welkom to the developer show, a program when we showcase up and coming developments, talk investments and discuss how you can find yourself in this latest development often pile called La Vie estates. Today we are joined by Troy Muton, who is the head of marketing and sales at Salsa properties. Troy, thank you so much for taking some time out to join us. My pleasure. Glad I could be here. I'm looking forward to the discussion. Now Troy, you've mentioned to me about this latest development often pile La Vie estates. Before we jump into that, can you just tell us a little bit about yourself, a little bit about your team and what a potential customer can expect if they decide to purchase within this development. Excellent. We started off as a very small real estate company in 2004 and since then we've just been growing from strength to strength over the years. We've been in the market now, been involved with real estate for 16 years. Like I said, we started off as a small company, just doing a few rentals, just doing a few sales and then over the years we progressed into pretty much a new development powerhouse where we've been specializing and being very involved with new developments, seeing developers in marketing their developments, taking everything from marketing to sales and to the end product of handover. We've put ourselves in a position where we've got quite a strong development game. Over the years we've completed anything from about 30 plus developments so we've sold over 2, 3000 new development units so we're very, very involved with that aspect. We've got a very strong rental portfolio of company. We've got a strong sales division as well but like I said, what we do product salesing is our new development game and what we can offer the client and the public in terms of that. It's always nice to hear when I have these discussions with different developers and estate agencies how many of them have got such a long and storied history in the real estate market because to me as somebody has these discussions and speaks to estate agents it brings a lot of reassurance knowing that you've been in the game for so long because obviously you're doing a lot of things right. Correct and you know what's nice I mean we started like a 70,000 for that 16 years experience and myself I've been involved here for nine years so I mean I've got more than enough experience and we've assisted you know majority of clients what we like to do is to stop clients from A to Z you know where initial contacts made from them from a response that we receive or an inquiry and we can sort of run them you know through through all the questions and concerns they might have up until date of handover you know when they receive their keys so we like to be involved you know with our client from initial response all the way through to the final process or when they get the keys to their home we like to be involved of you know as fast possible throughout that home ownership process no that's absolutely great here so today we're talking about levier state can you introduce us to this development talk me through it okay so levier state the the reason or the behind levier state how we pride in ourselves on finding the the correct position for the development is we we realise that the student accommodation market there's there's a shortage of student accommodation a lot of guys don't want to be you know in still and bosh paying excessive you know rental amounts and then guys also there's a lot of you know places in wellington as well student campuses as well that they need suitable you know affordable student accommodation so we found that levier in the middle of the commute between the still and bosh and wellington polls positioned nicely there you know in the newly developed area and in the growth node and that's that's while in the heart of the wildlands and we thought you know as an ideal spot for students you know to to easy commute in and out between still and bosh for wellington club but you know wherever they they need is for their their velocity in their studies we found poll to be the ideal position because it's affordable and it's like i say it's a mere 15 to 20 minutes drive to still and bosh the guys don't need to be in still and bosh you know paying excessive rates on one of two bedrooms here in levier itself i mean they can pay affordable rates and like i said the safe secure and it's a very short commute so levier state is actually ideal for students as well as you know first time buyers we we thought that's our target market guys you know trying to get into the market that's a very reasonable and realistic market price and that's that's how levier state came along still and bosh being such a popular university town how is that affected the demand on these units well the thing is we've seen the demand because still emboshed because they're such a they're such a under supply and over the mon at the moment over there we've seen a lot of students and a lot of you know parents of students coming and approaching us and saying to us listen here our kids need accommodation can we assist with that and based on that we've been helping and assisting you know many students in terms of rental accommodation and then many parents also seen it as you know the next sort of boom in terms of student accommodation the poll area because the fact that like i said still embosh is becoming overpopulated there's not as much accommodation as they as they would like to have and then you know that's why the parents and the families of these kids are looking at areas you know in the surroundings still emboshed to try and you know make make ends meet looking at this at least i'm mistaken and i'd love you to chat to me about this as well it's not really just a purchase that's going to solve a short term problem which is my child's going to university where am i going to put them at an affordable rate it's also something that you can look at as a future investment because still embosh is going nowhere so there's always going to be people who are housing in the area yes no definitely i mean we saw from from day one we saw the the whole reason behind the development and the location and as well the fact that we see we're going to position ourselves where we did we said that you know like you say there's such a shortage of accommodation affordable accommodation that's safe and secure you know that sort of satisfies the student's needs from a to z we came along we said levies perfect for that and you know we what we do as well as we we've put together the packages that you know can sort of assist the client as well as a student in terms of you know making ends meet on on their side so you know we definitely believe that levies state is and will be you know the next sort of boom and the area that the power area around our development as well is you know it's newly developed there's a lot of scope for new developments coming up around this so from mcline's perspective we definitely expect there's going to be a good capital growth in the area there's a lot of positivity and all of that you know that's that's coming along as well now troi i'd love you to tell me a little bit about the units what units are available and what do the units look like can you give me a rundown so pretty much the development was comprised of three unit types we had we had smaller bachelor units or studio apartments and then we had smaller one bedrooms and now we've got the the bigger one bedrooms that we currently still have available so the development was comprised originally of a few blocks we've had some of the blocks already being sold out so at the moment we're sitting with three blocks that are still available where you just can be bought which is blocks a b and g those blocks collectively have a availability of 51 units are still available these 51 units are still available they are the one bedroom 42 square meter one bed units and those units have a very spacious and open plan living in the kitchen area separate bathroom on the side and then it's a separate spacious bedroom so that case is pretty much for a student or you know a young professional working couple trying to to kickstart themselves of an affordable rate and what are the amenities are available within the development for potential tenants well what we do at the moment is we've got the clubhouse which is up and running there they're very nice and neatly finished off clubhouse the clubhouse offers a laundry mat with the drying yard so the laundry mat can you know be used on a on a coin basis en then what the tenants can use know once they've done they they're washing at the look at the clubhouse they'll take it to the drying yard they can hang it up it's very well supervised I mean there's not a concern I mean obviously a lot of people have concerns about hanging in laundry and stuff like that there's no concern in terms of that because there is a security on site so that is quite a nice initiative the fact that if tenants don't want to you know do their laundry in the apartment then they can always going to hang it up at the drying yard make use of the clubhouse en the laundry mat facilities you know it shows just how much thought you've put into this development and it's catering towards students knowing that the the the parents wouldn't need to also then get them a washing machine and also possibly get them a tumble dryer then we've really got those facilities on the on the on the grounds that that's the thing I mean like you say with the the full process we can just beforehand and we said to ourselves you know what sort of added bonus can we you know give towards students or our dog market being students and the younger individual I mean now they don't need to go you know upfront and go and buy and put money into getting washing machines and all of those concerns what they can do is just make use of the development clubhouse with the laundry mat and drying facilities and there they go I mean they don't need to go and fork out that initial expense you know for for those appliances you mentioned earlier that that Sals has got quite a strong rainfall portfolio and I wanted to ask you when you said that but I thought let me leave it just later into this interview in that if I decide to purchase within this development as an investment would you guys would you guys offer the facility to to find a tenant for me or to market that house for rent or is that something I'll need to take on and just make sure I handle all of that no so it's actually it's actually good that you also appreciate that because what we do is based on our new developments we've got a lot of our investors on the charity of our investors come back to us and ask us to further take over the rental management of the units so what we do is we you know once they bought the place and they've taken registration beforehand we ensure that they've got tenants in their units so that by date of registration you know they've already got an income being generated in the apartment and that's what we do so we can offer the assistance you know the rental assistance in terms of management of the apartments and the the investments to our investors that we you know facilitate and run the whole process from a to z in sourcing securing collecting rental en doing all of that on behalf of our clients which which is often very satisfying for them again another one of the the stresses or the potential stresses that you guys alleviate completely you purchase into the development knowing that you're going to hand all of it is absolutely fantastic my next question i know that this development is located in paul so maybe it isn't something that's top of everybody's mind but it's probably something that's quite good if we do go through it and that is security can you talk me around the security of this development well like like before and with any development we we obviously going to do the necessary research ensure that you know the correct security measures are put in place and that's what this development offers we've got a good security in the sense of completely boarded off the estate the estate then further offers electric fencing on the on the boundary walls and at the front we've got a wild access control 24 hour man security so they obviously ensure you know that that people that aren't or visitors that are meant to be there on you know allowed in and that's very well regulated in terms of allowing only the residents and you know the other visitors here and they in and out and security shouldn't be a concern to anyone looking to purchase in the development and within the development itself within the blocks you can purchase are they completed are they still being built what what stage is the development in well that's actually the nice part is the development of the the client initially doesn't have to worry about you know wait in a year or 18 months or so before they can take occupation and then subsequent registration of the unit what what's nice is we've already got the units built the blocks are already built units are painted everything's ready for occupation so should the should the investor purchase one of these units they've got the option to take occupation readily already put tenants in the tenants all the the the client is going to pay the developer the occupation or until up until the point of registration but what's nice is like i said should the client be by to live looking to purchase to state himself they can always move in prior to registration say within the first month or two paying occupation or into the developer and then they've got the accommodation you know that's that they don't need to wait you know 12 to 18 months before it's constructed well that's a huge selling point specifically with everybody going back to university now knowing that this is an option and you can move right in but it does beg me to ask the question how does that affect transfer duty well the thing is the development offers a nice a nice i'm going to say bonus and benefit is that no duties are payable so no transfer costs are applicable to a purchase in this in this development so from a purchase perspective you don't you're on live of any cost the only cost of the purchase is liable for is the bond registration cost should they opt to go the route of taking out you know home and finance on one of the units which is a which is a mere portion of the of the cost so they actually save quite a bit of money because they're not liable for any transfer costs or transfer duty in the development and only their their bond registration costs with that being said another great selling point the development is many developers or many times the client's going to be asked for a five percent or 10 percent deposit or initial deposit upfront you know to to guarantee and or for their commitment to the to the purchase here in this development we don't charge any deposit views whatsoever so the client is just liable for this the security of their purchase price whether it be by means of a home loan or whether it is you know getting the cash and guarantees in place that is very very nice to hear the other question i wanted to ask before we cut to break that is probably the question that every single student wants to know immediately is what is the situation with um was fiber is there really fiber installed in all units and are there any other benefits to to the to the tenants that we might have skipped on well definitely i mean with most developments now that we that we involved with we always like to have the facility or the the option you know for fiber installation in the complex so the infrastructure is already there fiber has been laid out to the development and it's just the it's just for the tenants you know on their behalf that they need to take out package of their choice but the like i said infrastructure is there it's really available the tenants can just take out that package from the service provider and they can have their fiber you know up and running in 15 hours so that is that is great so once again it just shows how much thought you put into this and i think everybody's very very keen for us to cut to break and take a look at this beautiful offering from salsa so let's take a quick break en we will be right back after it troi go to us good afternoon and welcome back to the developer show my name is Chad and i'll be your host and today we are joined by troi muton who is the head of sales and marketing for salsa properties troi is talking to us about their latest development right there by stalin washerby is located in paul and it is called la vie estate it's a very fancy name troi i must admit i do like it no thanks there's a bit of thought behind that as well but i think we we came to a good name for for the development that does sound nice and beachy and specifically where that's going into summer i think that's exactly what everybody wants to hear now troi i want to ask you we've been speaking about this development people have now had a good chance to look at it and take a feel through it i want to ask you what is its most unique selling point what is that one thing that somebody's going to see this development or maybe more than one thing they're going to see it and be like wow that is absolutely incredible well chad that's a great answer question because i mean i i certainly without a doubt until you know that what this development offers now at the moment stands out you know sixfold over any other development i can think of currently the unique selling point for me not only is all cost included the fact that we're not asking the deposit upfront on the purchase of a unit furthermore to that what we do is the developer from their side is offering a unique offering to the public now that should someone purchase a unit they're going to pay that client that invested a 2000 rand rental assistance from date of registration on their unit so let me give you a idea in a breakdown as to how it works should a client purchase a unit they wait two to three months for registration from that registration when they take ownership of that unit they need to have a tenant in place already which like i mentioned we can definitely assist with before hand but as from date of registration when they when they take ownership of the unit that tenant needs to be in place from that point onwards that 2000 rand rental assistance kicks in what the developer then does is pays that investor 2000 rand a month for 12 months over and above the current rental income they're currently getting on a unit so example if you're going to get between 5000 5000 500 rand rental return on one of these units the developer is further giving additional 2000 rand rental assistance to the purchaser so where your initial return on investment on a purchase of these units at say 5000 rand rental income was about say called seven eight percent you're now looking at a 10 to 11 percent return on investment which is it's Israeli really i mean it's unheard of nine terms of of new developments and purchases so definitely our 2000 rand rental assistance is something that definitely stands out and it's definitely one of the most unique selling points that we can offer the public with that being said this rental assistance only is effect effective of 12 months from date of registration given a tenant is in place already but should that investor only have a tenant in place after three months they then only going to get the regulations for nine months that it's only valid for a 12 month point while you have any tenant in place so in other words if the the tenants only put in place from registration after three months they lose after those three months of rental assistance they only get it from the first month that that tenant is in the remainder of the 12 month period so it's all in all is a 12 month period at 2000 rand a month which the developer that's just the purchaser because Troy that is absolutely incredible it really does seem like you guys have went over and above to not only appeal to students who are potentially the biggest clients for this but also to potential investors to move into the area yes and i mean that that's what we thought about as well we know that Mark has been hit hard by covid i mean many people are in a financially unstable position and just for reassurance and just you know give our assistance and you know try and assist as fast as possible from outside as well as the developer that is what was thought about and you know this is a proposal not that we give to the public this this rental assistance definitely you know stands out and this is i can i can really now mention it is really assisted our sales tremendously now over the past few weeks since we've implemented this and i'm sure it will definitely assist you know with future sales in the development because any any investor i mean they all look at this and they'll say listen yes and no brain i mean you can't go wrong with that absolutely you know you mentioned covid now and i did want to touch on that as well in that covid affected a lot of people's construction timelines and and their due dates and has it affected you guys at all has it affected your developer and if so did you guys have to take any any different routes to mitigate those delays while fortunately we were in a position as such that covid didn't affect us or our construction or development timelines whatsoever like i mentioned previously in the first half of the of the talk our development is ready up and running our construction is complete our blocks are ready both so that the the client has the option to take occupation readily we're not going to have any further delays in terms of covid so a client you know with with a accommodation you know problem could come to us and say listen yeah they would like to take occupation you know prior to transfer and we can gladly assist them you know with ready readily available accommodation so the units are up and running everything is in place it's just a matter of you know client will need to take occupation prior to transfer or not but like i said we get for that covid didn't affect us whatsoever how important is it for real estate companies to to properly properly vet their developers or do they do diligence before they move into business with different developers yes i mean that that is very important it's obviously a big factor we need to take into consideration but luckily you know we've we've been involved with this developer you know that's on the project currently we've we've walked a long road with them and we've had a long successful relationship over the years with past developments as well and we know our clients i mean we know the the service and the and the end product that we're going to get from them and based on that we we'd love to continue doing business with them because we know the product it's always going to be that of satisfaction the clients in public are happy with it and i mean they also look off to the the clients you know there's any problems at a later stage in terms of the snags and all of that so i must say from outside we've we've always been very comfortable working with developer and developer if the the public was ever you know concerned they can always go and google them and they can see they are a beautiful name in the industry and i will without a doubt you know go ahead and purchasing for the developments that they have to offer well that's a great year which leads me to the next question is take me through the process if i decide i want to purchase within la vie estates take me through the process of the moment i call you up and i say look i'm looking to purchase to the moment you give me the keys what happens there and what do you guys assist with um what is it maybe good to know for other people looking to purchase what's that advice you'd give to other people looking to purchase that they need to keep in mind when doing this as well or remember i mean most importantly and from the get go i'll say you know just make sure the agent you're working with the agent and subsequently the agency most important is to ensure that you're working with a reputable name in the industry that's got the necessary experience and qualifications as well as the fact that they've got the necessary knowledge and the knowledge of the market at the moment with that being said you know from the moment the initial contact is made the response is received by us an inquiry is received on the development we contact the client immediately and we will just have a walk through a chat with them you know just clarifying any concerns or any you know further questions they might have subsequently we will arrange a viewing on site with them take them through a show unit which we have which is already furnished which gives a great idea of the space in the development and the way you can lay your unit out in terms of furniture and all of that and then from that initial introduction we have with them should they express interest in your purchasing we then run them through the whole contract we we sit down with them explain the contract to them running through all the integrated parts of the contract get the contract signed and then from that point on was should they be subject to a home loan being should they be subject to a home loan being approved we've got in-house bond origination services that we offer further so our in-house bond originator offers the client you know the the assistance and facilitates the whole process with the client from A to Z in terms of applying at the banks negotiating fighting for better rates and then so once that is complete and we've got the favorable you know home loan in place or if the client is just meet you know to make cash deal they then secure the cash and the guarantees for the purchase price from that point onwards we then wait it out for transfer and registration to go through which is anything from two to three months i'd say about three months to be conservative at this point and then once once transfer and registration has gone through we meet to the client on site and then give them the keys you know to their to their new investment on new new home Troy another question i wanted to ask you when you mentioned bond originators why is it so important to rather go through a bond originator rather than just go hop on your banking app and apply for finance there you know i get also quite often and it's actually very simple many clients think you know what let's just approach our own bank and yes it's all while it being said clients often think they're going to get preferential rates especially their private bank and clients but it's not always a case what's nice is the bond originator and the services we offer is the bond originator doesn't go to the client's primary bank the bond originator then goes to the other banks as well so many a time the other banks might find more value in the client than their own bank does and offers them much better offerings in terms of full loan amounts as well as better interest rates in which event the client you know is alleviated the fact that the only you know being forced to go with their own bank or their own bank is offered they can see the other banks are even more eager for their business so many a time other banks give much better offerings which the client often pursues as opposed to go in the route of their own bank so the the originator fights and you know often just goes to the extra mile you know to get the better interest rates and the better offering on behalf of that client so that is always a a great initiative that we offer it's very interesting to know because i think a lot of people like you said think because i've been banking with this bank for so long they're going to give me the best rates and you don't often to think hold on what are the other banks going to do so it's nice to know that sals and yourself offer that option that you guys are going to take that handle it and come back to me with my best options well with all the options and then we can start boiling it down to the best actually just just rest assured for the client i mean at the end of the day the clients are responsibility so we just want to ensure that they get the best possible service at the best possible offerings that the market has to offer now we've been speaking about investments quite a bit today and i wanted to ask you just before we close off is what advice would you give to somebody looking to invest into property today well quite simply i mean i've always maintained in my my sort of what has always been the best time to purchase is yesterday i mean there's never better time than to purchase than the given time i mean any investment you're going to make now is always going to pay itself off you know in the long run so best you can do is the best property but i would always recommend that now is a very good time for for the clients the first time buyers specially you know to jump into the market and get their foot into the door because of the fact that take advantage of the current you know buyers market and the current market that we want at the moment as well as the fact is take advantage of the current interest rates i mean the interest rates are at a all time low i mean as we all aware seven percent been the lowest in you know 50 odd years or whatever it is so now is a very good time for the client you know to get into the market at a seven percent interest rate their bond and their monthly repayment is going to be much much lower than it was you know years ago so now is a very good time but actually better than ever for you know a client to get into the market and to get their foot into the door to start you know investing in property now truly last year i wanted to say is that salsa has had a long standing relation with private property and can you talk to me a bit about how much that's affected the way you market your products well you know private property is being they've made life so much easier for us from from an agency perspective and from a marketing perspective i mean the platform they provide everything is just very accessible very easy it's very user friendly and i mean they've also just given us the exposure to you know platform and market our developments and our listings and all of that in a very professional and and a market market how can i say in a way that the market would would like to see it i mean they also you know offer the option of us to do you know metaports and all the added bonuses you know that the industry likes to see you know where you can sit in the comfort of your own home and have a metaport or 3d where you can walk through the property virtually yourself without having to physically view the property so private property is definitely assisted us you know a lot in terms of the platform they provide to market on and also just the benefits like the show that they offer the public i mean i think it's definitely something that makes him stand out in terms of one of the marketing platforms that you can use nowadays troi thank you so much for taking some time out to join us today it has been enlightening and i think everybody who's joined in definitely is very interested to jump hop on to private property and take a good look at levier states so thank you very much it's my pleasure thanks chad and thanks to the private property team for taking the time today anytime i'm hopefully going to see you again on your soon but for everybody that's joined us thank you so much for tuning in and i will be seeing you tomorrow thank you again and goodbye


Good morning ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for attending this session. I'll be talking about affirmative action in South Africa particularly. It's an interesting case study particularly because South Africa has a long history of racial segregation but also racial segregation particularly by a minority group towards a majority group. And this historical legacy as I'll show to you hasn't necessarily been reduced despite an aggressive affirmative action policy which hasn't seemed to narrow the gaps and the question is is why and why not. So what this paper will do is is we'll really monitor the effects of the the racial wage gap over time and it'll monitor particular points and junctures where we find that laws have been updated to try and achieve racial equality. So we know that discrimination hurts incomes of various groups. If the majority discriminates against the minority such as in the USA then it's typically the minority whose incomes have get affected. But as in the case of South Africa where you typically have a minority discriminator particularly the white population that discriminated against the black African population then all incomes are affected. It's not really good for the situation in the long run and Gary Becker in his Nobel Prize lecture actually suggested that this is why apartheid policy faced its demise. By conjecture what should have happened is is that once apartheid was formally dismantled where job reservation was removed by conjecture all of this should have all the differences should have imploded and we should have seen a new trajectory of equality if that is true. But this is really not the case that we've seen. We haven't seen racial wage gaps disappear and despite these targeted policies which as I'm going to outline for you in just a second have been very very targeted but not necessarily had the effect. So we'll look at some empirical estimates from server data to try and show these changes. Just to give you a background of institutionalised ways discrimination in South Africa most of you would be aware of the apartheid, grand apartheid which basically instituted job reservation particularly favouring white individuals. However what many people don't know is that this predated apartheid and job reservation actually started much earlier than 1948 when the apartheid laws were instituted. The other important aspect here is that also apartheid laws banned African unions which really removed bargaining power of Africans vis-a-vis their white counterparts. So the early evidence suggests that by the 1970s when there was a significant history of racial segregation white men earned about five and a half times more than black men particularly due to job reservation. Some skilled jobs were reserved for white people and unskilled jobs were reserved for black people. In the 1980s there was a narrowing of the wage gap this was partially due to increases in attributes but also due to the unbanning of black unions which led to a convergence of wages across the groups but it didn't necessarily remove the discriminatory component within the labour market. Unexpectedly in 1994 when democracy appeared and when a lot of these laws were dismantled we actually witnessed a widening wage gap and especially also the discrimination component of it. So this wasn't due to necessarily greater gaps in productive characteristics such as education in actual fact discrimination worsened. One of the reasons for this might be is that there were actually no formal laws yet in place to counter discrimination effectively this only came in after 1998 as I'll discuss in just a second. So the the laws are really important in this section. From 2000 onwards there was an active affirmative action policy but the evidence that is available at this stage suggests that there was a negligible effect at the mean incomes. There was however a positive effect at the top of the income distribution where wage gaps narrowed at the top of the income distribution. This suggests that affirmative action has had the effect of removing discrimination within the elite but not necessarily for the average worker in the labour market. This led to actually the term which we call broad-based black economic empowerment which means that it was supposed to reach the entire income distribution not just the top of the income distribution. So what I'm going to do in this paper is I'm going to show you that we're going to look at monitor the effects of these targeted affirmative action policies and to see whether this changed a lot of the trajectories. We because the evidence has been mixed what we're also going to look as we're going to look at unobserved generational heterogeneity. It's not something which we can look at the individual level because in typically in these studies there are a lot of unobservables which we really do worry about. So in 1993 the interim constitution laid the foundation for affirmative action but it didn't necessarily start implementing it. This only started happening in 1998 with the Employment Equity Act which as it suggests it eliminated any unfair discrimination on paper. There were positive development objectives towards black individuals colored which in South Africa means mixed race it's the official terminology Indian but also towards women and disabled. The interesting thing here is that this also included white women because they were classified along the gender dimension. The Employment Equity particularly targeted firms above the age above the size of 50 in other words firms that were large and this is particularly with reference to the fact that South Africa has a very small small firm sector a large doth of small firms and that industry is quite concentrated. So the exception is in place to allow small firms to not be burdened by over regulation. But in 2003 this policy was stepped up a bit as I've suggested the BBEE and as you'll see by the title of this act it particularly focuses on race and removes this to some degree the gender dimension because it focuses particularly on black individuals okay and black in this sense is broadly defined not just black Africans for instance Asian individuals are also counted as black under this law. So it went beyond workplace regulation it went beyond Employment Equity but towards positive opportunity in all facets of life. So it really looked at the empowerment of black people including women workers youth people with disabilities and people living in rural areas and the important part here is this at the bottom here is this balance scorecard which firms have to require. They basically they develop a scorecard which each firm gets a point which works as some sort of accreditation and this accreditation allows firms to find government contracts it also creates the opportunity for firms to interact with each other if they want to work with credible firms okay. It also helps in public-private partnership and also when licenses are applied for. You'll see that a lot of firms would advertise and they'd tell you your BBEE certification okay this is an important component and as you'll see here this is how the BEE scorecard worked it looked at direct empowerment through also not just employment as the 1998 Employment Equity Act did it also looked at the demographic constituents of ownership it also looked at the management of the firms who's in charge of directing the firms but also what was previously covered by the Employment Equity Act only counts 15% of this BEE score. There's also a skills development component to actively promote the workforce but also indirect empowerment and it's this preferential procurement and socio-economic development. This part here is very key to understanding how the policy worked as is this part because it doesn't just focus on what happens within the labour market it focuses on what happens outside the labour market and also firms interactions with each other. In South Africa we there's this term which we call tender preneurs it's basically entrepreneurs who have been able to leverage their positions their BEE positions to be able to get preferential procurement which has led to a lot of corruption and to the creation of an elite and this is an important thing. So typically when people look at server data they turn to the classic Wachika Blinder decomposition and they decompose gaps wage gaps into observable components and unobservable components and the unobservable component is then just seen as discrimination but the important part here which we often don't think about is the fact that unobservables are not randomly distributed across racial groups and in South Africa this is particularly true because some of those unobservables are importantly for instance the quality of schooling which we know is very highly unequal and very polarized the distribution where the top 20 percent of schools is performing very well but the bottom 20 40 80 percent of schools are dysfunctional and this is still distributed across racial groups and this is an important unobservable which is a pre-labor market discrimination which we often cannot account for in just simple decompositions like this so what we really want to address here is this unobservable I'll show you we won't perfectly address it but we start to arrive at a solution. Typically these unobservables produce upward estimates of this unobservable discrimination component and as I've suggested quality of schooling is the main one there is a study that gives an indicator of evidence that school quality presents about 75 percent of the unobserved component so it really what we would call labor market discrimination is actually largely pre-labor market discrimination which suggests that there's a barrier to entry into good jobs into the labor market as a result of the hindrance of poor school quality now the one thing which we can note here is that school quality definitely is distinctly varies by generation people entering through the same schooling system also because a lot of the the laws surrounding schooling affected particular generations in South Africa such as for instance the Bantu Education Act which was also an apartheid error law which limited black African individuals to the type of schools they could attend and these were typically poorer schools so particular generations could attend particular type of schools and therefore the way we're going to tackle the problem of unobservables is by taking the unobservable up from the individual to the generation it won't account for absolutely all the unobservables but it will start arriving at better estimates to what we used to have we also have additional problems here which I won't discuss in much detail so our approach attempts to address these shortcomings because of problems of common support we limit ourselves to individuals who have eight years or more education this is quite simply because very few white individuals have primary school education or lower in South Africa and that that address that suggests this whole problem of varying schooling experiences which then have an impact on the labor market we also restrict our sample to formal sector workers because we assume that a lot of the laws that have been implemented do not necessarily affect informal sector workers directly we use the post-apartheid labor market series we we use it from 1997 to 2011 there was no earnings data in 2008 to 2009 that was formally published so we do have some gaps in those time series which I'll show you what is our approach we we decompose the changes in the wage gaps to try and arrive at the unobservables but what we do so is we specifically look at this within the same birth cohorts by looking at variation within particular birth cohorts to try and account for the fact that different birth cohorts have different unobservables okay so we we rely on a less stringent assumption even though it doesn't necessarily hold perfectly is that once we control for a look within the cohort that the unobservables across race would be more likely to be randomly distributed across race even if not completely so to look at this cohort type of analysis we borrow elements from age period cohort tradition particularly the the name here that economists would know most is Deaton who looked at this most effectively within our context what we do is we look at the change in the wage gap relative to a base period and we're going to start with 1997 just before the employment equity act was implemented we avoid looking at data before that because there's survey idiosyncrasies and essentially what we do end up with is an initial component which relies basically on changes in coefficients which is typically what we would understand from a Wachow-Blinder decomposition then we have a second component which is just a change in productivity because we know for instance education has been strongly converging across race groups in South Africa we then have an interaction term which needs a bit of unpacking and what you'll see is is that there's two components and I'm going to emphasize the first term because essentially what it suggests it's the increase in white attributes but valued at the initial discrimination so this does measure some form of discrimination but it's a persistent form of discrimination what we're measuring in this green bit is the changes in discrimination that has happened what we're measuring with this bit is a persistent part of the discrimination there is also a small second term but because what we're going to see is is that this blue term increases this is not as important even though for instance what we observe is that the returns to education for black African individuals particularly the returns to higher education have increased this should be important but we don't find that necessarily to be the dominant change in this identity just to give you an idea this is the evolution of the average white wage for formal sector above 8 education the dotted line is for black individuals and what we have here is the wage gap as I suggested the wage gap increased even beyond 1998 when employment equity was introduced but only started declining at a later stage we also there could be problems here with changes in server design the instrument changed along this period but it could also be differential responses to business cycle phases as this came shortly after the financial crisis and what we generally do see is is that the yeah we also can just recast this by cohort and what we see is is that wages are declining across cohort but I don't want to emphasize this because there's also an age effect in here what we see is is that across cohort the this top green line is is that the wage gap is actually remaining quite constant if we just do this with the usual Wachika blinder decomposition in each time period what we see is is that this wage this increasing wage gap only declining much later towards 2011 we actually don't see this any decline in this discrimination component not systematically except perhaps towards the end of the period so if you consider this 2003 as a threshold point when this aggressive black economic empowerment came into play it didn't seem to have any effect whatsoever but if you apply this this new approach we can look at this green term which is the change in discrimination relative to 1997 we actually see that this started picking off after 2004 recall however that the this blue component is also a part of component which represents the increase in white characteristics as if discrimination had remained constant across time that is increasing okay so what does it suggest to us it suggests to us that there's two components of discrimination that are moving in opposite directions this is the one that has been affected by the implementation of black economic empowerment it represents the pure change in discrimination which we observe as a result of the change in the laws but this component here is not not changing whatsoever so what does it suggest to us it suggests to us that the if we go back to exactly what that means this bit over here it suggests that the reduction in the for instance the the wage the attributes of white individuals it's it's not being the value it's not being revalued in that sense and we therefore do not see that reduction in the in the discrimination component so what do we know well we know that racial wage gaps declined before the end of apartheid it increased in the period shortly after the transition we do not see a massive effect for the 1998 Employment Equity Act even though it's something one would expect even despite the fact that tertiary education the returns to tertiary education increased for the black population this gives us an idea that perhaps these reforms weren't broad-based enough they weren't affecting the entire distribution and this is something which you would find being spoken about in the discourse quite extensively it's only the 2003 BE Act that does start seeing a change in one component of discrimination but in not all components of discrimination which suggests to us that even this hasn't had the desired effect to change the face of the labour market in a big way i'll leave it there thank you very much


A float with Henry Morgan. The notorious buccaneer Henry Morgan captures the Spanish ship. This is tragic news for the Spanish governor of Cuba, Don Pietro Pizarro, because the ship contains some of his own personal treasure, including a fabulous Aztec necklace. Diatz, a renegade Spanish member of Morgan's crew, covers the necklace to give to Kitty, the serving wench at the Dolphin Tavern in Port Royal. He incites two members of the crew to kill Morgan. Morgan is saved by a stranger and they go to the Dolphin Tavern. Kitty is taken by this man, who says his name is Jeffrey Hunter, but she is more taken by the necklace which is shown to her by Morgan. And after they leave, she tells Diatz that she will be his woman if he gets for her the Aztec necklace. And I mean it, Diatz. Get me that necklace and I'll be yours. You're not kidding. That is something I have dreamed of doing. The moment I set my eyes on it, I could see a line around your white neck. In my mind, I could see it. That's near there. Tonight you did boast loud and long as to how you could buy my freedom to make me yours. You don't need to buy it now. Just give me the necklace of your life.  It isn't easy to take anything from Captain Morgan when he decides it by himself. Then may have if I'm nice to Captain Morgan, he will give it to me of his own accord. Well, no, no. I just fancied that necklace. Remember, Diatz, there are plenty here in this tavern this very night who would willingly get it for me at the price I'm offering.  A woman can make an angelus only so far and then after that it's dangerous for a woman. Or may have the tall handsome stranger who was with Captain Henry could get it for me. You're driving me crazy. What was it Morgan was talking to the man about? Who is he? Oh, how do I know? Would you like to know more about the handsome stranger? I distrust this sudden friendship. May have I could find out from the man all about himself.  You'll get the necklace for me and then you'll have no need of the genus. You attract me, dear. A lot. I could be happy with you if I had the necklace. That's my price. Bring me the necklace and you need never have any genus of any other man. Captain Morgan I beg of you. Please go back to the ship and put that necklace in some safe hiding place. So it is careful you are over my help isn't it? A hundred men tonight wanted to get their hands on it. And you're full enough to roam this part of Port Royal at night alone. Next time may have I'll not be about when you're set upon. Leave me temporarily at the necklace. You take it. Take it back to my ship, the flying gull. Captain Morgan, you trust me enough to give me the necklace with instructions to take it back to your ship? Aye, Hunter, that's what I said. I trust as a reward for the service you did me tonight. Wait aboard ship till I return. Here. Take this ring. Show it to the man on watch and he'll know that you've come from me. He'll take you to my quarters. Wait there until I return. When will that be? That I don't know. I have business to attend to but I'll see you, Hunter, back aboard the flying gull. Sir, you're back again, Morgan. Yes, Sir Thomas. I must apologize for this late visit but I was detained in town. Your trip was successful. Highly successful, Your Excellency. I'm glad that you've died before coming to see me. While you're away, things have changed, Morgan. They've changed considerably. Huh? What do you mean? I have received from England documents set with the both seal. Documents which came directly to me as the Thomas Notford Governor of Jamaica. Not the assembly. And these documents contain what, Sir Thomas? Spain has protested to England against many of your type. England is beginning to frown on Buccaneers. It's been asked to see that it's stopped. No laughing matter, Morgan. No laughing matter at all. I know it is a serious matter. It was not that I was laughing at. It was that you should be ordered to stamp out this notorious practice. I am here to carry out the King's wishes. I publicly, Your Old Rogue, but not on the sly. Publicly, you must condemn me. But privately, you give me welcome when I return for my trips. That's how it is, is it not? Fine. That's how it is, Morgan. But I have a solution. Good. Let me hear it. An admiral could not be a Buccaneer, could he? I, St. David, is that what you have in mind? You line my pockets well, Morgan. I seek not to lose that which you have into my coffers. But I must obey the King's instructions. You understand that. As governor of Jamaican waters, I will give you a cloak of respectability. And the moment you sail into Port Royal, you will become my vice admiral. What you do beyond Jamaican waters, of course, is beyond my control. You sly fox. And what of the other Buccaneers? Those who don't join your fleet will be hunted down and wiped out. Oh, so that's what it is, is it? You're giving me a license.  Oh, no. I'm creating you vice admiral with the power to find your own fleet. Your main task will be to drive the other Buccaneers off the seas. Because what you do beyond the seas of Jamaicans is partly your own business. For creating this position for you, I naturally require recontent. And recompense you shall have man. Well, you'd better see I get it, Morgan, because I am supreme on this island. My word is law. I hold your destiny in my hands. Oh, that reminds me. I've received another mail on the last packet that arrived. Can you set sail almost immediately? I? For what reason? The ship called the Elizabeth Anne is due in any day now. I want you to go and meet her. Give her protection and bring her safety back to Port Royal. For what reason? Oh, there's the Kinnswoman of mine aboard her. And when it delays in, she's French in a distance relation. Her parents have died and she's coming to join me here in Jamaica. I'd like you to meet Elizabeth Anne and bring her safety to Port Royal. You're sure that that is the reason? You're not sending me out to a trap, are you? A trap? Why should I when you lie in my pockets and I've just made you by sad mode? That office might have been created to throw dust in my eyes. You might fear me. You wish to lull my senses with false promises and have me sailing to a trap. But why? Because the Kinns told you to be rid of Buccaneers and you fear me. I don't trust you, Sir Thomas Mockford, Governor of Jamaica. I know you're for what you are. I'll meet your vessel, but I'll be well prepared. This is all unnecessary. No, it is unnecessary, Finke. I know, Sir Thomas, that you'd sell me into trouble if you thought it was to your advantage. When I heard you wanted to see me, Cortes, I could not believe my ears. After giving you another ship, don't tell me you have failed me a second time. No, Your Excellency, Don Pietro. I have come to tell you that I have redeemed myself. Re-deemed yourself? Cortes, what do you mean? Two days out from Cuba, I sighted a ship. I recognized her as British. I engaged her in combat and I have captured her. Spain is avenge for the loss of my other ship. Indeed. Is that so? Yes. And did this British ship carry as much treasure as the ship you lost? Has that been replaced? I ask you, Cortes, have you replaced the fabulous Aztec Neclic? The cargo, Senor, was mainly silks and other goods sent for trade in Jamaica. A mere pettiness to the cargo you lost. Was she carried passengers quite a number? We will send them in a crew to the slave markets. They will at least bring back some more return. But when I think of the loss of the Aztec Neclic, I feel bitter about the whole thing. And you come prattling about the price you have taken. I have your excellency. There is something of great value aboard the ship. Well, what is it? I discovered amongst the passengers of the Elizabeth Anne a girl. Very beautiful. Then she will fetch a good price. Don't be ato. You must take my meaning. You will see for yourself. She is not English. She is French. Her name is Antoinette de Lacey. And she is a kinswoman of Sir Thomas Mottford, the governor of Jamaica. She was sailing to Port Royal to join him. So this is interesting. You have kept the woman safe? When you see her, you will understand it was with difficulty. But I succeeded. I took the liberty of bringing her with me here into your home. She waits outside in the anti-room now. She speaks quite fluent Spanish. Hmm. Bring her in. Bring that woman in here. Oh, dear. Then you are pleased. Please help me. Don't harm me. Please, I beg of you. Mme de Lacey, there is no need for you to be afraid. Please don't send me to the slave market. I beg. I beseech you. It would seem, Cortes, that Mme de Lacey thinks we ill-treat women. You need have no fear, Mme de Lacey. You shall be taken care of, looked after. Did I hear you, Father? Mme de Lacey, I want you to meet my daughter, de Lacey. De Lacey, take Mme de Lacey. She will tell you all about herself. Treat her like an honored guest. I will see you in a very short while, just when I finish speaking with Cortes. Yes, Father. Come with me. Oh, you are right, Cortes. You have brought me a treasure. The king's woman of Sir Thomas Muthard. I know Sir Thomas works hand in glove with that pirate Henry Morgan. So, in exchange for Morgan, Sir Thomas will have returned to him his kin's woman, Mme de Lacey. Messengers must be sent to him immediately, at once. Well, de Lores, what do you think of our guest? Father, have you sent messages yet to Sir Thomas Muthard? No, child. Not until tomorrow. Then, Father, do not send them. Huh? Why not? I have been talking to Mme de Lacey, asking her about herself. Well? She has never seen Sir Thomas Muthard. He has never seen her. As you know, I speak French and English very well. Sissy, but where is this leading to de Lores? My Aztec necklace went to Jamaica. I want it back. Now is the chance to get it back myself and to trap Henry Morgan at the same time. I will go to Jamaica masquerading as Antoinette de Lacey. How will fare this beautiful Spanish spy on the island of Jamaica? Listen to the next episode of A Float with Henry Morgan.


You can't manage what you're not measuring and most companies aren't measuring. Most companies don't even have an inventory of their information assets. When I talk to companies, some of them have told me they have a better accounting of their office furniture or even the toilets in their company more so than their information assets. And when you think about what's actually generating value or what could generate value for their business, it just doesn't make sense in today's world to not be quantifying the value of your data in any way.


The next item of business is a statement by George Adam on Scottish Government response to the report of the Citizens' Assembly of Scotland. The minister will take questions at the end of his statement, so there should be no interventions or interruptions. I call on the minister for around 10 minutes, please. I am pleased to publish the Scottish Government response to doing politics differently. The report of the Citizens' Assembly of Scotland. That is a crucial step for both the Citizens' Assembly of Scotland and any plans for public participation in our democracy in the future. There will be no value of government in this Parliament to not demonstrate that we have heard and acted on the views and expressed by the people of Scotland through these processes. Before I speak about our response, I want to acknowledge once again the commitment, enthusiasm and energy that the members of the Citizens' Assembly have brought to their task. Their dedication can be clearly seen in the breadth and ambition of their ambition and recommendations, and I thank them all, all of the members of the assembly and many of the people who supported their work. The assembly worked through a unique period of time, beginning its work in October 2019, with a series of face-to-face events and finally completing its work online in December 2020. The willingness of members to stick with the assembly through the challenges of the pandemic, adapt to virtual working and to bring their experience of lockdown to the table, makes the vision and recommendations all the more important as we continue to live our restrictions and we plan to build back better. The assembly produced 10 vision statements and 60 wide-ranging recommendations directed to the Scottish Government and to the Parliament. Some of those recommendations call for detailed policy responses, while others address more fundamental questions around how decisions are taken and how politicians and government can be scrutinised and held to account. The vision of the Citizens' Assembly is long-term. To realise the scope of its ambition, we will require change beyond the term of this Parliament alone. While our response lays out our immediate commitments, we also acknowledge the scale of the challenge that the assembly has set us all. When the report of the Citizens' Assembly was debated in Parliament in February, the Cabinet Secretary for Constitution, Europe and External Affairs explained that there was not enough time before the election to give the report and its ambitious recommendations the full and detailed consideration that it deserves. Since then, the recommendations have informed party manifestos, the agreement between the Government and the Scottish Green Party and the programme for government and also the Covid recovery strategy and other important areas of policy. When we published a consultation in Scotland's first framework for tax in August, the consultation document set out the vision for tax put forward by the Citizens' Assembly for Scotland. The consultation response to specific recommendations from the assembly included to provide more information and accessible language about taxes, building on the manifesto commitments and with the agreement of the Scottish Green Party, the programme for government sets out the Government's commitment to participative democracy, including the Citizens' Assembly model. That is a long-term commitment and to build on the real successes of the Citizens' Assembly and the climate assembly that is reported to the Parliament in June to transform the way that people are involved in decision making in Scotland. Our ambition, echoing the ambitions of the assembly's recommendations, is for public participation processes in Scotland to be a permanent addition to the democratic process in Scotland. We have gathered together a group of experts and participants—it is easy for me to say, Presiding Officer—democracy for Scotland from the UK and around the world. That group is considered the real and practical actions that we need to deliver our commitments. For example, how to set the questions to be answered by a Citizens' Assembly. The group's work is being informed by research into the experience of Citizens' Assembly of Scotland so that we can capture and benefit from all the important development work and learning from the assembly. The expert working group is due to report in the next few weeks with recommendations on how to fulfil our commitments on future participation, not just Citizens' Assembly but other forms of participation, including at a local level. Our plans of deliberative engagement on sources of local government funding already include plans for participative work on both local and national level. Deliberative engagement can start locally in the National Citizens' Assembly. Our other specific commitment is a brand new Citizens' Assembly for under-16s. That will ensure that the generation that will grow up with the consequences of the decisions that we take now can be involved in making them. It also echoes the Assembly's concern with the issues that young people face today. As well as its recommendations on entrenching participation in our system, the Assembly raised some fundamental questions about the scope and structure of the democratic engagement in Scotland's formal governmental and parliamentary institutions. Not all of them make for comfortable reading for us in this Parliament or in Government. Specific recommendations include the conduct and integrity of politicians, the responsibility of MSPs to their constituents and the availability of accessibility and comprehensive information. Given recent events in the Westminster Parliament, the importance of integrity in our political representatives can hardly be overstated. Those challenges should be of concern to everyone in this Parliament and in Government. We will be working with Parliament and seek cross-party involvement to address those challenges. A further immediate impact of the Assembly on engagement and participation in Government was the experience of the plans to recover from the pandemic. The Assembly reflects members' experience of the spring of 2020. In our response, we set out the importance of public engagement to developing the Covid recovery strategy. The strategy highlights the work of the Assembly in reflecting the concerns of members who are representatives of the wider public as they consider the issues arising from Covid, even as they were unfolding. In my statement today, I have highlighted the recommendations of the Assembly on participation and the Government's plans to progress these. In many ways, those are the heart of the Assembly's report. Its work is the evidence of the potential importance of greater systematic engagement with representative selection of the people of Scotland. However, the response that we are publishing today goes much further than that and wider than those recommendations. It sets out how the Government is acting. A range of specific policy areas that are identified by the Assembly, building on the commitments that were made in our election manifesto earlier this year, are now set in the programme for government and the Covid recovery strategy and elsewhere. Not all of our plans are identical to the recommendations, but the themes that are identified by the Assembly and many of the detailed recommendations are reflected in the Government's priority for this Parliament. Some of the recommendations are beyond the current powers of the Scottish Parliament and the Government itself. The Assembly has made some specific proposals for additional responsibilities to allow us to fulfil their vision. However, as I said earlier, that response can only be the start of a long-term vision set out by the Assembly for the Transformative Change for Scottish Politics, which will go beyond the programme for government and indeed this Parliament, embedding deliberative democracy in our decision-making process, ensuring trust and transparency in our institutions, hearing the voices of the people of Scotland and demonstrating that we are acting on their views are all very important in this process. Those are the challenges and the legacies of the Citizens Assembly of Scotland to us all here today. I am optimistic that all of us in this Parliament can share something of that vision for a stronger, more inclusive democracy that shines through the report of the Citizens Assembly. I hope that we can work together to ensure that we act on the recommendations of the Citizens Assembly of Scotland that aspire to fulfil that ambition and vision, and that we look in the words of the Assembly to do politics differently. The minister will now take part in a participatory Q&A session on issues raised in his statement. I intend to allow around 20 minutes for that. I invite members who wish to participate to press the request-to-speaks buttons now or as soon as possible. Thank you very much, Deputy Presiding Officer. I thank the minister for advance state of his statement. I also take this opportunity to thank the Assembly members for the power of work that they have put into the Assembly and this report. A key theme running throughout the report is the recommendation. People want to see decisions taken as close to local communities and people as possible. There seems to be a disconnect in the Scottish Government about that and how we do politics differently. COSLA, for example, has called Scottish Government plans for a national care service an attack on localism, which is potentially being an end for anything other than central control of services in Scotland. How does the minister match that with his statement that he has just given today? I will say that we have taken on board absolutely everything that was put forward by the Systems Assembly of Scotland. In my speech, I mentioned that there would be need for decision making at a local level. However, one of the most important things that we have to see as we go through the process is that we deliver the services that the people of Scotland want and the representatives of the Assembly do. I believe that if we continue down that route, and just to put the members' mind at ease, we find a way to work with local, locally and on a national level, we can solve many of the issues that the member has brought up. I thank the minister for advance sight of his statement. I commend the work of the Citizens Assembly and the many progressive ideas that it has put forward for creating a fairer and more equal Scotland. They are important proposals that deserve to be acted upon. What would the minister regard as the biggest change in government policy in response to the report? Can the minister also confirm that this will be an annual report going forward and statement to ensure that we can measure progress on this work? It does not go to waste. For example, the report calls for capping on private sector rents. When will the government deliver on this? How also will the government use its existing procurement powers to extend the living wage? Finally, one of the report's other recommendations was to increase accountability of those elected. Would the minister therefore agree that if we are serious about doing politics differently and better than MSPs should be banned from having paid directorships? Going further, we have only fair and reasonable exemptions that MSPs should be prohibited from having any second job. There were numerous questions there. I will try and answer as many of them as I possibly can. However, one of the things that I would say about doing things differently for ourselves, and the main question that you asked at the very beginning, Mr Bibby, was the fact that what is the main difference? I would say that the main difference would be the agreement between ourselves and the Scottish Green Party, between the Scottish Government and the Scottish Green Party, because what comes across all the time when we are dealing with members of the public is the fact that they want the political parties to work together in order to create the greater good for everyone else in our society. On the whole, I would say that that is probably the best example of it. With regard to very many of the other issues as we move forward, we obviously need to make sure that all the members of the organisation and the citizens assembly are listened to, and their ideas are included. I think that I made it perfectly clear within my actual statement that we are willing to do that and the differences that they have made throughout Government. It is not just a case, Mr Bibby, of how it has changed a specific policy or has it created a different bill. It has found a different way for Government to make sure that we can deliver what the public has asked us to do, and that might be through various other processes and other bills as well. One of the issues that came up was how politicians act and how politicians engage with the world and what they do is one of the uncomfortable things of the whole debate that the citizens assembly of Scotland had, and it is one that we should all take very seriously as we have debates when we move forward in the future. Michelle Thomson, to be followed by Donald Cameron. Thank you, Presiding Officer. I add my voice of thanks to those who participated in the citizens assembly. I would be interested to hear how the Scottish Government plans to feedback on going progress to them after all their hard work. I am not with interests that 62 per cent of participants strongly agree that the Scottish Parliament should legislate for an independent specialist body with responsibility for finding evaders and avoiders of tax and with power to recover tax due. That clearly demonstrates that people in Scotland share the pecuniary values for which Scotland is well known internationally. However, can the minister advise if the contributors were aware that it is Westminster that is set and perpetuated the regulatory environment where, regrettably, tax can be avoided in this way and that this kind of initiative can only apply to the small percentage of tax that the Scottish Parliament controls? The Scottish Government believes that everyone should pay a fair share of tax and support strong measures to tackle tax avoidance and evasion. Wherever we have the power to do so, that principle sits at the heart of our tax-paying policy making. That is why the Scottish Government's principle of good tax policy includes enforcement. On the member's question about getting feedback, we have been in touch with the convener and a network of members of the assembly to let them know about the response. I hope to meet members myself in the near future. The final report details the cost of the citizens assembly to date. What is the budget of upcoming assemblies and how much does the Scottish Government plan to spend on them throughout the term of this Parliament? I believe that, when we are looking at what I have already put out in my speech, how much would it cost us not to engage with the people of Scotland in a process like this? For me, that is the most important point. However, I have already established a participatory democracy working group, which brings together experts from Scotland, UK and international organisations to make recommendations on how we can make participation routine and effective. Bear in mind that we already have those people enforcing the original set-up costs that we had beforehand because we were setting up the new process. As time moves on, I believe that we will have a situation in which that will be a lot easier for us to work with. The working group will make its recommendations for governance, for future citizens assembly and questions that are set out from those assemblies. Decisions about the next citizens assembly will be made after the group has reported to us. The most important thing for me in this whole process is that we need to encourage that to continue and ensure that it is actually more important that we do engage with the people of Scotland and make sure that we can continue down this route. The citizens assembly recommends that, in order to overcome the challenges of poverty, the Scottish Government and Parliament should raise the minimum wage for young people aged 16 to 24 to a national living wage. What work is currently being undertaken with the UK Government to ensure that the Scottish Government has the powers to raise the minimum wage for young people? The national minimum wage, including the national minimum wage for apprentices, is a reserved matter for the UK Government, so the rates that are set out by the UK Government and the Scottish Government have no remit over those rates. We are fully committed to promoting fair work practices throughout Scotland, and we will continue to press the UK Government for the full set of powers around employment law to allow us to fully deliver our fair work ambitions. The Scottish Government has encouraged the abolition of the apprentice rate and a move towards the real living wage of 9.50 per hour for all workers. Minister, there are excellent suggestions from the citizens assembly on young people, on participation, apprenticeship pay and housing. How does the minister envisage the newly announced youth citizens assembly working with the Scottish youth parliament? Having highlighted that apprenticeships are vital for young people, can you say how you are going to use Scottish Government powers of procurement and contracting to ensure that apprentices are paid the fair wage? Can you answer Neil Bibby's question about the Scottish Government's date for introducing private rent controls? With regard to the first question about how we would engage with other youth organisations, I would assume that we would make sure that there would be engagement throughout the level so that we got that instrument. With regard to how the actual assembly would work, it is just a case of that we need to ensure that we listen to the young people of Scotland to ensure that they will be the ones that will be delivering living with many of the decisions that we make here in the future. With regard to the rent control stuff, I could possibly get to Mr Bibby and to Ms Boyack at a later date as well. Can the minister further expand on how the recommendations in the report relate to the work that the Scottish Government is already undertaking to reduce poverty? Members will appreciate that there is a complex range of issues that lead to poverty and inform the policies that the Government has in place to address them. In fact, some of the debate within the system assembly of Scotland shows you the complexity of that. In order to be part of the programme for government, the Covid recovery strategy set out a range of measures that we are taking to address those issues and identified by the assembly, including a strong social security system that treats people with dignity and respect, a national mission to eradicate child poverty and a new homeless together fund of £50 million over this Parliament. The Government welcomes the strong support and recommendations of the assembly to give help to those in our society who needs it most. I warmly congratulate and welcome the work of the citizens assembly. I think that it is incumbent on all the parties in the chamber to reflect on the challenge to do politics differently. I wish the young people's assembly that comes out of this well. I hope that they are given a proper platform to do good work unencumbered by the constitutional skirmishes of this chamber. In action 33 of the citizens assembly recommended permanent mental health support liaison officers in every school in Scotland. I could not see a response to that in the report that the cabinet secretary has just introduced. Can I ask the Government whether it plans to do this? I thank the member for the promotion to the cabinet secretary. I seem to have gone through the ranks quite quickly here today. I have one statement and I am a cabsech already, but many of the recommendations that I have said during my statement have been taken on board and will be worked through by the Government. A lot of it, in the case of the one in particular that you are talking about, will be something that will be looked at along with other recommendations to see how we take it further forward from then. I am quite happy to talk with the member on how we take that forward at a later date as well. One of the key weaknesses in participatory democracy is the lack of information about what will happen after the process and unclear assurances about how recommendations will be implemented. That will be particularly important to retain the trust and enthusiasm of young people as we go forward. Can the minister outline how we can ensure that people who participate in assemblies and other processes are clear about how their recommendations will be taken forward? I think that Ms Mackay hits the nail on the head on this issue. This is the important part of how we take this forward, because there is no point in us as a Government going through this whole process and ensuring that the recommendations made by the individuals on the assemblies do not get taken. If I can assure the member by saying that we are committed to having further assemblies in the future and to continue to use it as a process so that we can develop policy and move forward with knowing that we are dealing with the issues that the public wants. Any assures that I can give is that this is here to stay and it is not something that is going to go away. In addition to citizens assemblies, can the minister outline how the Scottish Government is creating space for genuine public involvement in decision making? The Government is committed to promoting not only citizens assemblies but other forms of democracy engagement, such as citizens juries, many publics and people's panels. Later this year, an expert group will report with recommendations to ministers on institutionalising inclusive participation democracy across Scotland's democratic processes, including the future governance and questions that are setting for citizens assembly. The working group will bring together those that we have already spoken about, of the experts from Scotland, England, the UK and international organisations, to propose recommendations on making this routine ineffective. They will include identifying methods of governance for delivering credible trustworthy democratic processes. Last week was Book Week Scotland, so the Scottish Government's additional funding for libraries is welcome, but that funding will have to be spent by the end of the financial year. Even after the funding, 16 libraries still remain closed indefinitely after Covid, with library campaigners branding the move a short-term fix. What thoughts have the Scottish Government had about a long-term solution to the issue of library funding? I'm a bit confused on how much that is specific to the issue that I'm discussing here. It's one of the recommendations, yes, on the fact of the libraries themselves, but at the end of the day, what we have to do is we need to obviously ensure that local Governments still have their opportunity to make decisions locally. As a former councillor, I'm only too well aware of the difficulties and challenges that councillors face, particularly this time of year, but our situation that we have with regard to budgets that go to local authority unfortunately is in a situation where, as the Scottish Government budget is cut by Westminster, there are obviously challenges created from that. That's what gives us the problems that we're dealing with in that situation. Of course, some of the recommendations that were made by the citizens assemblies actually showed that they wanted us to have more powers within this Parliament in order to create that better future that they all want. Maybe that's part of the process and maybe that's what we should be looking at with the citizens assembly Scotland. Does the minister support the recommendations that this Parliament should have the ability to create a fairer tax system for citizens, raise income from key industries such as tourism, food, drink and energy and create our own immigration system that works for Scotland? Isn't it time for the Tory Government to listen to this constructive democratic report and do the right thing? Otherwise, even more people will realise that the best future for Scotland is an independent country. My answer to that would be a resounding yes to all of the above. It's unfortunate that the current approach that the UK Government is to constrain and undermine rather than enhance devolution. This has been a problem that we have had in recent time as well. It's a problem that's going to go throughout this institution over the coming months with the aggressive attitudes from the Westminster Government towards devolution in general. It's a conversation that I have with my Welsh counterpart on a regular basis as well as they feel with it. On answering that question to the member, I would say yes because we live in difficult times. I think that the member should listen to this as the fact that one of the things that on part of doing politics different was the fact that they questioned the morality and integrity of many of us in this chamber and other chambers. Therefore, we should all take a long hard look at ourselves and see how we should take politics forward and do things differently. That concludes the ministerial statement, the Scottish Government response to the report of the Citizens Assembly of Scotland. The next item of business is a committee announcement, and I call Stuart McMillan, convener of the Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee, on an inquiry into the use of made affirmative procedure during the coronavirus pandemic. Thank you very much, Presiding Officer. Members will know that for the past 20 months many of the public health measures used to try and protect the people of Scotland from the full impact of the coronavirus have been made using secondary legislation. Many of those measures have been brought into law using the made affirmative procedure. That allows the Scottish Government to bring changes into force immediately. While this chamber needs to approve the changes within 28 days for the regulations to stay in force, the law will often have been altered weeks earlier. Prior to the pandemic, the made affirmative procedure for laying SSIs was relatively rare, really single digit figures per annum. Since March 2020, we have considered well over 100. The Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee has recognised the need to use the procedure during the pandemic. That has allowed the Government to respond quickly to challenges presented by the coronavirus, which has been ever-changing. We have also said that bringing substantial changes into force immediately before any parliamentary scrutiny should only be used when essential and should not become standard practice, particularly when time would allow the affirmative procedure to be used. The committee is therefore holding a short inquiry to ensure that the made affirmative procedure continues to be used appropriately and only when necessary. We hope that that work might be of benefit to this chamber as we seek to inform members' consideration of the made affirmative procedure in future legislation. We also want to ensure that there is an appropriate balance between flexibility for the Scottish Government in responding to an emergency situation, whatever that may be, while still ensuring appropriate parliamentary scrutiny and oversight. Our inquiry is due to conclude in early February, and we hope to have the opportunity to highlight our recommendations in the chamber then. In the meantime, if members or indeed committees wish to provide any comments on their use, we would welcome any input prior to the Christmas recess. Thank you, Mr McMillan. It is now time to move on to the next item of business. There are no questions to be put as a result of today's business, and that concludes decision time. We will now move on to members' business. I ask members to leave the chamber to do so quietly.