Oral Answers to Questions
Brendan O'Hara Excerpts(2 weeks, 5 days ago)
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Ian Murray
Of course, I could not agree more. It is not just the £4.9 billion, but all the other investment that the UK Government made outside the Barnett consequentials. The Labour Government have delivered billions of pounds more for schools and hospitals in Scotland. It is more money than ever before, but the SNP MPs voted against it. They voted to deny Holyrood its biggest ever Budget settlement by voting against the Finance Bill last week, but of course they will happily spend it in their Budget today. They also voted against Great British Energy, which will be based in the SNP leader’s own constituency. Given what we have read about the SNP’s selection processes, I guess the SNP MPs are keener to send themselves to Holyrood than billions of pounds of extra funding.
Brendan O’Hara (Argyll, Bute and South Lochaber) (SNP)
I am sure that pensioners in the Secretary of State’s constituency are as relieved as those in Argyll, Bute and South Lochaber that the Scottish Government’s Budget will introduce a pension-age winter heating payment for all Scottish pensioners. The SNP Government are doing the right thing by Scottish pensioners. Will he join me in urging the Labour Government here in Westminster to do the right thing by pensioners in England and Wales and give them back their winter fuel allowance as well?
Ian Murray
What the hon. Gentleman has just proved is that the winter fuel payment in Scotland is actually devolved.
Points of Order
Brendan O'Hara Excerpts(2 months, 1 week ago)
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Jamie Stone (Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross) (LD)
Further to those points of order, Mr Speaker. It may come as a surprise to Members that I have a photograph of Alex Salmond in my back hall. That is because a long time ago, he, the right hon. Member for New Forest West (Sir Desmond Swayne) and I were all members of the Students’ Representative Council of St Andrews University. It was a sleepy organisation in which we debated this and that. Then, with a flash and a bang, like Mephistopheles appearing in “Doctor Faustus”, he was there from nowhere—a fully equipped, fully armed, formidable young politician, still in his late teens. That came as a shock to us all.
Having debated with him in student debates, I can tell the House that if he turned that laser eye on you and fired a verbal sally, it went straight through you, and then straight through the wall behind. He was a superb debater—I have never seen his like. What was fascinating about him was that he was a fully developed politician so early in life. He knew exactly what he was about and was determined to achieve his end.
I was also briefly in the Scottish Parliament, as the hon. Member for Glasgow West (Patricia Ferguson) alluded to. In 2007, at a reception at the Signet library in Edinburgh, he said, “Jamie, I want a word with you.” He cornered me in one of those half-moon-shaped alcoves and told me very forcibly how supporting the SNP Government in 2007 would lead to a revival of the Liberal party in the Scottish Parliament.
Mention has rightly been made of his widow, Moira, whom I found to be a very nice person indeed. She once stopped me in the Royal Mile, shortly after Alex had become First Minister, to say that she had got that dreadful upright piano out of the drawing room at Bute House. She just wanted me to know that. My thoughts are not only with Alex’s family but with his circle of friends, to whom he meant a very great deal. Our condolences should go to his family and to his friends as well.
Charles Stewart Parnell made his name in history, and I believe that Alex Salmond will do so in exactly the same way, for many years to come.
Brendan O’Hara (Argyll, Bute and South Lochaber) (SNP)
Further to those points of order, Mr Speaker. I associate myself with so many of the comments from Members across the House. I first encountered Alex Salmond as a star-struck teenager, and a member of the 79 group attending a particularly fractious SNP conference in Ayr in 1982. So fractious was the conference that Alex was subsequently expelled from the party, albeit briefly. At the meetings that followed, even though he was less than 10 years older than me, I listened to the spellbinding oratory of this young man. He was destined for greatness then.
Alec and I became close allies in the late 1980s. I was part of the campaign team that saw him elected as SNP leader in 1990. Our paths took wildly different trajectories, clearly, but we kept in touch on and off over the decades. I would not be here today were it not for Alec having arranged for me to go through to Edinburgh so that he could persuade me to put my hat in the ring for the SNP in Argyll and Bute in the 2015 election. I am far from alone in being an SNP politician who owes a huge debt to Alec Salmond. He was a titan of our movement, an irreplaceable force without whom our independence, when it does come—which it surely will—would never have been achieved.
My thoughts are with Moira, as are those of so many in this House. My experience of Moira is that she is a very quiet but absolutely formidable force. I learned very quickly that if we wanted to get Alec to change his mind, we should go not to him but to Moira. She is an incredible force in herself. My deepest condolences and sympathies are with Moira and Alec’s immediate family. I do wonder when we will see his like again.
Jeremy Corbyn (Islington North) (Ind)
Further to those points of order, Mr Speaker. I am grateful to you for allowing this time to pay tribute to Alex Salmond; he absolutely deserves it and it is great that we are doing it.
The leader of the SNP, the right hon. Member for Aberdeen South (Stephen Flynn), spoke very well and very movingly about Alex’s contribution to life, which I think is very generous. The SNP clearly treats its former leaders with great respect, and I think that is a good idea. [Laughter.] I also thank the right hon. Member for Goole and Pocklington (Sir David Davis) for what he said. Alex did go through the most appalling stress and personal pressure, and no doubt he had moments of self-doubt and real concern about the whole thing. The fact that the right hon. Member spoke so well about that really is a testament to what Alex was made of.
During his time here, Alex was a good friend to lots of us. He always opposed wars, and he always stood up for civil liberties and justice. His strength of character, in Scotland and in the wider world, made the SNP the party it is and the formidable force it became. He made the arguments for Scottish independence cogent, realistic and understandable.
We should remember that Alex Salmond lived life to the full and spoke to the full. He was totally involved in absolutely everything he did, and was an amazing and very friendly force around this place. I, for one, will miss him. I send my condolences to Moira, his wider family, and all his colleagues in both Alba and the SNP in Scotland.
Oral Answers to Questions
Brendan O'Hara Excerpts(3 months, 2 weeks ago)
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Ian Murray
I thank the shadow Secretary of State for his question, but he should stop scaremongering, given the 90,000-strong workforce in the North sea. Oil and gas will be with us for decades to come. The Finch decision, to which he refers, was something that this Government had to consider very carefully. The Secretary of State has started a consultation on consenting, which will affect Jackdaw and, indeed, Rosebank, and that should conclude within the next six months.
Brendan O'Hara (Argyll, Bute and South Lochaber) (SNP)
Kirsty Blackman (Aberdeen North) (SNP)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Kirsty McNeill)
We will strengthen the Migration Advisory Committee, and establish a framework for joint working with skills bodies across the UK, the Industrial Strategy Council and the Department for Work and Pensions. The needs of our economy are different across the regions and nations, and different sectors have different needs. Given that skills policy and employment support are devolved, we will work with the Scottish Government when designing workforce plans for different sectors. This will ensure that our migration and skills policies work for every part of the UK.
Brendan O'Hara
The tourism and hospitality sectors right across my Argyll, Bute and South Lochaber constituency are desperate for people to come and work, but because of Brexit and the end of freedom of movement, we have the jobs but we do not have the people. The Government know that Scotland needs people, so will the Government reaffirm Jackie Baillie’s commitment—her assurance to voters—and commit to facilitating the creation of a Scottish visa?
Kirsty McNeill
We are committed to ensuring that there is effective Scottish representation on the Migration Advisory Committee, and I look forward to working with the Home Office and engaging with sectors on ensuring that immigration works for all parts of the UK.