Hansard

I apologise to members: after my speech I will not be able to stay for the rest of the debate, because I have another engagement.

I congratulate Jayne Baxter on bringing this debate to the Parliament and I welcome the opportunity to speak briefly on the fairer Fife commission’s report. Since the commission was established in September 2014, it has progressed towards its remit, which is to

“Take a strategic overview of the scale, scope and nature of poverty in Fife and the effectiveness of activity currently undertaken to address such poverty.”

Tackling deprivation ought to be close to all our hearts. I am sure that members agree that a strategy in that regard is fundamental to achieving a better world for everyone, especially young people. I commend the members of the commission, who volunteered their time to work for the commission for the benefit of others.

In his introduction to the report, Martyn Evans, the chair of the fairer Fife commission and chief executive officer of the Carnegie UK Trust, said:

“Our report has been enriched by those taking the time to contribute their thoughts and experience.”

I am sure that that is correct. He went on to express particular gratitude

“to the looked-after children from Fife who, supported by the Scottish Children’s Parliament, spent the morning with us and provided outstanding evidence on what is important for all children. Their view was that all children should be ‘safe, happy and healthy’.”

That is undoubtedly the case.

I also commend the contribution of Steve Grimmond, the chief executive of Fife Council, who I understand gave valuable advice and support to the commission throughout its work.

As it says in the introduction to the report,

“concepts of fairness, poverty and participation are at the top of the political agenda in Scotland, as they are in many other countries.”

That is an important comment. One of the great problems in many western countries is that the gap between rich and poor, far from narrowing, is getting wider. As the report makes clear, there is no universally accepted definition of fairness, but what is clear is that

“Unfairness exists when inequalities are allowed to interrelate and compound, which results in those experiencing disadvantage in one area of their lives too often experiencing others. In our society, income and wealth inequality is strongly correlated with inequalities in education, health, housing and our environment.”

That is undoubtedly true.

The report goes on to note the OECD argument

“that inequality is both a moral issue and a severe drag on the economic performance of a society.”

It is undoubtedly the case that if we tackle inequality, we are more likely to have a growing economy—it should be a win-win situation.

Looking at the report’s recommendations, I highlight those in the section on fair work, which include not only recommendations relating to the aim of making Fife “a living wage region” but a recommendation to explore fairness in self-employment, with a view to encouraging self-employed workers to

“structure their work and enterprise arrangements to maximise their earnings and work security.”

In my view, self-employees are particularly at risk during economic downturns and recessions, and they are at risk of poor health, either physical or mental. I therefore welcome that recommendation in the report.

Jayne Baxter has talked about a number of the recommendations. There are too many to go through in detail, but another one that I think is relevant is the recommendation to

“refocus the geography of economic development activity from a ‘Fife outwards’ perspective, to one that focuses on the assets within Fife ... supporting towns to attract ‘good jobs’ to Fife.”

This is an important debate, and I welcome having had the opportunity to make that modest contribution. Once again, I thank Jayne Baxter for bringing the debate to the chamber.