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Siobhan Mathers from Reform Scotland says just because something is not immediately popular does not mean we should not explore the policy.

Ms Mathers says it is important to get a basic income discussed.

She says there are ways of debunking some of the myths around the basic income. 

Siobhan Mathers from Reform Scotland says "It would be so fiddly and expensive to try and introduce it (a basic income) with the powers we currently have."

RSA director Anthony Painter says there would have to be a negotiation with the UK government or there would need to be more devolved powers.

Professor Donald Hirsch says if it is "fiddly" then you have already lost.

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SNP MSP George Adam says the hard facts are that to do this properly Holyrood would need more powers.

Mr Adam says the biggest challenge in Fife and Glasgow is working with the DWP and HMRC.

He asks if there would need to be major changes to the powers of the Scottish Parliament.

Landman Economics director Howard Reed says "it could be done as a slight cludge with the powers the Scottish government has at the moment".

RSA director Anthony Painter says a basic income would increase the ability for people to retrain. 

Mr Painter says at the moment people are experiencing "high-paid stress for low-paid work".

He says experiments in the US have shown that the system can promote a reduction in mental health and domestic violence and therefore it would be interesting to check the impact on the NHS during any pilot.

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Annie Miller from the Citizen's Basic Income Network in Scotland says: "A basic income would have enormous benefits for the NHS."

Ms Miller says the stress of the current system must have an enormous detrimental effect on the health of people. 

Landman Economics director Howard Reed says introducing an adult level of between £70 to £100 is expensive but not "outrageously expensive".

Mr Reed says the idea would be to start it at that level and if there is public acceptance then it could be moved up.

He says it would be introduced in two stages.

Green MSP Alison Johnstone asks Prof Hirsch if he thinks a trial of a basic income would be beneficial.

The academic from the Centre for Research in Social Policy at Loughborough University says you don't need my permission first of all

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He says: "I do feel very positive about a lot of ideas that are attached to the idea of a Citizen's Income."

"Yes it would be good to have those experiments."

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The professor says if we really think there is a case for giving people more freedoms then there is more than one way to do it.

The experiments may be worthwhile, but what you do with it is the question he says.

Prof Hirsch says he is sceptical that the public would buy into the unconditionallity of the basic income.

Annie Miller from the Citizen's Basic Income Network in Scotland exhorts the MSPs to get more powers for the Scottish Parliament to make a basic income more viable.

Professor Donald Hirsch, the director of the Centre for Research in Social Policy, at Loughborough University says there would be administrative savings.

Prof Hirsch says continuing to have a means tested benefits system then there is the danger of creating more complexity.

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Committee convener Sandra White says nobody has mentioned the money you could save with the introduction of a basic income.

Siobhan Mathers from Reform Scotland says the administrative simplicity of a basic income has been highlighted but it is hard to quantify the fiscal benefit.

Landman Economics director Howard Reed says most of the models he has seen do take into account the fact that benefits could be reduced or scrapped entirley. 

Mr Reed agrees there is some administrative saving.  

RSA director Anthony Painter says "you can talk about these models all day" and "drive yourself mad looking at the spread sheet".

Mr Painter says you can shift people with dialogue and you could create a Scottish model.

Chancellor Philip Hammond says National Insurance is being increased for self-employed workers because of "new challenges" the government faces.

Mr Hammond is facing a backlash against the Budget announcement, which breaks a 2015 manifesto pledge on tax rises.

He insisted ministers had honoured a "broad commitment" not to raise taxes.

Labour urged the government to "think again" on the change, which will mean 1.6 million people paying £240 on average more every year.

Shadow chancellor John McDonnell said his party could join forces with rebel Conservatives who say the increase does little to encourage enterprise and risk-taking.

Professor Donald Hirsch the director of the Centre for Research in Social Policy at Loughborough University says a lot of this would be paid for by people who are better off.

Prof Hirsch says someone who is earning £100,000 would go from keeping two-thirds to half their income on one of the versions of this system. 

"That is a big thing for people to accept," he says.

Prof Hirsch says, referring to the increase in National Insurance contributions for self employed people, that the opinion seems to be that   "white van man is being ripped off".

"The Daily Telegraph says that the chancellor of the exchequer should be shot," he says. 

He says this gives you an idea of public opinion on this big change and questions whether a citizen's income would be "politically conceivable". 

Professor Donald Hirsch, the director of the Centre for Research in Social Policy, at Loughborough University says when people have tried to even broadly cost this there have been broadly similar conclusions.

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Prof Hirsch says "everybody would get this unconditional payment" and you would raise the money from income tax and NI merged.

He says if you were single you would get £72 a week an then for every pound you earned on top of that in the first band you would pay 40% and then 60% at the higher rate.

The professor says you would have to have public buy in into no conditionallity and higher marginal rates of tax.

Labour MSP Pauline McNeill says what she is struggling with is where to start from.

Ms McNeill says she needs someone to talk her through the implications for everyone and particularly those who are in work because the witnesses are saying rates of pay and tax would change.

Annie Miller from the Citizen's Basic Income Network in Scotland says there are questions about how the system would work and that depends what the objectives are.

Ms Miller says it could start off small, for example, £40 per week in the current system to check if people like it and that it could gradually increase.

Ms McNeill asks if everyone should get that even if they are working. 

Ms Miller says "yes" and that it is "the working adult who is not particularly well served at the moment." 

Annie Miller from the Citizen's Basic Income Network in Scotland says the pilot should be around two years.

Ms Miller says a basic income system would be able to cope with any changes like automation.

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Last year we reported that one in every six jobs in Scotland's public sector could be lost within 14 years due to automation, according to a study.

The annual "State of the State" report from business advisory firm Deloitte estimated that 88,000 jobs could go.

It said administrative and operative roles were at greatest risk.

The report also said technology could help deliver more efficient public services by making it easier for the workforce to do their jobs

Siobhan Mathers from Reform Scotland says if Scotland is going to look at this properly "it will have to do some heavy lifting."

Ms Mathers says two or three years isn't long enough to test attitudinal changes.

"We would have to look at this ourselves," she says. 

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RSA director Anthony Painter says research in Canada showed women with young children withdrew from the labour market, as did young men spending longer in education.

Mr Painter says both of these are beneficial to society.

He says a basic income pilot would require basic citizen support. 

Landman Economics director Howard Reed says "there has to be a pilot" and people have to be randomised into it.

Mr Reed says that it is difficult to look at evidence in other countries but some of it is old pointing towards evidence in the US in 1975. 

Tory MSP Gordon Lindhurst says across Europe there are other countries where social inequality isn't as high at it is in Scotland and the benefits are not necessarily higher. 

Mr Lindhurst asks the witnesses if the basic income will have any impact on a persons attitude to work and is it possible to predict this without implementing the system.

Professor Donald Hirsch the director of the Centre for Research in Social Policy at Loughborough University says Finland is a useful example because those who are on benefits are being allowed to keep them unconditionally for two years.

Prof Hirsch says this is the importance of experiments because it is useful to know if these benefits are stopping people going into work or if there is no suitable work for that person.

He says it would be difficult to simulate the tax system that basic income would come under.

he says it is also difficult to predict what people's attitudes to this will be until the system is fully implemented. 

RSA director Anthony Painter says it needs the full support of the Scottish government to happen. 

Mr Painter says there are ways that the pilot can show how this would sit beside other sources of income.

He says the pilot will also encourage a national conversation around basic income.