A Smarter Scotland

We are ambitious about the part Scotland can play in a fast-changing global economy. We believe there is a great deal more we can do to exploit our advantages in knowledge and innovation and to tap into the potential talent available to us. We will ensure a smarter Scotland by expanding opportunities for Scots to succeed at every stage of life - from nurture through to life long learning - ensuring higher and more widely shared achievements for all.

Bringing about a smarter Scotland will, of course, help to ensure that people have better employment prospects and that, in turn, will strengthen our economy. Opening up opportunity to more people will also help to combat poverty and its associated problems, moving us toward a fairer and more inclusive society.

We believe that Scotland needs:

Ø A highly skilled, adaptable workforce with the knowledge and attitudes required for a growing, competitive economy;

Ø A healthy science and research base;

Ø Young people provided with the education needed to succeed; and

Ø Learning opportunities throughout life for all.

The first year

During our first year in government, we laid the foundations for a smarter Scotland:

• Committed to providing additional funding for phased 50% increase in free nursery provision, delivering full half-day for 3 and 4 year olds. 
• Launched process for long term early years strategy covering child care, development and education.
• Funding for extra 300 teachers and 250 more teacher training places from August,
• Additional £40 million in capital funding for school buildings to enable councils to plan investment.
• New pay deal for teachers, worth more than seven per cent over three years
• Extended trial of free, nutritious school meals for all P1-3 pupils in five council areas
• Announced review of national qualifications system inc literacy and numeracy exams, in line with new Curriculum for Excellence 
• Launched Volunteering Action Plan to improve recruitment, training and development for people giving up their time to boost young people's lives.
• £1.5 million funding increase over 3 years for youth organisations such as the Scouting Association and YMCA.
• Scrapped the £2289 graduate endowment, benefiting students who graduated last year, and students currently in the system
• Additional financial support for Crichton Campus in Dumfries
• Colleges and universities to receive an extra £100 million capital funding
• New Skills Strategy to better meet needs of individuals and employers. 
• Asylum children who have been here for at least 3 years given same access as Scottish children to full-time further and higher education.
• Major overhaul of system to support children looked after by foster and kinship carers.  Better financial support for carers

The year ahead

This year we are building on this progress and setting in place relevant legislation and policy priorities to enable more Scots to succeed:

• We have already made clear our belief that access to further and higher education should be based on the ability to learn, not the ability to pay. A Bill to abolish the Graduate Endowment Fee has passed its first stages in Parliament. This measure will immediately benefit around 50,000 students who will no longer be asked to pay almost £2,300 after graduation. Not only that, but each and every student studying at university in the years ahead will no longer be saddled with this burden. This is a major step towards our aim of tackling student and graduate debt;
• We will issue a consultation paper seeking the views of stakeholders about our policy to replace the current system of student loans with a fair and affordable system of means-tested grants. As part of this process we will seek the views of stakeholders on measures to tackle graduate debt;
• We will launch a consultation on those key policy areas supporting the Protection of Vulnerable Groups (Scotland) Act 2007 Regulations. This will include retrospective checking, fees, determination procedures and definition of protected adults. In the first half of 2008 we will be consulting on the main Regulations themselves;
• We will consult on proposals to introduce a legislative presumption against the closure of rural schools; and
• We will introduce any legislation which is necessary to support a decision that the charitable status of colleges should be retained.

As well as legislative measures, we have a number of policy priorities this year that will help take us further down the road toward a smarter Scotland:

• We have set out the details of our new Skills Strategy which, as well as contributing to our effort to build a wealthier and fairer Scotland, will contribute to our efforts to put success within reach of more and more Scots. Scotland needs both a skilled population and an economy and society that makes full and productive use of these skills. The strategy will address both the supply of skills (recognising the importance of developing skills at all levels), as well as the demand for skills (recognising the importance of employers that demand, value and make best use of their workforce's skills);
• We are developing our plans regarding the science and innovation strategy, developing a vision for supporting science to help support the economy, our people and our quality of life;
• We will support progress towards a modern Scottish curriculum fit for the 21st Century.. Engaging with the profession, we will help ensure that the curriculum will deliver the right mix of opportunities for all our children, whatever path they choose to take. We believe that education today must begin to focus more on personalising learning to enable children to fulfil their individual potential;
• We are building a long term and comprehensive early years strategy. We believe that a child's first few years are particularly important, even more so in communities where opportunities are limited by other factors, and this strategy will be aimed at giving every child in Scotland the best start in life;
• We have established a pilot of free school meals for all primary 1 to 3 children in selected local authority areas; and
• We are ensuring that vulnerable children and young people are enabled to aspire and achieve. This includes positive policies to provide the right support at the right time to ensure improved outcomes for vulnerable families, children and young people at risk and families needing support. For example, our fostering and kinship care strategy will focus on building the capacity and quality of foster care, as well as promoting the role of foster carers in supporting birth families to stay together. It will also ensure improved support for kinship carers to reflect their important role.

Together, this represents a comprehensive series of actions that will enable us to work with those within the children's services, young people and higher and further education systems - as well as others in Parliament and beyond - to fully develop the people and talent that we have in Scotland.

Some highlights from the Budget

To help achieve a smarter Scotland, the Budget will allow us to:

• work with local government as part of our historic Concordat, towards improving the learning experience for children and young people by improving the fabric of schools and nurseries; as quickly as is possible, reducing class sizes in P1 to P3 to a maximum of 18 and ensuring access to a teacher for every pre-school child; and making substantial progress towards a 50 per cent increase in pre-school entitlement for 3 and 4 year olds;
• work with local government and legislate to extend entitlement to nutritious free school meals to all primary and secondary school pupils of families in receipt of maximum child or working tax credit in 2009; and to allow further extension of free school meals to all P1 to P3 pupils in 2010;
• implement the Protection of Vulnerable Groups Act to improve protection for children and vulnerable adults and to reduce the bureaucratic burdens on those working with them;
• develop and work with local government to implement strategies for child protection, fostering and kinship care and youth justice, to improve support for the children, young people, families and communities most at risk. This includes providing allowances for kinship carers of looked after children;
• promote parity of esteem for vocational learning and qualifications and academic skills and work in partnership with local government, colleges, local employers and others to give more school pupils opportunities to experience vocational learning;
• work with our partners to provide more positive and engaging opportunities for all young people, allowing them to develop the enterprise and entrepreneurial skills and attitudes they need for the workplace. This will ensure that Scotland's young people have more choices and more chances to take advantage of opportunities in work, education or training;
• deliver a total investment of £5.24 billion (£1.67bn/£1.75bn/£1.81bn) in the further and higher education sectors in Scotland, with an extra £100 million capital funding package in 2007-08 to maintain the competitiveness and effectiveness of the sectors;
• deliver support for students of £1.55 billion (£509.1m/£507.7m/£538.8m), with a total of £29.0m/£30.0m/£60.0m to end the graduate endowment fees; and to phase in the transition from student loans to grants, starting with part-time students. £30 million will be available in 2010 to deliver a system of grants for Scottish students, with the details agreed following a consultation on student support and graduate debt proposals we are undertaking in 2008;
• invest £16 million in 2008-09 for the establishment of a skills body, Skills Development Scotland Ltd, and £20 million (£3.9m/£7.9m/£7.9m) for the implementation of Skills for Scotland to develop smarter demand for and use of skills in the economy and to deliver high quality training and learning provision across the population; and
• improve research links between colleges, universities and business to get the best Scottish ideas from the campus to the marketplace and enhance capacity in Dundee to support life sciences in Scotland.