այակ, Եվ դհահանասիրկ. Եվ էակ, Եվ էակ իս ՒՒէ equatorfen. բախե, Եվ էակ, ֆոՅ, Եվ էակ. 2020 ։ Իվ today, we will discuss about the status of the G.S. core. Եվ էակ, Եվ էակ, Եվ էկ, Եվ Եվ էակ. Please raise your hand if you know the G.S. Okay, perfect. Okay, first I will present me very quickly. I am an open source believer since a long time ago and I am inside FOSDEM development management since a while and now I am working as an open source architect at IBM with the help of Red Hat to help the client of IBM to migrate to open source and use open source every day. Okay, first I want to say a big thanks to Bet because in fact it was planned to be Betgrings to be here. She is one of Node.js core developers from IBM but she can't come for this Sunday. That's why I am replacing AI for this talk but the main content of this talk comes from AI. And by the way about Node.js at IBM we have 11 core developers inside IBM to contribute in Node.js. Other companies contribute also on Node.js and we have four STIR committees members in JavaScript. The STIR committees is to define the future of JavaScript. And finally maybe you might aware about Open.js foundation. It's a foundation under the umbrella of Linux foundation and the idea of Open.js foundation is to help the JavaScript ecosystem with Node.js, with the packaging and IBM is also active in this way. Okay, now on about Node.js. First information I want to give you it's about several releases and it's pretty important to understand what release you use for Node especially on production because it depends on the version you use of Node.js. You don't receive after a certain time the bug fixes and even more the security fix. It's why I recommend you to use LTS long-term support like you have for most Linux distribution like Ubuntu or Redat. And for your information for now Node.js 8 is end of life. You won't receive any more security fix on it. Please to upgrade your Node.js version. And for now the LTS version of Node.js is 12. You can use it until 2022 in safety way. And after that you need to plane to upgrade to the next version of Node.js. Okay, we have a lot of new interesting features inside Node.js to be more enterprise-ready. One of feature it's around promises to help you to handle easier. If you have several promises we have now several methods like all settled to be able to wait when all promises are finished to retrieve all results even if you have a problem on promises. Moreover this is a very interesting feature for when you write async function or coroutines in Node.js. This feature the async stack trace enables you to see the path where the stack trace comes. It means for now we want this feature you see only the last stack trace from this async function and with this feature you will see okay in fact this function has been executed after this function. It's easier to you to find what async function has launched the stack trace. Okay, moreover a feature from v8. v8 is JavaScript engine used by Node.js the same as Chrome. We have now private class fields where you as you can see you have a special syntax with hash at the beginning of the name and if you try to read this variable outside the object but you have a syntax error because you don't have the right to read the content. We have also tell us 1.3 it's pretty important because tell us 1.2 as released 10 years ago and since 10 years we had several security issues with SSL even with tell us 1.0 with EarthBleat and several security actors as decided to improve TLS in terms of security and also in terms of efficiency in terms of N checks and now it's natively supported with the latest LTS version of Node.js Moreover about the support of modules for now if you want to use modules often you need to use libraries like Rokard.js and with this feature now it's native inside Node.js we have also an article on medium on the Node.js foundation where you can have technical details about this feature but it's mainly to have this syntax import-export to be used we want to need to use something like Babel and on Node.js 12 we have diagnostic reports natively inside Node.js it means when you have an issue in production in terms of efficiency or you need to know the internal state of the virtual machine of Node.js you can now retrieve a JSON report with the internal state of your Node.js process Moreover finally when a long feature waited by the community the worker thread is finally the API is finally stable it means inside Node.js for now you have one thread the main thread with an event loop in case of you use your white piece of code use a lot the CPU it could block your main threads if you need to launch a computation in the past you need to start another Node.js process and now it's possible to use directly threads and it's easier to share memory between threads and we have a presentation to explain in details what it means in terms of usage in Node.js 12 we have also in the past when you start Node.js you have some memory configuration in terms of garbage collector was static and now at the start of Node.js it checks how many memory is available and define correctly the limits based on these values we use also now LLHTTP to pass HTTP requests and the NPN version has been upgraded moreover Node.js 12 is not the latest version it's the latest LTS version and you have also access to Node.js 13 it's not an LTS it means at the June it will be finished you don't receive any more new versions but you need to get to Node.js 14 and in this release you have a better support of internalization you don't need to use an external JavaScript library to be able to translate for example the dates here it's an example to translate to a Spanish date we have also some Node.js console improvements to be more fancy, more easier for developers to use with a completion preview and this release of Node.js has a national support of WASI just before my talk you had an explanation about WebAssembly WebAssembly at the beginning was targeted for the web browser WASI is a WebAssembly system interface it's for the backend and it enables you to execute WebAssembly inside the backend just of this you generate one time WASI binary file and you don't need to take care about the architecture or even the operating system your piece of code will run and to enable that when you start Node.js you need to add CLI parameter to be able to execute this this is a slide to give you an idea about the activity around Node.js score as you can see we have a lot of activities especially in terms of pull requests and we have more than 2000 contributors on Node.js score and we have also more than 100 collaborators it means they have enough rights in the source code to validate pull requests but we don't have not only Node.js score we have several working groups to do releases, to do security for Node.js for benchmarking to be sure we don't have any regressions in terms of efficiency between two releases and one of the most important working groups for you it's the build because the Node.js build working group generates the binary you can download on the Node.js website and here it's a photo of one of Raspberry Pi cluster we use to generate the IRM version of Node.js for different Linux distribution the build working group is maintaining the Jenkins CI as a build server and we use a lot of sensible playbooks to be able to create a machine from scratch and to build Node.js and we have more than 200 machines and more than 50 operating systems architecture combination and thanks a lot about the donors for the build working group because we need to host these machines from several cloud operators and if you want to contribute inside Node.js we have the website Node.js.to-do where you can see a small roadmap for you to be up and running to contribute inside Node.js voilà voilà voilà first question hi, thank you for the presentation the one thing you forget to mention that the spread operator is also became faster it became faster 100 times as of Node.js 12 just to finish I have a question about V8 Node.js so when will you move to 8th version of V8 and other question is when will optional change will be available the question is when will we look great to V8 V8 release we have an issue on it some blockers are so because as you can imagine it's not possible to simply upgrade V8 you have a lot of links between Node.js and V8 and it needs to adapt it for example they change some APIs you remove some APIs at my level I don't have an idea for the due date but I know it's planned some things like I've seen hooks that have been a while in different versions of Node and they still are experimental if there is a plan to move it to a more stable stage for what's the API? I've seen hooks for example here again to my knowledge we don't have a schedule for that but I don't know thanks for the presentation my question is that I can see that Node.js is still maintained but actually the creator of Node.js I saw once that he has a repo called Deno which is in the description saved Node.js version with TypeScript so they are working together or we will have a point where we need to switch to Deno or keep with Node.js to my knowledge it depends on you can use all the extension of the file to define how you can type of import I think you have also an option you can pass via CLI for that another question yes so I have a question about worker threads so you have different threads what about event loop you have event loop for every thread you have one thread on one event loop for all threads the question is with worker thread if we have only one event loop or event loop by thread the answer is we have an event loop by thread to be able to execute in parallel several event loops so as you know this is the exit this door doesn't exist anymore this is the exit so you'll have to come around blame me for security and everything that's fine there is an empty seat after everybody has stood up move to the left suggestion, critics, complaints, whining, ideas all there if you already have a talk for next year also there thank you


Everyone shiver one thousand here. We got monkey one thousand so Today just a quick video. We're going to check out these old computer speakers that was in with a bunch of her dad stuff Looks like he was trying to sell them at one time for five bucks So We're gonna say if they work and if they do we'll do another video later on a kind of restore these You know and and maybe selling them or or whatever, but Now we're going to see if they work Okay guys, so here's the Speakers now. I'm not sure what that's there how to pronounce it. It's t Is it J? J u s t E r juster. I don't know if you can see that how well you can see that day I've never heard them before It's really nothing on them except you know these probably run that number and find out but I'm not sure I'm not sure and I don't know much about them So I didn't research them because we're just going to see if they work if they do. Maybe we'll clean them up Because I think these come off Yeah, there's a light in that one.   Huh? Yeah so Get these all untangled here Okay, will it reach monkey's gonna plug them in for us Behind her there They reach okay, so she's got them plugged in first of all, let's see if I like them on our Oh Yeah, see there's a light on right here. Yeah, okay, it's plugging into my phone. I'm some royalty-free Stuff on here I'm not Let's plug these in here.  All right Here we go. All right, I gotta find it again hang on. Okay, so I got it back I want to try this here first. Let's plug this in Okay, there's all the way plug in now I know before it wasn't because this is kind of thick here Because that's rubber. It's really thick I don't know if you can see how thick that is or not, but Pretty thick so sometimes they don't want to plug all the way in so we're gonna turn these on power It's powered on You just crackling a little bit, but I got some spray that fixes that What it is is inside there that It gets kind of crude it after sent in for a long time But let's see here. Okay. Now it should be There we go working Like this and but Let's try the headphones It's working in the headphones, which is weird because They shouldn't be because that's not working right. It's coming up there. So I think that's bad. Yeah, see See the wires break inside there. I mean I could put another cable on it But is it worth it? Probably not. I mean my time to get you know to two bucks out of it wouldn't wouldn't be um Would not be feasible Say I get this on here. I don't know says talk to Alexa on the go. No, thanks You said her name Probably because so these will be probably going in the trash Normally I Would save something like this. It's just a 3.5 millimeter jack You do have one What don't you have one of those and not big bags that we got the flea market I might have but to take these apart and I mean we could do that if you guys wanted to let me know in the comments below if you guys want to tear these apart and Put a new end on here a new wire all the way up inside But if it don't work, I will cut the cord off Save the cord because I'm always needing cords There I blew up monkey So all right guys Hmm There we go. It's look it's still saying it's on Headphones talk to your assistant. I don't want to talk my assistant She's right here So there we go and shut it off month bang No, I don't want No, that's That's a quick video of really absolutely nothing Yeah, but for like a dollar or two, you know, yeah, but he he didn't realize I don't think that they weren't working, right? To your dad. Yeah, that's probably why he wanted to sell them But they're not five bucks. I mean No, even in perfect condition because the ones we bought remember those bad ass ones I use on the computer Yeah, I only gave 15 for them. Yeah, and they're nice and they're a decent. Yeah, they're nice You can buy these brand new cheap things like I said, this is you know, it's not Pioneer. It's not neighbor I've never heard of it Juster or juicer So I mean by the logic tech, yeah Well, I said these for like five bucks brand new, you know, so it's not worth me taking a part to fix them but For a video and just to hang out with you guys and have some fun Maybe we'll do that it'd be fun for that just to you know, take something that's not working and make it work But is it feasible to do it like if I was just going to sell these I would absolutely not do it Just they're not Fixing them.  Like I said, yeah, I wouldn't you know put the put the cord on there and And all that just to sell them for like two dollars or a dollar wouldn't do it But to make a video and just hang out with you guys and Monkey could join us on that one, huh? She can take one apart because it's that way if we screw it up who cares. They're junk anyway, right? So I can maybe teach monkey how to sod her a little bit Interesting. Yeah. Yeah. Well, you said one time you'd like to learn how to solder I mean, you know, it could be the issue in here But with that Wiggling what they do is the wire you can't see the brakes because the brakes are usually inside of here But these things get moved around a lot and can hold on and So you'll never see the break but when you go to wiggle them like that, you know, there's a break inside there Yeah, so maybe we'll do that sometime Tomorrow what are we gonna do? We're making something. I think you're gonna film it too, aren't you? Yeah We're going to make chicken noodle soup home made noodles Yep, we'll make homemade noodle soup. Yep with homemade noodles Now she kind of she didn't watch me when I when I did the noodle maker, that's what we're gonna use I was here and you was here, but I mean when I made the noodles. Yeah She didn't watch me, but so she kind of she said it'd be interesting to see how they're made. They're real easy. Mm-hmm, and And that way, you know, you know, I don't put sugar in them Some people do and I put very little salt less than what it calls for So, you know, you make it as healthy as you want in there It's kind of cheaper to do it that way because those once you dry them out You put them in a Ziploc baggy and they'll stay for a long time Yeah, just like noodles you buy at the store, but if you want to make Homemade noodle soup make it homemade make the noodles don't don't buy baggy noodles because you know we like them how they get thick and you know Right, so we're gonna do that. So stay tuned for that. That'll be on a chef Shea Bear Playlist and she'll have it too. I think you're gonna film it, aren't you? Yeah, so she's gonna film it too So we're gonna have two different cameras running for two different channels and it's gonna go So But seriously guys, if you if you've ever heard of this or if you own something from this company Or if it's a product of a company, I don't know if you ever heard that name brand if it is a name brand I don't know Let me know they might have came from circuit city, but I Have no idea. I think circuit city. I don't know maybe I'll do some research on it while While While I'm editing this video and if I find out anything I'll put it across the screen right here just what she did and My god So I Wouldn't even want to do this video. She's like but the video you guys just watched The review on the the multi tool We got them filming that I just took the card out of the camera and everything and she's like you got any more Like which is unusual We'll do back-to-back. I'm like, okay, so I was gladly. I was like, I don't have more reviews But I got something we can do, you know, so which I was planning on doing anyway But since she's here and she wanted to do another video. I was more than happy. I was like, yeah, let's let's do this I blow up machine here She better admit the man led him gone for now. Let's say she's out for now y'all.  I should wear this to bed.


Coming off a 6-2 Friday victory over St. Cloud State, the BSU women were also in action Saturday, looking for six points and the sweep over the Huskies. And it didn't take long for St. Cloud to get on the board in this one though. 22 seconds into the game, Hannah Petroikis redirects the Caroline Markstrom shot to the back of the net. The Huskies go up one. Five minutes later, the Huskies strike again. Ivy Dynick is able to squeeze the puck just past the skate of Brittany Moet to give St. Cloud State the 2-0 lead. The Beavers outshot the Huskies 31-14, but they were just unable to scratch anything across as St. Cloud State gets the split, defeating BSU 3-0 on Saturday.


lt for everyone to hear. You can speak up, minister, on your own, Neil, just a wee bit. I was talking about the capital borrowing policy under the previous MTFS. What it's looking at is about £250 million, which was the ffiscally sustainable level under the old fiscal framework limits. It's designed to allow for a level of attrition, and the late underspends materialise. The point that the minister makes is that if late underspends materialise and borrowing is reduced, there's no spending power lost on the assumption that borrowing can be re-profiled into future years. The policy is designed to be flexible because it's one of the few flexibilities in the capital budget. So it's to ensure that Scotland doesn't lose any money in terms of its expenditure overall, is that correct? Okay, thank you for that clarification. Okay, I'm now going to open up the session to colleagues, and the first to ask questions will be returning stall Daniel to be followed by my join. I'm not used to all of this lavish praise, convener. I really just want to follow up on a couple of points that were just discussed in question, particularly around transparency. I'm always struck by the fact that essentially the discussion and debate around budget time is always at level 3 and level 4, and yet the actual budget bill is essentially at level 1. Critically, when you look at the out-turn, that's by and large specified at level 1. Just in terms of transparency—and I fully take on board your point around over-provision can be a problem, and I also don't want to call us officials panic about lots more work—but is there a case to explore whether an out-turn could be specified at a greater level of detail? Ultimately, I take a very basic point of principle that, when you're setting a budget, you need to look at how you performed against last year's budget, and the importance and the level of scrutiny is really at that level 3 and level 4. Do you think that there's a case to be made to look at the rate at which we can report back at that level in terms of out-turn? That was a very well-crafted question, because you probably anticipated many of my answers in your preamble. Certainly, we wish to be able to provide as much information as possible. We have to recognise that it was a need for proportionality, and I appreciate you recognising the points of the potential unintended consequences of over-provision. We are looking at other provisions of transparency around the co-fog classifications, for example. I'm quite keen to ensure that we are able to provide information that is as useful as possible for Parliament and the wider public. In terms of the level of detail that we can go into, can you touch on where we are currently with our provision on out-turn? I would need to double-check. On the provisional out-turn, it's at the high-level information. I think that we do go into more detail in the accounts, but that's obviously prepared on a different basis. There can be trouble comparing Scottish budgetary bases to treasury budget bases, and that's a quite important factor, especially because the Scottish Government accounts are prepared against the spring budget revision totality, and the differences there are very different to what our out-turn versus budget is on a treasury basis, which is ultimately what matters for what's left in the Scotland reserve at the end of the year. I think that that's the case. I would need to double-check the precise level of detail that we go into the accounts, but it is at a lower level. It would be helpful if the committee is of one mind in terms of a view as regards to what level of detail it would like to be provided with regard to the reference to what we provide already. We are very happy to have that discussion and engagement. What I would say just very frankly is that the classic exchanges, Opposition parties, as a sort of convener illudici, must do X, Y and Z, and the Government turn around some justification and say, well, where does it come from? Until you have that complete level of clarity about how things, especially at that level, below level 1, actually are flowing through and how they pan out. It's actually kind of difficult to have that conversation. I think it would improve the level of debate. The level you get to, I think, is for further discussion, but I just sort of make that observation. You mentioned that I prefigured some of your response. You prefigured my next question about cofog, so I'm glad that that is continuing to be there. I think I just want to ask one last clarification question. We just had a brief exchange there about capital borrowing regimes, and obviously in recent weeks there's been some discussion about the issuing of bonds. I think that is interesting, but just for the sake of clarity, because I think some quarters people's minds have been racing ahead of themselves, my understanding is that that would fall within the limits of the fiscal framework. I think that it's probably worth just us all being very clear that this isn't extra money that can be raised, this was all within the fiscal framework and would be a source as an alternative to the other sources of capital borrowing that are available to the Scottish Government. Is that a useful clarification? John Toffol by Liz Just to pick up some other points, if I may, the DPLR committee raised a few points, I think, three on the papers. One, it says that regulation 2B of the instrument amends the amount specified for the Scottish Parliament corporate body but replaces the existing figure with the same figure. The Scottish Government advised that the insertion of an unchanged figure was unintentional but the figure remains correct. Can you explain what that means? That was just highlighted to SJLD as a figure that was changing when it hadn't changed, there should have been no inclusion of that figure, it was just an error. The commentary more than the actual figure, there was a problem right, okay, let's clarify that. I mean, just to follow up the convener's point about reserves, I mean, I actually fully agree that we should use reserves and not just leave money sitting there, but will it put more pressure on future budgets because that will be something we can't do again? I think it's an important point. It's recognising that reserves are there for a purpose, it gives those particular bodies which have that facility a degree of flexibility, which is commensurate with their particular roles and responsibilities. I think we do recognise though that in the financial situation that we find ourselves currently, there is that facility available there which allows us and assist us to manage the overall budget position, but, of course, implicit in your argument, a continuous use of reserves and depleting them would clearly be a cause for concern. They are there for a purpose, there will be no logic and rationale behind that facility being available. What we have set out here and some of the specific items that we have discussed with an agency and its reserves are a reflection of the particular circumstances that we find ourselves in presently. If we take Creative Scotland and Forestry and Land Scotland as examples, they are able to top up their budget from reserves at the moment, but, in future, either we would have to trim their budget or find more money elsewhere to put back in. As a made reference with Creative Scotland, we have committed to that reinstatement that we have not been able to provide in the autumn budget revision. Moving on, the Scotland reserve, at the start of 2022-23, was approximately £699 million. All of that was put into the budget and then at the end of the year, there were still £244 million put back into the reserve. Does it make any difference if we take the whole thing out and put some back in or just we take out the net amount at the end of the year? Is that just purely a different way of doing things? The way in terms of how the reserve operates, it is a facility to allow us to carry forward underspends from one year of financial year to the next financial year, and the nature of underspends as it can emerge very late in the day. We saw particular examples during the pandemic, where there were funding announcements and there just simply was not the means to deliver on that expenditure prior to the 1st of April, so the reserve provides that facility. I hope that we have set out in some detail the sources of funding for the reserve. I do not know, Neil, if you want to give some more detail. After the fact, there is no difference, but in terms of fiscal management over the course of a year, there is a bit of a difference because by drawing the reserve down in totality, you leave the maximum space in the reserve for the end of the year, especially as the minister talks about during Covid, where there was really significant volumes of funding changes late in the financial year. It was important to ensure that you had that full capacity there, so if you do not draw down the reserve, you are limiting your own capacity to absorb that. Okay, fair enough. The points made that the Ukraine resettlement costs have been more expensive in the current year than we had perhaps anticipated. Is that completely open-ended? Is there still uncertainty going forward, in other words? Well, the nature of it being a demand-led scheme, of course, we have seen a significant popularity of the super sponsor scheme in Scotland as of early October. Some 25,000 displaced people from Ukraine have arrived in the UK with sponsorship from an individual in Scotland, or from the Scottish Government, 20,000 of them under the super sponsor scheme. The additional funding takes total funding for this year up to an excessive £100 million, which combined with the funding provided last year, totals over £300 million to date. However, as the recent position paper published in partnership with COSLA and the Scottish Refugee Council set out, we are now in a position of pivoting from that emergence to respond to a longer-term holistic approach going forward. What would that mean for the finances that it is a longer-term holistic approach? We are also working with partners who continue to engage with COSLA. We will continue to monitor what the situation is in-year and, based on their understanding today, decisions will be taken at the budget in terms of allocations for the next financial year, but we remain absolutely committed to ensuring that we support those who have come from Ukraine to Scotland. Does that mean that, instead of being a specific Ukraine cost in future, it would be a bit more on housing costs, a bit more on school costs, a bit more on the NHS? There was a recognition of that need for the dedicated provision of support for people who are rebuilding their lives and providing that support around, for example, gaining employment, accessing public services, including benefits and indeed accessing long-term housing. We have continued commitment to working in partnership with local government in the Fudd sector to provide that support. There was £46 million taken from the colleges and universities budget to support the increased teachers pay settlement. Is that a one-off or does that have repercussions for the future? We are not in a position to commit to reinstating that funding. We will consider the needs of the SFC as part of the budget process and that funding allocation will be set out as part of the budget announcement. The guide also reports an additional £20.2 million arising from a home office comparability factor error. I was wondering if you could tell us what that was. That goes back to the spending review. I think that it was a £21.22 million, which means that we had been receiving a life-saving word due, and that is an error that has been rectified. I do not know if anyone wants to add, Craig. It is just in terms of the mechanics of it, so at the time the spending review is set, any increase in the home office department will budget from the UK and will feed into our block grant. That is quite straightforward if you are in something like education or justice, where the figure is used as the entirety. It is a 100 per cent comparability factor. We consider the entirety of the increase of the block of their budget and we get a population share of that. Conversely, we have a 0 per cent comparability factor and we get nothing. That is quite straightforward. The percentage used in the home office is about 74.1 per cent, which is a previous percentage used. There is a degree where some of the matters are devolved. What transpired was the slightly outdated percentage that has been used. 74.1 per cent should have been around 80 to 83 per cent, so there was an additional amount due that has been funded. Partly there was an amount in the previous SBR, as well as the ABR, and it will be reflected in the next year's budget as well as the final component of the spending review period. It has just been an error in the calculation use. That is reassuring that that error has been picked up. It will raise the wider question as the UK Government is making more errors that we do not know about. Those checks go back and forward in terms of making sure that those figures are correct and that they are highlighted and discussed at the official level to make sure that everything is consistent and correct. Okay, thank you very much. At least it was in our favour. Minister, you rightly said in your opening statement about the uplift in the teachers' pay settlement and how that is a very important and understandable commitment in the financial landscape that you have to deal with. Could I just ask for some clarification? I refer to table A21 when you talk about gross funding changes. Can I just ask that the figures that we have in front of us here are ones that are for the 2022-23 budget commitments on that? Yes. And what are the implications for the next budget of obviously the uplift that teachers and indeed known teaching staff have had? What are the implications going forward for those pay settlements for the budget? Those are settlements that have been agreed and we have committed to going forward. With regard to future rounds of negotiation, they will of course take place in the usual way through the joint committee, but we have worked constructively to ensure that we can support these pay settlements. They have, as I think the committee appreciates, necessitated taking some quite challenging decisions, but it does demonstrate the Government's commitment to the teaching profession. Indeed, overall we welcome that commitment, but you are right, it has led to some very difficult decisions and obviously the potential for more difficult decisions coming down the line for the commitments for future budgets. It is obviously a very large part of the budgetary negotiations and I was just wondering if you feel that that pressure is going to be there for the foreseeable future. Well, I think we have sought to support public sector pay in a way that is commensurate with the scale of the challenge that we face with the inflation of pressures. Thankfully, we have seen some signs of inflation beginning to fall and that will clearly create a different economic and fiscal context for future rounds of negotiations. However, I agree entirely with what is implicit in your question, Ms Smith. That has created exceptional pressures in the year and, of course, those pressures have to be carried forward and that is something that we are giving very careful consideration to in setting out our spending plans for the next financial year. In previous committee sessions, and you know that we are doing some work about public sector reform, we have discussed a previous Scottish Government commitment to ensure that the size of the public sector is roughly what it was at pre-Covid. Is that still the intention of Government policy for that to be the case? We are not taking an approach to setting exact numbers or particular targets. The clear focus has been able to deliver it. We recognise the need to go and deliver services more efficiently. That means more shared services, more collaboration, working across administrative and organisational boundaries. That also means looking at the disposition of our estate as well. All of those factors are at play, but the key to that as well is real focus on delivery and ensuring that our public services are not just delivering services to meet the needs of people but are very much focused on preventing the agenda. I recognise the committee's interest in medium-to-long-term fiscal sustainability. Yes, opportunities to increase revenue, whether that be through tax or medium-term economic growth, are going to be key. We know that we cannot meet that demand simply from increased revenue alone. It has to be about preventing that demand, avoiding the risk of failure demand emerging. Looking at how we reform our public services is not just to meet the fiscal challenges that we face in the here and now, but to deliver a more efficient and effective service that is focused on the preventative agenda that is key. In terms of embracing that approach, there is not one where we are setting ourselves definite numbers around headcounts, but rather focused on those particular priorities and ensuring that we have a workforce that can meet that particular requirement. I have two other points of clarification. There is money being taken away from the Scottish Funding Council. Can I ask why that decision was made and where that is being reallocated? I do not have it in front of me. I cannot remember what the actual number was. It was for the Scottish Funding Council that there was a reduction in the money that is being paid with the Scottish Funding Council. Was this the money for colleges and education? Yes. I touch on that in my answer to Mr Mason. We are not in a position to commit to reinstating that money. We will assess the needs of the SFC as part of our budget setting process. Sorry, I heard your answer. I was just asking why you made that decision. That decision was to support the teachers pay settlement. All of it? The position is fully allocated in the budget revision. By definition, everything that was returned to the centre is supporting everything else that is in the autumn budget revision. You will see in the funding tables that we provided in the document that there is no unallocated funding. In terms of the return to the centre, there is no unallocated funding, as Neil said, and that overall position is supporting everything that is set out in terms of allocations, but clearly the majority of funding that is allocated within the ABR is to support local government pay, including the teachers pay settlement. Sticking with the education and skills portfolio, am I correct in thinking that some pupil equity funding money has been returned to the centre? There has been a reprofiling, but there is no loss of spend on the front line. It is just a reprofiling across the years. I do not know if I can take it if you want. Are you in a position to tell us about that reprofiling? Find it. If you have not got it in your fingertips, you can get back to us on that. I would be happy to get back to you on it and provide some more detail. As I would want to stress, as part of that reprofiling is the flexibility that we have given to local government, there is no loss of spend on the front line. My final question is on the statement by the First Minister about the £300 million extra being allocated to the national health service, as I understand it, three years of £100 million in each successive budget. Are you able to see where that money is coming from? It will be a future year's budget, and it will be set out as part of the budget process. Of course, we are still in a position right now to see the autumn statement and forecast, etc. ahead of setting our own budget, so it will be taken as part of that process overall. Was there anything that you were wanting to add, Neil? Thank you very much. Good morning. I will draw attention to my register of interests as a partner in a farming business member of NFUS, etc. The money that the convener mentioned earlier, the £31 million for rural affairs, taken out of the rural affairs budget, I just confirm that money was ring-fedced for agricultural use, rural affairs use. In terms of the money that the savings have been set out to support the overall fiscal position, there were particular items that we identified that are, for example, the Marine Scotland line in conversation, where we looked at some of the detail. There are other areas where the overall budget has been maintained, for example, through the use of reserves. There are other areas where there are reduced forecasts associated, and then there are other areas where funding will be deferred but will be used and filled for future years. I do not know, Craig, if you can provide some more just to the specific detail on the ring-fencing point. The amounts that are surrendered are not ring-fedced, so there is ring-fedced funding that goes to the rural portfolio. We provide additional funding on top of that, and it is part of those amounts that have been returned to the centre as part of the budget revision. There is £14 million of the 31, which would relate to what is sometimes grouped as ring-fedced funding, but that is supplemented by additional funding from out-with-the-ring-fenced. The money, the 31 million, is being re-prioritised. Can you say where it is being re-prioritised to? As I said, the money goes to the centre, and in terms of what has been reallocated to that, it is set out within the ABR document. For example, there is the resource that I have touched on for local government, which is the £30 million support for Ukraine, but the resource that we save goes to the centre and is reallocated. Is there anything that you want to add, Craig? No, just the point that was made before, that all funding is just about every allocated as part of the revision, so it has all come into the centre and then been utilised for the pay offers for the Ukraine amounts that the minister touched on. I do not know if you are able to say what kind of internal discussions or consultation happen with your Government colleagues about that. Obviously, the 31 million coming out of a rural affairs budget is money that is intended to be used for agriculture, rural communities, et cetera. That is a significant sum that, as somebody who lives in and represents as part of a rural community, would be very welcome in a lot of the sectors in those areas. How do those discussions happen? What I would want to say firstly is that, whether it is a dedicated rural affairs land reform and islands portfolio, the interests of rural affairs are supported across a range of portfolios that we would recognise. Instead, in areas that we have sought to be more effective in getting money out of the door earlier on basic payment schemes, greening advances, et cetera. In terms of the decision making process, clearly when we have a set of circumstances as we have faced in this financial year and indeed in the previous financial year, we have to look for opportunities to generate efficiencies that can be returned to the centre to support the in-year fiscal positions, particularly when we have emerging pressures, such as in public sector pay. While the particular example that we are considering here is on regards to the rural affairs and land reform and islands portfolio, across Government there will be opportunities to look at for savings to be generated, and sometimes that can mean the refacing or refrofiling of particular budget lines. The aim of doing that is to generate that revenue internally to support the budget position in the year to meet challenges. For example, when you have a demand-led scheme where demand is not as forecast, then there is a source of revenue that can be redeployed where there is slippage perhaps in a capital project. Again, there is that opportunity for redeployment and that is a continuous on-going process as part of the in-year budget management process. Do you have anything to add to that, Neil? This money itself, the source, the original source, how is that linked to the uplift from the BU review? I am sorry, I missed the last part. Is that associated money coming from the uplift from the BU review or looked into the BU review with that be right or? I do not think that it is directly related in this case. The BU review funding is part of the broader ring-fenced culture funding. One of the things that I would say is that it is historically talked to us before, but the budget recovery that is provided for the schemes that are associated with ring-fencing is higher than the ring-fencing threshold and has been throughout the year. Despite the reprofiling, the terms of the ring-fencing have been met. When would you hope that this money would be returned to the portfolio? The decisions will be taken as part of the budget process. There is a guarantee that that money will be returned. We have made that commitment. Just a very quick last point. There were technical adjustments in the expenditure limit budget for rail services in relation to the sleeper service of £5 million. Can you give more details on that? Is it related to the move into public ownership? That is a technical matter. I am going to ask Graeme if he wants to comment. That is a recurring adjustment that has happened in the last three financial years, where a prepayment relating to the sleeper has been unwound, so it is more from the accounting perspective than anything else. I am going back to the police pensions thing. The minister said that it was demand-led, and that it would have been more of volatility. To what extent is there an overhang from Covid where we saw more people choosing to retire as a realisation that there was a life out there? In other words, do you have any sense on the extent to which it will continue, or the extent to which it was on and off? You might not know the answer to that. I am not in a position to give a detailed answer, but I will ask my officials at the SPPA to contribute towards the response of the committee to see if they can shed any light. The reason that I am asking is that, if that looks like that, something will continue, because you are right, there is more flexibility in terms of the way in which people will take their pensions. It would be useful to know that, and it does not just apply to the police scheme. I know that you have already agreed to write to us with what reserves are in place. It would also be useful for me to understand the rules around agencies that are able to gather or not gather reserves, as you pointed out, and whether there is any policy thinking about that. I think that most of us in this committee are pretty comfortable with agencies being required to use reserves where we are there, where we have got this fiscal tightness, but I am interested in things like SNP, when it does eventually move into profit. I personally think that we want them to be able to keep their reserves, because that is how we are going to get to the scale. That would be useful, so just a bit of meat on the bones for that. The third point is to thank your contribution today. I personally want to recognise the extra effort that has gone to this, and I find it very heartening in the finance committee. I know that does not happen very often, but I thank you very much for that.  I think that the committee felt that we did not have a sufficient level of rigor given that the estimates. I appreciate that. It would be nice if we could square that circle a bit from the actuals, which that represents. I know that that can only be accurate at actuals, but we have quite a fluid position, increasingly with FMs coming through the committee of where estimates. Thank you. I will make sure that the points that you have highlighted are reflected in the correspondence. I very much want to put in record my thanks to the committee for their constructive engagement. I express my thanks to the officials as well for the work that has been undertaken to get us to a position where we have taken the financial update forward. This is clearly a process for our event, and we will always be keen for feedback to ensure that we can present information as transparently as possible. As I say, this is part of an on-going discussion in a process of refinements, but I am very grateful for the committee's input. I will ensure that the points that you have highlighted with regard to financial memoranda are related to relevant officials and ministerial colleagues. Thank you. Just one more from me, and it goes back to the issue of reserves. We know that the Scottish Reserve is about 1.1 per cent of the budget. We know that local government is recommended that they have about 3 per cent of their annual expenditure on reserves, although many have below that. Some have higher than that for historic reasons, Shetland, for example. However, what I was intrigued by over recent weeks is that when it was revealed that Creative Scotland appeared to the reserve of £17 million against a £66 million Government award, which was reduced by £6.6 million, that is about a quarter of its annual reserve. I am not sure what the £6 million represents in terms of forestry, but I wonder whether the Scottish Government has any particular guidelines on what the level of reserves should be. We are talking about dipping into those reserves as it appears to have happened both in terms of Creative Scotland and forestry. If that is not going well, then there surely has to be a set of guidelines, if there are, and I am sure there are. It would be interesting to see whether or not, and to hear from you what your view is of what that reserve should really be looking at. If Scotland reserves 1.1 per cent, why is Creative Scotland at a 25 per cent level of reserve relative to the award? What are we actually looking at? There has to be some level of consistency surely across a public sector. If your permission can be made of what I would be happy to do in the touches on the points that Mr Mason was raising, it is to respond to those points in detail in writing, but if there is a chance to further discussions with officials and look at the matter in some detail myself. I think that it is an important point at the committee that raises and I think that it warrants a more substantive response from something extemporised by me at this stage in the session. I absolutely agree with that. I am sure that colleagues would feel that that would be very helpful. I want to thank you for the evidence that you have given. We are now going to move on to agenda item 3, which involves formal consideration of the motion on the instrument. I invite the minister to speak to and move motion S6M-10683, that the Finance and Public Administration Committee recommends that the budget Scotland Act 2020-23 amend regulations 2020-23 draft be approved. We have no members wish to speak and thank you. I now put the question on the motion, which is that motion S6M-10683 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? Members are all agreed. I would like to thank the minister and his officials for their evidence today. We will publish a short report to the Parliament, setting out a decision on the draft regulations due course. That concludes the public part of today's meeting. The next item on our agenda, which will be discussed in private, is consideration of a work programme. We now move into private session. I will have a two-minute recess while the official report and ministerial and official guests leave.


adjusted my presentation so that I can reinforce the circle or staying on the circle. Here again, I'm not going to throw too much slack into the rope right now because I want to be able to support my idea of circling. It's looking really good. We'll leave the center. I'll make sure that I have him settle once his feet come up and he relaxes and that looks pretty good right there. Alright so now Abby, come on over.