ar hyn o'r byd? Diolch. That concludes General Questions. The next item of business is First Minister's Questions, and at question number one I call Douglas Ross. I thank you very much, Presiding Officer. On Monday, minutes obtained by the BBC revealed that NHS leaders in Scotland had held secret talks about privatising parts of the NHS. A oeddiw'r systemu rhai'n gweithio i'r prysgwヲ na'n ddweud o'r drosgeist ac ddiolchwyddiant. Rhaid i'n gweithio i ddweud o'r prinsigau sydd trafnotu arian o'r NHS. Y First Minister nagiw'n fad i'r tyfu digon i'r NHS sefydliadur, ond mae yma mae oedd yn cyntaf yn yterfynion o hyd yn yr SNP-run health service a'r NHS diwg woeithi.  Rosell Cymru, hynny, mae'n sgwp gyd yn gyrtaeth ac yn gynnwysol arnyn nhw. Llyr Gruff іddiaid ymwneud y troi ein syncr. Rwy'n Palestin, esu'r MyроRa i wneud i dweud i ddymai i ddweud standaloneol o'r ystafell blaenau eu gweithio. Roedd rhai fod yn gan roi'r gweithio i dddigol arall, ac i ddweud, mae'r gweithio i ddweud gweithio i ddweud i ddweud i ddweud o'r gweithio i ddweud i ddweud i ddweud eu gweithio. I'm intrigued, though, at Douglas Ross's line of questioning. I did an interview on Monday addressing the comments in the minute. The minute is there. I wasn't denying then that the conversation had took place, and I'm not denying now. It was a meeting of some leading NHS directors. As a point of fact, it wasn't NHS board chief executives, but they were conversations not to use another word that Douglas Ross used, plans, because let me let Douglas Ross into what shouldn't be a secret, but he clearly doesn't understand it. NHS leaders, however much respect I have for them and I have considerable respect for them, do not make government policy. The Government makes government policy and the founding principles of the national health service that this Government has done more than any to protect and to enhance are not, and as long as I am First Minister, never will be up for discussion. I have to say, I think that it's very bold for Nicola Sturgeon to stand up and compare Scotland and other parts of the United Kingdom on privatisation when we know that in Scotland private treatment is up 84 per cent since the start of the pandemic compared to the rest of the United Kingdom that is half of that, 84 per cent here in Scotland, less than half of that across the rest of the United Kingdom. However, as the health secretary passes her some notes which she passes back against, that's clearly no use, Hamza, let's look at what the actual document said. It said that health boards had the green light from the leadership to come up with and present their ideas for the reforms. The reports of the document said that areas that were previously not viable options are now possibilities. Will the First Minister reveal what areas that she would not consider before are now on the table? Given that she has said that the ultimate decision would be with Government ministers, who gave NHS chiefs the green light to consider those plans going forward? Can you imagine Douglas Ross's reaction if I tried to dictate to NHS leaders what they were and weren't allowed to discuss in their meetings? Let's just imagine that for a second, but in direct answer to his question, none of those plans—none of those—and they're not plans—but none of those ideas that would have any impact on the founding principles of the national health service are being discussed or remotely considered by this Government. That can't be clearer. Certainly here in Scotland it's Government policy, but Douglas Ross talked about some figures around private health funding. Let me give him some facts on that matter. Let's look at people who self-fund for private care. In Wales, that figure is 30 per cent higher per head than in Scotland. Sorry, Douglas Ross introduced the comparison between Scotland and the rest of the UK. In England, we are just in case—I am sure that this is not the case—anybody has forgotten that the Conservatives are in Government. That figure is 15 per cent higher per head in England compared to Scotland. Let's look at NHS use of the private sector. In Scotland, total spend on use of the independent sector represents 0.5 per cent of the total front-line health budget. In England, where the Conservatives are in power, that figure is almost 7 per cent—12.2 billion pounds. This Government will take no lessons from the Conservatives when it comes to privatising the national health service. In fact, this Government will take no lessons from the Conservatives on the NHS full stop. Douglas Ross Sadly, in Sturgeon Scotland, no-one is getting any lessons today because teachers are on strike. Let's go back to the figures, because the First Minister did not dispute that, since the start of the pandemic, private treatments in Scotland have increased by 84 per cent. In England, the increase has been 39 per cent—sorry, in the rest of the United Kingdom, the increase has been 39 per cent—but let's go back to the point that I was making. Someone gave the green light within government. We'd usually expect that green light to come from the health secretary or from the First Minister, but there is clearly a complete breakdown of communication between NHS chiefs and the SNP. The First Minister has literally standing up today and rubbish this meeting of NHS chiefs. She's saying that they are completely wrong. They are apparently acting on their own without ministerial direction. That is what the First Minister said, but the reports clearly state that NHS chiefs here in Scotland are worried about the prospect of a two-tier NHS. If the First Minister is to be believed, NHS chiefs are not listening to the health secretary, but are going off to try and fix the NHS on their own with no-government oversight. Is that not just another confirmation that Humza Yousaf is out of control with Scotland's NHS? Before the First Minister responds, may I remind members of the requirement to always address one another respectfully?  He talks about a two-tier health service—perhaps he is talking about the one that already exists where the Conservatives are in government in England. There will not be a two-tier health service while this Government is in office in Scotland because we are committed to the founding principles of the national health service and always will be. NHS leaders are entitled to discuss what they want, but they do not make government policy. The Government makes government policy, and I could not be clearer about that. Of course, this is the Government—I was health secretary in the early years of this Government. This is the Government that reversed the privatisation of our health service where it had taken place. I was the health secretary that brought Strocathro hospital back into the public sector after Labour had privatised it. We were the Government that ended the contracting out of cleaning and catering services that moved away from the ruinously expensive Tory Labour PFI PPP contracts. We were the Government that ended prescription charges in Scotland because we support the founding principles of the NHS and we always will. Douglas Ross Last week, Nicola Sturgeon stood up and said that we should trust her, not a shipbuilding expert who had advised the UN. This week, we have to believe that Nicola Sturgeon is not NHS chiefs who run our service here in Scotland. According to the First Minister, Hamza Yousaf apparently has not lost control, yet nurses are on strike for the first time ever. We have waiting times at record highs. People cannot see their GPs and health chiefs are warning of a two-tier system in our NHS. It is quite clear that the First Minister is in complete denial about how badly her health secretary is handling the NHS crisis, in denial about the scale of privatisation in the health service that she oversees and in denial about Hamza Yousaf's two-tier system that is already becoming the norm in Scotland. She has become so distracted, focusing on her own political priorities, that she no longer realises just how bad the situation has got here in Scotland. The minutes of this meeting of NHS chiefs claim that there is a disconnect between what is happening on the front line and what the health secretary thinks is happening. They accuse Hamza Yousaf of, and I quote their words, being divorced from reality. They are right, aren't they, First Minister? First Minister, no, they are not. Let me set out some facts about the national health service. There is higher funding for the national health service in Scotland than there is for England's Tory-run national health service. There is higher staffing per head of population in Scotland than there is in England. Of course, NHS Scotland, thanks to the dedication of every single worker who works in it, is better performing than the NHS in other parts of the UK. This Government will always work to protect the founding principles of the national health service, which is more than can be said— First Minister. I have to say. When the First Minister is responding to a question, can we ensure that we can only hear the First Minister's voice? Which is more than can be said for Douglas Ross, because he wants some reality. Let me give Douglas Ross some reality. Last year, there was an amendment passed in the House of Lords that would have explicitly protected the NHS and excluded it from trade deals that could undermine its founding principles. Tory MPs in the House of Commons voted to remove this protection. Guess who one of those Tory MPs was? Douglas Ross. Even when he gets the chance, he does not stand up for the principles of the national health service. This Government always will. Question 2, Anas Sarwar. On Monday, the BBC revealed that the NHS crisis that is created by this Government had got so bad that health leaders had discussed charging for treatment. In response, the health secretary said that that was abhorrent. However, the truth is that there is already a two-tier healthcare system in Scotland. Can the First Minister tell the chamber how many procedures were carried out in private hospitals in Scotland in the past year? First Minister. I will provide that precise figure, but, as I have just said to Douglas Ross, the people whose self-fund for private care in Scotland is lower than it is in England—significantly lower—and it is even more significantly lower in Scotland than it is where Labour is in government in Wales. That is the reality, because we protect our national health service in these difficult times and we always will. Anas Sarwar talks about paying for treatment. Let me repeat. This was the Government that abolished prescription charges, something that Labour had many opportunities over many years to do and failed completely to do. Just as I will not take them from the Conservatives, I will not take no lessons from Labour on the founding principles of our national health service. Anas Sarwar. Perhaps the First Minister will want to take lessons from the people who have actually paid for treatment in Scotland. There were more than 39,000 patients treated privately in Scotland in the past year. That does not include the many private treatments carried out in individual clinics such as dental surgeries. The number of people now paying for treatment without health insurance has increased by 72 per cent. Often, those are people who are forced to borrow money, turn to family and friends or even remortgage their homes to get healthcare that should be free at the point of need. I know that the First Minister does not like facts, but let us look at the facts. Almost 2,000 people have gone for private treatment for endoscopies and colonoscopies. Privately, those treatments cost an average of £1,195. Over 7,800 people have gone private for a cataract surgery, average cost £2,660. A staggering 3,500 people have had a hip or knee replacement in a private hospital, average cost £12,500. Those figures make clear that, under the SNP, healthcare in Scotland is already a two-tier system. Does the First Minister accept that this goes against the founding principles of our NHS—a universal healthcare system—free at the point of need? No, I do not accept that. I do not accept that we have a two-tier health system in Scotland. We will always act to protect the founding principles, and we have done more than any other Government to achieve that. One thing that was missing completely from Anna Sarwar's question was reference to a global pandemic that caused the cancellation and the pausing of elected services in our national health service for a considerable period of time. That is why we have seen an increase in those figures in recent years, but those figures remain significantly below the comparable figures in England and in Wales, where, let me remind Anna Sarwar, his own party is in government and running the national health service. As we continue to progress the NHS recovery plan, get more operations done and, within waiting times in the national health service, we will continue to see the benefits of NHS care free at the point of need for everyone across Scotland. The First Minister wants to deny the facts. I do not think that the pandemic is a good enough excuse to say that, because it was a pandemic, it means that it is okay for you to have to go privately to go and pay for treatment. The First Minister denies that we have a two-tier system. In 2021, 40 per cent of all hip and knee replacements that happen in Scotland were paid for privately. 40 per cent is 3,430 people paying privately to get a hip or knee replacement. Our NHS is at risk because of this Government's choices and this Government's crisis. After 15 years in Scotland, there is no one else to blame. Take responsibility for your record. Hospital beds cut, nursing and midwifery training places cut, record long waits in A&E, 750,000 Scots on an NHS waiting list and people forced to go into debt to go private, undermining the very principles of our national health service, the Labour Party and our country's greatest ever public service achievement. Doesn't it get clearer every single day that our NHS is not safe in SNP hands? First Minister, we have record numbers of people working in our national health service significantly more than when this Government took office and significantly more proportionately than any other part of the UK, including where Labour is in Government in Wales. In terms of how we are responding, Anna Sarwar says that the pandemic should not be used as an excuse. I agree with that, but nor can it be ignored in terms of the impact on our national health service. All of the figures that he quotes, he takes no account of the impact of a global pandemic on our national health service, but what are we doing? We are building up the capacity of our NHS. I referred in response to Douglas Ross to one of the things that I did when I was health secretary, which brought back in to public ownership Stracathro hospital, which had been privatised by the last Labour administration more recently. Earlier this year, we have brought another private sector hospital, Carrick Glen in Ayrshire, into public ownership. That facility will be developed to become one of our new national treatment centres. Building up the elective capacity of our NHS to treat more people. That is the practical action that this Government is taking, and we are taking that and always will take that while we protect the founding principles of our national health service. I intend to take general and constituency supplementary questions after question 7. Members who have already pressed, please do not repress, but members who wish to put a question on questions 3 to 7, please do so at the appropriate point. I call Tess White at question 3. To ask the First Minister what assessment the Scottish Government has made of emergency response to flooding in the north-east of Scotland in recent days. First of all, my thoughts are with the family and friends of Hazel Nairn, who remains missing after the recent flooding. I know that there has been some distressing news on that this morning. The Scottish Government's resilience room was activated throughout the incident to support the local response. Transport Scotland also activated its multi-agency response team and Transport Scotland resilience room. We will now work with partners to reflect on the response and ensure that any lessons identified are taken on board and built into contingency planning and response arrangements for the future. As the cleanup continues, I want to take the opportunity to thank our emergency services and all local resilience partners, including the voluntary sector, for their on-going work to ensure that those communities that are most affected are kept safe and urgently get the support that they need. Tess White I associate myself with those remarks from the First Minister. Please allow me to pay tribute to Hazel Nairn, who tragically went missing during Friday's adverse weather. As the search continues, my thoughts are with her family and the responders on the ground. First Minister, in Breekin, two of the pumps belonging to the town's £16 million flood defences failed. Flooding homes and causing extensive damage. Villagers raised concerns with me about the safety of an electrical substation in Inchbear, which was half submerged in water for days. Communities rallied together over the weekend, but improvements need to be made to the organisation of the emergency response to weather events like this. How will the Scottish Government work with local resilience partnerships to expedite this process and reassure people in my region that every possible step has been taken to protect them? I thank Tess White for raising those issues. They are extremely important issues to any community affected by severe weather incidents. In terms of Breekin, again, it is an important issue to raise. The main flood defence in Breekin contains the south-esk river held. That is despite river levels provisionally reported by SEPA being the highest ever on record. It is worth pointing out that, had those defences not been in place, there would have been widespread and potentially dangerous flooding of an estimated 332 properties beyond anything yet experienced by Breekin. However, two of three pump stations that remove surface water from river streets, run-off and other sources did not start automatically when water was detected. As soon as that was identified, a council officer attended and the pumps were at that stage successfully started. We work closely with local resilience partnerships on an on-going basis, and it is very important that we do so. Anytime there is a severe weather incident like this, we ensure that any appropriate lessons are learned. That will be the case here, and that will be done as quickly as possible. If there are any issues raised by locals about concerns that I have not touched on today, if those are passed to the Government, we will ensure that they are fed in to that process of reflection and learning of lessons. Mercedes Villalba We are already seeing the effects of the climate emergency with further extreme weather events becoming more likely. The National Infrastructure Commission has argued that Governments should set resilience standards that operators would be required to meet. The UK Government is set to introduce a national resilience strategy, so will the First Minister make the case for the development of resilience standards for vital public infrastructure? The First Minister Yes, I am very happy to look at it. Of course, it is important that those principles are included in all the work that the Scottish Government does as well. The member is right to raise the climate emergency because those severe weather events, of course, are being caused by climate change. It is really important that everything that we do recognises that the climate emergency is central to all of our infrastructure planning work, and it is important that we continue to develop it in that way. I will certainly take that particular proposal and ask the Minister concerned to write to the member with further detail about how we will liaise with the UK Government on it. To ask the First Minister what steps the Scottish Government is taking to ensure that gender-based violence is being tackled in Scotland in light of the start tomorrow of the 16 days of activism against gender-based violence. The First Minister Violence Against Women and Girls is abhorrent. That is why it is equally safe. Our strategy to address violence against women and girls is so vital. We have already strengthened legislation, taking action to address the social drivers that perpetuate gender-based violence and invested record levels of funding in front-line services and in supporting survivors. The Domestic Abuse Scotland Act 2018 criminalises coercive and controlling behaviour, and we have taken forward work to ensure that those working in the public sector can confidently and sensitively work with those affected by violence against women and girls through equally safe in practice. The delivering equally safe fund provides £19 million this year to support over 120 projects that focus on early intervention prevention as well as on support services. Evelyn Tweed. I thank the First Minister for that answer. Research continues to show an enormous prevalence of gender-based violence in all areas of life. For example, the trade union congress found that more than half of women in the workplace have experienced sexual harassment, but 80 per cent of them did not report it. What is this Government doing to ensure that misogynistic abuse is taken seriously and survivors feel able to report it? This is an extremely important issue. Baranis Helena Kennedy's report on misogyny and the criminal law commission, of course, by this Government and published earlier this year, made several recommendations to address gaps in the law that could be addressed by new criminal offences to tackle misogynistic behaviour. Some of those are, of course, controversial and were committed to consulting on proposals that would give effect to those recommendations in this parliamentary year. The TUC report underscores the importance of ensuring that victims of misogynistic behaviour do feel empowered to report with confidence that their concerns will be taken seriously by their employer and where criminal activity is alleged by the police as well. Pam Gossel. This week, a United Nations expert on violence against women has condemned the SNP's gendered recognition reforms. The United Nations claims that this bill could allow violent males to access women-only spaces posing a risk to the safety of both women and trans women. The expert appealed to the Scottish Government to set aside more time to consider the bill's possible unintended consequences. Does the First Minister agree with the United Nations expert that the bill should be postponed so that the legitimate concerns about women's safety can be addressed? I believe that those who are responsible for violent attacks on women are those who perpetrate those attacks. Where that is, as is very often the case, is violent men. It is violent men that we should be focusing on. They continue to pose the biggest risk to women and I do not believe that we should further stigmatise the trans community because of the actions of violent men. Violent men right now who want to access women-only spaces do not need a gender recognition certificate to do that. Let's focus on the problem. When the problem is violent men, that is the one that we should focus on. In terms of the comments by the person from the UN, of course we will respond in full to that. I am not sure that the comments are quite as they were characterised in the question, but the social justice secretary will respond in detail on the issues raised. Many of those issues have been discussed and addressed already by Parliament during stages 1 and 2 of the bill. Of course Parliament will have the opportunity to discuss the bill again at stage 3 of the legislative process shortly. To ask the First Minister how much the Scottish Prison Service has spent on providing free mobile phones to all prisoners. At the start of the pandemic, we took the decision to provide mobile phones to those in custody to maintain vital family communication, including and perhaps especially with children, during what was an incredibly challenging period and when normal visiting, of course, was not possible. Between then and April, the amount spent to date is £4.12 million. First Minister, your Government is slashing budgets for our cops, courts and prisons. Money is tight, we get that. How on earth can mobiles for prisoners at a cost of £4 million and rising be a priority? Taxpayers' money should be spent in front-line services, not freebies for criminals. Those phones have been misused nearly 5000 times. They have been used to order fire bombings, drug dealing and to threaten crime victims. Prison officers tell me that SNP-issued phones are putting them in danger by fuelling violence between inmates, so when, First Minister, will you bin this costly and dangerous policy? Russell Findlay is right about one thing—budgets are extremely tight. They are tight because of Tory economic mismanagement and Tory erosion of our budgets. Prison is, yes, about punishment, but prison should also be about rehabilitation, and it is important that we do not lose focus on that. The mobile phone provision—which, of course, I think—I will be corrected if I am wrong about this, but I think it is something that the UK Government did as well during the pandemic. That is about ensuring connections between prisoners and families, including children, which is important to rehabilitation, which is important to reducing offending and re-offending. We will continue to consider all those issues carefully, but we will consider them in the context of a justice system that punishes criminals, which is extremely important, but one that seeks to rehabilitate those who commit crimes and reduce re-offending, because that is in the overall interests of communities across the country. 6. Stephanie Callaghan To ask the First Minister what the Scottish Government's response is to the Supreme Court decision regarding legislating on an independence referendum. First Minister. While, of course, I am disappointed by it, I respect and accept the Supreme Court's judgment on the Lord Advocate's reference regarding the Scottish Parliament's powers to legislate for an independence referendum. However, the denial of democracy by Westminster parties demonstrates now beyond any doubt that the notion of the UK as a voluntary partnership of nations is not now if it ever was a reality. It remains open to the UK Government to respect democracy and to reach an agreement with the Scottish Government for a lawful constitutional democratic referendum. However, regardless of attempts by Westminster to block democracy, I will always work to ensure that Scotland's voice is heard and that the future of Scotland is always in Scotland's hands. Yesterday's ruling has profound implications for the UK and Scotland's democracy, particularly as you mentioned the notion of the UK being a voluntary partnership of nations. If the UK Government wants to evidence that this is a voluntary union, all they have to do is stop standing in the way of democracy, come to the table and reach an agreement over holding a legal referendum with the Scottish Government. Why does the First Minister think that she is continuing to shy away from this? Well, Unionist Westminster politicians want to silence Scotland's voice because they are scared of what Scotland might say. It is quite simple. Any politician who was confident of their case and confident of being able to persuade others of their case would not be trying to block democracy—they would be embracing democracy. I think that we know everything that we need to know about the views of Westminster Unionist parties by their determination to block Scotland's democracy, but it will not prevail. Unionist politicians, with some critical faculties and perhaps the power of independent thinking, probably understand that yesterday's judgment raised profoundly uncomfortable questions about the basis and the future of the United Kingdom. Any partnership in which one partner needs the consent of another to choose its own future is not voluntary and it is not even a partnership. Within the UK right now, it is the case that England could decide to become independent, but Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland supposedly cannot. That is not a partnership, that is not voluntary and that is not equal. But Scotland's voice will not be silenced. Scotland's future is up to the people of Scotland and that will always be the case. Thank you, Presiding Officer. First Minister, Douglas Ross keeps saying that no one on these benches is asked how he would stay in the Union. While the answer is simple, win an election with that in the manifesto and you get to dictate the terms. The Scottish Parliament has the biggest ever majority for an independence referendum in the history of devolution, but it has been blocked from enacting that mandate. Can the First Minister inform the Parliament if she has had any indication from the UK Government as to how the people of Scotland can exercise their democratic right and have a choice in their future? The mandate for an independence referendum in this Parliament is undeniable. There is a clear majority for that and I think that in any other measure of democracy in any other country, we would not have politicians seeking to deny that. I stand ready to discuss this issue with the UK Government at any time. I fully anticipate, though, that their democracy denial will continue at least in the short term, because they are scared of the outcome of a democratic process. I watched Douglas Ross and others squirming on this issue yesterday on television. On the one hand, I am trying to say that the United Kingdom is a voluntary union, but on the other hand, I am gleefully trying to defend the fact that Scotland has no way of choosing a different future. It is not democratic, it is not sustainable. Let's have a proper process and let the people of Scotland decide our own future. When asked by Glenn Campbell during a BBC debate two days before the holiday election, what voters should do who, and I quote, want you, Nicola Sturgeon, as First Minister, but do not want independence, the First Minister confidently said that they should vote for me? Why now are her colleagues claiming that these voters support independence? Is this the same deep-seat of duplicity that we can expect to see in any de facto independence referendum at the next general election? If the Tories are now reduced to suggesting that people in Scotland didn't know that I supported a referendum, the Tories are even more desperate than I thought they were. Douglas Ross is just quoting my own words. Let me offer this, Presiding Officer. If the Tories don't think that my words were clear enough in the election last year, how about their words? The Tory message couldn't have been clearer. They said, if the SNP wins the election, there will be a referendum. The only way to stop it is to vote Tory. That seems pretty clear to me, Presiding Officer, and guess what? The SNP won the election. It's time to have a referendum. To ask the First Minister what action the Scottish Government is taking to ensure that refugees from Ukraine have suitable accommodation on arrival in Scotland. With more than 21,500 arrivals from Ukraine with a Scottish sponsor, Scotland continues to provide sanctuary to more displaced people from Ukraine per head than any other part of the UK. I want to thank people across Scotland for their efforts in achieving that. Our priority, of course, is to ensure that the immediate needs of those arriving are met, although we are clear that we do not want anyone to spend more time than is absolutely necessary in welcome accommodation. While we are ensuring that we have that welcome and temporary accommodation that is safe and suitable, we are also taking forward a number of actions that are focused on providing sustainable longer-term accommodation for those who are here and are still arriving. That will include a new Scottish-led host recruitment campaign that will launch at the end of the month. Can I thank the First Minister for that answer and refer members to my register of interest? The First Minister will be aware of the acute housing crisis in Edinburgh. The current contract for MS Victoria is due to end in January 2023. Figures published by the Scottish Government show that more than 1,200 people are currently on the ship. How will the Scottish Government ensure that the capacity provided by the ship is retained? Will she urgently look to expand the criteria for the £50 million housing fund for local authorities, which is largely unspent, to include purchasing property from the market and working with agents to retrofit buildings? Will the First Minister confirm continued funding for the city's welfare hub? We will continue to provide support. Yes, those are very real issues, and Sarah Boyack is right to raise them. They are issues that all countries that have stepped up to help Ukrainians are facing right now. I was speaking with the T-shirt at the British Irish Council just a couple of weeks ago, the Republic of Ireland is dealing with those issues too. I know that the Welsh Government is well and the UK Government in respect of England. It is right that we have welcomed as many Ukrainians as possible. It is right now that we work through those challenges. I know that Neil Gray has been keeping members and Parliament as a whole updated. The £50 million longer-term resettlement fund is important, and we will continue to look at the eligibility for that. That is helping us to bring void properties back into use. We are also investing heavily in our wider affordable housing programme, and we will continue to do that. Specifically, in relation to those displays from Ukraine, of course, we will continue to work with Edinburgh City Council and local authorities across Scotland to ensure that that support can continue. Let me take the opportunity to put on record my thanks to local councils who have done fantastic work on that. Those are not easy challenges for any Government to navigate, but we have a model obligation to do so, and we will continue to work hard to ensure that we are doing right by those from Ukraine who need our support and help and welcome. Presiding Officer, as members know, as part of the UK, Scotland's budget is tied to the poor decisions made by the Tory Government at Westminster. However, there is another strain on public finances in Scotland, namely the repayment of private finance initiative debts, designed by the Tories and rolled out by an enthusiastic Labour Party. Can the First Minister set out the current annual bill for Scotland's health service from Labour's decision to build hospitals, including hair mires and my East Kilbride constituency, using the reckless and costly scheme, as well as any impacts of the current cost crisis on these debts? Okay, just for clarity, this is general and constituency supplementaries. Well, this question actually highlights one of the ironies of previous lines of questioning in the session of First Minister's Questions. Since 2006-07, the cumulative bill to taxpayers for the costs of Tory Labour's ruinously expensive PFI-PPP contracts is £3.2 billion. That is £2 billion over and above the initial capital value of those projects, with costs increasing because of inflation. Right now, we are currently paying every year more than £250 million for those contracts commenced under previous Administrations. That includes hair mires hospital. The record of this Government, in line with our record of protecting the national health service, is one of unpicking Tory Labour PFI-PPP contracts. Jamie Greene, to be followed by Jackie Baillie. Thank you, Presiding Officer. Adrienne McCartney spoke to The Sunday Post last year and shared her harrowing story about how, time after time, the police and prosecutors let her down on a case of domestic abuse. The Sunday Post revealed last Sunday that, sadly, Adrienne has since passed away. Her solicitor said the following.  First Minister, one leading academic believes that the statistic for those who are dying of domestic abuse could be six times higher than official statistics due to ill health and, of course, suicide. Given that we are putting such a focus on the elimination of violence against women this week in the Parliament, can I ask quite simply why is the justice system currently in Scotland failing so many vulnerable women? Secondly, what legislation is the First Minister and her Government proposing to bring forward to address those horrific crimes against women? First Minister, firstly, can I take the opportunity to convey my deep heartfelt sympathies to the family and friends of Adrienne? Obviously, police and prosecutors operate independently of government, so I won't go into details that would stray upon their independent roles. However, what I will say—and I have said many times before—I do not believe that Scotland or any country for that matter yet does enough when it comes to preventing and responding to domestic abuse. The justice system has got a very large part to play in all of that. However, as I was reflecting earlier on today, we need to do more to tackle the behaviours that cause domestic abuse and prevent it in the first place. I know that the Lord Advocate is a big advocate for and champion of that. The justice system has to respond better to support victims of domestic abuse. I know that that is a real priority for her. I have already spoken about the Helena Kennedy report on misogyny. We have proposed proposals from Lady Dorian on how the justice system deals with cases of sexual violence, sexual fences and that will include domestic abuse. The Government will bring forward many of those proposals in legislative form over the remainder of this Parliament. Some of them will be controversial and I would expect very rigorous debate and scrutiny in this Parliament, but I hope that, as we are considering those proposals, that very good question from Jamie Greene will stay in our minds and that we will find ways to unite to make the necessary improvements to our justice system so that victims of domestic abuse are not let down here in Scotland, as they are here too often and indeed as they are in countries across the world. Jackie Baillie, to be followed by Clare Adamson. The breast screening programme was paused for all women during the pandemic and paused even longer for women over 70. It would appear that a further restriction has been applied and women over 75 are being denied breast cancer screening. My constituent who raised this with me describes this decision as discriminatory and agist. Can the First Minister advise whether this restriction is just in Greater Glasgow and Clyde or does this apply Scotland-wide? And if so, will she reverse this decision? I will ask the health secretary to write to the member on the detail of that, because it is important that we make sure that that is right. In terms of the restoration of the breast screening for the age groups for which breast screening is advised, that has already happened. In terms of the older age groups that are on a self-referral basis, that has been done in a phased way. I will come back to Jackie Baillie via the health secretary on the detail of that. I say one thing finally, as somebody who is responsible for all the decisions that were taken during the pandemic. Those decisions were not taken lightly. The pausing of the screening programmes, including the breast screening programme, was one that I know was agonised over by the then chief medical officer and others responsible for those decisions. It is important that we get those right and that we prioritise those for whom breast screening is recommended, which is what has been done. As part of the overall recovery plan for the national health service, our priority is to get all services back to functioning as they were before the pandemic and as people have a right to expect. Clare Adamson, to be followed by Liam Kerr. Thank you very much, Presiding Officer. Following the UK regulations to adopt by the financial conduct authority for funeral planning companies, a number of companies have subsequently gone into administration, including safe hands, funeral plans and One Life. Some of my constituents are left worried as to whether they will get any of their money back. Research shows that such savings schemes are overwhelmingly used by the most financially vulnerable. Can the First Minister offer any advice and support that is currently available for those affected? Has the Scottish Government at any engagement with the UK Government in relation to calls for a UK support screen to be set up? I thank Clare Adamson for raising what is not just an important issue but an extremely sensitive issue. We welcomed regulation of the sector, which we had been pressing the UK Government to do for some time. The UK Government's action, however, has come rather late and too late for some people. I understand that dignity is currently honouring safe hands, funeral plans and I welcome that support. Of course, regulation is a reserved matter and I would encourage the UK Government to look at the situation and consider if they should provide additional support. If Clare Adamson wishes to pass on any details of affected constituents, I will ensure that the relevant minister looks at it and raises it with the UK Government. The Scottish Government also provides support for funeral costs through funeral support payment and I would encourage anyone who may be eligible to apply. In February, I asked what action the Government was taking after a survey showed that nearly half of our dedicated, hard-working teachers in Aberdeen were considering quitting due to high levels of physical and verbal abuse. At best, the First Minister's answer was vague and non-committal. Yesterday evening, following physical and verbal violence at Northfield Academy in Aberdeen escalating, teachers at Northfield voted in favour of industrial action over concerns for the safety of staff. First Minister, teachers should never be subjected to violence, whether verbal or physical, and as nothing has apparently changed since February, I ask again what is this Government doing now to stop this appalling abuse? First Minister, no teacher should ever experience abuse in the classroom and I hope that that is something that would unite us across this chamber. Of course, the employer of teachers are local authorities and I would expect, and I know that local authorities take this seriously, them to have support in place for teachers and to support the wellbeing of teachers. I am indeed meeting with the president of COSLA later today and will happily discuss what more the Scottish Government can do to support that. It is vitally important that we support teachers in a range of ways and indeed other public sector workers and other workers generally who interact with the public to ensure that they are free from and safe from any abuse or attacks whatsoever. I am very grateful, Presiding Officer. Following the First Minister's correction to the official report on that energy consumption, will the First Minister's new understanding of the facts cause the Scottish Government to reconsider its stance on all forms of net zero energy? For example, nuclear powers in the south of Scotland, which the First Minister can see, plays a vital role in energy security. My understanding of Scotland's energy potential is as it has always been. Scotland is blessed with vast renewable energy potential and this Government will focus on not just talking that up instead of talking it down, like so many of the other parties in this chamber do, but we will focus on supporting the growth of renewable energy, offshore wind, onshore wind, hydrogen and green hydrogen energy. The fact of the matter is that Scotland is one of the luckiest countries in the world when it comes to energy and it is our job to maximise that potential. That concludes First Minister's questions. There will be a brief suspension to enable people to leave the gallery and chamber quietly.


from theCUBE Studios in Palo Alto in Boston, bringing you data-driven insights from theCUBE and ETR. This is Breaking Analysis with Dave Vellante. Black Hat 22 was held in Las Vegas last week, the same time as theCUBE's SuperCloud event. Unlike AWS Reinforce, where words are carefully chosen to put a positive spin on security, Black Hat exposes all the warts of cyber and openly discusses its hard truths. It's a conference that's attended by technical experts who proudly share some of the vulnerabilities they've discovered. And of course, by numerous vendors marketing their products and services. Hello and welcome to this week's Wikibon Cube Insights Powered by ETR. In this Breaking Analysis, we summarize what we learned from discussions with several people who attended Black Hat and our analysis from reviewing dozens of keynotes, articles, sessions and data from a recent Black Hat attendees survey conducted by Black Hat and Informa. And we'll end with a discussion of what it all means for the challenges around securing the SuperCloud. Now, I personally did not attend, but as I said at the top, we reviewed a lot of content from the event, which is renowned for its hundreds of sessions, breakouts and strong technical content that is, as they say, unvarnished. Chris Krebs is the former director of US cybersecurity and infrastructure security agency, CISA. He gave the keynote and he spoke about the increasing complexity of tech stacks and the ripple effects that that has on organizational risk. Risk was a big theme at the event. Where reinforced tends to emphasize, again, the positive state of cybersecurity. It could be said that Black Hat, as the name implies, focuses on the other end of the spectrum. Risk, as a major theme of the event at the show, got a lot of attention. Now, there was a lot of talk, as always, about the expanded threat surface. You hear that at any event that's focused on cybersecurity and tons of emphasis on supply chain risk as a relatively new threat that's come to the CISA's minds. Now, there was also plenty of discussion about hybrid work and how remote work has dramatically increased business risk. According to data from Intel 471's Mark Arena, the previously mentioned Black Hat attendee survey showed that compromised credentials posed the number one source of risk followed by infrastructure vulnerabilities and supply chain risk. So a couple of surveys here that we're citing and we'll come back to that in a moment. At an MIT cybersecurity conference earlier last decade, theCUBE had a hypothetical conversation with former Boston Globe War correspondent Charles Sennett about the future of war and the role of cyber. We had similar discussions with Dr. Robert Gates on theCUBE at a Service Now event in 2016. At Black Hat, these discussions went well beyond the theoretical with actual data from the war in Ukraine. It's clear that modern wars are and will be supported by cyber, but the takeaways are that they will be highly situational, targeted and unpredictable because in combat scenarios, anything can happen. People aren't necessarily at their keyboards. Now, the role of AI was certainly discussed as it is at every conference and particularly cyber conferences. It was somewhat dissed as over hype, not surprisingly, but while AI is not a panacea to cyber exposure, automation and machine intelligence can definitely augment what appear to be and have been stressed out security teams. You can do this by recommending actions and taking other helpful types of data and presenting it in a curated form that can streamline the job of the SecOps team. Now, most cyber defenses are still gonna be based on tried and true monitoring and telemetry data and log analysis and curating known signatures and analyzing consolidated data, but increasingly AI will help with the unknowns, i.e. zero day threats and threat actor behaviors after infiltration. Now, finally, while much lip service was given to collaboration and public-private partnerships, especially after Stuxnet was revealed earlier last decade, the real truth is that threat intelligence in the private sector is still evolving. In particular, the industry really mid-decade, really tried to commercially exploit proprietary intelligence and do private things like private reporting and monetize that, but attitudes toward collaboration or trending in a positive direction was one of the sort of outcomes that we heard at Black Hat. Public-private partnerships are being both mandated by government and there seems to be a willingness to work together to fight an increasingly capable adversary. These things are definitely on the rise. Now, without this type of collaboration, securing the super cloud is gonna become much more challenging and confined to narrow solutions. I'm gonna talk about that a little later in the segment. Okay, let's look at some of the attendee survey data from Black Hat. Just under 200 really serious security pros took the survey. So not enough to slice and dice by hair color, eye color, height, weight and favorite movie genre, but enough to extract high-level takeaways. You know, these strongly agree or disagree survey responses can sometimes give vanilla outputs, but let's look for the ones where very few respondents strongly agree or disagree with a statement or those that overwhelmingly strongly agree or somewhat agree. So it's clear from this that the respondents believe the following. One, your credentials are out there and available to criminals. Very few people thought that that was unavoidable. Second, remote work is here to stay. And third, nobody was willing to really jinx their firms and say that they strongly disagree that they'll have to respond to a major cybersecurity incident within the next 12 months. Now, as we've reported extensively, COVID has permanently changed the cyber security landscape and the CSOS priorities and playbook. Check out this data that queries respondents on the pandemic's impact on cybersecurity. New requirements to secure remote workers, more cloud, more threats from remote systems and remote users and a shift away from perimeter defenses that are no longer as effective, e.g. firewall appliances. Note, however, the fifth response that's down there highlighted in green. It shows a meaningful drop in the percentage of remote workers that are disregarding corporate security policy. Still too many, but 10 percentage points down from 2021 survey. Now, as we've said many times, bad user behavior will trump good security technology virtually every time. Consistent with the commentary from Mark Arena's Intel 471 threat report, phishing for credentials is the number one concern cited in the Black Hat attendees survey. This is a people and process problem more than a technology issue. Yes, using multi-factor authentication, changing passwords, using unique password, passwords using password managers, et cetera. They're all great things, but if it's too hard for users to implement these things, they won't do it, they'll remain exposed and their organizations will remain exposed. Number two in the graphic, sophisticated attacks that could expose vulnerabilities in the security infrastructure. Again, consistent with the Intel 471 data. And three, supply chain risks. Again, consistent with Mark Arena's commentary. Ask most CSOs their number one problem and they'll tell you it's a lack of talent. That'll be on the top of their list. So it's no surprise that 63% of survey respondents believe they don't have the security staff necessary to defend against cyber threats. This speaks to the rise of managed security service providers that we've talked about previously on breaking analysis. We've seen estimates that less than 50% of organizations in the US have a sock. And we see those firms as ripe or MSSP support as well as larger firms augmenting staff with managed service providers. Now, after reinvent, we put forth this conceptual model that discussed how the cloud was becoming the first line of defense for CSOs and DevOps was being asked to do more. Things like securing the runtime, the containers, the platform, et cetera. And audit is that kind of that was that last line of defense. So a couple of things we picked up from Black Hat which are consistent with the shift and some that are somewhat new. First is getting visibility across the expanded threat service was a big theme at Black Hat. This makes it even harder to identify risk. Of course, this being the expanded threat surface. It's one thing to know that there's a vulnerability somewhere. It's another thing to determine the severity of the risk but understanding how easy or difficult it is to exploit that vulnerability and how to prioritize action around that. Vulnerability is increasingly complex for CSOs as the security landscape gets complexified. So what's happening is the sock, if there even is one at the organization is becoming federated. No longer can there be one ivory tower that's the magic godroom of data and threat detection and analysis rather the sock is becoming distributed following the data. And as we just mentioned, the sock is being augmented by the cloud provider and the managed service providers, the MSSPs. So there's a lot of critical security data that is decentralized and this will necessitate a new cyber data model where data can be synchronized and shared across a federation of socks, if you will or mini socks or sock capabilities that live in and or embedded in an organization's ecosystem. Now, to this point about cloud being the first line of defense, let's turn to a story from ETR that came out of our colleague, Eric Bradley's insight in a one-on-one he did with a senior IT person at a manufacturing firm. In a piece that ETR published called Saved by Zscaler, check out this comment. Quote, as the last layer, we are filtering all the outgoing internet traffic through Zscaler. And when an attacker is already on your network and they're trying to communicate with the outside to exchange encryption keys, Zscaler is already blocking the traffic. It happened to us, it happened and we were saved by Zscaler. That's pretty cool. So not only is the cloud the first line of defense as we sort of depicted in that previous graphic, here's an example where it's also the last line of defense. Now let's end on what this all means to securing the super cloud. At our super cloud 22 event last week in our Palo Alto Cube studios, we had a session on this topic on super cloud securing the super cloud. Security in our view is going to be one of the most important and difficult challenges for the idea of super cloud to become real. We reviewed in last week's breaking analysis a detailed discussion with Snowflake co-founder and president of products, Benoit Dejavel. How his company approaches security in their data cloud, what we call a super data cloud. Snowflake doesn't use the term super cloud, they use the term data cloud. But what if you don't have the focus, the engineering depth and the bank role that Snowflake has? Does that mean super clouds will only be developed by those companies with deep pockets and enormous resources? Well, that's certainly possible. But on the securing the super cloud panel, we had three technical experts, G Rittenhouse of Sky High Security, Piyush Sharma, who's the founder of Accurix who sold to Tenable and Tony Quay who's the former head of product at VMware. Now, John Furrier asked each of them, what is missing? What's it going to take to secure the super cloud? What has to happen? Here's what they said, play the clip. This is the final question. We have one minute left. I wish we had more time. This is a great panel. We'll bring you guys back for sure after the event. What one thing needs to happen to unify or get through the other side of this fragmentation and the challenges for super cloud? Because remember, the enterprise equation is solve complexity with more complexity. Well, that's not what the market wants. They want simplicity, they want SaaS, they want ease of use, they want infrastructure as code. What has to happen? What do you guys think, each of you? So I can start and extending to the previous conversation. I think we need a consortium. We need a framework that defines that if you really want to operate in super cloud, these are the 10 things that you must follow. It doesn't matter whether you take AWS, Azure, GCP, or you have all, and you will have the on-prem also, which means that it has to follow a pattern. And that pattern is what is required for super cloud, in my opinion. Otherwise security is going everywhere. They're like, they have to fix everything, find everything and so on and so forth. It's not gonna be possible. So they need a framework, they need a consortium. And this consortium needs to be, I think needs to led by the cloud providers because they're the ones who have these foundational infrastructure elements and the security vendor should contribute on providing more severe detections or severe findings. So that's, in my opinion, should be the model. Well, thank you, G. Yeah, I would think it's more along the lines of a business model. We've seen in cloud that the scale matters. And once you're big, you get bigger. We haven't seen that coalesce around either a vendor, a business model or whatnot, to bring all of this and connect it all together yet. So that value proposition in the industry, I think is missing, but there's elements of it already available. I think there needs to be a mindset. If you look, again, history repeating itself, the internet sort of came together around a set of IETF, RFC standards. Everybody embraced and extended it, right? But still there was at least a baseline. And I think at that time, the largest and most innovative vendors understood that they couldn't do it by themselves, right? And so I think what we need is a mindset where these big guys, like Google, let's take an example, they're not gonna win at all, but they can have a substantial share. So how do they collaborate with the ecosystem around a set of standards so that they can bring their differentiation and then embrace everybody together? Okay, so G's point about a business model is, you know, business model being missing. It's broadly true, but perhaps Snowflake serves as a business model, where they've just gone out and done it, or trying to set a de facto standard by which data can be shared and monetized. They're certainly setting that standard and mandating that standard within the Snowflake ecosystem with its proprietary framework. You know, perhaps that is one answer, but Tony lays out a scenario where there's a collaboration mindset around a set of standards with an ecosystem. You know, intriguing is this idea of a consortium or a framework that Piyush was talking about. And that speaks to the collaboration or lack thereof that we spoke of earlier. And his and Tony's proposal that the cloud providers should lead with the security vendor ecosystem playing a sporting role is pretty compelling. But can you see AWS and Azure and Google in a Kumbaya moment getting together to make that happen? It seems unlikely, but maybe a better partnership between the US government and big tech could be a starting point. Okay, that's it for today. I wanna thank the many people who attended Black Hat, reported on it, wrote about it, gave talks, did videos, and some that spoke to me that had attended the event. Becky Bracken, it was the EIC at Dark Reading. They do a phenomenal job. And the entire team at Dark Reading, the news desk there, Mark Arena, whom I mentioned, Garrett O'Hara, Nash Borges, Kelly Jackson, sorry, Kelly Jackson Higgins, Roya Gordon, Robert Lepofsky, Chris Krebs, and many others. Thanks for the great commentary and the content that you put out there. And thanks to Alex Meyerson, who's on production and Alex manages the podcasts for us. Ken Schiffman is also in our Malboro studio as well outside of Boston. Kristen Martin and Cheryl Knight, they helped get the word out on social media and in our newsletters and Rob Hof is our editor-in-chief at Silicon Angle and does some great editing helps with the titles of Breaking Analysis quite often. Remember these episodes, they're all available as podcasts wherever you listen, just search for Breaking Analysis Podcast. I publish each week on wikibon.com and siliconangle.com. And you could email me, get in touch with me at david.volante at siliconangle.com or you can DM me at dvolante or comment on my LinkedIn posts. And please do check out etr.ai for the best survey data in the enterprise tech business. This is Dave Volante for the Cube Insights powered by ETR. Thanks for watching and we'll see you next time on Breaking Analysis.


Instead of walking from home plate to first base, I'm taking a mound visit because today's Intentional Walk is going to involve pitching and we're going to get inside some of the new technology that is going on with pitchers. Every time a Yankee pitcher throws a bullpen session or has a live BP session slash a simulated game, the Yankees set up a Rapsodo pitching device and they also set up an Edutronic high speed camera. So you're saying to yourself, what are those? I'm going to tell you what those are. The Rapsodo machine is able to detect spin access, spin rate, spin efficiency. I was talking to Clark Schmidt, a minor league pitcher and a former first round draft pick who you may see in the major leagues in 2020 and he said he loves to be able to get all the information after he has done a session. For instance, you want your curveball to be at an efficiency of 99 percent and what Clark told me is that you will find out that that last curveball you threw, it was at 92 percent. So what did you do differently? Did you lower your arm angle? Did you change your grip on the pitch? He said it's a rabbit hole of information that you can go down but it can give you so much help in improving as a pitcher. Obviously the high speed camera, those are self-explanatory. Adam Aduvino has talked about how that rejuvenated his career to be able to get a frame by frame shot of what you're doing. I mean I'm not a pitcher but imagine a pitcher into his wind up and coming through and everything with your body. You want to be able to see frame by frame where those pitches are going. Again, Clark Schmidt told me that this has become a big part in what he does and trying to prepare so this is not your father's spring training anymore. When the Yankees have those pitching sessions there's a little table right behind the pitchers. You see the rap-soto machine, you see the high speed camera and you see the information funneling through there, getting to the pitcher and the hope and the belief is that it's going to make them even better on the mound. My song today, we're talking about spin rate so we're going to go back to the mid 80s to a band called Dead or Alive. You spin me right round, baby right round. Google that song, you'll enjoy it.


Welcome back. It's still the breakfast and plus TV Africa. Khadija Okunoulamidi turned many heads. When she became the first woman and the youngest Nigerian to announce a bid for the 2023 presidency, Dottavle's lawyer and former works minister, Hajji Femio Kunou, Khadija entered the political fray without giving an indication as to which political party she is with. And this has got some Nigerians questioning her political sagacity. You'd agree with me that Nigerian politics is not for the faint-hearted. So how does she intend to prove her doubt is wrong? What is her plan for Nigeria if she becomes president? Joining us this morning on the breakfast is Khadija Okunoulamidi. Khadija, good morning to you. Good morning. Good morning. All right, nice. How does it feel? I mean, what has it been like for you since you made the announcement? Well, it's been relative calm, making the media rounds and actually putting a manifesto, getting it together and putting a team which is growing bigger by the day. With the volunteers, we have over almost a thousand volunteers now. Ten thousand? A thousand. A thousand. And these people are just willing to put down their skills and everything that is required. So this is how the momentum is going. Okay. Has it been what you expected? Yes. And you never really know what to expect. But if you have the right intention and you have everything that you think is good for the nation, then I think you should expect the best. All right. We know you made a speech and it was all over social media. Great optics. But why did you join the race? Well, it's time. I think there's a huge gap in the political space. What I've done should have been expected from most of our leaders out there. We see a business of silence these days. Things are going wrong. It's clear the ship is sinking. I don't think it's time for us to point fingers, number one. It's time to actually take, you know, show leadership by example. Not that there are no worries or no fears, but you need to put those things aside and actually put the nation in front and set the agenda and let people understand that there are ways to go about it to rearrange the polity and make it work, make Nigeria work for everyone. So was it a case of, you know, I can't keep quiet while things are going bad. If no one would stand up and speak out and do something about it, how would do something about it? This was how I was raised, yes. Okay, so let's quickly look at the state of the nation. I mean, currently right now on major consent for Nigeria's security. It cuts across board, you know, in the North East and, you know, the Northern part of the country you have insurgency and, you know, the North East, you have the issue of the iPop agitation. However, security is a major concern. Paraventure you become president or how do you intend to tackle all of this? Well, first things first, you know, some of the reasons for insurgency is idleness of our use and, you know, people's voices, people feel their voices are not heard. And these are the issues that we need to tackle. We cannot do it from one, you know, from one state. You have to actually go around and actually listen to what the concerns are and bring everybody to the table and let the resources that are, we have ample resources we're dependent on just one. We need to bring back all these resources and let people, let Nigerians benefit from the Nigerian resource. And you'll realize that insecurity comes from joblessness, it comes from, you know, lack of healthcare, comes from lack of education. These are the issues that surmount to becoming insurgency. So, you know, throughout the course of our campaign, we're going to visit every single state. We're going to have, you know, these round table conversations and discussions and actually find out what exactly are the issues because, you know, from different angles, you hear different stories. Let me hear exactly what it is and then we'll come up with a robust plan on how to solve, you know, the different issues and that overall solves the security issue. Because, you know, just like you have mentioned, I mean, some of this issue, the issue of idleness, not necessarily entirely the issue with the security architecture in the country and that could you probably say in the South is, a lot of persons are not satisfied with how resources, the marginalization and that might be the case for the South is. Well, you have the, you know, farmers, headers, clashes, some people would say this is banned. That would also be another, but it's a good thing that you have mentioned that you would like to visit all of the states and then it would be okay, you know, to actually find out. So, let's get straight to another one now. Structures, grassroots connection. We know that elections are not just won by, you just wake up and say, okay, I want to become president, I want to become governor. The grassroots, what's your connection with the grassroots across the entire federation? What structures have you built? Okay, first thing, I am a grassroots person. I've always been and I need, I need us to understand that structure, they're not, you know, we talk about it like they're people, structures are made up of people and what you need to do is ensure that you have as much connection to the people as possible. So, the existing structures, you could say they are counted for, you could, but I don't really believe that they are because right now 20% of, if we only get 20% voter turnout, that is not a clear indication of the voice of the people. So, we need to activate the structures which are people that we haven't, that have been disenfranchised or just, you know, voter apathy. They just don't want to take part in the process because they don't believe in the process. So, we need to reawaken the people for them to speak up to what they really want. Here is a test of the people. It's not a test of a small few, I mean, a few or a little group or a minority. It is a test of the majority. This is a majority we're reaching out to. So, the question now is this majority, you have talked about 20, 80. How, what structures have you put in place to reach out to the 80? How connected are you to this 80? Well, we have connections in every state. That's number one. We need to build on those. I'm sure you realize that I'm not sure we've really had elections where you get to interrogate your candidates on time. I think most times the elections always, you know, starts the momentum towards the election itself, three, four months towards the election. But right now we have quite a bit of time. We came out quite early. We stated our intention quite early so that we can have time to actually meet and speak and be interrogated and, you know, put our plans in place as we go. You know, it takes, it's a process and it takes time. So, we've come out early enough, just like I, you know, I'm sure other candidates. Well, I'm sure you realize that most, for the last maybe three, four election cycles, people come out. They only declare four months, three months before the election. So, everything is real, you know, fast space. Right now we have a bit of, we have a little, you know, it took a while to even step out in the first place. So, we have a bit of time and we're going to take, you know, go get to each of these states and build existing structure. You know, when people understand your message and people align with your message, that is how you build structure. People just have to buy into the vision. You have to have a vision.  This race is not for an anointing. It's actually for, you know, people having the best intention and having a vision for their people, for their people. And if people buy into it and key into it, then that's how you build structure. And yeah. Okay. We put some questions online, you know, asked the public to ask, tell us what they'd like to know about you. Some are asking to know if you've run for any political office before. No, I haven't. Okay. So, this is the first time. Yes. I've had conversations, you know, we've had conversations extensively about you. You've been a topic on many radio stations around the country and outside. And I'm sure you're well aware of that. Some people feel you should have gone for a lesser office, maybe state governorship or state House of Assembly or House of Representative or Senate. Someone even said to me, local government chairmanship. What do you say to that, having not run for office?  I know you'd say no. But what do you think about these comments? Okay. You know, I do appreciate people's opinions and how they believe we should go. However, you know, this was my call of duty. And the other positions you've mentioned, there are millions and thousands of credible Nigerians that are going to fill those roles.   There are no positions that are reserved. It is, you are backed by the constitution, you can run for office. And ambition is quite key in this journey. We cannot complain and not have, you know, ready candidates that would be ready to step up and take these positions. So, yes, you know, I'm looking forward to many Nigerians stepping up to take these roles. And, you know, I can only do one. I can only have, you know, take one role. You know, the others are open for everyone. What do you think it will have been better, you know, to, has it, have you not thought about it? You know, start from your state, your negotiation, I believe. And maybe start from one of the constituencies, a federal constituency. And build your political muscles to be able to fight for the next political muscle.  That's what you're looking for.  It's about your plans. And they say start here because it's a form of closing up the space. So, you think you have to climb this ladder.  But, you know, these things happen. And you, you know, first things, first we need political will for anything to happen. Political will is, would be got from the highest office. That is where we'll get anything that we need to get done. With the way our constitution is, most of the powers reside there. So, getting that power, it's not, you know, it's important. It's an important seat. Now, to build the country forward, it still has to start from the local governments. That's, there's no, there's no, there's no mistake in that. That has to, because if anything happens, if you have any issues with security, you don't call the IG first.  So, we still have to build from the ground up. But we need political will for anything to work from there. Are you in it to win it? I mean, some people saying, you know, Khadija is just coming out, like the regular politicians, to make a name for herself and see what comes out of it for her. Probably she'll bag on a poet bed from one of the parties or get a bag or check or something. So, are you in it to win it? Definitely. I'm not really, like you mentioned earlier, I've never had, I've never sought any political office. And the reason why I'm stepping out now is that I realise that most of our leaders have failed us. And, you know, here is a time where you need to answer that call of duty. You know, we're in it to win. However, all the political gain and personal gain, I'm quite happy and quite content with what God has given me. So, are you saying if you offered a position in the government that emerges, say you do not win in 2023, will you pick that office up? To serve? I think I can serve in so many other capacities. If you're given a ministerial position, for instance, in a very important minute, I see you sharing water on Instagram and it means you have a heart for the people. If the winning party and the winning government says, Khadija, we've seen your campaign, you've said a few good things we would like you to come on our team, want to give you a very important ministry, probably, I don't know. Well, I wouldn't want you to put it in terms of an office, because power is not in an office. But whichever part, whichever winning, whichever government wins, I do want to contribute as long as it's to benefit the country. So you will take up the position? Not, I don't think. If you were given that position, say, okay, come contribute as minister, for instance, as minister, for instance, come contribute. You lost, but we don't think we should let you go. We want you on board to contribute. There's no loss here. There's no loss. The fact that at the end of the day, a woman has to, you have to put women in, if you want to make a good decision, they say if you're making decisions without a woman on the table, you're making the wrong decisions now. I totally agree. So my candidacy alone has sparked conversations. It has, you know, the ruling elites have realized it's not business as usual. They realize that it's time to raise the status quo. You know, this alone, these are the kind of contributions that are wins for me and for my team. My team, they're an amazing set of Nigerians that are, they buy into this dream and this vision of making Nigeria work for all. And you know, so when you talk about positions, I don't want you to, you know, people might think you're going for the post, for all the positions. But you're saying you wouldn't, you would consider an offer to work with the government. Definitely. Yeah. Definitely. Okay. All right. I think that's something that we can So let's also look at, I know that you haven't been very vocal with the political party. Of course, you have to express your interest on that particular political party. I don't know if you're ready to tell us now or should we keep waiting? Well, the thing to do is that we want to make sure we get our message across to the people.  It's too mediocre. It's not even, it's too low. We talk about parties and we talk about, you know, the issue, you know, what parties better than the other, rather than talk about the issues and solutions that for the people, you know, so there are many parties out there and we're still in discussions, but we want to make sure that we make the right decision, but we'll announce soon. Okay. So let's even talk about the issues that you have mentioned. Another one still on the front burner is the fact that there's been call for agitation. I mean, you have a lot of people who want to go their ways because they feel like we can no longer be an entity, Niger.  Some people will say there's a difference between restructuring. Those who are calling for the polity to be restructured and those who are asking, we want to go separate ways. But I'd like to show your thoughts on that. Paraventure, I mean, we're just saying you have the opportunity. How would you handle this? The issue of restructuring and those who want to go their separate ways? Well, I understand that there are, you know, people are discontent with some of the ways that the country has been managed. However, I am not of the opinion that we should go our separate ways. So unity for me is key.  Once you break, it's a continuous downstream. And this is why you see that, you know, you have inter-tribal wars. This is how it starts. So our strength is in our unity. And I want us to keep it. I want us to keep it that way. You know, one of the things that I'm championing in this campaign is the fact that, you know, the Nigeria still is greater together. Coming out, we're coming out from a different angle as a contender, as a woman. There are so many. How do you put it? We're coming from a totally different angle. So, you know, we're coming out as, you know, the unifying force, which is what the plan is. And for us to be able to do this restructuring is going to have to happen. So you're not the reason why a lot of people are agitating. They feel very not satisfied. And that's because when you want to talk about resources, because at the end of the, all of this boils down to who controls what, who gets what when and how. And that's the politics, and that's the interest. Now, some parts of the country feel dissatisfied with what they are getting. They feel like we generate so much, but we're getting so little. When you want to talk about the issue of inclusion of government, they're not being carried along, specifically the southeastern region. And you want to also agree with me that for 2023, there's also call that, you know, we have someone from the power should actually be given to the southeastern region of the country in terms of presidency. Although the issue of zoning has never been inclusive in the constitution, but it has always been a gentleman's agreement. So how, how, how do you intend to resolve all of this? The marginalization is very big and people feel dissatisfied. You said we're making so much. We're not making one tenth of what we should be making as a country. But the little, but the little that we're making, you want to agree? Yes, yes. We're, we're depending on one tenth of our economy. And this is an issue. There's so many, there's so many resources that we have not. The problem we have is we have so much potential. We're not able to apply that potential in Nigeria. Same with human capital, same with resources. And what we need to do going forward is we need to ensure the reason why we're agitating for these small resources. When you have just a little, everybody agitates. So we need to open up the economy. We need, we need to, you know, have some kind of diversification. As you can see, I'm even in Ashoki. These are some of the things that we need to start thinking, thinking within and ensure that we grow our economy. That way, each region, you're making so much that, you know, the matter of what is coming from federal, federal allocation should be nothing compared to what you're making within. Though we need to give those sectors and give those parts of the economy attention and give them an enabling environment, that's the function of the government. It's not to allocate resources. And no, you're supposed to enable these regions to make sure that they can operate at full capacity. So you're saying you're supporting regional government? It's, I mean, this is part of the restructuring structure that I support. Okay. So you'll give the state's greater autonomy? More autonomy. Yeah, they need to take power away from the center. The center is, you know, we need, we do need to restructure that. Okay. I'm going to come to your economic policy and where you stand. But there are interests in Nigeria that are served by power remaining at the center. You know, of course, we know what happened in the regional system where you had the states controlling their resources, regions controlling their resources, the North, the Southwest, and so on. But these days, we are at the state, you know, we have a state system. They are passed or they are passed to the country that are carried along. Let me use that word. Better when everything is controlled from the center. And you're not alone. You're going to have to appeal to them to vote for you.  And they will not vote for you, may, sorry, may not vote for you. If you tell them, when I come in, I'm going to take away the national kick that you enjoy and allow states control their oil. And then we'll just give you something small. You make your money, you know. So how are you going to navigate this political, the geopolitics of Nigeria? Let's call it that. Okay. It still comes back to you. You're still zeroing in on oil. That's all we're talking about now. I'm zeroing on the interests. Yes. And the interests, the national kick right now is only baked by oil. And that's where the issue is. So, you know, it's easy. You know, when you have negotiations, you have to give something and take something. We need to give them other avenues to make money so that they understand that, you know, we don't all have to hold on to this one thing that is dwindling. Well, globally, globally, the people, you know, people's dependence on oil is dwindling. So that is not even a resource that is we should consider. But the people on the streets in Sokoto for instance. Don't worry. We'll get to them. That's not the problem. They listen to their leaders. Yes, which is fine. So the leaders... And of course, the other states are complaining that they will suffer if we have a restructuring where the states control their resources and the oil money doesn't get to the center to be shared by FAC. They will suffer. So you have to talk. Are you sure you can convince them? We're running a campaign and the campaign has a goal and a vision and a mission. So this is part of how we're going to get the country. You know, we're running to win, like we said, it's a victory campaign. However, the plan is to, you know, run a campaign such that we win the heart of the country. You know, this is what we're fighting for.  So I would say we have the utopian or the idealist scenario and we have the real. The real, if you talk to, we're political insiders. I call them outsiders. For instance, I can tag you an outsider, for instance, because you're not a career politician as it were. I've spoken to a couple of outsiders in my time as a journalist who say, I thought it was like this, but I got in and realized that it's like this. For God's sake, to even get proper documentation in an MDA of government, you may have to just push the envelope. So are you coming out with this idealist and this holier than thou, sorry to use the term, stance that I'm not like the other politicians. You want to change Nigeria? Leadership comes from the top. Whether you like it or not, what you see is what you mimic. And there are many like-minded individuals such as me, yourself, Mercy. It's quite, it's quite, you know, it's quite saddening that we have fallen into the narrative of, you know, the other side, if you want to put it that way. Even the people who are, you know, having all these ideas or doing these kind of, they understand that the country is going into, the ship is sinking and, you know, we're appealing to them to put self-serving behaviors and, you know, self, we're appealing to them to put these behaviors aside, because we're, it's time for us to grow the nation. It's time for us to- That's appealing to the electorate. Not the electorate. The politicians. The electorate, the politicians. But let me, kind of, I have some of come to the conclusion. I've interviewed a lot of politicians and I've come to the conclusion that it is the electorate that actually, they say, make the demands of politicians. I've spoken to one or two political outside and said, see, I went there and I campaigned to them. I gave them my beautiful ideas and I gave them speeches and, and I wowed them and they were inspired. On election day, they walked away to the side and collected 5,000 and voted against me. Khadija, are you aware, what do you say about this? And are you, are you prepared to fight dirty? Because that is how it is Nigerian politics.  I'm sure you're aware of that.  So, so, so, so. You have a war chest to pay? Because, so, so, she understands what I'm saying. No, sir, I just put it directly to her. Mercy, mercy, allow me to talk.  Let me get her. So, I wanted to ask, would you be involved in the money politics? Giving and taking? What do you call it? Pervention. I mean, that's what it is. Would you give, you know, to get people to come up to the side? It may not be money, it could be bags of rice. It could be anything. It could be materials or wrappers or anything. You're giving me, you're giving me examples of what ideas or what I should do.  And we're sending a message to understand, let people know what's in it for their children, what's in it for them in the next, you know, in the years to come, how they can tap into abundance, how they can tap into, you know, a country that they will be proud of. This is a message we're selling. This is a message that we want them to understand. As we go, as we go along the journey, and you talked about war chest, we're not fighting a war. Those who have a war, war doesn't win elections. That's, I mean, money doesn't win elections. Opportunities, access to opportunities wins elections. You know, so we understand, we understand the strategy of politics and that's what's more important than any other thing. So as we go along the way, we will do things, you know, we have to do victory. We have, I mean, we have to have legacy projects. Legacy projects don't come in 5,000 and 1,000 nairas. They come in things that are sustainable. You go to, there's so much underdevelopment that there's so much work to do. Regardless of if you win or if you don't win, you have to do this project so that people benefit from it for long term. You look back and I'm appealing to all the candidates on all the aspirants as they go about their campaigning. Please, let's, you know, let's go about projects rather than money, vote buying. So that at the end of each election cycle, we've seen so much work done. Even if you don't win. Yes, so this is how we should go about it going forward. So quickly, I'd like to show your thoughts on this one now.  Some people would say the 35% affirmation is nothing to write them about and you have some quotas asking this question specifically. What would you do to improve participation? We'll have laws. It's not like we don't have laws to actually encourage participation of women in politics but it hasn't really improved across different strata. You know, like we mentioned earlier, one of the benefits of this office that I'm running for is political will. You said there are laws, but without political will it would not happen. So, you know, 30% affirmation it's not going to, if you don't have the political it's not going to go through. So, this is one of the key reasons and one of the key, I mean, it's one of the major topics to handle once we get in power. And then also, women, I think we need to get up. There's no one, you know, we just need to get up. We make a difference wherever, we make a splash wherever we go and it's time for us to start improving. If it's going to work in Nigeria, it's on us. It's actually on us. So, let's also get you talked about the plan for Nigeria. I'm sure we haven't, you've told us about this is why you want to but really, really what are your plans for Nigeria? Well, as the cost of the campaign goes on, you will roll out more and more. You see more and more of our plans and, you know, the manifesto, you know, detail all the, all this. But, you know, maybe in a sentence or two, can you categorically tell, you know, Nigerians and those who are listening now, what are your plans? Well, okay. So, like you mentioned earlier, housing is really, really key in our manifesto, housing, education, health, and security, like you mentioned. So these are some of the things that we put on top priority. And then the youth inclusion, where innovation, we're going to have to have, you know, innovation, innovative public policies that will just, you know, take us leapfrog years ahead of time. So these are some of the things that we're considering. You know, a journalist once asked Femi Fanikairi who cross-captured from the PDP to the APC, back to the PDP and then back to the APC. Hope I got it right. He was once asked by reporter in Calabar, who is bankrolling you, you know, and Femi didn't take it lightly, but later apologized. Politics takes its money.  Even the gospel, we're told, you know, takes money to preach, you know, the gospel or whatever gospel you believe in. And do you have the funds to bankroll your campaign? Yes, we do. Okay, when you say we, so who? I don't want you to take offense with this question, but who is bankrolling you? The Nigerian people. You know, we are, our system of campaign and how we're rolling is we need to be accountable to the people. So we are crowdfunding at the moment, and that means every 1,000, 5,500 makes such a difference. And because people have invested in us, we are accountable to them, rather than, you know, one or two big money bags that silence the voice of the people. How much are you looking to raise? As much as we, as much as we go. Probably should have a budget, you know. So what's, what's, what's the figure? Well, those who are listening to know that this is what we need to help, the target. What's the target? Well, we just, look, I want every petty trader and every farmer and every cloth weaver and every shoe shiner, if we still have those, I want them to contribute into this campaign because it's, it's, we're, we're building, we're building the nation and it's, this is part of nation building. We're not going to, we promise, we're not going to mismanage your funds. We're going to be accountable. All our audited accounts will be available on all our platforms. I can give you our email.  And this is the same on all, across all platforms. KOL underscore Nigeria, Instagram, Twitter. So you're saying that you are going to rely on Nigerians to fund your campaign? Yes. And you don't have the money right now? We have, we have funds and yes, we do. Who, who, who is bankrolling? Obviously it's going to be personal funds. It's crowdfunding, crowdfunding. Okay, you've had some money coming from the public. Yes, yes. So you're saying that you don't have a godfather? No, I have my father, thank God he's, you know, I still benefit from his wealth of, of knowledge and experience. Okay, and he supports you? My father is. You don't have a, because, because one of the, I have a list of things I call, you know, the 101 on Nigerian politics for the political outsiders. What are the things that I've, you know, I've seen a lot of people say, outsiders who have become insiders, is that you need to have a political godfather. So one who will take your hand to the other godfathers or corridors of power across the country, because you have political systems that are headed by people, and you have a multitude of people who participate in the political activities, who move at their leader's command. It doesn't care whether the leader is doing right or wrong. It can see even in America it happens, right and left, they just stick to where they belong. They don't want to move. So, so, so have you thought about getting a political godfather, maybe? Does it have to be one? Okay, godfathers. Yeah, and godmothers. Yeah, I mean, fathers and mothers. Yeah, we have a lot of those. But you have godfathers. There are many, you know, progressive youth-minded elders in the political space that I, you know, close to and that direct and, you know, help with direction and how, you know, wisdom. So this is, this is the function they perform. And that's... Okay, so we're ended now. I mean, we're at a time, we're getting the prompt to end it now. Just one question. Just one and very simple. What happens if you don't win? I mean, it's not like you're not going to win. Everybody plans to win, but what happens if you don't win? We've already won. This is already won. Okay, so, so, I mean, realistically, let's look at that down. What happens if you don't win? Do you wait for another year? Do you fall back into something? You know, like, I'm a successful businesswoman and I have my, I'm an entrepreneur. However, you know, we are running a victory campaign and... And if you don't win? It's already a win. This is already a win when position is not power. Okay, so some would say, if you say you're already winning, means you probably just want to make a statement, make an impact and go.  We just need to understand our power and take it back. You know, that's all it is. If both leading political parties, APC and PDP, reach out to you, to be a member of each and come contest in their party primaries, which will you go for? I have never been a member of any political party and I'm not, I'm not inclined to, and those two. Those two? Yes. All right. All right, thank you so much Kadija Okuno for coming and we wish you the very best. Thank you very much for having me.