Chamber and committees

I am not sure whether it is good or bad that it takes Parliament to sit until a quarter to 10 just for Ross Greer and Stephen Kerr to find some agreement and common ground, but that may be an achievement for this evening.

I offer my support for Roz McCall’s amendment 206.

I express concern about Ross Greer’s amendment 205, however, because I think that there has been no consultation on his proposals—a point that Jackie Dunbar rightly tried to make. In addition, I am not sure how the chief inspector would take forward an inspection regime with the home education community, as that has not been consulted on. I welcome what Ross Greer is trying to achieve through amendment 205 and the potential for future consideration in that respect, but Scottish Conservatives do not support his amendments as a group.

I have brought back my amendment 200 from stage 2. It relates to petition PE1979, which is currently going through Parliament, and it would allow Scottish ministers to set out further detail by regulations, including how inspections should address safeguarding, how complaints could be made to the chief inspector and what actions the inspector would be able to take in response. It contains an important change, which I hope that the cabinet secretary has considered beyond stage 2, because I believe that we need a system across education and children’s services that looks at complaints that are made in relation to child protection and safeguarding functions.

I look forward to hearing what the cabinet secretary has to say before I decide whether to move my amendment, as I would like to know whether the Government will take the matter forward in improved guidance. That is important for the petitioners, who are still pushing for the wider change that they hope to see.

It has been a long day.

I admire what the member has tried to achieve, but does she not accept that a stand-alone bill would be needed to set up a new organisation? We cannot add it on to this bill. That is why we cannot support the amendments.

From the outset of consideration of the bill, I wanted to attempt to make sure that the voice of parents and carers was put at the heart of the new organisation. I am grateful for some of the work that has been done on that, although I have not got everything that I wanted from the bill.

Amendments 3 and 4 would expand on and clarify aspects of section 9(3)(ab), which were inserted into the bill by amendment 129 at stage 2. That section provides that members who are appointed to the strategic advisory council must include persons who represent the interests of parents and children and young people undertaking a relevant qualification. Amendment 3 would expand that provision so that it is about the interests of parents and carers, and amendment 4 would further clarify that it is children and young people undertaking a qualifications Scotland qualification who are relevant here.

It feels as though the Opposition parties are trying to lead the Government to a solution, but the Government is finding deliberate terms not to support that.

I see that Willie Rennie’s and Ross Greer’s heads are down, but it was for all Opposition parties to create a situation in which the Government had to bring forward reform. We have seen a weak version of that today, and I commend Pam Duncan-Glancy for the amount of work that she has done to try to get the Government to see sense.

I totally agree, which was why I wanted to bring the amendment back at stage 3. I had hoped for more engagement from the Government on a workable amendment of its own, but, as that did not happen, I have brought my amendment back. I hope that, if it is not agreed to, we will have a commitment for guidance on the matter. The work that many campaigners across the parties are taking forward in this area is important. The issue may not sit specifically in this bill, but I hope that it will be considered in the next session of Parliament.

Stephen Kerr’s amendments may also be considered if there is an opportunity to address whistleblowing more widely. Given that we have implemented a whistleblowing policy for the national health service, I am not quite sure why we would not have one for education and children’s services. I think that there is an opportunity to address that—if not in this bill, then in the next session of Parliament.

From the comments that university principals made at the Education, Children and Young People Committee, it is clear that the university sector in Scotland has become overreliant on international students. Given the increasing global uncertainty, what assessment have the First Minister and the Scottish Government made of the financial exposure and risk that our institutions face?

That is helpful. Any data that the sector can give us would be appreciated.

Vicki Nairn, do you have a figure that you can put on record?

I will bring in Professor Powell in a second.

You touched on the north-east. I met with North East Scotland College quite recently to have a conversation about the fantastic new campus that it is opening and about net zero and the just transition. It will have to stick to its credit numbers, though, so the resources for any new courses that it will offer will have to come from the original courses, which seems ridiculous, given the skills shortages. I believe that there was recently a conference in the Highlands where representatives of the renewables sector said, “These are all the shortages in skills that we know are coming, but very little is happening.” I do not know why, given the skills shortages that we are aware of, the Scottish Government is not providing additional capacity or bringing the private sector in to help fund that using a different model, because that just seems like common sense.

I will bring you in now, Professor Powell.

Sorry, that figure relates to all the private sector investment that has gone into the college sector—most of it has gone to Ayrshire College.