Hansard

I am grateful to colleagues for their engagement on the bill and for the recognition that the Government has tried to engage constructively on all the issues. Much credit goes to the bill team who have supported me superbly during the passage of the bill. It is an immensely complex bill with difficult issues and I have been fantastically well served by the civil servants who have acted on my behalf and engaged in a great deal of dialogue with members.

Members have commented on the fact that the bill has been improved since its introduction. Daniel Johnson commented that Parliament has exercised properly and fully its effective functions in the scrutiny of the bill. I accept that point: the bill is stronger as a consequence of the challenge of the committee’s stage 1 report, the robust scrutiny at stage 2 and the decisions that we have made today.

If I were to select one part of the bill that has been strengthened, I would pick section 11A, which was introduced at stage 2 by a proposal from the convener of the Education and Skills Committee. The bill was drafted and we did not include some important words on the face of the bill, because we thought that it probably did not need to be said. Section 11A is entitled “Principle of dignity, respect and compassion”. The convener asked us to include those words in the bill, recognising that any individual who comes into contact with redress Scotland—I do not know why it is restricted to redress Scotland—

“should be treated with dignity, respect and compassion”.

We can all sign up to that. I am grateful to the convener for that enhancement to the bill.

I am also grateful to Ross Greer, Beatrice Wishart and Jamie Greene for their remarks in the debate. They have acknowledged that the bill does not contain all the provisions that they would have liked to see in it but, despite that, they will support the bill because of what it does to address the issues and concerns of survivors. I acknowledge that that might be particularly challenging and difficult for Ross Greer, and I am grateful that he has signalled his support for the bill this evening. That will matter, because it will ensure that the bill commands confidence within the survivor community.

I have thought long and hard about the issues that are involved in the bill. I have been prompted to do so on many occasions, but I was particularly prompted as I prepared to give evidence on behalf of the Government to the Scottish child abuse inquiry, which is chaired by Lady Smith. That forced me to look back at the history of the Parliament and its actions in the past 22 years. The moment that we reach tonight started with one important contribution, which was a product of the Parliament’s arrangements that were legislated for in the Scotland Act 1998 and the work of the consultative steering group—the public petitions process. That is where it all started and it is incredibly fitting that Johann Lamont makes her final speech tonight as convener of the Public Petitions Committee, which she has led, as she has led everything that she has done, with tenacity.

The public petitions process sums up for me one of the biggest differences between the two Parliaments in which I have served. At 10.30 at night in the House of Commons, if a member of Parliament wanted to present a petition, they stood up, presented it and read it out, then walked down to behind the Speaker’s chair and dropped it in a bag behind the Speaker’s chair. Nothing more was ever heard about it. Here, we bring petitions in the front door, people such as Johann Lamont get unleashed on them and what happens? Over the course of 20 years, people whose voices were never heard have been heard. I pay tribute to Johann Lamont for that. She mentioned Marilyn Livingstone, who was an equally tenacious champion of the survivors of historical abuse. Frankly, they believed the people concerned and made sure that their voices were heard.

When people criticise this Parliament and say all the things that they do about the place, they have to remember that it has embraced the petitions process, which started with an early petition on this subject, which not many people had been willing to encounter or engage with, and we have made big progress.

Former First Minister Jack McConnell stood where I stand now and gave a remarkable apology on behalf of the people of Scotland to recognise the suffering of individuals. It was not perfect; Lord McConnell would accept that it was not perfect, but members of Parliament of all persuasions over the past 22 years have made sure that these historical injustices were addressed.

Iain Gray made his concluding speech tonight. I am feeling slightly off the hook, but there are education and skills questions on the final day of term if he feels like having an extra finale—I would not like him to pass up any opportunity to challenge me on any of the issues. Iain Gray said that all this could have been done sooner, and he is right. That was one of my other reflections when I was preparing to give evidence to Lady Smith. I have served in government for 14 years, and I look back and think that this could all have been done sooner. I regret that it was not done sooner.

What Parliament has heard tonight in the contributions of Iain Gray and Johann Lamont are two quite exceptional speeches, not surprisingly. It is not surprising because of their contributions to Parliament and because they are both long-serving, experienced and distinguished members of Parliament, who have served the people they represent with distinction. It is a particular pleasure for me, as a member who was elected with them in those heady young days of 1999, to pay tribute to them this evening for their service and to commend them for all that they have done in their long and distinguished service in this Parliament.

As I draw my remarks to a close, I am struck by something that we may have become accustomed to by now in the parliamentary chamber, a year into Covid. Something is missing—there are no members of the public in the gallery. Jamie Greene made reference to the symbols of the people that are around us. Tonight, the gallery should have been full of members of the public who have suffered. They should have been here tonight to hear and see the Parliament doing what it is about to do: putting into law a scheme that, in the terms of Brian Whittle’s argument, addresses some financial issues but is also part of what, I would contend, the Parliament has done for more than 22 years, which is to face up honestly to the darkest bit of the history of our country. Members of all political persuasions have faced up to it honestly and have said that we have to rectify that wrong.

Tonight is a landmark moment in that process. There have been many others, such as Lord McConnell’s apology; the first time the Public Petitions Committee heard from the petitioners on the subject; the moment when we passed the Limitation (Childhood Abuse) (Scotland) Act 2017; and Angela Constance’s announcement of the Scottish child abuse inquiry. Those are all landmark moments, but they happened because this Parliament, for all its critics, was prepared to face the darkness of our country’s past.

Members of the Scottish Parliament—those who are planning to come back after the election and those who have given distinguished service to make these events possible—should be rightly proud of what has been achieved. However, the people who should be proudest, I hope, are watching online—survivors, in their homes, understanding that this moment has happened only because of their bravery, their courage, their tenacity and their determination to say to their democratic Parliament, “We need you to shine a light into the darkness of this country’s past and to confront it.” I am so proud that our national Parliament has done that.