SCOTTISH Deputy First Minister Kate Forbes has called for a more family friendly Holyrood, after announcing she would stand down at next year’s elections.

Speaking to BBC Radio Scotland today following her decision to stand down, Ms Forbes, who made history as the first cabinet minister to take maternity leave in 2022, insisted she did not want to “miss any more of the precious early years of family life.”

Citing an “eight-hour return trip” from her constituency to Holyrood, she said: “So many parents know the pressures and the guilt of balancing all of this, and I’m totally in the same camp as them.

Arguing that “Parliament could do more and do better,” not least at its creche, which is open just three hours a day, three days a week, she added: “I don’t know anybody who only works three hours per day, so that doesn’t make sense.

“I’m certainly not advocating for the job to be any less demanding or any less all-consuming.

“But if we can’t even get some of the basic support right, then it will always be difficult for mums and dads.”