16:00 Tommy Sheppard (Edinburgh East) (SNP)

Or take the absurd situation with energy supply in our country. We have people looking through the windows of homes they cannot afford to heat at wind turbines on the horizon providing abundant, cheap renewable energy that they cannot afford to buy because of the ridiculous system of energy ownership and regulation in this country. We want the power to turn that system upside down and change it forever. But to do that, we need the powers of a normal independent country.

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16:45 Ian Murray (Labour)

We could have debated the biggest issue for our planet: climate change. SNP Members will not do that, either, as the Climate Change Committee said this week:

So we will not debate climate change.

Perhaps SNP Members would like to debate energy and the First Minister’s pledge to set up a Scottish national energy company, but they will not, because that plan has been dropped. The statistics that they have been bandying around on renewables have been trashed by the UK Statistics Authority, and Scottish civil servants have been telling them for a long time to stop using them. The only way to get a national energy company is through a UK Labour Government delivering on GB Energy, which would reduce bills, provide energy security, create jobs, contribute to our climate goals and be owned by the people, for the people. So, nothing on energy.

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17:11 Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP)

When we consider energy, we think of the lost opportunities of the bounty of North sea oil that have been frittered away and a lack of legacy for future generations, but now we face the bounty of green renewable energy. Just a few weeks ago, my party published a report on green energy and we talked about the potential in Scotland to increase our energy output fivefold between now and 2050; to create as much as four times the green energy that Scotland needs; to take our responsibilities as citizens of the world to deliver net zero in Scotland by 2045; and to deliver the cheap energy that my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh East (Tommy Sheppard) talked about. Is it not a disgrace that in energy-rich Scotland, when we have this opportunity of the economy of scale not just to power Scotland, but to generate energy for our friends in the rest of the UK and indeed throughout Europe, people are paying the price of the Westminster control of the energy market. Let us not forget that the pricing regime is based on the wholesale gas price, yet in Scotland, only 14% of our electricity comes from gas. We are being penalised by a market that is not fit for purpose, at a time when Scotland has that abundance of energy. That is the cost of being in the Union today and because of that we need to inspire and lead people in Scotland by saying what an independent Scotland would look like. Just from energy alone, by 2050 we could deliver 385,000 jobs in the energy sector, which vastly outnumbers the jobs we have today in oil and gas, but in doing so we would be creating the opportunities for a green industrial future and using that surplus energy to attract energy-intensive industries.

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17:20 Hannah Bardell (Livingston) (SNP)

Here is another list: free prescriptions, no tuition fees, free bus travel for the under-21s and over-60s, free personal care for the elderly, a game-changing Scottish child payment of £100 a month, baby boxes, no hospital parking fees, no bridge tolls, mitigation of the UK bedroom tax, and world-leading climate policies which include an energy transition fund, a green jobs fund and a just transition fund. Then there is redeploying Syrian and other refugees in our NHS and other public services, standing up to this Tory Government against Brexit, which Scotland did not vote for, and introducing some of the most progressive policies for LGBTQ people, including the trans community, while many members of this Government demonise them. I could go on. Those are just a few of the life-changing and life-enhancing policies that the SNP has pursued since coming to power in Scotland—and we do that with limited devolved powers and with one hand tied behind our back.

The Tory Government have destroyed the UK’s global reputation, cut benefits to the poorest and brought forward policies such as the abhorrent rape clause and two-child cap, which makes the lives of many vulnerable women even more precarious. They have crashed the economy with their ill-judged mini-Budget and failed austerity; they have cut international aid and turned their back on those most in need, just as the world faces a global climate catastrophe and many horrors of war and famine; and they have lined the pockets of their cronies and pals with the PPE VIP lane.

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17:45 Patrick Grady (Glasgow North) (Ind)

During this debate, we have heard from the Better Together parties that it is a waste of parliamentary time and that constituents want us to talk about the cost of living crisis, supporting public services and the challenges facing the economy. But as the hon. Member for Edinburgh East (Tommy Sheppard) laid out right at the start, the responses needed to really tackle all those issues in Scotland require the full powers of independence. It is Westminster that still holds the purse strings, embarking on yet another round of austerity, continuing with the absolute folly of Brexit, and increasingly oblivious to the climate emergency and its own commitments to emissions reductions.

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18:10 Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)

Even with Scotland’s renewable energy success story, Westminster decisions have held back our energy policy. When onshore wind subsidies were removed in 2015, it killed investment in the sector. That was done just to appeal to the Tory shires. The carbon capture scheme at Peterhead was pulled twice and is now only classed as a reserve. By no coincidence at all, the carbon capture clusters in red wall seats have been given track 1 status. Scottish bill payers are being forced to pay for nuclear power stations and they have the highest grid charges in Europe. The windfall tax is levied on Scotland’s energy sector, yet a renewables tax allowance to incentivise further investment is not allowed. All the precious oil and gas revenues have been squandered, rather than being used to create a wealth fund. Those are bad decisions made in Westminster and imposed on Scotland.

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