Meeting of the Parliament 16 January 2025
I thank Rhoda Grant for bringing this debate to the chamber. Along with debates this afternoon on the A9 dualling and on rural healthcare, it begins a very welcome focus to the Parliament today on issues that impact on the Highlands and Islands region—the focus on those issues is welcome because they are being discussed, rather than because of the underlying reasons why they are being discussed and the failure to deliver rural and island services.
This evening, I will speak in my colleague Tim Eagle’s debate on rural healthcare, so I will not focus on that now, other than to say that the impact of pressure on our health services is often felt more acutely in our more remote rural and island communities. Distance to care, and the impact of healthcare services being further away from those who use them, is a real and growing concern. When that pressure includes the downgrading of maternity services and a lack of social care, it challenges the sustainability of many of our communities.
The deterioration of health services is far from being the only challenge. After 18 years of this Government, we have a housing emergency in Scotland—a crisis that the Scottish National Party responded to by cutting the housing budget by nearly £200 million. Added to that, the dedicated rural and islands housing funds were not fully utilised, with millions of pounds left in Government coffers in Edinburgh despite the schemes being extended and there being a clear and desperate need for more affordable housing in our communities.
Transport connectivity was also highlighted in the commission’s report, and the crisis faced by our ferry-reliant communities has been raised in Parliament on too many occasions to mention. It is not only islanders who suffer; residents and businesses that are reliant on the ageing and unreliable ferries that serve the Corran Narrows route in Lochaber have been extremely vocal on just how great a threat the lack of a reliable service is to the sustainability of their communities. When I visited that area as part of my summer tour, many people were quite clear that, without action—soon—they would be forced to move away from the area that they call home.
Many Highland roads are not much better. Last year, I dealt with the case of a household who were stuck in their property because the condition of their road left them isolated in their home. There were potholes so large that the local delivery drivers refused to deliver to them. Thankfully, after a letter to the council on their behalf, work was done on the road and they can enjoy their home again, but also leave when they want to.
That issue of enjoying one’s home leads me on to another issue that I would like to raise, although it is not included in the report. People across my region are faced with the prospect of increased industrialisation of their communities, but they see little or no gain from it, and they feel powerless to have their say on it. New pylons, substations and other energy infrastructure are being forced on communities across the Highlands and Islands without their permission, and too often with only the most token amount of consultation—consultation that many see as almost a fait accompli. That is a clear democratic and moral deficit.
That leads me to my last point, which is about how decisions are made and their impact. Island residents have seen the introduction of legislation on island proofing to allow the consideration of unique island needs, although many are understandably sceptical about whether it is anything more than a tick-box exercise. However, rural communities are not afforded the same protections, despite many being as remote as—and, in some cases, more remote than—some of our island communities.
The report is interesting but, for many of us who live in the Highlands and Islands, it tells us little that we do not already know. There is a lack of affordable housing. Healthcare services are becoming more distant for some and inaccessible for too many. There is fuel poverty in communities that are circled by machines that heat the homes of others many miles away. Many people in the Highlands and Islands feel a long way from the decisions that are made here in Edinburgh but those decisions impact greatly on their lives. Although the Highlands and Islands are still a great place in which to live, work and be brought up, it is getting harder for many people to do that.
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