First Minister’s Question Time
Engagements
1. To ask the First Minister what engagements he has planned for the rest of the day. (S4F-01735)
With your permission, Presiding Officer, it might be useful for members if I give a brief update on the severe weather disruption facing Scotland.
As members will know, we have had gusts of wind of more than 100 mph in many areas. The Scottish Government resilience operation has been in operation all day. The Minister for Transport and Veterans is in the Transport Scotland control room, where he will be until the emergency passes.
I confirm that one weather-related fatality has been reported in Scotland. There have been a number of injuries but thankfully none yet has been reported as serious. There has been significant disruption to road, rail and ferry infrastructure. Our utility companies have reported that 100,000 customers have been offline, but 15,000 reconnections have already been made, and those will continue through the day.
In light of the tragedy at the Clutha bar, we all have very good reason to pay tribute to the outstanding work of our emergency services. I reassure members that that work is on again today, as we respond to the on-going emergency of the weather conditions.
I thank the First Minister very much for that update. Our thoughts are with those families who have been sorely affected by the bad weather, but also with all the brave people of the emergency services and other agencies who are working to get Scotland safe again, so that people can move about the country.
The First Minister put childcare at the heart of his white paper on independence. Can he tell me what the final stage of his plans would cost, how many jobs would be created and what the average salary of the jobs would be if a separate Scotland was going to recoup the cost of the policy—[Interruption.] Forgive me, but I thought that the policy was a serious one. I asked what the average salary—[Interruption.] SNP back benchers are laughing, but perhaps we can get the answer to my question. How many jobs would be created and what would the average salary of those jobs be if a separate Scotland was going to recoup the cost of the policy, as the white paper says it would, in income tax?
In the first term of office with an independent Scottish Parliament, the policy would cost £700 million a year. It would require a doubling of the childcare workforce, which is an increase of 30,000 jobs. One of the great economic benefits would be in releasing more women to be available to move back into the workforce. That estimate is just short of 100,000 women, assuming that we could raise women’s participation rates in the workforce in Scotland to the same level as in Sweden.
The Swedish example was taken for a number of reasons, but it has a lot of credibility on the basis that male participation in the Scottish and in the Swedish workforce is virtually identical at present. There seems no other good reason why there should be a 6 per cent differential in female participation rates in the workforce except for Sweden’s extraordinary supported childcare arrangements, which provide the opportunity for more equality in the workforce by allowing women not only to care properly for their children, but to fully participate in the workforce and society.
Whatever that was, it was not an answer to the question that I asked. Perhaps the First Minister will want to reflect on the fact that modern women are not too impressed by men who promise the earth without providing any evidence that they are serious about doing so. On that evidence, he is not serious about the matter, so let me try and help him.
The Scottish Parliament information centre estimates the cost of the policy to be at least £1.2 billion a year, and that is without the cost of new buildings and facilities to meet increased demand. Since the First Minister has promised for months that the white paper would answer all the questions about independence, he must have worked out how many jobs would need to be created, and at what average salary, for the policy to pay for itself. Unfortunately, in 670 pages, there was enough room to explain what time zone we would be in, but not those details. Will the First Minister give Scottish families, men and women the details that they deserve to know?
Johann Lamont asked me a question about the number of jobs to be created. I pointed out that we would require 30,000 extra jobs in the childcare workforce, and the policy would release an estimated almost 100,000 people, mainly women, back into the workforce, to be available to work. By the end of the first session of Parliament, if we remember—and that is the question that I answered—around 50 per cent of two-year-olds and all three and four-year-olds would be entitled to 1,140 hours of childcare a year. That would be one of the great benefits of having the freedom of independence. That would require an investment of £600 million a year in addition to the £100 million in the first year to make the improvements that were specified.
That is an argued transformational change in childcare provision in Scotland. We have consistently pointed out the benefits in terms of increased taxation revenue from releasing that additional workforce into the community of Scotland and the range of benefits in terms of employers’ national insurance, employees’ national insurance, income tax, VAT and the range of economic expansion and that those revenues will flow into the Scottish exchequer in an independent Scotland. Under the devolution position that we have now and the one proposed by Johann Lamont, they would go into the back pocket of George Osborne. As we are finding out from the autumn statement today, when it comes to increasing Scottish expenditure, we do not want to look to the Tory chancellor in London, who looks forward to further years of austerity.
That is why the difference is opening up: by showing that that transformational policy in childcare can be afforded and can be pursued in an independent Scotland, just as it is pursued at the present moment in an independent Sweden.
First of all, the First Minister reread the answer to the question that I did not ask him. He has not yet explained how he would cost the bit beyond the first term. He simply ignored that. He then says that the policy is transformational but does not give us the figures. We need to know the figures for it to be more than simple assertion.
I have done some estimates of my own. [Interruption.] In order to be of assistance to the First Minister, of course. Let us give the First Minister the maximum benefit of the doubt. There are currently 90,000 women unemployed. Let us imagine that they all get jobs because of the policy, even the ones without children. To give the First Minister the biggest possible tax base to draw from, let us say that the 35,000 jobs that he says will be created in childcare do not go to any of those women but all go to unemployed men. That is 125,000 people off the dole, saving at the most £370 million in jobseekers allowance. Those people need collectively to pay £830 million in income tax for the policy to pay for itself as the much-vaunted—[Interruption.]
Order.
I am only quoting what the white paper says. It is supposed to be the bible. It is the white paper that says it, and presumably the First Minister will rest on the figures in the white paper.
Does that not mean that, on average, every single one of them would have to earn more than £42,000 a year, almost twice the average wage, for an independent Scotland to recoup the money?
No, because the calculation of additional income to Government is about a calculation of the increase in output that is generated by that increase in the labour force. That increase in output goes across the economy; it benefits lots and lots of people. If we have more people in employment, spending more—[Interruption.]
Order.
—it does not just mean that they pay more tax. The people who benefit from the economic expansion also contribute more tax.
Incidentally, I would have thought that that would be recognised by the Labour Party since it has deployed this argument time after time in debates in the Westminster Parliament. Unfortunately, that instruction has not drifted its way up to Scotland. It is about the benefits of an economic expansion, as opposed to the austerity policies that we have been suffering from over recent years from both Labour and Tory Governments at Westminster.
I am surprised that Johann Lamont does not embrace that expansion and transformational change in childcare. She came to see me some months ago, but she still cannot explain how she would pay for any increase in childcare provision in Scotland. She did not have a single positive idea or suggested amendment to the budget to tell us what Labour’s plans to make any change in the provision of childcare would be.
Johann Lamont seems to suggest that it would be extremely difficult to get the proposed expansion in the number of women in the workforce but, thanks to John Swinney’s initiatives on the matter, employment among women in Scotland has increased by 3 per cent over the past year or two. Therefore, I do not think that it is overambitious to suggest that, through a transformational offer on childcare, a 6 per cent increase could be achieved, and the talent and ability that are locked away at the moment could be used for the benefit of the families concerned and of the wider Scottish economy.
I am absolutely delighted to get the debate on to the benefits of independence. Let us talk about jobs, let us talk about families and let us talk about the transformation of childcare and society.
Now we have the truth of it—this is not about men and women struggling with childcare; it is about getting on to the benefits of independence. How disgraceful it is that the First Minister is using the issue as an opportunity to argue about independence, rather than to address the needs of families across Scotland.
The First Minister says that the policy will benefit lots and lots of people. I hate to tell him that that is not good enough. His white paper is predicated not on output, but on the money that would be recouped through income tax. He has not been able to show us the figures. If he is telling us that his white paper does not tell us the truth, that will come as no surprise to us, but it might come as some surprise to the members behind him.
If the First Minister does not like my figures—and as his own figures do not appear to exist—I will give him some figures that he has not provided today. According to Scottish Government figures, if 105,000 women joined the workforce—that is more than the number of women who are currently unemployed—the tax revenues would be less than half of the most optimistic estimates of the cost of the proposed policy.
Last week, the First Minister googled his answers, but even Google cannot make those figures work. In order that we do not have to wait for a freedom of information request to get the fag packet that the policy was worked out on—crudely, to win votes for independence, not to meet the needs of families—will he now publish full costings of his flagship policy, or admit that it is a shameless attempt to con the people of Scotland, which we have all seen through?
From that line of questioning, we still do not know whether the Labour Party is for or against a transformation in childcare provision in Scotland. We do not know, because Labour has not laid out its policies and has not said how it will pay for them. We know that the cuts commission is looking in detail at cutting free transport and free personal care and at reintroducing tuition fees, but I do not think that those options will be palatable to the people of Scotland.
I will be delighted to lay down the calculations that show how an expansion in economic activity will result in a £700 million increase in Scottish revenues. Of course, that increase in Scottish revenues would occur at present, but what happens is that the vast majority of those revenues go to the Westminster Exchequer. Let us imagine for a second that Labour decided to cut everything else and to go for a transformation in childcare, and that those additional revenues were generated. Do we think that George Osborne would say, “That is fantastic. I’ll immediately return these additional revenues to Scotland. I shall help Scotland, because I think its policy on childcare should be supported”? That is not the fate that any of the no parties has in store for Scotland in the event of a no vote. We know what that fate is: it is a £4,000 million cut from the existing position in the Scottish public finances. We also know that that is supported by an all-party group—it is supported not just by the Tories, but by the Labour Party as well.
Not only do we have the prospect of a transformation in childcare and all that that means for families, women and equality in Scotland, and a policy that can result in a huge increase in jobs and economic output; we know what the alternative is—no improvements in childcare and a slashing of the Scottish budget. That is what would follow a no vote.
Secretary of State for Scotland (Meetings)
2. To ask the First Minister when he will next meet the Secretary of State for Scotland. (S4F-01734)
I have no plans to do so in the near future, but if it is helpful, I make it clear that I will, at any future meeting, protect the Secretary of State for Scotland from the Deputy First Minister’s debating skills.
We ask nurses to work long hours in physically and emotionally demanding jobs, and they do so with a huge amount of professionalism and care, but we also need to care for them. In 2006, the Royal College of Nursing Scotland reported that one in five nurses had suffered bullying at work in the previous year. At the time, the RCN said that such treatment was unacceptable and added:
“We can’t expect nurses to put up with this at work”.
The RCN report that is out today shows that the number of nurses who have been bullied in the past 12 months has risen from one in five to one in three. What steps is the Scottish Government taking to help to tackle the problem?
I make it clear that the Scottish Government has a zero-tolerance approach to bullying in the workforce. A number of aspects of the RCN survey cause concern. The Cabinet Secretary for Health and Wellbeing has already written to health boards around Scotland to draw attention to the survey—in particular to the suggestion that some people have not been properly remunerated for the work that they were committed to doing. The cabinet secretary has made it clear to health boards that people must be properly remunerated.
Ruth Davidson will find that the Scottish Government and our partners throughout the health service and public services are hugely responsive to any indications that bullying or other unacceptable practices might be taking place in our public services.
I welcome the First Minister’s words and the sentiments behind them, but the facts remain that nurses say that the problems are getting worse and not better, and that one in three is bullied. That is the equivalent of nearly 28,000 nurses having faced abuse in the past 12 months in Scotland.
We appear to have a system and a culture in which bullying of nursing staff is a widespread and systemic practice in our hospitals and health centres. It is clear that we are not rooting out the bullies, that we have not changed the management culture through which bullying has been allowed to happen, and that we are not properly supporting staff who have an already difficult job that is being made much harder by the abuse that they experience from their managers or colleagues.
Our nurses have consistently been failed and we must act now to make that better. Bullying in any form is unacceptable. I want to do something about it and I know that the First Minister does, too. Will he meet me, the other party leaders and nursing representatives to draw up an action plan to help to right this wrong?
As I said, we are sensitive and responsive to any indications that management practices are not what they should be in the health service. I can arrange a meeting with Ruth Davidson and the other party leaders to develop that argument.
I will say two things to Ruth Davidson. She should look at how the nursing workforce planning tools, which concern the workforce’s direction, have been welcomed by the RCN. The tools will be an important aspect of planning for national health service staff. She will know that we have more qualified nurses and more staff in the health service than we had in 2007, but she should appreciate the RCN’s welcome for that initiative.
Ruth Davidson makes important points, but she should also remember that guarantees have been given to our public services in Scotland that have provided a great deal of reassurance, such as the guarantee of no compulsory redundancies. I mention that because she might be aware that the national health service in England has made a total of 8,702 compulsory redundancies since July 2011.
I accept Ruth Davidson’s point that we must be vigilant, and we will operate on a cross-party basis to eradicate any unacceptable management practices in the national health service, but I hope that she will be generous enough to concede that, given the workforce planning tools, which the RCN hugely welcomed, and the no compulsory redundancies policy, aspects of the public service workforce situation in Scotland are incomparably better than what is happening elsewhere in these islands.
John Lamont has a constituency question.
The First Minister is aware of the dreadful weather conditions that are affecting many parts of Scotland, including the Scottish Borders. Many schools in the Borders had to close this morning because of a loss of power. Will he assure me that the Government will do everything possible to ensure that the local council is given all the support that it needs to get schools reconnected to power supplies as quickly as possible?
I tried to give a brief update earlier. The number of school closures is 195, of which seven are in the Scottish Borders. That was at 10.45, but—as John Lamont will appreciate—the situation is evolving.
The Minister for Transport and Veterans and the resilience room are in full operation. John Lamont will find that our public services are working very hard indeed to inform the public of the likely consequences of the disruption, including school closures as well as disruption to travel and the electricity supply, and to restore supplies as quickly as possible.
I will arrange for information to be lodged in the Parliament so that any member can see what the situation is in their area of Scotland.
Is the First Minister aware that funding for NHS Grampian falls short by £35 million a year of what it should be under the Government’s own funding formula? Does he agree with the chief executive of NHS Grampian, who told the health board this week that trying to run health services without proper funding is like running a race against Usain Bolt and having to give him a four-yard start? Will the First Minister help Grampian to catch up by setting a firm timetable for full implementation of the Government’s own funding formula in the very near future?
Lewis Macdonald will know that we have taken a policy decision to bring the boards that are under parity towards parity, and to try to do so in a way that does not cut services elsewhere. He should also be aware that this week I visited the new health village in Grampian, which is the first of the hub initiatives. It will have 500-600 staff working in combined service delivery, and from 10 December it will be seeing many patients. Lewis Macdonald should welcome that initiative, which is the first of its kind in Scotland and one of many that are being rolled out.
Lewis Macdonald should also be aware that I monitor very closely—he will understand this, as another local member—the statistics on waiting times in the emergency centre in Grampian, and I can tell him that spectacular new investment has been one of the reasons, along with the commitment of our national health service staff, for the very good performance in meeting targets on throughput of patients. That indicates, along with the new facilities that are being put in place and the commitment of our staff, that we can still make substantial improvements in our health service, which I am sure all members will welcome.
Barnett Formula
3. To ask the First Minister what recent conversations the Scottish Government has had with the UK Government regarding the Barnett formula. (S4F-01746)
I have written to the Prime Minister to seek clarity on the proposed Westminster plan for a £4 billion budget cut in Scotland in the event of a no vote. Although the Prime Minister has not yet provided any answers on the future of the Barnett formula, we know that those Westminster calls for spending to be cut in Scotland by as much as £4 billion would be equivalent to an extra £1,600 for every income tax payer in Scotland.
We also know that, in every one of the last 32 years, Scotland has contributed more in tax per head than the United Kingdom and that, in the five years to 2011-12, the relative surplus was £12.6 billion. It seems extraordinary, in the face of those figures on income, that Westminster parties together in an all-party committee are proposing to follow the Holtham commission’s suggestion of a £4 billion cut in Scottish expenditure.
It is very important that the Prime Minister answer that letter and reveal the intentions of his Government, if there is a no vote in Scotland next year.
As well as a £4 billion cut, we know from the Chancellor of the Exchequer’s autumn statement—[Interruption.] I hear Duncan McNeil. We know that Westminster has its sights set on Scotland’s pensioners, Duncan, with plans to raise the retirement age.
Does the First Minister agree that under those Westminster plans, people in Scotland will enjoy fewer years of retirement than pensioners in almost every other part of Europe? Does he agree that that is yet another reason for Scotland to vote yes in next year’s referendum?
When Bruce Crawford was making those excellent points, I heard some indication of disquiet from the Labour Party back benches. There should be disquiet—an all-party committee has proposed that the Holtham proposals on Scottish spending be followed in the event of a no vote.
We know what the Holtham proposals are. In an article in the Financial Times headed “Scotland is taking more than its share of funds”, members of the Holtham commission estimated that the proposals would cut Scotland’s spending by £4 billion a year. I have indicated what that would mean in terms of an income tax rise for every tax payer in Scotland, but perhaps members would like to reflect on the fact that the dramatic cuts to the Scottish budget that we have seen over the period of austerity amount to just over £3 billion a year in real terms. What Labour MSPs’ colleagues in Westminster have in mind for Scotland following a no vote is a cut that would be even greater than the austerity that we have seen from Labour and Tory Governments over the past few years. There is disquiet on the Labour benches; there will be more disquiet around Scotland as those facts percolate through into the debate.
Can the First Minister tell us why the report of an obscure Westminster committee has become the lead debating point in favour of independence from him and his party colleagues this week? Is it because his substantive economic and financial arguments in favour of independence have fallen apart within days, so that his “project wish” of last week has become “project scare” today?
The lead debating point in the case for independence is to explain how, with the transformation of childcare provision in this country, independence means jobs and new prosperity for Scotland.
I will tell Malcolm Chisholm why I take the issue seriously: it is because I met George Osborne when he was shadow chancellor to ask him what his intentions were with regard to the Barnett formula, and he told me that it was his intention to scrap it. Alistair Carmichael says that the Barnett formula will be in place until the period of austerity is over, but George Osborne has just told us that the economy has stabilised. That is why it is legitimate to point out the consequences of a no vote in Scotland.
Our argument is that we want access to Scottish revenue because although at the last count we received 9.3 per cent of spending, we had generated 9.9 per cent of the revenue of the UK. The no campaign and Malcolm Chisholm’s colleagues at Westminster want to cut Scottish spending but keep Westminster access to Scottish revenue. I will make available to the Scottish Parliament information centre a range of quotations from his colleagues and others who are heading in that direction. That argument’s coming through, along with the argument about the transformation in society that will be possible through having access to Scottish resources, will be followed by a yes vote next year.
Land Ownership (Devolution of Powers)
4. To ask the First Minister which powers over land ownership could be devolved to the Scottish Parliament to strengthen Scottish land reform. (S4F-01736)
The land reform agenda is part of building a more equal society. We are committed to taking forward proposals on land reform that contribute to the success of Scotland for future generations. Earlier this year, I announced a target to have 1 million acres of land in community ownership by 2020. I will not pre-empt the findings of the land reform review group, which is charged with producing proposals on land reform, but it is fair to say that decisions about the ownership, leasing and development of land are very much tied to policies on taxation.
I thank the First Minister for that answer with regard to taxation. Does he agree that Westminster’s Scottish Affairs Committee, which is inquiring into land reform and which met in Inverness this week, must focus on ways to end the United Kingdom tax system’s lenient treatment of landowners who use allowances for inheritance and capital gains tax; the vesting of companies whose beneficial owners are concealed; the registration of such entities in offshore tax havens such as Grand Cayman; and the offsetting of estate management losses against landowners’ non-landed business interests? Does he agree that the fact that powers over those issues are reserved hinders an effective approach by the Parliament to land reform in Scotland?
That is why we set out in the white paper that we would want a simple and transparent tax system after independence that is designed to minimise the opportunities for tax avoidance. The member will be aware of other important reserved powers. He will remember the attempted land grab by the Ministry of Defence at Cape Wrath, in his constituency, which was contrary to the wishes of the local community. I can assure him that, with the powers of independence, including powers over all public land that is owned by the Crown Estate and the Ministry of Defence, such a situation would not be allowed to happen.
I hope and believe that people in the chamber will celebrate the fact that, as part of the target to have 1 million acres of land in community ownership—although this does not make a huge contribution in number to the target it is nonetheless hugely important for communities and symbolically—we will shortly have a situation where the Mull of Galloway lighthouse on the south-west tip of Scotland and Cape Wrath in the far north of mainland Scotland are in community ownership. I think that most people in Scotland will think that that is hugely symbolically important and hugely important to those communities and that it points to the way forward and the benefits of having 1 million acres of land in community ownership by 2020.
“Coping with the cuts? Local government and poorer communities”
5. To ask the First Minister what the Scottish Government’s response is to the Joseph Rowntree Foundation report “Coping with the cuts? Local government and poorer communities”. (S4F-01739)
At a time when the Scottish Government’s budget has been cut by over 10 per cent in real terms for the 2010 to 2016 period as a result of the austerity agendas of the Westminster parties, the Scottish Government works very closely with our local government partners to protect communities from the worst of the cuts. As the Joseph Rowntree Foundation report makes clear, Scottish local authorities have fared substantially better than their English counterparts. Over the four-year period from 2012 to 2016, local government’s revenue funding and capital share will be maintained on a like-for-like basis, with extra moneys available for new duties. Although the Joseph Rowntree Foundation report recognises the protection that we have provided to council budgets in Scotland, it is disappointing that the analysis fails to recognise that the level of funding for individual local authorities in Scotland is determined by the needs-based funding formula agreed by the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities, which is largely driven by population and, importantly, by pupil numbers.
We can agree that local government is one of the foremost casualties of austerity in the United Kingdom. However, given that local government has borne the brunt of the Scottish Government’s cut when the costs of providing those services have risen by 10 per cent since 2007—with big social care and welfare challenges yet to come—and given the loss of £1 billion from Scottish Government spending on anti-poverty programmes, does the First Minister accept that it is vital that next week’s local government finance statement is underpinned by principles of fairness and social justice if the most vulnerable in our communities are not to be subjected to not just austerity but austerity plus?
Yes, which would seem a good reason for Scotland never again being subjected to a Government like the present one at Westminster.
I take issue with how Sarah Boyack described the situation. I have here the figures for local government spending and departmental expenditure limit as a share of the overall Scottish block. That has increased from 34.7 per cent in 2006-07 to 36.4 per cent on a like-for-like basis, so what Sarah Boyack said is simply not true. On the contrary, as the Joseph Rowntree Foundation report indicates, Scottish local authorities have not just fared better than their English counterparts but have a rising part of Scottish spending, on a like-for-like basis. It is simply incorrect for Sarah Boyack to try to assert that local government has borne the burden of cuts. On the contrary, the percentage of local government spending in our total budget has risen since 2006-07.
I do not accept the argument that this Government is not acting to mitigate the impact of austerity and poverty. For example, from 2013-14 to 2015-16, there will be spending of £244 million to mitigate the impact of Westminster’s welfare reform.
Perhaps Sarah Boyack and I will at some stage come to an agreement that, instead of having to take action to mitigate the worst of Westminster spending cuts, we should have charge of the resources of this nation and be in a position where we can plan out a new future for the country.
The First Minister explained earlier to the Opposition benches the reality of the £4 billion cut that is coming down the line from Westminster. Will he take this opportunity to explain to the Opposition the potential impact of that on this Parliament’s efforts to tackle poverty?
We have seen the extraordinary results of the austerity programme already. A continuation of that austerity will cause a great deal of misery across Scottish society. Through our action on the Scottish welfare fund, supporting charities to provide advice services to those suffering from benefits cuts, introducing the council tax reduction scheme, in partnership with our local authorities, to protect the people on council tax benefit from the impact of austerity, and indeed the commitment to mitigate the bedroom tax this year and next year, the Scottish Government has done everything within its powers to try and take the edge off these harsh policies from Westminster.
Of course, the result of these Westminster policies will be to make Scotland a more unequal society, and that is exactly why we have to take charge of the resources and spending of this country to move policy in an opposite and much better direction.