Speeches by Murray.

“The primary role of the Scotland Office is to uphold the constitutional settlement, and the constitutional settlement contains section 35, as it contains all the other sections that are in the Act, is a relatively obvious thing to say. However, I suppose the direct answer to that question is that Minister McNeill and I…”

“Congratulations to you on your election back in July. We have four key priorities. We have reshaped the Department and Director Laurence Rockey may wish to add something to this, but we have four main priorities. The first one being economic growth, which is the national mission of course of the UK Labour Government as…”

“The key things are that the Prime Minister has been pretty clear that Scotland will be at the heart of this new UK Labour Government. We want to achieve the UK national missions that were set out in our manifesto, but also those have to be achieved across the whole of the country. Growth has to be in all four corners o…”

“I can give you some practical examples. We have already managed to get both the Scottish and UK Governments to jointly fund Project Willow, which is about the future of the Grangemouth site. We worked with the Scottish Government and our colleagues in Treasury and MHCLG to get the Falkirk and Grangemouth growth deal ov…”

“The number they have come up with is probably accurate, but it does not include all the factors. A number that you come up with depends on the question you ask, and the question that has been asked has been analysed on the basis that it does not include the major impact on pensioners’ income which is the triple lock, t…”

“Tens of thousands of pensioners have got themselves onto pension credit because of the massive increase in the advertising and the efforts that have been done by DWP. That is not included in those figures as an example, so I am loth to comment on public policy on the basis of a figure that I deem to be not showing an a…”

“Thank you for the question. Just for the record, Chair, we have met twice previously. It is the third meeting that we have struggled to get back into the diary. This is a key part of what GB Energy has to achieve because the way to unlock the future of energy in the Scottish context is to unlock that community benefit …”

“I think I am familiar with the report that the DWP produced yesterday. Was that the—”

“For the benefit of the Committee, the analysis that DWP has done did not include the triple lock. It did not include the Household Support Fund and did not include the massive increase of uptake of pension credit. So I would challenge the figures on that in terms of the overall analysis because one of the key things th…”

“The reason that I do not have a figure to give you on that basis is because the 100,000 does not include the other stuff that the Government are doing. I would not like fear-mongering that people are being pushed into poverty without having the actual figures. If it does not include the triple lock, which is worth that…”

“If I can respond to that.”

“Obviously, the decision to means test the winter fuel payment in Scotland was made by your Government as well in terms of the Scottish Government’s position. On that basis, I think that if we are going to look at figures and analyse figures properly, particularly in terms of the baseline for poverty or other socioecono…”

“—some of the major public policy issues that this Government have already put in place, the triple lock, the Household Support Fund and the massive increases in pension credit. If you don’t include those figures, you end up in a situation where you are dealing with a baseline that is incorrect and, therefore, could end…”

“I think GB Energy is one of the best policies in our manifesto. It was really important for the legislation to be one of the first pieces of legislation into Parliament. Hopefully, it will be one of the first pieces of legislation out. I am disappointed that the Member who will actually host GB Energy did not back it a…”

“Ultimately, the size of GB Energy as an organisation is very much comparable with other bodies, probably 200 to 300. I would hope they will be headquartered in Aberdeen but of course they will have to be based across the country. We have heard from Mr MacDonald, who represents some of the most rural communities in Scot…”

“The Cabinet Secretary for Energy, Gillian Martin, and Minister Shanks have worked very closely together. The Secretary of State, Ed Miliband, has also been working very closely with the Scottish Government. One of the five missions of the UK Labour Government is to deliver that clean power by 2030, but all of that work…”

“There are active discussions. Maybe Laurence at an official level could tell us what the format of those perhaps are, but the key thing here is that these are joint priorities. The Scottish Government also have very ambitious climate change targets, obviously they have been diluted somewhat. We have to deliver this. Th…”

“It is a great question, and it has been the No. 1 issue that has been on our to do list since within hours of taking office in terms of the issues at Grangemouth. I think it is important at the start to separate the two issues out. There is the Grangemouth Refinery and there is the Grangemouth site. In answering your q…”

“The oil and gas industry is an ageing industry. We know that it will continue to decline and has been for some years now. It is important to say that oil and gas will be with us for decades to come, and we do require that world-class workforce to be able to ensure that we can have that active base in the North Sea, but…”

“We inherited an industrial crisis at the election as well—right across Scotland—as well as an economic and public finances crisis. That industrial crisis has touched on pretty much everyone’s constituencies, whether it be in oil and gas, Grangemouth, Mitsubishi Electric, Alexander Dennis buses, Harland & Wolff. The lis…”