Former Deputy First Minister John Swinney has been made an honorary professor at the University of Glasgow’s new Centre for Public Policy.
The SNP MSP will work on the education programme and support staff in the department launched earlier this year to “enhance the contribution of the University of Glasgow to the public policy process.”
READ MORE: Glasgow: Activists blockade arms factory in Palestine protest
Professor Swinney said it was “an honour and a privilege” to join the centre.
He added: “Now, more than ever, it is important that policy makers and parliamentarians work in partnership with our universities to help tackle the issues that are impacting our collective health, wellbeing and standard of living.
“Although the challenges we face are undeniably substantial, I have always been optimistic that change and reform is possible within our society. However, this can only happen with the truly collaborative approach that is the Centre for Public Policy's mission."
During his time in government, Professor Swinney served as education secretary, where he survived a no-confidence vote, brought because of his role in the Covid Scottish exams results debacle, which saw ministers reversing a decision to downgrade 124,000 exam results for 76,000 pupils.
Professor Sir Anton Muscatelli, Principal and Vice-Chancellor of the University, said he was delighted to have the veteran politician on board.
“I believe it is vital that we use our research and teaching strengths, our inspiring University community and our wider activity to engage with the public and support better long-term policymaking,” he said.
Professor Swinney will be joined in the centre, by Ken Thomson, a former director general strategy and external affairs at the Scottish Government and one of the key architects of devolution, who served as principal private secretary to Donald Dewar.
READ MORE: Police Scotland: ‘Unwillingness to challenge unacceptable behaviour’
He said: “Governments and those they serve face increasingly complex and disruptive challenges, so it is more important than ever to find ways to bring different disciplines and perspectives to bear in shaping public policy responses.
“The University of Glasgow’s initiative in creating the Centre for Public Policy is an exciting one. I’m delighted to be able to contribute to that work, and am looking forward to it enormously.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel