 yn the previous Tory government, so the continued investment from this SNP government will help to make that difference. We now move to First Minister's questions. Question 1, Kezia Dugdale. I think I know the answer to this one, Presiding Officer, but can I ask the First Minister what engagement she has planned for the rest of the day? First Minister, engagement is to take for the Government's programme for Scotland and a trip to Manchester for the general election leaders debate. Kezia Dugdale. The First Minister has claimed that electing more SNP MPs will deliver full powers for Scotland. On Monday, her deputy said that there would need to be legislative process to go through to make this a reality. Within 100 days of taking office, a Labour Government will bring forward a home rule bill to put the Smith agreement powers and more into law. Can the First Minister confirm whether her MPs will table amendments to the bill to legislate for full fiscal autonomy within the UK? First Minister, First Lady, we will be happy to support any bill that transfers powers from Westminster to the Scottish Parliament. Secondly, yes, the SNP MPs will seek to strengthen any Labour bill or indeed any Tory bill to bring more powers to the Scottish Parliament. I guess the question for Kezia Dugdale is will Labour support the amendments of the SNP to strengthen this Parliament even further? Kezia Dugdale. It is not quite a straight answer to what was a very simple and straight question. Full fiscal autonomy is the SNP's central general election demand and the First Minister said again earlier this week on the radio that that is what she wants. So I will give the First Minister another chance to be straight with the people of Scotland. She supports full fiscal autonomy within the UK. There will be a legislative mechanism by which this could be delivered. So will the SNP table amendments to the Home Rule Bill to deliver full fiscal autonomy within the UK? First of all, let's see if Labour, if they are in government, will bring forward this bill, because Scotland is very used to Labour's broken promises when it comes to delivering anything. The SNP stands for independence. I don't think that's any secret, and yes, we stand short of independence for maximum powers for this Parliament, and that is what we will argue for. But let me also throw back a challenge to Kezia Dugdale. What else SNP MPs will be arguing for and voting for in the House of Commons is a real alternative to the £30 billion austerity cuts that Labour has signed up to? Will Labour MPs back that? Secondly, we will be voting for an end to the proposal, the grotesque proposal, to spend £100 billion renewing Trident on the Clyde. Will Labour back that? She can't bring herself to say the words, full fiscal autonomy. It defines belief. It seems that the SNP are developing a bad habit of concealing their plans for even more austerity on the people of Scotland, because we know that full fiscal autonomy would impose an extra £7.6 billion worth of cuts in Scotland. That's billions of pounds of cuts to our schools, to our NHS and to our pensions. It's 130,000 jobs. In this chamber, on 19 March, the First Minister said of George Osborne's budget, that there is plenty that I would choose to reverse, starting with the austerity cuts that are going to be deeper than anything that we have seen before. Can the First Minister tell us how much spending would increase in 2015-16 under the SNP's plans compared to the Tories? The only cuts on the horizon for Scotland are the £30 billion cuts that the Tories have proposed and Labour has signed up to. Scotland's share of that £30 billion cut would be £2.4 billion. That's the reality. On what I propose, I have put forward an alternative to that. I have put forward a proposal for modest spending increases in the life of the next Parliament that would deliver additional spending of more than £148 billion over the life of the next Parliament. That is the alternative to the £30 billion of cuts that Labour has signed up to over the next two years. There is the choice that people face. It is a very clear choice. They can vote for Labour or the Tories or the Liberals and they are voting for more austerity cuts, or they can vote for SNP and they are voting for a clear alternative to austerity. We know from the SNP plans themselves that they do not plan to spend a single extra penny more than the Tories in 2015-16. Zero, nada, zilt, not a single penny. I cannot work out what is for such a radical change in the SNP's economic thinking. They tell us that they are anti-austerity, but they do not plan to spend a single penny more than the Tories. They tell us that they stand for public services, but they cut education spending—something the Tories did not even do. They say that they are for full fiscal autonomy within the UK, but they cannot tell us when. The SNP will not come clean because they know that full fiscal autonomy within the UK would be a disaster—a disaster for our schools, our NHS, our young, our energy, our working families, the unemployed, the sick and every single citizen in this country. At the weekend, the First Minister talked a lot about guts and backbone. Where is the backbone to push for full fiscal autonomy within the UK that she says she believes in? Why does she not have the guts to admit that the SNP's plans for full fiscal autonomy would be a disaster for Scotland's public services? First Minister? Let me set a few facts here. We will spend under our existing powers and resources an extra £600 million in the next financial year. I listened to Gordon Brown on Monday, and I have to say that he took sleight of hand to a whole new level even for Gordon Brown. He was promising to spend in the next financial year the revenue from tax increases proposed by Labour that will not actually take effect until the financial year after that. That is a nerve even for Gordon Brown, but what he did not say, of course, is that the so-called extra spending for Scotland will pale into total insignificance compared to the £30 billion cuts that Labour has signed up to, because Labour can duck and they can dive, but the Scottish people have got Labour's measure. They know that Labour is proposing further austerity, and they know that the only alternative to Tory Labour liberal austerity is the SNP. Thank you, Presiding Officer, to ask the First Minister when she will next meet the Secretary of State for Scotland. First Minister? No current plans. Presiding Officer, this week more than 100 job creators signed a letter saying that the Conservative-led government has been good for business, good for jobs and good for Britain. That is companies that employ more than half a million people across the UK, including thousands right here in Scotland. Apart from Jim McCall, can the First Minister tell us what businesses have come out publicly for her alternative plan of full fiscal autonomy? I think that we will see over the next few weeks what the people of Scotland, the ordinary voters, the length and breadth of this country, think about the record of the Tory Government and what they think about whether another Tory Government will be good for Scotland. There is a clear position that people in Scotland have taken for my entire lifetime, and that is one of rejection of the Tories, because they know that the Tories are disastrous for Scotland. That was pretty clear then, none. No businesses have come out for full fiscal autonomy. You do not need a whole front page for that. There is a very simple bottom line. The bottom line is that job creators are telling the world that Conservative policies across Britain have shown that the UK is open for business. Those policies have delivered 174,000 extra jobs in Scotland, 57,000 fewer job seekers and created 38,000 more businesses here. At this election, Scotland faces a choice—back to work with the Conservatives, or back to economic chaos with Labour, and this time with the SNP holding them to ransom. There is no wonder that job creators do not support their plans because it spells double trouble for our country. Between them, the parties to the left of me are threatening more borrowing, no cap on benefits and tax rises across the board. When what we need right now is stability and security, so can I ask the First Minister, Urga, does the First Minister believe that any pact with this Labour Party could possibly deliver it? Ruth Davidson talks about more borrowing. The Chancellor of the Exchequer, a member of her party, has missed his own financial targets in this Parliament to the tune of £150 billion—that is the reality of Tory stewardship of the economy. I have to let Ruth Davidson into a wee secret, and I suspect that it is going to come as a deep disappointment to her, but she is kind of wasting her time trying to convince me to vote Tory, or that the Tories are good for Scotland. It is not going to work. So what I suggest to her is that she takes her message to the people of Scotland and see what they think. The polls are shown right now what they think. The SNP is leading those polls in Scotland for the general election, although I take nothing for granted. I take nothing for granted. However, let me say this. If people in Scotland vote SNP, then they know that what they will get is a loud voice for Scotland in the House of Commons, and what they will get is progressive politics better than anything that the Liberals or Labour have ever had to offer Scotland. Today is World Autism Awareness Day. I ask the First Minister if she agrees with the call that was made during yesterday's members' business debate to make Scotland an autism-friendly nation. I ask her if she will also take the opportunity to congratulate the hard-working staff of the Scottish Parliament who have become the first public building in Scotland to achieve the Autism Access Award. Silyd, on the world autism awareness day, I want to state that I share the aspiration of making Scotland an autism-friendly nation. I give my commitment that the Scottish Government will continue to support the work of autism charities to increase awareness and understanding of autism across all sectors. The Government is committed to the delivery of the Scottish strategy for autism and is working with autism charities and statutory organisations to build awareness. I congratulate the Scottish Parliament on being the first building in Scotland to be awarded the National Autistic Society's Autism Access Award. All sectors of Scottish society should recognise and understand the needs of people with autism. It is fitting that the Scottish Parliament should be the first to receive the award. I now take the opportunity to call upon all sectors of Scottish society to work with us in making Scotland as a country, an autism-friendly nation. To ask the First Minister what issues will be discussed at the next meeting of the cabinet. Matters of importance to the people of Scotland. Last week, I told the First Minister that people were waiting up to an hour to have their calls answered at the police control centre at Bilston Glen. Police Scotland dismissed my concerns saying that calls were answered within a minute. That turns out to be true because it is an automated machine. A police call handler told me that people can wait an age to speak to a human after they have pressed the right button. Sargent Murray McKenzie told the police conference that super-sized control rooms are a disaster. Calls are constantly lost. I told the First Minister about this last week. Since then, what has she done about it? The First Minister. After FMQs last week, I did, of course, make inquiries. As I said to Willie Rennie that I would do, what I have found out is that one caller was, unfortunately, left in the line for 58 minutes while making a 101 call. That was due to a technical fault that caused the call to repeatedly drop to the end of the queue. The issue has been resolved and the chief constable has personally apologised to the individual concerned in that case. One calls at Bilston Glen are being answered, on average, within a minute. That is the case. And what I can say, as I said last week, is that the Scottish Government will continue to work with Police Scotland and with police officers and with those answering calls to make sure that the service members of the public get is of a quality that they have a right to expect. I do think that she needs to look into the veracity of the exploration that she has been provided to say that there is a queue that only lasts a minute when it is an automated machine that is unacceptable. I think that she needs to ask more questions of the police we have had, not just members of the public contacting me but call handlers and we have heard what Sergeant Mackenzie said this week at the police conference. I am increasingly concerned about the integrity and the practices of the leadership of Police Scotland. She heard them yesterday at the conference. She heard it loud and clear yesterday at the conference. On stop and search, on guns, on the information commissioner, on targets, the leadership of Police Scotland seemed incapable of being straight with their answers and now on control rooms. Her Government has created this single centralised police force. What is the First Minister going to do to fix it? As I will always do, if concerns are raised at FMQs, I will look into those concerns and I will give an undertaking to Willie Rennie that I will, as I did last week, look into the additional concerns that he has raised this week. I, like Willie Rennie and Ruth Davidson, were at the Scottish Police Federation conference yesterday. We heard concerns about a range of issues, but we also heard—I think that we should all reflect on this—about the good work in very difficult circumstances that our police officers do each and every single day. Take stop and search as an example. It is an example that illustrates the fact that, when concerns are raised, those concerns are responded to and actioned. This week, we have seen Police Scotland move to a presumption against non-statutory stop and search. We have seen Police Scotland remove the performance target around stop and search that has been causing concern. I welcome those actions. We have also heard Police Scotland undertake to implement all the recommendations of the report that Her Majesty's Inspector published on Tuesday this week. We have also had the Justice Secretary set up an advisory group, chaired by John Scott QC, to look at the longer-term issues around stop and search and how we move forward on that issue on a basis as far as possible of consensus, so that the public of confidence, Parliament has confidence, but Police Scotland also has the flexibility to do their job in the way that we expect them to do it. I would hope that Willie Rennie would take all of that as a sign that we do respond to concerns that are raised and that we do so in a very constructive way. Thank you, Presiding Officer. To ask the First Minister what steps the Scottish Government is taking to protect babies from meningitis B. Meningitis B can be devastating for children and for families. The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation has recommended that babies from two months old should be vaccinated against the disease. I am very pleased to confirm that Scotland will be one of the first countries in the world to offer a meningitis B vaccine as part of our routine childhood vaccination programme. I thank the First Minister for that answer. Does she agree with the World Health Organization that immunisation is a proven, safe and cost-effective tool for controlling and eliminating life-threatening infectious diseases, saving millions of lives every year? Given that meningitis B is life-threatening and is most common in babies and young children, does she agree that the roll-out of the vaccine is a significant step in making meningitis B a disease of the past, along with polio and tetanus? Can she provide more detail on what specific age groups will be covered by the vaccination in order to save lives and tackle the effects of meningitis B? A total of three doses of the meningitis B vaccine will be given, and it will be given at two, four and twelve months of age. All babies aged two months at the point of introduction will be eligible for the vaccine. As advised by the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation, there will also be a one-off catch-up programme for babies aged three and four months of age when the programme begins. The programme will have the real potential to save lives, and I know that everybody across the chamber will welcome it. Thank you, Presiding Officer. Another life-threatening disease is also meningitis W. Will the vaccine for that be offered in Scotland to teenagers? As Eileen Smith will be aware, we follow the advice of the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation when it comes to vaccines that are offered in Scotland. The decision on meningitis B flows from the recommendation that GCVI has made. We will continue across a whole range of illnesses and diseases for which there are vaccinations to follow that expert advice, and we will seek to apply that expert advice as quickly as possible. To ask the First Minister what services will be supported by the recently announced £20 million to help to tackle domestic abuse? The £20 million that I announced reflects my commitment to create a fairer and more equal Scotland, subject to discussion with both justice agencies and victims organisations. The funds will be invested over the next three years in a range of measures to benefit victims, in particular victims of domestic abuse that will help to speed up the court process, increase access to specialist advocacy support and legal services and expand innovative initiatives such as the Caledonian system, which helps offenders to change their behaviour and reduce harm to victims. We will also look to improve education and understanding that violence and abuse are unacceptable in modern Scotland. The funding follows the launch last week of our consultation on measures to strengthen the criminal law against domestic abuse and sexual offences, including plans for a specific domestic abuse offence. I am sure that the First Minister supports the Edinburgh domestic abuse court service, which helps to ensure the safety of women experiencing domestic abuse as well as their access to justice. Does she realise that the service run by Edinburgh women's aid is facing a shortfall of £147,000 from 1 June? Will she use some of the domestic abuse money to ensure that the service does not shrink to a dangerous extent? I am aware of the Edinburgh domestic abuse court service and I am aware of the shortfall and funding that Malcolm Chisholm talks about. I spoke last week—a week ago today, in fact—that at the Scottish Women's Aid conference in this issue was raised with me specifically. I undertook then to look into that further. Such is the value that I attach to the Edinburgh domestic abuse court service, which is delivering exactly the kind of services that I am speaking about and want to see expanded. It is exactly for that reason that this morning I have written to that service confirming that the Government will meet the shortfall and allow that service to continue. There were 60,000 incidents of domestic abuse recorded by the police in Scotland in 2012-13 at an increase of less than 1 per cent since 2011-12. Does the First Minister agree with those who think that that is likely to be an underestimate and that further work is required to work out the true extent? Yes, I think that the figures that are published and recorded will be an underestimate of the true picture. The Scottish Government recognises that the 60,000 incidents of domestic abuse recorded by the police in 2012-13 are not the whole picture. Even though the police record all incidents of domestic abuse, there will be victims who do not come forward. We are aware of the complexity surrounding domestic abuse and that is exactly why we have recently launched the consultation on reforming the criminal law to address domestic abuse and sexual offences. There are some instances of domestic abuse that we know do not easily fit within the current law and that is why we are looking at whether to create a specific criminal offence of domestic abuse. I hope that everybody with an interest in this will respond to that consultation so that we can go forward with action that makes the prosecution of this kind of offending behaviour more effective and that better reflects the true nature of domestic abuse as it is actually experienced by victims. Ruth Grant Thank you, Presiding Officer. While welcoming the additional funding, can I remind the First Minister that the joint strategic board tasked with the implementation of Equally Safe was supposed to provide an interim report by International Women's Day on 8 March this year? That has not happened. Can I ask the First Minister when will the membership of the board be published? When will it meet for the first time? And when can we expect an interim report? The First Minister We are taking all of that work forward as quickly as possible, but since Equally Safe was published on 25 June last year, positive progress has been made in a number of key areas, including the commitments that were made in the programme for government and the consultation that I have already referred to. That progress includes the courts and Crown Office have put in place additional resources to speed up the processing of cases. Police Scotland is currently piloting a disclosure scheme for domestic abuse in two locations, Aberdeen and Ayrshire. We announced that we will be investing additional funding to tackle domestic abuse. Those are some of the examples of the progress that we have seen, but Ruth Grant is right. We have got to make sure that the progress continues to move forward and I will ensure that the relevant minister keeps Parliament fully up to date with progress of this work. Margaret Mitchell Presiding Officer, while the fell funding is welcome, will the First Minister confirm that the majority of sentences that are given to domestic abuse offenders are short-term and therefore will not be affected by the proposed Government legislation to end automatic early release, which only applies to long-term prisoners? Margaret Mitchell knows that our proposals at this stage in automatic early release are to end automatic early release for long-term prisoners. With the First Government to take action to reverse the policy that was first introduced by a Conservative Government, we have had to invest in the prison estate in order to be able to do that. That is something that previous Conservative Governments completely failed to do. It remains our objective as soon as we are able to end the policy of automatic early release completely. The Government is making progress on that, and I would hope that people across the chamber would welcome that. However, I would say something that is just as important. Sentencing around issues of violence against women and domestic abuse is very important, but we need to look at how we prevent abuse, how we support victims better and how we change the behaviour of offenders. That is why our strategy to tackle domestic abuse and the funding that I am talking about is comprehensive in that respect. Sentencing is important, but there is a whole range of other things that we have to do much better as well. Christine Grahame, I very much welcome the announcement of the funding and acknowledge that the majority of victims are women, but there are male victims of domestic abuse. I would ask the First Minister to ensure that she receives support and that any proposed legislation reflects that this can happen to men as well as women. The First Minister and I have to recognise that the overwhelming majority of victims of domestic abuse are women. However, that said, men can also be subjected to this intolerable behaviour, and we know that there can be difficulties in reporting where there are male victims of domestic abuse. I encourage all victims, regardless of their age or gender, to come forward and report any incident of domestic abuse. The additional £20 million funding will, as I have already said, be invested in a range of measures, including widening access to specialist advocacy and support services for victims. Already, the Government is the first in Scotland to have made provision specifically for male victims of domestic abuse. We funded the men's advice line, which provides emotional support and advice for male victims. We have funded abused men in Scotland to help improve mainstream service. Responses to men who experience domestic abuse and the LGBTI domestic abuse project to raise awareness of domestic abuse in gay relationships is also supported by the Government. We will continue to take that comprehensive action, but we will also continue to recognise, unfortunately, that the vast majority of victims of domestic abuse are women. That is what we have to tackle and tackle effectively if we are ever to have true gender equality in this country, which is something that I and I know everybody wants to see. Question 6, Mr Fraser. Thank you. To ask the First Minister whether the Scottish Government respects the right of broadcasters such as the BBC to be free from political interference. Yes. Can I thank the First Minister for her straight answer? I hope that she would agree with me that it is one of the hallmarks of a liberal democracy anywhere in the world that the media has absolute freedom from political interference. So when the SNP backbencher Alex Salmond attacks the BBC for its coverage of the independence referendum and demands that it comes under the political control of this Parliament, is he speaking for her, her Government, the SNP or just for himself? First Minister. Everybody supports absolutely, I know I do the right of the media to be completely free of political interference. I would suggest gently to Murdo Fraser that he might want to direct some of his own comments to members of his own party. For example, I agree with the former director general of the BBC Greg Dyck, when he said this, when it comes to deciding impartiality, we can't let politicians define impartiality. Order. Those remarks were made in response to threats to the BBC licence fee by Tory party chairman Grant Shaps as a result of his alleged bias of the BBC. Perhaps he would also want to reflect on the fact that last week the Conservative party press office tweeted this BBC show in clear editorial bias by saying that there was no clear winner from last night's debate. With the greatest respect to Murdo Fraser, I will continue to defend the right of all broadcasters and all media to be completely free of political interference, but I suggest that he gets his own house in order. Does the First Minister think that the BBC will report the next time both she and myself visit Ferguson Shipyard in Port Glasgow to see how Scotland's greatest job-creator Jim McCall and the dedicated workforce are giving the yard a secure future? That's way, way wider of the question, Neil Findlay. The media, including the BBC, will play a huge role in the general election, but so will online media. Will the First Minister now show leadership and distance herself in her party from websites and blogs that revel in nasty, vindictive and gutter politics? I think that I might know about some of the websites and blogs that he is talking about. There is nothing to do with this side of the chamber. Let me say, quite clearly, as somebody who is an enthusiastic, sometimes too enthusiastic user of social media, I will always condemn anybody from any side of politics who indulges in abuse. I did that very openly in this chamber just a couple of weeks ago. I call on all parties to do likewise. It's not too long ago that a prominent Labour councillor in Aberdeen accused one of my colleagues disgracefully of using his child for political purposes. The response of the Labour Party was that his tweets were a matter for him. If he wants to ask me to lead by example, I'm happy to accept that challenge. A bit like I said to Murdo Fraser, I would call on Labour to get its own house in order as well. That ends First Minister's Questions. We are now moving to members' business, members who leave the chamber to do so quickly and quietly.