We will be doing well if we get through this item by 12.30. If we find that we are time constrained, we might have to ask Donald Gorrie to accept that his paper will have to be dealt with at the next meeting.
As long as it then gets favourable consideration.
We will put it at the top of the list.
We have nothing to add. We flagged up the recommendation in a previous discussion and are simply asking for its endorsement.
As no one from the Executive seems to have any comments either, do members agree the recommendation to note the number of questions; to agree to proceed as set out in the report; and to note that the matter will continue to be monitored?
That takes us to a more substantive report on the admissibility of questions. Do members have any comments on paper 5B?
I have a question about paragraph 9. As quangos
I sympathise with that view; I, too, have scribbled down some notes about paragraph 9. I understand that the untidy appearance of the bin store at Crosshouse hospital is not an appropriate matter for a parliamentary question and that any member who is worried about that matter should write to the local health officials. However, I have seen parliamentary answers on health matters that have contained the clear implication that a problem was a matter for the health board, even though the question that I have in mind concerned ministerial guidance to the health board in question on the disposal of surplus properties.
The position of local authorities is a little different, although we could still ask them about the bins. You have drawn a perfectly fair distinction between minor operational matters and policy issues that might involve the minister, but how would you make a similar distinction with local authorities, which have a fairly unique place?
I do not think that we should be asking questions about local authorities at all, unless they centre on ministerial guidance to local authorities. For example, on planning matters, we might ask why a minister did or did not call in an application. However, we cannot ask ministers whether Dundee City Council is keeping the streets clean enough. That is a matter for the local authority.
However, as you described, local authorities are acting as agents of the Government on many matters, rather than making independent choices, because much of the money is ring-fenced. If we accept the principle that you gave us, how would a distinction be drawn between councils clearly making independent choices and councils acting as agents?
That point is perfectly fair. I do not know how well the proposal will stand up to academic scrutiny. I would have thought that a council could not be questioned on how it discharged its education responsibilities, because those decisions are devolved to it. However, councils can act as contractors to the Scottish Executive. For example, they did that until recently to maintain trunk roads and if people wrote to a roads director about a matter of Executive policy, the letter would go to the minister, who would answer it, because the local authority was only the Executive's agent.
The Government doles out excellence funding for a particular purpose. I would have thought that how local authorities may use that money differentially was a perfectly legitimate subject on which to lodge questions.
Absolutely. I am sure that you could ask a question about the steps that the Executive has taken to monitor local authorities' effectiveness at handling excellence funding. The Executive would tell you what it did. However, I do not think that you could ask the Executive whether it agreed with the purchase of computers at Monifieth High School, for example.
The distinctions that you have drawn are not inconsistent with the practice that we follow. I emphasise only that the second sentence of paragraph 9 does not say that some questions are inadmissible. It simply describes what guidance we would give members about the most appropriate way of proceeding to obtain the information that they want.
We have been arguing about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin. The information is only guidance.
Another issue is the thorny old subject of the requirement in rule 13.3.3 that questions "be in English". Is that a wee bit too prescriptive? Paragraph 2.2.1(c) of annexe A says:
We have discussed that several times and reached a decision.
Not in this context.
No. However, on the grounds of logic and consistency, the decision that stands in relation to everything else should stand here. I would be embarrassed if our Australian compatriots, reading the Official Report avidly on the website, were confused because all Brian Adam's Doric questions began with "Fit like". I am happy for Brian Adam to lodge questions in Doric, but I would like to be able to read an English equivalent, which would need to be reasonably standard across the English or American speaking world. I think that we should stick with that point. However, Gil Paterson's comments will be recorded for posterity in the Official Report.
In that case, I will push it to a vote.
Oh dear.
It is the same thorny old subject. We say that the Parliament is Scots and Gaelic friendly, but rules such as this, in effect, say that those languages are substandard and not to be used. That sends out the wrong message. If we want to send out the right message, we should facilitate the use of Scots and Gaelic. We could include the phrase "should normally be provided". That would be more than adequate and would cover people such as me who use Scots an awful lot. There are many words that I use that are going out of fashion because people think that those who use such words must be ignorant.
Before we do that, could I clarify what the position would be if someone wishing to make a point of using the Scots tongue came to the chamber office with a question framed in Scots and wanted it to go in the business bulletin in that form? Does that happen?
It has never happened with a question, although it happens with motions from time to time. If it happened with a question, we would adopt the same procedure as for motions, which is that the English version would appear followed by the Scots language version that is provided by the member. If it were a matter of one word in a motion that was otherwise in standard English, it would depend on the context. We have to make a judgment on each case. I would not have thought that we would say that an alternative would have to be provided for one word.
That strikes me as a model of flexibility and good sense.
I will accept that. I was not talking about whole questions, but the odd word here or there. I frequently use Scots words, as do other members, including the Presiding Officer. I am satisfied as long as we would not have to write out such words from the script or put in another word.
I am sure that Gil Paterson will now draft a whole series of questions with single Scots words planted in them to test the validity of the ruling that we have been given.
The problem with the flexible approach that has been explained to us is that it is precluded in the standing orders, which say that a question "shall be in English". There is no choice as long as standing orders say that questions shall be in English.
I suggest that the English language is flexible enough, but I would like to test the ruling that we have heard. Would the word "dreich" be accepted in a motion?
It is certainly not English.
It is not English, but most people speaking English in Scotland would understand it. I am interested to know whether Hugh Flinn would accept it.
I would say that the word is English. Any Scots, Russian or Japanese word that is in common use in English has become part of the English language—it will be found in an English dictionary. Scotticisms—whether idiom or individual words—that are commonly used are English and are therefore covered. I cannot imagine a question that would include the word "dreich", but if someone came up with such a question, I would argue that "dreich" would be an acceptable English expression that should be allowed. We use all sorts of words that have no Celtic root and are Anglo-Saxon in their origins but are accepted every day in Scots, such as kirk, which is both a Scots and an English word. The Executive will resolve the matter for us.
As I understand it, the standing orders place the burden of interpreting the rule on the Presiding Officer. One could rest on the assumption that the Presiding Officer would always take a sensible view on what constituted English and what did not.
Do we have enough agreement to accept the paper?
We have redefined "English", we have redefined "admissibility", and we have had a rather dreich discussion.
I hope that the paper speaks for itself. It follows up points that were raised at the previous meeting when you took evidence from us. It deals with Executive resources and the current position on the advisory cost limit. In view of the time that is available, I will say simply that I am happy to try to answer any questions that members may have.
May I ask a question about the last sentence of the paper, in paragraph 15, which says that, on an interim basis:
That is right. We have used that mechanism very infrequently. Of the 14,000 questions that have been lodged, only 50 have been subject to it. We intend to continue to use it extremely sparingly.
This question may reveal my incompetence, but we were promised by Iain Smith, when he was a member of this committee—or rather an attender at the committee, representing the Executive—that there would be a sort of telephone directory of relevant senior civil servants whom members could phone. That would perhaps obviate the necessity of lodging a question. As far as I am aware, such a directory does not exist. The Executive website mentions various people, but I understand that that is more for the general public than for us. Has progress been made in that regard?
We hope to put in place arrangements for the directory to be made available to MSPs and parliamentary staff during the forthcoming recess. You will have access to it when you return from recess.
Good—that is very helpful. Thank you.
On page 2, paragraph 7 does not quite provide the response that I was looking for. My suggestion was aimed much more at getting guidance directly, as opposed to what is contained in the text of that paragraph, which says:
I am sorry if we have misunderstood the point, but there was no intention not to be helpful. We would certainly aim to be proactive; where we felt that the information was more easily obtainable than through parliamentary questions, we would aim to alert the member of that as quickly as we could—as well as answering the questions, which we would have to do, as they had been lodged.
That does not come across in paragraph 7. The implication is that members are already encouraged to access other sources. That is a general thing. The suggestion is, "Go and look it up somewhere else"; the paragraph does not say that you will provide the information on what the appropriate source is.
The second sentence of that paragraph says that:
Okay.
Can we agree to note the paper?
We now come to paper 5D, which is
Yes, it does. Where the answer to a question states that a letter exists, inevitably people want to see it. At the moment, if the letter comes to SPICe—as is often promised—that is all right for MSPs but it does not help anybody else. However, the letter does not always come to SPICe. I suggest that, where a minister says that they will write or that somebody else will write, when the letter becomes available it be reproduced at the end of the WAR.
That seems reasonable to me.
That seems reasonable to us all. It may be a wee bit of extra work somewhere but nothing quantitatively different. Is that problematic for the Executive in any sense?
Not really, convener. We regard this as a parliamentary matter. There is no desire on our part for responses to parliamentary questions, whether they are in parliamentary answer format or in any other form, to be unavailable to those who would like to see them.
I expose my ignorance again, but what is the WAR?
Written answers report.
It is what the Executive wages on you weekly.
Some of the comments refer to people like me. The purpose of the question can be clear in the questioner's mind but not in anyone else's. Like others, I meet an organisation, its members raise an issue and I bang in a question. It would probably be better if people like me sent a wee note to the department, describing the background to the question. Alternatively, if the department did not know the background, they could phone us to ask us what it is. While I am all in favour of transparency, my thought processes are not necessarily transparent to others.
If I was not clear, I would not lodge a question. I would write a letter, knowing that it would come back to me. If I had misjudged the issue or asked something stupid, only the minister and I would know. As I would not publish the letter, that would be the end of it. We discussed previously the matter of when we should ask a question and when we should write a letter. There may be matters that can be resolved by letter. If we were considering putting a question on the public record, writing might even help to clarify what question we should ask.
It would take even longer, as the track record for answering letters is not all that great.
Indeed, it takes a long time.
This is not a matter of just exposing public ignorance on issues. To follow Donald Gorrie's second point, where Executive officials are not sure what the question is about, it is quite reasonable for them to contact the member who lodged the question and to seek clarification. People on the chamber desk contact me on the questions that I wish to lodge. It would be in everyone's interests if Executive officials who wished to know the reasons behind questions were encouraged to contact members.
That is a fair point. I hope that Executive officials will see our request for e-mail contact points and a staff directory not as climbing all over the Executive but as encouraging communication. It ought to make Executive officials feel that they are entitled to speak to us. If it is a particular person's job to follow up a particular letter or question from us, that person is entitled to ask exactly what we mean. It would be a two-way process, and it might help everybody to do their job a bit better.
On most occasions, I would want the communication to be in the direction that you have just described, convener, rather than in the other direction with me bombarding Executive officials with requests. I want to give them the opportunity to clarify what was in my mind when I asked the question.
Mr Lugton, we accept that you may feel that only certain people should initiate contact with MSPs and that your staff may want to ask you to contact us. That would be a matter for you to decide.
In general, we would think it appropriate to go through the chamber office. The chamber office would only have accepted the question because it regarded it as clear, with no uncertainty as to what was required. If we were puzzled, the chamber office would be our first port of call, and we would ask it to pursue the matter with the member. I am not sure that it would be entirely appropriate for officials to speak directly to members to get clarification on a question.
Why not?
Because, as I said, we would need to proceed on the assumption that the chamber office regarded the question as clear; otherwise, it would not have accepted it. We would therefore seek clarification from the chamber office if we did not find the question clear.
We are asked to make our questions brief and to the point. It may well be that a phone call to the member—from an appropriate official—could provide the background information that was needed. To my mind, the role of the chamber office is different—to help members to frame admissible questions. That does not necessarily provide the background on why the question is being asked.
I think, Brian, that Mr Lugton is concerned about protocol and about the chamber office not being involved as it should be. The question has come through the chamber office and therefore it should go back through the chamber office.
That is correct. In the great majority of cases, if there were any lack of clarity in a question, we would hope to iron that out with the member before the question went to the Executive. There have been occasions when the Executive has asked exactly what was meant by the wording of a question, and we have been happy to take that request for clarification to the member concerned.
We feel that there could be more confidence in that procedure; we will see how it goes. We have nothing else to raise on this agenda item, and we will approve the report's recommendations. I thank the witnesses for attending.
I was going to suggest that members canvass within their own groups. There is an issue here and people may not like my attempt at resolving it. Having discussions in groups on how to resolve it would be helpful; people could then come to the next meeting with ideas supported by their groups.
Fair enough.