Finance Committee, 04 Dec 2007
Meeting date: Tuesday, December 4, 2007
Official Report
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Scottish Parliament Finance Committee Tuesday 4 December 2007
[The Convener opened the meeting at 14:14]
Good afternoon and welcome to the 11th meeting of the Finance Committee in the third session of the Scottish Parliament. I ask everyone present to turn off any mobile phones and pagers.
Before we begin today's business, I want to say something about the events of last week. Members will be aware that, following the committee's discussion in private of Professor Bell's briefing paper, The Scotsman ran articles on parts of Professor Bell's paper on Wednesday and Thursday and The Times ran an article on Thursday. All that occurred before the briefing paper was published. The first article specifically said that the paper was leaked.
The draft briefing paper was given to the committee in good faith by our adviser and, by agreement, discussed in private. There can be no doubt that that private and confidential paper was then made public. That breach of good faith and confidentiality strikes at the very heart of the efficiency, integrity and trust that are essential for the committee to do its work on behalf of the people whom we represent.
I remind members that unauthorised disclosure of confidential committee material constitutes a breach of section 7.4.3 of volume 2 of the code of conduct. I am disappointed and concerned that this situation should have occurred and do not want it to happen again. Such is my concern that I may take the matter further. If members wish to intervene they may do so, but given the clear restraints about further comment that are contained in the code of conduct, I suggest that no further comment should be made by any of us at this stage, and that we move to the business on today's agenda.