Aloha, welcome to Think Tech Hawai'i's Movers, Shakers, and Reformers Politics in Hawai'i series. I'm your host, Carl Kempanya. Today we're going to be talking about Native Hawaiian issues. There are a lot of Native Hawaiian issues to be really addressed that need to be addressed really in full, and it goes back to a long, long history. I'm not going to pretend that I know all of the history, but I do know some of it. I'm aware of it. So we have sovereignty issues. We have local issues here that deal with education. We have protests issues. We have land issues, which is related to sovereignty, but has obviously different capacities and different areas of that, including TMT. There's a lot of really areas to talk about. Today we're going to focus in a little bit on a couple of those areas, but I will invite you to join us and my guest today, Mr. Ikaika Hussi. Thank you for joining us today. Ikaika is a number of things, actually, and I want him to tell us a bit about him, but partially one of the things is he's a member of the Hawaiian Alliance for Progressive Action. So congratulations for that, and thank you for joining the show, and tell us a bit about yourself and where you are politically with Hapa, where you are Native Hawaiian side. Sure. So I've been involved in the Hawaiian sovereignty movement for about this point, let's see, 20 years, I think almost exactly 20 years. I got involved right after I graduated from high school, and it was a really interesting time. It was the mid-90s, a time when questions around Hawaiian sovereignty and governance were literally on the front page like every day, and... What school did you go to? I went to Iolani, myself, which I'm very proud is the same school that Principal Heel went to for a number of years, among other people who are interesting, Mufi Hanamid, et cetera. So I grew up during a time when Hawaiian sovereignty was something that everyone was talking about, and I decided that I wanted to be involved deeply in how the conversation was going. I had concerns about some of the things that were being said, and I thought I need to be involved. Okay, so did that begin your, I guess, entry into the political realm? It did, yeah, it really did. Okay, and that has persisted, as we know, again, congratulations you ran for State House last year. It's persisted, yes. Yeah, which is good. Okay, now tell us about Hapa, the Hawaiian Alliance for Progressive Action. What is that? Okay, so it's a relatively new organization, but it's incredibly effective, established by Gary Husser and some other progressives. It's essentially a coalition bringing together and helping to provide a kind of a gathering place for a lot of progressive organizations to come together and organize together. And so we've done, for instance, the Kuliana Academy, which has trained some wonderful leaders to take new roles in our staying and local politics. We convened the People's Congress in the last fall or last winter. And we also have, in fact, just last weekend, we brought together a group of activists and leaders on the island of Kaua'i, people who are farmers and fishermen, policy makers, talking about the very concrete, I should say, non-concrete things that need to be done on the island of Kaua'i around water and land use. So we're very engaged in the community. And in the environment and in culture. Absolutely, yeah. Okay, because they all kind of have to tie together. Sure, I mean culture is the way we look at things, right? It's the lens through which we see everything around us. Absolutely. Right, right, and that culture gets shifted and adjusted based on our neighbor cultures, based on who our neighbors literally are, not just the countries nearest us, but also the person who lives next to us. Sure. And how many of us are multicultural. Right. As well. And that's another issue that comes in, how that stuff gets addressed, specifically, again, trying to stick with Native Hawaiian theme. It is interesting. I don't have the exact percentage of Native Hawaiians population-wise. Maybe you have the number. It's about 500,000. About 500. About 500, roughly. From my understanding, the Filipino community is the largest single community represented within Hawai'i. Yeah, I should say, I'm sorry, 500,000 Hawaiians worldwide. Worldwide, yeah. Okay, yeah, because we only have 1.2 million people in Hawai'i. Okay, but that's one of the issues and concerns we have here in Hawai'i, as far as, okay, Native Hawaiian writes sovereignty. So let's dig into sovereignty a little bit more. Give me a summary, if you would, of your experience at the very least, and some background with some sovereignty issues that are happening even today. Sure. Well, I'm going to avoid recapitulating the entire. Yeah, we're not going to start with 1893 and go forward. But I'll sort of give a framework for context. The discussion right now runs between two polls, I would say. One poll is let's continue with politics as usual and the prevailing political economy of Hawai'i, which is overwhelmingly tourist-based and construction-based, military-based, and try to address Native Hawaiian land and sovereignty claims within that structure of. Self-governance within the structure. Right, within the structure of American, you know, of what I would call American imperialism and militarism, et cetera. The other way to do it, which is the frame that I prefer personally, is to flip it and to say, okay, the Hawaiian problem, the Hawaiian question, is really just the flip side of the question about Americanism and militarism in Hawai'i. And so I would prefer to address that as the issue, as the problem, and to look at how do we reconstitute our sense of what Hawai'i is and what Hawai'i can be within the framework of a multicultural, progressive, inclusive society that is grounded on, you know, a very long, multi-thousand-year history of Hawaiian culture in Hawai'i and that has been enriched by all of the other cultures and ethnicities that have come to make Hawai'i their home. So I would look at it in terms of how do we create a more progressive and inclusive society grounded in a Hawaiian sense of place and being? So it's more of like a, from what direction you're coming.  Right. So if this is Hawai'i first, America second, is that... In the age of Trump, I'm trying to avoid the use of the word first. Okay. However, I do believe that... Probably a good idea. I do believe that, like when people say they were in mainland, I like to pause and say, you know, I think that here for the people of Hawai'i and all of the kids of Hawai'i and the kupuna of Hawai'i, Hawai'i should be our mainland. Yes. And we should treat it as if it is our home. I don't think we should actually treat it as if it's paradise. I prefer to think of it as homeland. You know, if this is our home, we should do certain things. We should make sure that the people are healthy. We should make sure that the land is healthy, that the water is flowing and that the people are able to succeed in our home. Or even have access to the lands and to the water. Because there are land and water rights that are at our challenges now. Sure. That have been challenges for decades, actually. Yeah. I mean, if you look at like the issue of Red Hill, for instance. Yes. The Red Hill tanks, right? They're underground. There's like 20 storage tanks. Huge storage tanks. Right. Huge storage tanks. Yeah. There's been releases of fuel into the aquifer. Mm-hmm. And there's a concern that if there were more releases that it would affect the drinking water, not just to the people right around Red Hill, but really, I don't know, 800,000 people who live along all of South Oahu. Exactly. And that is because it's recognizing there are, I believe there are two aquifers that supply fresh water for Oahu. It's actually more than two, I think. But it is... Well, there's the one primary that handles really, as you mentioned, the whole Southern... Where everybody lives. Where a majority of the people live. Exactly. So you can't talk about... Yeah. And that's a big concern, actually. I don't want to... That could be a show into itself, actually. That is a big concern. So tell me about the Hawaiian side. Well, I would think of it not just as a Hawaiian side, but really the way that we as the people of Hawaii, the locals, the residents, whatever term... We should probably find a new word, actually, to describe this idea. But the people of Hawaii should look at that problem, at least the way that I look at it, is that this is something that's going to affect everybody. We need to address this, not because it's a Hawaiian issue, or because it's an environmental issue, but because this is something that's going to affect all of us. Absolutely. So we need to close down those tanks, get the oil out of our ground, and out of our water. Yeah. Well, as much as can be. Yeah. Because I know that ends up being a larger issue.  And what are those impacts then? Right. It becomes... But I know that's, again, that could be a whole show in itself, the whole Red Hill thing, but... Okay. So, again, now, that brings me just back to that main thought again. It's about not just direction of where you're coming from, but it's how you're perceiving it, how you're beginning your conversation, how you're recognizing we are... We live in Hawaii. We need to think about the people of Hawaii. And, yes, there's Native Hawaiians, but there's many other groups and cultures. What happens environmentally impacts everyone who's here. Yeah, absolutely. And so therefore, you're looking at the perspective I'm asking. I'm summarizing, and please correct me. You're looking at the perspective of what is Hawaiian to be representative of a thought process and of an inclusiveness in that regard. I suppose, I mean, I guess the way that I would say it is that I think that there's a lot of ways in which the Hawaiian interest is actually the same interest as the local Japanese interest and the local Chinese interest. That's because we're here... The local Filipino interest, right? Because we're all here. We're the people who are here. We're going to be doing business together, going to church together, driving on the same roads together, hopefully riding on the same rail together. Eventually. Having families together. We're one people in a lot of ways. We have different ways of entering into Hawaii. Different ways that we become part of this place. Different things that brought us here. But at the end of the day, we're all here together, so we need to work together to make sure that this place is successful. Now, that, I believe a lot of people would like to hear that idea, as opposed to, I think, the other side of some of the sovereignty statements that have been made, which is, all of you non-Native Hawaiians need to leave the islands, need to go away. I hear that sometimes, too. And you understand it. When you look at the history of it again, not re-litigating the whole thing, but when you look at it and you understand it from a perspective of what happened historically. So what is your thought process with regards to we're all here now, let's move forward together, versus, you know what, most of you shouldn't be here anyway. Which I think is one of the, I don't know how large or small that faction is, but one of the, I guess, desires from some of the people, some of the Native Hawaiians, some of them are actually not Native Hawaiians, but still believe that this should be true, as I've learned. So how would you, what's your thought on those? I would say that in every ethnic group, there are essentially people who are, they don't want to get along.  And I think we need to call it what it is. There's historical reasons for those perspectives. There's political reasons for those perspectives, but I don't think that that's a very productive politics, and it's not going to help us move forward. Yeah, no, I think that that's, your point is very valuable, as far as it's not productive policy for what we're doing today and how we're moving forward. Yeah, and the thing is, I think it, I mean, I can only speak for myself, right? And I can tell you my personal vantage point, which is growing up in a family where really the predominant identity was that we were Catholic, and it wasn't that we were Hawaiian or Filipino or part English or part Irish, et cetera. And it was really that we were a Catholic family. That was our main thing that we did as a family. We just happened to be Hawaiian and Filipino and Irish and all these other things. I... It's a different base. Yeah, it's a different base. And I've always had the perspective that I wanted to live under the same set of laws and within the same community as, like, my mom and her family, which is a local Filipino family, and I have a Caucasian wife and I have mixed children. But we all, you know, we all do hula, and we all learn olelo, and we all believe that the land itself is sacred. And I think that's a belief that, in spite of Mayor Aurekawa on Maui, I think that's actually something that a lot of people get behind. I think there's truth in that. Throughout Hawaii, at least, you know, from what I've heard here or there, but also I think there's truth in that, not just nationally, but globally when it comes to that, but it's about how we do that. So we have to take a quick break. Okay. So we're already there. And then we'll jump back. So again, thank you for joining us. Thank Tech Hawaii's Movers, Shakers and Reformers, Politics in Hawaii series. Thank you to my guest today, Mr. Ikegahase. We'll see you in one minute. Thank you. Hi, and thanks for watching Think Tech Hawaii. My name is Justine Espiritu, and I host the Hawaii Food and Farmer series with my co-host, Matthew Johnson of Awaku Fresh. Every week, we bring on farmers as well as all the other individuals and organizations that help support a thriving, sustainable food system. In fact, it's interesting to learn what others are doing, so you don't have to be a Hawaii resident or producing food on Hawaii to be featured on the show, like today's guest, Wyatt Bryson of Jewels of the Forest and Michael Lab Solutions. Aloha. Thank you. It's been a pleasure being on the show. I love seeing what you guys do, and I really support your mission. And it's really nice being back in Hawaii. And thank you again. It's an honor. So you can see guests like Wyatt every Thursday at 4 p.m. on Think Tech Hawaii. Thank you. Welcome back to Think Tech Hawaii's Movers, Shakers and Reformers, Politics in Hawaii series. Again, my host, I'm the host, Ikegahase. My guest today is Mr. Ikegahase. We are talking about as many issues as we can talk about with regards to Native Hawaiian concerns and going forward from today. So again, thanks for joining us.  You had a comment. I wanted to jump in. Which is that I think a lot of Hawaiians enter into conversations with non-Hawaiians or with themselves with the belief that Hawaiians are sort of on the losing side of history. And I think that that's wrong. And I have a couple of reasons for thinking that. One is that compared to the situation of most other Native peoples, both on the U.S. continent in places like Africa, et cetera, we're doing incredibly well. We have very powerful institutions. We have a lot of land actually controlled by institutions like Kamehameha Schools or the Queen's Trust. There's a large number of Hawaiians who are strongly middle class and are very successful in their professions, in their businesses. We have, I think, the largest indigenous language archive in the world through our newspapers and the work of people like Pua Ketnogami who have helped to bring us along into looking at those archives. I think I'd like to jump in and say that actually is a perfect transition to the next segment I want to talk about, which is if we're looking at it from that perspective, and I can agree with the points that you're making and several others, that actually Native Hawaiians are actually doing fairly well as far as the culture. There's a number of reasons for that, I suppose, as well. But doing well in what measure? In what way are we going to measure that? And one thing I want to talk about now is education. So I was able to attend an event last night at Kamehameha Schools where my son goes where, and we were talking earlier about this, where we learned the school is taking a new approach and they want new outcomes for the kids going to Kamehameha Schools. It all sounds wonderful, it all sounds great. But some of the statistics that we got last night was perhaps at this moment or at any given time they refer to being approximately 152,000 Native Hawaiian kids between the age of 0 and 24. Of those kids, we traditionally see year after year about 52% of those Native Hawaiian kids are prepared for kindergarten. In other words, 48% are not prepared. 48% are not prepared for kindergarten. And they're not talking about Kamehameha Schools' kindergarten. They're not talking about public schools. They're not separate. They're saying in general. All schools, charter schools, immersion schools, 48% are not prepared, 52% are. I mean the proponents of those numbers would really be, the larger percentage is really not charter schools or immersion schools. It's really standard DOE, right? Yes, absolutely. And that gets as they went further into those numbers as well in other categories. You see the stark difference between how the kids perform through Kamehameha Schools and some of their charter schools compared to public schools. One of the next statistics is 25% of Native Hawaiians graduate high school. So again, we're talking 152,000. 25% of them will graduate high school. And only 14% will graduate from a college. Now, that descending track there would probably be, to some degree, consistent maybe across multiple cultures in multiple areas, multiple parts of various countries maybe. As you see, okay, everybody starts here and then for various reasons things tail down. However, I find that to be an alarming number. Only 14% of Native Hawaiians are graduating from university, either a two-year or a four-year. Anyway, let me get your thought on that before I jump into the next thing. So as far as that sort of descending scale and only 14%. And so many jobs in Hawaii nowadays require a college degree. Exactly, we were talking earlier. The number that we were given last night was 65% of the jobs that are available in Hawaii require a college degree. So if 14% of Native Hawaiians are getting a college degree and 65% of the jobs require it, there's a gap, a significant gap. It's really fascinating, I think, is that if you were to rewind the clock a bit, in the 1840s, 1850s, Hawaii went from a zero literacy community, country, to being essentially having universal literacy in the span of like 20 years, an incredible feat. And we went to having, from there being no education system, no formal western recognized education system to one where essentially everyone is educated and we have a world-class education system.  We're now at the very bottom of actually the worst state in the United States, right? Which- For education. Right, in terms of education. The United States is also the very worst of the industrialized countries. So if you were to graph that, you're going from the very best on the planet to the very, very, very, very worst on the planet in, I don't know how many years that is. Not very many years. Not very many. 100 years. 106 years. Yeah, yeah, which- Right. And so- It says a lot. It says a lot. And I think we need to look at what happened in that time period. One thing I want to add though is you're right. There was a point where literacy rates among native Hawaiians was very high. And then all of a sudden- But that was also in native Hawaiian language. That was also in local language as well. Literacy was pretty high. And also in English. And in English. But then all of a sudden, in the schools and a number of other places, the native Hawaiian language was suddenly banned. Well, it's not quite that simple. Please- And I'm not a scholar in this. So we've got to bring in other folks who can really talk- Yeah, absolutely. But I look at the whole thing as how native Hawaiians have been- are being impacted. And what are the consequences we're seeing? I guess that's really where I'm at. What are the consequences that we're seeing? And what can we do from here now? Because it's not okay. Sure. So just real briefly, towards the end of the Kingdom period, the government made a decision to use English as a language for- of legal- legal jurisprudence of legal work. Partially because- The official legal language, yeah. Partially because English compared to Hawaiian is much simpler. Hawaiian is a very ornate poetic language where there are, you know, a lot of different meanings for a single word. But in English it's pretty kind of dry. You can get very specific in terms of the meaning, the semiotic meaning of a word. But, you know, I- so I think if you were to take that broad kind of 160 years and look at what's happened, part of that is the overthrow. It's the dispossession of Hawaiians from their own lands. The- the destruction or the replacing of a subsistence economy with an export-oriented monocrop economy. It's the idea that Hawaiians are not the mainland anymore, you know? So it's this- it's a broader story, I think, about people being kind of moved away from their own center. Marginalized and moved away. Yeah, in their own homeland. Right. So how- how do we fix this? I mean, I'm not saying you have all the solutions, but I would like to have the conversation. I would like to- I know I'm not beginning the conversation. I'm trying to advance that conversation. How do we begin to fix it? How do we change these education numbers? Because- So I would say that there's a lot of people who are actually working on this problem. Yeah. Right? There's- there's incredible scholars like Kūkāhākalao who has spent, I don't know, her career developing an indigenous model for Hawaiian education that she pioneered in the charter school movement and is now doing it independently. There's people like Clay Koakau who have been advancing the ideas about what education should look like in terms of sort of a- I would say sort of a pauloufrere approach, you know, looking at the humanity of the students. There's great charter schools and there's great teachers in the DOE as well and the commandment schools and the private schools who are working on this problem. So I don't want to- I don't want to be misperceived that there's a huge problem and there's no- No, I don't want that either. I agree. There's a lot of people who are trying to address it but in multiple levels, in multiple areas. I think we're not going to get to- we're not going to get back to the point where we have universal literacy and the world's best education system until we start to put Hawaii- until we start to treat Hawaii as our source in our center. You look at Finland, for instance. Finland is often trumpeted as- we can't use the word trumpeted. Not anymore. Not anymore. Something held up as a hold up for- for global education. I had the privilege of speaking with an individual who was part of the- the Finnish Ministry of Education, Pasi Solbury. And he told me, unfortunately, off the record, but I'm going to tell it to you now, he told me that the reason why- It's on the record now. I asked him, why did Finland decide to- to make this awesome education system? And he said, they were very worried about Russia. They were worried that Russia would invade again and take over Finland again. And they decided the best means of national defense was an educated populace. Now, I want you to juxtapose that against what we're doing with education in the United States and education in Hawaii. Historically, since the plantation era, education has been two-tier. It's been colonial in plantation. You have the Punahou and the- and Kamehameha to educate the Ali'i and the- and the- you know, the Lunas, essentially. The- the owners and the- of the plantation system. Right. And then you have the public schools, which were designed to create low-wage labor. Yeah. And I think we need to- we need to start treating our children as, you know, this is our best means of advancement for our entire society. I agree. I agree. That's why- that's why I wanted us to focus on education as a piece in this segment, because that- as- as- So- the Republican administration said last night, education is the civil rights issue of our- of our time. I don't know that- I think that it's even bigger than that, frankly. But- at least it's being recognized in that way. But, you know, you- imagine if we- if we were to really take education seriously. Yeah. The governor would not be- would not be pinching pennies when it comes to teachers- teacher salaries. Exactly. Exactly. If we were- if we were to give the- the appropriate representation towards the educators. Right. And towards the education. Right. As we recognize is the value going forward. We would have- 65% of the jobs- We would have had Air Conditioning and Maile- Long time ago. 20 years ago when we decided that it was a problem. Right. Right. Right. Right. For the first time. Exactly. So, across the board, education- so Finland as- as an example, as a reference point, as an example, education is one of the keys. And therefore, going back to what I learned last night and- and from this conversation is making sure that we all get back to recognizing how we can improve our educational system for all across the board and how we can make some of these numbers better for- for everyone as well. So, unfortunately, we're done. Okay. But I would love to have you come back and I- we'll take another issue and dig deeper in. So, thank you for joining us. This is Think Tech Hawaii's Movers, Shakers and Reformers. I'm your host, Carl Campania. Thank you once again to Ikai Kahase for joining us with the Hawaii Alliance- what is it? Hawaii Alliance of- For progressive action. For progressive action. Yeah. And we look forward to talking to you again next week and we'll see you soon. Thank you.


Constitution and Rights Constitution A constitution is a document of laws that a country follows. The U.S. Constitution was written in 1787 to replace the laws created after the American Revolution. Democracy A democracy is a type of government where the leaders are chosen by the people. The government of the United States is a democracy. Rules Rules are written or unwritten guidelines that people follow. Rules tell you what you are allowed to do and what you are not allowed to do. Laws Laws are the written rules that everyone in a country must follow. In the United States, the laws that the country follows are found in the Constitution. Human rights Human rights are things that everyone is allowed to have or do. Human rights include access to education and freedom from discrimination and slavery. Citizen A citizen is a person who is a legal member of a country. People are citizens of the country they were born in. Citizens have certain rights, like the right to vote.  Immigrants to the United States are able to apply for citizenship if they meet the requirements. Civic activities Events that you participate in as part of a community are civic activities. Examples of civic activities are volunteering at your children's school or in your community. Pathway The steps you take to meet a goal are called a pathway. Students entering college choose an educational pathway that will lead to a career. Wants Wants are things you would like to have but are not necessary for you to live. For example, you may want a new car or a new computer, but you will be okay without one. Needs Needs are the things that you need to live. Food, power, and water are examples of needs. Your needs are more important than your wants. Amendment A change to a document is called an amendment. The U.S. Constitution has 33 amendments. The first 10 amendments are called the Bill of Rights. The End


The final item of business this evening is a member's business debate on motion 819, in the name of Murdo Fraser, on Dewar's Centre in Perth. The debate will be concluded without any questions being put. I invite members wishing to participate, to press the request-and-speak buttons, or put the necessary indication in the chat function if they are joining us online. I call on Murdo Fraser to open the debate around seven minutes. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I start by thanking all members who signed my motion from across the chamber to allow this matter to be brought to debate here in the Scottish Parliament. Whilst my motion focuses on the future of the Dewar's Centre in Perth, curling has a reach right across Scotland and the issues that affect the Dewar's Centre affect many other venues in different parts of the country. It might seem strange to be debating a sport played on ice on one of the warmest days of the year so far, but curling is a real Scottish success story. It is a sport in which Scotland excels, with Olympic gold medal-winning teams and world champion winners in recent times in both men's and women's sections. The 2022 women's gold medal-winning curling team at the Winter Olympics was led by Eve Muirhead, for whom Dewar's was the home rink. As a consequence of that victory, the whole team was awarded the freedom of path and conross by the local council. Curling is a success story, not just for those at the elite end of the sport. It is a pastime enjoyed by many thousands of people across the country and is popular with the older generation who can continue playing when other sports become more difficult. There is also an important social aspect to the sport in helping to tackle loneliness and isolation, particularly among older members of society. However, it would be wrong to characterise curling as just a sport for older people, with a growing interest among the young, something that has been fostered at Dewar's and at other rinks across the country. Curling will only have a future, however, if there are facilities that can host it. We have a network of curling rinks across the country, but the Dewar's centre is regarded as the Hamden park of the sport, hosting national tournaments as well as providing a regular playing venue for locals. In addition, the Dewar's centre hosts indoor bowling and provides space for a range of exhibitions, conferences and other events. The Dewar's centre is owned and operated by Live Active Leisure Limited, an arms-length organisation but wholly owned by Perthincan Ross Council and with an independent board to manage it. Live Active Leisure also operates the adjacent Perth leisure pool, the Bell Sports Centre on the North Inch in Perth and a range of other community sporting facilities across the county. Just a few weeks ago, the future of the Dewar's centre was very uncertain, with real concerns that it might face closure. Like many other similar venues, we have seen substantial increases in operating costs, particularly in energy, and also a drop-off in user numbers since Covid. Live Active Leisure now has an annual deficit of some £600,000. It has managed to keep the facilities open for a further year by dipping into reserves, but that is clearly not a sustainable funding model for the future. The ultimate owners of these leisure facilities are Perthincan Ross Council, but given the scale of funding cuts that the council has seen, it is simply not realistic to expect greater council funding in the foreseeable future. Live Active Leisure is looking at other ways to increase the revenues at Dewar's. For example, by hosting more events, by increasing fees to users, but that is unlikely to fill the funding gap. There are also other interesting ideas such as creating a new Scottish curling museum at Dewar's, which could attract more visitors. The UK Government did announce back in March a swimming pool fund to help under-pressure leisure facilities meet rising costs, and there are Barnett consequentials from that. While the sums involved are not substantial, it would be interesting to hear from the Minister whether the Scottish Government intends to provide specific assistance to Scottish swimming pools to reflect the help that has been made available south of the border. There are plans to replace Dewar's and the adjacent leisure pool with a new combined complex under the PH2O project, but due to rising construction costs, this has had to be delayed and is unlikely to be taken forward for some years. In the meantime, we face a real on-going uncertainty over the future of Dewar's and other similar facilities. I am very clear that we cannot contemplate the closure of a facility like Dewar's. It is only through the provision of sports and leisure facilities such as those that we can encourage sports such as curling and indoor bowls, sports that are vital in terms of encouraging fitness, reducing barriers to inequality and fostering a sense of community.  I am bringing the matter to the chamber for debate, because I think that those are issues that the Scottish Government needs to seriously reflect on. The health and wellbeing agenda is rightly at the heart of what this Government says is important to it, but the provision of local sports and leisure facilities where it is delivered is left to local authorities and is not a statutory function. That means that, at a time when local councils are having real-terms cuts in their operating funding, it is facilities such as Dewar's that are under threat. The closure of ice drinks, swimming pools, gyms and sports halls, all of which are at risk today right across the country, would have a devastating impact on what is a shared ambition right across the political spectrum to improve our national health and wellbeing and with a knock-on impact on our economic output. I know that this is an issue dear to the heart of my colleague Brian Whittle, who will be contributing to the debate in a short time, but those facilities will only survive with a long-term and sustainable funding model. In closing, I would encourage the Scottish Government to engage directly with bodies such as Scottish Curling, the umbrella organisation for the sport, which has been campaigning for the future of rinks such as Dewar's across the country to ensure a bright future for this sport. If we are to continue to see successes such as those of Eve Muirhead and Bruce Mowatt, that will only happen if the venues are there to support them and to produce the new generation of gold medal winners that we all want to see. I welcome the opportunity to contribute to this debate on the future of the Dewar's centre, which is in the constituency of my colleague Jim Fairlie, who I anticipate will try to contribute to the debate and is adjacent to my own parliamentary constituency boundary in the city of Perth. The Dewar's centre, as Murdo Fraser has properly set out, is a really important and significant facility, very much the home of Curling and a facility that has attracted a formidable amount of the talent that Scotland has produced in the sport of Curling. Murdo Fraser correctly attributes a huge amount of appreciation to the achievements of Eve Muirhead, who originates from Blair Athel in my constituency and has gone on to have the most extraordinary career in international curling, becoming an Olympic champion in 2022. It is a welcome opportunity to complement Eve Muirhead and her squad in this parliamentary debate. Of course, Eve Muirhead is not the first woman to blaze a trail for Curling in Scotland. It is a special opportunity for me to pay tribute to one of my late dear neighbours, Francis Brodie, who was the driving force behind the group that established the First World Ladies Curling Championship in 1979 and chaired the First Official Ladies Committee of the International Curling Federation, later renamed the World Curling Federation. Francis was a most wonderful lady who graced our village and all aspects of the life of our village. From a very quiet Perthshire village, she made a phenomenal contribution to opening the sport of curling to women. She was, in every respect, a true trailblazer. In 1989, her contribution to World Curling was recognised by the Federation with the introduction of an award in her name, which has been presented at the conclusion of each women's curling championship since then. The recipient is selected by the curlers participating in the event to honour the curler who, I quote, by deed and action in the course of their performance best exemplified the traditional curling values of skill, honesty, fair play, friendship and sportsmanship. I cannot think of a finer description of Francis Brodie, so I am delighted to have the opportunity to put that on the record today. The issues that face Jures Centre, as Murdo Fraser has said, are challenging. I noticed a quote from David Macklewhals, the chair of Live Active Leisure, which cited the significant pressures of reduced customer income, rising inflation, high energy costs and the impact of long-term public finance constraints. These are issues with which we all wrestle. I set a budget for 2023-24 as one of my last acts in government, which was, as I told Parliament, in the most challenging context that I have ever had to operate. The issues of the pressure on the public finances will be felt by Governments, local authorities and leisure trusts into the bargain. It is essential that we try to ensure that in every step that we take, we try to ensure that the resources are available to support activities that are precious in our society, but to recognise that often involves hard decisions. I have to make the point that I was prepared to take a hard decision to increase the resources available in the Scottish budget by increasing taxation. Mr Fraser and his colleagues were not prepared to support us in that endeavour. There are hard choices if we want public expenditure to be used to support facilities of this type. If we are going to have debates of this nature in Parliament, we have to follow them up by being prepared to take the hard decisions that are necessary to increase the resources that are available. I hear the usual muttering from the Conservatives when I point out the hard financial realities that exist in their respect. While I am wholly supportive of the future of Dure's Centre, I point out the hard financial realities that the Conservatives are always ducking in this chamber. Alexander Stewart, to be followed by Clare Baker in four minutes. I am grateful for the opportunity to contribute to this debate, and I congratulate my colleague Murdo Fraser on bringing it to the chamber. I would also like to put on record that I am a past chairman of Perth and Cunroth of Live Active Leisure. As we have already heard, Dure's Centre is reckoned to be the hand-in-park of Curling because of its reputation. Murdo Fraser's motion rightly states that the potential closure of Dure's Centre in Perth would be the death nail of the legacy of Curling in Persia dating back decades. At this stage, let me make it clear that, as a former chairman of that leisure company and a past councillor for 18 years in Perth and Cunroth's council, I am acutely aware of the issues that take here. During my tenure as chair and the board and I and other colleagues had to make very difficult choices on a number of occasions, but we always looked forward to what we could achieve in Perth and Cunroth. However, Dure's Rink was always seen as a priority to ensure that funding was always available for that facility during my time to ensure, because it was talked about under circumstances in that stage because of the stature of that facility, the local, the national and the international level of Curling enjoyed and Perth's reputation worldwide. We felt that, at that stage, it had to be seen as a priority. The families and the organisations that have supported Curling during and over the decades have to be congratulated for the pioneering work that they did in supporting and ensuring that it was given the status that it rightly deserves. You only have to look at the accolades, the awards of reputation, ranging from local champions to, as we have already heard, Olympic gold medalists to see how much the facility matters to the community and matters to that sport. The closure threat stems from nothing more than, as I have said before, decades of chronic underfunding councils have had to endure and Perth and Cunroth has been no different under this SNP Government. Back in March of this year, the UK Government announced that there would be a £63 million of investment support for leisure centres and sporting swimming pools in England. As we have already heard, major sporting bodies urged the Scottish Government to match and to do prorata bases, to do something here in Scotland. Funding did come through Barnett consequentials that could have been and might have been. I know that Mr Swinney has made comments about making difficult decisions, but when you have a facility that is a world recognised and has a reputation throughout the globe, that would be of a possibility to be considered. The speciality of the sport is vitally important, not least for whether we acknowledge that sport pursuits, given individuals of all ages, the possibilities to expand their potential and develop their physical and mental health and wellbeing. We already know that an NHS is estimated at £357 million as saved from people who are actively involved in doing things. We look at where we are, but it is once again the fact that, time and time again, the threats of closure of sporting facilities are happening across Scotland. In conclusion, the overwhelming evidence is that the Jewish Centre has a contribution to make to curling and its stature is on the world stage. The addition of doing all that, and I strongly urge the minister to look into the situation and view and look at the long-term security of facilities like the Jewish Centre, because they have a massive contribution. The closure of the facility of the nature would be far-reaching consequences for Scotland's curling and the sport, so we need to support that rink. We need to support that sport and we need the Government to stand up and support those facilities to ensure that our communities, our constituents, can well act. I now call Clare Baker, who joins us remotely to be followed by Brian Whittle around four minutes, Ms Baker. I would like to thank Murdo Fraser for bringing this debate to the chamber today. I also apologise to members as I have to lead the debate early, and I will miss the contributions of others. I thank the Presiding Officer for accepting this request. Although the motion itself predates the decision to continue funding for the Jewish Centre for the next year, it gives us a welcome opportunity to talk about the need for longer-term security, as well as to highlight its role in supporting participation and community activity alongside the well-known success stories. We are always happy to celebrate Scotland's successes on the sporting stage, such as the winning of the world's men's curling championship in Canada recently, but behind those victories lie years of dedication of sports people and coaches, spent in venues and facilities that allow them a place to develop, to train and to work towards their goals. A key part of sporting success is the provision of quality facilities for those starting out to professional-level competitors, and that needs long-term investment and commitment. While the decision to continue funding the Jewish Centre for the next 12 months is welcome, there is still a question mark over its longer-term position. I know that Scottish Curling is committed to working to ensure that curling remains a prominent place at Jewish. As I am sure other members have, I have been contacted by constituents employing MSPs to do what we can to help to ensure the continuation of curling at Jewish, highlighting the various clubs of members who travel some not inconsiderable distances to regularly play there. Earlier this year, I was pleased to visit the Jewish Centre and meet with Vincent Bryson and Graham Lindsey of Scottish Curling, as well as Debbie Scott, who is the senior facilities manager for live action leisure, to talk about their work to increase participation in curling, as well as the importance of the centre as a training venue. We also discussed what the centre offers in addition to its importance to curling, both as a leisure venue and in providing permission space in conference facilities. Alongside the swimming pool the Jewish Centre is an important part of the Perth community. This was demonstrated when proposals to close both venues emerged and many people contacted live action leisure to plead them not to do this. While both facilities have been secured for another year, part of the funding solution was to allocate funds from LAL reserves, alongside a fee increase across activities, and come next year that maybe I need to look again at this issue. While the planned PH2O looks a great prospect, the construction timeline is not clear and a way forward has to be found, which recognises the strategic importance of the Jewish Centre and commits to the PH2O project. More broadly, we are increasingly seeing leisure facilities and provision across the country at risk as a result of under-investment in local authorities and more recently increased energy costs and much more needs to be done to prevent access to services at risk of being left without access. For multi-use venues such as the Jewish Centre, we need to see them supported to attract more exhibitions and conferences that can help to increase their income across the year that offers diversification and expands their offer into other areas. By encouraging a more active population, we can increase participation, which in turn generates income needed to keep these facilities open in our communities. It is in those communities that our sporting successes can begin. It is also where we see the related benefits of pursuits like curling, what it contributes towards social cohesion and addressing loneliness and allowing people to get and stay active for physical and mental health. These are important cross-cutting benefits of sporting activity that extend across our lives and we should recognise the vital role of quality venues in delivering that across Scotland. I thank my colleague Murdo Fraser for bringing such an important debate to this chamber and for broadening the debate out from not just the threat to the world-class curling facility at the Jewish Centre in Perth, but also for recognising the increasing threat to so many other key sporting facilities across Scotland. The debate once again allows me to focus on the wider implications of continuing to lose sports facilities. Physical activity in sport has such a significant impact across all of society. The health benefits are maybe the most obvious, especially physical health, but as Murdo Fraser alluded to, it has a massive impact on mental health outcomes, loneliness, isolation and inclusivity. There are wider impacts across the whole of the country. The greatest drag on Scotland's economy, for example, is our poor health record. We are the unhealthiest nation in Europe. Last time, I looked to some 13 per cent of our working population unable to work because of ill health. Given the need, as Mr Swinney alluded to there, to raise the tax take to pay for those under-pressure services, surely that would be a focus for the Scottish Government, tackling that inactivity. If that were the case, the Scottish Government would have been ensuring that physical activity was easily available to all irrespective of background or personal circumstances. However, as I have consistently highlighted in my time in this place, sport is becoming the bastion of the middle class. To compound that decline, school physical activity, especially in extracurricular activities, has also seriously declined, and school was the introduction of sport for so many of us with that positive effect on attainment and behaviour, much discussed in this chamber in the last couple of weeks. Murdo Fraser's motion highlighting the threat to Jewish Centre is reflected in threats to sports facilities across Scotland. Ice rinks, including in-air, swimming pools, hockey and football pitches, and even the national athletic stadium in Graegemouth was under threat. If the facilities themselves have not been under threat, we have had so many stories of councils considering significant hikes and costs to use the facilities, which will exclude even more. If we do not reverse that decline, the nation's health will continue to struggle, requiring more and more investment in ill health, leading to even less investment in facilities and that slow spiral downwards. Would it not be better, to begin to move investment upstream, invest in our sports facilities and give everyone the opportunity of that joy and pleasure of physical activity? Thank you, Mr Whittle. I now call Finlay Carson to be followed by Liz Smith. Up to four minutes, Mr Carson. Thank you, Presiding Officer. I congratulate my colleague Murdo Fraser for bringing this member's debate to the chamber today, celebrating Jewish ice rink. They may be the Hamden, but Dumfries and Galloway certainly provide the feeder clubs for our national success. This is clearly a worrying time for ice sports enthusiasts whether they are curlers, skaters or ice hockey players. Sadly, many of Scotland's ice rinks face prohibitive energy increases that now threaten their very existence. As the Scottish Ice Rinks Association has stated, I quote, we have literally come to the end of the road unless someone can wave a magic wand and get energy prices down to a realistic level, or we receive significant external funding. Where once annual bills used to be between 50,000 to 60,000, many are now heading towards almost 200,000, a three to four times increase just purely for energy. But without energy to make ice, there is no way around it because there are essentially massive refrigerators. But talks are being held with governing bodies, utility firms and the Scottish Government to find a way forward. Given that Scotland's ice rinks have been the breeding ground for such exceptional international talent, we need to support them in their efforts. In the south of Scotland, we have three different ice rink models, one in a hotel in Sronar, one council run facility in Dumfries while Lockerbie is now a registered charity. The north-west of Castle in Dumfries was the first hotel in the world to have its own indoor curling rink and continues to attract visitors from around the globe. It was taken over recently by bespoke hotels at the time the energy crisis was hit the strongest. But like other groups, they were worried about how to continue curling but now, thankfully, having got a season under its belt, things are looking slightly more encouraging. I want to put on record my thanks and that of the people of Sronar in the wider community to bespoke hotels, management including the ice rink manager, Gailman Row, for the sterling work they have done to keep curling in Sronar. Arguably, in my view, the most prolific breeding ground for world champions. Dumfries Ice Ball has a enviable reputation for nurturing world-class curlers as well. On that side, it is also successful in attracting world ice hockey championships. In our home to the award-winning figure skaters and synchronised teams, the Sawie Stars, the Sawie Eclipse, the Sawie Lightning and Comets, all helping to sustain the venues to ice rinks along with the ice hockey team that is based there. The hard work of the team deserves to be recognised because much of the success has been initiated by Dumfries and Galloway council staff's vision and a particular Richard Greaveson, who went on to be the chairman of Ice Hockey UK for five years. Sport Scotland has provided £1.75 million to mitigate the pandemic, but more financial aid is needed. We need to ensure that the legacy from the phenomenal success enjoyed by our curlers is felt for years to come. Winning a gold medal at the World Championship in Ottawa was the crowning glory of the Scottish men's curling team skippered by Bruce Mouatt. He was assisted by three team-mates who all came from the south of Scotland. Bobby Lammie and Hami Macmillan from Srinar are the latest trailblazers who have carried on the fine skills developed previously by their respective families. Those lads were joined in the winning roster by Dumfries Curlar at Grant Hardy with their near perfect percentage. Curling see them defeat the home nation in favourites in 9-3. That glory achievement came just months after Team Mouatt clinched their third men's European curling championship in Sweden, adding silver medal, the one in the 2022 Winter Olympics. Joining them on the Srinar talent conveyor belt is Hugh Nibblow, who helped Scotland win bronze at the World Wheelchair Curling Championships in Canada, reaching a century of international appearances for the Scotland national curling team and has also represented Great Britain at the Paralympic Games where he won a bronze medal in 2017 and a silver medal in 2019. But not to be outdone, Faye Henderson from Dumfries and Robin Monroe from Srinar helped Scotland's junior women strike gold at the World Junior Championships this year in Germany. Scotland's junior men team, skippered by Orrin Carson and team-mates Logan Carson, Archie Hyslop, Charlie Geb and Scott Hyslop, all of Dumfries curling club won bronze medal at the World Junior Championships. It was a success for Blair Haswell from Srinar and Jack Carrick from Dumfries, who in the Team GB won gold at the Winter edition of the World University Games staged at Lake Placid in New York State. I cannot allow this opportunity to go past without praise my own daughter who scored the one and only and the first ever goal for Team GB Ice Hockey scored against Japan in those same games. She has had the wonderful experience of playing ice hockey and ice rinks right across Scotland and the UK and indeed the world and it has been a huge part of our life and continues to be so. Their achievements, Presiding Officer, now inspire many youngsters to take up the sport which can only be good and to ensure that we need to ensure the future of our much-loved ice rinks. Thank you, Mr Carson. I now call Liz Smith to be followed by Jim Fairlie in four minutes. Thank you. I want, if I may, Deputy Presiding Officer, to make a very, very brief comment and I do so not just at Mid Scotland and Fife MSP who for many years has greatly valued the Dures facility for all the reasons that Murdo Fraser set out in his introduction but also as convener for 10 years of the cross-party group on sport and I know my predecessor, the late Margo MacDonald, would have been saying exactly the same thing in this debate namely that Dures is the epitome of a local sports facility which not only provides for elite athletes most especially curling in the case of Dures but also for the grass roots and we lose that at our peril. In an age when grass root sports matters more than ever in helping to address the concerns and anxieties resulting from Covid and the dearth of extracurricular activity in too many schools something that we've just been debating early this afternoon I implore the Scottish Government to think very carefully about its current approach for the reasons that Brian Whittle cited I've no doubt whatsoever that the Scottish Government wants to be constructive and helpful but I believe that the time has come to properly re-evaluate policies and the effects that they're having on grass roots sports and I know that the members of my cross-party group feel exactly the same. So thank you to my colleague and very good friend, Murdo Fraser, for bringing this debate, not just about Dures but I think for the wider implications for Scotland. Thank you very much, Ms Smith. I think as Brian Whittle and myself can testify after our football exploits on Monday there are downsides to physical activity as well. I now call the final speaker in the open debate, Jim Fairlie who joins us, hopefully, remotely. Ms Fairlie, up to four minutes please. Thank you, Presiding Officer. I apologise to you in the chamber for not getting here in much better-to-mere time. Unfortunately, the Edinburgh traffic had a lot to play with my time getting into the debate. But there is no question that perth in the surrounding area as a world-renowned place for curling excellence and its facilities helping to spawn the golden-spawn careers of legends such as Rona Howe Eve Muirhead, Dave Murdoch and others. Whilst we should take every opportunity in Parliament to highlight these wonderful achievements I regret that Murdo Fraser has muddied a happy and celebrated issue by introducing local politics to the attention of the chamber. By the way, he is doing it with an issue that he frankly does not have a like to stand on. My constituents tuning into the debate today should be aware that this is a member's debate. The Scottish Parliament does not vote in this matter as it is rightly a local government issue to decide. As we address the issue ahead, let's discuss what Murdo has brought to the local matter before us today. Looking back in his own words from September 2019 Mr Fraser went on to encourage the introduction of Mares in Scotland to the cities with a view and I quote, this would give the opportunity to devolve more power from the centre. The SNP is very keen in devolution from Westminster to Edinburgh but not at all keen in devolution from Edinburgh any further afield. This situation needs to be reversed. There is much greater autonomy for local areas. A couple of years on, we are discussing a local government decision in Parliament. If there is one thing that is not good, it is how to do hypocrisy. Perthner and Ross councillors of all affiliations have long advocated for a modern replacement of leisure facilities such as Perth leisure pool in your centre. So it is surprising to read the motion fearfully described that there might be imminent threat to curling facilities locally. The modern replacement is known as PH2O project and it will provide modernised leisure, water facilities as well as additional, 25m pool and training pool, bowling, curling, skating, a health spa, family play activities, conference support and cafe. It is a centre fit for the 21st century built to pass of house standards and represent a major step forward in the areas contribution to meeting Scotland's net carbon zero target with 2045 and necessary to replace the existing facilities that are showing their age both from a financial and environmental perspective. That was recognised back in 2021 by the Conservative leader of the council, Maria Lyle, who in committing to replacing Perth leisure pool and your centre said both were coming to the end of their useful lives. It is clear that Maria Lyle has a point as the annual utility costs for Perth leisure pool and your centre are running at a highly expensive £500,000 whilst facing significant pressures primarily from reduced customer income, rising inflation and high energy costs and I can think when I will agree that that is something that we should be talking about. All of those factors including a lack of workforce has caused another great economic disaster but they are making in Brexit and not to forget less trust. I have meant that it is probably a difficult project to get off the ground. However, it has not been the case as when in the administration they did that on introducing the project despite financial evidence from the council officers warning that both the necessity of the project and the significant cost implications of delaying. So when in power the Tories knew that this should have been a priority but it wasn't until they were voted out of office and replaced by the SNP that this project has got going with the current administration ring fence and £90 million for it to go ahead. Something else that does not add up is that as soon as the Tories were voted into opposition they introduced an amendment targeting an uncost of £350,000 commitment to keeping live active leisure facilities opening Perth during 2023 and 24. I understand that there is a need to ensure convenient availability to leisure facilities but why throw the money blindly at an issue other than to create a political stir. In contrast, the SNP administration has reacted responsibly not only by securing the long-term future of the curling services in Perth by setting the gears in motion for PH2O but also by working alongside the arms length organisation Live Active Leisure to provide £110,000 additional support to assist the financial challenges faced by jewellers in this financial year and so doing saving hundreds of thousands of pounds that could well be used. The SNP celebrates Scottish curling and is ensuring that Perth continues to be the home of champions in years to come. Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr Fairlie. I call on the minister to respond to the debate for around seven minutes, minister. Thank you, Presiding Officer, and thank you, Murdo Fraser for bringing this motion to the Parliament this afternoon and also to those from across the chamber who have contributed. As you all know, I am absolutely passionate about sport and I have watched with immense pride the fantastic achievements of Scottish curlers. From Rona Howe's final stone triumph in Salt Lake City to Eve Muirhead's skippering her team to Olympic gold in Beijing and just recently Bruce Mawrott's team winning the world men's curling championship Scotland's curlers continue to succeed at the very highest level on the world stage. The Scottish Government understands that part of the success is owed to the fantastic facilities that are available not only the Jewish Centre in Perth but other facilities around Scotland. We also have the Olympic performance programme for curling based here in Scotland. In fact it's the only UK sport Olympic and Paralympic supported programme based in Scotland. This reflects both the history of the sport which many of you will know was invented in Scotland as well as the fact that the overwhelming majority of curling clubs are located here in Scotland. Now I truly believe that you have to be able to see it to be it and the children and the young people of Scotland are fortunate to have these amazingly successful Scottish curlers as role models. But this visibility is only part of the story as our young people also need the opportunity to be able to try curling and to fall in love with the sport so any threatened closures are a real concern. Now as it's been noted during the debate live active leisure have committed to keep the Perth leisure centre and the Jewish centre fully open until the end of March 2024. That's really welcome news in the short term because we've got a lot of time for active leisure to work collaboratively with Perth and Kinross Council for a long-term solution. Now I'm aware that that's resulted in price increases of between 10 and 15 per cent and I understand that some will be disappointed with that decision but I'm delighted that live active leisure have committed to freeze charges for those people who are in receipt of a qualifying benefit. It's really essential that we don't increase to physical activity especially for our children and young people freezing prices for concessions will help to protect the people who are most disadvantaged in our society and can make a real difference in reducing health inequalities for the people across Perth and Kinross. Now we all know that local authorities are operating under very challenging financial circumstances. Certainly happy to. Thank you minister for taking this intervention. As Mardo Fraser mentioned in his contribution, the Scottish Government received Barnett consequentials as a result of the UK Government announcing extra funding for swimming pools in England. Will the money be passed on to our local authorities so sports facilities like Buxburn swimming pool in Aberdeen can be saved? We've seen over the last few days it's a really hard thing for my Conservative colleagues to understand but devolution enables us to make different decisions in Scotland. The UK let me finish the UK decision to fund swimming pools results in Barnett consequentials for the Scottish budget but that goes into the block grant as a whole and Scottish ministers make decisions on how to allocate the resources. Now some of the different decisions that we have made in Scotland are things like protecting Scottish citizens from the bedroom tax things like that game changer in tackling poverty the Scottish child payment and so on. Certainly. I thank the minister for taking this intervention. What she seems to not understand is that this was additional funding after the block grant allocation so this student would have been allocated something else so it could be moved to local authorities to save our local sports facilities. Minister. What the member doesn't seem to understand is that the Scottish Government spends millions of pounds every year mitigating policies that wreak havoc on our citizens in Scotland and cause immense pain and poverty the bedroom tax targeted particularly at people with disabilities. I'm proud that in Scotland we protect people. Now, as part of the process I'll give way to Mr Swinney. John Swinney. I think for the sake of completeness I need to advise Parliament that Mr Lumsden is wholly incorrect that the allocation of funding for the swimming pools fund was made at the United Kingdom budget in October of 2022 and therefore formed part of the block grant that I distributed in December 2022. So Mr Lumsden is wholly wrong in what he's just put to the minister. Minister. Absolutely. As part of the process we will consider what support can be provided to the sport and leisure sector in Scotland. We'll continue to work with Sports Scotland our national agency for sport to accurately understand the current facilities provision and the landscape in the short-term, medium-term and long-term to ensure the sustainability of the important facilities. I've given away a number of times just give me one moment I want to continue and finish this point. We have repeatedly called on the UK Government to use all of the powers at its disposal to tackle this cost of living crisis and to provide appropriate energy bill relief to fit leisure facilities I ensure that something we all in the chamber can agree would be a useful strategy for the Westminster Government to pursue. Given that most of the levers to respond to the financial challenges are reserved we do continue to urge the UK Government to use all of its powers to tackle the cost of living crisis and let me remind the chamber the UK is facing a worse cost of living crisis than EU countries and the UK Government should act now for its part the Scottish Government has increased the resources available to local government by over £793 million in 2023-24 that's a real-term increase of £376 million or 3% but as independent corporate bodies it is for local authorities to manage their own budgets and to allocate total financial resources available to them including on-leisure facilities on the basis of local needs and priorities we will continue to work in partnership with our colleagues in local government to ensure that the people of Scotland continue to receive the high quality public services they expect and deserve Sports Scotland and Scottish Government officials recently met with the Scottish Ice Rink Association and said that we know that they face significant energy costs and that energy efficiency remains a concern so between 2008 and 2018 Sports Scotland invested nearly £4 million in capital projects to replace the refrigeration systems in Scotland's ice rinks we also supported 13 privately opened operating ice rinks over the course of the pandemic with £2 million on-leisure facilities place such a critical role in improving people's lives whether it's taking part in sport and physical activity for the first time attending regular clubs and activities that help to develop friends as well as confidence and skills progressing and achieving success they are community hubs that bring people together and make a positive contribution to building healthier, happier and safer and stronger communities with the significant physical and mental social benefits of physical activity and I as minister want everyone, even my colleagues who are limping this week from their football game on Monday I want everyone to be able to benefit from sport and physical activity we are working hard to remove the barriers that still exist to people being physical active I have to inform my colleague Brian Whittle it's not a new problem it's reserved to the middle classes it has always been thus sport has always favoured the rich and this government is determined to change that it is really important that facilities including ice rinks are accessible for everyone in Scotland so that everyone has the ability to benefit and that the future curling world and Olympic champions of tomorrow can access that pathway to success I'm sure my fellow members across the chamber would all delight in seeing Scotland's curlers continue to be successful on the world stage and as minister responsible for sport I'll continue to look for opportunities to provide support for the Dewar Centre and indeed for all sport and leisure facilities throughout Scotland thank you thank you minister that concludes the debate thank you


The event-based public health surveillance workshops were attended by representatives from across sections of public sector agencies whose inputs were considered valuable enough in the development and implementation of an event-based surveillance system for St. Lucia. An event-based public health surveillance system looks at reports, stories, rumors, and other information about health events that could be of serious risk to public health. The first two days were spent focusing on the collection of information from the various stakeholders with the aim of using the information gathered to inform a needs assessment analysis and priorities for a proper event-based system in St. Lucia. The national epidemiologist Dr. Misha Fiswa acknowledged that the island's existing event-based surveillance system needed more structure. We are able to pick up information on the ground as it pertains to different occurrences happening out of the ordinary and prompt our response. However, we would like a bit more structure so that people know when to call, what to call for, and especially who to call. And of course, there is a response to that call. So we're trying to put systems in place to ensure that our surveillance system, as it pertains to events happening in St. Lucia, is more structured and we have a response when we receive those calls or information. The workshops were jointly hosted by the Ministry of Health, Wellness and Elderly Affairs, the Pan American Health Organization, and at the World Bank. Dr. Maria Almiron, Acting Unit Chief for Health Emergency Information and Risk Assessment at Power Headquarters, provided an overall summary of the 3D exercise. Dr. Almiron said that one of the recommendations was to continue similar engagements and extending them to the wider community. What St. Lucia is doing is we are recognizing all the effort and it's unique in the Caribbean in terms of embracing all the stakeholders, engaging with all of them to put a more sensitive surveillance system in the country. The objective of having a more sensitive surveillance system is to detect early and to respond quickly.  The engagement that we see here in St. Lucia is something that we want to also spread about because there is a high level of engagement of all the stakeholders that we have seen in a very, very productive way, sharing experience and also sharing ideas to move forward with this project, with this new and big project that St. Lucia Ministry of Health wants to implement. During the sessions, participants were introduced to eWars, an open source electronic early warning, a load and response system developed by WHO to help among other things with the early detection of disease outbreaks in emergency and vulnerable settings. From the Communications Unit of the Ministry of Health, Wellness and Otherly Affairs, Julie is Peter reporting.


State Tech Hawaii, Community Matters here. And Aloha, welcome to another edition of Hawaii in Uniform, I'm your host Calvin Griffin. And for most of us it has been a very, to say the least, hectic week, or enlightening and frightening in some of the different ways. I think they can comment on that a little bit later on here, but right now, for those of you who have seen the program, or may not have seen it, may not have seen the program before. Here we talk about a lot of things concerning the veterans in the military community. And today, one of my special guests is Mr. Randolph Alexander. And I want to thank you for coming on the program. Thank you for having me. Good. Can you tell us a little bit about yourself? I was born and raised here in Hawaii, live on the winter side of the island, went to public school, graduated, and joined the military back in 1974. Actually, I joined the Hawaii Army National Guard while serving my active duty and my advanced individual training. I suffered a service-connected injury, and that's how I became an eligible veteran to receive VA benefits. I'm a family of military background. My dad, I get kind of emotional. I understand. But my dad and my two older siblings served in the military. So if you put everybody's years of service together, who have more than 95 years of military service in my family itself, I was discharged in October of 1985. I was still young at that time, and I didn't know what I really wanted to do. To make a career. I wanted to be a career military personnel, but other things came up, and I wanted to go ahead and experience that career also. So I decided to leave the Army National Guard. Yeah. And total time that you spent in the military service? Total of 11 years. 11 years, yes. And you were medically discharged, or? No, I had an honorable discharge. Excuse me. Honorable discharge after 11 years of service. Yeah. I know that there's a lot of things that I'm told that you're involved with as far as with the veterans community. What is the main thing that you're concerned about right now as trying to? I'm trying to see if the Congress and Washington DC and the military change their policies in regards to offering all veterans. Doesn't matter if they're retired or not, to get some kind of benefits, such as commissary base or post exchange, lodging at the various cabin installations that we have here on the islands. And this to be recognized by the general public that we served in the military. Even though for myself, even though I didn't retire, I feel that I should be entitled or should be eligible to receive this type of benefits from the military. So I need to have help from other veterans that feel the same way that I do. Because it's very, very important for my stand-up point for you. So you're not talking about additional on the military or anything like that, but just access to the commissary, PX and things of that nature? Yes. No compensation is required. We just want to go to the PX, to the commissary. Maybe stay out a weekend at the Bellows Air Force Station and one of those cabins. Or even stay at the Paulette Cove Hotel here in Waikiki. You know, and just be recognized. You know, every year since the bombing of Pearl Harbor, there's only once day out of the whole year that the Pearl Harbor survivors are recognized. And of course, that's the anniversary date, December 7th. After that, you don't hear nothing about these survivors until the following year. They didn't serve only that day. They served every day of the year. So that's when they should be recognized. True, they get recognized from their loved ones, close friends that serve with them in armed forces, but I feel that we should be recognized by the general public. And even if we do go to the military installations, we should be recognized by the personnel that's working on the base that were prior service. You know, we didn't retire, that's true. But still we should be recognized that we're once served in the armed forces to defend the United States of America. Okay, what arguments are playing a devil's advocate here? Okay, we have people that say, well, I did 20, 25 years, one of those did the full time anyhow, and I'm entitled to it. And for someone to say, well, you know, I did my time, but I didn't do as much as you did, but I should get the fully recognized, which has been understandable, and also as far as access to the commissary PX. How much blowback or how much opposition are you getting or what arguments that have you heard, and how do you counter that argument? There was two incidents, and that's why I started this research. And the first incident, it was at the military installation rest cap at Polk High Bay on the west side. I belong to a committee that we formed our first annual reunion for our National Guard unit, and it was held at that facility. And we was told that we could make reservations over the phone or the weekend to have a cabin, which I did. And the only thing that person asked me on the phone was, do I have an ID, a military ID? And the only ID I have is this ID that I showed to get my medical treatments at the VA clinic. And this is it right here. Well, I should go this way, yeah, either way. But anyway, when I showed this ID to the receptionist, she said, oh, we don't honor that stuff. I said, excuse me, but we don't honor that stuff. It's not valid here. You need an active or retired ID card, either from the military or the Department of Defense. I said, I don't have that. She said, well, you can't get your room down. She said, the only way you can get a room or a cabin is to have one of your buddies send somebody here to sponsor you for the weekend. So I called the general chairman of our committee. If he could come, he sent his son who just turned 18 to sponsor me. And I was kind of puzzled with that because there's this young teenager just graduated from high school, just turned 18, and has more benefits than I do after I serve 11 years in the National Guard in the military. Why is that? I asked myself that question many, many times. Why? You know? Who, any of our elected officials that you contacted and then trying to make them aware of what you're going through and what a lot of other? I wrote a letter to Senator Macy Gerono. Her reply was budget. Budget? A budget. It will cost money to have more veterans, have the benefits of going to the PX and commissary, and what I was asking for. I also notified in-person and also by letter, Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard, who also is a member of the Hawaii Army National Guard. I also wrote a letter and went in to speak to the person that handles military affairs for the late Mark Tatai's office before he had anything started. He decided to leave his position there. When I called, I was given another person that was taken over. And when I explained my situation and my proposal, I guess you can call it, he said, what makes you think you should be entitled to the same benefits after only serving 11 years in a guard versus my 22 years went to war and retired from the US Marines. My answer to that is, I don't care how many years. It shouldn't be how many years of service you serve if you retired or not. As long as you serve your obligation with the military and was given an honorable discharge, you should be entitled to these benefits. As you may call it, a payback for the user service that you gave your life to. You know, guardsmen were called weekend warriors. Ever since December 1, 2001, the anniversary date of the bombing at the World Trade Center. And the United States went ahead and fight against the terrorists who did they deploy first with the Army, with the Marine Corps. Oh, the Army National Guard. This is one thing that we had discussed during the program before. We had a lot of National Guard reserve that served multiple tours. And some of them, you know, they get burned out at a certain point. And then they do get those discharges, like I say, before the 20-year period. You know, so I think everybody can empathize like what you're talking about as far as that's concerned. The other thing is budget, which I can't understand when they're saying, well, budget concerns. If we have additional individuals who are eligible who serve the country to patronize the PX and the commissary, what it does, it helps that system. Because the way they've been cutting down on the different commissary and PXs around the country, they're saying that there's not enough patronage for the organization to come in. Here in Hawaii, I mean, maybe a little bit different. We have, of course, about 120,000 veterans give or take. And even across the board anyhow. The recognition that you're looking for, I understand that back in November or December, there was supposed to be a ID card for veterans to recognize who's a veteran. And for some reason, they came out and said, well, the system's been so overwhelmed that we can no longer process it. To me, that's a little bull. I mean, you have something in place. And it seems that time after time, we have these different programs that have been announced. And then once they're initially instituted, then you've got all these tech problems that come up. And they say, well, you've got to wait a little bit longer. To me, that's unacceptable. And I think that's what you're talking about as far as with getting some sort of formal recognition where, as far as having access to the different facilities, because you did serve and honorably. And not the so-called full-time, but to the time that was satisfactory to the country, even one day of service is the way it is. True, that's very true.  And I came across this article put out by Military Times. And the Department of Defense, back in 2016, put in a proposal that their civilian workers would be good to have them have benefits going to the PX. Not so, not too much commissary, but the PX privileges and the gasoline facilities that they have on our military installations.  It took for one year. Out of that $130 million, $24 million was profit. Well, it will go out back to the organization and support it and also have these programs to continue. And who it serves? It serves the active personnel that's in the military today, you know? So I don't understand when they say budget. Yeah.  And such other things. So there's nothing, no cost, you know? And for us, for me, I have my ID card from the VA will get my medical treatments done at the tripler. We're gonna take a short break. Okay. You know, I want to, part of the program. Okay, sounds good. But when we come back, we'll be continuing our conversation with Mr. Alexander. And also looking for your feedbacks if you'd like to call in and make any comments about this. But we'll be back in a moment and this is Hawaii in uniform. Planning all week for the day of the big game. Watching at home just doesn't feel the same. Put on the list is who's gonna drive. It's nice to know you're gonna get home alive. Plan for fun and responsibility. Choose the DT. Captain of our team is the DT. For every game day, a sign a designated driver. Good afternoon. My name is Howard Wigg. I am the proud host of Code Green, a program on Think Tech Hawaii. We show at three o'clock in the afternoon every other Monday. My guests are specialists both from here and the mainland on energy efficiency, which means you do more for less electricity and you're generally safer and more comfortable while you're keeping dollars in your pocket. Okay, and you're back with Hawaii Uniform. Again, my name is Calvin and my special guest today, Mr. Randolph Alexander.  Yes, sure. Okay. Like I said, to continue in our conversation about the... I guess not the expansion, but the recognition of what benefits that should be extended. All right. In covered, what you're trying to cover is not only the veteran by your course of families, the immediate family. Yes. Yes. Okay. What response have you gotten from any of the major veteran organizations? Are they aware of what you're trying to do? Yes, I contacted the DAV at Tripler, also the American Legion organization. And, you know, they said I have good ideas, but I need to be the one to go out and get supporters to support my cause, you know, and I don't understand that because they're the organizations they're supposed to back me up or help me through the process because if you only get one person in his heart, you can't move a mountain with one person. But if you have a few organizations with a lot of membership, and that mountain can be moved, you know, and I don't know.  They just said right to my Congress, representatives, you know. I even called my National Guard Association for retirees. Yeah. And they'll mention it in the general meeting that was two years ago and I didn't get an answer about. To me, again, that's unacceptable, you know. Not knocking in these organizations but I said it in private and I said publicly there's a lot of things that a lot of these organizations can do, you know, to better support, you know, the military.   If you have the access to the people in Washington for, you know, legitimate reasons, then that's what they should do, you know, as far as telling you good to go out there and do something on your own and then they may or may not follow through and help you out. Again, that's unacceptable as far as from my point of view, you know. So, except with all the different, you know, the number of veterans we have over here, it is a shame that a lot of their issues are not addressed, I think, in a proper way by some of these organizations that claim to be looking out for their interest. All right. You know, getting back to my conversation earlier that I went to the late Mark, Senator Mark Takai's office, my initial visit there and the gentleman said that, you know, he's gonna write a letter to our state legislature and also our representatives in Washington, D.C. to see if they can start something in regards on their behalf, you know. And he said, but if we can't move it nationally for all veterans in the United States, then maybe our legislature just can take care of our veterans here in Hawaii, which we have over 100,000 veterans, you know, and I said, well, that's fine, you know, but we need to get more benefits for our veterans. Yeah, I think over here, we would have the opportunity to set the tone or the tenor for, you know, how, you know, for this initiative anyhow, you know, because it affects, of course, veterans here. I mean, also nation and worldwide when the number of repads we have overseas, you know, it's gotta be done. I mean, again, the budgetary issue, I don't think it's a non, I mean, it doesn't make any sense, you know, but to enlighten the veterans and their families and also the general population about what's happening, that's the good starting point anyhow. How long have you been working, you know, towards this goal? I mean, for the past couple of years, two, three, five years? Five years, five years. And no real response at this point. No, no. Yeah, what's your next step? What would you like to do? What would you like to see happen? I just want to be invited to, to one of our representatives offices here in Hawaii and go one-on-one and tell them exactly what I'm discussing here on this show. You know, to me, it's very important. It's not only for me, but for all the veterans and anybody, any female or male that served in the National Guard should be entitled to some type of benefits. Back in 1973, they stopped the drought. Before that, a lot of young guys, particularly males, joined the National Guard to get away from the drought because they didn't want to go to war in Vietnam or the other conflicts that the United States was involved in. But after the drought was put on site, you still had men and women joining the National Guard on their own, we will.  All right. Were you aware of the IDs that they were planning to put in place for the veterans? Have you heard about that before? Yes. I went on to vetverify.com to see if I was certified. And they got my records, but this is since I already have a veterans affairs ID card because it is almost identical. I don't need one. But I called the director of the state of veterans affairs office at E wing at the tripler and told him that he said, well, if that's what they said, then you don't have to. He's one of the gentlemen that really, really helped me on this past five years since I met him. Ron Han? Ron Han. Okay. He's a nice guy. And he's very concerned of my issues that I want to move forward, you know, because again, he was a member of the Air Force and also with the National Guard in Hawaii. But he knows exactly what I'm talking about where I'm coming from. So he's helping me. But again, you know, he has a lot of things on his mind right now and more other things to take care of with legislature just started and session and stuff like that. But even that would be a plus for me if I can be invited to the legislature if they want to cover a session with military. I wouldn't mind going and speak to them, I mean. Right. Well, the way it sounds, if you're waiting for an invitation that may be long and coming in any house, so they may have to take the initiative, you know, take some other supporters. I can only speak for myself or the venue that we're trying to reach now. But if there's something we can do as far as putting the word out there or contacting some people, you know, the elected officials who get an official response from them about what you're trying to do, I personally will commit to that, you know. Oh, I appreciate that. No, I can like say you're doing all of this and say, you know, service anyhow, you know. But they have this thing with the ID card, you know, they're telling us now that if you get this thing, it will cover everything. But then, you know, where you say that you got one form of ID, so that should be, you know, suffice, it could be a better clarification, you know, so we don't have people who are confused and concerned. And after that, you know, you want to get angry and feeling disrespected, you know. So, yes, that definitely has to be addressed. You know, they also mentioned about that part, about the ID card for all veterans, yeah. And they said about the cost and stuff, how much it will take to make an ID card. You know, if they need to charge a veteran, I'm pretty sure the veteran will pay whatever. I mean, if it's not an outrageous amount, you know, 20, 25 dollars, I think the veterans can come up with data and make a lifetime ID card for them, you know, to get benefits, of course, you know. And to me, that's the only thing that's going to cost is the ID card, I believe so. But other than that, there's nothing concerning budget. There shouldn't be no budget work, you know. That's true. Okay, they're getting down to the wire, you know, but is there anything else that Major, you want to touch on before we begin to close out? Well, again, I just want to ask for you folks, response to this program, to me it's very important to all the veterans, yeah. Is there a phone number they can contact you, or? Yeah, cell number is<PHONE_NUMBER>. That's my cell phone, you can reach me 24-7. Okay. I'd be more than happy to talk to you on the phone. Okay, no suggestion you might want to go before the Oahu Veterans Council. They meet at the last Saturday of every month and see what they may try to provide for you, you know. But again, we'll help you get the word out and we'll do a follow-up program. Invite you back and let us know how things are going, anyhow. Sounds good, sounds good. All right, anything, any other final words? No, no. Okay, anyhow, I want to thank you for coming on the program, but we're getting down to wire. I think we got maybe about a minute and a half, something like that, all right. I'm going to be very brief with this. And like this past Saturday, of course, we had a major event that scared the heck out of a lot of people. And I know everybody's been making comments about this, that and everything else and trying to point fingers and all that. The one thing I see and I still get angry about is the fact that I've seen the terror and I heard it in the voice of the people that I loved. And we talk about, you know, now putting more better things in place as far as bomb shelters, things of that nature. I think we need to get back to the basics. This is my take on it. Getting back to the root of the problem. If you think about it, there are a lot of people overseas that's experienced the terror that we went through. It's about prevention. Not about building up and all that. We have a lot of bad guys out there in this world to be sure. But as far as some of the problems and things that we're dealing with, how we're dealing with other countries and how they're dealing with us, the American people need to get more involved so we can prevent things like this so we don't have to go into that defensive mode. The protection part, think about it. The countdown when you're ahead, when you heard that you only had 15 minutes to live and you're seeing the terror, people screaming. Think about that. The countdown from 10, nine, eight, seven, and so forth. Think about, get involved, hold them accountable, hold ourselves accountable. Thank you, God bless and until that time.


So the next generation hand-held targeting system, what we're looking for is a replacement for a legacy system and we're trying to get capabilities of many different sensors down into one platform. So there is a significant improvement in terms of capability, right? So this one allows for targeting arranges, you know, further down with ever being able to target before. And in terms of weights, right? So reduction of weight by almost 60% and volume. We are removing a significant amount of volume that will not need to be carried by the MACDF. It's important because all of these tools come together in order to make a safer battle space, so we limit the risk of fracture sight. It also has a greater capability because it has an internal GPS, it has an internal digital magnetic compass, and it has an internal laser rangefinder. So not only is it able to laser target designate, but it's also able to self-locate and extract coordinates of target locations.