Meeting of the Parliament 29 January 2020
I thank the First Minister for fulfilling—for the first time, in my experience—a promise that she made here, in the Parliament. I have just received a copy of her migration proposals, which I have here.
Let us be up front about why we are here today. It is not because the First Minister thinks that she is going to hold a referendum this year; she knows that that is not going to happen. The reason that we have been called here today is that she needs to convince the yes movement, behind her and beyond, that something is happening—or that, if it is not actually happening, they should not worry, because it will soon.
That points to the real indictment on this Government: it is divided and fearful of telling hard truths to its own political supporters. It is so obsessed with mollifying them in some way that the interests of the people of Scotland are shoved to one side. If the First Minister feels the need to attend marches in her spare time in order to shore up her position with Joanna Cherry and the die-hards, that is up to her, but I do not see why the majority of people in this country have to play along with that ridiculous charade.
The First Minister says that there will be a referendum by Christmas. Really? Given the state of the ferry service over which she presides, they had better start sending the ballot papers to the islands now. There is also to be a new white paper—and yet, according to the First Minister, we are still to accept that the last one was the most authoritative ever. Her tame polling company breathlessly claims that people support the holding of a referendum being agreed, yet somehow it forgets to ask them whether they actually support independence. If only the Government spent the same amount of attention on the police and schools as it spends on polling and spin we might have the safest streets and the best schools in Europe.
While SNP members debate among themselves their favoured route to another referendum, what the timetable should be and whether they need the approval of Westminster, most people outside the political bubble just look on in either wearied resignation or abject fury. The debate that people outside the chamber want to see is on how to drive up educational standards and give their children the solid start in life that they need and deserve. Instead, they get parliamentary statements about more referendums.
People also want to see action on how to tackle a drugs death crisis that is claiming over 1,000 Scottish lives every year—the highest rate in Europe. They want to see action to reverse the record low in attainment in the highers and advanced highers results in Scotland’s schools. They want to see the four-year rise in violent crime stopped, front-line police officer numbers protected and a Government that does not describe collapsing ceilings in police stations as “hyperbole”. Instead, civil servants are directed to waste time in drawing up more plans for independence.
People want a debate over how to grow our economy; how to create more, better-paid and more secure jobs; and how to drive up living standards for everyone in Scotland. Instead—here we go again—we get more time devoted to the First Minister’s personal obsession at the expense of the country’s real and pressing priorities.
Perhaps the First Minister really cannot let it go. Perhaps she is fated to see out the rest of her days in office single-mindedly banging the drum for separation. That is a grim prospect for the rest of the country, but perhaps that is the way it will be. Only in the corridors of the Scottish Government—alone in the four nations of the United Kingdom—do we see a Government that is determined to keep us stuck in the past. The rest of the UK is moving on, but Scotland is being left behind.
There is a real tragedy here, too. The Government promised a fresh start after the divisions of the 2014 referendum, and the First Minister made, in her own words, a heartfelt promise to serve all Scots, regardless of how they voted in that referendum. How hollow that all sounds now. Instead of healing the divisions of 2014, the Government has exacerbated them. Instead of the fresh start that it promised, we have had five years of unceasing agitation for independence. Instead of a laser-like focus on education, health and the economy, all of those matters have been sidelined in favour of the First Minister’s singular priority.