Chamber and committees

The minister states that everyone should be given the opportunity. The national transition training fund creates opportunities for about 40,000 people, but 120,000 people are unemployed. Indeed, there were 80,000 people on furlough when that scheme finished. Does he believe that the response is sufficient, or will more places need to be created?

I begin by expressing my condolences to all those who have lost a loved one to the virus, and I pay tribute to all those in the health service who are on the front line of battling the pandemic.

What the Deputy First Minster stated in relation to the prospect of rolling out vaccination passports in more contexts will be of significant concern to those who run hospitality businesses, especially given the broad and non-specific nature of his statement. Will he clarify the following things? What process and timeline will the Government adhere to in examining the roll-out of vaccination passports? Will the Government publish further evidence on transmission in hospitality settings and will the Deputy First Minister confirm whether a negative test will be accepted in lieu of a vaccination passport?

In relation to enforcement, the hospitality industry raised the point with me last week that, although nightclubs have door staff and therefore have a natural point to check such things, cafes do not have door staff, so the practicalities of checking vaccination passports in those contexts is hugely more challenging.

I also ask about the booster programme. I, too, welcome the landmark that we have reached in the programme, but its progress continues to be variable. In my area, people are waiting two to three hours to receive their booster. The accessibility of the location of vaccination sites is problematic, and the promise of combined flu and booster jabs being given at the same time is not a reality. There are very variable roll-out rates across health board areas, so what steps will the Government take to support health boards that are struggling to roll out the booster vaccines?

Acknowledging the problem will not make it go away and it has taken until this point in the debate to hear an SNP member acknowledge that fundamental problem. I am not saying that people are not finding jobs in that area, or that there are not good schemes, but the Government is putting its head in the sand about the lack of teachers.

If we look at the urgent and pressing problems caused by Covid, we find ourselves in a different situation to the one that we expected. Many of us thought that we would be facing an unemployment crisis. That has not occurred, but there are labour shortages. There were 80,000 people on furlough when that scheme ended. Are the responses to Covid up to the job of reskilling those who need that? It is possible to have both labour shortages and people who are unable to go into those jobs because they cannot reskill.

The simple maths is that, between the young persons guarantee and the national training transition fund, only 44,000 opportunities will even be aimed at, let alone achieved. There was a rather odd quibble between Willie Rennie and the minister as to whether the national transition training fund number is 3,000, 7,000 or 9,000. That is irrelevant. The relevant point is whether the response is up to the scale of the challenge, which is measured not in thousands of opportunities or places, but in the hundreds of thousands of people who are currently unemployed. We need to tackle that.

Perhaps I should have been clearer. I was not questioning what was said by my colleague who sits behind me; I was questioning the quibbling that came from the Government benches. Willie Rennie is absolutely right. The precise number is irrelevant, but we need to ask whether the strategic targets are right and whether the scale of the intervention is appropriate given the scale of the challenge. In that regard, the numbers give us a much gloomier picture than the minister, perhaps, wanted to paint.

Ultimately, we need urgency and flexibility. We must not have long-drawn-out engagement processes and be met with a lack of resource to deliver, as my colleague Martin Whitfield said. To put it simply, the Government’s approach has been found wanting.

By the same token, however, there were some fair challenges from the SNP benches. We cannot simply paint a picture of doom and gloom, as there are real strengths in the apprenticeship system. We have seen a system developed that has the confidence of much of industry. In contrast with other parts of the United Kingdom, we have a system that is grounded in work and jobs, and to that extent I share the questions about what the Conservatives mean by a demand-led system. Fundamentally, we have a system that is driven by work.

Where there is criticism to be made, and where we should focus our critique, is on the flexibility of that system. Too many employers talk to me about the fact that they have to take the modern apprenticeship frameworks as they stand. People cannot take a more piecemeal approach, and the system is inflexible in relation to short-term needs. Likewise, many employers, including most notably employers in the retail industry, point out to me that the level of benefit that they get simply does not match what they are charged through the apprenticeship levy. Only 2 per cent of modern apprenticeships are retail and we have seen a 44 per cent reduction in retail apprenticeships.

The Government must address those issues. That is not to say that the system is completely flawed, but if we are going to improve the system, we have to recognise the flaws.

Does Willie Rennie agree that quibbling about a thousand or two here or there is totally irrelevant compared with the more than 120,000 people who are currently unemployed or the 80,000 people who were on furlough when that scheme finished?

This afternoon, we have been trying to address two fundamental issues. That is quite complicated to do, especially in only 90 minutes.

The first issue is whether our skills and apprenticeships system is up to the job of addressing the problems that have been thrown up by Covid. The second is whether the system adequately meets the needs of Scotland’s future. Addressing those issues is complicated and we do not have the luxury of picking them off one by one.

I have been frustrated by what I have heard from both the Government and from SNP back benchers. They have argued that because we have the young persons guarantee and the national transition training fund, no further questions should be asked. However, it is relevant and important to question whether those schemes are up to the job because of the urgency of the task at hand and the scale of the problem. That is the argument that my colleague Pauline McNeill set out. We are not saying that those schemes do not work; we are asking whether they do enough work.

The second issue, which was outlined well by my colleague Michael Marra, is the question whether the skills system is delivering fundamental skills, such as the digital and zero-carbon skills that our economy will not only need, but rely on in future. My frustration can be summed up by the exchange between Michael Marra and Clare Adamson. There are of course some great things going on to help young people get into coding, but the fundamental point is that, since 2008, the number of computing science teachers in our schools has dropped by a quarter. We cannot deliver the digital skills that we need if we cannot guarantee what Michael Marra called for, which is a higher computing science class in every secondary school. Young people cannot get the skills that they need if those subjects are not being delivered in schools.

I will close, Presiding Officer. We need flexibility and urgency and a response that matches the scale of the issue.

I have been contacted by dozens of constituents who are finding navigating the system confusing, if not impossible. I will give just one example. My mother-in-law has been waiting weeks past the six-month point for her Covid booster. She has been calling the helpline every day to no avail, until today. I checked with her, and she received a letter today offering an appointment at 7 am tomorrow morning. She can make that appointment, which is different from the situation with her flu jab: she was offered an appointment in Gorebridge, which is two buses away and a two-hour round journey—and that is for a women over the age of 70 who lives by herself.

She is not alone. Constituents are finding—

Constituents are finding the situation confusing—they lack information and the helpline does not help. Does the cabinet secretary think that that is good enough? If he does not, what will he do to fix it?

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking in response to reports of patients being given appointments for a Covid-19 booster vaccine within six months of their second dose of the vaccine and who were therefore unable to have the booster at the appointment. (S6O-00305)