Diolch am y cwestiwn.

I am very keen to remain in touch with the feasibility work being carried out in Fife and Glasgow. I think it’s important to be realistic about what they have embarked upon. They hope, over the months ahead, to arrange a feasibility study. That feasibility study would collect evidence and, if the evidence was strong enough, they would then establish a pilot. But, even so, that is a step forward in the UK context. Basic income in other parts of the world already has an established track record. Alaskan citizens have been paid a basic income since 1982 from the Alaska permanent dividend fund. And although it is a piece of work which, in Scotland, has secured support from the SNP—in Glasgow, it’s led by a Labour councillor, in Fife, it’s been supported by the Conservative group leader on the council there—nevertheless, we must anticipate that were we to move ahead on it, we would face headlines of the sort that ‘The Sun’ newspaper used when reporting the Glasgow experiment, saying that it was doling out pay for no work even to people who have a job. So, the idea, while attractive in the way that it can simplify and support people who currently have to rely on a very complex set of part-time work, part-time benefits and so on, the political world will face a job of convincing the public about the merits of the scheme.