Part of the debate – in the Scottish Parliament at on 27 October 2016.
The First Minister:
Yes, I will give that commitment. Indeed, we have already announced certain changes to help to make sure that that commitment can be delivered.
I have mentioned statistics: a horrifying statistic is that only 6 per cent of care-experienced young people go to university. We have therefore accepted the commission on widening access’s recommendation to ensure not only guaranteed places at university for care-experienced young people who have the grades, but full grants for those care-experienced young people going to university. That is a concrete example of the progress that we are making. We have to do much more, and we have to do it in partnership with the people who are the experts—those who are in care or who have experienced care.
I have been moved beyond belief by some of the conversations that I have had with care-experienced young people in the past few months. I have no doubt that, if we come together—not just as a Parliament, but as a country—and put those young people at the heart of what we are trying to do, we can do something really special that in years to come we can all look back on with pride.
Ministers make up the Government and almost all are members of the House of Lords or the House of Commons. There are three main types of Minister. Departmental Ministers are in charge of Government Departments. The Government is divided into different Departments which have responsibilities for different areas. For example the Treasury is in charge of Government spending. Departmental Ministers in the Cabinet are generally called 'Secretary of State' but some have special titles such as Chancellor of the Exchequer. Ministers of State and Junior Ministers assist the ministers in charge of the department. They normally have responsibility for a particular area within the department and are sometimes given a title that reflects this - for example Minister of Transport.
