So farewell then, Shirley-Anne Somerville and Jamie Hepburn.
Humza Yousaf’s freshly installed cabinet has a new Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills – Jenny Gilruth – and a new Minister for Higher and Further Education, Graeme Dey. But apart from the immediate observation that they are the previous and previous-but-one transport ministers, what do we know about them?
Graeme Dey is probably the first Scottish higher education minister not to have attended university – it depends a bit on how you define the role. His background is in journalism, most notably in sports reporting, and he became an MSP in 2011.
He’s held ministerial office twice before – first as Minister for Parliamentary Business and Veterans, and then as Minister for Transport, a position he resigned in January 2022 over ill health. Interestingly, he’s now been appointed to the joint role of Minister for Higher and Further Education and Minister for Veterans, a mixing of responsibility that has raised suspicions among some that he might be more interested in the latter role, given his previous experience.
