Chamber and committees

I think that I said previously to Pam Gosal in the chamber that we will consider the proposal sympathetically when we see more detail. I give that commitment again today.

It is the case that most victims of sexual crime are women. In 2020-21, the overall conviction rate for all crimes and offences in Scotland was 91 per cent. For rape and attempted rape, the figure was just 51 per cent. We also know that only a minority of rapes are reported to the police in the first place. Obviously, it would not be appropriate for any Government to seek a blanket increase in the conviction rate: conviction is a matter for independent courts. However, we have a duty to address systemic barriers to justice and the many challenges that women face at each stage of a criminal justice process that was designed by—and, to a very significant extent, for—men.

In last year’s programme for government, we committed to introducing a new criminal justice reform bill before this summer. That bill, which I am pleased to say is on track for introduction before the summer, will propose far-reaching reforms to the criminal justice system. Among other proposals, it will address the “not proven” verdict, consider how rape trials should be conducted and seek to implement key recommendations from Lady Dorrian’s review of management of sexual offences. I will not be in the Government when Parliament considers that bill, but I will be a strong advocate for it from the back benches.

Obviously, I cannot go into detail on that bill’s provisions today, but I want to highlight one important aspect of it, which is linked to an announcement that I was pleased to make this morning at the University of Glasgow. One especially intrusive aspect of criminal procedure arises when requests are made to lead evidence about a victim’s sexual history or so-called bad character. As a result, Lady Dorrian highlighted in her review the importance of victims having access to automatic independent legal representation in those circumstances. The Scottish Government is supportive of that, so I can confirm that the forthcoming bill will propose that women have access to free independent legal representation in those circumstances.

Thank you, Presiding Officer, and happy international women’s day to everyone here.

International women’s day is a moment of celebration, but it is also a moment of reflection. We rejoice in the achievements of women and women’s organisations here in Scotland and across the world. We mark progress towards gender equality, but, on this day, we also remind ourselves of how much more still needs to be done.

Of course, this is the last international women’s day that I will mark as First Minister. I recall speaking in this chamber on the day that I became First Minister, with my eight-year-old niece looking on from the public gallery. I said then that I hoped that my election, as the first woman to hold the office of First Minister, would help to open the door to greater opportunity for all women and that it would also help leaders to reach a point when girls no longer even question the fact that a woman can hold the highest political office in the land. We have a way still to go to achieve true gender equality, but we have also come a long way in these past eight years.

One of my first acts as First Minister was to appoint a Cabinet that was gender balanced. I got lots of emails in the days after that asking how I knew that all the women in my Cabinet were there on merit. I was struck by the fact that I did not get a single email asking me how I knew that all the men in my Cabinet were there on merit. [Applause.]

At the time, the Scottish Cabinet was one of just three gender-balanced Cabinets in the world. There are many more now. I take this opportunity to say that I hope that future First Ministers will continue that practice. Unless we believe that women are somehow less qualified than men, it stands to reason that any Cabinet that is not gender balanced is not properly reflective of all the talents at our country’s disposal.

Alongside many others, I have campaigned throughout my life for equal representation more generally—not least here, in our national Parliament. We are not quite there yet, but we are closer than ever. As of now, 46 per cent of us elected to this chamber are women. In addition, and perhaps partly because of that greater representation, this Parliament has taken important steps to protect, promote and improve women’s rights.

We were the first Parliament in the world to legislate for provision of free period products. We have ensured gender equality on public sector boards and we have passed vital legislation to give better and stronger protection to victims of domestic abuse. We will soon consider further measures to safeguard the right of women to access abortion services—in other words, to access healthcare—free from harassment and intimidation.

Before I leave office, I will say more about forced adoptions, and I hope that we will, in the interests of building a better future, continue to address and help to heal the past injustices that women have suffered.

We have also made childcare and support for families integral to our economic and social policies with policies including the baby box, the expansion of childcare, extra support for carers and the Scottish child payment—the policy of which I am perhaps most proud. Clearly, those policies do not benefit only women, but they benefit women disproportionately. They are achievements that our Parliament as a whole can be proud of—achievements to which all parties across the chamber have contributed.

Some of our policies to support families are made necessary by United Kingdom Government policies that do not have the interests of women at their heart. For example, we are ensuring that no one loses out financially as a result of the two-child benefits cap and the abhorrent rape clause that is part of it.

Too often, there are steps, including improvement of parental leave or addressing the injustice that is being suffered by WASPI women—women against state pension inequality—that we cannot take because we, in this Parliament, do not yet have the powers to do so. Indeed, the power to improve the rights and the lives of women, and to promote equality more generally, are among the many reasons why I support Scotland—and this Parliament—becoming independent.

That said, I truly believe that the record of the Parliament is one to be proud of—but we must build on it in the years to come. That is why my focus today is on the future rather than on the past. In particular, I will highlight two policy areas—enterprise and criminal justice—in which we now, I believe, have an opportunity, indeed a responsibility, to make more progress.

Two weeks ago, I visited the Roslin Institute with Ana Stewart, the entrepreneur and investor who is the author of a landmark report on women in enterprise. That report lays bare the reality that although women make up more than half of our population, only one in five businesses in Scotland right now is founded by and led by women. That inequality is unjustifiable—first and foremost from the perspective of fairness and equal opportunity. As the review says, the current position represents a

“denial of opportunity on, literally, an industrial scale.”

That inequality is also economically counterproductive. If women are supported to set up businesses at the same rate—or anything like it—as men already do, the benefits to our economy will be immense. The report therefore calls for better integration of entrepreneurial education across our system. It recommends that Scotland should create new sources of support for women-led businesses at the start-up stage, and again at the point at which they seek private funding. It makes the case for establishing Scotland as a leader in femtech, which is technology that is designed to address women’s health issues. It is an area that is of enormous economic and scientific potential that represents a particular opportunity for women entrepreneurs.

The report recommends that business support and incubation services should be available closer to nurseries, schools, supermarkets and general practitioner surgeries, so that primary carers—who are more likely to be women—find them easier to use. Those are powerful recommendations, and I look forward to seeing their implementation.

One of the interesting and important truths underpinning the recommendations is that the gender gap—whether it is in enterprise or elsewhere—is a consequence as well as a cause of the deep-rooted and often systemic sexism and inequality that still exist across our society. That is why the review report places a strong emphasis on education.

It is also why—perhaps unexpectedly in a report about enterprise—the report supports the creation of new criminal offences to tackle misogyny, which continues to constrain the ability of too many women to contribute fully to the economy, politics and wider society, and, sometimes, even just to live our lives without fear. That is something that is particularly true in the toxic online culture that we unfortunately live in, which too often spills over into our daily lives.

That brings me to the second issue that I want to touch on. A year ago today, on international women’s day, Baroness Helena Kennedy’s report, which had been commissioned by the Scottish Government, was published. It recommended new criminal offences for misogyny. Today, we have published a consultation paper on draft legislation to implement the recommendations of that report. The reforms will entail five new laws to give police and prosecutors new powers to tackle the pernicious impact of misogyny. I strongly encourage everyone with an interest to read and respond to the consultation.

That draft legislation is just one of a series of forthcoming changes that are designed to make the criminal justice system work more effectively for women and, by helping to free women from the scourge of misogyny, ensure that more of us can reach our full potential.

In recent years, the Domestic Abuse (Scotland) Act 2018 and action to improve access to forensic medical examination have made a difference. However, despite real progress, there is still too much evidence that the criminal justice system is failing too many victims of sexual crime—most of whom are women.

They have rightly supported a deposit return scheme and have previously criticised the Government for taking too long to introduce one, so their opportunism in now indulging in knee-jerk opposition is frankly breathtaking. So, too—I will use a parliamentary term that I believe is polite enough—is the blatant distortion of some Opposition politicians. Yes, I am talking about Alister Jack in particular.

To come back to the point—this is an important point—the number of companies in the drinks industry inevitably changes over time. At the outset of introducing the scheme, it was estimated that there were about 4,500 companies—[Interruption.]

First, Douglas Ross said that he was “on a roll”. I am not sure whether he meant rolling down the hill, but that seems to be what that question was. [Interruption.]

I said last week that Douglas Ross was seeming awful scared of Humza Yousaf. This week, it seems that he is also very scared of Kate Forbes, which says to me that whoever is standing here in my place in a few weeks’ time will keep the Conservatives firmly where they belong: in opposition in Scottish politics.

To go back to the deposit return scheme, this Government—and I, for as long as I am First Minister—will continue to work to introduce sensible schemes that protect the interests of business but that also protect our environment, because we have a deep responsibility to do that.

I also point out, again, that the introduction of a deposit return scheme is in no way unprecedented. Similar schemes are already operational in many countries and territories around the world. Indeed, I understand that some of the companies that are raising concerns—as they have a right to do here in Scotland—are part of the schemes in other countries around the world. I read in the newspaper today that the Conservative United Kingdom Government is about to announce its own scheme, perhaps as soon as tomorrow, which no doubt will have Douglas Ross squirming, as he often does when his colleagues in London make life difficult for him.

We will continue to be responsible. We will liaise and engage with business, but we will also take steps to protect our environment and make sure that the cost of dealing with waste—which, of course, has to be met—is dealt with fairly. That is what this is all about.

Maybe somebody here can help me, but I have lost count of the number of leadership elections that have taken place in the Conservative and Labour parties in the years that I have stood here as First Minister.

I think that people in Scotland will welcome seeing a robust debate about the future of our country, covering all of the things that Anas Sarwar has just talked about. They will appreciate seeing candidates for leadership setting out proposals to build on the actions that this Government has taken in recent years.

Anas Sarwar talks about the cost of living crisis. One of the things that I am proudest of—and always will be proud of—in my time as First Minister is the game-changing Scottish child payment, which is transformational for families and children across the country and is doing more than anything across these islands to lift children out of poverty. I am proud of that, and I am confident that whoever succeeds me as First Minister will continue with that record of success.

I hear Christine Grahame saying that there have been no strikes in our national health service, which makes us the only nation in the United Kingdom to have achieved that.

We continue to be the best-performing part of the UK outside of London when it comes to attracting inward investment into our country. We are lifting more children out of poverty than any other part of the UK is. That is why the Scottish people continue to trust the SNP in government. That is true today, and I believe that, no matter who succeeds me as First Minister, it will continue to be true for a long time to come, as we continue and complete the journey to Scotland becoming an independent country.

We engage regularly with all the main retailers. We are aware that some are currently experiencing temporary disruption to certain off-season fresh vegetables. Some retailers have introduced a buying limit as a short-term preventative measure to avoid bulk buying and ensure that customers can get what they need. Retailers have provided assurances that there is currently enough stock available for customers if everyone continues to shop responsibly and that the situation is expected to improve week on week. Of course we are monitoring this closely.

Given the pressure on food and drinks supply chains that have been caused by Covid, Brexit and war in Ukraine, the Cabinet Secretary for Rural Affairs and Islands wrote to the United Kingdom Government last year to raise the cumulative impact of labour and skills shortages and rising costs. No response was received to that, so the cabinet secretary has written again, as recent events have clearly highlighted the vulnerability and importance of supply chains.

I am happy to write to Russell Findlay or ask the Cabinet Secretary for Justice and Veterans to write to him again to provide details of the arrangements that are in place. We have well-established arrangements—not least the multi-agency public protection arrangements, or MAPPA, system—to ensure that the public have protections from registered sex offenders. There are requirements on people who change their name to give notification that they have done so, so it is not about people being able to hide.

I will, of course, happily remind Russell Findlay of the arrangements in a letter that I will arrange to have written to him.

I think that those surveys are really important. We have just had exchanges in the chamber about the need to record and monitor instances of bullying. Because the—in my view, manufactured—controversy around the survey led to some local authorities pulling out of it, we did not get as much information on bullying from the survey as we might have wanted to.

We all need to be responsible and make sure that we gather information about the real-life experiences of young people that allows local authorities, schools and national Government to take decisions about protecting their welfare and wellbeing. It is really important that we do that, and that we do it in a way—frankly—that avoids any temptation to get dragged into another Conservative culture war.

The member talks about “controversial” questions. Questions of that nature—which relate to smoking, alcohol, substance use and, yes, sexual health—have been included in health and wellbeing surveys for years. It is only recently that they have become politicised.

Questions about sexual health are asked in the equivalent surveys in England, where—in case the member has not noticed it—the Scottish National Party is not in government; another party is.