Chamber and committees

Our commitment to a circular economy—and to legislating for it—is known, and I look forward to taking that forward with co-operation across the Parliament.

I agree with the comments on what has been reported about Amazon. Governments have to do more to persuade everybody. We must lead by example in order to persuade individuals and companies, more generally, to cut down on waste and become much more environmentally responsible. However, I do not think that a company of the size and scale of Amazon should need a Government to tell it that it should not be destroying large amounts of things that—as Lorna Slater rightly said—could be given to people who are in need. I hope that Amazon will reflect carefully on that. That is a big challenge for all Governments across the world, and I hope that Scotland will lead by example.

Similarly, on the subject of fair work, I am not sure of the detail of the financial support—whether it is a grant or procurement for services—so I will look into that, but it is really important that we attach fair work conditions to any support that the Government gives to companies.

First, as I did on Tuesday in the chamber, I straightforwardly reiterate, with no equivocation or snark attached to it, a big thank you to teachers and all support staff in our schools, and to parents and young people. This has been the most difficult year that any of them will ever remember, both professionally for those who work in our education system, and for those who are learning in our education system. I can never find the words to thank them enough, but I hope that everyone knows how deeply appreciative everyone is in the Scottish Government—and across Scotland, I am sure—for everything that they have done.

I will be candid. The longer I am in politics, the more frustrated I get at the inability of our political discourse, for which we are all responsible, to engage in nuanced arguments that are not just binary black or white. It is perfectly consistent to say that, with regard to what the SQA is doing—[Interruption.]

I also get frustrated at the inability to take serious issues seriously in our parliamentary chamber.

I have confidence in the work that the SQA does around the certification of national qualifications. It is important for me to say that, not only for my assurance as First Minister, but for the benefit of young people and their parents across this country. I say it again today.

It is also the case that it is time for reform. The Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills made a statement here earlier this week on the subject. We have accepted the recommendations of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development in that respect, and have therefore given a commitment that we will carefully consider the nature and the detail of the issue, and that we will replace the SQA and remove the inspection function from Education Scotland.

All of that, taken in the round, is how people—whether they agree or disagree with every decision that the Government makes—would expect a grown-up, responsible Government to behave, and that is how this Government will always conduct itself.

This is an important issue. I recognise that, for some species, there is cause for concern. It is the case that we are seeing an increase in some species, with increases of more than 400 per cent. However, where there are declines, it is important that we address them, and the biggest long-term decrease is that of more than 50 per cent in capercaillie.

On the specifics, we consider short-term and long-term funding to ensure that we are supporting the objectives. Right now, we face a climate crisis and a biodiversity crisis. Those are obviously closely linked. The Government is very serious about addressing them both, doing what we need to do here in Scotland, and in so doing, setting an example for the rest of the world.

I welcome the tone of the question. I hope that the question is a signal that, when it comes to the detail of what is needed to meet those objectives, there will be more support from the Scottish Conservatives than there has been in the past. Recently, we have seen scaremongering about the talks with the Greens and what that might mean, rather than all of us recognising—[Interruption.] I know that the Conservatives do not like it when we talk about the details of some of this stuff. However, instead of just willing the ends, we must be prepared to do the means. That is harder and often controversial. I hope that the question and its tone, which I welcome, signal a change of heart from the Scottish Conservatives.

Remobilising and supporting the NHS is one of the top priorities for the Scottish Government and the other Governments across the UK—as I am sure that supporting their health services is for Governments across the world. We will shortly publish our NHS recovery plan, which will set out how we will continue to support patients to receive the highest quality of care and to expand NHS capacity.

The pandemic has had a significant impact on the ability of the NHS to operate normally for the past 15 months. That has consequences. I thank our NHS staff for the work that they continue to do to ensure that people who are in need of urgent care get it. They are working flat out to get care and treatment to people who saw that being delayed due to Covid.

To help staff, a range of wellbeing and mental health resources have been put in place locally. Staff tell us that they value that. Those services are supplemented by national resources, such as the national wellbeing hub, which has more than 100,000 users. We will continue to put in place the support that staff require.

Generally, the NHS is getting much closer to pre-pandemic capacity, and many parts of the NHS are beyond that—Jackie Baillie cited the example of A and E, where attendances have gone above and beyond what they were going into the pandemic. Urgent suspicion of cancer referrals, for example, are now at 120 per cent compared to April 2020.

We are supporting the NHS. It is a difficult task—particularly for those on the front line—to ensure that the balance between Covid and non-Covid treatment is where needs to be.

The one thing that I would say—it relates to my exchange with Anas Sarwar earlier—is that one of the big challenges that we have right now is to ensure that we continue to manage Covid in a way that does not distract from the efforts of the NHS to deal with the backlog and get back to normal. Last year, when we talked about not overwhelming our NHS, at that point we had pretty much set aside the whole capacity of the NHS. Right now, the situation is different—the NHS is getting back to normal, so the margins around that are much tighter. That is why, in answer to Anas Sarwar’s question about why we cannot get back to normal in more areas, more quickly, I said that we have to take great care not to allow cases to rise in a way that generates more hospital admissions for Covid, which would set back the recovery plan.

That is all important stuff, but it is also really complex. Right now, that is a very sensitive balance. That is one of the main reasons why, difficult though it is for many sectors, we must continue to be cautious as we navigate our way through the next few weeks.

I thank everybody in our vaccination teams across the country. I have taken the opportunity to thank people generally, but I also say that because Emma Harper is a member of a vaccination team. As well as carrying out her responsibilities in Parliament, she has been vaccinating people, so I thank her and the many others who have been doing that across the country.

Emma Harper has raised a key priority relating to the vaccination programme, given the stage at which it is. The Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Care and I were at a meeting earlier this morning about that very issue. Uptake rates are exceptionally high, which is really positive, but they get slightly lower the further down the age spectrum we go, although they are still much higher than they have been for previous vaccination programmes.

We are at an advanced stage of the programme, so we are looking at different ways in which we can get people who have not, for whatever reason, attended their appointment, to attend another one. We are considering providing more drop-in facilities and greater use of texting and other technology. Young people who register on the portal already get their appointment by text, but we need to go back and do a sweep to try to get to people who have not attended. I reassure Emma Harper and other members that over the next few weeks a lot of work will go into getting as many people vaccinated as possible.

One of the factors that Scotland is dealing with right now—we can see this in the Office for National Statistics survey that is published weekly—is that because we have generally had lower infection rates over the past 15 months, we also have lower population immunity, so more of our population is still susceptible. What does that mean? It means that it is even more important for us to get as many people as possible vaccinated. All of us in the Scottish Government are absolutely focused on that key priority.

I do not just unreservedly condemn organised crime; I unreservedly and unequivocally condemn the attacks on Councillor Campbell and his wife. I cannot imagine what they have been through in facing those attacks. I am sure that the thoughts of everybody across not just the chamber but the country are with them. I want to send Councillor Campbell and his wife a message of solidarity from me and from my party today.

Those matters have to be treated with the utmost seriousness. Nobody should feel, for whatever reason, that they have no choice but to leave politics or abandon any part of their life because of threats or attacks from organised crime or anywhere else. Of course, it is not for me or the Government but for the police to investigate and—I hope—bring to justice those who perpetrated the attacks. I offer my full support to the police in the actions that they will take to do that. However, for the purposes of today, I reiterate that message of solidarity to Councillor Campbell and his family.

As Pauline McNeill is aware, the finance secretary, with the leader of Glasgow City Council, co-chairs an action group to try to save the McVitie’s plant in the east end, which I am 100 per cent behind. Just this week, the finance secretary is communicating with Pladis senior management to make very clear our disappointment at the lack of constructive engagement on the options, with Scottish Government support, for saving that site.

We will not give up, and we will do everything that we possibly can. I will certainly do everything that I can to make sure that any options to save the plant, the site and those jobs are taken forward by the Government. We cannot force a company to accept offers of help that we give, but we will do everything that we can to make sure that those offers are credible and are accepted. That is what we have done in the past with other industrial plants. We are often criticised for that later on when opportunistic reasons arise to allow that to happen. However, that will not prevent us from doing everything that we can to save the McVitie’s plant or others that end up in a similar position.

On the petition, the workers do not have to petition me and the Scottish Government. We are on their side, and we will do everything that we can to save their jobs. I will not be able to accept the petition in person because, after First Minister’s question time, I will travel to Arbroath to attend the funeral of one of our former members—Andrew Welsh. I want to take the opportunity to say, in response to the passing of someone who was widely respected across the political spectrum, how much my thoughts are with his family. However, I will arrange for another member of the Government to accept the petition on my behalf.

Beatrice Wishart raises a really important point. Our islands, in common with the rest of the country, want to get back to normal. Tourism is a big part of normality for Scotland. We want that for our islands, but it is really important that it is safe. That is why we have given very strong advice—which we reiterate regularly; I do so again now—to anybody who plans to travel to our islands to test before they go. Lateral flow tests are available to allow them to do that.

Beatrice Wishart is right to point this out—in today’s figures, cases have been reported in Orkney and Shetland. Although the numbers are very small, that is a reminder that the virus has not gone away. If people intend to travel to our islands or any other part of our beautiful country over the summer, I ask them to please do so safely, to test themselves and to respect all the advice that is in place in any particular area to help to keep themselves and the local population safe.