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That is perfect, convener. Before I ask my question, I will take the opportunity to comment on the exchange between Mr Mountain and the minister.

Good morning, minister. The Scottish Government’s position appears to be that there has been very little time in which to have meaningful engagement and dialogue with the UK Government. The Scottish Government’s position is that that dialogue has not been substantive or meaningful, and you do not feel that you have been co-producing the UK bill. The committee will reflect on that, and we will take a view on that.

My question is on the Scottish Government’s view. It is clear that there is a timescale in which the Scottish Government will itself legislate for the bits of the bill where you believe there is clearly merit, but you would wish to consult appropriately and meaningfully within Scotland to get the best bill for Scotland. When you do that, however the UK Government legislates at a UK level, will you learn from that experience? When you legislate in Scotland, will you continue a dialogue with the UK Government? I would hope that, if the Scottish Government or the Welsh Government found a better way to change electoral legislation, that would be shared across the UK.

Even though, to date, relationships have not been positive, it is important that the Scottish Government uses the consultation for its pending electoral reforms to feed back to the UK Government. Can you give some reassurance that that dialogue will continue, irrespective of the different positions of the Scottish and UK Governments?

I see from the meeting papers that how we assign and categorise notional expenditure will change under the UK bill. I also see that the Scottish Government has a degree of sympathy for that. Will you say some more about it?

As the minister would expect, I have a follow-up question. Have you made any assessment of whether there could be potential confusion with different rules on notional expenditure across the UK? You said that taking different approaches to how that is operated has not been a choice of the Scottish Government, but, as you look, perhaps, to legislate separately on notional expenditure, what reassurances can you give that you will make sure that there is no confusion with potentially different rules across the UK?

That is interesting, because it is about consistency of argument, and the UK Government did not have a concern about Scotland deviating from the rest of the UK in order to improve matters. I will leave it at that.

I have a final, specific question. Has the Scottish Government had any discussions with the Electoral Commission about the need for clarifying legislation in the area of notional expenditure? The particular example that is given in our committee papers—I wish that I could say that it was my clever thinking, but it is not—is discussions in the light of the 2018 Supreme Court case R v Mackinlay and others (Respondents).

That is helpful. Other members may wish to highlight that certain groups are more significantly impacted by the requirement for voter ID than others—I will let them do that, but we should acknowledge that those are the facts.

My line of questioning is on the possible dangers of having voter ID at UK elections but not at Scottish elections. That would not be a reason for introducing voter ID at Scottish elections, but do you see any such dangers? Are there any concerns about polling staff possibly needing to become gatekeepers and having to turn people away if they did not have voter ID or had ID that turned out not to be on the list of acceptable IDs?

Can you talk specifically about any concerns around having different voting regimes in Scotland for UK and Scottish elections? On that issue, I think that Mr Mountain makes a reasonable point, although I do not agree with his conclusion; it is for the UK Government to decide what voter ID looks like at UK elections. However, it is absolutely for the Scottish Government to take a view on whether that could have negative consequences on democracy in Scotland for devolved elections.

When the legislation on digital imprints was introduced in Scotland, did the UK Government raise concerns that it would lead to different election rules across the UK?

Satwat Rehman just got to the nub of my question without my having to lead the witnesses down that particular road. Schools do not exist in a silo; they are anchors in the community and are already working with lots of third sector organisations. There are also parent councils, pupil groups and, indeed, a whole plethora of organisations around a school, and, now that PEF money has been guaranteed for four years, we have a real opportunity to carry out some key planning work and consultation with the local community to find out how best to tackle poverty and enhance attainment.

I think that that was what Satwat Rehman was saying. Do the other witnesses feel that that is how PEF should be used in the years to come?

That is helpful. There is obviously a contradiction between local independence and flexibility and consistency across local authorities and across Scotland.

Mr Dickie, do you have any comments? Convener, I will not come back in after that. This is my final question.

This has been a really interesting line of questioning. I wish to focus on the potential role of pupil equity funding. I will not discuss the level of funds, which might come up during the budget process anyway, but I would like to consider how the funds could be spent. We have heard evidence this morning that schools pretty much know their children and families better than they have ever known them. That was an unavoidable truth as they sought to help them during lockdown.

I would like to know about the future opportunities for how schools could use funds over a four-year period. In theory, they can now plan strategically over a four-year period—but not in a silo or in isolation. Are there opportunities to use pupil equity funding within the wider community to support the learning needs of children and the wider needs of families more generally, to make the children ready to learn when they get to school? Do you have any thoughts about how you have seen equity funding used well in the past, perhaps during Covid, to help young people and their families? What opportunities might there be? It would be helpful to get that on the record.

Good morning. Thank you for helping us with our scrutiny of the legislative consent memorandum on the Elections Bill.

The first thing that the committee wants to ascertain is whether there is a need for voter identification. Putting to one side the policy intent, on which I have strong views—I am opposed to the proposal—I see from our papers that only 0.7 per cent of people who work in polling stations believe that voter fraud or personation is an issue. What are your views on whether it is necessary to go down the road of voter ID for UK elections?