Jenny Young
Scottish Labour · Scotland
“Tomorrow, people in Bo’ness will come together for the most important day in the town’s calendar, the Bo’ness fair. There has long been a friendly rivalry between my home town of Linlithgow and neighbouring Bo’ness, so, in that spirit of community cohesion, will the minister join me in wishing queen elect Holly, the full retinue from Gran…”
“No one in this Parliament could argue that Scotland is where it needs to be. We have thousands of Scots waiting for NHS treatment and schools that are falling down the international league tables. As Willie Rennie rightly pointed out, across the UK, more than a million people aged 16 to 25 are not in employment, education or training.”
“Ben Macpherson: As I mentioned in the members’ business debate a few days ago, the question of the future of our universities will be pertinent for all of us who have the privilege to serve in this Parliament for the next five years.”
“For a politician or a tech billionaire, such rhetoric might just be words, but to the radicalised, the marginalised and the isolated, it is a call to action. Jo Cox was a highly political person who had strongly held convictions. She was someone who knew right from wrong and was not afraid to stand up and be counted.”
“I associate myself completely with the remarks that the minister just made. My supplementary concentrates on supporting our universities—I think that we can find some common ground on that. Yesterday, the principal of the University of Glasgow informed staff that a voluntary severance scheme would be launched.”
“Rather than hunt for the difficult, honest answers to the problems that our society faces, it is much easier for populists to point the finger at the outsider and the marginalised. Last week, I led a members’ business debate to mark the 10th anniversary of the death of Jo Cox.”
The complete record
Every one of 40 lines we hold for Jenny Young, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account.
“Tomorrow, people in Bo’ness will come together for the most important day in the town’s calendar, the Bo’ness fair. There has long been a friendly rivalry between my home town of Linlithgow and neighbouring Bo’ness, so, in that spirit of community cohesion, will the minister join me in wishing queen elect Holly, the full retinue from Grange primary school and the whole town a really successful fair day tomorrow? Simita Kumar: I thank Jenny Young for her supplementary question. I will not comment on the rivalry between Bo’ness and Linlithgow, but I welcome the celebration in her local community. The Presiding Officer: Thank you very much, colleagues. That concludes general question time for today. First Minister’s Question Time Party Leaders 13:59”
“For a politician or a tech billionaire, such rhetoric might just be words, but to the radicalised, the marginalised and the isolated, it is a call to action. Jo Cox was a highly political person who had strongly held convictions. She was someone who knew right from wrong and was not afraid to stand up and be counted. She has been very much in my thoughts of late. Helen McDade: Will the member take an intervention? Jenny Young: No. I genuinely want to find common ground in the Parliament, to recognise the humanity of those across the chamber from us and to work together with them for the good of the country, but there are lines that I will not cross. I appeal to those who seek to divide us to recognise what they are unleashing on our country and the devastating consequences that their words and actions could have. 16:06”
“Rather than hunt for the difficult, honest answers to the problems that our society faces, it is much easier for populists to point the finger at the outsider and the marginalised. Last week, I led a members’ business debate to mark the 10th anniversary of the death of Jo Cox. Jo Cox was murdered by a white supremacist with links to a US-based neo-Nazi group. As the forces of populism and the far right seek to take hold of our country, they must recognise that there are those who will respond to their incendiary rhetoric—for that is what it is—with violence. The events in Leith last weekend, which others have rightly condemned—I wholly associate myself with those remarks—are a potent reminder of that fact.”
“As others have said, Reform’s motion identifies some of the problems in our society—a flatlining economy, crisis in our public services and a lack of good, skilled jobs—but it is not interested in identifying who is really to blame or offering any genuine solutions. There is underlying inequality in our society. For too many people, the die is cast from their earliest days. Structural problems—not least, the state of our education system and the concentration of wealth and power in the hands of a few—leave people trapped in cycles and generations of poverty. That is why I am a member of the Labour Party and why I am in this Parliament to represent the interests of the people of my region.”
“It is— but not for the reasons that Reform UK wants us to believe. There have been 14 years of Tory austerity, 19 years of SNP waste and incompetence, and a political class consumed by navel gazing and culture wars, which feels increasingly detached from the people it is supposed to serve. However, when they shift blame, populists of all political stripes serve only themselves and their own political ends. They deceive people when they say that there are easy answers to the difficult problems that our country faces—answers such as a new constitutional settlement, freeing ourselves from the shackles of Brussels or Westminster, or blaming the other—be it an immigrant, a refugee or someone on benefits.”
“No one in this Parliament could argue that Scotland is where it needs to be. We have thousands of Scots waiting for NHS treatment and schools that are falling down the international league tables. As Willie Rennie rightly pointed out, across the UK, more than a million people aged 16 to 25 are not in employment, education or training. Millions more face the prospect of never owning their own home, while more than 10,000 children in Scotland do not have a home to call their own. There is the existential threat of climate crisis, as the mercury rises and yet more heat records are broken this very week. With war, genocide and threats to our national security, it is little wonder that people across our country feel let down, left out and worried about the future. They work hard and pay tax but feel as though the system is rigged against them.”
“With regard to the University of Glasgow situation, although, like all universities, it is autonomous, we strongly urge universities to consider redundancies only as a last resort.”
“There are many reserved aspects that have caused higher costs for our universities. In particular, issues of immigration law make it much more difficult for universities to recruit internationally. The national insurance increase was a surprise and a very high cost for our universities. Jenny Young: The Scottish Government cut their funding. Ben Macpherson: We realise that support for our universities from the devolved Government is important. However, in relation to that question, we do not exist in isolation. It is worth remembering that, in the most recent budget, we increased the budget for universities by 5 per cent and that we are liaising closely with them.”
“Ben Macpherson: As I mentioned in the members’ business debate a few days ago, the question of the future of our universities will be pertinent for all of us who have the privilege to serve in this Parliament for the next five years. The cross-party work that was established before the election on the framework for the sustainability and success of our universities has three pillars of exploration and collaboration. That work is going on right now—with a variety of stakeholders—to come up with proposals for how to make the changes that are required for our sector to continue to be successful. We are thinking ahead about the decades to come and making sure that we are agile and changing in the way that is necessary. Responsibility for the pressures on the funding of our universities does not sit entirely with our Government.”
“I associate myself completely with the remarks that the minister just made. My supplementary concentrates on supporting our universities—I think that we can find some common ground on that. Yesterday, the principal of the University of Glasgow informed staff that a voluntary severance scheme would be launched. Jobs are on the line and, understandably, university staff are worried about what it will mean for the future. In the past decade, there has been a 39 per cent real-terms cut to Government funding for Scottish students. Does the minister appreciate how concerning that news of the scheme is for staff and trade unions involved in the University of Glasgow and, more broadly, does he accept that something needs to change to fix the damage that his Government has done to Scotland’s universities?”
“The growing influence of social media—and of the bad actors who control and manipulate those platforms—has certainly fuelled the culture of outrage and conflict that dominates public discourse and media today.”
“I believe that, if anything, our politics has become more divided, and more entrenched as us versus them. In his book, “Why We’re Polarized”, the American commentator and journalist Ezra Klein explains how political affiliation in America has become one of many signifiers of identity or belonging that are stacked on top of so many others that to cross sides from one party to the other becomes virtually impossible. Although our political context might be quite different from that of the United States, it strikes me that the growing prominence of identity politics in our country—of tribes, teams and groups—has hardened those dividing lines. People become not just politically opposed, but “enemies”, “traitors” and “threats to society”.”
“Jo was also a powerful advocate for women’s involvement in our labour movement, serving as chair of the Labour Women’s Network from 2011 to 2015. The Jo Cox women in leadership programme is a mentoring and training programme for women in the Labour Party that was established in memory of Jo to continue that important work alongside the Labour Women’s Network, and I am pleased to say that graduates of the programme include my Scottish Labour colleagues Katherine Sangster and Carol Mochan. As a result of the programme, hundreds of Labour women have stood for election, led in their communities and campaigned for change. I cannot think of a more fitting legacy than that for a woman such as Jo. In the days leading up to this debate, many people have asked whether our political discourse has improved in the decade since Jo’s death.”
“Through the Jo Cox civility commission, the foundation works to create a safe and respectful democracy by challenging the abuse and intimidation of elected representatives. In February, the commission published the report “A Renewed Call to Action for the Devolved Nations”, and I encourage members across the chamber to read its findings. The foundation also advocates for building stronger communities through the great get together, an annual celebration that sees communities across the UK coming together for a range of events, from park runs and litter picking to picnics. I will be hosting a great get together event next Tuesday lunchtime here in the Parliament, and I hope to see many members there.”
“In the aftermath of her death, changes were made to better ensure the safety of MPs and their staff, with enhanced security measures for MPs and changes to how surgeries were advertised and conducted. Then, in 2021, Sir David Amess MP was tragically killed while conducting a constituency surgery. My thoughts are with Sir David’s family today, too. There is certainly more to be done to protect elected representatives and their staff, while also recognising the risks inherent in aspects of the job that we all do and in many of the public- facing jobs in our society. The Jo Cox Foundation was established by Jo’s friends and family after her death, to champion the ideals that Jo spent her working life fighting for.”
“Jo Cox’s career was defined by her humanitarian work, whether at Oxfam—as head of policy and advocacy in the United Kingdom, which included working on the make poverty history campaign, and later as head of Oxfam International’s humanitarian campaigns in New York—or in the UK Parliament, where she established the friends of Syria all-party parliamentary group and advocated for the Syrian people and an end to the civil war. Fittingly, her final questions in Parliament focused on protecting children in conflict. On 16 June 2016, Jo was shot and stabbed outside a library in her Batley and Spen constituency, where she was due to hold a surgery. Her death shocked the nation, and tributes to her poured in.”
“I thank members from all six parties who added their support to the motion and helped secure tonight’s debate. I want to start by recognising that, first and foremost, Jo Cox was a daughter, a sister, a wife and a mother, and my thoughts are very much with her family, for whom I am sure that 16 June will always be a difficult day. Loss does not diminish with the passing of time. In recent weeks, I have been in touch with Jo’s sister Kim, and I conveyed my deepest condolences and very best wishes to the family. I hope that this debate will be a fitting tribute from this place in Jo’s memory.”
“To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on when construction work on Winchburgh train station will begin. (S7O-00062)”
“There is nothing in it about the party’s vision for a better Scotland or how to improve the lives of the people it represents; it is just an opportunity to throw rocks at the SNP because we won the election and Labour lost it. It is so utterly depressing. Labour might think that it is clever to drag out lengthy debates on Peter Murrell, because it thinks that it will somehow harm the SNP, but it has failed to understand that it does not diminish the SNP. Our members and supporters understand that the SNP was the victim of this crime. This debate diminishes Labour. Sadly, as a consequence of the personal attacks, the grasping at straws and insinuation, it also diminishes our politics. It is off-putting to ordinary people and makes politicians seem out of touch. Daniel Johnson: Will the member give way?”
“Will the member take an intervention? Kate Campbell: No, I will make progress. Those parties did not listen or come up with plans to make lives better. They thought that they could just bandy around words like “secretive” and “dishonesty” and that that would somehow damage the SNP. We can see how that went for them. Jenny Young: Will the member take an intervention? Kate Campbell: No, I will make progress. Just to ensure that everyone knows how catastrophically it has failed to learn the lessons of that defeat, Labour has, for its very first debate— its first opportunity to bring something to this chamber and to set out its priorities—lodged this motion.”
“I want to engage cross party on that, which is why I have been in contact with all parties to set up initial meetings in that space. I know that Michael Marra is keen to engage on those steps, and I would be more than happy to engage with Ms Young, too. We must work collaboratively to respond to the situation. That is the most appropriate and responsible action that a Government can take.”
“Jenny Gilruth: I hope that Ms Young knows that I am taking a keen interest in those matters, given my responsibilities as Deputy First Minister. However, I have to work in partnership with the Cabinet Secretary for Public Service Reform. That is exactly why the event that we held on Monday was so important to that end. The Government has to work to meet and balance our budget every year—Ms Young will well understand that we do not have borrowing powers that exist in other parts of the United Kingdom. The discussion that I had with the IFS was important, as was the engagement that we have already had with the Scottish Fiscal Commission. It goes back to the work that Ivan McKee is leading in relation to public service reform.”
“In addition, last week, I met the IFS to discuss its report and findings in more detail, including the learnings for the Scottish Government, to inform our next steps. Jenny Young: The interventions that the Deputy First Minister references were made when we thought that the budget deficit would be £5 billion. If the projections for earnings growth turn out to have been more optimistic than what actually transpires, it is likely that that deficit will increase by a further £1 billion. The Scottish Government has a budget of around £60 billion, and that would be a deficit of £6 billion—around 10 per cent of the entire Scottish budget. The IFS has said that Scotland “faces a fiscal reckoning—with spending cuts or tax rises on the way”. Which one of those will it be?”
“To ask the Scottish Government what its response is to warnings issued by the Institute for Fiscal Studies on 27 May 2026 that, if earnings in Scotland grow in line with the rest of the United Kingdom, Scotland could face a deficit of over £6 billion by 2030. (S7O-00032) The Deputy First Minister and Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Local Government (Jenny Gilruth): Governments across these islands face significant pressures on public finances. Those challenges have intensified in recent months due to global instability. Last summer, we published the medium-term financial strategy, which sets out the scale of the challenge and the action that is required. That was reinforced through the spending review and portfolio efficiency and reform plans, which were agreed in January, led by cabinet secretaries across the Scottish Government.”
“If the Scottish Government’s talk of a just transition and economic growth meant anything, the college nearest to Grangemouth would not be forced to scale back at what is a critical moment for the region that I represent. The injection of funding from the Scottish Government in the 2026-27 budget—”
“Jenny Young: Rachael Hamilton will be well aware that, when we inherited the financial and economic mess that the Tories left in 2024, we had to make difficult decisions to fund the NHS and other public services. I am sure that she will agree that it is the Scottish Government that has done the most damage to our colleges. There has been a 20 per cent cut to their funding over five years. How are colleges supposed to fix that? As I was saying, I met the principal of Forth Valley College, Kenny MacInnes, at the college’s campus in Falkirk yesterday. That campus has long specialised in construction and engineering, which are two vital sectors for our economy nationally, as well as locally, in my region, in proximity to Grangemouth.”
“Just when our economy, businesses and workers need colleges the most, colleges the length and breadth of Scotland are having to cut costs, let staff go and scale back. Yesterday, I met Forth Valley College’s principal, Kenny MacInnes— Rachael Hamilton: Will Jenny Young take an intervention? Jenny Young: Yes—happily. Rachael Hamilton: Many of the college staff I speak to in my constituency cite the increase in employer national insurance contributions by the Labour Government as one of the reasons why colleges are not investing in people and skills. What representations to the UK Government on scrapping that policy will Jenny Young make?”
“There are huge skills shortages in our economy, but there are also huge numbers of people—particularly young people, as other members have said—who are not currently in education, employment or training. There is a huge amount of untapped potential in our economy, and the Government is not doing enough to unlock it. As other members have said, this is undoubtedly a time of economic transition, primarily in our energy sector, but there are, of course, impacts on the wider economy. Colleges should be in prime position to work with businesses and support transitions by training and retraining workers. However, instead, over the previous parliamentary session, the SNP cut college funding by 20 per cent. The Scottish Funding Council now estimates that 22 out of Scotland’s 24 colleges are not sustainable.”
“We also need the Government to recognise the convening power that it possesses. A key example relates to business rates, as the Government should be a much more constructive partner with businesses, in contrast to its track record over the past few years, with reliefs not being passed on in full and the recent damaging revaluation, as many members across the chamber have acknowledged. Even as AI and other technologies play an ever- greater role in the economy, we simply cannot deliver economic growth without recognising that it is people who make our economy turn. As a proud trade unionist and GMB member—I happily declare that interest now—I know that that is the case.”
“I welcome today’s debate on economic growth, which is one of the most important topics—if not the most important one— for the Parliament to address. If the Government can concentrate on driving up economic growth for the next five years, that will be five years well spent for the sake of our fellow citizens, businesses and, of course, public services. However, to do that, we must confront and address the fact that earnings and employment growth in Scotland are lagging behind that in the rest of the UK. As my colleague Daniel Johnson laid out, the Scottish Fiscal Commission projects that, in 2026-27 alone, the economic performance gap will be £785 million. We need to confront that reality. It cannot be wished away, and populists of various political stripes have ill served our people and our economy by pretending otherwise.”
“Last weekend, I was contacted by my constituent, Cecile, about her son’s interminable wait for support for autism and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. His emotions have become increasingly dysregulated, and the family has been forced to pay for private assessment and medication as they await any support at all from CAMHS. Cecile told me: “This is what waiting for support can look like. It is not just a name on a waiting list. It is a child becoming more distressed … families pushed to their limits before meaningful help is available.” Does the First Minister accept that, despite the best efforts of staff, CAMHS are in a dire state? Will he look into this particular case to accelerate this boy’s path to treatment?”
“Too many in our region feel left behind by those in politics, those with power and those who know only privilege, but I believe in that better future for all our children and I have come here to fight for them. Thank you.”
“A future can be won where our schools are improving, not sliding down international league tables; where kids struggling with their mental health do not wait years for an appointment; where our colleges are adequately resourced and appropriately joined up with business and the needs of our economy—a future where sporting facilities are enhanced and growing, rather than shuttered by local authorities that are starved of funds by central Government. It is pretty hard to take advantage of a free swimming lesson when there is no swimming pool where you live. It is never guaranteed that the future will be better than the past. The people of Central Scotland know that all too well.”
“Some days, there was a support assistant with him, but with support stretched ever thinner across the school, that became less frequent as the months went on—a boy’s life chances diminished by a school system that was going backwards and by the growing gaps in support that saw him falling through the cracks. It is clear to me that the choices and opportunities on offer to our young people today are narrowed and diminished below what any of us knew and I refuse to accept that this is as good as it gets. I refuse to tolerate blaming these choices on other people in other places. I refuse to endure the constitutional bickering that elevates subjective identity politics above the objective fact that kids in Scotland are a year behind kids in England in maths—why is that?—because that boy and all those children deserve a much better future.”
“Our brass bands, our gala days—so many of our towns and villages’ proud traditions have their origins in the industries that made Central Scotland the industrial powerhouse of our nation through the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, but our area is more than its past, and I have come here to fight for a better future. My own working life has mostly been spent teaching French and Spanish in West Lothian secondary schools. Any teaching career, it is safe to say, is the sum of the joys and woes of the young people we spend our days with and our nights worrying about. There was the boy in my French class who could barely read a word of English. He was a native speaker of English, with seven years of primary education in this country, and he was functionally illiterate.”
“It is a privilege to make my first speech in Parliament as a representative of the people of Central Scotland and Lothians West. My sporting career—if I could call it that—began in the early 2000s at Linlithgow Athletic Club, the Irene Langlands Stenhouse school of dance and the Linlithgow tennis club, peaking in the lower reaches of the University of Cambridge tennis leagues. It is safe to say that sporting blues were certainly never on the horizon and, Deputy Presiding Officer, I have stuck with the reds ever since. I share my region’s pride in our historic achievements as the beating heart of Scotland’s industries, from shale oil, collieries, the Carron ironworks, fire bricks at High Bonnybridge and Whitecross to the Grangemouth oil refinery and, of course, the Ravenscraig steelworks.”
“If I have time, I will reflect that people have talked to me about starting social media accounts with a completely blank canvas and very quickly finding that the algorithm is sending them countless images of young boys engaging in violence and highly sexualised content of girls. That is what we are dealing with here, and we need to arrest that.”
“I have listed the range of stakeholders with whom we have been working on the development of the guidance, and with whom we will continue to work as we develop the legislation. Violence in our classrooms is something that I and the Government are concerned about. On Thursday, I am attending the Educational Institute of Scotland annual general meeting in Dundee, and I expect to discuss the issue with teachers then. I have no doubt that bold policy changes such as this can have a big impact on behaviour in the classroom—again, not only because of the disruptive tendency of phones but because of what we know that our young people absorb, on a really repetitive and addictive basis, when they are online.”
“I thank the cabinet secretary for advance sight of her statement today. I am very glad that the Scottish National Party has shifted its position on the issue. As a former French teacher, I know the huge level of disruption and distraction that phones can bring into our classrooms, but I also know that my former colleagues are under immense pressure due to rising violence in schools and an ever-increasing workload. What assurances can the cabinet secretary give that our overworked teachers will be able properly to contribute to the consultation without ever more duties being piled on them? Màiri McAllan: I thank Jenny Young for her insights, and I will add her as another teacher whose input I look forward to getting in this role. I assure her that teachers’ views are central to how we develop the policy.”
“I, Jenny Young, do swear that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to His Majesty King Charles, his heirs and successors, according to law. So help me”