The Scotsman Politics FMQs Review - December 07 2023
The Scotsman Politics FMQs Review - December 07 2023
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00:00 (upbeat music)
00:02 - Hello, and welcome to the Scotsman's Politics Show.
00:10 We're here to wrap up First Minister's Questions.
00:12 My name's Dale Miller, I'm Head of News at Scotsman,
00:15 and I'm joined by our political editor, Alistair Grant.
00:19 Alistair, the PISA results were out
00:22 around education on Tuesday.
00:24 They made for pretty grim reading for the Scottish government
00:27 and it looks like it led things to that.
00:30 - Yeah, so these are obviously the PISA education results
00:34 run by the OECD, a kind of international comparison
00:38 of the performance of 15 year olds around the world.
00:41 And as you say, made for quite grim reading in Scotland,
00:45 showing long-term decline across maths, science, reading,
00:49 and unsurprisingly, it came up at First Minister's Questions.
00:52 I think it actually was the first time
00:54 that I can remember in quite a long time
00:56 that all three party leaders who were asking questions
00:59 went on the same topic.
01:00 So the Tories, Labour, the Liberal Democrats,
01:03 all raising education, all having a go at Humza Yousaf
01:07 over the SNP's stewardship of education.
01:12 And I think it was quite interesting
01:13 that Humza Yousaf was essentially accepting
01:16 that this was a poor set of results
01:18 and that the Scottish government is accepting that,
01:20 is going to do something about it.
01:22 He said there'll be a statement
01:23 from the Education Secretary, Jenny Gilruth,
01:26 next week about this.
01:28 But I think, you know, quite strong language
01:30 used by the opposition politicians.
01:32 So you had Douglas Ross, the Scottish Conservative leader,
01:34 calling this a national disgrace.
01:36 You had Anas Sarwar, the Scottish Labour leader,
01:39 accusing the SNP effectively
01:41 of destroying Scottish education.
01:43 And we obviously have this narrative in Scotland,
01:45 whether it's true or not,
01:47 that Scottish education is world-leading.
01:49 It's something we're hugely proud of,
01:51 and we have been proud of for hundreds of years.
01:54 It's been a story we tell ourselves about what Scotland is.
01:58 And these results throw that into question,
02:00 you know, showing long-term decline.
02:02 And Douglas Ross also linking that decline
02:04 to the curriculum for excellence
02:07 and the impact that's had on Scottish education
02:10 and calling for that to be scrapped.
02:12 And as I say, I think it's interesting
02:14 that Humza Yousaf was accepting
02:16 that these results are not good.
02:18 But on the other hand,
02:19 he was also launching quite a robust defence
02:21 of Scottish government education policy,
02:24 pointing to exam pass rates,
02:27 pointing to the number of people
02:28 going to university in Scotland,
02:30 the number of people going to so-called positive destinations,
02:33 you know, education or employment after they leave school.
02:36 So, you know, very much trying to defend
02:39 the Scottish government's records
02:40 and also pointing out that this is just one set of results,
02:43 you know, albeit international results.
02:46 But there's other indicators
02:47 that the Scottish government obviously uses as well.
02:49 But I think there's no two ways about it.
02:51 This is an extremely difficult First Minister's questions
02:54 for Humza Yousaf.
02:54 As I say, unusual to have all three party leaders
02:59 going on the same topic.
03:00 - Now, listen, can you see any options
03:02 for the Scottish government?
03:03 Because they made the decision a number of weeks now
03:06 to delay some plans, reforms to the education system.
03:10 They had their summits on school violence.
03:13 They've identified that as the issue
03:15 that they need to deal with first
03:16 before they make more wider structural changes.
03:19 But it feels like these results are all to do
03:22 with wider structural changes.
03:23 So where can they go?
03:25 - I don't think there are no quick fixes.
03:27 You know, Humza Yousaf obviously quite keen
03:29 to highlight the effect of COVID.
03:31 And obviously that hasn't had an effect.
03:33 We've seen declines globally in education standards.
03:36 But it's not the full story
03:37 because when the decline started,
03:40 obviously predates COVID.
03:42 And we've also got, you know, the situation now
03:44 where we look to our neighbours in England
03:46 and children there seem to be performing better
03:48 across maths, science, reading.
03:50 Albeit, I think Wales is performing worse than Scotland.
03:54 But I think that there's just no quick fixes.
03:56 And I thought it was interesting if you kind of read
03:58 some of the commentary around the OECD's report
04:01 and some of the kind of issues experts,
04:03 including from the PISA, kind of OECD themselves
04:06 have highlighted.
04:07 And there's things like the use of smartphones
04:10 in classrooms, these kind of the impact of technology,
04:13 even the impact of, I think the kind of parental involvement
04:17 in the education system in Scotland
04:19 was highlighted as a source of concern.
04:21 So there's obviously huge structural issues,
04:23 no quick fixes, but there will be calls, you know,
04:26 from across the Holyrood Chamber, as we saw today,
04:29 to do something about this.
04:30 Everyone or many people in Scotland
04:32 obviously have an investment in this.
04:34 It's their children going to these schools.
04:36 And the state of the Scottish education system
04:39 is something that the Scottish government
04:40 will be extremely concerned about.
04:43 - Just lastly, there's gonna be
04:44 an emergency cabinet meeting tonight
04:46 where the Scottish budget, which is just around the corner,
04:49 is gonna be discussed.
04:50 You wrote a bit about a couple of things
04:53 that are being considered, need to be considered
04:57 ahead of that meeting and the plans around the budget.
04:59 You can read that at scotsman.com.
05:02 Just very quickly, what are the keys here?
05:05 What do they have to work out between now and December 19th?
05:09 - Yeah, so this is a special cabinet meeting
05:11 being held tonight.
05:12 Obviously, cabinet is usually held on a Tuesday.
05:14 It's extremely unusual to have more than one
05:16 cabinet meeting in a week.
05:17 It shows the level of concern
05:19 in the Scottish government about this.
05:20 I mean, some of the key areas I was highlighting
05:22 are things like income tax,
05:24 what they're gonna do about income tax.
05:26 There's been lots of rumors and reporting
05:27 about potentially introducing a new income tax band
05:31 for higher earners.
05:32 I think that's very much up in the air.
05:34 I think one of the problems with that
05:35 is that you have to then factor in
05:37 a potential electoral backlash.
05:39 It would obviously be controversial
05:40 among some sections of the media.
05:43 We've got a general election probably happening next year,
05:46 so that will be a source of concern.
05:48 I think you've got the council tax freeze.
05:50 That was a decision that Humza Yousaf announced
05:52 at the S&P conference in October.
05:55 He said that would be fully funded,
05:56 so councils wouldn't suffer financially for that.
05:59 But they've not defined what fully funded means,
06:01 so we need to have some answers around that.
06:04 What does that mean in cash terms for councils,
06:06 and will they be happy with it?
06:08 I'm gonna say probably not.
06:10 We've got other areas like businesses.
06:12 We obviously had the UK Chancellor, Jeremy Hunt,
06:16 was introducing some tax breaks for businesses down south.
06:20 One of them in particular
06:21 for hospitality leisure businesses,
06:24 he's extending for another year.
06:26 The Scottish government last year chose not to pass that on
06:28 to businesses in Scotland.
06:30 There's lots of pressure now,
06:32 considering some of the pressures
06:33 businesses themselves are under to pass it on this year.
06:38 And I think if they don't,
06:38 there'll be a lot of anger among the business community.
06:40 And of course, Humza Yousaf, as First Minister,
06:42 has tried to improve relationships with the business sector.
06:46 So that's just a few of the areas,
06:48 but there's so many different things.
06:49 I mean, public sector funding,
06:50 I should probably just touch on very quickly as well.
06:52 We've had dire warnings from councils
06:54 that they're at risk of bankruptcy
06:55 if they don't get the funding they need.
06:57 We've had dire warnings from Police Scotland
06:59 about potentially losing thousands of officers,
07:02 kind of affecting how they can respond to incidents
07:06 if they don't get the funding they need.
07:08 We've had Shona Robison, the Deputy First Minister,
07:10 saying that the public sector will need to shrink.
07:13 It's just extremely grim.
07:15 And of course, the Scottish government
07:16 has to deliver a balanced budget.
07:18 They have to balance the books.
07:20 They can't have a one billion pound black hole.
07:22 That exists in theory at the moment,
07:24 but it can't exist in practice.
07:25 So yeah, extremely difficult decisions need to be made.
07:29 - Alistair, the big red,
07:31 if we were talking about cheerier things
07:33 in the lead up to Christmas,
07:35 but that is the start of Play's Raid,
07:37 all the latest from FNQs at scotsman.com.
07:41 We ran a blog throughout,
07:43 so you can catch up on all the exchanges
07:45 around the PISA results.
07:47 And if you want all your politics,
07:49 go to the navigation bar on the homepage,
07:51 look for the politics tab,
07:53 you'll get all the very latest there.
07:55 Thanks very much for joining us, everyone.
07:57 (upbeat music)
08:01 (upbeat music)
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