My speech in todays debate on the Scottish Governments Programme for Government Mark McDonald (Aberdeen Donside) (SNP): I have a lot to get through, so I will not bother with the fact that Mary Scanlon has taken what I have said out of context. Frankly, I could deal with most of her speech as being quite gratuitously out of context. The programme for government has social justice running through its core and at its very heart. It is built on the principles that we want to establish and it sees fairness and prosperity as two sides of the same coin. To redistribute wealth, we need to create wealth in the first place, and the Government is acutely aware of that. The programme for government builds on the progressive policy approaches that the Government has taken in other areas, such as through the cancellation of the right to buy. That has enabled councils to build houses again after many decades in which council houses were sold off at discounts, which made building new council houses uneconomic. Regrettably, the Labour Party did absolutely nothing about that during the time that it spent in office at Westminster and in Scotland. It introduced pressured area status, but it did not allow for the removal of the right to buy. It took an SNP Government to deliver that. I will look at two other policies. One is the land and buildings transaction tax, which redresses things for those who are trying to get on to the property ladder for the first time, because we accept that there has to be a balance between renting and purchasing. The other is the living wage policy, which I am pleased that the Government is to take further. I welcome the additional funding for the Poverty Alliance to bring forward the accreditation programme. I welcome the establishment of the commission on local government finance, which was recommended by the Local Government and Regeneration Committee. I was pleased to hear Alex Rowley welcome that today, although it did not seem to be met with quite such a strong welcome from Labour front benchers yesterday, who seemed not to want to be involved in constructive discussions about local government finance. I hope that they will revisit that approach. As the parent of a child with additional support needs and as a campaigner on the issue, I am excited about the prospect of new rights for children with additional support needs in the forthcoming education legislation. I will be very interested to see what those rights are, what they entail and how they will be delivered. Although I am not a member of the committee that will scrutinise that legislation, I will take a keen interest in a section of the legislation and I will be interested to hear what external bodies have to say. Through the Scottish strategy for autism and “The keys to life”, which is the learning disability strategy—another important piece of work—the Government has taken a strong approach to additional support needs. Enshrining some of that work and those approaches in rights through legislation will be exciting, and I look forward to seeing it happen. I look forward to the work on attainment and literacy. I was struck by Liz Smith’s speech. Recently she stated in the chamber that there are failing schools in Scotland. It is open to her to take that position, although I disagree with it. However, I do not see how she can hold that position and be against the establishment of attainment officers in local authorities. Surely if her view is that there are failing schools she should welcome support being put in. I believe that that support is necessary, although I disagree with Liz Smith’s diagnosis. There are issues in some of our most deprived communities that the attainment officers will need to take a closer look at. To leave the burden solely with directors of education would run the risk of losing some of the hands-on approach that could be taken through the appointment of attainment officers. Liz Smith: I did not say that I was entirely against attainment officers; I said that I needed to be persuaded and that I was looking for more details about the role that they would have in relation to directors of education and about how the attainment improvement would be measured. Mark McDonald: I am happy to take that as Liz Smith’s position and I hope that she will be persuaded. The establishment of attainment officers will be coupled with the drive on literacy and numeracy, which will focus on deprived communities. Some of the schools involved are in my constituency and I look forward to examining the detail closely. At the outset, both proposals carry substantial merit and should be welcomed. The legislative proposals regarding domestic abuse are extremely welcome. I am very pleased about the piloting of Clare’s law in Aberdeen. I will be interested to see how it progresses and I hope that it will be rolled out across Scotland. Beyond that, we must have a stronger focus on addressing domestic abuse. In this day and age it cannot be right that far too many individuals still fall victim to domestic abuse. I put it on record that, as well as the physical element of domestic abuse, we must acknowledge the psychological abuse that can take place, which can be just as damaging and can cause great harm to individuals who find themselves on the receiving end of it. I understand that psychological abuse might be more difficult to prove than physical abuse, but I hope that the legislation will take cognisance of it.
Posted on: Thu, 27 Nov 2014 22:01:24 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015