Chamber and committees

I am pleased to support the Government’s amendment, and I welcome the range of anti-poverty measures that it highlights.

As the head of education services at Glasgow City Council, Gerry Lyons, told the Education, Children and Young People Committee on 4 May, the Scottish Government’s focus on poverty did not start with the attainment challenge, but it allows even greater focus to be put on that policy priority.

Over this parliamentary session, the challenge will be supported by £1 billion of investment, which is an increase of £250 million from the previous parliamentary session. The refresh that was announced by the cabinet secretary included that increase in investment. It also included a change in the challenge’s mission to acknowledge that poverty cannot and should not be tackled only during school hours. Increases in the school uniform grant, the expansion of free school meals and the Scottish child payment are all policies that link into the work of the attainment challenge.

The challenge refresh also includes a change to the distribution of funding. As Emma Congreve of the Fraser of Allander Institute told the committee,

“It is incredibly difficult for a diverse country with different needs in different parts of the country to agree on what the best approach is.”—[Official Report, Education, Children and Young People Committee, 9 February 2022; c 10.]

The decision to use a funding model based on the data on children in low-income families will deliver challenge funding to every local authority in Scotland, including the nine original challenge authorities. That move was welcomed by COSLA and council leaders across the country. The cabinet secretary has also delivered a tapered reduction in the year-on-year funding to the nine authorities that already receive it, to enable them to manage their resources.

As Ruth Binks, director of education in Inverclyde Council told the committee, the local authorities that are in receipt of challenge funding knew that the funding was not guaranteed year on year and were regularly challenged on their exit strategy. She said,

“There is poverty throughout Scotland ... so revision to the original funding model was merited”,

and she went on to say,

“I think that it was a fair thing to do.”—[Official Report, Education, Children and Young People Committee, 4 May 2022; c 7, 8.]

The committee heard from headteachers from the West Partnership that any cut requires to be looked at, of course, but they accepted the situation in order for funding to be fairly distributed across all local authorities.

I welcome the opportunity that Labour has given the Parliament to reflect on the many ways in which the Scottish Government is delivering funding to reduce the attainment gap the length and breadth of Scotland. I thank colleagues in my party for mentioning some of them; I will not go over them again.

The Government is clearly serious about reducing the attainment gap. I am shocked that Labour endlessly chooses to align itself with the Tories in attacking the Government when it is taking sustained, meaningful action on a hugely important issue. [Interruption.] I am about to finish.

The Education, Children and Young People Committee has taken extensive evidence from teachers and school leaders, and I pay tribute to all those people, who have worked incredibly hard. Indeed, quite a few of them put on the record the support that the Scottish Government has provided to enable them to do their jobs.

When Opposition members try to do down education, they do our children and educators a disservice—

Andrea Bradley of the EIS also said to the committee on 20 April that

“There is an opportunity now in the fact that the framework has been adjusted to include all 32 local authorities”,

and that

“With the new framing, there is an opportunity for us to do more and to do things differently. It is important that we seize that opportunity to the best of our ability.”—[Official Report, Education, Children and Young People Committee, 20 April 2022; c 3.]

Does Michael Marra acknowledge that she also said that on behalf of the EIS?

I thank the cabinet secretary for the statement and would welcome a cross-party briefing on the details.

I am concerned that, despite assurances from the UK Government that the four nations would work closely together to tackle building safety issues, the interests of the devolved nations are being ignored. Does the cabinet secretary believe that the UK Government is no longer interested in co-ordination when it comes to cladding remediation? If so, how should the Scottish Government proceed?

I refer to my entry in the register of members’ interests, as I am a union member.

I welcome the opportunity to contribute to the debate on this important bill, the sole purpose of which is to empower the Government to act swiftly in the interests of public health to prevent illness and death and to protect public services in the event of future outbreaks of this deadly virus.

I further welcome the Deputy First Minister’s clarification that the Parliament will always be required to approve the use of the powers in the bill. Clearly defined caveats are also included in the bill and I will refer to those later in my speech.

The impact of the pandemic is fresh in our collective memory. The effect on our daily lives of the first and subsequent lockdowns will be felt in so many ways for years to come. We are enjoying some uplift of that and getting back to some kind of normality.

Staff in schools and other education institutions faced a hugely challenging situation, both in terms of how they delivered education to their pupils and students, and in terms of their duty of care. As someone who worked in education throughout the first lockdown in March 2020, I know that it was a complete shock to everyone involved when schools were closed overnight. We had to turn on a sixpence and adopt remote learning practices with little or, in my case, no experience. Nevertheless, we know that our schools and teachers were a real lifeline for children and families.

By the time of the second lockdown, at the end of 2020, with action from the Scottish Government on speeding up local delivery of technology and funding provided by Connecting Scotland to deliver tablets and wi-fi devices via various partners and schools, teachers and pupils were much better prepared to teach and learn remotely. Improvements continue to be made there.

The bill’s provisions underline that commitment to continuity of learning, and there are repeated caveats throughout, including in the sections that deal with the power to make provision

“relating to the continuing operation of an educational establishment for a specified period.”

The bill confirms that such a power is to be used only if it is

“a necessary and proportionate action for or in connection with protecting public health.”

What that ultimately means is that remote learning, which is nobody’s preferred option—not teachers’, parents’ or children’s—can be introduced quickly across the country if, and only if, it is deemed necessary and proportionate in the interests of protecting public health.

Having worked as a teacher before, during and after the lockdowns, I am fully aware of the challenges that have to be faced, and I understand the concerns of the teaching unions. I thank the NASUWT for its briefing, which was sent to all members and which outlined its concerns. The Deputy First Minister will have addressed some of those concerns during the updates that he has made today.

The reason for the bill is clear. The ability to act swiftly and comprehensively to save lives and protect services is absolutely vital. The commitment from the Deputy First Minister that the Scottish Parliament will always be consulted before the legislation is enacted is welcome, and it reassures me that the sole purpose of the legislation is to serve the public good in the event of a future deadly strain of the virus.

I am grateful to Maggie Chapman for giving us the opportunity to have a members’ business debate on an important issue that affects universities and colleges around Scotland.

Scotland’s universities are world leading. We can and should be proud of their success and international reputation, both of which are down to the expertise and dedication of lecturers, academics, librarians and other staff, who often go above and beyond to ensure that success.

I would also like to take the opportunity to acknowledge the work that university and college staff have done in supporting students throughout the pandemic and to thank them for it.

Universities play a key role in the Scottish Government’s Covid recovery plan, and we need them to be robust and resilient institutions so that they can fulfil that role effectively. It is clear that the on-going dispute that today’s debate highlights undermines that work, and it is absolutely vital that a resolution can be found as soon as possible.

The dispute focuses primarily on measures to cut the universities superannuation scheme pension. We have been clear in saying that the UK-wide universities superannuation scheme does not fall within the devolved responsibility of the Scottish ministers. Universities are autonomous institutions, and matters relating to pay, working conditions and pensions are for them to determine. Therefore, the Scottish Government has no locus to intervene in the dispute.

Nevertheless, the Minister for Higher Education and Further Education, Youth Employment and Training has met university leaders and trade unions on a number of occasions to encourage them to continue negotiations, in an attempt—

I will just crack on.

Most recently, the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland was ranked fifth for studying the performing arts in the prestigious Quacquarelli Symonds world university rankings.

I make no apology for repeating that Scotland’s unis and colleges are institutions that we can be proud of. I remind everyone that Glasgow Kelvin is very proud to have eight—the figure increases to nine if we include the Open University—further and higher education institutes within the constituency. I trust that employers and unions will redouble their efforts to find a resolution.

Will the cabinet secretary join me in recognising the work of local authorities such as Glasgow City Council, which has passed a motion to support decolonisation of the curriculum and has produced a modern studies guide for its schools?

Will the cabinet secretary provide an update on how the Scottish Government is supporting all local authorities to ensure that Scotland’s colonial history is acknowledged and reflected in the curriculum?

I understand the member’s point, but the dispute resolution process must be conducted between the employer and the trade unions. That is the nature of collective bargaining. We would not want the Government to intervene in that process.

Central to the Scottish Government’s fair work approach is the expectation that employers, workers and trade unions should work together to ensure that workers are treated fairly, and university and college staff should not be an exception to that approach.

The UCU’s briefing for the debate lists some concerning statistics that suggest that resolution of the dispute will be difficult, but that does not remove the responsibility of university leaders and trade unions to reach an agreement as soon as possible, in the interests of staff and students. Many students have written to me to highlight the effects that the dispute is having on their education and learning.

Despite the on-going dispute, today, Universities Scotland has released statistics that show that nearly 85 per cent of the research submitted by Scotland’s universities has been judged to be world leading.

On the refreshed approach, “The Scottish Attainment Challenge: Framework for Recovery and Accelerating Progress” says:

“The Scottish Attainment Challenge mission is central to all of Education Scotland’s work supporting Scottish educators”,

and part of it is to

“support local authorities to deliver an agreed plan”.

The evidence that we have been taking from teachers, among others, suggests that there is a lack of consistency across local authorities. What work is Education Scotland doing to reduce that inconsistency? Everybody is entitled to have quality input, wherever they are in Scotland. I do not know who is the best person to answer that—it might be Craig Clement, but I will take the witnesses’ lead.