Well last weekend was a busy one for me I was at Hamilton Palace show grounds to do the honours and give the prizes to the winners of the Davie Cooper Soccer 7’s. It was great day with 380 boys and girls competing for the trophy. The event is organised by the Hamilton Sports Council and the people who are on the board are to be commended for the work they do to keep people of all ages in the Hamilton area fit and healthy and its fun too  the boys event was won by St Mary’s after a nail biting 1 – 0 game.

The girls event was won by Muiredge Primary, they wore a particularly fetching strip with some lovely colours!!!  I hear yellow and black is the new black this season!

It was a quick hop up to Hamilton Rugby club in the afternoon to present the prizes at the Rugby 7’s again another great event and another event organised by Hamilton Sports Council.

I was impressed by the speed and skill of these young players and I think there are a few who could easily go on to play for Scotland.

This is me at the club cheering on both teams of course, in the final.

The winners were Howe of Fife and what a fine bunch of lads they are……don’t you agree?

Monday morning saw me meeting the new person in charge of the skills body in Scotland, Marie Burns and she is doing a grand job supporting our young people into employment and delivering our Governments commitment in the Skills Strategy.

In the afternoon I was back in Hamilton visiting a project called PETAL which supports people experiencing trauma and loss, some of the stories are heartbreaking but it’s good to know that the Scottish Government is funding these projects to help people cope in times of real loss and pain.

Tuesday I was back in  Edinburgh to meet with some people promoting the use of smart meters to control energy use, it was a very interesting presentation and I think there are real benefits for people if this is rolled out country wide. As you know energy is reserved and that means even if we did want this in Scotland we still need to wait until Westminster has given the go ahead. That really annoys me because we can get things done much quicker in the Scottish Parliament. Well I don’t think it will be long before we have all the powers of an Independent Nation.

At Education Life Long Learning and Culture committee on Wednesday we heard from the EIS and some research experts that lower class sizes can benefit children with their learning and social development. So I am delighted that once again Fiona Hyslop has got the policy on class sizes absolutely right.

Thursday was back to chamber business with the usual excitement at First Ministers Questions that’s why the tickets are booked out months in advance.

Tonight I am off to a reception to celebrate Adult Learners week another great event celebrating the achievements of people who have taken up the life long learning challenge.

So as you can see another busy week behind me, with me looking forward to a few days with my family to recharge the batteries and get ready for another busy week next week.