Chamber and committees

If Mr Kerr will allow me, I will make more progress.

It is precisely in that context that we propose to introduce a mandatory domestic vaccination certification scheme. The scheme is not an additional layer of restriction being imposed on a world that is essentially back to normal, but a proportionate response to a world where a continued risk of serious harm from Covid exists, where our hospitals are under strain and where we are beginning to see the serious impact of long Covid.

If the choice is between sectors and settings being closed and a limited certification scheme being used to keep them open, the Government believes that it is right to make a choice in favour of a limited certification scheme.

Part of that analysis must take into account the point that I have just put on the record. Because of the escalating challenges of Covid, we might have to consider further restrictions, which would have an economic impact as a consequence. We are trying to avoid that consequence. We are saying that this will have a lesser and more proportionate impact on society as a consequence, and businesses will have to respond accordingly.

Will Douglas Ross give way?

On the issues that Mr Ross raises, we have of course published detail, we have provided more detail to Parliament today, and we will continue the dialogue with sectors such as those that Mr Montgomery represents.

I ask Mr Ross to set out to Parliament the steps that he believes we should take, given the rising threat of the coronavirus and the delta variant, to avoid the application of further restrictions.

I have read Professor Reicher’s thread on Twitter today. It is a balanced thread, because it goes through the arguments that justify the application of a vaccine certification scheme and the circumstances in which it would work—when high levels of trust exist in the advice and guidance that are in place—while highlighting the issues that could potentially lead to the reinforcement of vaccine anxiety.

It is a balanced argument, and, although I do not have her words to hand, it is my recollection that the First Minister indicated at lunch time that Professor Reicher’s assessment was balanced in setting out the pros and cons of the steps that the Government takes. Ultimately, it is a matter of judgment, and I will set out the rationale as to why the Government has come to the conclusions that it has.

Mr Whittle asked me to put some detail on the record, and it is important that I do that, for the sake of clarity.

The Covid check verifier app will be available during the course of the next week, well in advance of the launch of the scheme. Detailed guidance will be provided for venues on how to use the app, and there will be options for venues to integrate the verifier functionality into their own systems, as the source code is open source.

I ask that Mr Simpson allow me to complete the detail.

A person who, for medical reasons, cannot be vaccinated will be able to apply for a document that says that they are exempt. Those who are on clinical trials should already have their exemption letter, and they will be able to show that instead of a record of vaccination.

The introduction of Covid vaccine certificates—even in the limited circumstances that I have set out—is a significant development, but the evidence base for their introduction in Scotland is not unique. There are no factors to do with the virus or our circumstances that mean that the measure is unreasonable in Scotland but reasonable elsewhere. The UK Government has announced its intention to introduce certification for England, and several European countries, including France, Italy and Ireland, have already introduced certification. Indeed, certification schemes in other countries often cover a wider range of venues than the ones that we are currently considering for Scotland.

As I have indicated, the Government has set out to Parliament details of the nature of the scheme. We put those proposals to Parliament as part of our approach to protecting people in the very fragile situation that we face in Scotland and in hospitality of rising infection, which poses a threat to our national health service. We are trying to take proportionate action to protect the public from the coronavirus, and I encourage Parliament to support the measures by supporting the motion.

I move,

That the Parliament commends the extraordinary effort of vaccination teams throughout Scotland, which means that, as of 6 September 2021, 84% of eligible over 18-year-olds were double-vaccinated against COVID-19; recognises that case numbers remain stubbornly high and that action is needed from all sectors to ensure that baseline COVID measures are rigorously implemented; acknowledges that a number of other countries have introduced COVID certification schemes and that the UK Government has plans to introduce a vaccine certification scheme in England; believes that, in line with the Scottish Government’s strategic intent, a COVID Vaccine Certification scheme can provide a targeted means to maximise Scotland's ability to keep certain higher risk settings open, while reducing the impact of transmission and encouraging the remaining sections of the population to get vaccinated; supports the implementation of a COVID Vaccine Certification scheme; agrees that the scheme will apply to nightclubs, sexual entertainment venues, indoor unseated live events with 500 or more attendees, outdoor unseated live events with 4,000 or more attendees and all events with 10,000 or more attendees; notes that measures are being taken to ensure digital inclusivity and to ensure that disabled people are not disproportionately impacted, and agrees that this scheme will be kept under regular review.

I welcome the opportunity to close the debate for the Government and I apologise for being unable to do so in person due to a requirement for Covid self-isolation.

The annual programme for government debate stirs up a series of positive and negative reactions. We have heard many positive remarks about the programme for government from Sarah Boyack, Pam Duncan-Glancy and SNP members, but we have also heard negative reactions from Douglas Ross, Anas Sarwar, Alex Cole-Hamilton, Jamie Greene and Oliver Mundell.

What those comments and negative reactions ignore is the outcome of the election, to which none of them referred. The outcome was that the SNP gained ground, the Green Party gained ground, the Labour Party lost ground, the Liberal Democrats lost ground and the Tories were as flat as a pancake. I encourage the commentators that I named to recognise that their strategy of endless negativity and of always talking down the genuine achievements of the Scottish Government is getting those three parties nowhere. It has not advanced their electoral cause.

The public have handsomely supported the SNP and the Green Party, which led to the positive discussions that we had over summer and the creation of the partnership agreement. Mark Ruskell gave a clear and strong explanation of the merits and strengths of sharing power across Parliament and with the public, which he cited as part of the foundation of this Parliament. Our partnership agreement is designed for that type of sharing.

Alex Cole-Hamilton made a fair point about international co-operation agreements in which green parties have been involved. He said that green parties had participated in progressive Governments around the world. I am glad that we have added Scotland to the list of areas of progressive co-operation.

The First Minister made it clear in her statement that the programme for government focuses on a number of key themes. The Government’s immediate and highest priority is the challenge of Covid. We will address deep-seated inequalities in society and confront the climate emergency. We will mitigate the consequences of Brexit—we heard absolutely nothing from the Conservative Party about the dire implications of Brexit. We also heard about the importance of shaping our choices about our economy and society by giving people in Scotland a choice about their constitutional future. I will return to that topic later.

The programme for government is focused on the immediate challenges of Covid recovery, but it is also about setting the direction of travel for Scotland to be able to take the decisions that matter about the future of our country.

In summing up for the Government, I want to comment on a number of specific issues, and the first is child poverty. That is an example of an area where the Government wants to act more and go further and faster than we have been able to go so far. Pam Duncan-Glancy said that the Government must do exactly that. Patrick Harvie made it clear in his intervention that there is a range of measures that the Government has taken and is taking—on school clothing grants, free school meals and the abolition of core curriculum charges, to name but three—where we are significantly reducing the cost of schooling and therefore family budgets, and making an impact on child poverty. That is in addition to the early steps that we have taken on the child payment.

However, as the First Minister said earlier, the question of doubling the child payment, which is an aspiration that the Government would wish to achieve at the earliest possible opportunity, is one of the decisions that we will have to take in a budget process, so the opportunity is there for the Labour Party to engage constructively with us on how we make the hard financial choices that will have to be made if we wish to progress on the agenda earlier and at a faster rate, which the Government is intent on doing.

The second issue is energy and climate change. Jenni Minto made a powerful speech about the renewables capacity of Argyll and the islands, and Mark Ruskell set out some of the elements of the programme for government that emerged from the partnership agreement with the Greens in order to ensure that we are able to deliver the investments in energy-efficient housing that will strengthen the country’s ability to meet the aspiration of achieving net zero, and to do that in a way that supports families in overcoming poverty into the bargain.

I am certain that the contributions of Lorna Slater and Patrick Harvie to the Scottish Government and the partnership agreement that we have reached with the Scottish Green Party will help us significantly to advance on those questions and to ensure that the aspirations, which are broadly supported in Parliament, can be taken forward in an effective way across the whole of the current session of Parliament.

The third issue that I want to talk about is the proposed national care service, which I am certain will be the subject of a great deal of substantive debate. It represents a bold and significant reform to the way in which we deliver care services in Scotland. John Mason accurately highlighted the challenge that will lie at the heart of the debate. At times, there are demands in Parliament for there to be much greater consistency in the standards of care that are delivered around the country. Indeed, there has been enormous parliamentary pressure on ministers on many of these questions.

However, one person’s demand for there to be less variability and, therefore, more consistency is another person’s rush to centralisation. If Parliament wishes there to be more consistency or much less variability so that our citizens in every part of the country can be assured of the quality of care and the standards that they should be entitled to expect, what will come with that is some requirements being inherent in the national care service in the same way we experience in our national health service.

We cannot duck that issue or that sensitivity about the importance of what will lie at the heart of the decision making around a national care service, because it is integral to the decisions that we will take about consistency of service provision around the country. The Government will, of course, engage constructively with our local authority partners on all those questions, but if Parliament wishes to see progress on consistency of care services around the country, it has to be prepared to will the means by which that will come about. That is the rationale behind a national care service.

Finally, I want to talk about the question of the independence referendum, which dominated a number of speeches from members across the political spectrum. I very much agree with a point that Annie Wells made about the question. She said that how we address the challenges of Covid will define us for years to come. I think that that is absolutely correct, and I do not want the response to Covid to be defined for my country by Boris Johnson and the people he surrounds himself with in the UK Government, because I do not agree with the direction of travel that that UK Government represents. What I agree with is the right of the people of Scotland to make their own choices and decisions, and to define how they wish to take forward the steps that Scotland makes in recovering from Covid.

The decisions that we take now will affect the economic opportunities in our society and the way—and the extent to which—we tackle inequality. I certainly do not want to be in a situation whereby we do not do everything in our power to tackle the fundamental inequalities that have bedevilled Scottish society and which have been exacerbated by Covid. I want the Scottish Parliament and the people of our country to have the powers to determine those issues. They can do that by taking the power into their own hands, through a referendum on independence. That is the promise of this programme for government, alongside a range of other significant priorities, not least of which is protecting the country from the effects of Covid. That is the mission to which the Government is committed, and we look forward to doing that in the spirit of the partnership that we have constructed with the Scottish Green Party, and which we are determined to sustain for the years to come.

In the immediate term, we have to ensure that we take the necessary steps in relation to international travel that are appropriate to tackling Covid. These issues are the subject of controversy; I have read a lot of commentary from people who tell us that we have been far too restrictive on international travel at different stages of the pandemic. I do not think that the United Kingdom has been strict enough, but these are difficult issues to wrestle with.

We will have to address the whole question of the scale and nature of air travel and the environmental issues that come with it as part of the measures to tackle climate change. That will be a wider policy process in which Government is involved, and it will be at the heart of the decisions around COP26 in Glasgow later this year.

All societies will have to wrestle with that question, but the immediate challenge that we face is to ensure that we take the correct approach on international travel in a way that is commensurate with the steps that we need to take to suppress Covid within the population as effectively as we can.