26th March 2025 - Meeting Minutes

Minutes of Meeting on Wednesday 26th March 2025

Venue: Online via teams

Time:  16:00-18:00

Type:  Panel Meeting

ATTENDEES:

Panel: Matthew Cole, Kirsten Jenkins, Alister Steele

Apologies:  Margaret Corrigan and Fraser Stewart

Secretariat:  Philippa Brosnan and Roanna Simpson

AGENDA ITEM 1:    Introductory Remarks

Matt welcomed everyone to the meeting and noted Maggie and Fraser’s apologies.

 AGENDA ITEM 2: Panel meetings and Engagement meetings (1^st Qrt 25-26)

The current planned meetings were noted in the context of the need to organise further meetings to prepare the response to the Scottish Government’s periodic report.

The following in-person meetings are already in the diary.

The Panel was asked to note the cancellation of the meeting on the 14^th of April.

It was proposed that further meetings should be scheduled as follows:

1. Online meeting before the 9^th of June to discuss the Annual Report, also a session with the Scottish Government Fuel Poverty Team, and to work on the Periodic Report response.
2. Online meeting in June to discuss Annual Report and the Periodic Report response.
3. Online meeting in August to review the Periodic Report response prior to sign off.

The Panel noted that some comments on drafts may be necessary over the summer.

There are a number of engagements coming up with the Acting Minister for Climate Change, a session with Dr Sharon Stevelink on her draft report on what the data shows about poverty in rural Scotland.

 AGENDA ITEM 3: Focus for ’25-’26 and what this means for the Workplan ’25-‘26

The aim is to finalise the draft workplan before mid-April. be done via email.

The Panel agreed that their research requirements should be considered in the context of the Periodic Report and the Panel’s response to this. Therefore, a place marker for the research will be put in the workplan to allow the Panel to see what:

• emerges from the Periodic Report
• it might want to follow up on from this and their reflections during the process of responding to the Periodic Report
• emerges from the focus group research which Roanna will be analysing and collating, and whether the focus group model seems a good one to replicate during the lifetime of the ’25-’26 workplan.

The Panel’s work in quarters 3 & 4 will be set out at a high level and reviewed at the end of Qrt 2.

 AGENDA ITEM 4: Annual Report

This is to be published at the end of June.

 AGENDA ITEM 5: Periodic Report Response

The Panel’s response needs to be finalised well ahead of the publication date.

There is a question around engagement with others to inform the response and the Panel discussed how this might be best approached given the short timescales. The Panel discussed publishing its feedback to the Scottish Government ahead of the Scottish Government’s preparation of the periodic report. The Secretariat will take this forward. The Secretariat will also produce a plan setting out the key activities and milestones for the Panel’s production of its periodic report response.

AGENDA ITEM 6: Publication of the health outcome

The Panel signed off the minutes of the meeting on the 10^th of March and agreed with the approach of using these as a mechanism for publishing the discussion on exploring fuel poverty through a public health lens. This will be done on the Panel website.

AOB – Matt invited reflections and then closed the meeting.

 Next meeting  – 15th May, 12:00-15:00pm – online.