Patricia Ferguson: Madam Deputy Speaker, may I thank you, your team and all parliamentary staff for your cheerfulness and support over the last few weeks? I promise that I will eventually stop asking how to get to places, but it might not be for a while yet. I am very pleased to follow the hon. Member for Oxford West and Abingdon (Layla Moran). I listened carefully to her very interesting speech, from which I...
Patricia Ferguson: I thank my right hon. Friend for his statement, but will he outline the categories of loss that victims can claim against the scheme, and how will this inform the size of the compensation award that they can claim?
Patricia Ferguson: I had thought that Mr Doris might declare an interest, given the recent happy birth of his son Cameron. I congratulate him and Mrs Doris on that. Does the cabinet secretary acknowledge that the good work that Glasgow City Council does in tackling poverty in the city will be vastly affected by the cut of some £130 million as a result of his Government’s funding settlement to the city?
Patricia Ferguson: I think that the cabinet secretary is aware of my particular concern about the rehousing of sex offenders in multistorey flats and other properties with communal entrances and exits. Has any consideration been given to the dangers that such situations pose to young people who might live there, and does the Government plan to take any action as a result?
Patricia Ferguson: I, too, congratulate my colleague Linda Fabiani on securing the debate, which is an annual event. The Marie Curie Glasgow hospice is based in my constituency and I feel honoured and humbled to have had the opportunity to visit it on a great many occasions. It is one of those places that you always leave feeling much better than you did when you entered, because there is such a feeling of...
Patricia Ferguson: 9. To ask the Scottish Government when it will make a decision regarding the possible electrification of the north Glasgow suburban railway line. (S4O-05623)
Patricia Ferguson: The cabinet secretary will be aware that passengers who travel on that line have recently suffered severe disruption from a number of causes, including the Edinburgh to Glasgow improvement project and the problems with the Forth road bridge. All that disruption is, perhaps, understandable, but they also now face 20 weeks of considerable disruption and substantially increased journey times...
Patricia Ferguson: I add my thanks to Graeme Pearson for securing today’s debate on a very difficult, but important, subject. I, too, praise the work of the Moira Fund and Petal Support. The support that those organisations give to people affected by murder and culpable homicide is vital and should be supported. Today I highlight just two of several cases that I have been involved in, to explain why the...
Patricia Ferguson: Will the minister take an intervention?
Patricia Ferguson: Will the minister take an intervention?
Patricia Ferguson: Will the minister take an intervention?
Patricia Ferguson: Will the member take an intervention?
Patricia Ferguson: I, too, thank the Auditor General for illuminating the entire saga, and I thank the Parliament’s Public Audit Committee for the thorough and analytical report that it has produced on a very sorry chapter in further education in Scotland. My colleague Jackie Baillie was quite right to discuss at the beginning of her contribution the various ways in which colleges matter. They matter to our...
Patricia Ferguson: 5. To ask the First Minister what action the Scottish Government is taking to stop deaths from breast cancer. (S4F-03218)
Patricia Ferguson: The First Minister will be aware of the 2050 challenge campaign that was launched this week by Breast Cancer Now. As a breast cancer survivor myself, I know how crucial that campaign is. However, I am one of the lucky ones. The First Minister will have seen earlier this week Colin Leslie’s heart-breaking account of the loss of his fiancée, Sharon, to breast cancer. No one should have to go...
Patricia Ferguson: I thank all the members who have signed my motion on the issue. As the minister has acknowledged, unaccompanied children already come to Scotland. Many members would like that number to increase, as has been discussed. In spite of our recognition of the burden that that would place on services in local areas and Scotland as a whole, I wonder whether we should demonstrate our willingness by...
Patricia Ferguson: It is widely recognised that the Trade Union Bill is one of the most ill-judged, unnecessary and ideologically driven pieces of legislation since the days of Margaret Thatcher. It is ill judged because it will take away the last resort that is industrial action by workers and will force them to take more direct political action; it is unnecessary because days lost to strike action are at an...
Patricia Ferguson: Will the member take an intervention?
Patricia Ferguson: When the cabinet secretary next meets NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde, I wonder whether she could raise the issue of podiatry. I have a number of elderly constituents who have been refused simple toenail cutting. One such constituent is in his 90s and cannot bend to attend to his nails. Another suffers from vertigo. When I asked the board to consider that case as a special case, I was told...
Patricia Ferguson: On a point of order, Presiding Officer. Can you advise what remedy is open to members of the Parliament who are wrongly accused by the Cabinet Secretary for Health, Wellbeing and Sport of denigrating NHS staff? [Interruption.]
