Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government estimates that the new relationship between the European Union and the United Kingdom could cut Scotland’s gross domestic product by around 6.1 per cent by 2030, compared to continued EU membership. That would be equivalent to £9 billion in 2016 cash terms.

In particular, we have forecast that one of the immediate impacts will come from challenges in recruiting and retaining EU citizens as workers here. That has, indeed, proved to be the case. The fuel crisis and the labour and skills shortages that are now being experienced across the economy and in public services lay bare the economic recklessness of a hard Brexit. The UK Government pressed ahead with leaving the EU, despite repeated requests for delay. Everyone in the country is now seeing the result of that short-sighted ideology everywhere we look.

Again—no, I do not. Although very few people, if any, like the measures that we are having to take in order to control the virus, the vast majority of people across Scotland understand the reasons for those measures and would prefer a situation where people are asked to show proof of vaccination over a situation where venues such as nightclubs or large-scale events have to close or stop again. That is the balance that we are seeking to strike.

With regard to the legal challenge, any organisation in a democracy has the right to challenge the decisions of Government right up until those decisions come into force and, indeed, afterwards. Interestingly, the Tories south of the border are seeking to take the right to judicial review away completely, or at least limit it considerably.

However, the judgment of Lord Burns this morning is very clear and emphatic. On the point about some venues and some circumstances being covered but not others, again, I paraphrase and summarise, but the judgment recognises that it is widely known that the combination of alcohol and dancing, late at night and inside, create a high risk environment for the transmission of Covid, which does not occur to the same extent in other venues.

There is no perfection when you are dealing with an infectious virus. All the steps and measures that we have to take are imperfect, and of course they are far from ideal. However, we cannot simply wish Covid away. We have to take the steps to get cases back under control.

I said this the other day, and I think that it is worth repeating. Over recent months, Douglas Ross has opposed almost every step that we have tried to take, from face coverings through to Covid vaccination certification. If I had listened to Douglas Ross, we would probably not be in the position that we are in—thankfully—of having cases on a downward path. Perhaps it is Douglas Ross who needs to reflect a bit more on some of the arguments that he makes in this chamber.

It is simply incorrect to say that ministers have overturned almost 50 per cent of planning applications. The vast majority of planning appeals are decided by independent reporters from the planning and environmental appeals division of the Scottish Government. It is right and proper that ministers have no involvement in cases that are delegated to reporters.

In the last financial year, 135 decisions on planning appeals were made, and planning permission was granted on 67 occasions. However, in the same period, local planning authorities decided on approximately 25,000 planning applications, and 94.5 per cent were granted planning permission. Planning approvals issued by reporters were approximately 0.3 per cent of the planning permissions granted over the course of this year in Scotland. That is my response to that claim.

We seem to have gone from planning applications to children’s services. We work in partnership with local authorities to make sure that we are delivering for people across the country.

Let us go back to planning applications. There is no centralisation here. As I said, in 2020-21, 25,000 planning applications were decided by local planning authorities. The vast majority of them—94.5 per cent—were granted planning permission. There were 135 decisions on planning appeals made through the arrangements in the Scottish Government, which I have set out, and Scottish ministers made the final decision on four recalled planning appeals.

The whole premise of the question is deeply flawed, which is probably why Miles Briggs chose to go on to something else after my first answer rather than stick with the subject matter of his question.

I have not seen those comments in full, but I am happy to look at them and to consider them carefully. Those are serious issues.

The quality of our food and agriculture is important. I do not support genetically modified crops; opposition to that is important. I know that we are not talking about exactly the same thing, but it is important to consider all these things carefully. I will consider the comments and say more once I have had the opportunity to do that.

Jim Fairlie appears to be suggesting that not everything that comes out of the mouth of Boris Johnson can be relied upon. Perish the thought. Perhaps the more pertinent question is whether anything that comes out of the mouth of Boris Johnson can be relied upon.

Jim Fairlie is absolutely right. The Prime Minister owes an apology because what he said is not the case and has been described as “misleading”. Of course, the UK Government has betrayed our farmers and our fishermen, and each and every day right now our entire agricultural sector is paying the price of the Tory Brexit. That price is getting higher and higher with every day that passes. Perhaps the PM should apologise not just for the misleading statement about the import ban on lamb but for all the damage that the UK Government has done through Brexit.

We will continue to do everything that we can. The question about the need for us to look on an on-going basis at whether we are doing all that we reasonably can to help low-income families and to help people who are unemployed is a fair one. I certainly give the assurance that we will do that on an on-going basis.

I return to the answer that I gave to Anas Sarwar. I am afraid that we, and people across the country, are suffering the impact of decisions that are beyond the control of the Scottish Government and the Scottish Parliament. There will always be a limit to what we can do to mitigate the impact of those decisions. It would be far better if we did not have to go cap in hand to a United Kingdom Government to ask for furlough to be continued. It would be much, much better if we could take such decisions here in Scotland, in this democratically elected Parliament.

If Labour is serious about such matters—I respect the fact that Daniel Johnson is—it must stop holding to the position of merely willing the ends of things. It must get into a position in which it gives Parliament the means to do the things that we all want it to be able to do.

I did, Presiding Officer. People will draw their own conclusions, but the fact of the matter is that the Tories do not want people to hear these questions because they hope that people will not see the damage that Tory policies are doing to people across the country. However, people are feeling it in their jobs, in their pay packets and in their energy bills. They will see it and they will know exactly who is responsible.

On local government budgets, during a decade of Tory austerity we sought to treat local government as fairly as possible and will continue to do that. However, whether it is through austerity or Brexit, we see the damage that the Conservatives are doing, which is why more and more people think that this country should be independent.

There were a number of perfectly reasonable questions there.

Obviously, local authorities generally are the employers of social care workers, so the data is likely to be held mainly by local authorities, but I will undertake to look at whether we can publish the kind of information that Pam Duncan-Glancy is asking for, so that we have greater understanding and transparency around the level of vacancies.

I absolutely agree that—notwithstanding my previous answer or, probably, this answer—the temporary suspension of services will be of profound concern to everybody who is affected by it, and everybody wants to see those services reinstated as quickly as possible.

We will continue to have debates in the chamber about funding. We are increasing funding to social care, and it is important that we do that. There is a recognised need to drive up the pay and conditions of the social care workforce. That is part of our national care service proposal, but the issue needs to be progressed in the lead-up to the delivery of that proposal. I take all of this very seriously.

I do not want to get back into the exchanges about Brexit that we had earlier, but I will say that we face a shortage of labour in this country that is affecting haulage companies—as we can see right now—and many aspects of the private sector. We all have to recognise that it is affecting our health and care sector, too, and that is likely to be exacerbated in the coming period. Yesterday, the health secretary and I discussed the issue with officials, and we have a number of plans in progress to try to increase recruitment into social care. We will do everything that we can to do that. It is one of the impacts of decisions that have been taken over recent years that will cause difficulty for us in the coming months. We all have to recognise that and resolve to do everything that we can to overcome it.

Throughout the pandemic, we have done everything that we can to support tenants in general, and in particular to support any who may be facing the threat of eviction.

Councils have now been allocated £10 million to give grants to tenants who have Covid-related rent arrears and are consequently at risk of eviction. That brings our total pandemic support to tenants to almost £39 million. That additional money will make a big difference, but we continue to consider all ways in which we can provide practical support.