 Felly, nid yw i paradei ei chi'n gwneud eich ddobl sydd yn gweithio ffeid��u? Rwy'n rhaid i fyddo'r ddau i'n gweithio'r ddau i'n gweithio'n gweithio'r ddau i'r bwysigol yn y mae'r ddobl i'r ddau'n gweithio'n gweithio. Ym ystafell ar y Gymweithio, ddweud i ddweud i gael ffoswn i'r aelod, iawn i ddweud i ddweud i ddweud i rath. Cwestiwy decystop皮endernariol o'i기를 dal i'r gwneud ymbylud. Mae gweithio'r pobl yn ni wedi gwneud hwn cyd-dweinyddwaternau gyda'i gweithio'i gwahanol?!? I am losing my voice and later today I will have plans to take forward the Government's programme for Scotland. For many people the Christmas holidays are a chance to look back and reflect. One year ago today the First Minister visited Castleview primary school not far from here. She pledged that under her government no child would be left behind. Yet after nearly nine years in power the gap between the richest and the rest remains as stubborn as ever. In his budget yesterday John Swinney announced massive cuts to the local councils that pay for our schools and are key to the education of our children. COSLA estimates that 15,000 jobs will be lost as a result of yesterday's budget. Can the First Minister tell us how many of those job losses will come from our schools? Yesterday's budget settlement was a tough one for local government. I make no bones about that but I want today to put that into some context. The net revenue reduction for local authorities next year will be £320 million. That amounts to a reduction in the total expenditure of local authorities of 2 per cent. That is a challenging settlement but that does not take account of the additional allocation that the Deputy First Minister announced yesterday of £250 million for social care. Previously it has been the sole responsibility of local authorities to fund social care but that is no longer the case. The NHS will now share that responsibility and next year we will invest an additional £250 million in that. Of course the core budget of local authorities does not equally take account of the additional £33 million that was announced by the Deputy First Minister yesterday for specifically tackling attainment and tackling the attainment gap in our schools. What we set out yesterday was the choices that we are making in this budget. A budget that we will see over the next few years the total Scottish budget decline as a result of cuts from Westminster but we set out our priorities and those will be priorities that I will be proud to take to the Scottish people. If Kezia Dugdale wants to prioritise different things then she has an obligation to say exactly what those alternative priorities would be and secondly and perhaps more importantly where the money for those other priorities would come from. Kezia Dugdale, Mr Dugdale. Our councils are essential to the education of our children yet John Swinney's budget pulled the rug out from under them and the reality is that Nicola Sturgeon can't guarantee the budget won't result in job losses for our specialist teachers, for our classroom assistants, janitors and office staff. This week the OECD published a sobering report on the state of education in Scotland. The rest of the world is catching up with us and they are overtaking us in maths and yet again the poorest children continue to get left behind. The report warned against a scattergun approach to education so let's see how that £33 million is being spent. A few weeks ago I visited two schools in one building, Cochran Castle and St David's in Johnston. They share a joint campus. The pupils use the same gym hall, the same dining hall and the same playground. Many of them come from the same streets yet just one of those schools gets money from the Scottish Government's attainment fund. One school gets funding to close the gap but the other gets left behind. Does the First Minister agree that that's just not fair? Can I say to Kezia Dugdale that I would encourage her, if she hasn't already done so, to read the OECD report that was published on Tuesday in its entirety? What she will find is that OECD report has many very positive things to say about Scottish education. It says, for example, that we are above the international average when it comes to science and reading. It says that Scottish education—I think that this is a direct quote—is on an upward trend of attainment. It says that our schools are inclusive. It says that young people are positively engaged with education. It also, of course, presents challenges to the Scottish Government and to everybody who cares about education. It says in particular that curriculum for excellence, which it praises, is at a watershed moment. It endorses the approach that this Government is taking to introduce a national improvement framework with standardised assessment at its heart. The OECD report, far from the way that Kezia Dugdale has characterised it, is positive and sets out a clear path for further improvement and further reform. On the attainment fund, I have made very clear my priority when it comes to tackling the attainment gap. The budget that the Deputy First Minister set out yesterday sets aside the funds to make sure that we are progressing with that work to close the attainment gap. £33 million next year, which is part of a bigger programme of £100 million over and above local authority school budgets to prioritise improvement in attainment. That is the commitment that this Government has made. I say again to Kezia Dugdale that, if she wants to come forward with proposals—this is a draft budget—suggesting that we spend additional money in any particular area of our responsibilities, she has an absolute entitlement to do so, but when she does so, she also has an absolute responsibility to tell this chamber and to tell the people of Scotland where in the budget the additional money would come from. I give her that invitation today. Scotland used to be able to boast that it had the best schools in the world, and today she tells us just to be glad that they are above average. Is that really the extent of the ambition? Under this Government, more than 6,000 children left primary school last year unable to read properly. That is 6,000 children who have spent every year of their primary school education under this Government. The new powers heading our way give us the power and the chance to do something different. We do not just have to manage Tory austerity like the SNP's budget did yesterday. She wants a plan, so here is a plan. Under the Scottish Labour's plan, headteachers would get £1,000 for every pupil from a deprived background. We would hand real power to headteachers to decide how to improve the life chances of children in their school. It is a plan that sends funds to where they are needed most, and it would end the farce, like that in Johnston, where schools on the same shared campus are not entitled to the same support. Will the First Minister make a commitment here today to back our plan to use the new tax powers to invest in our young people? Let me just point out to Kezia Dugdale what the OECD report said this week. It said, I know Labour do not like to hear this kind of thing, but it said, based on the action that this Government is taking through progressing with curriculum for excellence, through the new national improvement framework, through the introduction of our evaluation and assessment system, then Scottish education has the potential now to become a world leader. That is what the OECD says. I know Labour do not like it because it tops up the potential of Scotland, but that happens to be the fact. I invited Labour to put forward alternatives, but I also invited them to say where the money is coming from. Unless Kezia Dugdale in her next question is going to tell me where from this draft budget, the money to fund the proposal that she has just outlined to this chamber, is going to come from, then she does not deserve to be treated with any credibility whatsoever. The Deputy First Minister put forward yesterday a fully funded plan to tackle the attainment gap in Scottish education. That is the reality. Now, Kezia Dugdale says that we should use new tax powers. Let Kezia Dugdale give us a straight answer to this question today. Is she saying that next year, in this draft budget, the Scottish Government, she thinks that the Scottish Government should put up the basic rate of income tax? That is a simple question. Let us hear a yes or a no answer. The First Minister tells us that she is a progressive, but every single time she has offered a progressive tax, she votes it down four times in this chamber. I tell you what is not credible, for in the business of what is not credible, it is governing with a budget one year at a time with no plan for the future like this Government has. Through yesterday's budget, it is clear that their commitment to ending austerity does not extend much beyond the odd press release. The OECD last reviewed Scotland's education system in 2007, and since the SNP Government has cut the number of teachers by 4,300, the number of qualified teachers in our nurseries has fallen, and the gap between the richest and the rest remains as wide as ever. What is the SNP's response to all of that? To cut, cut and cut again? Why is it that this SNP Government appears to be content to let the next generation pay the price of austerity? The First Minister said something correct in that last question. We are getting to the nub of the matter. Progressive taxis, land and buildings, transaction tax—as soon as John Swinney had the power, he made that progressive yesterday—he outlined plans to raise £130 million in additional revenue from business rates, but here is the nub of the matter. Next year, the only way that we could raise extra revenue from income tax is if we were to raise income tax at the basic rate and raise income tax for the lowest-paid people in our society. When faced with that question, everybody watching this session of First Minister's questions today will have seen Kezia Dugdale duck the question completely. Labour wants to tell us what they disagree with, but when it comes to putting forward any funded alternatives, Kezia Dugdale and Labour simply run for cover. We have made our choices in this budget. Those choices are to protect the NHS, to protect social care, to protect educational attainment, to protect colleges, to protect university research and free tuition, to protect the place, to protect free personal care, to protect household budgets and to protect against Tory cuts through the welfare fund and mitigating the bedroom tax. If the opposition wants to make different choices, let them tell us what those choices are and for once let them tell us where they are going to get the money. Thank you, Presiding Officer. I add my Christmas wishes to those who have already been expressed by others in this chamber. I know that the First Minister had the pleasure to meet him this morning, but I am obligated to ask when will she next meet the Secretary of State for Scotland. The Deputy First Minister has the pleasure to meet the Secretary of State for Scotland. I have no plans in the near future. I had the pleasure—I am going to put it that way—of meeting the Prime Minister on Monday. All I will say is that when I went into Downing Street, I didn't have this stinking cold. I had it when I came out. Ruth Davidson, another thing that's Westminster's fault, Presiding Officer. I'll tell Dave to put the mistletoe away next time you come. Presiding Officer, at the unveiling of the Scottish budget yesterday, I was pleased to see that the SNP Government was going to pass on an extra £440 million to hospitals received through extra NHS spending in the block grant. However, it does rather contradict her Government's central claims. Before the referendum last year, the then health secretary, Alex Neil, said this. Only a yes vote in the referendum can fully protect Scotland's NHS. Can I ask? The day after the First Minister has just allocated an extra £440 million to health, does she still really believe that leaving the United Kingdom is the only way to protect Scotland's NHS? I'll return to my favourite word of 2014. Yes. I think that this is a bit rich from the Conservatives. Let's remember that the budget of this Government, because our overall budget is still determined by the Tories at Westminster, is going to be reduced by £1.2 billion in real terms between now and the end of this decade. Overall, by the end of this decade, our budget will be cut by almost £4 billion in real terms since the Tories took office—£4 billion. That's been the cost to this Government, to this Parliament and to this country of Conservative Government at Westminster. That's the reality. We will make sure that we protect the priorities that we hold dear. That's why I'm so proud that John Swinney yesterday announced extra funding for our national health service of more than £1 billion, taking the health budget in Scotland for the first time to almost £13 billion, proving yet again that the national health service is safe in the hands of this Government. Nice try, but not exactly backed up by the facts, because the truth is that her failure to increase spending on the NHS at the same rate as the UK Government has cost Scotland's health service almost £700 million over the past five years. However, as I said, it's Christmas and I am delighted that, belatedly, the Scottish Government has recognised that shortfall as a beginning to address it and has handed an extra £440 million to the NHS in Scotland. However, that is something that happened under devolution not independence, First Minister, because junior colleagues said that you couldn't protect a health service without independence, but you've just increased it by £440 million under devolution. You said that you couldn't increase childcare without independence, yet childcare has gone up under devolution. You said that Scotland couldn't get a fairer deal on fishing without independence, but we've just had this week a massive boost for our fishing communities, all good news and all without independence. Since it is the season of good will, I wonder if the First Minister could find it within herself, just once, to accept that she and her colleagues got it wrong. Or is it still the case that, when it comes to the SNP, it's always Westminster bad? Sorry, I'm losing my voice. Look, her argument may be contorted and it is certainly very, very contorted, but in the spirit of Christmas I am going to take a positive and I'm going to thank Ruth Davidson for just setting out there. I thought quite eloquently how well this Government is doing to protect the health service, to protect and improve childcare and I think that the third one was to do so well by our fishing industry. Thank you so much at this festive period to Ruth Davidson and the Tories for that vote of confidence in the Scottish Government. The next thing you know, you'll be saying yourself, quoted on the SNP election leaflets. Question number three already. I too wish everybody a good festive season and I hope they have a fantastic break. To ask the First Minister what issues have you discussed at the next meeting of the Cabinet, I didn't think that Christmas would get heckled, but only the SNP could do that. Let me wish a happy Christmas even to the Liberal Democrats. Matters of importance to the people of Scotland will be discussed at the next meeting of the Cabinet. I don't think that the First Minister has grasped the contradiction. I listened to what she said to Keis Dugdale earlier. A few months ago, she said that even though she had been in power for eight years, she was just getting started on education. It was, she said, her driving and defining priority of her Government. How on earth does cutting the budgets of Scotland's education authorities count as a good start? I set out to Keisie Dugdale that the settlement for local authorities is challenging. That's why John Swinney said yesterday that before stage 3 we'll discuss in a spirit of partnership with local government how we work together to implement our priorities. I also put that in context. The net revenue reduction amounted to 2 per cent of the overall expenditure of local councils. It doesn't take account of the additional money that we are investing in educational attainment over and above the core school budgets of councils. Willie Rennie does not take account of what the Deputy First Minister said yesterday about maintaining teacher numbers. I remain absolutely determined to prioritise education. That is demonstrated in the budget. More than that, it is demonstrated in the action that this Government is taking through the national improvement framework and the new system of assessment. I think that Willie Rennie should reflect very carefully on the OECD report because things that he's been criticising and telling us that he's hard and fast against are things that the OECD said earlier this week are putting Scotland on track to becoming a world leader. I think that it's about time that Willie Rennie changed his position. That just fails the most basic test. The biggest thing that councils do is education. They are being hammered by the Government in this budget. She clings on to this attainment fund while she butchers the school budgets of councils. It is not as if she had no choices. She decided to match George Osborne on income tax, match him on second homes, match him on business rate poundage and undercut the Tories on the council tax. She had a range of choices, but the result is that she is proposing lower tax and lower spend than even George Osborne thinks is needed. How can she say that education is her top priority if she is putting all of that before the children of this country? I'm not taking any elections from Willie Rennie on George Osborne. Willie Rennie needs party prop George Born up in the treasury for five long years. I think that Willie Rennie maybe needs to go back to school himself. He's criticised us for what we're doing on second homes in LBTT. Does he not know that that raises additional money to invest in public services? That's the whole point of doing it. We've made our choices, as I said earlier on, protecting the health service, protecting social care and protecting educational attainment. If Willie Rennie wants to propose that next year in this budget we put up the basic rate of income tax, hitting the poorest, hardest. If he's proposing that we should put up the council tax, hitting the poorest, hardest, he's quite free to go to the electorate and put that forward as a proposal in his manifesto. I would say that we'd see the Liberal Democrats plummet as a result, but there's probably not much lower. They've got to fall. Thank you very much, Presiding Officer. To ask the First Minister whether she will provide an update on her meeting with the Prime Minister this week. Well, I held what I think was our constructive meeting with the Prime Minister on Monday. In particular, I made clear to him that I want to see a deal on the fiscal framework and more powers for the Parliament ahead of our election, but that we will not accept a deal that is unfair to Scotland. I welcomed the Prime Minister's agreement that we will both work towards a February deadline for reaching an agreement on the fiscal framework. We also discussed security issues, where the Scottish Government will benefit from increased co-operation with the UK Government, and we discussed the trade union bill, where I can assure Parliament that I made very clear to the Prime Minister the cross-party and civic opposition across Scotland to this draconian and unnecessary piece of legislation. Can I ask the First Minister to set out the Scottish Government's plans for further opposition to the trade union bill? Will the First Minister agree that that highlights the clear problems of leaving employment policy in the hands of ideologically motivated Tory Governments? I hope that the irony has not been lost in some of those who are now demanding that this Parliament could stop the trade union bill, but for those who are now demanding it, the very same people who argued in the referendum that we should keep the powers in the hands of Westminster, the irony surely is not lost. The Scottish Government submitted a general policy memorandum to the devolution committee on Friday, which will enable them to hold an inquiry into the impact of the bill and for this Parliament to have a vote on it. At the same time, we will continue to make clear our opposition to the bill across the UK and in Scotland. Let me be absolutely clear, in my view this bill is unnecessary, it is unwarranted, and despite my discussions with the Prime Minister on Monday, I am still unaware of any logical reasoning behind the bill other than an ideological attack on the trade union movement. The Scottish National Party will oppose this bill across the whole of the UK, but I have to agree with Christina McKelvie that the fact that trade union law is not the responsibility of this Scottish Parliament has left us facing draconian laws that Scotland, if we did have the power, simply would not introduce. The First Minister has just confirmed that she is indeed against the trade union bill, which is fundamentally a Tory attack on trade unions and workers rights. That being the case, I wonder if she could then explain for me why she allowed the union bashing and demnification clause that compensates big business out of the public purse to remain in the Serco-Caladonian sleeper contract. I am more than happy to write to the member on that specific issue, and I would be very happy. I hope that this is an issue where Labour—there may not be many of those issues, but I would have hoped that this is one where Labour and the SNP could join together. We are absolutely clear in our view of the importance of trade unions. In the importance of trade unions, not just in reducing the risk of industrial action but the importance of trade unions in making our workplaces safer, more productive, healthier, happier places to be. I support the trade union movement. I know that the member fully supports the trade union movement, and we should join together in trying even now to stop this attack on it. To ask the First Minister whether it remains the Scottish Government's position that the NHS 24 ICT future programme is an exemplar of good practice. The Scottish Government has not expressed that view or used those words about the NHS 24 future programme. As I stated, during FMQs on 19 November, it is very disappointing, if I can put it that mildly, that a decision to pause introduction of the NHS 24 future programme had to be taken, but it was taken in the interests of patient safety and therefore clearly it was the right thing to do. A full review is under way into the issues that led to the decision to pause the roll-out of the new system, and we will receive the initial report into that at the end of this month, with a full report in January. We will consider those very carefully to ensure that all appropriate lessons are learned. I thank the First Minister for her reply, but the gateway report, which I presume was from the Government, actually did say that it was an example of good practice. The Government's management of ICT and the NHS is unfit for purpose. Does she agree with that? The SNP has had two highly critical reports from the Auditor General. It cancelled the eCare programme at a cost of £56 million. It failed to deliver on its promise that the NHS portals would be linked up between boards, so a doctor on Tayside still cannot see information from Fife. Now the NHS IT fiasco, with three separate reports—the gateway report, Ernest Young report and the Price Waterhouse report—is £40 million over budget, over time and finally suspended. Why, First Minister, is it still being delayed for a further eight months at a cost of £0.45 million every month? That is another £3.5 million of taxpayer's money. It could not be because there is an election and it is being delayed to June, could it? No, it certainly could not. It is for patient safety reasons, and I would hope that all members across the chamber would accept that. Can I take on the point about the quote, exemplar of good practice and Richard Simpson may be interested in knowing that that was a quote that came from—it was quoted in the gateway review by the then NHS 24 chief executive, but it was the opinion of the independent review team. The Scottish Government's Centre of Expertise and ICT provided advice in establishing the review, but we are not involved in the conduct of that review. I hope that explanation helps Richard Simpson on the wider issue. Let me say that this is an important issue, and I think that it is absolutely right that the Parliament, both today and in the future, gets the proper opportunity to scrutinise all of the issues here. But decisions that have been taken about the new system have been taken for patient safety reasons, and because of that they are the right decisions. What we are now focused on is making sure that any issues are resolved, that any lessons are learned and that the system can come into full operation as quickly as possible. That is why we are waiting on the initial report, which we will get on 30 December or thereabouts with a full report during the course of next month. At that point, it would be absolutely appropriate for all members of the chamber to have the chance to look carefully at those reports, scrutinise them and ask whatever questions they deem appropriate to me or to the health secretary. To ask the First Minister what the Scottish Government's response is to the final report of the commission on local tax reform. We welcome the commission's report, which is very much in line with the Government's ambitions on taxation. We will bring forward in the new year, as the Deputy First Minister said yesterday, a detailed plan for reform that will embody the principles of the commission report, and I would urge others to do likewise before the election so that the people of Scotland can look at the different options. All political parties were approached and invited to participate in the work of the commission, and I would thank those who did participate for doing so. It is disappointing that only now are the Conservative parties showing an interest in the findings when they were the one and only political party in this chamber who refused to participate in the work of the commission in the first place. I thank the First Minister for her response, but having read the report, I think that we have rather been vindicated because the report took in a great many words to tell us that it did not like the council tax. It thought that the council tax should be replaced, but it had absolutely no idea what it would replace it with. Can the First Minister guarantee a happy Christmas to aspirational hard-working families across the country by guaranteeing them that whatever replacement tax she proposes will not hit them hard in their pockets? I can guarantee to the people of Scotland that their council tax is going to be frozen next year for the ninth consecutive year. Murdo Fraser, when he responded to the budget yesterday, appeared to be disappointed that the Deputy First Minister hadn't decided to put up tax, income tax or the council tax, but we are a Government that has protected household incomes and made sure that the obscene increases in council tax that we have seen under previous Administrations came to an end. What we will do over and above that is to bring forward our proposals for longer-term reform of the council tax. I am in no doubt that this Government will do that and will put those proposals before the Scottish people in advance of the election. My challenge to every other party in this chamber is to do likewise, and then the people of Scotland will be able to choose. We are now moving to members' business, members should leave the chamber, should do so quickly and quietly.