Oral Answers to Questions
Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts(1 week, 5 days ago)
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Melanie Ward
The Prime Minister wants to see reindustrialisation, and we are committed to driving growth in Grangemouth and the wider region. We have acted swiftly at every stage as the Grangemouth site transitions, including through a £120 million commitment to safeguard the chemicals plant. I know that the Minister for Reindustrialisation and Cabinet Secretary Flynn are focusing especially on the preparation of ground conditions and the remediation of potential sites for new projects, which is key to unlocking the £200 million from the national wealth fund. I know that my hon. Friend will continue to push for his constituents.
Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)
Scottish Government figures released yesterday show the lowest level of new house building in more than a decade. Ahead of the Budget, councils in England are expected to benefit from new investment to stimulate council house building and access low-interest borrowing. Will the Minister engage with her Scottish Government counterparts to encourage similar support in Scotland to help local councils to build more homes and, in turn, support local economic growth through construction?
Melanie Ward
The hon. Lady makes an excellent point about this Government’s record on building new homes in England. My officials regularly engage with the Scottish Government on a range of matters to exchange learning. As she knows, housing and planning are devolved matters, so house building responsibility rests with the Scottish Government. Of particular concern are the increasing numbers of children living in temporary accommodation in Scotland and the increasing numbers of people sleeping rough. While our Prime Minister is determined to end rough sleeping, in Scotland it is on the rise, and that is not good enough.
Oral Answers to Questions
Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts(6 months, 3 weeks ago)
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Kirsty McNeill
That is precisely one of the focuses of the Pride in Place programme. Our high streets have been neglected for far too long and are at the real heart of community pride. I am delighted that so many of the Pride in Place bids are focused on exactly that.
Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)
The Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr Douglas Alexander)
The UK Government stand ready to provide the support needed by families in response to recent events in the middle east. The Prime Minister has set out our plan to deal with the immediate impact of the conflict on the cost of living, which includes cutting energy bills by an average of £117 per household, extending the fuel duty cut until September while closely monitoring prices at the pumps, providing £4.6 million for low-income families in Scotland who heat their homes with oil to tackle surging prices and, of course, continuing to push for de-escalation of the conflict itself.
Wendy Chamberlain
I welcome what the Minister has said, but the challenge is that the Government have yet to correct the challenges from the ECO4 scheme, which in North East Fife has blighted houses with not only a lack of insulation but poor installation of inappropriate heat pumps and so on. Can the Secretary of State advise me when the Government will start inspecting these properties and consider a compensation scheme for constituents such as mine?
St Andrew’s Day and Scottish Affairs
Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts(10 months, 4 weeks ago)
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Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)
As the hon. Member for Dunfermline and Dollar (Graeme Downie) highlighted in his opening remarks, as the MP for North East Fife, I represent St Andrews, so I thought it was important to be here today.
St Andrews was the ecclesiastical capital of Scotland until the Reformation, but it was not always a safe harbour for religious leaders. Cardinal Beaton, the last Scottish cardinal prior to the Reformation, was murdered by Fife lairds angered by the execution of Protestant preacher George Wishart. He was stabbed and his body was hung from the window of St Andrews castle. In the last Parliament, The House magazine invited MPs to write about something of particular interest in their constituency. I do not know what it says about me, but I chose to write about the murder of Archbishop Sharp, who was murdered by Covenanters outside St Andrews as his made his way there from Ceres. Indeed, the centrepiece of the annual parade and celebration by the Kate Kennedy Club, which is part of the University of St Andrews and celebrates its centenary next year, is a re-enactment of that murder. Members should definitely come and see it—it is great.
I liked the comments made by hon. Members about Charles I. When I give a tour of the Houses of Parliament, I take pleasure in pointing out, “That is where the Fifer was sentenced to death.” As a member of the History of Parliament Trust, I am clear that we should not refer to the English civil war but the war of the three kingdoms, because that whole conflict started in Scotland, with the first bishops’ war.
I pay tribute to some of the groups and organisations that work in St Andrews, such as the community hub; the St Andrews community council, which recently hosted the hoolie that marked St Andrew’s day in the town; and the university. I was here not that long ago marking the passing of my predecessor-but-one, the right hon. Lord Campbell of Pittenweem, or Ming Campbell, who was the chancellor of the university.
I note the debate that is taking place in Westminster Hall. I thank the hon. Member for Glasgow North (Martin Rhodes)—who is not here, but in the other chamber—because he is marking Fairtrade. It is the 20th anniversary of the same group in St Andrews as well.
Let me mention the St Andrews Harbour Trust, which is not a normal trust, because it was gifted to the town by James IV. One of the challenges we have post- Storm Babet is that the harbour needs essential funding to maintain the whole coastline, and the trust is struggling to do that. I have written to the Secretary of State for Scotland looking for support because of how critical that infrastructure is.
As the MP for St Andrews, I get to be on the board of the Links Trust—my father does not share my politics, but he is a keen golfer, so he is very happy about that. We are known for golf, and the Open returns to St Andrews in 2027. Let me take this opportunity to highlight a recent report by the Links Trust, which demonstrates that St Andrews and the courses there deliver £300 million of economic impact to Scotland’s economy. Visitors and their families support nearly 1,700 full-time jobs in St Andrews and more than 4,000 jobs across Scotland. For every pound that passes through the tills of the St Andrews Links, an additional £3.43 is generated for other businesses in St Andrews. More than 100,000 visitors made St Andrews Links their destination in 2024, with more than 91% coming from outside Scotland.
St Andrews is absolutely vital to the wider Scottish economy as well as the wider North East Fife economy. Earlier this week, I was speaking to the owner of a hotel in my constituency outwith St Andrews, who pointed out how essential St Andrews is to their trade. However, they also pointed out how they are hampered by their rural location, poor footpaths between communities and poor local transport links. With the decision following the Scottish Transport Appraisal Guidance on a station in St Andrews being turned down, it is important that we get the other recommended transport links, so that we can connect tourists and the local workers who support the industries I mentioned but cannot afford to live in St Andrews.
I have aspired to the lofty opening of the hon. Member for Dunfermline and Dollar—he really tried to set the scene—but I will highlight one concern. As a former police officer, I thank my former colleague Martin Gallagher and “Jobs Forgotten” for their work on a particular issue in relation to the McCloud judgment. The McCloud judgment in 2018 and the changes to public sector pensions have been challenging for all Governments, but it seems that the Scottish Government have found it the most challenging. They have missed numerous deadlines, despite knowing since 2022—arguably since 2018, because that is when the judgment happened—that work to ensure remediation for the people affected by the McCloud judgment in relation to their public sector pensions was mitigated.
I am concerned to hear reports that retirement statements are apparently not being provided when requested, simply because an individual is yet to submit their intention to retire. Why would somebody make a decision on whether to retire if they do not have the financial information they need? That makes me wonder and be concerned about what the overall liabilities are, particularly given the 8% per year increase in interest rates in relation to those delayed decisions, which are paid for by UK taxpayers. The Chair of the Scottish Affairs Committee may be interested in that, because just recently, on 2 December, the chief executive of the Scottish Public Pensions Authority gave evidence to the Scottish Parliament’s Finance and Public Administration Committee. He apologised, but he failed to provide information or confidence in the system or to say whether the issue can be totally resolved by 2027.
I have here a freedom of information request suggesting that less than 3% of individuals who retired on the grounds of ill health have had their statement in relation to the McCloud judgment. That is very concerning, and I hope the Minister will agree that the Scottish Government should not have got themselves into this situation. It is unacceptable for public sector workers such as firefighters and police officers—some of whom, as I mentioned, retired on the grounds of ill health directly related to their service—to be left in this limbo. In particular, there are concerns that back payments might need to be made and that they might lose money as a result.
It is really important that we have the opportunity to debate St Andrew’s day, our patron saint and Scottish affairs in this place, and I am grateful to have had the opportunity to do so.
Several hon. Members rose—
Devolution in Scotland
Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts(1 year ago)
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Melanie Ward (Cowdenbeath and Kirkcaldy) (Lab)
Hon. Members may be aware that in May the people of Scotland sent 37 Scottish Labour MPs to this place—and a diverse bunch we are. It probably ages me to note that when my hon. Friend the Member for Falkirk (Euan Stainbank) speaks shortly, he may talk about the referendum, and he will mean the one in 2014, when he was just too young to vote, whereas when I talk about the referendum, I mean the one in 1997, for which I was just too young to vote.
Of course, that 1997 referendum asked whether there should be a Scottish Parliament and if it should have tax-varying powers. At the time, I remember feeling that if I had been old enough to do so I would have voted yes to both. It was a long-held Labour manifesto commitment to bring decision making on hugely important issues—our health, education, community safety and economy—into the hands of the Scottish people. I still remember being in the car with my mum the day after the vote, listening to the news coverage and feeling excited that the result had been “yes, yes”. It felt like such a huge opportunity for all of us.
In his speech at the opening of the Scottish Parliament in 1999, Scotland’s then First Minister, the late great Donald Dewar, said that the Scottish Parliament was
“first a hope, then a belief, then a promise. Now”
it is
“a reality.”
The question today is whether the SNP Scottish Government are using the reality of those significant powers they hold, together with record levels of funding —an extra £5.2 billion this year alone—to make the greatest possible difference to the lives of our people. I believe the answer is clearly no, whether through incompetence or by design.
The Labour-led Scottish executives, as they were when the Scottish Parliament was first formed, took bold decisions: banning smoking in public places, the fresh talent initiative and action on sectarianism—something that too often is overlooked in Scotland. They took action and, crucially, delivered results, and we need far more of that in our politics in Scotland.
Today’s reality for many in my constituency, and across Fife and Scotland as a whole, has been bitterly disappointing after almost two decades of SNP division, diversion and failure. One in six Scots languish in pain on NHS waiting lists—over 40,000 of them in Fife. Indeed, more people are waiting over two years for NHS treatment in Glasgow alone than they are in the whole of England. A third of ambulances wait at hospitals for more than an hour while the patients in them wait for a bed. Last winter, medics at my local hospital, the Victoria hospital in Kirkcaldy, had to set up a makeshift ward outside the hospital, because the queues of ambulances were so great. SNP Members may not think that that matters—they may think it is a record to be proud of—but that is not what my constituents feel at all.
Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)
The Victoria hospital is not in my constituency, but it serves my constituents. Does the hon. Member share my concern that the proposed downgrading of the neonatal intensive care units in both Dundee and Fife will means that our constituents will have to travel much further for critical need, and that their premature babies will be far away from home?
Melanie Ward
I thank the hon. Member; I have seen the work she has been doing on this issue. It is essential that the special intensive care treatment available for premature and sick babies at the Victoria hospital does not change in any way. I wish the Scottish Government would get on and act to put at rest the concerns that our constituents no doubt share about that.
Chris Murray
My hon. Friend gets exactly to the nub of the issue. We have seen good debate, gestures and discussion in Scotland, but we have not seen the concomitant focus on policy, delivery and outcomes. The Scottish Parliament has been a success; the Scottish Government have not. It is important to draw that distinction.
A highly centralised structure has concentrated decision-making in St Andrew’s House, to the detriment of local communities. As we have heard, councils have had their funding and influence hollowed out. There has been a proliferation of quangos and agencies; there are now more quangos in Scotland than there are Members of the Scottish Parliament. That breeds a clientelism and elitism that shut ordinary people out of decision-making processes.
Wendy Chamberlain
The hon. Member is making a very strong and powerful point. Does he agree that, as a result of those quangos and the things he is describing, we have actually seen a loss of power to the Scottish Parliament, where MSPs are not getting the opportunity to put things forward? Often, that is because the Scottish Government are bringing forward framework Bills that do not have proper policy decisions, which is why the implementation of so many pieces of legislation ultimately fails.
Oral Answers to Questions
Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts(1 year, 5 months ago)
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Kirsty McNeill
When this Government took office, we inherited a £22 billion black hole, which required emergency action. We said at the time that our decision on the winter fuel payment was a difficult one that we did not want to make, and we are very pleased to be in a position to reconsider it.
Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Kirsty McNeill)
Scotland’s universities are of course world-class, but I am very concerned about the financial difficulties faced by several of them. As the hon. Lady will know, higher education is a devolved matter, and Scotland’s universities, their staff and their students all need a Scottish Government with a proper plan to turn this crisis around.
Wendy Chamberlain
International students are hugely valuable, not just when it comes to sharing cultures and knowledge, but to our universities and local economies. In North East Fife in 2021-22, that value was estimated at £159 million. What discussions has the Minister had with the Scottish Government about the economic impact of the reforms relating to international students in the immigration White Paper? Can she update the House on whether an economic impact assessment has taken place?
Kirsty McNeill
We are in ongoing discussions with the Scottish Government and Scottish universities, but I want to be absolutely definitive about this, because there has been some confusion in the press. Education policy is devolved, and the international student levy will not apply in Scotland unless the Scottish Government decide to introduce it. I met Universities Scotland just this week and made that very clear, and I am pleased to do so again today.
Budget: Scotland
Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts(1 year, 10 months ago)
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Each debate is chaired by an MP from the Panel of Chairs, rather than the Speaker or Deputy Speaker. A Government Minister will give the final speech, and no votes may be called on the debate topic.
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
Kirsty McNeill
I will make some progress. We have also confirmed that all 12 regions of Scotland will be covered by a growth deal. Our investments include nearly £890 million of direct investment into freeports and investment zones, the Argyll and Bute growth deal and other important local projects across Scotland.
Kirsty McNeill
I will make some progress. Those are all the choices of a Government resolutely focused on the future. In conclusion, the Budget does exactly what Scottish Labour was elected to do. It secured billions for Scotland; the SNP voted against it.
Oral Answers to Questions
Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts(2 years, 6 months ago)
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Mr Jack
My hon. Friend is absolutely correct. It is the Conservatives who are trusted to defend the whole of the United Kingdom. The SNP has consistently proposed abandoning our nuclear deterrent, including in its most recent independence paper. The irony is that the SNP wants to be part of the NATO alliance, but not part of a nuclear NATO alliance.
Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)
A vital part of defence spending is ensuring that military personnel live in safe and suitable accommodation. At last week’s debate on the Renters (Reform) Bill, my hon. Friend the Member for North Shropshire (Helen Morgan) ensured concessions from the Government on the standards of military accommodation. What assessment has the Secretary of State made of that in Scotland?
Mr Jack
The hon. Lady is absolutely right. As the father of a serving soldier, I completely agree with her. I hear from members of the military that they are disappointed with the standard of accommodation. I have raised the issue on a UK-wide basis and discussed it with the Defence Secretary. He said the programme of improvements, which started before last winter, amounts to £400 million of spending.
Petitions
Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts(2 years, 6 months ago)
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Mr Robin Walker (Worcester) (Con)
I rise to present the petition of my constituents in Worcester. My petitioners include a constituent who lost her mother to this scandal; a dear friend of mine, who is a long-standing councillor and former chairman of my association, who lost his beloved wife and the mother of his children; and a constituent who was infected as a child with HIV and hepatitis, but went on to found the Tainted Blood campaign.
The petition states:
The petition of residents of the constituency of Worcester,
Declares that people who received infected blood and who have suffered as a consequence have, along with their families, waited far too long for redress.
The petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urges the Government to implement the recommendations in the Second Interim Report of the Infected Blood Inquiry without delay.
And the petitioners remain, etc.
[P002967]
Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)
I rise to present a petition on behalf of the residents of North East Fife. In common with those presented by the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) and other right hon. and hon. Members, the petition relates to the recommendations of the infected blood inquiry. Like the hon. Member for Strangford, I pay tribute to the right hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Dame Diana Johnson) for her work on the issue.
Two of the families directly impacted in North East Fife came into my office on Friday to sign the petition. One lost his father to hepatitis C as a result of the scandal, and the other’s husband was infected as a child at school.
The petition states:
The petition of residents of the constituency of North East Fife,
Declares that people who received infected blood and who have suffered as a consequence have, along with their families, waited far too long for redress.
The petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urges the Government to implement the recommendations in the Second Interim Report of the Infected Blood Inquiry without delay.
And the petitioners remain, etc.
[P002968]
Oral Answers to Questions
Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts(3 years, 4 months ago)
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Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)
Christine Jardine (Edinburgh West) (LD)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (John Lamont)
This Government are committed to tackling child poverty and protecting the most vulnerable in society. In the recent Budget, the Chancellor announced additional support measures for households and families across Scotland and, indeed, across all parts of the United Kingdom. A further example of support for families was announced earlier today, with the UK Government making childcare more affordable.
Wendy Chamberlain
Almost 90,000 food parcels were given to children in Scotland last year, and the Trussell Trust’s “Hunger in Scotland” report shows that single parents make up only 2% of the population but 17% of those who have gone hungry. This is about insufficiency of income. The adult rate of benefits should be restored to single parents under the age of 25 on universal credit, which would be a practical way for the UK Government to support them. Does the Minister agree?
John Lamont
I recognise the work that the hon. Lady undertakes with the all-party group on food banks. The Government are protecting the most vulnerable, with a £94 billion support package for households, and we have helped nearly 2 million people out of absolute poverty, after housing costs, since 2010.
Oral Answers to Questions
Wendy Chamberlain Excerpts(5 years, 4 months ago)
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Mr Jack
I join my right hon. Friend in paying tribute to my close friend Alasdair Houston, and I send my deep sympathies to his family. Ali was a proud Scot, a lover of Dumfries and Galloway, and a formidable champion for Gretna, his home town, and the Star of Caledonia would be a very fitting tribute to him. He will be missed by many.
Wendy Chamberlain (North East Fife) (LD)
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (David Duguid)
I and other UK Government Ministers are in regular contact with the Scottish Government and other devolved Administrations to try to secure the harmonisation particularly of covid-19 guidance when it comes to regulations on international travel, while at the same time of course respecting devolved competence in matters such as public health.
Wendy Chamberlain
Golf tourism plays a major part in the local economy of North East Fife, particularly as St Andrews is the home of golf. There is a whole ecosystem built up around golf tourism, including accommodation, hospitality and inbound tour operators. The majority of these tourists come from north America and then travel to other golf courses around the UK, and there are concerns about the incoherent travel rules between the four nations and restrictions within the four nations deterring those visitors. Can I therefore ask the Minister to outline what steps he is taking to reach consensus, particularly in relation to the US?
David Duguid
I thank the hon. Lady for her question, which is pertinent not just for golf tourism but for whisky tourism and tourism in general across Scotland. The UK Government are committed to full alignment with the devolved Administrations, because we recognise the importance of such alignment for public compliance, as well as for business confidence and for tourism. We share the data, and we have created the structures to make that happen. However, we also respect the right of the devolved Administrations to make their own decisions on devolved matters. Thankfully, the differences in the exemptions, particularly for international travel, are not currently that material and can be justified as legitimate differences, but I do take on board the comments she made about golf tourism specifically.