For almost two years, the Scottish Government has said that it was not its responsibility to resolve a long-running college pay dispute and that it had no money to fund a pay deal.

Until this week, when, by all public accounts, it took responsibility and produced £4.5 million to fund a new pay deal.

On Monday morning, Higher and Further Education Minister Graeme Dey met with the EIS-FELA lecturers' union and College Employers Scotland and triggered a breakthrough.

Immediately following that meeting, EIS-FELA issued a statement that they were suspending a wave of strikes scheduled for the next day as a good-faith measure in anticipation of a revised pay deal.

Details of that pay deal were released on Friday morning. CES, EIS-FELA and the Scottish Government have all indicated that it represents a real chance to resolve the dispute, with EIS-FELA General Secretary Andrea Bradley recommending that members vote to accept the deal.

But how did we suddenly get here? Negotiations had been stalled for months. Support staff unions have already accepted a three-year £5,000 pay rise (Unison, the largest, and Unite accepted on May 31, after GMB had already agreed to the deal earlier in the year).

That just left EIS-FELA and CES to come to terms for lecturers. Rather than put the three-year offer out for a member vote, EIS-FELA had been asking for a fourth year to be added to the deal at a rise of 5%.

Until Friday, that had been the sticking point, with CES suggesting 3%, but both sides struggled to find a middle ground.

From the public’s perspective, anyone following the recent coverage would be forgiven for thinking the pay offer, the government funding infusion, and sudden optimism have come against the run of play.

This week, a group of students spoke to The Herald about their frustrations at City of Glasgow College. The college has been the site of national strikes and targeted strikes over local disputes, which meant students missed significant portions of their courses.

Read more: Students stood on the picket lines, now they want to know who stands with them

Torn between their support for the striking lecturers and concern over their future, the students expressed worries that many have shared over the years but have not wanted to speak about openly.

Earlier in August, Mr Dey told our education correspondent James McEnaney that there was no reason to expect money from the government.

“This is a matter for the colleges and the unions to resolve,” he said. “The government is not in a position to suddenly come up with money to resolve the current dispute.”

That was August 6.

On August 18, comments appeared in the Scotsman, in which Mr Dey said that employers and the union “are not at a position where we are within touching distance of resolving the dispute.”

Then, on August 19, the Scottish Government offered to provide an extra £4.5 million to help resolve the current dispute.

In announcing the details of the new pay offer on Friday, CES Director Gavin Donoghue made it clear what resulted in the breakthrough:

“Given the financial pressure colleges are under, it has only been possible to improve the pay offer because Ministers have agreed to the employers’ request that additional funding of £4.5 million be made available from 2025/26.”

The pay offer will be sent to EIS-FELA members for a vote and is likely to return a result within the next week. In the meantime, important and potentially far-reaching questions still hang over the deal.

Where did this extra £4.5 million come from? If negotiations were a matter of an extra £4.5 million from the government, why did it take so long for the government to make the offer?

Ministers, Mr Dey included, have previously made it clear that part of why the college sector did not receive a promised £26 million infusion last year is because the government had to cut it to pay for a significant teacher pay deal.

Can other areas of education now expect to come up £4.5 million short?

If it was never the government’s job to get involved, and if, as Mr Dey told Holyrood on May 7, government intervention would be a negative force and would “fundamentally alter the nature of the voluntary national bargaining process," then why was he at the meeting on Monday?

The Scottish Government has been approached for answers to these questions.