Meeting of the Parliament 19 March 2026 [Draft]
I reject claims that Scottish Water is being privatised in any way, not least by stealth, as Richard Leonard characterises it. There is a great deal of build-out—remedial and new—of infrastructure for which Scottish Water has to procure services to augment the workforce that it already has. The Scottish Government has no intention of halting or interfering in the procurement process, which is absolutely an operational matter for Scottish Water.
It is important to us and, I think, to everybody that Scottish Water secures a supply chain that can deliver the vital innovation and investment that are necessary to adapt to climate change while maintaining service levels, and a great deal of Scottish companies and Scottish workers will receive contracts and work as a result of its improvement works and new infrastructure build.