I welcome the cabinet secretary to his new post and congratulate Katy Clark on her maiden speech.

I am delighted to be able to participate in this afternoon’s debate on the recovery, renewal, and transformation of Scotland’s justice system. As has been the case across society, the Covid-19 pandemic and the necessary restrictions that followed have prevented changes and there have been severe challenges across our justice system. It is incumbent on the Parliament to work to ensure that our streets are safe, that those who break the social contract are punished and that we protect the rights of the victims in a timely and efficient manner.

The most pressing concern that the criminal justice system faces in Scotland is the court backlog. Although I acknowledge that there has been innovation—the cabinet secretary touched on that point earlier when he mentioned the use of cinemas as remote jury centres—there is still a lot to do to get the backlog sorted.

The criminal court trial backlog has doubled in the past year, and the SCTS has told us that the number of trials will not get back to normal levels until March 2025. The justice of the peace courts resume their work only this week, and they have a lot to manage too, so the Scottish Government needs to make a more concerted effort to tackle that backlog.

As someone who served on the Tayside joint police board, I find that some of the developments in recent years since the SNP’s merger of our local police forces have saddened me. My constituents have raised concerns about the loss of community policing in their area. The fact is that there are fewer officers on the streets and they have to work over much larger geographical areas—that is what is happening in our society, and it is important that we restore more bobbies on the beat.

Presiding Officer, I congratulate you on your appointment to your new role. I take the opportunity to welcome the new members who gave their maiden speeches today, Natalie Don and Marie McNair. I look forward to working with all members in the chamber over the next five years. I also congratulate the cabinet secretary on her appointment.

It has been a privilege for me to serve the region of Mid Scotland and Fife. This is my first opportunity to speak in the chamber since being returned as an MSP—I am delighted to be given the chance to serve for a second parliamentary session. It has been a privilege to represent areas such as Clackmannanshire, Stirling, Perthshire, Kinross-shire and Fife, and I very much look forward to representing them again over the next five years.

I am particularly pleased to participate and sum up in the debate on tackling poverty and building a fairer country, in my new role as my party’s shadow minister for equalities and older people. I have always been passionate about promoting equalities, including during my eighteen years as a councillor, as well as in the previous parliamentary session, when I had the opportunity to sit on the Equalities and Human Rights Committee. During that time, I worked with local charities, the third sector and other organisations, and, in the past, I worked for Ark Housing, which looks after individuals with learning difficulties in their community. I look forward to engaging with the public, private and third sectors to ensure that we tackle the issues that they bring to our attention.

I am slightly disappointed by the tone of the SNP motion, which focuses on attacking the UK Government rather than addressing the issues that the motion covers. However, given the record of the Scottish Government, it is no surprise that the SNP aims to deflect from its failings during its tenure in office. The motion demands the devolution of

“all employment and social security powers to the Scottish Parliament”,

yet the SNP has failed to deliver any of the benefits that were devolved by the Scotland Act 2016. The SNP promised that a new Scottish welfare system would be fully in place by the 2021 election. [Interruption.] I cannot take an intervention—I have lots to cover and time is limited.

Even before the pandemic, in 2019, the social security minister declared that responsibility for the severe disablement allowance would be handed back to the Department for Work and Pensions so that there was no “unnecessary disruption”. Now, the Scottish Government has said that it wants to take full responsibility, but not until at least 2025. How can it be possible that we should take nearly a decade to secure such a system? Let us not forget that this is the same party that assured voters that Scotland could become fully independent from the UK in the space of 18 months—yet it has the gall to demand that further social security powers be devolved now. The SNP needs to sort out the mess that it has created so far before it takes on the responsibilities of new devolved powers.

Despite the First Minister’s protestations that education was her number 1 priority, the attainment gap has remained stubbornly wide. Between 2017-18 and 2018-19, the gap between the percentages of the most deprived and the least deprived P1 to P3 pupils who achieved the expected numeracy standards did not reduce at all. Between 2016-17 and 2018-19, the attainment gap for the proportion of S3 pupils who achieved the literacy standard grew from only 13.6 per cent to 13.8 per cent. Audit Scotland has challenged the SNP’s tackling of the issues, and has said that the Scottish attainment challenge funding does not go far enough and is limited in its scope. However, education has been fully devolved since the recommencement of the Parliament.

The Scottish Conservatives have a positive plan to tackle poverty, and it is welcome to see that other parties have already adopted some of our initiatives. We were, for example, the first party to announce proposals to offer free school meals to all primary school pupils. We want to go further and give five extra hours of wraparound childcare for schoolchildren in P1 to P3, which would help remove the barrier that prevents too many parents, particularly mothers, from returning to the workplace.

We have also pledged to deliver the biggest social housing programme since devolution, with 60,000 new affordable homes which, together with an accelerated housing first scheme, would ensure that the scandal of rough sleeping is removed by 2026.

No, I only have a minute or two to go.

We would enshrine in law that the Scottish Government should deliver a ring-fenced percentage of its annual budget to local councils, which need the money. That process would restore budgets to the levels at which they were in 2007, before the SNP decided that it would cut budgets.

Our job over the next five years is to shine a light on the current Government’s failings and to ensure that there is a positive vision for the future.

I will highlight the contributions of my colleagues who spoke in the debate. Miles Briggs talked about recognising the long-term impact of homelessness and about the need for a national housing first programme. Jeremy Balfour spoke with passion, as he always does, about social security and the Government’s lack of ambition. Our new member, Sue Webber, spoke about child poverty and homelessness, and gave harrowing examples of what is happening on the ground in the communities that she represents.

In conclusion, the Scottish Conservatives are determined to seek action on tackling poverty and building a fairer country. The SNP might talk a good game on those issues, but when we scratch beneath the surface, we see that it is failing to secure information and support for so many. During its time in government, poverty levels have remained far too high; the attainment gap between the richest and poorest pupils has remained stubbornly wide and homelessness has increased. There are many other examples, because the SNP continues to prioritise its obsession with independence over anything else.

If the SNP is truly serious about tackling poverty and building a fairer country, it needs to end the division, stop blaming Westminster, use the vast array of powers for welfare that it already has and start to promote and secure funding for local councils. Until that happens, the Government will continue to fail more Scots.

took the oath.