Chamber and committees

You mentioned the organisations that do not get it right. Are there any organisations that do get it right?

More widely.

A lot of the legislation relating to migrant individuals who are fleeing domestic abuse is reserved to the Westminster Government, but is there anything that the Scottish Government could do to improve the situation?

Good morning. We have spoken about the need for safe spaces and suitable accommodation, and the fact that we need to prevent homelessness in the first place. What support is out there for individuals who have no recourse to public funds?

In evidence that we have heard, I was surprised to hear people who have had to deal with the child maintenance service say that, although the CMS accounts for cases of domestic abuse, in reality, it just signposts. Dr Glinski, what are your views about what we have to do to raise awareness?

Will the member give way?

To ask the Scottish Government what recent discussions it has had with the City of Edinburgh Council regarding the progress of the Edinburgh city plan 2040. (S6O-04588)

Many community organisations across the city, such as Wester Hailes Community Trust in my constituency of Edinburgh Pentlands, have produced local place plans for the deadline of August this year, at the cost of great time and expense. What responsibility lies with the local authority to take into consideration those local place plans, which are the aspirations of local communities?

It is. Since 2010, under the Conservatives, vehicle excise duty for new cars has risen from £1,200 to £2,605, and car insurance premium tax went up from 5 per cent in 2010 to 12 per cent in 2017. Which party is it that has a war on motorists, again?

Grangemouth oil refinery was of economic importance to Scotland, just as Port Talbot was to Wales and as Scunthorpe is to England. Unfortunately, Petroineos announced today that refining has ended.

The Labour Government was right to intervene quickly to save the steel jobs in Scunthorpe, but the same should have applied to Grangemouth as the last oil refinery in Scotland.

The importance of Grangemouth was highlighted in the run-up to the general election, when Daniel Johnson referred to it as a key economic asset and said that its closure would undermine our energy security, which could be damaging for this country.

Anas Sarwar promised that a Labour Government would step in and save jobs at the refinery, but, despite promises of change, the Labour Government has repeatedly prioritised investment in England, including £200 million for Old Trafford, as reported by the Financial Times on 13 March.

How do we save the skilled refinery jobs? The UK has positioned itself as a leader in sustainable aviation fuel, and the Labour Government could have announced that Grangemouth would be one of the additional eight production sites to receive funding. However, under Labour, it is only jobs south of the border that are worthy to be saved by Government intervention.

Another example is the £800 million supercomputer that was promised for the University of Edinburgh by the previous UK Government. In 2024, Labour shelved the plans to build a state-of-the-art supercomputer at the university that would have been 50 times faster than any current computer in the UK. That cancellation was after the university had spent £31 million on a purpose-built facility for the supercomputer as part of the Edinburgh and south-east Scotland city region deal. The university has been at the heart of research and development in AI for the past 60 years and has been the host of national supercomputing services for the UK for the past 30 years.

Then, in January 2025, Labour launched the “AI Opportunities Action Plan” to make the UK a global leader in AI. The AI growth zones will start in Culham in Oxfordshire,

“where approval planning for data centres will be accelerated and access to the energy grid improved. The plan also includes a pledge to build a new supercomputer and increase the UK’s compute capacity 20-fold by 2030.”

Is that another example of investment in England taking precedence over investment in Scotland?

Despite that setback, the Scottish Government is investing £321 million through the current budget in Scottish enterprise agencies that support emerging tech, including AI and robotics, and in programmes such as the ambitious Techscaler programme. It is just a pity that Labour has once again turned its back on Scotland.

Manufacturing faces challenges relating to automation, shifts in global supply chains and the need for greener production processes. One such sector is the whisky industry, which in 2024 alone accounted for £5.4 billion in exports and was ranked as the world’s most internationally traded spirit. Yet, the Labour Government’s industrial strategy, “Invest 2035,” with its ambition to drive economic growth by targeting high-potential sectors, does not include food and drink among its eight key growth sectors. That is despite the global significance of Scotch whisky, which is a major economic powerhouse for Scotland and the UK. The industry contributes £7 billion in gross value added to the UK economy and supports 41,000 jobs in Scotland.

The UK Labour Government also has an industrial strategy advisory council, which is there to ensure that the needs and interests of industry across the UK are represented in the Labour Government’s policy-making processes. Yet, there is a lack of representation of the food and drink sector on the industrial strategy council. As Diageo pointed out in evidence to the Scottish Affairs Committee:

“Food and drink is a large, important sector that is economically important to the UK and has strong domestic support. We believe that this must be recognised via representation on the Council and the formation of the wider strategy.”

Once again, a key Scottish industry is being ignored by the UK Labour Government.

Universities Scotland also has concerns about the industrial strategy advisory council, given its cross-UK remit. It has called for

“a transparent framework or formal mechanism to ensure the Council connects to the Devolved Administrations and other stakeholders in the devolved nations on a regular basis.”

It went on to state:

“We note and understand the inclusion of Skills England on the Council. Whilst it makes sense to have a strong connection into strategic skills policy, this is another body in which Scotland is not directly represented, nor is it yet clear whether Skills England will set strategy for England only or cover cross-UK agendas. This gives us cause for further concern that the UK scope of the Council will inadvertently but inevitably be steered in the direction of the needs of England and its regions.”

Scotland has shown stronger economic performance than the UK. Our gross domestic product growth was higher; we now have more people in employment and a lower unemployment rate. In January 2025, Scotland’s private sector economy climbed from 11th to sixth among UK nations and regions, which was driven by strengthening services activity and slower decline in overall activity compared with other regions. Despite that, Scotland faces challenges such as the UK-wide impact of US tariffs, rising energy costs and increased employer national insurance contributions. We can combat those challenges only with the economic levers that other countries have to protect their economy. Labour has shown that its focus is on the south of the border, not Scotland. Therefore, only independence will deliver the support that our industry needs in these challenging times.