Hansard

As we gather today for this important debate, it is perhaps fitting to acknowledge the sombre fact that, earlier this week, we learned that deaths from coronavirus in the United Kingdom have surpassed the 100,000 mark. Over the past 10 months of this terrible pandemic, we have become used to hearing a plethora of statistics and numbers when it comes to the virus, whether they relate to positive cases, transmission rates or infections. The sheer enormity of the huge number of deaths is matched by the need to recognise that that number represents 100,000 individual lives, 100,000 grieving families and sorrows more numerous and infinite than can ever be counted.

This will be no comfort to those who have lost their beloved family members or their friends, but the future holds some hope for those who are still vulnerable to the virus. We know that, across the United Kingdom, more than 6.8 million people have now received their first dose of the Covid-19 vaccine and that just over 462,000 people in Scotland have received it—I am using figures from today. Some 470,000 people across the UK have received their second dose, too.

Three vaccines have been approved for use. Two are in full circulation, and the third is due to arrive in the spring. The last of those—the Moderna vaccine—is showing signs that it is effective against the known variants of the virus.

As was announced last week, the Army is working in close partnership with NHS Scotland to establish 80 additional vaccination centres across Scotland, with 98 military personnel working to set up the sites and get them running before they are handed over completely to the NHS.

Those are all positive developments, which I know will be welcomed by members across the Parliament. However, it remains the case that we are not out of the woods. In addition to the figure that I mentioned, according to National Records of Scotland, in the period to 24 January 7,902 deaths were registered in Scotland in which Covid-19 was mentioned on the death certificate, and some 175,000 people have tested positive since the start of the pandemic. It is clear that cases remain stubbornly high and, given the concern that the new variants pose, it is right that we remain vigilant and continue to stay at home, protect the national health service and save lives.

None of us underestimates the challenges that the current restrictions present for people throughout Scotland. As a father of three young children of primary school age, I particularly sympathise with parents who are having to balance work with looking after their children and ensuring that they continue to receive a good education from home.

I also understand the frustrations of the many businesses in Scotland that fear for their future, as well as the fears of their employees, who do not know whether they will have a job to go back to. I represent the Highlands and Islands region and I have been contacted by many small hospitality and retail businesses, which in many cases are not receiving significant financial support and fear that they might go to the wall if restrictions are not eased soon.

We should continually acknowledge the sacrifices of the many people who are shielding. Whether people are facing loneliness, feeling worried about going to the shops and collecting medicines or simply frightened of catching the virus, the pandemic is taking its toll on many people in our society.

With that as a backdrop, and with all the anxiety and uncertainty that the situation entails, it is baffling that the Scottish National Party Government has spent days if not weeks trailing its plans for a second independence referendum. After everything that Scotland has gone through and is still going through, it beggars belief that the Government thinks that it is right to talk about indyref2 at this time. For some unfathomable reason, the SNP has chosen the middle of a global pandemic as the right time to serialise its never-ending obsession with independence.

It is not just unfathomable; it is unforgivable. Let us look at a timeline of recent events. In September last year, the First Minister presented her headline announcement in the final programme for government of this parliamentary session. She said:

“we will publish, before the end of this session of Parliament, a draft bill setting out the proposed terms and timing of an independence referendum as well as the proposed question that people will be asked in that referendum.”—[Official Report, 1 September 2020; c 19.]

At the time, the First Minister had announced significant new Covid-19 restrictions in three local authority areas in the central belt, and it was clear that cases were on the rise again. However, she indicated to the Parliament not only that vital civil service time would be spent on drafting a new independence referendum bill but that the Scottish Government would be focus grouping on its referendum question.

Earlier this month, John Swinney told the BBC programme “Politics Scotland” that independence is “an essential priority”. Let us fast forward to the middle of January, when the SNP announced that it would establish an indyref2 task force, which it described as

“the final piece in the jigsaw that will help deliver independence.”

This weekend, the SNP made another proclamation when it produced its 11-point road map for a second independence referendum, which includes a proposal to hold an unlawful referendum after the Scottish Parliament elections.

Not only is all that breathtakingly irresponsible, it flies in the face of what the people of Scotland want. Just last year, polling showed that the constitution question was low on the public’s list of priorities—it came in at seventh, with just 15 per cent of people listing it. It was not surprising to learn that people care more about improving our NHS, schools and economy than they do about the constitution—even when the current pandemic is taken out of the equation. Government is about making choices and, to its eternal discredit, this Government is choosing—of its own volition—to prioritise more constitutional division over the deep and pressing issues that are thrown up by the Covid-19 pandemic.

One such issue is the economy, and I am sure that other members on the Conservative benches will talk about the imperative to prioritise the economic recovery. I want to concentrate on vaccine roll-out, which should be the Government’s immediate priority. The fact is that the vaccine roll-out fits a pattern in which the delivery of important health policies during the pandemic has been poor. Over the past year, regrettably, there have been a number of failures by the Government in relation to the Covid pandemic. In many instances, the Government has simply refused to take responsibility for those mistakes; all too often, Opposition parties and the media have had to force the Government to apologise for its failings and provide solutions for problems.

On care homes, the Scottish Parliament twice voted for an urgent public inquiry to take place when it was found that Covid-19-positive hospital patients were being transferred into care homes and other patients were being moved in without being tested at all, putting care home staff and vulnerable residents at risk.

On personal protective equipment, the SNP has failed time and again to properly protect our front-line NHS and social care staff. I do not need to remind members that, at the beginning of the pandemic, more than 1,000 Scottish care workers wrote to the First Minister and said:

“We do not feel safe at work. By not giving us the PPE we need and by not testing front line workers, we are being forced to put not only ourselves but our family and our clients at risk.”

As I noted in the chamber last week, BMA Scotland had raised concerns over protection against the new strain of Covid-19, stating that

“The currently recommended PPE may not offer the best protection in some clinical environments.”

Similarly, we are seeing real and concerning failures in the SNP Government’s handling of the roll-out of the vaccine. The Scottish Government has had months to prepare for this moment. We all want and need the roll-out of the vaccine to be a success, but on Sunday we saw the lowest published figure of people vaccinated since the daily figures began; it was less than half the number of people who were vaccinated on Saturday. Last week, the First Minister effectively conceded that the SNP Government’s target of vaccinating 560,000 people by the end of January will not happen, saying that the target date has been “refined”—a convenient shorthand for the fact that timetables have slipped and the goalposts accordingly moved.

We know that the issue is not one of vaccine stock levels, despite the claims by the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Sport that vaccines were being “back-ended” by the UK Government. It is an issue of roll-out and blockages in the system here in Scotland. I will repeat the remarks of the BMA Scotland’s general practitioners committee that I referred to last week, because they are important. That committee noted the

“variable and sometimes slow rate that vaccines were being made available to GP practices”.

We also know that BMA Scotland asked the Scottish Government’s interim chief pharmaceutical officer to consider allowing GPs to directly order the supplies that they need to vaccinate their patients, in effect bypassing health boards. We all accept the logistical challenges here, especially given Scotland’s geography, but clearly something is not working.

The views of our GPs and other healthcare workers are vital to this debate, but so too are the stories of our constituents, and we will all have had those in our mailboxes. I have received some particularly distressing and worried emails from people right across Scotland. People feel that they are in the dark. One lady from Perthshire emailed me on Monday to say that her parents are both in their mid-80s but have not yet been given a vaccination appointment. When she contacted the local GP to inquire, she was told that they did not know when they would receive more vaccines or how many doses would be available. Another lady got in touch with me to say that a 98-year-old family friend from Renfrewshire who lives by herself had not yet received an appointment. Today, someone emailed me saying that he is 85 years old and that, two weeks ago, he received a text from his surgery saying that he would shortly be called in for a vaccination; since then there has been silence, but his wife, who is 77, has received an appointment for next week at a nearby community centre.

Those are the real stories of people who are being impacted by both the lack of information and the lack of action. This is genuinely a postcode lottery between health boards, within health boards, and even within families, and it is affecting some very old and very vulnerable people and playing havoc with their hopes and expectations, given what is at stake.

When those aged 80 and over and their families see others elsewhere in the UK being vaccinated, it is only right that they will question what is happening in Scotland. All of that points to a disorganised and chaotic roll-out process with no clear direction or leadership.

It also does not bode well for the future, when we will get to the next priority groups in the coming weeks and months. That is why the Scottish Conservatives are today calling on the SNP Government to establish a vaccine task force. Such a task force must have a primary focus on supply and vaccination methods throughout Scotland. The task force should ensure that supplies get to GP surgeries and other places that are administering the vaccine within the right timeframe and it should aim to keep GPs informed of progress with supplies on a regular basis. It should also make recommendations on which methods are being used across the country to carry out the vaccination programme. That would allow any gaps to be seen quickly, the methods that are working best to be identified and best practice to be shared and used. We believe that that is critically important so that we can ensure that targets are met and, most importantly, that people are protected against this awful and deadly virus.

The Scottish Conservatives urge the chamber to support our motion. It is abundantly clear that the very last thing that Scotland should be doing at this critically important moment is planning for a referendum of any kind, let alone one carving Scotland out of the United Kingdom. People do not want an indyref2 task force; they want a vaccination task force. The people of Scotland want all of us to focus on rolling out vaccines, reducing the number of deaths and cases of Covid-19 and rebuilding our economy. Regardless of our views on the constitutional debate, we urge the Scottish Government to pause, reflect and realise what is at stake if we take our eye off the ball at this critical juncture in the pandemic. Now is not the time to divide communities all over again. Instead, now is the time to unite people across the country, as we, hopefully, enter the final chapter of our collective struggle against the pandemic that has wrought much sadness across Scotland.

I urge the chamber to support our motion.

I move,

That the Parliament believes that planning an independence referendum in 2021, during an ongoing global pandemic, would be reckless and damaging; notes the Scottish National Party’s plans to establish an independence taskforce and believes that this will divide Scotland when people should be united in tackling COVID-19 and supporting the economic recovery, and calls on the Scottish Government to instead establish a taskforce to speed up the roll-out of the COVID-19 vaccination programme across Scotland.