Chamber and committees

Will the member take an intervention?

We are all behind the Scottish Government and the UK Government as they try to save bus manufacturing in Scotland.

On the point about the forward order book, which is all that matters now, section 12 of the UK Procurement Act 2023, which was commenced in February this year, requires that contracting authorities

“must have regard to the importance of … maximising public benefit”

when awarding contracts, which is much stronger than the Procurement Reform (Scotland) Act 2014, which only requires authorities to consider social value. Will the Deputy First Minister consider how we can strengthen the language in the 2014 act?

In addition, will the Deputy First Minister take cognisance of the quality concerns that have been raised by bus operators in Scotland, such as McGill’s Buses and First Glasgow, around ADL’s electric vehicle products compared with their Chinese equivalents? Will she consider how we can establish a kaizen group involving the operators, Scottish Enterprise and the Scottish manufacturing advisory service to provide assurance and restore confidence in ADL’s products?

I want to ask about a particular example. The £360,000 Scottish Enterprise grant that has been given to BAE Systems to create the applied shipbuilding skills academy in my region of Glasgow is a positive in my view. Does Lorna Slater agree?

It is a pleasure to speak in the debate, and I second the amendment in the name of my colleague Mr Johnson. It is a very sensible amendment and I encourage the Government to support it in full, as Stewart McDonald, the former SNP defence spokesperson, has indicated it should. He provides cogent analysis that we can have an ethical policy on arms export sales—there is cross-party consensus in that regard—notwithstanding the need for serious and robust investment in this country’s defence capabilities. Ultimately, that is what this debate is about.

Scotland contributes a great deal to the UK’s defence and to NATO’s defence collectively. That is never more the case than through our shipbuilding industry, in which I worked prior to my election to the Parliament—indeed, I believe that I am the only serving parliamentarian in Scotland who has a background in the shipbuilding industry. I also had the opportunity to serve as a Scottish Enterprise account manager for two years, during which time I worked with businesses—mainly, small and medium-sized enterprises—across the aerospace, defence and marine sectors in Scotland. Therefore, I have a fairly deep understanding of the potential of Scotland’s defence and maritime industries, and I am increasingly concerned by the hostility that is expressed towards them by the Government.

A recent example was the Government denying Rolls-Royce a support grant to establish a naval welding centre at the Scottish Government-supported National Manufacturing Institute in Inchinnan and to replenish the space at Rolls-Royce that has been vacant for some years since the end of the maintenance, repair and overhaul activity. That was a huge opportunity for high-value manufacturing development in Scotland, but the Scottish Government spurned that opportunity to crowd in investment in an area that desperately needs it. I am really grateful that the UK Government has stepped in to offer alternative grant funding to ensure that the project goes ahead, but that should provide the Scottish Government with a reality check on its position. We need those industries and we need to support them.

In the past, the Government in Scotland has supported our shipbuilding industry. For example, a £360,000 grant was provided for the applied shipbuilding skills academy at Scotstoun, which is a great asset not just for BAE Systems but for the country’s wider shipbuilding ecosystem. When I worked at BAE Systems, we regularly collaborated with Ferguson Marine—indeed, the only thing that is keeping Ferguson Marine operational today is subcontract work on the fabrication of steel units for the type 26 frigate programme. It is rather ironic, therefore, that the Government’s amendment to today’s motion is about diversification away from defence at a time when the Government is engaged in precisely the opposite—it is increasing its dependence on defence work to sustain commercial shipbuilding activity on the Clyde. We could, of course, go into detail about public procurement reform and the need for support to increase ferry production, but that is perhaps off the topic of the debate.

I encourage the Government not only to reflect on the emerging consensus—the reality of geopolitics in Europe, the need for security, the need to defend our country—but to recognise the immense contribution of shipbuilding in Glasgow and the wider Clydeside area, which is still the region’s largest manufacturing employer. Quite frankly, some of the comments from back benchers, which cast aspersions on the industry, were absolutely disgraceful. The facilities are not bomb factories and the funding cannot come from the largesse of those companies alone. The Government should engage and be proactive with and supportive of those industries, not dismissive of them.

The message that is going out to more than 4,500 people who work in shipbuilding in Glasgow and the west of Scotland needs to be much more positive and supportive of that industry and must recognise the immense value and wealth that it creates for our country. Although the Government explored those opportunities for diversification, its industrial policy is so incoherent that it is actually driving commercial shipbuilding opportunities away rather than in.

Immense opportunities exist to work in collaboration across the industry. Indeed, I chair the cross-party group on maritime and shipbuilding—which several members attend—where we are looking at those opportunities. It would be helpful if the Government made its defence support policy much better and much more rational instead of reactionary. The need for sure ethical safeguards for defence export sales should not be met at the expense of the need to build up our defence industry. We are an island nation and we need a navy.

That is fairly axiomatic.

[Made a request to intervene.]

It is a pleasure to close for Labour in today’s debate.

Having listened to the debate, I am not sure what the Government’s goal is. It seems that its instinct is to be defensive rather than to recognise an open scandal in our national health service. When discussing the issues with clinicians and doctors, junior doctors in particular, across Scotland, it is raised as a recurring and persistent matter. It does not seem that the tone of the debate—certainly from the Government benches—has been remotely concerned with that reality and the lived experience of our constituents or our medical professionals.

I welcome the intent in the Deputy First Minister’s response, but the Government’s apparent hostility to a naval vessel—it is not a munition—on the Clyde is stifling investment in the west of Scotland’s single biggest industrial employer and jeopardising the creation of new jobs. It is rather ironic that the only thing that is keeping Government-owned Ferguson Marine open is its steel fabrication subcontract work from BAE Systems for type 26 frigates, while the Scottish Government’s own procurement agency has recently awarded CalMac ferry contracts to Turkish and Polish shipbuilders.

I urge the Deputy First Minister to reconsider that particular investment decision, because it is incoherent. Surely it is good to use public money to support critical naval shipbuilding research work that contributes to our country’s security and sustains thousands of high-skilled and well-paid jobs right across Scotland.

That was recognised across parties. It is a massive issue. However, the Government has not expressed the vigour that we would want in its addressing of that.

The sickness and absence rate across NHS Scotland has risen to 6.4 per cent, but we know that it is much higher in nursing, at more than 7 per cent across Scotland. To have that level of absenteeism across the NHS, due to that moral injury, burnout and sense of hopelessness—not to mention the mental health impacts that it has on staff—is atrocious.

We mentioned the inflow and pressure on training. Sixty-six per cent of nursing students have considered dropping out due to cost pressures. That is a massive waste of human potential and public resource.

We need to develop the workforce plan. The Government has had 18 years of incumbency in which to develop it. It is shocking that it is only now getting around to proposing getting together. The time has run out. We are less than a year away from the next election. The point of getting together to work it out has passed. The point of being held to account is now here. I hope that the people of Scotland, including the clinicians of Scotland—the people who work in our NHS every day—will hold the Government to account for its abject failure to meet the needs not just of that workforce but the whole population of this country.

That is all well and good, but we need leadership from the health secretary in Scotland, not simply further commentary on the matter. I take the point, and I will give the health secretary the benefit of the doubt with regard to his willingness to build consensus. However, although he claimed in response to my colleague Ms Lennon that there is a workforce plan—which we have been calling for, for years—if we inspect the Government amendment, the reality is that it is about a

“commitment to develop future workforce planning in response to the forthcoming population health and service renewal frameworks ... which will report on the planned dialogue, alongside an analysis of workforce demand and supply, by the end of 2025”.

It does not feel as though there is a sense of urgency in Government, or a sense of grip.

That is why we lodged today’s motion for debate, which comprises fairly scandalous data from BMA Scotland. For example, seven in 10 resident doctors who responded to the survey were concerned about possible unemployment. When surveyed on the issue of applying successfully for specialty training, most people said that they had not been able to get their desired job and 27 per cent said that they applied for specialty training unsuccessfully. Of those applying for clinical development new fellow roles, 34 per cent were successful, and just 19 per cent of those who applied for a locally employed doctor position did so successfully. Of our junior doctors, 10 per cent said that they were planning to locum extensively, introducing even more waste into the national health service. Further, 11 per cent said that they were applying for medical jobs abroad.

An 11 per cent bleed rate overseas is not good enough. There needs to be a much greater effort to stem that flow. When it comes to the NHS, we do not have an immigration crisis, we have an emigration crisis—to Australia—which is endemic. Almost all of my university peer group who were medical students are in Australia or New Zealand right now. That is not just anecdotal; it is met by the data. People are disappointed that they do not have the opportunity to get their first-choice training post, and they are going overseas while they have the opportunity to do so before settling down.

The competition ratios have got worse in the past few years. The average is five people chasing one specialty training post. The disappointment rate is too much, and it has come about because the number of posts has flatlined while demand has increased. It feels as though the plug is out of the bath; simply turning the tap on to a faster flow will not solve the problem if there is no investment in those specialty training posts.

The irony is that, at the other end of the process, there is an increasing outflow of consultancy positions. We hear from the consultants that more and more of them are looking to leave the NHS or reduce their hours.

At both ends of the system, therefore, there is incoherence at the heart of the issue that we are facing. It applies not just to doctors but nurses, as was ably put by speakers in the debate. Not only do we have a huge vacancy issue in the NHS, we have a vicious cycle of dependency on agency nursing and the costs of that to the NHS.

Even within the inflow, there is pressure on nursing students. Brian Whittle made an excellent point about looking at directly paid training courses through an apprenticeship programme such as we might have in the police or the armed forces.