Meeting of the Parliament 16 March 2016
No, but my belief is that, had we worked towards the conversion model that all stakeholders were working towards and making progress with before the new idea of assignation came in, we would have been able to reinvigorate the tenanted sector. That has always been my aim. Nobody has been more consistent over the years in calling for that reinvigoration than I have been.
In dissenting from that entire part of the bill at stage 1, I highlighted the real progress that was being made by all stakeholders working on the conversion model, but I said that it needed more time—time that I believe could and should have been provided in the next session of Parliament, with the ultimate prize of a consensual outcome and restoration of trust between landlord and tenant.
Instead, we are ploughing ahead with a crude assignation model, a new rent review system that no one yet knows how to work, or even whether it will work, and the distinct likelihood that short limited duration tenancies and the limited duration tenancies that will be coming to an end over the next few years will just not be renewed. That does not point the way to a vibrant or reinvigorated sector. It points to one that is moribund, ineffective and dying in the water, and I can say with certainty that I will take no pleasure in watching its death throes in my retirement.
I have said many times over the past 17 years that I hope that I am wrong in my predictions, so I will finish my 17 years by repeating that hope. I hope that I am wrong in my predictions, but I am afraid that I do not say so with any conviction, and for that I am truly sorry.
If I may be indulged for a further 30 seconds, Presiding Officer, I would like to say that I am not sorry for having spent the past 17 years of my life as a member of this Parliament. I want to thank all of my staff who, over the years, have made my role so much easier in so many ways, and I want to thank the Parliament staff—all of them, but particularly those who supported and guided me through my four years in the role of Presiding Officer. That was a privilege and an honour that came close to that of serving the people first of the South of Scotland, then of Galloway and Upper Nithsdale, and latterly of Galloway and West Dumfries. That privilege is one that will stay with me for as long as I am able to remember anything, so to parody the words of the former First Minister this morning, this is goodbye from me—not for now, for good.