The next item of business is a debate on motion S6M-14406, in the name of Liam Kerr, on free school meals for all primary pupils. I invite members who wish to participate in the debate to press their request-to-speak buttons now or as soon as possible. I warn members that there is no time in hand so they will have to stick to their speaking allocations.
I call Liam Kerr to speak to and move the motion. You have up to seven minutes, Mr Kerr.
14:58
How times change. Do members remember the then First Minister promising in 2015 to completely close the attainment gap? Now, this Government simply aspires to reduce it. We have had warm words from the current First Minister, who has stated that the eradication of child poverty is
“the single greatest priority for this Government.”
However, last week’s debate highlighted not only that the child poverty rate has remained largely unchanged since 2007, but that the Scottish National Party’s multiple failures have had a detrimental impact.
I bring that up because of another promise. This one was made in the SNP’s 2021 manifesto, which said that
“Over the course of the next parliament”,
it would make sure that
“no child is hungry in the classroom by providing free school breakfasts and lunches to every primary school pupil, all year round”,
yet we heard last week that the provision will be only to primary 6 and 7 pupils whose families are in receipt of the Scottish child payment. Let us be very clear about what that means.
[Made a request to intervene.]
I will take Monica Lennon’s intervention later.
Last week, John Swinney confirmed in this Parliament that he was scrapping the SNP’s pledge to introduce universal free school meals for P6 and P7 pupils. A promise was made, and that promise has been broken.
Here is the issue: we know that the Scottish Government has never seriously tried to close the attainment gap. It does not know how to do that; it has not forensically worked out what interventions would be required to do it. However, everyone knows that our kids need food in order to be ready to learn. As the Children and Young People’s Commissioner Scotland said yesterday,
“Going to school hungry is not only a barrier to learning and educational achievement but it can severely impact development in childhood and into adulthood”.
The mission of eradicating child poverty will be set back by the Government’s decision, as it has been told by Save the Children, the Joseph Rowntree Foundation and the Child Poverty Action Group.
I welcome Liam Kerr’s motion and hope that the whole Parliament will back it today. All primary school pupils in Wales and in London have free school meals because that has been made a political priority. Does Liam Kerr agree that the SNP needs to drop the spin and the excuses in its amendment and put the needs of Scotland’s children first?
I absolutely agree with that—it is a good point well made. The amendment is as predictable as it is shameful and, indeed, ignorant.
On 5 September, in this chamber, in a rare moment of self-awareness, John Swinney said:
“We will not be able, in this parliamentary session, to roll out universal eligibility across primary 6 and primary 7 pupils, because our budget has been eroded by ... fiscal mismanagement”. —[Official Report, 5 September 2024; c12.]
Hasn’t it just? The Government is sitting on the largest cash-terms block grant in devolution history and, as Monica Lennon says, it makes choices about how it spends that budget. We should never forget that the Scottish Fiscal Commission said just last week that the SNP’s financial woes are largely the result of its own spending incontinence.
Nowhere can I find an official costing for the extension of free school meals. To assist, I have done a very rough calculation. I think that the cost to deliver free school meals for P6 and P7 pupils would be, at worst, around £110 million. In breaking its promise, the Government chooses not to cover that.
What choices has the Government made instead? It chose to spend £400 million on ferries, of course. However, no one will forget the figures that were released in July that show that Nicola Sturgeon’s SNP spent more than £180 million on spin doctors, foreign trips and hospitality. By total coincidence, £110 million of that was spent on press officers, social media and internal communications. Just last week, we also heard about the special advisers that have cost millions. There are then the more than 120 ministerial overseas trips that have been made in the past two years alone to more than 30 different destinations, despite foreign affairs being reserved to Westminster. Maybe those trips were made to visit the nine Scottish Government overseas offices, which cost £9 million, or to get away from the £16 million in losses and special payments that have been made by the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service. Perhaps they were made to get away from the £82.95 million in last year’s consolidated accounts for losses and special payments.
If it is priorities that we are after, some may have missed that Angus Robertson’s budget of £347 million—for the portfolio that covers such things as external affairs and the constitution, which are not actually devolved—was spared the axe in last week’s cull by the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Local Government. Interestingly for those who worry that £110 million is a lot of money for the Government to find, when Shona Robison was asked why she had not cut that £347 million budget, she said:
“It is a small budget by comparison”.
By axing the universal roll-out of free school meals in primary schools, the SNP has shamefully betrayed Scotland’s poorest pupils. It has abandoned any pretence that it knows how to eradicate the attainment gap and/or child poverty, and it has played fast and loose with the trust that the people of Scotland invested in it.
When, in September 2020, the Scottish Conservatives first pledged to introduce free school meals for all primary school pupils, we were supported by all parties across Parliament, because some things are just more important than party politics. Two months later, John Swinney, who was then the Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills, announced that that would be SNP policy. I therefore call on MSPs from all parties to put party politics aside today and send the strongest possible message to the SNP that it cannot—it must not—abandon the young people of Scotland. Let us in this Parliament back the roll-out of free school meals for all primary pupils by voting for the motion in my name.
I move,
That the Parliament believes that free school lunches should be provided for all primary school children, including provision in the school holidays, in this parliamentary session, as promised by the Scottish Government.
I call Jenny Gilruth to speak to and move amendment S6M-14406.3.
15:04
Last night, I met the world schools debating champions at Bute house. Team Scotland was represented by Portobello high school, St Columba’s high school from Kilmacolm, Broxburn academy and Dollar academy. As education secretary, I put on the record my congratulations to them on their success, and I am sure that the Parliament sends them our best wishes, too.
Liam Kerr said that some things are more important than party politics, and I agree. Last night, I told the young people about the topic at hand for today’s debate. I explained that it would be a challenging day for the Government, because we do not disagree on the principle of the motion that is in front of us. As the motion recounts, in the 2021 election, the SNP committed to delivering universal free school meals. Today, I want to put on record our recommitment to that delivery because, as a politician, I believe emphatically in the principle of universality and, as a teacher, I know that hungry children cannot learn.
The amendment in my name seeks to provide the necessary financial context to the situation that we find ourselves in. Let us be in no doubt that more children in Scotland today are receiving free school meals thanks to the Scottish Government: every child in primaries 1 to 5, those in special schools, as well as all eligible pupils from primary 6 right up to secondary 6. Free school meal provision in Scotland is saving families on average £400 per child per year. In total, Scottish Government funding is providing free school meals to more than 270,000 children every single year from primaries 1 to 5. We are now focusing our efforts on pupils who are in receipt of the Scottish child payment, which will see an additional 26,000 children benefit. However, I understand the deep disappointment that universal roll-out to primaries 6 and 7 has been delayed and, frankly, I share that disappointment. It is in that spirit that I will listen to and engage with the Opposition today.
Only last week, Parliament heard from the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Local Government the full extent of the budgetary challenges that the Scottish Government faces. As Sir Keir Starmer has stated on the issue of free school meals,
“The money is a big factor, I won’t shy away from it.”
The Prime Minister is right. Of course, it is a painful matter of fact that, under the current devolution settlement, in the absence of any clarity on additional consequentials, any emerging in-year costs have to be funded by cuts elsewhere.
I share the cabinet secretary’s deep disappointment in the Scottish Government’s decisions, but can she help us to understand what representations she made to the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Local Government to say, “Don’t take it out of my budget”?
I made strong representations to the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Local Government. If the member is interested, he can speak to her directly about that.
We are in a Parliament of minorities, and this next question is not really one that is reserved for the First Minister or for me as education secretary. How do we fund the approximate £256 million funding gap that I am presented with in order to deliver universality in this parliamentary session? Right now, the Government simply does not have the resources to deliver that, so I want to hear alternatives for where I should draw the additionality that I need.
Will the cabinet secretary take an intervention?
Pam Duncan-Glancy is attempting to make an intervention. I am conscious of time, and I would like to make progress, but I am going to name Pam Duncan-Glancy, because she has reassured me over Twitter that the cavalry is en route. However, I cannot accept a tweet from Ms Duncan-Glancy as confirmation of the extent of the consequentials that Scotland will receive from London. Those who hold the purse strings have offered me no such confirmation.
Liam Kerr quoted the Scottish Fiscal Commission. It has noted that there is “significant uncertainty” on the level of funding that we will receive from the UK Government ahead of the UK Government’s budget on 30 October. I would welcome confirmation today from any Labour MSP in the chamber on the totality of consequentials that they expect to flow to Scotland from the new UK Labour Government.
As I referenced earlier, we know that the combined capital and revenue costs of universal expansion will total £256 million. My question to Parliament, and particularly to the Labour Party, is simple: where would you find the money? Like its friends in the Conservative Party, the Labour Party has opposed just about every revenue-raising measure that the Government has put in place. Just like the Tories, Labour seek to slash taxes on higher earners, leaving us with less money to invest in our public services.
What is the answer? If members want to commit to the immediate universal expansion in primary schools, which the Scottish Futures Trust’s independent research estimates will cost £256 million, what £256 million of cuts would they make? Would they make cuts elsewhere in our schools, such as to additional support needs provision, the school clothing grant or the Scottish attainment challenge? Would Labour stop funding to the eight new schools that are being built? Would it make cuts elsewhere? Would it make cuts to the national health service, childcare or the Scottish child payment, or would it do what it has been desperate to do since 2007 and reimpose tuition fees on Scottish students?
You need to conclude, cabinet secretary.
The reality is that austerity is a political choice. It matters not one iota whether it is red or blue. The result is less money for Scotland, less money for education and less money for our children. In a Parliament of minorities, it is incumbent on the Government to engage with the Opposition on the facts, so I will listen today with the interests of Scotland’s children and young people at the forefront of my mind.
I move amendment S6M-14406.3, to insert at end:
“; notes, however, that the impact of the austerity agenda pursued by the previous Conservative and current Labour UK administrations has reduced the value of Scotland’s budget, meaning that the required combined capital and revenue funding of £256 million is not available to deliver fully during the current parliamentary session; recommits the Scottish Government to full universal delivery for all primary pupils when the budgetary position allows; recognises the progress that has already been made with the delivery of free school meals to all children in P1 to P5, special schools, as well as eligible pupils in P6 to S6; welcomes that the Scottish Government will now make further progress with expansion to P6 and P7 pupils in receipt of the Scottish Child Payment, which will see an additional 26,000 children benefit, and calls on the UK Government to change its fiscal rules to end austerity and allow increased investment in public services to eradicate child poverty.”
15:10
I am pleased to open on behalf of Scottish Labour in the debate and to speak in support of the motion and the amendment in my name.
I have said this before, but it is worth repeating: education is a great leveller. It can smash the glass, class and step ceilings in the way of opportunity, and any barrier to its full potential and power is a barrier to that opportunity for Scotland’s young people. However, sadly, with its litany of broken promises and incompetence in delivery, one such barrier to opportunity in Scotland is the SNP Scottish Government.
The Government has now promised but not delivered free school meals for every primary school pupil for four years. Although child poverty is stagnant on its watch, people across Scotland will be baffled at the choices that it has made. Experts are, too. The Children and Young People’s Commissioner Scotland said:
“Any rollback or dilution … can only be seen as a broken promise”.
The Child Poverty Action Group said that the Government is
“falling behind in … actions that”
it
“has already committed to and that families so desperately need.”
Children 1st said that it is
“deeply concerned that the drastic cuts to public spending will throw many children and families already in crisis over the edge”.
It is not just lunches; it is breakfasts, too. As the chief executive of Magic Breakfast pointed out last week,
“Despite being the minister who announced it, John Swinney is now the third First Minister in a row to exclude ... universal breakfast provision from their Programme for Government.”
Alone, broken promises to young people on food would be bad enough—but they are not alone. In 2007, the SNP promised to cut class sizes to 18. It abandoned that promise in 2009 and primary classes have not been below 23 while it has been in power.
The SNP manifesto in 2021 promised an increase in the number of teachers and classroom assistants. Teacher numbers have fallen and, in Glasgow alone, against the Parliament’s will, 450 might go. The same manifesto promised to reduce contact time for teachers, but a recent Government-commissioned report found that it will not do that, either.
It does not stop there. Pledging to end the digital divide, John Swinney announced in 2021-22 that every child in Scotland would get a digital device. That commitment was dropped this year. Then there are the free bikes. This year, Transport Scotland confirmed that just over 6,000 bikes have gone out to the approximately 250,000 children who are in poverty.
On 11 June, the First Minister said that, where families have free school meal debt, we have written that off, but families are still being pursued and the Government cannot tell us how many families have had their debts written off.
Thousands of Scotland’s children and young people who were promised all of that by the Government have now left school. That matters not only because people are sick of being promised stuff that they do not get but because broken promises to young people impact education and stifle opportunity. Because of the SNP’s litany of broken promises and incompetence, attainment is down and the gap is up. Fewer young people are in jobs, education or training after leaving school.
Will Pam Duncan-Glancy give way?
I am sorry, I do not have time.
Young people from the most disadvantaged backgrounds are five times more likely to be unemployed. Those are not just numbers: they are young people denied opportunity.
Scotland’s once world-renowned education system is on its knees after 17 years of the Government’s mismanagement, and the SNP cannot keep blaming someone else. I find the Government’s amendment and the speech from the cabinet secretary to be tiresome. People watching are tired of the Government’s excuses for not delivering the things that it said that it would deliver. The SNP can point the fingers all it likes, but people in Scotland see the missed opportunities for reducing child poverty and the incompetence and waste that cost us £5 billion and they can hear the experts when they tell the Government that that is because of its own spending decisions.
It is clear that the path to change does not and cannot lie with this incompetent SNP Government. It must fall to Labour members, who are already delivering, to reduce poverty through a new deal for working people, create jobs in GB Energy and improve finances for working people. That is the change that Scotland needs, that is the change that young people deserve and that is the change that we will deliver.
I move amendment S6M-14406.2, to insert at end:
“, and regrets the Scottish National Party administration’s repeated broken promises to Scotland’s children and young people.”
15:14
I should start by thanking the Conservatives, not just for using some of their time this afternoon to debate free school meals, but because the topics of their debates are a defence of green policies from the Bute house agreement era. I am delighted that, having spent so long trying to bring down the Bute house agreement, our Conservative colleagues are now the first to defend the legacy of the Greens in Government.
I will try to be collegiate, but I need to start by making the point that there is more than a whiff of hypocrisy in the Conservatives talking about ways in which we can tackle child poverty. The single biggest driver of child poverty in modern British history is the Conservative Party and the decisions that it has made, whether it be introducing the two-child cap, slashing universal credit or decimating public services. They cannot pick and choose when they want to lift children out of poverty and when they want to push more children into it without accusations of hypocrisy being flung at them.
On that point of collegiality and consensus, I want to talk about a visit in the previous parliamentary session that Oliver Mundell and I and some other colleagues made to multiple schools in Finland, which has had universal free school meals for some time. It was an experience that we all gained a great deal from. We saw almost every pupil sitting together and staying in school at lunch time for a healthy, warm, free meal. That did a whole range of things. It tackled inequality and helped those families who needed it and who would have struggled with paying for school meals. It improved attainment, because hungry children struggle to learn and behave. It eliminated stigma, because we know that, even with the best will in the world and with the most subtle systems of means testing and entitlement, children can find out who is and is not entitled to a free school meal. Even if they do not find out, those children who are entitled under our current system are worried about people—even members of staff—knowing that their family’s situation means that they are entitled. No one misses out under a universal system.
The Finland system also increases social cohesion, because, as we saw, all children eat together, including the children of families who can afford to pay for meals but who otherwise would have probably gone out of school at lunchtime. A very different culture is created as a result of universal provision. Finland is the gold standard. It is all the proof and all the evidence that we need that universal provision works.
It is outrageous that, here in Scotland and across the UK, we have children sitting in school hungry in one of the richest countries in the history of the planet. I am proud that, during the final budget agreement of the previous parliamentary session, just a few weeks before the pandemic brought a lot to a halt, the Scottish Greens managed to secure the Government’s agreement to immediately expand universal provision of free school meals to primary 4 and 5 and then move on to primary 6 and 7.
That was part of a wider package that we worked on together with colleagues in the SNP to do things such as cancel school meal debt. The Scottish Greens were the first to uncover the scale of school meal debt in Scotland. We did the research, we campaigned and then, with the support of the cabinet secretary and the then First Minister, Humza Yousaf, we secured funding to cancel that debt.
This afternoon’s debate is a bit odd, because we are debating something that we all agree on. The real question is about money. I agree with Liam Kerr that it is a question of priorities, although his priorities and mine are very different. I believe that the Greens have proposals for making the scheme financially affordable. For a start, there are ways of minimising costs using shared catering facilities and timetabling.
The problem that I have with the Government’s amendment is that it presents, quite rightly, the scale of austerity delivered by the Conservative Party—and not reversed by the Labour Party—as a challenge. However, it then makes out that that challenge makes austerity inevitable. It is not inevitable. There are a range of ways in which the Scottish Government can save money in-year in this financial year. On the capital side, we would freeze spending on trunk roads and motorway expansion. On the revenue side, we would scale back on tax breaks for shooting estates, for example. It is a question of political choice. I want to hear more about the choices that all colleagues would make this afternoon if we genuinely had a consensus on the priority of delivering the policy.
15:19
Marcus Rashford made a big impact on this whole debate in 2020 and before that. He has left a lasting legacy that has been credited, quite rightly, across the United Kingdom. At that point, the SNP was a victim of its own spin and approach to politics. It is now still a victim as a result.
At the time, John Swinney sought to exploit that campaign and to draw a difference between the Conservative Government at Westminster and the Scottish Government. He said that hunger “doesn’t take a holiday” and that every child, every minute and every school day are incredibly important for learning. He committed the SNP to delivering that promise by August 2022—two years ago—but it is clear that the SNP did not have a costed plan. It was evident from almost the point that the SNP agreed that commitment and put it in its manifesto that it was retreating from it.
Initially, the SNP blamed local authorities for being unable to deliver the commitment in 2022, then it blamed the Westminster Government, and now it is blaming the Labour Government, even though it has been in power for only a few weeks, as opposed to the 17 years for which the SNP has been in government. The SNP hunted around almost from the very beginning for an explanation and an excuse for its failure to deliver the solemn promise that it put in its manifesto in 2021.
It was clear at that point that the SNP refused to accept that there was a looming financial crisis at the heart of the Scottish Government, which successive finance committees and the Scottish Fiscal Commission have been telling us about for years, and it made endless promises, jumping on the headlines that had been created—quite rightly—by Marcus Rashford, but doing so without having a costed plan. I have no problem with the Government meeting the needs and desires of the electorate, but it must be honest and straightforward from the very beginning, rather than using such promises as election gimmicks.
Today, the education secretary has challenged us to say where we would find the money. If she had been at last week’s meeting of the Education, Children and Young People Committee, she would know the answer to that, because Graeme Dey knows exactly where all the money is. Apparently, he has worked it all out. He made an agreement with the college unions across the country, and he told us that he did not have a clue where the finance was going to come from. I suspect that he knows everything about the finances of the Scottish Government and that he has the money tucked up his sleeve. Therefore, all that the education secretary needs to do is to reach over to Graeme Dey, who will have the answer to everything.
We will take no lectures from the SNP about the need to say where we would find the money, because it plays that trick against the Opposition every single time. The Government knows the finances back to front. If it did not, why did the SNP make that promise in 2021? Surely it would have had a costed plan that was worked out over the years. Surely it would have known that the Conservatives were going to have austerity for years and that the successive Labour Government was going to be dreadful. Surely it had worked all that out before it made that promise. However, we know that it had not, because it has played fast and loose with Scotland’s public finances by making endless promises that it simply cannot keep.
Today, the education secretary faces a challenge, because it is clear from what my colleague Ross Greer said, and from what Conservative and Labour members and I have said, that all of us will vote against the Government’s amendment, so she will lose. She must decide how she will respond to the will of Parliament, because the will of Parliament is incredibly important, as we have heard from her bosses—previous First Ministers—over many years. We would expect the Government to make a statement on how it will meet that promise—
You need to conclude.
It is not only our promise; it is the Government’s promise, and it is for the Government to deliver it. We deserve an answer from the Government today.
We move to the open debate.
15:23
I declare an interest in that my eldest daughter is a teacher. She is head of guidance as well as being a physical education teacher.
When I came into Parliament, I led with the statement that I thought that education was the solution to our health and welfare problems, and I believe that even more now. In fact, as I have said in the chamber many times, I think that education should be the cornerstone of every portfolio. However, the biggest disappointment that I have experienced in this Parliament has been the Scottish Government’s failure to drive the changes in education and health that it could have made, given that those portfolios are entirely within the Scottish Government’s control. It could have been bold, taken its own path and delivered solutions to some of the country’s biggest issues, but it has seemed content to stumble along behind the crumbling excuse, “It’s not our fault.”
The Government’s usual fallback position is, “We need more money,” but here is the thing. If you invest in education, you are investing in health, justice, welfare and the economy—the economy that is required to pay for all the services that we need.
We need to define the issues we are trying to address. In education, those are poor physical and mental health, declining behavioural standards, declining attendance and the attainment gap, as well as hunger and malnutrition. Today, we are talking about free school meals for all primary school children. If we are tackling malnutrition and hunger for children coming into school, why are we not talking about free school breakfasts? Logic tells me that that is the meal that we should be targeting, although I am not against also having free school lunches for those children from the most deprived areas.
If we want the uptake of free school meals to improve and the queues outside the chip shop to go down, we need to offer pupils more reasons to be in school. I have put forward the idea of offering some kind of activity prior to the start of the school day that happens to have breakfast included and of offering extracurricular activities at lunchtime to keep children in school and active. Those initiatives would tackle all the issues that I previously highlighted and the costs associated with them.
The Scottish Government’s approach is one of crisis management rather than tackling the long-term needs of our educational environment. It has been funding increases in salary by cutting support staff and reneging on a manifesto promise of free school meals.
Will the member take an intervention?
I am afraid that I do not have time.
Ploughing that furrow simply digs a deeper and deeper hole for our educators, heaping ever more responsibility on to our already stretched teachers.
It is increasingly obvious that, in SNP Scotland, if a pupil is not academically inclined, school offers less and less for them. Sport, art, music and drama are all in decline despite all the mental and physical health benefits that they deliver. Now, the SNP wants to cut back on school meal provision. It is a false economy. It will disincentivise pupils further, leading to more absenteeism, unhealthier pupils, poorer behaviour and a widening attainment gap.
The biggest inequality is the inequality of opportunity, and this decision by the SNP Government is just another element of that inequality. Instead of its delivering the rounded education that we desire, we see short-termism that will just hand on the problems to the next Government.
At some point, we need to halt the continuous decline in our public sector and recognise that, by getting education right, we can start tackling all the other crises that the SNP has presided over. Education used to be the SNP’s number 1 priority. Unfortunately, when it failed to deliver on that pledge, it just moved on to another of its priorities, leaving our education system much worse off than when it inherited it.
The Opposition parties might not agree with some of the solutions that I have put forward, and that is perfectly acceptable—as long as they come up with their own solutions. However, as we know, the SNP’s solution is inevitably yet another consultation that leads to yet more inaction. It will not do. Cutting school meals is yet another symptom of a Scottish Government without a clue.
15:27
I find myself back on the back benches, freed from the shackles of Government, able to say what I really mean and what I really want to say. However, you are all gonnae be extremely disappointed, because sometimes I find Opposition business extremely tedious. Here we have the classic attempt by them to get that “gotcha” moment, talk down the Government and offer no ideas about delivery or what they would do.
The Presiding Officer will remember that we used to discuss the big ideas here, during all parts of this chamber’s business. We used to talk about them all the time—but no longer. It now seems to be about a very simple “gotcha” and trying to get the next headline from the Opposition parties.
Liam Kerr said that we should “put party politics aside”. I would quite gladly do that. If people genuinely want to work with me and others in the SNP to make a difference to young people’s lives, I would say, “Let’s go for it.” However, he made the most partisan political speech that I have heard for some time.
Free school meals are there to support many families who are struggling. I am happy to work with the Government and others to achieve all our ambitions on school meals. This is more than just an academic discussion for me, given my background. My family are from Feegie—which, for the Official Report, is Ferguslie Park, in Paisley. It is an area that has had its challenges with poverty over the years, and that is what this is all about. I am here to represent the people of Paisley and the people I grew up with.
Like other parts of Scotland, Ferguslie Park, in Paisley, has had to deal with those challenges with little support from successive UK Governments. The Scottish Government has invested to support those families as much as it can. A perfect example of that is the £400 million-worth of measures such as the Scottish child payment that have brought 100,000 children out of poverty.
The Scottish Government has had to focus on those things while dealing with the constraints of the Westminster settlement. The problem is that the Scottish Government cannot keep propping up continually failing UK Governments. As I have stated, our on-going challenge in Scotland is that we have been continually hampered by successive UK Governments. I am sure that, with the full powers of independence, we could change all of our children’s futures for the better and move away from 14 years of Westminster failure on top of decade after decade of Westminster failure.
Keir Starmer has been in office for two weeks and has chucked it already. He says that things can only get worse, but the Scottish National Party’s vision is greater than that. When Westminster says, “The game’s a bogey; we might as well chuck it,” we offer hope. We want to empower the people of Scotland to make their own decisions on the future. Even with the devolution settlement, the SNP has managed to bring 100,000 children out of poverty while the Tories, Labour and Westminster accelerate further austerity.
I am here to represent the great town of Paisley, as you may have guessed, and its many buddies. They are my people, and it is my town and my place in the world. When Westminster offers more of the same, I and my colleagues in the SNP offer hope. When they say that things can only get worse, we say that there is another way. I hope that we get further down the road to independence and make things better for the people of Scotland.
15:31
In 2021, the First Minister, then Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills, said that free school meals were a landmark policy. Successive First Ministers committed and re-committed to the policy. Those empty promises are now coming home to roost. If it is not school meals, it is the pledge to give an electronic device to every child, which then became every household, being cancelled, or the pledge to give bikes to children in poverty being cancelled after only 6,800 were delivered—that is less than 3 per cent of the 250,000 children who are in poverty. The Scottish Government promised an increase in teachers and teaching assistant numbers by 3,500, but we now have 250 fewer.
Make no mistake, our children are suffering because of these failures. While we have had this SNP Government, education standards have undoubtedly fallen. The programme for international student assessment results from last year made it clear as day. Our science and maths scores in 2006 were 515 and 506, and they have now fallen to 483 and 471. The poverty-related attainment gap grew in the most recent exam results. For a Government that seemingly sees the issue as a priority, that should be a mark of shame.
Another broken promise on increasing non-contact time by 90 minutes is placing teachers under more pressure. A WPI Economics report found that that would be possible only by raising teacher numbers, but they are now falling. Twenty per cent of teachers are leaving during their probation year, with many reporting stress as a factor. Children will experience the consequences of those broken promises, with large classes and overworked teachers. That will serve only to entrench inequalities and increase the attainment gap that the SNP says it wants to eliminate.
The social attitudes survey this year showed trust in the Scottish Government at the lowest it has ever been, and U-turns such as this are fuelling that perception. The public wants the Scottish Government to succeed and to improve people’s lives, but announcing policies and then going back on them is eroding trust. When politicians make promises and fail to deliver, it reflects badly not only on the Government but on us all. We must understand that headlines are not a replacement for good governance. Governments should do what they say they will do; they should not over-promise and then cry foul when they are unable to deliver.
We need tangible action to give children the best start in life. We need a real living wage to ensure that parents have money to put food on the table, an end to zero-hour contracts to allow stable work, and lower energy bills that are not at the mercy of the global market. That is how we can truly deliver.
15:35
The Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills said that she wanted some context and to engage with the Opposition. Like Willie Rennie, I will take her back a bit in the journey. I will talk specifically about how opinions have changed over time.
When I was first elected to the Parliament, in 2007, the first committee session that I went to on the Education, Lifelong Learning and Culture Committee was a debate about whether free school meals were necessary and, if they were, on what basis. We took extensive—and I have to say, very interesting and, in some cases, surprising—evidence about whether that was the right thing to do. It came not just from Scotland—I remember a big study from Hull City. What was then called the Aberlour Childcare Trust warmly welcomed the committee’s engagement, but the trust said that it was “yet to be convinced” about universal school meals.
Barnardo’s said the same, and Tam Baillie, who was the Commissioner for Children and Young People at the time, said:
“I am not at all sure that introducing free school meals would be the best way of achieving the desired objective amongst our most vulnerable children.”
He also said that many felt that the problems that the committee was trying to address would be far better addressed by giving assistance to those in the earliest years and not necessarily to those who were further into their primary school years.
That was then, and this is now. Fourteen years on, my very strong view is that tackling the problems of unhealthy eating among our schoolchildren—for all the reasons that Brian Whittle set out—should be a major priority during this session of Parliament.
Will the member take an intervention?
I will, in a minute.
I presume that that is why the SNP made the manifesto commitment that it did in 2021. It made that promise, which we are debating this afternoon. As we all know, election promises are very important. If voters are attracted to those promises, as they were to those of the SNP, it is wrong to remove them. If the SNP cannot see that, it need only look at the general election, when other parties—mine included—were soundly taken apart in relation to some of the promises that we had broken.
What matters here, of course, is our young people’s health. Evidence consistently shows that Scotland’s public health is very poor. It also shows that there is a very strong link between poor health and poor attainment. My goodness, the current state of attainment in Scotland is nothing of which to be proud.
There are several issues to be debated. Are free breakfasts better than free lunches? At what age do pupils see the best results from free school meals? Is universalism the way forward? What do we do about the significant waste of food that far too many of our school dining rooms have every day? Those questions are all important but, for the purpose of this afternoon’s debate, the SNP made a clear and unequivocal promise, and to suddenly remove it is both disingenuous and deeply worrying to the parents who are finding it difficult to make ends meet. On that basis, I support the motion in Liam Kerr’s name.
15:38
No child should go to school hungry; I think that we can agree on that across the chamber. I grew up receiving free school meals, and I know how important they are to life chances. As I came from a very poor background, they were essential for my development in every way. However, to be clear, universal school meals have not been axed, and currently the Government provides free school meals for nearly 278,000 pupils. The Scottish Government is reducing the cost of the school day by saving families £400 per child, per year. That provision is being expanded even further to those in primary 6 and 7 who are in receipt of the Scottish child payment.
The decision to delay universal roll-out beyond the 2026 target has not been made lightly, and we must consider the financial backdrop to why such a decision was made. It is impossible to explain the choices that are made in Scotland without looking to the finite and unpredictable budget that is handed down from Westminster each year. It is impossible to divorce the size of that budget from the economic situation in the UK, which has been damaged by years of austerity, the catastrophe of Brexit and the 49 days of Liz Truss.
To place the blame squarely on the Scottish Government is to deliberately and disingenuously obscure the national and international contexts. To justify austerity, successive Westminster Governments blame their predecessors for the conditions that they have inherited, but austerity is a political choice. Since 2019, the Scottish Government has spent £750 million to directly mitigate the effect of UK policies such as the bedroom tax and the two-child benefit cap in order to protect our constituents from the draconian policies that were introduced by the Conservatives and are now being continued by Labour.
Of course, to be in a position where the roll-out of universal free school meals must be delayed is deeply upsetting to me. However, we must work together—cross-party and cross-Government—to find solutions not only to the financial situation that Scotland and the UK are facing but to poverty and inequality more broadly.
The Scottish Parliament’s think tank, the Futures Forum, had an event last night at which the very issue of inequality was discussed, with wide-ranging views and with passion, and one thing was clear—we need to work together to tackle inequality. We have been elected to make people’s lives better, not to participate in a race to the bottom. Austerity has left the poorest even poorer, yet the wealth of the rich soars. The richest 1 per cent of Britons hold more wealth than 70 per cent of the population combined, and 60 per cent of the public think that the rich are not being taxed enough.
The chancellor has been hinting at large cuts ahead without providing the detail that is necessary to plan appropriately. I fear that that may be the first of many difficult decisions, but it does not have to be. The predecessors of our Labour colleagues founded the welfare state as they believed that those in need should have a safety net, and now their Westminster colleagues have the power to end austerity should they choose to do so. Universality is the goal, if we work together.
We now move to closing speeches.
15:42
In its programme for government last week, the Scottish Government made the welcome commitment that tackling child poverty would continue to be one of its top priorities. The challenge, however, is how the Government expects to hit its existing child poverty targets while rolling back on the very commitments that were key to doing so.
I acknowledge that the Scottish Government’s budget is, frankly, hopelessly overcommitted, and no party in Parliament’s hands are clean on that. We have all made extensive spending demands of the Government—my party, in our time in government, secured a number of those demands and has contributed towards that. Far too often, such debates in Parliament—especially when they are about an issue that we all agree on when it comes to the policy—involve quite a lot of fantasy finances.
I have spoken before about my frustration at other Opposition parties for not putting forward proposals, but I am also frustrated by the Government’s line this afternoon that it is somehow powerless to act in this situation. That is not true and I will run through some of the proposals that the Scottish Greens would make for how we could fund this. I do not expect there to be widespread agreement for many of them, but this is our position on how we could afford a policy that we acknowledge is expensive.
In the first instance, we would reform and reduce the overall scale of the small business bonus scheme—that is a quarter of a billion pounds a year, and we all acknowledge that many of the businesses that are in receipt of the money are not small businesses. In fact, they are large and profitable businesses, as the Government’s own review found; they are simply in low-value property. As I mentioned earlier, every year, between £3 million and £5 million of that scheme goes to give shooting estates tax breaks.
We could condition additional tax breaks on companies meeting fair work and climate standards—at the very least, that would give savings for a few years while those companies made the necessary changes to hit those standards.
We could increase the additional dwelling supplement so that we are raising more from those who have the good fortune to be able to afford a second or holiday home.
We could introduce a levy on supermarkets that sell alcohol and tobacco. The Fraser of Allander Institute’s model for that says that it would raise just under £60 million a year. Granted, those in the alcohol health charity sector who have pushed for that believe that money raised from that should be spent specifically in that area, but equally, we could argue that spending on something such as free school meals is preventative health spend.
We could lower the threshold for advanced and higher rates of income tax, which would raise a considerable amount. We could stop standardised tests, which would save us about £5 million a year on the contract with the company that provides them. I note that the Parliament has voted before to end standardised testing, at least in primary 1, yet it still takes place.
We could stop providing grants and other forms of support through our enterprise agencies for the arms dealers that are currently funding the Israeli genocide in Gaza. We could give new powers to councils, such as a demolition levy and a carbon emissions land tax, which would allow them to raise money to fund the policy directly.
We could update council tax valuations from 1991—that is before I was even born, yet it is the foundation of our second most significant form of taxation in Scotland. We could save a fortune by diverting all those who do not need to be in prison to community sentencing options instead.
I could get really niche here—I am sure that everybody is thrilled already—but we could repeal section 55 of the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984, which ring fences parking fine proceeds only for public transport and road network purposes. If we took away the ring fencing, we could spend that money in other areas, such as school meals.
All parties should put forward proposals, perhaps in a more interesting and invigorating way than I just have. It would help the Parliament if we were all honest about how we expect to fund such policies. I disagree with the Conservatives’ constant attacks on the Scottish Government’s international offices, which I think provide value, but the Conservatives have at least proposed a saving with that, although it is more than cancelled out by the tax cuts that they would introduce.
The Scottish Greens are honest. We want universal free school meals and we want them for children up to S6, which is why our proposed amendment called for a pilot in high schools to be completed. That is an expensive policy, but we have laid out a range of options for how we would pay for it. We all agree at least on the principle of universal provision in primary school, but the debate has not taken us any further forward on the key question of how we can afford to do that.
15:47
This have been like a canteen in a high school, as people have rushed through the debate with their four-minute slots. There have been some interesting contributions that I will pick up on. I start by returning, not quite to Liam Kerr—my apologies—but to the cabinet secretary, as I, too, congratulate the debating team winners. It is important that our young people see that their successes are celebrated.
I am slightly disappointed that the SNP Government cannot agree to the motion. We have heard a number of speeches that go around it. I will address Evelyn Tweed’s contribution and her point that the Scottish Government is reducing the cost of the school day but that it is impossible to separate the choices that are made here from what the UK Government is doing. I think that there is a step before that, which is what the motion is about. To disagree with Mr Adam—although it is welcome to see him making his contribution unfettered from the back benches—the debate has been about what it means to promise: to promise in a manifesto, in speeches and in debate.
Will the member take an intervention?
I will, simply because of the courtesy in the way in which it has been asked for.
At last, I have been called courteous. I think that the member has just walked into a bear trap: the great big promise from Anas Sarwar was that there would be no austerity under Labour. How is that for a broken promise?
The member talks to the heart of what this interesting cross-party debate has been about. We will always hold others to the highest level, but we will forgive our own.
The Scottish Government promised young people free school meals—[Laughter.] No. A promise is to assure someone that they will definitely do something.
At lunch time, I had the great privilege to sit at a round-table event when I listened to people discussing promises that have not been kept and what the effect of that was on them. We heard what the effect of being told that something was going to appear in—strangely enough—the programme for government but then seeing that it had been omitted.
Of course, here we are, having a debate about a promise that the Scottish Government made not once, not twice, but on many occasions; a promise that is supported and recognised as being important by members across the chamber, as could be seen in the powerful speech that Liz Smith made about the movement that there has been in the view and the value of free school meals from where we were in 2007.
The Scottish Government promised children free school meals. It assured children that it would definitely do something, but it cannot now deliver that and it wants to address the issue by pointing to challenges from other places—a variety of speeches have pointed to a lack of support from the UK Government down the road, and others have pointed to other areas. However, the question is, did the Scottish Government mean to keep that promise when it made it? The reality is that it has failed to do so. The lived experience of our children is of an SNP Government that has made promises—on bicycles, which Foysol Choudhury mentioned, on iPads, on smaller class sizes and more teachers—that it has failed to keep.
Will the member take an intervention?
Unfortunately, in this vast canteen of delivery and debate, I do not have time to take the intervention.
Maybe the Scottish Government should stand up and say what consideration it actually gave to the matter before it made its promise of free school meals, which it is now unable to keep.
15:51
This afternoon’s debate had the potential to shine a light on how a minority Government can work with the Opposition to deliver improvements for our young people. At times, it failed to live up to that expectation. Nonetheless, I want to respond to some of the points that have been made in what was sometimes quite a frenetic, but important, debate.
Ross Greer spoke to the Finnish example of free school meal provision and the impacts on improved learning outcomes for young people that he and Oliver Mundell observed. I am delighted that he and Mr Mundell benefited from that overseas opportunity. Of course, as education secretary, I do not quite get the opportunity to take part in international travel, but this morning I was at a school in Dundee, where I talked to a number of teachers and young people about their experience of the cost of living crisis in that school. Pam Duncan-Glancy spoke about schools being on their knees and, to some extent, I would agree with that assertion. Today, schools in Scotland such as the one that I visited this morning in Dundee have food banks and clothing banks. They have staff supporting families with the exorbitant costs that are associated with increases in their heating bills. That is austerity in our schools, and it is being challenged by support from the Scottish Government in the form of extra funding for the school clothing grant and the £1 billion investment through the Scottish attainment challenge and funding to remove core curriculum charges.
We do not need to travel internationally to find good practice. For example, Inverclyde Council is a Scottish local authority that has rolled out universal free school meals to all primary pupils. We have examples of local producers and young people with ideas. At the round-table discussion that the cabinet secretary and I held, we heard that many councils are ready to go in that direction, but we need leadership, direction and a wee bit of pulling people together. Will the cabinet secretary pick up the phone to some of those who are doing it already?
I am more than happy to engage with them. I appreciate the member’s interest in the issue and acknowledge that we have worked well together on it in the past. However, what I have not heard from the Opposition thus far—with the exception of Ross Greer this afternoon—are any credible contributions on where the money to fill that funding gap of £256 million will come from. Willie Rennie believes that Graeme Dey has the £256 million up his sleeve. However, I have checked and it is not there, so that is not quite accurate. He went on to traduce the SNP without offering me an answer on the exam question set.
What is our context in Scotland? That context matters. There has been a block grant cut of nearly 9 per cent, which means £1.3 billion less capital for Scotland. [Interruption.] I hear the unionist parties heckling from a sedentary position. This is their union. They should take ownership of the cuts that are coming to Scotland—a £1.3 billion cut that we are having to fund to mitigate Westminster austerity in the shape of things such as the bedroom tax. Further, inflationary pressure is largely driven by Liz Truss’s disastrous 49 days in office. [Interruption.] I hear anger from members on the Conservative benches. However, this is their union: they should own it.
That context is what the unionist parties have bequeathed to the children of Scotland. The Scottish Government is in a financial straitjacket, and there is never a scintilla of recognition that maybe—just maybe—decisions that are taken elsewhere are harming the decisions that are taken in this Parliament.
Let us listen to some of the organisations that are involved with child poverty, because we discussed them last week at length. As CPAG has noted,
“Holyrood policies are working”,
but the UK Government
“must also invest in social security to reverse long-term damage to living standards, starting by scrapping the two-child limit and benefit cap, and restoring the value of child benefit.”
I did not see or hear any commentary on either of those issues this afternoon.
Liz Smith was right to point to the dial shifting on free school meals. It is fair to say that her party has been on somewhat of a journey on that topic, and I note some of the comments from her former colleagues. In 2020, when someone tweeted at Ben Bradley about free school meals, saying
“£20 cash direct to a crack den and brothel really sounds like the way forward with this one”,
Ben Bradley responded:
“That’s what FSM vouchers in the summer effectively did”.
Mark Jenkinson, the former MP for Workington, said:
“I know in my constituency that, as tiny as a minority it might be, food parcels are sold or traded for drugs.”
Therefore, the Conservative Party has been on a journey in relation to its views on free school meals.
Will the cabinet secretary take an intervention?
I am conscious that Mr Kerr would like to make an intervention, but I have five seconds to go, so I will not take it.
It is very clear that, while Westminster takes away, the SNP Scottish Government is investing in Scotland’s future. Child poverty rates are lower than the UK average, and the Scottish Government policies, such as the Scottish child payment, are helping to keep an estimated 100,000 children out of relative poverty this year. Investment in the school clothing grant is worth up to £150 per child, and the removal of core curriculum charges is driving down the cost of the school day.
You need to conclude, cabinet secretary.
I could go on, but I look forward to engaging with the Conservatives and, of course, the Labour Party on these issues through the budget process and on how they intend to meet that £256 million budget gap in order to deliver universality of free school meals in Scotland’s schools.
15:57
I am delighted to close the Scottish Conservative Party debate on free school meals for all primary school pupils in Scotland.
I have heard SNP members, including the cabinet secretary, ask repeatedly where the money should come from. Solutions and comments have been given, but the problem is that the suggestions are unpalatable to them, so the response is to deny that they are being made. Mr Kerr and Mr Greer gave us a fair selection of suggestions and I will make more in this speech. The suggestions are unpalatable, so it is being stated that they are not forthcoming, and that is simply not the case.
The Scottish Conservatives were the first party to make this proposal. In fact, in our September 2020 manifesto, we proposed to expand free school meals to all primary school pupils.
Will the member take an intervention on that point?
On the fact that we had it in our manifesto? I am pleased to do so.
Briefly, Ms Dunbar.
Can the member clarify whether the Conservatives are keen to put food in the bellies of all our bairns or just the first two in a family, because I realise that they are still for the two-child benefit cap.
The proposal was in our manifesto in 2020. I was glad to see the SNP follow suit shortly after that, when the former First Minister announced the same policy at the SNP conference and in the 2021 SNP manifesto. That promise was not only made to the electorate at that conference and in the manifesto but backed up by the next First Minister, Humza Yousaf, in the Scottish Government’s programme for government in 2023-24, when the Government stated that it would
“Work with COSLA in the coming year to prepare schools and infrastructure for the expansion of universal free school meal provision to Primary 6 and Primary 7 pupils”.
Therefore, it is disappointing that the SNP has rolled back on its promise. Yet again, commitments are made and then withdrawn. It is now a pattern. Too many times, we have witnessed the SNP Government promise, with definitive statements, and then underdeliver.
As usual, there was an excellent contribution from my colleague Liz Smith. I note that, back in 2007, Barnardo’s was unsure about the roll-out of free school meals, which is in stark contrast to Barnardo’s report this morning, which highlighted food insecurity and a concern about not expanding school meals to all primary school pupils. That is quite a change. I echo Liz Smith’s comments that unhealthy eating by children should be seen as a major priority.
We also heard very competent comments from Pam Duncan-Glancy, Liam Kerr, Brian Whittle and Liz Smith about breakfasts being included. That is certainly something that should be discussed further.
I was interested in Brian Whittle’s comment that investing in our education is investing in health and our economy and, therefore, in our future. Mr Rennie stated that the will of Parliament is important, so I guess that we will just need to wait to see what happens later.
Today’s debate is about broken promises. It is about more than just the school meal roll-out, as important as that is. In its amendment, the SNP has again cited funding constraints that are halting its ability to stand by its word. One would assume that any manifesto pledge would be fully costed. One would also assume that the priority placed on manifesto pledges was sacrosanct, but it seems that some pledges are more important than others.
There have been no funding cuts for independence papers and staff, so that manifesto pledge is a priority. Why do we not look at year-on-year mismanagement? HMP Barlinnie’s replacement went over budget and £300 million was wasted; £27.6 million was wasted on Scotland’s census in 2022 due to delays and deadline extensions; £57.6 million was wasted by the SNP Government on overdue ferries at Ferguson Marine; and £13 million was wasted on admin for the National Care Service (Scotland) Bill, which we do not actually agree with.
To spin the financial pressures on the Scottish Government as Westminster austerity is simply not correct, and the electorate are wise to it. Over the past 17 years, the SNP has boldly stated its intention with definitive statements. It was not that long ago that education was the watchword. Education was the answer to Scotland’s problems. We have all heard the defining mission—to close the attainment gap, which then became the poverty-related attainment gap. At that time, the First Minister, Nicola Sturgeon, on her Government’s education record, stated:
“Let me be clear—I want to be judged on this.”
I do judge the former First Minister on that, and I believe that she has been found wanting.
We are now told that the Scottish Government will eradicate child poverty—another bold statement—but if it cannot commit to its promise to roll out school meals to all primary pupils, I believe that that is deceitful. I urge members to vote for our motion today.
That concludes the debate on free school meals for all primary pupils. There will be a brief pause before we move to the next item of business to allow members on the front benches to change over.
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