United Kingdom General Election
Our next item of business is a debate on motion S3M-4344, in the name of Annabel Goldie, on Scotland needs a general election.
I point out to members straight away that we are very tight for time in this debate. Members will be held strictly to the time that is allocated to them. I call Annabel Goldie to speak to and move the motion. Miss Goldie, you have 13 minutes.
This debate comes during a tumultuous period in British politics: there is a crisis of confidence in our political system, which has been brought into sharp relief by the expenses scandal at Westminster; there have been daily resignations from the Government; there has been a reshuffle in which the Cabinet, not the Prime Minister, called the shots; and there has been electoral meltdown for the governing party. In the European elections, Labour was beaten by the nationalists—in Cornwall. Labour is a national party no more. Only as a source of ridicule and contempt does the Labour Party operate at anything approaching a national level.
The demise of the Labour Party does not, of course, trouble me any more than it troubles the Prime Minister, but the consequences of the collapse in authority of the Government and the Prime Minister are not confined to Westminster or to reserved areas; they affect Scotland and the Scottish Parliament, too. That is why this debate is needed. That is why members of the Scottish Parliament should be concerned.
I have spoken previously of the need for a new relationship between Scotland's two Governments. In a time of economic turmoil, that is more important than ever. However, such a relationship cannot exist when the United Kingdom Government is hellbent on creating tension, as it was when the current Scottish Government was formed. I still find it astonishing that, during this time of economic crisis, the Prime Minister and the First Minister did not meet for nearly a year, as Labour's recession emerged. However, a new relationship cannot exist when the UK Government itself has ceased to function in any meaningful form.
We have a careworn and exhausted Prime Minister, wrestling with the recession and raddled by the treachery of colleagues who are united only in their desire to distance themselves from him as quickly as possible and who are vying with each other to accomplish that end with the ultimate in tawdry, tacky and contemptible behaviour. From the smoking ruins of the Government that they have left behind them arises the shadowy spectre of an unelected éminence grise, Lord Mandelson: the new Prime Minister by default omnipotent, absolute and unchallengeable. What a distortion of democracy. [Interruption.]
Order.
We have a Prime Minister who, even at the peak of his power—[Interruption.] It is interesting, Presiding Officer, that for member's debates and party debates we seldom see more than about five Labour MSPs in the chamber. What a testament their presence today is to their insecurity. What a visible demonstration of their discomfiture. What they lack in quality they are going to try to make up for in numbers.
This Prime Minister has paid scant attention to Scottish issues. He has been content to pick fights with the Scottish Government, and content to allow others to do so as well. Now that he is fighting for his political life, what chance is there of his adopting the constructive approach that is needed? To paraphrase James Purnell, with Gordon Brown there is no chance.
If anyone on the Labour benches should doubt that the Prime Minister's time is up, let me remind them of the harbinger of doom, the final sign that all is lost: Lord Foulkes has pledged his full support. It can now be only a matter of time.
Where is he?
Order.
In the 10 years that I have been a member of this Parliament, the party that has been in power at Westminster has never had a majority here. It has always been possible for all the other parties in the Scottish Parliament to combine to defeat the party of Government at the United Kingdom level. However, that has never happened in a vote on a motion of this kind. Today's vote, if carried, will be a parliamentary first. We have not lodged our motion lightly. A unique combination of factors makes it right that we demand a UK general election. We are in the final year of the current Westminster Parliament. Even Gordon Brown cannot avoid calling an election in the next 12 months, unless he ceases to be Prime Minister. The question is not whether we have a general election in the next 12 months, but when. Let no one pretend that there is any principled objection to holding a general election now.
The expenses scandals at Westminster have caused grave damage to trust in politics in general. All parties at Westminster—Labour, the Conservatives, the Liberal Democrats and the Scottish National Party—have had serious questions to answer. The issues may be particular to the Westminster system of expenses, and the transparency with which we operate in this Parliament may stand in contrast to the shroud of secrecy that surrounds the House of Commons, but let us not pretend that the public considers the Scottish Parliament beyond reproach. Last week's elections show us that much, if we did not already know it.
We are, sadly, all tainted by what has happened at Westminster—deservedly or not—so we have a legitimate and fair question to ask: how do we restore faith in politics? Yes, there must be transparency and changes to the rules, but until there is a general election and the opportunity for the people to have their say, the stench will remain. There is currently a wave of cynicism—not just a lack of faith in individual politicians or even in the political system, but a more fundamental and damaging view that politics can never deliver change. That is corrosive and strikes at the heart of democracy. That cynicism or scepticism must be dispelled.
Why do the public doubt the motives of politicians of every party more now than in the past? Why has there been such a breakdown of trust in the capacity of politics to deliver? Yes, in large part it is a reaction to the expenses scandal, but there is much more to it than that. We have grown used to a Government that routinely says one thing and does another. That is a lesson that the SNP Scottish Government must heed. We have become accustomed to a hatchet job being done on anyone who dares to speak out or question what the Prime Minister says or does. When Government ministers speak openly of smears against colleagues, what message does that send to the public?
Moreover, what signal does it send when the Chancellor of the Exchequer is the subject of briefings by number 10 and is hung out to dry in public? He is clearly the Prime Minister's second choice, yet he remains in office not because the Prime Minister wants him there but because the Prime Minister lacks the authority to move him. That sends an atrocious signal to the financial markets, investors and the international community. It sends an even worse signal to the public. If the Prime Minister has no confidence in the chancellor, why should anyone else?
Until there is a general election, a cloud will hang over politics. I shall, of course, campaign for the return of a Conservative Government at the next general election. I hope and expect that David Cameron will prevail. Others will argue for different outcomes. However, the fact remains that, at present, we have a weak and pitiful excuse for a Government that is not worthy of the name.
Unlikely as it seems, it is possible that Labour could win a general election. Let us consider that ghastly prospect—one party should certainly consider it. How can any Labour member seriously argue that their Government and Prime Minister would not have greater credibility and more authority if they had the mandate of a general election victory? Would any member really claim that the Government is better able now, in the current horrendous mess, to take tough but necessary decisions than it would be following an election victory? In short, would the party be better able to govern if it won that election? Of course it would. There is only one reason why Labour members are against a general election: they expect to lose it, as the Prime Minister admitted at question time some weeks back.
Government is a privilege, not a right. It requires the national interest to be put ahead of party interest, but it is clear that such a concept is alien to the Labour Party and to Gordon Brown. As Scotland languishes in what is expected to be the worst recession since the second world war, members of the UK Government are more concerned about briefing against each other and clinging to office than about taking the right decisions for our future.
The right decisions involve not only sorting out the appalling mess that Labour has made of the public finances, although that challenge will dwarf all others, and will have direct and lasting consequences for this Parliament and Scottish Governments for years to come. There should be a UK Government that not only tolerates the devolution settlement but is keen for it to evolve, and which treats the Scottish Government and Parliament with respect.
David Cameron's Government will be such a Government. He has demonstrated impressive leadership on the expenses issue, and has shown how a new relationship that is built on mutual respect must be forged between our Parliaments and Governments. That is why David Cameron, if he is elected as Prime Minister, will meet the First Minister within a week of taking office; why Conservative ministers will be allowed to appear before committees in the Scottish Parliament—[Interruption.] Perhaps one of the Labour members will, among all the sedentary bawling and shouting, volunteer to tell us how often Labour ministers at Westminster have appeared before committees in this Parliament.
A Conservative Government—[Interruption.]
Order.
There may be order, Presiding Officer, but there are no volunteers to answer the question.
A Conservative Government will seek to strengthen and stabilise devolution, rather than undermine it at every turn as the current Government has done. We are seeing not only the collapse of a Government and the waning of power of a Prime Minister, but a wholesale collapse of faith in the political process. Promoting Lord Mandelson or bringing in Glenys Kinnock cannot correct that; even Sir Alan Sugar cannot fix this one. The situation can only be resolved by a general election, and the Scottish Conservatives would welcome the opportunity to prove, as we did last week, that we are again winning throughout Scotland. [Interruption.]
Order, order.
The voters deserve the chance to have their say on our broken economy and our broken politics. They deserve the chance to cast their verdict on our unelected Prime Minister—and on the unelected real Prime Minister, Lord Mandelson: the man who is actually pulling the strings and running our country. In a parliamentary democracy, the public are rightly outraged that so much power has been seized in a number 10 coup by someone who has twice been dumped from Government.
Change happens when those who do not usually speak are heard by those who do not usually listen. The people have found their voice, and their cry must not fall upon deaf ears: Labour must listen. Scotland needs a general election, and the sooner, the better.
Today, the Scottish Parliament can speak out not only for the majority in Scotland, but for the majority in the whole of the United Kingdom. In the words of the legendary Labour reprise, "Bring it on." Today, this Parliament can tell the Prime Minister to do just that.
I move,
That the Parliament believes that the interests of Scotland and the United Kingdom would be best served by holding a general election for a new House of Commons as soon as possible.
The Labour Government in London has lost the trust and confidence of the people of Scotland; that was clear from last week's elections. That Government has run out of ideas and time, and is fast running out of supporters. It is presiding over the worst economic downturn in generations. We are living with the consequences of the decisions that the UK Government took during its age of irresponsibility. The UK Government has adopted a truculent attitude towards Scotland and our aspirations by blocking, undermining and always saying no.
For 12 long years, this Labour Government, which has had a majority sufficient to deliver real reform and real social justice, has allowed the UK's system of parliamentary democracy to slide into the mud. It is weak, it is irrelevant and it is now mired in sleaze.
When the Scottish Government asked whether it could accelerate capital investment to stimulate the Scottish economy, did the Treasury say yes or no?
Whether or not the Treasury said no is utterly irrelevant. [Interruption.]
Order.
We have accelerated that expenditure. We have brought forward £293 million of capital expenditure into 2009-10 to support more than 6,300 jobs. That stands in contrast to Labour's cuts, which will lead to 9,000 job cuts.
Will the member take an intervention on job cuts? [Interruption.]
Order. There is so much noise that the minister cannot hear a member trying to make an intervention. I really suggest that you keep the noise level down.
In the 12 years that the Labour Government has presided over the country, the gap between the rich and the poor has grown. It has lied to take us into an illegal war and it now promises swingeing cuts in Scottish public spending while pressing on with a £100 billion investment in new nuclear bombs.
We know only too well that, with the recent scandals at Westminster, faith in politics and the political system has been shot to pieces by the double barrel of the economy and expenses crises. The damage inflicted on the democratic process has been very deep. The reaction of the people of this country has moved from initial disbelief to justifiable anger and disillusionment. No one can seriously believe that the current Labour Government or the current Parliament has either the leadership or the moral authority to see through the necessary reforms.
I agree with much of what the minister has said about the UK Government and the democratic process, but why should we look forward to replacing a tired and broken Prime Minister without a democratic mandate with a bright, shiny, new and arrogant Prime Minister without a democratic mandate and no interest in reform?
At the end of the day, whatever Government is in power, democracy is all. The people will choose.
No wonder people are angry. Yesterday, Gordon Brown showed that he has truly lost his direction when he announced his plans to reform our democracy. Those plans fall short of what is needed to address the crisis of confidence in that democracy; indeed, the best that one can say about them is that they are auld kail reheated. For example, the plans include a consultation on the voting system, but nothing about a referendum this side of the election; consideration of lowering the voting age, a move that has long been the policy of the SNP Government; reform of the House of Lords, which was started 12 years ago and shows no sign of completion; and allowing Parliament to debate public petitions, which is already a familiar occurrence in this Parliament. It is not difficult to imagine a seriously underwhelmed public asking, "Is that it?"
Vital reforms are needed, and it is patently obvious from what was announced yesterday that we also need a new Government and Parliament with a fresh mandate if any such reforms are to be successfully implemented. That is why a general election is required as soon as possible. The people deserve to have their say.
However, no matter when that general election is held over the next 11 months, the fact is that this deep economic crisis was with us long before the expenses tsunami engulfed the political process at Westminster, and unfortunately it will be with us long after Westminster has, I hope, put its house in order.
Not only have expenses scandals dominated the headlines, unfortunately they have also dominated the political agenda, at the very time when everyone's efforts should be aligned and focused on tackling the challenge of recession and delivering recovery at the earliest possible juncture.
Does the minister agree that the public expect all of us to take responsibility for what we claim? Does he, for example, think that it is acceptable for his leader to refuse to apologise for anything and claim that he somehow got caught up in the expenses culture? Does the minister not accept that MPs have a personal responsibility to address the question of expenses?
That is the usual smears and utter nonsense from Johann Lamont. The attacks from the parties of moats, duck islands, tennis courts, chandeliers and flipping are laughable. Alex Salmond has said clearly that he is more than happy to be audited, and that will be completed shortly. I hope sincerely that Westminster sorts itself out. We in the Scottish Government are concentrating all our efforts and using all the levers that are available to us to protect jobs and facilitate recovery.
Like it or not, nobody can dispute the fact that Gordon Brown—the Prime Minister—and the Labour Government have lost their authority to govern. It is no wonder, as they have made significant mistakes, such as the decisions at UK level on fiscal deficits and on a regulatory system that dropped the ball and was unable to respond appropriately to the challenges in the banking and wider financial system. The UK public finances have a forecast debt in excess of £1 trillion in 2012-13. That is a truly mind-boggling figure—it is the equivalent of £17,000 for every person in the UK. The bottom line is that the UK Government's irresponsibility during the good times means that the UK public finances are, to say the least, not well placed to respond to the current downturn.
Other nations have avoided that situation. It is increasingly clear that the consequences of the UK Government's high levels of borrowing will be felt throughout the public sector for years to come. Rather than follow the lead of others, the UK Government is set on making swingeing cuts in Scottish spending. Those cuts come at the wrong time for our economy and they stand in stark contrast to the approach of President Obama in the United States, where stimulus will continue next year and will be focused on delivery at state level. In contrast, the UK Government will take money out of the economy next year and will reduce the money that we have to fight the recession and to support Scottish jobs. We must stop that, and the people can do so in a general election. The only way to protect Scotland from the cuts, and the best way to save the 9,000 jobs that are under threat from the UK Labour Government, is SNP success. The more SNP MPs there are, the better. We will be able to protect Scotland from the cuts, whether they come from Labour or the Tories. They amount to exactly the same thing, which is why there should be shame in Labour ranks.
I wonder whether we can touch on reality again. It does not matter who is elected. If the UK economy is deprived of its AAA rating among those people who lend us money, neither of the two parties that have so far spoken about cuts will be able to do anything about it.
I point Margo MacDonald to some other countries that have done very well in the situation.
Iceland!
What about the arc of prosperity?
Order. Mr Henry, if you wish to take part in the debate, I suggest that you press your request-to-speak button and queue up to do so.
Thank you, Presiding Officer.
Canada, which has a much smaller economy than that of the United Kingdom, has been lauded by many experts as coming through the situation very well. Norway, with 4 million people, recently announced that it will contribute almost $5 billion to the International Monetary Fund to help its neighbours. At issue is how we deal with the situation.
Does the minister agree that Canada has been able to take a different path because, for the past decade, it has had surpluses, rather than the persistent deficits that we have had under Labour, even in the good times?
No—it has the traditional Scottish banking model, which we should have stuck to in this country.
When the first signs of recession came along, the Scottish Government was quick off the mark in deploying our economic recovery plan. We are redoubling our efforts to tackle the problems for businesses and families and we will continue to do that.
In the previous Scottish Parliament elections, we said that it was time for Scotland to move forward. The people of Scotland agreed, and they trusted us with government. We are working hard day in, day out to repay that trust and to govern with vision and competence. Vision, trust and competence—those are our watchwords. The extraordinary lack of vision, the betrayal of trust and the lack of competence shown by the UK Government and the Westminster Parliament in recent years and months are the strongest possible evidence of the need for a UK general election. There is no doubt that we can do more without the dead weight of the failing Labour Government in London.
Presiding Officer,
"The reality is that no matter what the Parliament resolves at 5 o'clock, it will mean nothing whatever. This is a massive exercise in self-indulgence … It means nothing."—[Official Report, 14 June 2007; c 704-705.]
Those were Murdo Fraser's withering words on parliamentary posturing. He was talking about Patrick Harvie, but today the self-indulgence is all Annabel Goldie's. This debate has nothing to do with Scotland's interests and everything to do with the perceived interests of the Tories.
Nye Bevan said in 1951:
"The Tories, every election, must have a bogeyman. If you haven't got a programme, a bogeyman will do."
Here is Annabel Goldie:
"arises the shadowy spectre of an unelected éminence grise—Lord Mandelson … omnipotent, absolute … unchallengeable."
What a lot of florid, melodramatic guff—a Mills and Boon of a press release and a bogeyman instead of a programme. The people of Scotland know what the Tory programme is because they have suffered it before.
Can the member tell us what sells more copies—Mills and Boon novels or Labour Party manifestos?
The answer is absolutely clear, but it is certainly the case that Mills and Boon sells florid, melodramatic guff, and that is exactly what that press release is.
The people of Scotland know what a Tory programme is. Thirty years ago the Tories came to power and began to slash and burn our public services. Twenty-five years ago the Tories took on our mining communities and destroyed them: they closed the pits, turned their police force on the miners and tried to starve them into submission. Twenty years ago the Tories imposed the poll tax on Scotland: they set the bailiffs on our people, they pushed them into debt that some Scots still suffer to this day and they would not back down until there were riots in Trafalgar Square. In 1992, Scots were paying interest rates of 15 per cent while one financier made £1 billion in a single day by short selling not a bank, but Britain itself, and the Tories gambled $27 billion to shore up the pound.
Does the member agree that under the Conservatives in Government we never had to service debt interest at a level greater than the entire Scottish budget, which is what we are seeing from the Labour Government at Westminster?
Under the Tories the people of Scotland serviced and suffered the consequences of the way in which this country was mismanaged. The Tories dare to talk of a broken Britain and smoking ruins when they scarred Scotland, tore out its heart and set it against itself.
The only thing that has saved any Tories in Scotland is this Parliament. There they are, the Scottish Tory survivors huddled together in the lifeboat Holyrood. After 10 years, they think that they have spotted land at last, but for the Scottish Tories there is no safe harbour in Scotland; they are not welcome here.
In 12 years their recovery amounts to a single Tory member of Parliament.
Will Mr Gray give way?
No, sorry.
That Tory MP has spent thousands publishing thousands of photographs of himself—he is here, he is there, he is everywhere. However, we are not fooled: there is still only one Tory MP in Scotland.
Annabel Goldie is right that the MPs expenses scandal has poisoned British politics. Every major party has been embroiled in it, and some MPs have paid a heavy price, as they should. However, it has revealed the everyday concerns of average Tories—their country houses, moats, planting an orchard on their estate, the servants quarters and the ducks quarters. That gives the lie to the story that David Cameron has spun of a changed party. The Tory party is still the party of privilege and of the few—it has not changed. It is no wonder that David Cameron thinks that he can work with that other Margaret Thatcher fan, Alex Salmond. That is all a long way from the hug a hoodie and hug a husky photo calls.
Yesterday, the Tories' health spokesman gave the game away. Cuts of 10 per cent would mean cuts of £3.5 billion in Scotland. Will Annabel Goldie tell us what she wants to be cut? Is it schools, hospitals or care of the elderly? What is it to be?
In all fairness, I must ask a question. Does the leader of the Opposition believe that it is possible to service our debt without incurring cuts in service provision?
Parties must be judged on their track records. We have a track record of investment in public services; the Tories' track record has always been to cut.
Someone once said:
"A politician thinks of the next election; a statesman, of the next generation."
The debate is about the next generation. In the previous Tory recession, I was a teacher in a school in this city. I saw the spirit, the hope and the life drained from the young people in that school, because they believed that they would never find a job and that society had no place for them. Even the best of them believed that there was no point in trying.
Will Iain Gray give way?
No—I am sorry; I am in my last minute.
A whole generation was lost through the politics of doing nothing in a recession, letting industries die and saying that unemployment was a price worth paying.
Labour is doing what is needed in the downturn to save the economy, to protect jobs and to support people who are in debt or who are unemployed. Labour is investing more, not less, in our young people and in their skills and education. Labour is strengthening rights at work, not reducing them. Labour is supporting the economy, not starving it as David Cameron would. This morning, we see from National Institute of Economic and Social Research figures that that approach is working.
Scotland needs politicians who are focused on the next generation and not simply on the next election, the next headline or the next parliamentary stunt. Labour will fight to ensure that Scots are supported through the downturn. A general election will come, and then we will fight the Tories and their nationalist acolytes for every vote. That is in the interests of Scotland.
For a raft of reasons, Liberal Democrats think that Scotland would be better off if we had a general election. Apart from the self-evident fact that the Prime Minister and his Government are well past their sell-by date, Liberal Democrats highlight two reasons for that.
The first is the need for a completely new and more honest approach to economic management that will be more sustainable and which will produce a fairer society. What Margo MacDonald said in her interventions is right. It does not matter which way we look at the situation. We all welcomed the bailing out of the Royal Bank of Scotland, but that money did not grow on trees and it will have to be accounted for. On "Good Morning Scotland" today, we heard a debate in which the Labour and Tory finance spokesmen pretended that the whole issue would somehow disappear and evaporate. Such a debate is not honest and is certainly not the approach that will get us out of our present difficulties.
The second issue for Liberal Democrats is the urgent need to end the attack on civil liberties that the Labour Government is perpetrating.
The economic crisis is global. However, it stretches credulity for the Prime Minister to argue that because it is global, that exonerates his Government from any culpability.
The Labour Government changed the law on banking regulation and introduced the so-called light-touch regime. It was content to see personal debt reach record levels and for house price inflation totally to outstrip headline inflation. Indeed, it was content to give tax breaks to the rich but not the poor and to delude itself into believing that it had ended economic cycles. There were two severe outcomes of that flawed approach. First, as we have heard, Britain was particularly badly placed to cope with the collapse of the banking sector and the concomitant collapse in the availability of credit. Secondly, in Britain—more than anywhere else in the world—if someone is born poor, they will die poor.
We need an election to ensure that the financial structures are rebuilt on sustainable lines—we cannot simply have a repumping of the existing failed model. As our Treasury spokesman at Westminster, Vince Cable, has argued cogently, we need a new financial regulatory regime. We need to redefine and separate short-term and long-term financial and investment banking institutions, and we need to make the Bank of England responsible for all aspects of inflation.
We also need to redress the imbalance between innovation, production and the service sector; return property to its traditional role as a long-term investment that yields lower but sustainable returns; close tax loopholes; and shift the burden of tax to achieve a greener outcome and lift out of tax millions of people who should not have been in that tax trap in the first place.
The Labour Government's erosion of our civil liberties has been steady and progressive. That is evidenced by its efforts to reduce the use of trial by jury; its support for the retrial of those who are acquitted, thereby threatening the double jeopardy principle; and its move to place previous convictions before juries. It has also attacked the independence of the judiciary. The terrorism legislation has reversed the presumption of innocence in respect of articles held by suspects and imposed restrictions on liberty on the basis of reasonable suspicion, evidence that is unavailable to the suspect and charges that are not disclosed. The terrorism legislation has also extended the period of detention without trial for suspected terrorists to 28 days, which gives the United Kingdom a period that is more than double the length of that in any other stable democratic state.
Finally, we have Labour's surveillance society, in which we have seen a massive expansion in the number of bodies that are authorised under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 to use surveillance information. Labour and the Tories talk of not curtailing but increasing those powers. We need an election to curtail significantly the use of those powers, which should be restricted to the investigation of serious crime. This country does not need identity cards or to retain innocent people's DNA. What it needs is regulation of the use of closed-circuit television.
We indeed need a general election to allow the public to return to Parliament members who are committed to sustainable economic policies that are designed to create a fairer society and who will defend our civil liberties. Indeed, we need to return to Parliament members who are committed to the principles of liberal democracy.
We move to the open debate, in which speeches will be of six minutes.
I thank Labour members for turning out in such force this morning to support their leader, Iain Gray, even if, in their speeches, they are questioning our right to debate the subject, given that it relates to Westminster. Of course, they present that as a matter of principle, of respect for the reserved and devolved divide, and of focusing this Parliament's attention solely on issues for which it is directly responsible rather than wider issues. However, whether an election happens in the next few months or is delayed until June of next year, I am in no doubt that there will be a change of Government before long and that Scotland and the rest of the United Kingdom will elect a Conservative Government that is led by David Cameron.
I ask Labour members to say whether the same self-denying ordinance will apply to all Scottish Parliament debates subsequent to that general election. Will Labour members undertake never to lodge a motion or amendment in which they criticise the actions of a Conservative Government in a reserved area? Can we be assured that that will remain a no-go area for Labour and that its members will hold scrupulously to that position of principle? Perhaps Mr Gray would like to tell us.
Is Mr McLetchie seriously defending this morning's political posturing on the basis of hypothetical debates that we might bring forward in 2014? How pathetic is that? Why does he disagree with Mr Fraser, who is sitting next to him, who made it very clear two years ago what he thinks about this kind of pathetic posturing?
Mr Fraser has spoken about many reserved matters in Parliament, including when he was trying to defend the Scottish regiments, which were abolished by the Government of Iain Gray's party.
To my mind, there are two main reasons why Scotland needs a general election. The first relates to constitutional reform, and the second relates to the state of public finances. On Monday of next week, the report of the Calman commission will be published. I will not anticipate its conclusions or recommendations, and I have no particular insight into them, but I very much hope that the commission will come forward with a unanimous set of recommendations that can form the basis for enacting such changes as may be required to the present devolution settlement, with a view to drawing a line in the sand and establishing once and for all a constitutional future within the United Kingdom for Scotland that is stable and which takes full account of the experience of the past 10 years.
We need a new Government at United Kingdom level if we are to take the Calman commission's recommendations forward. We also need a new Government and a new House of Commons that will promote a better working relationship with this Parliament and the Scottish Executive or Government than has been evident under Labour over the past 10 years.
Will the member give way?
No. I am sorry, but I need to make progress.
The second reason why we need an election relates to public finances. We have heard a great deal about £500 million-worth of spending cuts in 2010-11 and dire warnings of what might follow in later years. As with all Government sums, the figures are complex and can be interpreted in a number of ways. What is certainly true is that the £500 million reduction that is frequently trumpeted by the First Minister is a reduction by reference to previous planned increases in spending totals. It is therefore perfectly fair for Iain Gray, Andy Kerr and others on the Labour benches to point out that the actual overall total will still increase in real terms.
However, we have to ask ourselves who introduced into the political lexicon the concept that a reduction in a projected rate of increase was in fact a wicked cut. The answer is the Labour Party. It is a standard Labour Party tactic to denounce anyone who calls for restraint in the projected growth of public spending as slashers, burners and cutters of public services, and to do so in the most alarmist manner, when that is manifestly not true. Our spendthrift Prime Minister, the architect of Labour's recession, tried to pull the same trick in the House of Commons yesterday, and Iain Gray has been at it again this morning in this Parliament.
In relation to the budget in this Parliament, Labour has been hoist by its own petard. Its own argument has been turned on itself, and Labour has no right to complain.
Will the member give way?
No, thank you. I am in my last minute.
The late John Mortimer, who was best known as the creator of Horace Rumpole of the Bailey, entitled his autobiography "Clinging to the Wreckage". As a working title, it would be equally suitable for the Prime Minister, who is clinging to the wreckage of the new Labour ship. Some of the crew mutinied; others jumped overboard before they were made to walk the plank; the captain is floundering; and the ship is on the rocks. It is a sad and bitter irony that the Prime Minister is even more in hock to his new first mate, Lord Mandelson, than was his predecessor.
Gordon Brown is clinging to a wreck of his own creation, but such tenacity is not in the best interests of Scotland or the United Kingdom as a whole. The challenges that face Government and Parliament require a general election, a new House of Commons and a Government with a popular mandate to tackle the recession and the very serious financial problems that affect our country. That requires of Government and Parliament the political conviction and courage and the public trust and confidence that are sorely lacking at present. Those challenges are highly relevant to the powers and responsibilities of the Scottish Parliament, and we should not be afraid to say so. I support the motion.
We cannot talk about the prospect of dissolving the Westminster Parliament without talking about the European elections and their impact on the present political climate. Where should I begin? When I relate the story of the European elections, should I heed all the wisest political advice and keep my comments consensual, measured and free from any taint of triumphalism, or should I just unleash my inner Kenneth Gibson? Are there things that it would be more decent not to mention about the circumstances that have brought each member present today to the subject of a UK election, such as the fact that, in my constituency—a seat that was held by Labour two years ago—the Scottish National Party got its highest share of the vote in any local authority area in Scotland? Perhaps, in the interest of balance, I should even that up by saying that Labour did not suffer in the Western Isles the fate that it suffered nationally; it did not get its worst result since the first world war. In the interest of fairness, I should say that Labour had one worse election in the Western Isles in 1924.
However, I will avert my eyes from all that and concentrate on the reasons why so many people in the Commons argued for dissolution or struggled lamely to argue against it and, more important, why all politicians would do well to understand that the public's patience with the current United Kingdom Parliament is now at an end. The reason for that is certainly the expenses scandal: not only the transgressions of individual MPs and peers—spectacular as some of those have been—but the fact that the present United Kingdom Parliament spent four years fighting tooth and nail through the courts and elsewhere to conceal the scandal rather than address it. Eighty per cent of those polled by the BBC and Ipsos MORI on 31 May agreed that not only MPs but the whole Westminster system were to blame.
Will the member give way?
No.
We would struggle to find many people who would trust the current Parliament to reform itself.
My intervention is about personal responsibility.
Well, okay. If Johann Lamont wants to intervene, I am happy enough for her to do so.
Does Alasdair Allan agree that Westminster MPs have to take personal responsibility for what they did and that it is unacceptable for anybody to excuse their behaviour on the basis that they were caught up in a culture? That is what the public believes.
We should all commend people who, for example, give their second salaries to charity and are prepared to call for a general election and bring on a contest. Perhaps we should call for a general election in the House of Lords and get rid of our other dual-mandate member in the Parliament.
We would struggle to find many people who would not be impatient with the United Kingdom Government for another reason as well. However long that Government may stagger on, it knows that it is now kept in office solely by the personal terror with which its back benchers view a general election or anything that might rock the boat in the direction of one. Can we any longer be said to have a United Kingdom Government to speak of? We have seen 11—or is it 12?—ministers resign in a fortnight, few of them with good grace. If a Prime Minister finds that nobody will work for him except those whom he does not want to be there in the first place, his Government has surely long since lost its authority.
In the words of one of the speakers in another place last night—not someone in my party—the present House of Commons is "dead on its feet". Some members here talk with horror about bringing down Governments, but perhaps they should wake up and realise what everyone outside this Parliament has already realised: the present United Kingdom Government is already over.
In Scotland, people want a UK general election but, if the European election results are to be believed, not for the reasons for which those who lodged the motion might hope. We should not allow the idea to take root in fanciful Tory minds or paranoid Labour ones that Scots want a UK election because they want a chance to elect a Tory Prime Minister. Scots realise that, as ever under the present constitutional dispensation—as ever, without independence—whether they get a Tory Prime Minister, with all the undoubted misgovernment that that implies, will not be a decision of Scotland's making.
People in Scotland want a UK election because Scotland clearly faces a choice. Do we want to send to the House of Commons MPs who will represent Scotland's interests and aspirations, or MPs who will not do so? For all of us who on hearing the words "dissolution of the House of Commons" have the mental image of something permanent and conceivably acidic involuntarily brought into our minds, an election cannot come soon enough. Scotland has outgrown the debate about which UK party might be worst at ignoring Scotland, because we now have a Parliament of our own in Scotland. As the European election results prove, we have minds of our own, too. Bring it on.
The Tory motion exposes the Tories' attitude to the Scottish Parliament. They have never believed in it, and they still do not. If they were committed to devolution and to providing Scottish solutions to Scottish problems, they could have picked any number of important topics to talk about, as Iain Gray highlighted. They could have talked about the failure of the SNP's financial policies, including the Scottish Futures Trust and the local income tax, the failure of the SNP's transport policies, particularly its botched handling of the new Forth crossing, or the failure of the SNP's education policies, which are under attack from pre-school providers to university providers. However, they have decided to debate a nonsense of a motion. No one in the Scottish Parliament has the power to call a general election, and the House of Commons threw out a similar motion last night.
The Scottish Parliament has an enviable education outreach programme, which has resulted in thousands of Scottish youngsters coming to Holyrood. I enjoy the question-and-answer sessions that we as MSPs have with those youngsters. A question that is regularly asked is, "Why did you get involved in politics?" My answer to that question is simple. I did so because I saw at first hand the damage that was done to Scotland by Margaret Thatcher and successive Tory Governments in those long-ago days from 1979 to 1997. Thousands of people were thrown out of work. Industries such as the steel-making industry, the aluminium-smelting industry and the truck and car manufacturing industries were destroyed by a Prime Minister who famously came to Scotland and told the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland:
"There is no such thing as society."
I do not believe that.
Will the member give way?
No. Sit down. We have heard enough from the Tories already.
I do not believe, and I do not think that the people of Scotland believe, that there is no such thing as society. That is why Scotland has always rejected Thatcherism and why the Scottish Tories are still an endangered species.
Only a few weeks ago, we marked the 25th anniversary of the miners' strike, the decimation of Britain's coal industry and the destruction of the National Union of Mineworkers by a Tory Prime Minister who used all the forces of the state that were at her disposal. I see that Mr Johnstone thinks that that is funny, but communities in Scotland are still suffering from that. When I talked to our visitors that night, memories were brought back of the lengths that a Tory elite will go to in order to smash the working class. [Interruption.] The Tories find that funny; that is pathetic. [Interruption.]
Order.
The Tories may believe that they won the war against the NUM, but they did not break the spirit of those who manned the soup kitchens and kept their communities going, and they have not erased the memories of what Britain was like under Tory rule.
The member remembers covering the miners' strike as a journalist, as I did. I am sure that he remembers the devastation that was caused by the lukewarm support for the miners that came from the Labour Party.
I am sorry that I gave way to Margo MacDonald because, not for the first time, I do not agree with a word that she said.
That was a devastating riposte.
Absolutely—just like Murdo Fraser's.
Let us not forget that it was the SNP that let Mrs Thatcher gain power. [Interruption.] SNP members have woken up. Ever since the SNP let Mrs Thatcher gain power, the real Tories and the tartan Tories have colluded against Labour. They were at it again last night in Westminster, aided and abetted by our First Minister, Alex Salmond, who made his way south for a rare appearance to vote against the Labour Government. Who knows how much that has cost the nation in food bills? He is nowhere to be seen for this morning's debate in this Parliament, in which he is First Minister.
On the Conservative motion, I do not believe that Scotland needs a general election at this time. There has been unprecedented economic turmoil over the past year. Our two major banks and one of our leading building societies were brought to their knees by a combination of global recession and bad management.
This morning we have already heard the usual guff from the Tories about "Gordon Brown's recession"; that illustrates their failure to understand the nature of the world economic crisis. Who put together a rescue plan for the Royal Bank of Scotland, HBOS and the Dumfermline Building Society? It was Prime Minister Gordon Brown's Labour Government. Who put in place a financial rescue package of quantitative easing and other measures to stimulate the economy that drew international praise? It was Prime Minister Gordon Brown's Labour Government. Who organised the G20 summit that brought the most powerful nations in the world to London to draw up a plan to tackle global recession? It was Prime Minister Gordon Brown's Labour Government.
What has David Cameron had to offer while all of that has been happening? The answer is nothing. If it were left to him and his shadow chancellor George Osborne—a man who looks like a rabbit caught in the headlights every time that he is asked what he would do to tackle the UK's current economic problems—the United Kingdom would be following Ireland's example by slashing public spending and putting thousands of public sector workers on the dole. Yet theirs is the party that the SNP supports, not only in today's debate but at other times—Tories and tartan Tories together. No wonder Derek Brownlee was able to say that the next best thing to a Tory Government is a Government that does what the Tories tells it to do.
There is a glimmer of hope. Perhaps SNP members will tell us whether they agree with Pete Wishart, their MP for Perth and North Perthshire, who told the Commons yesterday:
"the last thing that Scotland needs is a Conservative Government."—[Official Report, House of Commons, 10 June 2009; Vol 493, c 861.]
Presumably, that means that he prefers a Labour Government.
Now is not the time for a general election. Labour believes that there is still work to do and time to do it before an election must be called. When the time comes to call a general election, Labour will be back where it belongs—in government.
I will be able to get everyone in if members stick to their time. From now on, I will keep members strictly to time.
I congratulate our Conservative colleagues on overcoming their reluctance to discuss reserved issues by bringing this important debate to the chamber. That is another small step forward in taking charge of our affairs.
Given that I have been in a good mood since last week, I will express deep sympathy for Prime Minister Gordon Brown. He has been attacked most unfairly. It is intolerable that such a nice man should have been accused by the former Minister of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, Jane Kennedy, of being involved in bullying behaviour; by Frank Field of being even more inept than expected; and by his back bencher, Sally Keeble, of being unable to command authority in his Government. It is outrageous that he should have been charged by the outgoing Minister of State for Europe, Caroline Flint, with appointing women ministers merely as female window dressing, or by former Labour chairperson and Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, Hazel Blears, with having lost connection with the public. It is scandalous that resigning Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, James Purnell, should have been so disloyal as to suggest that Gordon Brown should stand down if Labour is to have any chance of avoiding being massacred at the next general election. Later he was joined by Charlie Falconer, the former Labour Lord Chancellor, in calls for Gordon to quit. How can anyone support such treachery? Where is loyalty these days? Gordon Brown has his weaknesses, but even the greatest general could not win a battle with such troops behind them.
However, there are some small criticisms to be made. If Kennedy, Blears, Flint and Purnell are nothing but self-serving opportunists—as we are now being told—who appointed them as ministers in the first place? Who chose them? If Hazel Blears was guilty of totally unacceptable behaviour with regard to her expenses, why was she allowed to remain as Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government until she chose to go in her own time? We have often heard that the sure sign of a ship that is sinking is rats swimming away from it. What can we assume when half the ship's officers join them in trying to escape?
We are told that a strong reason for keeping the Government in office is the financial experience and credibility of the Prime Minister. Let us look at his record. He came into office as chancellor in 1997, promising to end the cycle of boom and bust. Do members recall that promise? We heard it many times. Over the next 10 years, we all experienced the good times, and some—including Gordon Brown himself—praised his Presbyterian values and moral compass. However, those good times were not all the product of sound financial decisions. The revenue from North Sea oil, which in Norway has been utilised to prepare for a future without oil, has all been spent. Our gold reserves were nearly all sold off when the price of gold was at a record low, and the income spent. A barely noticed change in one of his early budgets has meant that about £100 billion has been siphoned out of private pension funds. That money has been spent, but hundreds of thousands of pensioners have been left without the income that they confidently expected to support their needs in the last years of their lives. He has built hospitals and schools using the private finance initiative, which has built up debt for future generations of taxpayers. He allowed private debt to spiral out of control, with lax regulation and supervision.
Yes, the global downturn has hit all countries, but we should ask ourselves why the pound in particular has crashed. Why are the credit rating companies threatening to downgrade the UK as a credit risk? It is because we spent all our money and borrowed more in the good times. Now, folk are reluctant to lend us more. That is financial mismanagement on a huge scale. Is the architect of that disaster the best person to lead us out of it?
The truth is that, in the mid-1990s, the Labour Party made a Faustian pact with Tony Blair: "Abandon your principles, forget the poor and disadvantaged, cosy up to big business and I will give you political power."
On the issue of Faustian pacts, why is the SNP so enthusiastic in its support for Tory efforts here today and yesterday at Westminster, when we now know from Andrew Lansley that a Tory Government would mean £3.5 billion of cuts for a Scottish Government? Would that perhaps serve the SNP's purposes?
I am sorry, but there was so much noise from the Labour benches that I did not quite hear the end of the member's question. However, it did not sound incredibly relevant to the point that I was making.
Under the Labour Government, of which we heard so tearfully from Mr Whitton, the gap between rich and poor has widened. The rich have become richer. Much of that wealth flowed into Labour's coffers, as Labour became the natural party of government—the friend of the likes of Bernie Ecclestone and not so much the friend of the poor.
However, there is a price to be paid for abandoning principles, and that price is being paid now. I feel sorry for many Labour members of this Parliament, who instinctively opposed what has happened in the Labour Party over these last years. Many of them said so, but they have not done enough to avert what is now happening to their party. Any party without principles is doomed sooner or later to lose power because no one believes what it says any more. To quote Cromwell's words to his Parliament, the time has come:
"You have sat too long here for any good you have been doing. Depart, I say, and let us have done with you."
Yesterday in the House of Commons we saw the biggest display of self-indulgence, led by the nationalists in Scotland and Wales. In arguing for a general election now, they were franchising for the Tory party—well, what is new? Today, we see the same spectacle, but this time the Tories are doing the bidding of the nationalists.
When asked to justify why Scotland's First Minister yesterday left his post in the Scottish Parliament unattended so that he could sit through that Westminster debate—the First Minister made, I think, one intervention—Stewart Hosie MP said that the debate was on "a vital UK issue". However, he gave the game away when he said that he believed that the SNP is on course to elect more SNP members to a Parliament that it does not even believe in. No wonder people are cynical. Will people really trust the judgment of SNP MPs, who have so admired other countries such as Ireland—whose economy, sadly, is becoming a basket case—and Iceland? I do not think so.
Angus Robertson MP claimed on television yesterday that the people are demanding a general election. That is simply not true. It is made up. It suits the SNP's political agenda, but it is dishonest. The SNP is orchestrating chaos and is displaying a purely party interest. I, too, was on the election stump, not just last week but the week before. Not one voter demanded a general election. Rather, voters demanded the reform of MPs' allowances. They wanted action by all political parties to put their house in order. Calling for a general election now, before that process is complete, is irresponsible. All political parties have failed the public, so going to the country to get the people to choose which party they blame the most is cynical.
If the nationalists had the courage of their convictions, they would have led a motion of no confidence in Westminster yesterday. However, they would not do that. Why? Because it would nail the place in history that the SNP tries to deny, which is that it voted down a Labour Government in 1979, thereby giving Scotland the most right-wing Government that it had ever had, which inflicted misery on millions.
They say that politics moves in cycles, and here we are again, in a new cycle with the SNP trying to pave the way for another Tory Government.
Will the member give way?
The member admitted as much when he spoke earlier.
A Tory Government will impose billions of pounds' worth of cuts in the Scottish budget.
Respect? It is not respect that Scotland wants but a decent Government.
The SNP says that it is indifferent to having a Tory Government, and Bruce Crawford displayed that indifference in his speech. How can anyone be indifferent towards a party that did not believe in the minimum wage? Do SNP members not remember when the security industry paid its workers £1 an hour? The Tories carved our NHS in Scotland into 47 individual trusts, forced trade unions to re-sign up their membership every three years and abolished the wages councils. They would not stand in the way of any bad employer having free rein over workers' conditions.
Norman Buchan MP, God rest his soul, said in 1979 that the Tories used the SNP as a "dishonourable trigger". The nationalists, desperate to be separate, believe that a Tory Government will help their case in Scotland because it will undermine Scotland's relationship with the UK. However, David Cameron says that the Tories want a general election because they want to cleanse our political system and let the people give their verdict. Which is it? Last night, on "Newsnight", I heard Murdo Fraser say that the Tories wanted a general election so that they can kick out the current Prime Minister and get David Cameron in. Will they tell us why they want a general election?
The behaviour that is on display today only makes the public more cynical about political parties, because, when they hear the statements of the parties that argue for a general election, they can see through them and they understand that they are motivated by self-interest.
Annabel Goldie argued that a democratic approach should be taken but thinks that, just because the Tories think that Labour's time is up, we should abandon governing the country and hold a general election. Gordon Brown rightly said that he would steer the country through this difficult period and that he would give the country the stability that it needed. Indeed, there are signs that the economy is beginning to turn. This is the wrong time to dissolve the Westminster Parliament. Members know that four weeks of general election campaigning would create the crisis that we do not need.
Whenever the general election is called, Labour will stand on its record. We put millions back to work. We have been the most radical Government on social policy—whether on gay rights or the reform of family law, we did difficult things in government. We have been the most decentralising Government in history—witness the creation of this Parliament, the National Assembly for Wales, the Northern Ireland Assembly and, in effect, the return of the Greater London Council in the shape of the London Assembly. We have made difficult decisions. We have reduced child poverty—instead of one child in three being in poverty, the figure is now one in five—and have made serious progress on pensioner poverty.
This morning, we should be discussing how we can fix the problem of stimulating the Scottish economy and the situation of those who face the repossession of their homes but have a Government that has been slow to take the right steps to put the situation right. We should have been talking about how we can kick-start the construction industry and challenge the broken promises of this Government, which said that it would match our programme brick for brick.
Labour has had victories in Glasgow and around the country. We stand on our record.
What we have seen over the past few weeks has been unbelievable and unprecedented. I am talking not only about the expenses scandal but about the paralysis of Government—a Shakespearean tragedy involving the bitter resignation of ministers—and the language that has been used. James Purnell wrote to Gordon Brown:
"I owe it to our party to say what I believe no matter how hard that may be. I now believe your continued leadership makes a Conservative victory more, not less likely … We need to show that we are prepared to fight to be a credible government and have the courage to offer an alternative future.
I am therefore calling on you to stand aside to give our party a fighting chance of winning."
Caroline Flint wrote to Gordon Brown:
"I am extremely disappointed at your failure to have an inclusive Government. You have a two tier Government. Your inner circle and then the remainder of Cabinet … Several of the women attending Cabinet—myself included—have been treated by you as little more than female window dressing.
I am not willing to attend Cabinet in a peripheral capacity any longer."
The scale, the volume, the hatred—in my experience, they have never been seen before. Hazel Blears, Jacqui Smith, Beverley Hughes, Tom Watson, Geoff Hoon and John Hutton have all gone. In Parliament yesterday, Gordon Brown spoke of responding to people's concerns and of major reforms. He got big cheers, just as Iain Gray got big cheers this morning. However, I will make two points. First, Gordon Brown has now had more than 12 years in government to show his radical or reforming instincts but, on the crucial issues, he and his party have shown neither. Secondly, the proposals that we have seen so far have been timid and the commitment to delivery has been pathetic.
David Cameron, too, is using weasel words when he tells us that he is ready merely to consider, not to deliver, significant constitutional change. We cannot expect radical, dynamic change to be delivered by a mortally wounded Prime Minister, nor by the leader of a deeply conservative party that has resisted constitutional change at every key moment in Britain's history. Members should look around them at the Scottish Parliament and its chamber. We would have none of this with the Conservative Party. Considering fixed-term Parliaments, debating electoral reform and cutting the number of MPs are hardly a response on the scale that people are demanding.
What of a new voting system? Again, we hear weasel words from the two old parties. To those who are said to be considering the alternative vote system, I say that reform of the voting system that delivers an unfair, non-proportional system is precisely that—unfair and non-proportional, just like the first-past-the-post system that Gordon Brown and David Cameron have defended throughout every stage of their long political careers.
The message to them is that now, for the first time in more than a quarter of a century, people are crying out for change on a dramatic scale. They want revolution, not evolution, and now is the time to act. To have Gordon Brown twisting and contorting in the death-throes of his time in office for another 10 or maybe 11 months will be deeply damaging and destructive. In my view, it already is. The corrosive atmosphere is poisonous and bitter. Trust and confidence have vanished. It is time for change, and it is time for some genuinely radical proposals.
We need a fair, proportional electoral system for the House of Commons, with members elected by single transferable vote in multimember constituencies—a system to match the proportional representation systems that we have for council, Scottish and European elections. We need a reformed, elected House of Lords, with fixed-term elections of the type that we have for the Scottish Parliament. We need votes at 16. We need a true separation of powers, with an elected Prime Minister and an elected First Minister. Ministers should no longer sit as members of the legislature. We need a stronger Parliament with less control from the party whips, and significant new powers to hold the executive—the Government—to account.
We need a more open and transparent Government that pushes forward with freedom of information rather than seeking to hold it back. We need more powerful scrutiny of ministers and confirmation hearings for key appointments. We need genuine decentralisation of power in a UK-wide federal system, with major new powers for the Scottish Parliament, including tax-raising powers. We need a written constitution to safeguard our civil liberties and freedoms.
That is the sort of transformation that would dramatically change government on a scale that has not been seen since Lord Grey's Great Reform Act of 1832. That act, which was passed by a Liberal Government, swept away the patronage and corruption of our past, just as today we must sweep aside the decay and corruption of our 21st century politics. Whether it is flipping houses, phantom mortgages, moats, duck ponds or inflated meal claims, now is the time when people expect change that is major, not timid, and wide-ranging, not superficial. Gordon Brown needs to realise that now is the hour.
The wounds that have been inflicted on our democracy are deep, damaging and divisive. Gordon Brown hangs on to office but is losing his grip on power. It is time for a general election.
I have been called many things in my political lifetime, but I am certainly not a Tory acolyte. That said, I thank the Conservatives for holding a debate on a reserved matter, and I look forward to their lodging a motion on fiscal autonomy, which I know many Conservatives support.
Will the member take an intervention?
I have just started; please sit down.
As for Labour's 30-year time warp to 1979, I remind Labour members that it was a Labour MP, George Cunningham, who introduced the 40 per cent rule, whereby the votes of the dead counted as a no vote, and prevented the establishment of this Parliament for three decades. I need no lessons in history from Labour members.
I suppose that we should not kick them when they are down, but I have to. Gordon Brown—the man who would have it all—has the classic fatal flaw of a Shakespearian character. After trawling the Shakespearian tragedies, I have settled for Hamlet, who prevaricated, wavered and finally brought about his own death. Yes, the Hamlet cap fits, for we are watching the slow political suicide not only of Gordon Brown but of Labour plc—and not a moment too soon.
Gordon Brown's epitaph will refer to his announcement, in April 2007, of the abolition of the 10p tax rate; to Damian McBride and smeargate; to the YouTube video—oh!—to the Ghurkas, on which he had to do a U-turn; and to the issue of MPs' expenses, which has already been dealt with. There have been ministerial resignations by the boat load: Beverley Hughes, Jacqui Smith, Tom Watson, Hazel Blears, James Purnell, John Hutton, Geoff Hoon, Margaret Beckett, Caroline Flint and Ian Gibson have all resigned.
What of the Cabinet at 10.32 and one second? The Presbyterian man of democracy has many lords a-leaping. At the top of the leaping pile is Lord Machiavelli, Lord Mandelson. He is joined by the right hon the Lord Adonis, the right hon the Baroness Ashton of Upholland and the right hon the Baroness Royall of Blaisdon, all of whom are unelected. On top of that, there are appointees by the bucket load: Sir Digby Jones, trade minister; Professor Sir Ara Darzi, health minister, patient care; Admiral Sir Alan West; Lord Malloch-Brown; Lord Stevens; and the Lib Dems Baroness Neuberger and Lord Lester. None of them has been elected by anyone—they are all outside appointments.
What about Sir Alan Sugar?
I am coming to him.
The man who relies on those appointees has to keep Alistair Darling—that darling man—in the Cabinet. I wonder why. Maybe he knows where all the bodies are buried. Gordon Brown is so weakened and humiliated that he cannot even do a proper shuffle of a shuffle. He is trying desperately to be popular by clutching at celebrities. Sir Alan Sugar is to join the Lords and all the other appointees.
Why does he not bring in some other famous faces? Let me think. He could bring in Susan Boyle for culture, Joanna Lumley for immigration and Andy Murray for sport, although that will depend on whether he wins Wimbledon. If he wins, he will be British; if he loses, he will be Scottish. We must remember that Gordon has to wrap himself in the union flag.
This is the man who says that he will reform and improve democracy. I have just given his track record, his curriculum vitae, his report card. Meanwhile, the people are losing jobs and homes as a direct consequence of a credit crisis that was set in train on his watch as chancellor. The economic tsunami will last for generations, as we pay to bail out banks that were allowed to run wild in handing out credit. I have one message for that Shakespearian tragic hero—it is time to quit the stage, Hamlet.
I welcome the opportunity to take part in this morning's debate, in order to expose the Tory failings ahead of the general election whenever it is called. There is no doubt that the Conservatives are not the answer. They are the party of the squires who would keep working people in the servants' quarters, they are the party of public spending cuts, and they are not the party that will take Scotland forward.
I submit that this debate is not the best use of parliamentary time. This is a legislative chamber, and we should be considering how we can use the levers at our disposal to protect the Scottish economy, to create jobs, to build more houses to avert the housing crisis and to find places for our probationary teachers.
In securing the debate, it seems that the Tory boys hanker for a return to the university debating club. However, if a general election were called now, the debate would not be about policy. Never in the field of political discourse has there been so much discussion about politics and so little discussion about policy. That is what has happened in recent weeks. An election called now would be all about moats and duck houses, and about a First Minister claiming food when Parliament was in recess.
Incidentally, has the First Minister managed to return home from London yet? What a shocking performance yesterday. While we discussed serious legislation at stage 3, the First Minister was down in the House of Commons, languishing on the green benches.
Will the member reflect on the fact that, since becoming Prime Minister in June 2007, Gordon Brown has voted in only 10.8 per cent of divisions in the House of Commons? That should be on the record, in the interest of fairness.
While we are speaking of Prime Ministers, I am reminded that, back in August, Alex Salmond took the time to praise a previous Conservative Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher. Perhaps he was showing his true colours.
When the election comes about, it should be about how we can support the economy, how we can build employment, how we can help businesses, how we can help the banks, and how we can stimulate economic growth. However, it should come as no surprise that we see the Tories and the tartan Tories lining up together, just as they did in 1979. I see Mr Welsh sitting quietly across the chamber. No wonder he is sitting quietly: he was one of the guilty men in 1979 who propelled Margaret Thatcher into Downing Street. [Interruption.]
Order.
I have named Mr Welsh, so I will give way to him. I apologise to Margo MacDonald.
I appreciate that.
As I said earlier, George Cunningham introduced the 40 per cent rule. What was on offer for Scotland at that point was less devolved power than that of the Isle of Man or the Channel Islands. I sat in a House of Commons that gave more devolved power to the island of Tuvalu than it was prepared to give to Scotland. I have no regrets about bringing down a failed Labour—
This should not be a speech, Mr Welsh.
Perhaps Mr Welsh should apologise to the millions of people who were thrown on the scrap heap during the Tory years.
Will the member give way?
I apologise to Margo MacDonald, but I have already taken two interventions.
There is no doubt that the SNP wants David Cameron in Downing Street. The SNP believes that having the Tories in Downing Street would enhance the SNP's prospects in any referendum. That is why the SNP is supporting the Tories in trying to bring forward an election. The SNP supports the hasty entry of David Cameron into Downing Street.
Last Thursday, on the day of the European elections, I spoke to many people in Rutherglen and Cambuslang in my constituency. They did not want a general election, and they said loud and clear that they do not want the Tories back in. In the area that I grew up in, and the area that I represent, people remember how the local steelworks were closed and people were thrown on the scrap-heap, some never to work again. As Pauline McNeill has said, security guards were on £1 an hour and poverty levels rocketed. I see the Tories smiling on the other side of the chamber, but all that time the Tories stood callously by and let it happen. They did not intervene.
This is not a time for Tories or nationalists. People have long memories and, when the election comes, they will remember that Labour delivered the national health service while the Tories gave us Margaret Thatcher; that Labour delivered the Open University while the Tories gave us the poll tax; and that Labour delivered the minimum wage while the Tories gave us mass unemployment. I look forward to the election, whenever it comes, and to seeing the Tories once more getting a hammering in Scotland.
After that speech from James Kelly, Gordon Brown sounds almost coherent.
We might be forgiven for thinking that Labour would want a general election as soon as possible. Only yesterday, Iain Gray denounced the First Minister for spending time at Westminster and we have heard similar comments today. All that Iain Gray has to do is phone Gordon Brown and tell him to call a general election and he will have Mr Salmond's undivided attention. But how many Scottish Labour MPs voted last night to keep poor Mr Salmond down in London for up to another year? Perhaps having had a taste of revolt last week—unsuccessful as it was—they have decided to turn their attentions to the hapless Mr Gray.
The attitude that we have heard from the Labour Party in the debate has been all over the place. Yesterday, the Labour Party issued a bizarre press release in which it complained—a complaint that we have heard again this morning—that this debate is a waste of parliamentary time. That is rich coming from a party that, when it was in government, produced a walking strategy for Scotland that was full of such matters of pressing national importance as the thought that
"a pleasant walk in the sunshine is enjoyable in itself"
and then spent parliamentary time debating it. I apologise for our decision to debate such trivia as a UK general election when we could have followed Labour's lead and debated what a good thing breathing is, how nice it is that the earth revolves around the sun or even the merits of introducing detention without limit or trial for anyone who so much as looks the wrong way at Richard Baker. Such important matters of state will have to wait until Labour business, after the summer recess.
It is obvious to everyone except the Prime Minister that we have a lame duck Government clinging on in the hope that something—anything—will come up to save its skin. The Government has become so wrapped up in its internal politics that it is unable to provide a lead. That is not for the want of a parliamentary majority, as Labour has a majority at Westminster that many previous Prime Ministers would have been grateful for—but to what purpose?
Iain Gray mentioned Margaret Thatcher. We all remember that, early in Gordon Brown's tenure in Downing Street, he invited Baroness Thatcher to number 10. Perhaps we should remind the Labour press office of that when it spews out press releases about the 1980s. At the time, many people speculated about the conversation that took place. In one way at least, Gordon Brown is the true inheritor of the Thatcher legacy. She came close to killing off the Labour Party; Gordon Brown is finishing the job.
The lingering demise of the Labour Party is of no concern to the Conservatives. I suspect that it is of no concern to the SNP either. However, the fact that we are in the middle of the worst recession since the second world war, with a weak and divided Government that is unable to grapple with the problems that the country faces, is a real worry. Last month, the International Monetary Fund warned that the UK Government needed to
"put public debt on a firmly downward path faster than envisaged in the 2009 Budget."
However, the Government has postponed all the difficult decisions until after the next election. In the meantime, it is merrily running up debt at a rate that has never been seen before. Every independent commentator in the country knows that taxes will have to go up, that spending will have to come down or that there will have to be a combination of the two if the Government is to deal with the debt crisis. However, the Government will not admit that—it is in wholesale denial.
I remind Labour members of the reality of what their Government is proposing for public spending. The Labour Government's own figures show that, after debt interest and benefits payments have been made, departmental spending will fall by 7 per cent in real terms between 2011 and 2013. If health spending in England were to be protected from that cut, the figure would be 10 per cent in real terms in all other departments.
Alistair Darling, the chancellor—presumably for the rest of the UK Government's term of office—said only last month:
"I have cut overall public spending".
It is a pity that he did not tell his neighbour in number 10. It is left to the chancellor to sort out the mess that Labour is in, but we know, after the events of last week, that the Prime Minister has no confidence in him. The chancellor was the subject of unprecedented briefing by number 10 last week but is now apparently unsackable.
Iain Gray mentioned spending under Labour, but the problem is that Labour has been spending money that we do not have. He talked earnestly about the next generation, but that generation is now saddled with debt: every child who is born in this country will have £22,000 of national debt to its name. David Whitton wanted us to debate local income tax, but we defeated that proposal back in January—one might have thought that the deputy finance spokesman for the Labour Party would have noticed that. Mr Whitton also wanted to talk about the miners' strike, but not with Margo MacDonald.
Labour members talk about unemployment, but they do not mention the forecasts that suggest that the number of people who are unemployed under the current Labour Government could rise to 4 million. Pauline McNeill mentioned employment law, but not the fact that the Labour Government has not reversed a single change that the Conservatives introduced in that area between 1979 and 1997. She also made the bizarre argument that it is cynical for the Conservatives to argue for the election of a Conservative Government.
A general election would allow a new Government to be formed that could command the confidence not only of the people but of the financial markets. It would allow the UK Government to give greater certainty to the Scottish Government about the path of public spending and the consequences that we will have to deal with here, and it would draw a line under the expenses scandal.
We always seem to face the question of how to deal with the mess that a Labour Government has made. Pauline McNeill said that Labour will campaign on its record—I sincerely hope that it does.
I believe that we need a general election now to restore our faith in democracy. Following scandal after scandal, it is not only the Labour Party but the entire UK system of government that has fallen into disrepute. The misuse of the allowances system demonstrates the need for dramatic reform at Westminster—
Will the member give way?
I have just started.
The system cannot be changed while the old personnel are still in place. We now have lame-duck MPs, whose reputations are ruined, and yet—with the notable exception of Ian Gibson—they have refused to resign and allow their constituents the opportunity of a by-election. It is no wonder that people feel that they no longer have any power over or influence on the way in which their country is run.
Will the member clarify the SNP's position on the responsibility of its members of Parliament in relation to expenses? Do its members take responsibility for the claims that they made, or do they take the view—as the SNP's leader does—that they got caught up in a culture and could not help it?
Every individual MP has to take responsibility for what happened, but they must also take some responsibility for not having enough faith in their people to let them decide the future. Public disillusionment with politics is running at an all-time high, and we have to deal with that.
A recent BBC/MORI poll showed that half of the general public think that at least half of their MPs are corrupt, and that has serious consequences for democracy. From my party's perspective, last Thursday's election results were a resounding success, but there was one note that had a sobering effect on me and on many other members in the chamber: the election of two BNP MEPs. The reasons why voters chose to elect two racists who peddle fear and hatred in our society are many and complex. They are not the fault of one party, nor are they the responsibility of one Government or institution to resolve. However, I believe firmly that in circumstances such as those that we currently face, in which people feel that they are not listened to and have no voice, extremist parties can grow. They can manipulate feelings of disillusionment, whip up resentment and take advantage of public dissatisfaction with the political system.
We need a general election now to wipe the slate clean and give the people a chance to have their say. We need to show people that we have the ability to give them an election and to put the power in the hands of the electorate.
I infer from the member's remarks that she agrees with the commentators who have said that Britain is now represented by BNP members. Does she agree with me that this chamber is not represented by those members, and that they do not speak for Scotland?
I fully agree with Margo MacDonald, and pay tribute to Pauline McNeill for lodging a motion on the current "not in my name" petition that makes that very point. However, we in Scotland cannot be complacent.
In the longer term, Westminster should learn from the Scottish Parliament's open, transparent and democratic system; it should not only emulate our expenses system, but move towards fixed terms to ensure that elections cannot be called at the ruling party's whim. It is clear to all that with their politics of self-preservation, Gordon Brown and his Government are putting their own best interests—and careers—before their country's interests. By limping on, the Labour Party is treating democracy with contempt. As with MPs' expenses, it might be acting within the rules, but it is not acting within the spirit of the rules. Meanwhile, in Scotland, it is a tale of two Governments: while the SNP fights to protect Scottish jobs, the Labour Government at Westminster is too busy fighting to protect its own.
Gordon Brown's ministerial team went into unprecedented meltdown before the European elections. However, what happened did not come out of nowhere, but represented the final straw of two disastrous years of a divided Government. Since taking the top job, Gordon Brown has seemed unsure of what to do with it, stumbling from one crisis to another with no clear strategy, no clear mandate and no clear policy direction. Instead of the promised conviction politics, we got dithering, indecision and insincere attempts on YouTube to alter his image to suit his audience.
I did not agree with Tony Blair, but at least I knew what he stood for, even if it happened to be illegal wars and a privatisation agenda that would have made Mrs Thatcher's toes curl. I may not agree with David Cameron, but at least I know what he stands for: the usual round of Tory cuts to public services. Except for his mission to save the world, who knows what Gordon Brown stands for?
The public could not have sent a clearer message than they sent last week in the European elections: they want to have their say. We should remind ourselves of the facts: Labour got 16 per cent of the vote; was third behind the United Kingdom Independence Party; achieved a disastrous second place in the Welsh heartlands; and came in second place in Scotland. I am particularly pleased that for the first time the SNP won the vote in Edinburgh, with fantastic wins in Edinburgh North and Leith, Edinburgh East and the Chancellor of the Exchequer's Edinburgh South West constituency. Gordon Brown might not have been able to budge the chancellor from the Treasury in his botched reshuffle, but perhaps in a general election the people of Edinburgh will finish off the job on his behalf.
Gordon Brown must listen to the message from the elections. When he became Prime Minister in 2007, he said that he would
"heed and lead the call of change".
Will he heed that call now and call the election? Another rebranding of Gordon Brown will not wash; we all know that the new Gordon is out to save himself and not the country, never mind the world.
The Labour Party has lost all authority to govern. A democratic mandate is not an added extra for a Government, but a necessity. It is time to end the misery, put politics back on track and call the election now.
As Iain McWhirter made clear in the Sunday Herald on 7 June 2009,
"there is no doubt that if Scotland had been independent",
as the SNP wants,
"when the"
global economic crisis
"hit,"
our
"economy would have been destroyed by the debts of our delinquent banks, HBOS and RBS, just like Iceland's. The losses on their multi-trillion-pound balance sheets would have wiped out the £30 billion Scottish economy in half a day. …
First minister Salmond's mistake was to get carried away by Celtic neo-liberalism, and start thinking that Scotland's future was as a small open economy with low taxes and very big banks. That would have led to a very big disaster and decades of pain."
Where is the First Minister today? By the way, he does not, as one SNP member suggested this morning, have two salaries; he has three, with an income close to £250,000 a year. They seek him here; they seek him there; but that Alex Salmond is never here.
In the face of the past year's global economic crisis—not, I add, Gordon Brown's economic crisis, Nicolas Sarkozy's economic crisis or even Angela Merkel's economic crisis, but the direct consequence of the outrageous decisions made by bankers and of American sub-prime mortgage lending practices—our Prime Minister has been at the forefront of leading the way out.
Barack Obama emphasised the need for G20 leaders to sing from the same song sheet when he said:
"The most important task for all of us is to deliver a strong message of unity in the face of crisis."
That is exactly what every political leader in Scotland should be doing today. Instead of indulging ourselves as the Tories, Liberals and the SNP have been doing this morning, we should be acting in unity and forming a coalition and united front to focus solely on helping our people.
Scotland's people need all politicians to lead them out of the on-going challenges that we face collectively in Scotland. We do not need the approach of the Tories that we had on the BBC yesterday morning and again this morning. We heard Andrew Lansley—who is not very popular with his leader, David Cameron—talk about £10 billion of cuts in the UK. That would be together with tax giveaways to the 3,000 richest people in the UK.
Gordon Brown has led the way and continues to do so—we are very proud of him. He has the required experience, knowledge and ability to ensure that the United Kingdom recovers from the crisis. As G20 leader, the British Prime Minister proved his ability to deal with the post-crisis policy, globally and in Europe. I have known Gordon personally and worked with him for more than 26 years. He is a good and decent man who commands respect across the spectrum. Globalisation's first great crisis necessitated a co-ordinated international response and a decisive exercise of collective action on world and European scales. Gordon Brown saw that and led from the outset. It is thanks to his vision and leadership that we were able to lay the basis for a new system of global economic governance at the G20 summit last April. Gordon Brown was hailed by leaders from throughout the world—Sarkozy congratulated him. Last week, constituents in Cowdenbeath came out of polling stations one after the other saying that Gordon Brown is a class act. No one in Westminster comes near his intellect in seeing the big picture and the solutions.
At the weekend, Michael Portillo said that the Tories will go into the next election with fewer MPs than Michael Foot won in 1983, with 199 to Foot's 210. So to win a majority of just one, Cameron must secure a net gain of 125 seats. Assuming a mere handful of Scottish seats, that is a very big mountain to climb, so Cameron has still not sealed the deal. Why is that? He has been leader for three and a half years, so we might think that people would have made up their minds about him by now. If they have, they have decided that they can take him or leave him. We have not yet heard one of his policies, which is a big issue for the people of Scotland.
I watched Prime Minister's question time on the television yesterday and noted that not one question to Gordon Brown from the Conservatives, the Liberals or the SNP was directly relevant to the real issues in the United Kingdom. The Government and Opposition parties should concentrate on the issues that matter most to the people of the United Kingdom and Scotland, such as how to solve the current financial crisis, how to get companies employing again and how to reduce the number of companies that have no option but to make redundancies. Calling a general election now would not benefit the country on issues such as employment; it would waste time. Having MPs and ministers rolling round the country on the campaign trail would take the emphasis away from the real issues, such as employment and the economy. Those issues would simply be talked about, and nothing would be done to resolve them.
As has been pointed out by those who are involved in the nitty-gritty of delivering training services, if we had a general election now and the Labour Party was no longer in government, many service programmes that are designed specifically to help the unemployed would be scrapped by the Conservatives or the Liberal Democrats. I refer to programmes such as the new deal for 18 to 24-year-olds, new deal 25 plus, the new deal for disabled people, the entry to employment plus scheme and the many others that are designed to help the UK's unemployed back into sustainable employment. The Tories would simply scrap those programmes and replace them with nothing. The UK's unemployed would be left with no real support or training to help them back into work.
Calling a general election today would not help the country out of the recession, nor would it help the unemployed or those who face unemployment to find new jobs or to retrain. Some people might want to take us back to the nuts and bolts of the tragic years of Thatcher's Britain—there is book after book about that on bookshelves throughout the country. However, I will certainly not support the Tory motion at decision time.
It was quite a surprise to hear that Helen Eadie will not support the Tory motion. In the interests of accuracy, I wonder whether I might take issue with her opening remarks. She said that had Scotland been independent, there is no doubt that—if members will excuse the metaphor—we would have been all at sea when the tsunami hit us. Had Scotland been independent, we might have had a Labour Government and we might have repatriated Gordon Brown to run the economy in Scotland. We cannot choose our hypotheses without looking at the corollaries. The corollaries would have been that we would have had the same sort of oil fund as Norway has. We might well have had a leftish Government and the sort of regulations on the financial centre that there should have been. I urge Helen Eadie to take that into account when she says what it might have been like had we been independent.
In the interests of historical accuracy, I correct my friend James Kelly. It was not the SNP that brought down the Thatcher Government; it was a man called Frank Maguire, who represented Fermanagh and South Tyrone, and who abstained in the vote of confidence. He is the man to blame if we are handing out blame.
I apologise to Dave Whitton for reminding him that the miners' strike was a bit more complex than he presented it. I pay tribute to men such as Davey Hamilton—a present member of the House of Commons—for his efforts in the miners' strike, but that does not take away anything from my criticism of the Government. I am sure that there are Labour members in this chamber who are a wee bit embarrassed by some of the things that the present Labour Government in London has done.
Do we need a general election to give Labour a chance to stay in government or to hand over to—I forget his name—the nice Tory man? No, we do not need a general election for that reason; we need a general election to get rid of the stench of corruption and the disgust that people feel with the democratic process, and for the very practical reasons that were advanced by Derek Brownlee. We are walking a tightrope as far as the finances of not just Scotland but the United Kingdom are concerned, and we had better get off the tightrope and start being honest about the choices that we have to make on spending cuts. As I have said before in the chamber, it will not matter who is elected in London.
David McLetchie mentioned that we should debate the constitution and I could not agree more. It is a pity that he is not here—[Interruption.] Oh, he is over there; good. If members look at page 26 of today's Business Bulletin, they will see my excellent amendment to the motion; unfortunately, it was not accepted for debate. It would have meant that we spent the time between now and the inevitable general election, which will come not sooner but later, informing people in Scotland of the constitutional choices. Then, depending on the outcome of the election, we could use that as the basis for renegotiation either of advanced devolution or, as I hope, the transfer of sovereignty to this Parliament. I commend that idea to members.
Would Margo MacDonald prefer to have a Conservative or a Labour Government in London?
It does not matter what I prefer; it matters what people in England prefer. Any Government that is elected to Westminster should answer to people in England and conduct their affairs. We have the Scottish Parliament to build on and we should do the same for Scots voters. I take the same interest in who is elected to be the Government in England as I do in Governments that are elected in other countries over which I have, and seek, no control.
There is no chance of a general election being held, because members of Parliament—not just those in the Labour Party—have worked out that they will do better with 12 months' wages than with 10.
Before members of the Scottish Parliament fall into line and churn out Pavlovian responses about spending cuts, I commend to members another of my ideas, which I shared with the Scottish Trades Union Congress last week at a meeting of its general council. It might be a good idea for the people in here to trust the people out there and consult them on how they want to determine priorities during a time of spending cuts and contraction of services. We cannot service our debt without making cuts or—more likely—having a mixture of tax increases and cuts. I find some agreement with that analysis from Ross Finnie. We know that cuts will happen, so why do we not consult our communities? The STUC could do that by working in conjunction with representatives from the Parliament. That would ensure that people were properly informed and allow them to make the priority choices that suit them and not us. If we are serious about cleaning up politics, that is how we can start. We could do that between now and the general election.
There will be a general election, so people should just put up with it. We should try to ensure that we get something better for Scotland from the election. That is not selfish; it just makes sense. We know perfectly well that a huge difference exists between the construct of the Scottish economy and that of the English economy, and we know perfectly well that the size of our public sector demands a different answer. We in the Parliament can provide that answer.
I am happy to speak in the debate, which has several features—some are unsurprising, some are surprising and some are less surprising than they might have been in the past.
I will comment first on the miners' dispute. I am proud that we have a Prime Minister and a Government who are willing to use the Government's power to intervene on people's behalf rather than to unleash the state's power against communities. If anything ever confirmed my views about nationalism, it was the fact that I never understood how the nationalists could have compassion for miners and mining communities in Ayrshire but not for mining communities in Yorkshire. The nationalists considered the oppressed person to be the Duke of Argyll in Scotland and not the miner in England. That is inexplicable, and those who claim to be progressive must explain that.
It is hardly surprising that Opposition parties want a general election—that is what Opposition parties say. However, it is illogical to say that the scandal of parliamentary expenses must be addressed through a general election. How do people expect to deal with the problem by holding a general election before the investigation is complete into those who affront us all in the political process by claiming what they are not entitled to, and before political parties can clear out those who have brought shame on us? That makes no sense.
It is equally unsurprising that the First Minister preferred to travel the length of the country for a 20-second contribution to a political stunt in Westminster than to be in this Parliament on one of the few occasions since the SNP became the Government on which the Parliament has had thoughtful and challenging debate—yesterday, it was about how best to legislate to protect victims of rape and sexual violence. Of course, that subject does not attract headlines or lend itself to the music-hall approach to political debate with which the First Minister is most comfortable, so the choice for him was a no-brainer. His Government wants to condition us not to expect debate in the Parliament. The Government wants to use its executive power and resists parliamentary accountability. Shamefully, it is backed by back benchers who are silent when it acts in a way for which it did not seek the support of the people in the Scottish Parliament election.
I am genuinely surprised that the Tories collude with the SNP's instinctive approach of making this place a combination of a student debating chamber, a vehicle for lobbying Westminster and a platform for grievance. I am genuinely surprised that the Tories have actively chosen to debate having a general election rather than the absence of a strategy for supporting businesses and construction workers, the fact that the SNP is in denial about what is happening on its watch in education or the funding cuts that groups and organisations are experiencing. What SNP ministers tell us that they care about is absolutely separate from the resources that they deliver and their accountability for that. The SNP centralises credit for the fruits of plans that the previous Scottish Executive produced and delegates blame wherever it can for the consequences of the active political choices that it makes in the Parliament.
I referred to features that are less surprising than they might have been in the past. We had come to expect the SNP to put its own cynical party advantage above all else; the memories of 1979 are strong. We believed that its approach was entirely about party advantage—let the people across the UK suffer, if that means drawing increased political support to the SNP as Scots turn away from the UK Government. However, it is becoming increasingly clear that the SNP thinks not only that a Tory Government might be to its advantage, but that a Tory Government would believe in the same things that it believes in. Alex Salmond believes that Thatcherite economics had a lot to recommend it. He leads a Government that will not put a duty on public bodies in Scotland to narrow the gap between rich and poor in the way that is happening elsewhere. Indeed, until very recently, he believed that the British banking system was overregulated—in fact, he takes his economic advice from George Mathewson. On the front bench of the SNP Government, we have David Cameron and Alex Salmond—Thatcherite brothers under the skin. That is to their parties' political advantage, and, increasingly, their political advantage in combination, too.
The fact is that Labour understands the need for change. It has delivered change. It decentralised powers to the Scottish Parliament and took a courageous position in pioneering the openness and transparency for which people commend this place. It is critical that that work be done elsewhere. We have to take seriously the debate on expenses. When I was a teacher, it was unacceptable for a child to say, "It wasn't just me who did it", or "A big, bad boy did it." It is similarly unacceptable that the leader of the SNP takes that approach to the expenses question by implying that the problem is particular to the Labour Party.
It was the Labour Government in concert with the Liberal Democrats that brought that about in this Parliament. It was not given to Labour; you did it yourselves.
My point is that Labour promised a Scottish Parliament and then delivered it. Labour handed out the power so that the Parliament would be open and transparent. I am proud of the role that we played in that. Ten years on, I am proud that we fought for that. We are unlike that squad in the SNP, who claim that they believe in things but do not deliver.
These are serious times. Hard choices have to be made regarding economic intervention. The Labour Government is determined to act on economic questions, and the constitution.
Annabel Goldie opened the debate with a rather negative speech. She claimed that a general election was needed primarily to clean up Westminster. However, she completely failed to say what the Conservatives would do to reform politics. Why? Because the Conservatives have nothing much to offer. They want a general election simply because they seem to think that it is Buggins's turn. That will not do.
Bruce Crawford said that only the SNP could protect Scotland from Westminster's cuts. The statement was rather nonsensical. Indeed, he provoked much laughter when he said that Canada's success in the recession was due to its having a Scottish banking model. The SNP needs a reality check.
Iain Gray's performance was not his best. In a very partisan speech, he seemed to say that only the Tories with their moats and duck houses were involved in the MPs' expenses scandal. However, members of all parties are involved to a greater or lesser extent. Given that Iain Gray decided to go down that road, why did he not mention the worst excesses? I refer to MPs claiming money for mortgage interest payments when they no longer had a mortgage to pay. Some would call that criminal activity; others might call it fraud.
Mr Rumbles misrepresents what I said. I said that MPs of all parties were embroiled in the scandal and that some had paid a heavy price, and rightly so. My point was that the claims about the Tories revealed the kind of lifestyle that seems to pass as normal in Conservative circles. That is a different point altogether.
I am glad that Iain Gray clarified what he said earlier. However, from what he said, I took the points that I have just mentioned.
In contrast, Ross Finnie focused on what we need an election for. He was the only opening front-bench speaker to set out clearly and methodically why we need a general election. He said that we need a new and honest approach to the economic management of the country's affairs; that we need to end the UK Government's attack on our personal freedoms and civil liberties; and that we need political reform of our institutions, of our economy and of our entire taxation system. Above all, we need to elect MPs—of all parties—who believe in and will promote liberal democracy and an open and transparent system.
I turn to one or two speeches from back benchers. Alasdair Allan seemed to think that Scotland has no influence on who governs the United Kingdom. Has he forgotten that we have a Scots Prime Minister and a Scots Chancellor of the Exchequer? They are not doing very well, to say the least, but nobody could deny—except, apparently, Alasdair Allan—that they are influential Scots. There is no doubt that Scots will influence the next UK general election.
Nicol Stephen said that the UK Government had failed the country. Dramatic constitutional change and reform will not happen with the present UK Government. The Prime Minister has had 12 years in which to initiate change and reform. Nothing happened with the Jenkins commission, for a start. Why has the Prime Minister failed the test?
It is time for a change. The country realises that. It is time for radical reform: fixed-term Parliaments, voting at 16, an elected Prime Minister, electoral reform and fair votes, and a more transparent and open system of government.
This morning's debate has given MSPs around the chamber the opportunity to engage in what I thought would be pure partisan political knockabout—I am not complaining about that.
He would never complain.
I said that I was not complaining, if Christine Grahame wants to listen. It was therefore no disappointment when that happened. However, the debate could have been an opportunity for each of the four main political parties to set out its stall on why we need a new UK Government. As I said, Ross Finnie did exactly that for the Liberal Democrats, and I will focus on that. We need a new approach to economic management, a focus on individual freedoms and the protection of civil liberties, and political reform. I have already mentioned fixed-term Parliaments, an elected Prime Minister, voting at 16 and a more transparent and open system of government.
This could have been a real debate about what the political parties have to offer the country, but I am afraid that, for the most part, the opportunity to highlight positively what we all have to offer the country has been wasted.
When I first learned that the Conservatives had, rather than hold the Scottish Government to account, chosen this subject for debate, I was disappointed but not surprised. Over the past two years, we have witnessed ever more examples of the strengthening of the tartan Tory alliance, which first emerged in the late 1970s, when the SNP and the Tories combined to bring down a Labour Government, heralding in the Thatcherite destruction of Scotland's economy. [Interruption.] Regardless of how many members in other parties might try to refute that, those are the facts.
As my Labour colleagues have argued this morning, the Tories could have used their time today to highlight the SNP's dangerous plans to end six-month sentences, they could have debated the state of Scottish schools, and they could have forced the issue on hospital-acquired infection, or the increasing problem of home repossessions. Instead, given the outcome of a similar debate yesterday in Westminster, they are indulging in a pointless debate in order to join with their tartan twins, not to argue for any high moral ideal, but for base political self-interest.
Even if they are not prepared to hold the Scottish Government to account, we might have found some value in this debate—I agree entirely with Mike Rumbles on this—if our opponents had used their time to outline the policies that they would bring to a general election. However, not one policy idea has been forthcoming. We are left to wonder what the purpose would be of a general election now, as our opponents are clearly devoid of any policy ideas on which they would fight a campaign.
The Tories have told us, however, that they cannot wait to get started on their campaign. I am sure that we will see David Cameron's fake concern for our disadvantaged communities soon enough. It would appear that he will be visiting as many people who have no hope and no money as he can, to learn from their experience. His first stop will be Nick Clegg's office.
The debate has helped to expose yet more of the contempt with which the First Minister treats this place. Alex Salmond would prefer to pop off to Westminster to attempt to repeat history and vote down a Labour Government, than to take part in important votes on sexual offences legislation. I appreciate that he cannot vote in two places at the same time, even though his Westminster expenses claims indicate that he may have the capacity to eat in two places at the same time, but how telling it is that he hates Labour more than he cares for the victims of crime. Alex Salmond has never been able to make his mind up about whether he prefers Westminster to Holyrood. I was going to suggest that he should take a long, hard look in the mirror, but there is no point—he admires himself so much that he will be doing that anyway.
The debate has provided us with the opportunity to remind the Scottish people of the 18 years of Thatcherism. Scots remember Ravenscraig, the demolition of the Scottish mining industry and the Tories using Scotland as a guinea pig for their hated poll tax. The tartan Tory alliance claims that we need a general election so that we can restore trust and confidence in Parliament and politicians, but the motion merely exposes the SNP's desire to join forces with the Tories in order to defeat Labour. The fact is that the next general election will be a two-horse race between Labour and the Tories. The SNP's support for an election now, as it was in 1979, is calculated to help to put a Tory—David Cameron—in office. The SNP wants not an election but a Tory Government. It knows that Scotland dislikes the Tory party and hopes that the election of David Cameron would drive more Scots towards supporting independence. No matter how good it thinks that that strategy is, it should consider the results.
Is Michael McMahon not concerned that having to put up with the embarrassments of the Labour Government for another year would harm his party's chances when it comes to the Scottish parliamentary elections? Is there nothing for the Labour Party in Scotland in having an early election and the stables being cleansed?
I could not disagree more with Margo MacDonald. We need more time to remind people of what the Tories did when they were in office; that the Labour Government delivered the Scottish Parliament when it promised to do so; that it introduced a minimum wage that the tartan Tories opposed; and that there are other great benefits of the Labour Government. We are in a recession and we must, although it is a difficult time, remind the people what Labour Governments have done for Scotland. I would never give up the opportunity to do that.
Scotland and its people are far too important to be treated as pawns in the SNP's obsessive constitutional game. Labour is down, but it is certainly not out. The Labour Government led by Gordon Brown will lead us out of the recession, and Labour and the UK economy will be stronger for it. That is why the tartan Tories want an election.
The debate has been an utter waste of Parliament's time. The Tories will win the vote tonight, but they will not get what they want and will not get the result when the election comes.
I admit to being confused by two things during the debate. The first is Helen Eadie's invention of a new political philosophy—Celtic neo-liberalism—which I must investigate further. The second is curious—it is a dog that has not bitten. It is Labour members' slavish loyalty to their London colleagues, which is bizarre, because we all know that they do not like one another much. That is an open secret, so why are they locked together in that way? I will tell members why. They are locked together in a dance of electoral death; they are going down together. If anybody had any doubt about that, it was demonstrated by the results on Monday: 22 out of 32 local authority areas voted for the SNP, not Labour. In the three that preferred Labour, the difference between the two parties was—I will not use a phrase that my friend Kenny Gibson once used in the chamber—very narrow.
The reality is not only that Labour is going down but that it deserves to go down. I will use two examples to prove that. The first, which was referred to by Dr Alasdair Allan and Nicol Stephen, is yesterday's extraordinary sight: Gordon Brown trying to pose as the great reformer. He is not so much the great reformer as the late reformer. On expenses, he failed to act and, indeed, damaged action by his bizarre YouTube performance.
On a written constitution and bill of rights, which he claims to believe in, it is "Maybe aye, maybe no." On reform of the House of Lords, he is, after 12 years, still talking about an unelected element. On electoral reform, which he has rejected again and again, there is simply more talk. Westminster first considered electoral reform in a Speaker's conference between the wars, and has since considered the matter again and again. The Jenkins commission has been referred to, but no decision has been taken. There was, despite the corrosive arrogance of the Westminster system, nothing in Gordon Brown's speech about the sovereignty of Parliament, nor was there anything about innovation, except perhaps in respect of giving people the vote at 16, which the Scottish Parliament is already pursuing. There was but a mere mention of Calman. In short, there was nothing at all in the speech. Any Prime Minister who builds up their statement as a major step forward and then delivers nothing deserves the description that Disraeli gave of Gladstone's Government:
"a range of exhausted volcanoes. Not a flame flickering on a single pallid crest."
For that reason, the Labour Government has to go.
There is another stronger reason why the Westminster Labour Government must go, which has been repeated again and again today. The argument that we have heard is that the Labour Government must remain in office because all the other options are worse. That is an affront to every member, to every citizen of this country and to every citizen who believes in democracy. What has been said is not a fact, but the opinion of a group of people: if those people said that the sky is blue, one would have to go out and check for oneself. Members have even claimed that elections are a waste of time and that they would make people suffer. That is an outrage. Democracy should triumph—people should decide. Any Government that says that people cannot vote it out because they will make the wrong choice should automatically be voted out. Brecht talked satirically about the people failing the leaders and electing a new people. That is now Labour's mantra.
What has been said is an outrage because it is wrapped in a lie. We have heard repeated again and again in the chamber the lie in which that outrage is wrapped. Iain Gray, David Whitton, Pauline McNeill, James Kelly, Johann Lamont and Michael McMahon have all said the same thing. They have pointed to a lie that I must disprove. I shall do so in three ways.
First, the fall of the 1979 Government was caused by Labour rebels, not by the SNP. In evidence, I cite none other than James Callaghan, who wrote a book entitled "Time and Chance"—an appropriate title. Labour has had its time and now it must go; its chance is over.
On a point of order, Presiding Officer. Is it appropriate for the member to call other members liars, particularly when they are telling the truth?
I will look at that. Mr Russell, carry on, please.
James Callaghan said in the book that I mentioned:
"Michael Cocks, the Chief Whip, had spoken with some of Labour's Devolution rebels. In his view the difficulty within the Party was much greater than any from the Scottish National Party and the Whips' judgement was that the Government could not rely on the votes of Labour Members from Merseyside or the North".
That is first point. Labour brought itself down.
The second point is very important. It is that the manifest failures of Labour brought down that party then, as they are doing now.
Thirdly, let us get to the heart of the democratic point. I will tell members who it was that voted the Labour Party out of office. It was not 11 SNP MPs—not even my good friend Andrew Welsh—who voted the Labour Party out of office. It was voted out by 13,697,923 voters in an election. Those voters brought down the Labour Government—nobody else.
Let us tackle the other myth about what happened during the Thatcher years. Those years were awful, and the Thatcher Government was culpable. I was among those who marched and protested. I was at Gartcosh, Ravenscraig and Caterpillar. I did not pay the poll tax—I could have, but I would not. Labour could have followed that campaign, but instead it undermined it. When the marchers got to London, it preferred to debate Westland to Gartcosh. I was in George Square; indeed, I was on the board of Scotland United. Labour did not back us, but instead walked away.
Will the minister give way?
No, I will not. I want to quote again from James Callaghan's memoirs; what he said is important. He said that, in 1979, he consulted Labour's general secretary, Ron Hayward, who
"reported that the Party in Scotland was pretty shell-shocked."
It wanted to take forward devolution, which should have remained
"in the forefront of Labour's programme, but the well-being of the Government must be the priority".
That was the case with UK Government then and it is now.
Let us take the issue further.
Will the minister take an intervention?
No, I will not.
I believe that politics is about the positive, not the negative. The more Labour argues a negative line, the more it will repeat the experience of the past weekend. There are now nine points between positive and negative. Shortly there will be 19, and the gap will continue to grow.
I want an election now for the following reasons. They are positive reasons that will move Scotland forward. I want an election to give the people of Scotland the opportunity to choose a better way for Scotland. I want an election because I reject the self-interested desperation of the "late reformer" yesterday. I want an election because I reject the intellectually dishonest compromises that we have had. I want an election because I want to ensure that we do not have the empty glitz of David Cameron. I want an election because Scotland needs an independent future and because an election can usher one in. The time for change in Scotland is now. An election can change us—we should have one.
Yesterday at Westminster we saw a valid attempt by the Scottish National Party and Plaid Cymru to force dissolution of the House of Commons. Their call was supported by the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats. I am sorry that that bid failed, not least because—as we have heard throughout this debate—it brought back memories of the famous vote of no confidence in the Callaghan Government 30 years ago, which was supported by the SNP at the time and which famously ushered in the 18 years of Conservative Government of glorious memory. I am sorry that we did not see history repeat itself yesterday, but I am confident that it is only a matter of time before the glory days come again.
Will the member take an intervention?
Not at the moment.
Today the Scottish Parliament has an opportunity to do what Westminster did not do yesterday—to resolve firmly that the United Kingdom needs a general election now. Let us send a clear message from this place to the Labour Government that its time is up and that the Scottish Parliament believes that this country needs a fresh start.
There are three clear reasons why we believe that an election is required now. First, the whole political system has been rocked by the scandal of MPs' expenses that has been revealed by The Daily Telegraph over the past five weeks. We have all been shocked by revelations not just about moats and duck houses, but about MPs claiming for phantom mortgages that have already been paid off, for flat-screen televisions, for digital radios and for Toblerones. The First Minister has claimed for generous amounts of food for periods when he may not even have been at Westminster. Public confidence in the whole system has been seriously undermined, and some MPs have behaved disgracefully.
I genuinely wonder how Murdo Fraser thinks people can pass judgment on their candidates when the full extent of the problem is not known and the parties have not been able to act against their offenders. Does he not agree that there should be a thorough investigation, so that people can make a real choice knowing who has dipped their hands in the till and which members at Westminster are still honourable?
What an arrogant attitude is on display from the Labour Party. Labour members say that it should be up to the political parties to sort out the matter. No—it should not. The people, not the political parties, should decide whether MPs are re-elected, which is why we need an election. Let the public have their say on their members of Parliament; let them decide whether members are fit to be re-elected to the House of Commons. That is how we will restore confidence in our democracy, not through some stitch-up by political parties.
The second reason why we need a general election is that the Labour Government in London has run its course. It is out of ideas, has lost its way and no longer has anything to offer the country. The Government has presided over the worst economic recession since the second world war at least. It has mismanaged the public finances to the extent—as Derek Brownlee reminded us—that every child who is born in Britain today is saddled with £22,000-worth of debts. Believe me, Presiding Officer—the welfare of newborn babies is of great interest to Conservative members at present. All the debts will have to be repaid. What a cheek it was for Iain Gray to lecture us on lost generations when he is saddling future generations with such a debt burden.
Throughout the debate, we have heard from Labour members the repeated mantra about Tory cuts. Have they forgotten already this week's Finance Committee report, which refers to evidence from the Centre for Public Policy for Regions that, under Labour's spending plans, this Parliament's budget will be cut by 13 per cent in real terms—£4 billion in real terms—by 2014? That committee's report was agreed to unanimously, including by the three Labour members: Jackie Baillie, James Kelly and David Whitton. Each of them signed up to that report, which undermines the attack that has been made by their front-bench spokespersons. Therefore, let us hear no more about Tory cuts. Labour cuts are coming down the line and we will all suffer their consequences.
I will give way to the guilty man.
Murdo Fraser names me the guilty man, but he is the guilty man if he thinks that we are returning to "the glory days".
If Murdo Fraser reads the Finance Committee's report properly, he will realise that the Scottish Government's budget will still increase over the next two years.
I am surprised that David Whitton is so quickly trying to distance himself from a report that he signed up to. The facts are clear: cuts are coming—Labour cuts—that are far worse than any cuts the Tory party would impose.
I accept that some people, perhaps even some members of this Parliament, will believe that the Labour Government deserves to be re-elected. I think that they are wrong and that they represent a dwindling section of the population, but I would ask even them why they do not put that belief to the test. In a democracy, the people should decide whether a Government continues in office. That is why it is time we had a general election to allow the people their say.
I agree with Mike Russell that we have seen an appalling attitude from Labour members today. They have argued that we cannot have an election because it would be too confusing and too distracting, or that the people might reach the wrong decision. Like Mike Russell, I remember Bertolt Brecht's satire on the East German communist Government—there are so many parallels with that today—in which he wrote that the people had lost the Government's confidence and would have to work very hard to regain it.
I thank Murdo Fraser not only for taking my intervention but for exposing the fact that a Tory-SNP alliance brought down the previous Labour Government.
Murdo Fraser has agreed with Michael Russell on a number of points. Does he agree with Michael Russell that those who pass legislation should encourage people not to pay their taxes?
I can assure Mr McMahon that I do not agree with Michael Russell on that point.
The third reason why we need a general election is that we have in Gordon Brown a Prime Minister who has lost all authority. As Chancellor of the Exchequer for 10 years, he promised us that he had delivered an economic miracle. He promised that there would be no return to boom and bust, yet he delivered both. As Prime Minister, he now has the worst personal ratings of any Prime Minister in history. Do not just take my word for it—many of the Prime Minister's senior colleagues in the Labour Party are now saying the same thing. Stephen Byers and James Purnell, and even The Guardian newspaper in its editorial, are all saying that Gordon Brown's time is up. Gordon Brown still has some friends in the Labour Party—some of them have been in evidence this morning—but they are hanging on to him only because they know that, if they change leader now, they will need to have a general election, which is the thing they fear most. Labour members know that, if a general election was held now, they would be utterly crushed.
In the European elections results on Sunday, the party of Government scored only 16 per cent across the United Kingdom, which was behind the Conservative party, which is ready to take office, and even behind the United Kingdom Independence Party. In Scotland, the Labour Party came top of the poll in just three local authority areas, whereas the Conservative party came top in four. Following the local elections down south, the Labour Party now controls not a single county council. Perhaps worst of all, the collapse of the Labour vote has allowed the election of two members of the extremist socialist British National Party as members of the European Parliament.
It is truly painful to watch the slow death of the once mighty Labour Party in Scotland. It would be the kindest thing in the world to seek to end that torture by putting the party out of its misery with a swift and painless execution. I appeal to all members—even those on the Labour benches—to have a heart. Now is the time to put Gordon Brown and the Labour Government out of its pain. Now is the time to give the country a fresh start under David Cameron and a Conservative Government. Now is the time to have a general election and allow the people to decide.
I have pleasure in supporting the motion.