the work with local authorities and the Scottish Futures Trust to make sure we can deliver for families in the way we have set out. Thank you. I am afraid that ends questions this afternoon and we have to now move on to the next item of business which is a debate on motion number 15430 in the name of Liam McArthur on Education. I would be grateful if all of those members who wish to speak in this debate could press the request to speak buttons now. I have to notify the chamber at the outset that we are very tight for time. There is no extra time at all in this debate pan gennych chi gael eich beithasol gwneud yn wych i'w dda i'i banderaf yn gyfynu'r hunain.  Mae'n gweithio i ei gwahau i gyfnodol, ac mae'n gweithio i ddefnyddio eu llunio i gael eu ydych chi'n eu cyfle i gyfnod, i'n ddechrau i dweud, oedd Scotland wedi eu dynol yn cyd-dechrau'r cynhyrchu, ac mae'n rhaid i ddweud wedi ddweud y system yw yng Nghymru yn ysgrifennu. Yn dod, mae'r cyfrifyddiant iawn i ddweud yw bod yn eich darglwyddiant yma yn y ddweud, a yn ddweud y ddweud, mae'n ddweud sy'n ei ddweud. Mae'r ddweud o'r clywed iawn erbyn i'r ddefnyddio The recent OECD report captured this picture very well. It offered signs of encouragement, but also confirmed that we are seeing falling standards in literacy and numeracy, while the gap in attainment between rich and the rest remains wide and largely untouched. The OECD concluded that we are at, quote, a watershed moment for education in this country. A leading educationalist told the education committee this week that, if we are not careful, we could snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. Scottish Liberal Democrats agree that that is why we are prioritising education and the proper funding of education over the next five years. Ministers will argue that this is what they are doing already, however, too often, their actions lack ambition or a willingness to put their money where their mouth is. Expansion of early learning in childcare and the establishment of the attainment fund are good examples, both very worthy in themselves but under-resourced, under-delivered, and in the case of the attainment fund, poorly targeted. Meanwhile, savage cuts to council budgets of £500 million, the very councils that are required to deliver school education and an obsession with national testing in primary schools, seems inconsistent with a determination to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. Of course, SNP ministers never tire of lecturing other parties on the... Yes, okay. For absolute clarity, to those members who were not involved in the informal discussion in the education committee with the individual that you were referring to, can you also confirm that he said that Scottish education was well above average and, in fact, was seen worldwide as still a beacon of good educational standards? Liam McArthur. I think that that is exactly what I said in the opening remarks. SNP ministers will lecture other parties on offering up alternatives and be clear on what they do about paying for them. That is despite the fact that they are able to magic up money for projects, whether they are the mood or the new cycle dictates, and despite running an underspend of hundreds of millions of pounds, but the challenge is not an unfair one, so let me respond. Unlike the SNP, Scottish Liberal Democrats are determined to use the full powers of this Parliament to make a difference in education, and with those powers we can make a real difference on education. My colleague Willie Rennie set out earlier today plans to transform Scottish education over the next five years. By committing to raising income tax by one pence, we will be able to spend £475 million more on education next year alone, the biggest investment in education since devolution, and what a difference that could make. It could help to address some of the damage done to our college sector over recent years. By a Government, hell bent on slashing budgets, jobs and places, 150,000 fewer places representing 150,000 opportunities lost for those looking for the skills that they need. Those extra resources could help to reverse some of the savage cuts made by John Swinney to the council budgets. Cuts less face it, that will dig deepest into education and children's services at a local level. There would also be an opportunity—not at this moment—to deliver on the promises made by ministers in relation to early learning and childcare. At present, rather than the promise 27 per cent of two-year-olds for more disadvantaged backgrounds accessing provision, a mere 7 per cent are reaping their benefits. South of the border, the figure is 42 per cent. That shortfall is unacceptable and there is nothing to help to address the attainment gap. Save the children and others make clear that the foundations for the attainment gap are established in the early years, often before a child is even born. Evidence shows that, for every £1 spent before a child is three, 11 pounds is saved later in life. As well as helping to close the attainment gap, that represents investment in our economy and the social wellbeing of our country. That is why Scottish Liberal Democrats have placed such high priority on targeting what resources are available on the early years and those who need it most. It is an approach that is reflected in a consistent argument for extending free early learning and childcare to two-year-olds from the poorest backgrounds. It is also, Deputy Presiding Officer, why we have challenged the approach taken by this Government in relation to its attainment fund. Again, as I have done on many occasions previously, I welcome the additional resources. However, the way that ministers have decided to spend the money is wrong. Firstly, it was targeted at a mere half dozen councils. Since then, more local authorities and schools have been added to the list, to the point where the minister now boasts that 64 per cent of disadvantaged pupils now benefit from funding. The living councils, including Orkney, Shetland and Aberdeenshire, remain excluded. Children from poorer backgrounds in those areas, whose needs may be every bit as great as their counterparts elsewhere in the country, are deemed by this Government as ineligible for that support. They are not alone. Almost 30,000 children, it appears, are set to lose out on a postcode lottery entirely of ministers making. I thought that Iain Gray, in the debate earlier this month, summed up the absurdity very well when he talked about Cochran Castle and St David's schools in Johnson's, who share one building but where one gets attainment funding while the other does not. It is not just the inconsistency between neighbouring schools but also between neighbouring streets in some cases. How on earth is it going to be squared where the First Minister has promised to close the attainment gap completely? Assuming that the First Minister and Cabinet Secretary are serious in their intentions, they must recognise that funding should be based on the individual needs of the individual child wherever they live. That is the underlying principle behind the pupil premium. It is working south of the border, thanks to Liberal Democrats. We want to see the same principle applied here in Scotland. This year, very briefly. I am always somewhat apprehensive about a Liberal Democrat talking about finances and education, giving your history on tuition fees. Ms MacArthur tells us, how much would the pupil premium be for every pupil? What is the total cost and how much is the one-pence income tax going to... I have already explained that it would deliver an extra £475 million a year into education, something I am sure that, as a former spokesman on finance for the Liberal Democrats, Chip Brody would acknowledge. This year, funding available equated to £1,320 per primary, £935 per secondary pupil south of the border. The average-sized school, with average numbers in receipt of free school meals, would represent £200,000. Many schools use the funding for individual coaching, but other projects have included summer classes for pupils moving from primary to secondary school as well as paying for transport for extracurricular activities. According to Ofsted in 2014, the pupil premium is making a difference in many schools. Similarly, the national audit office noted last year that early signs are that the pupil premium has potential effusive praise by auditor standards. Are there areas that need improvement? Yes. Will it take time for this approach to demonstrate its full value? Probably. Is it already delivering results in closing the gap in attainment at primary and secondary levels in England? Does it merit being rolled out here in Scotland? Absolutely. The minister's spin doctor was busy earlier this week, dismissing the idea as unfunded, not true and unproven, similarly not true. Presumably, this spin doctor is less open to embracing new ideas than the First Minister and Ms Constance declare themselves to be. The Labour party seems supportive of the idea of a pupil premium, although the thorus has been used to find other ways of expressing it. I genuinely welcome the support that it has shown for the principle of targeting funding on the needs of the individual child, something that the Labour peer Lord Adonis, a fan of the pupil premium, argued for very strongly. Meanwhile, the Tory amendment claims that it was all Dave's idea. I would question that and certainly the political drive behind the pupil premium came from Liberal Democrat ministers in the previous UK Government. Nevertheless, again, I welcome the support of Liv Smith, though I think that it would be clarity needed on how the Tories plan to pay for this north of the border, but I'm sure that Ms Smith will come to that in her speech. It seems that the SNP are now the only ones advocating an area-based approach, rather than ones based on the needs of the individual child. That is a shame, but it won't stop Scottish Liberal Democrats continuing to argue for a more effective and well-funded approach. The gaps in attainment and achievement continue to scar the lives by preventing the potential of each and every individual being realised.  That is why, just one of the reasons why, Scottish Liberal Democrats have taken the decision today not just to prioritise education but to prioritise the means of delivering the ends. That would be the biggest investment in education since devolution. It could deliver transformational change. I hope that the next Parliament will have the courage to use the powers at its disposal to make that happen. I have a pleasure in moving the motion in my name. Two weeks ago in this Parliament, the cabinet secretary set out this Government's determination to focus on the twin aims of excellence and equity within our education system, to deliver a world-class system that has at its heart the tenet that all of Scotland's children must be able to achieve their educational potential, breaking the link between poorer attainment and poverty in the process. We have a duty to take bold action to ensure achievement of those twin aims. The recent OECD report confirmed that, with curriculum for excellence, we are on the right track and that our system has many strengths, including our holistic approach, the four capacities, professional engagement, a high degree of consensus and enthusiasm for learning and teaching. I see that in action week in and week out when I visit schools. We already know that our system is a good one and is delivering higher standards of achievement for most children. Last year there were a record number of passes at higher and advanced higher and more young people received qualifications relating to wider skills for life and work. More students are staying on at school until sixth year, fewer are leaving with very low or no qualifications and all young people can now undertake relevant work-related learning as part of their curriculum. Now more than nine out of ten of last year's school leavers were in employment, education or training nine months later. We are in a good place, but we cannot accept being complacent. We know that some children from our most deprived communities do not do as well as they should. In an excellent and equitable education system, we cannot allow that to continue. That is why we already have a relentless focus on improving the outcomes of those children supported by an additional four-year £100 million attainment Scotland fund. He set out the funding that is available, and he has explained the relentless focus on those from more disadvantaged backgrounds. However, he will be aware that many of those from disadvantaged backgrounds, roughly 36 per cent, do not fall within the ambit of the attainment fund. Therefore, how are their needs being reflected with equal priority to others elsewhere in Scotland? The fact that, in addition to the local authority-based approach, the fact that there are 57 schools that have been identified and beyond that, many sources of intervention in the lives of individual families and individual communities is a recognition that there are many solutions to that problem. However, I have to say that I would very strongly defend the major intervention that the challenge represents. I also say that the focus around that has been on primary schools, as we know how important early preventative work is in improving children's longer-term outcomes. Over 300 schools in our most deprived communities have benefited from that funding. That is, I should say to the member, some 54,000 children. Local authorities in schools have worked hard to put in place the approaches that will really make a difference, approaches that are based on evidence of what works. They have thought long and hard about the children in their school and how that funding can support them. The result is targeted and focused work on literacy, numeracy and health and wellbeing both within and beyond the school. Family link workers, speech and language therapists, community learning workers and alongside teachers are paid for by the attainment Scotland fund, alongside work to develop programmes and approaches to close the equity gap. The pupil premium approach in place in England and Wales, which seems to be recommended by some in this place, is yet to be shown to have had an impact. The June 2015 national audit report concluded that it was too early for the impact to be known, and it also concluded that pupil funding had fallen in real terms in 45 per cent of schools between 2011-12 and 2014-15, with funding for the 16 per cent most disadvantaged secondary schools having fallen by more than 5 per cent over the same period, despite the introduction of the pupil premium. In Scotland, our average for pupil spending in 2014-15 for both primary and secondary was higher than in England, and the attainment Scotland fund will provide additional funding to those children and communities who face some of the greatest challenges, and we will continue to do that. It is clear that where there are large concentrations of children living in deprived communities, there is a greater need for support, and our approach delivers that. We will continue to review how we target funding to ensure that we reach the children and the young people whose outcomes are impacted greatly by living in poverty. Although our focus is on schools where there is high concentration of children living in deprived communities, we are also aware of the need for universal support to close the attainment gap and have enhanced the support that is already available by putting an attainment adviser in place for every authority. The development of the national improvement framework, the primary one-to-three read-write count campaign and our making maths count programme. We must not lose sight of the fact that success is elusive for a small number of our children and a significant number of our children from deprived communities. The gap in attainment is narrowing, but if we are to achieve our ambition of delivering a world-class education system for all of our children, we must and we will do more. Our approach to targeted funding through the attainment Scotland fund is clear evidence, I believe, of our attainment, of our determination to achieve just that, and I move the amendment in Ms Constance's name. Many thanks. I now call Ian Gray to speak to and move amendment 15430.2, maximum five minutes, please, Thank you very much, Presiding Officer. I rise to move the amendment in my name, not in any great opposition in truth to the motion from the Liberal Democrats, because our proposals do, as Mr MacArthur alluded to, bear significant similarities. Although in developing our own proposal we did consult rather more than a thesaurus to find a different name for it, and indeed one of the things that we did consult was the work in research and analysis that had been done of the pupil premium. I would argue that the proposal that we put forward today and have done already on a number of occasions is a more focused and more detailed proposal, and indeed it is closer, in fact, to what was introduced in Wales, where some changes were made to the pupil premium exactly to try and meet some of the flaws that had been identified. Perhaps the most significant flaw identified with the pupil premium is that although it did, as Mr MacArthur said, find some evidence of effectiveness, it also found some evidence of headteachers banking the pupil premium as part of their overall budget and, in fact, not using it in any way to help to close the attainment gap. Our proposal, as I will come to later, does try to avoid that as a possibility. However, what we do very much agree with Mr MacArthur is on the weaknesses of the approach of the SNP Government. We have argued previously and continue to argue that the attainment fund, while welcome, is inadequate and that it is not enough funds and that it is wrongly targeted. Really, the minister rather gave that away when he said that he would continue to consider how it is targeted, which gives the game away. I think that, since that fund has been announced, the Government has shown every signs of making up as it goes along in its targeting. In the past, I have given examples of some of the worst cases of the result of that approach. Mr MacArthur referred to one of the two schools in Johnson, Cochran Castle in St David's, two schools, one campus, one entrance, one gym hall, one dinner hall. Pupils come from exactly the same streets, and yet one of those schools gets attainment funding and the other one does not. In fact, the one that gets no attainment challenge funding is the one that has more pupils from poorer parts of that community. However, we see the same thing elsewhere. In East Ayrshire and Kilmarnock, I have seen an example of a street that is divided by a catchment area boundary, so that children from the same street go to two different schools. In one of those schools, they will benefit from attainment challenge funding, and in the other, they will not. I was in the Borders earlier this week, where only two primary schools in the whole of the Scottish Borders get attainment challenge funding. Both of them are in Hoich, so in Gallashield, where I was, no schools benefit at all. I have not surprisingly spoken before about the example of my own constituency where not one single school benefits from attainment challenge funding. That is why we have proposed an alternative, fair start funding, £1,000, which follows every child with a free school meal entitlement to primary school. That would benefit pretty well every primary school in the country, but it would mean that the headteacher would have to use those resources from a choice, a suite of agreed evidence-based interventions that we know would really make a difference, as is the case in Wales. I am really poosed for time. A fund would also provide a lesser fund to nurseries, providing free nursery place entitlement, because Mr MacArthur is right when he says all the evidence's intervention must be as early as possible. What would the benefit of all this be? For the Borders, which I referred to earlier, their primary schools would share some £860,000. In East Ayrshire, £1.9 million, in a council area where, at the moment, only six primary schools benefit. In my constituency of East Lothian, almost £1 million. That means that, in my constituency, some schools would have a fund every single year of around £85,000, which they could use to employ additional staff, classroom assistants, particular equipment or to run particular programmes in literacy, numeracy, whatever the staff and headteachers in those schools thought would be possible. Indeed, schools in the Borders and East Ayrshire would benefit to the tune of more than £100,000 a year. That would be a transformational change in the future of those children, and it is a transformational change in the future of our country. That is why we think that it is worth support, not just from opposition parties but from the Government too. I must reiterate that we are very short of time. I now call on Liz Smith to speak to her on the move amendment 15430.1. We are delighted that the Liberals have chosen this topic for debate, because it is incumbent upon all of us ahead of the election to set out our manifesto stalls when it comes to addressing the attainment gap. I think that all parties in this chamber are agreed very much on the fact that there has to be additional funding, but there are clearly very sharp differences about how that can be allocated. The pupil premium is part of that debate. The Liberals like to claim credit for that, but I will have to correct them on that, because it is a long-time Conservative pledge. I have the evidence of that right here. It is a policy that we believe brings very specific advantages when it comes to doing two things. First, identifying those most in need, and secondly, creating the incentives to ensure that every effort is made to target the resources on those pupils. Since the cabinet secretary said in response to Willie Rennie just last Friday that the policy is neither costed nor proven to work, I want to challenge her on that, as I think that most of the facts prove otherwise. Before I do so, can I just flag up again the academic works of Sue Ellis and Jim McCormack, who are respected by the Scottish Government as much as they are by the rest of us, as they have clearly shown that the majority of deprived children do not actually live in the most deprived areas. The use of the SIMD index is therefore very limited, since it tends to target the whole school or, in some cases, the whole local authority by the postcode. The benefit of the pupil premium is, as Ian Gray and Willie Rennie and Leigh MacArthur both said, that it is actually following the individual child. There is one provider to this, which I will come to in a minute. In England, that 2015-16 pupil premium varies from 935 per annum to 1,900, and they are obviously paid to pupils who have been eligible for a free school meal in one of the six previous years. That money is paid directly to the school on behalf of each individual recipient pupil, which numbers 3 out of 10 in both England and Wales. That can be spent by the school accordingly in a way that best fits the pupils concerned. I heard what Ian Gray said about not banking up that money. I think that there is a way around that. A great deal of attention has recently been focused on helping schools to provide the individual attention on the most disadvantaged pupils. If you read the reports from the vast majority of the headteachers, it is very clear that a high proportion of them have very clear evidence that that pupil premium is working for the most disadvantaged. Of course, that can be measured by the outcomes in those schools, but more than anything else. The minister will perhaps be interested to read the 2015 Sutton Trust report, because it is very helpful to providing some of the evidence that we need to see to ensure that that policy can be taken forward. Obviously, £2.5 billion was the cost for pupil premiums in 2014-16—that is 6 per cent of the total school's budget down south. However, the important thing is that schools are held absolutely accountable, if necessary, by the Auditor General for exactly how they are spending it—no reedics from central or from local government. The important thing is that there are actually no right answers, but there is full autonomy and accountability. I think that one of the best lessons to be learned from schools in England is that it is entirely up to the schools not to treat the disadvantaged pupils as a homogenous group. I think that that is a very important lesson. I appreciate that there are other advantages. I will not go into these just now, and there are probably ones that the Liberals would not accept, and that is because they provide greater incentives to those who are at the cutting edge of encouraging academy in free schools. That is something that is a debate perhaps more for down south, but nonetheless it is important in principle for up here, particularly at a time when I think that we have more parents—parents incidentally who are absolutely wedded to the best values of the state sector—wanting to see some diversity in the state provision of schooling. That is something that the Scottish Conservatives obviously want to do. It is very clear that both the Labour Party and the Liberals have committed to much higher tax rates in order to fund that. The Scottish Conservatives will not do that. We have used our costings on the Scottish Government figures that were produced at the end of last year, looking at the £100 million that has been promised for the attainment fund, but also relating that to the supplementary financial memorandum for the education bill that was published last week, in which there are clearly significantly increased costs that the Scottish Government has acknowledged, and therefore is presumably in the business of providing. To our mind, the basic would be £136 million—I am happy to put on record how we have calculated that. I think that there will be circumstances if we can make use of that supplementary financial memorandum, where we can drill down further on that. The Scottish Conservatives are quite happy to put before the electorate not just the principle of that but also the costings of that. May I conclude? Our overall aim is to raise standards everywhere, but to raise them most quickly in the areas that most need it. I entirely accept that, but it will not happen if we use SIMD. It has to be on a pupil-by-pupil basis, so may I move the amendment in my name? Thank you. We now turn to the open debate. Speeches of four minutes please. Stuart Maxwell, to be followed by Alec Crowley. Presiding Officer, our Parliament has dedicated a considerable amount of time recently to the issue of educational attainment, and it is quite right that we have done so. The ambition that all of Scotland's children are given the opportunity to fulfil their potential, regardless of background, is one that I am certain has shared right across this chamber. It is in this spirit that I welcome the chance to speak in this afternoon's debate on education. However, I must say that I was more than a little disappointed to hear Willie Rennie describe Scotland's education sector as being at a crisis point. Although there is recognition that there is still work to do, particularly in areas such as attainment, I think that it is rather disingenuous, to say the least, to describe Scotland's school as being in some sort of crisis. I realise that the Lib Dems may not be in any rush to consult the opinion polls, but I draw Mr Rennie's attention to the recent survey poll showing the positive net satisfaction ratings of plus 28 per cent from voters in favour of the SNP's record on education. Such positive poll ratings are not exactly indicative of an electorate that considers the education system of Scotland to be universally failing. Indeed, the SNP Government has taken a number of positive steps in its drive to improve standards in Scotland's schools. On Monday, the First Minister announced a further £230 million for the construction of 19 new schools across Scotland. Since 2007, the Scottish Government has worked with local authorities to rebuild or refurbish over 600 schools across the country. Last week, thanks to a PQ lodged by my colleague George Adam, we heard that the number of school leavers going into education and worker training is at a record high, contributing to the highest level of youth employment for a decade. The number of children in Scotland benefiting from a free school meal has also more than doubled to over £259,000 in the past year, providing vital support to children from low-income families. Earlier this month, the First Minister unveiled the innovation fund as part of the package of support that is available through the £100 million Scottish attainment fund. The innovation fund is open to all schools, not just in those local authorities that have been targeted for support through the attainment fund and complements the work of the attainment advisers that have been recruited for every council area. I have listened carefully to the case put forward by the Lib Dems, and I have tried to do so with an open mind. However, I have yet to see any compelling evidence that a pupil premium approach to tackling the attainment gap would be more effective than the attainment challenge programme that is advocated by the Scottish Government. The Lib Dems argue, and we have heard it again here today, that the pupil premium has been a rousing success in England—I really do not have the time, I apologise. However, a recent UGov survey of teachers in England found that less than half of teachers believe that the pupil premium has been effective. Indeed, 4 per cent of teachers said that they thought that the policy had actually had a negative impact on disadvantaged pupils. Furthermore, the report last year by the National Audit Office suggested that any reduction in the attainment gap as a result of the pupil premium has been marginal at best, to quote directly from the report. While the attainment gap has narrowed since 2011, it remains wide, and at this stage, the significance of the improvements is unclear. That is hardly a rousing endorsement for the pupil premium policy that is advocated by the Lib Dems. Removing barriers to educational attainment is a challenging but important undertaking. The OECD report in December underlined many of the successes in our education system, highlighting clear upward trends in recent years in areas such as attainment and positive school leaver destinations. However, the OECD review group also highlighted a number of challenges, and there is undoubtedly much more work to do so that our education system delivers for every child in Scotland. I believe that a good quality education is key to ensuring that children from disadvantaged backgrounds have a ladder of opportunity to escape the poverty trap. I therefore welcome the Scottish Government's determination to further strengthen Scotland's education sector and to ensure that our young people leave school with the education and skills that they need to fulfil their potential. Many thanks. Before I call the next speaker, can I remind the chamber that the code of conduct requires that no member in the chamber turn their back on the Presiding Officer? I now call Alec Rowley to be followed by George Adam. Like Stuart Maxx, I agree that there are a whole range of factors that will be important in school buildings and the type of facilities that young people are taught in are important. That is why I welcome the types of partnerships that have been put in place recognising the investment of the Scottish Government and the investment of local authorities. Last week, I visited a new school building in Glasgow, where three primaries are being pulled together into one. Local authorities are doing some innovative work to get those new facilities in place. I would ask the minister to agree to come and visit my constituency in Invercaden High School, which is in a dire state and needs a replacement. I was really disappointed in the announcement last week. Those schools that were welcomed in Invercaden were not one of them, so school buildings are important. We belong today to not also mention the massive pressure that education authorities are in up and down the country, while staff perhaps would not use the term crisis for education. What I would do is first acknowledge the hard work that is going on in schools and every community in Scotland for the teachers and all the staff that are involved in schools. They are under immense pressure. You just need to talk to teachers locally to know the pressure that they are working under with the difficulties in the budget cuts that are taking place. The budget cuts that are taking place will perhaps not affect teacher numbers if we are seeing classroom assistance being cut, but if we are seeing continued professional development being cut, that will have a massive impact on them. If you look at Fife, that is an example where it focused millions of pounds into raising attainment, and a big part of that came around leadership. There was a major investment programme around leadership in the schools, but there was also a major investment programme to ensure that teachers had the support to be able to do more to lift attainment and lift numeracy and literacy levels. If education authorities are cutting those areas, that will have a negative impact on the attainment levels. The other criticism that I have heard in terms of the Government scheme, although well-intentioned, is that it tends to be input-based, with little regard to outputs, and it tends to be project after project after project. We find that more and more staff spend their time trying to write bids and write projects, and we need to really try to move away from that. That is why I think that the proposal coming forward through the fair start fund allows us to target money at schools and do something about that. I mean that is a point that Alasdair Allan talked about, the OCD report. There is a lot of positives in the OCD report in terms of curriculum for excellence and the direction that we are going on, and that would be the first to recognise that. There were a few points, however, that I wanted to mention. For example, they talk on page 80 that not all the findings can be described as positive. Education Scotland inspection reports, for example, gave it as many as one in five schools, only a satisfactory evaluation and inspections. That is quite staggering. It is not good, not very good, not excellent, but satisfactory. That cannot be satisfactory for this Parliament, so it shows that there are areas where a lot of work has to be done. There are other parts of that report that there is not time for me to draw attention to today, but they talk about the number of different projects that are being done and the danger that you end up with a little strategic direction and strategic focus. I would suggest that we can learn a lot from those authorities where they have brought about major improvement and focused on that improvement. However, I would just conclude by saying that we have to move away from not looking at outputs and simply looking at inputs, and that would be the main criticism that I would level against the Government today. I appreciate members trying to keep to their phone minutes. Please, George Adam, to be followed by John Pentland. Our aim is to have an excellent equitable education system, in which every young person across the country is able to achieve their full potential, regardless of their family's circumstances or background that they are born into. I feel as if I have said something like that or something very similar on numerous occasions when the debates have had, but that is because this is a very important debate. It is one that we all may disagree on how we get to our achieved goal, but we all know that it is one of the most important issues. I think that the First Minister, in particular, is to be commended on making sure that this is a major issue. However, the £100 million attainment Scotland fund is rightly targeted at primary schools, which serve our most deprived communities in Scotland. For far too long, we have allowed parts of our communities to fail in education over decades, over years, as well. I have mentioned it before, and I take no pride in mentioning it again, that, in my constituency, there is an east-west divide, where there is one area of deprivation and another area that is an aspiring area, in which people are doing a lot better financially. That is making the difference with how those young people attain what they do within education. I believe that, with the national improvement framework and the attainment advisers, we have the opportunity to ensure that we systematically get the resource to the right child at the right time, using the framework and the advisers. For me, the attainment advisers' job is to ensure that they get that resource. It was also mentioned by Education Scotland when it came to the committee. It mentioned that the attainment advisers' job would be to find ways to do either nationally and work with other local authorities in the area. I would love to, Mr Gray, but I do not have much time in the debate. For me, the job, the attainment advisers position and the framework itself are an important part of the debate, and it shows that the Government is moving that argument forward. In the recent OECD reports that have been mentioned of Scotland's education system, it recognises that the Government's determination to focus on achieving both excellence and equity in our education system. As I have already said, I do not doubt that everybody's commitment to trying to close the attainment gap that we currently have, but the Scottish Government has already tackled that through the £100 million attainment funding. During this week's we had an informal session, which has already been mentioned by my colleague, Mr MacArthur, where we spoke to education listeners. One said to me that £100 million is more than enough to achieve what we want to achieve, but what they want to do is how we get there, how we actually do it. For me, the debate is to take the plans that we have here with the Scottish Government and how we move forward. The attainment Scotland fund is already supporting more than 300 primary schools, which collectively serve 54,399 primary-aged children, who live in the most deprived 20 per cent areas in Scotland, so 64 per cent of the total across Scotland. We are aware that those children living in poverty do not just live in the 20 per cent areas of Scotland. We have already mentioned that during this debate, and that is why there is included the £1.5 million attainment challenge innovation fund, which will support other schools across Scotland to explore and develop innovative approaches in raising attainment. One of the other things, which has already been mentioned, is the fact that the £230 million scheme. In those challenging times, the Government has still been able to invest £230 million to build 19 new schools. When you are talking about targeting and how things are, you only have to look at that one of those schools is St Fergusley Park, which will be rebuilt. That to me shows that the Government is moving in the right way. There is still plenty of work to do, but we need to rise up to that challenge and work together to make sure that we do this. Many thanks and I call John Pentland to be followed by Willie Coffey. For some reason, Presiding Officer, the SNP still wants to be judged on the record, so okay, let's do that. You know, after nine years of nationalist decline, I'd say that the Cabinet Secretary's quote ought to be on a sugary peg. Does she, does anybody in the SNP think that it's acceptable that young people from wealthier families are twice as likely to go to university, are seven times more likely to get three A's at higher, and are 12 times more likely to become a medical student? Can the cabinet secretary in the SNP really be taking comfort from an OECD report that notes poor literacy of primary and secondary students and the decline in relative and absolute achievement levels in mathematics? Can you really take comfort that it says that we might have a good system if it is strengthened with a stronger role for local authorities, i.e., less control by the Scottish Government and more money for councils? How can you and the SNP pretend that things are wonderful when we see the narrowing of the curriculum, the decline in modern language study and the lowest teacher number for 10 years? In the face of such a mess, what does the cabinet secretary and the SNP do? It reprofiles £500 million from council budgets. It's backbenchers, many ex-councillors say nothing. It's councillors' mutter, but comply if in council control, if not, they blame the council rather than the Scottish Government. Cabinet secretary, in case you don't know, education is a huge proportion of council spending, in some cases over 40 per cent, so you can't have such extensive cuts without harming education. Mr Pentland, can you address your remarks through the chair? Please rather than directly to the cabinet secretary. UK cuts have been multiplied fivefold with devastating consequences for council services such as schools and childcare. That severely undermines any good done by the attainment fund. How much good that fund does is highly questionable when it ignores over 1500 schools and 11 local authorities. Taking money away and then making a big fuss about giving some back is not a solution to anything other than a quest for publicity. The SNP is bereft of adequate answers, but what we do know with over 6,000 Scottish children leaving primary unable to read properly is that tackling the attainment gap must start in early years. Scottish Labour has set out proposals that would more effectively target those in most need. The fair start fund would give primary schools £1,000 and nurses £300 for every child from a deprived background. The money would go direct to head teachers to spend in whatever way is most appropriate to tackling the attainment gap in their schools. The Scottish Government needs to take on board the advice of the OECD, its poverty adviser and others who highlight its failings, no matter how unparthable that may be. Those failings must be recognised in order to be addressed, so a certain out-education system will require a degree of honesty that is rarely seen from this Government. I am not home on breath, cabinet secretary, but you could try being honest about your failures and then ask to be judged on your honesty. The short debate will inevitably cover much of the ground that was covered a few weeks ago in the Scottish Government's education debate, but that is no bad thing, since it gives us an opportunity to highlight some of the many initiatives that are under way in our schools today. In Scotland, we currently spend about £5 billion every year on our schools, despite the UK budget cuts. Clearly, raising the attainment of our young people and working to close those attainment gaps across Scotland is already a big part of that spend. In Scotland, we already do spend significantly more on each pupil compared to Exit to England, for example. However, there are a number of key programmes in place with additional funding attached that focus on many of those compelling issues around improving attainment. The £100 million attainment fund that Scotland mentioned by several colleagues is currently supporting more than 300 primary schools and over 50,000 pupils from some of the most deprived communities in our country. There are a host of other Scotland-wide initiatives such as the Challenge Innovation Fund, which also reaches out to our secondary schools, inviting them to come up with new and innovative approaches to closing the attainment gap. The Access to Education Fund tries to identify and reduce the barriers to learning that are often more pronounced within our disadvantaged communities, which I think is a crucial piece of work. Sometimes we might think that solutions to these key issues are to provide more and more money, but it can be as simple as providing a little support to youngsters to help them to overcome the most basic difficulties that they face before they even arrive to open a book at school. There are other initiatives to all of which are seeking to make a difference by giving our young people the crucial help that they need, just to get on a level playing field with those who are perhaps more fortunate. And to also steadily improve performance across our country in this pursuit of excellence. The independent OECD report confirms that improvements in attainment are taking place in Scotland. We are achieving scores in science and reading levels above international averages. We have a record exam past results and record numbers of school leavers who are working, who are in training or staying in education. The decline in maths that began under Labour has been stopped, and we have almost doubled the numbers of young folk from our most deprived communities who are getting at least one higher. Those positive improvements have been recognised by the OECD and give us a solid foundation to build on. While the off-stead report referred to in the motion records some positive differences being made in schools in England, it clearly says that it will take some time to establish whether that approach will lead to a narrowing of the attainment gap itself. The most recent analysis by the Deemys tank in February last year suggests that the attainment gap in England may in fact be widening with more than half of England's authorities reporting as such in 2014. Parachuting a completely untried scheme urgently into Scotland from England, as the Lib Dems want to do, while having our own programmes well under way, I think would be a ridiculous and dangerous thing to do. Presiding Officer, if we are to achieve the step changes and improvements that we all seek and move beyond what the OECD report calls this watershed moment for education, we will need more than cash new processes and assessment systems to help us get there. The report says that we need to improve what it calls this middle area, involving networking and collaboration. That, it says, will help us to achieve that new dynamic in learning and teaching that we actually need. Our new national improvement framework with a reliable and consistent evidence base for assessment at the heart of it and all of the current interventions in progress should give Scottish education the opportunity to realise the potential of being that world leader in education. Many thanks. We now turn to the closing speeches into a call on Mary Scanlon. Four minutes please. I also thank the Liberal Democrats for bringing forward this debate on educational attainment and, hopefully, we move on towards attainment and achievement. Like my colleague Liz Smith, I take issue with the point in the motion stating that the Parliament, and I quote, recalls that the Liberal Democrats in the previous UK Government successfully made the case for and introduced the pupil premium in 2011. Well, I'm afraid on this occasion that the Lib Dems are just plain wrong. The pupil premium was in the Conservative policy paper as far back as 2007. It was also in the Conservative manifesto for the UK general election in 2010. Whatever claims the Liberal Democrats have over their power and influence in the coalition government, they certainly cannot claim to have written the UK manifesto, although I appreciate that's what they're trying to do today. Page 501 of our manifesto for 2010 UK level is to raise standards in schools and I quote, we will improve standards for all pupils and close the attainment gap between richest and poorest, as well as supporting our long-standing commitment to the pupil premium. I would also like to use this debate today to look at the service pupil premium, which is of £300 per pupil, which is also available in England but not in Scotland. According to the Armed Forces Covenant, Scotland has its own needs-based formula for service children, which they have judged as more effective. I thought that I'd just phone Murray Council and ask what funding they get for service children there, especially when we've got the royal engineers, regiment at Kinlos and children of the Royal Air Force personnel at Lossymouth. I asked the convener of Murray Council what is given in Scotland compared to the £300 per pupil in England and the answer was nothing. If the money is used in England so that new pupil joiners to a school receive a proper induction, including initial assessment to avoid any potential gaps in their coverage of the curriculum, if it's good enough for England, for children of defence families, why isn't it good enough in Scotland? While the Lib Dems claim that the pupil premium grant was their idea, I would also add that the budget is now four times greater than it was at the time of introduction in 2016. That is certainly not due to any Lib Dem input both at the moment or in the future. Much has been said today about the Scottish system and the English system. I don't think that anyone comes up with a system and on day one it's perfect. I'm very pleased to hear that a Labour MP, Frank Field, supported by two Conservatives, is now seeking an early day motion to look at ways to improve the identification of children with low attainment so that more children can be eligible for the pupil premium. I think that that's a grown-up way of looking forward. The UK Public Accounts Committee, which I've chaired by a Labour MP, is also calling for improvements to identify pupils in need. I think that's also the right way forward, and it should not be aligned to party politics. There have been serious criticisms of the nationalist government approach to closing the attainment gap. Despite the Lib Dems trying to rewrite history in their favour, that has been a helpful contribution to the on-going debate on attainment and, I hope, in future achievement. I welcome the opportunity to contribute to the debate again, which has shown that there is cross-party consensus growing and tackling the attainment gap, but not necessarily on the methods. Although, as I noted earlier, the methods do not seem to be much difference between ours and the one proposed in the Lib Dem motion. I encourage that all sides of the chamber are committed to ensuring that educational inequality is a top priority for this and that future parliaments have been set out in parties' manifestos. It's been pointed out admirably by members that there is a gap in attainment between children from poorer backgrounds and those from more affluent circumstances. However, the report card for the Scottish Government after eight years does not make comfort in reading. A pupil entered primary 1 when the Scottish National Party began running our education system while hitting high school. That time, that group of pupils have borne the brunt of education budget cuts, full on teacher numbers and the rising attainment gap, watching their classmates from wealthier families pull away from them. We welcome the Gumpts ambition to close the attainment gap, but there is a big question mark on how that will be achieved. The Scottish attainment fund should be used to close the gap, but thousands of pupils across the country miss out on support. Under the SNP plans, more than 1,500 schools in Scotland get no extra support to close the gap between the richest and the rest, with half a billion pounds of cuts to local services. Like our schools coming from the Government's budget, there is a real risk that pupils at a disadvantage will get left even further behind. On that side, we believe that there is action beyond what the Government is proposing that can make a difference. In the coming years, the Parliament will have a substantial suite of new powers that will open up new choices in education. We would use the additional revenues from a new 50p tax rate on top earners in the country to redistribute money from those who can afford it to those who need it most by investing additional resources over and above the Government's proposals in tackling educational disadvantage. The SNP Government's budget yet again slashes the funding for local schools, which will make the problem even worse. We would use the Parliament's new powers to introduce a fair start fund that would give every primary school an extra £1,000, every nursery an extra £300 for every pupil from a deprived family. That money would go directly to headteachers that difference from the pupil premium scheme that we have already seen in place in England, so that they get to choose from a suite of proven methods and make sure that they spend that money in the best way that they see fit in their local circumstances to close that attainment gap between the richest and the rest. We would use that additional revenue from a new 50p top rate tax rate to redistribute resources from those earning more than £150,000 a year to those who need it most. That is over and above what the Government has already committed to tackling the educational attainment gap. I think that it would be a shame, Presiding Officer, given the consensus around tackling issues and the weight of support that we offer to the educational challenges, that again, if that opportunity were to pass us by for us to put more resources into schools to tackle that problem? I now call on Angela Constance, minister. You have up to six minutes, cabinet secretary. How we ensure that resources, services, opportunities reach the children most in need is, indeed, essential. It is a fundamental question of how we deliver education in Scotland. All targeting has to be done in the context of a strengthened universal offer. There are pros and cons with all forms of targeting, and the danger with any form of targeting, if done in isolation, is that you miss your target, is that you miss the point. Getting that right blend of approach is absolutely crucial. The bigger prize is about how you ensure that universal service, that £4.8 billion investment in education, provides more for all children to maximise the impact of additional more targeted measures. What we do, and how we do it, is important as well as what we invest. Our approach through the Scottish attainment challenge and the attainment Scotland fund, which is £100 million over four years, as I indicated earlier, is targeting additional funding at local authorities and individual schools with the highest concentration of children growing up in areas of deprivation. Those schools and local authorities reach out to 54,000 children, two thirds of Scotland's poorest children. Of course, we accept that poorest children do not always live in the poorest areas. We also know that, if you target children and young people in accordance with free school meals, and there are many cases where we do and should do that, we will know that there will be other children in struggling families that will just miss out. That right blend of targeting and universalality is absolutely imperative. We must, throughout our education system, get the right approach through collaboration. In terms of the approach through the attainment challenge, we have attainment advisers in every local authority who will knit together and spread that invaluable experience and learning that has been pioneered in the attainment challenge areas to ensure that it is spread throughout the countries. That is an approach that is not new to Scotland. We have the raising attainment for all programme, we have the early years collaborative, the schools improvement partnership programme and many authorities. The authorities that are most successful in tackling deprivation in their schools have been at the vanguard of a clustered approach, schools working with each other and, of course, local authorities working with each other. You did not take me earlier, Mr Gray, I do not want to seem churdwish but no thanks. What we have made clear through the Scottish attainment challenge is that, where there is a shared campus and, admittedly, if you have two schools serving two different catchment areas, as we have in the school that I grew up in, the school that I went to was one of those schools, we are encouraging schools with shared campuses to share resources and approaches because we know that not all children live in those areas identified as poor. The interests of this Government and what motivates myself and the First Minister and the team of education ministers is on what works. I am not interested in lazy ideology, I am not interested in what has been, I am interested in what works. The evidence around the pupil premium at best is mixed. I had to wonder if we were talking about the same national audit office report, because it very clearly said that some schools in England with very poor pupils actually had less money now per pupil. Whereas in Scotland we continue to have higher spending per head per pupil in comparison, £4,899 per head per primary school pupil compared to £4,500 per pupil in England. Similarly, in secondary schools over £6,600 per head compare that with £6,000 south of the border. The same national audit office report also very pointedly remarked on our real terms funding per pupil had decreased in almost half of the schools between 2011 and 2014. Mr Pentland's rather downbeat contribution certainly gives me an opportunity to talk about Labour's record. His time in office, perhaps not him personally, but his party's time in office, aided and abetted by the Liberals at the time, is littered with examples of not meeting their own targets and then dumping them. What we are doing in this Government is that we are not being afraid to be ambitious. In terms of how we measure the attainment gap in Scotland, we are comparing the 20 per cent most deprived with the 20 per cent least deprived south of the border, how they measure the attainment gap is the 20 per cent most deprived with the rest, the remaining 80 per cent. The task that we have set ourselves, Presiding Officer, is far, far higher. It was under Labour's watch that we seen a decline in our international standing in accordance with the PISA, and it took this Government, Mr Pentland, to halt that decline. We will not be taking any lessons from Tories and Liberals, the architects of austerity, welfare cuts and rising child poverty. My final point, Presiding Officer, to Mr Rowley. Six hundred and seven schools rebuilt or refurbished under this Government. That compares Mr Pentland to 328 under your collective watch. I am not going to argue with Mary Scanlon. I think that it is unwise to argue with such an eloquent member of the chamber, but what is clear is that we have a consensus almost across the chamber in favour of targeted support to those children who need it and the intellectual gymnastics of the education secretary. I think that they have to pay tribute to her. Her ability to try and explain but then not explain why all kids do not get the support that they absolutely need by somehow saying that we need to concentrate on areas that have the most poor kids. What about all the other kids in East Renfrewshire, in Kilmarlic and in Paisley who are deprived of the funds? I did not hear those members speak up for those children, but I am sure that those children and parents and schools are not happy about not getting the funds that they deserve. I believe that, unlike many members in the chamber on the SNP benches, every child deserves the chance to get up and get on. Not just every child who happens to be in the right area that the SNP decides is the appropriate area to invest the funds in. That is not some bureaucratic exercise. That is about giving kids a chance to get up and get on. The evidence is clear that we are making progress on the pupil premium in England. The national audit office and Ofsted have both said that there is evidence. However, the SNP members prefer to rely on evidence that does not exist at all in favour of some attainment fund that they have just started. As stronger evidence to support their scheme, there is no evidence for the SNP scheme. There is evidence for the scheme, the pupil premium, and there is support across the chamber in favour of the pupil premium. I think that Ian Gray was right. We have learnt about the pupil premium process as it has gone on. I think that Kirsty Williams, my colleague in Wales, was at the forefront of arguing that it should be introduced in Wales. They learnt the lessons from in England to make sure that the scheme that was developed in Wales was even better than that. Equally, in England, they are learning about the process as well. You cannot deny that between the years 2011 and 2014, there was a 4.7 per cent closure of the gap in attainment at primary schools. That is pretty clear. Liz Smith was very good at highlighting some of the other evidence in terms of the trusts in England that have been looking at the pupil premium and the evidence to support its implementation. The SNP, rather than adopting a scheme that is working, preferred to adopt a brand new scheme, so that it can call it its own, which is disappointing because it misses out on 36 per cent of the kids who deserve the support. I was amused by Stuart Maxwell, but I do not think that he meant to say crisis what crisis. The words that he almost brought down in fact did bring down the Callaghan Government in 1979, but that was effectively what he was saying. He ignored the widening attainment gap in Scotland, as highlighted by the OECD report, which also highlighted that Scotland, one of the world's best education systems in the past, is now slipping down the league tables. He ignored that. He ignored the fact that, when the education secretary said that 27 per cent of two-year-olds would get nursery education and now only 7 per cent of them are getting it. He ignored that figure as well, and he also ignored the fact that the colossal, whooping, massive cut that is about to be imposed on councils of £500 million. Half of what councils do is education. If he is saying that that is not a crisis, then I am afraid that I completely disagree with him and that shows how the SNP is increasingly complacent about the education system in Scotland. That is why we have proposed today an urgent investment in education with a penny on tax for education. We will say where the money comes from. Very clearly, £475 million investment for a transformational change in education in Scotland. Those people can sit on their hands, but we are going to make the investment in education that pupils deserve. That money will be invested in the pupil premium, the pupil premium that is shown to work in England. Colleges cut 152,000 places over the last few years by the SNP Government, which has deprived so many people on part-time courses as well as many full-time courses. Older people deprived places. That, we will repair some of the damage on that too. We will stop the cuts to education through our schools. We will make sure that the SNP does not get their way on cutting the budget. We will also invest in expanding. He has an awful lot to say, Mr Waxwell, but when it comes to it, he does not deliver. The reality is that what we need to do is to invest in nursery education, because it has been shown to be the best educational investment that we can make. Some of the experts across the globe have said that if you invest before the age of three, you can actually change their life chances for the rest of their life. That is why we need to invest in the pupil premium. We need to invest in nursery education. We need to invest in our colleges, not just to give kids the chance to get up and get on in the world, but also to provide the skills for industry, because there is a massive skills gap in this country. It was just in Aberdeen last week that we were saying that there is still a skills gap. Despite the fall in the oil price, there is a skills gap in that area. We need to invest to fill the skills gap to make the difference for the future. That is about giving everybody the opportunity to get up and get on and improving the economy. That is why we are proposing a penny on tax for education.  If you look at somebody who is earning £100,000, they will pay 30 times more than somebody on the median wage in Scotland. That is progressive. What we have seen from the SNP, because despite the grand words from the education secretary and her deputy about having excellence and bold measures, they often talk left but walk right. They never follow through on the rhetoric. That is why the challenge is now being laid down to the SNP administration. If they really believe in changing the life chances of the people in their constituencies and in my constituency, they would adopt that bold measure, that progressive measure, to invest in education, to change the life chances, to improve the economy. If they really believe that and are not just hiding behind the constitutional argument so that they do not have to take any action at all to change the life chances of people, then they can adopt that approach if they wish, but we will not follow it. The most important aspect is that we look in terms of investment in education, because we have seen from the SNP administration an enormous assault on the education system. They may say that it is not a crisis. They may poo-poo the ideas of a pupil premium. They may fail to deliver on nursery education, but Liberal Democrats will not. We will put forward the proposals and we will fund them. Many thanks. That concludes the debate on education. It is now time to move on to the next item of business, which is a debate on motion 15432 in the name of Jim Hume on fuel poverty. I invite members who wish to speak in this debate to please press the request-to-speak buttons now or as soon as possible, and Mr Hume, if you are ready, up to 10 minutes please, tight for time. As we speak, there are approximately 1.8 million people in Scotland that is 35 per cent of all Scottish households, 1.8 million that are in fuel poverty this winter. Of those households, 9.5 per cent are in extreme fuel poverty, requiring more than 20 per cent of their income to pay for fuel. Some even have to make the tough choice between paying for tomorrow's breakfast or turning the heating on for another hour because they cannot afford to have both. This is a trade-off that no one should have to face in this day and age in Scotland. It is a trade-off that has not improved in the past two years and it is a trade-off that the Scottish Government has a duty to remove from every single household. Yet what the Administration has done has led to no real change to the fuel poverty level in 2014 from the year before. Instead, the Scottish Government again blames others, points of finger and state has little control over fuel price changes, while failing to recognise that its own target is not going to be met. The Scottish Government's argument that it does not have power over fuel prices and is content with pointing the finger on the rise in fuel poverty to everything but its inaction is like saying that if people do not get sick then the health system would be able to reach all its targets. However, just like any Administration, it would be working flat out to contain an imminent threat to public health. Why is the Scottish Government not working flat out to contain the threat to public health? That is fuel poverty. It is a deeply disappointing stance to see that the denial of the facts on the ground can only cause more problems and no solutions. Some of the most recent fuel price increases have been mitigated by increased incomes, but what about those whose incomes remain below the income poverty line and those who are over the income poverty line but are still in fuel poverty? It begs the question whether the definition of fuel poverty needs to be updated and that is a recommendation given by the independent adviser on poverty and inequality in her report last week to the First Minister. That report stated that over half of all fuel poor households probably would not be classified as income poor. The fuel poverty definition needs to be looked at again so that future programme focus more specifically on helping those in fuel poverty who are also in income poverty. Apart from differences in income, there are also major regional differences that we need to address. As the Labour amendment rightly points out, rural areas in island communities across Scotland are suffering because of cold homes. The latest figures clearly show the disproportionate impact of fuel poverty on rural areas. It is a shameful reminder to this Government of its record on the issue that 43 of Scottish Borders households, 45 per cent in Dumfries and Galloway, 58 per cent in Orkney and 62 per cent of Western Isles households were in fuel poverty in 2013. When people's incomes, health and comfort are in danger, we should all be putting aside our political differences and work to address those problems. I hope that we will hear some cross-party support here. Mike McKenzie. I am very glad that you indicated that, to a large extent, this is beyond the control of the Scottish Government, not having any control over energy prices. However, would you also agree with me that the UK Government's curtailment of eco and abandoning the Green Deal also have a huge bearing on this problem? I disagree with the member in the fact that it is actually the Scottish Government that is proposing a 13 per cent cut to addressing fuel poverty, which I will come on to in due course. Scottish Lib Dems want to build cross-party support, like we have never seen before, and with comments like that, we will probably never see. However, the Scottish Government amendment represents a deviation from the cross-party support and remains complacent in tackling the issue decisively—an issue that leads to suffering, stress and poor health. However, as I said, the issue should cross-party lines. I am almost certain that there will be support of any initiatives and measures that will lead to that. The minister's motion talks up installing energy efficiency measures in 14,000 homes. However, when 845,000 households are in fuel poverty, it should explain to the other 831,000 households why that is such a great improvement. Last June, the Scottish Government announced that energy efficiency would be a national infrastructure priority. Eight months on, we have heard close to nothing on the details of any plan, so I expect that that information will be eagerly received by all who suffer from fuel poverty. I would like to invite the minister to address that and provide more details in her remarks this afternoon. I am also supportive of many other schemes, such as ensuring that new-built homes, as well as social landlords, are here to and are supported by stronger energy efficiency standards. However, there is a lot more that we could do. The Scottish Government refusing to acknowledge that it is set to miss its fuel poverty target by November would be a starting point. As recently as last week, the Minister for Housing and Welfare told my colleague Liam McArthur that the Scottish Government has no current plans to reassess the fuel poverty target, while, of course, last year, in October, the Cabinet Secretary for Social Justice reassured himself of having another year to reach the target. Meanwhile, after the successful Paris climate change talks, my colleague Tavish Scott has asked the minister for environment to provide details in his question to her. The minister has not even written to Mr Scott yet, and I would like to invite her in her absence to write to him as soon as possible. Not only does the Scottish Government's constant denial add insult to injury for the millions in cold homes, but the proposed 13 per cent cut in fuel poverty spending is simply counterproductive. I know that the minister may protest on that, but just two days ago, she said, and I quote that the Scottish Government has not proposed to reduce the domestic energy efficiency budget by 13 per cent and that we have allocated £103 million to tackle fuel poverty and climate change in this year. I remind her of the answer that the cabinet secretary for social justice gave to this chamber three months ago when he said, and I quote, that this year we are spending £119 million on dealing with fuel poverty. That was replicated by the minister on the environment last month in answering a Tavish Scott's question, a topical question, where she also stated that it was £119 million this year, £103 million next year, a £16 million slash, a 13 per cent cut. That is disproportionate, that is regressive. It is not just bad for people's pockets but for their health and leads to further pressures on our precious NHS. A cold home is neither conducive to good health nor a satisfactory learning environment for any child to quote the commission on housing and wellbeing. It is indefensible that cold, hard-to-heat homes continue to leave the most vulnerable in our society at the mercy of cold weather each winter, not my words but the words of the director of the Royal College of Nurses. The WWF points to the worst figures of winter deaths in more than a decade. Deputy Presiding Officer, when nearly half of pensioner couples live in fuel poverty, as Age Scotland warns, it is pivotal that we rethink our approach. When senior citizens are hospitalised with aggravated heart diseases, strokes and flu, we need to look at what the preventable causes are and prevent them. When people old and young alike are facing increased risk for mental health problems because they are unable to live in a warm, comfortable environment, we should be more proactive in our prevention strategy. Edison once said that the doctor of the future will give no medication but will interest his patients in the care of the human frame, diet and in the cause and prevention of disease. How to and appropriate about 100 years later to tackle fuel poverty and cold homes Last year, the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence published its recommendations for dealing with health risks associated with cold homes. I look forward to hearing from the minister whether any of those recommendations are being taken on by the Scottish intercollegiate guidelines network and what progress there is. The debate that the Scottish Liberal Democrats have brought to the chamber today is one that requires us to look realistically at the ugly truth of the condition of our homes in Scotland. Fuel poverty is not just a matter of infrastructure or energy or technology, it is a matter of providing people across Scotland, old and young, rural and urban, with the security that they need to have a full, filling and comfortable life, a brighter, healthier life for Scots and the reduction of the burden on the already hard-pressed NHS. All can be achieved by tackling fuel poverty. This Government needs to think outside the box, spend to save, spend to reduce fuel poverty and spend to reduce the financial burden on the NHS. We are urging all parties to commit their efforts in easing the burden of those families on the lowest incomes, who pay the biggest share on heating. I call on the Scottish Government to reverse the fuel poverty spending cut, join the other parties in reassessing its 2016 fuel poverty target, set by this Parliament and commit to additional measures that will enjoy cross-party support, to achieve a warmer, a healthier home for every person in Scotland. I move the motion in my name. Minister, you have up to seven minutes, please. I welcome the opportunity to take part in this debate. I agree on some of what Jim Hulman has said, and one is that Scotland is an energy-rich country and there is no room in Scotland for fuel poverty. Tackling inequality is at the heart of this Scottish Government's commitment to create a fairer country for all. Nothing is more important to me and to this Government than responding to the real pressures that individuals and families face across Scotland, and there is no complacency whatsoever about that. We know that fuel poverty is a real issue for thousands of households in Scotland struggling to pay fuel bills and keep their homes warm. We have seen more and more people being pushed into fuel poverty as they have tried to cope with unaffordable and rising fuel prices over the past few years. Powers over the regulation of the energy market remain reserved to the UK Government, but I assure you that the Scottish Government is doing all we can through taking action on the one contributing factor to fuel poverty that we have control over, which is energy efficiency. I will take a small intervention. The minister said that this Government is doing everything that it can, but we have had the cabinet secretary and one of your ministers state that £119 million was going into tackling fuel poverty, and that has been reduced to £103 million in just over a month. That is a 13 per cent disproportionate cut. Will the minister explain? I will explain, and I have explained before. In this current year, we are spending £119 million for fuel poverty, and in that £119 million included £15 million of consequentials that we received from the UK Government for their green homes improvement scheme. With no warning to the Scottish Government and no consultation with the Scottish Government, it stopped that scheme, which meant that we did not get that £15 million. We also had an overall budget cut by the UK Government, so if Jim Hulme or anyone else in this chamber can tell us where to get that £15 million within our existing budgets, and we have asked you that question before, we are willing to listen, but that is the reason why that £15 million is no longer available. We have maintained the rest of the budget, the £103 million, as we said, and no-one has yet come across and said where to find that £15 million that has been taken from the Scottish Government budget. Since 2009, we have allocated over half a billion pounds to make Scotland's homes more energy efficient, and over 700,000 households have received assistance to help them to heat their homes affordably, and most of those are our most vulnerable households. I have already said about the £119 million budget allocation for 2015, and around 80 per cent is grant funding and targeted at the poorest households in Scotland to make their homes warmer and cheaper to heat. I will give way briefly. Since the draft budget was published in December, on how many occasions has the minister formally requested more money for fuel poverty from the Deputy First Minister? The budget overall to Scotland has been cut, and we got the same allocation this year as we had last year. There is pressures on all the budgets, and what I am going to say is that I heard what was asked, but what I am saying is that his Government in the UK cut out overall budget and took £15 million away from our fuel poverty budget, and Gavin Brown is now asking us to find that money again. I would say to Gavin Brown and others to show us in the budget where to find that £15 million. I am taking no more interventions. I come in to hear the Liberals shouting for more money for education. I am now hearing them shouting for more money for fuel poverty. What I am saying to them is that show us where to get that money in a fixed budget. If they can do that, we will consider it in detail. We are continuing to demonstrate our commitment to tackle fuel poverty head-on by maintaining the expenditure available in the budgets that we have under our control, and it has been a very tough financial climate. All the increases in fuel poverty since the target was introduced can be explained by above inflation energy price increases. Our figures indicate that a fuel price had only risen in line with inflation between 2002 and 2014. The fuel poverty rate for 2014 would have been around 9.5 per cent instead of 35 per cent. The latest statistics have shown that, without our sustained and long-term commitment of funding, the figure would be much higher. We are also looking very carefully at the recommendation from the poverty adviser that Jim Hume referred to in his opening remarks. We have said that we would look carefully at all of our recommendations and respond to each and every one of them. However, our long-term investment is helping to improve the energy efficiency of Scotland's homes. The share of homes rated EPC, band C and above has increased by 71 per cent since 2010 and by 11 per cent in the last year. That is helping to reduce greenhouse gas emissions while helping people to heat their homes. Our record in energy efficiency demonstrates that it has always been a priority for this Government, because we know that it is the most sustainable way of keeping energy bills affordable and cutting greenhouse gas emissions. That is why we have designated energy efficiency a national infrastructure priority and committed to the development of Scotland's energy efficiency programme, SEAP, for short. Work to develop SEAP is under way and we continue to engage with stakeholders, including the fuel poverty strategic working group, and believe that this is a real opportunity to transform our approach to retrofitting existing building across Scotland. SEAP will, for the first time, integrate action on domestic and non-domestic energy efficiency and look for opportunities to develop district heat networks. Through this new programme, we are committed to continuing our support for vulnerable households, but we also want it to be the norm for every household and business across Scotland to invest in energy efficiency improvements. To help us to achieve that, we will seek to leverage private investment to support the development of loan schemes to help households and businesses. To conclude, I have set out in my remarks what the Scottish Government has done, is doing and plans to do in the future to tackle fuel poverty. I believe that that demonstrates our firm commitment to improving energy efficiency and eradicating fuel poverty in Scotland. Can Mackintosh speak to and move amendment 15432.2, Mr Mackintosh, up to five minutes, please. At last year, the number of excess winter deaths in Scotland was the highest in more than a decade at a staggering 4,060 excess winter deaths. It is an uncomfortable phrase, but it means the number of people who die during the winter months compared to the average throughout the rest of the year. The World Health Organization suggests that at least 30 per cent of those 4,000 extra deaths can be attributed to cold, damp housing. I say all this simply to highlight how much fuel poverty matters. For some people, high bills are a source of annoyance. For others, they mean a real struggle to balance competing financial demands. For others still, they lead to choices that can prove fatal. The existing Homes Alliance highlights that spending time in a cold, damp house can aggravate conditions such as heart disease, strokes and flu, and increase the risk of mental health problems, as well as the increased risk of illness and death among older people, young children and those with a disability. As the Liberal Democrat motion before us this afternoon highlights, more than a third of Scottish households live in fuel poverty, that is the need to spend more than 10 per cent of their income on gas, electricity or fuel bills. One in 10 is in extreme poverty, having to spend 20 per cent of their income just to keep warm. Those are damning figures. When we look at the statistics in more detail, they are even more worrying. More than half the people affected are pensioners, more than 70 per cent live in social or private rented accommodation. As always, it is the most vulnerable in our society who suffers the most. It was also different 15 years ago. In 2001, the then Liberal Labour Administration led the way, apparently winning support from the SNP in saying that we can abolish this blight in our society and setting the target to end fuel poverty entirely by November this year. We were united in our expectation that our political commitment could make a real difference. How many of us could have predicted that, after nine years of SNP government, we would have gone into reverse, not abolishing fuel poverty but increasing it? Nine years after coming to power, the SNP's record is that a third of all Scots come home to a cold damp house. If you live, I will do for Mr Don. I'm very grateful to the member. I'm just wondering what fraction of those who he's just mentioned in drawing up that target expected fuel prices to increase quite disproportionately over the period. Either you sign up to these targets and you claim credit as you constantly do for the work that you're doing or not at all. I have to say that I expected better for Mr Don with the pathetic excuses that we're hearing from the SNP today. The amendment today from the Scottish Government trying to excuse any responsibility or culpability is one of the most feeble and apologetic we have ever witnessed. Yet again, it is all either the UK Government's fault or the power company's or nothing to do with us, Gov. We've done it all we could. Of course, and I'll point this out to Mr Don, we discovered, sneaked out in the budget, in fact, that the SNP is not doing all it could far from it. As Alan Ferguson, chair of the existing Homes Alliance, said, just a day after we learnt there has been no progress in reducing the 35% of Scottish households living in fuel poverty, we discovered that the draft budget for ending cold homes is less than was available this year. We unearthed the fact that the Scottish Government tried to cover its tracks by comparing two sets of draft figures rather than using the final or outturned figures for the year. The SNP published figures suggesting an increase of £14 million, but, as Spice, the Parliament's own entirely independent research has revealed, using the final budget figures, the truth is that Scotland faced a reduction of around £15 million. The sector, those who have to deal with the day-to-day problems caused by inadequate housing, have not been fooled by the SNP's inadequate response. John Swinney's decision, I will in a second, did not just come out the day after these terrible fuel poverty figures came a week after the First Minister flew back from the international climate change conference in Paris, claiming to have embedded climate change in the SNP draft budget. I would delighted to hear Mr Mackenzie explain that from away. I am very grateful to Mr Mackintosh for taking the intervention. This SNP Government has spent over £0.5 billion in fuel poverty measures since 2009. I would be very interested to hear from Mr Mackintosh how much Labour would have spent over that period, how much he suggests we spend within this budget and what would he cut in order to achieve the spending necessary to eradicate fuel poverty. I thought that the amendment was feeble, but the intervention is even worse. Can I suggest that, as the Government, along with the Liberal Democrats that set this target, our commitment to fuel poverty and the essential heating programme, the winter fuel allowance, our record on fuel poverty is absolutely there for all to see and compared to your record, the SNP's record, this is not just a social problem, it is not just about poverty, it is about the environment too. It is very fitting that we are having this debate in January. Janis, the two-faced god of Roman times, and I have to say I hope that Mr Mackenzie goes away and reads his Roman history to learn a lesson there too. Call on Gavin Brown. Up to five minutes, Mr Brown, as you speak to, and move amendment 15432.1. Thank you, Presiding Officer. I start by moving the amendment in my name and congratulating the Liberal Democrats on bringing forward this extremely important debate and something that has become a bit of an Achilles heel for the Scottish Government, because the amendment that they have laid down and the contributions that we have had today so far, I have to say, have been pathetic. They have been a very feeble and lame tale from a Government whose record in this area is genuinely poor. That is not just political speak in an objective sense, it has been poor, because it is absolutely clear to anyone who can count that we will miss this target. It is absolutely clear that we will miss this target by some considerable distance, and it is absolutely clear that there is not a plan from this Government in order to rectify that failure. It is simply business as usual. Not a hint of regret from the Scottish Government. They want us to recognise their commitment. They want to blame the UK Government. They want to blame the energy companies. Here was my favourite one. If only fuel increases had risen in line with inflation in every single year between the years of 2002 and 2014, we still would have missed the target, but just by not quite as much as we are actually going to miss the target. They have the audacity in closing their amendment to say that they have a long-term commitment to tackling fuel poverty head-on. If that is the Scottish Government tackling it in the long-term head-on, I would genuinely hate to see anything that they are not tackling head-on. We will probably hear from Nicola Sturgeon at First Minister's questions tomorrow or next week that they are not going to fail to meet the target. They are simply going to re-profile the target, and that way they will have met the target quite carefully. It is perfectly acceptable—it is perfectly fair, as Mr MacKenzie said—that there are areas within the target over which they do not have direct control. Energy prices are not controlled by the Scottish Government, wages are not controlled by the Scottish Government. However, in 2007, when they came into this Government, they accepted that target in its entirety. They did not make excuses. They did not say that they will accept the target as long as energy prices do not rise and as long as wages rise in line with inflation. They have accepted that target in every year since becoming Government. Therefore, they have taken responsibility for it and are ultimately accountable for their failure. They cannot blame the fact that prices have gone up with a few months to go for failing to meet the target when that has been apparent for something.  I am very grateful to the member for taking an intervention. I have a great deal of respect for Mr Brown's financial literacy. I wonder therefore if he could lay out the Conservative plans for eradicating fuel poverty and tell me how much is that going to cost and what part of the Scottish budget would you cut in order to achieve that? If two bad interventions do not make the point, try three, appears to be my MacKenzie's approach. I sat on a cross-party committee with some of his colleagues who were in the chamber today. It was apparent to the Economy, Energy and Tourism Committee in 2009 that we needed a sea change. We produced a report, all of us signed up to a sea change, listening to experts like Energy Action Scotland. We were told by the then minister that the Scottish Government has produced a sea change. They were putting in place measures in 2009 that were going to create this sea change over time. It clearly and quite simply has not happened. We heard earlier today about the number of households in fuel poverty, but not only are we failing to meet the target, we have gone backwards. When this Government came into power, 26.5 per cent of households were in fuel poverty. Today, it is 34.9 per cent. In 2007, 7.6 per cent of households were in extreme fuel poverty. Today, it is 9.5 per cent. It has been pretty obvious that we have not been on track for quite some time. What the Government has failed to do is to put the money behind it. In 2009-10, they put in £68.3 million. It was obvious then that we were moving towards a target, so they increased it to £68.5 million. Then they cut it to £58 million. Then it went to £67 million and then £66 million. It remained broadly static for a five-year period when it was obvious that we were failing to meet those targets. They did increase it in 2014-15. Yes, they did increase it last year. Now that it is blatantly obvious that we are not going to hit the target, what are they doing? They are cutting it once again. I was genuinely disappointed when I asked the minister quite simply on how many occasions has she asked the Deputy First Minister for more money on how many times has she tried to champion the cause to make sure that she is fighting for the space and the resources that it deserves? The answer to all listening was none. It is pretty obvious that the minister hasn't asked a single time since the draft budget was published for more resources for something that she claimed in her speech, where she said that nothing is more important. A huge disappointment from the Scottish Government. I move to open debate speeches at up to four-minute speeches for the four open debate speakers, please. Well, if you left the fuel poor to the Tories' care, then they are not going to get anything to help them see through a winter. As for listening to the economical with the truth Liberal Democrats, I have to say that it is sickening because the realities are very different from the picture that they paint. There is no one-size-fits-all. There is no sense for one minute that the problem is solved in a simple way because it is much more complex than they say. I can assure you that I am going to talk about some of those effects in my constituency without intervention. My constituency in Sutherland has some of the most fuel poor people in the country and also one of the areas with the lowest income quartile. They have to buy off-grid gas from tanks. They have to pay two pence more for electricity in the grid. They have till recently had to pay more for petrol and diesel. They have to pay extra charges for parcel delivery. All of those add to the ability of people to decide whether they are going to invest in the ways that they can improve their homes. That is something that must be taken into account in this debate. Crying about the fact that there is one particular measure that you disagree with does not take into account many of the factors over which we have absolutely no control. In the UK Parliament, my colleague Mike Weir, MP for Angus, tried to get cross-party support to bring forward the winter fuel payment. He actually had cross-party support for that, so that people off the grid could get paid earlier to try and help pay for their fuel. It was talked out in the Parliament and now, thankfully, winter fuel payments are going to come apart of the Scottish Parliament's future power. The rural fuel poverty task force, which meets next month, is going to be looking at welfare reform resources, including winter fuel payments. During this year, it may be possible for this Government to bring forward winter fuel payments to the areas where the climate is wettest and where we do not have enough time, I do not think. Thank you very much. I have heard enough of people who use words like you did in the debate. I am most certainly not, Presiding Officer, giving you any more space to use evil language. The situation with this debate is that, as far as I am concerned, things that are practical to do, we will try to do. When I see some of the measures of improvement that have taken place since 2009, I really think that it is necessary to recognise that that improvement has taken place. However, in the conditions in which the overall budgets are cut, that is not taken into account by this Liberal Democrat motion. Sanctimonious it is as usual and absolutely cut away from the reality. We have excellent examples in our constituency of district heating systems. How many other constituencies have been setting those up? The one in WIC related to the distillery there is excellent. We have a situation in which we have reliance in Thurso and WIC in various other places of gas that comes from tanks by roads. Those are under threat. They are going to come not from Liverpool but from Canvey Island, I believe. Those are things that affect the cost of fuel in my area. None of those details have come out of any of the speeches from the unionist politicians so far, and therefore that makes this debate a farce. Thank you, Presiding Officer. I certainly think that this debate is far from a farce, and if the Scottish Government addressed the issues under levers that were in their control, we would not be quite so seriously in fuel poverty and missing our targets this year as we are. This is indeed an important debate, having been bought by the Liberal Democrats. Fuel poverty statistics are indeed a scandal, with 34.9 per cent of households affected in 2014. These are often, as we have heard from many speakers, low income families with small children, older people, those with disabilities or health problems. As Ken Macintosh highlighted, it is appalling to learn that in 2015-16 there were 4,060 excess winter deaths. Comparing that to the lower figures of significantly colder countries like Germany and Sweden, it is undeniable that more must be done. As we have already heard, I do not have time for interventions. No, I am sorry. As we have already heard, the Scottish Government will not meet its 2016 target. I would be very interested to hear from the minister in her closing speech what the Scottish Government is going to be doing for this infrastructure project about which we hear so much. I look forward to that from the minister. As our motion points out and Jim Hume stressed, rural fuel poverty is even more grave, and Rob Gibson has highlighted this as well. The UK fuel poverty monitor showed rural households are more than twice as likely to be in extreme fuel poverty as urban households, and the fuel poverty decline is less pronounced in rural areas. Where remote communities are off-grid, more expensive fuels are the only option. Older dwellings are hard to heat and insulate, and there are higher fuel costs, as we all know, and higher refurbishment costs, as well as higher living costs and often lower incomes, such as in the borders in my region. This can be a slippery slope into fuel poverty and fuel poverty and the ruthless choices that many families have to make. District heating is indeed, as Rob Gibson says, good for distillery and for WIC for the community, but there is not the option at the moment for low-income families to have a biomass boiler or ground and air source heat pumps. That is something that could be addressed by the Scottish Government very quickly. I have also had concerns with energy efficiency in private rented sector, and that problem is widespread, particularly in historic tenement buildings in large cities, and it has a significant effect on the risk of fuel poverty. There is currently a huge gap between the private rented sector and the private sector, and that is due to the lack of standards in place. In 2014, I lodged an amendment to the housing bill to take on this issue, head on, requiring landlords to ensure that their properties adhere to a minimum energy efficiency standard, with penalties for failure to meet those standards. The amendment was labelled, I quote, unnecessary by the Minister, and instead would be considered by the regulation of energy efficiency in private sector homes working group. The postponement of the REAPS consultation is deeply disappointing. Can the Minister explain the reasoning for this delay? To change all this, we need to fill the funding gap, and we have heard from other members today about what that gap is, and that is again in the power of the Scottish Government, who is there that is the Government, and they need to prioritise energy efficiency and renewable energy issues and support low-income families if this is to be addressed. To change all this, the Scottish Labour will bring in a warm homes bill, with 80 per cent of our houses still here in 2050. This will, amongst other initiatives, develop a retrofitting programme addressing fuel poverty, while bringing jobs to local communities and tackling climate change. As a member for Skylark, Aberyn, Bardinoch, I know only too well the effects of fuel poverty. The rural nature and remote nature of the Highlands and Islands mean that we are at the highest risk of fuel poverty in the country, and we have been suffering from that for some considerable time, although the SNP Government has made in-roads into that. The Scottish Government has spent, as has been said already, a quarter of a billion pounds since 2013 in dealing with fuel poverty, and it intends to allocate £103 million for fuel poverty programmes for 2016 and 2017. It remains firmly committed to the eradication of fuel poverty. That is a very local issue for me. Fuel poverty affects twice as many Sky residents and West Highlanders in my constituency than anyone else in Scotland. To eat or eat is a phrase that has been used many times in this debate over the years, but it is the harsh truth for many. To me it is clear that the North West Highlands needs to be treated as a priority. We are in restricted financial state at the moment, caused by austerity driven by the Westminster Government, and the Tories and the Liberals and the Labour need to recognise that fact. Wouldn't it be nice just once for them to accept that the cuts are driven by the Tories in London and that has a knock-on effect on our budgets in Scotland? In Scotland, I am arguing for a priority for the North and the West. The new regional approach under warmer homes in Scotland is welcome, but more needs to be done for off-gas grid areas, certainly. Just one knock-on effect then. Does the member accept that the percentage cut to the fuel poverty budget is greater than the change to the overall Scottish budget next year? The member is incorrect, because, as was explained by the minister earlier on, the budget went down by £15 million from £119 spent in the current year to £103, which is a £16 million reduction. That was because of the cut to heaps. That was a Tory decision in London. Do you accept that, Mr Brown? No answer. He does not accept it. He does not accept any responsibility whatsoever. In percentage terms, the fuel poverty budget gets a far greater cut than the change to the Scottish Government. Does he accept that that is the case? I do not accept that that is the case, and you did not answer the question. You did not accept that the cuts that are being driven by the austerity agenda of your party in London, ably supported by Labour and the Lib Dems in Scotland, who never criticise the Tories, which does not surprise me in the least. Anyway, to get back to the main point, Energy Action Scotland advises that remote, rural and off-gas grid areas need to be better served by the main programmes, in particular with supported measures for heart-to-heat homes and houses using LPG and oil. Next year's energy efficiency budget needs to take into account the problems in the north and the west. Those areas need to be targeted, particularly those that are not on the gas grid, because people on the gas grid have a huge advantage of those who are not on the gas grid. Fuel poverty is a complex issue, and it is full of misconceptions. Fuel poverty does not just affect pensioners or individuals who rely on benefits. A fuel-poor home is the result of a combination of the household income being below the poverty line and a property having higher than typical energy costs. In one of the briefings that we received for the debate, which came in from Scottish Gas, it highlights that we recognise that affordability is a significant concern for customers and understand that energy costs can be a major component of a businesses expenditure. Not just about business, but energy costs are a huge concern for domestic customers. That is a point that has been brought up in the debate, but, unfortunately, Gavin Brown in his comments refused to accept that and just tried to put all the blame upon the Scottish Government when clearly the Scottish Government does not have that responsibility, does not have the power over energy costs. It will only have four minutes, Mr Hume, so I cannot take intervention today, I am sorry. However, it has come back to the point that the Scottish Government does not have that power and that the above inflation energy increase is something that clearly Scottish Gas recognises as an issue, but, unfortunately, Gavin Brown and the Conservatives do not. Fuel poverty is often more acute in off-gas grid rural areas, and my colleagues Rob Gibson and Dave Thompson just highlighted that. The highlight was that household energy bills are, in average, 27 per cent higher again at energy-efficient homes that play a big role in that. Important drivers of fuel poverty are outwith the control of the Scottish Government, but the Scottish Government is determined to do all that it can to tackle it. In a constrained financial climate, i.e. cuts from Westminster, the Scottish Government has preserved the resources that are available for energy efficiency. The draft budget figures that were published in December show an increase of £40 million in the fuel poverty budget compared with the draft budget for last year. That is an increase from £89 million to £103 million to tackle fuel poverty and climate change and help to improve the condition of Scotland's homes. The Scottish Government has only four minutes, Mr McIntosh. Usually, I take an intervention, but not today. The Scottish Government has allocated over £0.5 billion since 2009 on a raft of fuel poverty and energy efficiency programmes to help the most vulnerable people in our society to heat their homes affordably. It is a point that seems to have been missed by many in the opposition benches today, that more than 900,000 energy efficiency measures have taken place since 2008. That is more than 900,000 in Scotland. There is still more work to be done, but the opposition parties have to recognise that the work that has been undertaken has been undertaken. The Scottish Government has spent over £500 million so far, and the Scottish Government spending on domestic energy efficiency has already made hundreds of thousands of homes warmer and cheaper to heat and has helped to mitigate the rise in fuel poverty. I am just about to conclude, Presiding Officer. In September, the Scottish Government launched a new fuel poverty scheme, which aims to help up to 28,000 more households to stay warm over the next seven years. There is so much more that I can talk about, but time is curtailed, so I will leave it at that, Presiding Officer. I welcome this opportunity to discuss fuel poverty because it is so important that everyone has affordable access to the energy that we all need, especially in the depths of winter. Fuel poverty particularly affects older people, those with disabilities that keep them at home and families on low incomes. Although the exact situations may differ, it is right to say that three main factors in fuel poverty are relatively low disposable incomes, high prices of energy and poor levels of energy efficiency in homes. Colleagues across the Chamber have made many points on addressing the issues, and there are several options that are worth considering in detail. However, I think that I will take a slightly different tack here in order to broaden the debate a bit further. When it comes to addressing the problems caused by low disposable incomes, the solution obviously lies in measures that lead to increased levels of income and more of it being disposable. We must therefore direct help accurately to those who need it most at the same time as creating the conditions for economic growth that will sustainably increase employment opportunities and raise incomes in the long term. As for the disposable element, it is clear that we should help people to keep more of the money that they earn by increasing personal allowance and keeping taxes low where possible. As for the problems associated with high prices for energy, there is certainly work to be done, but we have to ensure that it involves more than just demands that prices be lower and government task forces set up. As we all know, the energy market is complex and there can be reluctance to switch providers due to a lot of confusion among the relationships between costs, tariff, customers and end prices. For many vulnerable consumers who end up in fuel property, it can be the case that they are stuck overpaying for their energy when a better deal could be had if only it was easy to find and secure. For example, customers may be overpaying the odds when they are stuck on pre-payment metres with higher tariffs than direct debit customers. The point that I am getting at is that we need to explore ways to open up and harness consumer power by making switching providers much easier. Such pressure on energy providers can play a very important role in introducing prices across the board so that the demand on people's incomes can be reduced. Many of my fellow MSPs have rightly pointed out that the energy efficiency of homes is crucial factor in fuel poverty, an important target if we were to tackle the issue. There are a few worthwhile programmes, but again I think it is worth broadening the debate with a wider view of the problems. It is right that newly built homes should be as well insulated as they can be so that their arguments do not waste expensive fuel bills on heating that is simply lost. For this to have a meaningful impact, new homes need to be built in the first place. As I mentioned before, we need actively to encourage more house building. At the moment, the system is simply too cumbersome to deliver the level of house building we need and slow progress on energy efficiency, and therefore fuel poverty is one of the outcomes. According to the Presiding Officer, I would like to underline my agreement that we need a comprehensive plan for tackling fuel poverty and I therefore support the amendment in Gavin Brown's name. Preventing fuel poverty is an ambition we must all set our minds to so that the best solutions can be found. However, we must be clear that this should involve more than just setting targets. To make lasting progress, we must create the conditions that allow these primary issues around disposable income, fuel prices and energy efficiency to be tackled for the long term. To do this, we must focus on the causes as well as the symptoms. Thank you. Over the past few months, I have taken part in a few debates on housing, where it has been exasperating to say the least to hear the minister and her backbenchers go through such linguistic contorsions in order to defend their record. Time after time, I have listened to them either simply deny the crisis or try semantic gymnastics to pat themselves on the back despite their continued failure to address the crisis that they are presiding over. Although they surpassed themselves this afternoon in their verbal dexterity and their attempts to deflect away from their own responsibility over the current fuel poverty situation, despite their best efforts, Stuart McMillan and Dave Thompson did really well in that regard, but the gold medal has to go to Mike Mackenzie, who has excelled himself. As for Rob Gibson, I think that we have to put him down as a DNF did not finish, but there is so much to refute in the SNP's amendment this afternoon that I would take the whole debate to the bunk et al, and I only have four minutes. I will concentrate on asking a very simple question. What purpose did the Scottish Government think it serves by trying to deflect attention for the situation here towards the situation in the south of the border? Does the Scottish Government really think that people freezing in their homes in Scotland will be in any way warmed up by the thought that less money might be being spent in England? I am pretty sure that most people affected by fuel poverty in Scotland will recognise that that section in the Government's amendment is an utter red herring. It may warm the nationalist cockles, but it does nothing to address the reality of fuel poverty here in Scotland. To hear the minister's explanation actually beggars belief, to explain that because a consequential didn't emerge that the SNP have tried to do nothing to address that but simply passed on that reduction, it quite clearly shows that they are much happier managing austerity than actually trying to tackle it. I will take the minister. I will ask again, and it is a question that Mike Mackenzie asked. We are criticised for we didn't get the £15 million of the UK cut or budget cut, that £15 million as well. Can Michael McMahon tell us where that £15 million we can find in our budget? Given the budget that you have and given the priorities that you set, it is your responsibility to ensure that you meet the targets that you set. We will make the argument that you have decided to pass on the cut rather than meet your target, and that is your responsibility. The simple fact is that Scotland has the highest rates of fuel poverty in the UK, and you are doing nothing to address that by the budget that you set this year, and it is your budget and your responsibility to do so. Almost 60 per cent of single pensioner households and over 40 per cent of pensioner couples live in fuel poverty. Fuel poverty amongst older people can be particularly acute in rural areas, with over 70 per cent of households in the western Isles alone living in fuel poverty. Disabled people are twice as likely to live in poverty as non-disabled people, making them more likely to experience fuel poverty. Living in a cold home has negative impacts on children's health and wellbeing, and children who live in privately rented accommodation are more commonly affected by fuel poverty than children living in other tenures. The private rented sector has a great proportion of energy-efficient homes than any other tenure, but we have heard absolutely nothing from this Government this afternoon about what they would do to address that problem. Who cares? We spend more money on the problem than they do in England. What a disgraceful, nationalist attitude to a problem that is your responsibility, and you have to address it. Many thanks. I now call on Minister Margaret Budge. Just up to six minutes please, Ms Budge. Okay. Thank you, Presiding Officer. This has certainly been an afternoon of SNP bad. All sides of the chamber are suggesting that the SNP Government has done nothing to tackle fuel poverty, and that is simply not the case. We have done more than any previous Government in this Parliament to tackle fuel poverty. We are not complacent about fuel poverty. It is a real issue. It is a real concern for our constituents, for my constituents, as well as many other people's constituents across this chamber. I will take one intervention because I have things to say. Will you go to the Deputy First Minister and ask him to find that £15 million from within the budget to do your job? Here we go. Gavin Brown suggested that part of the Labour Party has picked it up. That is the question of the afternoon. What I would say to Gavin Brown is that we know what the Tory's answer to fuel poverty is, and yes, I will say what they are doing in the UK. The Tory's answer to fuel poverty is to make everyone pay, including the fuel poor, and that is their answer to it. They have no answer to either. None of the parties in this chamber have come forward with a budget, but I have worked with low-income groups all my life. They understand what a budget is, and they understand how competing priorities are. They know that when they are competing with high priorities all over, how they have to set that budget up. We have asked the Opposition—no, I am taking no more interventions—to tell us where we should adjust our budget. What are we spending too much money on? Is it housing? Is it health? Is it education? What are we spending the money on that you are telling us that we are not spending? We are doing that as a Government. We are listening to stakeholders in the sector, and we are investing in fuel poverty measures, and we are providing a long-term commitment to tackle fuel poverty. Yes, we will tackle it head on. We are investing in unprecedented levels of funding—no, I am taking no more interventions. We are investing in unprecedented levels of funding significantly more than any previous Government in Scotland. We have invested over £1.5 billion to 209 on a raft of fuel poverty and energy efficiency programmes, and this year we made available a record £119 million. This investment not only supports those in fuel poverty, but it supports around 1,300 full-time jobs, and that is what will be supported across the Scottish economy next year. We know that there are hundreds more people employed in the industry than there were in 2009. We also know that the industry welcomes the investment made by the Scottish Government and values the role it has in supporting jobs. Our efforts are paying off with nearly one in every three households having received measures to make their home more energy efficient since 2008. The variety of schemes under the Heaps Banner today gives households a wider range of support than ever before. I think that Rob Gibson and Dave Thompson talked about the particular difficulties in rural areas, and we are looking very closely at that. Rural areas get more per head of population than other areas of Scotland, and that is because it recognises those issues. I will take one intervention. I thank the minister for taking the intervention. In taking credit for all the achievements over the years, including the credit that Alex Neil tried to claim for the £119 million that he spent last year, did Mr Neil thank the UK Government for this money, or does he only mention the UK Government when he is blaming them for cuts? That is just an absolutely ridiculous question to ask when we are talking about the seriousness of fuel poverty in rural areas and how we are trying to tackle it. We are trying to tackle it, and we know that we need to do more. That is why we are looking and working still with the task force. We have a rural poverty fuel task force, and we have the fuel poverty forum. We are working with all of them to come together to develop our national scheme. Only last week, Alex Neil announced that £14 million funds that will allow councils across Scotland to make homes, public buildings and businesses more energy efficient. That is part of Scotland's national energy efficiency programme, and that funding will pilot new and innovative approaches to energy efficiency with community groups and businesses that will help to improve warmth in buildings and homes, drive down energy bills and work towards reaching climate change targets. Those initiatives can then be taken forward when seep is rolled out fully in 2018. The development of energy efficiency as a national infrastructure priority will create transformational change in improving the energy efficiency and heating of homes, businesses and public buildings in Scotland, reducing fuel bills and greenhouse gas emissions. Through seep, we will introduce multi-year funding that will give our delivery partners the certainty that they need to deliver ambitious energy efficiency projects, and it demonstrates our long-term commitment to tackling fuel poverty. We have had successes today, and they have been hampered by many challenges above inflation. Price rises can explain rises in fuel poverty. Alongside that, the UK Government's changes to the energy company obligation and the withdrawal of green deal support caused uncertainty and has impacted on the delivery of many measures. The only funding that is announced for fuel poverty and energy efficiency in the UK Government's spending review and autumn statement, as I said to Gavin Brown, was through energy supplier obligations and a regressive form of taxation. Presiding Officer, we have achieved a great deal despite the lack of support from the UK Government and despite rising fuel prices. This Government remains passionately committed to ending fuel poverty in Scotland. We will continue to push the boundaries and encourage innovative solutions to ensure that everyone in Scotland lives in a warm home that can afford heat. Now, I call on Alison McInnes to wind up the debate. Fuel poverty is often mentioned in passing in debates on health and housing, for example, but this full Parliament has not had a dedicated fuel poverty debate outside members' business since April 2014, and that is why we allocated time for this in our business today. Just as the Parliament came together to set a fuel poverty target in 2001, Scottish Liberal Democrats believe that it now needs to come together to have a constructive, honest debate about how we are progressing against this Parliament's laudable and continuing ambition to eradicate fuel poverty. The debate has been largely worthwhile, although it has been some interesting contributions, I have to say. I welcome the support and commitment of other Opposition parties and, indeed, the Minister who says that we are all still committed to the eradication of fuel poverty. I think that Ken McIntosh was right to highlight the excess winter deaths, and Claudia Beamish was right to point out in particular the problems facing rural areas and off-grid customers. I think that Gavin Brown was right when he said that this genuinely poor record in tackling fuel poverty is the Achilles heel of the Scottish Government. Rob Gibson said that it was a complex problem, and I agree that it is a complex problem, but he then went on to give a very intemperate contribution, which we would be best to gloss over. Dave Thompson seems to think that it is always Mr Fault. I am happy to acknowledge, as Stuart McMillan said, that there are three key drivers of fuel poverty—fuel costs, low income and energy efficiency. However, contrary to Dave Thompson's assertion, all of the Opposition parties stated that in their contributions this afternoon, but they then went on to focus on what we can affect here in our devolved Parliament. As Michael McMahon said, I did not hear anything from the SNP about taking responsibility for the levers that they do control. I must take the Minister to task. No one said that the SNP had done nothing for fuel poverty, but I say to Margaret Burgess, have you done enough? The answer is no, you haven't. That is not just my verdict, it is the verdict of Energy Action Scotland, WWF and many other campaigners. There has, of course, been general agreement that fuel poverty is anathema. I said that we needed to have a constructive and honest debate, but truth be told, it has not been as frank as it could have been. It does not surprise me, though it always disappoints me that the Government sticks true to form. The amendment in the Minister's name calls for everyone else to do more while being overly self-congratulatory of its own achievements. It is a lengthy amendment that plays around with stats, deploys smoke and mirrors over the budget and, of course, it resorts to the usual, if only, moan that we hear and hear every day. We were elected by our constituents to apply ourselves assiduously and imaginatively to solving the problems we face within the powers of this Parliament, but it seems instead that the SNP prefers applying their imagination to drafting amendments. Spending in 2016-17 is set to be lower than it has been in 2015-16. There is just no getting away from that fact. Whether it was budgeted in advance or not, there is projected to be a reduction in funding next year compared to this year. That is a cut. The Minister asked how to fund a reinstatement. There is a simple answer. This would be a preventative spend that costs the health service £80 million a year to deal with the impact of cold homes. To quote Joe Biden, do not tell me what you value, show me your budget and I will tell you what you value. The Scottish Government has so far refused to acknowledge that it is set to miss its targets to ensure that, by November 2016, people are not living in full poverty. If we are to end the misery caused by full poverty, then we need to start with a frank assessment of progress to date. The SNP's refusal to admit that they are going to miss the target does not help us to move forward. The Minister's claim to tackling full poverty head-on prevents a new course of action being taken now. I urge the SNP to agree that we can and we must do more here in Scotland using our existing devolved powers to tackle the scourge of fuel poverty. I support the calls from the director of energy action Scotland, Norman Kerr, who has urged Scottish ministers to acknowledge that the 2016 target will not be met and to start discussions on producing a new fuel poverty strategy for Scotland. We are entirely supportive of course of eradicating fuel poverty, but ministers need to face up to the reality of what is happening and reconsider how best to address the problem. Jim Hume, in opening the debate, set out the scale of the problem that is still facing us here in Scotland. In 2014, the level of fuel poverty was 34.9 per cent—that is 845,000 households—with 9.5 per cent in extreme fuel poverty. That compares to 35.8 per cent in 2013. That is not much progress. That is well over three quarters of a million people struggling each day to heat their homes. Unaffordable fuel bills force households to restrict their heating and live in a miserably cold home with consequences for physical and mental health and social wellbeing. High fuel bills force people to sacrifice spending on other essentials, including food, compounding hardship and leading to additional health implications. Scotland has the highest rates of fuel poverty in the UK. The wider social and economic impact of fuel poverty makes this a serious cause for concern. As Age Scotland outlined in a briefing, while fuel poverty affects us all, it has a disproportionate impact on older people. Over half of single pensioner households, 58 per cent and nearly half, 44 per cent, of pensioner couples live in full poverty. The World Health Organization attributes 30 per cent of preventable deaths to cold and poorly insulated housing. As Ken Macintosh said, last winter Scotland saw excess mortality rates reach a record high of 22,000 deaths. Ill health, caused by cold housing, costs the NHS in Scotland up to £80 million a year. That is where the money should come from, Minister. We support Labour's amendment, as a warm homes bill could provide the necessary impetus, but we do not need to wait for a bill in the next session. The Government has designated energy efficiency as a national infrastructure priority. Beyond that grand sounding,