Meeting of the Parliament (Hybrid) 11 March 2021
To date, the advance payment scheme has made 560 payments to elderly and terminally ill survivors. It will remain open until the statutory scheme can accept applications. I am pursuing an aggressive timetable for the establishment of the statutory scheme, which I hope will address the issue that Mr Gray is legitimately concerned about. We will open the scheme for applications as soon as possible before the end of this calendar year. We will begin the public appointments process and we will advertise for a chair of redress Scotland before the end of this month, and we will advertise for a chief executive in April.
The advance payment scheme was set up on the grounds of urgency in the public interest under common-law powers, which limits the scope of any changes that we can make to it. I will provide an update about that, and about progress towards the statutory scheme opening, before the summer recess if this Government is re-elected, but I will take steps immediately, before royal assent, to begin the preparations, assuming that Parliament will support the bill later this evening. I hope that that provides reassurance to Mr Gray.
I said at the time when the bill was introduced that there was no doubt in my mind that it was one of the most important pieces of legislation that the Scottish Parliament would consider in its lifetime. Since then, as the bill has progressed and as we have heard powerful and moving evidence, that belief has only strengthened.
Today is about actions, not words; it is about deeds, not promises. Today, we must fulfil our duty to our fellow citizens who have suffered. We must vote to pass this seminal piece of legislation into law.
Today, as individuals, as a Parliament and as a nation, we have the opportunity to stand with survivors, to see them, to hear them and to walk alongside them in a way that no one did during their childhood. Today, without compulsion and without agenda, I do that to fulfil the commitment that I made to survivors when I was appointed to my role in 2016. I know that that determination is shared by all members in the chamber, across the political spectrum.
We now have the chance to do something historic. Today, I hope that we will agree together, as a united Parliament, to take our next step in facing up to this dark chapter of Scotland’s history, to show survivors that we are now building on our words of sorrow with action. I suggest that we vote unanimously to do exactly that.
I move,
That the Parliament agrees that the Redress for Survivors (Historical Child Abuse in Care) (Scotland) Bill be passed.
18:42