paid the real living wage and insecure work. I commend that motion. I call James Kelly to be followed by Bill Kidd. Thank you very much, Deputy Presiding Officer. I think that this is a very timely debate, because it is now nearly five years since the procurement Scotland bill was passed by this Parliament. One of the big debates on that bill was the mandating of the living wage and public procurement contracts. It is worth to reflect back on that debate, not to go over the debate again, but to then look five years down the line and to examine what progress there has been. Going back to 2014, Labour argued for the mandating of the payment of the living wage and all public contracts. The Government, as we have heard in the benches this afternoon, was very keen on it, but it could not do it. It would be breaking EU law. It was all very difficult. I think that that was a bit of a red hern at the time, as Mr Finlay pointed out in terms of how it has been laid out in the care sector. Clearly, it was a red hern, but what the Government then said was that we are really keen on payment in the living wage, and we will make sure that the guidelines are strong. It is made clear to the public that public contracts have been set out and that the expectation is that the living wage should be paid. How has that gone? If you go back to 2015, there were 460,000 people in Scotland who were not being paid the real living wage, and today that figure is 480,000. Sadly, the situation has deteriorated in terms of people being paid the real living wage. The figures that he has provided are not inaccurate. We must do more, but he would accept that, as a proportion, it has fallen because there are more people in employment today, so there are also more people earning above the real living wage. James Kelly Of course, minister, I think that you are dancing on a heavier pin. The reality is that there are 20,000 people more who are on poverty wages, not being paid the real living wage than they were in 2015. I am outlining this simply to say that, going back five years, as a Parliament and a Government, we have not made the progress that we should have done if we listened to some of the speeches that were made back in 2014. That is backed up by examining the fair work action plan. As many have said, only 601 employers, 0.55 per cent, have signed up to the business pledge. I want to make some progress. I will let you in later on if I get a chance. Nowhere is the situation more stark in the city of Glasgow that I represent. 150,000 people in Glasgow have not been paid the real living wage. There is a poverty alliance pointed out in their briefing for the debate. Even if we are able to make some progress on that with a quarter of 37,500 people, if we were able to make that progress, that would boost the Glasgow economy by £27 million. There would also be increased tax revenues coming in to the Scottish Government by £16 million, so there are real advantages in that. The other thing that I would say in Glasgow is that, as well as poverty wages, there is a tie-in to sadly exploitation. I am aware of two examples in terms of retail stores in Glasgow. One that runs relatively short fixed-term contracts and changes the hours in order to suit the floor business. That sometimes can mean people working full-time hours and then getting cut to maybe 25 hours. That is a real problem if you are having to pay bills and run a house. I am also aware of one other large retail store in which someone was on a so-called probationary contract, and they only knew that they were not being continued in that probationary contract when they got a P45 through the post. I think that there is a lot more in the Scottish Government. Those are the main organisations. I think that there is a lot more. No, I have only got a minute to speak on some points that I want to make. I am very calm, Mr Lyle. If you think that it is funny to ignore the fact that there are 150,000 people in the city that you represent and they are not being paid the real living wage, that is treating a lot of your constituents. We can tempt, Mr Doris. In terms of moving that issue forward, there are two specific things that the Scottish Government should be doing. Five years down the line, it should be making payment of the living wage mandatory in all public procurement contracts. It should have been done five years ago, but let us do it now. The other thing is that we are talking about fair work in this debate. Let us have fair taxation. We have just passed a taxation policy that hands tax cuts to lawyers and P45 to librarians. If you are really talking about tackling poverty, you cannot have a taxation policy that gives 99 per cent of taxpayers, including all those earning up to 124,430 tax cuts, so it needs a fundamental rethink of the Government's approach in both of those areas, and I will end on that point, Deputy Presiding Officer. Thank you very much. I call Bill Kidd, to be followed by Jeremy Balfour. Thank you very much, Presiding Officer, and I would like to thank the Minister for Outlining the Fair Work Action Plan today and for highlighting the importance of centering fair work at the core of the Scottish economy. As the plan points out, fair work drives success, wellbeing and prosperity for individuals, businesses, organisations and, in fact, for everyone in society. Fair work means treating people with dignity and respect the effect of which is to improve staff motivation and retention. Moreover, that core value underpins sustainable and successful businesses. I will focus on today the opportunities dimension of the fair work framework in particular. I want to look at how refugees have the opportunity to access fair work. The opportunities dimension states that it is reasonable aspiration to want work that is fair and for fair work to be available for everyone. Fair opportunity allows people to access good work and employment and is a crucial dimension of fair work. I want to emphasise the role that employers can play in ensuring that fair opportunities are provided to refugees. In Scotland, we have made it our prerogative to welcome refugees. We have offered a new place to start over and make beautiful Scotland their new home. For new Scots, a priority is finding community and becoming integrated into Scottish life. Integration through getting into work holds relevance as a topic in the debate today, refugees often face unique barriers to accessing work that councils, employers, Government and Parliament should all be aware of. The fair work action plan, I believe, offers an opportunity for employers to consider those unique challenges and, consequently, how they can create fair opportunities. I would urge the Scottish Government to assess how their particular challenges can be incorporated into the benchmarking tool so that the needs of refugees are benefited. Charities such as the Scottish Refugee Council, the Refugee Survival Trust, the Bridges programme and others are doing incredible work. While refugees can provide greater expertise, I will do my best to reflect on three barriers. The first is an obvious point, but nonetheless significant. A key factor in helping refugees get a job is first having the appropriate mastery of the English language. Although refugees are offered free ESOL lessons, opportunities to learn out of the classroom are extremely valuable. Ongoing research is being conducted by the University of Edinburgh, and it suggests that short-term placements such as volunteering one day a week can make a tremendous impact in that regard. Experience like that could help to accelerate learning, while building connections in with the community. Councils could encourage local employers or public services such as libraries to help. Although many refugees have the language skills required to work, in such cases they need to be offered the opportunity to work. That is my second point. An excellent example of local employers offering fair opportunities is through the Bridges programme located in Glasgow. The Bridges programme helps refugees with their equipped for the future course, helping them to understand their skills from their experience and translate that into a CV, completing applications and interview preparation. Among other things, the Bridges programme offers short-work experience opportunities with Glasgow-based companies. Those normally last for 12 days, spread over a couple of months and often lead to a job offer. The second point weaves into my third one, often when refugees apply for what their qualifications and experience are not recognised. That may be due to paper work being lost that could prove ability and proficiency for working in a specific field. Often people who have had 30-year-long careers are required to retrain before they can enter the same or related field once again. Many refugees face challenges like this, but I think that it would be helpful in such circumstances, particularly for regulated fields that require qualifications here in Scotland, would be accelerated programmes that help refugees enter back into their professions here in Scotland. That would be beneficial to us all, as it would enrich our workforce and utilise people's skills and expertise. At the same time, it would also provide fair access to work for a group of new Scots facing unique challenges. The Scottish Government has funded a new refugee doctors project with NHS education for Scotland and the Bridges programme, the BMA, Clyde College in my Annie's land constituency and the City of Glasgow College. Refugee doctors are given support to attain a level 7.5 IELTS English language proficiency at the Annie's land campus of Clyde College. They then assist with steps to obtaining a licence to work as a doctor here in the UK. Indeed, just last year, because of the refugee doctors project, NHS Scotland started four refugee doctors working here. That comprehensive programme shows how tailored support can address the unique challenges faced by refugees in returning to their professions. Although each industry will have different requirements, that programme shows that fair opportunities, even in the most difficult circumstances, can be provided. Whether a farmer, pilot, engineer, teacher or nurse, new Scots share a desire to contribute to Scottish life and build a home for themselves here, aligning the fair work framework with to help employers to consider refugees and recognise their previous work experience would be highly valuable. I hope that the Scottish Government can pursue that. I was beginning to wonder the connection with the motion, but there is a connection with the motion, worthy though the speech was. I call Jeremy Balfour, to be followed by Bob Dorris. Mr Dorris is the last speaker in the open debate. I, too, would like to thank the minister for bringing forward this important debate today. In my speech, I would like to touch on some of the actions included in the disability employment delivery plan, one for suitable labour market plan that forms the fair work action plan. I would also like to refer to some of the observations that I have made having met disabled people, disabled organisations and employers to discuss disability employment. It is estimated that there are 264,000 disabled workers in Scotland. Despite the employment rate improving and the advent of the Equality Act, there is still a significant difference in the number of disabled people in employment, 42 per cent compared to the overall figure of 73.4 per cent. Disabled people, like most people, see the importance of work as a source of income, something to do for their own wellbeing and as a way for people to feel they are contributing to society. Yet many disabled people and those with long-term health conditions, learning disabilities or mental health issues still face particular and complex barriers to staying employment such as societal employer attitudes and lack of confidence and even low expectations from family and society. Within the business community, I have found unanimous support for the recruitment of disabled people. Rather than viewing the employment of a disabled person as a diversity box-ticking exercise, employers see an opportunity to increase the pool of candidates within a business. They recognise that reflecting the diversity of a customer base within the workforce can help in maintaining a long-term offer that people buy into more easily. However, all except that there is much more that needs to be done to narrow the disability employment gap. Employers acknowledge that, while at a leadership level there is support for the business to be more inclusive, more steps still need to be taken and embedded so that that aspiration mindset can go down to line managers and others who do the day-to-day recruiting. I found agreement among employers that the diversity and the language surrounding disability can be intimidating for hiring managers who are concerned that they may offend. That view is supported by recent research conducted by Leonard Cheslow, in which 24 per cent of employers said that they would be less likely to employ someone with a disability. Employers agree that this reluctance identifies a need to improve education and training within the workforce and to promote role models within the workforce with disabilities. Disability organisations tell me that there needs to be better support provided for both disabled people looking for employment and for employers. One disability charity spoke about employer ability, suggesting that we need to consider how we support businesses to make a mainstream approach to recruitment more inclusive and fairer than rather than seeing the disabled person as a problem. Employers tell me that the split in employment between legislation between Westminster and the Scottish Government creates complexity. Employers refer to a crowded landscape. I hope that the Scottish Government will work closely with Westminster. For example, why not have one website with all the information from the UK Government and the Scottish Government rather than separate ones that cause confusion? I encourage the Scottish Government to outline the disability employment action plan to actively promote DWP's access to work scheme to employers and disabled people. Through the scheme, disabled people can claim up to almost £60,000 per year to help pay for additional support that they may need in the workplace. That can include workplace adaptations, technology, transport, interpreters—all of them that can make a viable difference for a disabled person remaining in employment. Disabled charities also stress the need for appropriate in-work support to enable a disabled person to carry out their job. I was therefore very concerned when I saw recently figures published revealing that 45 per cent of jobless individuals referred to fair start Scotland did not take part in the back-to-work scheme. The Scottish Government took charge of the employment support service back in April 2017. Claiming of the service would offer high-quality in-work support to those who are required to help them find work. I am concerned that disabled people are being let down due to the lack of support. The SNP must pick up the pace and make sure that people who are getting back to work have the support and opportunities that they need. A young disabled woman recently spoke to me that she was desperate to get real work. Real work is not a job designed for disabled people, but a job that she could have flexible hours in with an employer who understood her needs. Government leadership is important to ensure that disabled people can expect the same opportunities for care progressions as non-disabled people. Until we see that 20 per cent figure reached among disabled people, we should never rest and we should continue to work hard to achieve it. I would like to highlight an aspect of fair work that I believe has been addressed successfully very recently in Glasgow. The chamber will know that Glasgow City Council has long-standing injustices since the SNP took over the council administration in 2017. We would like to outline that, but it dropped back to the relevance of fair work across Scotland and the Government's policy to secure that. Women who were structurally discriminated against for far too long in our city by a previous Labour administration, quite frankly women who did a fair day's work but simply did not get a fair day's pay, were discriminated on two fronts. First, by being denied equal pay by the previous administration and, secondly, women were forced to fight for years through the courts and were denied justice in the money that they rightly owed. That was not fair work. That has now been rectified by Glasgow City Council agreeing to be £500 million to settle the long-rolling equal pay dispute, putting thousands of historically low-paid women in line for an average pay out of £35,000. I pay tribute to the women who won that fight and to Councillor Susan Aiken for the leadership that everyone showed. However, I want to acknowledge Richard Leonard. He said last year that there was too much legal obstruction in relation to that matter, regarding the fight for equal pay in Glasgow, effectively admitting that Labour was on the wrong side of the argument and also saying, for that I think that we owe those women an apology. That was gracious. I suspect that the previous Labour administration found equal pay issue simply too challenging to tackle, if I have been quite honest about it. However, in relation to Glasgow's equal pay settlement, it shows that even the most intractable challenges regarding fair work can be solved and we can end discrimination with will and determination. It is vital that, when we talk about fair work, we try where possible to come together outwith party political boundaries. I will very briefly name-check Mr Kelly here, with a tune for all during his speech. I will come back to low-paid workers in Glasgow. I promise that I will do that to show that I am taking this issue seriously. It is vital that we try to do things on a bipartisan basis where possible. I want to refer to some of the matters that Mr Rennie raised. What we can do to encourage more companies to sign the Scottish Business Pledge is a reasonable question to ask. Even I think that Mr Rennie's choice of language might not have been aimed at getting a consensus, but I think that it was a very fair line of questioning for Mr Rennie to pursue. I want more businesses to sign the pledge and Mr Rennie to focus on the largest companies in Scotland, but I would like to focus on smaller businesses. The majority, 65.7 per cent of signatory businesses, are small, employing less than 50 people. However, small firms make up 96.3 per cent of firms within the Scottish economy. Proportionally, more medium and large firms have signed up to the pledge, and those firms share of the Scottish business base, so disproportionately small businesses are not signing up. Therefore, I began to learn more about how the Scottish Government will encourage small businesses to work towards signing the pledge. If I think of the small businesses in Mary Hall of Springburn constituency that I represent, their time is very precious. They also do not have personnel that they can free up to align to that business pledge. However, they may very well be willing, and if it is made more convenient to sign up and they get some specific support to help to meet some of the criteria, they may very well do so. I would therefore be keen to identify fair work champions who can offer not just publicising the scheme but practical and business support to assist small businesses to pay the real living wage and the compliance necessary to sign the Scottish business pledge. Quite frankly, businesses may have to review, revise and adapt their medium-term business plans if they are to sign up to that business pledge. That is particularly challenging for small businesses. If you go online and look to sign up to that business pledge and click on the correct icon, it says, thank you for your interest in the Scottish business pledge. To make a commitment, your company must have offices and staff based in Scotland to pay the real living wage, and it goes on. It says to you that you must pay the real living wage, and then it says that you must commit to two of another eight outcomes that you must achieve and you must work your way towards achieving the other six. That can be quite burdensome for a small company that wants to do the right thing that employs five or six people and is just making ends meet. We have to get them into a financial position where they can sign that pledge or work themselves towards signing that pledge, because it allows them to make them more financially stable as well. In relation to Glasgow, for example, Mr Kelly, I think that it would be good if we had those champions in Glasgow supporting the small businesses that we both want to support and we want to actually pay the real living wage to. I think that that would be an important thing to do. In the time that I have left, which I know is very brief, let me just say two of the things that companies might value in doing, because it is not as intimidating as it is at first. One of the themes that we could sign up to is to invest in youth, and some of the examples given are quite practical. It is entering into partnership with local schools, original colleges, influence the development of young people in education, input into careers guidance, or just three of the examples given. That is doable with a little bit of help and energy in the right direction. There is also information about how you might want to meet the community's outcome, which talks about supporting formal community activities and volunteering opportunities in the community for your workforce. I think that most businesses could be in compliance with a little bit of help in getting themselves on to that Scottish business pledge. If we do work across the chamber, we can do much more to necessitate fair work that we all want to see. Thank you very much. This has been a broad debate today, and it has touched on some of the key issues impacting people who are working. We heard Richard Leonard welcome the fair work agreement. I think that it is fair to say that it is probably not a lot else. Willie Rennie has thoughtfully highlighted the important role of employment in addressing and reducing offending and how we might tie that into fair work. Willie Rennie's focus on the business pledge demonstrates why a voluntary approach alone cannot deliver fair work. John Mason spoke of the need to close the gender pay gap, and it requires employers to publish their plans to address that. Bill Kidd highlighted the barriers facing refugees and organisations working to address those barriers. Neil Findlay was right to highlight dwindling life expectancy, and Stuart McMillans highlighted that the excellent briefing from Close of the Gap was very welcome, as was his focus on unpaid care. Undoubtedly, it is the case that women remain primary carers. There are difficulties in balancing unpaid care with work, and perhaps it is not surprising that 50 per cent of employees on zero-hours contracts are women. We need to look at how flexible employment, where that is the case, is fair work to. Only 6 per cent of jobs paying £20,000 or more are advertised on a flexible basis. Close the gap and tell us that in its briefing for today. Michelle Ballantyne says that there is more to fair work than sticking a living wage sticker on our windows. Of course, there is, but by all means, do those other important things, but let's all get to a situation in which we can all claim the right to have that living wage employer sticker on our windows. I am very pleased to have one of those. It is the case that the Government's fair work action plan marks important progress. More employers pay the living wage in Scotland than anywhere else in the UK at 80.6 per cent, compared with 77.1 south of the border. Bill Bowman spent some time highlighting fair work action in Dundee, a city set to become the first real living wage city in the UK, with 50 employers increasing their hourly wages. I hope that many across Scotland will follow their lead, including here in Edinburgh. The fair work action plan also commits to taking forward a series of initiatives that will put the pressure on many businesses to adopt ethical employment standards. Greens welcome that fair work first criteria will be applied to Government business support, including grants and loans by the end of this Parliament. I would be very grateful if the minister in closing could give an indication of the timeline of that work. That is progress, because, in 2013, as a member of the economy committee, I questioned John Swinney on that, asking if there was any scope for Scottish Enterprise to tie the award of such funding—I was referring to regional support assistance—to criteria that state, for example, that the company must abide by taxation rules. It is fair to say that the response that I had was not as positive as the progress that we are seeing today. I welcome that progress. The Scottish Government is using some of its powers to improve the livelihoods and working conditions of the workforce. That is exactly why we have a Scottish Parliament and I fully support the further devolution of powers over the regulation of employment, but there does remain much to be done. Ensuring that our next generation of workers are fully trained in the skills that are needed to work in a low-carbon economy, removing the barriers that too many women face when juggling career progression with bringing up children—it is still women who are the primary carers, as I have said before—and creating jobs that have real value and fulfil people's ambitions. We still have the challenge, the central assumption here. When the Government's motion unamended would conclude by backing economic growth, as though the only reason that we would strive for fair work is to make the country ever richer—or a few people in the country ever richer—and it is seen in purely financial terms. However, that model is defunct and is profoundly self-destructive. The pursuit of economic growth is hurtling us towards a climate and ecological breakdown. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's report last year starkly laid out the consequences that that will have for people and planet unless we rapidly transition to a low-carbon economy. A report from WWF involving 59 scientists from around the world found that we have wiped out 60 per cent of the world's animal population since 1960. The natural environment is the basis of our economy and it is this life support system that we are destroying under our current economic model. Let me be clear, there cannot be fair work unless our economic model is fair to the planet. We will have hundreds of our young people outside this Parliament this Friday asking us to take action to address climate change. That is not an unconnected issue. All those issues are very much interconnected. Scotland can and must do everything it can to make work fairer for all, but a fair work nation means being fair to workers, to the environment that our livelihoods and very existence depend on and to those future generations. It means restructuring our economy. As far back in 2015, Greens commissioned the Jobs in Scotland's new economy report and it found that investing in the transferable skills of the offshore workers who are currently employed on oil and gas could create more than 200,000 jobs in the renewables industry by 2035 against the 156,000 that are currently provided by fossil fuel extraction. That is just one little example of the enormous rewards on offer to Scotland if we build a sustainable and inclusive economy where fair work is the norm. Thank you very much. I call him Rhoda Grant, close for labour, Ms Grant, please. Thank you, Presiding Officer. Sadly, workers' hard-fought rights are being eroded. The gig economy, zero hours contracts and the lack of collective bargaining have led to this and young people and women bear the brunt. Careers that are gendered, predominantly female, suffered disproportionately. Alison Johnstone pointed out that we have the ninth highest gender pay gap in Scotland at 16.5 per cent. During the debate, the nationalists have said that they do not have the devolved power over an employment law to do anything about that. They do not have those powers, but instead of complaining about what they do not have, they should use the substantial powers that they have to make a difference. John Mason questioned whether he could use contracts and procurement to do that. Of course, he can. As Neil Findlay and James Kelly pointed out, they voted down amendments to the procurement bill, not because it was illegal but because they did not want to do it. The Scottish Government and its agencies have enormous buying power, but they do not use it to push higher standards for all contracts. It is not enough to say that they will extend fair work first to as many contractors as they can and possibly within six years' time. They should do that now for all procurement and contracts, but they voted against that for the procurement bill and, as Richard Leonard pointed out, they are actively involving companies in their contracts that do not recognise trade unions. Further, has the Scottish Future Trust and the Scottish Government signed up to unite the union's construction charter? Fair work must be extended to Government departments and agencies. The minister said that they were starting to roll out fair work first with regional selective assistance. While any move in the right direction is welcome, there will be signing contracts that will run for many years hence that will not have fair work principles at their core. James Kelly pointed out that, since 2014, when the Scottish Government could have put a living wage into the procurement bill, there are 20,000 more people earning poverty wages. Annabelle Ewing talked about the care sector, she talked about the heroes and heroines of that sector, and I absolutely agree with that. However, on 26 February this year, the Fair Work Convention published its report, Fair Work in Scotland's social care sector 2019. The inquiry found—and I apologise for quoting at some length—that the social care sector is not consistently delivering fair work. The existing funding of the commissioning systems are making it difficult for some providers to offer fair work and that the social care workforce does not have the mechanism for workers to have an effective voice in influencing work and employment in the sector. In addition, given the predominance of women workers in the sector, the report also highlights the failure to address the issues such as a voice deficit and low pay will significantly contribute to women's poorer quality of work and Scotland's gender pay gap. The burden of variations in demand for social care is falling heavily on front-line staff who face zero-hour contracts, sessional contracts, and working beyond contracted hours and working unpaid overtime to meet the needs of care service users. That is a sector that is almost entirely delivered by Government contracts. It is an absolute disgrace. Bob Doris I thank you for giving way, but I appreciate that there has been success in relation to the social care sector. For example, a deal with the Scottish local authorities means that the living wage is now paid to care staff in care homes across the country. In Glasgow, for example, Corde has been taken back in house by Glasgow City Council, which meant pay increases by female workers who were lower paid under Corde until the SNP changed that way. Any improvements in care staff working has to be welcomed, but some of those changes are being made to care contracts. People are getting their hours cut. They are not being paid for sleep-ins, for example. We need to look at the whole thing. We need to make sure that, when people are working, they are being paid a fair wage for that work and not having their overall pay cut just because they have sleep-ins as part of their working contract. We would pay a living wage of £10 an hour for all, while the SNP wants a 5 per cent reduction in poverty pay over the next three years. That is absolutely timid that only an additional 25,000 people will be paid a real living wage over the next three years, while 480,000 people are paid less than the real living wage in Scotland. It is an absolute drop in the ocean. Bowman talked about high rates of unemployment in Dundee. It seems to be saying that that was a reason not to pay a real living wage. That makes no sense to me at all. Why should people on poverty pay for the misfortune of those who cannot find work? Surely we should be looking to the higher-paid people to fill that gap rather than those already in low pay. James Kelly made the point that the Scottish Government should have used fairer taxation rather than consigning 20,000 more people to poverty pay. There is so much more that we can do to create a fair work environment. The procurement powers that the Scottish Government and its agencies have are vast and the Government must lead by example and also force up standards across all sectors of procurement and contracting. Neil Findlay said that it is simply wrong that companies that operate a blacklist are receiving government contracts. I would have to declare an interest in that because my husband was blacked from the North Sea for demanding better health and safety protection. Rather than progress in six years' time, we need fair work now for all workers today. Deputy Presiding Officer, I now close on behalf of the Scottish Conservatives. I will not manage in doing so to name check all those who spoke this afternoon and had something very worthwhile to say. I think that what we have seen from the debate is that supporting people fairly in the workplace is something that we all agree with and that it is not just something that is beneficial just for the employees, but that happier workers create more productive and better working environments. Those in turn benefit employers and indeed the economy and society as a whole. We have heard today about some new and updated commitments from this Government, including the Refresh Scottish Business Pledge, with the living wage at its core, which aims to maintain a light-touch approach. Bill Bowman, in his dulcid tones, talked about the example of Dundee, recently given recognition for its plans to become the first living wage city in the UK. That is, of course, an admirable goal, but one that needs to be developed across sectors to ensure that businesses buy into it while maintaining high standards and competitiveness. Other interesting initiatives in that plan include an online assistance tool to be developed for small and micro enterprises. Those make up more than 99 per cent of private sector businesses, the majority of which are unlikely to have large and complex human resource departments. Within a business support environment, which is already described as cluttered, it will be essential for this tool to be visible and accessible for the smallest of employers and their employees to benefit from. Perhaps the minister can comment in closing on how such a tool will be rolled out within the wider business support system. Deputy Presiding Officer, Scotland, as part of the United Kingdom, is perfectly aligned to be able to benefit from the opportunities that exist in the modern technology-driven era, and the rapid changes that are thrown up with their own challenges are what we must be prepared for. The Scottish Conservative amendment today highlights the good work plan following the work of the Taylor review on modern working practices. Employees can now benefit from the rise in more flexible and varied ways of working, offering working patterns that allow families to mould working hours according to their own lives to suit them. However, that should not mean that the protections that British people have relied upon through our strong track record of workers' rights should be eroded. We welcome today the extension of workers' rights that has been brought about by the good work plan, which includes legislating to give all workers the right to request a more stable contract. That is making it easier for employees to access employment rights by extending the time required to break a period of continuous service. Increasing as well the rights of agency workers are just some of the commitments that allow people to make the most of the opportunities afforded by a modern economy. However, as we have heard today, there is much more that we can do and need to do if we want to bring everyone on this journey with us, including those currently without work. Again, Bill Bowman, in discussing the benefits of the living wage for Dundee, reminded us that the city has also the lowest employment rate in Scotland overall, so there is much to be done there. Michelle Ballantyne reminded us that only 55 per cent of job seekers are accessing Fair Start Scotland compared with 75 per cent for the reserve UK programme. We also heard about the importance of the older workforce, whose experience and skills, even in the technology-driven era, are immensely valuable. Indeed, I met with apprentices last week, some of whom were telling me just that, that they valued very much the wisdom, the experience and the assistance of older members of the workforce that they were involved in. Greater reskilling and lifelong learning opportunities for our older workforce, highlighted by Jamie Halcro Johnston, would not only help those people to find a place in the modern economy, but would allow businesses to access the wealth of knowledge and expertise that I have just spoken of. We heard from Jeremy Balfour about the barriers that continue unfairly to stand in the way of those with a disability. He spoke about the need not only for greater support for disabled people looking for employment, but for employers to make the recruitment process more inclusive and fair, with 24 per cent of employers currently admitting that they would be less likely to employ someone with a disability. In concluding, Deputy Presiding Officer, as has been evident today, both Scottish and UK Governments are making commitments to our workforce that ensures that they can thrive in the modern economy. It is essential that both work together in this endeavour, but as Government realigns policy to fit with modern working practices, it must take everyone on that journey. As the minister himself said in the forward to this action plan, fair work is an investment in everyone for everyone. Thank you very much. I call on Jamie Hepburn to close the Government and Minister till decision time, please. Thank you very much, Presiding Officer. I begin by thanking the various members who have spoken in today's debate to varying degrees. Some have been more constructive than others from my own perspective, but I think that the debate overall has been worthwhile. I emphasise at the outset that this is a collective endeavour. I think that there has been much said across all parties to emphasise our support for fair work. I hope that all parties will commit to supporting, after we support the motion this evening, to becoming involved in the round table that I have said that I will hold. I do not pretend that this action plan has all of the answers far from it. I do not pretend for a moment that everything that is contained within this action plan will necessarily, in and of itself, lead to us becoming a fair work nation. On that basis, I want to hear what others have to say. Let me turn to the second contribution to the debate after my own of Mr Halcro Johnston, which I think was a very constructive contribution. As with some regret, I say at the outset that we will not be supporting his amendment this evening. I understand that he will want to be trumpeting the good work plan, but we have some reservations about its efficacy as an approach. The fair work convention has expressed concern about the lack of consultation involvement in the Taylor review and the good work plan. Indeed, any measurement of quality of work would fall short of its expectations of what would be defined as fair work expectations that this Government shares. However, Mr Halcro Johnston talked about the other action plans that we are taking forward. I am happy to provide a bit of an update in relation to those. Mr Halcro Johnston spoke about, in the context of International Women's Day, the gender pay gap action plan, which I am very delighted to announce as she has just arrived. The First Minister launched on Friday, which I think was welcomed by a wide range of bodies. We have set out a series of actions to try to breach the gender pay gap that exists and persists in Scotland, such as supporting 2,000 women to return to work after a career break through our new women returners programme worth £5 million, seeking to improve workplace practices for victims of domestic abuse, supporting women through the menopause, expanding the workplace equality fund, as I mentioned earlier, and showing leadership as an employer undertaking our own equal pay audit, as well as researching ways that businesses can reduce their gender pay gap. In relation to the future skills action plan that was mentioned, that is of the utmost importance. We know that our economy is changing. We know that our workforce needs to be adaptable to be ready to respond to those circumstances, and our future skills action plan will be published in due course. A disability employment gap was mentioned by a number, including Mr Halcro Johnston. Of course, we published our disability employment action plan on 11 December of last year. We have set an ambition to at least half the disability employment gap. The most optimistic projections at the current trajectory is that to achieve that would take some 200 years. We have set ourselves a target of achieving that within a tenth of that period of time. We lay out the range of activity that we will try to take forward to that end. Jeremy Balfour spoke of the need for Government leadership. I absolutely concurred with that. One of the things that we have committed to is this spring publishing our recruitment and retention plan, setting a target for the employment of disabled people in our own workforce. We will encourage other public sector organisations to follow that example. We agree that, at the Scottish Parliament, we also need to do more to encourage people who have disabilities to come and work for us here. That is a point well-made, and it is one-hour endorse entirely. Willie Rennie asked some questions about the fair work first initiative that we have laid out. I accused him of misquoting me when I referred to him as a pilot. I have to apologise to him. I did look back. I did use that term, but what I meant in that sense was not a time-limited sense of an initiative, but that we will lead the way by rolling out our fair work first agenda through Scottish Enterprise regional selective assistance grants. That was the first phase of our activity. Mr Rennie wondered if we would be moving quickly enough. I can say that that activity will happen from next month, so I hope that he would accept that that is moving pretty swiftly, very briefly. Willie Rennie? I thank the minister for telling me that I am right, which is always welcome. Can he tell me how many businesses does he think this will cover? How much money will be involved in this initial pilot? Minister? I think that I was wrong when Mr Rennie is correct, but we will let that slide. I cannot say that, because it is from April onwards that it will apply to those who have regional selective assistance. I cannot say that at this stage that we disingenuous of me to suggest a good but. Nonetheless, we will begin that work. Alison Johnstone looked for the timetable on the wider work. That is, of course, the first element. We will then engage with others about our wider work. We will then publish an implementation plan this summer, and we will look to roll out the entirety of our— Just a minute, minister. There is too much chit-chats. You can talk to each other outside the chamber. I want to hear the minister summing up, as do the members, who took part in the debate. Thank you, Presiding Officer. They will then look to roll out the rest of the fair work first principles over the remainder of the parliamentary term. Willie Rennie spoke about the business pledge not having enough signatories. Bob Dorris made that point. I agree with that. That is why we have refreshed the business pledge. That is why we want more people to sign up to it. Bob Dorris in particular talked about the need for small business to engage. Sorry, minister. I think that I am speaking to myself. I said that I want to hear the minister and I see people just ignoring me. Do not do it. I greatly appreciate that. I agree that we need to do more to get small business in particular to sign up to the business pledge. That is why we have tried to reduce the complexity of sign up. That is why we are creating a business learning network and a leadership group to aim to increase the take-up along with our new service for small and micro employers to adopt fair work practices. I want to turn to Richard Leonard's remarks. He really set out by producing our fair work action plan, as he wants. He failed to mention that the poverty alliance has welcomed this plan. He failed to mention that the general secretary of the STUC has welcomed this action plan. Many others have as well. He also then went on to talk about and so did James Kelly, and Rhoda Grant talked about our ambition to see 25,000 more workers paid at least the real living wage. That is not being good enough. I agree that that is not good enough. That is not our ambition. The point about the 25,000 extra people being paid the real living wage is that there is a consequence of our funding through poverty alliance negativity. Of course, I want to go further. One of the things that we could be doing today, if we had the power of employment law, is to make it a statutory minimum wage. Something that we have set out, we would do in our fair work action plan. I love the zeal of the convert, of course. It was very welcome to see Mr Leonard set out that the Labour Party now believes in the devolution of employment law. I welcome that, and I look forward to working with us to ensure that the Scottish Parliament has responsibility for that in due course. Annabelle Ewing spoke of the social care sector. I welcome the fair work conventions in quiet and important. We must do all that we can. We are committed to funding payment of the real living wage. We will do more. We will respond to that report in due course. John Mason mentioned the flex work agenda. That is very important. That is why we have committed £150,000 to family-friendly working Scotland this coming year. Stuart McMillan mentioned the carers act and had I seen the news this morning, I was aware of it. I think that it is an excellent piece of legislation. I know that because I took it through Parliament. Of course, it is the Minister for Public Health and Sport who will respond. However, I agree that it must be implemented. One of the things that I can say through the fair work action plan is that we will better promote the carers positive scheme that Dick Lyle mentioned. Bill Kidd talked about support for refugees to get into employment. It has got his government funds and supports the recognition of the prior qualification scheme that Glasgow Caledron University and the Bridges programme takes forward. We will, of course, be willing to consider what more we can do. Let me close, Presiding Officer. Alison Johnstone, in welcoming the action plan, said that there is still much more to be done. I agree with those sentiments entirely. There has been much achieved, but there is still much to be done. I said that at the outset. That is why we have this fair work action plan. That is why we are having this debate. That is why I want to bring people together to discuss how we can do this collectively. We should back this motion before us and we should commit to working together to that end. Thank you very much. That concludes this afternoon's debate. We are going to move straight to decision time to vote on the motion. First, amendment 16257.3, in the name of Jamie Halcro Johnston, which seeks to amend motion 16257, in the name of Jamie Hepburn, on working to make Scotland a fair work nation by 2025, be agreed. Are we all agreed? No. We are not agreed. We will move to our division. Members may cast their votes now. The result of the vote on amendment 16257.3, in the name of Jamie Halcro Johnston, is yes, 31, no, 83. There were no abstentions. The amendment is therefore not agreed. The next question is the amendment 16257.1, in the name of Richard Leonard, which seeks to amend the motion in the name of Jamie Hepburn, be agreed. Are we all agreed? No. We are not agreed. We will move to our vote. Members may cast their votes now. The result of the vote on amendment 16257.1, in the name of Richard Leonard, is yes, 24, no, 90. There were no abstentions. The amendment is therefore not agreed. The next question is the amendment 16257.2, in the name of Alison Johnstone, which seeks to amend the motion in the name of Jamie Hepburn, be agreed. Are we all agreed? Yes. We are not agreed. We will move to our vote. Members may cast their votes now. The result of the vote on amendment 16257.2, in the name of Alison Johnstone, is yes, 94, no, 20. There were no abstentions. The amendment is therefore agreed. The final question is that motion 16257, in the name of Jamie Hepburn, as amended, on working to make Scotland a fair work nation by 2025, be agreed. Are we all agreed? Yes. We are not agreed. We will move to our vote. Members may cast their votes now. The result of the vote on motion 16257, in the name of Jamie Hepburn, as amended, is yes, 93, no, 21. There were no abstentions. The motion as amended is therefore agreed. That concludes decision time. We are going to move now to members' business, in the name of Andy Wightman, on who owns Scotland, but we will just take a few moments for members and the minister to change seats. A few moments before we begin.