A Hectic Year Of Activity In Parliament

As 2006 draws to a close, we have seen that the Parliament has been a flurry of activity, with more than 15 Bills becoming law, along with the many debates and question-times that have taken place since the turn of the year.

One of the more recent Bills that passed has been to establish a bank holiday for St Andrew's Day, although the Labour-led Executive diluted the original proposals.

Instead of creating an additional public holiday, Labour decided to offer to replace an existing holiday.

This is disappointing, given the fact that Scotland has fewer public holidays than any other EU country. Labour once again have shown their lack of ambition by refusing to back the proposal of making St Andrew's Day an extra holiday.

The benefits are obvious for everyone to see: the holi-day would be a welcome break, as well as bringing a boost to our tourism, retail and hospitality sectors over the winter period.

2006 saw local politics take off when our communities rallied round to campaign in a bid to save their maternity units.

Given that the Executive's own report into the NHS stressed the importance of keeping health services local, the policy that NHS Grampian adopted with relation to maternity units was entirely at odds with the stated Government policy.

However, thanks to the hard work and dogged determination of those who campaigned to keep our services, we now have a very good chance of getting birth units in Fraserburgh and Banff similar to those which have been working very well for some time in the NHS Highland area.

The meeting I had with the Health Minister recently highlighted that local people can bring about change, and I would like to congratulate all of those that made their voices heard. Hopefully in the new year, we will have something to cheer about!

Icy chill

NOW that winter has finally descended, there is a further chill in the air with the recently released figures that tell us that 328,000 households in Scotland suffer from fuel poverty.

The Executive should hang their heads in shame that we have fuel poverty; after all, we are an oil-rich nation just like Norway.

The difference between Scotland and Norway, however, is that Norway is independent.

This independence has given Norway the ability and confidence to create a petroleum fund, which is now worth £90 billion and will secure the future of the Norwegian economy and people not just for 20, 30 or 40 years – but probably for hundreds of years to come.

It has been so successful that the Norwegians are using not only the interest on the capital but the interest on the interest on the capital to invest in their economy.

Scottish Gas and Scottish Power have increased their prices by 22% and 17% respectively: I fear that people will be left with the choice of whether to eat or heat.

What my party and I would argue for as a long-term solution is the citizens' pension, which would offer a decent standard of living for all. At this time of year I would especially ask those with elderly neighbours to take the time to check that they are okay.

Finally...I would like to take this opportunity to wish everyone a happy and safe Christmas and New Year.