Meeting of the Parliament (Hybrid) 27 January 2021
Because the vote on Brexit took place before the pandemic, and the timetable for it was already set out.
This is not about denying the SNP its right to believe that Scotland should be independent; it is about its recognising that although that will always be its first priority, that does not automatically mean that it is Scotland’s.
As the First Minister has so often said in her daily briefing, we are in the middle of a pandemic and are dealing with a deadly virus. If, as she has also often said, the virus does not take a day off, why does she think it is acceptable for her Government’s civil servants to spend time drafting a referendum bill? Why does she think it is acceptable for her ministers to be focused on anything other than dealing with the pandemic and helping to restore Scotland’s economy and public services in its aftermath?
Every politician here will have heard stories from constituents who are worried about when they or their loved ones will have their vaccination or access to a test. Prior to the pandemic, the shortage of NHS staff was continually highlighted in debates in which it was said that we were hundreds of GPs and thousands of nurses and midwives short, or that we had a shortage of consultants or of mental health clinicians. That crisis has been starkly highlighted and exacerbated by the Covid-19 pandemic. Where is the 11-point plan or the task force to deal with that on-going crisis?
We have the worst drug deaths rate in the developed world: it is more than three times the rate in the rest of the United Kingdom under the same regulations. Only now, after 14 years of being dragged into the chamber on the subject, has the Scottish Government decided to take notice of it. Call me a sceptic, but I wonder whether that has more to do with the upcoming election than with any real attempt to deal with that crisis. Only last night we heard that deaths due to homelessness sit at twice the rate that exists in the rest of the United Kingdom. Where is the plan to tackle that? There is a mental health crisis in our schools, where waiting times for child and adolescent mental health services were far too long even before Covid and are only growing through the pandemic. Where is the big plan to deal with that?
Businesses will be the backbone on which our recovery must be built. Even before the pandemic, the SNP was failing Scotland’s economy. Its half-hearted approach to supporting businesses and entrepreneurship has always been a let-down. It is certainly no friend to the business community. Even the Scottish Government’s own advisory group on economic recovery recognised the need to improve relationships with Scotland’s business community. However, time and again during the pandemic, we have seen the consequences of the Scottish Government’s failure to work with businesses large and small. New business grants are continually being announced to great fanfare, followed by an interminable wait for those seeking grants as guidance on the new funds grinds its way through the system.
It is not unusual for the Scottish Government to overpromise and underdeliver when it comes to support for business, but that has never been less forgivable. Yet, at the weekend, the SNP launched its 11-point road map for a second independence referendum. How about consideration of a task force to plan our road map out of Covid restrictions, as the vaccination programme protects more of our most vulnerable citizens? Yesterday, I asked the Deputy First Minister that very question, but he gave no answer and there was no plan. How about a plan to give—