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Donate to our crowdfunderGraeme Dey: ...—before the full scale of the impact emerges. As Mike Russell and Jackie Baillie have highlighted, there is already great concern among businesses, large and small, about all the implications. Brexit and its possible consequences are creating genuine worry over the future viability of some businesses in my constituency. Within a matter of hours of the outcome of the referendum being...
Graeme Dey: 6. To ask the Scottish Government what assessment it has made of the implications of Brexit for the college sector. (S5O-00186)
Graeme Dey: ...minister will be aware, from her recent visit there, of the success story that is Dundee and Angus College. However, the progress that has been made post-regionalisation faces being undermined by Brexit, with the college being confronted by the loss of £2 million of annual funding from the European social fund and the European regional development fund as a consequence of the UK leaving...
Graeme Dey: ...think that Dundee and Angus College would be looking to the future with justified optimism. However, right now a cloud is hanging over that college and all Scotland’s colleges, in the form of Brexit and the long-term implications of exiting the EU. In its former existence as separate entities and in its current guise, Dundee and Angus College has benefited from some £30 million in EU...
Graeme Dey: After years of the drip-drip undermining and misreporting of the EU by sections of our print media, was it altogether surprising that so many people in the UK fell for the claims of Brexit advocates about aspects of EU-inspired law? There were stories about those Brussels bureaucrats who were imposing their will on the Brits and demanding that bananas and cucumbers not be overly curved, that...
Graeme Dey: ...the cabinet secretary for that reply, which lays bare the damage that Scotland being dragged out of the EU against its will would have. Does he agree that the continued uncertainty surrounding Brexit is already putting at risk potential investment in Scotland by business?
Graeme Dey: I wonder whether we could, for a moment, focus on the human aspect of all this: the people who are in the firing line of Brexit and those who could, if Scotland finds itself with no access to the single market, suffer directly from its consequences. I refer not only to the overwhelming majority of Scots who voted to remain, and those who voted to leave but not for the hard Brexit that is...
Graeme Dey: ...Scotland rural development programme forest grant scheme. In the past 15 months, 1,500 hectares of woodland creation has been approved and supported by £10 million in funding. Clearly, courtesy of Brexit, the future nature of LEADER and the SRDP are in doubt, along with a 55 per cent underwriting of the forest grant scheme from the European agricultural fund for rural development, but in...
Graeme Dey: 4. To ask the Scottish Government what progress is being made in negotiations with the United Kingdom Government regarding the freedom of movement of agriculture and horticulture workers post-Brexit. (S5O-00703)
Graeme Dey: ...project? There is still some way to go and we will shortly see what the three-yearly Scottish biodiversity strategy tells us. We will also see the potential challenges that are to be faced around Brexit. However, progress is being made and, with regard to building on that, there are some encouraging signs of people reaching out to find common ground and agreement. The newly produced SWT...
Graeme Dey: ...sure that businesses in the areas that we represent understand the back-up that is available to them and to their employees. Sadly, that is going to become increasingly important in the light of Brexit. I note that the Tory amendment does not mention the B-word—I assume that it is covered by the phrase “other challenges”—but Brexit is beginning to have an impact. The other day, I...
Graeme Dey: ...Heritage report on the future vision for Scotland’s uplands to digest and act on, is it realistic to increase that workload, especially as it is set to be added to greatly by the consequences of Brexit? We should recognise that deer management, wildlife crime, land use in the uplands and biodiversity are, to varying degrees, issues of direct relevance to the existing parks and they would...
Graeme Dey: ...go along with it and there are still associated costs. As I said, in making my comments, I am playing devil’s advocate rather than trying to shoot down the idea. Without considering the impact of Brexit, where would the money to fund new national parks come from at a time of constrained and, indeed, shrinking budgets? Would the expectation be that we would cut the funding for the...
Graeme Dey: The uncertainty around Brexit is already impacting significantly on the United Kingdom soft fruit sector, with reports emerging of European Union worker shortages. This morning, Angus Growers from my constituency was on national radio to highlight once again its concerns about where this is headed. Will the First Minister outline what can be and what is being done here in Scotland to help...
Graeme Dey: 5. To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to address the impact of Brexit on Scotland’s public finances. (S5O-01199)
Graeme Dey: ...at the result and was already processing its potential impact on his industry, given its reliance on migrant workers. I committed to working with him and his colleagues to address the damage that Brexit might inflict on a sector that contributes more than £47 million a year to the economy of Angus. Astonishingly, more than 500 days on from that vote, the question remains of exactly where...
Graeme Dey: ...downgraded to grade 2. Presiding Officer, in total, those farms took a £660,000 hit, courtesy of having fewer workers at their disposal. If not entirely, that is certainly largely because of the Brexit decision. No one can reasonably suggest that things are going to get better, at least, not any time soon. The NFUS believes that mechanisms to allow access to workers must be introduced, so...
Graeme Dey: Brexit, as it looks like it will play out, will have deeply damaging consequences for my constituency, particularly the college, agriculture and tourism sectors. Now that we know that the United Kingdom Government’s leaked Brexit analysis shows broadly the same thing as the projections that the Scottish Government published, does the First Minister think that it was reasonable for Ruth...
Graeme Dey: ...to meet the cost of removing cigarette butts. However, I guess that we might be racing against time given that the UK Government’s intention is not to transpose that proposal into UK law post-Brexit. Individually, cigarette butts might not give the appearance of causing a significant detrimental environmental impact, but we are told that, globally, 4.5 trillion cigarette butts make their...
Graeme Dey: This feels a wee bit like groundhog day. We are the best part of two years on from the fateful Brexit vote, and still we have no resolution on what migration will look like after we leave the EU. I find myself rising in the chamber yet again to highlight its implications for a key economic contributor in my constituency—the soft fruit sector. In the time since I first raised the matter back...