Another hectic Holyrood term

With the summer finally upon us MSPs have now departed Holyrood for their constituencies after a parliamentary term that has seen no shortage of activity or excitement.

It is true that a week is a long time in politics and by this logic, six months a stretch that can witness enormous progress, change, and indeed its fair share of drama. And this term has been no exception. With a raft of legislation put into action, numerous manifesto claims honoured by the SNP Government and several unexpected turns by our opponents, events have all made for interesting times in Scottish politics.

One of the defining moments of the term came early in the year as the first ever SNP budget was delivered. The historic budget heralded a number of success stories for Scotland, the material benefits of which are already being felt by people in Banff & Buchan and across the country. Not least of these achievements was enabling local authorities to freeze council tax and allowing a further 1000 police officers to be recruited over the next three years. A key focus of the budget was on stimulating the economy to grow, both locally and nationally. This was achieved through the common sense measure of scrapping and slashing business rates for small companies – a move that came as a major relief to businesses in Banff & Buchan, particularly in the current tough circumstances of rising oil and food prices.

It has been a period of little rest for the SNP Government, as we work relentlessly on all fronts to fulfil our manifesto promises. In a short six months we have abolished bridge tolls on the Tay and Forth Road Bridges, eased the financial pressures on students by scrapping the graduate endowment fee and lowered prescription charges from £6.85 to £5 as the first phase of eradicating the costs completely in 2011. We have taken our democratic engagement with the people of Scotland to the next level by engaging civic groups and organisations in the National Conversation, the nation-wide forum on Scotland's constitutional future.

Over a year since the 2007 Scottish elections however our steady progress has not been matched by our opponents across the chamber. The last six months has seen the Labour party in utter disarray, still struggling to come to terms with their new role in opposition. After abstaining from voting on our national budget, including their own amendment, the party have undergone their Scottish leader's continued dodgy donations fiasco, a series of confusing u-turns on her position on an independence referendum, and now, unsurprisingly they face another leadership contest less than a year since the last. As the SNP get on with advancing its agenda to make Scotland wealthier, healthier, fairer, safer, smarter and greener, Labour has no clear leadership, no clear vision for our country and no clear position on Scotland's future. With a number of key manifesto pledges delivered it seems fair to say that the 'honeymoon period' is far from over for the SNP and that our success has had little to do with novelty. The SNP is proving its substance in Government and proving that it will govern consistently with Scotland's best interests at heart. But we are far from complacent and realise there is much more to be done over the next three years. For my part, as the recess period commences I look forward to continuing the good work here in Banff & Buchan and serving the needs of all of my constituents over the summer months.

A fairer tax for a fairer Scotland

Tax is never a popular issue but it is up to any good government to make tax as reasonable and as fair as possible. This is why the SNP Government is proposing to replace the unfair and regressive Council Tax with a fairer, means-based Local Income Tax. We believe, as do the majority of the Scottish public, that the property based tax is unfair as it takes no account of people's ability to pay and can result in some of the most well off paying the least and some of the least well off, including pensioners, paying the most. This is a fact that is not lost on Scotland's councils as we recently saw the body which represents them, the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities (COSLA) give their backing to the tax. It is not surprising that local authorities would support this progressive tax when the vast majority of people will be better off while those earning the very least will see an average 5.7 per cent weekly increase in their income as a result. The SNP want to ease the burden on taxpayers and put money back in people's pockets as part of a wealthier, fairer nation.