Meeting of the Parliament (Hybrid) 24 March 2021
First, Ruth Davidson has spent weeks misrepresenting me. Many legitimate questions should have been, and have been, asked of me, and I have shown plenty of contrition where that has been merited. However, I have heard on the grapevine that there is a lot of division within the Conservative Party about its tactics over the past few days, so, moving on from misrepresenting me, Ruth Davidson is now misrepresenting the Deputy First Minister.
I am really not sure what many people could find to disagree with in the view that, yes, we should help young people to catch up in their education, but, as we do that, we should help them to recover from the overall wider impact that Covid has had on them. That is the point that the Deputy First Minister was making. I find it really hard to see how and why Ruth Davidson would disagree with that.
The Audit Scotland report has much to say about progress. For example, it says:
“At the national level, exam performance and other attainment measures have improved ... There has been an increase in the types of opportunities, awards and qualifications available to children and young people and an increase in the number awarded.”
The report also focuses on the impact of Covid, and that is why we are so focused on dealing with that in the widest sense. We have committed almost £400 million of new funding over this year and next year as part of education recovery. That involves funding a range of actions, including the recruitment of 1,400 additional teachers, 200 additional support staff, new digital devices and youth support work—all the things that we need to do to support young people. That funding is also supporting the introduction of a £20 million pupil equity funding premium, which will be part of record investment through the attainment Scotland fund.
I hope to be standing here again in the next parliamentary session—that is up to the Scottish people. While Ruth Davidson is off taking £300 a day to sit in the unelected House of Lords, those of us who are in this chamber will be getting on with the job of improving education for all.