There is a Better Way Campaign
The Deputy Presiding Officer (John Scott): The final item of business today is a members’ business debate on motion S4M-00003, in the name of Elaine Smith, on there is a better way. The debate will be concluded without any questions being put.
Motion debated,
That the Parliament supports the STUC There is a Better Way campaign; believes that cuts are neither unavoidable nor inevitable and that they would actually threaten economic recovery across Scotland and impact on areas such as Coatbridge and Chryston; considers that a sensible and sustainable response to the current economic crisis is contained in the People’s Charter; understands that public sector cuts are likely to have a disproportionate effect on women, children and disabled people, and would welcome widespread support for the STUC campaign and local campaigns such as those in North Lanarkshire and West Lothian.
17:02
Elaine Smith (Coatbridge and Chryston) (Lab): I thank those members who have stayed behind for the debate and those who have signed the motion. I should point out that I am on the Scottish organising committee of the people’s charter. I have spoken quite a bit from the chair in this new session of Parliament but this is my first opportunity to speak in a debate, and I am pleased that it is my own members’ business debate on such an important issue.
I lodged the motion immediately after I was sworn in because of the importance to my constituents of the Scottish Trades Union Congress’s better way campaign and the people’s charter. Their main concerns at the moment are cuts to jobs, benefits and vital public services alongside an increasing cost of living. As the motion suggests, public sector cuts are likely to have a disproportionate effect on women, children and disabled people. That basically means that the most vulnerable people in society are being made to pay the price for the economic crisis, while those at the top who caused it do not suffer at all. Obviously, big business and the better-off do not depend on public services. They can call for cuts because less public spending on welfare and services means more chance of tax cuts to subsidise their own lavish lifestyles.
It is business as usual at the major banking institutions, with bank bonuses expected to run into billions of pounds this year. At the same time, in local government there was resistance to paying the £250 one-off award to those who were deemed to be on low pay because they were earning less than £21,000. Why was that? Because 63 per cent of the workforce came into that category. That shows that low pay is ingrained in the public sector. It is an absolute myth that public sector workers are underworked and overpaid—the opposite is the truth: they are overworked and underpaid. They are the people who work in our hospitals and community centres and who look after our elderly. It is their jobs that are already being lost, which means a loss of those services.
Councils face an unprecedented squeeze on budgets and extremely difficult decisions. Indeed, the chief executive of North Lanarkshire Council has stated:
“These are the hardest financial pressures I have seen in local government”,
and he has been around for some time. Tonight, I call on councillors up and down the country, from whatever party, to set needs budgets and to show support for the better way campaign. Such budgets would consist of what they would do if the cuts were not being imposed. If the Scottish Government is serious about opposition to the cuts, it should encourage councils to set needs budgets and mobilise our citizens against the cuts.
The cause of the cuts is casino capitalism, not casualty staff, and that brings me to the fact that the health service has been reducing services for some time. In Lanarkshire, elderly people have had their podiatry services withdrawn, and they cannot afford to pay for them privately. This week is national breastfeeding awareness week, but breastfeeding mothers and their babies are losing support services. The most vulnerable are suffering disproportionately as a result of the cuts, which is simply unacceptable.
Against that background, and due to vicious attacks on pensions, the Public and Commercial Services Union has voted to strike on 30 June. No one wants to strike, but these hard-working, invaluable employees clearly feel that they have no other option. It is an absolute scandal that millionaire Cabinet members are attacking modestly paid teachers and civil servants for standing up to attacks on their old-age provision.
We can add to that the Scottish Government’s desire for a pay freeze across the public sector. At the same time, it wants control over corporation tax so that it can bring it down. So, the poor pay and the rich get handouts. That really does not seem like “be part of better” as far as the vast majority of workers are concerned.
We all know that the deficit is not the fault of the public services or of public sector workers, and they should not be paying for it. The Scottish Government must stand up for our public services and find ways to challenge the cuts.
The STUC better way campaign and the people’s charter provide a real alternative by promoting growth through investment in new jobs and public infrastructure, including housing, and by calling for tax justice.
Growth is not just about creating a bigger cake. It is how the cake is divided that is important—otherwise, the fat cats just take more.
Gavin Brown (Lothian) (Con): How many of the policies within the people’s charter are Labour Party policy, either north or south of the border?
Elaine Smith: A number of the policies should be everybody’s policies, no matter the party, because they would get us out of this situation and they would stop public sector workers and public services being blamed for something that is the fault of bankers and people at the top.
Most of the big unions support the people’s charter. Roz Foyer of Unite sums it up very well in an article for the Scottish Left Review in which she says:
“It has the power to unite the left across party boundaries behind a positive agenda that is set out in terms all can understand and it neatly encapsulates ‘The Better Way’.”
The charter provides a sensible and sustainable response to the current economic situation through six key aims and proposals. They are: a fair and balanced economy in which leading banks are run democratically and under public ownership, along with proper, progressive taxation; more and better jobs to increase spending power and to provide greater economic stimulus; decent homes for all to tackle the housing shortage and to help growth; protection for our public services and the saving of public money by bringing key services such as energy and transport back into public ownership and ending corporate profiteering in health and education; fairness and justice in society through measures such as free childcare and youth facilities and delivering equality for all; and, lastly, building a better future for all. That last section highlights the folly of spending billions of pounds on war and replacing weapons of mass destruction while people are losing their jobs, their homes and vital services.
The charter will shortly be submitted to the Scottish Parliament’s Public Petitions Committee, with a focus on its Scottish dimensions.
In 1945 the Labour Government mounted a crusade against injustice, even though it was operating in times of deficit. It created the national health service, undertook a massive rebuilding programme and established the welfare state. The people’s charter, if we adopt it, could provide a similar level of stimulus while solving major social problems.
Recent research by the Institute for Fiscal Studies revealed that pensioners and the unemployed suffer from the highest levels of inflation, as they have to concentrate their spending on food and heating. Meanwhile, supermarkets have declared massive profit levels and, as we know, the gas and electricity companies raise prices quickly at the merest hint of higher costs. The editorial in the Morning Star last week put it well:
“The supermarkets and energy companies don’t operate a free market so much as a free-for-all, using their power in the marketplace to enrich themselves and beggar the rest.”
Before Labour took power in 1945, Quintin Hogg, a Tory MP, warned Parliament:
“if you do not give the people social reform, they are going to give you social revolution.”—[Official Report, House of Commons, 17 February 1943; Vol 386, c 1818.]
The people have given the Scottish Government a mandate based on an expectation that it will provide protection from the Tory cuts. If that is not forthcoming, they will no doubt take to the streets in vast numbers to show their anger at the cuts. By supporting the people’s charter and the STUC’s better way campaign, we give a clear signal that MSPs and the Scottish Government are on the right side: the side of the workers.
17:10
Jamie Hepburn (Cumbernauld and Kilsyth) (SNP): Presiding Officer, I apologise to you and others in the chamber, because I may have to leave early to attend a constituency commitment.
I congratulate Elaine Smith on securing the debate, and I am sure that all speakers in the debate will do so. She secured a similar debate previously, and I congratulate her on her tenacity in bringing the issue back to the chamber.
However, there is a key difference between the two debates, which I welcome. In the previous debate, a few of us remarked that no Conservative or Liberal Democrat members were taking part; and in this debate, no Liberal Democrat member is taking part. Perhaps the party’s reduced numbers in the Parliament goes some way towards explaining the situation—although there were no Liberal Democrats at the previous debate, when the party had more MSPs. However, I am glad to see that Gavin Brown is here to participate and perhaps try to defend the United Kingdom Government’s record, although I believe that it is fairly indefensible. I look forward to hearing what he has to say.
The debate is about an important issue, so it is right to debate it again. I support the STUC better way campaign. In my constituency, the PCS in Cumbernauld will have a conference this Friday in support of the campaign. Unfortunately, I cannot attend the conference, but I am glad that such local events are being held. I am sure that there will be similar events in other members’ constituencies.
Like Elaine Smith, I support the people’s charter. I should declare an interest in that I, too, am a member of the Scottish steering group of the people’s charter. I believe that I have Elaine Smith to thank for that. I use the word “thank” advisedly, given the increased commitments in my diary.
Gavin Brown: I have a question for the member that is similar to the one that I asked Elaine Smith. How many of the policies in the people’s charter, which he has just claimed to support, are Scottish National Party policies?
Jamie Hepburn: A primary example is the policy to end investment in nuclear weapons. Another example could be that my party last year debated the issue of the Afghan war and we believe that we should withdraw from Afghanistan this year. I know that the people’s charter also has that position. So, those are two examples for Mr Brown.
My starting point in this debate is the same as my starting point in the previous debate: is the UK Government’s agenda necessary? My conclusion in the previous debate was that it is not and, in the interim, I have not seen much evidence to make me change my opinion. The fiscal deficit that we face is a problem, but I believe that the UK Government’s approach is wrong because it is too fast and the cuts are too deep. The UK Government’s direction of travel is not inspired by the necessity of dealing with the fiscal deficit; in fact, it is an ideological approach in which we see unreconstructed Thatcherites trying to roll back the state. It is an attack on the state, and they are questioning what it is for.
Putting that to one side, is the approach correct? I believe that it is wrong. In the previous debate on the issue, I quoted Paul Krugman, and I will use the same quote again. He pointed out that
“there is no evidence that short-run fiscal austerity in the face of a depressed economy reassures investors. On the contrary: Greece has agreed to harsh austerity, only to find its risk spreads growing ever wider”.
So, the UK Government’s approach will not necessarily deal with the problem that it says it wants to deal with. Elaine Smith’s comments about the approach in 1945, when there was, proportionally, an even bigger deficit than there is now, were well advised.
I reassure Gavin Brown that I accept that there is a need to deal with the deficit. The STUC has said that it accepts that need. However, the current approach is wrong. I believe that there is a better way.
17:14
Neil Findlay (Lothian) (Lab): I must declare an interest. I have been involved with the subject of the debate and in the there is a better way campaign for some months in my home area of West Lothian.
There are two reasons for my involvement in the campaign: I am sickened by the cuts agenda and the consequences for our people and society, and I believe that there is an alternative to the mad, careless and callous rush to acceptance of neo-liberal orthodoxy. The cuts that we are witnessing are as unprecedented as they are unnecessary. Many economists around the globe categorically reject the argument that the cuts were needed to soothe market conditions, and the evidence clearly shows that there was no prospect of the UK’s credit rating being downgraded. The internationally recognised economist and professor of economics and political science at the University of California, Berkeley, Barry Eichengreen, was right when he said that the current breed of cuts-obsessed politicians are
“simply intent on cutting ... for ideological reasons”.
Clegg’s and Cameron’s Cabinet of millionaires does not have a clue about what it is like to live on less than the living wage or to have to choose between spending money on food or kids’ clothes. It makes me want to puke when I hear Osborne and his Bullingdon club chums lecturing us about the big society. We know that volunteers in projects in Blackburn, Addiewell, Pilton, Mayfield and Leith are working themselves to the bone to protect people from the worst of Osborne’s cuts.
Those who caused the crisis in the first place are conveniently forgotten in all of this. The bankers and speculators are not punished, and they continue to cash their fat bonus cheques. The cuts are punishing those who had nothing to do with the crash. It was not public sector workers who speculated on derivatives or caused the crash through irresponsible lending; it was the city geniuses, who we apparently cannot live without and are, as we all know, about to embark on the money-making merry-go-round once again.
My support for the there is a better way campaign was not born simply of a principled objection to the cuts; it also comes from a belief that there is an alternative and better way to deal with the deficit and to build and create a better society. We should be tackling the massive levels of tax avoidance and evasion. Even Mr Gavin Brown’s party has estimated that it brings losses of £40 billion a year. If that party says that there are losses of £40 billion, we can be guaranteed that the figure is many times more than that. If we tackled tax avoidance and evasion, we could maintain and even expand our public services while we reduced the deficit. I say to Mr Brown that, instead of appointing a notorious tax avoider—Philip Green—to advise the Government on how best to slash public spending, perhaps the Government should be collecting the £285 million that he and his wife owe the public purse. He is just one example.
Gavin Brown: I entirely agree that the Government must clamp down on tax avoidance and evasion, and it is doing so. However, if collecting £40 billion is as easy as the member suggests, why on earth did that not happen between 1997 and 2010?
Neil Findlay: I absolutely accept that that should have happened, but let us see Mr Brown lobbying in his party for that to happen now, and calling for Mr Green to be removed from his Government advisory position.
Tackling tax avoidance and evasion is not part of the Con-Dem agenda, and it does not seem to be part of the Scottish National Party’s agenda, either. Rather than shouting about cuts to corporation tax, the First Minister should be arguing with Osborne and Cameron to tackle the tax evaders. Furthermore, how about the First Minister pushing a progressive taxation agenda? Imagine the type of society that we could have if the country’s wealth was shared around a bit more equitably.
We should be investing in our people and our society. That is not only morally correct; it makes economic sense. As my colleague Elaine Smith said, with around six times the deficit equivalent after the second world war, we created the welfare state and the NHS, nationalised key industries and created full employment. We invested in our people then, and we should do it again now. We should, for instance, be pushing for a living wage across the public sector and for all subcontracted workers in that sector, and we should stimulate the construction industry with the anticipated borrowing powers.
The Deputy Presiding Officer: The member should close, please.
Neil Findlay: I had more to say, but I will finish.
I hope that the Parliament will engage with the STUC and trade unions with a view to seeing which areas of the there is a better way campaign we can progress in the Parliament with the powers that we already have.
I ask the minister to address those points in summing up, and I thank Elaine Smith for bringing this debate to the Parliament.
17:19
Gavin Brown (Lothian) (Con): I, too, congratulate Elaine Smith on securing the debate. I will focus on what I guess is the central thrust of the motion. It has been mentioned by every speaker so far, and will no doubt be mentioned by most speakers who follow: that is, that they have signed up to the people’s charter, they believe in it and they believe that it ought to happen. I put questions deliberately to Elaine Smith and Jamie Hepburn, who gave two examples of where he believes in the charter. However, it contains dozens of policies. Every speaker so far has said that they have signed up to it, but if they believe so strongly in it, why have their parties not signed up to it?
Neil Findlay: Will the member give way?
Gavin Brown: The member gave way to me, so I will happily give way to him.
Neil Findlay: I am sure that those members will be arguing within their political parties for the people’s charter and for some of the policies in it to go into their campaigns. I doubt whether we can say that about Mr Brown.
Gavin Brown: The point is that Mr Findlay was happy to criticise the Conservative and Liberal Democrat parties because they have not signed up to the people’s charter, but his party has not signed up to it either.
I will give some examples. The charter believes that control over interest rates should be taken away from the Bank of England and given back to the Government, but it was a Labour Government that gave control to the Bank of England in the first place.
The charter states that all
“leading companies of the banking, insurance and mortgage industries”
should be taken into “public ownership” and
“run for the benefit of all.”
That is not the policy of any party, and I can just about guarantee that it will not be in the next Labour manifesto for Westminster or Holyrood.
The charter also states that there should be a local income tax, yet in the previous session of Parliament, the Labour Party along with the Conservative Party fought tooth and nail against a local income tax. However, the charter says that it should happen and members are happy to say that they have signed up to it.
Elaine Smith: Does the member think that we should take banks into public ownership only when they have toxic debt and that we should hand them back when they are making profits so that the fat cats at the top can once again benefit?
Gavin Brown: My point is that the member is claiming to push something forward and criticises other parties for not doing so, but it is as clear as day that her party does not support the charter at all.
The charter states that
“energy, transport, water, post and telecommunications”
should be brought
“back into public ownership”.
Again, that is not the policy of the Labour Party or any other party.
Jamie Hepburn: Gavin Brown talks a lot about what other parties are doing, but he has not yet addressed what his party is doing. Incidentally, I did not criticise the Conservatives for not signing up to the people’s charter; I criticised them for the measures that they are taking. When will the member get on to his Government’s record? For example, it has cut posts in Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs, when retaining those posts might result in an increased tax take, which is something the member says he supports.
Gavin Brown: Mr Hepburn might be aware from reading the press in the past couple of weeks that, in relation to tax evasion and avoidance, in just the past year in which the coalition has been in government, the amount that is being recovered from high-net-worth individuals has doubled. That is pretty good progress, but there is much more to do.
The starting point for the debate must be the eye-watering size of the deficit and public debt and the sheer amount of money that has to go in paying interest before we spend a penny on public services. Right now, that is the best part of £50 billion a year. Within three years, the figure that is spent on debt interest alone, before we can spend any money on health, education or anything else, will go to £70 billion a year. That is why we have to get the deficit under control and why the Government is right to take the actions that it has taken to reduce the debt and debt interest, so that we can spend money on things that do public good rather than simply on interest.
17:23
John Finnie (Highlands and Islands) (SNP): I congratulate Elaine Smith on her motion. I, too, support the STUC in its there is a better way campaign. I want to pose the question, “Better than what?” It is certainly better than the £1.3 billion of cuts from the UK Government, which will affect every citizen in Scotland and will disproportionately affect the weak and vulnerable. It is better than the on-going attack against the weak and vulnerable in Scotland, which members will know about if they speak to any citizens advice bureau. I am sure that we have all had dealings on disability living allowance and the appointment shambles that goes with it, as well as the curtailing of payments and the distress that it causes not only to individuals, but to their families and friends.
The proposed way is better than spending obscene sums of money on weapons of mass destruction which—as we know from recent events—threaten the communities in which they are based because of safety issues. It is certainly better than waging wars—illegal or otherwise—and the confusing position in which that puts the UK in terms of explaining our position on war to our Syrian and Yemeni brothers and sisters. I believe that there is a better way.
Economists argue in many different ways. I am not an economist, but it is economists who prompt phrases such as, “There’s no such thing as society”. Economists no doubt fed the Conservative manifesto that talked about making
“Britain the most family-friendly country in Europe.”
The Conservatives are a long way short of that.
When a statement is made, we need to ask who is saying it and on behalf of whose interests, what evidence they have, and—most important—what it means for those without a voice. Those who are most affected are, as always, the public sector workers: the very workers who, as we have heard, provide the services that are most vital to our communities. In my view, they should be our most valued workers.
Is the economy threatened? It is not if you are an international speculator with offshore accounts, given the outsourcing that is going on. That is certainly the case with a firm in Inverness at present, much to the distress of many people in the area.
The economy is certainly not threatened if you are an arms dealer, given the unseemly sight of the UK Prime Minister peddling arms at the same time as people were fighting for their democratic rights. It is not threatened if you are a banker, with the greed that has brought about this situation.
I hear what has been said about the people’s charter, and I consider it to be an aspirational document. As with a number of other manifestos, I do not subscribe to it 100 per cent, but where would we be without aspirations? I will pick up on some of the points that the charter makes. It states that we should
“Take the leading banking, insurance and mortgage industries fully into democratic public ownership run for the benefit of all.”
Given the investment that there has been in the banks, many people might imagine that that would be happening at present. However, that is not the case—certainly not for any small business that is looking for a loan.
The charter goes on to state that we should
“Tightly regulate the City markets to facilitate lending and to stop speculation and takeovers against the public interest.”
That is the interest that we in this chamber must serve: the public interest. The charter also states that we should
“Restructure the tax system so big business and the wealthy pay more and ordinary people pay less.”
That is what most folk would call fair and progressive, but George Osborne called his emergency budget fair and progressive, and it was widely reported as such.
An awful lot could be said. We heard earlier today from the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Sustainable Growth about the attack on public sector workers’ pensions, which he rightly described as a “real and immediate concern”. He also said—which I thought was very significant—that it is not the “correct course”. That is another way of saying that there is a better way: I believe that there is a better way.
17:27
Drew Smith (Glasgow) (Lab): I congratulate Elaine Smith, as others have done, on bringing this debate to the chamber. I will focus my remarks on the “better way” elements of the motion.
I draw members’ attention to my past service on the general council of the STUC, which came to an end in April 2010. In my final few months serving on that body, attention was focused almost exclusively on the banking collapse, the bail-out and the potential consequences for ordinary working people in Scotland and for our public services.
It was clear to us then that we were all threatened with a political backlash against public spending and an incoming Tory Government intent on using the global financial crisis as an excuse for ideological attacks on working people. We believed that, rather than learning the lessons of regulatory failure and seeking to correct market excess and corporate greed, the Tories would instead seek to further reduce regulation and tax at the top by punishing those in the middle and at the bottom. We knew that the deficit, which we considered to be manageable and necessary to sustain the economy and return us to growth, would be misrepresented and used as an excuse to attack investment in public services and public spending in general.
Both of those fears have proved to be correct, which is why the STUC embarked on a campaign to educate workers and the public about the economic facts and the assault that we knew would come. The “there is a better way” campaign has been the biggest mobilisation of trade unions, civic Scotland and community activism since devolution. It has involved the voluntary sector, churches, local community groups and affiliates on local trade union councils and it has been extraordinarily successful.
The campaign is explicitly not just an anti-cuts campaign. It pre-dates the Government’s cuts agenda and is not a response to the actions of others. It is a proactive articulation of the long-held view of the STUC and others that consensus around financial deregulation, diminishment of manufacturing and so-called labour flexibility in a market-knows-best economy was never going to be a sustainable route to a prosperous or equal society.
The campaign highlights four priorities: living wages, fair taxation, public services and jobs. It was launched with a rally in this city last October and I was a steward on the march. I know that the Labour shadow secretary of state, Ann McKechin; my leader in this place, Iain Gray; and many members from the two main parties in the chamber were also present. As I said, that was the launch of a movement and the proclamation of an idea, not an end and not the culmination of a campaign. Since then, the STUC and its affiliates have been continuing to rebuild their campaigning capacity, with many better way conferences and training events taking place in workplaces and communities around Scotland.
I pay particular tribute to the Public and Commercial Services union Scotland for its Wick wants work campaign. Two weeks ago, I joined my colleague Neil Findlay at a meeting of the West Lothian TUC to discuss its campaign and I commend it for what it has already achieved. A major mobilisation of Scottish workers also took place with the march for the alternative in London. Again, I was able to be present and the rally was addressed by the leader of my party, Ed Miliband.
As an MSP I will continue to pursue the issues and causes that have brought me into this place. There is an alternative economic vision, which the Scottish Government and the UK Government should be listening to. In relation to the cuts that are being imposed, I hope that the minister will say something in closing about the different impacts that they will have in many communities and on many low-paid workers and vulnerable people.
I know that Government back benchers were on the march last October. I hope that they will remember, in the five years ahead, why they were there. Hundreds of placards were produced bearing the slogan “fair taxes”. They were not brandished in support of slashing corporation tax. Indeed, a speaker from the Irish Congress of Trades Unions explicitly warned against the approach that is still being espoused by the Scottish National Party, despite the death of the Celtic tiger dream and the bending of their arc of prosperity.
Focus on those issues will now be in the context of looming industrial action, which the Tory Government is provoking with its announcement of final positions in advance of negotiations with the unions. At the congress of my own union, the GMB, at which, but for my election to the Parliament, I would have been a delegate, Vince Cable threatened basic rights and freedoms, which are recognised internationally, for workers to organise and represent themselves collectively in defence of their interests and conditions, their industries and, in many cases, their public services.
My party fought the election on a manifesto that contained many elements of both the better way priorities and the people’s charter, which Elaine Smith outlined earlier, and I look forward to pursuing my involvement and activism in these issues in this, our Scottish Parliament.
17:32
John Wilson (Central Scotland) (SNP): As other speakers have done, I congratulate Elaine Smith on securing this worthwhile debate. As per my entry in the register of interests, I declare my membership of the trade union Unite and the fact that I have been a trade union member for more than 30 years.
I come to the debate with a sense of déjà vu, as we debated the issue in the chamber in March 2011—I am not the only one who might think that it was that long ago. Some new faces have contributed to the debate today.
Elaine Smith: Does the member agree that this is such an important issue that we should continue to debate it until we get the people’s charter implemented and the STUC campaign fully supported?
John Wilson: It is such an important debate that this is my first speech in the chamber since the election. It is a very important issue and I have signed up to the better way campaign.
If we are talking about protecting the interests of the vulnerable and the low paid, we need to look at what has happened to the lowest paid in local government in the past decade, particularly those low-paid women workers who are still being denied their right to equal pay in local authorities.
It was interesting that Elaine Smith quoted Gavin Whitefield, the chief executive of North Lanarkshire Council, in relation to the financial squeeze that the council faces—the very same council that has used every legal argument to deny the settlement of equal pay claims in that authority, to the extent that Unison announced just last week that it is proposing to take legal action against the council to secure the equal pay settlement that many low-paid women workers should have been entitled to 10 years ago, rather than today.
We are looking at the issues that local authorities face and the cuts that are now upon them, but they have not always been undercut regimes. Equal pay is one issue that highlights where local authorities have failed to deliver for low-paid and vulnerable women workers. At the same time as North Lanarkshire Council was holding back on making equal pay settlements, in 2003 and 2004, senior officers in the local authority were awarding themselves pay rises of 13 and 14 per cent. We must address the issue in the context of the debate about what is happening to vulnerable workers and what we are trying to achieve now.
I support the STUC’s campaign, because I think that there is a better way.
Helen Eadie (Cowdenbeath) (Lab): I agree with the member that there are concerns, if what he is saying is accurate, but is there not an element of hypocrisy if we take into account the fact that the Scottish National Party Government is presiding over a situation in Scotland in which consultants in the health service are being paid £3,500 a week just for their salary—not including accommodation, which is free, travel expenses and agency fees on top of that? Does the Government not need to get a grip on that situation?
John Wilson: I fully support Helen Eadie in that demand. I have raised on the record the issue of what local authorities and other public sector bodies pay for consultants in Scotland. Local authorities and health boards should employ people to deliver services. The issue relates to the cuts agenda. If the Scottish Government were to take away the consultants, it would be accused of cutting back services in the health service.
I return to my initial point that it is vital to protect those who most need protection: the lowest paid and those facing the worst cuts to their terms and conditions. We need a realignment of political and trade union ideas to ensure that the most vulnerable, those in poverty and the disadvantaged are given the help and support not that they need, but that they deserve.
It is interesting that the Labour Party is now demanding a living wage of £7.15. The Labour Party introduced the minimum wage at Westminster in 1999. It had ample opportunity to ensure that the national minimum wage became a living wage; instead, it held back. The Scottish Government has led the way on protecting jobs in Scotland. The briefing that we received from PCS today indicates that the Scottish Government has guaranteed to protect jobs until 2012. That guarantee will be subject to further negotiation, but let us move away from Westminster, get independence and lead the way on protecting all vital services.
17:38
The Minister for Energy, Enterprise and Tourism (Fergus Ewing): I welcome a second debate on this important subject. In March, my predecessor, Jim Mather, responded to a debate that was led by Elaine Smith. She is certainly persistent in her campaign, and I admire her for that. If I may be so bold, I say that she has demonstrated tonight that even Presiding Officers can still be passionate about their politics. There is nothing wrong with that.
Over the years, all of us as elected representatives have campaigned on many issues where we have felt that a reduction in public expenditure has been leading to hardship for people in this country. I am sure that all of us have done that in many different ways. That is the essence of the sentiments that are expressed in the motion.
In its campaign, the STUC focuses on jobs, services, tax and a living wage. I will try to cover each of those points in turn. The Scottish Government is committed to securing jobs, investment and economic growth. Last week, we saw the seventh consecutive reported fall in unemployment in Scotland—a decline of 10,000 during the three months to April 2011. More good news is in my notes, but I will not read it out, because it is nothing to be complacent about. What I said is true and is to be welcomed: for someone who is one of the 10,000, the situation is welcome. It is an improvement for 10,000 living human beings. However, none of us in any party is complacent about the challenges that we face or the misery of anyone who faces a P45, redundancy and the impact of expenditure reductions.
Our aim is to protect public jobs and services. We have therefore acted to constrain pay, by producing the one-year policy of no compulsory redundancies for staff who are under our control. That is the right policy, although we have been criticised for it, as the First Minister pointed out at this morning’s national economic forum meeting, which I compèred—if that is the right word. We have been criticised for not going far enough—it has been said that we should make compulsory redundancies and that we should put people through the fear and worry of thinking, “Will we be next for the cut?” Instead, we have said that a policy of no compulsory redundancies should apply.
Such a policy has many economic benefits, as well as the human benefit for those who are involved. The economic benefit is that, because people do not worry as much about whether they will be in a job, they do not constrain their spending. We all know that, when people worry about whether they—or even their friends—will have a job, that makes them think twice about spending, particularly on large purchases. That damages the whole economy.
Helen Eadie: Does the minister realise what is happening in the area that I represent in Fife? The reality is that Fife Council, which is SNP and Liberal Democrat controlled, is making compulsory redundancies.
Fergus Ewing: I bow to Helen Eadie’s local knowledge of Fife and I am happy to consider such matters with her further. Announcements have been made recently about successes in bringing jobs to Fife, which I am sure she welcomes, as do we. We have given a lead with our policy of no compulsory redundancies. I hope that that lead will be followed throughout the public sector.
In 2011-12, for staff groups that are under our control, we have targeted resources to protect family incomes for the lowest paid by introducing a living wage of £7.15 an hour and a minimum increase of £250 for people who are paid less than £21,000 a year, to which Elaine Smith referred. That policy is right and I hope that other members will agree—including Mr Brown, who has fought his corner doggedly tonight, particularly given that he is alone on his benches, as his Westminster colleague is all the time.
Neil Findlay: Will the minister consider taking the case for a living wage in local government to his Cabinet colleagues? A living wage could be achieved in local government if the Government pursued it. He might say that the issue is for local government, but the council tax freeze was such an issue and it was imposed by central Government. Why not impose a living wage on local government?
Fergus Ewing: I say with respect that I do not need to take the policy of a living wage to the Cabinet, because the Cabinet produced the policy of a living wage for employees who are under the Government’s control—I was at the Cabinet session at which the decision on that policy was taken. I urge Mr Findlay to make his views known to the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities, as I am sure he will. We have given a lead in respect of public sector workers for whom we are directly responsible.
We have gone further than that. In the context of jobs, services, tax and a living wage, it is reasonable to make the point that we have said that a pay freeze should apply—[Interruption.] I hope that that noise is not from my phone; I do not think that it is.
A pay freeze is justified. In hard times, surely many people—perhaps most people—accept that it is better for all of us to remain in employment than to live in fear of redundancy. That must be a principle. Certainly, from speaking to constituents, I know that, although it is tough and nobody likes it, it is by and large accepted for the greater good of us all.
Elaine Smith rose—
Fergus Ewing: I will go on to make the second point. In exchange for that restraint, we have undertaken that we will do various things. One of those is to extend the council tax freeze that we carried out in our first term of government into our second term. That is in the form of a social contract. We are asking people—rightly including members of the Scottish Parliament and ministers—to accept restraint in their own wages but, in exchange for that, we say that there is one bill that will not go up substantially. We heard about electricity and gas bills going up last week, but there is one bill—the council tax bill, which we are responsible for—that we will freeze.
Neil Findlay rose—
Fergus Ewing: I am sorry. Was there another intervention? I am happy to take one if I have time, Presiding Officer.
The Deputy Presiding Officer: If you want, but this is the final intervention, because we are already over time.
Neil Findlay: The Scottish Government is not responsible for the council tax bill. The councils are responsible for the council tax bill, but the Scottish Government has decided to impose a freeze on them whether they like it or not. I repeat the point: if Mr Ewing is willing to impose a freeze on council tax, is he willing to pursue a living wage in local government? Mr Ewing needs to answer that point, because the principle is the same as it is for the council tax freeze.
Fergus Ewing: That was a double-barrelled intervention. We did not impose the council tax freeze. We indicated that there would be a council tax freeze provided that local authorities were willing to act in partnership with us, and they were.
It is only reasonable to point out that, as far as I understand, the party that Mr Findlay represented at the election fought the election on a policy of a council tax freeze. I do not really like to make partisan comments, but the debate has had an element of partisanship here and there. It seems reasonable that the Labour Party should either stick to its council tax freeze policy or jettison it and should not be for and against it at the same time, which is what we have seen in debates over the past few weeks.
The Scottish Government will do its very best, despite the budget reductions that we have received from the Westminster Parliament, to use taxpayers’ money as best we can to avoid wasting it. Every pound that we waste and, indeed, every £1 million that is wasted by the Government, means that there is less to use for the real priorities in this country. That is why it is so important that we work together to protect, as far as we can, those who elected us to this place, through the provision of services in health, education and all other areas. That is what the Scottish Government will do.
Meeting closed at 17:48.
The Deputy Presiding Officer (John Scott): The final item of business today is a members’ business debate on motion S4M-00003, in the name of Elaine Smith, on there is a better way. The debate will be concluded without any questions being put.
Motion debated,
That the Parliament supports the STUC There is a Better Way campaign; believes that cuts are neither unavoidable nor inevitable and that they would actually threaten economic recovery across Scotland and impact on areas such as Coatbridge and Chryston; considers that a sensible and sustainable response to the current economic crisis is contained in the People’s Charter; understands that public sector cuts are likely to have a disproportionate effect on women, children and disabled people, and would welcome widespread support for the STUC campaign and local campaigns such as those in North Lanarkshire and West Lothian.
17:02
Elaine Smith (Coatbridge and Chryston) (Lab): I thank those members who have stayed behind for the debate and those who have signed the motion. I should point out that I am on the Scottish organising committee of the people’s charter. I have spoken quite a bit from the chair in this new session of Parliament but this is my first opportunity to speak in a debate, and I am pleased that it is my own members’ business debate on such an important issue.
I lodged the motion immediately after I was sworn in because of the importance to my constituents of the Scottish Trades Union Congress’s better way campaign and the people’s charter. Their main concerns at the moment are cuts to jobs, benefits and vital public services alongside an increasing cost of living. As the motion suggests, public sector cuts are likely to have a disproportionate effect on women, children and disabled people. That basically means that the most vulnerable people in society are being made to pay the price for the economic crisis, while those at the top who caused it do not suffer at all. Obviously, big business and the better-off do not depend on public services. They can call for cuts because less public spending on welfare and services means more chance of tax cuts to subsidise their own lavish lifestyles.
It is business as usual at the major banking institutions, with bank bonuses expected to run into billions of pounds this year. At the same time, in local government there was resistance to paying the £250 one-off award to those who were deemed to be on low pay because they were earning less than £21,000. Why was that? Because 63 per cent of the workforce came into that category. That shows that low pay is ingrained in the public sector. It is an absolute myth that public sector workers are underworked and overpaid—the opposite is the truth: they are overworked and underpaid. They are the people who work in our hospitals and community centres and who look after our elderly. It is their jobs that are already being lost, which means a loss of those services.
Councils face an unprecedented squeeze on budgets and extremely difficult decisions. Indeed, the chief executive of North Lanarkshire Council has stated:
“These are the hardest financial pressures I have seen in local government”,
and he has been around for some time. Tonight, I call on councillors up and down the country, from whatever party, to set needs budgets and to show support for the better way campaign. Such budgets would consist of what they would do if the cuts were not being imposed. If the Scottish Government is serious about opposition to the cuts, it should encourage councils to set needs budgets and mobilise our citizens against the cuts.
The cause of the cuts is casino capitalism, not casualty staff, and that brings me to the fact that the health service has been reducing services for some time. In Lanarkshire, elderly people have had their podiatry services withdrawn, and they cannot afford to pay for them privately. This week is national breastfeeding awareness week, but breastfeeding mothers and their babies are losing support services. The most vulnerable are suffering disproportionately as a result of the cuts, which is simply unacceptable.
Against that background, and due to vicious attacks on pensions, the Public and Commercial Services Union has voted to strike on 30 June. No one wants to strike, but these hard-working, invaluable employees clearly feel that they have no other option. It is an absolute scandal that millionaire Cabinet members are attacking modestly paid teachers and civil servants for standing up to attacks on their old-age provision.
We can add to that the Scottish Government’s desire for a pay freeze across the public sector. At the same time, it wants control over corporation tax so that it can bring it down. So, the poor pay and the rich get handouts. That really does not seem like “be part of better” as far as the vast majority of workers are concerned.
We all know that the deficit is not the fault of the public services or of public sector workers, and they should not be paying for it. The Scottish Government must stand up for our public services and find ways to challenge the cuts.
The STUC better way campaign and the people’s charter provide a real alternative by promoting growth through investment in new jobs and public infrastructure, including housing, and by calling for tax justice.
Growth is not just about creating a bigger cake. It is how the cake is divided that is important—otherwise, the fat cats just take more.
Gavin Brown (Lothian) (Con): How many of the policies within the people’s charter are Labour Party policy, either north or south of the border?
Elaine Smith: A number of the policies should be everybody’s policies, no matter the party, because they would get us out of this situation and they would stop public sector workers and public services being blamed for something that is the fault of bankers and people at the top.
Most of the big unions support the people’s charter. Roz Foyer of Unite sums it up very well in an article for the Scottish Left Review in which she says:
“It has the power to unite the left across party boundaries behind a positive agenda that is set out in terms all can understand and it neatly encapsulates ‘The Better Way’.”
The charter provides a sensible and sustainable response to the current economic situation through six key aims and proposals. They are: a fair and balanced economy in which leading banks are run democratically and under public ownership, along with proper, progressive taxation; more and better jobs to increase spending power and to provide greater economic stimulus; decent homes for all to tackle the housing shortage and to help growth; protection for our public services and the saving of public money by bringing key services such as energy and transport back into public ownership and ending corporate profiteering in health and education; fairness and justice in society through measures such as free childcare and youth facilities and delivering equality for all; and, lastly, building a better future for all. That last section highlights the folly of spending billions of pounds on war and replacing weapons of mass destruction while people are losing their jobs, their homes and vital services.
The charter will shortly be submitted to the Scottish Parliament’s Public Petitions Committee, with a focus on its Scottish dimensions.
In 1945 the Labour Government mounted a crusade against injustice, even though it was operating in times of deficit. It created the national health service, undertook a massive rebuilding programme and established the welfare state. The people’s charter, if we adopt it, could provide a similar level of stimulus while solving major social problems.
Recent research by the Institute for Fiscal Studies revealed that pensioners and the unemployed suffer from the highest levels of inflation, as they have to concentrate their spending on food and heating. Meanwhile, supermarkets have declared massive profit levels and, as we know, the gas and electricity companies raise prices quickly at the merest hint of higher costs. The editorial in the Morning Star last week put it well:
“The supermarkets and energy companies don’t operate a free market so much as a free-for-all, using their power in the marketplace to enrich themselves and beggar the rest.”
Before Labour took power in 1945, Quintin Hogg, a Tory MP, warned Parliament:
“if you do not give the people social reform, they are going to give you social revolution.”—[Official Report, House of Commons, 17 February 1943; Vol 386, c 1818.]
The people have given the Scottish Government a mandate based on an expectation that it will provide protection from the Tory cuts. If that is not forthcoming, they will no doubt take to the streets in vast numbers to show their anger at the cuts. By supporting the people’s charter and the STUC’s better way campaign, we give a clear signal that MSPs and the Scottish Government are on the right side: the side of the workers.
17:10
Jamie Hepburn (Cumbernauld and Kilsyth) (SNP): Presiding Officer, I apologise to you and others in the chamber, because I may have to leave early to attend a constituency commitment.
I congratulate Elaine Smith on securing the debate, and I am sure that all speakers in the debate will do so. She secured a similar debate previously, and I congratulate her on her tenacity in bringing the issue back to the chamber.
However, there is a key difference between the two debates, which I welcome. In the previous debate, a few of us remarked that no Conservative or Liberal Democrat members were taking part; and in this debate, no Liberal Democrat member is taking part. Perhaps the party’s reduced numbers in the Parliament goes some way towards explaining the situation—although there were no Liberal Democrats at the previous debate, when the party had more MSPs. However, I am glad to see that Gavin Brown is here to participate and perhaps try to defend the United Kingdom Government’s record, although I believe that it is fairly indefensible. I look forward to hearing what he has to say.
The debate is about an important issue, so it is right to debate it again. I support the STUC better way campaign. In my constituency, the PCS in Cumbernauld will have a conference this Friday in support of the campaign. Unfortunately, I cannot attend the conference, but I am glad that such local events are being held. I am sure that there will be similar events in other members’ constituencies.
Like Elaine Smith, I support the people’s charter. I should declare an interest in that I, too, am a member of the Scottish steering group of the people’s charter. I believe that I have Elaine Smith to thank for that. I use the word “thank” advisedly, given the increased commitments in my diary.
Gavin Brown: I have a question for the member that is similar to the one that I asked Elaine Smith. How many of the policies in the people’s charter, which he has just claimed to support, are Scottish National Party policies?
Jamie Hepburn: A primary example is the policy to end investment in nuclear weapons. Another example could be that my party last year debated the issue of the Afghan war and we believe that we should withdraw from Afghanistan this year. I know that the people’s charter also has that position. So, those are two examples for Mr Brown.
My starting point in this debate is the same as my starting point in the previous debate: is the UK Government’s agenda necessary? My conclusion in the previous debate was that it is not and, in the interim, I have not seen much evidence to make me change my opinion. The fiscal deficit that we face is a problem, but I believe that the UK Government’s approach is wrong because it is too fast and the cuts are too deep. The UK Government’s direction of travel is not inspired by the necessity of dealing with the fiscal deficit; in fact, it is an ideological approach in which we see unreconstructed Thatcherites trying to roll back the state. It is an attack on the state, and they are questioning what it is for.
Putting that to one side, is the approach correct? I believe that it is wrong. In the previous debate on the issue, I quoted Paul Krugman, and I will use the same quote again. He pointed out that
“there is no evidence that short-run fiscal austerity in the face of a depressed economy reassures investors. On the contrary: Greece has agreed to harsh austerity, only to find its risk spreads growing ever wider”.
So, the UK Government’s approach will not necessarily deal with the problem that it says it wants to deal with. Elaine Smith’s comments about the approach in 1945, when there was, proportionally, an even bigger deficit than there is now, were well advised.
I reassure Gavin Brown that I accept that there is a need to deal with the deficit. The STUC has said that it accepts that need. However, the current approach is wrong. I believe that there is a better way.
17:14
Neil Findlay (Lothian) (Lab): I must declare an interest. I have been involved with the subject of the debate and in the there is a better way campaign for some months in my home area of West Lothian.
There are two reasons for my involvement in the campaign: I am sickened by the cuts agenda and the consequences for our people and society, and I believe that there is an alternative to the mad, careless and callous rush to acceptance of neo-liberal orthodoxy. The cuts that we are witnessing are as unprecedented as they are unnecessary. Many economists around the globe categorically reject the argument that the cuts were needed to soothe market conditions, and the evidence clearly shows that there was no prospect of the UK’s credit rating being downgraded. The internationally recognised economist and professor of economics and political science at the University of California, Berkeley, Barry Eichengreen, was right when he said that the current breed of cuts-obsessed politicians are
“simply intent on cutting ... for ideological reasons”.
Clegg’s and Cameron’s Cabinet of millionaires does not have a clue about what it is like to live on less than the living wage or to have to choose between spending money on food or kids’ clothes. It makes me want to puke when I hear Osborne and his Bullingdon club chums lecturing us about the big society. We know that volunteers in projects in Blackburn, Addiewell, Pilton, Mayfield and Leith are working themselves to the bone to protect people from the worst of Osborne’s cuts.
Those who caused the crisis in the first place are conveniently forgotten in all of this. The bankers and speculators are not punished, and they continue to cash their fat bonus cheques. The cuts are punishing those who had nothing to do with the crash. It was not public sector workers who speculated on derivatives or caused the crash through irresponsible lending; it was the city geniuses, who we apparently cannot live without and are, as we all know, about to embark on the money-making merry-go-round once again.
My support for the there is a better way campaign was not born simply of a principled objection to the cuts; it also comes from a belief that there is an alternative and better way to deal with the deficit and to build and create a better society. We should be tackling the massive levels of tax avoidance and evasion. Even Mr Gavin Brown’s party has estimated that it brings losses of £40 billion a year. If that party says that there are losses of £40 billion, we can be guaranteed that the figure is many times more than that. If we tackled tax avoidance and evasion, we could maintain and even expand our public services while we reduced the deficit. I say to Mr Brown that, instead of appointing a notorious tax avoider—Philip Green—to advise the Government on how best to slash public spending, perhaps the Government should be collecting the £285 million that he and his wife owe the public purse. He is just one example.
Gavin Brown: I entirely agree that the Government must clamp down on tax avoidance and evasion, and it is doing so. However, if collecting £40 billion is as easy as the member suggests, why on earth did that not happen between 1997 and 2010?
Neil Findlay: I absolutely accept that that should have happened, but let us see Mr Brown lobbying in his party for that to happen now, and calling for Mr Green to be removed from his Government advisory position.
Tackling tax avoidance and evasion is not part of the Con-Dem agenda, and it does not seem to be part of the Scottish National Party’s agenda, either. Rather than shouting about cuts to corporation tax, the First Minister should be arguing with Osborne and Cameron to tackle the tax evaders. Furthermore, how about the First Minister pushing a progressive taxation agenda? Imagine the type of society that we could have if the country’s wealth was shared around a bit more equitably.
We should be investing in our people and our society. That is not only morally correct; it makes economic sense. As my colleague Elaine Smith said, with around six times the deficit equivalent after the second world war, we created the welfare state and the NHS, nationalised key industries and created full employment. We invested in our people then, and we should do it again now. We should, for instance, be pushing for a living wage across the public sector and for all subcontracted workers in that sector, and we should stimulate the construction industry with the anticipated borrowing powers.
The Deputy Presiding Officer: The member should close, please.
Neil Findlay: I had more to say, but I will finish.
I hope that the Parliament will engage with the STUC and trade unions with a view to seeing which areas of the there is a better way campaign we can progress in the Parliament with the powers that we already have.
I ask the minister to address those points in summing up, and I thank Elaine Smith for bringing this debate to the Parliament.
17:19
Gavin Brown (Lothian) (Con): I, too, congratulate Elaine Smith on securing the debate. I will focus on what I guess is the central thrust of the motion. It has been mentioned by every speaker so far, and will no doubt be mentioned by most speakers who follow: that is, that they have signed up to the people’s charter, they believe in it and they believe that it ought to happen. I put questions deliberately to Elaine Smith and Jamie Hepburn, who gave two examples of where he believes in the charter. However, it contains dozens of policies. Every speaker so far has said that they have signed up to it, but if they believe so strongly in it, why have their parties not signed up to it?
Neil Findlay: Will the member give way?
Gavin Brown: The member gave way to me, so I will happily give way to him.
Neil Findlay: I am sure that those members will be arguing within their political parties for the people’s charter and for some of the policies in it to go into their campaigns. I doubt whether we can say that about Mr Brown.
Gavin Brown: The point is that Mr Findlay was happy to criticise the Conservative and Liberal Democrat parties because they have not signed up to the people’s charter, but his party has not signed up to it either.
I will give some examples. The charter believes that control over interest rates should be taken away from the Bank of England and given back to the Government, but it was a Labour Government that gave control to the Bank of England in the first place.
The charter states that all
“leading companies of the banking, insurance and mortgage industries”
should be taken into “public ownership” and
“run for the benefit of all.”
That is not the policy of any party, and I can just about guarantee that it will not be in the next Labour manifesto for Westminster or Holyrood.
The charter also states that there should be a local income tax, yet in the previous session of Parliament, the Labour Party along with the Conservative Party fought tooth and nail against a local income tax. However, the charter says that it should happen and members are happy to say that they have signed up to it.
Elaine Smith: Does the member think that we should take banks into public ownership only when they have toxic debt and that we should hand them back when they are making profits so that the fat cats at the top can once again benefit?
Gavin Brown: My point is that the member is claiming to push something forward and criticises other parties for not doing so, but it is as clear as day that her party does not support the charter at all.
The charter states that
“energy, transport, water, post and telecommunications”
should be brought
“back into public ownership”.
Again, that is not the policy of the Labour Party or any other party.
Jamie Hepburn: Gavin Brown talks a lot about what other parties are doing, but he has not yet addressed what his party is doing. Incidentally, I did not criticise the Conservatives for not signing up to the people’s charter; I criticised them for the measures that they are taking. When will the member get on to his Government’s record? For example, it has cut posts in Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs, when retaining those posts might result in an increased tax take, which is something the member says he supports.
Gavin Brown: Mr Hepburn might be aware from reading the press in the past couple of weeks that, in relation to tax evasion and avoidance, in just the past year in which the coalition has been in government, the amount that is being recovered from high-net-worth individuals has doubled. That is pretty good progress, but there is much more to do.
The starting point for the debate must be the eye-watering size of the deficit and public debt and the sheer amount of money that has to go in paying interest before we spend a penny on public services. Right now, that is the best part of £50 billion a year. Within three years, the figure that is spent on debt interest alone, before we can spend any money on health, education or anything else, will go to £70 billion a year. That is why we have to get the deficit under control and why the Government is right to take the actions that it has taken to reduce the debt and debt interest, so that we can spend money on things that do public good rather than simply on interest.
17:23
John Finnie (Highlands and Islands) (SNP): I congratulate Elaine Smith on her motion. I, too, support the STUC in its there is a better way campaign. I want to pose the question, “Better than what?” It is certainly better than the £1.3 billion of cuts from the UK Government, which will affect every citizen in Scotland and will disproportionately affect the weak and vulnerable. It is better than the on-going attack against the weak and vulnerable in Scotland, which members will know about if they speak to any citizens advice bureau. I am sure that we have all had dealings on disability living allowance and the appointment shambles that goes with it, as well as the curtailing of payments and the distress that it causes not only to individuals, but to their families and friends.
The proposed way is better than spending obscene sums of money on weapons of mass destruction which—as we know from recent events—threaten the communities in which they are based because of safety issues. It is certainly better than waging wars—illegal or otherwise—and the confusing position in which that puts the UK in terms of explaining our position on war to our Syrian and Yemeni brothers and sisters. I believe that there is a better way.
Economists argue in many different ways. I am not an economist, but it is economists who prompt phrases such as, “There’s no such thing as society”. Economists no doubt fed the Conservative manifesto that talked about making
“Britain the most family-friendly country in Europe.”
The Conservatives are a long way short of that.
When a statement is made, we need to ask who is saying it and on behalf of whose interests, what evidence they have, and—most important—what it means for those without a voice. Those who are most affected are, as always, the public sector workers: the very workers who, as we have heard, provide the services that are most vital to our communities. In my view, they should be our most valued workers.
Is the economy threatened? It is not if you are an international speculator with offshore accounts, given the outsourcing that is going on. That is certainly the case with a firm in Inverness at present, much to the distress of many people in the area.
The economy is certainly not threatened if you are an arms dealer, given the unseemly sight of the UK Prime Minister peddling arms at the same time as people were fighting for their democratic rights. It is not threatened if you are a banker, with the greed that has brought about this situation.
I hear what has been said about the people’s charter, and I consider it to be an aspirational document. As with a number of other manifestos, I do not subscribe to it 100 per cent, but where would we be without aspirations? I will pick up on some of the points that the charter makes. It states that we should
“Take the leading banking, insurance and mortgage industries fully into democratic public ownership run for the benefit of all.”
Given the investment that there has been in the banks, many people might imagine that that would be happening at present. However, that is not the case—certainly not for any small business that is looking for a loan.
The charter goes on to state that we should
“Tightly regulate the City markets to facilitate lending and to stop speculation and takeovers against the public interest.”
That is the interest that we in this chamber must serve: the public interest. The charter also states that we should
“Restructure the tax system so big business and the wealthy pay more and ordinary people pay less.”
That is what most folk would call fair and progressive, but George Osborne called his emergency budget fair and progressive, and it was widely reported as such.
An awful lot could be said. We heard earlier today from the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Sustainable Growth about the attack on public sector workers’ pensions, which he rightly described as a “real and immediate concern”. He also said—which I thought was very significant—that it is not the “correct course”. That is another way of saying that there is a better way: I believe that there is a better way.
17:27
Drew Smith (Glasgow) (Lab): I congratulate Elaine Smith, as others have done, on bringing this debate to the chamber. I will focus my remarks on the “better way” elements of the motion.
I draw members’ attention to my past service on the general council of the STUC, which came to an end in April 2010. In my final few months serving on that body, attention was focused almost exclusively on the banking collapse, the bail-out and the potential consequences for ordinary working people in Scotland and for our public services.
It was clear to us then that we were all threatened with a political backlash against public spending and an incoming Tory Government intent on using the global financial crisis as an excuse for ideological attacks on working people. We believed that, rather than learning the lessons of regulatory failure and seeking to correct market excess and corporate greed, the Tories would instead seek to further reduce regulation and tax at the top by punishing those in the middle and at the bottom. We knew that the deficit, which we considered to be manageable and necessary to sustain the economy and return us to growth, would be misrepresented and used as an excuse to attack investment in public services and public spending in general.
Both of those fears have proved to be correct, which is why the STUC embarked on a campaign to educate workers and the public about the economic facts and the assault that we knew would come. The “there is a better way” campaign has been the biggest mobilisation of trade unions, civic Scotland and community activism since devolution. It has involved the voluntary sector, churches, local community groups and affiliates on local trade union councils and it has been extraordinarily successful.
The campaign is explicitly not just an anti-cuts campaign. It pre-dates the Government’s cuts agenda and is not a response to the actions of others. It is a proactive articulation of the long-held view of the STUC and others that consensus around financial deregulation, diminishment of manufacturing and so-called labour flexibility in a market-knows-best economy was never going to be a sustainable route to a prosperous or equal society.
The campaign highlights four priorities: living wages, fair taxation, public services and jobs. It was launched with a rally in this city last October and I was a steward on the march. I know that the Labour shadow secretary of state, Ann McKechin; my leader in this place, Iain Gray; and many members from the two main parties in the chamber were also present. As I said, that was the launch of a movement and the proclamation of an idea, not an end and not the culmination of a campaign. Since then, the STUC and its affiliates have been continuing to rebuild their campaigning capacity, with many better way conferences and training events taking place in workplaces and communities around Scotland.
I pay particular tribute to the Public and Commercial Services union Scotland for its Wick wants work campaign. Two weeks ago, I joined my colleague Neil Findlay at a meeting of the West Lothian TUC to discuss its campaign and I commend it for what it has already achieved. A major mobilisation of Scottish workers also took place with the march for the alternative in London. Again, I was able to be present and the rally was addressed by the leader of my party, Ed Miliband.
As an MSP I will continue to pursue the issues and causes that have brought me into this place. There is an alternative economic vision, which the Scottish Government and the UK Government should be listening to. In relation to the cuts that are being imposed, I hope that the minister will say something in closing about the different impacts that they will have in many communities and on many low-paid workers and vulnerable people.
I know that Government back benchers were on the march last October. I hope that they will remember, in the five years ahead, why they were there. Hundreds of placards were produced bearing the slogan “fair taxes”. They were not brandished in support of slashing corporation tax. Indeed, a speaker from the Irish Congress of Trades Unions explicitly warned against the approach that is still being espoused by the Scottish National Party, despite the death of the Celtic tiger dream and the bending of their arc of prosperity.
Focus on those issues will now be in the context of looming industrial action, which the Tory Government is provoking with its announcement of final positions in advance of negotiations with the unions. At the congress of my own union, the GMB, at which, but for my election to the Parliament, I would have been a delegate, Vince Cable threatened basic rights and freedoms, which are recognised internationally, for workers to organise and represent themselves collectively in defence of their interests and conditions, their industries and, in many cases, their public services.
My party fought the election on a manifesto that contained many elements of both the better way priorities and the people’s charter, which Elaine Smith outlined earlier, and I look forward to pursuing my involvement and activism in these issues in this, our Scottish Parliament.
17:32
John Wilson (Central Scotland) (SNP): As other speakers have done, I congratulate Elaine Smith on securing this worthwhile debate. As per my entry in the register of interests, I declare my membership of the trade union Unite and the fact that I have been a trade union member for more than 30 years.
I come to the debate with a sense of déjà vu, as we debated the issue in the chamber in March 2011—I am not the only one who might think that it was that long ago. Some new faces have contributed to the debate today.
Elaine Smith: Does the member agree that this is such an important issue that we should continue to debate it until we get the people’s charter implemented and the STUC campaign fully supported?
John Wilson: It is such an important debate that this is my first speech in the chamber since the election. It is a very important issue and I have signed up to the better way campaign.
If we are talking about protecting the interests of the vulnerable and the low paid, we need to look at what has happened to the lowest paid in local government in the past decade, particularly those low-paid women workers who are still being denied their right to equal pay in local authorities.
It was interesting that Elaine Smith quoted Gavin Whitefield, the chief executive of North Lanarkshire Council, in relation to the financial squeeze that the council faces—the very same council that has used every legal argument to deny the settlement of equal pay claims in that authority, to the extent that Unison announced just last week that it is proposing to take legal action against the council to secure the equal pay settlement that many low-paid women workers should have been entitled to 10 years ago, rather than today.
We are looking at the issues that local authorities face and the cuts that are now upon them, but they have not always been undercut regimes. Equal pay is one issue that highlights where local authorities have failed to deliver for low-paid and vulnerable women workers. At the same time as North Lanarkshire Council was holding back on making equal pay settlements, in 2003 and 2004, senior officers in the local authority were awarding themselves pay rises of 13 and 14 per cent. We must address the issue in the context of the debate about what is happening to vulnerable workers and what we are trying to achieve now.
I support the STUC’s campaign, because I think that there is a better way.
Helen Eadie (Cowdenbeath) (Lab): I agree with the member that there are concerns, if what he is saying is accurate, but is there not an element of hypocrisy if we take into account the fact that the Scottish National Party Government is presiding over a situation in Scotland in which consultants in the health service are being paid £3,500 a week just for their salary—not including accommodation, which is free, travel expenses and agency fees on top of that? Does the Government not need to get a grip on that situation?
John Wilson: I fully support Helen Eadie in that demand. I have raised on the record the issue of what local authorities and other public sector bodies pay for consultants in Scotland. Local authorities and health boards should employ people to deliver services. The issue relates to the cuts agenda. If the Scottish Government were to take away the consultants, it would be accused of cutting back services in the health service.
I return to my initial point that it is vital to protect those who most need protection: the lowest paid and those facing the worst cuts to their terms and conditions. We need a realignment of political and trade union ideas to ensure that the most vulnerable, those in poverty and the disadvantaged are given the help and support not that they need, but that they deserve.
It is interesting that the Labour Party is now demanding a living wage of £7.15. The Labour Party introduced the minimum wage at Westminster in 1999. It had ample opportunity to ensure that the national minimum wage became a living wage; instead, it held back. The Scottish Government has led the way on protecting jobs in Scotland. The briefing that we received from PCS today indicates that the Scottish Government has guaranteed to protect jobs until 2012. That guarantee will be subject to further negotiation, but let us move away from Westminster, get independence and lead the way on protecting all vital services.
17:38
The Minister for Energy, Enterprise and Tourism (Fergus Ewing): I welcome a second debate on this important subject. In March, my predecessor, Jim Mather, responded to a debate that was led by Elaine Smith. She is certainly persistent in her campaign, and I admire her for that. If I may be so bold, I say that she has demonstrated tonight that even Presiding Officers can still be passionate about their politics. There is nothing wrong with that.
Over the years, all of us as elected representatives have campaigned on many issues where we have felt that a reduction in public expenditure has been leading to hardship for people in this country. I am sure that all of us have done that in many different ways. That is the essence of the sentiments that are expressed in the motion.
In its campaign, the STUC focuses on jobs, services, tax and a living wage. I will try to cover each of those points in turn. The Scottish Government is committed to securing jobs, investment and economic growth. Last week, we saw the seventh consecutive reported fall in unemployment in Scotland—a decline of 10,000 during the three months to April 2011. More good news is in my notes, but I will not read it out, because it is nothing to be complacent about. What I said is true and is to be welcomed: for someone who is one of the 10,000, the situation is welcome. It is an improvement for 10,000 living human beings. However, none of us in any party is complacent about the challenges that we face or the misery of anyone who faces a P45, redundancy and the impact of expenditure reductions.
Our aim is to protect public jobs and services. We have therefore acted to constrain pay, by producing the one-year policy of no compulsory redundancies for staff who are under our control. That is the right policy, although we have been criticised for it, as the First Minister pointed out at this morning’s national economic forum meeting, which I compèred—if that is the right word. We have been criticised for not going far enough—it has been said that we should make compulsory redundancies and that we should put people through the fear and worry of thinking, “Will we be next for the cut?” Instead, we have said that a policy of no compulsory redundancies should apply.
Such a policy has many economic benefits, as well as the human benefit for those who are involved. The economic benefit is that, because people do not worry as much about whether they will be in a job, they do not constrain their spending. We all know that, when people worry about whether they—or even their friends—will have a job, that makes them think twice about spending, particularly on large purchases. That damages the whole economy.
Helen Eadie: Does the minister realise what is happening in the area that I represent in Fife? The reality is that Fife Council, which is SNP and Liberal Democrat controlled, is making compulsory redundancies.
Fergus Ewing: I bow to Helen Eadie’s local knowledge of Fife and I am happy to consider such matters with her further. Announcements have been made recently about successes in bringing jobs to Fife, which I am sure she welcomes, as do we. We have given a lead with our policy of no compulsory redundancies. I hope that that lead will be followed throughout the public sector.
In 2011-12, for staff groups that are under our control, we have targeted resources to protect family incomes for the lowest paid by introducing a living wage of £7.15 an hour and a minimum increase of £250 for people who are paid less than £21,000 a year, to which Elaine Smith referred. That policy is right and I hope that other members will agree—including Mr Brown, who has fought his corner doggedly tonight, particularly given that he is alone on his benches, as his Westminster colleague is all the time.
Neil Findlay: Will the minister consider taking the case for a living wage in local government to his Cabinet colleagues? A living wage could be achieved in local government if the Government pursued it. He might say that the issue is for local government, but the council tax freeze was such an issue and it was imposed by central Government. Why not impose a living wage on local government?
Fergus Ewing: I say with respect that I do not need to take the policy of a living wage to the Cabinet, because the Cabinet produced the policy of a living wage for employees who are under the Government’s control—I was at the Cabinet session at which the decision on that policy was taken. I urge Mr Findlay to make his views known to the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities, as I am sure he will. We have given a lead in respect of public sector workers for whom we are directly responsible.
We have gone further than that. In the context of jobs, services, tax and a living wage, it is reasonable to make the point that we have said that a pay freeze should apply—[Interruption.] I hope that that noise is not from my phone; I do not think that it is.
A pay freeze is justified. In hard times, surely many people—perhaps most people—accept that it is better for all of us to remain in employment than to live in fear of redundancy. That must be a principle. Certainly, from speaking to constituents, I know that, although it is tough and nobody likes it, it is by and large accepted for the greater good of us all.
Elaine Smith rose—
Fergus Ewing: I will go on to make the second point. In exchange for that restraint, we have undertaken that we will do various things. One of those is to extend the council tax freeze that we carried out in our first term of government into our second term. That is in the form of a social contract. We are asking people—rightly including members of the Scottish Parliament and ministers—to accept restraint in their own wages but, in exchange for that, we say that there is one bill that will not go up substantially. We heard about electricity and gas bills going up last week, but there is one bill—the council tax bill, which we are responsible for—that we will freeze.
Neil Findlay rose—
Fergus Ewing: I am sorry. Was there another intervention? I am happy to take one if I have time, Presiding Officer.
The Deputy Presiding Officer: If you want, but this is the final intervention, because we are already over time.
Neil Findlay: The Scottish Government is not responsible for the council tax bill. The councils are responsible for the council tax bill, but the Scottish Government has decided to impose a freeze on them whether they like it or not. I repeat the point: if Mr Ewing is willing to impose a freeze on council tax, is he willing to pursue a living wage in local government? Mr Ewing needs to answer that point, because the principle is the same as it is for the council tax freeze.
Fergus Ewing: That was a double-barrelled intervention. We did not impose the council tax freeze. We indicated that there would be a council tax freeze provided that local authorities were willing to act in partnership with us, and they were.
It is only reasonable to point out that, as far as I understand, the party that Mr Findlay represented at the election fought the election on a policy of a council tax freeze. I do not really like to make partisan comments, but the debate has had an element of partisanship here and there. It seems reasonable that the Labour Party should either stick to its council tax freeze policy or jettison it and should not be for and against it at the same time, which is what we have seen in debates over the past few weeks.
The Scottish Government will do its very best, despite the budget reductions that we have received from the Westminster Parliament, to use taxpayers’ money as best we can to avoid wasting it. Every pound that we waste and, indeed, every £1 million that is wasted by the Government, means that there is less to use for the real priorities in this country. That is why it is so important that we work together to protect, as far as we can, those who elected us to this place, through the provision of services in health, education and all other areas. That is what the Scottish Government will do.
Meeting closed at 17:48.
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