Hansard

Margaret Smith (Edinburgh West) (LD) LD Chamber

17 Mar 2011

Scottish Executive Question Time · New Royal Hospital for Sick Children (Edinburgh)

I share the concerns about the delay in the project. Given that the Scottish Government is continuing to give £850 million in capital to NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde for the Southern general hospital, will the cabinet secretary give an assurance that, if the SNP is in power a...

Margaret Smith (Edinburgh West) (LD) LD Chamber

16 Mar 2011

Higher Education Funding

I welcome and share the cabinet secretary’s commitment to free education with no fees and no graduate contribution. Our position builds on our record of scrapping Labour’s fees in government and the graduate endowment in opposition. We share, too, a commitment to fund the gap....

Margaret Smith (Edinburgh West) (LD) LD Chamber

16 Mar 2011

Public Records (Scotland) Bill

I add my thanks to those already expressed to the clerks to the Education, Lifelong Learning and Culture Committee for their assistance during the passage of the bill. It is probably fitting that I add my thanks to them for their work over the course of the parliamentary sessi...

Margaret Smith LD Committee

15 Mar 2011

Forth Crossing Project

Do you accept that, as an Edinburgh MSP, I am decidedly twitchy about the idea that a contract for the biggest public infrastructure project ever in Scotland can go through in a few months, especially given what we have experienced with the tram project, while progress does no...

Margaret Smith LD Committee

15 Mar 2011

Forth Crossing Project

So you have not received a formal response from Newton community council to the proposals that were put to it and are experiencing difficulty getting community councillors together to talk about community engagement going forward. You seem to be taking a long time to deal with...

Margaret Smith LD Committee

15 Mar 2011

Forth Crossing Project

There are a couple of issues. There seems to be delay in working out the proposals for mitigation involving Newton. Those were put to the community council at the end of the year, but we do not know what is happening.

Margaret Smith LD Committee

15 Mar 2011

Forth Crossing Project

Is that, rather than the fact that you cannot get some community councillors into a room, not likely to be the real reason?

Margaret Smith (Edinburgh West) (LD) LD Committee

15 Mar 2011

Forth Crossing Project

I apologise for being slightly late. I want to clarify a couple of things that you said about the forthcoming brochure. You said first that it would be ready in the near future, and then that it was at an early stage, because input was needed. Which is it?

Margaret Smith LD Committee

09 Mar 2011

Autism Strategy

This is less of a question and more of a comment. When we had the more informal session with people from Glasgow, I was struck by the fact that some of the ideas from people who are on the spectrum about what could make a big practical difference to their lives were less about...

Margaret Smith LD Committee

09 Mar 2011

Autism Strategy

I want to pick up on the point about the not insignificant resource that is required and the financially straitened times. One concern that we had about the Autism (Scotland) Bill was that there were no resources behind it. No matter how good a strategy or piece of legislation...

Margaret Smith LD Committee

09 Mar 2011

Subordinate Legislation

As I have some constituency experience of dealing with the University of Edinburgh when it took on Dunfermline College of Physical Education, as it once was, I do not know that the picture is always so sunny. However, let us move on.Minister, you mentioned in passing that mini...

Margaret Smith (Edinburgh West) (LD) LD Committee

09 Mar 2011

Subordinate Legislation

Minister, I echo your comments on the UHI and what will become the royal conservatoire of Scotland, which are two of Scotland’s most innovative higher education institutions. I think that we all wish them well.As the minister noted, the Subordinate Legislation Committee indica...

Margaret Smith (Edinburgh West) (LD) LD Chamber

09 Mar 2011

“Report on preventative spending”

As a non-member of the Finance Committee, I thank Andrew Welsh for his contribution to the Parliament, and the committee for its very useful report.The committee’s strong support for preventative spending is welcome. As the report states, such spending“has the potential to del...

Margaret Smith (Edinburgh West) (LD) LD Chamber

09 Mar 2011

“Teaching Scotland’s Future”

I thank the minister for her statement and I thank Graham Donaldson and his team for what is a comprehensive piece of work that will help the next Scottish Government to improve Scotland’s teaching workforce. We welcome many of the recommendations around selection and on-going...

Margaret Smith LD Chamber

09 Mar 2011

Employment Services (Edinburgh)

Will the minister give way?

Margaret Smith (Edinburgh West) (LD) LD Chamber

09 Mar 2011

Employment Services (Edinburgh)

I add my thanks to Sarah Boyack for securing this important debate. I also thank the unions, the partnership workforce, the people from the connected service, real jobs, Four Square, Jumpstart, Impact Arts and the various service users and staff who are with us today. I thank ...

Margaret Smith LD Committee

02 Mar 2011

Subordinate Legislation

I am very unhappy about the situation in which we find ourselves. Essentially, we have come to an impasse between two legal opinions. I am not particularly persuaded that we would gain any more clarity if we carried things on for another week and the issue was considered by th...

Margaret Smith LD Committee

02 Mar 2011

Subordinate Legislation

The policy is not in any doubt.

Margaret Smith LD Committee

02 Mar 2011

Subordinate Legislation

It is up to us to ensure that we are content with what we put forward. We either send out the message that we accept the order or we say that we still have concerns, in which case we put that to the Parliament as a whole to make a decision. I am happy to accept that we are not...

Margaret Smith LD Committee

02 Mar 2011

Subordinate Legislation

I accept the minister’s point that we are not a court, but we are also not a rubber stamp.

Margaret Smith LD Committee

02 Mar 2011

Subordinate Legislation

I will pick up on your point that there are three ways of looking at the issue. One option is, in effect, to go away and look at the order. Although there is cross-party support for the policies behind the order, and any concerns are simply about its legal standing, there is a...

Margaret Smith LD Committee

02 Mar 2011

Subordinate Legislation

Ultimately, the concern that we all have is not that we will pass a piece of legislation that could be subject to a decision in court—that may happen to any legislation that we pass—but that from day 1 there could be a query. We can envisage a number of people—for example, som...

Margaret Smith (Edinburgh West) (LD) LD Committee

02 Mar 2011

Subordinate Legislation

Yes, unfortunately.It is unfortunate that the minister has decided to go down the route of trying to turn this into a partisan issue. Committee members are signed up to the policy changes that are involved in the approach to the GTCS that the minister has pursued over the past...

Margaret Smith LD Chamber

24 Feb 2011

Scottish Executive Question Time · Forth Replacement Crossing (Procurement)

Can the minister assure us that the Government is doing everything it can to afford opportunities to Scottish businesses to get involved not only in those tenders, but in smaller pieces of work in this unique project? Does he accept that a range of concerns exist about the pro...

Margaret Smith LD Committee

23 Feb 2011

The Future of Schools Management in Scotland

That is great. Thank you.

Margaret Smith LD Committee

23 Feb 2011

The Future of Schools Management in Scotland

Kenny Gibson talked earlier about the thorny issue of bad teachers. I agree totally that bad teachers should not be in our classrooms—they should be out of teaching and doing something else, as the price that is paid for their bad teaching is paid by the children. In conversat...

Margaret Smith LD Committee

23 Feb 2011

The Future of Schools Management in Scotland

The evidence that the committee took in its round-table discussion, which I think we all found extremely helpful, suggests that there is not the same appetite for radical change in structures in Scotland as there is in England. From your discussions with stakeholders and headt...

Margaret Smith LD Committee

23 Feb 2011

Broadcasting in Scotland

Is there any mileage in putting that argument to the Government again? Do you have any indication that it will look at the matter again in a couple of years’ time?

Margaret Smith (Edinburgh West) (LD) LD Committee

23 Feb 2011

Broadcasting in Scotland

I apologise for being slightly late this morning.Your comments suggest that there is very much a mixed view with regard to producing a lot of your own material. You have lobbied the Department for Culture, Media and Sport to be categorised as an independent producer rather tha...

Margaret Smith LD Committee

09 Feb 2011

Future of Schools Management in Scotland

I have a final small question. You say that you are gathering evidence. What is your perspective on the degree of variation across Scotland in devolved school management and on the differences in approach between local authorities at present?

Margaret Smith LD Committee

09 Feb 2011

Future of Schools Management in Scotland

You touched on the issue of staff. One area of concern, certainly from the unions’ point of view, is how we balance giving greater autonomy to headteachers in their schools with national agreements on staff. You talked about the frustration that headteachers have in relation t...

Margaret Smith LD Committee

09 Feb 2011

Future of Schools Management in Scotland

Having federations of support is an interesting idea. From carrying out the review, you will know that we do not exist in a vacuum; we all know that starkly. Right now, councils across Scotland are having to take some serious decisions about funding. My local authority is taki...

Margaret Smith (Edinburgh West) (LD) LD Committee

09 Feb 2011

Future of Schools Management in Scotland

You have touched on some of the capacity issues that I wanted to pick up on. We all know headteachers in our local schools who are absolutely ready to take on as much responsibility as possible and have the ability across a range of functions to do just that. Equally, there wi...

Margaret Smith LD Chamber

09 Feb 2011

Budget (Scotland) (No 5) Bill: Stage 3

I will ask Des McNulty a clear question: did the Labour Party make any representations to the Government to ask for any improved funding for bursary support students? Did it, or did it not?

Margaret Smith LD Chamber

09 Feb 2011

Budget (Scotland) (No 5) Bill: Stage 3

Will the member take an intervention?

Margaret Smith LD Chamber

09 Feb 2011

Budget (Scotland) (No 5) Bill: Stage 3

No.Bursary funding is not a new problem. There have been problems for many years and there have been understandable calls for a new, guaranteed approach to bursary funding, so that students and potential students can have certainty about the funds that they will receive to get...

Margaret Smith (Edinburgh West) (LD) LD Chamber

09 Feb 2011

Budget (Scotland) (No 5) Bill: Stage 3

This is not the budget that we would have chosen to put before the Scottish people had we been in government, but the duty of a reasonable, responsible Opposition at this time, of all times, is to work with Government to try and deliver an improved budget that we can support. ...

Margaret Smith LD Chamber

03 Feb 2011

Further Education Colleges

Last year, we fought in our budget negotiations to secure additional college places. In those negotiations this year, we hope to obtain a better deal for colleges. I sincerely hope that we will do that, because they certainly deserve it. Colleges deserve our thanks and appreci...

Margaret Smith (Edinburgh West) (LD) LD Chamber

03 Feb 2011

Further Education Colleges

I thank Andrew Welsh for securing the debate. Like Stewart Stevenson and Elizabeth Smith, I pay tribute to him for his great service to the Parliament and to his colleagues. He has always been a tremendous support to his colleagues in the work that he has done on the corporate...

Margaret Smith LD Committee

02 Feb 2011

The Future of Schools Management in Scotland

I have a brief observation on the sharing of best practice. Those of us around the table who are politicians probably all do what I do, which is to go into my local schools on a regular basis. When you are an education spokesperson, you make use of that to pick people’s brains...

Margaret Smith (Edinburgh West) (LD) LD Committee

02 Feb 2011

The Future of Schools Management in Scotland

I have a question that picks up on comments by Christina McAnea from Unison. I would have thought that the motivating factor in all of this for all of us in Parliament is to ask what evidence there is that structural change would improve Scottish education—it might be a little...

Margaret Smith LD Committee

26 Jan 2011

European Union Legislative Proposals (Reporter)

He is not in the room.

Margaret Smith LD Committee

26 Jan 2011

Review of Teacher Education in Scotland

The big issue is the much greater number, whom we might call average teachers.You asked how we raise expectations and aspirations in the teaching profession. I would have thought that one thing that will flow from a teaching profession that has raised expectations and aspirati...

Margaret Smith LD Committee

26 Jan 2011

Review of Teacher Education in Scotland

I agree that, as long as there is the will to deal with that small group of teachers, they are relatively easy to deal with, and they ought to be dealt with.

Margaret Smith (Edinburgh West) (LD) LD Committee

26 Jan 2011

Review of Teacher Education in Scotland

I thank you and your team for an excellent report. I concur with Kenny Gibson’s comments about how we deal with teachers who should not be in the classroom. One of the good things about the report is that you have focused not just on the people at that end of the spectrum and ...

Margaret Smith (Edinburgh West) (LD) LD Chamber

20 Jan 2011

Historic Environment (Amendment) (Scotland) Bill: Stage 3

I got so carried away listening to Ted Brocklebank that I did not realise that it was my turn next.I thank all those who have been involved with the bill, particularly those who gave evidence to us and have continued to contact us about the bill to offer their opinions. The co...

Margaret Smith LD Chamber

20 Jan 2011

Young People (Opportunities)

One great aspect of volunteering that involves a large time commitment is that it helps to build a work ethic as well as skills. Those qualities are utterly transferable to people trying to get jobs. If the DWP and others do not understand that, they are not doing their jobs p...

Margaret Smith LD Chamber

20 Jan 2011

Young People (Opportunities)

Will Hugh O’Donnell take an intervention?

Margaret Smith (Edinburgh West) (LD) LD Chamber

20 Jan 2011

Young People (Opportunities)

The debate is welcome and we are supportive of the concept of microfinance and, indeed, of entrepreneurial education as a whole. We have heard that unemployment in Scotland has fallen by 5,000 from September to November and the labour market statistics show that employment in ...

Margaret Smith (Edinburgh West) (LD) LD Committee

19 Jan 2011

Public Records (Scotland) Bill: Stage 1

Another concern that the voluntary sector has raised with the committee is how the records management plans will fit among their existing obligations to various regulatory bodies. Do you have any thoughts on that aspect? Do you see any potential conflict with requests for info...

Margaret Smith LD Chamber

13 Jan 2011

Scottish Executive Question Time · Terminal Illness

The cabinet secretary will be aware that recent research by YouGov noted that the majority of terminally ill Scots would like to die at home, but that only 25 per cent are able to do so. That is an understandable aspiration. We applaud the work in that regard of Marie Curie Ca...

Margaret Smith (Edinburgh West) (LD) LD Chamber

13 Jan 2011

Scottish Executive Question Time · Terminal Illness

15. To ask the Scottish Executive what it is doing to allow terminally ill patients to choose to die at home rather than in a hospital or hospice. (S3O-12580)

Margaret Smith (Edinburgh West) (LD) LD Chamber

13 Jan 2011

Scottish Executive Question Time · Royal Hospital for Sick Children

Can the cabinet secretary assure members that the Scottish Futures Trust will not discard the significant work that contractors and others have done, which was paid for by the national health service, as it tries to secure the new funding source? Can she assure us that the SFT...

Margaret Smith LD Chamber

13 Jan 2011

Education

I think that the member’s question contains a bear trap for me in relation to the situation in Renfrewshire. I spent time in the Parliament yesterday having a go at the cabinet secretary for interfering in the decisions of locally elected councillors, so I cannot the next day ...

Margaret Smith LD Chamber

13 Jan 2011

Education

No.It is fundamental to the delivery of quality education that we have the right number of teachers in our schools. I accept that there are positive signs, but there is no place for complacency when the GTCS survey of post-probationer teachers reveals that the number of people...

Margaret Smith LD Chamber

13 Jan 2011

Education

I heard someone ask why we are shutting them. The bottom line is that the mess to which the cabinet secretary referred in his statement yesterday is a mess of the SNP’s and independents’ making. People have had to come in and pick up what happened beforehand, but the mess is n...

Margaret Smith (Edinburgh West) (LD) LD Chamber

13 Jan 2011

Education

I had wondered whether Mr Russell would make a new year’s resolution to bring to the Parliament a new, come-clean approach on the state of education in Scotland, good and bad, and to own up to some of the SNP’s broken promises and failures on this most important subject. It se...

Margaret Smith (Edinburgh West) (LD) LD Chamber

13 Jan 2011

Education

The point that we were making yesterday was not that rural schools are not worth defending—they clearly are. It was that the manner by which the cabinet secretary conducted the defence of rural schools was questionable to say the least.

Margaret Smith LD Chamber

12 Jan 2011

Proposed School Closures (Argyll)

Why did the cabinet secretary compromise his ministerial position by telling SNP councillors what to do? That is not a fair and transparent way in which to deal with school closures.

Margaret Smith LD Chamber

12 Jan 2011

Proposed School Closures (Argyll)

Did the cabinet secretary seek permission in any way from regional MSPs? When he was asked by parent councils to attend meetings, was he asked to attend those meetings along with other candidates or was he asked because he was the candidate who happened to be the Cabinet Secre...