Gwyn SRF. Can I welcome everyone to the ninth meeting of the Education and Skills Committee? Can please remind everyone present to turn on mobile phones and other devices on to silent for the duration of the meeting. The first item of business is consideration of the additional support for learning sources of information Scotland order 2016, SSI-2016, stroke 299. This instrument is subject to the negative procedure, which means that it comes into effect unless Parliament agrees to a motion 2-0. No such motion has been lodged. Do members have any comments? Thank you very much. In that case, we will then move on to agenda item 2, an evidence session with the Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills. Good morning, Cabinet Secretary. Before recess, the committee heard from six panel of witnesses on matters right across our remit. The purpose of these sessions has been to inform this session with the Cabinet Secretary and the committee's on-going work programme. I'd like to put on record my thanks to everyone who has contributed to the committee's work so far, and welcome to the meeting the Cabinet Secretary, John Swinney, Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills, Eileen McHechnie, director of advanced learning and science, and Fiona Robertson, director of learning at the Scottish Government. I understand, Cabinet Secretary, that you wish to make a short opening statement. Yes, convener, I am grateful to the committee for the opportunity to explore the issues which stakeholders have raised with the committee in the overview sessions that have been held since September. It may be helpful if I provide some context for our discussions by outlining my plans and priorities for early learning and childcare, education and skills, and setting out some of the recent progress that we've made in this respect. Education is the defining mission of this Government, and I'm determined to ensure that every child has the same opportunity to succeed. As I said when I appeared before the committee in June, I'm focused on delivering three key priorities. Ensuring that our children and young people get the best start in life, providing a strong foundation for the future. Relentlessy, pursuing the twin goals of equity and excellence for all in Scottish education. Ensuring that every child reaches their full potential with the right range of skills, qualifications and achievements to allow them to succeed. Thirdly, widening opportunities to access higher further and vocational education by opening up the education system for all of our young people and delivering greater flexibility and more opportunities for every child to succeed. Those three priorities are underpinned by the policy frameworks getting it right for every child. Curriculum for excellence and developing the young workforce in Scotland. It's important to remember what those familiar programmes and academic stand for, the outline our ambition and succinctly describe what we are aiming to achieve. As a Government, we've made clear commitments to use those policies to deliver real improvements and demonstrable progress has been made in doing so. Since I became education secretary just short of six months ago, we have committed to baby boxes for every child in Scotland with pilots commencing in January 2017, launched a consultation on how we deliver the transformational expansion of early learning and childcare and established a programme of trials, began a wide-ranging engagement process on the named person to ensure that vital innovations impacts swiftly and positively, launched a governance review to examine how best to devolve more meaningful powers to schools and communities, provided teachers with a clear and concise statement of the curriculum for excellence framework, along with guidance on assessing progress in literacy and numeracy, invited Education Scotland to assess the curriculum related work road at local authority levels and to follow that up to ensure that action is taken where needed. Reduced the workload of teachers and learners on national qualifications by agreeing to move mandatory unit assessments at national five hires and advanced hires over the next three years, announced an independent review of the care system to build on wide-ranging improvements in kinship, foster care and residential care, launched an independent review of further and higher education student support to ensure that the entire system is equitable and fair for students, particularly the most vulnerable. Last week we published the conclusions of the first phase of the review of the Enterprise and Skills provision in Scotland, which will ensure that our Enterprise and Skills agencies work hand in glove with each other and collaborative with our business, academic and civic partners to optimise economic impact across the whole of Scotland. The second phase of the review will consider how to improve the learner journey as part of this process. I continue to see great examples of innovative creative work where professionals are actively seeking to use the flexibility and resources they have, not just to make a difference to the lives of children and young people, but to make a significant and discernible difference in their lives. That addresses the needs of individuals and supports their aspirations. I am sure that the committee has a range of questions and I will be delighted to engage in those questions. Thank you very much for that, cabinet secretary. Just like to say that we have a great deal of ground to cover and limited times to ensure that I do not need to curtail discussion too much to ensure that we get through all the themes. I ask that both questions and responses are kept focused and to the point. The questions today will be based around the themes that we have been dealing with over the last few months and we will start today with further and higher education. I have one question, cabinet secretary, and it relates to Brexit and the impact it will have on further and mainly higher education. What discussions have the Scottish Government had with the bodies that are going to be impacted by this and do you have any information that you can give us about how we are going to be approaching it? We have had extensive dialogue with the higher and further education sectors in this respect, both myself and the Minister for Higher and Further Education have been involved in those discussions with institutions. I think that the concerns that have been expressed and the committee will be familiar with some of the comments that are made by institutions themselves and was recently by the principal and vice chancellor of the University of Edinburgh, Professor O'Shea, who made some very strong remarks on this to the Scottish Affairs Committee of the House of Commons just last week. The concerns of the sector relate, essentially, to two factors, I would say, most particularly. There are three factors, actually. One is about the attractiveness of our institutions for higher education students coming from other countries and from Europe to come here and essentially what signals have been given off as a consequence of the Brexit vote. The committee will be familiar with the fact that the Government has provided the assurance that for students entering into our institutions in 2016-17 and now for 2017-18, there would be no change to their financial arrangements once they decide to come here in relation to any issues in relation to fees or financial circumstances. We have given that commitment and we hope that that helps institutions in their recruitment and marketing exercises. The second area of concern relates to access to research funds and research co-operation. There has obviously been a certain amount of assurance given on this but I think the point that worries the institutions most is the sense that it would be disadvantageous to have institutions from the United Kingdom, part of national European panels of research activity because of the uncertainty caused by the Brexit vote and of course that's a terribly painful issue for institutions to deal with because of the academic and research excellence that exists within the institutions. The third issue which I think is at the heart of the anxiety of institutions is about the attraction issues for members of staff. All of our universities and colleges in Scotland are populated by individuals from many many countries and that's part of their strength and some of the research strength of our universities is a direct result of the fact that people from a whole variety of different backgrounds have come together in this one place and are bringing together their research skills in this one place and the research isn't inherent in the buildings of these institutions, it's a product of the interaction of these individuals and I think that the institutions are particularly concerned about these points. Obviously those concerns are fed directly into the work of my ministerial colleagues who are leading on the negotiations and discussions with the United Kingdom Government on the implications of Brexit with a view to informing the way in which we have taken steps to ensure that all measures are taken to ensure that the United Kingdom Government is aware of these issues and prioritising them in the negotiations that we take forward. Thank you very much. You've got a couple of questions. Notwithstanding the issues that you've just rightly outlined about the Brexit scenario which is obviously very serious there are some domestic concerns to cabinet secretary. Could I start by asking you whether you agree with the comments that have been made by Lucy Hunter Blackburn several times now that one of the reasons for the considerable drop in bursaries and grants as a percentage share of the student support pot is due to the Scottish Government's commitment to have free tuition? I don't agree with those comments now. Could you expand a little bit as I think the minister at the weekend was in a bit of difficulty with the BBC trying to provide the evidence as to why you feel that the free tuition policy is going to deliver the best option for students and for universities when the statistics seem to imply that particularly when it comes to those from the most disadvantaged backgrounds there is a great deal of difficulty for them. The first thing that I would say is that free tuition obviously means that young people from deprived backgrounds don't have to wrestle with the implications of paying back if they were in an institution in the rest of the United Kingdom £27,000 in fees that would be their personal liability at the end of their academic experience. I think that would be a significant factor for an individual from a deprived background to consider as part of their judgment about whether or not they wish to embark on free tuition. I think that there are some deeper questions about the issues in relation to the uptake of bursaries and the eligibility for bursaries which are the subject of the rationale why the Government has undertaken and commissioned the review of student support which we announced last week to be led by Jane Angadia because we need to make sure that the judgments that we made in 2013-14 which were driven by our dialogue with stakeholders the purpose of which was to ensure that we maximised the resources that were able to be in the hands and the pockets of students actually turn out to have that effect. We have to look very carefully at that point which is precisely why we have established the independent review to look at those questions of student support. Mr Swinney, given that the defining agenda for the Scottish Government is to widen access and to ensure that there is equity the statistics about the percentage drop in bursaries and grants within Scotland seems having a considerable effect on not allowing as many students from these disadvantaged backgrounds to attend university in the way that they are in the UK. What is the Scottish Government's answer to this, because it seems to me that there are very difficult times for a very disadvantaged student? We are seeing, of course, an increase in the proportion of Scottish domiciled full-time first-degree entrants going to Scottish universities from the most deprived areas in Scotland. That figure is rising. It was 11.2 per cent in 2006-07. It now stands at 14 per cent and has been very clear and focused on the agenda that we have on widening access to ensure that we reach 20 per cent by 2030. We have a very clear agenda and the pattern of progress is in the right direction in achieving that objective. What we have to do is to make sure that we are taking forward a range of different measures and that the student support will be about the work that has been set out for us by the widening access commission to make sure that we take all necessary measures. I do not think that it is possible to discount the significance of the impact of a young person considering embarking on a higher education who may have to contemplate assuming an additional student loan debt of up to £27,000 which would be the comparable example in the rest of the United Kingdom to the one that Liz Smith puts to me in Scotland. Except for the fact, Mr Swinney, that it does not appear to be much evidence that that is putting off students applying to the university system. The key issue that I am getting at is that when the Scottish Government says that this is all about equity there has been a substantial drop in the number of bursaries and grants available in Scotland as the percentage share of that student support. Those are some money that do not have to be paid back whereas if you are on a student loan system that money does have to be paid back and the balance quite clearly from the statistics that have been produced is much more in favour of that loan system. Will your review look at this problem because I think that there is a genuine concern that it is having a detrimental impact on widening access? That is precisely why I answered the first question the way that I did to say that these are issues that need to be explored and that is why we have commissioned Jane Angadia to undertake an independent review of student support. I come back to what I said in my earlier answer when these arrangements were put in place in 2013-14 the objective of the Government and our stakeholders and all those who welcomed the reforms that we made in 2013-14 is that the Government in 2013-14 were to ensure that we put more money into students' pockets. That was the rationale in 2013-14 and what we announced at that time was widely supported by stakeholders and endorsed by NUS Scotland. So what I am saying is that we need to make sure that those arrangements are working effectively. That is precisely why we have invited Jane Angadia to undertake this work and we look forward to the conclusions of her exercise. Can I just finish on one last question? Would you accept that those who hear the Government make a very strong commitment to free higher education? They would like to see the evidence that supports that that policy is better than other possible funding solutions which would be beneficial not only to universities and to students but to those when it comes to widening access around. Where is the evidence, Mr Swinney, to support that policy? There are two points here. One of political philosophy and outlook and one of evidence. On a point of political philosophy and outlook, I take a fundamentally different view to Liz Smith and I think that we should be honest about these differences. It is important in politics we are honest about our differences of view. I believe in free access to higher education. It is part of the commitment that our country should make to young people in our society that they should have access to that facility. I know that Liz Smith does not agree with that point of view but I want to make it absolutely crystal clear that that is my philosophical and political position that I hold. The second point is an evidence based point and that is the fact that the proportion of Scottish domiciled full-time first degree entrants to Scottish universities is rising and has risen since this Government came to office during which time we have had the policy of free access to higher education. If Liz Smith wants to see evidence of why that policy has been successful I would give her the statistics that I have put on the record twice which make exactly that point. A brief supplementary from John. I wonder whether you believe that there is free access to higher education where the places are capped if you want to comment on the view that has been expressed that in fact it is more difficult for a Scottish student to get into university now than it was five years ago and that while we are maybe providing funding although some would say underfunding of places at university what we are also doing is rationing by qualification and if you are not clear whether that is the case or not would you be willing to consider doing some research into whether that is actually the case? I think again I come back to the statistics that I was using my answer to Liz Smith that there is a rising proportion of young people who are going to university from the 20 per cent most deprived areas in Scotland so I think that that demonstrates that access is improving. There is of course a wider debate about the appropriate destinations for young people to fulfil their educational potential and of course we have got a very broad range and I certainly take the view and I think this is a widely held view that university is not appropriate for everybody within our society so I think there will be a range of choices and destinations to be available for young people what I am satisfied about is that we have the right mechanisms in place to ensure that young people from the most deprived backgrounds are able to access their education although we have higher ambitions to secure that respect and the Government will concentrate on those efforts. I will come back to the issue around research funding and the implications of Brexit in our relationship with the UK Government and this is a couple of other things that I have recently developed a post-study work visa also adding pressure to universities or the post-study work visa pilot that concerns were expressed as by University of Scotland about the fact that they weren't consulted and I wonder if there has been any negotiation between the Scottish and UK Governments on that? We have made a number of representations over a consistent period I have to also acknowledge with wide cross-party support from within this Parliament appreciated and valued by the Government and I think it's the nature of that cross-party support really makes the argument ever more compelling because of the fact that despite the fact we've just gone through an issue of political division and debate there but I think it's equally important that we acknowledge areas of political agreement within the Scottish Parliament and it's actually not just agreement within the Scottish Parliament I can rarely think of issues that command such universal support within the educational community and within Parliament so these points have been made to the UK Government over a long period of time both around the removal of these provisions and then about the efforts to try to seek their resumption of course there was a very specific avenue of discussion opened up as a consequence of the Smith commission report because Mr Scott and I served in the Smith commission and one of its conclusions was to try to advance this issue and that was taken forward by the Government with the UK Government and the UK Government decided not to make such provision I have to say I was I think I felt a sense that there was going to be no movement on this issue until after the Brexit referendum I didn't quite imagine the movement that was going to happen on the issue after the Brexit referendum which was to completely ignore the interests and the perspectives and the unity of purpose within Scotland and to make facilities available for a number of institutions south of the border so I think that's really a perverse outcome of this situation and I give Gillian Martin and the committee the assurance that the Government will continue to sustain and represent that cross-party unity within Scotland to try to persuade the UK Government to make available such provision that would help our institutions on a slightly different topic but the same witnesses we also had concerns raised about the UK research education, higher education and research bill and we're going to be taking evidence in the next couple of weeks expanding on that they've obviously made the same concerns to yourself and I just wondered if you would like to give us your review and how you see that progressing and what the Scottish Government's going to be doing by way of negotiation on that we've been in close contact with the United Kingdom Government on the UK research bill and indeed I met John Kingman the prospective chair of the UK research organisation just last week and he was on a visit to Scotland to signify I don't actually think it was his first visit to Scotland in his perspective to signify the importance that he attaches to the UK research organisation that is being established having a UK-wide perspective notwithstanding the fact that it's also got responsibility for research in England and the clear substance of that conversation was to reassure the Government in Scotland that there would be a very strong focus taken around the way in which the interests of Scotland are taken into account in this perspective the Scottish Government suggested amendments to the bill to safeguard the interests of research and innovation policy in Scotland while making sure that the arrangements are put in place would recognise and acknowledge the particular interests of Scotland we we think the UK Government is unlikely to take on board all of these amendments but we will continue to have a discussion to make sure that we take steps to protect the interests of Scottish institutions and to make sure that the type of commitments that I was hearing last week are followed up as a consequence of the arrangements that are put in place there is one particular issue which is about the access to the research framework and it is an option for Scottish institutions to participate within that and we've made it clear to Scottish institutions if they wish to do that they should feel free to do so so as a result of quite a few things that you've discussed with regard to Brexit this bill the issues around research staff from EU countries there is a potential for a perfect storm in our universities and I would like to know should it come to that what contingency plans the Scottish Government are making to support universities should they not have their EU staff available to them should they not be able to attract research funding in the way that they have I know that that's probably an impossible question there's quite a few uncertainties in the way of answering that question as to what the arrangements might look like if we end up in a situation where EU nationals are unable to remain in employment at our Scottish institutions then the Brexit will have delivered an absolutely disastrous outcome to Scottish institutions and it can be so the comments of Principal O'Shay last week will be absolutely vindicated and I've seen principles of universities over time expressing some pretty strong opinions about certain things but I don't think I've quite seen commentary of the nature of anise expressed by Principal O'Shay last week about the implications of Brexit and the United Kingdom Government I think has got to try extremely carefully about these questions because all of our institute there will not be a higher or further education institution in Scotland there is not a collection of individuals from many many different countries who are working together to create research and teaching excellence and if there's a consequence of Brexit that is damaged that is weakened one bit then we will suffer negative economic consequences now Julie Martin raises a fair question about what the Government in Scotland will do to try to address that issue we will of course work closely with our university colleagues to do as much as we can to articulate their concerns and to address any possible implications should there be any negative implications that arise Thank you very much Do you want to ask a couple of questions about colleges? Sure, thank you very much Can I just say Cabinet Secretary that I don't think he answered my question on the simple proposition that if there is a cap on places then people will be excluded potentially by rationing through qualifications it's not that somebody is openly going to university but somebody with qualification five years ago that would have got them into university is no longer getting them into university and I wonder whether Lisa would make a commitment to explore that proposition and to ensure that your policy is not causing that but on the issue of college places there are two things that I just wanted to flag up with you in the evidence we've got around colleges and I think that this does relate particularly to the attainment gap of young people achieving their potential is the decision by government to reduce the number of part-time places the NUS in particular expressed concern about the issue of reduction part-time places and have a particular impact on women, on carers on adult returners and perhaps people who would not be able to sustain a full-time place and I wonder if you could indicate first of all have you investigated the impact of that policy decision and would you review it and secondly the question of the drop-out rate at FE, the failure of something that 36% of people taking on courses in FE not completing those courses now when Shona Struthers from College of Scotland was before the committee she said it was possible that some of this could be explained by people having positive destinations and stopping the course because it's something else to do they said they would provide further information in a publication in College Leaver Destinations 2014-15 but that document doesn't provide that information I wonder if you have considered why there's such a high level of drop-out in further education and what your government is exploring in terms of how you might address this problem the first thing I'd say is that I think we must we must always be mindful and focused on ensuring that people reach positive destinations and have access to educational opportunities that address their circumstances and their needs now when we look at some of the detail underpinning this question the number of part-time college enrolments in HE and FE has remained stable since 2012-13 so in terms of the part-time position there is a continuity around these points John Lamont is correct that the Scottish Funding Council in response to guidance from ministers de-prioritised short courses which were often around five hours in duration which had an effect on the number of students who would actually be participating in the head count calculation that was involved in 2014-15 97 per cent of learning hours were delivered in courses that led to a recognised qualification that was an 8 per cent increase since 2006-07 so the purpose of that reform was to make sure that more and more of the activity that was undertaken within colleges was enabling people to have qualifications which would then enable them to progress on to positive destinations in terms of the point that John Lamont raises about the participation of women in colleges women studying full-time courses are up by 16 per cent since 2006-07 which demonstrates that whilst I accept that there has been a shift in the emphasis from part-time to full-time courses the purpose of that has been quite clear to try to enable individuals to then be able to gain access to qualifications that will help them on their progression into positive destinations and if that's the overall strategic direction that has been delivered then from the perspective of women, women are making up a significant increase in the number of women undertaking full-time courses and women account for a majority of the college population in 2014-15 at 52 per cent so the NUS is wrong that in the context of cuts to further education of a significant level that deliberately targeting part-time places which I think there's a gloss put on this that somehow these are all leisure courses and profoundly misunderstands of people but that suggestion by NUS that this is the disproportionate impact on women disabled learners and mature adult returners and they would like to see some rebalancing of that, they're simply wrong well obviously I'll be very happy to discuss these questions but I think that the point that I would make is that when we look at the number of places in full-time equivalent of places in 2014-15 was 119,078 now it was 116,399 in 2012-13 so I think some of the language that John Lamont uses to characterise this situation is not valid so the NUS position is wrong then there's not going to be a disproportionate impact what I'm simply saying is that the evidence does not substantiate what John Lamont is saying because the number of full-time equivalent places has grown between 2012-13 and 2014-15 now I'm the first to admit I'm not going to sit here and deny that there has been a change of emphasis to prioritise more full-time learning and the purpose of that has been to create better capability amongst individuals to gain access to the labour market and I think as a consequence of that we are seeing a greater proportion of learning now focused on courses that are leading to a recognised qualification first of all you missed the point if people are unable to take up a course because of their clearing responsibility they're not able to do a full-time course so these people are not transferring to full-time courses, they're simply being excluded and I still say to you that it's not my comment but the comment of NUS that that balance is wrong and it should be remediated but secondly you haven't answered the question about the drop-out rate of 36% in the college sector and what you're doing to understand what that is caused by and to what extent it's caused by the different funding regime in colleges and again I would emphasise you the importance of the college sector providing a bridge for people in education at the school stage on the last point I agree unreservedly with John Lamont I think it's important that when I when I talk through the priorities that are very much in my mind as I pursue my responsibilities I have three priorities there are three policy foundations to what we're doing in education getting it right for every child curriculum for excellence and developing Scotland's young workforce if I adapt the concept of getting it right for every child the message of that is that we have to enable and support individuals to fulfil their potential and if people have been an unhappy educational experience in school we've got to try to find a way of intervening and delivering a better outcome for them at a later stage in life so there are of course and the learner journey that John Lamont talks about is an entirely appropriate journey where individuals will come into the system and try to acquire new skills that will help them to move on to do other things and they may not be able to come in on day one and do a full-time course that's why short courses that lead to work and lead to progression within the system are still funded within our education system and within our colleges so that there is a progression available for individuals but I think that it's equally right that we focus more and more on that on individuals acquiring the skills that enable them to be able to make an economic contribution in our society on the issue of the dropout rate I will explore that further and identify because that's it's not desirable there's nothing desirable about that and we have to understand better what is causing that and make sure that if there is remediation that we can take to address it that we do exactly that but I think that colleges will also be focused very much and should be focused on making sure that that dropout rate is minimised by ensuring that they deliver learning in a fashion that meets the needs of individuals Tavish, you've got a brief supplementary on that, Ian. Thank you You've hosted a series of extremely lengthy meetings in Vanessa Lake with regard to the University of Ireland's Islands Can I just be assured, Mr Swinney, that the further education colleges will now be full partners in the future of the island's islands in delivering courses for students rather than having the top-down, if I may say, traditional university model foisted upon them as some I think rather disappointingly sought? Well, as Mr Scott, has asked the question, I've spent a lot of my time in the last few months trying to ensure that the University of Ireland's Islands is able to fulfil its potential and I think it's quite I think this is one of the most exciting economic propositions for the islands and islands and that's why I've devoted a significant amount of my personal time to try to make some progress on this question because the argument for establishing a university of the islands and islands was predicated on the fact that however good the colleges were, they were not able to offer the opportunities that would either enable young people to remain in the islands and islands to complete their higher education and in some cases which they can now do under the University of the Islands undertake a PhD in their own locality which I think would be one fact that would help access. Secondly, there would be compelling reasons to attract people to come into the Highlands and Islands to pursue their education and research careers. Now none of that could be achieved by unless we had succeeded and my predecessors had succeeded in achieving university title for the University of the Highlands and Islands. So this is a massive prize what I want to make sure and I chaired the convention of the Highlands and Islands on Monday and if I can't quite remember the exact bullet point that was in a presentation from the principal of the University of the Highlands and Islands but once I rediscover it in my mind I shall write to Mr Scott with it because it sums up exactly my version. It's a very very good summary and one bullet point it essentially said we should have learning in all of the various communities of the Highlands and Islands but as a consequence of the UHI platform that should have global reach that's exactly what it was education in the communities with a global reach and that's what I want to create so the University of the Highlands will not develop in a top-down fashion it will be built up on the strength of the foundations of the colleges within it there's always a butt on these questions there has to be an acknowledgement that there has to be co-operation and collaboration between institutions to make sure that there isn't wastefulness or duplication and secondly there has to be an acceptance that there will be major projects which will deliver that global ambition for the University of the Highlands and Islands and I think that a super job has been done by the UHI on the establishment of the School of Health Sciences which is delivering a fantastic level of global capability in the Highlands in life and health sciences research and teaching the institutions have got to collaborate to make that possible and that might mean that not all of these projects can happen but there are localities around the Highlands and Islands but I give Mr Scott my absolute assurance that the federated nature of the college input into the UHI will be the way in which it proceeds in and I'm making sure that along with that the global reach of the University is able to be delivered as well Ian, you've got a short supplement I follow up to John Lamont's point cabinet secretary you're very clear there that you've felt NUS were wrong to say that the college reforms that had a disproportionate impact on women and second chance learners but the auditor general made exactly the same point in exactly the same terms in her recent report in the FE sector I wonder if you think she's wrong too I think it depends what the purpose of the question is to say that certain learning opportunities that were available in the past are no longer available then I can accept that point because they're not, because we've given we've taken a very deliberate decision that we need to focus more learning on progression towards qualifications and employment and why we're doing that we're doing that so that we can enable individuals to be able to make an economic contribution to our society I don't think that's an undesirable aim I'm very surprised, I'd be very surprised if that is viewed to be an undesirable aim now there are there remain to be short courses that lead to work or progression, these are still funded within the system there are a whole variety of different access mechanisms that enable individuals to make that journey back into education when education has perhaps not worked out for them the first time round but the prioritisation of short courses of often around five hours was done deliberately to increase the ability of individuals to enhance their employability and to lead to progression and that's the purpose of the reforms that we've undertaken Thank you very much, Con the last question on this Thank you, convener I was looking at comments by College Scotland who's submission to the Government's 2017 spending review estimates that delivering these national pay scales for college lecturers would cost up to £80 million which is a wee bit alarming in terms of funding for the college sector there's also been some comments made that funding sitting with the arms length foundations could be utilised to meet these costs which clearly should not be I wonder whether you had any comment on that Obviously there's a we've put in place the measures to address the issues around the pay arrangements within the college sector and that would be part of the discussions that the Government takes forward in relation to the wider financial settlement for the college sector but I have to be clear with the committee that the context within which the financial decisions have been made in relation to the forthcoming spending review will be extremely challenging so the decisions will be taken in that context we've put in place a number of different measures to assist the colleges in resolving these issues and we will of course continue to discuss those questions in relation to the arms length funds obviously that was a mechanism put in place to ensure that colleges remain incentivised to generate income and to be efficient and the resources that are there can of course be used appropriately to support and to enhance the college propositions that are undertaken for the funding council that is exactly how they are being used okay, thank you very much for that con before we move on to skills on Ross Thompson can I just remind people that we do have a full agenda here we spent 45 minutes on the first theme alone so if we could ask both questions and responses to be as short as possible thank you very much Ross thank you very much convener I have a question in relation to the apprenticeship levy which the cabinet secretary will know to force next year and no doubt we'll be aware that it's expected that as much as up to 300 million could be made available to the Scottish Government I was looking to see if the cabinet secretary could confirm that the Scottish Government's intention would be that the money that is raised from the levy would be reinvested in developing the skilled workforce particularly in the region I represent I know that's something which is incredibly important and to ensure that that money is directed in that way rather than being sifoned off into any other projects first thing I'd say is that I think that Mr Thompson is being a tad optimistic with these numbers there but we'll wait and see what comes in that respect but I think he's being a bit on the optimistic side secondly and of course I should point out that these sums will be allocated as part of the block grant allocation that were made by the United Kingdom Government in the light of the autumn statement the second point is that obviously the Government intends to use the resources that arise from the apprenticeship levy to support the development of our skills agenda and detailed announcements and that will be made once Mr Mackay has made his financial statement following on from that cabinet secretary again as part of the work of this committee we know that the commission looking at developing Scotland's young workforce highlighted that around about 30 per cent of employers have contact with colleges and schools and that there would be a lot of work that could be done to help improve that and it sort of follows on from some of the comments that have been made in relation to the loss of flexible and part-time places in colleges to give this committee an idea in relation to what steps the Government will be taking to help improve that relationship between colleges and the private sector and how those links could be built particularly in relation to skills in developing young workforce I've put it on the record before but I'll do it again delighted to do so again I think that developing Scotland's young workforce support that was produced by was one of the best pieces of work I've seen in my in my public life and as a consequence of the manner in which Sir Ian undertook that task the implementation of that report has been very energetically pursued by a whole range of different organisations because essentially they agreed with the contents of it and had felt involved in the process I think that it was a model exercise in how that can be undertaken The fundamental point that Mr Thomson raises with me is an important point it's one with which I agree entirely that the connection we cannot have enough connections in my opinion between the world of work and business and our academic and educational services so as I go round the country I see a significant development manifestation within schools of the application of the developing Scotland's young workforce I attended with Mr Hepburn one of the gatherings of the developing Scotland's young workforce national group which is chaired by Rob Woodward and we met in our ladies high school in Cumbernauld and we had a demonstration from the pupils there of the steps they've taken to incorporate developing Scotland's young workforce into the life of the school and in a very short space in time a remarkable amount of achievement had been made and that's been replicated very broadly across the country I'm sure there's more that needs to be done to enforce that but I give Mr Thomson the assurance that the Government is focused very much on encouraging that I met Rob Woodward just yesterday as the chair of the national group and in I think later on in November I'm meeting the chairs of all the organisations around the country who are doing a lot of very good work in making sure that this practical work is undertaken to establish the connections between schools colleges, the world of work and I give the committee the assurance that we view this to be and I come back to my point this is one of the three foundations of our education policy developing Scotland's young workforce and actually if we if we get the arrangements correct in that respect we may reduce the number of individuals that Johann Lamont cited to me as people who have not a very good educational experience by identifying their needs earlier by having connections to the world of work that may actually enable us to create opportunities and links that will better serve those individuals rather than trying to to maintain their school presence when in all honesty we accept that it's not going to work very well for them and so I see developing Scotland's young workforce as opening up really very significant opportunities for young people to secure outcomes that are appropriate for their needs Thank you, thanks very much Good morning Cabinet Secretary I had the pleasure of visiting Skills Development Scotland on Monday as an example of collaboration between Skills Development Scotland the schools, employers and the college there so it's certainly working well in Murray However, what I'd like to ask about is what you feel the impact of Brexit will be on Scotland's skills agenda I appreciate this is very much linked to your previous portfolio as well but in terms of skills gaps in Scotland we're often up until now they have been plugged in part by attracting people from overseas and looking ahead to some of the challenges that we may face in terms of plugging in those skills gaps how would that influence your skills agenda? I think the answer to that lies in knowing the answer to the question of what is going to happen to the issue of free movement of individuals because Mr Lochhead will know intimately from the area that he represents and I see this around a whole range of different organisations around the country there is quite literally organisations that would find it difficult to continue to operate without the mobile workforce that they have been able to attract and that's a very significant issue for us and that's why I think the whole question of free movement of individuals should not in any way be underestimated as to what it represents because it will, if it is taken to and that I can readily see how we could face skills shortages as a consequence of such measures that's why we have to make sure that these points are fully and properly understood by the United Kingdom Government in its negotiations and obviously the general ethos of our approach on skills is to make sure that we are involved in engaged dialogue with different stakeholders to ensure that we have all of the necessary skills available to us in different localities and I was in the hands and hands on Monday at the convention and one of the updates that we had at the meeting on Monday was the delivery of the skills investment plan which is a joint ruben facilitated by the convention of the hands and hands and anchored by Skills Development Scotland and there's a tremendous amount of work going on in dialogue with companies and organisations to make sure that we weave together the intelligence on skills requirements and that we address that satisfactorily. Thank you very much. We move on to attainment and curriculum for excellence and Liz, do you have a question for the cabinet secretary? Yes, I do. The cabinet secretary mainly related to some of the SQA issues and the attainment question. As you know, I think very frustrated when you made a comment in the chamber quite rightly so that some of the aspects of the national 5 computing science exam were not particularly accurate both in terms of typographical and coding errors and you said that you would have regular meetings with Janet Brown. We've had a scenario just recently where obviously there have been other exams that have not been quite up to the mark so I wonder if you are completely satisfied in relation to the paper that Janet Brown has produced to this committee about the quality assurance for the exam process and if you could answer one particular point, in the last bit she says that there has been additional subject specialist meetings to finalise the draft question papers for STEM subjects. I'm interested if you could tell us why there is to be additional scrutiny for STEM subjects because I think if I was a parent I'd be wanting to know why STEM is being picked out and whether there is appropriate quality assurance for the other exams. Quality assurance is an absolute requirement within the system so it is essential that those arrangements are put in place to ensure that young people have no other factors other than the purpose of the exam to contend with when they're actually undertaking the exam and the purpose of the exam is to assess their eligibility for qualifications and to test their knowledge and awareness and their learning so I think that the necessity for accuracy is an absolute and that's why I correctly identify my frustration about this point and I think it's intolerable if there are errors of a whatever nature actually it doesn't matter what adjective you put in front of them there are errors and they shouldn't be errors in exam papers and there's plenty of time and opportunity to make sure that these are quality assured so I certainly intend to make sure that quality assurance is at the heart of the approach I continue to have my regular dialogue with the chief examiner and to ensure that all of these questions are raised and I'm certainly very happy to raise the point that Liz Smith raises with me to make sure there is no I suspect the way it's been presented to Liz Smith has been to make the argument about extra scrutiny to be extra sure as opposed to a level of assurance to give us confidence the first time round but I will raise that issue too from my satisfaction Thank you and just one follow-up point I've done some work actually on the number of markers that are available for each exam and they seem to be reasonably consistent notwithstanding the change that's taken place between the old and the new hires what I'm interested in though is back to this issue of quality in Janet Brown's paper about the national 5 computing exam there were obviously a series of questions quite a number actually where she's identified that there were issues about the comprehension of students who were sitting that there was something wrong with the way in which the questions were asked which in other words meant that there were difficulties for the pupils who were answering that and I think what I'm getting at particularly in the context of the attainment and how important it is for all youngsters to have absolute equity when it comes to sitting exams and you know let's be honest their future is at stake that we are absolutely sure that the quality of the setting of the exams, the verification of these exams and the marking of these exams is absolutely up to scratch and I would ask you as Cabinet Secretary just to give a guarantee that everything possible will be done to ensure that that is I'm very happy to do so because it must be a given for our examination system there's one caveat I'll put into this which I'll make in a moment but let me make it absolutely clear to the committee the importance that I attached to this point this is the core purpose of the Scottish Qualifications Authority that should be clearly understood that it's the core purpose if this isn't done correctly then obviously there are significant issues about the performance of the SQT so I think this is absolute co-orternity the one caveat I'll put in is this that young people in you know let's take computing as an example young people must have a satisfactory level of literacy to be able to comprehend the questions that they will be posed in computing so the fundamental literacy literacy skills of young people will be tested in other subjects tested onward will be challenged now what we have to make sure is that the core purpose of the SQT is fulfilled and that the comprehension is not impossible or unimaginable by young people but there will be an element to which literacy skills of young people will be challenged in other subjects and that's the importance of ensuring that the broad general education has provided the necessary foundations for young people to be able to perform in that context I just make the point that either the literacy aspect of some of the questions asked is not good enough or that we have too few children who are coming through the system who have good quality literacy skills that's the point that I'm making that the second point is always an issue of the performance of the education system the first point is the performance of the SQA and the performance of the SQA point we cannot have questions that are incomprehensible that is not the SQA fulfilling its core purpose but the second point about the literacy skills of young people is a direct product of the education system and that's why I have such a focus on attainment thank you very much Ross cabinet secretary the attainment gaps particularly acute when it comes to young people with additional support needs are likely to be unemployed as other young people some months after leaving school only 65% of them achieve at least one level 5 qualification before they leave compared to 90% of young people without an additional support need the Scottish Children's Services Coalition have proposed that either a proportion of the attainment fund or a new fund specifically is set up to address the attainment gap for young people with additional support needs so I was wondering if you could outline the Government's thoughts on that to be opportunities for the attainment fund to be used to support the improvement of attainment for young people with additional support needs so there would be in my opinion no reason why that could not be taken forward and I think I come back to my the three foundations of our policy which I have very much in my mind in all the actions that I'm taking and getting it right for every child means that children with additional support needs have to be able to have their potential fulfilled and supported to fulfil their potential as a consequence of their interaction with the education and other public services Thanks there does seem to be an issue in terms of diagnosis for young people with additional support needs and there's quite a disparity between local authorities on this so I won't get the numbers exactly right but in Westin Bartonshire there's an additional support need in North Lanarkshire I believe it's about 5% and we've in this committee heard concerns from the Scottish parent teacher council that parents requests for support and diagnosis are sometimes going unheard does the Government believe that there's an issue then of significant numbers of young people who do have an additional support need not receiving the support that they need because it is not being diagnosed because of constrained local authority budgets Statute is very clear in this the education additional support for learning Scotland act requires education authorities to identify, provide for and to review the support for pupils who need support to overcome barriers to learning so statute is absolutely crystal clear in this so there can be in my opinion a little debate about whether or not the assessment should be carried out or not carried out young people should be protected by the terms of the education additional support for learning Scotland act in ensuring that their needs are met appropriately by local authorities who carry that statutory duty What work then would the Government be undertaking to ensure that there's a bit more consistency and support available to local authorities to ensure that they are identifying, diagnosing and then supporting all their young people with additional support needs? The Government reports annually to Parliament on implementation of the additional support for learning provisions The most recent report and the forthcoming report indicates that attainment for pupils with additional support needs has increased by 4.3 per cent since last year and that 86.2 per cent of pupils with additional support needs are now in a positive destination and that's been a continuing trend and obviously we will work with local authorities to ensure that we continue in that direction but I think there's some encouragement that that is happening obviously there will be and my constituency experience tells me this very directly some of the assessments of the relevant support needs of young people is not a straightforward process but in that complexity and in that challenge there is a very clear statute that has to be followed to make sure that additional support needs are met in all circumstances Just very briefly I think we can all agree that that is a positive trend but the trend is for young people with identified additional support needs and my point would be that it seems that there's a significant number of young people out there who have unidentified additional support needs I come back to my point about the statute, there's a duty on education authorities to make sure that that assessment is undertaken I always say we have various measures that various interventions that assess the capacity and the capability of education authorities in fulfilling that obligation and I certainly will look carefully at the issues that Mr Gleir raises to make sure that I'm satisfied that the needs of young people have been met in these circumstances Thanks I wonder if I could deal with curriculum for excellence in the context of your laudable observations particularly in the letter that you sent all teachers at the start of the school term about the clarity they need over those matters This week and in previous weeks Education Scotland have dispatched 62 pages of benchmarks for experiences and outcomes to science teachers and a comparable number of pages 49 pages of benchmarks literacy in English teachers and 43 pages on numeracy in mathematics I'm just wondering how the aim which I entirely agree with of clarifying and providing simplicity around this is helped by a vast amount of paper that's just been sent to those different teachers I think what has to be borne in mind is that the volume that Mr Scott is talking about I'll express this point in relation to literacy mathematics literacy and numeracy I'll not comment on the specific examples that Mr Scott has raised but on literacy and numeracy the benchmarks that are being issued which are the definitive benchmarks these are the levels that young people have got to reach to be judged to be at the appropriate level of literacy and numeracy are spanning from age 5 to age 18 so we're not talking about everybody having to be conversant with absolutely every part of these documents the teaching profession will be able to utilise the parts of it that are relevant to their circumstances but the benchmarks have been set out to make it clear for the young person's journey through the curriculum what is expected of them over the duration of that period so that's the purpose of the benchmarks and those benchmarks replace the significant aspects of learning which were previously issued by Education Scotland which is designed to simplify the process and to give what I said in my own covering letter to the chief inspector's letter in August was definitive guidance to the teaching profession I appreciate this is a level of detail but I do give the committee the assurance that this is the definitive piece of guidance it will not be the science ones for example are out in draft they will be the subject of interaction with the profession until the point in which they become the definitive guidance but they are designed to ensure that these needs are met the final point I'd say is that Education Scotland raises a not unreasonable point about volume and breadth and I discussed this issue with the teachers panel who I met with last week and I think one of our conclusions is that in general we should have an eye to making sure that the benchmarks are as focused as they can be but we are I've looked through personally the literacy and university benchmarks and I can see exactly why there is a need for the level of detail to be there across that whole age range I think it is possible to navigate your way through them because I was able to do it to work out what would a child require to reach at a particular stage in their educational journey and it's really quite clearly expressed in that respect so you wouldn't be concerned that they would encourage a box ticking approach to teaching because I know that's a concern that has been expressed. That's a slightly different issue and I think that yes I would be concerned if they led to a box ticking exercise, yes because that would defeat the objects of curriculum for excellence and this is where I suppose I'll just rehearse out loud the dilemmas at the heart of this we have a curriculum which is essentially is dependent on teacher judgment it is a liberating curriculum for teachers I think it's a great reform a very successful reform which has attracted international commendation when you have that atmosphere we have that situation but we also have teachers saying I'd like a bit more clarity about whether I've got the children to where they need to be that's the purpose and that's equally understandable because teachers want to deliver the goods for young people in their classrooms so I would be concerned if this became a box ticking exercise I don't see the need for that because fundamentally the system is driven by teacher judgment and the benchmarks are there to help teachers frame in their mind where does a child need to be to reach a particular level that will be satisfactory your point about literacy in English and numeracy in mathematics benchmarks being definitive that's absolutely the case because science science got draft to August 2016 I should have they're out to consultation so they're not definitive they're in a consultative phase so they'll be definitive very shortly once we get to that point we've heard all the feedback but there's a dilemma here which I hope Mr Scott understands we want to take the profession with us we want to put in place measures that the profession look at and think yeah that's valuable that helps me and just us sitting in dare I say it top down education Scotland saying this is what is good for you indeed but I assure Mr Scott that the process we're going through is to get to definitive guidance that is not replaced in a couple of years time that gives the clarity that the profession is looking for but we want to do it in an inclusive way did you notice that Professor Priestly at Stirling University had observed that two suggestions to you as the cabinet secretary one is to abolish ease and oes outcomes and come on Liz experiences thank you as the main cause of bureaucracy affecting all teachers that was his first suggestion the second one was to ensure that a single set of detailed CFE guidelines with clear and consistent message about the curriculum and development was what was in place I thought that was quite pertinent advice I haven't seen that from Professor Priestly but Mr Scott would like to give me the reference I'll go and have a I tried to keep an eye on it I can't say that I managed to see every addition but two points to Mr Scott the first is that this document issued by the chief inspector of education which I attached a covering note was designed to give exactly the address exactly the second point that Professor Priestly has made and I think it's a totally fair point that's why this document is here I'd have to say that this document has had a very good reaction across the education system I don't think that just because people are polite to me when I go around schools teachers come up to me in the street and tell me it just in my own constituency I was waiting to board a ferry in the western Isle the other day and a teacher told me how valuable she thought this document was so there's a lot of good feedback and it's been downloaded over 50,000 times from the Education Scotland website that can't just all be members of the Scottish Parliament downloading it it must be members of the teaching profession on Professor Priestly's first point about ease and oes in this document it says key message is what to avoid do not tick off all of the ease and oes separately do not plan for individual ease and oes and the point of all of that is to say that ease and oes are not some obligatory tick list they are there to contextualise learning and to give guidance, background reference points for teachers they are not a tick list they should be viewed as a tick list ok ok, thank you very much one thing I have learned in this committee is what ease and oes stands for and I hope the rest of the world understands that as well I used to think that it was a pop song by the pulp in terms of tackling teachers workload which I commend the cabinet secretary for wanting to tackle which is so important it also involves the issues clearly and Ross Greer in terms of additional support needs and I guess as politicians we have to do our best to put ourselves into the shoes of teachers and understand the 21st century classroom environment and the pressures that teachers face and I notice that the number of pupils with additional support needs has increased by 57.2% over the last few years between 2011 and 2015 that's a very significant increase and clearly the modern classroom environment with inclusive education which is the right thing to do in terms of getting it right for every child is different to what it was 20 or 30 years ago so the level of resources to support teachers dealing with pupils with additional support needs does not match the increase we've seen in demand over that period of time and clearly there's going to be a lot of pressure on classroom teachers and I just wondered whether the cabinet secretary and the Government are willing to look at the correlation between the increase in number of children with additional support needs and the level of resources available to deal with that the head teacher who gave evidence to this committee a few weeks ago said that a small number of pupils with particular support needs can take up quite a large amount of resources and time which is quite an obvious and understandable statement so that balance between resources and the increase in number of children requiring the resources is that something you might be willing to look at? I'm certainly prepared to look at that I think that the issues that are raised are genuinely issues obviously Parliament when we passed the Standards in Scotland Schools Act in 2000 my member says my right built in the presumption of mainstream education for all children there are of course a couple of caveats to that and one of them is the appropriate assessment of the educational environment in which a young person should be educated to ensure that their needs are met and that obviously there is then a range of provision which is available actually within schools and I see a range of different approaches that are taken I was in a school in Mr Gay's constituency at the weekend at Preston Lodge High School and I observed a workshop which was led by one of the additional support for learning teachers within the school who went through the developments in that school over a period of years in essentially changing the focus of the facilities available for young people with additional support needs to make sure that they were better met and it's a very good example of how that would be undertaken and of course there will be many others around the country of that character but I think that the question that Mr Lochhead raises is one that requires further scrutiny and I certainly will undertake to do that OK, thank you very much Fulton, do you still want to come in on that? Yes, it's actually just a quick supplementary on Richard and Rossie's point about children with additional support needs I've actually been having quite a lot of constituents coming to me about this issue in my own constituency and something that's coming across quite consistently is that parents when they're dealing with the local authority are feeling that their views aren't being heard and they're not being treated as the experts. Do you think, cabinet secretary, that through the attainment agenda that parents' views may be given more weight to when they're dealing with local authorities, for example I can actually just say as well before I can put on record in the committee thanks very much for your recent visit to Colbridge High School at my old school and I think that it was very much appreciated by the staff there. I was there to visit a learning festival which was a fantastic a literacy festival which is a fantastic example of innovation within the school which was a great experience I think that the whole question of parental involvement in education is central to ensuring the strength and the effectiveness of our education system so it's really vital that we there is that effective dialogue now obviously there are challenges in that to address fully the needs of parents the views of parents in relation to the needs of their children and that has to be the subject of very active discussion with parents to ensure that schools are properly meeting the needs of all young people regardless of their particular needs okay, thank you very much we're now going to the governance review at Ian and thanks very much cabinet secretary we know the governance review is now in consultation phase and a number of engagement events have been set up in different parts of the country for parents which is a commendable thing to do but we also know that the first of those in Glasgow didn't go particularly well we read in the press that some of the parents there felt the document was filled with jargon that the officials present couldn't provide clarification for some straightforward questions and they also felt that the questions the consultation asked of them really made little sense to them and I've certainly spoken to one of the parents who was present who confirms that that was an accurate representation of what happened in the light of that I'd like to ask what action you've taken cabinet secretary to ensure and improve the quality of the consultation the consultation's been published and we'll have these events and are certainly not going to publish another consultation document no I'm not going to do that the consultation document to me addresses the issues that have to be addressed and we'll have that dialogue around the country in these different events I'll make sure that officials are in a position to address the questions that are raised and I certainly personally will be involved in a range of these different conversations so I'll be able to hear at first hand the different perspectives and views of parents in that respect you don't feel the parents' concerns in the Glasgow event were valid then I didn't say that I said I'm not going to issue another consultation document I'll listen carefully to the events and I'll make sure that officials are able to handle the questions that are put to them I've had one conversation with the national parent forum for Scotland in the beginnings of our consultation process I'll be seeing them again in a couple of weeks time I think it is for one of their regular meetings where I shall be in attendance again to hear their perspectives and we'll we'll take it forward in that respect I think I've also been advised here that the event was not a Scottish Government event that was held I'm not sure if Government officials were there but I'll certainly make sure that Government officials that are events are able to answer the questions that are necessary to be answered I think Government officials were there because they were named in the reports so it certainly seemed to be a genuine opinion but it is early days in the consultation and certainly in my initial discussions with some of the members of parent councils locally including the school that you are visiting in the weekend and indeed some of the soundings that I've had reported back to me through meetings with the national parent forum one of the concerns has been expressed is around the idea of a national funding formula that would be a centralisation of decisions around budgets for particular schools so my question is simply this if in response to the consultation stakeholders overwhelmingly believe that a national funding formula is not a good idea is it an idea where she will withdraw we're in a consultation around the governance process and what I've signalled as part of this process is that there will be further work undertaken in the spring of next year, March 2017 on the question of a national funding formula for education and what we say in the document is that the review offers an opportunity to comment on the principles which will underpin this formula and we invite to the contribution we've got a consultation process under way I'll listen to what comes back in that consultation exercise and reflect on it The questions in the consultation are about the principles underpinning a formula not by the existence of such a formula as a mechanism my question is if stakeholders overwhelmingly reject the idea of a national funding formula in favour of being taken locally will you listen to them? I'll listen to all of the contents of the consultation responses but I would also remind Mr Gray that the Government put this proposal in its election manifesto and the Government was elected as a consequence without either a majority of the public vote or indeed members in Parliament so my question is the consultation that you're undertaken I understand the question entirely and I'm simply giving a complete answer which is yes, I will listen to the consultation but I'm also reminding Mr Gray that the Government was elected on a manifesto commitment to deliver this and obviously the Government needs to effect its agenda properly but that's one of our manifesto commitments Thank you, Liz Quickly, could the cabinet secretary update the committee on where the Scottish Government is with the request from St Joseph's primary school to come out of local authority control? I'm considering the request that they've made I met the parents group in late June and I said I hoped to be in a position to give them a response to the issues within a six month period I'm obviously mindful of the fact that the Government's review addresses some of those questions and is scheduled to run until the 6th of January 2017 so I'm wrestling with those issues and the competing timetables between the two David Thank you, can I ask you to wrestle with two others in the context of the Government's review that Mr Gray started on? The first is that in some areas such as Sheffan there are teaching heads so in your consideration of how head teachers will take on greater responsibilities can you please be aware of the complexity of their lives when they already have classroom contact time and actually teach? I'd appreciate that small schools since probably not in many parts of Scotland but it's certainly in mine and the second point is as you'll know cabinet secretary there are society of Edinburgh and many others across education have raised repeatedly the dual role that education Scotland have between inspectors on one hand and the policy area on the other are you open minded to consider reform on the first point that Mr Scott raises I'm acutely aware of the point he raises although I would point out that the head teacher of Preston Lodge high school was making the point to make the weekend that he still teaches in the classroom as well so that's a large secondary school in Preston pan so it's not just in small schools that head teachers are teaching and it's very welcome on the second point I know Mr Scott has raised this point before and obviously I'll explore this point and this is an appropriate opportunity for us to do this I think the discussion of this question I think has to be informed by a consideration of the question of what is the purpose of inspection and what is the purpose of improvement activity because I think in a sense that if I understand the RSE position the they're suggesting there is a fundamental distinction between inspection and the other wider roles of Education Scotland I'm not so sure I accept that distinction because I actually see inspection the purpose of inspection being about improvement and the other bit of Education Scotland is about improvement it's about curriculum development and the enhancement of teaching and educational practice and to me the advancement of teaching and educational practice is what is the point of inspection into the bargain I'll certainly look at the point and I'd give the assurance that I'll consider it as part of this exercise but I just put down the marker that I think we've maybe got to look at the role and the purpose of inspection in a slightly different fashion to how some people might characterise the purpose of inspection not just attributing that to the RSE but I think in general inspection is perhaps not always readily viewed as being about improvement which I unreservedly believe it is I take that but you would accept I presume that a lot of teachers a lot of people in education authorities also think Education Scotland are the basis of the huge amount of paperwork that we were discussing in our earlier exchange and there's a better way forward on that I'd hope you'd at least pay attention to that there's a better way forward and the paperwork I can assure Mr Scott of that and there'll be vast amounts of guidance that has previously just been added on to the Education Scotland website which makes it very difficult for teachers to navigate to work out what the best thing is to do a lot of that will be getting dumped and it'll be getting dumped over the course of the next few weeks and months and we're moving to a national improvement to hub on the Education Scotland website that will be a gathering point for really strong noteworthy measures to improve educational performance it will be a it will be a real asset for the teaching profession and it will be much easier to navigate than the current range of different sources so I think there's a I think undoubtedly Education Scotland needs to slim down the volume of material that is available that is underway and I will make sure it happens because teachers must be able to access material more readily than they are currently able to do so having said that I'm also very struck by the feedback that I get about the role of Education Scotland in their inspection activity which is viewed certainly by many individuals that have made representations to me in my discussions around the country having had a profound benefit on schools so the real valuable deep inspection activity that is undertaken can really enhance educational provision and so it should but I'll reflect on those points Thank you very much, Ross The Cabinet Secretary announced that the Scottish Government would look to create new education regions with the aim of helping to encourage greater collaboration amongst our local authorities Educationalists in my own region have advised that at the moment there seems to be a lack of clarity and understanding about how the regions will operate with different professionals reaching different conclusions and different interpretations in terms of how that would work making it quite difficult to participate in any meaningful consultation because you don't really know what they're being asked to comment on so could the Cabinet Secretary advise the committee how he envisages the education regions working and what the relationship would be between schools and education authorities as well? In a sense this is the one of the key questions within the consultation exercise and my view on this is driven by a number of factors the first is that the OECD in their assessment of Scottish education yes commended curriculum for excellence and said that we had every right to be proud as a country of the bold reform that we had undertaken and that's welcome but they also challenged us to ensure there was more collaboration within education and I think that's a bit of advice that we would be well served to follow and to accept and that is where the educational regions point comes from about the need for us to ensure there is much more collaboration in educational practice and enhancement in the years to come the second factor is that I think we we are currently doing things in education 32 times and to varying scales of intensity some local authorities have three secondary schools some have 20 secondary schools and so that although we're doing things 32 times we're doing things 32 times in very different scales and I think we have to address the inefficiency of some of that and the fact that there could be shared purposes coming out of that educational collaboration that would be beneficial in terms of sharing good practice and learning in the development of educational provision and the third factor is money if we're doing things 32 times then I've ventured to suggest in a tight financial climate there are ways in which we could collaborate to save money for local authorities in doing things that are done next door in exactly the same fashion and avoiding the need for there to be replication on a multiple scale and if I'm frustrated about anything I'm frustrated about the lack of progress on some of these questions which is not necessarily about my responsibilities as the education secretary but more my frustrations as a former finance secretary who gave every encouragement to local authorities to observe and pursue some of these efficiencies and frankly I don't see much evidence of them having done so so that's some of the three points of principle behind it now Mr Thompson will I'm sure be aware of the work that has gone on in the Northern Alliance in his locality which brings together the local authorities Aberdeen City Aberdeen Shire, Murray Highland, the Western Isles Orton and Shetland in a collaboration to support and enhance educational practice and yesterday I attended an event which was organised by the convention of Scottish local authorities which had presentations from three different collaborations, one was in the Northern Alliance one was in the Tayside area, one was in the west of Scotland all demonstrating to varying degrees the opportunities to collaborate to enhance educational practice and to secure efficiencies that could be deployed to invest in education so there's a conversation to be had here based on those questions I think the rationale of it is pretty clearly explained by the OECD and I've obviously put some more colour on it this morning and we obviously will listen to what comes back from the consultation exercise I thank the cabinet secretary for that answer Mr Keir Bloomer gave evidence to this committee I think on the 28th of September when I asked him a similar question about the proposed education regions he responded that the Royal Society of Edinburgh was likely to be skeptical that the proposed new setup would offer anything additional and helpful so what assurances can the cabinet secretary give this committee that the Scottish Government proposals won't simply create another layer of bureaucracy in our system and I welcome the fact that you mentioned the Northern Alliance because there is collaboration there I think they would seek reassurance that we're not going to see duplication and additional bureaucracy added into the work that they're already doing well I couldn't see how that could be a worry for the Northern Alliance because it's actually probably the most advanced concept of an educational region in the country my question is what's the rest of the country doing that's the question I've got what's the rest of the country up to doing things 32 times when we could be collaborating not to duplicate but to avoid costs and also to ensure that we're adding value the core question in the governance review is this I think we all accept that learning and teaching the quality of learning and teaching is central to the closure of the attainment gap and if we all believe that the question that I pose in the consultation document is well what adds value to that learning and teaching experience in a classroom an individual interaction between a teacher and a pupil that must be surely the opportunity for us to convey learning so that must be good and to make that even better what adds value to that interaction and that's the question I ask in the governance review and to be honest about it I'm asking the question are all of our are all of our local authorities adding as much value to that learning and teaching experience as on an equal basis and I think and it's not just my opinion on that audit Scotland assessments about the capabilities of education authorities very very significantly around the country and I can't afford to ignore that because if I'm interested in closing the attainment gap in every part of the country it's not good enough to just accept or to resign ourselves to the fact that one authority is a fabulous education authority that adds lots of value to the learning and teaching experience and another authority at the other end of spectrum doesn't do so, that's not fair to young people so this isn't some abstract lines on a map discussion that I'm raising I'm raising an issue about what enhances the learning and teaching of young people in our country to be honest enough to confront it and not all the practice that is undertaken in our country adds enough value and that's got to be addressed now into the mix this is where some of the points that Mr Scott raises about education Scotland are relevant I want to make sure that education Scotland in its improvement function is able to be part of assisting in that process so that we really add value to the educational experience of young people in our localities thanks very much we're now going to go on to children's services and then follow up by early years but Fulton, you've got questions for the cabinet secretary thanks again, convener cabinet secretary will be aware that the First Minister has said there'll be a routine branch review of care services which she confirmed at First Minister's questions last week can the cabinet secretary tell us perhaps how this might work and how it might link into the review that's on going? There are two very different purposes and I would want there to be there may well be issues that arise out of both of them but I'd want them to be undertaken as two distinct exercises Catherine Dyer is undertaking a really challenge exercise on our child protection arrangements to make sure that they are as effective as they need to be to protect to fulfil the statutory obligations of child protection and to ensure that we have all the necessary arrangements in place to to address the welfare of young people so it's a very specific exercise to ensure that the provisions of statute and the arrangements that we have in place practically live up to the requirements of statute in all these circumstances The wider review on which the First Minister has committed to is to respond to the appeal of young people who have been in care and some who are still in care that they have not felt the system has served them despite all of its complexity, despite all of its detail and all of its good intentions that it's not delivered the best outcomes for them and the First Minister has committed to a very engaged process with those young people and with other stakeholders to ensure that we undertake that review and that we learn the licence that listening to the experiences of young people who have been in care can assist us in addressing the requirements of the system Short supplementary, thank you very much Cabinet Secretary Do you think that looking at the hearing system as part of that process will be useful and do you think that that will be done obviously we are considering as a committee looking at the children's hearing system as part of the work programme and looking at the situation of how children feel involved with that particularly if I looked after kids as part of that review will the hearing system be included? We will look at the hearing system we wouldn't be looking at the whole system if we didn't I was quite struck in a conversation I had with some young people who were in care at listening to the experience of a young man of how it felt to be an eight-year-old at a children's hearing to have everybody else talking about you and you not saying a word and I had never ever thought of it in that fashion it was a profoundly powerful explanation from him and it was in a meeting room of about 12 years around the table and probably the number of people that would be around a children's hearing table and he explained the feelings he had because he was not saying a word and I was stunned by that I think that the children's hearing system does a tremendous amount of good work but we can't ignore that input of that type and how that makes a young person feel particularly when it's their whole circumstances in their life that's been assessed so it will be part of that process but I do want to say that there's an awful lot to be proud of in the children's hearing system as well but I don't think that we can be oblivious to that type of input Right, thanks very much, John Thank you To say that I had the privilege of being an observer at a panel very recently and I was very grateful for the opportunity to do so because it's certainly there is nothing as powerful as actually sitting watching a child's life the importance of it but also some of the challenges that are there and I may write you separately to some of my observations on that because I think there are big issues there around you talk about a young person having a voice but of course if we strip out all the support workers out of our schools and so on there is a question of how you actually ensure that voice is heard but I am very grateful that you will be looking at the whole question because I think there's also a question about how it relates to the legal system it felt over legalised to me as well but again that's something I think that's a really important piece of work but I did want to... Can I just reflect on just one piece of feedback I saw a presentation some weeks ago from looked after children and they showed me a graphic which had a roundabout with all sorts of exits but in the core of it was written in small letters all the legislation that relates to the construction of the system in which their lives are as Johann Lamont says discussed and there's a lot of it and most of it has been created out of probably difficult situations that have emerged but it's very legalised very legislative heavy and when you actually listen to the experience of young people what made the profound impact of me was that it wasn't a piece of legislation that set this young person on a better course it was an individual and they could literally name the individual who had given them the turning point in their life so it wasn't actually clause 2 subsection 6 para whatever it was a person and I was struck by the city of the legislative framework that is underpinning all of this and I think we've all regardless of our politics I think we've all got a duty to look carefully at these issues I mean I certainly agree with that but I think there is this question of me I remain sceptical about your proposals around Governments one of the things that whatever happens is you can't take pluck schools out of the support system and young people find themselves in the services that come together whether it's social work or whatever and I think that's a separate question for another day but I want to relate to reflecting on the importance of child protection I think as a society we've basically played catch up we play catch up on understanding what the abuse and neglect of children means and we end up in a position where obviously we have now an inquiry into historic child abuse which is a reflection of our fruit failure society to listen to young people when they were telling us what was happening to them or to believe that it could possibly be true and I just wondered in reflection on the situation we now find ourselves with inquiry where a chair is resigned another panel member is resigned citing Government interference as the cause where survivors are saying they're concerned about the question of the remit not being addressed because it excludes people who feel that they have been abused and that they should be listened to that the question of redress is not being progressed properly and of course we know there's now been significant criticism of the survivor support bit of the Scottish Government in the way in which that has been delivered we can't go into all of this now but would you agree that it's very serious that survivors who saw this inquiry has been an important way of them getting justice they do not believe currently I wonder do you accept how significant that lack of confidence is in sapping the energy both of survivors and those who want to see that justice I wonder if you have a view on why we've ended up in a place which I think is very serious and what actions you as a Government are going to take to convince survivors that this inquiry is serious that it is going to be able independently to do its job and be inhibited in relation to the decisions that it makes about how that has to be done and would you confirm that you are looking actively at the question of redress and amending the remit to ensure that people are not unnecessarily excluded from this investigation I do acknowledge the significance of the issues that are involved in the inquiry and that's why I've taken steps to ensure that I have kept the committee and Parliament updated on a whole range of different questions in relation to the inquiry and I want to go through a number of the points that have been raised I'm looking for one piece of talk the first thing I want to say is that on the questions in relation to the chairing of the inquiry we have I listened to survivors who expressed in the circumstances that I faced over the summer I listened to survivors who said to me that they had always felt that the inquiry that had been created had not fulfilled their expectations because it had not been led by a judge I took great lengths to make sure that I could address that and I appointed Lady Smith to lead the inquiry and I have not heard anything other than commendation for the appointment of Lady Smith to lead the inquiry so I hope in responding to the views of survivors who made it clear to me they wanted a judge to be the inquiry that Lady Smith's appointment fulfilled that commitment I have made it clear to Parliament on a number of occasions that I am satisfied that the steps that were taken by my officials were proper and appropriate in relation to their duties under the inquiries act and I would I have absolutely no desire for the Government to have any role in this inquiry that it is not entitled to have and I think the best way I can possibly signal that is by the appointment of Lady Smith because anybody that knows Lady Smith will know there's no prospect of the Government being able to do anything that it shouldn't do in relation to that inquiry a judge of 15 years standing and a very strong pedigree on issues of domestic violence and tribunal conduct I hope that it convinces people that the inquiry is strongly led and as I have not heard anything to the contrary since Lady Smith's appointment I appointed Lady Smith within a month of the vacancy arising I think that it was much quicker than anybody anticipated so I think that the inquiry has been able to continue its work with the minimum amount of interruption because it must be able to conduct its work and obviously I don't account for the inquiry I don't explain for the inquiry so the committee if it wishes satisfaction at that point I'm sure can ask the inquiry in relation to some of the other questions the committee has had a letter from Mr Allen Draper on behalf of Vincas about a number of issues one of the points that Mr Draper says it is clear from recent pronouncements on Lady Smith that there have been no discussions with her about the remit of the inquiry which she described as fixed I'm afraid that that statement is incorrect I have personally discussed the question of extending the remit with Lady Smith so I ask the committee to understand that whilst I appreciate strong things are said some of them aren't accurate and I said to people I would look at the extension of the remit and I'm considering that point to make in steps to address that I've seen survivor groups John Lamont was at one of the meetings I had with survivor groups I've seen survivor groups individually subsequent to that I have seen individuals I'm seeing another individual on Tuesday and I'm seeing survivor groups again on Wednesday to continue my discussions on these questions and I take it very seriously but I have to be mindful on a number of questions in relation to the remit if I extend the remit of the inquiry I will inevitably broaden well I wouldn't be narrowing the scope of the inquiry so I would be extending it and I would inevitably be extending the length of the inquiry and I have to be mindful of the views of survivors who want this exercise to be preceded with and not to be something that becomes longer than it needs to be because they want to get progress on these questions so the dilemmas on this are not easy because they ultimately will come down to that question that it's unavoidable that the length of time with inquiry will be extended if I decide to extend the remit and that's a significant issue with which I'm wrestling the question of redress is being actively explored I've said that to the survivor groups and I'm looking at that very carefully and I have to look at all the details about how that might be taken forward and I'm doing that and then finally John Lamont raised the issues of the press coverage around the survivor Scotland fund and obviously Mr Gray raised this First Minister's question time as well and the Government takes that seriously into the bargain and I have put in train measures to satisfy myself that the arrangements are appropriate the survivor Scotland arrangements were not a product of a creation of the Government they were a product of an interactive process led outside of Government Government was obviously part of it but it was driven by external parties and survivor groups and it created the arrangements that we are now implementing in which are now I might add supporting a range of individuals with practical assistance about 80 individuals are now being supported practically through the survivor Scotland fund I've always read the material that's been in the herald and obviously I want to satisfy myself that we have in place arrangements that are appropriate and that those criticisms are not valid and that works not yet complete those discussions are going on that I've asked officials to undertake and they've been reported to me to make sure that I can be satisfied that the external process that created the survivor Scotland approach is actually a valid and appropriate way to proceed that will give people the support that they require Can I just say in response that I appreciate a lot of what you've said and I recognise that you do take this matter seriously I would make the point that survivors at the meeting that we attended expressed support for the previous chair and remain concerned about the fact that she had been removed and that is something obviously that we would I think it's something that we need to look at in more detail I hear what you say about you can't extend if you change the remit you'll extend the inquiry but of course part of the problem is we've reduced the number of panel members by one so there's now going to be two rather than three I'm not sure if that fits with that either and on the last point around survivors I should declare an interest of a member across party group on historic child abuse as adult survivors but there is also a live petition to the petitions committee which I convene expressing concern not so much about whether there is funding but the model that is used to deliver that support to people and they believe and they have made representations to ministers in the past that that approach is not the one that meets properly the needs of survivors that you would be alive to that issue round the question it's not just is there a pot of money that people can access it's the way in which that money is going to be spent which actually is a different kind of model and signposts people and so on but we don't have time to go into that in detail now but I suppose the final point I would ask you to reflect on there is a view that yes you say that you don't do things outwith your area of responsibility you have a responsibility round the financing of the inquiry would you confirm that you would not see your role in terms of that as inhibiting the inquiry where they want to go with certain ways of getting evidence and support to be a proper understanding of what's happening there's one thing between being financially sensible and another where you use that or that remit is used to say you can't take that approach in relation to the inquiry there's three points I'd like to make in relation to Johann Lamont's points the first is to say as a matter of fact the chair resigned from office in July and the chair was not removed by the Government she resigned from office she wasn't very happy was she as a matter of fact the chair resigned from her post the second point is on the Survivors Scotland fund and the question that Johann Lamont raised about the issues that have been raised about the way in which it is organised and that's the issue I wanted to satisfy myself about it's not about that there's a pot of money around and it can support people I want to be satisfied that the process that has created Survivors Scotland actually delivers what is appropriate in these circumstances I stress that the Survivors Scotland approach was created by an interactive process which the Government was involved in but it wasn't that we just said this is what it's going to be which I appreciate is what a lot of things happen there's a lot of interaction which if my memory says me right the equality and human rights commission were involved in supporting us and taking that forward so I want to satisfy myself I'll look also at the petition issues that Johann Lamont raises because I suspect they will be part of this discussion into the bargain and then the final point about the financial arrangements in all circumstances the requests for authorisation or approval of financial measures which are required under the act to come from the inquiry to the Government in all circumstances they have been approved none have been rejected by the Government and we may have asked some questions we may have said do you need does it need to be does it need to be on that basis what about this basis but they've all been accepted ultimately and I think that Johann Lamont committee will understand that the Government has the required act provides for us a legitimate right to ask questions about things to satisfy ourselves that the financial arrangements have been taken forward properly and indeed that's the subject of the letter that I've written to the committee to give some further detail on that financial provision which I hope was of help to the committee thank you very much we'll move on to the last theme which is early years and start with Colin Beattie thank you very much one of the things we've been looking at is flexibility and choice for parents in connection with early years and I looked at this document that came from COSLA which isn't great but which does highlight the fact that there's a wide diversity of views from parents and from local authorities as to what that flexibility and choice could entail and there's clearly the possibility that this could become very, very complex do you have any views as to how you would see this being taken forward? In the publication of the early learning childcare blueprint which was published just during the October recess the Government set out many of the options around some of these challenges under the four principles of quality flexibility accessibility and affordability and I think we need to be mindful of those four principles in designing the approach to the roll out of early learning and childcare to make sure that we ensure the quality of intervention is there for the benefit of young people and to support them in their development but then also other factors of the accessibility of those services to parents and families and the flexibility of those arrangements work in all circumstances so those principles will underpin the discussion that we have around how we might take forward the roll out of the policy to make sure that we satisfactorily address the needs of children and families Clearly the question of affordability comes to the fore when we look at the options that COSLA have been looking at and the potential for additional costs Is it going to be left to the local councils to determine the mix by which they deliver the service? That's essentially a material point in the arrangements that we take forward and your Parliament will have to consider how these principles of quality, flexibility, accessibility and affordability will be laid out I think it's you know there's a whole range of existing provision and a whole range of different ways in which local authorities take forward some authorities work with very much through their own capacity some work in partnership with a range of other organisations and I think it's in some of these models that we will see some of the answers to the four questions of principle that I've set out The two very brief supplementaries from Gillian Nintag When we had the representatives from COSLA here on this issue of flexibility I asked the question of whether there was a correlation between the low take-up in existing childcare places provided by local authorities and the reluctance of some local authorities and we haven't received a response really detailing that in the document that Mr Beattie just referenced I wonder that's going to be key in delivering these 1,140 hours I just want to know your view on that I think that's one of the material issues that we've got to consider as part of this because there will be if we're to fulfil that commitment in principle to make sure that it can be fulfilled against the four principles that I've set out and undoubtedly the role of childminders and other providers will be part of that discussion and that's why we've undertaken this on an open basis so that we can have that conversation more widely and get the best input possible to determine how we might design an approach that satisfies those principles Thank you I was just going to ask about the requirement in terms of delivering a policy for 20,000 extra staff which I think is the Government's own extrapolated figure which by any standards is very significant when would the Government be in a position to provide the committee with their plan as to how those 20,000 will be recruited given the timescales which I think everyone accepts are pretty tight on delivering such a large number of people into the system The number that I have in front of me is 14,000 I'm not nitpicking it's just a little bit different from 20,000 it's still a big number and obviously once we go through the exercise and the consultation and learn the licence on some of the pilot work which we'll be commencing shortly we'll be in a position in the course of 2017 to set out some of the detailed arrangements that would be in place to ensure that that was the case obviously there's a even without that detail however Mr Scott raises a fair point that it's pretty obvious we're going to need more people so we need to put in place the mechanisms and the measures to enable us to support that and if I go back to one of the earlier questions that Mr Scott raised with me about the UHI this is a perfect opportunity for us to see opportunities to develop new skills in localities such as the ones that Mr Scott represents where the UHI can have a very significant role to play in delivering that benefit Thank you Ross Thomson In evidence of the committee when we looked at the expansion of early years provision Claire Scofield who was from the national day nurseries association had advised members that as we move the expansion of hours up to the 1140 that there would be a number of challenges in relation to the number of hours and flexibility and it was quite clear from the evidence session that one of the key things is about flexibility so it's welcome that the Scottish Government did announce as part of the consultation a childcare account however at the moment there's very little information on what that actually means and how that would work I was just wondering if the cabinet secretary outlined to the committee how he envisages such a childcare account working particularly in relation to that element of flexibility Obviously when the Government consults on provisions we put ideas out there to see what the reaction will be of individuals and organisations and obviously the detail that comes back helps us to come to an informed judgment about the design of particular policy interventions so there is a you win that position where these questions are under consideration and assessment and without reaching a definitive conclusion The childcare account provision is essentially a measure whereby there would be an ability for parents to be able to choose where provision would best be deployed to suit their interests and it might also take on the point that Gillian Martin made about childminders that might involve a range of different provision to meet those needs so it's essentially I suppose the practical manifestation of one element of the flexibility principle that I've set out as part of the process but obviously we'll gain feedback from the consultation exercise and decide accordingly Thank you Thanks very much, Ross Cabinet Secretary, you'd be delighted to know that I have one question left for you as they say I started so I'll finish We previously had COSLA in front of us about the underspend in early years from local authorities they promised us first of all I was quite surprised to hear that they didn't have a mechanism that despite their protestations showed how much money was spent on early years provision within each local authority because I don't see how they could say that they were clearly meeting their targets if they didn't know how much money they were spending but they also told us that they would give us an immediate response to that with the figures from each local authority which we never had Were you aware that COSLA wouldn't have had these figures to hand from local authorities did you think you would be responsible for collating those figures within COSLA Were you surprised that there's not and is there anything we can do to make sure that there will be? The information that informed the report to which you refer was gathered from the local financial return for 2014-15 the provisional outturn data for 2015-16 and budget estimates for 2016-17 all of which are supplied by local authorities and the production of the report was overseen by a working group that involved COSLA and local authorities so I'm at a bit of a loss to understand how there can be a problem with the data because the data was provided for the formulation of the report from local government itself The position that COSLA took was that they spend money in other ways to build their requirements and that was the information that we were hoping to get but so far it's not been I don't think I can say any more about it convener we've gone through a process which has involved local government to undertake this financial review to assess how the funds that the government has made available directly for the payment of the 600 hours have been utilised the data has been provided by local government the report has been formulated under the auspices of a steering group and local authorities have been participants so I'm at a loss to understand how the information is not the correct information okay thank you very much for that and can I thank you and Eileen McEchnie and Fiona Robertson for your perseverance and for such a good session this morning thank you very much we will now close the public session