Meeting of the Parliament (Hybrid)

Meeting date: Tuesday, March 1, 2022

Official Report 981KB pdf

Points of Order

On a point of order, Presiding Officer. Today, the Scottish Government held an event in Dundee to launch a document that sets out a 10-year economic plan. Clearly, it is intended to be a document of significance that will shape Scottish Government decision making and spending on the economy in this session of the Parliament and the next. It is convention that the Government makes statements to Parliament if matters are significant.

Presiding Officer, do you share my disappointment that the Government chose to hold an event with private invitees rather than placing the document in the Parliament and announcing it through a ministerial statement, which I believe has been done for previous strategies? Did you or the Parliamentary Bureau receive a request for such a statement to be given prior to the launch and prior to the strategy’s being published and shared with the public?

I thank Mr Johnson for his point of order. Government-initiated questions are one of the mechanisms by which the Government can make information available to the Parliament. However, the issue was discussed at the bureau earlier and, as I said there, I expect the Government to consider what the best mechanism is for each significant announcement, particularly on a day when the Parliament is sitting.

While the response to the GIQ states that there will be a debate on the strategy at a later date, I am sympathetic to Mr Johnson’s query about whether that was the most appropriate mechanism to use for announcing the strategy, for the reasons that I have outlined. At the bureau today, I asked the minister to reflect on the choice of that mechanism and he committed to look at that. I expect him to update bureau members at the earliest opportunity.

Presiding Officer, in relation to your ruling on Daniel Johnson’s point of order, could you be more specific about when you expect the minister to come back on that? This is a vitally important policy announcement, and it has been made to a closed meeting in Dundee. It is vitally important that such matters are brought to the chamber and are discussed and scrutinised by members of the Parliament. Could I ask for your guidance on that, and will you intercede with the Government to insist that such a statement is brought to the Parliament—as early, even, as tomorrow, I hope?

I thank Mr Kerr for his point of order. I am sure that he shares my view that the minister was in no doubt as to the strength of feeling that was expressed by the bureau. The minister will take that seriously and will report to the bureau and me at the first opportunity.

We now move on to the next item of business.