Five years ago, section 2a – known variously as Clause 28 or Section 28 in England and Wales – was finally removed from the law of Scotland, thus concluding a very difficult legislative process for the fledgling Scottish parliament.
Thank you I am delighted to be here in Dubai to participate in this the third day of our conference.
Scotland, as some of you may know, is a small nation, part of the Britain.
Indeed Scotland’s position as part of Britain is not so different from Dubai’s position as part of the Emirates.
One of the occupational hazards of politics is the charge - “that we are all the same”. It’s the ultimate put-down.
But of course it is economic policy debate that explodes that muddled myth.
Ms Wendy Alexander (Paisley North) (Lab): As members know, fairytales sometimes convey important truths. A fairytale has taken hold of the Scottish budget process, and that fairytale is “Peter Pan”. As we have already heard this afternoon, in the Scottish budget fairytale Peter Pan McConnell is the beneficiary of good fairy Tinkerbell Brown’s block grant. Members will recall that Mr Darling had only a bit part in the Peter Pan story. However, such a view of Scotland’s budget process is straight out of Never-Never Land itself. The Never-Never Land aspect of the Scottish budget process comes from the lost boys on the Opposition benches because, from the September day when the budget is announced, the lost boys of the Opposition fly off to Never-Never Land, never to return until spring, when the bill has been safely passed. From the start to the finish of that process, the nationalist lost boys-Neil, Morgan and Mather-all fly off to Never-Never Land. Whatever the budget proposes, they are in a Never-Never Land talking about the need for more people, more oil, more powers-indeed, anything other than the Executive’s spending plans.
Jim Mather: Will the member give way?
Ms Alexander: Indeed I will. I give way to lost boy Mather.
Jim Mather: I ask Wendy Alexander for clarification. Is she advocating a lower population in Scotland?
Ms Alexander: No. The point that I am making is that it would be unthinkable in England in a debate on the budget to start talking about population and immigration. Whether it is lost boy Jim “growth target” Mather, Alex “population” Neil-in fairness, he is not here, but he is usually talking about it-or Alex “oil” Salmond, it is all about escaping to Never-Never Land rather than scrutinising the spending plans.
If I sound a somewhat world-weary Wendy, I am. I looked to the Tories. Perhaps they could be relied on not to fly off to Never-Never Land. In fairness to Michael Howard, who is every inch a latter-day Captain Hook, he is pretty clear about the services that will have to walk the plank. He is clear that health and education might escape the plank, but he is also clear that his trusty crocodile, the James report, has the clock ticking on savings of £35 billion. In Scotland, however, we have heard not a word about the clock ticking on the Scottish equivalent of the James programme. Lost boy Monteith is off to Never-Never Land.
It all seems rather amusing, but in less than an hour we shall pass a budget that enshrines how to spend £25 billion. That is more than the total wealth of 100 other nations. Let us think about that. We are about to pass a budget that is more than not just the spending but the wealth of 100 other nations on the face of this earth, yet the Opposition’s lost boys have simply nothing to say. Of course, as all children in Scotland and their parents know, the lost boys just did not want to grow up, and the flight of the Parliament’s Opposition to Never-Never Land discredits a young Parliament and infantilises the debate. There is no serious engagement as there should be.
Peter Pan’s Wendy was an optimist, and all fairytales have happy endings. At the end of “Peter Pan”, the lost boys eventually grew up. I hope that, the next time we debate a budget bill that plans to spend more than 100 nations on this earth earn, we can look to the lost boys of the Opposition not to fly off to Never-Never Land but to start providing some proper parliamentary scrutiny. This Wendy commends the Executive for a set of sound spending plans for Scotland’s budget.
I want to dwell on the issue that has come to dominate the debate—the fact that neither the Scottish Tories nor the SNP has produced even the bare bones of a budget proposal.
I accept wholly Fergus Ewing’s point that it is unreasonable to expect every detail to have been finalised; however, with £25 billion at their disposal, surely they could have come up with something.
It has been a somewhat strange start to the parliamentary year.
We all returned from our holiday chastened by the terrible tsunami.
Then we paused.
The members who are here this morning are the hardy few.
They are a bit like the shepherds in the Christmas story: the poor souls who are still at work when everyone else has gone to rest or to play.
I will dwell on the Christmas theme this morning, because the Christmas season is typically associated with generosity, gift-giving and largesse.
ELEANOR Roosevelt once observed that women who are willing to be leaders must stand out and be shot at. Females who enter public life, she said, need “to develop a skin as tough as rhinoceros hide”
I am delighted to be here, I was invited to give a pre-dinner rather than an after- dinner speech - about which I have no complaints.
I thought I would build what I want to say around a few quotes rather than a few jokes.
