Meeting of the Parliament 23 September 2015
I would always argue for more money to come to Scotland. However, I am talking about the Scottish Government’s distribution of the money. I am asking for that to be done more fairly and in a way that funds those who farm on the periphery, in conditions that are much worse than those elsewhere. The Scottish Government needs to distribute the money that it gets in a more equitable fashion. The subsidies come from Europe to create a level playing field but, in Scotland, we use them to do the exact opposite.
The Highland clearances leave a long shadow over much of the Highlands and Islands. Villages were cleared and left to return to the wild. The Scottish Government should make it a priority to resettle the areas that were cleared by Scottish landowners in the past. It should find ways of encouraging people back into those abandoned villages, which often have the best ground in the Highland crofting counties. Instead, the Government is presiding over further clearances by making farming and crofting in our remote rural communities uncompetitive and impossible. I would like the Government to seriously consider how we repopulate the Highlands and Islands. People made and shaped those communities, but they are fast becoming the endangered species there.
The cabinet secretary talked about the dairy sector. In Argyll, much of the sector has gone and it will disappear altogether if the Scottish Government does not act. We have seen milk prices plummet, as the cabinet secretary acknowledged, and dairy farmers are facing bankruptcy. The creamery in Campbeltown needs to be put on a secure footing financially and through diversifying the products that it produces, to build on its name and reputation. It would be desperately sad if, because of the Government’s inaction, the creamery closed, as so many in the area have done, and its premium products disappeared. [Interruption.]