2. I begin by saying that all our thoughts go to those involved in this morning’s incident at Stonehaven and all our thanks and support go to the emergency service crews who are in attendance. Let us hope that lives are saved and not lost.

“I want Sam Galbraith out of office, not off the hook.”

Those are your words, First Minister, from 24 August 2000, when the then education secretary faced a vote of no confidence from this Parliament after 9,000 pupils did not get their exam results on time. That is a fraction of the 75,000 pupils whose results were downgraded by the Scottish Qualifications Authority on your own education secretary’s self-confessed instruction. Why then, First Minister, do you want John Swinney off the hook rather than out of office?

People are going to have to make their own minds up about this, although I suspect that minds in this chamber are pretty fixed on it. Richard Leonard is giving the impression that he is more interested in the politics of this than in having the issue actually fixed for young people across the country. However, we are living right now in unprecedented and unique circumstances. We were faced with something that has not happened in Scotland in more than 100 years: the cancellation of our exam diet. There was no easy option open to ministers, just as there were no easy options open to the Labour Government in Wales or the Conservative Government in the United Kingdom. We had to come up with an alternative to exams to certificate our young people’s achievements.

We asked the SQA to come up with an approach that maintained standards. We have reflected in the past few days that that was not the right approach. We have the humility, frankly, to say that we got it wrong and to apologise to young people and put it right. I think that, particularly in these times of crisis, that is what people want to see happen. I was struck, in something that I read in the media about the Deputy First Minister over the past week, by a comment from the father of a young person who had been affected by this. I actually suspect that what he said is how not everybody, but probably the Majority of people across Scotland feel. He said:

“Show me a man that has never made a mistake and I will show you a man that’s never worked. He is human and I take my hat off to him for saying he was wrong. Everyone makes mistakes and I hope everyone learns from this.”

That is the approach that this Government is taking to these unprecedented times. It is up to the Opposition, as it would have been up to us in Opposition, to decide how they tackle these things. However, I think that all the evidence right now suggests that, in these difficult times, the public wants to see leadership that is prepared to admit when they get things wrong and to put them right. That is the approach that this Government is going to continue to take.

I will go to something else that the First Minister said, which is from August 2015:

“Let me be clear—I want to be judged on this. If you are not, as First Minister, prepared to put your neck on the line on the education of our young people then what are you prepared to. It really matters.”

If it really matters, why did neither the First Minister nor her education secretary listen to the voices telling her that the SQA moderation system was not right? She was warned in April; she was warned in May; she was warned in June; and she was warned again in July that this system would not work. In fact, in May, the Equality and Human Rights Commission warned that the

“SQA have been unable to demonstrate that they have considered any equality issues in their work in this area, or that they have met their legal duties”.

We now know that the results were pre-released to John Swinney five days before the pupils saw them. He could have fixed it then; he could have saved all those young people from all that anguish; he could have saved the First Minister from having to make a grovelling apology—but he did not. Why is his neck not on the line?

The First Minister:

John Swinney announced yesterday that there will be an independent review to look at the lessons that should be learned, and I think that that is the right thing to do.

I made a judgment. We are in difficult circumstances and we did not get this right. I accept that, and it is important to be absolutely open about that. We did not get this right. We acted with the best of intentions. We judged that it was important to have a set of results this year that were comparable in standard with those in previous years. I think now that that was not the right judgment, which is why we have made the decision that John Swinney announced yesterday.

I accept that in the circumstances in which we are living, there has been no decision that I or any member of this Government has taken over the past five months that has been easy or where there has been an absolute right or wrong. We are living through the most horrendously difficult set of circumstances. That is why it is so important to recognise that where, despite the best of intentions, we get things wrong, we do not dig our heels in but we put things right. That is what we have done.

Again, I think that the evidence suggests that people prefer that approach to government to the ding-dong exchanges that I, in Opposition, have been as guilty of as anybody else—I am not criticising that. However, we are not living in normal times. Richard Leonard can quote me from four years ago or 20 years ago, but we are living through a global pandemic right now, where the choices that we face and the challenges that confront us are really difficult. We will continue to lead the country through this as best we can and we will not shy away from saying when we get things wrong and taking the action that we need to take to put things right. I think that people prefer that approach to the traditional approach to politics that we have in more normal times.

But the point is that month after month after month, the First Minister was forewarned that this problem would arise when the results were announced last week. “Judge me on education,” the First Minister said. Of the young people who demonstrated, forced the Government climbdown, and refused to take this injustice lying down, the oldest have been at school for 13 years, so every single day of their education has been under the stewardship of the Scottish National Party. Where did it take them? To having to organise street demonstrations and online petitions just to get the Government to hear them and to give them the results that they had worked hard for.

Schools all over Scotland are making a fresh start today. Pupils, staff and teachers have our good wishes and our good will, but they need the resources to make the return to school work and they need an education secretary in whom they can have confidence. Will the First Minister give them that and sack John Swinney?

The First Minister:

First, on the young people who made their case over the past few days so passionately, as Richard Leonard rightly says, for many of them, their entire school careers have taken place while my party has been in Government.

I reflect on the fact that the objectives of curriculum for excellence are to ensure that young people are confident individuals and are engaged, active and responsible citizens. I think that, in the way that they have conducted themselves, those young people are actually a credit to the Scottish education system, because, having listened to many of them over the past 24 hours, I know that they understand and recognise the difficult circumstances and welcome the action that the Government has taken and the fact that I and the Deputy First Minister have apologised to them for their experience over the past few days.

One of the few things that cannot be said to be my responsibility, I am delighted to say, is how the Opposition parties conduct themselves, but I think that, for all that the Government got this wrong—I keep saying that because I do not want anyone to think that I am shying away from that in any way, shape or form—we also put it right, and I think that it is the Opposition that is increasingly out of touch in not recognising that the public understand how difficult the situation that we face right now is. They want a Government and leadership that accepts that sometimes we will get things wrong and we will put them right and continue to lead the country forward in the best way that we possibly can.