| Allan Wilson:
As we conclude
our deliberations on the Water Industry (Scotland) Bill, I seek to maximise
the political consensus that surrounds it—a cause that is presumably already
lost in the case of the Scottish National Party and Tommy Sheridan.
The bill is
now far better by virtue of the efforts of Bristow Muldoon, Des McNulty,
Nora Radcliffe, other coalition colleagues on the Transport and the Environment
Committee and non-committee members including Jackie Baillie and Tavish
Scott. Those efforts were not assisted by the posturing of the SNP.
I listened to
other, external interests, including churches, youth organisations and
the Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations, when we were reviewing
our charitable relief scheme. I would commend the art of listening to the
nationalists in our midst. They cannot hear that when we say public, we
mean public. Nothing in the bill signifies a departure from our long-standing
commitment to a publicly owned, publicly controlled water industry. The
challenge now is for Scottish Water to vindicate the modern public sector
model that we are, I hope, about to endorse.
We send Scottish
Water out into an extremely competitive arena, because of the potential
opening up of the public water infrastructure to private competition. I
say to John McAllion that that private competition already exists throughout
Scotland in the delivery of core supply and treatment services. Scottish
Water will be assisted in handling competition by the enhanced provisions
that we have agreed on consultation, accountability and transparency and
by a regulatory system that is robust in its defence of customer interests
and high quality standards. We must resist the temptation of micromanagement,
but it is for us to hold the industry and its regulators to account.
It is my happy
task to repeat my appreciation for the hard work and constructive approach
of the Transport and the Environment Committee. I repeat also my personal
appreciation for the long hours that Mike Neilson and his team of officials
put in and for the effort that they made in helping us to pilot the bill
through Parliament.
I commend the
Water Industry (Scotland) Bill to the Parliament and recommend that we
pass it today.
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