|
 |
| |
COMMISSION ON THE POWERS AND ELECTORAL
ARRANGEMENTS OF THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY FOR WALES
|
MINUTES OF PROCEEDINGS
|
of the
|
| |
EVIDENCE OF:
CHAIR OF THE CULTURE COMMITTEE OF THE
NATIONAL ASSEMBLY FOR WALES,
RHODRI GLYN THOMAS
|
|
held at National Museum & Gallery,
Cardiff
on
12TH December 2002
|
|
LORD RICHARD: Thank you very
much for coming. We have been asking our witnesses to
give a brief opening statement, and then we put questions
to them. Would you mind introducing yourselves for the
sake of the record?
|
|
MR THOMAS (In Welsh, then interpreted):
My name is Rhodri Glyn Thomas, Assembly Member for Carmarthen
East and Dinefwr. I am Chair of the Culture Committee.
I am very happy to extend greetings from Bettws to the
Chair. Marie Knox is sitting by my side. She is responsible
for the Secretariat of the Culture Committee.
My presentation from the point of view
of the Culture Committee is quite brief, because the
Minister has already been here and I am aware from her
presentation to the Commission that we would not actually
differentiate or say anything differently to the points
she raised with you. The Culture Committee is fortunate
that the position is relatively simple, because the
legislative restrictions on the Assembly do not impact
very much on the deliberations of the Culture Committee.
There are three areas we are interested in, and I believe
the Minister referred to these. The first is certainly
the Welsh Language Act and, as you know, we have just
undertaken substantial work in our review of the position
of the Welsh language in Wales. The legislation, of
course, is something that we would wish to look at had
we the powers.
The second area is telecommunications,
and it is there that we have endeavoured to influence
the legislation in Westminster. We had representatives
from the DCMS down to the Committee. They gave us a
presentation. We had two sessions with people in the
media and in the communications fields generally. We
presented our observations to the Minister, and the
Minister made a presentation or had an input into the
consultation process, but unfortunately, in two areas
specifically we failed to influence the legislation,
and I think those two areas are securing a voice for
Wales on the body that will regulate telecommunications,
and the other subject was how exactly those committees
work with the Assembly, what the process is. There is
a reference in the legislation to the fact that they
must consult with the Assembly, but there are no details
on exactly how that would work. So although we did go
through the process, we failed to bring any influence
to bear. Another area is the Lottery, because once again,
this is an area that is regulated from outwith Wales.
I think it is true to say that our
relationship with bodies that are accountable outside
Wales is very good, and it is a relationship that operates
on a voluntary level. They volunteered to come in and
to present evidence to us and to listen to our comments,
but of course, at the end of the day they are not accountable
to us.
The other areas where there are limitations
and restrictions upon us is with the Royal Charter of
the Arts Council of Wales, the Sports Council of Wales,
the museums and galleries and the National Library of
course. Within that Royal Charter all of those organisations
can say, "We are not accountable to you" but
once again, the relationship is a particularly good
one because it is a voluntary relationship. They listen
to and respond to us, but at the end of the day they
could tell us they will not accept what we say because
they are accountable to the Charter.
Primary legislation as I understand
it would not make any difference. You have to actually
made a bid or a request to the Privy Council and the
application would have to come from those organisations,
and so according to my understanding, I do not believe
that primary legislation would make any difference on
that position.
We have had two major reports published.
We inherited the first report, which was A Culture
in Common, which was accomplished by the Post Sixteen
Committee, which existed before the changes that occurred
last year when the Culture Committee came into being,
but although they completed that report, our Committee
actually inherited the work of presenting that report
to the Assembly. That was an exceptionally interesting
process, because only two people on the new Culture
Committee had been part of the process of drawing up
the A Culture in Common report, and although
we all thought it was a particularly good piece of work,
the Committee that had inherited the report had its
own ideas, and of course, the process of presenting
it to the Assembly was a fascinating one.
We have carried out substantial work
on the Welsh language, and we hope that it is a substantial
document. It took a year of our time, and I think that
what has occurred there is more important than anything
contained in the report, which is that the Welsh language
ceased to be a political football or debating point
in Wales, and when the Government’s response was
presented in the Assembly, there were no dissenting
voices and no voices questioning the substantial investment
that has been made into the Welsh Office, over £30 million
of additional funding for the Welsh language. I think
the whole way we discuss the Welsh language has changed,
and I believe that has been part of the political process,
and a very important part of it.
At present, we are undertaking a review
of sport, and before the end of this session we are
going to lay the foundations for looking at culture,
probably Anglo-Welsh literature in Wales. I think it
is an extremely rich field that perhaps has not been
given the attention it deserves.
From the point of view of the operation
of the Committee, there are some problems. Because of
the way in which the Assembly was established in the
first place, we began with the committee system, and
as you will know, that was changed into a system of
having an executive Cabinet system, and because of that,
the foundations have been laid and we have this strange
situation where the minister is a committee member.
The Culture Committee I hope operates in a very inclusive
manner and the Minister also has acted in an inclusive
manner, but there are problems associated with that.
For example, with the review of the Welsh language,
the Minister sat through all the evidence-taking sessions
and sessions discussing the evidence presented. If the
Minister had chosen to react in a different manner to
the recommendations of the report, it would be an interesting
situation, to say the least, because as the Chair, one
of the questions I would wish to ask the Minister is,
"You accepted this evidence, just like the rest
of us, and we came to our conclusions, and now you choose
to act in a different fashion." As it so happened,
the Minister chose to respond to the recommendations
of the report positively, but I believe that the role
of the Minister is one that has the potential to be
difficult. It is not the case in the Culture Committee,
but there is the question of scrutiny, and once again
to return to the House of Commons model that some of
you will be familiar with there.
The Select Committees, as I understand
it, tend to be non-political in the sense that every
member believes that they are there as a scrutineer.
Their responsibility is to hold the minister responsible.
I am not sure whether in the Assembly that is truly
the case. I would imagine you would have a problem when
you have a committee chair of the same political party
as the minister, and that the minister is part of the
committee. That is a practical problem. If we as members
decided to question the minister very hard, then as
a member of the committee, the minister would get all
the information from the secretariat just as other committee
members receive it. So there is the potential for difficulties
there, but from our experience in the Culture Committee,
that has not developed.
I will leave it at that, but I am very
happy to respond to any questions you may have.
|
| LORD RICHARD: Thank
you very much indeed. Can I perhaps pursue some of the
points you made towards the end of your statement, particularly
on this system of having the minister as a member of the
committee? To a naïve outsider like me, it does seem to
me that the scrutiny role must be more difficult if the
minister is sitting there. |
|
MR THOMAS: Yes, I think the
scrutiny role is very difficult if you have the minister
as a member of the committee. We do try and scrutinise
through the minister’s report, but it is not the
same position as actually sitting the minister at the
other side of the table and looking in detail at policy
decisions which have been taken. I think that is the
model in the Select Committees in the House of commons,
if I understand it correctly. Yes, potentially there
is a problem there, and I think it is something which
we inherited when the initial concept of the Assembly
was a committee-based Assembly, and when we turn to
the Cabinet system, we still inherited a committee with
a minister as a member.
My own view is that the minister should
not be a member. I refer to the review of the Welsh
language. If I were the minister, I would have said,
"You carry on with your review. I will accept your
recommendations and I will think about it and come up
with my report," but actually sitting through the
whole process makes it very difficult, I would have
thought, for the minister.
|
| LORD RICHARD: How do
you actually do it, in a practical way? The minister gives
report, what, once a fortnight to the committee? |
| MR THOMAS: Once a month.
There is a committee meeting every fortnight. |
| LORD RICHARD: Is the
report in writing? |
| MR THOMAS: Yes. |
| LORD RICHARD: How much
of the meeting is devoted to questioning the minister? |
| MR THOMAS: Up to an
hour. |
| LORD RICHARD: Does it
usually take as much as that? |
| MR THOMAS: Yes, because
there are about 25 items normally on the minister’s
report, and a number of those are things which members
would want to ask detailed questions about. I think initially
in some committees we had problems where certain secretaries,
as they were then, used to read out their report, but
I have taken the view that if it is written, members should
have read it beforehand, and the minister will make some
opening remarks for about two or three minutes, and the
rest of it is down to questioning. |
| LORD RICHARD: About
what proportion of the meeting? |
| MR THOMAS: The Culture
meetings tend to go from 9 to half past 12, three and
a half hours, with a quarter of an hour break in the middle. |
| LORD RICHARD: So you
have a good hour for the minister. |
| MR THOMAS: Yes, and
it can be extended if there are controversial issues. |
| LORD RICHARD: The Minister
does not sit on the other side of the table. |
| MR MORGAN: She sits
next to me. |
| LORD RICHARD: Is it
a round table? |
| MR THOMAS: Yes. It is
very inclusive. I used to chair the Agriculture Committee.
I should not mention that because that is a very difficult
issue. You can talk to Glyn Davies about all the difficulties
of agriculture in terms of the constitutional settlement,
but in that sense, that was far more controversial, certainly
in the first year of the Assembly. Because we were all
new to the system as well, it was a very difficult time.
When Carwyn Jones became the Minister for Agriculture,
it became far more straightforward because Carwyn would
take issues head on and it was an interesting debate,
but the role of the minister is one which I think needs
to be looked at. |
| LORD RICHARD: One of
the advantages of being a minister obviously is that you
have access to the civil service, you have access to information,
analysis and all the rest of it. The minister has that;
you do not in the same way. Do you find that a disadvantage
in cross-examining and scrutinising? |
| MR THOMAS: It has been
a disadvantage. I think we are now addressing that issue,
because additional staff are being appointed, and we are
still in the process of appointing to the secretariat. |
| LORD RICHARD: A parallel
secretariat? |
| MR THOMAS: It is a secretariat.
I think initially all we had as chairs was a clerk and
a deputy clerk, and they had to prepare all the papers
for the committee, they had to ensure that all the arrangements
were made for anybody who was invited, and therefore they
had very little time in terms of offering any kind of
guidance to members about the sort of issues which should
be looked at. Again, going back to the Select Committees,
as I understand it, the clerk would tell you, "This
is what you need to look at in terms of the minister.
The minister said this last year and you should really
be asking what has happened." They have not had the
time to do that, but that is hopefully what will happen
now with the new research capacity we are adding to the
secretariat. |
| LORD RICHARD: We were
told that initially, as far as the Assembly was concerned,
you had access to the civil service. |
| MR THOMAS: We do have access
to the civil service, but again, that is based really
on good will and to the extent the civil service want
to help us. At any point the civil service can tell us
that they are not prepared to offer us information or
to do any work on our behalf. We can ask them, and by
and large, certainly in terms of Culture, they have always
responded positively, but we do not have the formal position
of being able to access information from the civil service. |
| LORD RICHARD: What sort
of library do you have, for example? |
| MR THOMAS: The library is developing,
and we are getting more and more briefings from the library
now. Again, that is evolving as the Assembly itself is
growing. It was initially a restriction but it has improved. |
| MS KNOX: In February,
when the Assembly Review Procedure Group reported to plenary,
one of the recommendations was that the research support
for committees should be boosted, and that was accepted
by plenary, and we have been working since then to come
up with a structure for the service and then to recruit
staff. What we did in the end was to decide to incorporate
the members’ library, which had previously provided
briefing only to individual members and was not really
geared up to provide a service to committees, into the
committee secretariat, so I am now responsible for both
the committee clerking side and the members’ research
side. We have done this on a team basis, so within the
members’ research service there will be a team of
staff which will be able to support each of the committees.
We have increased the number of staff. We did a recruitment
exercise over the summer, and the new staff will be starting
in the first two weeks in January, and we will be launching
the service from the end of January. |
| LORD RICHARD: One of
the great tools of Westminster for MPs and indeed Members
of the House of Lords is the quality of the library and
the quality of the service you get from the library. Are
you trying to reproduce that? |
| MS KNOX: I understand
from my colleague who is the head of the library that
there are 200 staff in the library in the Commons. Do
not hold me to that. The total staffing of the committees
and research will be about 60 members of staff once we
have recruited the new staff, which obviously does not
match the kind of resources that there are in Westminster,
but then the size of the Assembly is not the same. |
| LAURA McALLISTER: Perhaps
I can pursue the question of the relationship between
the ministers and the committee in particular, and set
it within the wider context of your relationship with
the ASPBs. When the Minister attended, we heard quite
a lot about the remit letters that are agreed with the
ASPBs. What I am interested in is how confident you are
as a committee that you feed adequately into those remit
letters – the structure is very important in terms
of policy delivery – and whether you feel there are
any gaps in the accountability link between yourselves,
the ASPBs and the minister. That leads on to a second
question, which is, how can you scrutinise the ASPBs adequately
within that framework? |
| MR THOMAS: Let me start
with the second part of your question and work backwards.
We try to get the ASPBs in at least once a year to the
Committee, sometimes more often, depending on the situation
that they find themselves in. For example, the Arts Council
has been coming in at least once every three or four meetings
because of the restructuring which is happening. All these
ASPBs have a corporate plan and an annual report, both
of which we look at. They are also subject to a quinquennial
review, where we can feed into the review process there.
The Sports Council is now undergoing a quinquennial review.
I initially had an opportunity to talk informally to the
reviewers. They will be coming to our meeting next week,
when they will tell us about their initial look at the
Sports Council, and we get to feed into that process.
So obviously we do feed in our suggestions to the Minister,
but the remit letter at the end of the day is a matter
between the Minister and the ASPB. |
| TED ROWLANDS: Do you
get sight of that letter? |
| MR THOMAS: Yes. |
| LAURA McALLISTER: But
you cannot amend it. |
| MR THOMAS: No. |
| LAURA McALLISTER: The
Committee cannot discuss it and suggest amendments? |
|
MR THOMAS: We can. If we feel
that the remit letter is in our view insufficient and
does not refer to certain aspects which we think it
should do, we can tell the Minister, "We think
you should include this in your remit." The Minister
can tell us, "Thank you very much. I have listened
to what you have had to say but I write the remit letter."
You are quite right. If I were a minister, I would not
want the committee to have the power to tell me what
to put in that particular letter, but again, it is based
on the working relationship between the committee and
the minister, which as far as Culture is concerned,
is a very good one. I cannot on the whole remember any
situation where we have had confrontation in terms of
our suggestion and the minister’s views. The Minister
has tended to listen to us and respond positively to
our recommendations. When she has taken a different
view, she has always explained that to the Committee,
and the Committee have accepted, on those very few occasions,
that the Minister has been well within her rights to
act in that way.
You are down then to a working relationship
with the minister, and again, you have the problem of
the minister being a member of the committee. I would
have thought, for example, if the minister were a member
of Plaid Cymru, the Party of Wales, my inclination as
Chair, if there were a confrontation, would be to shield
my colleague in my own party. I do not know how it works
in committees where the chair is of the same party as
the minister, but this goes back to the difference between
the Assembly and Westminster, where that particular
relationship with a minister would not be the same.
You have to remember we are talking about a body which
has 60 members, and it is very difficult. In the House
of Commons, if you fall out with somebody, you can avoid
them for three or four weeks, or even three or four
years. In the Assembly, you will bump into them the
following morning. It is that kind of close, cosy arrangement,
and the fact that the minister is a full member of the
committee does potentially, I think, lead to a situation
where scrutiny is not a natural process.
|
| TED ROWLANDS: Cosiness
and scrutiny do not go together. |
| MR THOMAS: No, and you
have to be very clear. My view as a Chair is that we have
two roles and only two roles. One is scrutiny and the
other is policy suggestion. Policy development is a matter
for the Cabinet, in my view. We have a role of suggesting
in terms of policy. We do not have a role in terms of
formulating policy. I know some committee chairs have
a different view. I think they are deluding themselves. |
| PETER PRICE: If you
had more time in your Committee, what would you do that
you do not do now, and what do you think you would do
better than you do now? |
| MR THOMAS: In terms
of Culture, we do not have a problem in terms of the time.
I think the capacity to deal with everything we need to
deal with is there. We would presumably get the ASPBs
and other bodies in more often, but I think we adequately
cover that in terms of capacity. Culture is very straightforward.
It is limited in a sense, although in another sense it
is not limited at all: culture is everything, is it not?
But it is very straightforward. Again, going back to having
chaired the Agriculture Committee, I think there was a
problem in terms of capacity there, especially when you
had something like the beef on the bone issue, which we
spent a long time on initially, and then foot and mouth,
and also looking back over BSE and the whole complexity
of trying to work with Westminster and Europe. I would
have thought that with something like agriculture there
is a problem in terms of time capacity. With education
and health, those committees probably have, but in terms
of culture, I do not think the time issue is a factor. |
| PETER PRICE: In terms
of those committees meeting more often, why do they not?
What are the constraints? |
|
MR THOMAS: The constraints are
the size of the Assembly. We are only 60 members. I
sit on two committees, and always have done. I am on
the European Committee. So I never have a week without
a committee. We come in on Tuesday mornings and we go
home late on Thursday evenings. I certainly have not
seen any correspondence during those three days because
we are fully taken up with meetings. Cardiff is very
convenient in terms of your constituents and also lobby
groups, and therefore the early evenings are filled
up with people wanting to see us, wanting to discuss
various issues with us, and the view I get from people
who have been Members of Parliament is that, while they
do not feel that they are working such long hours as
they were in the House of Commons, it is certainly more
intense in terms of the Assembly.
With 60 members, it would be impossible
to have more than a fortnightly committee meeting. I
think that then begs the question whether we need 80
or 100 members and what difference would that make.
I cannot see that 80 members would mean that those committees
could meet more often. Perhaps if we had 120 members
we might well be in a position then to have weekly committee
meetings.
|
| TOM JONES (In Welsh,
then interpreted): Turning to telecommunications, you
said the majority of the powers you want as a Committee
are in your gift. We will not follow up the question of
the powers over S4C. We heard from the First Minister
that he was offered those powers but chose not to adopt
them. But telecommunications is a worldwide area, but
it has special implications for Wales in the creation
of OFCOM in particular. The Minister was trying to secure
a Welsh representation on the board of OFCOM. This is
a body that was created post-devolution. It is a UK-wide
body. The question is, what method of inputting ideas
would you like to see put in place? You are trying to
have a Welsh representative on the board, and it is a
great ambition. The question arises then who is accountable
to you? Would that individual have to appear before you
as a Committee, or would he do so voluntarily, or should
the chair of that body appear before you and be accountable?
As to the make-up of the new body, how much input did
you have into the creation of that body? How much of a
Welsh stamp is there on OFCOM? In terms of management
of the body in future, you are asking for a single voice,
which seems particularly weak to me. What about the rest
of the influence on that? |
|
MR THOMAS: (In Welsh, then interpreted)
Yes, the Minister is actually asking for a representative
on the management board. I am not convinced that that
is the important thing. I think the relationship between
this whole new system of regulation is important, and
the relationship with the Assembly. As I said in my
opening remarks, there are clauses in the Bill that
refer to its relationship with the Assembly but it is
very ambiguous. I think there should be a role within
this new system. There should be a defined role and
a defined status to the discussions between the Assembly
and this new system.
I think we have to look in particular
at broadcasting in Wales, because the whole situation
of regulation is changing. OFCOM will be a very different
body to the ITC, which deals mainly with programme quality
and programming hours. OFCOM will be far more mechanical
in its dealings with telecommunications, and it will
do a lot more with masts and links and a lot less with
content. So I think we need to look at broadcasting
in Wales. I agree with the First Minister that I would
not want like to see S4C separated from the rest of
the area of broadcasting in Wales, but within the new
system there is a strong argument for having a system
similar to OFCOM in Wales, and there is certainly an
argument for having one regulator, a regulator for broadcasting
in Wales specifically. So there is an area there that
I think is far more important than the presence of an
individual on the management board of OFCOM, because
of course that individual could have an influence but
that influence could be very small. It depends on the
individual, but I think the important thing is the relationship
between OFCOM and the Assembly.
|
| TOM JONES: (In Welsh,
then interpreted) What channels are you using? Obviously,
you can influence the Minister in the Assembly. Do you
have any links with officials in Whitehall? Do you use
MPs? |
| MR THOMAS: (In Welsh,
then interpreted) What is interesting is that there is
a minister from Wales in DCMS who is responsible for this
area, but that is just a coincidence. What we did was
that when we were discussing the telecommunications bill,
we invited officials from DCMS to explain to us what the
legislation was, because its effect on Wales is exceptionally
complex. We had a long session with him. We sat down then
with relevant bodies – BBC, HTV, ITC, S4C –
and other individuals who were involved with aspects of
telecommunications in Wales. We heard evidence from them.
We made our comments to the Minister. The Minister then
made her response into the consultation process, so in
that way we managed to ensure that our ideas were heard.
I am not convinced that there has been any great adhering
to them, but we are using the system. The system is not
there for us to have a direct influence on an area that
is exceptionally important to Wales. |
| EIRA DAVIES: (In Welsh,
then interpreted) It is obvious that, as a member of the
S4C authority I cannot participate in the debate on broadcasting,
but may I follow that up with the problem we had with
the Criminal Records Bureau, because that was a similar
problem as far as I can see of endeavouring to influence
bodies and organisations in England. |
| MR THOMAS: (In Welsh,
then interpreted) Yes, and we failed completely and utterly.
I have been in touch with the First Minister on this,
and he has written to David Blunkett, because it is the
responsibility of David Blunkett’s Department. The
First Minister has written to David Blunkett, but I have
not seen any response on this issue. I do not know whether
the full Commission is aware of this problem. It was a
problem of the registration with the Criminal Records
Bureau. There are a number of organisations in Wales that
would have to register their staff members, people such
as S4C, the Youth Movement, the National Library. Many
of them administer their work through the medium of Welsh.
Churches and chapels as well. The Criminal Records Bureau
did not seem to be aware of people’s entitlement
or right to register through the medium of Welsh. The
point was made crystal clear to them. They have some kind
of Welsh language policy, but we are still in a position
that we are not able to tell them, as we would wish to
do, through the Welsh Language Board to present their
scheme or policy to the Board. The Board would say this
is a deficient scheme because it does not respond to people’s
fundamental right to use the system, because they can
translate the documents but you cannot register with them
through the medium of Welsh. It comes under the auspices
of David Blunkett. All we can do is ask the First Minister
to write to him and ask him to explain the position to
them. The First Minister has done so, but my understanding
is that David Blunkett has not even replied. |
| VIVIENNE SUGAR: I want
to go back to the issue of sport and the effectiveness
of the Committee when there is no transcript of proceedings.
We were told by an earlier witness that it was a problem
with the availability of translators, and I would like
your comment as Chairman of the Committee on that. |
| MR THOMAS: Marie would
be in a better position to deal with the problem in the
capacity of translation. There is no written record of
committee proceedings. We have minutes. We have had problems
with minutes. We had a problem during the review of the
Welsh language, where minutes had been ratified by the
Committee, with certain suggestions, and six months later
when we came to look at those suggestions and proposals,
members of the Committee had formed a different view about
some of them, but unfortunately during the process they
had agreed them and ratified the minutes, and in my view
as Chair, they stood. But that is a problem, because there
is no written transcript. We do have a video facility,
therefore if there is a question arising from something
which has been said, if somebody says, "The minutes
state that I said this but I didn’t actually say
that," we can go back to the video and check, and
that I think is done quite often by the secretariat, but
Marie would be in a better position to deal with the whole
question of the written transcript. |
|
MS KNOX: The requirement in
Standing Orders is for there to be minutes of committee
meetings and for there to be a transcript where there
is evidence-taking. Our interpretation of what constitutes
evidence is quite narrow. It is really limited to the
Audit Committee or circumstances where a witness’s
position in their organisation might be in jeopardy
for what they might say in front of the Committee. Where
it is oral presentations by organisations, where they
are coming along and doing a PowerPoint presentation,
we do not do a transcript in those circumstances.
In terms of the record of proceeding,
we have a unit that provides a record of proceeding
for plenary, which is about seven hours a week. If every
committee had a transcript, I think that would be an
additional 17 hours a week. We have about five committees
and three and a half hours of meetings, which obviously
is a significant increase on what is already being provided.
As Rhodri has said, if there are any questions over
what was said at a meeting, we dig out the video tape
and replay it and check the accuracy of the notes that
we have taken, and we have done that in the past.
|
| VIVIENNE SUGAR: Where
I am coming from is the democratic deficit argument, that
a member of the public cannot look at the work that you
are doing and understand why you might have come to certain
conclusions, unless they either personally attend the
meetings, which is obviously difficult, or if they can
get hold of the video record. |
| MS KNOX: The minutes
do contain the key points of the meeting, so in a sense
it brings out the key issues without somebody having to
wade through many, many pages of verbatim record. The
minutes are probably about 6-8 pages for a committee meeting,
and the key points would be included. |
| MR THOMAS: That is available
on the intranet and the internet, so people do have access
to it through that process. People have raised the whole
issue of a written record of all the proceedings of the
Assembly. We do have a written record, but it is not published
in a written form, and some people have raised that issue
with us as well. We are doing a webcasting trial apparently.
I have no idea what a webcasting trial is. |
| LORD RICHARD: Can I
follow on from the question you were just asked? How do
you decide what the Committee’s work is going to
be? Do you decide collectively, "Right, we will have
a look this month at that issue" or is it much more
reactive, in the sense that things happen in the Assembly
which you think you ought to look at? |
| MR THOMAS: When I chaired
the Agriculture Committee, I found that that was purely
reactive; there were so many things happening in agriculture
and rural affairs that you were responding all the times
to events. The Culture Committee is very different. We
have been able to put forward a programme where what we
have tried to do is look at areas where we can have an
influence and make a difference, and in terms of the two
substantial reports, the one we inherited and the one
we have actually carried out ourselves, those are two
areas where a tremendous difference has been made. In
terms of A Culture in Common, the Arts Council
in Wales has been totally restructured as a result of
that and the Wallace Report and the work put in place
by the Post-Sixteen Education Committee, which has been
carried on by the Culture Committee, because we are continuing
to evaluate and monitor that restructuring. In terms of
the Welsh language, the situation has been totally changed
in Wales as a result of the report we undertook. So in
terms of Culture, we are in a very privileged position
where we can take a strategic view and say, "We can
make a difference in these areas. We will actually prioritise
these things." Health, Education, Economic Development
are governed by events but we are not. |
| LORD RICHARD: I am not
sure I fully understand that. One of the interesting things
about Select Committees in the House of Commons is they
can pick a subject. In theory, I suppose, you could look
at the structure of Welsh rugby union if you wanted to,
if you decided that was something that would be useful.
(I am not suggesting you should.) Would you then have
a system of calling evidence in front of you? Would you
ask people to come? |
| MR THOMAS: Yes. In terms
of the WRU, there were concerns in the Committee about
the Millennium Stadium, and we asked Glanmore Griffiths
and his colleagues to come in, and they came in and made
a presentation, and we were given the opportunity to ask
them questions and to make comments. |
| LORD RICHARD: That is
normal, is it? |
| MR THOMAS: In Culture
Committee, it is the normal practice. We choose what we
do. Because of the privileged situation we are in, I would
argue that the Minister for Culture, Welsh Language and
Sport is probably the best job in the Cabinet, because
you can make a difference. You are not confined in any
way by the constitutional settlement, whereas you would
be in other portfolios, and you can make a real difference,
as is happening, I think, in terms of culture in Wales.
So we are in that position, but I do not want to give
you the impression that every other committee is in that
situation. I do not think any other committee is in the
same position as the Culture Committee. We are in a very
privileged position and we are enjoying it immensely. |
| TED ROWLANDS: You have
made a number of references to Select Committees in the
commons, and I sat on one for 14 years. One of the powers
we had was to call officials before us in a proper scrutiny
role. Do you have that power? |
| MR THOMAS: We presumably
have the power to do that. |
| MS KNOX: The committee which
officials and not ministers are in front of is the Audit
Committee, which has the role of the Public Accounts Committee.
With other committees, I think the general view is, because
of the political responsibility, the decision-making responsibility
lies with the minister, it is the minister who is responsible,
but ministers quite often bring officials with them to
provide the detailed information about implementation. |
| MR THOMAS: My view as
Chair is that the political responsibility lies with the
minister, and I would have to be convinced that there
would be a reason. |
| TED ROWLANDS: That is
the same in Westminster, but I have seen some of the most
important scrutiny sessions being conducted when officials
are present and not ministers. |
| MR THOMAS: I think it
is something which we need to look at. Throughout these
discussions we have to remember that the Assembly is three
years old, and it is an evolving process. It is not something
which does happen, and I think the reason is that we are
trying – at least, as a Chair I try and ensure that
there is political responsibility and political accountability.
As an Assembly, we are always in danger of being content
with administrating rather than governing Wales, and in
that sense, I think it is very important in these early
days that ministers are scrutinised and that they take
full responsibility, but I take your point that in terms
of the actual detail of how things happen, it might well
be a good idea to have that ability to question officials.
I must say, in terms of the civil service in Wales, it
has been a tremendous culture change. Having been behind
closed doors, to suddenly find themselves in front of
committees, on live television, having to answer questions,
and having to make statements and to be accountable for
them has been a tremendous culture change for them, which
I do not think has always been very comfortable for them. |
| TED ROWLANDS: One of
the influences of the last referendum was the strong underlying
feeling in Wales – and you have just mentioned the
difference between administering and governing –
that in fact a quango state had built up within Wales
which was not accountable and was not answerable. The
strong point was that this quango state must be brought
to account. I have to say, reading some of the minutes
of the various committees preparing for this Commission,
I do not sense that the quangos have been quaking in the
last three years. I know the special problems of the Royal
Charters of Arts and Sports, but I do not think they would
hide behind their charters, if you really went to shake
them up. The Arts Council has been shaken up. You seem
to have the powers. I am curious why the system has not
done what the Welsh people wanted it to do, which was
to make the quangos well and truly accountable. |
| MR THOMAS: I think it
is a matter of political will. I would argue that the
constitutional settlement is a mess, but you can work
your way through it, if you so wish. The powers are limited,
but there are things you can do if you have that political
will. |
| TED ROWLANDS: What are
the implications of bringing the quangos to account in
your area? |
|
MR THOMAS: In the culture area,
the only problem basically is the Royal Charter, if
they wanted to hide behind it – and I share your
view that they have not done so. In terms of communications,
all the broadcasting bodies have been quite happy to
come in and on a voluntary basis to be accountable to
the Committee and to the Minister. In terms of culture,
those powers do not affect us. The problem we have,
as I see it – and I remember sitting through a
seminar on the constitutional settlement by the foremost
expert on the constitution in Wales. The other day he
admitted to us that he did not understand the constitutional
settlement, and why certain things were devolved and
other things were not. Initially, we had tremendous
problems trying to do things, and then suddenly realising
that we did not have the power to do them. For example,
I remember – I think it was before I was Chair
of the Agriculture Committee – that there was a
problem with calf slaughtering in Wales, and we just
could not get rid of them. We came up with a calf slaughtering
scheme, which we thought we could do, but at the end
of the day, it came down to a process where, because
we are a country within a member state, Commissioner
Fischler would have allowed it had Nick Brown, who was
then the Minister for Agriculture, made a phone call,
and Nick Brown decided not to make that phone call,
and therefore a lot of hard work, working out the calf
slaughtering scheme with the industry, working out all
the costings, working out that we could afford it, and
it would be good for Wales, was suddenly lost because
of that. I think there are grey areas of the constitution
in that sense which make it difficult.
The one area in terms of the constitutional
settlement which does have a bearing on the Culture
Committee is the Welsh Language Act, because we do not
have primary legislative powers. The Welsh Language
Act now is outdated, in the sense it was passed in 1993.
Since then we have had the Government of Wales Act,
and there are conflicting areas within that with the
Welsh Language Act. The Welsh Language Board is a grey
area in terms of legislation. It is really a peculiar
situation that there is need to review the Welsh Language
Act, but at the moment we would have to petition Westminster
and we would have to ask Westminster to review the Welsh
Language Act. If there is one area where the Assembly
should actually be taking some legislative action it
is in terms of the Welsh Language Act. We are clearly
the body which has the expertise and the knowledge and
the understanding to actually reform the Act in way
which would be beneficial to Wales.
|
| PETER PRICE: Have you
thought about preparing a draft bill, taking it through
the Assembly and then presenting it to Westminster on
the basis that this is pre-eminently a matter about Wales
and about which Wales has the expertise in order to deal
with it? |
|
MR THOMAS: We have considered
that. What is happening at the moment is the Minister
is looking at the potential of the 1993 Act to see in
which way it can be extended. The one area which impacts
on everybody’s lives is the public utilities, and
there is a section within the Act which says that bodies
which interface with the public can be brought into
the Welsh Language Act and therefore in the private
sector, because the Welsh Language Act as it stands
does not cover the private sector, it could be interpreted
that those utilities would have to provide a Welsh language
scheme to the Welsh Language Board in the way bodies
in the public sector have to do.
We are looking at that. The other issue
came up in the Welsh language review, and I was asked
to ask you as a Commission to look at the situation
in terms of the need to reform and perhaps even have
a new Welsh Language Act. There was no agreement in
the Committee on that, but the option which might well
be the option we would take is to do exactly as you
have suggested, to prepare that legislation in the Assembly,
take it through the Committee, through the plenary,
agree on it and then present it to Parliament and ask
them then to ensure that it goes through the legislative
process in Westminster, but it does seem a rather roundabout
way to do something which we should be capable of doing
in the Assembly ourselves.
|
| LORD RICHARD: You drew
a distinction between administering and governing. Would
you like to expand on that? |
| MR THOMAS: I cannot
see any signs – and as a member of an opposition
party I would probably say this – or any wish within
the administration in the Assembly to actually push at
the boundaries, to challenge the status quo and to say,
"We want to do this in Wales. We want to make a difference."
It seems to me they are continually looking for the problems,
continually saying, "Well, that’s going to be
very difficult to do." I think it is down to political
will. I would say, for example, that if we look at Ron
Davies as the architect of devolution, Ron Davies had
a very clear idea in his own mind how the National Assembly
for Wales was going to work, and unfortunately, because
of events, Alun Michael then took over and found himself
in a very difficult position in the sense that he had
not really been part of the process of setting up the
Assembly but found himself having to lead the Assembly
and then Alun Michael resigned and Rhodri took over. Because
of that I think we have been stumbling along, content
to use the powers we have and not to challenge on anything
and saying, "We really want to do this. This is something
which we could do." |
| SIR MICHAEL WHEELER BOOTH:
You have twice used the expression "lack of political
will". |
| MR THOMAS: Yes. |
| SIR MICHAEL WHEELER BOOTH:
Does your Committee lack political will? For example,
on quangos, or ASPBs as they are called now, the White
Paper leading to A Voice for Wales says that the Assembly
is going to regulate them and cut them down, generally
make them more accountable. Is your Committee not part
of that? You refer to yourself being a member of an opposition
party, but you seem to say, "It is the Minister’s
job to hold the ASPBs responsible." |
| MR THOMAS: It certainly
is. |
| SIR MICHAEL WHEELER BOOTH:
"It is outwith our remit. It is nothing to do with
us." There seems to be a conflict. There is a drift
in what you have been saying to us, very interestingly,
and a solution, because instead of saying, "All right,
we’ll have a go," you say, "It’s nothing
to do with us." |
| MR THOMAS: I hope I
am not saying that. I think it goes back to the initial
concept of the Assembly, where you started off with the
committee structure. If you have a committee structure,
the committees have to take responsibility for the kind
of areas you are talking about. We then moved to the Cabinet
system and we have been left with this strange notion
of corporate body, which does not exist, because if you
have an executive, you cannot have a corporate body, because
the power and the decision-making lies with the executive.
That is why I was saying that our role as a Committee
is to scrutinise, is to suggest policy, directions of
policy changes, but the responsibility must lie with the
Minister. Therefore we take our role in terms of the ASPBs
and other bodies in terms of scrutinising and then trying
to influence the Minister. At the end of the day, the
responsibility lies with the Minster. If you are asking
me if I were a minister, would I want to do away with
the quangos, the answer would be yes. |
| SIR MICHAEL WHEELER BOOTH:
Have you looked at the remit, for example, of these bodies
and then tried, using evidence, to see how far their delivery
has matched up to it? |
| MR THOMAS: Yes, we certainly
do that regularly. As I say, we look at the corporate
plan, we look at the annual report, we go through the
quinquennial review and all these things are gone into
in detail. |
| SIR MICHAEL WHEELER BOOTH:
Therefore presumably you suggest amendments to the remits
if you think that they are not satisfactory. |
| MR THOMAS: Yes, certainly,
and in the remit letter we would tell the minister she
should really be including it in the remit letter. |
| SIR MICHAEL WHEELER BOOTH:
The Western Mail today has a headline saying, "Bonfire
of quangos has simply gone out." |
| MR THOMAS: We have not
lit the match yet. |
|
LORD RICHARD: Have you poured
the petrol on?
Can I ask a question which just occurs
to me? How much control do you have over the culture
budget?
|
| TED ROWLANDS: £45 million. |
| MR THOMAS: Yes. It is
an interesting question. I do not know whether you have
seen the draft budget. This is one of the areas that I
know the Committee will be looking at over the next few
months. The budget lines for culture have changed dramatically
and we now have a culture fund of £46 million, which will
rise to £62 million at the end of the three-year
period. |
| TED ROWLANDS: Outwith
the Arts Council, outwith all these other bodies? |
| MR THOMAS: They are
all in there, and there is a question in terms of scrutiny
and the accountability of that budget. Rather than saying
this is what the Arts Council has to spend, it will all
come out in due time but I think that there is a question
there. In terms of the Committee, all we can do is scrutinise;
the responsibility for the budget lies with the Minister.
If the Minister so wished, she would be in a position
to distribute that money herself and not go through these
bodies. I think the view within the Assembly generally,
across all party lines, is that the arm’s length
organisation is useful in that sense because obviously
it protects us from actually being in a situation of patronage.
It is very comfortable for the Minister to be able to
say, "If you want money you can go and see the Arts
Council rather than coming to me personally." |
| LORD RICHARD: You are
reacting to the Minister’s proposals and scrutinising
the way in which she spends the money. |
| MR THOMAS: We can be
proactive in the sense that we could say, "Look,
Minister, we don’t really think that this expenditure
is justified. You should be moving it to another area." |
| LORD RICHARD: Could
you go and say, "The Bettws Choral Society needs
another £5,000 a year in order to keep going"? |
| MR THOMAS: That did
happen with the Swansea Orchestra. There was a tremendous
amount of criticism about it. My own view is I do not
think all the money going to the arts in Wales should
be confined to the Arts Council. I think there is a role
for the Minister to say, "The Arts Council has decided
not to support this. I am minded to support it."
So I think a limited amount of money being used in that
way is something which is beneficial. |
| LAURA McALLISTER: There
needs to be accountability if that is going to happen. |
| MR THOMAS: There has
to be accountability. I am now flogging this, I am afraid,
but if you were to ask me to justify the existence of
the Assembly, the one thing I would say is that if you
look at the funding of the Assembly, the Barnet formula,
that is the one thing where you see accountability and
traceability for the first time. It was never there previously.
Nobody understood how Wales was funded, and for the first
time, because of the work undertaken by the Economic Development
subject committee, we have now full transparency and accountability
in terms of the public purse in Wales. So if you were
to ask whether the Assembly has justified its existence,
in that sense it has. |
|
LORD RICHARD: Thank you very
much indeed. That was very helpful and very interesting.
|
|
|
|
|
|
