Did you mean Scottish Welfare find?
Maurice Corry: I declare that I am an armed forces veteran and convener of the cross-party group on the armed forces and veterans community. It is a real privilege to take part in, and to lead for, the Scottish Conservatives in the debate. We will support the motion at decision time. I record our appreciation for the considerable work that the minister has done in the past year for our veterans. He and I...
Shirley-Anne Somerville: We have provided a £350 million funding package to ensure support for people and communities that are most in need. We have significantly increased the Scottish welfare fund and we have targeted help with housing costs, including through increasing our discretionary housing payment fund and introducing a tenant hardship fund. In recognition of the additional pressures that unpaid carers have...
Aileen Campbell: The Scottish Government has invested more than £130 million to tackle the food insecurity that has been caused by the pandemic. That includes free school meal provision over the summer. We have also recently announced that we will continue to support free school meal provision in holiday periods up to and including Easter 2021, which will benefit more than 150,000 families. That is in...
Baroness Berridge: My Lords, the method used by the Scottish and Welsh Governments is, in fact, a similar methodology to the local authority welfare assistance fund, as it is through local councils and does not expect schools to deliver it. This is a time, during the pandemic, when all of us—government, communities, faith communities, families and charities—need to come together to support everyone.
Lord Callanan: ...to thrive and has been the source of unhindered and open trade across our country. It has helped to demonstrate that, as a union, our country is greater than the sum of all our parts. Around 60% of Scottish and Welsh exports are to the rest of the UK, which is around three times as much as exports to the whole of the rest of the European Union. About 50% of Northern Ireland’s sales are...
...Covid to work from home and to continue to be paid, as far as that is possible. The details of all of that have been set out, and the payment will be administered by local authorities through the Scottish welfare fund, which is a tried and tested way of getting money quickly to those who need it most. This week, we confirmed that there will be a new proactive service that will also be...
Ronnie Cowan: ...mental health, yet the current system dangles the threat of sanctions over the heads of recipients, going so far as to drive some to suicide. UBI removes that psychological burden. A UBI will not fund the lifestyle of an MP, but it is a platform on which individuals can add other income without fear of financial repercussions. The current system ties work to welfare. It can make the...
...Minister: The support scheme is the key way by which we will help people on low incomes to self-isolate if they are asked to do so. It is a payment of £500 that will be administered through the Scottish welfare fund, and will be targeted particularly at people who are on universal credit, although some flexibility will be needed in order to reach others who are in need. We are also...
Nicola Sturgeon: We confirmed yesterday that the fund will be administered through the Scottish welfare fund, which is already established and is tried and tested in making crisis support available to people who need it. It will be available to people on low incomes and targeted at people on universal credit who will lose income if they are not able to work because of the advice to self-isolate. However, we...
Drew Hendry: ...the Tories won. Why? Because they do not listen to the people of Scotland and they do not have their interests at heart. Using this Bill, they are able to lower standards by holding a veto over Scottish Parliament decisions. The mutual recognition mechanism in the Bill starts a race to the bottom on standards, with the UK Government imposing their will. As we heard, clauses 2 to 9 contain...
Kate Forbes: Patrick Harvie makes a good point about the impact on our tax receipts, as well as about the increased need for welfare support. He will know that, when it comes to setting a budget, one of the reasons that the timetable is so important is that the Scottish Fiscal Commission needs enough time to provide its own forecast, which will include the likely impacts on tax and welfare support. We...
Aileen Campbell: ...of the pandemic, I announced £350 million of community support, which went to local authorities, the third sector and communities themselves. It also enhanced the support around, for instance, the Scottish welfare fund so that, at an individual level, people were able to access additional support from the fund if they required it. More important is the way in which communities across...
Clare Adamson: ...truth of the afternoon is that the Conservatives are responsible for the austerity policies that cause poverty and that they hold the levers of power to address the issue fully. That leaves the Scottish Government mitigating for poor ideological decisions that are taken elsewhere—a conundrum that would easily be solved by a vote for independence. The Scottish Government has tackled...
Nicola Sturgeon: That concerns me deeply—as, I know, it concerns everybody. Throughout the pandemic, the Scottish Government has invested significant amounts of money in helping to tackle food insecurity. We will continue to take that very seriously. The money includes, but is not limited to, the money that was provided to carry on provision of school meals throughout the school holidays. We have also...
Aileen Campbell: ...provided a considerable amount of support to local authorities, including £57.6 million to provide co-ordinated support with food and essentials for people at risk. We have also doubled the Scottish welfare fund. Our programme for government commits to more investment in people and communities, including £275 million over five years to support community-led regeneration and town centre...
Shirley-Anne Somerville: We will be making the Scottish child payment only two months later than was originally planned. That two-months change is due to the difficulty of having a benefit go live during the Covid pandemic. That does not mean that we are not serious about our responsibility to ensure that we support low-income families. For example, £110 million has been spent to tackle food insecurity during the...
Kate Forbes: Last year, we spent around £1.4 billion supporting low-income households, including more than £100 million to mitigate the impact of United Kingdom Government welfare cuts. In response to the pandemic, we have gone well beyond our original £70 million food fund commitment, which was introduced in March, by investing more than £110 million on tackling food insecurity, supporting people...
Pauline McNeill: ...we predicted that. I raised it many times during the course of the first and second coronavirus bills. My amendment 22 to the Coronavirus (Scotland) (No 2) Bill called for the creation of a tenants fund, but the Government voted against it. I am pleased to see the announcement of a tenant hardship fund, but I wonder why it took so long for the Government to come to the same conclusion as...
Scottish Welfare Fund
Aileen Campbell: ...in the chamber. Citizens advice bureaux support people in our communities across the country. As he knows, the majority are individual charities, with each bureau being responsible for its own funding, including any core funding from the local authority as well as project funding from other sources such as the Big Lottery Fund. For example, through the Department for Work and Pensions, the...