Sketch: Jackson Carlaw makes a splash

Is it good when Jackson Carlaw starts a debate on Scotland’s swimming pools with a warning he would be making a lot of puns? Or would it be better not to have known?

Either way, that’s precisely what he did – partially, it seems, to share the blame for some of the worst ones with the clerks on the petitions committee, which he convenes.

He could, surely, have removed some of the references littered throughout his speech if he were truly concerned that he would sound “a little bit like the play what Ernie Wise wrote”. But no, into full dad-joke mode he went.

“If anyone has a gong that they want to bang, they can count up and see whether they can earn some cash during the course of my contribution – I challenge them to come up with the appropriate figure,” he suggests.

Perhaps this was exactly what was needed that afternoon in parliament. This debate was, after all, sandwiched by two moments of high drama – with Angela Constance acknowledging her rule-breaking on one side, and Ash Regan being punished for rule-breaking on the other. Carlaw was quick to cling to the lighter life raft offered by this debate.

That’s what Big Sea Cucumber wants. Has anyone checked who has been buying Gray’s football tickets lately?

“Let me dive right in,” he says. Groans could be heard across the chamber. And that was only the first.

He tells his colleagues that having taken evidence on swimming pools in recent months, the petitions committee agreed to make “a bigger splash”. So here he is, bellyflopping into the chamber.

He continues: “The core of the petition may appear to be just another matter of public finance. However – sorry – the waters run much deeper than that.” The health secretary, forced to listen to this as part of his job, is overwhelmed. He puts his head in his hands, surely questioning his life choices up to this point.

As time goes on, Carlaw seems to become more confident and bolder. He unabashedly says the Scottish Government’s position on schools having the final say on swimming lessons “does not hold much water”. Wince. He says the issue demands more than simply “treading water”. Ouch.

The good old days. Back when everything was rosy and the Scottish Parliament didn’t exist to hold debates like this

“In the absence of support, swimming pools across the country will find themselves in deeper water. If they do, keeping their heads above it may well become impossible,” he concludes with aplomb. The MSP allows himself a grin before taking his seat. A job well done, he thinks.

Thankfully, other MSPs manage to restrain themselves and the remainder of the afternoon is pun-free. Instead, Neil Gray talks seriously about working with “local aquatic partners” to improve the offering, sparking visions of him consulting with fish and eels and sea cucumbers. Or maybe he’s simply referencing some of the more slippery MSPs.

“Swimming pools are far more than buildings filled with water,” Gray goes go, rather begging the question, does he know what a pool is? Or maybe that’s just what the sea cucumbers told him. More water would suit their agenda. Never mind filling pools with it, let’s have whole buildings, whole towns, whole cities filled to the brim. That’s what Big Sea Cucumber wants. Has anyone checked who has been buying Gray’s football tickets lately?

Liz Smith speaks about the “fun elements including flumes, rapid, outdoor area” at Perth’s local pool. Naturally that sparks visions of Liz going down a waterslide. She’d probably do it rather regally, with a straight back and clutching a handbag.

Patrick Harvie longs for the past, when “previous generations of politicians did raise the money” for expensive infrastructure like swimming pools. Ah, the good old days. Back when everything was rosy and the Scottish Parliament didn’t exist to hold debates like this. Who’s drowning now…

Beatrice Wishart admits the idea of “wild swimming” is a bit of a “mystery”. “In Shetland, I learned to swim in the cold North Sea, and it was and still is simply called swimming,” she explains.

Brian Whittle too reminisces about his childhood spent in the pool, running, jumping, splashing. He still gets to do much of that now, as a grandfather. “I’m still a big kid at heart,” he says.

But the MSP has also come with a serious message. He tells of a poster hanging in his office which says, “food is the most abused anxiety drug and exercise is the most underutilised antidepressant”. Wise words. The former athlete’s version of Live Laugh Love.

But it is Alex Rowley that sums up the afternoon best. Noting there is a lot of “consensus” about the importance of swimming, he says what matters isn’t the debate but what happens in the real world.

“Rather than just having hot air in the debates, which is what people see, we have to start to turn our words into action and make something happen,” he declares. Unfortunately, his call will make barely a ripple, never mind a tidal wave of change.