First Minister’s Statement: Taking Scotland Forward
The first item of business is a statement by the First Minister on taking Scotland forward. The First Minister’s statement will be followed by a debate, so there should be no interventions or interruptions.
10:30
Presiding Officer, I will start my statement with an apology and a revelation. The apology is that I am meeting the Secretary of State for Defence in Glasgow early this afternoon, which will necessitate me leaving the chamber, perhaps before the end of the morning session. No discourtesy is intended to you, Presiding Officer, or to the many new members who will have their first opportunity to speak today.
The revelation is that, only last evening, I found out that one of the things that our excellent civil service does during the purdah period is prepare for any scenario that might arise after the election campaign. My understanding is that a majority Government was not the favoured scenario, nor was it considered to be the most likely. However, one scenario that was considered to be likely was the possibility of a Labour-Conservative coalition. I have had a totally sleepless night over that, but I am thinking that, if anyone tires of the Government and the people who are in the chamber during the next five years, they should think about what the alternative might have been.
Presiding Officer, my statement sets out the Government’s vision for the next five years. In a letter to Jackie Kennedy, John Steinbeck referred to Scotland as an “unwon cause”. That is a nice phrase. In my younger days, I imagined that all that we had to do to prove Steinbeck wrong was to become independent. However, every society is an unwon cause. The struggles for fairness, equality, tolerance and the rights of free speech and thought are never truly won. They require constant vigilance and courage. That does not mean that the cause should not be fought or that the values are not worth the fight; they are. The quality of our society is my cause.
History shows us that a truly equal, fair and kind society is built on good education, good health, and the strength and integrity of public services. It values happiness higher than money and sees that people share a bond with one another, connecting them from house to house, community to community, and across the world.
For the next five years, the Government will champion the unwon. Devolution was born for a purpose: to let Scotland find peace with herself and for our nation to become comfortable in her own skin. However, much of what was held up as a problem in need of a solution in 1999 is still a problem or a difficulty. During the past 12 years, we in the Parliament have done much good work, but not enough. The resounding vote of confidence in the Government came about because the people want more. They want real powers for real change.
The people of Scotland’s desire for their Parliament to have economic powers is not academic, nor is it a small thing. It is at the very core of our future. Elsewhere in these islands, the tolerance of the poor is being tested. Budgets are being slashed, priorities have been changed, and hope has been crushed by the braying tones of people who claim to know best. We should aspire to be different. In Scotland, the poor will not be made to pick up the bill for the rich—at least not in the areas over which we have control.
When we control our natural assets as a sovereign power, the profit from the land should go to all. Too many of our people have been ill served by the union as it currently stands. There is a better way. Scotland should have control of her destiny. What we choose to do with that control—the alliances that we forge, the bonds that we make and the interests that we share—is ours and ours alone to determine. That is what independence means.
We are not rushing the journey. Do not let our steady pace fool anyone into thinking that we are not determined. We shall keep travelling and get ever closer to home.
For that journey, it is important that we have a Scotland Bill that is worthy of the name. The Scotland Bill is too important to be left to Westminster, which is why the Parliament should convene a Scotland Bill committee so that the voice of Scotland’s Parliament can continue to be heard on the legislation. There is consensus for changes—often more consensus than we care to admit—across parties, and between the previous Scottish Parliament and the present Scottish Parliament. We should ensure that the bill incorporates those changes.
We should ensure that the Crown estate comes under the control of this Parliament, so that Scotland’s communities can share the vast offshore wealth of our nation. We shall see that we have borrowing powers appropriate to the size and ambition of this Parliament and this country—with the prize not the power, but more jobs and the chance to protect our recovery.
We should demand that corporation tax be devolved. The logic is irresistible: if Northern Ireland is capable of controlling its corporation tax rate, so is Scotland. If the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills in the United Kingdom Government says that the logic of the case is solid, who am I to argue with St Vince Cable? He is a Liberal Democrat who sees that the path to redemption out of the shame of coalition is to claim traditional liberal values—so he naturally finds himself in agreement with a Scotland that wants more powers. I am sure that, where Vince has led, the Liberal Democrat members in this chamber will enthusiastically follow.
We need control of excise duties, so that we can tackle the problems of alcohol abuse and can benefit the public purse. Many of our leading cultural figures have backed this Parliament’s call for a Scottish digital channel. In the previous Scottish Parliament, the call for a Scottish digital channel was unanimous. We need regulatory influence in broadcasting to take that forward. And, of course, our key industries would benefit from more influence over European policy. The age of benign diktat is over.
This Parliament is not a lobby group—and it should not consider itself as one—begging Westminster for what should by right be ours. This Parliament speaks for the people of Scotland, and the people’s voice should be heard.
Having a majority gives this Government more scope, certainly, but we must still act within the restricted powers of this Parliament. That does not confine our ambitions for Scotland, but it confines our ability to achieve those ambitions. That is why constitutional issues are a priority for this Government, and should be a priority for this Parliament, in the short term and the medium term. In the short term, the immediate priority is to convert the current Scotland Bill into a worthy successor to Donald Dewar’s original, so that each and every member of this Parliament can honestly say of the new bill, as he said of the first bill: “I like that!” That is why, as we promised to the Scottish electorate, our referendum on moving towards independence and full financial responsibility should be well into the second half of this parliamentary session.
Constitutional change is not an end in itself but a means to a better nation. The Scottish National Party is sometimes characterised by others as only a constitution party. In fact, we are not. Constitutional progress is only part of our ambition for our nation. My passion is not to cross some imaginary constitutional finishing line at some point in the future and think, “My goodness. The race is won.” The challenge that drives me is not the constitution, but the people. My aim is now—as it has been in the past, and as it always will be—to deliver a better society for the people of Scotland. It happens that we need full powers to do that, but the people come before the powers, the community before the constitution, and the children before the state.
Today, I want to talk about the quality of the Scotland, and the type of Scotland, to which I think that we should all aspire, and to talk about the three elements that speak to who we are and how we govern.
First, there is the economics of security. Already, within the Scottish Government, we have secured a no-compulsory-redundancy deal covering 30,000 workers in this Government and its agencies. Our commitment is to seek to extend that—first to the 160,000 workers in our national health service—before working to ensure that a policy of no compulsory redundancies spreads across the public sector. Will that be easy? No. Is it important? Without any doubt whatsoever. It is, in fact, an essential part of economic recovery. With security of employment comes the confidence to invest as individuals, and to build and to spend. The benefits of that confidence will be seen in the corner shop, in our high streets, and in our housing market. It is one crucial way in which this Government can, and will, nurture economic recovery and growth in Scotland.
Secondly, I want to talk about the concept of a social wage. A social wage is part of the pact—the promise—between politicians, public services and the people. We will deliver the social and economic circumstances that allow people to dream, to aspire and to be ambitious, but it is for the individual to realise their dreams, to reach for their hopes and to meet their ambitions.
The General Assembly of the Church of Scotland has been in session this week. When it heard from a United Kingdom Prime Minister 23 years ago, the speech that she gave sounded to this nation like fingernails being dragged across a blackboard. Margaret Thatcher’s address became notorious as the sermon on the Mound. Let us say to her political heirs and successors that there is such a thing as a Scottish society, and we intend to protect it.
We are, and should be, united in the effort to build a better nation. We are not individuals alone in a cold world, but a community that is united to protect all our people, and the steps that this Parliament has already taken—the provision of free personal care, the abolition of tuition fees, the scrapping of the tolls and the delivery of free prescriptions—are our side of the bargain. Many of those advances took place under this Government in the previous session of Parliament, but it was the Parliament that started on that road by providing for free personal care and free bus passes across Scotland under previous Administrations. It was the Parliament’s instinct to take those measures.
The next steps include the freezing of the council tax until the end of the present parliamentary session. As constituency MSPs, every one of us knows the pressure that there is on family budgets. We know that tough times force difficult decisions on homes the length and breadth of our nation. Many, many people have accepted a wage freeze. People understand that public spending must be restrained.
In return, we must stand alongside the family in Dumfries that wants to send their daughter to university; we must support the commuter in Dunfermline who travels daily across the Forth, or the family in Ayrshire who would otherwise have to choose which medicine they can afford for the family member who suffers from a chronic condition. We should remember that previously, 600,000 people in Scotland who earned less than £16,000 a year were forced to pay prescription charges. We will protect the pensioner in Inverness who lives off her savings and fears ever-rising prices and bills.
Free university education, no tolls, no tax on ill health and one bill—the council tax—that will not soar: that is the concept of the social wage. For the sacrifices that all of us are and should be making, there is a reward in the form of a society that is geared to our values. We do things differently here, not because we can but because we want to, and we should be proud of that.
For Scotland’s patients, our commitment to protecting the health budget is all about delivering the better and faster treatment that we know they seek and need. For victims in society, we will take forward the necessary reforms to improve their rights and give them their proper place at the heart of our justice system. For our unpaid carers, men and women, young and old, who give so much of their lives to look after the people they love, we will work to ensure that they are true partners in the delivery of care and that their very special role is fully recognised. For jobseekers, students, pupils and parents, our commitment is clear: we will create opportunity. We will work to build the conditions here in Scotland where you and yours can flourish.
Those and others are the living embodiment of a social contract and of a new partnership between Government and the people. That is the society that we will build and protect. We guarantee that neither the market nor crazed ideology should be allowed to tear us apart. There is such a thing as society—it is ours to defend and ours to celebrate.
The third element is our fund for the future. During the election campaign, we set out plans for a Scottish futures fund—a fund that was designed to tackle head on some of the endemic problems and capital underinvestment in our society and, more than that, a fund with a core purpose to create new opportunities across Scottish society.
Some in this chamber told us to use the private finance initiative to build the new Forth bridge. If we had listened to them, there could be no Scottish futures fund. Some said that we should scrap the Scottish Futures Trust but, without its expertise and the efforts of Transport Scotland, we would not have the prospect of a £250 million saving on the cost of the Forth replacement crossing.
The Scottish futures fund will stand as a testament to good government and sound financial management. Just as the Forth replacement crossing is a bridge to jobs, growth and economic security, so the futures fund will be a bridge to a better and fairer future.
Within the £250 million fund there are five separate initiatives, each with the potential to reshape our nation. The youth talent fund will draw out and encourage the very best of talent in all parts of our country. It will help to create the next generation of sportsmen and women, and the artists, playwrights and performers who will thrill and entertain us for years to come. More than that, the fund will change for good and forever the life path of thousands of young Scots.
The warm homes fund will deliver warm homes for thousands of Scots in our most fuel-poor communities. It will provide those communities with their own renewable generation and, from that clean green energy, an income that the communities will control. It will tackle, for once, not just the symptoms of poverty but the causes. This investment will prepare our nation to meet the challenges of the future. A future transport fund will enable us to make the necessary transition to more sustainable travel. The next generation digital fund will open up Scotland to the potential of the new digital revolution. Our sure start fund has at its heart the determination to transform the life chances of thousands of newborn Scots.
Our vision is of a nation that is fair and just, and fertile for ambition and talent, where the deepest challenges we face are first acknowledged and then tackled head on. The Scottish futures fund will create the opportunity to make a difference for families and individuals in all parts of Scotland. It will be a defining initiative of this Government, and one that begins to change our nation for good.
If we invest in each other, we invest in ourselves, and we will build a secure society—a place of equality, fairness and justice. This will be our offer to the world: live here because the life is good; work here because the people are well educated and ambitious; visit here because it has a beauty that radiates from the land and the people; and invest here because it is productive and ambitious. We shall deliver collectively a better quality of society, leaving room for the individual to flourish on these solid, Scottish foundations. Crucially, we will leave no one behind.
Part of the social wage is that we should work towards a safer society. In the age of Twitter and texts, the dreams of a free-speaking world are contaminated by viral strains of bitterness. Technology has given fresh energy to old hatreds and pustulant sectarianism again seeps across our land. It must and will be stopped. I will not have people living in fear from some idiotic 17th century rivalry in the 21st century. I will not have Scotland torn apart by the memory of battles that no one alive fought in, and by confected rivalry between faiths that long ago united in the ecumenical movement. We are all children of the past, but we are capable of growing up and saying, “Not here, no more.”
Sectarianism must stop, and it will, not because it is embarrassing to our national image, although it is, nor because it is embarrassing to ourselves, although it is that too, but because it is a pointless cause pursued by the pitiless. Such hatred—of the self, of others and of our society—shall end.
Sectarianism travels hand in hand, at least in part, with another scourge of our safety and happiness—the booze culture. I think that we have confused our appetite for fun with a hunger for self-destruction. We tolerate a race to the bottom of the bottle, which ruins our health, our judgment, our relationships, our safety and our dignity. At the core of our approach is the idea that there is a dignity in being human; a duty to behave with respect to one another and to ourselves; and merit in grace and kindness that far outweighs careers and profit. Drink robs us of our personal and collective dignity. It makes infants of the wise, and victims of the young. Thus, early legislation in this session of Parliament shall address both bigotry and booze.
Across this chamber, we know that Scotland must tackle those issues, but they are not the only priorities that we must address in these first weeks and months of our new parliamentary session. Jobs and growth, the pressures on our budgets, and finding new and better ways of delivering the public services that the people of Scotland expect and deserve must also be at the forefront of our minds and actions.
This summer, the Christie commission will report on ways to reform our public services. I do not wish to prejudge that process, but let me focus on one area of reform, and on how we can create and protect jobs and deliver a stable, safe society while doing things in a new and better way. It is an area in which we have shown that it is possible to have fresh thinking and in which creativity and ingenuity mean getting more for less.
Building a better nation means investing in housing and improving the living standards of those who currently live in unacceptable conditions. A child living in an overcrowded house will not realise his or her full potential. The health of a pensioner living in a damp house will suffer. Investment in housing is essential to promote economic growth. We will therefore bring forward new proposals to improve the quality and quantity of housing in Scotland. The people of Scotland deserve to live in homes that are fit for the 21st century, and this Government is committed to that goal. It is a goal that is essential if we are to achieve our vision of a better nation for all.
Driving forward that vision is a commitment to boosting our economy. The jobs agenda will be at the heart of our programme for government. Our own actions in the public sector will do all that we can to support employment, but ultimately it is the private sector that will be the key driver of job creation in this country.
Our ability to support job creation will succeed only if our workforce has the skills and training necessary to succeed. We have tailored our support to accommodate the different requirements of individuals across the labour market spectrum, from new entrants to people returning to employment, retraining for a new career or upskilling within existing employment. That focus will continue in support of employment.
We will continue our efforts through Scottish Development International and the enterprise agencies to make Scotland an attractive place for investment. Members will have seen yesterday’s survey from Ernst and Young, which shows that this nation leads these islands in inward investment projects. What is even more important is that we lead in reinvestment: the world’s greatest companies, already having had experience of investments in this country, are reinvesting in the future of Scotland.
In recent months, we have seen welcome and valuable investments from leading global companies, including more than 3,000 jobs—permanent and seasonal—announced by Amazon this year alone. Mitsubishi Power Systems, Ryanair, Gamesa and Doosan—these investments and others have been secured. That is good news for our economy, but it is only a start.
There is a world of opportunity for Scotland’s job creators, our entrepreneurs and our businesses. Our economic strategy will position our nation to make the most of our natural and comparative advantages and to use the skills of our people and the depth of our research to create a decade of prosperity. Our ambition is a Scotland that flourishes: a Scotland that is open for business, where success is rewarded and nurtured, and where opportunities are seized quickly with both hands.
Our approach will mean a renewed focus on our growth companies, our growth sectors and our growth markets. In growth markets, we will prioritise the internationalisation of Scotland’s economy, bringing new wealth and generating the high-quality, well-paid jobs that are an essential requirement for success in the 21st century. External trade, investment and the flow of knowledge and skills are crucial to our future as a dynamic, flexible and modern economy.
A legacy of the recession has been the creation of new opportunities for Scotland, particularly in emerging markets. There are 2.5 billion people in the fast-growing economies of India and China alone. They are customers who will look to the best that Scotland can offer. Today that market is, in many ways, still untapped for Scottish companies, but in the future it can be a cornerstone of our national prosperity.
Internationalisation provides opportunities for all parts of the economy, whether it is in tourism and events, the export of specialised services in oil and gas, education, financial management or the array of manufactured products that we export from Scotland. Building on those strengths and our overseas support networks, we have set ambitious targets for export growth for the economy. To match that ambition, we will deliver greater support for growth companies—big and small—who wish to sell their goods to the world, bringing about a vibrant and growing export sector with existing exporters expanding their share and new entrants discovering new markets.
A time of challenge is also a time of opportunity. We know of our great comparative advantage in natural resources and the opportunities that exist in transforming to a low-carbon economy. In renewable energy, we have just one of many growth sectors, and through our renewable wealth we can and will reindustrialise our nation as we research, develop, export, engineer, fabricate, install and then service the new energy systems that will power this century. That is a strategy that will take the nation forward to recovery and an approach that will create wealth and jobs.
This is a Government with ambition for Scotland. It is a Government that presses for new powers and responsibilities, not for its own sake but as a means to achieve a nation of aspiration and achievement. It is a Government that seeks to work with all parties in this Parliament and all the people in this nation to create the Scotland that we all should wish to see—the nation that we all know Scotland can be.
This is a Government that wants to build the foundations for success, from this day forward, for future generations to enjoy—built on a clear Scottish vision of a fair society and a promise between politicians and the people that, together, we will make Scotland better.