Equality and Human Rights Budget Advisory Group

Overview

The Equality and Human Rights Budget Advisory Group (EHRBAG) is a non-statutory advisory group, convened by the Scottish Government. In September 2022, the name of the group was changed to include 'Human Rights' in recognition of the human rights aspects the group covers. 

The remit of the group is to help shape our equality and human rights approach to the budget. The Equality and Human Rights Budget Advisory Group does this by:

• supporting a process of equality analysis to ensure the equality and human rights implications of the policy process informing budgetary decisions, and that corresponding information presented in the Scottish budget documents is clear
• contributing to mapping the pathway between evidence, policy and outcomes with the allocation and spend of public finance
• identifying linkages between the Draft Budget, the National Performance Framework, the Economic Strategy and policy making in general, supporting scrutiny of outcomes in relation to these measurements
• contributing to improved awareness of and commitment to mainstreaming equality and human rights analysis into policy and budget processes

Read the group’s workplan (as of February 2023). This is a live document, content will be subject to continual improvements and updates are to be expected.

The Equality and Human Rights Budget Advisory Group collaborated in producing informal guidance for policy makers on equality and human rights budgeting, published in August 2019.

Previous minutes of this group are available in the website archive.

Recommendations

In 2021, the group set out recommendations to the Scottish Government on equality and human rights budgeting. Since then a response has been published outlining the actions that the Government intends to take to progress these recommendations. 

 

Members

Scottish Government officials:

• Rob Priestley, Mainstreaming and Strategy Unit
• David Holmes, Equality, Policy and Capability Division
• Tom Lamplugh, Social Policy
• Simon Wakefield, Public Spending Analysis
• Fiona Page, Scottish Budget
• Alasdair Black, Scottish Budget

External members:

• Emma Congreve, Fraser of Allander Institute (Interim Chair)
• Chris Birt, Joseph Rowntree Foundation
• Sara Cowan , Scottish Women’s Budget Group
• Alison Hosie, Scottish Human Rights Commission
• Mirren Kelly, COSLA

Secretariat:

• Laura Graham, Mainstreaming Unit
• Niamh Cannon, Mainstreaming Unit

Publications