Ms Campbell points to policies like Fair Start Scotland and funding for early learning and childcare will help to tackle child poverty.

Poverty levels are impacted by UK government welfare cuts, she says, pointing to funding which goes towards mitigating this.

Mr Bowman says the Scottish government has cut Dundee's allocation of the Scottish Welfare Fund.

The cabinet secretary says the member has a "brass neck" to come to the chamber when his party is cutting welfare at UK level.

Image source, Getty images

One in five people in Scotland are living in relative poverty.

Latest government figures covering the last three years show that 1.03 million people are existing below the poverty threshold.

The figures reveal that 240,000 children are living in poverty, two thirds of those coming from working households.

The data is based on income and shows a continuing trend of rising poverty and income inequality.

Read more here

Tory MSP Bill Bowman asks the Scottish government what policies have been put in place to tackle the reported rise in relative poverty in Scotland’s communities.

Image source, bbc

Local Government Secretary Aileen Campbell says councils have autonomous control over 92% of the total funding provided by the Scottish government and of the money they've raised themselves.

Core revenue funding has gone down across the country which has a negative impact on the ability to provide and maintain leisure and sporting facilities, she adds.

Ms Campbell insists local authorities have had an increased and fair settlement and cites the £500m less they would have received under Tory tax plans.

Image source, Thinkstock

The Accounts Commission recently said funding had "increased slightly" between 2018-19 and 2019-20, but set this against a longer-term reduction of 6% in total revenue funding since 2013-14.

And the report underlined that an increasing share of local authority funding is now tied to Scottish government priorities. This rose from 6.6% of revenue budgets in 2018-19 to 12.1% in 2019-20 - leaving councillors with "less flexibility in where to spend and where to save".

Read more here.

Image source, Accounts Commission

Tory MSP Brian Whittle asks the Scottish government's position on the impact on local authorities' autonomy of increases in ring-fenced funding.

Image source, Getty Images

MSPs will now quiz communities and local government ministers during portfolio questions.

Find a full list of their queries here., external

Image source, bbc

MSPs quiz communities and local government ministers during portfolio questions.

The Health and Care (Staffing) (Scotland) Bill will be debated for the final time.

Ben Macpherson pays warm tribute to Iain Gray's incredibly moving and powerful opening speech.

The international development minister says "Kwibuka" means remember in Rwanda and that is what the people have been doing during these 100 days of remembrance.

"Scotland's links to Rwanda have strengthened and deepened."

Mr Macpherson says in 2016 Rwanda became one of four partner countries in Scotland's international development programme.

Image source, bbc

The Scottish government has joined with Comic Relief in its Levelling the Field programme in Rwanda.

It looks for creative solutions which influence, motivate, and inspire women and girls to break down the barriers that prevent them reaching their full potential.

"We are very proud of our relationship with Rwanda."

The Scottish government wants to extend to the Rwandan diaspora here in Scotland and to those back in Rwanda our deepest consideration at this time of commemoration.

Dr Callum Henderson, Honorary Consul of Rwanda in Scotland said:

“This is a deeply significant time in Rwanda's journey of recovery from the genocide against the Tutsi.

“Twenty-five years after the horrific events of 1994 there are still many who bear the scars of trauma and loss.

“The involvement of the Parliament in this motion and debate is greatly appreciated by the Rwandan community of Scotland and the Rwandan people.

“It is a strong signal of support for the healing of Rwanda and the process of reconciliation."

The genocide has cast a long shadow over regeneration and talk of ethnicity remains illegal.

But the country has recovered economically, with President Kagame's policies encouraging rapid growth and technological advancement.

He won a third term in office in the most recent election in 2017 with 98.63% of the vote.

Growth remains good - 7.2% in 2018 according to the African Development Bank.

But Mr Kagame's critics say he is too authoritarian and does not tolerate dissent.

Green MSP John Finnie agrees with Mr Gray that violent action starts with words of hate.

He says the application of the word genocide is often too slow because of the players often involved in such crimes.

"We must be positive, we must believe that things can get better."

Mr Finnie concludes we must learn and look to the future.

On 6 April 1994, a plane carrying then-President Juvenal Habyarimana - a Hutu - was shot down, killing all on board.

Image source, EPA

Hutu extremists blamed the Tutsi rebel group, the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF). It denied the accusation.

In a well-organised campaign of slaughter, militias were given hit lists of Tutsi victims. Many were killed with machetes in acts of appalling brutality.

One of the militias was the ruling party's youth wing, the Interahamwe, which set up road blocks to find Tutsis, incited hatred via radio broadcasts and carried out house to house searches.

Click here and scroll down to see the BBC News reports on how the story of the genocide emerged.

• Rwanda genocide: 100 days of slaughter 4 April 2019
• Rwanda outgrows its genocide orphanages12 March 2015
• The Rwanda photographs that reunited families 5 April 2014

Image source, bbc

Tory MSP Jeremy Balfour says last September through Tearfund, external he had the great privilege of visiting Rwanda and seeing the projects being undertaken there.

Mr Balfour pivots to the genocide saying: "We in the West in the United Nations stood back and let it happen."

He returns to his visit to Rwanda and says he was bowled over by the way people have been able to live again through a huge reconciliation.

The Tory MSP tells the story of a man he met who had killed a lady's husband and children but told him that when he returned to the village the lady was the first to welcome him.

"That's reconciliation beyond my understanding."

Rwanda's president said the country had become "a family once again", while marking the 25th anniversary of the genocide that killed 800,000 people.

Paul Kagame, who led a rebel force that ended the slaughter, lit a remembrance flame in the capital Kigali at the beginning of April..

Rwandans will mourn for 100 days, the time it took in 1994 for about a tenth of the country to be massacred.

Most of those who died were minority Tutsis and moderate Hutus, killed by ethnic Hutu extremists.

• Orphans' search for family continues
• Read more here