Seòmar agus comataidhean

I welcome the recommitment from the cabinet secretary today to the full dualling of the A96 between Inverness and Aberdeen. It is a vital project for many reasons, not least road safety and rural connectivity. The Nairn bypass, in particular, has the potential to alleviate many issues, including reducing congestion and pollution in the town and opening up potential for active travel. Can the cabinet secretary speak to that part of the programme in particular? Is she willing to commit to bringing forward the construction of the bypass to as soon as possible within the overall timescales?

There is so much in the bill that I would love to speak about today, including the right to keep a pet—which my cat, Blue, joined me on screen in committee to support—but I will focus my contribution on rent controls. It would have been easy, under pressure from landlords, to drop that policy, so I am glad that the Scottish Government has done the right thing and stuck to it.

Eighty-two per cent of Scots support a form of rent control. A minority of the other 18 per cent might be loud, litigious and likely to complain, but that does not make them right.

A couple of weeks ago, Future Economy Scotland briefed MSPs on the benefits of rent controls if they are done correctly. Some of the data that was shared was terrifying, even for someone who has experienced homelessness and talks housing on a weekly basis. We were told that private renters on the lowest incomes spend almost 50 per cent of their income on rent alone. We were reminded that the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development recently found that advanced economies without rent controls are in the minority—only 18 countries have no form of rent control, whereas 23 do. We heard that, despite continuing investment from the Scottish Government to mitigate UK policies such as the bedroom tax, 140,000 people, including 50,000 children, live in housing-induced poverty, which they would not be in if it were not for housing costs.

All that shows that rent controls can save the public purse. The Government is paying out to supplement rent payments for those who face unfair rises in the form of housing payments that go straight to private landlords. Instead, we should spend that money on supporting people out of poverty altogether.

As if any further evidence of need were required, this week, statistics were published that show that average rent in the Highlands and Islands has risen by 67 per cent since 2010, and I am well aware that that figure will be hiding low increases in some places where even the council struggles to fill its homes, as well as extreme increases in places such as Inverness.

I have already met the Minister for Housing to discuss potential changes at stage 2 to strengthen the bill. In particular, I hope that he will consider amendments that seek to rebalance the power dynamic between private landlords and their tenants. The penalties for breaking the rules on rent increases or evictions must be more than a risk worth taking for a landlord who wants to make as much money as possible. The system must also be fair to landlords who care and stick to the rules; they cannot look around and see others benefiting from poor behaviour.

The facts on rent levels cannot remain up for debate. Frequently, those on both sides of the argument say that we do not have the evidence, data or knowledge required to justify action or inaction. That is within our control. We can require information to be provided rather than ask local authorities to ask landlords to have a think about sending it in. It is not a tall order to want to know what somebody is charging for something as fundamental as a home.

Ariane Burgess made the important point that the need for a rent control area, when evidenced, should result in a rent control area. We cannot repeat what happened with rent pressure zones, which even keen councils did not manage to introduce. As someone who sat in a council in which two thirds of the attendees declared interests in relation to such controls but stayed to vote against them anyway, I know that there must be a willingness to step in when the need for intervention is clear, as we should always prioritise the need to protect tenants.

I will conclude by repeating that it is encouraging that the Scottish Government is continuing with worthwhile protections for tenants and measures to prevent homelessness. Those are valuable causes, and I look forward to working with the Minister for Housing to ensure that our shared aims are achieved.

To ask the Scottish Government how the Land Reform (Scotland) Bill will empower local communities and ensure that land is being used to their benefit. (S6O-04006)

In advance of world AIDS day this Sunday, it is good to hear the minister reaffirm the commitment to end HIV transmissions in Scotland. We know that levels of stigma can often be higher in low-prevalence areas, such as many of the rural and island communities that I represent, where there is less awareness and additional barriers to accessing healthcare. What specific action is being taken to increase access to HIV healthcare and education in rural and island areas of Scotland, so that we can meet the 2030 target?

The cabinet secretary is well aware that Scotland has one of the most concentrated patterns of land ownership in the world, so I am looking forward to seeing a bill passed that ensures that local communities have a much greater say over how the land around them is used. Can the cabinet secretary speak to how provisions in the bill about breaking up large landholdings and giving communities advance notice of certain sales will tackle rural depopulation, which is still far too common in the Highlands and Islands?

We had a lot of snow and then a storm affecting the islands and the north of Scotland, with everyone in Scotland getting a share of the snow and wind over the weekend. It is important not to forget that every extreme weather event means that the people in public and voluntary services on whom we rely are putting themselves out there in hazardous and challenging conditions to keep us safe. Will the cabinet secretary join me in thanking everyone involved in national and local resilience efforts over the past 10 days?

The UK budget represents a wrecking ball taken to Scottish agriculture, and the worst part is that, yet again, in the same style as we were used to under the Tories, there was no opportunity for Scotland’s Parliament, Government or sector leaders to feed into the decision making. It is unfathomable that the UK Government has taken decisions that impact on Scotland in particular without speaking to the Scottish Government or to farmers, crofters and other stakeholders in Scotland—or, apparently, to anyone here—first.

Any one of those people could have raised the issues that have been put forward publicly since the public announcement of the budget, and a way could perhaps have been found to meet policy aims without cutting funding to Scotland’s agriculture sector. Every member in the chamber heard from the cabinet secretary earlier that she was perfectly willing to enter into constructive discussion and make tough decisions together.

For stakeholders, the Barnettisation of funding for agriculture and marine activity in Scotland has been a huge fear since Brexit. Labour coming in and doing that in its first budget, without warning, will be a huge letdown to all those people who turned their backs on the Tories, thinking that the change that Labour offered was going to be positive. It seems to have been one letdown after another, from false promises in the Brexit campaign all the way to the Scottish Government now being unable to plan for our farmers and instead being dependent on unpredictable, year-on-year settlements from a Labour Government that is intent on cutting Scotland out of decision making.

The announcements around the agricultural property relief could be described in a kindly way as being clumsy. I am not opposed to reform, but the huge discrepancy in the figures that are being used by the Treasury and by the sector, and the—to be frank—insulting commentary around the importance and value of farms and farmers clearly show that the UK Government did not know what it was doing when it made those calculations and announced those changes.

Apart from anything else, we cannot blame or punish small farms for the distorted land market that exists here. I look forward to having a detailed debate on that when the cabinet secretary progresses this session’s land reform bill. I am not sure that any party here would support the change of use of farmland to whatever those who can afford the actual market value choose to do with it.

People should be in no doubt that what Labour has announced is a wholesale devaluing of Scotland’s farmers. The UK Government will continue to benefit from Scotland the brand in relation to trade—including in whisky, which it has just hiked duty on—and the food resilience that we provide to the whole of the UK, but it chooses to squeeze the Scottish Government’s budget and pick on those who are producing our food and drink.

It is obvious to anyone who is paying attention to this pattern of announcements that Labour is employing any tactic possible to cut the money that is available for spending in Scotland and to blame it on the SNP. Changing how funding comes to farmers across the UK in a way that disadvantages Scotland, removing funding for the winter heating payment and then devolving it midway through a financial year, and talking over and over about how the block grant is higher when all of Scotland’s public services are now having to pay out for Labour’s hike in national insurance are all blatantly political choices. I hope that farmers, pensioners and people across the country can see Labour’s game playing with their lives and livelihoods for exactly what it is.

That is not the only uncertainty that exists in policy making and budget setting. The United Kingdom Internal Market Act 2020 remains in place despite its obvious incompatibility with the principles of devolution that are set out in the Scotland Act 1998. The Subsidy Control Act 2022, which it then allowed, has agricultural support within its scope. The principles in schedule 1 of that act risk constraining the Scottish Government’s ability to tailor support to Scottish farmers and crofters. Ministers in Scotland are now expected to allocate support to farmers without knowing what constraints are in place on their doing so or what might be dropped on them at the last minute.

A genuine optimism was shown—including by members of the Scottish Government—about the opportunity of a new UK Government coming in and having a different, more productive and more respectful relationship with the Scottish Government. It is disappointing, if unsurprising, that Labour’s promised change has given way to more of the same, with Scotland not being consulted on important issues that affect us more than anywhere else.

Ariane Burgess described a feeling of groundhog day, and it is telling that we are having a debate—two weeks in a row—on the negative impacts on rural Scotland of decisions taken for us but not by us. One day it is Brexit, another it is the Labour budget, but the result is the same. Over and over, successive UK Governments prove to people that we cannot trust promises made by UK parties or expect fairness to be shown to the agriculture and fisheries sectors here.

We cannot allow those Governments to have control over the fate of industries as critical as our food and drink producers. Scotland needs full fiscal powers and every option on the table, not this uncertainty. Scotland must become an independent country so that we can take a full view of our priorities and be certain, from one year to the next, what we have to spend and what we are permitted to do.

I was pleased to host a briefing yesterday evening with Future Economy Scotland, debunking some myths around rent controls and highlighting that 82 per cent of Scots back this Scottish National Party policy, which has the potential to have a positive impact on the economy as well as on tenants’ finances. Will the First Minister outline how the proposed rent cap method balances vital protection for tenants with certainty and reliability for the housing sector as a whole?

I thank the minister for that clear answer. The UK Labour Party promised to reduce tuition fees if Keir Starmer won the election, but, instead, fees have risen, so it is clear that the Scottish National Party is the only party that has got into government and then stuck by its beliefs on free tuition. What impact does free tuition have on Scottish students’ debt levels compared with those in the rest of the UK?

Can the cabinet secretary confirm that the Scottish Government will approve the use of Government cars only for what is official business?