Public Petitions Committee

Meeting date: Thursday, November 24, 2016

Official Report 463KB pdf

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New Petitions

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Local Authority Education Committees (Church Appointees) (PE1623)

Agenda item 1 is consideration of new petitions. PE1623, by Spencer Fildes on behalf of the Scottish Secular Society, is on unelected church appointees on local authority education committees. The petition calls for a change to current practice under section 124 of the Local Government (Scotland) Act 1973, which requires that local authority education committees must include members nominated by various churches. The petition has collected more than 700 signatures and has received 48 comments, mostly in support of its aims.

I welcome to the meeting Mr Fildes, who is accompanied by Professor Paul Braterman of the Scottish Secular Society. Thank you for attending today. You now have the opportunity to make a short opening statement, after which we will move to questions from the committee.

Thank you for inviting us, convener. My thanks to the rest of the committee, too.

At present, every council education committee in Scotland is required by law to include three full voting members nominated by churches. Voters and their elected representatives have no choice in the matter. That legal requirement dates back to 1929—and, in its present form, to 1973—but it is so broadly worded that it could apply to any future education system.

We believe that the current system is out of place and does not reflect a constantly evolving, rapidly modernising Scottish democracy. We would not dream of allowing churches to impose their members on the Parliament’s Education and Skills Committee, for instance, but that is exactly what we do with Scottish councils. The future of Scottish education is under active discussion, and we believe that this would be the perfect time to review the status quo.

One major consideration is the fact that parents who hold no belief now represent the majority among primary school parents. That has created a democratic deficit with regard to representation within local authorities. To address that changing demographic, we respectfully suggest that the simplest change would be to relax the requirement. We would like the law to allow—not compel—elected members to appoint up to three such representatives and to decide whether to give them voting powers, much as they do now for parent-teacher councils and representatives.

We gauged the views of all of Scotland’s MSPs by writing directly to them, and we found considerable cross-party support in our responses. I will quote and comment on some of the responses that we received. We got comments such as:

“there may well be merit in looking afresh at this again”;

“there should be a greater amount of autonomy in choosing the best people whether they be religious leaders or not”;

“I am broadly supportive of the concept of members of Education Committees being elected”;

and

“it is up to each local authority to decide who should be on the education committee.”

The final comment was:

“the status quo is an anachronism”.

Supporters of the petition include Professor Dame Anne Glover, who was a scientific adviser to the Scottish Government and the European Union; the clergy letter project, which is a global representative body comprising 15,000 ordained clergy; the secretary of Glasgow Unitarian Church; and the Glasgow Theosophical Society.

Our petition statement makes it clear that the present situation is undemocratic and unjust. It encroaches on human rights and is highly problematic in its enforcement. Moreover, it infringes local autonomy and is actually the opposite of participatory democracy. It is also unnecessary, given that denominational schools have their own separate mechanisms of governance. Churches are already involved to some extent in most Scottish schools, including non-denominational schools. Believers, like everyone else, can and should vote, take part in public debate and stand for office. That is not what we are challenging today. In this case, however, religion should be afforded no privilege against those who may hold no belief.

The requirement infringes local autonomy because laws handed down by central Government—in this case, by Westminster Governments in 1973 and 1994—are imposed on local councils irrespective of councils’ wishes and needs. It is certainly not participatory democracy. The broader community is not involved, and the appointees are answerable only to their own churches.

Finally, many councils have difficulty filling the positions. In our view, there are some questionable appointments. If the system were meeting a legitimate need, that problem would surely never arise. In its own response to the petition, the Church of Scotland admits that an element of reform is required, and we believe that the simplest reform is the one that we have suggested. Scotland’s regions are highly diverse, and we believe that local councils are the best judges of local needs. They already have a local mandate from their voting system, and they should be free to use it.

In conclusion, we respectfully ask you to seek opinions from organisations that represent non-believing as well as believing bodies and from organisations and campaigns such as the time for inclusive education campaign and the Equality and Human Rights Commission that are concerned with schooling and human rights with a view to forwarding our petition to the Education and Skills Committee. Thank you.

Thank you for your statement. I want to ask a couple of questions before I open it up to my colleagues.

First, you will be aware that in February 2014, in response to a previous petition on the issue, the Scottish Government indicated its support for

“the involvement of religious representatives in the decision-making process by councils in relation to education”

and it did not at that time

“have any plans to change the existing provisions”.

As you have mentioned, the Scottish Government is currently undertaking a governance review of Scottish education. Do you see that as a means of making your views known and highlighting the whole question of education committees?

Secondly, did you seek the views of individual local authorities on what they thought of the mechanism that currently applies to them with regard to education?

On your first question, we are participating in consultations; indeed, we have been invited along through the Equality Network and other bodies. We have made representations. As you know, such processes are on-going, but we have—for want of a better term—chucked our oar in.

We did not receive responses from any local education authorities because they believe that, as the matter relates to legislation, it should be referred back to the Government. As with most things that are politically or administratively sensitive, we did not really expect them to make a statement on the issue. That is where we are.

If local authorities felt strongly about the impact of particular bits of legislation, they would make their views known and there would be evidence of it. Are you aware of individual local authorities that have said that they are not happy with this or which have raised concerns? You have mentioned the difficulty in filling places.

After putting in a freedom of information request about how those places are filled, we found that, in nine cases, local authorities had struggled to fill the places and had had to use newspaper advertisements. Basically they were left with some churches as the only ones that would stand up and do the job, because they were the only ones around or the only ones that were actually willing to do it. For any large budget holder, policy maker or decision maker, that must be really frustrating.

In that sense, therefore, the only feedback that we got was about the recruitment process, not about how the authorities felt about the people who formed part of the committee. One of the key issues that raised its head was how problematic the system actually is, and how they find it difficult to get the right people to come in and participate.

However, that does not suggest that there is any drive by religious people to get themselves on to education committees. It has been suggested that they have some disproportionate or inappropriate influence, but you are saying that there is difficulty in recruiting them to committees. That suggests that there is no drive by churches and religious people in that regard.

And that is the basis of our argument. Surely if the need as a result of the current legislation is not being fulfilled or mandated, that suggests that the process is not working and is beginning to fall apart.

Perhaps this is also happening because of the changing landscape of religion in our country. A hundred years ago when 99.9 per cent of the population were members of some religion, it might have mattered whether there were religious representatives on education committees. However, we now find that more than half the population have no religion. Perhaps the fact that local authorities are finding it more difficult to meet the need for religions to be represented on education committees is a reflection of that changing dynamic.

Angus MacDonald has the next question.

Can I just add that there is very distinguished precedent for people prominent within the churches to—

I am sorry, Professor Braterman, but we will take the next question and then I will bring you in.

Good morning, gentlemen. In the background information to your petition, you referred to the recruitment process and said that

“in 17 out of 32 cases, there is reason for concern about the way in which the system is operating.”

Without referring to specific cases, can you expand on that statement?

I am sorry, but could you speak up a bit more for Paul Braterman’s sake?

I am sorry—I have a bit of a cold today.

I will repeat the question. In the background information to your petition, you refer to the recruitment process and say that

“in 17 out of 32 cases, there is reason for concern about the way in which the system is operating.”

Without going into detail or referring to specific cases, can you both expand on what your concerns are?

Certainly. In 15 out of the 32 local authorities, the position on the education committee was publicised by newspaper advertisement and, in eight of those cases, there was only one response. As for problematic appointments, there are to our knowledge at least six cases where one of the appointees, usually the third, is a committed creationist—a young earth creationist—and therefore committed to denying key elements of curriculum for excellence being taught in the schools that they are supposed to administer.

In one case—Falkirk, in fact—the third nominee is there because the church that was first requested to nominate never got around to responding, and the nominee is a member of a church affiliated to the Assemblies of God, which asked people to vote for Donald Trump. In another case, the third nominee, having lost his seat in an election, appointed himself on the strength of his involvement with the Boys Brigade, which I think illustrates the kind of problem that we have.

Having served on Falkirk Council’s education committee, I have been following developments in it. Is it not the case, though, that in some local authorities—including, for some time now, Falkirk Council—church appointees do not have any voting rights on education committees? If that were the case in all local authorities, would that be acceptable to you?

Our argument is not really about members of a church being on education committees, but about the mechanism by which they appear on the committees. That is what we are seeking to broaden. If someone from the Catholic Church or the Church of Scotland or a Unitarian is the best, most qualified person for the job and is on the committee by the will of the local authority, that will be the case and represents an open, democratic and participatory way of approaching the issue. However, the situation in which a person can have the position because they are religious, which is the only qualification that exists in this case, is one that needs to be amended. As I have said, if it is the will of the local authority and the people in that locality, that reflects the will of that locality, but as it stands, there is a huge imbalance.

There is also a huge demographic imbalance, especially when you look at how different religions are spread around Scotland. In Glasgow, for example, there is a large concentration of people from the Muslim community, but they are not equally represented on the education boards. In the Highlands, the situation is very different. No one is addressing those issues, and we think that the best way of doing so is to make all committee members equal from the outset and appoint them purely on their qualifications.

10:15  

The petition refers to the 2011 census, which indicates that 56 per cent of the population have a religious affiliation. Your petition says that the census figures

“show a steady decline in religious affiliation among Scots.”

Can you provide us with more information on that trend? Can you demonstrate that?

Yes. We used your own evidence—in other words, the Scottish household survey and the Scottish social attitudes survey, which every year have consistently shown the proportion of people who claim to have no belief to be greater than 50 per cent. That is the trajectory. If we look at parents who are now sending their children to primary school, we see that the figure goes up to 64 per cent. That evidence comes from the 2014 Scottish social attitudes survey.

The census offers a great substrate, but it does not move with the times—and the times are moving very fast. Those who say that they have no religious affiliation are now the majority in Scotland.

The petition sets out your views on the current system. What work have you done to understand whether your views and concerns are shared by pupils, parents and others with an interest in the delivery of the education system?

This petition is part of that. The Secular Society runs its own membership system and—like everyone these days—has a Facebook group, which is the quickest way of connecting with people. We constantly canvass the members on our Facebook group. We also have discussions every first Thursday at the Glasgow Theosophical Society to which we invite educationists as well as people of different faiths and those of no faith, and we always ask them questions on those issues.

Although we do not have a precise methodical or scientific approach in that respect, we have a census of opinion that comes back anecdotally. The Secular Society has a complaints system for parents with regard to all sorts of issues with religion in schools, and the make-up of education committees comes up consistently.

To have any influence on what happens at ground level in schools, we need to go further up the tree. The local education authorities are part of that hierarchy and the influence that some religious representatives might have—especially in the local education authorities where they hold the balance of power—is very important. I find it difficult to believe that anyone who is religious or responsible to a church can decouple their religion in such conversations; it should drive part of what and who they are.

However, coming back to my original point, I think that many people out there who do not hold a belief feel that they are not being fairly represented. Even when we look at it on paper, I find it difficult to argue for every single one of the 29 local education authorities in question having a Catholic, a Protestant and A N Other, given that the largest majority, who do not have a belief system, have no such privilege. We would not do the same with literature or science—for example, we would not impose a scientist or a teacher on any other group—but we do it with religion, and we think that now is a good time to start examining that approach.

Good morning. The Church of Scotland’s church and society council submission comments on the fact that parent, pupil and teacher representatives on education committees are also unelected. I appreciate that you might well have answered this point, but can you clarify your position on there being unelected representatives, other than church representatives, on education committees?

I go back to my earlier point. If the local authority believes that such a requirement needs to be met, it would be a smarter move to cast a broader net and bring in someone with a more specialist professional interest.

For instance, my colleague Paul Braterman, who is a chemistry professor at the University of Glasgow and emeritus professor at the University of North Texas, has spent his entire life considering the needs of a child’s education. As he pointed out earlier, someone could be qualified to sit on a committee because they had worked with the Boys Brigade. Alternatively, we could have an individual such as Professor Braterman. If we are looking to interview two people on a competitive basis and consider who will have the biggest impact and add more value to the system, we really should consider those kinds of requirements. We would like a more relaxed approach to allow local education authorities to reach out to such people.

In his submission, Andrew Strachan makes the point that, if such appointments were removed, there might be an impact on schools that

“provide faith based education for local authorities.”

Our briefing note says that the current

“provision reflects the historical roots of school education as a religious concern.”

What consideration have you given to the impact of any change to the provisions on schools with a particular religious ethos?

We are primarily talking about non-denominational schools; the faith schools argument is probably a different argument for a different day. However, it validates our point of view. If the rules were to be changed, if the legislation was relaxed and if the local authority did not have to make a change to meet needs, that would be fine.

It would have the option.

Yes. That would give it the option. That currently does not happen; instead, we restrict and narrow the aperture. We just think that it should be widened.

That is a slightly different point from the one that Professor Braterman made, which was about people whose views are such that they ought not to be on an education committee.

I see and support Professor Braterman’s view in the sense that, even for those of a particular religious denomination who hold a belief in a world view, there are conflicting issues. That will be the same with any system. We will not get 100 per cent of everything running smoothly 100 per cent of the time. On the basis of our freedom of information request, we identified that young earth creationists sit on some of these committees. That is a worry, because they are very proactive in their beliefs.

So, in essence, your view is that this should not really be a matter for local authorities. Although you have said that the concern just now is that this is not a matter for local authorities and that this is imposed on them, actually your view is that people with such views ought not to serve on education committees.

No, not really. That is moving the argument slightly. Our argument is that, by default, those views should be taken into consideration before the individual is elected to the committee.

So if the local authority were to accept somebody who had those views—

Then that is what it accepts.

And if that person thinks that Donald Trump should be president—

Exactly. As we have seen, that happens.

If only 20 per cent of the population have religious views and that figure goes down to 10 per cent, do we not have a responsibility to protect or respect their views?

We do that in the public sphere, legislatively and in every other area, but our biggest responsibility is to uphold the principles of democracy. That has to be more critical than anything else. In any case, those people will naturally be protected as a group in that system of democracy. We have checks and balances in place and laws to ensure that we do not discriminate against such groups. However, the balance is weighted in favour of those who are religious against those who are not religious. We need to draw a middle line and get a win-win for everybody.

Secularism is a two-way street. Part of our ethos is freedom of religion and freedom from religion, and we want to ensure that those freedoms are always upheld for both parties. Unfortunately, we are talking about one area in which we think that the balance in skewed in favour of the other.

So the issue is not really the balance of views in our society as a whole. I should say that I am really just testing the arguments here.

Of course.

The census figures for the number of people who have religious views are not the core issue. Why would they be the core issue if we agreed that we should protect people’s religious views?

There should always be a platform for religious views, and society should always permit the manifestation and expression of a religious perspective. That is freedom of speech, and that is what we want. If a person believes in a religious perspective and projects that somewhere, such as on to the committees that we are talking about, it is up to the people on those committees to decide whether that view has any weight.

If someone who sits on an education committee is religious, that is part of who they are, and if they want to project that perspective on to what they are attempting to influence, change or help with, that is fine. That is normal discourse. However, that is not the argument. The argument is about how they get a seat on an education committee in the first place, not about the perception or treatment of religion in society.

If a person who is religious wants to put their name on the ballot box for anything, they can do that anywhere in our society, including in an election as member of a local education committee. If they say something that their committee colleagues think is a little bit off-the-wall or absurd, that is nothing to do with us; because they have been voted on to the committee, it is a matter between them and the committee. The process of getting them on to the committee is the issue, not what they say when they are there.

We have identified through freedom of information requests that, unfortunately, some of the beliefs that are held are contradictory to curriculum for excellence. That is a bit of an issue. Take biology, for example: a creationist who believes that the earth is 6,000 years old and not that we came down from the trees on to the savanna might run into issues. As I have said, though, that might apply to one or two people out of every 100.

There is a question about the extent to which any education committee can determine the curriculum in schools, but that is another issue that we might want to explore.

Does anyone else have any other questions?

I have an issue with what Mr Fildes has just said about a person who happens to have a view that goes against curriculum for excellence. Surely, by your own definition, that should not preclude them from standing for office.

It does not. It is the local education authority’s decision whether that person’s views are acceptable and whether they are qualified to sit on the committee. However, if their views contradict the implementation of curriculum for excellence, which has already been set out, the authority has to consider that matter, too.

This is simply about widening the opportunity for local education authorities to enhance the value and quality of what they offer, what they do and what they are. Right now, they are constrained purely because of what we see as a historical anomaly. I appreciate that you look for evidence, you look at the checks and balances and you examine the data and the methodology, but none of that takes place with regard to the question whether religious representatives are qualified to be on education committees. They are mandated, but nobody measures or quantifies whether they are effective or have an impact. There is nothing qualitative about the nomination process; it just happens to be there. Because it is something that we have always done, the reaction seems to be that we will continue to do it. Indeed, I received the same reaction from many of your colleagues when I wrote to them on behalf of the Scottish Secular Society.

Elected councillors are responsible to the electorate, but the representatives of churches are beholden only to the church that nominated them. Two of the representatives will be from the Roman Catholic Church and the Church of Scotland; the third representative is very often just the only other church that showed up. It is a curious situation. There is a lack of accountability—it is power without responsibility.

The logic of your position, however, is that you would not have lay members on education committees. The idea is that significant academic experience should be brought in instead, but there is a strong argument for bringing in groups that perhaps support young people with special needs, parents or whoever who have direct experience of the importance of education. Sometimes those people are on those committees but, as I have said, the logic of your position is that such lay members would not be.

I disagree somewhat. That would be taking two steps forward, because we would be past the process with regard to those who are allowed to make these decisions. I understand what you are saying, but that is what would come next and therefore it is not much to do with us. What we are saying is that it does not matter what the education committee decides to do next; what matters is that it can look beyond religious representatives and get whoever they feel are fit or most qualified to sit on the committees. That is the basis of our argument.

Thank you very much. We have had a reasonable consideration of the issues, and you have had the opportunity to flag up what, for you, are the key issues.

We need to consider what action we might now take. There are clearly questions to address. For a start, it would be useful to know whether the Scottish Government still takes the same view, and we might wish to contact it in that regard.

10:30  

That should be the first port of call, because we need to see whether there has been a change in attitude or approach from the Government.

It would also be worth while knowing whether local authorities find this a problem. There is a suggestion that local authorities might decide this for themselves, but are there other groups that we could ask for a view?

Would we write to every local authority for its opinion?

I suppose that we could contact the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities. That would be easiest, because COSLA would know, through its education convener, whether there was a strength of feeling on the matter or differences in different areas. Perhaps we can test whether the issue goes beyond the particular interest of your organisation, Mr Fildes; indeed, we could write to a range of organisations to ask them for their views.

I think that we should do that. I am very supportive of the petition, and we should seek the widest range of views in order to take the matter forward.

Paragraph 8 of our briefing paper suggests some organisations that we might wish to write to. Do people agree with the list? Do you want me to read them out?

I think that it would be fair to contact all of them.

Okay. In view of the written submissions that we have received on this issue in the past, we might wish to contact the Scottish Government, COSLA, the Scottish Parent Teacher Council, the Association of Directors of Education in Scotland, the Church of Scotland education committee, the Scottish Catholic Education Service, the Educational Institute of Scotland, Interfaith Scotland, the Muslim Council of Scotland, the Equality and Human Rights Commission and the Humanist Society Scotland.

Just for clarification, are we going to ask the Scottish Government about its position? The specific issue is not really being covered in its review.

There are two things that we might ask the Scottish Government. First, has it changed its position? Secondly, what is it doing to address the question through its governance review? It is one thing for people in the Scottish Secular Society to speak to the Equality Network, but whether they have been invited to give evidence or a view to the Scottish Government is quite a different matter.

Do members agree to take those actions?

Members indicated agreement.

Thank you for your evidence this morning, Mr Fildes. I appreciate the time that you have given. We will, of course, come back to you in due course with the progress that we have made with your petition.

I suspend the meeting briefly.

10:32 Meeting suspended.  

10:34 On resuming—  

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Diabetes (Continuous Glucose Monitoring Sensors) (PE1619)

Our second petition is PE1619 by Stuart Knox, which calls for continuous glucose monitoring sensors to be made available on the NHS to all patients with type 1 diabetes. Mr Knox was invited to provide oral evidence today but is unable to attend. Members should have a copy of the petition and a Scottish Parliament information centre briefing. Do members have any comments or suggestions?

I sit on the cross-party group on diabetes and the issue is discussed frequently. The specific issue is the worry about what happens when people—particularly young children—are asleep and there is a depletion of sugar levels to the point at which the person may lose their life. There is a lot of evidence around continued monitoring and there is a lot of innovation out there. However, availability of continuous glucose monitoring on the NHS seems to be piecemeal. There is a strong call for CGM by the cross-party group on diabetes. It is logical that if such innovation is available to some people—there is compelling evidence that it can save lives—it should be available across the NHS.

Just for clarification, is CGM available to some people on the NHS, but not to all?

Yes.

On what grounds would people be excluded?

The sensor that is mentioned in the petition, the FreeStyle Libre, is very new and has not yet made its way across all the NHS trusts. Evidence suggests that the treatment potentially saves lives and should be available to all.

Are there any other views?

I am just looking at the answer to a written question from the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Sport. She said:

“Work is currently on-going to develop a national approach for the use of Continuous Glucose Monitoring (CGM) devices in Scotland, as we recognise the speed of development of this technology.”——[Written Answers, 8 November 2016; S5W-03762.]

It would be worth our while to write to her to ask how that work is proceeding and whether there is an approximate timescale for a decision.

I suggest that we write to the Scottish Government and to diabetes organisations, specifically Diabetes UK. We can find out whether other diabetes organisations have a view.

We spoke before about how we can engage with petitions, particularly when we have not heard oral evidence. One suggestion was that we go out to speak to some of the organisations. Brian Whittle has an interest in the issue and is on the cross-party group, so he will know more about it than others, but it might be worth the committee’s while to speak to groups about the issues and challenges and about how technology may offer some very positive hope for the future.

The cross-party group on diabetes is extremely well attended. If the committee is looking for people to speak to about the issue, they will all be in the room during a meeting of that group.

Do we agree to contact the Scottish Government and diabetes organisations, and to do a wee bit of work around engaging with the issues that have been flagged up by the petition?

Members indicated agreement.

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Sepsis Awareness, Diagnosis and Treatment (PE1621)

PE1621 is a new petition by James Robertson, calling for awareness of the early signs of sepsis to be increased among Scottish health professionals and the public. The petition was not open for signatures. Mr Robertson was invited to provide oral evidence to the committee today, but is unable to attend. Members have a copy of the petition and the briefing note.

It is worth highlighting that the petition arises from the petitioner’s personal experiences. In the petition, Mr Robertson explains that he is concerned that NHS Scotland is not doing as much to raise awareness of sepsis as is being done by the NHS in England. To address that, the petition suggests the following three steps: establishment of a working group to increase awareness of early identification among clinicians and the public, diagnosis and management of sepsis; work with relevant charities to develop and distribute guidance on sepsis in pre-hospital and hospital settings; and encouragement of the Scottish intercollegiate guidelines network to review its guidance on sepsis, giving consideration to recent National Institute for Health and Care Excellence guidelines.

Do members have any comments or suggestions? The petition highlights an important issue.

I declare an interest in that Mr Robertson is a constituent of mine. He has asked me to pass on his apologies for not attending the meeting.

That is perfectly understandable.

Are there any suggestions for what actions we might take on the petition?

We always seem to do it, but we should write to the Scottish Government to ask for its position on the petition. I am interested in what it thinks the differences are between the protocols south of the border and what is happening up here. It is suggested that the protocols south of the border are better than ours.

We will write to the Scottish Government and perhaps the health boards to see whether there are differences in different parts of Scotland. It is also suggested that we contact Healthcare Improvement Scotland and the UK Sepsis Trust. I am not aware of other organisations in this area, but the UK Sepsis Trust might have an overview of the different bits of the United Kingdom and what is being done differently.

I agree with all of that. This is an incredibly important subject and we need to widen the net and get as many views and as much information as possible. It is crucial that awareness be expanded as widely as possible.

And as quickly as possible, because there are growing issues with sepsis, and we need to move forward rather than delay.

Is that agreed?

Members indicated agreement.