Engagements
I know that I speak for all parties when I say that the thoughts and prayers of everyone in the chamber are with the family of Bailey Gwynne, who was stabbed and killed at a school in Aberdeen yesterday. We offer our full support to his parents, and to pupils and staff at this tragic time.
To ask the First Minister what engagements she has planned for the rest of the day. (S4F-03015)
I begin by expressing my shock and sadness at the incident that occurred yesterday at Cults academy in Aberdeen. I also convey my deepest sympathy and condolences to the family and friends of Bailey Gwynne who tragically died in the incident. The circumstances of the young man’s death are subject to on-going and thorough police investigation. I am sure that the whole Parliament will want all those who loved Bailey and, indeed, all those at the school who have been affected by the tragedy, to know that our thoughts are very much with them at this desperately sad time.
Later today, I have engagements to take forward the Government’s programme for Scotland.
I appreciate that statement from the First Minister and know that she will be as shocked as everyone is by the incident.
I have four questions to ask and will use most of them to hold the Government to account in the normal way. However, I would like to use my first question to ask about the death of Bailey Gwynne. We do not know all the details of the case yet. Countless families across the country will feel pain and sorrow today: it is every parent’s worst nightmare—that they send their child off to school in the morning, only for them never to return home. Will the First Minister reassure parents across the country that everything that can be done is being done to keep our children safe?
Yes. Of course, I can and should give that assurance. Parliament may want to know that I have, this morning, spoken to the leader of Aberdeen City Council to offer our sympathies and condolences and to convey directly to her that any support and assistance that the council or the school needs from the Scottish Government in the days, weeks and months ahead will be forthcoming.
Such incidents are deeply shocking and deeply tragic. The impact on the lives of those who knew and loved Bailey Gwynne is impossible for any of us to imagine. Notwithstanding that, it is important to remember, and to remind ourselves, that tragic incidents such as this are, thankfully, extremely rare in our schools. That does not, of course, take away at all from the tragedy of this incident.
The Scottish Government will, in the fullness of time, ensure that any lessons that require to be learned from the incident are learned. I give the assurance that we will continue to take all steps to ensure, as far as any Government possibly can, the safety of our young people in our schools, but it is worth remembering that violent incidents—incidents involving young people possessing knives and dangerous weapons—are on the decline. That is no reason for complacency because—as the tragic events of the past 24 hours have reminded us—one such incident is one too many. I am sure that we are united today in our determination to ensure that no young person ever has to go through this again.
I thank the First Minister for that very welcome and full reply.
I turn to student finance. Figures that have been published this week by the Student Awards Agency for Scotland show that, under the Scottish National Party Government, the average student bursary or grant has been cut by almost 30 per cent, and that it is the poorest students who are suffering. Students from deprived backgrounds are being forced to take on an even greater debt burden. Students who have the potential to get on in life and to do great things are being held back because their parents do not have a lot of money. The gap between the richest and the rest has grown on the Scottish National Party’s watch.
I know that the First Minister will talk about tuition fees in answer to my next question—it is her standard response whenever we talk about student debt and grants—but I would like her to answer this question very specifically. Can she tell us the total value of student debt in Scotland?
I am not going to talk about tuition fees; I am going to talk about student support, because that is what Kezia Dugdale has asked me about, and it is an important question.
Our students have
“the best support package in the whole of the UK”.
Those are not my words; they are the words of the National Union of Students Scotland. The number of students who are receiving support is higher than ever before, and the average support that is being provided is higher than it has ever been. When we look at the average student loan debt, we find that the figure for Scotland is significantly lower than the figure for any other part of the United Kingdom. In England, the figure is £21,180, in Wales it is £19,010, in Northern Ireland it is £18,160 and in Scotland it is £9,440. That is the reality.
Kezia Dugdale may or may not be aware that the Scottish Government has also taken the step of increasing the bursary element of the student support package in the current academic year. In the next academic year, we will raise the income threshold for eligibility for the maximum bursary. Those changes were described by NUS Scotland in the following terms:
“great news for Scottish students ... the Scottish Government is to be congratulated for doing more to tackle student poverty.”
That is what the Scottish Government is doing, and we will continue to take action to ensure that all those who want to go into further or higher education can do so regardless of their background or circumstances.
There was a lot of gloss in that answer, but the reality is that support for the poorest students in Scotland is the worst in all the four nations of the United Kingdom. I asked the First Minister specifically about student debt. I think that, on this occasion, she knew the answer but was too ashamed to say it out loud. The value of student debt in Scotland stands at £2.7 billion—or, as Alex Salmond might put it, £2,700 million. The value of student debt in Scotland is more than the combined cost of the new Forth replacement crossing and the Queen Elizabeth university hospital in Glasgow. In fact, the value of the accumulated debt of students in Scotland is now the Government’s single biggest financial asset.
The student debt monster that the SNP once promised to dump is now a debt mountain. Did the First Minister have any intention of keeping that promise?
Kezia Dugdale cannot escape the fact that the average student loan debt is significantly lower in Scotland than it is anywhere else in the UK, or the fact that Scotland-domiciled students—here I will talk about tuition fees—do not have to pay the fees of up to £27,000 that are charged for tuition elsewhere in the UK. That is a real saving that does not become a debt in Scotland, as it does in other parts of the UK. Currently, if the least well-off students in England and Scotland took up the maximum amount of student loan that is available to them during the term of their degree, the English students would accumulate about £12,000 more in debt than the Scottish students. That is the reality.
We have the best student support package in the UK, and the average student debt is less in Scotland than it is in any other part of the UK. We are also taking steps to increase the bursary element of the total student support package, which stands in sharp contrast to what the UK Government is currently doing. Not content with imposing tuition fees, the Chancellor of the Exchequer announced in his budget speech that the UK Government is going to abolish bursaries altogether and move entirely to loan funding. That is something that the Scottish Government will not do.
That is all from a First Minister who told students that their debt would be zero. We were told by the First Minister to judge her on her record. So here it is. The reality is that, today, it is easier to be poor and get to university in England, even under the Tories, than it is to do so in Scotland under the SNP. [Interruption.] I heard cries of “Shameful.” Yes, that is shameful.
The First Minister promised to abolish student debt; instead, it has increased. She promised to expand grants; instead, they have been cut. Is not it the case that, despite all the promises and all the moments of self-congratulation, the SNP Government is letting down Scotland’s poorest students?
As I think I said in both my previous answers, in this academic year we have increased the bursary element of the student support package. [Interruption.]
Order.
It was that which led NUS Scotland to say that the Scottish Government should be
“congratulated for doing more to tackle student poverty.”
Since 2006, there has been a 50 per cent increase in applications to universities from the 20 per cent most deprived areas in our country. Young people are more likely to participate in higher education by the time they are 30 than was the case in 2006.
On the specific issue of student debt, let me repeat some of the figures, because those are the figures that matter to people and students across Scotland. In Scotland, the average student loan debt is £9,440; in England, it is £21,180. In Wales, which was being governed by a Labour Administration the last time I looked, the average student loan debt is £19,010—almost double the figure in Scotland.
Everybody knows that we live in tough financial times, and tough choices always have to be made, but we will continue to ensure that we provide good support for our students so that more of our students from the most deprived parts of our country can take the opportunity to go to university. We will continue to get on with the job and we will, as usual, leave Labour to moan and whinge about it, regardless of what we do, from the sidelines.
Prime Minister (Meetings)
I add my and my party’s condolences to those that have already been expressed by the First Minister and the whole Parliament to the family and loved ones of Bailey Gwynne. Our thoughts and prayers are with all those who have been affected by that terrible tragedy.
To ask the First Minister when she will next meet the Prime Minister. (S4F-03019)
I have no plans to do so in the immediate future.
We have just heard a series of quite serious exchanges regarding funding and access to universities, but I did not hear in any of those exchanges a credible alternative plan for how we will fund bursaries for poorer students and ensure the wider access that we all say that we want. So here is one. Under our plans, we would ask all graduates who have enjoyed their university education to pay back a contribution once they get a decent job. [Interruption.]
Order.
That money could then be used to help to increase bursaries for poorer students who, under the current scheme, cannot even get a foot through the door. That plan is sensible and moderate and would help those who are most in need. What reason, other than an ideological one, would the First Minister have for not considering that plan?
I give credit to Ruth Davidson. She is putting forward her policy, which is to support the introduction of tuition fees, and she is absolutely entitled to put that before the Scottish people at the election in a few months’ time to allow them to cast their verdict on it. However, we have an honest disagreement. I believe in free education. I benefited from that as a young person and I believe that I have no right to take it away from any other young person today. We will have that debate in the months to come.
Students who graduate and benefit from a university education pay that back through taxation. I believe that that is what should happen—not that we should have tuition fees, a graduate tax or whatever terminology Ruth Davidson wants to use.
We will continue to take the steps that I outlined in detail to Kezia Dugdale to support students from the poorest backgrounds to go to university.
I have already said, so I will not repeat myself at length, that we have increased the bursary element of the student support package and I have cited the figures that show the lower levels of student loan debt in Scotland. Ruth Davidson will be aware that, right now, the work of the commission on widening access is under way, and the commission will advise the Government on what additional steps we need to take to support poorer students to get into university. We will continue to do that hard and serious work and we will have the honest debate about the funding options that Ruth Davidson talks about as we approach the election next year.
I thank the First Minister for confirming that her position is based on an ideological point of view and that the SNP has written so-called free education on a tablet of stone. It is sad that this First Minister is too stubborn to recognise the need for change, because change is needed.
The facts are these: only one in 10 of our poorest 18-year-olds are getting to university, and someone who is rich is three-and-a-half times more likely to go to university. She talked about her situation growing up. Mine was similar. I was also on a full grant of student support when I went to university, which is what helped me to get there. For all the talk of widening access commissions, this Scottish National Party Government has singularly failed in more than eight years of office to close the gap between rich and poor in respect of access to university.
We have a solution, and it works. All that we ask is that the First Minister has the courage to ditch the stone carvings and the vanity projects and move to practical solutions for our poorest students. Will she?
Ruth Davidson calls it “ideological”; I call it “principle”. It will be for the people of Scotland to make up their minds. Ruth Davidson will put forward her policy at the election and I will put forward mine, and I am happy to allow the Scottish people to be the judge.
In the meantime, we will continue the hard work to ensure that everyone has an equal chance of going to university. That is why we established the widening access commission. As I said, since 2006, there has been a 50 per cent increase in applications to university from those in the most deprived parts of our country.
I will take no lectures from a representative of a party that, right now, is in effect raising the tax rate for the poorest people in our community by up to 90 per cent as a result of working tax credit cuts. Ruth Davidson might be better advised to wonder about the effect of those cuts on those in the poorest parts of our community.
We have a constituency question from Liam McArthur.
The First Minister will be aware of the disappointing news this week that wave developer Aquamarine Power has called in administrators. These are worrying times for the staff employed at a company that has achieved a great deal in taking forward the development of wave energy in this country, including at the European Marine Energy Centre in my Orkney constituency.
Can the First Minister offer an assurance that her Government and its agencies are doing everything in their power to support the company and its staff in securing a positive outcome and an early exit from administration? Will she agree to lend weight to the efforts of her energy minister by getting personally involved in discussions with stakeholders about how we secure the future success not just of the wave energy sector but of wider marine energy development in Scotland?
I am happy to give those assurances. Obviously, the news that Aquamarine Power has entered administration was disappointing. We very much hope that a buyer can be found for what has been and is a leading Scottish wave energy firm.
I was pleased to note that the administrators will continue to trade the company while they seek a buyer and that all 14 staff are being retained.
The Scottish Government remains absolutely committed to the marine energy sector and to doing everything that we can to help to secure a buyer for Aquamarine Power.
It is also important to point out that, as I am sure Liam McArthur would acknowledge, we recently took steps to strengthen our commitment to the sector by establishing the wave energy Scotland initiative, which is the biggest wave technology development programme of its kind. We did that precisely because we recognise the challenges that the industry faces just now, specifically the lack of private backers.
We will continue to back the industry and the sector and I assure the chamber that we will do everything that we can to back the people who work in this particular company at what I know will be a difficult and challenging time for them.
Cabinet (Meetings)
I am sure that we all appreciate the way that the community in Aberdeen has rallied round following the horrific circumstances at Cults academy. Our thoughts are with the family and friends, and also with the wider community at this difficult time.
To ask the First Minister what issues will be discussed at the next meeting of the Cabinet. (S4F-03012)
Matters of importance to the people of Scotland.
I have just listened to exchanges between the First Minister, Ruth Davidson and Kezia Dugdale. For five years, I have been lectured by the First Minister on student finance. All the while, her Government was breaking its promise to dump the debt. [Interruption.]
Order.
It has—[Interruption.]
Order. Let us hear Mr Rennie, please.
I have—[Interruption.]
Order.
I have been lectured for five years. The debt has not been dumped; it has been doubled.
However, the question that I want to ask the First Minister is this. When will her Government publish an estimate of the potential number of refugees who could be accommodated in Scotland? That estimate would help to keep up the pressure on the Conservative Government to be compassionate to the plight of refugees by accommodating more here. When will we get that estimate?
First, I thank Willie Rennie from the very bottom of my heart for so bravely reminding the Scottish electorate, just a few months before a Scottish Parliament election, of the Liberal Democrats’ record on tuition fees. [Interruption.]
Order. [Interruption.] Order.
That was indeed a most charitable thing for him to have done.
However, on the very serious and important matter of refugees, I am happy to ask Humza Yousaf to update Willie Rennie directly on the work of the task force that I established.
In short, our position here in Scotland is as it has been from the outset. We want to, are willing to and are preparing to take a proportionate share of the number of refugees who come to the United Kingdom. Clearly, the number of refugees who are permitted to come to the UK is not within our control; it is determined by the UK Government.
The Prime Minister has said that 20,000 refugees will be admitted from the camps around Syria over the life of this Westminster Parliament. We are arguing for that number to go higher and for it to extend not just to the camps around Syria but to refugees who have already made the journey to Europe.
The task force is ensuring that everybody who needs to be involved is working together to ensure that we have plans in place to accommodate refugees. We do not yet know the precise numbers and profile out of that 20,000 figure that has been committed to already. We would expect some refugees to come to Scotland before Christmas and we are working very hard to ensure that we can accommodate them and look after them properly.
Just for completeness, on student finance, we will—[Interruption.]
Order.
We will—[Interruption.]
Order. Let us hear Mr Rennie, please.
We will take every opportunity to remind people that this Government promised that it would dump the debt but it has doubled the debt.
On refugees—[Interruption.]
Order.
It is all well and good for people to laugh about refugees, but I think that they will—[Interruption.]
Order.
We need an estimate of how many refugees Scotland could take, but Humza Yousaf said to us this week that he had prepared no such estimate after months on the job. The First Minister has said that Scotland will take its Barnett share of refugees but surely we should be more compassionate than a technical accounting rule when lives are at stake. [Interruption.] I think that members should listen to this serious subject rather than—
I think, Mr Rennie, that you should just get on with it.
Winter is coming, which will leave many refugees vulnerable. We could send a powerful message to the Conservative Government by agreeing to take more. We should act now. Does the First Minister not agree?
I do not want to overstate this, but I think that Willie Rennie should be mildly ashamed of himself about the tone of his question today.
To his credit, Willie Rennie sat round the table, as did Kezia Dugdale and Ruth Davidson, at the summit that I convened a few weeks ago. I think that we agreed there a degree of consensus about the approach that Scotland would take. I am not setting a technical Barnett share; I want Scotland to do as much as possible. However, I think that it has been an appropriate starting point to say that we would take a proportionate share of the refugees that come here. That is why we are focused on the work that would support around 2,000, which is a proportionate and reasonable share of the 20,000 refugees whom David Cameron has said will be admitted to the UK over the life of this Parliament.
However, I would like to see the Prime Minister go further than that in two ways: first, in terms of the number, and secondly, in terms of the reach of the programme. I think that that is the appropriate way to behave—to argue for a more expansive approach from the UK Government but do the hard work, which Humza Yousaf is leading just now, to ensure that we have the practical preparations in place to take that proportionate share. We will get on with that work and I really hope—this is a genuine invitation to Willie Rennie—that he will come back into the consensus rather than try to make cheap political points out of an issue that is so important.
Tax Credits
To ask the First Minister what correspondence the Scottish Government has had with the United Kingdom Government on its discredited plans to cut tax credits by April 2016. (S4F-03023)
The Deputy First Minister wrote to the Chancellor of the Exchequer in early July to set out the Scottish Government’s concerns about the UK Government’s plan to cut tax credits. On 20 July, the Scottish National Party, together with Plaid Cymru, the Liberal Democrats and the Greens, voted against the second reading of the Welfare Reform and Work Bill—the Labour Party abstained in that vote. On 23 October, the Cabinet Secretary for Social Justice, Communities and Pensioners’ Rights wrote to the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions again voicing our serious concerns about the proposed reductions. Today, again, I urge the chancellor to think again and to abandon a misguided policy that will penalise hard-working families across Scotland and the UK.
I remind members that they should keep to the question wording that is in the Business Bulletin and not add words to that.
Thank you very much. Can the First Minister offer the chancellor any advice on how he should proceed with his discredited plans to cut tax credits to working families now that he has been told to go back and think again?
I think that he should abandon those plans. I do not believe that they are right, but I also do not believe that they are necessary. George Osborne has said on a number of occasions this week that he is “in listening mode”, but if he is genuinely serious about listening he will admit that he has made a serious mistake here and reverse these damaging proposals.
The Scottish Government’s analysis of the impact of the proposed changes shows that a quarter of a million working households with tax credits could lose an average of £1,500 a year just from the changes that are to be brought in next April. In the longer term, if the full set of cuts is implemented, low-income households with children could lose on average around £3,000 a year. I think that those changes would be unconscionable and I hope very much that the chancellor will use his autumn statement and the comprehensive spending review to say that he is not proceeding with them.
Nurse and Midwife Training Places
To ask the First Minister whether a reduction in the number of training places for nurses and midwives has contributed to the rise in agency nursing costs as highlighted by Audit Scotland. (S4F-03016)
Under this Government, the number of qualified nurses and midwives working in our national health service has gone up by over 2,200, which is an increase of over 5 per cent and it takes the number of qualified nurses and midwives in our NHS to historically high levels.
On the question of agency nurses, when we took office there were 728.2 whole-time equivalent agency nurses working in NHS Scotland; in 2014-15, that had been reduced to just 191 whole-time equivalent nurses, which is a reduction of 73.8 per cent in agency nursing under this Government.
The First Minister says that, after eight years, we should judge the Scottish National Party on its record. [Interruption.]
Order.
Audit Scotland last week passed judgment on the First Minister’s record. She herself took the decision to cut training places when she was health secretary. Scotland’s nurses have told us the consequences: agency spend quadrupled from £3.9 million to £16 million. That mismanagement led her to the damning report card that she was given last week. After eight years in government and her failure to address previous warnings, does she now agree with Audit Scotland that we need fundamental change in how we deliver and staff our health service?
Of course, it is this Government that is coming forward with those change proposals. From the transformation in primary care through to the expansion of elective treatment centres, this is a Government that is getting on with the job.
Let me turn to nurses and nurses in training. The number of nurses in training has, on average, been 1,000 a year higher under this Administration than was the case under the Labour-Liberal Administration, and there are 2,200 more qualified nurses working in our national health service today than when we took office. Vacancy rates are broadly the same—they were 3.6 per cent when we took office and are 3.7 per cent now—and agency spend is lower now than when we took office. Jenny Marra has cited the figure of £16 million, but it is worth pointing out to the chamber that that is 13 per cent lower than the £18 million it was when we inherited the position from the last Labour Government.
In common with health systems across the developed world, our NHS faces challenges and pressures, mainly from our country’s changing demographics; indeed, we see more evidence of that in the registrar general’s report this morning. However, we will continue to make sure that our NHS and all who work in it are supported to face up to those challenges, so that it can continue to do the excellent job that it already does.
Living Wage
First of all, I associate the Green and Independent group with all the comments that have been made regarding the tragic events at Cults academy.
To ask the First Minister what proportion of the labour force has a secure job that pays at least the living wage. (S4F-03020)
The latest figures show that more than 80 per cent of employees in Scotland are paid at least the living wage, which represents a higher proportion of the workforce than is the case anywhere else in the United Kingdom outside of London and the south-east of England. There are now more than 370 Scottish-based living wage-accredited employers, with workers from a variety of sectors across Scotland benefiting from the progress that is being made. However, although that is good progress, there is no room for complacency. We want the living wage to be extended even further. Of course, next week is living wage week. As part of that, my ministers and I will be promoting the living wage at events throughout the country, and I encourage MSPs from across the chamber to do likewise.
I am pleased to welcome the increasing emphasis across society on the quality of employment rather than the overall job numbers in our economy, and the fair work convention and the business pledge as well as the New Economics Foundation’s recent report citing job quality as one of the national indicators of success are good steps that add momentum to that agenda. However, business support services and grants are still being provided by the Scottish Government that are mostly contingent on headline job numbers and which do not place the same emphasis on job quality. Is it not time to start putting every bit as much emphasis on job quality when we decide on eligibility for Government support services and grants that have been paid for by the taxpayer?
Patrick Harvie makes a fair point. Through the fair work convention and the approach that we are taking through the business pledge, we will, of course, continue to consider such issues. I do think that, for people out there across the country, job numbers matter, but Mr Harvie is absolutely right to say that the quality of work matters, too. We want to see more full-time work for people who want it instead of people being in jobs in which they are working fewer hours than they would like to, and we want to ensure that people in jobs are paid a decent living wage, have good working conditions and are respected and well rewarded in those jobs. That is the whole focus of the business pledge and the fair work convention.
Crucially—and this, I think, gets to the heart of why we are seeking to develop a partnership approach to business on this—my message to business is that it should do all these things not because Government says so but because it is good for business as well as for our society. I think that we are making headway on that argument in Scotland, and I hope that we have the chamber’s support to push even further ahead on it.
That ends First Minister’s questions.
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