 We start this morning with General Questions. Question 1, Mike Briggs. The Scottish Government, what action is it taking to reduce waiting times for orthopedic treatments? We are taking significant action to reduce waiting times. I recognise that some patients are experiencing long waits, and that is why I have made £50 million available to NHS in Scotland. I expect to see improvements between now and the end of March. It was announced on the 29 August 2018 that setting up an exit group to reduce waiting times and improve the way elective care services are provided. The elective access collaborative programme will bring experts from the Scottish Government, the NHS and the royal colleges together to provide support to health boards. That effort has seen us deliver improvements in undisguadowed care, I will make a further announcement on that shortly. Is the cabinet secretary aware that in Lothian patients who require new hips and knees F talents are being told by NHS Lothian that it cannot meet the target of 12 weeks for referral for a new outpatient appointment and that instead they will have to wait up to 37 weeks or more than 9 months just for an initial appointment with a consultant. Will the cabinet secretary apologise to my constituents in Lothian who are suffering in pain for many months before they even see a consultant and discuss the surgery that doesn't the cabinet secretary now believe that this is yet another indictment of this Government's shambolic NHS workforce planning? I do not want any patient to wait longer than they should, but Lothian has done a lot of work in this area. Of course, I should add that the number of consultant staff working in Lothian with a specialty of trauma and orthopedic surgery has increased under this Government by over 14 per cent, but so has demand increased at the same time. Lothian has risk assessed its long-waiting specialties based on clinical priority and risk to the patient, and the board is undertaking a comprehensive review of its trauma and orthopedic services that includes an integrated back pain service, a redesign of the foot and ankle pathway and fracture pathway, investing in significant additional physiotherapy and advanced physiotherapy practitioners to support the new service models, redesigning of the hip fracture pathway to optimise care of frail and elderly older people, and improving performance through the enhanced recovery after surgery programme that looks at optimising patient recovery after joint replacement. I believe that all of those things will make a significant difference. On the issue of workforce planning, it is a bit rich of Miles Briggs to raise this issue today, when the nursing and midwifery council has published today figures that have found that the number of EEA nurses leaving the register between October 2016 and September 2016 has increased on the previous year by 67 per cent. In addition, the number of new initial registration nurses from the EEA joining them has fallen by 89 per cent compared to the previous year. I will take no lectures from Miles Briggs about workforce planning when this is having a huge impact on our nursing and midwifery workforce in the here and now, because of their ridiculous Brexit policy. Liam McArthur, the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Sport will be aware from our correspondence of the lengthy delays that orthopedic patients in Orkney are facing as a result of a lack of capacity in NHS Grampian. One constituent referred to the surgeon in May, he was told that he would have to wait 68 months, only to receive the same letter again in September announcing a further 68-month delay. In NHS Orkney this week, I have talked about plans to develop proposals with Western Isles to address the large backlog, as they call it. What steps is the cabinet secretary going to take to ensure that orthopedic patients in Orkney are treated within the 12-heat time frame set out by the Scottish Government? I appreciate the concerns that Liam McArthur has raised. The patients in Orkney rely on the services of NHS Grampian and others. What I can say to Liam McArthur is that NHS Grampian has had a significant share of £50 million to deal with and address it with some of the longest waits now, and we expect progress to be made by the end of March on those longest waits. There is a lot of collaboration between the boards in the north of Scotland, and one of the key plans that they have is working together across boards in the north to plan elective care far more efficiently and to ensure that they use all of the capacity in their northern boards. I am very happy to keep Liam McArthur up-to-date with those developments as they are taken forward. To ask the Scottish Government whether it plans to extend the electric vehicle loan scheme beyond 2018. The low-carbon transport loans will be provided until at least 2020. It is one of a range of incentives to promote the adoption of electric vehicles. I thank the cabinet secretary for that answer. The Scottish Government has set admirable and ambitious targets regarding phasing out the need for new petrol and diesel cars and vans by 2032. What longer-term initiatives has the Government got in mind to encourage the motor and public to embrace electric vehicles in terms of, for example, advantageous loans and infrastructure investment? Over the coming months, we will be making a number of announcements in this area. Those will cover infrastructure and supporting the uptake of vehicles in the public and private sectors, and those will build on the strategy that is set out in Switched on Scotland, launched by the Minister of Transport and Islands in June 2017. So far, the electric vehicle loan scheme has only been offered for new vehicles. Will the Scottish Government consider extending the scheme to used vehicles? We are always happy to consider suggestions, and we can consider that one. The loan scheme has been fairly successful thus far, and we want to build on it. I would also say that funding has enabled the grants for domestic charging points, as well as 1381, and a free advice helpline. The existing scheme is quite comprehensive, but we want to build on that. As I have said, we will be making further announcements in due course. To ask the Scottish Government what to impact the proposed cost increase for ferry freight from 1 January 2018 will have on the Northern Isles in light of reports that it was believed that prices would remain frozen. I can confirm that the revisions to freight fares reflect the terms of the Northern Isles ferry services contract, which allow for increases based on CPI. That follows two years where freight fares have been frozen. It was announced on 22 August that passenger and car fares would be reduced on ferry services to the Northern Isles in the first half of next year, fulfilling a key manifesto pledge. In light of that planned reduction in fares in the interim, we have frozen passenger and car fares on the Northern Isles ferry services. For freight, we are conducting a comprehensive freight fares review, as per the commitment that was made in the ferries plan 2013-2022. The review will fully consider the impact of any freight fare changes on island economies. That is a complex process. However, the outcome of the review will be announced as soon as possible. Rhoda Grant, I welcome the review of the freight fare increases coming into being early next year. The cabinet secretary will be aware that increases in freight costs are tantamount to tax on everything that is transported to the islands. Already, we have online retailers who will not deliver to the islands because of costs. If we are to grow the island economy, which is part of the reason for an island's bill, surely that flies in the face of that ambition. The cabinet secretary is proud of the achievement of introducing road equivalent tariff. It has been a terrific success for individuals, especially those residents in the islands. It has also helped to promote the economy of the islands. I am very pleased that Rhoda Grant has welcomed the proposed reduction fares for the Northern Isles. In respect of the freight fares review, I am sure that you will appreciate that this is a complex process. It is a very important one, and we shall announce this in due course. As far as retailers in the UK and elsewhere are not willing to make deliveries or impose additional charges, I have to say that this is something that I have worked on myself and the Scottish Government has worked on for a number of years. The postal delivery service is a matter that is reserved to Westminster, and it has utterly failed to take any action whatsoever on this for decades. Many people in the highlands and islands have, as Rhoda Grant says, suffered, paid extra or not been able to receive goods as a result of that total inertia from the UK Government on this matter. Jamie Halcro Johnston Council leaders from Orkney and Shetland will be meeting with the finance secretary later this month in relation to inter-island ferries. In today's Orcadian, the Orkney Islands Council has warned that the services may fall back to 1960s-level and have knock-on effects on council budgets unless action is taken. Is the minister content with that as a possible outcome, and how does that possibly fit with the Scottish Government's commitment to ferry funding for the northern isles? Michael Matheson Michael, if Mr Briggs was listening, he would have heard that we are just about the other one, sorry. Michael Matheson Mr Halcro Johnston If he had been listening, he would have heard that we are about, in fact, to reduce fares to the northern isles. We are proud of that. I do not recall many occasions where previous Administrations have taken that action, and we are the Administration that introduced road-equivalent tariff. If any members of the Conservative team, whoever they are, want to put forward any serious plan of any sort for any public service budget, that would indeed be a precedent, because all we hear week after week is calling for more public money and tax cuts at the same time. Perhaps Mr Davidson will get real and bring forward some grown-up policies in this Parliament. Patrick Harvie I can ask the Scottish Government what research it has carried out or commissioned on the likely impact on Scotland of the UK leaving the European Union, and whether it would publish that. Michael Russell The Scottish Government has published a number of papers that include research and commissioned work, including Scotland's Place in Europe. More recently, we published Brexit at what is at stake for business, highlighting the impact on Scotland of the UK leaving the EU. The dedicated Europe section on the Scottish Government website contains links to those, as well as to a number of other relevant publications, including the First Minister's letter to EU citizens in Scotland and the minutes of the standing council meetings. The Scottish Government believes in the need for transparency in the Brexit negotiations. We will continue to press the UK Government to publish its own analysis of the likely impact on Scotland leaving the EU. Patrick Harvie Since I lodged the question, just since yesterday's debate at Westminster, the UK Government has been forced to accept that it must publish its sectoral impact analysis statements. I very much welcome that, although I wonder what other issues in the news it is trying to distract from by publishing information merely about the destructive impact that it will unleash on the country's economy. How long will it take the Scottish Government to take the sectoral impact analysis and turn it into a more robust impact assessment about Scotland geographically, because that work, bizarrely, has not even been attempted by the UK Government? John Swinney The UK Government has had several positions on this matter, including an assertion by the Secretary of State for Scotland that such an analysis existed and would be published, and then a denial that such an analysis existed in terms of the overall analysis of Scotland from the Secretary for Exiting the EU. I wrote to the Secretary for Exiting the EU, David Davis, yesterday, asking for access to the 58 sectoral studies that have been referred to from time to time in meetings with the UK Government but never brought forward. Once we have those, we will certainly look to see what we can do with them. I fear from some of the speculation yesterday that what will appear will be heavily redacted documents if those documents have substance anyway, because we have not seen them and we do not know the depth of the research and how they have undertaken the work. Once we have that material, if we do get that material, I am happy to discuss it with members. Tom Arthur Does the minister share my concern that the uncertainty over Brexit is influencing businesses to delay decisions on capital investment, which could, of course, negatively impact on future productivity? I agree, and I think that there is now growing evidence that businesses are exceptionally worried about the lack of information and the uncertainty. Many are telling the UK Government and the Scottish Government that decisions that they have to make will have to be made by the end of the year. If there is no certainty and no information by the end of the year, then they will have to work on the worst-case scenario. Indeed, German companies, or part of the German chambers of commerce, have already been told by their central organisation that if they have business interests in the UK, they should plan for essentially a cliff edge Brexit. That is very bad for those companies and their plans, and it is very bad for other companies that are based in Scotland. We continue to say that the UK Government should be much more transparent and much more open. It should be making some progress in telling people what it intends, but it is working both by hiding information, by not publishing information and also allowing other information to emerge that will only cause uncertainty. For example, the Chatham House report today on farming indicates very strongly that, for many people who back Brexit, the best way forward is to abandon farming subsidies. The effect of that on the constituencies of virtually every member of the Scottish Parliament would be catastrophic, particularly for those like me who are members for the Highlands and Islands. It would be the end of agriculture and, indeed, much of the rural population of the Highlands and Islands. The UK Government really has to get a grip. Perhaps it recognises that Brexit remains a fool's errand. To ask the Scottish Government what discussions the Cabinet Secretary for Communities has held with Glasgow City Council regarding its budget allocation. Ministers and officials regularly meet representatives of all Scottish local authorities, including Glasgow City Council, to discuss a range of issues as part of our commitment to working in partnership with local government to improve outcomes for the people of Scotland. I met the Glasgow council leader, Susan Aitken, on 8 August. I have no doubt that the Scottish Government can continue to have a strong and productive relationship with Glasgow City Council, which will benefit the people of Glasgow and the rest of Scotland in the months and years to come. Johann Lamont I am not sure whether I can thank the Cabinet Secretary for Communities for that response. In my view, as a representative of Glasgow, it is entirely unacceptable that the SNP Government has cut Glasgow's budget every year since 2007, forcing savings of £377 million, a cut of 17.5 per cent to Glasgow's budget. What assessment has the cabinet secretary made of the terrible impact of those decisions on the individuals, families and communities in Glasgow by a Government that claims to care about inequality? I ask the cabinet secretary what representations did the leader of Glasgow City Council make to you about the budget allocation? Did she seek an increase in her budget? Is she willing to stand up for Glasgow and those vulnerable communities who are currently facing the cuts made by your decisions? Susan Aitken, the SNP leader at Glasgow, is sorting out the mess that she inherited from the Labour Party and is doing a grand job in that respect. I have to correct Johann Lamont that Glasgow City Council's budget did not go down. The budget for local services has increased as a consequence of our decisions. In fact, the spending power for Glasgow's local services has increased, not a reduction, but an increase of some £45 million. That is a 3.4 per cent increase on the previous year. I look forward to the exciting plans around infrastructure, childcare and housing, where we will be able to invest more in the services right across Scotland. Of course, it is the new mature administration that exists in Glasgow City Council that has taken Glasgow back into COSLA so that we can work in partnership with local government to ensure that it continues to have a fair settlement from the Scottish Government. To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking regarding the decline of part-time students at college. Minister Shirley-Anne Somerville. As the First Minister said at First Minister's questions last week, short courses for younger and older students alike continue to be available. Indeed, 72 per cent of total enrolments at college in 2015-16 were on part-time courses. Alison Harris. Although I thank the minister for that answer, does she acknowledge that for months the policy has been described as inflexible, involving a serious loss of part-time places, often for students who are furthest removed from the labour market and, in particular, it has created difficulties for those students who are trying to balance the college course with other work and family commitments? As I stated, the number of part-time courses is still at 72 per cent, and we see that the majority of students within colleges are women. That policy came out in my letter of guidance to colleges and universities in March. I checked today how widely distributed that was, and it is well going to the funding council. It went to the education committee within Parliament, college representatives, university representatives, every single trade union involved, as well as all the government agencies. That policy has been developed to ensure that all our colleges are responding to the needs of not just young people but of returners to work and those within wider society, and all those who are responding to the needs of the economy. I am confident that our colleges will do just that. Kenneth Gibson. Thank you, Presiding Officer. There has been a complete restructuring of the colleges under the Scottish Government. What that has meant is that there are more full-time places than ever before in our colleges, preparing more of our younger people for work. In fact, some of the part-time courses that have been reduced—79,000 of them—were a mere five hours—not five hours a week but five hours in total. Do you agree that, by reducing those very minuscule courses, it has allowed colleges to invest much more in providing not only full-time but the part-time courses that allow our young people to get their work they so require? Minister Gibson. Well, Mr Gibson is quite right to point out that there was a decision made to ensure that colleges were asked to look at recognised qualifications leading to employment, something that I think the party opposite would welcome rather than mock. The reason why we did that was to ensure that youth unemployment came down. Youth unemployment is now at a rate of one of the lowest in the EU, something that should be welcomed across this chamber and proves that the college policy has worked well for our young people and for the economy. Thank you, Presiding Officer. That concludes General Questions' point of order, Mr Findlay. Yesterday, the UK Parliament unanimously voted to instruct the UK Government to release in full 58 sectoral papers on Brexit and impact assessments to accompaniment. It now appears that the Tory Government is going to refuse to do that, or they are going to release them heavily redacted, thus holding Parliament in contempt. It is my understanding in light of this. Today, Opposition parties, including SNP and some Tory MPs who believe in defending the principle of parliamentary sovereignty, are discussing the lane of a contempt motion because of the dismissive arrogance of the Prime Minister and her Government. Given that this Parliament has, since May 2016, defeated the Government over NHS cuts, Highlands and Islands Enterprise, fracking, council funding, the Offensive Behaviour at Football Act and failing educational policy, and just like the UK Government, the SNP has repeatedly ignored the will of Parliament. Can you advise me in the chamber? Order, please. Let's hear the point of order, please. Can you advise me in the chamber if you would accept a similar contempt motion if and when this SNP Government replicates the arrogance of the Tories and ignores the democratic will of this Parliament? Any motion that is laid before the Parliament, I will consider on its merits, the motions of this Parliament are not binding on the Government, but we do expect, and the Government is expected to pay attention to them. That is the point of order dealt with. I move on now to general questions.