Part of the debate – in the Scottish Parliament at on 28 February 2023.
Alex Cole-Hamilton
Liberal Democrat
Nobody but nobody in this chamber is disputing the fact that Scotland has tremendous offshore renewable energy generation potential. What we are disputing is the bogus statistics that artificially inflate that potential on the world stage. Twice now we have seen some fancy footwork from the Cabinet secretary trying to say that the statistic has been overtaken by developments, but if the developments that he is talking about are the realisation that that figure was always mince, he is quite right. This was a mash-up of reports and academic research going back to 1991 that excluded the renewable powerhouse of Scandinavia. We have raised that point time and time again. I challenged the First Minister and Lorna Slater on that figure and they told me that it was outdated when, in fact, it was never true.
They dodged my parliamentary questions asking them to correct the
Official Report in the requisite time. That correction has never been requested.
Why are there no consequences for any of those ministers, including the Cabinet Secretary for Constitution, External Affairs and Culture? Does accuracy, transparency and accountability in Parliament and on the international stage matter so little to this Government?
The cabinet is the group of twenty or so (and no more than 22) senior government ministers who are responsible for running the departments of state and deciding government policy.
It is chaired by the prime minister.
The cabinet is bound by collective responsibility, which means that all its members must abide by and defend the decisions it takes, despite any private doubts that they might have.
Cabinet ministers are appointed by the prime minister and chosen from MPs or peers of the governing party.
However, during periods of national emergency, or when no single party gains a large enough majority to govern alone, coalition governments have been formed with cabinets containing members from more than one political party.
War cabinets have sometimes been formed with a much smaller membership than the full cabinet.
From time to time the prime minister will reorganise the cabinet in order to bring in new members, or to move existing members around. This reorganisation is known as a cabinet re-shuffle.
The cabinet normally meets once a week in the cabinet room at Downing Street.
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.
