John Swinney has said serving as Nicola Sturgeon’s Education Secretary changed his politics by focusing on child poverty. The First Minister said witnessing the “corrosive” effect of deprivation on kids altered his outlook fundamentally.
Swinney took over as FM from Humza Yousaf after previously holding a number of jobs in the governments of Alex Salmond and Sturgeon. He also had an ill-fated spell as SNP leader in the early part of the century that ended in failure.
Swinney was considered a moderate, centrist figure during these periods, but allies say he has moved leftwards in recent years.
He has cited tackling child poverty as his top priority in Government and used the draft budget to back the abolition of the two child benefit cap.
Asked by the Record if it was covid that changed him politically, he replied: “I don’t think covid changed me. I think being Education Secretary changed me because I saw very, very directly the corrosive effect of poverty.
“It was visible to me in the engagement I had with the education system and with children and young people.
“That’s the period I would say changed my outlook, basically realising ever more sharply that unless we overcome the burden of child poverty in people’s lives, we have to do that to create the best foundations for the future.”
Swinney had a mixed record in the education brief after Sturgeon said she wanted the attainment gap to close. The gap remained wide during Swinney’s period in charge and he was condemned over the scandal of pupils from poorer backgrounds having their grades downgraded during the pandemic.
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