 That concludes General Questions. We turn now to First Minister's Questions. Question number 1, Ruth Davidson. Thank you, Presiding Officer, to ask the First Minister what engagement she has planned for the rest of today. First Minister. Engagements to take forward the Government's programme for Scotland. Ruth Davidson. There is no specific area where abel children in Scotland really excel. Over the past 10 years we have seen a pronounced and sustained decline in abel pupils' performance in science gyflym i ar y jwglu sydd wedi gwybod hwn. Rwy'n cael ei wneud, ym mhyself ac yn gyffredinol o gyllid y Llywodraeth Cymru. Gwelch chi'n mynd i ddweud y ffordd pethau 15 oes y borda. Felly, dyma'n gwybod i ddweud y ffordd o'r cyflwyno hwnnw i ddweud y Llywodraeth Cymru. Rhywethaf y byddai'n wych yn cydweithio'r cyflwyno. Rhywethaf y byddai'n wych yn cydweithio'r cyflwyno, bob hampwyswys ar draws. Rydyn nhw'n trebaidi i'r ysgolwg hapur yn trio mewn gael apartadwyr libraryr. Rydyn nhw'n trebaidi a'r amser i ta programs, ac yn yr ys sl Dumfевro, yn ni'n zchange'n mylocken rwy, gydynau dda ag ysgolwyr cyff Sick pillow sy'n gweld byddartad i ddiesbyn i heb achastraith digon, felly rydyn ni ddim yn uwchaf sydd gyda gaf from Christie ynghylch, y dyfodol, i ddim yn ei ddweud, y dyfodol i'r system erbyn ar y ddweud. Felly, y dyfodol nid o'r ddweud i'r ddweud o'r ddweud. Rwy'n ei ddweud o'r ddweud o'r ddweud. Rwy'n ei ddweud o'r ddweud o'r ddweud o'r ddweud o'r ddweud. Felly, o'r gaf amser o'r cyffredinol i chi'n ei ddweud o'r ddweud, y gaf yw i'n llaw o'r gyffredinol o'r ddweud o'r ddweud i'n llaw o'r ddweud o'r ddweud o'r ddweud o'r ddweud o'r ddweud o'r ddweud o'r ddweud o'r ddweud o'r ddweud o'r ddweud o'r ddweud o'r ddweud. Ruth Davidson. As always the First Minister has her long list of excuses ready but the answer to the question that I asked lies at the door of an SNP which has failed utterly over 10 years of government to set Scottish education on the right course. But the First Minister fails to address some of those clear suggestions that are in that report this morning. Recomm lamead recommendations that could make a difference to a child's education, because a Sutton Trust says that our best performing schools should help to support pupils in under performing schools. That could lead to supporting pupils and developing leadership and professional learning of staff. It's an idea that we called for last year. Will the First Minister knit on it? First Minister. Forky recommendations that are in that one report Ond we have established what is called the insight system that allows teachers in the senior phase to see how their schools are performing compared with others, identify areas of success and identify where improvements can be made, enabling schools to see where there is best practice and learn from過icaith Якrach Lessain is already underway. We have already, as part of our governance reforms, committed to taking forward clusters of schools to allow inwn wyn dogsonell gy мол i'r cyfnod o dechrau? There are other recommendations in my report that we are already taking forward in different ways. One of the key recommendations is about how we monitor pupils. I heard from the Sutin trust that point on radio this morning making important monitoring pupil at all levels of ability at all stages. That, of course, is what the National Improvement Framework is all about, informed by standardised assessments and mumId Periods' with school data. ond we have a range of reforms that are under way to make sure that we do improve attainment overall but close the attainment gap. All of that programme of work is backed and underpinned by the attainment fund just last week. John Swinney outlined how £120 million will be allocated directly to head teachers so that they are equipped to take this work forward so that we see the further improvements that we need to see over the years to come. I am surprised by the First Minister's sounding so positive on that because we know that a project specifically twinning flagship schools with underperforming schools in Scotland was recently dumped by this Government without any real explanation and with Education Scotland confirming that there was no new money to keep it going. The blunt truth is that the Sutton Troth findings on attainment in science are particularly shameful. To help turn this around, we said that bursaries should be provided to attract the brightest graduates into science teaching and last week the Royal Society of Edinburgh supported this call. Yesterday the Scottish Government decided instead to launch a poster campaign. Does the First Minister really think that that is sufficient to get enough teachers into teaching? I will take on all of those individual points. In terms of the particular programme that Ruth Davidson talks about, that approach was incorporated into our attainment challenge, including the approach that I talked about in my initial answer and, of course, underpinned by the additional funding in our attainment challenge and the work around clusters of schools. I think that that is the right way to develop the work that has been done over the past few years. In terms of getting teachers into schools, I think that for a party that south of the border is taking bursaries away from many different professional groups, it is a bit rich to talk about bursaries. We will continue to take the steps that we consider to be appropriate. What John Swinney and the General Teaching Council have announced over recent times is a range of different ways in which we attract our best and brightest into teaching, particularly into areas where there is identified to be a shortage. Ruth Davidson may mock some of what has been announced, but those are important initiatives to make sure that we get teachers coming into education generally but also coming into the STEM subjects. We will continue to consider carefully if there is more action that we should be taking. In terms of the attainment gap, I have said repeatedly and will continue to say that this is the priority for this Government and we are absolutely focused on making sure that we take the action that delivers further improvements. Across a range of measures, whether it is on school exam passes, whether it is on positive destinations, we are seeing signs in our education system of that attainment gap narrowing. I want to see it narrow further and I want to see it narrow faster, which is why we are taking the action that we are doing. Ruth Davidson. And yet Scotland still has 4,000 fewer teachers than when her Government came to power. Presiding Officer, we now see the consequences of 10 wasted years of this SNP Government and the harm that it has done to the life chances of our pupils. In science, 15-year-olds in Scotland are two years behind children in Singapore. In reading, they are a year behind children in Finland, in Canada and in Ireland. In maths, they are a year behind children in the Czech Republic and Estonia. That is the legacy of this Government. It is a generation of Scottish children that are being left behind in the race for qualifications and for future jobs. Scotland used to lead the world in education. Why under this SNP Government are we always playing catch-up? I think that Ruth Davidson in that final question does a disservice to pupils and teachers across our country. I do not and never will shy away from the challenges that we must address, but in our education system today we have record high exam passes. We have record numbers of young people going into positive destinations after they leave school. We also do see signs whether they are in exam passes, positive destinations or access to university, signs of a narrowing of that attainment gap. That is the reality. However, as I repeatedly said, that is not good enough. That is why, since the data and the Sutton trust report was gathered two years ago, we have embarked upon a programme of reforms in our education, underpinned by substantial additional funding, going straight into the hands of headteachers. There are headteachers right across this country right now who last week got told of the substantial additional funding that they will have at their direct disposal to invest in additional teachers or the things that they think will help to raise attainment. That is solid action. It is action that we are determined to continue to focus on so that we deliver the improvements that young people and their parents across the country have got a right to see. To ask the First Minister what engagement she has planned for the rest of the week. Engagements to take forward the Government's programme for Scotland. A new report today from the Sutton trust exposes the SNP's catastrophic failures on education. Order please. They can grown all they like, but it is true and they should read it. In the subjects most important to growing Scotland's economy in the future, young people are being let down. Despite the hard work of pupils and teachers, the SNP's failure is there for all to see. Time and time again, I have come here and argued that the SNP are leaving the poorest children behind. Now this report shows that they are also holding the brightest children back. The First Minister said that education would be her defining priority, so why is her Government failing a whole generation of children? At risk of repeating the answers that I gave earlier, this is an important report. I absolutely and readily accept that. However, the data in this report is based on a survey carried out two years ago. Why that is significant is that it predates the programme of reforms that we have under way. It predates the additional resources that we have made available through the attainment challenge and the attainment fund. Those approaches are not just getting additional resources into the hands of headteachers, they are introducing standardised assessments so that we track the progress of our young people more routinely and more robustly and they are leading to the publication of more transparent data and information on an on-going basis about Scottish education on a school-by-school basis so that we can track our progress. Those are important reforms. I think that every politician in this chamber who raises these issues is absolutely right to do so. Such is their importance. However, I think that they also have an obligation to get behind the reforms that we are introducing. On some of those reforms, we have seen members on the Labour benches having initially backed them when they come under some pressure on them, decide that they do not back them after all. I would say that this certain trust report underlines the importance and the necessity of those reforms to education. That is why I hope that all members across the chamber will enthusiastically back them. It is clear from that answer that, when the First Minister runs out of excuses, she just repeats them. She dismisses the report in today's paper, but she cannot dismiss every single report that preceded that. The question is how many reports does she have to get about the state of education in Scotland before she accepts the simple truth at the heart of each and every one? When she cuts through all that, there is a simple truth missed by both the SNP and the Tories. If we want to give young people the best possible chance in life, we have to invest in them, and that means investing in local schools. What we get from the SNP is £1.5 billion worth of cuts since 2011. In Naomi Eisenstadt's original report, that is the one that was not rewritten by the First Minister, the independent poverty adviser said this, any reduction in those services would be damaging for low-income households. Who should we believe, the First Minister or her own poverty adviser? Firstly, in terms of Kezia Dugdale's first comment in that question, I did not dismiss the certain trust report and anybody watching this at home will have heard me say it is an important report that aids our understanding of the challenges that we face. I simply pointed out the fact that it is based on data that is already two years old and predates the work that we are doing. In terms of previous reports that Kezia Dugdale also wrongly claims that I am dismissing, the certain trust report published this morning, which I have read, is based on the PISA report that was published in December. It is not new data. That does not make it unimportant, but it is an important contextual point to make. In terms of Kezia Dugdale's point about investment in schools, absolutely she is right, which is why we have established the attainment fund. The attainment fund is putting £120 million in the coming financial year into the hands of head teachers in 95 per cent of schools across this country. It adds to the £50 million that we were already investing in the attainment challenge. That is the kind of investment that, yes, we need to see in our schools, the kind of investment that this Government is delivering in our schools. My last point on budgets. We have heard weekend and week out in this chamber. Kezia Dugdale stands up here talking about what she claims are council cuts. This week, we started to see Labour councils inverclyde yesterday deciding that they have enough money available to them without using the flexibility that we have given councils on council tax. Labour here repeatedly says that tax rises are necessary to protect services such as education, but we have Labour councillors now saying the opposite, that Scottish Government funding is enough so that they do not have to raise council tax. That proves the point that we are giving the resources to local councils to enable them not just to protect services but, in the case of education, to get more money into the hands of those who run our schools. Kezia Dugdale. Senosa, the First Minister has just told us that she is giving councils the resources that they need, but what we have just heard is that she is putting in £120 million and taking out £1.5 billion from local services. You have been in power for 10 years, First Minister, and that is your record. The Sutton Trust report proves beyond all doubt that teachers need more support to give young people the skills that they need for the future. Under the SNP, there are 4,000 fewer teachers in Scotland, and we have lost 826 science and maths teachers since the SNP took office. It is no wonder John Swinney had to launch a recruitment drive for teachers yesterday. Here we have it. Teacher numbers down, the attainment gap winding, the only thing on the up-under the SNP is cuts to schools. Even with a record this poor, a primary people can do the math. Why cannot the First Minister? Kezia Dugdale certainly cannot do the math. Maybe she should ask Stephen McCabe, the leader of Inverclyde Council, to do it for her. As a result of the changes announced by Denic Mackay in this chamber last Thursday, there is now £400 million of additional resources available for local services. That is the reality, and that includes £120 million available for headteachers to deliver improvements in our schools. For Kezia Dugdale, to stand up here today and talk about cuts in local services, the day after the Labour leader of Inverclyde Council took to social media to boss that he had enough money that enabled him to become the leader across Scotland that had frozen the council tax for longest. Labour will go on contradicting themselves. As Labour will go on contradicting themselves from the sidelines, we will get on with delivering the improvements in education that parents and children have a right to expect. Will the First Minister join me in welcoming the Taycities deal bid with a plan to make Dundee and Angus a world centre for oil and gas decommissioning? I welcomed the £5 million fund that she announced yesterday, although I agree with Gary Smith of the GMB that, given the scale of the opportunity, it is a drop in the ocean. Will she back the Taycities deal proposal by guaranteeing at least half of the fund to Dundee to give us the best chance of securing decommissioning jobs? First, as the Government has demonstrated through its actions, we are enthusiastic supporters of city deals and have supported already a number of city deals. We will continue to work with councils in Tayside to ensure that we are doing everything we can to support development in Dundee and across Tayside. I am glad that Jenny Marra welcomed the announcement yesterday of a £5 million decommissioning challenge fund. If she had, as I am sure she did, to be fair, read the material that was published yesterday, she will see that this is an initial fund with future funding expected in future years. Our supply chain already does very well in winning work in aspects of the decommissioning process. For example, project management, abandoning and plugging wells, but where we need to make sure that we have the infrastructure is in place to enable firms to compete successfully for the work around removal of top sides and disposal of rigs onshore. That is why the fund is so important. We will continue to make sure that, as we support the oil and gas industry in terms of production, because it has a bright future ahead of it on that front, we will also make sure that Scottish firms, wherever they are, Tayside and in the north-east in Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire, are well placed to take advantage of the benefits of decommissioning. Yesterday, I met in Aberdeen two firms that are doing just that, and I want to see more of them be able to compete in that way. Another constituency supplementary from Jackie Baillie. Patients were turned away from the GP Out of Hours service at the Vale of Leven hospital last Sunday. It had to close because there were no doctors to cover the rotor. Yesterday, I was told of a private report from NHS Greater Glasgow Incline that gives their preferred option of centralising the Vale Out of Hours service to the Royal Alexandra hospital in Paisley. Given that retaining out of hours GP services was a key commitment in the vision for the Vale, what action will the First Minister take to stop her health board from breaking her promise? First Minister. Jackie Baillie mentions, as she does often in this chamber, that she is right to do so the vision for the Vale, just to remind her that the vision for the Vale is what we had to come up with while I was health secretary to protect the many services at the Vale of Leven that had been put under threat by the previous administration that was in place. In fact, had that Labour administration stayed in place, I very much doubt if the Vale of Leven would still be open as a hospital at all today. That is the reality. We will continue to support services at the Vale of Leven and we will continue to make sure that we support the vision for the Vale so that that hospital and the excellent and dedicated staff who work there can continue to provide the excellent services that they do. Thank you to ask the First Minister when the Cabinet will next meet. First Minister. The Cabinet will next meet on 21 February. The aviation industry claims to have an aim of halving its CO2 emissions by 2050 compared with 2005 levels. The UK Climate Change Committee, which is the Scottish Government's chosen adviser on climate change, has ruled that aviation emissions should be no higher than 2005 levels by the same date. Yet the Scottish Government's climate action plan published last month implies that there will be emission reductions in aviation but does not say how much or how they will be achieved. The Scottish Government is now setting about redesigning the aviation tax regime without appearing to have any such target in mind, despite knowing that its tax proposal will increase emissions. Does the Scottish Government have any idea of the actual level of aviation emissions that it considers acceptable? Climate change plan sets out in detail across a range of different sectors how we will go about meeting our climate change obligations. By its very nature, that is a plan that will develop over time and on which we would expect input from the chamber and across a range of different sectors. As we have said repeatedly before and I will say again today, the environment must be a consideration in every decision that we take, including any decisions around aviation and any decisions around APD, which of course is what Patrick Harvie is getting at. We have also said before that if we pursue any policies that lead in one area to any increase in emissions, then what that means in order that we meet our targets is that we have to work harder in other areas to ensure that we are driving down emissions overall. Both as we develop our climate change policies and remember that we are of course meeting our current climate change targets ahead of schedule and we are about to go into a process of legislation where we will toughen those targets but as we do so we will continue to ensure that not just our policies in that respect but our policies across all of the responsibilities of government take account of the environmental obligations that we have. Patrick Harvie. Well, I'm afraid that the climate action plan doesn't give the details on aviation emissions that the First Minister seems to suggest that it does but I'm glad that she thinks that environmental considerations should be a factor in setting aviation tax levels. I hope to have the government's support therefore in writing that into the legislation so that no future government is able to ignore that important consideration but what I've found most astonishing in hearing the witnesses giving evidence in support of the government's proposal is that none of them seem capable of producing a shred of credible evidence about what the impact will be, not on flight numbers or prices, not on job creation. They all produce different figures for that, mostly based on well out of date research figures plucked from the air. They're not able to tell us what the impact will be on the economy or on public finances. Even those that claim some baseless prediction of extra tax being generated in the economy produce no robust evidence about how much of it will flow to the Scottish Government and how much of it will flow to the UK Treasury. Adding to that the lack of any clear impact of the effect of this policy on the environment, the one thing that we do know about this policy is that it will be an effective tax cut to a highly profitable, highly polluting industry while public transport languishes. Isn't it time to shelve this whole plan until the Scottish Government has got anything approaching an evidence base? A tax cut for the individuals and families who use air travel, including families who go on holiday and who may well welcome a reduction in the cost of going on holiday. In terms of some of the evidence from those who would support this policy, they do make very clear statements in terms of the impact of that in greater routes from Scotland, more flights in and out of Scotland and more jobs in the industry. As we take forward both the legislation around the devolution of air passenger duty but also our budgets for future years, we take account of competing priorities, although we have been very clear in our commitment around APD, and I am absolutely clear about that commitment today. Across all our policy areas, the obligations that we have to reducing emissions and to protecting our environment are absolutely key. That is why the climate change plan, backing up the legislation that is already in place, paving the way for the new legislation that we are going to bring in, is so important. Let us not forget one of the central issues here. Scotland is already meeting its climate change target. Scotland is seen internationally as a world leader when it comes to reducing emissions and tackling climate change. That is something that all of us should be proud of, and we should continue to make sure that, in everything that we do, we set environmental standards that the rest of the world wants to emulate. Some additional supplementary points from Stuart Stevenson. Did the Prime Minister note that last night, the Labour Party signed a blank check to the Prime Minister to allow her, without further democratic reference, to determine the terms of leaving the EU? In particular, the white paper at paragraph 8.16, which said that there should be a mutually beneficial solution for the Spaniards in the UK in relation to fishing, clearly confirming a sell-out of her interest by the Tories once again. Nobody should be surprised if the Tory Government is preparing to sell out the Scottish fishing industry, because they have done it on plenty of occasions before. In terms of the wider issue about the vote in the House of Commons last night, I think that it is deeply regrettable that amendment after amendment was rejected by the Government. We are talking here about amendments that simply ask for protection for EU nationals, ask the Government to commit not to doing things like breaching the Good Friday agreement in Northern Ireland. All of those amendments were rejected, not a single concession was won through any of those amendments, and yet we still have a Labour so-called opposition that decides to vote for that bill and hand the Conservative Government a blank check. I think that that is utterly pathetic and shows the weakness of the opposition that there is in the UK Parliament in the form of the Labour Party. I saw Jeremy Corbyn tweeting last night that the real fight begins now, how utterly pathetic. It is not so much bolting the stable door after the horses bolted, it is more like closing the stable door after the horses dead and buried. The UK, badly, badly needs vigorous opposition in the House of Commons. The SNP is providing it day in and day out. It is just a pity that the Labour Party is failing to do so. Oliver Mundell. Thank you, Presiding Officer. This week, the SNP has confirmed beyond all doubt that they no longer accept the overall outcome of the democratic process. In that same spirit, can the First Minister guarantee that my constituents, who neither voted for her as First Minister nor for this Scottish Government, will not be forced to take part in a second independence referendum against their express will? The First Minister. I think that it is clear and becoming increasingly clear with every week that it passes that the people that the Tories in this chamber represent are the Tory Government in Westminster. That is who they are here to represent and stand up for. Let me remind the member that 62 per cent of the people of Scotland voted to remain in the European Union. I have a duty as First Minister to stand up for the interests of this country and to do everything I can to make sure that the Tories do not get away with taking Scotland off a hard Brexit cliff edge with the implications that we will have for jobs, for investment, for our economy as a whole and for the very society that we live in. On a question of a second independence referendum, I have been very clear about my determination to find compromise. It just so happens that I am facing a UK Government that is not willing to compromise with me. I have also said that I am determined to ensure that Scotland will not be dragged out of the EU and dragged off that hard Brexit cliff edge against its will. For that, it was in the manifesto that I was elected on just under one year ago. In relation to Patrick Harvie's question, does the First Minister think that it is hypocritical for politicians to oppose the expansion of aircraft flights and flight paths while sitting around the Cabinet table supporting airport expansion and the scrapping of air passenger duty, both of which are designed to increase flights and flight paths? As I have said before, and as most people recognise, we have to strike the right balance between ensuring that our economy can grow and that we are providing the infrastructure and the travel connections, whether they are public transport, road networks or aviation connections that support the economic growth of our economy, but also making sure that we have that focus on the environment that I have already spoken about. Scotland is leading the world when it comes to tackling climate change, and that is something that all of us across the chamber should be proud of. To ask the First Minister what legislation is in place to deal with drug driving. Drug driving, such as drink driving, can ruin lives and taking illegal drugs and driving is completely and utterly irresponsible. Scotland is a long-standing legislation in place that makes it an offence to drive while impaired due to drugs. That is used by Police Scotland prosecutors and our courts to ensure that those who take drugs and drive can be held to account for putting their lives and the lives of others at risk. Our priority is to help to make Scotland's road safer, and we will always consider carefully any policies that can help us to further that goal. I thank the First Minister for that reply, and I would like to refer members to my register of interests, a member of the management board of moving on a drug rehabilitation project. The First Minister will be aware that drug driving limits were introduced in England and Wales in 2015, and an evaluation of the impact of the new limits is likely to be published in the next few months. Can the First Minister tell me if the Scottish Government will be looking at the evaluation and the impact that those limits have had, and which I fully consider introducing further legislation in Scotland if it is deemed appropriate to do so? The First Minister. Yes, we will. The member raises an important point. The Scottish Government is absolutely committed to making our roads safer based on the evidence of what works. That is why we prioritised legislation in 2014 to lower the drink drive limit, as evidence showed that lives would be saved by doing that. We will study carefully the available evidence showing the impact that drug driving limits have had since they were introduced in England and Wales, with a view to considering whether legislation should be brought forward to introduce such limits here. If the evidence shows that that has been successful and that lives can be saved, we would not hesitate to legislate here. Thank you, Presiding Officer. I welcome some of the comments that the First Minister has made. However, as Stuart McMillan said, the legislation changed in England and Wales two years ago. While he is waiting for an evaluation, we already know that there has been a fourfold increase in the number of motorists charged with drink driving, and conviction rates have risen from 52 per cent to 95 per cent. Is that not the evidence that the First Minister needs, and why is Scotland behind the curve with the rest of the UK on this very important issue? Yes, I think that that is some of the evidence that we will want to look at and make sure that we are responding to. I think that it is important to stress this so that anybody listening to this hears this loudly and clearly. It is already an offence to be in charge of a motor vehicle while unfit to drive through drink or drugs, and it is very clear that all of us, while taking part in what I think is an important discussion, do not allow that message to be underplayed. When police suspect that a motorist of drug driving can already carry out the roadside test and if a driver fails that test, that can provide sufficient evidence to arrest and take the driver to the police station where further tests are carried out. It is already an offence to drive a car in this country if you are impaired due to drugs, and absolutely nobody should do such a thing. We will wait for the evaluation of the drug driving limits in England and Wales to inform our consideration of the best approach to that in Scotland to see whether that development would help us to make our roads even safer. I am sure that all members would understand that. It is a complex area where, in England and Wales, I understand that there are individual limits for 17 different drug types. The evaluation that I know is due to be published this year. We expect that to be helpful, and it will build on the evidence that the member has already cited so that we can understand the full practical implications of drug driving limits and whether the potential benefits have been realised in England and Wales. The final point that I would make here, while stressing absolutely that one death in our roads is one too many, is that our roads generally are becoming safer overall. That is a good thing, but it should also increase our determination to make sure that we do anything reasonable to make our roads even safer still. Thank you, Presiding Officer. In relation to driving offences under the Anti-Social Behaviour Scotland Act 2004, the police of authority to issue a written warning for driving they consider is causing alarm, distress or annoyance. If, indeed, there is a repeat of that fence within 12 months of authority to confiscate the vehicle, yet there is no appeal procedure in relation to the written warning. Can I ask the Cabinet Secretary of the Government to revisit the legislation, as it seems to me that is in breach of article 6 of ECHR, the right to fair hearing? I am happy to look into this matter and ask the Justice Secretary to reply to Christine Graham. Without prejudging, the response will give, in due course, to that. I would simply say this. I think that it is important that the police have the tools that they need to make our roads as safe as they possibly can be, which is why I stress the laws that it currently stands, but I also say readily that we must look at evidence elsewhere in the UK to see whether there are further steps that we can take. It is important that the police have the tools that they need, but I will ask the Justice Secretary to look into the specific issue that Christine Graham raises and respond to it as quickly as possible. To ask the First Minister what steps the Scottish Government has taken to reduce the number of delayed discharges from hospitals. The introduction of health and social care integration is the key driver in helping reduce delays in discharge. We have seen progress with the latest census showing the number of bed days lost to delays are lower than they were in the previous year, and every month in this financial year has shown a decrease compared to the corresponding month in the last year. To make further progress, the draft budget for 2017-18 plans for almost half a billion pounds of NHS investment in social care and integration. Finlay Carson I thank the First Minister for that response. The Cabinet Secretary for Health and Sport promised to eradicate bed blocking two years ago, but the latest statistics show that, in November 2016, over 45,000 days were spent in hospital by people who were fit to leave. Last month, it was revealed that nearly 700 people died in Scotland's hospitals while waiting to be discharged. In this week, we heard that one patient in Dumfries and Galloway was stuck in hospital for 508 days awaiting discharge. For the avoidance of any doubt, I and my colleagues all recognise and thank the fantastic commitment and professionalism of our NHS staff. However, does the First Minister accept responsibility for this dismal record and she will accept that more needs to be done to prevent vulnerable people being stranded in hospital? Absolutely accept the importance of us continuing to make progress in reducing and eradicating delayed discharges in our hospitals. I think that, in terms of some of the reports that we see about very, very long waits, although I am not going to get into individual cases, it is important that, often, we take care in talking about these cases because what we will often find with those that appear to be exceptionally long waits and are exceptionally long waits are very complex situations. For example, some people who wait for very long periods of time will be subject to adults with incapacity legislation, where the reason for them continuing to be in hospital is completely outwith the control of our health and social care services. It is waiting for processes in our court system. That would be the first point that I would make. The second point that I would make is that, although we have still got work to do, we are seeing a steady reduction in bed days lost from delayed discharge in Scotland. I have spoken to people in our health and social care services who will tell me that it is down to the benefits that are now coming through the system from integration and the investment that we are starting to take from the acute health service into expanding social care services. It is important that we accelerate and keep very focused on that work. The last point that I would make is not in any way to say that we do not have more work to do here in Scotland or to absolve in any way the Scottish Government of our responsibilities. However, what we are seeing with delayed discharges is a real divergence between the experience and performance of the NHS in Scotland and the NHS in other parts of the UK. Delayed discharges are going up in England, and we have seen the King's Fund and the Nuffield Trust saying that the official figures there do not even tell the full story and that they hide a lot of the reality of the situation. We have more work to do, but let us get behind those in our health service and social care services as they seek to do that, because this Government has made the reform in the shape of integration and is putting in the resources to equip them to do just that, so that we can continue to see reductions and eventually the eradication of delayed discharges in our hospitals. Alex Cole-Hamilton Thank you, Presiding Officer. I would like to thank Finlay Carson for raising the attention of the Liberal Democrat investigation into this. Further to which, today, we publish additional fresh statistics that show that, as of mid-January, patients in Lothian, Highland, Ayrshire and Arran were waiting as many 200 days and more to be discharged from hospital after they were deemed fit to go home. In Glasgow, there is a patient who has waited over 370 days for discharge after being fit to go home. Dr Patrick Statham, two weeks ago, a consultant neurosurgeon from the Western General came to my constituency to bemoan the biggest crisis in his career. Every week, his colleagues and himself are having to turn away patients and cancel operations due to bed blocking in that hospital. Will the First Minister accept Patrick Statham's invitation to the Western General this afternoon to explain to his patients why their operations have been cancelled? The First Minister I have visited the Western General Hospital many times in the years that I have been in government, particularly when I was a health secretary. I am always delighted to visit the Western General and look forward to doing so in the not-too-distant future. That is a really important issue, but I would say to Alex Cole-Hamilton the same as I said to the previous member who asked that question. Of course, we do not want to see anybody delayed in hospital any longer than they have to be there, but, particularly when we are dealing with examples of very long waits—when those are raised with me in the chamber, more often than not, when I go and look into the specific circumstances, what we find with very long waits are really complex situations, often involving the adults with incapacity legislation. What that means is that this is not a situation where somebody has been delayed because of anything the health or social care services are not doing is the court process in terms of adults with incapacity. Often there will be other complexities in those cases. For example, I heard of a case, and I will not go into the detail of this, where the reason the person was delayed longer than he should have been was because the accommodation that had to be provided for that person was so specialist that it took longer to do that. I simply caution members from citing those particular cases as evidence of a wider issue. The wider issue in terms of delayed discharges in Scotland is that, yes, we still get work to do, but unlike other parts of the UK, we are seeing bed days lost to delayed discharges coming down. That is a good thing. It is not happening accidentally, it is happening because of integration of health and social care, it is happening because of the increased investment and, above all else, it is happening because of the hard work of those who work in our health and care systems right across the country. To ask the First Minister what the Scottish Government's response is to recent NSPCC figures that show that thousands of children were serious mental health problems turned to child line last year? More children and young people are coming forward to ask for help, and that shows that in the past there were far too many children who were not seen and whose needs were not met. We do want people to come forward for help to whatever agency they feel most comfortable, including to child line. It is not the wrong response for a young person to contact child line, and that is exactly why the Government continues to support child line financially this year to the tune of £310,000. This week, the Scottish Children's Services Coalition highlighted that the number of children with identified mental health problems in schools more than doubled between 2012 and 2016. That is according to the Scottish Government's own pupil census statistics. Over the same period, Scottish Government statistics confirm that the number of educational psychologists employed in Scotland continues to fall, and applications for postgraduate study have been plummeting since 2012. The same year, the bursary funding for trainee educational psychologists was removed by the Scottish Government. Is the First Minister willing to give consideration to reinstating funding support for trainee educational psychologists? What assurances can she give that the Minister for Mental Health and the Cabinet Secretary for Education is working jointly to urgently address the mental health crisis in our classrooms? In terms of psychology posts, CAMHS children's adolescent mental health service psychology posts have increased by almost 60 per cent in terms of the most recent figures. Overall, psychology services posts are up by more than 60 per cent as well, and all applied psychology posts up by 60 per cent too. Overall, CAMHS workforce has increased by 50 per cent. That reflects the additional investment that we are putting into mental health services. Monica Lennon is right to raise this issue, and she raises this issue regularly, and I commend her for doing so. She started her question rightly by talking about the increase in the number of young people with identified mental health needs. That is something that reflects what I repeatedly say. In the past, we know that many young people did not become identified, did not get the help they need. We now have, because of the reduced stigma and other factors, we now have more young people being identified and therefore able to access the support they need. We are continuing to invest in mental health services to increase the workforce, to reduce waiting times and to make sure that young people get access to the services that they need in a timely fashion. On the issue of school liaison, I have said in the past couple of weeks in the chamber that the health service cannot deal with that on its own. The joint working between our education system, between councils and health services is extremely important. The mental health strategy, when that is published, will reflect that need for joint working. Finally, on the issue of child line, it is important, given that that was the thrust of the question. We will continue to make sure that we are providing bursary and financial support where we consider that to be necessary. Just a couple of weeks ago, we announced increased bursary support for nurses in our health service, but in terms of child line, let me not finish before I thank Child Line for the work that it does. Child line is an essential resource for young people, which is why the Government will go on supporting it with the financial help that we do.