Devolution in Scotland

Jim Shannon Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd October 2025 Commons Chamber

[Dr Scott Arthur (Edinburgh South West) (Lab)]

I start by thanking the hon. Member for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (Jamie Stone) for introducing the debate—it took us two goes to get here, but I thank him. I was inspired by his bravery in admitting that he was on the committee that oversaw the building of the Scottish Parliament, because I think it was 10 times over budget, but perhaps those are skills we can deploy to build ferries in Scotland. Perhaps they are already; I do not know.

It has now been 26 years since the Scottish Parliament was established with the promise of empowering our nation. For that to work, it has always been the case that the Government in Scotland need to have a can-do attitude. In the early years under Scottish Labour, the Government made significant progress, as we have already heard. We abolished tuition fees. We introduced a smoking ban, free personal care, and free bus passes for older people—that is one of my favourite ones—and we reintroduced the rail link to the Borders. One of the most amazing things that I read today was that during the 1999 to 2007 Parliaments, life expectancy in Scotland increased by 2.3 years. These are the wonders of a Labour Government. Of course, we also oversaw a vital expansion of social housing in Scotland, something that is needed today.

The pace of change during that era was incredible, as Scotland was finding its feet with its new Parliament, which felt like a bit of an experiment at the time but is now here to stay. In the two decades since then, however, the SNP Government have overseen a period of stagnation and decline across all of the same areas.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I commend the hon. Gentleman on including some positivity in his speech. Does he agree that we do not want my Gaelic brothers and cousins, the SNP Members who are sitting in front of me, to leave the Union? I want them to stay in this great United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland forever, because we are better together. It is the money that comes centrally from Westminster that keeps the Scottish Parliament and its people going.

Something that perhaps has not been mentioned yet is that one of the advantages of devolution has been the tourism connections between Northern Ireland and Scotland—our cousins across the straits. Does the hon. Member agree that that is one of the things that is positive and good in the relationship between people from Ulster and people from Scotland? I am descended from the Stewarts of the lowlands of Scotland, so I am probably Scottish, maybe from before some people were—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Caroline Nokes)]

Order. Mr Shannon, I am sure we are all fascinated by from whom you are descended, but could I respectfully point out that Members who have not been in the Chamber for the bulk of this debate should not be making lengthy interventions?