Labour Leader Iain Gray kicked off the last FMQs of the parliamentary year by challenging the First Minister on knife crime.

 

Following the passage of the Criminal Justice and Licensing Bill through parliament yesterday, in which the Labour Party’s amendment to impose mandatory six-month sentences for knife crime fell, Gray asked the First Minster why he supports mandatory sentences for gun crime but not knife crime. 

 

"Yesterday I met Kelly McGhee, whose brother Paul was brutally murdered on the 25th October 2009. He was stabbed outside his family’s home when he went to help someone else,” he said.

 

"Kelly’s question to Alex Salmond is ‘when more people are killed by the use of a sharp instrument in comparison to being shot, why is there is a minimum sentence in place for gun carriers and not knife carriers?"

 

The Labour leader pledged that mandatory minimum sentences for knife crime would feature in the party’s election manifesto next year.

 

First Minister Alex Salmond responded that public confidence in the police is at an all time high in Scotland and this is the reason why knife crime is falling.

 

However he added that Iain Gray chose to misrepresent things. There will always be sympathy on this side of the chamber for the victims of knife crime and their families but the idea of additionality in public spending will not be possible for many years, he said. The policies Iain Gray has put forward on minimum mandatory sentences would cost the public purse £140m. If the Labour Party come into government and spend money on this measure this will be sure to hit spending in frontline services such as the number of police on the streets, he warned.

 

7000 criminals have been released from prison this year as a result of SNP policies, Gray hit back. “But we shouldn’t be surprised that the SNP end this year by releasing 7000 criminals because they started it by releasing the Lockerbie bomber,” he added. 

 

“Why is the First Minister always on the side of the criminals and never on the side of the victims?” he asked.

 

The FM pointed to the broad based support for the SNP’s position on short term prison sentences from figures including Cherie Booth and former Labour First Minister Henry McLeish. Considering the number of people raising their voices in support “I think Gray is very foolish to politicise issue of criminal justice”, he said.  The SNP had already kept 77 of its 94 manifesto promises, he added. 

 

Conservative Leader Annabel Goldie tackled the FM once again on the collapse of the company behind last year’s Homecoming event, The Gathering.

 

“It is now all too clear that the SNP Government has been negligent. Yet the First Minister still won’t answer these key questions about the Gathering fiasco, which has left over 100 small businesses out of pocket to the tune of over £300,000,” said Goldie.

 

“The collapsed company, overseen by two Scottish Government quangos and an SNP Council, was reporting cash flow problems two months before the Scottish Government granted the secret loan.

Goldie accused the FM of being patronising in his response to questions about the collapse of the company, to which the Scottish Government had granted a loan, when he said he was delighted the Homecoming Year was such a success.

 

The First Minister responded saying that Goldie would be better informed had she been in the chamber for the Ministerial Statement on The Gathering yesterday. It is not a trite response to state the success of Homecoming, he argued. Neither was it an unreasonable action for the government to take to grant the company a loan.

 

Goldie said the FM could resort to bombast but small businesses were still owed money as a result of the failure of the company, with one small business still owed £11,000. That company and other small firms have today released a statement saying that they should have known been made aware of the loan made to the Gathering Ltd, she told the chamber.

 

The FM replied that the Auditor General has judged that the action taken by the Scottish Government in this case was reasonable.

 

Lib Dem leader Tavish Scott questioned the First Minister on why the Scottish Government was spending £1.2m on Patient Rights Officers, while cash-strapped health boards have to cut nursing posts.

 

“As Health Boards are cutting nurses across Scotland, this SNP Government is putting over a million pounds into Patients Rights Officers for a Bill with no rights,” Scott said.

“When medical staff are cut, patients will worry that they can’t see a doctor or a nurse, not whether they can meet a government bureaucrat.”

 

The Patient’s Rights Bill has been supported by patients’ groups across Scotland, Salmond replied.  With two thirds of the current public finances a legacy of the previous Labour Government and the other third a design of the new Lib Dem Conservative Government, talking about public sector job cuts is not Scott’s strongest suit, he advised.