Meeting of the Parliament 05 December 2024
I am pleased to close on behalf of Scottish Labour in an important debate. I will pick up where other speakers have left off in reflecting on the importance of ensuring that boys and men understand the vital role that they play in reflecting on and changing their behaviours, and not leaving it to women and girls to tackle the scourge of violence, aggression and all the issues that have been discussed and debated. It is disappointing that Ben Macpherson and I appear to have been the only male speakers in the debate. There has been a range of inspiring and important speeches, but they have all been made by women. We have to reflect that more men must take responsibility in the Parliament and in society for our behaviours and that we need to work together.
In summing up, I want to reflect on the many contributions that have been made and the many actions that we can take from the debate and move forward with. The motion for debate focuses on the role of young people, and we have heard much about the concerning nature of what young people are experiencing. It is important that we learn from that and move forward. We need to ensure that we have good education in schools, which we have heard from a number of speakers. Of course, there needs to be education of young women and girls so that they understand issues of consent and respect and the support that they can get. Crucially, as I said at the start of my speech, we need to ensure that boys and young men are educated, that they have positive role models, that they understand the real issues that exist around consent in respect, and that they reflect on their behaviours and have space in order to do that. We will all want to take that away from the debate and do more work on it.
That is why am glad that Katy Clark raised the work that is being done in Scottish Labour. We have a suite of policies that I think we could look at on a cross-party basis. The minister has referred to the work that has been done by the Government, and other members have spoken about the work of their parties to move the issue forward. It is clear that toxic masculinity is on the rise, that we have serious and concerning issues on sexism and misogyny, and serious issues with access to harmful pornography. I recognise the work that has been done across the Parliament to look at many of those issues in depth—to look, for example, at better online regulation, at the education piece and at the need for positive role models. It is important that we continue to work together on those issues.
I highlight the work on strangulation to which members have referred today, such as the event that was held last week. My colleague Claire Baker has been involved in that work. A consensus has come out of today’s debate that there is more work that we can all do together to look at those very serious issues.
I was pleased to hear members refer to some of the international issues that sit across the 16 days of activism, not least the very serious issues in Afghanistan. We should all take those issues seriously, and reflect and take action on them, so it is important that Beatrice Wishart was able to bring that aspect into the debate.
In the latter section of the open debate, we heard powerful contributions from Pam Gosal, Elena Whitham, Carol Mochan and others, reflecting on the questions that we, as a society—and as men and boys—need to ask ourselves. Pam Gosal’s challenge to us all was to get to a stage at which mothers—it could also be fathers—say to their sons, “Who are you going to be when you go out tonight, and how are you going to treat women?” That is vitally important. Ben Macpherson followed that up by saying that it is not enough just to not “be that guy”—we should all try to be a better person and a good guy, and think about our behaviours. Those two reflections were extremely important.
As I said, I am conscious that we could have had more men speaking in the open debate, but I acknowledge that the First Minister will make a contribution at the debate’s conclusion. That is important, and it shows that the whole Government is taking the issue seriously.
It is clear from the contributions from members on all sides of the chamber that we all have more work to do. It is not just about the 16 days of activism, although they are important. There are 365 days in a year, and we need to ensure that we take the issue seriously, and that—crucially—men and boys take our role seriously. We must work to change attitudes and behaviours, and to ensure that we have respect for women and girls and that we build a more equal society as we move forward.
16:46