Anne McTaggart: I congratulate Stewart Maxwell on securing this important debate. Today is a day for everyone to pause and remember the 6 million Jewish men, women and children who were murdered by the Nazi regime in occupied Europe. It was not just Jewish people who were killed. Many other people met their deaths on the same sites, including Poles, Russians, socialists, communists, Christians, homosexuals,...
Anne McTaggart: I am pleased to take part in this important debate on what is surely one of our most cherished institutions: our national health service. I know that members from across the Parliament feel passionately about it. We all want an NHS that meets the needs of people across Scotland. After all, it was the Labour Party that created the NHS in 1948, as a service based on people, not profits. For me,...
Anne McTaggart: It is your law. You put it in place and you have broken the law 12,000 times. That is 12,000 people and families who have been affected. Behind each of those stories is a vulnerable patient and their family who are suffering, which is why we need to take urgent action. We know that the NHS in Scotland is facing significant pressures while having to make major changes to services to meet...
Anne McTaggart: I most certainly do acknowledge that—I totally agree with Mr Robertson that that will accommodate some of the difficulties that we are facing just now. However, I and most of my colleagues have asked for a front-line fund for the NHS. Although I welcome the fact that the Government has committed £100 million over the next three years to reduce delayed discharge numbers, I believe that we...
Anne McTaggart: How many of the organisations that receive money from that ever-decreasing budget are living-wage employers?
Anne McTaggart: I thank my colleague Hanzala Malik for securing this important members’ business debate. We have all been shocked by the barbaric actions of the Taliban in Peshawar. There are many Pakistani residents in my region, which is Glasgow. I express my deepest sympathies to the victims, their families and anyone else who has been affected by the terrorist attack that we are discussing. That...
Anne McTaggart: Thank you, Presiding Officer, and happy new year to all. I am delighted to close the debate on winter festivals on behalf of Scottish Labour. I am a mother of three dear children, and my family get involved in winter festivals every year in my home town of Glasgow. Scotland has a strong record and an enviable reputation for arts participation. We also host world-class events such as the...
Anne McTaggart: I appreciate Joan McAlpine’s intervention, but it is important that we concentrate on what the Scottish Government is doing with its budget instead of looking at what is happening elsewhere and laying blame elsewhere. The Scottish index of multiple deprivation shows that only 68 per cent of those adults who live in the most deprived 20 per cent of areas have participated in cultural...
Anne McTaggart: I am particularly pleased to participate in this members’ business debate on the NHS Tayside report on new psychoactive substances, as I have previously worked in and around addiction services. I thank Alex Johnstone for bringing the debate to the chamber. Although there is much media and political interest in new psychoactive substances, there is currently very little robust data on...
Anne McTaggart: I am pleased to have another opportunity this week to contribute to the debate on welfare reform and the Smith commission. I welcome the findings in the Welfare Reform Committee’s interim report and thank it for all the hard work that it has done to date. As I am sure members throughout the chamber will agree, welfare and its challenges are among the most common subjects of the...
Anne McTaggart: I am pleased to have the opportunity to contribute to the stage 1 debate on the Welfare Funds (Scotland) Bill, which is vital to many of my constituents in Glasgow. I am broadly in support of the general principles of the bill. However, there are a number of reservations that I and a number of support organisations are of the opinion will have to be addressed. A principal aim of the interim...
Anne McTaggart: I thank John Mason for securing this important members’ business debate. The on-going issues to do with the Bellgrove hotel have been of great concern to many of my constituents in Glasgow. A fundamental responsibility of society is to protect the wellbeing of all its citizens, and particularly its most vulnerable members. John Mason’s motion seeks to do exactly that. It seeks to protect...
Anne McTaggart: I am particularly pleased to speak in this debate because I am a member of the Local Government and Regeneration Committee. I thank and congratulate my colleagues on the committee and our wonderful clerking team. Given that we have produced our eighth report, I am sure that the clerks will take a well-earned rest now. I hope that the report’s recommendations will inform the decisions that...
Anne McTaggart: Yes, I most certainly agree with Kevin Stewart that we could learn lessons from some areas. Part of the issue is that the powers that community authorities hold are not those that community members believe most affect them. I therefore agree with the recommendation in the report that powers be moved to the lowest appropriate level. However, part of moving power closer to communities is about...
Anne McTaggart: I thank Fergus Ewing for securing time in the chamber to discuss the issue, as there is not much disagreement that 2014 has been a great year for tourism in Scotland and particularly my city of Glasgow. In my contribution to this interesting debate, I will highlight a few facts. I am well aware that members mentioned some of the events, but some of them are so important that I will mention...
Anne McTaggart: At the outset, I welcome Derek Mackay to his new ministerial role and tell him that I am missing him already from local government. I thank Jim Hume for recognising in the motion a great example of the Scottish Government doing its job. The motion recognises a simple matter on which the Scottish Government has worked to benefit directly the people of the eastern borderlands. The creation of a...
Anne McTaggart: 4. To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to promote the benefits of organ donation. (S4O-03704)
Anne McTaggart: I thank the minister for the outstanding work that the Scottish Government has been doing. However, in light of the facts that, for every one organ donor, seven lives can be saved, and that 38 people died last year in Scotland alone while waiting for organs, will the Scottish Government back the introduction of a soft opt-out system for organ donation so as to increase the number of available...
Anne McTaggart: The on-going matter of welfare benefits for people living with disabilities is of great concern to all of us here and to many of my constituents. As a society, we are responsible for looking out for those who are in need, including people with disabilities. Surely we all subscribe to that view regardless of our political colour. In the past few years, though, little has been done to protect...
Anne McTaggart: I will answer that further on in my speech. We should support the existence of the UK-wide welfare state in which a social union exists and where we work together to protect the basic entitlements enjoyed by all British people. Professor Iain McLean, professor of politics at the University of Oxford, in his submission to our Finance Committee, said: “It is for this Parliament to decide...
