Inside Holyrood: Scotland has a good education system with great schools and staff alike and we know that the early years of a child’s life are the crucial stages of influencing positive impacts to their future

Fergus Ewing says that has takes up a seat on the the education, children and young people committee he will be particularly focused on ensuring the best quality of care and education for those children with additional support needs.

After 14 years serving as minister and being questioned by various committees, I was delighted to take a different seat this parliamentary session and be added as a member of the education, children and young people committee.

The committee had its first official meeting of the new parliament and has now elected its chair and vice chair as we get to work on seeking to improve the lives of Scotland’s young people.

Scotland has a good education system with great school and staff alike. We know that the early years of a child’s life, are the crucial stages of influencing positive impacts to their future. It’s encouraging to see a record number of our young people now leaving school to go onto positive destinations and receiving higher exam passes than ever before.

But we, of course, have much more to do. This last year has been difficult for children, parents and teachers alike as we’ve all adapted to a new way of life and learning due to lockdown restrictions. From this, we have many lessons to learn and clear areas of reform that need to happen.

We know that reforms affecting children in the early years of their life, particularly in those crucial early years of education, are key to making real progress on raising attainment in our education system and ending the decades of education inequality that has existed in Scotland.

I’m particularly focused on ensuring the best quality of care and education for those children of additional support needs, where their years in education often need extra support to aid their development. Speaking to parents, I know that finding the right support for their child can often be difficult and I hope through working closely with colleagues on the committee, we can make positive steps forwards to finding solutions to change this.

n Parents and grandparents will know how play parks are a source of endless fun for kids – and some respite for the adults. Though my own daughter is now a teenager, through the years we’ve been to just about every play park in the constituency and many throughout the country.

So the pledge to devote £60 million to improving play park provision all over Scotland and ensuring that all children have access to quality play in their own community is welcome.

I would encourage any readers interested in accessing this fund for play parks in your own community to contact me. There are campaigns ongoing and I am working closely with community groups to see that all are aware of this opportunity.

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