Hansard

Tricia Marwick will need to take that matter up with Fife Council. The reality is that when Peter Peacock was the Minister for Education and Young People, he allocated money directly to every education authority throughout the country specifically to employ additional teachers. When I became the Minister for Education and Young People, I allocated money to authorities to be provided directly to schools to allow them to make decisions about where it should be spent. More money is going into Scottish education. How the money is allocated and spent locally is a matter for the local authority, but the record is clear. The investment has been made.

One thing I know from the considerable record of new builds and refurbished schools in Fife since 2003 is that the promises that have been made by the SNP to build new schools cannot be delivered, because its proposed system of funding is not only unproven but cannot work because there cannot be borrowing. The SNP is still failing to answer the questions about how its programme would be funded. Pupils, teachers and parents throughout Scotland should rightly be worried about what will be done to Scottish education by the SNP's futile argument.