COMMISSION ON THE POWERS AND ELECTORAL
ARRANGEMENTS OF THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY FOR WALES
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MINUTES OF PROCEEDINGS
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of the
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EVIDENCE OF:
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COMMITTEE CONVENORS OF THE SCOTTISH PARLIAMENT
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BRISTOW MULDOON, MSP
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ALEX FERGUSSON, MSP
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TRISH GODMAN, MSP
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KAREN GILLON, MSP
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held at
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The Scottish Parliament
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on
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Thursday, 13th February 2003
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| LORD RICHARD: Can I thank you for coming to see us this
afternoon and for giving up your time. I’ll just
say what we are here to try and do. So far as this Commission
is concerned, it was set up by the National Assembly for
Wales to look at the way in which Assembly is defined
and whether it should have additional powers. Oviously
there is a huge difference between the way in which your
Parliament operates and the way the Assembly operates
and therefore we felt it would be very useful for us to
come up and have a fairly intensive couple of days looking
at Parliament and the way in which it works. One of the
interesting things we perceived is your Committee system
which we think looks extremely interesting. Perhaps you
can introduce yourself and your Committee and tell us
what it is you have been doing and should have been doing
who does what, why and when. Can you give us a run down
on the sort of work that you do and then if we may can
we ask questions? |
| MR MULDOON: Good afternoon and welcome to the Scottish
Parliament and I think on behalf of my colleagues we’re
certainly very happy to give evidence to the Commission
you are working on to give evidence, I think it is very
important work that you are engaging on and I know that
certainly Assembly Members have a desire to increase their
powers… Sorry was I going too fast? |
| MR FERGUSSON: We’ve been trying to slow him down
for years. |
| MR MULDOON: I have spoken to some Assembly members and
am aware that Assembly members have a desire to increase
the powers and influence of the assembly. I will set out
the workings of the Scottish Parliament from my own perspective
in the Transport and Environment Committee. |
| I represent Livingston Constituency, a new town about
15 miles away from Edinburgh and I have been the convenor
of the Transport and Environment Committee since December
2001, and I was a member of the Committee for about a
year before that so I have been there for most of the
term of the Scottish Parliament. In terms of the sort
of issues we have been looking at in the period of the
first term of the Scottish Parliament, we have dealt with
a number of major pieces of legislation, we have dealt
with the Transport Act which introduced powers to introduce
congestion charges for Scottish Local authorities and
also transport powers in terms of a form of regulation
of the bus services, what we call quality contracts and
quality partnerships between Local authorities and bus
companies. We also looked at issues as to whether or not
we would want to introduce a broader form of road charging,
such as traffic on trunk roads, or workplace parking levels,
however these were ultimately not in the Bill as it was
passed 2 years ago. |
| Others included: two pieces of legislation concerning
the water industry. The first Act established Scottish
Water as a public corporation which brought together three
water companies which were still our responsibility. So
three quangos into one effective corporation and that
was essentially earlier in April of last year. We have
been passing legislation on the implementation of European
environmental features concerning the Water Framework
Directive and just completed it in the last few weeks.
We have carried out in the process a complete review of
building regulations in Scotland as planning issues also
come under our remit. So these are the major pieces of
legislation we have passed and these pieces of legislation
have been Executive inspired. |
| As a Committee I think in terms of workload some of
that comes from Executive inspired legislation, and some
of the workload comes from areas of enquiry as a Committee
we have decided to carry out investigations into. We have
carried out a review of the railway industry and the way
in which the powers are split between the Scottish Executive
and the UK Government. Effectively, we are responsible
for definition of the Passenger Act franchise in Scotland,
where the UK Government is responsible for safety issues
and infrastructure. We looked at that relationship and
published the report on that just recently. |
| Another issue we looked at the mobile telephone communications
masts and following on from recommendations that were
made, the Executive brought forward proposals to introduce
new forms of planning that apply; to that industry in
Scotland. |
| We have also dealt with a number of issues that have
been brought to the Committees often by the communities
of Scotland through the public petitions system. I think
the Transport and Environment Committee has had the highest
number of petitions referred to us, normally by peoples
concerns about various types of environmental problems
whether it be noise, whether it be smells, whether it
be contamination and we have looked at a number of these
in detail and produced reports that recommend alternatives
to the Executive. On some of those issues, the Executive
has got to take action to introduce new regulations. |
| That I suppose that is probably the range of issues
that we have dealt with today. |
| MS SUGAR: Could you say a bit more about how the Scottish
Parliament (petitions system) works and whether people
can Actually appear before you? |
| MR MULDOON: Basically, the way it works is we have got
a Public Petitions Committee which officially looks at
any petitions that are submitted into the Parliament.
There are about 9 MSPs on that Public Petitions Committee.
They will take direct evidence from a petitioner; an ordinary
member of the public, community group whatever, trade
unions. Any type of group can bring forward a petition
providing it is within the competence of the Parliament
and is something that Parliament has an ability to respond
to or deal with. The Petition Committee will look at it
and try to ascertain whether they believe there is a substantive
issue that the petitioner is bringing forward that Parliament
should look at. There is a case you some times get one
individual who has got an obsession with an issue so the
Petition Committee will try to root this out and not pass
that back to the Committees but whether they believe that
there is an important and significant issue there should
be further work carried out. They will the refer it on
to the lead Committee, transport issues, health issues,
anywhere. The lead committee will take the decision on
whether or not we carry out a substantive piece of work
on it and if they do this they will call on appropriate
witnesses to give evidence to the Committee prior to coming
to some sort of conclusion in terms of recommendation
they may or may not wish to make. There have been a number
of areas I think where communities within Scotland have
felt that it has given them an opportunity to influence
Government in a way it never been able to in the past.
There have been a number of instances where the actions
of the Parliament have actually been seen to be effective
in responding to community concerns. Telecommunications
was an issue from a Public Petition initially. I think
and also issues such as the spreading of organic waste
is an issue that has been dealt with in that manner and
a whole range I think the Transport and Environment Committee
has dealt with in one way or another, about 90 petitions
throughout the Scottish Parliament, not all to the same
depth, but we are trying to look at the importance of
the issue. As a Committee we have not initiated any legislation
of our own in terms of a Committee Bill although obviously
the Parliament has the power to do that, other Committees
have done so. I think Trish, your Committee has done so,
and there have been some in the Education Committee and
one or two other Committees have, but we haven’t
had direct experience of it. People have been asking questions
about how that process works but we certainly have been
an influence in initiating action by the Executive in
response to the reports we have produced and changes in
legislation has followed. |
| LORD RICHARD: How often do you mean? |
| MR MULDOON: Weekly normally. |
| LORD RICHARD: How many? |
| MR MULDOON: There are 9 in our Committee. There is then
Committee membership which is made up in proportion to
the way all the parties in the Parliament are elected,
we have got four Labour members, two SNP members, one
Conservative, one Liberal and one Green Member, so no
party has an overall majority albeit the coalition parties,
if they vote together have a majority although this does
not always happen. |
| MS GODMAN: I am Trish Godman, and I am convenor of the
Local Government Committee and there are 7 members on
that Committee, I will just briefly say some of the things
the Committee have done but perhaps to take you very briefly
through the system. What happens is if an Executive Bill
is given to us? We look at taking information or evidence
from witnesses before we get to draft the Bill and we
have an idea of what the Executive are going to produce
in terms of the Bill. We look at it, and we have pre-legislative
scrutiny of that Bill and in terms of Local Government
and I am sure it is the same with all of the Committees
by the time it comes to the Bill it might have changed
substantially because of the evidence we have taken earlier.
I, as a rule do it but you don’t have to do that,
so the Executive puts down a Bill and we look at it and
by the time we put down the draft Bill it can be changed
significantly because of the work the Committee has done.
Bristow has mentioned the fact that Committees can bring
forward legislation on their own. We have not done that
but I think Education and Social Justice have done it
and again that is because they have been listening to
evidence from witnesses, and that is a bit of a Law, something
in mortgage Law that Cathie Craigie did and that was through
listening to cross-examination of witnesses so that is
one way of a Bill being introduced to a Committee, a Executive
Bill and a Committee Bill and Private Members Bill and
all of the Committees have experienced Private Members
Bill and I just finished one for the proposal, of PR and
Local Government in 2003 which we didn’t agree the
general principals for lots of reasons( but for lots of
reasons) not only political, we have had a huge Local
Government Bill which has just gone through the Parliament
which in essence has three parts, one being Community
planning which there is duty for, if you like, Education
and a particular area Health, Local Government, Police
and in Strathclyde Passenger Transport Service and Community
Scotland which is our housing part of the Executive, needed
to sit round a table looking at it and working out a community
plan to sign up to….. Sorry, am I speaking too fast
for you? The first was community planning, the second
was best value and the third is the power of well-being
and that is to enable the Local Authorities to make decisions
that would be looking at the health and safety of an area
in principle, so this Bill went though last month. Before
we became a Parliament, Donald Dewar, then the Secretary
of State for Scotland, took into the House of Commons
a motion that we should review Local Government in Scotland
and indeed that was done by McIntosh who at that time
was the Chief Executive of Strathclyde Regional Council.
It was the first debate we ever had in the Parliament,
when we were able to legislate, that was on the 2nd of
July 1999 and we looked at the report and one of the things
that McIntosh recommended was that we were all to know
that there should be a independent legislative review
of Local Government finance and that is a very very complex
area. The Executive decided they would not do that so
the Committee decided that they would, that was the different
decision that they would do nothing. Now there is a question
about how independent that would be given that we are
a Committee of this Parliament, however, it took us 18
months and we produced a report which we took into the
Parliament about three months ago, I think and again the
Executive picked up some things in that for example, we
now have three year funding for Local authorities and
it will not drop below a certain amount, and indeed there
will be no Section 94 consent and don’t ask me what
this is because I can never remember it. If you work in
Local Government you have to know about the work and the
other thing was borrowing at prudential rules which interested
me because I am not an absolute supporter of PPP or PFI
and this was allowing the Local Government to look at
other ways of borrowing money when they had an important
thing they wished to address so the Executive listened
to this, they didn’t go in the final analysis, we
said we really need a review of Local Government finance,
we also looked at the fact of Council Tax was introduced
in 1991 and it has never been reviewed and houses have
never been re-valued in Scotland since then. We are looking
at that, that was a big part of that Report and obviously
if you are going to look for the number of bands you have
in Council Tax you have to re-value your homes and indeed
that has been undertaken, so where we didn’t get
everything that we wanted, we got something that was quite
important. One other, Public Bodies and Public Appointments
Bill which we had just taken through Parliament and it
was agreed at Parliament that we dismantled some of the
quangos in that, not as many as I would personally like
but some of them and we are going to put in place after
the election a Commissioner for Public Appointments, Jamie
Rennie is the one we deal with at the moment but we will
have our own Scottish Commissioner for public appointments
and have wide ranging Private Members Bills from dog fouling
which if you have been a councillor in the past is Actually
is quite an important Act today, and Actually published
today and will be discussed in Parliament next week. The
Committee today discussed a Private Members Bill by the
SNP member as to whether we should have a tolerance zones
for prostitutes and the decision of the Committee has
been difficult I would have to say we had incredible sympathy
for what Margo Macdonald was trying to do in terms of
the safety of women who are street prostitutes. We came
down on the side if we do that then we are managing prostitution
and we were not prepared to do that, so we are going into
Parliament the week after next asking Parliament not to
accept the general principles of this Bill but leaving
a legacy for the Executive that we really need to review
the Law on prostitution the Law of soliciting because
there is a gender imbalance if we don’t charge men
for kerb crawling now. I say that but I have got arguments
for and against doing that and one of the most difficult
things in this report was that every time we had a witness
in front of us who said quite clearly said there should
be a tolerance zone for all those reasons then the next
witness that came in front of you says I assure you there
should not be tolerance zones for all those reasons. The
Executive took an interesting position that they didn’t
take any decision when we had the Minister in front of
us he did not answer one question and I am not saying
anything I shouldn’t say but he didn’t answer
a question. What he said at the end was the Executive
are waiting until the Committee decide, so there is a
bit of power for the Committee there. I think you mentioned
at the beginning that you were interested in the Committee
system and I think that you are right that is one of the
strengths of this Parliament in the way that the Committee
works, we can introduce legislation, we can look at Private
Members Bills and we can look at Executive Bills and we
can take reports as I did into Parliament which are not
a Bill but a report that is well put together and well
researched and the Executive will support some of it,
so I think that is basically where our strengths are.
I am sorry if I spoke too quickly. |
| MR FERGUSSON: Welcome to the Scottish Parliament. My
name is Alex Fergusson. I was looking around your name
tags, and while I don’t know if Mr Tom Jones can
sing, I certainly can’t play football or indeed manage
it either. But I do welcome you here on this obviously
interesting exercise you are undertaking. I am convenor
of the Rural Development Committee. I am a Scottish Conservative
who are a minority breed in Scotland and in the South
of Scotland. Just as membership of Committees is pro rata
based so are the convenerships, something I think works
well on the whole and am very proud of the role I have
in this Committee of 11, which the largest size you can
have. I have four Labour members, two Liberal Democrats,
three SNPs and two Conservatives. I have to say I find
having another Conservative on a Committee which I convene
very helpful as I try to remain virtually apolitical as
convenor unless I can stand it no longer and I do find
it useful to have another member on my Committee to make
the political points that need to be made in debates.
I merely mention that in passing. Obviously our principal
role is to scrutinise Executive Actions. I call that our
re-Active role. Our pro-Active role I will come to later
but again, equally obviously, our main role is to scrutinise
Bills and propose amendments to legislation. We have dealt
with up to now, three Members Bills ranging from one of
the shortest Bills, a Sea Fisheries Amendment, tabled
by a Liberal member from Shetland called Tavish Scott
which simply went through the nod, to one of the longest
Bills, the Protection of Wild Mammals Bill, known as the
Hunting Bill, which is a Private Members Bill by Mike
Watson and that took us virtually almost two years of
extremely hard work. We are currently just finishing dealing
with the Organic Farming Targets Bill, a Private Members
Bill tabled by Robin Harper. The Convenor of the procedures
Committee, Trish Godman, said they were going to recommend
that the Parliament not accept the general principles
of a particular Bill, but to me there is an alternative
procedure which we took on this particular Bill which
is we chose to make no recommendation to the Parliament,
and while that may seem to some a bit of diminished responsibility,
I don’t believe it is, because there are technical
legal reasons why we found it impossible either to recommend
it or to recommend against acceptance of the general principles,
so we chose in principle to leave it up to the Parliament
as a whole to give a decision whether or not that Bill
should go to stage two. Parliament chose not to do so
almost at the last minute, having listened sympathetically
to the Bill, and that Bill has died for the time being
although the very Act of bringing it forward has prompted
the Executive to come forward with its own Organic Farming
Targets and I don’t think that would probably have
happened if Robin Harper hadn’t brought forward the
Private Members Bill. So the effect of bringing forward
a Members Bill on the Executive can be quite marked. So
that was our three members Bills. We have had and we have
had two very large Executive Bills. The First was the
National Parks Bill and the first two National Parks have
now been set up. We have had the Salmon Conservation Bill
which became more contentious the longer it went on which
is probably the wrong way to proceed. Hoxever, that Bill
has now been passed. We had the fascinating Fur farming
Scotland Bill, and I say fascinating because there is
no fur farming here in Scotland, and we are currently
rather just having to rush through the Agricultural holdings
Scotland Bill which is quite a contentious part of the
Executive legislation containing a pre-emptive right to
buy back secured tenancies from their landlords when the
land is on the market, and create new types of tenancies.
We are obviously having to meet a tight timetable to progress
this piece of flagship legislation before the election.
We are almost at the stage and there has been a huge meeting
going on behind the scenes between the Executive and stake
holders, with both sides trying to reach a consensus on
a lot of these points, but the result of this is we have
been having amendments recently which have been almost
at the last minute, because these stakeholder meetings
were ongoing as we were meeting to discuss the issues
involved.… I don’t want to be too condemnatory
of them and that has got to be welcomed. That is the most
of the legislation. Over the last year we have had 66
negative statutory instruments of subordinate legislation.
Last year we had 12 petitions on a wide ranging variety
of subjects, National Parks, Scottish Agricultural College,
Foot and Mouth disaster. We also have a statutory requirement
every year to look at the budget and to present a report
on it. A wonderful way of doing that by appointing an
advisor who draws up a report which we do look at and
usually agree with, but I think it’s probably fair
to say our membership is not the most qualified one to
look at matters of a financial concern. We also examined
the review of the Common fisheries Policy and obviously
it is a hugely emotive subject at the moment given the
state of the whole fishing industry. The Committee also
has to agree an annual report which goes to the Parliament,
drawn up by the Clerk teams and possibly another advisor
into which we have an input. Now that is what I call the
re-Active side but there is a pro-Active side as well,
that being the Committees undertake their own enquiries
and we have done two, one in the very early days, studying
Changing Employment Patterns in rural Scotland. The idea
of that was to try to identify what might be happening
in the future, so the Executive can use that as a template
to measure some of their work against, to see how it would
come together. It was a constructive piece of work to
better inform Executive decisions, although whether it
has or not is a matter for conjecture. The second one
really grew out of the total domination overtaking this
Committee by the Protection of Wild Mammals Bill for the
better part of two years as I said. We were absolutely
determined that we did not want to be remembered at the
end of the Scotland’s First Parliament as the Hunting
Committee and without going into the rights and wrongs
of the debate, it had become a demanding feature of our
work. So we undertook, as soon as we could, to hold an
inquiry into ‘Integrated Rural Development ’,
and particularly the barriers which people perceive to
stand in the way of delivery of successful rural development.
I have to say in hindsight it was an incredible opportunity
and a subject which became an enormous piece of work.
We managed to complete it however, and in doing so it
has been a fascinating exercise. We had several meetings
outside Edinburgh as we have done whenever we possibly
can and taken an enormous amount of evidence. One of the
weaknesses that we found we felt in taking evidence was
that unless somebody is officially on the agenda of that
meeting you can’t take evidence from them in the
official part of the Committee’s work, so we rather
pioneered the way on the Committee of allowing the general
public, the man in the street, if I can call him or her
that, a more direct way of inputting in Committee business
where it is suitable to do so. We closed a formal session
of evidence taking, usually in the middle of the agenda,
and we open it up to members of the public who just want
something off their chest. It stemmed from the one in
Stirling, on the National Parks Bill, where the hall was
absolutely packed with people all of whom had strong things
to say, but none of whom could say them because there
wasn’t a way to do so. What we have done, although
it is open to abuse by individuals or lobby groups if
they wish to do so (but it hasn’t been abused so
far), is get them to put their names forward to the Clerk
and they get 90 seconds or two minutes to get anything
they want to say off their chest. It is a bit like a soap
box and we don’t ask questions. |
| MR ROWLANDS: Is there a record taking of that? |
| MR FERGUSSON: There is a minute kept of their input
but it’s not part of the Official Report, Hansard
if you like, as are all our official proceedings, but
there is a minute taken so we can refer to it if we wish
to do so while drawing up the new recommendations. I was
going to finish on that noteI I think it’s very effective
way of letting people have direct input without having
been officially invited to do so. Normally one invites
organisations and agencies, all the usual suspects to
give official evidence and I think it is quite a good
way of doing it. I know one or two other Committees have
begun to do that. I will stop at that point. |
| LORD RICHARD: Thank you very much indeed. What interested
me is the Actual process of legislation, I mean you get
what, a draft Bill or something like instructions to Counsel? |
| MS GODMAN: You get a draft Bill. I have always taken
evidence on a draft Bill so we have a draft Bill in front
of us. These are proposals from the Executive. |
| LORD RICHARD: Are the proposals of the Executive drafted
by Parliamentary counsel in the form of a Bill, something
you have first read? |
| MS GODMAN: Right. We have this draft Bill and between
Clerks and myself we decide how many days Committee sessions
we’ll set aside to take evidence on this draft Bill
and as you start to do that and take evidence as Alex
said you take the evidence from the so called experts
in the communalities, parts come up either A. it won’t
work or B. aren’t really what this Bill is setting
out to do because at the end of the day you are sitting
in a room making legislation other people have Actually
got to work it.. People who are going to be involved right
in at the very beginning they are able to say this may
or may not work. |
| LORD RICHARD: I can see that. Can you Actually change
the policy? |
| MS GODMAN: What you can do is you then have a right
to respond to the draft report which goes to the Executive
in about three or four… |
| MR MULDOON: Within two months. |
| MS GODMAN: You take the evidence and write a report
and which goes to the Executive, they respond within two
months, and very very often, the Executive have not come
back and said you are right, we will change it so when
the Bill comes you have to look at it properly and thoroughly,
it can be significantly changed. |
| MR ROWLANDS: Is it a redraft or does it include amendment
at this stage or not? |
| MS GODMAN: We will; our report should come to an obvious
conclusion when you read it and it will be supported by
evidence, the evidence is saying that this part of the
Bill will not work for example because of this, this and
this or if you proceed with this you will need an amendment
because it is contradictory… |
| MR ROWLANDS: So you are a video camera? |
| MS GODMAN: So we are identifying amendments and whether
it just really would not work and then so when the Bill
comes up to us it can be significantly changed, we then
look at it again much more in depth and when we do our
last report in response to it we can have suggested changes
as well which then come into what we call our stage two
which goes to Committee for amendment, and that is when
it is changed by amendment. |
| MR ROWLANDS: It comes back to the same Committee? |
| MS GODMAN: Back to the same Committee for amendment
and it goes to the Parliament at stage three to agree
and then again that is another area. |
| LORD RICHARD: When you started off with a draft Bill
and you take evidence from experts you are bound to get
people who say we don’t agree with what the Bill
is trying to do and it would be better if it was this
way rather than that way, it all goes in your report,
does it? |
| MS GODMAN: Yes, it would go into a good report, yes,
because the pros and cons of how you have come to your
decision…. |
| LORD RICHARD: And then goes back to the Executive? |
| MS GODMAN: And they come back with the Bill as they
are presenting it to you. The Bill as published, as its
agreed. |
| LORD RICHARD: What happens if they don’t agree
with the report: |
| MS GODMAN: If they don’t agree, it comes back as
published and we still have an opportunity to put amendments
in because Committee members can put amendments in. |
| LORD RICHARD: That is at Committee stage? |
| MS GODMAN: Yes. |
| MR FERGUSSON: Again on the Wild Mammals Bill members
did not agree with the Bill by majority and we were split
on a huge number of issues but nonetheless that Bills
comes back and only way to add is at stage two as well
during amending stage because after an amendment is put
forward that is, indeed it can be in stage one in your
report, you can take further evidence at stage two. |
| LORD RICHARD: Do you… |
| MR MULDOON: Yes, basically the process does not have
to have a draft Bill, most of the major pieces of legislation
do, but there have been some different approaches. I think
to date there has not been a case where an Executive Bill
has been rejected by Parliament at stage one, the Bills
that have been rejected at that stage are generally Private
Members Bills. |
| LORD RICHARD: Do you have white papers? |
| MR MULDOON: Yes. |
| LORD RICHARD: Would your pre-legislation group get a
white paper or wait for a draft Bill? |
| MS GODMAN: We would probably wait until we had a draft
Bill, it depends on how busy the Committee is but we would
probably wait for a draft Bill. |
| MS SUGAR: Mr FERGUSSON you mentioned the annual report
that the Committee produced and I would like to congratulate
you on that it is a very useful document. I think it showed
that the scope of the work, what was easy to read as well,
my questions are this, why are you allowed to substitute
on the Committees and how does that work in practice?
Attendance is slightly optional and there is a bit of
fluctuation of members depending on availability and the
second is how do you identify the resources that you need
to do your work. So you scope the work you need to do,
you say we are going to need Lawyers advice, specialist
advice, people from university here or whatever and how
is that delivered, are you getting enough support to be
able to do that? |
| MS GODMAN: I will answer some of that. The first question
was about the annual report and substitutes. I think yes,
there has been one substitute member in particular coming
to this tolerance zone Bill from the Tory party, since
he was at the beginning of it, he has continued to come
right through it, we have also a convenors group and we
did talk for a long time about substitutes. I would have
to say in the Local Government Committee they’re
very good attendees and only had one substitute for one
specific bit of work, but other Committees not so well
attended as mine and I don’t know why that is. The
Justice Committee I think only once has not had the full
quorum, but I think that it is the only one Committee
in the Parliament. The quorum is three for Chair as well,
I think a substitute who, obviously that person would
not sit as Chair, if I were not there. As far as support
is concern we obviously never get enough support but Alex
FERGUSSON is right to pick up on the advisors who are
available for any piece of work although it’s very
helpful for the budget, but we can call advisors in, our
Clerks with a team behind, them, we sit down with the
Clerks and talk through who you think you need to have
in front of you and again we are all bringing different
experiences, my background is social work and in doing
this particular piece on tolerance zones, was able to
point them in the direction of routes out of prostitution
we have in Scotland and other areas where I think that
they needed to pull in expert advice and I am sure that
is the same in other places. But you are not happy with
substitutes? |
| MR FERGUSSON: No, although I think it’s important
to have substitutes, we have I think rather well attended
Committee and it is important I think particularly when
you are coming to division, it is important to have a
mechanism whereby if we come to a division the make up
of the Parliament is reflected if you like because there
is a mechanism whereby that can be actually reflected
through the voting public which very often goes against
my view. We didn’t have such substitutes originally,
we have a dozen now, my reservation for the substitute
holding where a substitute came along and before voting
on something really said he didn’t understand what
part of this was about and then proceeded interestingly
as Executive member which I thought was fascinating, so
I mean I just have a little difficulty in that unless
substitute come all the way through the process I think
that is fine but a substitute being put in as voting voter
if you like which can happen without any understanding
of the scrutiny that has gone through but I think though
it is important they are measured, but on the whole I
think membership is really good. We always started off
with meetings once a fortnight and attendance has really
been really good, absolutely excellent, first class from
the Clerking point of view, and external advisors and
external help and no problems in that regard whatsoever. |
| SIR MICHAEL WHEELER BOOTH: What do you think of Minority
Reports? |
| MS GODMAN: I don’t think any Committee has ever
had one, if it goes to a debate, the debate can be recorded
or you can have a particular member dissent on the particular
part. |
| MR MULDOON: Dissent is recorded in the body of the report
and how many members have dissented. I agree with Alex
about problems of substitutes. I think there are some
occasions where people who have not taken part in any
consideration of the Bill and who are without the detailed
knowledge and, as Alex suggests come voting and I would
prefer not to have them. I think the reason we have them
is because we have tried to condense all the Committee
meetings of the Parliament into Tuesdays and Wednesdays,
what that means on occasions, Committee members can be
individual member on one Committee which clashes with
another. Personally I would like to see us resolve that.
On Mondays the reason we don’t attend is a lot of
members try to protect Mondays for dealing with constituency
work. I would wish us to use Mondays to allow flexibility
so we won’t have clashes, and if it doesn’t
clash then we don’t need the substitutes. |
| LORD RICHARD: Who decides how many Committees do you
have? |
| MR MULDOON: Parliament has the vote. |
| LORD RICHARD: Who decides on the size of the Committees? |
| MR MULDOON: Again Parliament, there are negotiations
between the parties and there is a motion put to it Parliament
and I think the size of Committees have generally been
agreed across parties but there is a potential to be… |
| MR FERGUSSON: The size of most Committees was reduced
at one stage because there was a problem I think if you
take away the Ministers of which there are 16 Labour Ministers
you Actually make some sit on three Committees and I am
absolutely shattered sitting on one. There was a real
difficulty, so in effect membership of the Committee if
you like to, that is not a criticism so I think there
was a need to down size totally down size and it wasn’t,
I mean I totally bitterly opposed the Rural Development
Committee being down sized and it wasn’t, it stayed
at 11 but it’s an awful lot easier to get through
the business if you have only 7 people. If you are a few
people short I think there is an argument for that I think
in an ideal world you would not have substitutes whatsoever
and this is not an ideal world, I would rather not, I
would rather have them than not have them. |
| MS MCALLISTER: Can we go back to the diverse rules of
the Committee and all three of you talked about that.
I was reading in an academic journal about Scottish Committees,
being described as legislative sausage machines and when
effectively legislation is bogged down the agendas to
such an extent there is very little extent for any kind
of strategic role, I was just wondering where you think
your own Committee might have been better served on the
scrutiny role in particular and another point made in
the academic article was that the scrutiny in terms of
some of the quangos in particular has been very abysmal
rather than looking at the Executive policies for having
quangos in the first instance…. |
| MR MULDOON: I think the Transport and Environmental
Committee has tried to avoid being a sausage machine,
we have Committee meetings that agree our own agenda,
in order that we can deal partly with Executive legislation
coming through but also scrutiny we want to take forward.
I think myself that part of the reasons for, in the first
term of the Scottish Parliament there has been that criticism
or that observation is that because we have not had a
Scottish Parliament for so many hundreds of years there
is a whole stack of legislation, and reforms that had
pressing demands to be put through and so the Executive
had a large programme of work in the first term. I suspect
that a number of Acts of Parliament to pass in the second
term will be significantly down than the number of Acts
passed in the first term and it will regulate itself at
a lower level and that will take some of the pressure
off all the Committees. I think though some Committees
have handled it better than others in terms of trying
to get a balance between work they have brought forward
and scrutinising public bodies and work they have to do
because as Executive piece of legislation being brought
forward…. |
| MS GODMAN: I would agree with that though, let’s
put our cards on the table, we have what we call a family
friendly Parliament. We are not here on Monday and not
here on Friday most weeks unless there is special reason
for a Committee meeting. We start at 2.30 on a Wednesday
and we work till 5 o’clock and we work from half
past 9 to 5 o’clock on a Thursday normally. That
was a decision taken by the Parliament for all the reasons
you will be aware of we don’t have to go into today.
So to get the legislation through we have to work very
hard on Tuesday and Wednesday mornings in Committees and
like Bristow I have lots of legislation to be put through,
if it means a long Committee time that means a long Committee
time because they have a choice of coming back either
on Monday or a Friday. If you put that to your Committee
nine times out of ten they don’t want to do that.
The other things is there are two Justice Committees and
there are two, because the Chair of the first Justice
Committee talks so much you couldn’t get stuff through
and that is a matter of fact, so there is now two Justice
Committees so it is incumbent upon the Chair to run their
Committee properly and get through the business but still
be a Chair and run it properly. We are now asking them
to come together under one umbrella. So there is that
side of it and Bristow is right, there are moments when
we feel it’s coming fast and furious and we are a
very new Parliament as you know and we are keen to get
a lot of legislation through but we are keen to do it
properly and if we take our time on the Committee and
say I started 2 o’clock every Tuesday I can be there
sometimes at 6 o’clock, and I tell them they are
going to be there until that time, so be prepared, we
have a comfort break in the middle of the day and get
the work done and if the will is there you will be able
to do it in the next session, Bristow is also right, it
will be a bit slower again because there’s been a
lot of stuff that’s been technical, we have had to
do a lot of Sewel motions, we have had to look at in the
Parliament and arrange our time in that way but what is
meant is every Monday and Friday I can be in the constituency
all day knowing that when I come here on Tuesday morning
I am working hard at it until I leave on the Thursday
evening when I leave. |
| MR FERGUSSON: There is nothing to a add to that, I would
possibly argue perhaps been too much legislation during
the first four years and that was almost bound to happen
given the fact this was a new institution that was up
and running and an isolated point I really don’t
want to get into but the only thing I would say wit the
benefit of hindsight I would give my life not to have
had the Protection of Wild Mammals Act and not because
of what it delivered but we won’t get into that at
all but simply because of the total dominant role we have
had for two years. |
| MR ROWLANDS: I think the Common might agree with that
too. |
| MR FERGUSSON: We drew up a list of priorities we wanted
to concentrate on and I mean hunting was not one of them.
We never got to any of those priorities because we were
so dominated by this thing and I wish we could have, I
am not disappointed but if I could have my time again… |
| SIR MICHAEL WHEELER BOOTH: On the Hunting Bill you made
a point, it seems a bit odd that people who have not heard
the evidence of the arguments in the House of Lords very
occasionally overridden the Committee, it is not down
to us, but very very very occasionally and have put overwhelming
reasons because it’s like having a jury trial something
like that you have put there? |
| MR FERGUSSON: I see exactly where you are coming from,
I was totally opposed personally to the Wild Mammals Bill
but the alternative and you can’t have this is legislation
by Committee and you can’t have that and so I think
the Parliament has to reserve the right and also this
was a Private Members Bill, it was not special, it was
an Executive Bill but I don’t see that with the best
will in the world over the whole of Scotland, we would
have a much more, you can’t, you can’t have
them governed by a Committee which is the only alternative. |
| MR MULDOON: To put it into context as well Alex, the
Committee did move against that particular Bill but it
was a six, five vote within the Committee and also I am
sure you recognise this issue… |
| SIR MICHAEL WHEELER BOOTH: It doesn’t seem a very
good procedure it doesn’t seem very satisfactory
I must say? |
| MS GODMAN: That the Parliament should decide… |
| SIR MICHAEL WHEELER BOOTH: I am questioning how right
it is for people who have not heard detailed evidence
and I have not read the report I don’t have any of
the details about it, but presumably some of the arguments
depends on whether it was feasible and feasible way of
doing it. I mean it’s like going on a stag hunt,
what they come up with in that it was a bad idea but they
said the Bill as drafted would not work and then nobody
though of over ruling it and people are bitterly against
stag hunting. |
| MR MULDOON: I think that is the only occasion that Parliament
has voted against the committee on whether or not to support
the general principles of the Bill and I think really
just comes to the fact about polarisation of debate. |
| MR PRICE: Can I take up the issue of the consensual
nature of the Parliament and focus this particularly to
Mr FERGUSSON. The extent of which and the reasons why
the extent of it looking at it from your perspective somebody
from a minority party and from your perspective as a Committee
convenor really in your Committee, how much is this 11
members listening to the evidence forming a view of a
collective sort of basis as compared with a majority representing
the Executive and so on where is the balance in that and
the second thing is that we know there is a great extent
of consensual approach here, is it because there is as
it were a Scottish view a greater commonality of view
of here in Scotland or is it institutionally driven that
there are factors about the way this institution is comprised
for example, PR system etc., which drives it in a consensual
direction? |
| MR FERGUSSON: I hope my colleagues will help me out
here, I mean it is an extremely good question, I am not
convinced it is consensual. I think in the Committee it
would depend on whether we are doing re-Active or pro-Active
work, enquiries and reports. I think a Committee does
try wherever possible to come to a unanimous point of
view at the end of the day particularly maybe the down
side of that is the upshot of the report itself would
then tend to be, again there will always be areas of like
the last point of common dominator whereby you can have
an absolute report. It could be argued a report in some
instances might not be as punchy as some individuals might
like it to be. I believe there is considerable report
in a Committee coming to a unanimous decision on that
type of issue but certainly on scrutinising the work or
re-Active side of the work, we are a very interesting
Committee, it is one of the few I do perhaps in which
the Liberal Democrats side of the coalition parties aren’t
always prepared to back the Executive stage but it makes
for interesting debate from time to time. So I mean we
have had huge divisions over the agricultural holding
legislation and been dealing with just recently. So I
am interested in your perception that we are consensual
body but I am not absolutely certain that is a reality
but might come back in on that. |
| MS GODMAN: I would agree with that, the Local Government
Committee, Bristow was on it said at the beginning four
years ago, there was 11 members then and 9 of them were
ex councillors so we started off if you like base of people
who are committed to the Local Government and the delivery
of services at that level so I suppose I started off very
much on the plus side . We are now down to 7 and there
are 4 ex councillors on it and they have been there right
from the very beginning so there is a good base there,
but like Alex we have had many a division we have had
many a good solid argument during the Committee stages
particularly when we are discussing the draft report which
is done in private, so that is where there are no reporters
in the room at all and it is sleeves rolled up and say
what you like and hash it about and until we then produce
a report. It can be very controversial… |
| MR PRICE: Can I just butt in for a second and draw a
distinction between the members disagreeing and therefore
bringing a consensus for that reason as compared with
the confrontational line being draw between the coalition,
the supporters of the Executive and the opposition parties,
are we talking about the non consensus just because the
individuals disagree or the line up of the parties? |
| MS GODMAN: Certainly my experience in Local Government
Committees when we are in private session discussing our
report or response to a Bill that I get all kind of different
opinion and then I as the Chair pull that together I can
ask are you saying such and such and if you disagree then
it will go to a vote and like Alex I don’t always
have the Liberal Democrats on my side and on many occasions
and indeed the Section 28 debate which my Committee took
through which was really controversial in terms of how
the media handled it, and it was very controversial within
the Committee, the PR and Local Government was on my casting
vote because the Liberal Democrats voted with the SNP
Private Members Bill. If we look at what happened in the
Parliament and we got really bad press about how this,
about how we can’t speak properly, the debates are
boring, it’s really awful. I think we certainly don’t
debate the way they do it in the House of Commons and
I think part of that is because there are many more women
in the Parliament. We are not as confrontational as it
would appear to be some times in the House of Commons.
As far as the Committee is concerned, in a sense I make
a particular decision because as I say I have a majority
who are ex councillors, so no matter what we are looking
at we are looking at based on a principle of Local Government
delivering services at a Local level and how we do that
best and everything sort of comes from there. |
| MR MULDOON: I think there is more consensus in Committees
than there is in Chamber and often I think that is a factor,
one is everyone in the Committee is hearing the same evidence
and if you approach it in a relatively open minded manner,
hear all the evidence of the same case, so the case a
large percentage of the time in Committees we are dealing
with legislation or reports, there are not that many disagreements.
Partly I think that is also due to the fact that from
my own observation that three quarters of the MSPs in
the Scottish Parliament are described as being on the
centre left of politics and so this area is quite heavily
populated. In social terms the Labour Party, the SNP,
and the Liberals are all on similar ground in terms of
left right, although there are obvious splits on issues
such as to whether or not to remain in the Unions of the
United Kingdom, but on a lot of day to day issues there
maybe broad agreement between the parties. I think on
the Committees you get that consensual work whereas sometimes
when issues gets to the chamber there is a bit of posturing
takes place but that is just down to party politics some
times rather than genuine disagreement. |
| MR FERGUSSON: I think the answer to your question whether
there is individual or party disagreement really depends
on what we are discussing because if they are discuss
something that is coming from the Executive and is part
of the coalition agreement then it will end up if it comes
to division of the party alliance or Executive but very
often if its Private Members business or enquiry or something
that has been set up by the Committee itself I think there
is possibly more individual freedom if you like to pursue
your own but that is not cast iron but I think it plays
a part. |
| LORD RICHARD: Thank you very much for coming. |
| MS GILLON: Sorry I'm late, we had a school meeting that
ran on for longer than I imagined. On my own Committee,
apart from the line by line stage two amendment, we have
only ever divided once and that was on the draft report
on free school meals. that was split on party lines but
even on that division, there was a lot of agreement in
that we agreed the Bill was not the right thing but it
was support for whether or not it should go forward to
Parliament for further debate and that is the only division
we have had. Even on the line by line amendments, we have
just taken through the Protection of Children's Bill which
was passed yesterday and at stage two, we have members
of the same party voting against each other which is pretty
different but because of the issue then you would have,
particularly in my own party and within the SNP, very
distinct lines in relation to the right of adults or individuals
and the rights of children and the two party groups split
down these lines and it was fascinating to watch. it was
split down two lines. |
| LORD RICHARD: That is an Executive Bill? |
| MS GILLON: Yes. |
| LORD RICHARD: Thank you very much. |
| MR ROWLANDS: I was just going to ask about the relationship
of Whitehall and Transport issues. |
| MR MULDOON: We did carry out a enquiry into the railway
industry in particular but not transport in general because
roads are pretty much fully devolved… |
| MR ROWLANDS: Could we get a copy of that? |
| MR MULDOON: Yes. We did publish a report on the rail
industry. |
| MS DAVIES: Could we have a copy? |
| MR MULDOON: Yes. absolutely |
| MS DAVIES: What percentage of your Committees time is
spent on policy between the Committee what was the percentage
of your time … |
| MR FERGUSSON: Half of the time on legislation and half
of my time is spent on scrutiny. |
| MR MULDOON: I would say half of it on legislation and
half of it is on discretionary work. |
| MR FERGUSSON: I would agree with that. |
| MS GILLON: It hasn't been as much the education Committee,
I think it is more like 40/60, 40 on legislation and 60
on our own stuff but we are also taking through our own
Committee Bill so it gives a slightly different perspective.
The Bill is now ready to have its final reading and that
has been a two-year long process. that has been fairly
detailed work for my Committee but in real terms we have
had as much legislation as those other Government colleagues
have had in the past. |
| MS DAVIES: If I may ask a final question, in the Welsh
assembly the Minister is the member of the Committee,
what are the merits or disadvantages of your system? |
| MS GODMAN: Ministers are called as part of our deliberations
and also there is a lot behind the scenes, Ministers are
extremely available here and if we have amendments, that
comes from the Executive we can sit down and tell them
they are going to lose, this unless you change this or
say this or do that ,and from that ,you can take the Ministers
and Ministers staff and organise things before it proceeds
so they do give every piece of legislation and Bill you
are looking at, you bring to relevant Ministers and as
I said earlier the Minister who was in front of me today
on the tolerance zone did not answer one question. |
| LORD RICHARD: Well I think we will formally close the
evidence and you do not formally have to record this,
thank you. |
|
|
