BANFFSHIRE and BUCHAN COAST Liberal Democrats

Liberal Democrat Constitutional Affairs spokesperson Wendy Chamberlain MP has branded the Home Office as 'not fit for purpose' as she tabled an amendment to an SNP motion due to be heard in the House of Commons on Tuesday afternoon.

The amendment condemns the Conservative Government's Hostile Environment, which has caused people to be wrongly denied access to public services, evicted from their homes, detained and deported and calls upon all parties to work across the chamber to fix the Home Office.

Commenting on this afternoon's budget statement, Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Willie Rennie said:

"This is a budget that is going to need substantial revisions.

"We need to see serious efforts to support local government, the police, mental health, nursery education and the environment.

"In particular, councils are buckling under pressure. The services they manage have been scraped back and back by years of underfunding and this budget doesn't deliver a fraction of the funding they need to get things back on track.

Commenting on the full review of Scotland's curriculum announced by the Cabinet Secretary for Education, Scottish Liberal Democrat education spokesperson Beatrice Wishart MSP said:

"Something has gone wrong in Scottish education. We have plummeted down the international rankings.

"Teachers workloads are intolerable. There has been continuing confusion about the responsibilities of Education Scotland. Abolishing the survey of literacy and numeracy when the results declined, to replace it with new national testing, has made it harder to see what is really going on.

Responding to the Independent Inquiry into Mental Health Services in Tayside which warns of "a breakdown of trust in many aspects of the provision of mental health services in Tayside" and makes 51 recommendations for improving services, Scottish Liberal Democrat health spokesperson Alex Cole-Hamilton MSP said:

Alex Cole-Hamilton MSP has today demanded both of Scotland's governments urgently adopt new policies to tackle the "emergency" of homeless deaths, after the first ever statistics for Scotland revealed 195 homeless people died in 2018 - 4 a week.

They also showed:

• Scotland had the highest rate of homeless deaths of all GB countries in 2018, with a rate more than twice that of England or Wales.
• a 19% increase on the estimated 164 deaths in 2017.
• 53% of deaths in 2018 were drug-related (up from 41% in 2017).
• 8% of deaths in 2018 were suicide
• 8% of deaths in 2018 were alcohol-related
• 79% of those who died were male, while the mean age at death was 43 for females and 44 for males.

Responding to confirmation that in December 2019, four, eight and twelve hour waits at A&E were the worst on record, Scottish Liberal Democrat health spokesperson Alex Cole-Hamilton MSP said:

"The SNP Health Secretary said that she would turn round years of decline, but these figures confirm that she has spectacularly failed.

Responding to the news that the number of community payback orders issued fell by 1,500 (8%) last year, Scottish Liberal Democrat justice spokesperson Liam McArthur MSP commented:

"For years we have heard the Scottish Government talk about maximising the use of community sentences, but these new figures show that their use has dropped for the third year in a row.

Scottish Liberal Democrat health spokesperson Alex Cole-Hamilton MSP has today voiced concern about the mounting and "colossal costs" of the unopened Sick Kids hospital, as he revealed staff costs for the empty hospital are topping £139,000 a month.

Staff costs from March to August 2019 totalled £834,000, which covered domestics, catering and logistics. There were 137 staff whose employment covered working at the new hospital either part or full time during September 2019.

Research revealed today by the Scottish Liberal Democrats shows that 375,305 images were supplied to the Police National database from Police Scotland's Criminal History System since 2014, without a clear legislative requirement for their deletion if the person pictured is found to be innocent.

Scottish Liberal Democrat justice spokesperson Liam McArthur MSP has tabled an amendment to the Scottish Biometrics Commissioner Bill which would see innocent people's photos deleted after 3 years, in line with current law for DNA and fingerprint retention. It will be voted on at the Scottish Parliament's Justice Committee this Tuesday.

Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Willie Rennie said

"The SNP Leader's statement will be met with almost universal frustration.

"People who want the division to stop will be dismayed that Nicola Sturgeon wants yet more constitutional arguments after years of Brexit and independence.

"Independence supporters will feel let down with promises of yet more talking shops and a spin-job. This was supposed to be a game changing speech but all it's changed is the name of the pointless talking shop.