The final item of business this evening is a member's business debate on motion 5615 in the name of co-cab steward on changing the boundaries, ending institutional racism in sport. The debate will be concluded without any questions being put. I invite members who wish to participate to press the request to speak buttons now or as soon as possible. I call on co-cab steward to open the debate for around seven minutes. I would like to offer a warm welcome to the visitors in the gallery to so many individuals and organisations, including colleagues from running out racism, showing racism the red card, Active Life Club, the SDUC, among others that worked tirelessly to eradicate racism in all its forms, including sport. I acknowledge the overwhelming cross-party support for this motion also and we are all grateful for that. This is indeed an uncomfortable topic. Recognising the existence of institutional racism is to admit to years of apathy as people suffered around us and to accept that processes and structures designed without all voices present have caused harm and affected the achievements of so many. If there is one clear message that we should take away from the debate today, it is that we need to get comfortable with being uncomfortable, for it is in that discomfort that true change can take place. Today we have reflect on the findings of the plan for sport independent review into racism in Scottish cricket and I commend Sport Scotland for commissioning the review. It is never easy for anyone to come forward, often suffering negative impacts on career, family and mental health, but it is because of their bravery that we now have a chance to reflect and move forward in the true spirit of sporting endeavour. Maya Angelou said, when you know better, do better and this is our chance to do better. Woven throughout this damning report are themes of an absence of leadership, lack of accountability, transparency and overall loss of confidence in the incident report handling processes. Four hundred and forty-eight examples of institutional racism were identified against the national governing body cricket Scotland. Sir William McPherson in his 1999 report of the public inquiry into the death of Stephen Lawrence defined that as the collective failure of an organisation to provide an appropriate and professional service to people because of their colour, culture and ethnic origin. That is the definition that is referred to by the authors of the review. From participants we heard that there were too many close friendships in Cricket Scotland for confidentiality requirements to be upheld, that people who had previously raised concerns were victimised as a result and the familiar old adage of its just banter invoked as a means of silencing those who spoke out. At board level there was no overall vision or strategy for tackling racism and a total lack of diversity in workforce and governance procedures. However, while the findings of the report are alarming, it is vital that we not only consider the consequences of our inertia, but we seize the opportunity to learn. I am grateful to Anilla McKenna, an experienced diversity officer for informing my thoughts on the subject. I would like to acknowledge the examples of excellent practice that are clearly evident, especially at grass roots, club and association level. We can learn from the good and with a collective will and responsibility we can improve across all sporting disciplines, not just in Cricket. As a starting point, the review includes many practical and deliverable recommendations. I acknowledge the work that is already under way by Sport Scotland and urge them to proceed in partnership with organisations that have expertise and experience to offer, and that may well help to rebuild trust and confidence. I welcome Cricket Scotland's commitment to have a new board to be in place by the end of this month. Now, let's be clear. Racism exists everywhere in society, but what makes an organisation institutionally racist is not that it has racism. It is whether it is priorities tackling it and being actively anti-racist in its policies, procedures and cultures, or remains passive, content with a never-ending cycle of deny, defend, deflect or repeat. Even if we never truly understand the experiences of others, it is important to strive to be an ally. Paul Reddish, who is here today, OBE, talks of allyship as standing up for those when they are not in the room and handing the microphone back when they are present. I am minded of the words of Nelson Mandela. Sport has the power to change the world. It has the power to inspire. It has the power to unite people in a way that little else does. In allyship, we must strive to share the pitches, the tracks and the boardrooms as equals. Looking forward, there is a need for on-going, proactive oversight and scrutiny of sporting bodies and organisations and to include critical expert voices in that process. One option may be to link into the Government's on-going work on a national anti-racist infrastructure led by Dr Ima Jackson. A key recommendation of that work is to establish more effective accountability and governance infrastructure in Scotland as the terms of recent state. Too often recommendations have been made on racism and minority ethnic issues that have subsequently been forgotten and not implemented. They may then be raised again by other groups without reference to what has been asked for before. The absence of institutional memory within the current system and structures is frustrating, disempowering and can be understood as a mechanism by which systemic discrimination occurs. I believe that governance structures and policies that adhere to and deliver on the McPherson definition of institutional racism should become a statutory obligation for bodies in receipt of Government funding. They should be able to be applied robustly across different groups with support from the national agency whilst recognising the varying size and demographics of sporting bodies. Let's ensure that another generation do not suffer from racism with nowhere to go and no hope of redress or apology, but are instead embraced by the sport that they love. We must rebuild trust amongst our sportsmen and women of colour and ensure that we are not discussing the same issues yet again in the next Parliament session. I would like to thank Cassin Shake and Majid Hack for their enormous bravery, and I note that Majid is in the gallery today, but we cannot continue to rely on the bravery of individuals to raise those issues. In closing, there is momentum here for positive change. Scotland has given us great sporting successes. Imagine the increased scope of that success if all the potential of all of Scotland's sports people was set free from the shackles of discrimination. That is truly a leadership moment. I urge everyone, those in authority, from Government to Sport Scotland to clubs and association, to embrace the facts, uncomfortable though they may be and they may make us, and deliver the necessary policies to change them. I will finish with the words of James Baldwin. Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced. I know that this is an issue about which people quite rightly feel passionate, and it may seem counter-intuitive, but I encourage those in the public gallery not to participate, and that includes applauding. I appreciate that it may be difficult, but that is one of the protocols that we ask the public to observe here. Ms Stewart, we now move to the open debate. I call first Pam Gosall to be followed by Pam Duncan-Glancy for around four minutes. I would also like to give a warm welcome to everybody in the gallery. I am honoured to open today's important debate on ending institutional racism in sport on behalf of the Scottish Conservatives. I would like to thank the member, Cwcab Stewart, for bringing that forward. I would also like to extend my thanks to Sport Scotland for commissioning the Changing the Boundaries report, planning for sport for conducting the review and producing the report, and running out racism for their hard work in condemning institutional racism within sport, and for taking active steps to reform the way sporting bodies conduct themselves. Along with the member, Cwcab Stewart, I am one of the first women of colour to become a member of the Scottish Parliament, as well as being the first Indian Sikh in the Scottish Parliament. It has taken a long time for ethnic minorities to gain a voice, but we have one now. It is strange that we hear talk of fair in an inclusive Scotland, but the report reveals that, as one of yet, it is merely an empty phrase and a tick box exercise. Sport brings out many emotions such as competitiveness, joy and pride, but, unfortunately, it also has an ugly side that has been known to bring out anger, bitterness and hate. When we think of racial discrimination in sport, we often think of it as abuse from opponents, fan club but rarely from within the sporting bodies themselves. The Changing Boundaries report is a damming indictment of institutional racism that still permanates our institutions. The review recorded a shocking 448 examples of institutional racism, with 31 allegations of racism against 15 different people, two clubs and a regional association. The definition of racism used in the report highlights what is often forgotten, which is that there is no process whereby individuals can report discrimination, then there is no opportunity for redress. Without proper reporting mechanisms, how can any organisation know about the extent of racism that they are presiding over? In the absence of willingness or fairness to implement anti-racist infrastructure, sporting bodies are in effect inhibiting racism to go unchecked. Cricket is an internationally acclaimed sport, with top teams from all over the world such as India, Pakistan, Zimbabwe, New Zealand and the West Indies and many more. Yet, to see institutional racism and such a lack of inclusion in Cricket Scotland is shameful. I am hopeful that changes to be made as Cricket Scotland, such as a new board and the collaborative working between Cricket Scotland, Sport Scotland, Plan for Sport and running out racism will see an overall of previous lack of oversight and scrutiny. However, that is only the beginning. The changing boundaries report has highlighted what is missing from many sporting bodies across the country and provided recommendations that I hope will be in eye opening for many. It is essential that BAME individuals feel valued, feel a sense of belonging and a sense of confidence that this club has in their interests that will condemn and take action. I hope that we do not wait another lifetime before we see transformational take place. First, boards must be diverse. Only when the boards are representative with BAME people have a voice in the operational processes. Secondly, the Scottish Parliament must take more responsibility for the development and implementation of anti-racist infrastructure. We must incentivise sporting bodies to reassess their operations structurally and culturally. I now call Pam Duncan-Glancy to be followed by Jackie Dunbar for around four minutes. The publication of the report shocked not just Scottish Cricket but the wider sporting community and people across Scotland, not just because of its clear and undeniable conclusion, but because of the force and veracity of which the allegation of institutional racism had been proven and the scale of which it was rife within the sport. It was a devastating publication, a stark reminder that we must intensify our efforts to overcome racism and prejudice. The report identified an astounding 448 examples of institutional racism, with 29 out of 31 indicators coming to light. One study conducted as part of the inquiry found 62 per cent of respondents had experienced seen or reported incidents of racism or discrimination, with 34 per cent having experienced it personally. That is unacceptable in sport and in our society. I want to thank the two former international players, Cassie McShake and Majid Hodge, who are here today, for being brave enough to share their experiences in Scotland. That ultimately led to the inquiry and the report, not least because that was not the first time that the report had spoken out, but because I know that they themselves have felt previous complaints that they made during their playing career had little impact. We know that Scottish Cricket's governing body is now in special measures, with oversight from Sport Scotland. I hope that it will be closely monitored to ensure that it demonstrates an anti-racist approach, but we must acknowledge that the problem was allowed to get so bad in the first place. Veal change is needed and so too is scrutiny. To move forward, we must see oversight of the issues of the governing bodies and for the governing bodies, who are often volunteer run overloaded with vital responsibilities and lacking the expertise that they need to deal with them, supported to end racism and all forms of bigotry and discrimination. Anti-racist expertise and lived experience must, as my colleagues have said, be central to shaping what comes next. I am not sure that the organisations themselves have that experience yet, so the Government must do what it can to support them, a key part of which must be that both governing bodies and Sport Scotland must take strides to improve their own internal diversity too. We want a Scotland with all and actively anti-racist societies, and Sport plays such a central role in that, as it does in our everyday lives, and that is why it is so important that they already agreed anti-racist infrastructure to oversee public bodies will be used to scrutinise Sport. Last summer brought rightful outcry as England football players Sancho, Saka and Rashford faced a torrent of online racial abuse following their mispenalties at the final of Euro 2020, so we know that it is not only in one sport. Cove Rangers played player Shai Logan, has regularly spoken about the racist abuse that he has faced throughout his playing career, and still now, and has often shared abusive messages from opposition fans, it is simply unacceptable that this is still going on. I was pleased to see the SFA step up following the shocking cricket report, writing to all clubs and making it clear that any player or official find guilty will have a 10-match ban. However, the solution cannot just be simply punishment or piecemeal, it is going to have to be systemic and structural to tackle the root causes of the problem and prevent this in the future. Sport is, of course, an area where we must focus such anti-racist activity because of the report, but we must also focus on it to harness it as a source of community and solidarity, a source of good that is vital if we are to address bigotrain discrimination. On that note, I would like to pay tribute to Partick Fistle Football Club and its community trust, whose hard work to promote inclusion is the kind of example that we need to see replicated across the SPFL and beyond. Their accepting activity programme run from Petershill Park in Springburn brings people with a range of challenges in their life together to play football, people who are homeless, asylum seekers and refugees, people facing recovery from addiction. Over 50 adults regularly attend every Monday and Thursday, and around 75 per cent of them are from a black minority ethnic background. They are able to play free football, where both training kit and football boots are provided for free too. When the game is over, the players are all provided with food. The community trust tells me that they have participants from all over the world, Ghana, Gambia, Syria, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Vietnam, Iraq and the list goes on. Many of them still have now joined local grass roots clubs such as Petershill, Somersden and Night'swood. I also thank the excellent work of Jags for Good. A number of those players are now able to access Partick Fistle home games through the free season tickets group that this group has fundraised for. Not only is that a good standard, a gold standard example of using football for goods and bringing communities together, but it also encourages diversity from the offset. Sport is a force for good. It should be open to everyone. When we come together and face the uncomfortable truths that my colleague Colcab Stewart spoke about, we can begin to tackle injustice. This is a fight for all of us, and I believe that we, all in this chamber, are ready to take that fight for the good of the people that we represent. I now call Jackie Dunbar to be followed by Brian Whittle for around four minutes. As deputy convener of the Rugby Cross party group in Parliament, I am delighted to have the opportunity to speak in this important debate, and I thank my colleague and friend, Colcab Stewart, on securing it. It is regrettable that we have the need for this debate, but it is crucial that we, collectively, as a Parliament, send a clear and loud message to all in the sports community that racism has no place in sport, no place in Scottish society, and that racism should be addressed and called out at every level. I want to begin by paying tribute to Margeed Hack and the Custom Shake, who had the courage to put themselves above the parapet and to bring about the exposure of the level of racism that was seen in Scottish cricket. I also want to thank everyone who is part of the report process, their contribution and what is a difficult situation is invaluable, and my thanks and admiration go to all involved. This work, I hope, will be instrumental in bringing about the start of a new era, not just in Scottish cricket but across sport in Scotland more generally. Presiding Officer, the report carried out by the Change in the Boundaries makes for grim reading, and the investigations will be concluded in due course, and it is important that, as a Parliament, we allow this to happen in the proper way. The report also made several high-level and sub-recommendations for immediate action to address institutional racism in Scottish cricket. Those recommendations are crucial, and while I welcome the commitment from the Scottish Government and Sport Scotland to see them implemented, I would welcome an update from the Minister on the timescale for the completion of those recommendations. Similarly, I have been highlighted that, presently, Sport Scotland has limited powers to address issues within a governing body, who are often volunteer run and discharged with vital responsibilities, such as safeguarding against discrimination, and I call on them to use those powers to their full extent. Going forward, I would therefore support the calls for safeguards to be built into sports governance to allow for the scrutiny and oversight of boards' activity to ensure that all discrimination is addressed. Although the report on cricket raises significant issues, it is important to also look to the future and to the positive work that the sport community in Scotland has undertaken to tackle racism and discrimination. Indeed, as the managing director of plan for sports stated, whilst the governance and leadership practices of the organisation have been institutionally racist, the same should not be said for cricket in Scotland. There are many outstanding clubs and individuals delivering local programmes that truly engage with diverse communities. I also welcome the Scottish Government's funding and support for sport, Scotland's sport for life, equality, diversity and inclusion approach. That approach provides meaningful internal action and leadership to Scotland's sporting community to tackle racism and all other forms of discrimination. Scottish Rugby have picked that up particularly well, and I congratulate Scottish Rugby on winning the Sports Equality Award for the work that they do across their clubs to celebrate diversity and to cut our discrimination. I ask the minister for a commitment that this work will continue and that the Government will redouble its efforts to tackle racism. Presiding officer, in conclusion, as Martin Luther King Jr said, I look to the day when people will not be judged by the colour of their skin but by the content of their character. I now call on Brian Whittle to be followed by Paul McLennan again for around four minutes. Mr Whittle, thank you Deputy Presiding Officer. I thank Co-Cab Stewart for bringing this debate to the chamber. In her speech, Co-Cab Stewart quoted Nelson Mandela when he said that sport has the power to change the world. It has the power to inspire, the power to unite people in a way that little else does. It speaks to youth in a language that they understand. Sport can create hope where there is only one despair. It is more powerful than Governments in breaking down racial barriers and it laughs in the face of all types of discrimination. Those of you who had to endure my stumbling speech last term in the Black Lives Matter debate may recognise that quote because I used it there. I think that it is extraordinarily powerful because sport can be such a force for good. It is the tip of the spear when we are tackling inequality, be that of colour, creed, religion, sex or gender. Sport is about viewing something through the prism of performance and excellence. Sport is about what we have in common with each other, not what divides us. Sport is a way of society when accepting our differences. In the end, the only difference that sportsmen and women are interested in is our ability to perform, recognising the dedication and the effort in delivering in the arena. As you may know, this is a very personal debate for me having witnessed friends of mine suffer racial discrimination over the last four decades or so that we put the current situation in a whole different light. Forty years ago the world was very, very different. I ran against the first two Black men that I met. Both of them were heroes of mine at the time and are now, I am glad to say, lifelong friends. Scotland was not the diverse country that it is now becoming. I have coached athletes from India, from French Guyana, which I have to say really tested in my schoolboy French. Polish athletes Iraq, just to name but a few. It was unheard of 40 years ago and I am always delighted to see my own local athletic club with athletes from such diverse backgrounds. The younger generation these days are much more integrated and informed than we ever were at that age. Back in the early 80s, many Black and ethnic sports men and women suffered in silence for fear of being excluded from teams and it was extraordinarily hard to witness.  It was the norm to have words and phrases dropped into conversations that would make us recoil these days. I suspect and I really hope that the current situation is that unintended casual racism has had to be endured and thankfully has eventually been called out, which is, of course, what we must continue to do whenever it rears its head. That is an education issue and, to be honest, I think a generational issue to a certain extent. What we must guard against is the fact that racism is a learned trait and we must continue to tackle that. Let's not fall into the trap of thinking that racism is a thing of the past. Just consider, as Pam Duncan Glancy said, the appalling treatment of the young Black English footballers from miss penalties at the European Championship. At the top of my speech, I said that sport can help to change the world. I'm thinking of real pioneers in sport, people like Jesse Owens back in 1936 in front of Adolf Hitler, Cassie S. Clay, Olympic Boxing Gold, who goes back to his country into segregation, Arthur Ash and Tennis, where the Stated Stadium is now named after him, Tiger Woods and Golf, winning at the Masters when only a few years previous Black men were not allowed to play. They shone brightly and are remembered because of their sporting prowess. That doesn't mean to say we've not got more work to do. After this year's European Championships, I was approached by a complete stranger on the street who indignantly inquired of me if white men are not allowed in the team anymore. I have to say that I use language that I would not repeat in this chamber. However, it gives us a reminder that we have so much more work to do. I thank Colcab Stewart for bringing this debate to the chamber to remind us once again that racism still pervades our society despite the huge steps that we have seen over the last 40 years in the sporting arena. Let us continue to use sport and music and art, incidentally, to highlight what binds us and what connects us. Ultimately, we should respect and celebrate individuality the things that we should be judged on in our actions and performances. Sport is such a great leveler, Presiding Officer. It's why I'm so passionate about investing in it and promoting it. It's not about teaching our children to do sport, it's more about teaching our children through sport. Deputy Presiding Officer Thank you, Mr Whittle. I now call Paul MacLennan to be followed by Gillian Mackay for around four minutes, Mr MacLennan. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer, and I thank Colcab Stewart for bringing this debate forward tonight. Our passionate speech really moves me, so thank you. I'm sad to be speaking in this debate tonight. We shouldn't need to be debating racism and cricket because it shouldn't be happening, but the sad fact in this instance has been institutional in cricket for many years. In preparing for this date tonight, I attended the briefing on this by Sport Scotland, which I'll touch upon shortly, but we'll also brief on this issue by running out racism. So who are running out racism? They decide on themselves as a group of cricket players, administrators and fans, cricket lovers. They want the current coverage in cricket in Scotland to lead to changes in the way in which institutions are run so that racism of all forms in cricket can be eradicated. We want to be part of that solution, and to have our say in what happens next. It's fantastic to see so many people in the gallery tonight. My thanks doesn't say a thanks to you for all for raising this issue in the bravery in doing so. They find the running out racism brief and highlight the following things, and this is the main important thing that they've said going forward. All of this happened with Cricket Scotland winning various diversity awards and with continued budgets and oversight signed off. This demonstrates issues in oversight and governance of governing bodies. Cricket Scotland lacked both diversity and expertise to take things forward. It's critical that anti-racism expertise and voices of lived experience are both involved in the action planning. There needs to be a safeguards bill and it can provide scrutiny and oversight to such issues. At the moment, Sport Scotland has limited powers to address issues within a governing body. We are often volunteer run and discharged with vital responsibilities, including racism, discrimination, safeguarding and the like. The plans to implement already agreed anti-racist infrastructure to oversee and support public bodies approaches to ensure Scotland can become an anti-racist society are used to provide scrutiny to sport. Finally, the focus for this infrastructure is for all policy development and implementation in health, education, housing and equally applies to into sport and culture, given its current profile and challenges. Other people have talked about other sports and other sports need to listen from the view of racism into the sport. I coached football for over 25 years, 15 years of those in the professional game.  As a football fan and a hip season ticker holder, I'm sorry to mention that, I've heard racist abuse being directed at players. One of those players was a guy called Kevin Harper. Kevin was the first black player, one of the first black players in Scotland and one of the first black players for hybs. I've spoken in person on lots of issues and it still affects them now, all these years later. Last year in my constituency, I was contacted to be two constituents, one week after another about racist incidents and two amateur football games, one week after another, who were frustrated at the lack of action by the Scottish football authorities. Following that, I arranged three roundtables, which included the sports minister Marie Todd and all the football governing bodies, the Scottish Football Association, the Scottish Youth Football Association, the Scottish Junior Football Association, the Scottish Amateur Football Association and the Scottish Women's Football Association, and a couple of the senior clubs, hybs and hearts in the area. At that meeting, I discovered that the SFA had one person only employed to look at diversity and racism issues, including policy, incident reporting and liaison with clubs. The SFA does have an equality and diversity board. That group meets quarterly and is keen to get a wider understanding of different issues if the work that is carried out. In comparison, in England, all Premier League and Championship teams must have full-time diversity offers. Now, I understand and appreciate that there is more money in English football. Those full-time diversity offers look at the issues of racism, misogyny and homophobia. That is extending to league 1 also during the course of this season and league 2 this season after. The Scottish footballing authorities need to learn from the experience of Scottish cricket and dealing with the issues, and how Sport Scotland dealt with that, and do more to tackle racism, sectarianism, trans and homophobia and misogyny and our sport. In closing, I commend Sport Scotland for its work, including in other sports, particularly football, needs to do more. I thank Cocab Stewart for bringing this important debate to the chamber and for her passionate speech earlier on. The Changing Boundaries report is damming in its conclusions and, as others have said, the wealth of evidence was undeniable. It is worthwhile noting that Plan for Sport, who conducted the Changing Boundaries report, had almost 1,000 interactions with people to hear about their experiences. I thank each and every one of those who did come forward and share their stories about the impact that Scottish cricket has had on their lives. The report found the leadership practices and governance of cricket Scotland to be institutionally racist. The report also found 448 instances that demonstrated institutional racism. Like so many colleagues across the chamber, I expressed my deep concern at those findings and solidarity to those who experienced this institutional abuse. No one should be made to feel unsafe, unwelcome or abused in sport.  Cricket Scotland has won various awards for diversity, which is a further cause for concern, and demonstrates that we cannot be complacent about the perceived progress that we have made on equalities in Scotland. We cannot be content with any progress that we have made, while racism still thrives. It is essential that the safeguards that we build in to provide the additional scrutiny and oversight that is needed in Scottish sport take account of the limited powers that institutions such as Sport Scotland currently have in being able to effectively explore and address racism across different governing bodies. Where vital responsibilities are discharged over areas such as safeguarding racism and bullying in governing bodies, it is essential that institutions that lack effective expertise across their boards, which can often be small or reliant on volunteers to function, are fully supported in those endeavours. The Scottish Greens share the view that genuinely impactful equalities and anti-racist strategies should be central to organisations that receive Government funding. Further to that, I welcome the assessment framework that is set out in the report, and I share the view that was noted in Cocab Stewart's motion that that could be effectively used as a conditional part of funding criteria for all funding in Scotland. I look forward to the response of the Scottish Government on the proposed anti-racist infrastructure model, which we currently understand is being considered and potentially published next year. That report will inform on oversight and how to support public bodies to ensure Scotland can become an anti-racist society. I am pleased that some measures are already being taken to provide oversight to Cricket Scotland until October 2023. Cricket Scotland is undertaking an immediate recruitment process for new board members and for additional staff to ensure the effective operation of new equalities measures and the undertaking of a governance review. It is vital that the voices of those with lived experience are part of the process. We must also remember that Cricket Scotland will not be the only sport that those issues have taken place in. That should be a wake-up call to all governing bodies and taken as an opportunity to stand together and say that racism will not be allowed in our sports teams. Although I have spoken about the structures and teams involved, we should all remember the impact that that will have had on individual players, their lives, their families and the love of their sport. I hope that all those who have come forward are getting the support that they deserve. I would also like to thank Running Out Racism and other organisations such as Show Racism, The Red Card and Kick It Out for their campaigning efforts to bring this important issue to the public attention that it deserves and to thank all the people who joined the rally outside Holyrood to make their voices heard that racism has no place in Scotland. As parliamentarians, we must tackle those prevalent challenges in all areas of public life. We must continue to be vigilant in the face of discrimination and address any form of inequality head-on. Sport should be a welcoming place for everyone. Racism and all other forms of bigotry and discrimination have no place in Scottish sport and no place in Scotland. Thank you and I call Faisel Chowdry to be followed by Rona Mackay for around four minutes, Mr Chowdry. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I would like to thank Cocov Stewart for bringing this matter, a very important matter, to the chamber. Thank you, Cocov. Here we go again, Presiding Officer. Another investigation. Another organisation found to be an institutional racist and long list of actions to be taken. In 1999, the Macpherson report noted that institutional racism is the collective failure of an organisation to provide and appropriate and professional service to people because of their colour, culture or ethnic origin. Since then, positive moves towards equality have been taken and uphold the work of campaigns such as show racism the red card and kick it out, which encourages the end of racism within sports. 23 years after the 1999 Macpherson report. However, racism is still present across society. Recently, we have seen stark inequality laid bare in the Scottish Government's equality impact assessment into its race, recruitment and retention action plan. Now, institutional racism in sports most recently within the cricket Scotland has been brought to light. Institution that receives government funding must be held to account and must promote anti-racist equality practice. Institution that their boards must not be given awards, whilst failing to uphold standards of fairness, equality and accountability for those they serve. It is unacceptable that cricket Scotland was winning diversity awards, whilst 448 cases of institutional racism were happening. The report details of allegations of favouritism towards white children from public school within cricket Scotland. I commend those who shared their lived experience of racism within the sports, including from Scotland International, Majoddl Hock and Kazim Shaik. Doing so has helped to expose the realities that racism does still exist in Scotland and that something needs to be done now. I hope that in the future it will be easier for other victims of racism to share their experience and be supported in doing so. I welcome reports that many clubs do support diversity and equality. However, more needs to be done so that this culture of equality is present within all clubs and indeed across sports. Institutional changes is needed to weed out institutional racism and introducing roles such as diversity officers and independent complained mechanism within sports could be a good start. The plan for sports report, while shocking and extremely disappointing, it is a wake up call about the reality of racism in sports and Scotland today. We need to use the opportunity of influence to the future for both cricket Scotland and for other sports bodies and institutions within Scotland. Now is the chance for the Scottish Government to prove that they take institutional racism seriously and instead of offering peaceful recommendations that do not go far enough are instead committed to overhaul racist institutions and practice throughout the nation and within their own institutions. This is the time for all of us to work together and I am committed to joining any discussion that the Scottish Government might have to influence meaningful action that could end institutional racism in Scotland and in Scottish sports. I am a cricket lover and I have played the game myself. Sports should be an exciting, enjoyable pursuit for children and adults alike and we should not be allowing a cultural culture where people feel that they cannot succeed in or enjoy sports because of institutional barriers against their skin, colour, religion or cultural background. I want to see a strict law monitoring and methods to ensure changes. Racism in Scotland has gone for long enough. Now is the time to deliver change. Thank you. In order to allow the last speaker in the open debate to contribute a minded to accept a motion without notice under rule 8.14.3 to extend the debate by up to 30 minutes and I invite Cokab Stewart to move such a motion. Thank you very much. The question is that the debate be extended by up to 30 minutes. Are we all agreed? Thank you very much, that is agreed. That is not an invitation to take up to 30 minutes, Ms Mackay. Around four minutes please, Rona Mackay. I thank my friend and colleague, Cokab Stewart, for bringing this hugely important debate to the chamber and indeed for our long-standing work in combating racism throughout society generally. I am delighted that her motion received such amazing, wide-spread cross-party support. The fact that the debate is about ending institutional racism in sport is shocking. The fact that it has been proved that there is institutional racism in sport is shocking. The fact that it took two international cricketing whistleblowers, Kazim Sheik and Majid Haq, to speak out until this was acknowledged is beyond shocking.  He should not have had to do that. His complaints about racism had been ignored until they were endorsed by the Sports Scotland report. That speaks volumes. Cricket's governing body and even some fellow players have turned the other way when complaints were raised—a case of see no evil, hear no evil. As we have heard, the Sports Scotland report reveals 448 institutionally racist incidences. 448, like that, is shocking. There is no doubt that cultural change is required. Uncomfortable truths must be confronted and we can only hope that this is the watershed that has been needed for so long. Cricket Scotland's entire board resigned on the eve of the Sports Scotland report. The sport is now in special measures. It has until the end of the month to develop an action plan and will remain in special measures until at least September 2023, subject to delivering outcomes that demonstrate an anti-racist approach. The irony of all this is that all of this happened with Cricket Scotland winning various diversity awards, as Gillian Mackay has highlighted. It beggars belief and it devalues the very purpose of those awards, which, in my opinion, in 2022 should not even be needed if we were a truly diverse population. Sporting excellent has nothing to do with the colour of anyone's skin.  Yesterday, I spoke in a member's debate brought to the chamber by Liz Smith when we celebrated the success of Team Scotland at the Commonwealth Games, and there was much to applaud. That is in stark contrast with today's debate. How do we move on from this sorry state of affairs? I do not pretend to know what goes on behind the scenes of sporting bodies. I can only comment on what has been made public. It seems to me that both bodies have traditionally lacked both diversity and expertise to take things forward. Of course, the voices of lived experience are, in my opinion, the most important people to have at the heart of any forward planning. Safeguars must be built in to provide independent scrutiny and oversight. I understand that, at the moment, Sport Scotland has limited powers to address issues within a governing body that appears to be all-powerful. That has to change, and I hope that the measures that have been proposed are effective. In conclusion, we know that the problem of racism in sport does not exist just in Scotland or just in cricket. However, as a small nation that consistently punches above its weight in the sporting arena, we must address it now and eradicate it for good. I want to thank Co-Cab Stewart for raising that motion about what is a really important issue and a significant moment for sport in Scotland. The changing the boundaries report was more than uncomfortable to face, frankly. It was distressing, shocking and utterly damning. Tonight's debate has covered a lot of ground. While I am encouraged by some of the positive stories, I am under no illusion that there is a long way to go to ensure that sport is truly inclusive and welcoming for all. Let me be absolutely clear. I firmly believe that there is no place for racism or for discrimination of any kind in sport or in wider society. Nelson Mandela has been quoted by a number of colleagues, and I think that his quote bears repeating. Sport has the power to change the world. It has the power to inspire, the power to unite people in a way that little else does. It speaks to youth in a language they understand. Sport can create hope where there was once only despair. It is more powerful than Governments in breaking down racial barriers. It laughs in the face of all types of discrimination. Sport is the game of lovers. I really, really believe that this can be the case. Sport can unite people and sport can be a leading light in tackling some of the ingrained inequality and unfairness that we have in our society. Being involved in sport and physical activity is so beneficial for people's physical health, their mental health and their social health. It helps to prevent heart disease, strokes, diabetes and a whole lot of cancers. It plays an important part in helping us to maintain a healthy weight. It makes a really positive contribution to good mental health, helps to reduce stress, improve self-esteem, self-efficacy, helps to manage depression and anxiety. Sport also strengthens communities, and that is why I believe that it is vitally important that everyone in Scotland feels welcome in sport and has the opportunity to be involved. Sport is a critical part of improving the health of the nation, but it is also a critical part of creating a fair and just society. Now I was saddened, angry, distressed to read about what many have experienced in Scottish cricket. Last week, I met the interim CEO from Cricket Scotland and Sport Scotland to discuss the changing the boundaries report and the recommendations and the associated action plan. I was genuinely pleased to hear the progress so far and how they plan to proceed. The board recruitment process is under way for a chair and two non-executive directors, and I know that they are promoting these roles widely to reach directly into as diverse an audience and communities as possible. The governance review will be commenced once board members are in place. The action plan is being developed and an equality, diversity and inclusion task force is being established. The cabinet secretary and myself have been absolutely clear that we expect to see this progress continue and we will be undertaking regular meetings to hear of the progress. We are also looking forward, along with the minister for equalities, to our forthcoming meeting with running out racism. That is an organisation that others have said, which was established after the concerns about racism within Yorkshire cricket were raised, and it has done a huge amount to support all the people who have experienced racism within cricket. I want to give my heartfelt thanks to each and every person who spoke to the review and who described their experience. I know that that cannot have been easy. Fundamental to our response to this report is the need to listen to those who have bravely spoken out and to ask them about the changes that they need to see take place in cricket and sport. I have confidence that Sport Scotland and Cricket Scotland absolutely understand the importance of that work. I know that they are willing and positive about working with others to bring about change. I am also grateful to Sport Scotland for a pointing plan for sport to undertake the independent review so quickly after allegations surfaced and for their commitment to the work. Of course, as many have said, racism is not confined to cricket, just as racism is not confined to sport. Sport Scotland is speaking to all Scottish governing bodies of sport about the issues that are raised in the report, and they are supporting them all to consider what needs to happen in their own sport. My own feeling, certainly, is that that will have just lifted the lid and we are peering inside and we will see a grim picture replicated throughout sport. I am very grateful to the minister for taking the intervention. I am listening to the debate today with great interest. I keep hearing the idea that Sport Scotland does not have the powers that it requires to tackle racism. I am thinking about my own sport. To be an affiliated club in Trackfield Athletics, you have to have a trained welfare officer at each and every one of the clubs, and to be a coach in that club we have to undergo every time we renew our licence and equalities courses. Is that not something that we should be thinking about replicating across the whole of Scottish sport? There are certainly good pockets of work in many sports. We have heard about some of them today, but what we need to do is take a systematic approach to this right across the board and make sure that there is no sport and no place for institutional racism to thrive, as it clearly has done in cricket. We absolutely need sports to ensure that they are truly inclusive of the communities that they take place in. As many have said, that needs to be from the playing field right to the boardroom. We have to do more. It needs to include not just people who are involved in sport. It is not just that they have to educate themselves about racism, but they have to understand about unconscious bias as well. We all need to be active in our attempts to root out racism. That passive sympathy is just not enough. I have to acknowledge that there is a lack of trust in the organisations and the processes. Given the level of institutional racism that has been exposed, that does not surprise me. I understand that. We have to work to rebuild that trust by listening to people with lived experience and to act to ensure system change. That is such an important issue. It is important to everyone in the chamber and the communities that we serve. The report has made absolutely grim reading. It is a low point in Scottish sport, but let us hope that that low point can be a new beginning. I am open to all ideas about how we might work together to collectively make a difference. I am more than happy to continue cross-party discussions and to update colleagues regularly. I am keen to hear ideas on how we take that forward. I am keen to understand where gaps exist and strengthen structures where they need to be strengthened. We are listening. We are having more detailed conversations about the issue and engaging with stakeholders right across a range of issues from race to safeguarding. Finally, I want to thank everyone who has contributed to the discussion tonight. I again thank my colleague Kochab Stewart for bringing this motion to the Parliament. Mostly, I am grateful to the many people in the gallery and the many people watching at home who shone a light on this issue, who made us all feel uncomfortable. I promise you that we will do better. Thank you, minister. That concludes the debate. I close this meeting of Parliament.


Superman is one of the most iconic characters of all time, since his inception in the 1930s he has existed in many different forms, on the page, on television, and of course on the big screen. I don't think that there is a definitive example of Superman. At this point his character represents something bigger than any specific incarnation of the hero. In his article titled The Philosophy of Superman, AC Grayling writes, America is an earnest need of a savior, for everything from the minor inconveniences to the major horrors of world catastrophe, and here he is, the down home, clean cut boy in the blue tights and the red cape. And I think we can spend all day discussing and debating what Superman stands for, but today I want to focus on why it can be difficult for writing a character like Superman. The first thing that I want to stress is that I don't think that Superman is a bad character, quite the opposite in fact. He has a strong set of morals that he sticks to no matter what, and is willing to do anything to ensure that his code isn't broken. I want to begin by looking at the central conflict of Superman, not within a specific narrative, but instead the overarching conflict that the character must face. This is something that is found within every well-written character. For example in the Lord of the Rings trilogy, the narrative central conflict is everyone trying to destroy the ring or rid the world of evil, but each character also must face an internal struggle. The hero chooses to sacrifice his own well-being for the betterment of all of Middle-earth, while Aragorn needs to accept the responsibility of King. Superman doesn't have a central conflict, or at least not one that can be tested easily. He's a savior of the people of Earth and always does his best to do as much good as possible. There is no moral ambiguity, nothing to question, so the most common way that writers are able to get around this is through making his character fail, putting him in a situation to make a choice. Much is the case in Richard Donner's 1978 Superman. Clark Kent is haunted by his inability to save his father. All those powers, I couldn't even save him. His central conflict is that he can do incredible feats, but he can't do everything. This reemerges at the end of the film, he's able to save the town, but unable to save Lois, he can only do so much. The inherent problem with this is that he fails. It isn't a good way to end the story, and yes, in this case the writers were able to pull themselves out of that corner. But turning back time isn't a good plot device that can be used again and again. In order to have a good story there needs to be conflict, and Superman is able to eliminate that conflict before it even begins. But the problems don't stop there, and to illustrate the next point I want to look to Sid Field's four essential qualities that every good character needs. A dramatic need, a point of view, an attitude, and finally to change. The first three can be easily found within the character, in fact they're his defining traits. But the fourth element is what I view as the most important aspect. How does our character change from the beginning of the story to the end? Superman never changes. His morals never waver. He starts out in the story in one position and ends it in the same exact one. This isn't a problem exclusive to Superman, it's one that plagued the Matrix sequels. Superman has no room for growth as a child who is raised with a proper set of morals. He has everything right, unfortunately this creates an inherent problem with storytelling. With no room for personal growth, the harder it becomes to relate to and care for him as a character. Yet another problem exists when creating an antagonist force that is strong enough to rival him. He is all-powerful, stronger than any human could ever hope to be. The people he faces need to find a way to put him in a position where he can't save everyone. Meanwhile, the writers need to find a way for him to be able to do just that. The most compelling villains he faces are the ones that outthink him. Those who understand his moral beliefs and challenge them. Hours of watching indestructible figures fly around beating one another up doesn't work when we know that they actually can't die. His struggle is a moral one, not at all a physical one, so the writers and directors need to find a way to show off that moral struggle visually. Before writing begins, the writers are already back into a corner, but that doesn't mean there is no way out. With all these restrictions and limitations, I want to look at what I consider to be the best Superman story in a motion picture. Brad Bird's the Iron Giant. It isn't exactly a one-to-one retelling of the Superman story. Brad Bird and co-writer Tim McAnley's took certain elements of the story and reimagined others to create a near-perfect story. Much like Superman, the Iron Giant is about something that people cannot understand, something that we are afraid of. Despite that, it takes just one person to see the good in him. Hogarth teaches the Iron Giant the principles of morality, that there is right and there is wrong in the world, and everyone has the choice to be either. I want to examine three of the elements that help make this telling of the story successful. First of all is the scale. The film stays grounded, it focuses entirely on a small town, not some giant plot of world domination. Because of this, we know what the stakes are. We know the characters of the town, so when there is trouble, we actually care for it. In addition, the story is not seen through Superman's eyes.  Despite that, he is determined to do good. When he does something dangerous, he is risking serious harm to himself, unlike Superman. It also is a much more relatable position to the audience, and just like the audience, Hogarth makes the choice to see the Iron Giant for what he truly is. He doesn't pass preconceived judgments, the Iron Giant is just as misunderstood as he is. He instead sees right from wrong. Finally, there is emotional growth from the Iron Giant. Early on, he is naive, almost childlike, but he has taught the importance of doing good in the face of adversity. Later in the film, his pre-programming takes over, and he unleashes his true nature, his violent side. But then, he realizes that he was wrong. The world doesn't need more violence, in fact, quite the opposite. He chooses to be good. He chooses to be Superman. And I think this reveals the main message about Superman. And that is, we don't care about him because he can fly or shoot lasers from his eyes. We care about him because he always does the right thing. He puts others in front of himself, and that's not a superhuman trait. One of my favorite parts of Man of Steel is watching other characters do this. Jonathan Kent in this scene, Lois Lane later, and Perry White all choose to put themselves at risk to save others. That isn't something that comes from Krypton. That is something that is found within each of us. All we have to do is choose to be super. Hey everyone, I hope you enjoyed. Superman has always fascinated me as a character. When I was younger, I loved everything Superman. And to this day, I still enjoy some of the films he is in, although it's hard to deny that at times they can oftentimes be problematic. Still, I'm glad characters like Superman are being written. In full honesty, I'm not a big comic book reader at all. So I really can't speak for how well he is handled in that medium. But I am interested. So for you comic book buffs out there, please let me know if a lot of what I brought up here has been addressed. And if so, how they do it. Anyway, if you're new here, make sure you hit that subscribe button. I'm working on a couple of pretty big videos so there won't be a new one next weekend, but there will be a couple of good ones coming soon. In case you missed it, I put a link to my last video on a brother where art, though, in which I explored the hero's journey towards redemption. Be sure to check that video out if you missed it. I will see you next week.


The Appalachian Advantage Plan is the simpler, better way to get the phone you actually want instead of paying hundreds of dollars up front.  It's called the Appalachian Advantage and is available at Appalachian Wireless. Local community members in the city of Pressensburg showed up in large numbers as the city submitted a video to HGTV's show Hometown for a chance to renovate downtown Pressensburg. We're in the process of applying for the hometown takeover. It's one of the programs HGTV has on there and they come in, they help spruce up the town a little bit and we're applying for it. The video is part of our application process. The event that we had, we asked people to come out, we had over 200 people show up. We had Sasquatch, we had Pathfinder from the college, we had dogs, we had bicyclers, we had runners, we had cheerleaders, we had all these different people who really care and they showed up to try to show their support and hopefully we will catch HGTV's attention. One is it's community and it shows that we're a community and we care. And two is obviously, you know, if we can get something spruced up downtown, you know, we're very fortunate. We have a lot of stuff that are outside of downtown and we get that little bit of just pushed downtown, that's really going to help us out. What we need for people, if they don't care to get out there and you're going to see videos, you're going to see pictures, push it out there, you know, maybe that one picture might catch somebody's eye, they have something to do with HGTV that will get them interested. And I cannot tell you how much I appreciate everybody who came out. You know, over 200 people showed up four o'clock in the afternoon, right after school and we knew it was a bad time but we couldn't wait in later because the, you know, it's dark and that just shows that people in Prestonburg, there's two things. One is they're interested and two is they're interested because they care, not for any other reason. And that's why it takes. In Letcher County, the city of Weizberg is also vying to be selected for HGTV's hometown makeover. Mayor James Wiley-Craft told me that the video the city will submit, how it's not only what Weizberg has to offer now, but also what it could offer if it is selected for the hometown makeover. We want to get their ideas. We want to have them come in, look at our town and make suggestions as to what needs to be done, although we are proud of what we have and we think it's beautiful as it is, but I'm sure it can use some improvement. We have several things that are tourist attractions that will cause people to want to come to town, plus the fact that it's just naturally beautiful. We're situated in between two gorgeous mountains and we are very proud of all of that. The deadline for submitting entries is this Friday, February 7th.


Welcome back to the end of the week podcast and we've got three things on the agenda. We're going to talk about the supreme month of November, as far as the US equity market is concerned. So we'll look to deconstruct that. Why did it have such an amazing month? In fact, the best November since 1980, we'll do a little bit of a pop quiz on how the Magnificent Seven performed and maybe a few others and also what a couple of the big Wall Street year end targets are looking like for the end of next year because there's been a few more and there's a little bit of divergence as well in terms of what they think for the year ahead. Then of course, we're going to talk about Elon. I'm sure everyone has seen the clip by now. So I'm going to refrain from swearing in the show opening here and I'll save that for the segment for exactly what he said. But we'll talk about that. We'll talk about Twitter, discuss maybe a few ideas of why this is happening, why he's doing this, if we can, if there is any method to the madness that is, and then we'll also talk about the Cybertruck as well, which came out this week. And then to finish, we're going to have a look in the oil market and talk about the OPEC plus meeting, which of course was delayed because of the scrabbling that was going on between all the different nations. So to kick things off, as I said, we had a really good finish. So we're recording this on the 1st of December. We finished up 8.9% for the month in November, the second best November since 1980. A few other stats here, the VIX volatility index, the fear gauge is hovering around its lowest levels since before the pandemic now. To give you an idea, I was looking at the heat map of the S&P 500. So I'm going to ask you for who was the worst and who was the best performer out of the magnificent seven? In the month, just in the month of November. Yeah. What type of percentage are we looking at? Do you think? I'll give you a clue. The worst performer was up 7%. Worst performer, Google? Correct. OK. If you're going to play that game, give me the full sequence then. Oh, God. Well, Google, because they've just been having a worst time of it in this kind of open AI race or AI race, I should say. So I would say the best performer then it might maybe it's Tesla. Correct. All right. Correct. All right. What do you reckon the neighbor up in the last four weeks?  Wow. OK. Crazy, isn't it? Decent. Then I'm going to go Microsoft. Number two. Microsoft. Number three. Up 12%. OK. Is it Amazon? Amazon number five, up 9.8%. I should have just stuck with my first two guesses. The wheels are coming off here. So who's number two then? Nvidia. OK, yeah. They're up 15, Apple up 11, Meta second worst, only up 8.6%. Bank stocks. Check this one out. JP up 12, Citi up 17, BlackRock up 23%. That's some punchy num. I mean, for those big tech firms, well, tech, right, you know, they're normally that kind of sector, the share price is normally more volatile. So you expect bigger numbers. Banks are definitely less volatile, so they're huge figures for bank stocks. What would explain BlackRock up 10% more than JP Morgan? Well, I'd say that's just a direct function of the fact they're an asset manager. So they derive their revenue from charging a fee on the value of the assets under management. And so ultimately, if stocks go up best month, what did you say for a long time? 1980, yeah. Best November, yeah. They've had their best month depends what you look at. But the Bloomberg US aggregate bond index has had its best months in 1985, that's just any month, not just a month of November, any month best since 1985. Here's a question back at you. So if you think like the S&P went up, what did you say? 8.5%. Yeah. So what do you think the percentage rise was for the US? Bloomberg US aggregate bond index, 18%. No, you've gone the wrong way. 4.3. So bonds are less volatile. Well, at least I thought I was thinking that bonds got absolutely crushed. Yeah. I was thinking maybe they've just got an exaggerated bounce. There's there's yeah, it's a bit more it's way broader that US aggregate bond index. I would say Van the S&P is broader in so much as in there you've got everything from treasuries US government bonds all the way through to high yield US corporate junk bonds. So there's a there's a huge I'm sure if you went down to that higher yield end of the spectrum then you probably did get numbers well into the double digits because there's way more volatility down there. So. So what I guess before we move on then two things what exactly just in a shorthand statement because this is something that I guess a lot of students would be asked in a potential interview situation. They're like, OK, great, we all went up. Why did it go up? Yeah, what would be a neat way to package that up? Well, everything went up. Apart from one thing, which was the US dollar that went in the exact opposite way or all for the same single reason. But yeah, asset prices through the roof US dollar value dropping. So this is all about the story we've been banging on about forever, which is right. It's it's about future interest rate expectations. What's the Fed going to do with interest rates in the future? We know they're at the top of the hiking cycle. So it's just about when are they going to cut? And we've been talking about this for weeks. I mean, we were talking about how Goldman's were saying, right, they're going to start to cut at the end of 2024. But Morgan Stanley are predicting that they were going to cut mid 2024. And so it's all about when are they going to cut and what's happened in the last week? There's been a very notable shift in the market consensus expectation as to when cuts are going to start. So pre this event, we were thinking end of 2022, you know, second half of 2024, probably in the autumn, right? That's just shifted now to the first half and it's shifted to May. So now they're pricing in a 25 basis point rate cut by the Federal Reserve in the May 2024 meeting. Why? Why the sudden change? Because of this guy called Christopher Waller. So he's on the FOMC. So he's one of the rate setters at the Federal Reserve. And he made some comments at a conference and they are what you call dovish comments. So he was I'll explain in the details in a second. But the key thing here, why did markets sort of swing and react so much is because normally Christopher Waller is one of the more hawkish members of the FOMC. So he's normally the one going, right, we should be hiking rates. You know, very much about tightening policy and for him to come out and say some dovish comments, dovish just meaning, right, we're going to cut rates or loosen policy for him to say it is way more meaningful than if another member of the committee had said the same thing. But they're already normally dovish. It wouldn't have had much of an impact. But this guy's now shifted his stance, which is a measure and an indication that the whole Federal Reserve Committee on average has shifted to a more dovish place. Basically, what he was talking about was real interest rates. So what is what are real? Because we always talk about the interest rate. What's the Federal Reserve's interest rate? Five point seven five percent. So what's the real interest rate? Well, then that's just taking into account inflation. So the real interest rate, which is ultimately thought to be, you know, ultimately that that's a more accurate, truer reflection of the cost of borrowing, as well as the yield you get on savings. So the real interest rate is just the nominal interest rate, i.e. the interest rates set by the central bank minus inflation. So if the Fed wants to keep interest rates unchanged, right, but you've got inflation falling, well, then actually, even if they keep rates unchanged, if inflation is falling, well, then actually the real interest rate is going up because you remember it's nominal rates minus inflation. But if the minus inflation bit is getting smaller, the net outcome is higher, right? So his point was, look, if inflation continues to trend down, us doing nothing means rates are going up. So he's saying we may well look at cutting interest rates, not to boost economic growth or we're worried about deflation or we're worried about the economy slowing too fast, nothing to do with that purely. We will cut rates purely to maintain the real interest rate. So this was kind of quite a big curveball. And suddenly everyone's talking about real interest rates again. And that explanation has really altered people's predictions as to when the Fed might start to make a move. So another word that I saw quite often this week was Goldilocks. People referring to this Goldilocks type environment, which perhaps you could explain a bit more about what that is in this kind of context. Well, it's not too hot and it's not too cold. It's just right. OK, so this is referring to, you know, like the economic conditions, OK, whereby. They're not too hot. So too hot means the economy is growing too fast. Upside inflation pressure. Right, we've got to hike interest rates to try and curb that. Too cold is the opposite where, you know, you're getting the economy going the other way. Just right is where we get the sweet spot of the economy is growing. And actually, we had GDP figures for the quarter three announced earlier this week for the US, which got revised up. So 5.2 percent growth annualized, that is, in quarter three, which is I mean, just stellar, right, huge growth figure. So the economy is doing really, really nicely. Inflation is coming back down. So we've got this scenario where economic conditions are really good and the Fed aren't going to be hiking anymore. And if wallows to be believed, quite the opposite. So you might even have this phenomenal scenario where you've got really good economic conditions and you're getting rate cuts.  That's your Goldilocks. So yeah, people are starting to get a little bit excited. I would say it. OK, well, there's one there's one bank on the street that's not getting excited. Morgan Stanley. No, do you know what? Your man, Mike, seems to have got out the right side of bed this time. He definitely sits on the bearish side. He's not the biggest bear on the street. So Morgan Stanley is what? Goleman's are forecasting 4,700 for the S&P year end. Morgan Stanley and Barclays, 4,500. JP Morgan are going for 4,200. As context, Bank of America are going 5,000. Deutsche are looking for 5,100. Interesting. So JP, their rationale. So let me let me give you both the ends of the scale here. Yeah. So with JP Morgan, most bearish on the street, they're saying global growth decelerates, household saving shrink. Jubilitical risks remain high with national elections, including those in the US, which could add policy volatility. Summary. Yeah. Deutsche corporate earnings to remain resilient, even if the United States experiences a mild short recession. Yeah. Interesting. I mean, I. Yeah, it's very bearable. I mean, to give context here, the S&P is trading at 4,568. So those saying 4,500, I mean. They're basically saying it's not going to move. It'll be exactly where it is now in 12 months time. Um, saying that, saying that, if you've got the chart up, yeah, go look at the last 12 months. Yeah. So where were we trading? What was the respective low and high over that 12 month period to give us an idea of the variance of movement? OK, so 12 months ago. Started December 2022, trading at 4,000. OK. Dipped a bit into year end and actually the low of the whole year of 2023. The low. Well, so far, I guess, you know, you never know. But the low was at 3,800. And that was on January the 5th. So right at the very start of the year, we've then rallied and actually the high so far. And this could be broken was on the 31st of July, which was at 4,588. So we're sat like just 20 points off the summer high. So if there were, if there were any more upside into year end, then we will be, you know, finishing on the high. We started on the low. So, you know, a workout to be a very tasty 12 month period for the index. So, yeah, we're kind of right up at the top end of the year's range. 4,200 would take us kind of take us back to levels. We dipped below that at the end of October. And the reason for why November's got these crazy figures in terms of the amount of upside, it's the timing of the the kind of wave pattern of this market. The big nose dive low was on October the 27th down at 4,100.  And then we just pinged higher right from day one of November through to through to the end. So so it sounds quite straightforward until you go back in time eight weeks and you're like higher for longer, sell everything. And then you go forward four weeks, no cut rates, buy everything. So what's to say that this can't flip again on its head? Well, absolutely. And it can and it could do, you know, I think the most important thing between now and the end of the year is the inflation data for November that will get released about halfway through the month. And then we've got a Fed meeting on the 13th of December. So really, if that inflation figure comes in lower than last month, we had a big drop last month, which is why people have got excited again and why Waller's starting to say, hang on, we might need to cut rates. So if inflation goes down again, then I think that's your further evidence that actually rate cuts are going to happen sooner. But look, if that inflation number jumps back up, then right, we're going to massively see sore, maybe back to the panic mode of, oh, no, rates are going to have to stay this high for for much longer. And yeah, you'll get the sea sourcing back down to the downside into year end. So yeah, it's a pretty, pretty important number that which will come halfway through the month. Well, all right, well, let's let's move on and let's talk a little bit. Elon Musk, who, yeah, made the headlines again this week. What's the swell? Do we have a swearing policy on this podcast? Well, yes, you can only swear if it's repeating verbatim of what someone else has said. OK, that's where yourself. That's the rules. OK, as long as it's a direct quote. Yeah. OK, perfect. So do you have the quote? Do you want to take the honest? Yeah, the quote.  Is that clear? I hope it is. I actually think he said it twice.  But yeah, he he said that. I think it was like a New York Times dealbook conference thing. And yeah, he's on a stage and it was a little bit out of left field. He obviously looked pretty disgruntled and he went on to talk about the fact that the advertising boycott was basically going to kill the company. And then he started saying, well, let the people of planet Earth then decide it and we'll document it. It was all quite weird to watch, to be quite honest. Yeah, the context here was that there's a few parts, but essentially he endorsed an anti-Semitic post on Twitter. Had a lot of backlash. The Advertiser Exodus began as well after a nonprofit media matters published a report that showed advertisements from major companies alongside neo-Nancy posts. So Apple, Disney had a little pop shot of Bob Iger. Isn't it this year of Disney in particular? Yeah, a few of those other big kind of household brand names who have all left Twitter, I say Twitter X. Yeah, though, other than this kind of headline story and other than feeling like, wow, imagine if you're the CEO and and Elon comes out with that. How are you must feel trying to manage that fall out the next one? Just quickly on that front, because like the companies that have pulled out like IBM, Apple, Walt Disney, Comcast, Warner Brothers, you know, giant organizations with giant advertising budgets. And they were kind of pulling out anyway, not just because of that anti-Semitic post that Elon must have, but also since Elon Musk was taken over.  So they've kind of pulled out. So he hired a new CEO to come and charm them back. OK, her name is Linda Jacarino. So he hired her to specifically because of her connections within the media industry and to get these advertisers back.  Do we know that kind of thing, you know, her salary? Like, I don't know what's in this for her. Well, well, to to be the CEO of one of the big. So she talked about most talked about companies, I guess. Yeah. OK, so. Just trying to think of.  Yeah, where obviously he can kind of leverage down and say that this is all not I don't want to I don't want to go into the political side, because we know that point. But I was trying to think, OK, so that aside from a business perspective, what's his angle here?  Well. Yes, indeed.  It wasn't planned. He just came out to shoot. I don't know. Maybe he was drunk.  Maybe that was the case. Oops.  Or it's a very genius play. So here's that story, because at the moment, right? We know what what do we know? Because we don't Twitter is not a publicly listed company anymore. He bought it, took it off the stock market, right? So he doesn't have to report earnings. So we don't know finer details about the financial position of the firm. What we do know is last July, he said that we are still negative cash flow and that were revenue is 50 percent down from when he bought it. And that's because of advertisers pulling out, right? So 50 percent down, maybe. So that was in July. Maybe things have got worse, especially after this tirade, right? Maybe things have got worse to the point where he's thinking, well, hang on a minute, this isn't going in the right direction. And the problem they've got in terms of. Financing the deal, you know, he bought Twitter for forty three billion dollars in terms of financing. He borrowed twelve and a half million. That's a billion dollars. So there's twelve and a half billion dollars of debt involved here. That was a syndicated loan from the big banks. Who was it? Morgan Stanley, Bank of America, Barthes and Mitsubishi Bank. So they they syndicated this loan for him, right? Thirteen billion, let's just round it up. So that's really expensive. That's not helping that cash flow. The negative cash flow part of that story is these big interest payments that they've got to make on this debt, right? So maybe maybe Musk is thinking, hang on, this is not. I can't pull it off. So let's bury it. Let's actually go ahead and bury this thing, the company, so that I can get this debt written off. Or I mean, like there's an extreme case like the company goes bankrupt and OK, the liquidators come in and the debt holders.  I don't know, five percent, ten percent, OK? Or most more likely, Musk will go to the banks and go, look, conditions are really bad. This is go heading towards bankruptcy. So you've got two choices, banks either. Let's let it go to bankruptcy. You're going to get five percent of your money back or restructure the debt. Let's restructure the debt. Let's let's take a haircut, as we say, which means, right. We're going to say the debt, well, it's 12, 12 and a half billion. Let's call it six point two five billion. So let's write off half of it. OK, with the other half, let's restructure it with a better interest rate. Help me out here, guys, to make sure this company doesn't go bankrupt. And then, right, we'll get it back on its feet. So there's maybe if he's being a genius here, then I think that's probably the play where he's trying to get some of this debt written off before then the company revives. And he sells off into the sunset, having saved himself six point two five billion dollars of debt repayments. All while he's feeling pretty pleased with the 20 percent appreciation of Tesla in one month. Indeed, I guess the next 12 months then will be really interesting to see how that plays out. There's also, of course, a political year in the US was an election at the end. So it's definitely going to be a year of Elon Musk. Yeah, for sure. That's true. And he said he said publicly that he wants Trump back on the platform. He's basically given him a public invite to return. Of course, Trump has his own platform. Is that still going? I've got apparently it is, but no idea on what the figures are. I don't know if anyone I don't know what the user figures are. But I guess it's just full of Trump's. Fans, right? So yeah, I don't know. So what in that scenario that you described? I like it. I like that this theory. So looking at it from the bank's perspective. Just bad deal, then, or. Well, yeah, I mean, I.  His track record is pretty phenomenal. It's not just Tesla, of course, but SpaceX, you know, the boring company. Muralink, he was founded Open AI just in his spare time. You know, he's everything he's touched has turned to gold. So he's a backable guy. So these banks came in and backed him. Yeah, it's just, I think in the end, for sure. Musk paid way over the odds for the asset. And I think probably he's still a little bit pissed off about that, which is maybe why he's engineering this scenario where he can. Get out of some of this debt that he used. So that that will lower the price, right? So if half of the debt got taken away, that's 6.25 million, right? So that'll take his actual purchase price down to 37 billion rather than 43. So maybe he'll feel a little bit more. It does make me think that maybe take it one step genius further, that this was he was kind of almost because he was already trying to battle in court. Wasn't he over the fee to start with from the beginning? So he knew it was way too toppy. Yeah. Well, that's it. He messed up in the kind of legal contract he signed, you know, to do this deal. He kind of he rushed it, I guess. And the legal clauses meant he was basically forced in the end to buy it at 43 billion when actually he didn't in the end, he didn't want to. But he was legally obligated to do so. So yeah, left a bit of a bad taste. OK, we'll see how this goes. Yeah, or to come, I'm sure, more controversy always with Elon. All right, so let's take a little look about OPEC. So what I just want to touch, you mentioned Tesla, of course. Oh, sorry. Cyber trucks.  But it kind of got kind of they had another kind of mini launch yesterday, even though it got launched back in 2019 in terms of the concept of it. So back in 2019, it was like, here we go, cyber truck going to change the truck world and it's going to be delivered in twenty twenty one and it's going to cost forty thousand dollars. That's what they said in twenty nineteen. Right. Here we are. And the twenty twenty three is finally being delivered except the cheapest price will be sixty thousand nine hundred and ninety dollars, but that one's not available yet. The only one you can actually buy with the twenty twenty four delivery date is the all wheel drive version, which is eighty thousand or the cyber beast, which is the top end of the range. And that's a hundred thousand dollars. So. So that got kind of rolled out yesterday. The reason the reason why it was a very infamous launch back in twenty nineteen, you remember, because there's loads of features of this truck, which has caused a massive headache in production, which is why it's late. Things like it's got an ultra hard exoskeleton. Basically, they're making it out of cold rolled stainless steel, which is bullet proof. I mean, only in America. So apparently it's bullet proof for up to a nine millimeter handgun. Why? Anyway, it's got this armored glass, OK, and the launch in twenty nineteen, they were raving about all these features. And yeah, check out the glass. It's an armored glass. And basically they throw a baseball at it. Or was it a baseball bat? Like a cannonball, like a mini cannonball thing was. Yeah. And the glass shattered. It was like, oh, oops. That wasn't supposed to shatter. It's supposed to be on purpose. Did that maybe? Maybe so. They did it yesterday. They did it again yesterday. OK. And it works like the glass didn't shatter. Well, surprise, surprise. I saw the build up to this launch. There was about maybe three or four weeks ago. There was a viral post on on X and it was a video of someone filming and they had the Cybertruck. You know, when you have like a road test vehicle and it's all in like this kind of weird. Right. Yeah. Yeah. So you can't tell what it is, but you know what it is. Yeah. And then there was then then it had bullet holes in the side and it went viral because someone's driving beside the Cybertruck filming it, going, look at the bullet holes, man. Obviously, marketing build up to the launch. Oh, what?  But I mean, I just I'm not I guess I'm not the target target market. Well, there's some craze.  Like, did you know it can do zero to 60 faster than a Ferrari 2.9 seconds, zero to 60. I mean, it's crazy. It's got some quite cool things like it's going to have solar solar charging as an optional extra. So you can have solar panels in and it'll charge to increase the range, which apparently is going to be up to 500 miles anyway. So it's a pretty phenomenal machine.  Therefore, you're implying that somehow. You know, putting it, putting your foot down and a car moving like even if it's faster, you and I know that there's a lot more even just driving straight line speed. Well, look, all I can say is there's two million people on the pre-order book. Yeah, but that, yeah, that again, is part of the bigger, wider, musk. Yeah, musk-esque ways where he uses his influence, his power, absolutely, shape these public opinions to everything he does. It's all orchestrated to fit an engineer that results in tangible things like a two million waiting list for an absolute heap of junk. I'm not going to. But there's real problems with production. So even those are two million waiting this right next year. The only records are going to be able to build 250,000, like at best. And his track record on hitting production targets is not good. So probably less than 200,000, right? So they'll let they'll make less than 10 percent of the pre-order book next year. So, yeah, the waiting list for this thing is going to be insane. OK, yeah, I tell you now, you'll be lucky to hit 10 percent. Yeah, the reason why is any factory line process. You can't just have a brand new vehicle with new materials and new design without fault.  I mean, don't sit on the fence. Anyhow, let's move on. Let's talk OPEC OPEC Plus. So these this would be the group of nations, oil producing nations, namely Saudi, Russia, but a whole heap from the Middle East, Africa, but the wider plus being namely Russia, but does include a few other outside members. But they've essentially agreed to make additional voluntary cuts to oil production in 2024 to bolster the market. Now, the idea being here that it was quite well anticipated in the sense of the general economic climate, did I have to do more? Oil hasn't really responded to cuts done thus far. Saudi, others, the kind of sweet spot is still higher than where oil is currently trading, not that far off. The sweet spot being about 80 dollars. The idea being here, Saudi is the easiest example that they have a budget to manage. And so they need money coming in as well as money going out. And for that book to balance, they need 80 dollars a selling price. And at the moment, we're trading just below there. So the kind of details of the deal, Saudi Arabia pledged to extend an existing voluntary cut of one million barrels a day until the end of the first quarter, Russia. So this is always the kind of contentious relationship here. There is no deal unless those two deal together, just given the magnitude of the kind of waiting of the overall OPEC Plus production. It's very much tilted to those two. And Russia said they were going to deepen its existing voluntary export reduction to 500,000 barrels per day from 300. So they've gone another step further, essentially. So the group did agree with total production curbs of 2.2 million barrels per day from eight members. And that figure then is around 1.3 when you're talking about the Saudi, Saudi-Russia mix. So, yeah, that was the the latest one. One interesting kind of summary I saw from one analyst. He said the Saudi lollipop. The meaning of that being that it's a little kind of sweetener has been successfully socialized into the OPEC Plus lollipop. Yeah, you lost me at lollipop. So what is this? What is this voluntary word? What's why is that in there? Voluntary cuts. Why aren't they just saying we are cutting by Excellent. Well, I guess the biggest problem you have here is that these countries, probably the easiest way to look at this is if you were to take Saudi in Iran, two countries which historically do not see eye to eye for religious reasons. And so therefore they do bat for the same team, though, when they're in OPEC, that being that both of them are sensitive to the value of what oil is trading in terms of their income as a country. So the problem you have at Volunt or the problem you have in trying to enforce cuts is that or who is exactly going to monitor, check and enforce these things. It needs to be done as a collective agreement in the greater interest of all parties. But therein lies the biggest problem because every one of these countries is quite unique, economically, culturally, as I said, religiously. So it's a tough gig trying to get everyone on board. You know, you think of Saudi and Russia being critical. Obviously, Saudi are lined with the US. And at the moment, there's a war still going on in Ukraine and the West sanctioning Russia. So there's some delicate relationships for sure. This meeting in itself got delayed. The delay from the meeting from Sunday was partly motivated by talks with African members in particular. Angola, Nigeria pushed back against attempts to curb their output because they're looking to revive their oral output sectors after years of underinvestment, mismanagement, civil war. They're like, no, we want to get cracking. We want to pump as much as we can get away with and sell it to make as much money as possible, which goes counter, obviously, to the objective that Saudi Arabia has, which is to try and at least manipulate the supply handle to offset the falling demand. Right. Well, that's the price. So, right, the point of OPEC or OPEC plus that is that supply handle and them having an effect on price. I would argue that they failed. On that attempt this time because they've cut production by more. So price should go up, right? But it didn't price went down. I mean, we had a pretty big sell-off couple of dollars or more, two or three, even three dollars to the downside of the back of this announcement, which is the opposite way to what theory suggests it should go, right? So it's the least because they didn't even have a the meeting was delayed indicating or hang on, there's there's disagreement. And then they made the announcement yesterday and they didn't even have a press conference, which is like. They always have a press conference. So that you can clearly tell that there's big disagreement and this these cuts, I mean, are they even going to happen? Right. You know, is it just so here's a question. Is OPEC are we seeing the beginning of the end of OPEC? Well, I think we said this before. I think the writing has been on the wall for for some time. Yeah, particularly given the emergence as well, of if you think more long term and you do think about these African nations in particular, the countries like Nigeria will in time become more powerful within that mix. For Saudi Arabia, unfortunately, the only way is down here. And hence the reason why they're doing their quest to diversify. They know this, they have known this. If the others are on the rise here and that in itself will fracture the relationship because there will need to be a shift in power of which will be unacceptable to all parties at some point. So yeah. Yeah. It will certainly be an interesting time ahead. The geopolitical consequence, though, of that fracturing could get interesting. Yeah, for sure. All right, well, look, we will wrap it up there. Thanks, Piers, for your time and for everyone else. Have a great weekend. We'll see you next week. Yeah, have a great weekend.