Scottish Parliament, 11 December 2008

386 contributions from 83 members. The official report.

Official Report 11 December 2008

ScotRail Franchise

Alex Fergusson (None, Galloway and Upper Nithsdale)

Good morning. The first item of business is a debate on motion S3M-3075, in the name of Des McNulty, on the ScotRail franchise.

Des McNulty (Labour, Clydebank and Milngavie)

There was widespread concern and disappointment in April, when the Scottish National Party announced that it had, without consultation with passenger bodies, trade unions or anyone else, agreed to extend First ScotRail's train contract to 2014. Ministers did not seek separate advice when First ScotRail claimed that the negotiations were sensitive, in that they could affect the company's share price. They put the company's interests before those of passengers and employee representatives, who were denied any input, even on a confidential basis.

Ministers could have waited until Audit Scotland had completed its programmed review of the operation of the franchise, which was deliberately timed to help Transport Scotland learn lessons that could be applied in developing the franchise in the event of a three-year extension being granted or a new franchise being tendered for, but the minister and Transport Scotland decided not to consult and not to wait.

They did a deal that they claimed would guarantee that £73.1 million would be made available to reinvest in the network. In the context of a £2.5 billion contract, that is not much of a dividend. Moreover, it turns out that the provision of that sum is not even guaranteed, as it depends on First ScotRail meeting revenue targets. The revised terms kick in only after First's profits exceed £27.247 million per year. The agreements were adjusted so that First will retain a greater proportion of income before anything is paid back to the Government. First is protected from any downturn in passenger revenue, as the Government is now contractually obliged to step in with additional financial support. That is not a bad deal from First's point of view. The company can coin it during the good times, when revenues are on the increase, and is protected from financial risk when times are harder.

As Iain Gray pointed out last week,

"lack of consultation created practical difficulties."—[Official Report, 4 December 2008; c 13095.]

Strathclyde partnership for transport had agreed to fund closed-circuit television on its stations for the full term of the contract, at a cost of almost £0.5 million a year, but the Minister for Transport, Infrastructure and Climate Change did not bother to ask where the money for that would be found, with the result that a hole was left, which Transport Scotland will have to fill using its £73.1 million piggy bank—if, indeed, it gets that money.

If the minister had asked his officials to supply him with a properly documented business case and had tracked the detail carefully, such omissions could and probably would have been identified but, according to Audit Scotland, the contract—which is huge—was let on the basis of presentations to the minister.

The minister must have been aware that his signature is worth a huge amount of money to FirstGroup. Parliament and the Scottish people have a right to expect a level of due diligence commensurate with the scale of the contract; they do not expect the approach that the minister adopted yesterday, when he announced a huge raft of vaguely costed and specified projects, for which there is no timetabled programme. He admitted that he had not based his plans on any projections of how much the Government would have to spend on transport projects in the 2014 or 2017 spending review periods.

In the Audit Scotland report, it was revealed that the finance director of Transport Scotland, the man whose job description presumably includes advising on financial issues, had a substantial shareholding in First. The handling of that conflict of interest does not seem to have satisfied Audit Scotland, and I feel sure that the Public Audit Committee will want to consider that as part of its investigation, the holding of which I understand was agreed to yesterday.

If the contract is price sensitive, surely someone must have recognised the sensitivities in relation to a financial conflict of interest. How on earth could a situation have been allowed to come about in which someone who had a financial interest was sitting at the table and had access to financial information? What judgments were made by those whose job it was to deal with such matters to protect the reputation of Transport Scotland?

Let me put the questions that the politicians must answer. When were ministers made aware of the conflict of interest involving the finance director? What view do they take of the handling of such staffing and governance matters by Transport Scotland? Have further investigations been carried out? Is any action being taken as a consequence?

On Saturday, The Sun ran a story that suggested that Mr Houston had been under investigation in relation to a separate matter—the M80 extension—about which my colleague Cathie Craigie has been seeking a meeting with Transport Scotland, unsuccessfully, for weeks. I do not want to take that issue any further, as we might be getting into personnel matters, which it is inappropriate to air in the Parliament.

However, this week I received a faxed copy of a letter to Transport Scotland from the former operators of a bus company in Scotland, who complained that the finance director of Transport Scotland, Mr Houston, had treated their company unreasonably in relation to payments under the concessionary fares scheme, for which he had managerial responsibility, with the result that they were forced out of business. They claim that the only beneficiary of that is FirstGroup.

I do not know the full background to the issue or where the truth lies, but problems are stacking up on the issues of probity and governance. It is the job of both Transport Scotland and the minister to ensure that such matters are properly dealt with. The problems are not resolved by the departure of Mr Houston. We must find out why the conflict of interest arose, what its implications might have been, why it was not prevented, what steps should have been taken and why they were not, and whether the monitoring and scrutiny of Transport Scotland, which is ultimately the responsibility of the minister, has been properly carried out.

We should have had a proper consultation before the franchise extension was agreed to, not a sham consultation afterwards. There would have been far more point in discussing the options that could have been delivered before negotiations on the contract were completed rather than carrying out a consultation on priced options afterwards. Ministers claimed at the time that the agreement would lock in various benefits and would secure increased investment from ScotRail, but that is dependent on the revenue that is generated; it is not a cast-iron guarantee.

The whole process needs to be investigated properly, and the Public Audit Committee would be best placed to do that. It is only reasonable to ask the minister to answer the questions about what went wrong, why that happened and what he intends to do about it.

I move,

That the Parliament notes the Audit Scotland report on the extension of First ScotRail's contract to 2014; expresses serious concern regarding the lack of consultation over the extension of this franchise and the failure of ministers to require a fully documented business case; notes the resignation of the former finance director of Transport Scotland; calls on the Scottish Government to cooperate with any Audit Committee investigation, and urges the Minister for Transport, Infrastructure and Climate Change to issue a statement to the Parliament should any investigation into the probity or governance within Transport Scotland make that necessary.

Stewart Stevenson (Scottish National Party, Banff and Buchan)

Good franchise management is critical to the success of Scotland's rail services. I very much welcome Audit Scotland's finding that Transport Scotland manages the core aspects of the franchise contract well. Audit Scotland also states that the franchise is performing well—there are more trains running on time, passenger numbers are well ahead of expectations and passenger satisfaction is up. That performance, together with Transport Scotland's comprehensive recommendations, helped us to make the informed decision to extend the contract.

The rigorous appraisal process, as described by Audit Scotland, delivered value for money—more than £70 million—and, for the first time, a cap on the profits that FirstGroup may take from the franchise. It has delivered for passengers, taxpayers and ScotRail staff.

In raising an issue about a bus company, Mr McNulty said that he did not know the details. In a debate of such seriousness, will he please not raise such matters when he does not know the details? I do know the details, and he would be wise to be careful.

The negotiated position, which external views from the experts Ernst & Young aided us in arriving at, followed consideration of the full range of options, from doing nothing through to granting the extension. We also tightened the contract, requiring more from First for the same subsidy and tying it into the delivery of new services, while creating, for the first time, a profit cap.

Much has been made of Audit Scotland's comments that governance of the extension could have been better. The fact that we do not agree with all of Audit Scotland's analysis could no doubt be explored in more detail by the Public Audit Committee, but Transport Scotland will act on the report's recommendations when that is appropriate.

I turn to the role of individual directors. The management commentary of Transport Scotland's annual accounts for 2007-08 notes, as it did in 2006-07, that it records board members' interests in a register that is publicly available. The interests that have been referred to were documented there in 2007.

Transport Scotland's directors gave assurances that no conflicts of interest arose in the exercise of their duties. I have received assurances that processes—which were signed off by Audit Scotland—were adhered to throughout the extension discussion. The agency's processes, established under the previous Administration, are not only rigorous, but ensure that no conflicts of interest impact on decision making.

This is not the first time that the extension of the franchise has been used to try to make political capital. When we announced it in April, some opposition MSPs suggested that it represented a policy shift without consultation. That is entirely wrong. The extension was always contemplated by the original contract, which was consulted upon and then let in 2004.

Patrick Harvie (Green, Glasgow)

The minister refers to an issue that is addressed in part by the Conservative amendment, which refers to the fact that

"the original contract, negotiated by the previous Labour-led Scottish administration, 'did not specify the conditions under which an extension should be considered'".

In other parts of the United Kingdom, if the original contract did not specify the conditions, extensions have been consulted on. Did the minister make the decision not to consult, or was it some other part of the Government?

Stewart Stevenson (Scottish National Party, Banff and Buchan)

Ministers, in considering this option, were aware of the provisions that were described in a letter from the then-transport minister, Iain Gray, to the Transport and the Environment Committee on 2 December 2002, that the franchise would be a seven-year contract with a possible three-year extension. We exercise the powers and the ability given to us by the contract that Iain Gray put in place when he was the minister.

The Executive of the day said that it favoured a 15-year franchise, but upheavals in the industry at the time, such as the replacement of Railtrack with Network Rail, meant that that was not advisable. Instead, when a Strategic Rail Authority review in 2003 moved to shorter franchises, ministers followed suit, but with the extension there to provide for the necessary flexibility.

That move also fitted the assumptions at the time about the implementation of major investment projects. The Government of the day effectively put in place a contract that envisaged that those services would be in place by the 2011 termination date, as it was then. The extension that we secured delivers what could not be guaranteed in 2004—a contract that will see the major projects and now the Commonwealth games services delivered reliably and safely.

The extension also grants us an opportunity that a refranchise in 2011 would not: to explore the option of moving the next franchise to a not-for-profit model. I have had encouraging discussions with the Scottish Trades Union Congress and union representatives, who are pleased to explore the opportunities that we have created. We will carry out a full consultation and give all stakeholders the chance to comment and input during 2009. This is an exciting development—one that would not have been possible without the extension.

We are committed to delivering real improvements to our rail network, in recognition of the important role that it plays in supporting sustainable economic growth. This is the right deal at the right time. It benefits passengers and businesses and supports sustainable economic growth. I welcome members' support for that commitment.

I move amendment S3M-3075.3, to leave out from "expresses" to first "Transport Scotland".

Alex Johnstone (Conservative, North East Scotland)

The quality of train services in Scotland is often far lower than passengers and taxpayers have a right to expect. It is generally accepted that FirstGroup has presided over an improvement in service levels over the past four years. First ScotRail's managing director, Mary Grant, is widely credited with having overseen improved performance of the company and deserves credit for that success. We are therefore confident that rewarding First with an additional three years is the correct decision.

While the recent Audit Scotland report contained some criticism of Transport Scotland's handling of the franchise and the extension process, its overall assessment of the franchise was generally positive. It is therefore strange that the Labour Party places so much emphasis on the report's findings. Much of the criticism contained in the report refers to Transport Scotland's oversight of the franchise since 2004. As the Labour Party—together with the Liberal Democrats—was responsible for Transport Scotland during most of that period, it is they who are being criticised, at least as much as the present Government.

It should also be borne in mind that it was the previous Labour-led Executive that established Transport Scotland, awarded the current franchise to FirstGroup and provided the three-year extension period as an option. It is therefore at best disingenuous and at worst outright hypocrisy for the Labour Party to seek to blame others for failings for which it is at least partially responsible. While there is no doubt that mistakes were made in the way in which the franchise extension was conducted, and that civil servants at Transport Scotland and the ministers concerned must ensure that lessons are learned, it is hard to escape the conclusion that this debate has as much to do with the Labour Party playing politics as with any serious concerns about the handling of what remains an overall success for ScotRail.

John Park (Labour, Mid Scotland and Fife)

Will the member give way?

Alex Johnstone (Conservative, North East Scotland)

No. I have only four minutes.

On the future of rail services in Scotland, we are encouraged by some of the concessions that the Government has secured from FirstGroup as part of the franchise extension. The list of priced options that the Government may require First to implement during the term of the franchise includes a number of interesting proposals. I particularly welcome the opportunity that it has given to reopen the station at Laurencekirk. Improvements to Edinburgh to Glasgow services, among others, are important opportunities that have been taken up.

We would like the Government to use today's debate to outline any further improvements that it intends to implement over the coming years, including further improvements to the Edinburgh to Glasgow service, the potential for additional rolling stock to be brought in from other parts of the country and possible improvements to the Caledonian sleeper service.

Ultimately, we would like effort to be focused on ways of rebalancing the present ratio of public-private funding for the franchise in favour of reducing the enormous public subsidy, while simultaneously increasing commercial freedom for the operator. The present irony is that while the railways are officially privatised, micromanagement by the state—through civil servants at Transport Scotland—is arguably far greater than it was even in the days of British Rail. Increased commercial freedom in return for an increased share of private sector funding would therefore be a worthy aim for the Government to pursue.

Des McNulty introduced additional issues to the debate. I will not take a position on the information that he presented to us and will wait to hear more about that.

I move amendment S3M-3075.1, to leave out from "expresses" to end and insert:

"notes from the report that the original contract, negotiated by the previous Labour-led Scottish administration, 'did not specify the conditions under which an extension should be considered or the criteria to be used to decide whether an extension might be appropriate'; believes that practice and procedures for future contract management can be improved and notes the report's recommendations for Transport Scotland; considers that, in light of the finding that 'First ScotRail was performing above its punctuality and capacity improvements targets within its first year of operating' and 'key aspects of the original franchise contract were no longer fit for purpose', the decision to extend the contract, inserted into the original contract under the previous Labour-led Scottish administration, was on balance justifiable."

Alison McInnes (Liberal Democrat, North East Scotland)

I welcome the chance to debate the extension of the First ScotRail passenger franchise. Although I welcome the debate, I cannot help but feel that it is a debate that we should have had a long time ago, perhaps before the Government committed an extra £800 million of taxpayers' money. Back in the spring, before the Government made its decision, we might have been able to hold a constructive debate on the case for the extension. Instead, we are left with an inquest. How could Transport Scotland make its recommendation without a formal consultation process? How could the minister make such a huge decision—the largest contract that the Government has handed out—without ever seeing a documented business case? I do not have the answer.

Any member here, with the possible exception of those on the Government's benches, might easily fill the whole morning going over the shortcomings—no, the downright failures—of the process. As tempting as that may be, however, our time is brief and I will have to settle for the highlights, if that is not a contradiction in terms. What we get from them is a damning indictment of the decision-making process of this Government. Although the problems started before the minister got in on the act, we do not need to look much further than him for the root cause. If someone knows that the boss will say yes to whatever they present him with, why bother following what the rest of us would consider to be a proper process?

John Swinney (Scottish National Party, North Tayside)

Will Alison McInnes enlighten Parliament about what her last remark meant? I do not understand her point about the boss saying yes.

Alison McInnes (Liberal Democrat, North East Scotland)

Mr Stevenson is less than thorough in some of his decision-making processes. Yesterday, he brought us an enormous document with absolutely no details in it. He seems to be less than interested in some of the details.

Audit Scotland's report is, as we well know, highly enlightening on the subject. It said that Transport Scotland established criteria

"to determine whether the extension should be awarded"

and that it

"considered risks during meetings".

But Transport Scotland did not think it necessary, or even sensible, to make any formal records of that.

Although a—now former—senior director holds shares in FirstGroup, we are assured that he had no vote on any decision and was not involved in the review. However, yet again, we have no record of any declaration of interests—other than those in the formal register—or of whether he absented himself from discussions.

There was no external consultation on the extension—although Transport Scotland had "concerns". Was it not even a little worried about the appearance that would be given by keeping things hidden from view? Multimillion pound decisions should not be taken—cannot be taken—in such a way. A lack of proper consultation leaves passengers and stakeholders disconnected from the process and can all too easily lead to unintended consequences, as has already been pointed out by Des McNulty.

I think that we are all agreed that Transport Scotland should know better. It should understand the need for proper procedure and for openness and transparency throughout. Perhaps the problem is that it also knows that this Government is not as concerned with those things as the rest of us. As we know, the minister blithely backed the extension, never asking to see a proper business case. Indeed, as far as we know, he never even considered the need for a consultation, and never saw a problem with the nature of Transport Scotland's work. In fact, if we consider his amendment, perhaps we can say that he was proud of it. The sad thing is that none of this surprises me.

Still, even after the catalogue of errors, the extension itself brings an opportunity in the form of £73.1 million to reinvest in transport projects—investment that the whole of Scotland could benefit from. That is, of course, if the minister does not have his way. It worries me that he may already have committed much of the money to improvements in the central belt. No doubt work needs to be done there—but not there alone. The franchise return funds must be used in a way that will benefit every region. Investing some of the money in improving services between Aberdeen and Inverness, Perth and Edinburgh, and Glasgow and the south of Scotland could play a huge role in making the railway an attractive alternative to the car for people across the country.

Almost as important as the decision on how to spend the funds is the manner in which it is made. The minister must make a commitment—here, today—to come back to Parliament following the current consultation. How to spend money in a way that will best benefit Scotland is a matter for this chamber, not for secret meetings behind closed doors.

I move amendment S3M-3075.2, to insert at end:

"requires the Scottish Government to conduct the next steps of the franchise extension process with the greatest possible transparency, and therefore calls on the Minister for Transport, Infrastructure and Climate Change to bring before Parliament the draft proposals on how the £73.1 million accrued through the franchise extension will be reinvested to allow close scrutiny of the plans before any further funds are committed."

Alex Fergusson (None, Galloway and Upper Nithsdale)

We now come to open debate. We have a little flexibility, so if members are minded to accept interventions, I will be able to add on time for that luxury.

Charlie Gordon (Labour, Glasgow Cathcart)

I was one of the MSPs who, in April in this chamber, expressed surprise at the timing of the extension of the ScotRail franchise. I thought that it was unnecessarily abrupt, and not at all transparent.

As a co-signatory, in a previous capacity, to the first franchise for ScotRail, I know for sure that it is perfectly possible to balance public accountability with commercial confidentiality in such circumstances. I do not at all accept that it was necessary for things to be done in secret and with no public consultation—which was bemoaned by, among others, the body that represents the interests of rail passengers.

Rushing ahead with the extension to the ScotRail franchise before a study—a scheduled study—by Audit Scotland, was risky; but it has now emerged, through Audit Scotland's work, that rushing ahead may well have been reckless.

The extension delivers a win-win deal for First ScotRail. To be fair, it is true that the management team at ScotRail have done a competent job of running the franchise. However, that does not necessarily make them men and women of vision. For example, the team operates the Scotland to London sleeper services, but as far as I am aware they have not asked to give oral evidence to the Parliament's Transport, Infrastructure and Climate Change Committee on its current inquiry into high-speed rail services. High-speed rail may well have implications for ScotRail's services.

I will repeat a concern that I expressed to the chamber in April: hastily extending the current franchise kills off the possibility of reintegrating train operation in Scotland with track management—what I call vertical reintegration in the railways. That would bring enormous benefits, but it has, in effect, been kicked into touch.

Stewart Stevenson (Scottish National Party, Banff and Buchan)

I am interested in the member's point. Does he believe that this is the right time to transfer more responsibilities to the Scottish Parliament—including responsibility for the metal, so that the wheel-metal conjoining that he advocates can actually be delivered?

Charlie Gordon (Labour, Glasgow Cathcart)

Indeed, yes. I have advocated that on more than one occasion in this chamber—and I have reminded the Scottish Government that it is not using its current powers to the full. For example, the First Minister never seems to use his legal power to give instructions—instructions—to Network Rail. It seems to me that we have been sold short by a lack of vision, not only among the rail operators in the industry, but within the Scottish Government itself.

Des McNulty started this debate in a measured way. However, if one considers press concerns about a certain individual and the M80 contract, and if one considers new concerns expressed about the same individual vis-à-vis financial relationships with bus companies, I have to ask: what are the press and the public supposed to think when ministers insist on behaving in a secretive fashion? With great glee, the minister rejoined to Des McNulty, saying, in effect, "I know the truth about that bus business and no one else does." Presiding Officer, one of the things that I dislike most about the Scottish Parliament is when ministers, from any party, stand at the front bench and say to MSPs, "I know something you don't know, but I'm not gonnae tell you what it is." Not only does that not happen in local government, where I spent 18 years, it is actually illegal in local government not to tell elected members the full truth about the issues before them.

I will close on a point about Alex Johnstone. It made me sick to hear him bemoaning the huge subsidy to the ScotRail franchise. Does Mr Johnstone not realise that, on the day that the railways were privatised, by a Tory Government, the public subsidy that had been going into the nationalised British Rail doubled overnight? It was the Tories what did it.

Christina McKelvie (Scottish National Party, Central Scotland)

One thing we can never accuse the Labour Party of is having a good sense of timing. Calling a debate on the ScotRail franchise for the day after the Scottish Government announced investment of £3 billion over 10 years in the maintenance and safe operation of Scotland's railways—yes, that was £3 billion—was a stroke of genius, and I congratulate Des McNulty on it.

Of course, there was also other investment in our railways: up to £2.5 billion for the electrification of our rail network, and about time as well; millions on reducing journey times and on park-and-ride schemes and integrated ticketing; and up to £250 million on rail enhancements. That was excellent news for rail users, from a Government that cares about making Scotland better.

The other excellent news for rail users is that the extension of the franchise gives everyone a chance to have a proper look at what is going on in Scotland's railways today—and it will allow some organisations the time that they need to prepare a bid to run Scotland's railways.

Patrick Harvie (Green, Glasgow)

I can entirely understand that the member is very excited about yesterday's announcement. However, does she not understand the point that passengers, members of the public, MSPs and others wanted the chance to have their say before the decisions on the strategic transport projects review or the extension of the franchise were made? Offering such a chance would not have set a precedent; other Administrations elsewhere in the UK consult on decisions before they announce them.

Christina McKelvie (Scottish National Party, Central Scotland)

Yes, the member obviously has a point. However, the contract was set in place in 2002—by Iain Gray.

As I was saying, I understand that one of those bids is now likely to come from the railway unions—and I take it that Des McNulty and his Labour colleagues will be keen to welcome that interest from the unions and will welcome the contract extension that gives them the time to prepare a bid. Or perhaps not—because Labour members do not appear to remember much.

In a Labour Party news release from 28 November, Des McNulty is quoted as claiming that the SNP negotiated a deal in private to extend the ScotRail franchise. The truth is, of course, that it was the previous Labour and Liberal Democrat Administration that negotiated the contract. In fact, I am sure that Labour members will be delighted to be reminded that the transport minister who negotiated that contract with the extension option was a fellow by the name of Iain Gray. I wonder what he is up to these days—he is not reading Labour motions, that is for sure. I am glad that the motion

"notes the Audit Scotland report".

On page 17, that report states:

"Transport Scotland reviewed the contract using a rigorous appraisal process".

Well said, Audit Scotland. The report also noted the £73 million investment that will come from First ScotRail as a result of the franchise extension. I am sure that even the Labour Party will welcome some of the fruits of that investment—it is certainly a better dividend than the one that we get from the union. There will be additional rolling stock to help improve services, even if they carry the saltire livery that Lord Foulkes insists is nationalism by stealth. There will be extra services down the west coast to Ayrshire; extra services between Glasgow and Edinburgh; extra services up the east coast; some long-awaited improvements in the Highlands; wireless internet access on trains between Glasgow and Edinburgh, which I am sure will help some MSPs when they are working while they are on the train; extra customer service staff; improvements in stations across the country; a profit cap mechanism to pump more money into improvements in our railway; and fare protection, which was completely missed from the original contract, which I believe is a travesty.

The Scottish Government is delivering so well that George Foulkes will soon be accusing us of making things better on purpose. I am delighted to be able to contrast the record of improving our railways with the atrocious record of the Labour Party. As one Labour councillor was heard to remark:

"God bless the SNP government."

While Gordon Brown thinks that he is saving the world, the SNP will just carry on making Scotland better.

Cathy Peattie (Labour, Falkirk East)

There is something to be said for people in positions of power avoiding conflicts of interest, particularly where they might be open to accusations of putting personal gain before the public interest. If they cannot, or do not want to divest themselves of any private financial interest that might have a bearing on decisions that are supposedly being made in the public interest, the very least that they should do is declare their interests and exclude themselves from deliberations. How was it that the finance director of Transport Scotland participated in key meetings to discuss the extension of the ScotRail franchise without declaring his financial interests in First ScotRail's parent company, FirstGroup? He was then exposed by Audit Scotland, which led to his resignation. Why was he allowed to participate in the first place?

When the extension was announced, I, and many others, had misgivings. There was no consultation with the public, the workforce or the trade unions. The extension was agreed without assessment or a business case. Those of us with doubts had real difficulty obtaining adequate information about the extension. That was because a lot of the information that we wanted simply was not available. Meanwhile, First ScotRail was on the fast inside track, with signals locked on green and all the barriers raised.

There was no proper assessment of whether the extension was in the interest of the travelling public—the same people who are about to be hit by further price inflation in the coming year. Many already pay over the odds for their journey. Rail travel often offers little incentive for people to get out of their car and use public transport. I am sure that many members of the public will have their doubts about the extension.

What was the Scottish Government's role in all this? The Scottish Government is responsible for the £2.5 billion public subsidy to First ScotRail—and a further £900 million during the three-year extension—the largest contract awarded by the Scottish ministers.

Was the minister flattered by the suggestion that a presentation to him was somehow more appropriate than public scrutiny? Did he really believe that by allowing the extension in advance of the Audit Scotland report, any criticism contained in it would somehow be made irrelevant? The simple fact is that the Audit Scotland report will be made irrelevant if the ScotRail franchise extension is allowed to proceed without proper scrutiny of not only the contract itself, but the circumstances that allowed it to be extended without such scrutiny. I would call a halt to the franchise extension and instigate an inquiry by the Scottish Parliament. The very least that we should do is insist that the Scottish Government co-operate with any Public Audit Committee investigation and that the minister issues a statement to the Parliament in response to any such investigation.

Sandra White (Scottish National Party, Glasgow)

I would echo the comments of my colleague Christina McKelvie, who set out the detailed improvements that have been seen and will be seen throughout Scotland as a result of the strategic transport projects review, the conclusions of which were announced yesterday.

Alex Johnstone sets out in his amendment the history of the original contract—it will do no harm to remind ourselves of exactly what that contract was. In 2004, the Labour Executive awarded the contract for another seven years to 2011, with the opportunity for a further three-year extension. I say to Mr McNulty that it included no specified conditions, no criteria were laid down for future management, and there was no mention of consultation. That happened on the watch of the Labour Executive, so Labour should spare us its hypocrisy.

Patrick Harvie (Green, Glasgow)

Will the member give way?

Sandra White (Scottish National Party, Glasgow)

I am sorry, but I want to get through all my speech.

I remind Cathy Peattie that Transport Scotland was set up in 2006 and its membership would have been known to the Labour Executive, so she should spare us her crocodile tears.

John Park (Labour, Mid Scotland and Fife)

Will the member give way?

Sandra White (Scottish National Party, Glasgow)

No—sorry.

If I may be so bold, I will answer Des McNulty's calls directly in a few sentences. "Yes" and "yes" would be the answers to the calls that he makes in his motion. This Government has co-operated and will always co-operate with the committee structures of this Parliament—something that, sadly, cannot be said for the previous Executive. Furthermore, this Government—unlike Des McNulty—values the integrity and impartiality of the committee structure and will not seek to pre-empt the conclusions of any investigations by lodging spurious motions for debate in the chamber before the committee in question has had an opportunity to investigate the matter fully.

Cathy Peattie (Labour, Falkirk East)

Surely Sandra White is avoiding the issue. It is all very well to talk about the committees, but the debate is about the ScotRail franchise; it is about the lack of consultation and failure to declare an interest.

Sandra White (Scottish National Party, Glasgow)

I believe that Audit Scotland said that the gentleman in question did declare an interest, so Cathy Peattie's remarks are spurious. The issue is about the strategic transport projects review as well as various things that are happening in Parliament. Cathy Peattie cannot dictate to the minister or to Parliament what a committee will do. She cannot see into the future—that is the point that I am trying to make. We should not be dictating to the minister or to the committee. The minister has already said that he would not dictate to the committee. Cathy Peattie's accusations are pretty spurious to say the least.

If it is deemed appropriate for the minister to make a statement to Parliament, I am sure that he will make one. I put that point strongly.

I hope that those points answer in a nutshell the concerns of Des McNulty and others.

Des McNulty's motion seems to misrepresent the findings of Audit Scotland's report. Indeed, everyone has accepted that the report was generally positive. It stated that

"Transport Scotland's management arrangements are generally effective ... Transport Scotland used the Network Modelling Framework and drew on the Department for Transport's templates and guidance on franchise continuation."

Despite that, Des McNulty expressed "serious concern"—there is possibly even a conspiracy involving unscrupulous ministers and shadowy figures within Transport Scotland. To make unfounded accusations about the integrity and impartiality of Transport Scotland and individuals in a sad attempt to make a political point is lamentable; it does the Labour Party and the Parliament no service.

James Kelly (Labour, Glasgow Rutherglen)

I welcome the opportunity to take part in this morning's debate and rise to speak in support of the Labour Party motion. The motion is specific, not "spurious", and it deals with important issues of scrutiny and accountability.

The railways have an important part to play in this country in relation to economic growth. If we boost the rail network and improve connectivity, we can also boost the economy and retain and grow the number of jobs in Scotland. Increasing the number of passengers who use the rail network is also important to reducing carbon emissions and helping the environment.

There are serious concerns about the process. The contract's value is £2.5 billion over its lifetime and the three-year extension is worth £900 million. The fact that no formal business plan was produced for the extension is astonishing. The minister chides Des McNulty about detail, but the minister did not examine the detail of a business plan. The extension seems to have been granted on the basis of a PowerPoint presentation. Rather than signing up to a contract extension, the approach seems to have been, "Click on the contract extension button and off you go boys, that's your extension." It is clear that several members are concerned that the extension was awarded before Audit Scotland's investigation was completed. In addition, trade unions and passenger groups were not consulted.

I draw members' attention to a case that my constituent Scott Bowie from Rutherglen raised with me recently. He and his partner were stuck on a train from Glasgow Central station to Rutherglen for two hours, during which communication about the problem was lacking and the train's toilet facilities did not work. He described other train delays in the area and said that three-carriage trains were being operated at peak times. That is clearly unacceptable against the backdrop that he and his partner spend £1,500 on rail fares each year. I have taken up those matters with ScotRail, because they are for it and not for the minister. However, when passengers have such concerns about ScotRail's service and the lack of facilities on trains, surely when the contract extension was being considered pressure should have been put on ScotRail to seek improvements. Passengers were not given the opportunity to be involved.

Another concern is that the extension agreement raised the revenue-sharing threshold by 8 percentage points. That says clearly to ScotRail that although the Government made great play yesterday of putting in place transport infrastructure, improving infrastructure and boosting the economy, ScotRail can continue earning money and can do so up to a higher limit before the taxpayer shares those higher income levels.

Questions must be answered by the PowerPoint wizard—the minister. Why did no consultation take place? Why was no business plan produced? Why was the income-retention threshold raised? It is time for answers to those questions.

Jim Tolson (Liberal Democrat, Dunfermline West)

The key point about the contract extension is that no formal business plan was presented to, or taken on board by, the minister before he confirmed the extension.

By April 2006, First ScotRail was outstripping contractual performance requirements, and 80 per cent of its additional revenue was being returned to the Scottish Government. Transport Scotland was concerned that that could discourage further service growth and improvements. As has been said, the previous Administration put in place the contract and the intention was that an extension would be done openly, but the minister simply set probity aside. The Government did not seem to negotiate prices. Under its extended franchise, First ScotRail has recently raised prices by well above the inflation rate, with no recourse to the Parliament, individual MSPs or the public.

Last week, the First Minister said:

"the report also highlights issues of governance for Transport Scotland, which will be considered for future improvement."—[Official Report, 4 December 2008; c 13104.]

Transport Scotland's former director of finance and corporate services, Guy Houston, resigned following the publication of Audit Scotland's report, which criticised his participation in key meetings to discuss the extension of First ScotRail's franchise without having declared his financial interest in First ScotRail's parent company, FirstGroup. As the First Minister conceded last week, governance needs to be improved.

Consultation on how to spend the £73 million dividend has closed before the Minister for Transport, Infrastructure and Climate Change has made a commitment to come to Parliament and allow his plans to be scrutinised before any final decision is made. Have ministers already allocated that money? If so, what projects has the minister committed to funding with the dividend? The consultation on how best the £73 million could be spent on further services did not begin until after the contract was extended, and it closed just two days after the Auditor General's report condemning governance practices was issued on 28 November.

Des McNulty was right to say that not enough consultation happened before extension of the ScotRail franchise was announced in April. That lack of consultation created practical difficulties and showed another funding black hole in the Government's programme. The fact that the contract was let on the basis of representations to the minister is in some ways bizarre. When were ministers made aware of the conflict of interest of Transport Scotland's finance director? What are the implications and what steps should have been taken? The minister is ultimately responsible, so I hope that he will give Parliament more clarity in summing up.

The minister said that

"Good franchise management is critical to ... success".

That may be true, but the process has certainly not been open or above board on the minister's watch.

Alex Johnstone said that First ScotRail had overseen improvements in the past few years but that there is more to do. I agree. Anything that First ScotRail does or that is done through the minister must be much more open and transparent.

Alex Johnstone might be happy with some franchise improvements, such as Laurencekirk station, but he might not know that that was on the way before the franchise was extended. Perhaps he should examine some of the details.

My colleague Alison McInnes touched on key points. As she said, the debate should have been held a long time ago and certainly before the Government handed out the largest contract without so much as a business case.

Stewart Stevenson (Scottish National Party, Banff and Buchan)

Is the member aware that the costed options deliver £7.8 million of benefits to north-east Scotland? That is a substantial addition to Laurencekirk station.

Jim Tolson (Liberal Democrat, Dunfermline West)

I am aware that not only the north-east, but many areas throughout Scotland will be helped. However, the minister must be aware that much more openness is required and that many such measures were in place before he extended the contract. That is a key point to bear in mind.

Government procedures have received a damning indictment. Audit Scotland's report was enlightening. No external consultation took place and the minister did not heed the appearance that actions were being kept hidden. Huge concerns remain not just in Parliament, but among many people outwith it.

In his amendment, the minister tries to remove reference to controversial concerns. I hope that the Liberal Democrats' amendment, in conjunction with Labour's motion, wins the day.

Gavin Brown (Conservative, Lothians)

It is clear that the Labour Party has found a stick with which to beat the Government, but it is equally clear that it is a pretty small stick. It is also clear that the previous Administration must accept a fairly high degree of culpability for some of the criticisms in Audit Scotland's report.

First, as we have heard, the initial contract contained a clause for a three-year extension. It is staggering that the transport minister who completed that contract did not include a single term about how the extension process should work or a single criterion for operating an extension. The transport minister of that time must therefore accept some culpability.

There is another reason why the previous Administration has to accept that it is to a degree culpable, but which has not been raised in the debate thus far. We heard criticism that the franchise was extended by means of a PowerPoint presentation and that it was done at the click of a mouse, but if one reads the Audit Scotland report—I question how many members have done so—one finds that the first moves for reviewing the contract were taken by the previous Administration.

In October 2006, external consultants were engaged to provide advice and to review the Transport Scotland analysis. In November 2006, Transport Scotland acknowledged the need to review the contract. In December 2006, the Liberal Democrat Minister for Transport of the time agreed to a formal review of the existing agreement. The previous Administration is on quite shaky ground on this.

As my colleague Alex Johnstone said, we are pretty supportive of the franchise extension, albeit that we are not 100 per cent happy with the means by which it was done. The Government needs to take away some lessons from all this. As Audit Scotland said:

"Overall, First ScotRail's performance to date has been good, and continues to improve."

The reason why it was critical for the Government to examine the issue—in this respect, the Liberal Democrat former Minister for Transport was right to put the process in train in December 2006—was the bizarre situation in which we found ourselves at that time. If First ScotRail had reached over 100 per cent of its target revenue, 80 per cent was to flow back to the public purse, so there was a real disincentive for First ScotRail to invest or to improve performance. For every pound that it invested, it would have had to make £5 just to break even, which had not been anticipated at the outset of the contract. I do not criticise the former Administration for that; indeed, I applaud it for moving on the review in December 2006 once it appreciated the bizarre situation in which it found itself. A review of the contract absolutely had to take place at that time.

Alison McInnes (Liberal Democrat, North East Scotland)

rose—

Gavin Brown (Conservative, Lothians)

No—not at this time.

Coupled with that was the need to reset performance targets in line with performance at the time. As Jim Tolson said, First ScotRail was outstripping most of its performance targets. For as long as performance remained above target, First ScotRail would have incurred no penalty for reducing performance, so there was a clear need to reset performance targets. We were absolutely behind the Government decision to do that.

My criticism of the Government is on the means by which the extension was made—the process could have been more open and transparent. I take seriously the comments that Bruce Crawford made only this week that the Scottish Government is "more open than ever" and that it is "leading the way" in promoting openness and transparency. Mr Crawford also made the point that one has to "go beyond" what is in contract and statute. I hope that the Government will in the future be more open and transparent when it is considering franchises.

Although the review is a good thing in itself, there have been one or two missed opportunities. The chamber has heard about the £73 million of additional moneys but, as Audit Scotland pointed out, at least £1.5 million of that will have to go over three years on CCTV in Strathclyde. Although that was the only cost that Audit Scotland mentioned in its report, it would be useful to know whether the minister will agree to look quickly at the matter. It is important for Parliament to know that the £73 million figure stands up, or whether it will be eaten into even more than Audit Scotland has suggested.

Another missed opportunity is that some performance measures in the contract were not made subject to review. For example, toilet facilities, which are extremely important in passengers' minds, are low on the list of penalties against First ScotRail. There is also no requirement for a routine or reliable assessment of overcrowding—one that could establish the extent of the problem.

We could have taken other opportunities and some of those that were taken could have been better done. We could also have looked at how transport could be better integrated. In saying that, I think back to what was said in the chamber in the ferries debate only a couple of months ago.

The Scottish Conservatives are supportive of the end—it is the right one. We think that it is critical to have had the review and for the terms of the contract to be changed. As I said, although we have some criticism of the way in which the extension was handled, on balance we support it. I also support the amendment in the name of my colleague Alex Johnstone.

John Swinney (Scottish National Party, North Tayside)

Mr Brown made a very constructive and thoughtful speech, so it is a pleasure to follow him. He made the crucial point about why it was necessary for us to act, and why it was necessary for our predecessors by their actions to open up the possibility of extending the contract in 2006. As Mr Brown properly set out, we were in the perverse situation whereby, because of the arrangements that were in place at the time, First ScotRail was financially incentivised to reduce costs—something that would inevitably have resulted in poorer services to passengers and loss of employment in the rail industry.

If we had not as a Government acted to extend the contract, the Labour Party would have called for us to come before Parliament—and, no doubt, before its committees—to say why services were declining in parts of the country or why people in the rail industry were losing their jobs. That would have been its criticism if we had not acted, so I am glad that we did.

John Park (Labour, Mid Scotland and Fife)

Obviously, the Government had to take a decision on whether to consult. Did it take the decision that it would be right not to consult after the event, before the event or at the time? If not, was a conscious decision taken not to consult?

John Swinney (Scottish National Party, North Tayside)

The conscious decision that ministers took was to act within the terms of the contract that our predecessors had negotiated—a contract about which I have no complaint. The consultation on the nature of the contract had been undertaken in the period before the contract was signed in 2004. The contract that resulted was for a given period but made provision for the franchise to be extended. If a contract is in place between the two parties, the proposition that ministers should act to utilise its functions and terms is not unreasonable.

Des McNulty (Labour, Clydebank and Milngavie)

There is a clear contradiction between the two points. The cabinet secretary is saying that a substantial change had to be made and that it was not necessary to consult because the extension was a continuation of an existing contract. Those two things are poles apart.

John Swinney (Scottish National Party, North Tayside)

With the greatest of respect to Mr McNulty, his point is ridiculous. I said that we inherited from our predecessors a contract that included the facility to extend it—

Alison McInnes (Liberal Democrat, North East Scotland)

Will the minister give way?

John Swinney (Scottish National Party, North Tayside)

Allow me first to deal with Mr McNulty, after which I will deal with Mrs McInnes.

The contract provided the Government with the opportunity to extend the terms and duration of the contract—a provision of the contract on which Mr Gray had consulted before 2004. One of the imperatives to our acting as we did—which, I assume, was also an imperative in Mr Scott's in-tray in 2006—was, as Mr Brown correctly said, that the contract had reached a point where there was incentivisation for poorer services and job reductions and not for passenger growth, the last of which is the interest of this Administration.

Alison McInnes (Liberal Democrat, North East Scotland)

No one disputes the need to consider the franchise extension. I am happy to concede that the previous Minister for Transport instigated a formal review. However, the debate is substantially about a move from a formal review to one that was taken by an informal, un-minuted, secretive decision-making process. Such a process was not included in any contract that was laid in the first place.

John Swinney (Scottish National Party, North Tayside)

It is lovely how Alison McInnes can get herself worked into a lather of indignation on the issue. She should instead read the Audit Scotland report, which states:

"Transport Scotland's appraisal process was rigorous and has resulted in a guaranteed £73.1 million investment by First ScotRail".

That was not some sort of secretive process, but a "rigorous" appraisal process that was undertaken by the people whom Government employs to manage the franchise.

Audit Scotland goes on to say that

"Transport Scotland is generally managing the franchise contract effectively, but there is some scope to improve".

We unreservedly accept that there will be a need for improvement and we accept that issues of governance need to be considered, so we will consider them. Of course, ministers will deal with and co-operate with any parliamentary inquiry that the Audit Committee brings forward, as was, I am aware, agreed yesterday. Parliament would expect us to do nothing less. Much of the hot air that we have heard from the Labour Party today is rather out of context when we look at what Iain Gray wanted to do back in 2002. On 12 June 2002, he told the Transport and Environment Committee that the then Government's aim was

"refranchising at the end of the existing franchise in April 2004 ... on the basis of a longer franchise period—the committee will know that we hope it will be 15 years".—[Official Report, Transport and Environment Committee, 12 June 2002; c 3267.]

The Labour Party's aspiration was to put in place a contract for 15 years, but now it complains because we have acted within the contract that it negotiated—which includes the facility to extend the contract—and have delivered £73.1 million of investment in the rail network. Members must ask themselves how much good news the Labour Party is prepared to turn its back on.

The key point is that we must have a sustained programme of committed investment in the rail industry to ensure that the franchise delivers the aspirations that we all share. I do not question anyone's motivation—we all want passenger numbers to increase and more people to get out of their cars and to use trains and other forms of public transport, which is the purpose for which we have extended the contract. We want to ensure that we have sufficient resources and the flexibilities and incentives that are required to add to services. My colleague Mr Stevenson referred to the consultation that is under way on the range of options for utilising the extra investment money. I do not have time to go through them, even in this undersubscribed debate—which I suspect tells us that we are flogging a dead horse—but there are many options for investment to be considered in every part of the country.

On that issue, we had another example of beautiful consistency between the two front-bench spokespeople of the Liberal Democrats: Alison McInnes complained that there are no measures for the north-east of Scotland, but Jim Tolson told us that there is investment in every part of the country. There we have it—the Liberal Democrats facing both ways in a debate. Mr Tolson also questioned fare increases. He is absolutely right that fares have increased, but First ScotRail's fare increases are, in my opinion, at the correct end of the performance league table—they are at the bottom, thank goodness. First ScotRail is not at the very bottom of the table, as London Midland and Merseyrail are below it, but it is among the lowest and it has certainly not made the 11 per cent fare increase of CrossCountry in England and Wales or the 7.2 per cent increase of South West Trains.

Members should accept that effective activity is taking place to ensure that we have in Scotland an effective rail service that increases passenger numbers and delivers the modal shift that the Government seeks. That is supported by the negotiation of the contract extension that we have undertaken. The Government will respond constructively to the report from Audit Scotland, which is a thorough examination, if ever I saw one.

John Park (Labour, Mid Scotland and Fife)

The debate has been important because it is important for members from throughout Parliament to have put on the record their concerns about how the Government arrived at its decision on the ScotRail franchise. My colleague Des McNulty laid out several of our concerns, but I will refer to a comment that he made in April this year, when we heard the initial statement from the minister on the contract extension. It was mentioned at that time, although it has not been mentioned today, that the Government was dragged kicking and screaming to Parliament to answer questions about why it extended the contract without consultation. We must remind ourselves of that. I remember that the tone of the statement that day was rather conciliatory—the tone has been different this morning as the debate has developed.

Mr McNulty pointed out some other important issues that we must consider. One is about when the Government became aware of Mr Houston's conflict of interest and what it did about that. I am sure that that will be followed through in Parliament in the coming months. Des McNulty and my colleague Charlie Gordon also mentioned Mr Houston's involvement in a bus issue, of which the minister said he is aware. It will be interesting to find out what the minister knows and what he says about that in the future. Charlie Gordon stressed that point far better than I could.

The semantics that the Government has used on the issue are breathtaking. The key issue is that there was no consultation of the workforce or commuters. The cabinet secretary and the minister know that they should have consulted, regardless of what the contract says. They should have consulted properly on the issue and they know that there is no excuse for not having done so. My colleagues Cathy Peattie and James Kelly laid that out well.

Alison McInnes made several key comments that I support. The Labour Party will support the Liberal Democrat amendment at decision time this evening. I particularly support her points about how the £73 million will be reinvested to improve services for passengers, as that is a key issue. I agree with Mr Swinney that we need to improve services. The issue is about the services that we deliver in Scotland and the services that passengers expect. It is only right that we should have much more detail on that and that we should have an opportunity to ensure that services improve.

On Sandra White's and Christina McKelvie's points, I must say that they would be the first to cry foul if a Labour, Liberal or Conservative Government acted in a similar way. Those members should have the courage of our convictions on the issue. I would love to be a fly on the wall at the next SNP meeting when they have to defend what they will do at decision time today. It is absolutely unbelievable that they stood there defending the Government's decision not to consult commuters or trade unions on the contract extension.

Alex Johnstone did a good impression of a bullet train as he went through his speech rather quickly. I know that the Tories are energetic supporters of private sector solutions, but they must recognise the need for effective and meaningful consultation. I sometimes agree with the Tories—although not often—particularly with their arguments about good governance. They know that good governance is about meaningful consultation and engagement with commuters and trade unions.

Gavin Brown (Conservative, Lothians)

Should Iain Gray accept some responsibility for there not being a clause in the contract regarding consultation on extension?

John Park (Labour, Mid Scotland and Fife)

It may seem as if we have rehearsed this, as I was coming on to that very point.

I have private sector experience and have dealt with contracts between the private sector and the public sector and the relationships between organisations. When a contract is agreed, consultation is carried out beforehand and if a contract is extended, consultation is carried out before that, too. In all my time of dealing with such issues, I have never come across a contract that has involved no consultation before a contract extension.

The role of the trade unions, in particular the STUC, has not been mentioned. I am talking not only about the contract extension, but about the Government's general relationship with trade unions. The STUC has a memorandum of understanding with the Scottish Government that is well documented and which has been lauded in Parliament by many SNP members. The memorandum was signed by the previous Executive and I am sure that there is support for it throughout the Parliament. The Government's memorandum of understanding identifies trade unions as an important social partner and one key element of that partnership is

"openness and transparency in communications".

However, there was no openness or transparency in the communications on the contract extension, which causes me grave concern about the future of the trade unions' relationship with the SNP Government.

The decision on the contract defines the SNP's relationship with the trade union movement: the SNP is the fair-weather friend of trade unions. I knew and understood that relationship before I became a member of Parliament, but I now see it at first hand day in, day out. The SNP is happy to quote the unions when it suits its political agenda on issues such as the private finance initiative or public-private partnerships, but it is much less enthusiastic about supporting the trade unions' role as social partners, particularly on issues such as the ScotRail franchise. The SNP's hidden agenda is to split Labour and the trade union movement because the SNP would, when it comes to the crunch, prefer to stand shoulder to shoulder with millionaire bankers or give a nudge and a wink to the private sector, than support the collective views of trade union members. The Government should apologise to those members and to commuters. I am pleased to support Des McNulty's motion.

Kinship Care

Trish Godman (Labour, West Renfrewshire)

The next item of business is a debate on motion S3M-3078, in the name of Rhona Brankin, on kinship care. I invite those members who wish to speak in the debate to press their request-to-speak buttons now.

Rhona Brankin (Labour, Midlothian)

I am delighted to have the opportunity to bring a very important issue to the Parliament today. Kinship carers deserve our sincere thanks for the work that they do for children who, for a variety of reasons, are no longer able to live with their parents and for whom living with members of their extended family will often be the best option.

Indeed, Parliament agreed unanimously with that sentiment last December. As a grandparent, I can testify to the work that is involved in looking after my grandson for an evening, let alone 24/7. The kinship carers network estimates that kinship carers save taxpayers in Scotland more than £1 million a year compared with the cost of accommodating children in local authority care. We believe that the whole nation owes kinship carers a big debt. I welcome to the public gallery today the many kinship carers who have travelled from all over Scotland to listen to our debate. [Applause.] We believe that they are unsung heroes and I am pleased that they are able to be with us today as we discuss kinship care. However, I am disappointed that the cabinet secretary is once again posted missing when there are serious issues to discuss.

As the motion reminds members, last September the First Minister backed Labour's plans to fast-track £10 million to deliver better support for kinship carers. When Mr Salmond was asked to fast-track £10 million for kinship care allowances to enable kinship carers to be supported immediately, he said:

"Wendy Alexander should take 'Yes' for an answer."—[Official Report, 27 September 2007; c 2222.]

I am sorry that that "yes" appears to be a "no". [Interruption.] I hear the Minister for Children and Early Years saying, "No, he didn't," but if he cares to check the Official Report, he will find that I quoted Mr Salmond word for word.

Almost exactly a year ago, the minister told Parliament that kinship care allowances of at least £119 a week would start to be paid in April 2008.

Adam Ingram (Scottish National Party, South of Scotland)

indicated disagreement.

Rhona Brankin (Labour, Midlothian)

Oh my goodness me—well, it will be very interesting to hear what the minister thinks that he said, because I have checked my facts carefully.

More than a year on from Alex Salmond's warm words and Adam Ingram's commitment, all we have is a litany of broken promises, backtracking and buck-passing. As the kinship carers who are here today will tell us, the promised payments simply have not materialised in many cases.

Bob Doris (Scottish National Party, Glasgow)

Will the Labour front-bench spokesperson please tell me what promises and commitments Labour made to kinship carers before May 2007?

Rhona Brankin (Labour, Midlothian)

We made a commitment to kinship carers in our manifesto, exactly as the Scottish National Party did. The difference is that if Labour had been in power, we would have delivered on that commitment.

I submitted freedom of information requests to Scotland's local authorities to get a detailed breakdown of the support that is being provided around the country for kinship carers, as Adam Ingram has repeatedly stated in written answers that the information is not available centrally. I will be helpful to the minister and provide him and the Parliament with the information that the entire machinery of the Scottish Government apparently does not have. The results expose the hollowness of the commitments that he and the First Minister gave in the chamber. Of the 24 local authorities that have responded so far, 14—a clear majority—are not paying kinship care allowance and, of the other 10, only two are paying it at the recommended rate to which the Scottish Government committed itself a year ago.

Ever keen to rally round beleaguered ministers, Bob Doris lodged a motion the other week seeking to apportion blame to Westminster for the SNP's unfunded and broken promise. Mr Doris's motion is a red herring as, in his area, Glasgow City Council has made it clear that it will make payments to kinship carers in a way that will not prejudice other benefits. I congratulate Glasgow City Council on that.

From recent ministerial replies from Adam Ingram, it seems that he and the Government are still backsliding on their commitment. The press release of 4 December 2007 was quite unequivocal. If Mr Ingram would like to listen, I will read it to him:

"The Scottish Government and COSLA are working to deliver allowances based on The Fostering Network's recommended rate of between £119 and £198 per week for all foster carers and approved kinship carers of looked after young people."

Recent replies from Mr Ingram make it clear that the commitment is now to pay kinship carers the same as is paid to foster carers, which in virtually every council in the land is far below £119. Will he come clean today and admit that the commitment of his Government and his party to doing the right thing for kinship carers gets watered down with every passing month?

The FOI responses highlight a postcode lottery of support for looked-after children in Scotland. The motion that the Parliament passed last year committed the Government to

"the provision of equitable and appropriate support for all carers of looked-after children".

That is not happening. A kinship carer of a looked-after child in Clackmannanshire receives £121 per week, but a kinship carer in neighbouring Stirling receives no allowance whatsoever. Such massive local variations make a mockery of any claims that Mr Ingram might make about "equitable and appropriate support".

I ask the minister to outline in his opening speech how he plans to address such widespread discrepancies. Is his message to those kinship carers in Stirling and elsewhere who are not in receipt of the allowance that they are beneficiaries of the historic concordat with the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities? That is simply not good enough and it is simply not good enough to blame Westminster.

The minister promised that kinship care allowance would be paid from April 2008, yet he now hides behind the concordat, which is a fig leaf for his broken promises. A commitment to pay the allowance starting in April is now an open-ended aspiration on working towards paying kinship carers at some point in the next three years at the discretion of local authorities. I say to the minister that that is not a coherent strategy for kinship carers; it is a shameful abdication of responsibility.

I make it clear that Labour is not blaming local councils. We believe that the concordat is simply not working. I have here a confidential document that makes it clear that only £4 million has been made available to councils instead of the £10 million that was promised by the First Minister. The minister might shake his head, but I will be very interested to hear what is happening.

Adam Ingram (Scottish National Party, South of Scotland)

I have made it perfectly plain in the public domain to kinship carers and others that the funding for that commitment was to be phased in over three years: £4 million this year; £8 million next year; and £12 million—not £10 million, as Rhona Brankin said—to fully fund the commitment. I would like Rhona Brankin to acknowledge that and the fact that her figures severely underfund the commitment to kinship carers.

Rhona Brankin (Labour, Midlothian)

That is all very interesting, but the minister should get out more. I suggest that he talk to more kinship carers because what he described is not what they believe. I have in my hand the document that was used to reach the agreement on the concordat. It says:

"Kinship care was not initially discussed but has now been added."

It speaks of £4 million each year. Alex Salmond promised that £10 million would be made available immediately. That has simply not happened and it is not good enough. The £12 million is to be phased in over three years, but £10 million was promised immediately. It has not been delivered and the kinship carers know that.

We on this side of the chamber give our support to the kinship carers in the public gallery and the thousands of others throughout the country. We believe that they are unsung heroes. I hope that colleagues in other parties will join us today in supporting kinship carers by backing the motion in my name and rejecting the SNP amendment, which is merely an apology for broken promises.

I move,

That the Parliament notes the commitment given by the First Minister on 27 September 2007 to provide allowances for kinship carers and ensure that funding would be brought forward to ensure that all kinship carers of looked-after children in Scotland were paid the recommended allowance for foster carers; further notes the commitment contained in the Scottish Government's strategy, Getting it right for every child in kinship and foster care, to introduce a minimum national allowance of between £119 and £198 per week for kinship carers and the comments of the Minister for Children and Early Years in the subsequent debate on 5 December 2007 that he anticipated that payment of this allowance would begin in April 2008; is concerned that this has not materialised and that the vast majority of kinship carers are not in receipt of an allowance consistent with the promises made by both the Minister for Children and Early Years and the First Minister, and therefore calls on the Scottish Government to honour in full its pledge to Scotland's kinship carers and to properly recognise the vital role that kinship carers play in looking after some of Scotland's most vulnerable children.

Adam Ingram (Scottish National Party, South of Scotland)

In speaking to our amendment, I acknowledge at the start that it is right that we debate the support that kinship carers and the children who live with them should receive in Scotland. I know from my constituency cases and from having met many kinship carers that they and the children in their care are often marginalised. Too often, they believe that agencies consider the needs of children to be dealt with as soon as a kinship carer has agreed to care for a child—they feel abandoned. It is therefore no surprise that many kinship carers feel frustrated that their needs and concerns have been overlooked for so long.

When I became the Minister for Children and Early Years, I was determined to achieve improvements for kinship carers, but I inherited a situation that was, frankly, disgraceful. I asked for statistics on the number of kinship carers in Scotland, but few were available. I also asked for information on the approaches that local authorities had taken to ensure that children were placed appropriately with kinship carers; apart from a few areas demonstrating good practice, the situation was patchy. I wanted to know what support was available to kinship carers; again, although there were pockets of good practice, I found that planned and co-ordinated support was not available to many kinship carers who needed it. For those kinship carers who were in financial hardship, I found that financial support was ad hoc, with little advice and support available to help people to understand benefits entitlements. That was the Labour legacy—bitter, gutless neglect.

Rhona Brankin (Labour, Midlothian)

Will the minister give way?

Adam Ingram (Scottish National Party, South of Scotland)

I ask the member to sit down.

From a position in which no central Government support was available, the Scottish Government has initiated a thorough and co-ordinated programme of action to deliver improvements for all kinship carers.

Rhona Brankin (Labour, Midlothian)

Can the minister say that the Government's approach is co-ordinated when the results of my FOI requests show that there are huge differences across the country? It is simply inaccurate to say that there is a co-ordinated approach.

Adam Ingram (Scottish National Party, South of Scotland)

I am afraid that the member's FOI exercise is a bit out of date. I will provide the chamber with more detailed figures on that front.

The improvements that we are delivering include the production of interim guidance by our external reference group, which is made up of kinship and foster carers and local authority and third sector representatives, to ensure that every child and carer receives a co-ordinated assessment that sets out the range of support that they may need.

The Scottish Government has also been consistent in its proposals for financial support for kinship carers. Given the financial limitations, I have had to prioritise looked-after children. On 31 March 2008, there were 2,398 such children—16 per cent of all looked-after children. The number has more than doubled since 2000. That increase shows the vital and important role that kinship carers play in protecting the needs of our most vulnerable children, who would otherwise be placed in foster or residential care. It makes sense to ensure that there is equity between the support that kinship carers receive and that provided to foster carers. We think that an amount equivalent to the weekly allowance that is paid to foster carers, minus benefit entitlements, is fair. Members need not take our word for that. Professor Jane Aldgate, who is chair of Kinsfolk Carers Edinburgh and author of the most recent research into kinship carers in Scotland, says:

"Payment of allowances to approved kinship carers of looked after children is a fantastic step forward by the Scottish Government in strengthening the range of support which kinship carers require".

We recognise the challenges that local authorities face. The progress that they have reported is that 20 authorities—the majority—are paying allowances. A further six have plans well under way, and the remainder have agreed in the concordat to implement the policy. More progress is required, but local authorities face a significant hurdle. If any sum of money, however small, is paid by an authority to a looked-after child, the carer loses entitlement to benefits, with the exception of child benefit. The reasons for that are complex, but the straightforward explanation is that United Kingdom benefits law does not support the needs of looked-after children living with kinship carers. That is why we have made a start with the kinship carers about whom we know—carers of looked-after children and those against whom UK benefits rules discriminate.

I am not at all happy with the situation. My goal is to use existing resources to support all kinship carers who are in financial need.

Karen Whitefield (Labour, Airdrie and Shotts)

Will the minister take an intervention?

Adam Ingram (Scottish National Party, South of Scotland)

Not at the moment.

We should supplement the UK benefits system when kinship carers are in financial need—the Scottish Government should not have to subsidise it. However, until we have achieved the necessary changes to UK benefits laws, it is right that our focus should be on supporting those kinship carers who are disadvantaged by the system.

We need the Parliament, local authorities, third sector groups such as Children 1st and kinship care groups to work together to raise the profile of kinship care in Whitehall and to build a coalition of support for change for kinship carers. It is a pity that Labour in the Parliament is undermining that coalition with its cheap political posturing.

I move amendment S3M-3078.1, to leave out from "to provide" to end and insert:

"to kinship carers; notes the increase of over 100% of looked-after children since 2000 who live with a kinship carer; recognises the crucial role that these carers play in supporting our most vulnerable children and that they should be supported financially at an equivalent level to foster carers; welcomes work by local authorities towards providing financial support to approved kinship carers of looked-after children using resources provided by central government and further welcomes the work of COSLA and the Association of Directors of Social Work to support the efforts of all local authorities to achieve this; calls on the Scottish Government to work constructively with the UK Government to resolve issues arising out of the interface with United Kingdom benefits legislation, and in this context notes the willingness of United Kingdom ministers to address anomalies in benefits entitlement for kinship carers."

Elizabeth Smith (Conservative, Mid Scotland and Fife)

This time last year, the Scottish Conservatives welcomed the Government's statement on fostering and kinship care and the publication of "Getting it right for every child in kinship and foster care". We welcome this opportunity to review the position one year on.

During last year's debate, the minister said that we must do better and assured us of the Government's commitment to providing much better-quality care for the most vulnerable children in Scotland. I believe that that was a genuine commitment, but I cannot find evidence to support the view that the Government has managed to move things forward since December last year. In her opening speech, Rhona Brankin provided evidence that she believes shows that there are serious discrepancies between what was promised in December 2007 and what is being delivered in December 2008—namely, 14 councils are not delivering the policy. It is also true that many people who find themselves in kinship care circumstances perceive that they have been badly let down by the Government; I am sure that members have been on the receiving end of complaints in that respect.

The current state of affairs is particularly unfortunate given the belief of all parties represented in the chamber that kinship care often offers the best option when children are unable to live with their parents, and our desire to see foster care and kinship care allowances placed on a much more equitable basis. Last year, we agreed that kinship care placements usually give children the best chance of overcoming the disruption and stressful circumstances that they have faced and of developing new confidence and self-esteem. Surely it is important that policy commitments reflect that objective.

I share the concerns of Labour and the Liberals when they criticise the minister and the First Minister for the language that they used in December 2007. It was easy to read into that language that the Government believed that it could address the discrepancies in support for kinship care in April 2008. In particular, the language that was used implied that there would be parity between kinship carers and foster carers, because the minister said clearly that the cash settlement within the concordat covered the payments due to kinship carers

"as it covers payments for foster carers."—[Official Report, 5 December 2007; c 4085-6.]

That was an unfortunate statement. The fact of the matter is that it was slightly disingenuous because it was perfectly clear then—as it is now—that there were other obstacles in the way. What the minister meant to say was that payments to kinship carers would be phased in over the period 2008 to 2011.

Just as important, the minister should have been much more up front about the issue of UK benefits. That is a genuine problem that has nothing to do with the terms of the concordat—which is not a legally binding document and, frankly, is not worth the paper it is written on. The Government should know by now that it was very dangerous to place any flagship commitment in the concordat at the same time as allowing councils to have discretion about which priorities they chose—class sizes, school meals, school buildings and teacher numbers all tell that story.

Ironically, the Government's main failing on the issue has been to put far too much emphasis on a concordat deal that becomes shakier each day. It would have been much better if the focus had been on addressing the anomalies that result from the fact that kinship carers can claim child benefit, which means that, technically, they lose that amount when they are compared with foster carers, who are unable to claim child benefit. Those are the issues that will determine whether real progress is made in the area and help to eliminate the substantial discrepancies between different local authorities in Scotland, which are one of the main reasons for complaint among kinship carers. We should not forget that the overall growth in demand for these vital services means that the problem could get worse, rather than better, if we do not address the inconsistencies in the child benefit system.

What matters most are the best interests of children and their carers and the need to achieve a workable and effective balance between family and state support. By definition, that means that we must establish greater consistency between Westminster and Holyrood legislation, especially on where the final responsibility should lie. We should tighten up the definition of "looked-after child" and the legal status that is accorded to the various categories.

No one doubts that the area is complex and that it has suffered from a lack of clarity on the part of the Scottish Government, which is acknowledged—albeit too late in the day—in the Government's amendment. Labour's motion has forced the Government's hand. The Government has had to acknowledge the extent of concern among Scotland's kinship carers, who expected more progress to have been made by now. However, it is not reasonable to put all the blame on the concordat, because even if it worked better, many issues would remain that leave kinship carers at a disadvantage. The Parliament must address those issues.

Hugh O'Donnell (Liberal Democrat, Central Scotland)

The debate is undoubtedly important. In light of statements that were made in the Parliament last year, everyone who is committed and dedicated enough to take on the role of kinship carer is right to feel let down by the Government's lack of action. A couple of weeks ago, the Parliament united to acknowledge the challenges that are faced when the state takes on the role of carer and the state's relative failures in that regard. I will not rehearse the arguments that were made during that debate, but if we can acknowledge those challenges, we should be able to recognise fully the people who willingly take on the role of kinship carer.

The lack of consistent information is a challenge. Legal definitions are used as a means of avoiding costs to the state. Our overarching ambition must be to address that issue soon, because there are many casual kinship carers who, for a variety of reasons, are not in the system and who are suffering the consequences of Government indecision.

Most members who are taking part in the debate know full well that the SNP Government has let down kinship carers throughout Scotland. Notwithstanding the complicated issue of benefit clawback, the Government is failing to deliver on its promise, and is again passing the buck but not the bucks to local authorities, under the increasingly hysterical concordat. Perhaps if the SNP had been less focused on populist measures such as giving middle-class children free school meals, it would have had the money to help hard-pressed carers with more than warm words and advice that they speak to their local councillors.

Kinship care allowances were supposed to be paid on the same basis as fostering allowances are paid, but the Scottish Government has left it to local councils to decide whether, how and when to pay allowances. Now we discover that the deadline for delivery is 2011. Where does that leave the grandparents, cousins, aunts and uncles who are waiting for a decision now?

Adam Ingram (Scottish National Party, South of Scotland)

What mechanisms did the former Administration, of which the member's party was part, put in place to support kinship carers?

Hugh O'Donnell (Liberal Democrat, Central Scotland)

An initiative of the previous Administration was the strategy consultation document that was published in 2005, which, in fairness to the current—

Adam Ingram (Scottish National Party, South of Scotland)

A strategy consultation document?

Hugh O'Donnell (Liberal Democrat, Central Scotland)

Does the minister want to hear my answer or would he rather comment from a sedentary position? I was about to say that the current Government has begun to implement the strategy. There has been progress, which was initiated by the previous Administration.

Despite the promises that were made in Parliament and to kinship carers, the situation remains unclear. The wish to pick a fight with Westminster over clawback might meet the SNP's narrow agenda, but it will not address the issue. Funding for the Citizens Advice Scotland carers support service is welcome, but it is no substitute for clarity on delivering the promises that the First Minister made in Parliament.

My big worry is about how we define "looked-after children". I hope that the minister will clarify the situation. There are between 12,000 and 14,000 looked-after children in Scotland. How many more children are being looked after on an informal and casual basis and are not being supported by the state?

The Liberal Democrats will support the Labour motion. The SNP Government has given us warm words and strategies that have no—or, at best, opaque—financial underpinning. Its approach is little more that a wish list and could be characterised as a letter to Santa: "Dear Santa Swinney, We know we've not been that good this year. We've not done things we promised to do, we've wasted lots of money, we've ignored the advice of our betters and we've picked too many fights with our neighbours, but please could you give us the money that kinship carers are entitled to? Yours faithfully, The Minister for Children and Early Years".

Rhoda Grant (Labour, Highlands and Islands)

The Parliament debated kinship care about a year ago, when the minister announced the introduction of kinship care allowance for looked-after children who are placed within their families. At the time, I welcomed the announcement but said that the Government needed to go further. I have not changed my mind. Indeed, if anything, my concerns are greater.

For a start, despite kinship care allowances being mentioned in the historic concordat, councils have been given until 2011 to introduce them. Families who qualify under the current narrow criteria are still not receiving a penny. Each year that goes by means that more children do without, and I ask the minister to have urgent discussions with COSLA to ensure that allowances are paid now.

Another concern is that kinship carers who take out guardianship or residency orders are excluded and lose their entitlement to the allowance. I have noticed that councils are encouraging carers to take out such orders. In some cases, councils that have not been paying kinship care allowances have paid for legal assistance to enable people to take out orders.

My greatest concern is that the carers of children who are not defined as "looked after" are excluded. When a family member or friend steps in immediately after a crisis to offer a young person a home, councils do not apply for looked-after status for the child, so the carers are not entitled to the allowance, despite their plight. Every story is different. There are children who have lost their parents through drug abuse or whose parents' addiction problems meant that they could not look after them properly. There are children whose parents are seriously ill and there are children who have been orphaned. Such children are already facing a catastrophic loss in their young lives. Their friends or families step in immediately because they refuse to cast vulnerable children to the mercy of local authorities and the uncertainty that that would bring.

It is unfortunate that such carers are penalised for stepping in. Many are grandparents who have retired and are living on a fixed income. One grandmother told me that she was afraid to have her grandchildren defined as looked after by the council, in case they would not be placed with her. She and her husband had chronic illnesses and were unable to work. Their income was meagre and she feared that, as the children got older, they would realise that they did not have things that other children have. The children were already different, because their parents were dead; she did not want them to feel more different because of things that they did not have.

If families and friends do not step in, councils must pay for foster care. There must surely be a way of helping such people. Could an allowance be paid that would cover the additional expense of bringing up a child but would not include the element of payment that is made to foster families? Such an approach would ease child poverty and be much cheaper than foster care.

Children 1st and other organisations have provided members with briefings in which they say that it is vital that options for placement within the family should be exhausted before a child is placed with strangers. In a pioneering approach, children's organisations have developed family group conferences as a means of identifying family support and involving young people in important decisions about their future.

Bob Doris (Scottish National Party, Glasgow)

With kinship care, we are debating an issue that is close to my heart. A couple of years ago, the kinship care group in north Glasgow hosted a Scotland-wide election hustings on kinship care. From that moment, I was determined to help kinship carers and their families when I could. Their commitment, hard work, dignity and passion made a real and lasting impact on me. I knew that my party—the Scottish National Party—had given commitments on kinship care, and I was keen to be elected to deliver on them. That is the context for the debate. Labour did not even send a speaker to those hustings two years ago. What is more, the Labour Party manifesto for the May 2007 elections did not mention kinship care payments at all—I hope that Rhona Brankin did not mislead the chamber earlier.

Cathie Craigie (Labour, Cumbernauld and Kilsyth)

Will the member take an intervention?

Bob Doris (Scottish National Party, Glasgow)

No, thank you. I have only four minutes and a lot of good news to tell.

We have before us a Labour Party motion on kinship care. For that I am truly grateful, and I genuinely congratulate the Labour Party. I welcome all politicians who are converts to the cause of supporting kinship carers; the issue does not have to involve party politics. However, I will take no lessons from the Labour Party, which in eight years of running the Scottish Executive did nothing for kinship carers. It is an SNP Government in Scotland—not the Labour Party—that is giving additional funds to councils to provide kinship care payments.

Kinship carers are rightly impatient for their money. I said in this chamber a few months ago that, until kinship carers see additional hard cash, they will not believe any commitment from any political party. However, they should not be taken in by other political parties, none of which promised to give kinship carers allowances equivalent to those for foster carers. They promised absolutely nothing, and it is clear that, if the Labour Party had been returned to power, not one additional penny would have been forthcoming.

Elizabeth Smith (Conservative, Mid Scotland and Fife)

Will the member take an intervention?

Bob Doris (Scottish National Party, Glasgow)

I apologise—I do not have time.

I acknowledge the frustration that must be felt by kinship carers who care for children who were previously designated as looked after. Because of stability issues, they have sought residency orders, and they fear that they may lose out. I understand those fears, and I give a special mention to Jessie Harvey from the north Glasgow kinship care group, who is in the public gallery today and who has campaigned relentlessly for all kinship carers. My colleague Christina McKelvie will say more about residency orders later.

Some councils are starting to deliver payments to kinship carers, building up to the equivalent amount that is paid to foster carers. My local authority—Glasgow City Council—is about to pay £40 per week for looked-after children in the new year. I wanted the council to work more quickly, and I wanted the sum to be larger. I met the leader of the council—a Labour council—and agreed that a working group should be set up to prepare for payments. That £40 is the first step in the SNP and Labour in Glasgow working together positively. Labour MSPs should stop whingeing and get with the kinship care agenda.

I have heard comments about the Department for Work and Pensions potentially clawing back money from kinship carers. I have lodged a parliamentary motion to say that that should not happen under any circumstances. Many SNP members have signed it, but not one member from the Opposition benches has done so. I have written to James Purnell at the DWP to ask for clarity to be given to kinship carers and for local authorities and Scottish taxpayers not to subsidise the UK Government when all that we want to do is help the most vulnerable groups in our society. I phoned yesterday and again today to ask for that clarity, but none has been given yet.

Significant amounts of money are being delivered. Kinship carers rightly want the money to be delivered as quickly as possible, and they want to see hard cash. I welcome Opposition parties now getting with the SNP agenda and converting to the cause of supporting kinship carers.

Alasdair Morgan (Scottish National Party, South of Scotland)

I call Duncan McNeil. [ Interruption. ] Mr McNeil?

Duncan McNeil (Labour, Greenock and Inverclyde)

Sorry, Presiding Officer. It is not that I dropped off during that last contribution.

The Parliament welcomed the minister's announcement last December, in that at least the statement recognised, in a small way, that too many of our children in this small country can no longer safely stay at home with their parents. It recognised that they need to be rescued from dire circumstances, which are driven in the majority of cases by parental drug misuse. It recognised that we need to increase the number of places of safety for those children—places that do not exist in sufficient numbers.

The Parliament also welcomed the proposals that sought to recognise properly the work of foster carers and, for the first time, the important role of kinship carers. We gave that support not without question. The minister will recall that I shared the concerns of NCH—now called Action for Children—that, if adequate resources were not provided, we would not be able to deliver.

Like others, I asked some specific questions. How much money would be available? How many carers would benefit? Would the allowance be available in all local authorities? I suggested that those questions needed to be answered if we were to avoid a cruel deception being played out on kinship carers. We regrettably have our answer today.

The minister is in some difficulty, which was reflected in his speech. He has to ask himself whether he has done everything possible to ensure that those children stay within the wider family, as he said he would in his press release on the day of the announcement last year.

As stated in The Herald, the announcement was of a Scottish first—a national allowance scheme for kinship carers, costing the Scottish Government up to £20 million a year. The story went on to say that kinships carers who took on the parent/guardian role would be given the same status as foster carers across Scotland, and the minister proudly stated that the new programme was a joint commitment by the Scottish Government and COSLA. I presume that the media were briefed by the Scottish Government's spin doctors—spin that is now described as myth in the COSLA briefing that was sent to all MSPs yesterday.

COSLA can now—a year later—answer the questions that we asked on the day of the announcement. Its briefing helpfully outlines a number of questions and answers. First,

"Does the commitment apply to all children who are looked after by friends and family?

The answer is no.

Secondly:

"How much will kinship carers get?"

The answer is:

"This will vary across Local Authorities".

In response to the third question, which is "What is the timescale?" the answer is, "over the period 2008-11", and not—the minister will note—April 2008.

Finally,

"Is there an issue with benefits?"

The answer is yes. Is that a surprise? Despite all the ministers, all the officials at the back of the chamber and all the brains in COSLA, we are told that not one of them was aware last year that there may be a problem. I think not—the spin needs to stop. The facts are that the First Minister said that the money was available and that the Minister for Children and Early Years said that he would deliver. The Parliament supported the minister in that goal, and it is time to deliver—no ifs, no buts.

There is a wider point. If the Scottish Government cannot deliver on its stated policy of increasing the number of places for children at risk, how can we have any confidence in its programme of action to improve the identification of children at risk? How can we believe that the Government will be able to build on the capacity of services for children at risk, strengthen the management of immediate risk and develop an evidence base if it cannot deliver for the minority of children—the tip of the iceberg—who have been identified as being at risk? How can we be confident that the Government can or will do any better for the 60,000 children under 16 who have a parent with a drug problem or the estimated—the Government does not even know the exact figure—10,000 to 20,000 children who live with a drug-using parent? Who knows where the remaining 40,000 are?

Finally, we need to establish who is in charge. To my knowledge, at least four cabinet secretaries—none of whom is present in the chamber—and three ministers have responsibility for kinship care. An important point is that not one of them is accountable to the Parliament for the issue—safety in numbers, indeed. Only when one of those cabinet secretaries with influence in the Government and over the budget is prepared to step forward to accept that responsibility and accountability will we know that the Scottish Government is serious about the protection of children. Until then, we will continue to be disappointed, just as we are today.

Christina McKelvie (Scottish National Party, Central Scotland)

Anyone who takes an interest in what the Labour Party has to say about kinship care will not take long to get through it. A wee search of Scottish Labour's website reveals only two references to kinship care.

In its manifesto for older people for last year's election, "Active Ageing—Labour's Vision for Older Scots", Labour said that it would

"consider the future of grand-parenting in fostering and kinship care".

There was no mention of any other type of parenting—involving aunts, uncles, brothers or sisters—and certainly no mention of money.

Marvellous. What a commitment—or is it a non-commitment?

The policy was further developed after the election, right enough. During her excellent period of leadership, Wendy Alexander published a paper titled, "Scottish Labour: new directions—Change is what we do". In that truly visionary document, she laid out a future for the Labour Party in Scotland. She mentioned kinship care in that document. She asked:

"Why have we not resolved the funding of kinship care"?

Why not, indeed? At that point, Labour had been in power in Westminster for 10 years and had been in Government for eight years in Edinburgh. True to form, Labour failed to take action on the issue, just as it failed to take action on any of the issues that were pressing hard in Scotland. Unfortunately, like so many other Labour members, Wendy Alexander offered no solutions to the questions that she posed. It is easier just to wail that things are not right than to put them right.

It is just as well that an SNP Government was elected to start to develop the structures around kinship care. Through the concordat, we are working with and trusting local authorities to start providing delivery on the ground and around the country.

In his own passionate style, my colleague Bob Doris has laid out the shameful position of the London Government, which wants to claw back any payment made to kinship carers in Scotland who are in receipt of benefits. That will be a matter for the consciences of Labour Party members.

Rhona Brankin (Labour, Midlothian)

Will the member give way?

Christina McKelvie (Scottish National Party, Central Scotland)

Sorry, I have only four minutes.

Labour members will need to decide for themselves whether they are content to remain members of a party that would do such a thing.

The SNP Government, on the other hand, is delivering. In response to a parliamentary question in April from Elaine Murray, the Minister for Children and Early Years, Adam Ingram, made it clear that children who are subject to section 11 orders are not excluded from support from local authorities, as Elaine Murray had alleged in her usual scaremongering style.

Local authorities have discretion to provide payments to children in families in need. Dumfries and Galloway Council, which Elaine Murray asked about in another parliamentary question, has had to take steps to reassure kinship carers since then—it is shocking that it had to do so. At a coffee morning meeting at the Ruddicot Hotel on 3 June, a council officer assured carers that the discretionary payments would commence on 1 October. It is a scandal that kinship carers had to seek section 11 orders just to ensure security of income, but that is an issue that Labour ignored.

The Labour motion alleges that the payments for kinship carers have not materialised. The minister made the money available in October. The money was welcomed by groups such as Children 1st, which stated:

"today's announcement is good news for foster and kinship carers in Scotland and good news for the thousands of vulnerable children currently being looked after away from home."

Good work is being done by councils across the country in support of kinship carers. Labour members should have the decency to recognise that, especially as some of those councils are Labour controlled. There will be problems that need to be addressed, but those will not be addressed by turning the issue into a party-political football for the sake of scoring petty, party-political points.

I trust in the good will and hard work of the Minister for Children and Early Years, and I support the amendment in his name.

Claire Baker (Labour, Mid Scotland and Fife)

It is only a few weeks since I took part in the debate on looked-after children. That morning, we were all in agreement on the pressing need to do more to support this group of children and young people to ensure that they have better life chances and opportunities. Often, the best chance for such children or young people is to stay with a member of their extended family—a kinship carer. Such carers are often grandparents, who take on the responsibility of looking after their grandchildren in difficult circumstances because the safety and care of their grandchildren is their prime concern.

It is regrettable that we return to the issue of looked-after children today in much more adversarial circumstances, but I am afraid that that is unavoidable, given the treatment of kinship carers by the Scottish Government. In the debate almost a year ago, we welcomed the Government's promise to deliver on a kinship carers allowance. We have initiated today's debate because, regrettably, the Government has failed to deliver on that promise.

Some complex issues need to be resolved, as Liz Smith explored. The measures that the Government has suggested are limited. Children 1st has identified 7,000 kinship carers who do not receive additional financial help because of the status of the child. Although today's debate is focused on the 2,000 kinship carers who should qualify for the suggested additional support, more must be done—including having discussions with the UK Government—to deliver better levels of support.

Last year, the Scottish Government gave false hope to carers. That was unfair. The First Minister, the Minister for Children and Early Years and the concordat all gave a commitment that is not being delivered. Once again, the ability of the concordat to deliver Government priorities has been called into question.

Within Fife, 80 carers of looked-after children, and 148 carers of non-looked-after children, currently receive a kinship carers allowance that is paid at the same rate as the foster care allowance, which ranges from £80 to more than £140 a week, depending on the child's age. Fife Council's arrangements have been in place for a number of years so they pre-date the Scottish Government, the concordat and Fife Council's current SNP-Lib Dem administration. In response to Bob Doris and Christina McKelvie, I point out that the policy was originally delivered by a Labour administration in Fife. It is nonsense to suggest that Labour took no action on the issue. On 1 April 2008, Fife Council had no delays in payments, no broken promises and no carers waiting for funding that they had been promised.

However, I have spoken to officials at Fife Council, and I am very concerned to learn that the allowance is under review. Fife Council is considering whether it can afford the current rates, whether it needs to extend means testing and whether it can continue to provide an allowance to kinship carers of non-looked-after children. The historic concordat is forcing Fife Council to look again at its kinship care arrangements. We are told that the historic concordat provides money to pay for the kinship carers allowance, but the review in Fife could lead to a cut in provision in the region.

In many ways, families in Fife are fortunate, given the continuing postcode lottery in kinship care support. The Government's commitment to

"the provision of equitable and appropriate support for all carers of looked-after children"—[Official Report, 5 December 2007; c 4089.]

is not being realised. Worryingly, kinship care is referred to in the single outcome agreements of only 11 local authorities. That is a serious omission, given that kinship care is a concordat commitment.

Kinship care is another example of the concordat not working because it is unable to deliver national priorities that were promised by a Government that is not providing enough money to enable delivery. There is a yawning gap between the promises that were made by the Government in the Parliament and local government's ability to deliver them. In its defence, COSLA has produced a briefing that sets out the reality of the implementation of the policy. The fact that it needs to deal with the

"myths that have built up around the policy on kinship care"

payments is a direct result of misrepresentation by the Government. Today's debate will, I hope, push the Government towards making good on the promises that it made a year ago.

Alasdair Morgan (Scottish National Party, South of Scotland)

We now move to wind-up speeches.

Margaret Smith (Liberal Democrat, Edinburgh West)

Usually at this point in a debate, I stand up and say what an interesting debate we have had. In many education debates over recent weeks, we have found a degree of consensus during the debate. However, this debate has been very acrimonious, with more heat than light. Therefore, I will try to be helpful to the minister and to colleagues by trying to get back to the basic issue.

Rhoda Grant made a good speech that brought us all back to what the debate is meant to be about—kinship carers and the children who are being cared for. The consensus is that we all want to make improvements, and we need to get back to that.

The minister and others commented on the previous Government's record. Not a single member of the Liberal Democrats or the Labour Party here today would say that we got it all right. We started a journey that we are still on. As the minister said, that journey requires a coalition of support for kinship carers, which must be built in this chamber and through our relationships with councils, with Westminster over the benefits system, and with kinship carers themselves. I am talking not just about the minority of kinship carers who are to be supported by the minister's proposals, but about the wider range of kinship carers who Duncan McNeil talked about. Those carers care for children, day in and day out, week in and week out, and we all rely on them for many things. Not least, they save us a great deal of money: if we paid for the services that they provide for us, we would have to find a great deal more money than the minister or anyone else has mentioned this morning.

I agree that we have to build a coalition of support. It is fair to say that, last December, the Government received cross-party support for a better deal for kinship carers. The First Minister and the minister made promises last year, and I do not doubt for a single second the minister's absolute commitment to dealing with the issue.

Elizabeth Smith and others commented on the complexity of the issue. It involves all sorts of different definitions, and there is a lack of information—it is difficult to build the right kind of service if we do not have the right information as our starting point.

The language that ministers used suggested that certain payments would be made, equivalent to those made to foster parents. Those comments and commitments have raised expectations among kinship carers. Those expectations do not have to be managed or spun, but they must be dealt with. Instead of spin and myth, we need delivery.

In recent debates, we have discussed the stark differences between the life chances and experiences of looked-after children and those of children who live at home with their parents. We have talked about looked-after children in relation to health, education, housing and crime. We have all said that improving the situation is vital and that the interests of Scotland's children must be put first in policy making and decision making. The Government has said that it is committed to getting it right for every child and to supporting families that need to be supported in caring for their children. They are the most vulnerable and they need our support.

However, the reality is very different from what the minister said last year it would be. As Rhona Brankin told us, the reality is that people in one council might be paid nothing, whereas those in a neighbouring council area receive a reasonable amount of money for the care that they give. However, their need is the same—the costs of bringing up the children are the same. The reality on the ground is not what the minister said it would be, and it is not what we all hoped it would be.

Instead of squabbling, it is time for us to address the major issue of the care that is being given to children who we all want to protect and care for. The people who are in the middle and doing the job for us are the kinship carers. Instead of squabbling, we must make sure that we address the issue afresh and put in the required money. We must make sure that what Scotland's councils need to do is being done, irrespective of which council or part of the country a child lives in.

Murdo Fraser (Conservative, Mid Scotland and Fife)

I congratulate Margaret Smith on an excellent speech. I will start, as she did, with the basic point on which we agree—the importance of kinship carers. Rhona Brankin made that point well in her opening speech.

Sadly, we live in a society in which family breakdown is a serious issue, and its consequences are most damaging for the children. The sad fact of life today is that families break down and children need care. We also have parents who, for reasons of ill health, mental illness or drug and alcohol addiction, are unable to bring up their children. We all owe a huge debt to the army of grandads, grannies, uncles and aunts who are prepared to step in to look after children in such situations. That is good news for the children, because it is so much better for them to be cared for by their blood relatives than to be taken into care. It is also good news for the tax payer, because in the end it saves the tax payer a huge amount of money when children are looked after in a kinship care setting and not a formal looked-after setting. It is all good news, and we can all agree that we want to support kinship carers.

We have to move on to look at the detail of the debate. As my colleague Elizabeth Smith said, the Labour position and the criticism that Rhona Brankin set out effectively this morning go to the heart of the contradiction and confusion at the core of the SNP's approach to local government. We see that in relation to kinship care, free school meals and smaller class sizes in primary 1 to 3. The SNP Government says that it wants to deliver those things to the Scottish people, but that it is up to local councils to decide how and in what manner those policies should be delivered.

The increasingly tattered historic concordat is the delivery mechanism, and as we have heard today, delivery is patchy. It cannot be denied that we do not have uniform delivery across Scotland, which is a consequence of allowing local decision making. Let me be clear: the Conservatives support the removal of ring fencing and the empowering and trusting of local authorities, but the lesson for SNP ministers is that they should not make promises that they cannot keep, because they have given up their power to implement policies.

In the case of kinship carers, the SNP Government made a promise, so it is not surprising that people feel let down. This morning, I listened to Radio Scotland's phone-in, which other members will have heard, too. Carers from across Scotland said that when the SNP came to power, it led them to believe that it was going to give them kinship carer payments, but those payments have not been delivered and there is no sign of them being delivered. It is not surprising that people feel let down: they are entirely justified in feeling so.

The COSLA briefing that we received in advance of this debate provides little comfort. In response to the question

"Have Councils been funded to deliver kinship care payments?"

it says:

"Local Government budgets are currently under pressure due to a range of factors - some of which stem from the economic downturn. Full implementation will need to be discussed in this changed context."

There is little comfort that councils believe that they have the money to fully deliver the policy.

I will talk briefly about the Westminster angle. I have some sympathy for the minister's position. There have been difficulties with the implementation of the kinship care policy that are not of the Government's making. There are difficulties around the interaction between what the Government is trying to do, which we agree with, and the benefits situation in Westminster, particularly with regard to child benefit. I know that the minister has been working proactively and constructively with the Westminster Government to deal with those problems, and I welcome the SNP amendment's wording on that point.

It is therefore a pity that all the minister's good efforts were so undermined by the contributions from the SNP back benches. Bob Doris's rant and the lesser one from Christina McKelvie let the cat out of the bag: despite the fine words in the SNP amendment and Mr Ingram's constructive approach, we see the real SNP approach, which is to blame it all on Westminster. That is deeply depressing. The minister has been very constructive and I welcome his contribution.

We all support the kinship carer policy, but it is not being properly delivered. Let us work together constructively so that Scotland's kinship carers are not left out in the cold.

Adam Ingram (Scottish National Party, South of Scotland)

I thank Murdo Fraser and Margaret Smith for bringing some reason to the debate. I agree with Margaret Smith that this debate has generated more heat than light. I find the Labour Party's fears-and-smears approach to this serious issue profoundly distasteful, not least because of its own track record. The Labour motion creates a narrative to justify its claim that the Government has broken its promise to provide kinship care allowances. That is a deception, and I caution members against taking it at face value. Let me take the motion apart.

First, the First Minister made no commitment on 27 September 2007. In fact, it was Wendy Alexander who called on the First Minister to make a statement. He expressed sympathy for the proposal, but no more. Secondly, although we support minimum payments of £119 to £198—the Fostering Network rates—those are not specified in the Government's strategy documents, as the motion alleges. I refer members to the COSLA briefing for the debate. Furthermore, although last December I expected that kinship care allowances would start to be paid from April, I did not stipulate that they would be paid at those rates immediately.

As the chamber knows, all 32 local authorities are committed, through the concordat, to the introduction of kinship care allowances. Of those, 20 councils have schemes in place and are currently paying allowances. I explained earlier that, given the phasing of the funding, a lot of councils are paying interim rates at the moment, which will climb over the next two years. Five councils are currently paying the full fostering rates: Aberdeen City Council, Clackmannanshire Council, Angus Council, Western Isles Council and Orkney Islands Council. I commend those councils for that. Moreover, a further six local authorities have schemes that are scheduled to start.

Cathie Craigie (Labour, Cumbernauld and Kilsyth)

I am listening with interest to the minister's analysis of how the councils are delivering. SNP ministers, the First Minister and SNP members have said that there will be a national kinship care scheme, not a postcode lottery scheme. When can we expect to see a national scheme?

Adam Ingram (Scottish National Party, South of Scotland)

The mechanism for delivering the policy, as for delivering other policies, is our concordat with local authorities. I accept that we are working in a new way that has not been tried and tested. We are working in partnership with local authorities to deliver our policies and they are being delivered. That might be happening more slowly than if there had been a diktat from central Government, as there was under previous regimes, but I point to the fact that many of those diktats did not work either, so, at the very least, the chamber should allow us to work through our policy with our local government partners.

Margaret Smith (Liberal Democrat, Edinburgh West)

Does the minister accept that the people who are paying the price for his sticking to that worthy principle of not issuing a diktat from central Government are the most vulnerable children in Scotland and some of the poorest families in Scotland?

Adam Ingram (Scottish National Party, South of Scotland)

I point out to Margaret Smith that this is the first Government that has taken the initiative to introduce kinship care allowances. We should, therefore, be allowed a little leeway in ensuring that the policy is rolled out properly throughout the country.

Of course, I would like all local authorities to pay kinship care allowances that are equivalent to foster care rates sooner rather than later. However, as I have made clear to the kinship carer network, different local authorities will move at a different pace because of the way in which we are phasing in the funding over the three years to 2011 and the fact that each local authority is starting from a different base.

The Government has been open and above board about the way in which we are implementing the policy, despite the difficulties that we face in doing so. Let me spell out what we are doing. We will review jointly with COSLA and the Association of Directors of Social Work the interim guidance on the assessment, approval and payment of allowances to kinship carers. We have funded Citizens Advice Scotland to advise individual kinship carers and local authorities on how to maximise benefit entitlement and the payment of the allowance. COSLA is establishing a member/officer group to discuss the detail of the policy's implementation by local authorities. Finally, Scottish ministers are seeking with our UK counterparts solutions to the problems that we have with UK benefits legislation.

We are making good progress in fulfilling our commitments to kinship carers. I realise that some people remain sceptical, even cynical. Given our predecessors' track record, that is entirely understandable. However, this Government is determined to prove its doubters wrong.

Karen Whitefield (Labour, Airdrie and Shotts)

This has been a lively debate, which is to be welcomed, as this is an important issue for many families throughout Scotland. However, the comments from SNP members in suggesting that they are the only party that cares about the issue and the only party that is ever going to act on the issue are disingenuous at best and dishonest at worst. They do a great disservice to the many kinship carers of all political persuasions throughout Scotland who want to know what is going to be done to support them and to help the children whom they look after.

Dave Thompson (Scottish National Party, Highlands and Islands)

Will the member take an intervention?

Karen Whitefield (Labour, Airdrie and Shotts)

I will not, as SNP members would not take interventions from any of the Opposition parties.

Everyone recognises that if a child must be removed from their parents, finding them a home with another family member who is capable of looking after them should be the first preference. Children need love if they are to thrive and develop, and families are always best placed to provide them with that love. However, placing vulnerable children with relatives must not be seen as a cheap option for the state.

It is vital that we provide support, advice and respite to relatives who care for children who might otherwise end up in state residential accommodation. Indeed, the kinship carers who are in the public gallery today thought that that was what they were getting when, in December 2007, the Minister for Children and Early Years announced with COSLA a joint strategy for carers. I am sure that they believed that that was what was going to be delivered. The reality is very different.

Notwithstanding that, I welcome the investment that the Government has made in the citizens advice bureau services for kinship care. Hugh O'Donnell was right to highlight the lack of consistency in the information that is provided to kinship carers in Scotland. I recognise the value of providing proper support, information and advice to kinship carers, and firmly believe that citizens advice bureaux are in an ideal position to offer that service. I am, therefore, particularly pleased that my local CAB in Airdrie will be responsible for providing the regional support for North Lanarkshire, South Lanarkshire, Argyll and Bute, West Dunbartonshire, Renfrewshire and East Renfrewshire.

Bob Doris (Scottish National Party, Glasgow)

I, too, endorse CABx and the giving of £4 million to them for the provision of better-off calculations for kinship carers.

Karen Whitefield (Labour, Airdrie and Shotts)

This is meant to be an intervention.

Bob Doris (Scottish National Party, Glasgow)

Do you appreciate the difficulties that CABx are having in making those better-off calculations because it is unclear what the Department for Work and Pensions will take off kinship carers' benefits?

Karen Whitefield (Labour, Airdrie and Shotts)

Mr Doris, I will come on to your smokescreen about Westminster—

Alasdair Morgan (Scottish National Party, South of Scotland)

I remind all members not to use the second person.

Karen Whitefield (Labour, Airdrie and Shotts)

As you rightly say, Mr Doris, front-line staff and volunteers at CABx will help carers to understand the legal status of the child whom they care for and point out any assistance that might be available from local authorities. However, we need a scheme that operates throughout Scotland and to which every kinship carer is entitled. Although I welcome the provision of advice, we must ensure that kinship care is properly funded.

The overriding problems that kinship carers throughout Scotland face centre on how much money is available, how much has been delivered through the hysterical concordat, and whether or not the scheme is national. The Minister for Children and Early Years suggested that he was going to fund the concordat to the tune of £4 million, £8 million and £12 million over three years. However, as Rhona Brankin pointed out with reference to COSLA's own internal documents, local government will receive only £4 million in each of the next three years.

I am afraid that the Scottish Government has to face up to the fact that although Scottish local authorities want to deliver for kinship carers—indeed, we heard this morning that that has happened in Fife—the reality is that they simply do not have sufficient funding to provide the kinship care allowance at the recommended level. Many councils simply cannot afford it.

The SNP Government might think that it has played a very clever game with Westminster and Scottish local government but, as the Scottish people and kinship carers know, it is not good enough simply to blame Westminster and local councils. If Mr Doris's claims are correct, he should explain to the chamber how Glasgow City Council has been able to introduce a scheme that does not affect benefits entitlement.

Bob Doris (Scottish National Party, Glasgow)

rose—

Karen Whitefield (Labour, Airdrie and Shotts)

Sit down, Mr Doris. [ Interruption. ]

Alasdair Morgan (Scottish National Party, South of Scotland)

Order.

Karen Whitefield (Labour, Airdrie and Shotts)

I do not believe that kinship carers will be persuaded by the Government's claim that the lack of funding or support for the kinship care allowance has nothing to do with it and everything to do with Westminster and local councils. That is simply disingenuous.

We should examine exactly what commitments the First Minister has made to the chamber. This morning, the Minister for Children and Early Years suggested that Mr Salmond had made no commitments on money, but, according to the Official Report of 27 September 2007, the First Minister, in response to Wendy Alexander's question about whether he would "consider fast-tracking" a

"proposal to provide £10 million for kinship care allowances"

said:

"Wendy Alexander should take 'Yes' for an answer." -—[Official Report, 27 September 2007; c 2222.]

Ten million pounds—[Interruption.] Ten million pounds—[Interruption.] Kinship carers were promised £10 million and had expected to receive the money by now, but they have not. Scotland's Government is letting down Scotland's kinship carers. That is unacceptable. The issue is not new, but it is one that the Government has failed to address. [Interruption.]

I am pleased that this Parliament recognises the tremendous work that grandparents, aunts, uncles and other relatives carry out in caring for vulnerable young people. The state can neither afford to pay for that level of care nor provide the love that is offered in such relationships. Every one of us in the chamber has a responsibility to support carers and recognise how difficult it can be for them to provide care. We all welcome the steps that have been taken to provide information and advice, but the Government must accept its responsibility in this matter and provide our local authorities with the required funding to ensure that kinship carers enjoy the same benefits as foster carers.

I urge members who care about kinship care to support Rhona Brankin's motion.

Duncan McNeil (Labour, Greenock and Inverclyde)

On a point of order, Presiding Officer. Given that this morning there was no ministerial support for the nonsense that was spoken in defence of the kinship care policy, is it in order for ministers to enter the chamber at the end of the debate and make sedentary comments when they have not taken part in the debate?

Alex Fergusson (None, Galloway and Upper Nithsdale)

That is not a point of order. However, I point out that, in the brief time that I have been in the chair, I have noticed sedentary comments coming from all parts of the chamber, not just one.

Question Time — Scottish Executive — General Questions

Bill Wilson (Scottish National Party, West of Scotland)

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will make representations at European level in favour of extending to the Scots language the provisions of part III of the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages that apply to the Welsh, Gaelic and Irish languages. (S3O-5229)

Linda Fabiani (Scottish National Party, Central Scotland)

I should first clarify a point of procedure. The Scottish Government would in the first instance be required to satisfy the United Kingdom Government of its ability to implement specified additional undertakings with regard to extending part III coverage to Scots before the UK Government made any referral in that respect to the Council of Europe. Any additional measures of support for the Scots language to be ratified by the UK Government would likely have to be in place at the time of ratification. I think, therefore, that the right thing to do just now is to ensure that, as a minimum, the undertakings that have already been ratified in respect of Scots in part II of the charter are being fulfilled in the best possible manner.

Bill Wilson (Scottish National Party, West of Scotland)

In light of that response, I highlight a complaint that I recently received from a constituent about the Department for Work and Pensions providing material in Welsh, but not in Scots and Gaelic. The DWP has informed me that it provides material in Welsh because of obligations under the Welsh Language Act 1993 and that no similar provision exists for Scots or Gaelic. Will the minister consider making representations to the UK Government on ensuring that Scots and Gaelic have equal status with Welsh and English?

Linda Fabiani (Scottish National Party, Central Scotland)

I am concerned by the case that Mr Wilson has highlighted, given that all those who sign up to the charter have a responsibility for ensuring that these matters are progressed. I am happy to meet Mr Wilson to find out more about the case so that we can indeed make representations to the UK Government.

Bill Kidd (Scottish National Party, Glasgow)

To ask the Scottish Government what discussions it has had with banks over any reluctance to co-operate with small innovative companies that are in receipt of Government funding but are unable to gain match funding, despite the Scottish Government guaranteeing 75 per cent of any loan via the small firms loan guarantee scheme. (S3O-5218)

Jim Mather (Scottish National Party, Argyll and Bute)

The Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Sustainable Growth has written to the Scottish clearing banks to encourage them to utilise all available sources of funding, including, where appropriate, participation in the United Kingdom-wide small firms loan guarantee scheme, which is the UK Government's principal intervention in the debt market via approved lenders, mainly banks. The cabinet secretary plans to meet the Scottish clearing banks to explore how the Scottish Government and the banking sector can work together more closely in this period. We also welcome the positive moves made by some Scottish banks to access the substantial additional resources available from the European Investment Bank to support business customers.

Bill Kidd (Scottish National Party, Glasgow)

What further actions will the Scottish Government take to support small and medium-sized enterprises in what are, regardless of Gordon Brown's arrogant assertions, undoubtedly difficult times for all?

Jim Mather (Scottish National Party, Argyll and Bute)

We are already doing a number of things. For example, Government is managing with more flexibility regional selective assistance for proposals with good business prospects to increase the banks' propensity to lend. In addition, not only has there been strong progress on the early payments programme with a higher and higher proportion of invoices being paid within 10 days, but there has been sound progress on public sector procurement with 14,000 businesses registering on the recently opened public contracts Scotland portal. The procurement data that are being published are giving SMEs and innovative companies a clear indication of the buying patterns of public sector entities, the SME—and Scottish SME—share of that activity and so on. Finally, I point out that the full 100 per cent small business bonus will come on stream in April.

Patrick Harvie (Green, Glasgow)

Given that a number of small businesses are finding it hard to access the support that the Scottish Government and the United Kingdom Government offer because of the difficulty in securing even very small loans from the commercial banks, and given that we are seeing another wave of mergers so that there will be a small number of megabanks instead of a diverse range of more traditional financial institutions, is it not time for the Scottish Government to lead discussions on the creation of new financial institutions for Scotland that can exist on a more sustainable basis, provide small loans and allow small businesses to support one another in the same way that communities support one another through institutions such as credit unions?

Jim Mather (Scottish National Party, Argyll and Bute)

Essentially, the Bank of Scotland was formed in the coffee shops of Edinburgh in 1695. I welcome the recent visit here by Muhammad Yunus of Grameen Bank and the conversations that he has had in Scotland about what might be done particularly to support further social enterprise activity, to which the Government is committed. We are having open conversations with all the sectors in Scotland and with Scottish Financial Enterprise to encourage as much innovative activity here as possible.

Des McNulty (Labour, Clydebank and Milngavie)

To ask the Scottish Executive what assistance it will give to St Margaret of Scotland hospice to allow it to continue to provide services to palliative and continuing care patients. (S3O-5193)

Nicola Sturgeon (Scottish National Party, Glasgow Govan)

NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde is responsible for planning the provision of national health service services for the population that it covers, and St Margaret's receives NHS funding for the particular services that it provides. The Scottish Government continues to encourage both organisations to discuss options for future service provision in addition to the highly regarded palliative and end-of-life care services that St Margaret's provides that are unaffected by the current proposals. We hope that there will be a resolution without undue delay that meets the needs of the local population and allows St Margaret's to continue to do its work

Des McNulty (Labour, Clydebank and Milngavie)

It is clear that the continuing care services that St Margaret's provides are needed and that the care that is currently provided for the category of patients in question is excellent, so why is Greater Glasgow and Clyde NHS Board so resistant to allowing that care to continue on the St Margaret's site?

Nicola Sturgeon (Scottish National Party, Glasgow Govan)

The decision on the reduced requirement for continuing care beds in Glasgow was, of course, taken some time ago by a joint committee of NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde and Glasgow City Council. All along, NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde has made it clear that it wants to continue to support St Margaret's, which is why it has engaged in discussions on options for future service provision. I understand that St Margaret's has said that it has considered and rejected two options that NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde has put forward, which is disappointing, but NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde must reflect on that.

In doing so, it must fully consider St Margaret's proposal and then decide what the best way forward is in the interests of everybody concerned.

As I said when we discussed the issue last week, I value the service that St Margaret of Scotland hospice provides, as does NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde, but like any statutory agency that commissions services from the voluntary sector, NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde must ensure that those services align with the needs of the population that it covers. NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde is involved in a process, which I hope will reach a quick resolution.

Roseanna Cunningham (Scottish National Party, Perth)

The cabinet secretary knows about my interest in palliative care. Is she as surprised as I am by the new-found concerns that Labour MSPs such as Des McNulty are expressing? Will she remind us exactly when the decision in question was taken?

Richard Simpson (Labour, Mid Scotland and Fife)

That is shocking.

Nicola Sturgeon (Scottish National Party, Glasgow Govan)

Roseanna Cunningham should be treated seriously, given her concerns about palliative care. She has expressed an intention to introduce a member's bill that covers that extremely serious issue.

Roseanna Cunningham raises a central and fundamental issue. We are dealing with the implementation of a decision that was taken by a joint community care committee of Greater Glasgow and Clyde NHS Board and Glasgow City Council. There was a reduced requirement across the city for continuing care beds because of reduced demand for them. To answer Roseanna Cunningham's question directly, the decision in question was taken in 2005—in other words, under the previous Administration. Like her, I struggle to recall Des McNulty expressing objections at that time.

Richard Simpson (Labour, Mid Scotland and Fife)

The amount of nonsense that is being talked is simply ludicrous. That Roseanna Cunningham should say that my colleague Des McNulty has not been involved in the process is unacceptable—he has been involved in it from the outset.

We agree that there is a need to refine the number of continuing care beds in Glasgow—there is no problem with that—but Greater Glasgow and Clyde NHS Board is going to replace the continuing care beds at St Margaret's with similar provision at Blawarthill hospital. Thus, it will condemn St Margaret's to being ineffective and inefficient and it is likely that the hospice will close. Will the cabinet secretary intervene in the process and ensure that St Margaret of Scotland hospice is maintained so that it provides a good and effective care programme for the community?

Nicola Sturgeon (Scottish National Party, Glasgow Govan)

Richard Simpson is right in one respect: a lot of nonsense has been spoken in the chamber on the issue. Unfortunately, however, the nonsense is coming from the Opposition.

Let me make one or two things clear. First, the future of St Margaret of Scotland hospice is not in doubt. Those who suggest that the provision of palliative and end-of-life care services at St Margaret's is somehow being jeopardised by NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde are not doing a disservice to me; rather, they are doing a disservice to the population that depends on those services. That is disgraceful.

Secondly, there is a duty on NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde to ensure that it provides services that the population that it serves needs. NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde is involved in a process with the board of St Margaret of Scotland hospice. It would be better for all members who have a genuine interest in the matter to encourage both sides—not only one side—to stay around the table and reach a solution that meets the needs of all concerned. If we all do that, a solution might not be too far away.

Des McNulty (Labour, Clydebank and Milngavie)

On a point of order, Presiding Officer. Roseanna Cunningham made an accusation that I had not previously taken an interest in the matter. There is a considerable audit trail of work that I have done in asking questions about the process under the previous Government as well as under the current Government. I ask Roseanna Cunningham to withdraw what she said.

Alex Fergusson (None, Galloway and Upper Nithsdale)

The member will be aware that that is not a point of order. However, the member whom he mentions might want to consider what he said. By raising a point of order, his view is now on the record.

Aileen Campbell (Scottish National Party, South of Scotland)

To ask the Scottish Government what importance it attaches to the role of rural schools. (S3O-5208)

Fiona Hyslop (Scottish National Party, Lothians)

We attach a great deal of importance to the role of rural schools and recognise their significance within their local communities. That is why early next year we will introduce a bill to safeguard our rural schools and improve the way in which all school closure proposals are consulted on and handled.

Aileen Campbell (Scottish National Party, South of Scotland)

The minister may be aware of proposals to merge rural schools in Clydesdale's upper ward in the South of Scotland region, which I represent. Many parents have expressed concerns to me about how those proposals are being handled. Does the minister agree that local authorities that seek to alter rural school arrangements should fully consult in the way that she says they should—in the most open and transparent manner possible—so that Chinese whispers and rumours do not unnecessarily scare parents in rural communities about the future of their schools?

Fiona Hyslop (Scottish National Party, Lothians)

I am aware that South Lanarkshire Council is informally considering possible future options for schools in the Clydesdale part of its area, and my understanding is that things are being done entirely openly with parent councils. If—and I stress the word "if"—the council were to decide at some stage in the future that it wished to consult officially on proposed changes to the current arrangements, a full, open and transparent public consultation process in accordance with the current statutory requirements would be conducted, which would allow all interested parties ample opportunity to give their views.

Murdo Fraser (Conservative, Mid Scotland and Fife)

The minister will be aware of serious concerns that parents groups have expressed about the nature of some consultations by local councils in advance of proposed closures. It has been said that consultations are often slanted, unbalanced and full of leading questions. In the proposed legislation, will the minister address the need to improve the quality of such consultations?

Fiona Hyslop (Scottish National Party, Lothians)

I thank Murdo Fraser for his continuing interest in the issue.

The bill that I mentioned will be aimed at improving the consultation process, including the process at the start of consultations, and ensuring that if any concerns exist about the information that a council provides, there are opportunities right at the beginning of the process for that information to be corrected and shared with parents.

Jeremy Purvis (Liberal Democrat, Tweeddale, Ettrick and Lauderdale)

There is cross-party support for the retention and, indeed, the strengthening of the rural schools network, which I know benefits my constituency. [ Interruption. ] I ask members to pay attention. [ Interruption. ]

Alex Fergusson (None, Galloway and Upper Nithsdale)

Order.

Jeremy Purvis (Liberal Democrat, Tweeddale, Ettrick and Lauderdale)

Does the cabinet secretary understand that councils that offer a rural schools network require additional support to help with the additional costs of providing it? Does she accept that there must be recognition that local authorities need to be properly supported to implement policies that come down from the Parliament, such as free school meals? Scottish Borders Council is already experiencing pressures in that regard.

Fiona Hyslop (Scottish National Party, Lothians)

The bill that we will introduce is intended to maintain existing rural schools, which should not cost any more to do than it does under the current settlement. The allocation of grant-aided expenditure already takes account of rurality—that is reflected in the settlement that rural areas receive.

I welcome the Liberal Democrats' support for improving consultation on rural school closures and I look forward to hearing their constructive suggestions when the bill is introduced.

Robert Brown (Liberal Democrat, Glasgow)

To ask the Scottish Executive what its target number of teachers is for 2008-09 and 2009-10. (S3O-5232)

Fiona Hyslop (Scottish National Party, Lothians)

Under the terms of the concordat, local government agreed that it was funded to maintain teacher numbers broadly at 2007 levels despite falling school rolls, and our planning assumptions are that it will do so.

Robert Brown (Liberal Democrat, Glasgow)

I am grateful for the cabinet secretary's reply, but she will be aware that a report that the General Teaching Council for Scotland published yesterday reveals that only 31 per cent of newly qualified staff have found a permanent post this year and that 700 probationary teachers—an extraordinary number—who qualified this summer have no job in teaching, either full time or supply.

In its target figures for next year, what account has been taken by the Scottish National Party Government of its lamentable failure this year to find employment for all those teachers who have already been trained? Does the cabinet secretary agree that the situation represents a horrendous waste of public resource and individual aspiration?

Alex Fergusson (None, Galloway and Upper Nithsdale)

Very briefly, Mr Brown.

Robert Brown (Liberal Democrat, Glasgow)

Does she also agree that blaming the local authorities for a nationwide problem is pretty shoddy? As the responsible minister, what does she intend to do about it?

Fiona Hyslop (Scottish National Party, Lothians)

The member posed a variety of questions. His initial question was about the target number of teachers, but this year's situation is a result of planning that was done, and decisions that were made, by his Government two years ago. Quite clearly, a number of today's post-probation teachers were recruited as a result of decisions by the previous Government. That is one reason why I set up the teacher employment working group. A series of recommendations has been made.

It is absolutely correct to identify the need to ensure more permanent employment, particularly for primary school teachers, but 79 per cent of post-probationers are employed in teaching. We need to work to improve that situation, but it is not helpful when some local authorities do not maintain teacher numbers at 2007 levels, even though they have been provided with the resources to do so.

Duncan McNeil (Labour, Greenock and Inverclyde)

To ask the Scottish Government what action is being taken to meet the increasing demand for money advice and advocacy services. (S3O-5191)

John Swinney (Scottish National Party, North Tayside)

The Scottish Government is taking a range of actions to support those who need money advice and advocacy services in these challenging economic times. Those measures include providing £3 million for legal advice and representation for people who face repossession and other debt problems; funding a £400,000 awareness-raising campaign for the national debtline to encourage people to take early action to address debt problems; and providing an extra sum of around £1 million over three years, from Barnett consequentials arising from the pre-budget report, to expand face-to-face advice capacity.

Duncan McNeil (Labour, Greenock and Inverclyde)

I thank the cabinet secretary for his answer and welcome the fact that additional funding from consequentials will be made available; I am sure that he will agree that it is certainly required.

On a visit to my local money advice centre, I found that, year on year, the number of inquiries is up by 100 per cent, the amount of mortgage debt is up by 104 per cent and the number of people who present with debt on secured loans and who are therefore likely to face repossession is up by 371 per cent. How will the cabinet secretary guarantee that my constituency will get its fair share of the money available to meet the need for money advice?

John Swinney (Scottish National Party, North Tayside)

People face economic difficulties and challenges and that is why this Government has taken action to support them. We encourage the United Kingdom Government, which has responsibility for macroeconomic policy, to do likewise.

On 8 December, in consort with the Department for Work and Pensions, the Scottish Government launched the financial inclusion champions Scotland initiative in Greenock, in Mr McNeil's constituency. Greenock is centre stage on this and many other occasions. I assure Mr McNeil that the seriousness of the issues that he raises is well understood by ministers. As I indicated, we will be providing support to assist individuals who face financial difficulties with appropriate and effective advice.

First Minister's Question Time

Iain Gray (Labour, East Lothian)

To ask the First Minister what engagements he has planned for the rest of the day. (S3F-1270)

Alex Salmond (Scottish National Party, Gordon)

Later today I will have meetings to take forward the Government's programme for Scotland.

Iain Gray (Labour, East Lothian)

In September, Fiona Hyslop said, with regard to new teachers, that the General Teaching Council for Scotland survey

"does not show that an increasing number of post-probationers are not getting permanent jobs."—[Official Report, 11 September 2008; c 10704.]

The latest GTCS survey came out yesterday. Will the First Minister tell us whether the number of new primary teachers in permanent jobs is up or down? While he is at it, what about new secondary teachers in permanent jobs? Is that number up or down?

Alex Salmond (Scottish National Party, Gordon)

The survey shows that 79 per cent of probationers have moved into teaching employment. I share the desire of all members to see that figure increase, although a declining trend has been evident in the survey for some time. That is why the Cabinet Secretary for Education and Lifelong Learning, in conjunction with the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities, the local authorities and the GTCS, have had a working group. That group met in June, reported in October and made 12 recommendations on how we can more effectively move probationary teachers into employment after they have done their probationary year. That is effective planning. I accept that that should perhaps have been done earlier, but at least this Government is addressing the problem in a way that it was not addressed over the past eight years.

Iain Gray (Labour, East Lothian)

The latest GTC survey bears further examination. It shows that one in five new teachers has been unable to find teaching work—down almost 9 per cent on last year. The number of primary teachers in permanent jobs is down on last year, and the number of secondary teachers in permanent jobs is down from 70.9 to 58.1 per cent. New teachers on supply lists are up—they are included in the percentage that was quoted by the First Minister—to 30.2 per cent from only 18.7 per cent last year.

After the first full year with the Scottish National Party in charge, this is what the Educational Institute of Scotland has to say:

"The rate of unemployment among new teachers has risen dramatically, and the quality of employment for those who do find work has deteriorated."

The EIS believes that that is an alarming situation and that it needs urgent action. What urgent action does the First Minister plan to take?

Alex Salmond (Scottish National Party, Gordon)

Urgent action is the 12 recommendations that have been brought into place. Incidentally, I would not criticise the use as supply teachers of people who have completed their probationary year. One of the recommendations of the joint working group was to use the talents of new teachers as opposed to bringing retired teachers back into the workforce. I hope that that would be very much welcomed.

Maintaining the teaching population at a record level of around 53,000, along with declining school rolls, should allow for the reduction in class sizes that we want. Vacancies arise throughout the school year due to retirement. Although we are extremely concerned that in October—at the start of the survey—705 probationers were still to find employment, in the last month alone, since the start of November, 423 vacancies have been advertised in the Times Educational Supplement. The vacancies are arising. When the survey is redone at the start of the new year, I hope that it will show—as the trends did last year, when we got to 93 per cent of probationers in employment—a sharp uptake and that young people who are moving into the education profession are getting the career opportunities that we all want them to have.

Iain Gray (Labour, East Lothian)

Teachers have always retired during the course of the year; even when I was a teacher—30 years ago—they retired during the course of the year. The point is that, at this stage of the year, far fewer new teachers are in permanent jobs than was the case last year and many of the jobs that the First Minister says have been advertised are, of course, promoted posts that newly qualified teachers cannot apply for.

There are more than 700 new teachers and every one of them has a story. Lynne and Cara McAllister are sisters and both are newly qualified teachers. One is a secondary teacher and one is a primary teacher, and both are unable to find permanent teaching jobs that use their skills and talents. Cara went on the supply list, as the First Minister suggests people should do. She has had six days' work in six months, and is now looking for jobs outside teaching.

GTC Scotland says:

"We are currently producing some of the most talented teachers we have seen in Scotland".

Those are talented teachers who, under the SNP, are going to waste. What hope does the First Minister offer Lynne, Cara and the hundreds of other young teachers like them? When will they get the chance that they want to play their part in building Scotland's future?

Alex Salmond (Scottish National Party, Gordon)

To assist young teachers is exactly why the education secretary convened the working group and exactly why the 12 recommendations were made. I hope that Iain Gray is more familiar with those recommendations than he has indicated so far, and I hope that he supports them. They are effective action.

I point out—I would have thought that this was reasonably obvious—that when there are advertisements for promoted posts, opportunities are created for new teachers to move into the profession. I hope that Iain Gray agrees that we should see a sharp rise in probationers taken into employment when we see the new survey in the new year.

On one issue, I accept that I have considerable concerns. I think that it is agreed across the chamber—Jackie Baillie certainly agrees—that the money supply to local authorities is increasing over the next three years. It is increasing in terms of both local authorities' budgets and the share of the Scottish budget. However, as I look across local authorities, I see widely diverging patterns of new teachers being employed. Of course, there are differing factors of demographics and population, and those factors have to be taken into account. However, to show that I am not making a party-political point, let me address two authorities that lie cheek by jowl and which are under different political control. From the most recent information, from 2007, we note that West Lothian Council took on an extra 111 teachers, that South Lanarkshire Council took on another 103, and that teaching jobs are at record numbers. My question is, if those authorities can do that under the concordat, why are some local authorities apparently so reluctant to employ teachers? Is there any Labour Party instruction in the matter? That is what we want to know.

Iain Gray (Labour, East Lothian)

I cannot answer that question. I cannot explain, for example, why Perth and Kinross Council—under SNP control—is cutting teacher numbers by almost 6 per cent. Why would that be?

The problem is not whether I support the First Minister's or his education secretary's working group; the problem is that young teachers are not convinced by that working group. Lynne McAllister, after a first-class honours degree and a year of teacher training with nothing to show for it, is going to Canada to see what prospects there are there. Her sister Cara is looking abroad, too. Next year, 2009, is meant to be the year of coming home to Scotland, but for Lynne and Cara it could be the year of giving up on Scotland. They do not want to go, but they need to hear more than a celebrity chorus of "Caledonia" from the First Minister. They need to hear him say that they have a future here in Scotland as teachers.

We cannot afford to lose the brightest and best of our young people. What action will the First Minister take today to convince Lynne and Cara that they can find a job as teachers here and stay in Scotland where they want to be?

Alex Salmond (Scottish National Party, Gordon)

The effective action that we are taking is what the education secretary has provided for under the working group. I will remind Iain Gray of just a few of the proposals, one of which is to increase the payments that teachers receive to help them to move to areas where there are vacancies. As we know, there are vacancies in many areas of Scotland. Another is to achieve greater reconciliation between workforce decisions and the national planning process. A third is to use post-probationary teachers in supply vacancies, rather than relying on recently retired teachers. Those are just three of the 12 measures agreed between the partners to take effective action.

I accept that local authorities have to make their own decisions, but across the board in local authorities we now have the final budget estimates on education for 2007-08, over 2006-07, and we can compare them with previous years. The outrun figure for last year shows, thanks to the effective interventions of the Cabinet Secretary for Education and Lifelong Learning, a 6.8 per cent increase across Scotland in the revenue budget for education. In the last year of Labour control, the figure was 0.6 per cent.

It may be that local authorities around Scotland are rebuilding after the eight wasted years of Labour and Liberal control. I believe that, given the effective action taken by the Cabinet Secretary for Education and Lifelong Learning, we will see in the next probationer survey an increase in the number of probationers moving into teacher employment and every one of us will welcome those fantastic young people being given their opportunity in education.

Annabel Goldie (Conservative, West of Scotland)

To ask the man who thinks he is saving Scotland when he will next meet the man who thinks he has saved the world. In deference to you, Presiding Officer, I will ask the question that was lodged.

To ask the First Minister when he will next meet the Prime Minister. (S3F-1271)

Alex Fergusson (None, Galloway and Upper Nithsdale)

That was better.

Alex Salmond (Scottish National Party, Gordon)

I have no immediate plans to meet the Prime Minister in the near future. However, like everyone else, I am in awe of his talents and self-proclaimed abilities. [Interruption.]

Alex Fergusson (None, Galloway and Upper Nithsdale)

Order. That is enough, thank you.

Annabel Goldie (Conservative, West of Scotland)

In opposition, the First Minister's colleague Michael Russell called for an independent watchdog to be set up to ensure that all Scottish Executive advertising was "justified and non-political". This week, it was confirmed that the Scottish Government is spending nearly £700,000 of taxpayers' money on advertising its discredited home reports. What happened to Mr Russell's watchdog idea and how would a watchdog have justified such spending?

Alex Salmond (Scottish National Party, Gordon)

I remind Annabel Goldie that home reports were passed by a considerable majority in this Parliament. Indeed, as I recall, every party, bar the Conservatives, voted to introduce them. Given that parliamentary mandate—which we do not get for every measure that this Government brings forward—does she not think it entirely reasonable that the information on home reports and their introduction is spread across the population? Does she suggest that, having voted to introduce home reports, we should deny people information about how to use them?

Annabel Goldie (Conservative, West of Scotland)

Let us examine what Alex Salmond's priorities really are when it comes to spending taxpayers' money on Government public relations. Here we are: £700,000 is spent on PR for home reports, but the Government is spending less of the advertising budget on child protection, tackling domestic abuse or warnings about sex offenders. This Government clearly thinks that home reports are more important than those issues. Unbelievably, it is spending more of its PR budget on home reports than it has spent on either alcohol or drugs abuse. We now know the warped priorities of the Scottish National Party. Less worthy and important than home reports are the issues of child protection, domestic abuse, the scourge of alcohol and the scars of drug addiction. That is absolutely shameful. What do those lopsided and bizarre priorities say about the Government? Does the First Minister really have the brazen effrontery still to argue that spending £700,000 to advertise a sales tax is justified?

Alex Salmond (Scottish National Party, Gordon)

The Scottish Government has a broad range of advertising to try to promote a range of issues in the public interest. Annabel Goldie should acknowledge that we are introducing a new measure that most of us believe will be extraordinarily helpful, particularly for first-time buyers moving into the housing market, who are getting, for the first time, a range of information in what should be, can be and almost certainly will be the most important financial decision of their lives.

I do not believe that Annabel Goldie seriously argues against having an effective information campaign. Incidentally, that was targeted at the first-time buyers market and at those who are moving into the housing market. Surely we should provide effective information to ensure that policies that the Parliament has passed are available to the people whom they are designed to benefit. It would be extraordinary to introduce a significant new policy but to provide no information to the population to ensure that the policy achieved its benefits when rolled out. The Tories confuse their own political opposition to home reports with what is in the general public interest.

Tavish Scott (Liberal Democrat, Shetland Islands)

To ask the First Minister what issues will be discussed at the next meeting of the Cabinet. (S3F-1272)

Alex Salmond (Scottish National Party, Gordon)

At its next meeting, the Cabinet will discuss issues that are of importance to the people of Scotland.

Tavish Scott (Liberal Democrat, Shetland Islands)

Is the First Minister serious when his Government says that, after the new Forth crossing, all 28 other transport projects that were mentioned yesterday are of equal priority? Will that be the case even if the Treasury declines the opportunity to make an interest-free loan to pay for the Forth bridge? Is the Scottish Government's position the reason why The Press and Journal says today that

"The SNP is trying to be all things to all people"?

[Interruption.]

Alex Fergusson (None, Galloway and Upper Nithsdale)

Order.

Tavish Scott (Liberal Democrat, Shetland Islands)

That was in The Press and Journal .

Alex Fergusson (None, Galloway and Upper Nithsdale)

That is enough advertising, Mr Scott.

Tavish Scott (Liberal Democrat, Shetland Islands)

The Courier says:

"Talking up the prospect ... is all very well but, as of now, it has all the substance of a mirage."

Alex Salmond (Scottish National Party, Gordon)

I am still laughing at being accused of being all things to all people by the Liberal Democrats. That is the most extraordinary question that Tavish Scott has come up with.

The strategic transport projects review has received a broad welcome. I have a range of quotations from transport users and transport groups around the country who have been galvanised by the review's strength and vision. If the Liberal Democrats are capable of being all things to all people, given the excellent projects that are proposed in every part of the country—lo, even unto areas that the Liberal Democrats represent—surely Tavish Scott can find something to welcome in the most ambitious transport plan that has been presented to Scotland for a generation.

Tavish Scott (Liberal Democrat, Shetland Islands)

The difficulty is that The Press and Journal also said that the review was all spin and wrapping paper. The Scotsman says:

"All of this has a fishy smell about it."

I ask again: are the 28 remaining transport projects all of equal status? Are they all at equal risk if the SNP cannot make its sums add up? Is the truth not that the one real SNP priority is to create a war of words with the Treasury?

What is it about the Government and transport? It has a rail franchise with no business plan, a bridge with no funding and a Scottish Futures Trust with no money. The Government must tell us the timetable for all the projects and which will survive into plan B. When will the First Minister stop being all things to all people?

Alex Salmond (Scottish National Party, Gordon)

I have said some hard things about the Treasury in my time and I have no doubt that I will say a few more, but they pale into insignificance after the extremely vehement attacks that Tavish Scott has launched on the Treasury over the HBOS merger.

Let me see whether I can bring the Liberal Democrats up to date with the international financial reporting standards. They mean that all the available mechanisms for funding public transport projects now come on balance sheet. There are no more public-private partnership dodges or private finance initiative alternatives—they all come on balance sheet. Given the excellence of our proposal for the Forth crossing, it is entirely sensible to ask for the capital cover to ensure that we can follow through on a transport plan for all of Scotland.

I heard the member who I am now calling Seven-Minute McNulty explain tolling on the Forth crossing as some sort of alternative from the Labour Party. If Tavish Scott and the Liberal Democrats dislike the cut of our excellent transport review, they can tell us at some point what they would keep and what they would leave out.

Alex Fergusson (None, Galloway and Upper Nithsdale)

I remind all members that I do not encourage the use of nicknames in the chamber.

I will take one constituency question from Malcolm Chisholm.

Malcolm Chisholm (Labour, Edinburgh North and Leith)

The First Minister's answer to every question on cuts is to say what he alleges will happen in 2010-11. Will he for once concentrate on the present and the cuts that are happening in many schools in my constituency, the result of which is fewer front-line staff and resources? How can he describe as efficiency savings the 1.5 per cent cut to school budgets that is currently being imposed and the 2 per cent cut that is proposed for next year? I am thinking in particular of what John Swinney said recently:

"What might be described as crude cuts in services can in no way pass the test for efficiency savings."—[Official Report, 20 November 2008; c 12632.]

Alex Salmond (Scottish National Party, Gordon)

The member may recollect that the efficiency savings of 2 per cent across the range of budgets that the Scottish Government is asking for are less than those that Wendy Alexander demanded last year in her famous hungry caterpillar speech. Of course, the key difference in our treatment of local authorities in terms of efficiency savings is that authorities will retain every penny of those savings for investment in front-line services. That did not happen under the Labour Administration.

Given that Malcolm Chisholm believes that I imagined the £500 million of coming cuts a year from the Labour Government at Westminster, I note the release of Professor David Bell's advice to the Finance Committee, which indicates £505 million of cuts in each of the two years. Given that evidence, even members on the Labour benches—Iain Gray in particular—will have to admit that £1 billion of cuts is coming to Scottish public services by virtue of Alistair Darling, Gordon Brown and Jim Murphy.

Dave Thompson (Scottish National Party, Highlands and Islands)

To ask the First Minister what action the Scottish Government is taking to combat drink driving over the Christmas and new year period. (S3F-1276)

Alex Salmond (Scottish National Party, Gordon)

The Scottish Government is committed to improving the safety of people on our roads, and is delighted to support the Association of Chief Police Officers in Scotland in all its campaigns in that direction, particularly its festive drink/drug driving campaign. The festive campaign was launched here at the Scottish Parliament on 8 December and supported by my colleague Mr MacAskill.

The Scottish Government is working closely with the police on the campaign and is providing supporting publicity through the Road Safety Scotland don't risk it message. That includes three weeks of radio publicity and two weeks of roadside billboard messages, both of which commenced on 1 December, as well as a substantial amount of online advertising. Topics include morning-after driving, the repercussions of someone losing their licence, and encouraging the public to report cases of drink driving to the police. The support for that campaign from the Scottish Government alone comes to a total of more than £86,000.

Dave Thompson (Scottish National Party, Highlands and Islands)

I welcome the Scottish Government's initiative to tackle drink driving over the Christmas and new year period. That said, the current legal alcohol limit for drivers of 80mg per 100ml of blood does not help, given that it is far higher than the limit in other European Union countries. Does the First Minister agree that a big step forward in tackling the issue of drink driving would be to bring Scotland into line with most other European countries by reducing the legal limit to 50mg of alcohol per 100ml of blood?

Alex Salmond (Scottish National Party, Gordon)

I agree that the limit should be reduced in that direction. We are not alone in thinking that; prominent and respected organisations including the Association of Chief Police Officers in Scotland, the British Medical Association and the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents have called publicly for a similar reduction in the drink-driving limit.

Obviously, legislation on that subject is reserved to the United Kingdom Government. Over recent months, the Cabinet Secretary for Justice and the Minister for Transport, Infrastructure and Climate Change have corresponded with the UK Government on the matter. We were therefore disappointed to find that the "Road Safety Compliance Consultation" document, which was published on 20 November, did not include a direct question on lowering the drink-driving limit.

Our view is that the evidence to support a reduction is extremely strong. There is growing consensus on the matter north and south of the border. Indeed, I understand that the UK Government's chief medical officer has indicated his support for exactly that move. The current drink-driving limit was set more than 40 years ago. We believe that the time is right to look at the limit again.

Richard Baker (Labour, North East Scotland)

To ask the First Minister how the Scottish Government will ensure that the Scottish Police Services Authority and the Scottish Crime and Drug Enforcement Agency are as effective as possible in fighting crime and supporting local police forces. (S3F-1291)

Alex Salmond (Scottish National Party, Gordon)

The Scottish Crime and Drug Enforcement Agency has been extremely effective in the fight against serious organised crime in Scotland. Last year, the agency seized 220kg of class A drugs, with a street value of £15.8 million, which was a threefold increase on the previous year, and it identified more than £4.6 million of criminal assets for seizure, which was an 8 per cent increase on the previous year. The SPSA provides effective and efficient support services to Scottish police forces. For example, it provides training for the record numbers of new recruits at the Scottish Police College, as part of the Government's commitment to providing 1,000 additional police officers in our communities.

Alex Fergusson (None, Galloway and Upper Nithsdale)

As there is considerable interest in the question, I remind members that it is about the effectiveness of the organisations. I ask them not to impinge on disciplinary matters in the board of the SPSA, which are sub judice.

Richard Baker (Labour, North East Scotland)

In light of recent speculation on the relationship between the two agencies, will the First Minister assure us that there will be clarity on that key issue? Given the wider leadership issues in the SPSA, is it right for it to continue to propose the closure of the Aberdeen forensics laboratory on the basis of a flawed consultation process and despite the opposition of Grampian Police?

Alex Salmond (Scottish National Party, Gordon)

The SPSA board continues to operate under the leadership of interim convener Councillor George Kay and it continues to provide vital police support services. Following a public appointment process, we announced on 8 December the appointment of Vic Emery as convener of the SPSA board. He will take up his appointment in January 2009. Those changes do not have a bearing on the decisions on the future of forensic science and fingerprinting services in Aberdeen. There is a pressing need to invest in modern police forensic science facilities, which is why we are funding the new forensic laboratory as part of the Gartcosh crime campus project and why we gave approval in May for the SPSA to proceed with the new forensic laboratory in Dundee. The Cabinet Secretary for Justice has asked the SPSA to engage in a fresh consultation on the delivery of forensic science services to the north and north-east of Scotland and to let him have further advice. That consultation is under way. In the meantime, there has been no decision to close the Aberdeen laboratory.

Mike Rumbles (Liberal Democrat, West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine)

The chief constable of Grampian Police has told me that he believes that the relocation of the forensic and fingerprint service from Aberdeen to Dundee would not improve the fight against crime in the north-east. Given the opposition to the SPSA's plans to close the Aberdeen-based service, will the First Minister give a commitment to ensure that a genuine consultation, including an option to retain the service in Aberdeen, is published to replace the current paper, which was issued by the SPSA and which focuses only on the SPSA's reasons to remove the service in Aberdeen and replace it with one in Dundee?

Alex Salmond (Scottish National Party, Gordon)

As I said, the consultation is under way. Consultation exercises usually take place on a proposal that is going forward. As I said, the Cabinet Secretary for Justice has asked the SPSA to engage in a fresh consultation on the delivery of forensic science services to the north and north-east. That is exactly what we expect and what will be done. On the timing, obviously, by definition, the consultation will not be complete until the new leadership is in place at the SPSA.

Brian Adam (Scottish National Party, Aberdeen North)

I hope that the First Minister is aware that the on-going alleged consultation in no way satisfies the normal criteria for consultation. Will he and his cabinet secretary colleagues take an active personal interest in the detail of that consultation? At present, it just has 10 reasons to close the Aberdeen laboratory and none of the questions that should be asked about the available options.

Alex Salmond (Scottish National Party, Gordon)

On my personal interest, I met representatives of the Scottish Police Federation in the north-east of Scotland on Monday this week. I will certainly pass on Brian Adam's comments to the Cabinet Secretary for Justice, who is sitting beside me listening avidly, and ask him to ensure that the consultation exercise is beyond reproach.

Lewis Macdonald (Labour, Aberdeen Central)

Does the First Minister not then accept that the consultation document that has been issued offers only a single option, namely the closure of the Aberdeen laboratory? Will ministers take the opportunity to withdraw that document?

Alex Salmond (Scottish National Party, Gordon)

It is not unusual for consultation exercises to take place on a proposal—that is what normally happens. On investment in forensic science throughout Scotland, I would say that the Government's attitude is beyond reproach. I cannot anticipate the results of the consultation exercise, but I am certainly prepared to give the assurance that the cabinet secretary will ensure that the consultation exercise is proper and thorough-going.

I remind Lewis Macdonald that when we were left by the previous Administration consultation exercises on other public services to centralise the health service and to remove vital services from the north-east of Scotland, in both children's cancer treatment and other vital services, it was decided after effective consultation by this Government to resist that attempt at centralisation.

John Scott (Conservative, Ayr)

To ask the First Minister what discussions the Scottish Government has had with the Food Standards Agency concerning supplies of pork to consumers. (S3F-1273)

Alex Salmond (Scottish National Party, Gordon)

Government officials have been in daily contact with the Food Standards Agency to ensure that the Cabinet Secretary for Rural Affairs and the Environment and the Minister for Public Health are fully informed about developments on the incident that originated in the Republic of Ireland. The cabinet secretary has commissioned regular briefing on the matter.

The Scottish Government is conscious of the potential damage to the pork industry from the incident and has taken measures to reassure the Scottish public. Officials are liaising with the red meat promotional body, Quality Meat Scotland, which is sending brand ambassadors to Scottish supermarkets to reassure customers about the guarantees of origin, welfare and standards offered by Scottish products carrying the specially selected pork brand.

Specially selected pork is quality assured and no specially selected producer will have sourced their feed from the Republic of Ireland or Northern Ireland. Some 99 per cent of Scottish pork carries the specially selected label.

John Scott (Conservative, Ayr)

Concerns remain about food labelling and animal feed. Will the First Minister give a guarantee that no contaminated feed from Ireland or elsewhere is entering Scotland or being used on Scottish farms? Will he also put further pressure on UK authorities to develop food product labelling so that countries of origin can be identified accurately, particularly in the processed meats sector?

Alex Salmond (Scottish National Party, Gordon)

I appreciate John Scott's concern. When we have food difficulties, such as contamination, we are all rightly concerned. Having looked at the issue in this case, I do not think that there is any argument but that the Food Standards Agency has worked quickly and effectively to withdraw any potentially contaminated products from Scottish shelves. Equally, there is no argument but that those who are charged with the responsibility to promote Scottish produce have also acted effectively and quickly to protect the Scottish brand.

I have substantial sympathy with the member on the labelling of products. As I said a few seconds ago, the specially selected product label under the Quality Meat Scotland banner does exactly that and 99 per cent of Scottish pork carries that specially selected label, which guarantees sourcing and customer reassurance.

Question Time — Scottish Executive — Justice and Law Officers

Alasdair Morgan (Scottish National Party, South of Scotland)

To ask the Scottish Government what progress has been made in discussions on the retention and distribution of fiscal fine moneys. (S3O-5231)

Kenny MacAskill (Scottish National Party, Edinburgh East and Musselburgh)

Discussions are on-going with the Treasury as to the retention of fiscal fine moneys in Scotland. We want those funds to be retained in Scotland and put to good use in Scotland to help the justice system to deliver benefits for the people of Scotland.

Alasdair Morgan (Scottish National Party, South of Scotland)

I urge the cabinet secretary to pursue those discussions vigorously. In those arguments with the Treasury, will he press his case on the basis that the funds should be used to benefit the communities that have suffered as a result of the actions of criminals?

Kenny MacAskill (Scottish National Party, Edinburgh East and Musselburgh)

Absolutely. We want to ensure that the communities benefit. Clearly, in some instances, the funds are used to ensure that the wheels of the court service run. However, I support the general ethos that the member expresses, which is that fines, levies or compensation orders that those who commit offences against our communities are forced to pay should be used to compensate those communities in some shape or form, whether through the bureaucracy that enforces justice or, more particularly, by making those communities better and alleviating their problems.

Bill Aitken (Conservative, Glasgow)

I agree with the sentiments that the cabinet secretary has expressed. Will he, in turn, agree with me that, in light of the derisory levels of payments of fiscal fines, a rather greater priority might be to ensure that the fines are collected?

Kenny MacAskill (Scottish National Party, Edinburgh East and Musselburgh)

I assure Mr Aitken that the fines are in the process of being collected. Many have been paid. I do not recognise the reference to "derisory levels of payments".

A system is in place. The fine has to be intimated to the individual, who must have an opportunity to decide whether to accept or decline it. Thereafter, the individual has a period of time in which the payment can be made. That process must be gone through.

I assure the member that we will seek to ensure that those who are given fines are forced to pay. If they do not pay, the whole system will be brought into disrepute. Matters are being dealt with, and the new system of fines enforcement officers is being rolled out, which will ensure that we enforce justice.

Alex Fergusson (None, Galloway and Upper Nithsdale)

Before we come to question 2, I repeat what I said at First Minister's question time this morning, which is that the supplementary questions on the matter that is about to be discussed should relate purely to the efficiency of the organisation that is involved.

Mike Rumbles (Liberal Democrat, West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine)

To ask the Scottish Executive whether it agrees with Grampian's chief constable that the proposed closure of Aberdeen's forensic laboratory and fingerprint service will not lead to an improved service to Grampian Police. (S3O-5241)