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Armed Forces Day
27/06/2009
First Minister Alex Salmond paid tribute to Scotland's service men and women, past and present, at Armed Forces Day celebrations in Edinburgh today.
Housing and Communities Minister Alex Neil will joined the FM at the inaugural national day of celebrations.
The Ministers observed a march past at The Mound and joined the parade as it went to Princes Street Gardens.
The FM said:
"Armed Forces Day allows people from across the country and across generations to recognise and pay tribute to the selfless commitment of our service men and women, past and present.
"Scotland has a long and proud military history. Our service men and women have bravely fought in World War II and conflicts since.
"This inaugural day of events is our opportunity as a society to record the debt we owe our service personnel and veterans, and the support we must offer in return.
"The Scottish Government fully recognises the courage and the sacrifice of our Armed Forces and is committed to improving the lives of men and women who are serving their country, now or in the past.
"Last summer we published our commitments paper which outlines Scottish Government support for military personnel and veterans to improve access to services such as housing, health care, transport, education and training.
"The Tri-Service Chiefs warmly acknowledged the progress we have made over the past year in areas such as priority treatment for veterans, access to housing, concessionary bus travel, prosthetic limbs, mental health services and access to NHS Dentistry when they met the Scottish Cabinet recently.
"It is important that we honour the efforts of the Armed Forces to make the world a safer place and that we provide the best possible services to these men and women when they come out of uniform and return to civilian life."
The Scottish Government's paper - Making our Commitment - was published last year and developed the proposals in the MoD's Command Paper in relation to Scotland's devolved responsibilities to improve the quality of life for service personnel, their families and for veterans.
Scottish Government actions include:
Creating a Veterans Fund with resources of £240,000 over three years to 2011
- Extending priority NHS treatment to all veterans with a condition associated with their military service, on the basis of clinical need
- Housing advice emphasising that veterans seeking housing allocations should not be disadvantaged
- A commitment to change the eligibility criteria of concessionary bus travel from 1 April 2011 to include service personnel and veterans under the age of 60 who were seriously injured in service and are resident in Scotland.
- Measures to improve access to NHS Dentistry services for service personnel and their families