Chamber and committees

According to today’s forecast, the bills for health and social care and devolved social security benefits account for more than half of all Government spend, with both bills rising every year for the next five years to the tune of £150 billion. The Scottish Government claims that economic growth is its top priority, but with one in five Scots economically inactive, surely the public sector reform that we need is the sort that will help to get people back into work, reduce the welfare bill and make our nation wealthier, healthier and happier. Does the cabinet secretary not accept that today’s forecasts instead demonstrate an unsustainable budget that achieves none of that?

Although the apology is overdue, it is very welcome, and the Liberal Democrats unreservedly add our voice to it. However, let us not pretend that the rhetoric and narrative about the Gypsy Traveller community from some quarters, particularly from politicians, has always been just or justified, so I hope that the apology is universal across the chamber.

Many of the problems of yesterday are still the problems of today—be it higher suicide rates among the community, lack of educational attainment or lack of access to basic fundamental public services and human rights, such as those relating to health and housing—so there is clearly more to be done. Given the scale of those challenges, will the First Minister commit to a full parliamentary debate in Government time after the summer recess so that we can discuss them?

In 2023, it was reported that the airport had received a boost of more than £20 million through its military flight usage. Although it is hard to ascertain the true number, it has also been reported that, since 2017, the Pentagon has paid more than £70 million through some means or other for the use of Prestwick airport. It has also been used as a hub for North Atlantic Treaty Organization flights in order to send supplies to Ukraine, for example.

Given that the Scottish Government owns the airport, what impact would the removal of any military usage and loss of associated income have on the airport’s ability to compete as a going concern—or, indeed, to be sold as a going concern, which I presume is still the Scottish Government’s position?

At some point, we are going to have to have an honest debate in this Parliament about the net income forecast for Scottish income tax, which has reduced by £850 million on outturn versus forecast.

However, there is another line that I was very concerned to read about in this outturn, in relation to carers allowance reduction. There is more than £100 million of underspend in that line, yet so many carers in Scotland are facing the harsh reality of difficult finances due to the cliff edge of earnings in relation to receiving that benefit. Is the Scottish Government willing to look at the thresholds, and at whether any of that underspend could be used in this financial year or ring fenced to support carers in the vital role that they perform, instead of that money disappearing into what is clearly next year’s fiscal black hole, which is sitting in the Scottish Government’s accounts?

The proposed development at Loch Lomond has definitely filled my inbox more than any other planning issue over the years. My office has dubbed it the “Loch Lomond monster” in the past couple of weeks, such is the great strength of feeling around it.

This long-standing saga is symptomatic of a much wider issue: how planning decisions are made in Scotland; how they are consulted on; how objections are dealt with; how long decisions take; and whether we need a wider root-and-branch review of the entire planning regime—which, incidentally, we do.

I do not want to linger on the very well-rehearsed arguments for and against the development. A lot has already been said about that and, dare I say it, there has been a fair amount of political opportunism. There seems to be a very live competition about who is taking credit for bringing the topic to the chamber the most times.

However, on the substance of the debate, there are people who are in favour of the development, and I think that it is fair to comment on that. Perhaps those are the 35 per cent of people who responded to Jackie Baillie’s survey who believe that the development will deliver jobs and investment.

There are claims—and they are claims—that the development will lead to up to £40 million of investment across the west of Scotland, provide up to 200 new jobs and bring around £3.4 million to the local economy. Job creation or economic growth in the west of Scotland is not to be sniffed at, and the reporter seemed to agree.

However, we cannot ignore the great number of those who were opposed to the development. They had valid concerns about road capacity on the A82 and environmental concerns about the effect on wildlife and ancient woodland. They also had many suspicions about the true economic or employment value of the whole project.

The minister is right to say that this is a matter of national significance, particularly given the polarisation of views, although the nature and location of the development are important, too. I believe that, in this instance, calling in the application is probably the right thing to do. My natural instinct is to keep ministers as far away from planning decisions as we can, but, nonetheless, escalating such decisions is an appropriate part of the planning process.

I have a bit of a problem with today’s debate, because the Government’s 11th-hour announcement that it will call in the application is quite an embarrassing one. The Government was staring down the barrel of a defeat at decision time today and the minister has caved accordingly.

Initial proposals for the development were brought back on 1 January 2018. Since then, they have been withdrawn, rejected, appealed, approved and again face potential defeat. The problem with that uncertainty is that it is not fair on either local residents or the developer, which I am surprised did not walk away from the project ages ago.

I will explain what I am nervous about. If every proposed major development in Scotland results in a seven-year-long battle, which has to end in a debate in its national Parliament, good luck in attracting any future investment. For future investment to happen, two things must happen in parallel. First, local communities must be confident that planning, consultation and appeals processes are truly fit for purpose—and we all know that many do not believe that to be the case. Secondly, future investors must know that Scotland is open for business and that applications will be treated fairly and squarely, free from rhetoric and falsehoods.

This long, drawn-out saga has damaged confidence in investing in our tourism sector just as much as it has damaged confidence in our current planning processes.

I am uncomfortable with leaving a decision such as this to the Government, which is bereft of consistency when it comes to overturning local decisions. I am just as uncomfortable with leaving a major multimillion-pound investment decision to sit on the desks of ministers when they already have a lengthy backlog of decisions to make, including, for example, on the Loch Long salmon farm. Those are decisions that ministers deem are far too controversial to go ahead with.

My one ask of ministers today, which is perhaps naive in an election year, is simply this: please do not let politics get in the way of sensible evidence-based decision making in making this decision. The Scottish Government will have to carry the can, and it will have to own any decision that it makes. I wish the Government good luck—it is going to need it.

I have a straightforward question: are there any circumstances whatsoever under which the Scottish Government would refuse more money, if asked for it, to complete the Glen Rosa, or is it the case that we have simply passed the point of no return and that the vessel will be finished, whatever the cost?

The problem is that the issue is not coming to any resolution. Anyone who saw the news last night will have seen that it is the elderly and vulnerable across the west of Scotland who are suffering, through no fault of their own.

Many people have sympathy with the drivers and believe that they should get a fair deal on pay. Equally, some people in my part of the world are now housebound because there is no public transport. That includes, in particular, people who do not have cars, who live in rural communities, who are on low incomes or who have disabilities.

One or two days of striking here and there is one thing, but six weeks is another. More than 30 services have been cancelled. Although the dispute is a private matter between the two parties, public connectivity is not. What is the Government doing to help to resolve the issue?

To ask the Scottish Government what it is doing to ensure the connectivity of local communities in the west of Scotland, in light of reports that over 400 Stagecoach drivers in Ayr, Arran, Ardrossan and Kilmarnock have begun industrial action until 21 July. (S6T-02586)

Has the minister spoken to Unite the Union or Stagecoach in the past three days? I would be keen to hear an update on that in response to my supplementary question.

There is a much wider and more problematic issue here. It should simply not be the case that, in Scotland in 2025, entire communities can be cut off completely from public transport because of industrial action in a single bus company. Rural communities in particular expect and deserve more reliable services, better connectivity and more resilience in public transport.

Is the Scottish Government willing today to commit to a full root-and-branch review of rural bus services, which will look in particular at contingency planning, so that no one in Scotland is treated as a second-class citizen when industrial action takes away their only method of transport?

I will make some progress first, and then I will.

The backlog did not happen overnight; it is a long-term failure to plan to meet demand, which has been growing for almost a decade. In the years from 2019 to 2021, demand for ADHD assessments increased by 500 to 600 per cent. That happened six years ago—the Government has known that demand will increase, but capacity has not kept up.

The SNP made some very explicit and specific promises. The Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Care is shaking his head, but here are some specifics of what his Government promised to voters when it got into power in 2021. It said:

“10% of our ... NHS budget will be allocated to mental health.”

Is that happening? Nobody else seems to believe that it is.