Chamber and committees

On a point of order, Presiding Officer. I would have voted no.

Communities in Aberdeenshire are tolerant, respectful, welcoming and understanding, but they face a situation that was supposed to be temporary. Aberdeenshire Council is at a disadvantage because it is the fourth-lowest-funded council in Scotland and is now making swingeing cuts to its creaking services, which are already at capacity. How much of the £7.9 million, and of the additional £300,000, will go to Aberdeenshire Council?

Huge sums of taxpayer money have been used to line the pockets of penny-pinching paper pushers in Glasgow as they sail off into taxpayer-funded early retirement. There is no accountability. Will the cabinet secretary ensure that there is a code of conduct for council chief executives and officers, with proper sanctions, to stop rogue officers exploiting the public purse for personal gain?

To ask the Scottish Government whether it has engaged with the Equality and Human Rights Commission in relation to the 19 public bodies and organisations that were found to have misrepresented the Equality Act 2010. (S6O-04949)

The Scottish National Party Government has let public bodies break the law, betray women and burn public money. It is defending the indefensible, and that is absolutely shameful. The EHRC has reprimanded 19 organisations for misrepresenting the 2010 act, yet the SNP Government is still peddling guidance that promotes self-identification to schools and prisons. Public bodies are completely at sea because the SNP puts ideology before women’s rights. Will the minister be finding out whether any of those organisations are based here in Scotland? Will she and the Government issue a directive to public bodies to follow the law by the end of the year at the latest?

I apologise for being 40 seconds late for this important debate. Like others, I pay tribute to my colleague Pam Gosal for securing the parliamentary time for it.

We are five months on from the Supreme Court judgment, and it should shame the SNP Government that MSPs are still having to call for policies to be updated in line with the law. I am delighted that Jackie Baillie has spoken in the debate. I thank her for that, but I would have liked to see more of her Labour colleagues speaking in the debate.

To Maggie Chapman, I say that I find the term “cis woman” offensive, and I say to Rona Mackay that she must have drawn the short straw to have to come here tonight to be the Scottish Government’s spokesperson.

When Scottish ministers are determined to dodge scrutiny, we must use every available lever to demand answers. It is shocking that my colleague has to bring a members’ business debate in order to do that. Whether it is because of their arrogance or ignorance, we will not let SNP ministers get away with it.

Let me first congratulate the tenacious trio who are here today from For Women Scotland. Marion Calder, Susan Smith—I am sorry; I am getting emotional—and Trina Budge courageously fought for women’s sex-based rights from their kitchen tables to the highest court in the land. After meeting on Mumsnet, those three incredible women defended women’s rights while the SNP Government and its army of lawyers did their best to dismantle them. Sex Matters and Scottish Lesbians, as interveners in the case, should also be thanked.

The Supreme Court judgment was unanimous: under the Equality Act 2010, “woman” means a biological woman, and “sex” means biological sex. We cannot get clearer than that—no ifs, no buts.

The Scottish Parliament has acted to comply with the law. So, too, has the City of Edinburgh Council. Even the beleaguered Edinburgh Rape Crisis Centre has fallen into line. However, under the SNP Government, there are still men in women’s prisons; too many hospital wards are still mixed sex; women and girls are still having to get changed in gender-neutral changing rooms at their local leisure centres; and children went back to school in August with unlawful trans guidance still in place, which means that teenage girls still have to share school toilets with boys. It is absolutely shocking.

Shamefully, there has been no directive from John Swinney to Scotland’s public bodies to comply with the Supreme Court ruling, leaving them, as my colleague Jackie Baillie said, wide open to litigation. The foot dragging from Scotland’s First Minister is sending a clear message to women and girls across the country. As Michelle Thomson said, inaction is action. The captured SNP would rather keep our rights in limbo than confront biological reality.

The SNP is fixated on self-ID and is pandering to party activists rather than upholding the rule of law. It is not wishful thinking; it is wilful ignorance. Now, Scottish ministers are throwing away even more taxpayers’ money to defend themselves again in court. I do not know the exact figure that is being spent—it was quoted as being £250,000, but my understanding is that, this week, the figure has risen to £600,000, and, as Jackie Baillie said, could go up to £1 million. That is shocking. NHS Fife is paying only a small part of that; the large part is being paid by the Scottish Government.

There are fears that the can could be kicked well into 2026. I would like to ask the minister to address that point in closing the debate. Is the Scottish Government going to kick the issue into 2026, or is it going to follow the law this year? If it is kicked down the road into next year, that beggars belief.

I say to the SNP Government that the game is up. As Jackie Baillie and my colleagues have said several times in the chamber, nobody is above the law. The Supreme Court has provided clarity, and now the SNP Government must restore its tattered credibility.

In closing, I echo the words of women and girls up and down the country who cannot speak for themselves: just get on with it—women will not be ignored, and we will not wait.

My next question is for Emma Congreve. The feedback that we have been given this morning is that there is, as Angela O’Hagan put it, a

“gap between narrative and practice.”

We hear these words, but it is quite damning that, although something is said, nothing happens and things are kicked down the road. In your view, does the Scottish Government’s positive narrative in the equality and fairer Scotland budget statement and in its budget responses to the committee reflect the reality in relation to policy impact and the changes that it has made to budget processes, data and documentation?

You are smiling, Emma.

We hear you loud and clear on those very important points. The mood music can quickly turn sour if there is no delivery. I read in the papers today about carers going on strike. People have had enough if their basic needs are not being met. I also refer to the point that Emma Congreve made about the Pareto principle and the focus on the few important things. We had an example this morning of people being locked up. The committee learned about the huge percentage of women and girls with learning difficulties who are being sexually assaulted. That resonated loud and clear. The Promise, social security and violence against women and girls have also been mentioned. As I said, we hear you loud and clear.

The next evidence session is with the Minister for Equalities and the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Local Government, and it is our job to take what you have shared with us this morning, and what we have heard over the past few months, and to present it to the Scottish Government—so, thank you.

Good morning. The human rights bill has been flagged as essential to helping citizens to understand minimum core requirements. How is the Scottish Government working to progress the public’s understanding of human rights, given the decision not to legislate during this session?

Thank you, cabinet secretary, but, in the previous evidence session this morning, we heard a huge concern about the gap between narrative and practice. With something as clearly beneficial as breastfeeding, if even the most basic provision is not being followed through with defined minimum core criteria, do you have a concern that there needs to be a tighter follow-through to ensure that there is accountability for that?