Holyrood is STILL on holiday while the problems just pile up

IT’S back to normal for thousands of families this week as pupils return to school. But our MSPs can look forward to another fortnight’s respite before the new parliamentary term begins. With nine months until the Holyrood election, the opinion polls say the SNP is heading for another landslide victory. But while the prospect of a second independence referendum is set to dominate political debate, a host of issues remains unresolved after eight years of SNP government. Here are just some of them:

SCHOOLS

THE crisis in our schools has emerged as the key battleground in the forthcoming election campaign.

Scottish primary school classes are among the most crowded in the developed world. Class sizes exceed those in Greece, Estonia and Slovenia – despite repeated SNP promises to reduce overcrowding.

Thousands of teachers are planning to quit the profession early over a series of botched reforms including the new curriculum – adding to a staffing crisis that has led to 900 unfilled teaching posts.

Last year, 45 per cent of 13 to 14-yearolds fell short of acceptable standards on literacy – up 9 per cent since 2012.

Radical reforms are needed.

NHS

PATIENTS are being turned away from GP surgeries as staff shortages force practices to close their lists.

The BMA has warned that family doctors are on ‘the brink of a crisis’ as they struggle to recruit new GPs.

Locum doctors, nurses and other health workers are costing Scotland almost £100million a year.

Meanwhile, concern is growing over the Scottish Medicines Consortium, which has refused to fund a series of life-prolonging cancer drugs.

Yet the NHS is spending nearly £25million a year on free prescriptions for ‘over-the-counter’ remedies such as multivitamins and throat sweets – an unaffordable luxury when people are being left to die.

POLICE

THE creation of the single police force in 2013 remains the SNP’s most significant reform – and its most calamitous.

Chief Constable Sir Stephen House has faced calls to resign after a woman was left dying by the roadside for three days following a crash on the M9.

The f ailure of police to respond to a call from a member of the public alerting them to the wreckage is now the subject of multiple inquiries.

Holyrood’s justice subcommittee on policing is poised to investigate claims that officers have been snooping on journalists without judicial approval. The Scottish Police Authority – the force watchdog – is in turmoil as its chairman prepares to step down following an internal revolt by half of its governing board.

A change of leadership is needed – and a major rethink of how the single force can be held to account.

BUSINESS

SMALL businesses represent the backbone of our economy but have come under sustained assault from SNP policies.

Scotland’s small firms will pay more in tax than the entire North Sea oil industry this year, following an increase in business rates. They rose by 2 per cent in April, which will see an extra £2.8billion in revenue for the Scottish Government.

Retailers warn that High Streets are set to lose hundreds of shops every year.

The SNP must stop draining the lifeblood from our towns and create the conditions for business to flourish.

ENERGY

SCOTLAND faces an energy crunch with the collapse in North Sea oil prices, the Longannet coal-fired power station set to close next year and no new nuclear power stations planned.

But the SNP has declared a moratorium on fracking for shale gas to allow a public debate on the controversial method of extraction, loathed by the green lobby and many pro-independence activists.

The Royal Society of Edinburgh has said fracking is no more harmful to the environment than conventional gas production.

The SNP’s obsession with wind energy continues – with the number of turbines doubling in the past year.

Nationalist inertia must end now to head off a full- scale energy crisis.

UNIVERSITIES

ALEx Salmond f amously pledged that ‘ the rocks will melt wi’ the sun’ before tuition fees are imposed on Scottish undergraduates.

But fewer than half of firstyear entrants at our top universities are native Scots, as principals focus on boosting their coffers by recruiting feepaying international students.

Despite this drive to raise cash, university chiefs have pocketed inflation-busting pay rises this year and now earn £200,000-£334,000.

According to official figures for 2012-13, 6.2 per cent of students quit after only one year of study. This compares with 5.7 per cent for England, 5.4 per cent for Wales and 6 per cent for Northern Ireland.

COLLEGES

THE Tories have described the cuts to college places as a ‘decimation’ of the sector.

In the five years to 2013-14, the SNP cut 150,000 part-time college places and replaced them with 9,000 full-time ones.

In Fife there were cuts of more than 18,000 places, 20,000 across Aberdeenshire, 16,000 in Edinburgh and more than 30,000 in Glasgow.

The cuts have been driven by widespread mergers, fuelling a slump in staff morale – with more than nine out of ten college workers warning that the sector is underfunded.

PAY GAP

NICOLA Sturgeon’s ‘ genderbalanced’ Cabinet is presented as proof of the SNP’s commitment to equality of the sexes.

But recent figures showed Scottish women earn £4,258 a year less than men – and the gap is growing. This widening divide is in contrast to England, Wales and Northern Ireland, where it is narrowing.

Experts believe Scotland’s reliance on public sector jobs, particularly for women, is the cause, as the sector has seen a pay freeze in recent years.

In the private sector, which employs more men, wages have risen.

JUSTICE

THE abolition of automatic early release for prisoners was a key SNP pledge – but one it has yet to fulfil.

Legislation has been passed to modify the practice – but in reality it has been scrapped for only 3 per cent of prisoners.

Soaring numbers of teenage criminals are not being prosecuted under a Nationalist drive to slash prison numbers.

Figures for 2013-14 show 662 under-18s were given counselling for alcohol or drug abuse, advice on work or education, or even instruction on how to access benefits, i nstead of appearing in court.

While prisoners are pampered in expensive super-jails, some offenders spared prison are being taken to pantomimes under Community Payback Orders.

The SNP needs to reverse the soft-touch legacy of the past eight years and prioritise victims over offenders.

NAMED PERSONS

THE named persons scheme will see the launch of an army of state snoopers with powers to meddle in family life.

Campaigners have begun a judicial review of the legislation – but ministers remain committed to a scheme that seems to owe its origins to George Orwell’s 1984.

Children’s development will be monitored by named persons – headteachers and health visitors – while pregnant women will be quizzed on their lives and even have their homes scrutinised. If suspicions are raised that the mother’s lifestyle poses any threat to her baby’s well-being, she could f ace i nterventions or be reported to social workers.

It is a scheme the SNP should scrap immediately.