“Diversity Delivers”
Good afternoon and welcome to this meeting of the Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee. We have received no apologies; all members are present.
The first agenda item is consideration of the consultation document on the public appointments commissioner's proposed equalities strategy. I welcome to the meeting Karen Carlton, the Commissioner for Public Appointments in Scotland, who will give evidence to the committee.
The document, entitled "Diversity Delivers", was lodged in the Parliament on 21 November 2007, and members will recall that we agreed to consider it when we discussed our work plan. In any event, it has now been referred formally to us by the Parliamentary Bureau.
By way of background, the Public Appointments and Public Bodies etc (Scotland) Act 2003 requires the commissioner to prepare and publish a strategy to ensure that the Scottish ministers make appointments in a manner that encourages equal opportunities. That might include setting targets. Before finalising the strategy, the commissioner must consult the Scottish Parliament and the Scottish ministers. Under standing orders, the committee must now consider the draft strategy and report its views to Parliament, which will debate them.
Members should note the questions posed by the commissioner in the consultation document, which are set out in annex A of committee paper SPPA/S3/08/2/1, as well as a letter from the Equal Opportunities Committee in annex B.
I invite Karen Carlton to make some brief opening remarks.
Karen Carlton (Commissioner for Public Appointments in Scotland):
Hello. I am grateful to the committee for this opportunity to discuss my proposed equal opportunities strategy for public appointments.
The strategy's starting point is the limited diversity on the boards of our public bodies, which is due mainly to a lack of diversity among applicants. My research has identified that the key factors are a widespread lack of awareness of public bodies, their boards and the opportunities for serving on them; an appointments process that is less applicant-focused and less supportive of diversity than it might be; and a lack of opportunities for developing the leadership and governance potential of future public appointees.
To address those challenges, I have made several recommendations that fall into three broad categories: awareness and attraction; confidence and capacity; and education and experience. Within those recommendations, I have identified what I believe to be priorities for achieving the strategy's aims, including a communication campaign to raise public awareness; a hub website for public appointments; improved monitoring of applicant statistics; and the establishment of a centre of expertise to advise on and administer the public appointments process.
Although the recommendations will not be achieved without some initial financial and human resources costs, I have in producing this strategy been mindful of the need to keep costs to a minimum. For example, the centre of expertise is designed as an alternative to the Scottish Government public appointments team, not as an additional resource. Likewise, although the introduction of a hub website and communication campaign will clearly involve some set-up costs, it will ultimately result in a significant reduction in the publicity budget for public appointments and will achieve much more widespread awareness.
The committee will have noted from the document that there is little evidence of practical action that has been taken or of improvements that have been made as a result of previous research into enhancing equal opportunities in public appointments. I believe that that is because previous recommendations have not always been sufficiently specific and that ownership of the recommended actions has not been made from the outset. Indeed, even when recommendations have been specific and ownership has been clearly allocated, there has not been adequate monitoring to review the actions that have been taken and to revise them if they have not been effective. Finally, previous recommendations have not suggested specific measures for the development of potential future public appointees.
This strategy, "Diversity Delivers", has produced a set of specific, practical recommendations, with proposals for implementation and monitoring. I look forward to answering any questions that the committee may have.
Thank you. We have a number of questions.
Good afternoon. "Diversity Delivers" is described as a strategy for enhancing equal opportunities. On page 19, you talk about equal opportunities and diversity, which you have mentioned today. What is the difference between diversity and equal opportunities? The Scotland Act 1998 refers to equal opportunities, but you have homed in on diversity.
The two concepts are not mutually exclusive. I see diversity as a route by which to achieve equality of opportunity. As you know, diversity simply means difference. In the strategy document, I am trying to capture the fact that we are not looking only at the traditional strands that are enshrined in equalities legislation. We want to widen the field to everyone in Scotland who is a potential future public appointee and to ensure that any difference—in age, ethnicity, location or socioeconomic grouping—will not be seen as a disadvantage. I suggest that we enable all those differences to be accommodated in the process, and the proposed strategy looks at ways of doing that. We should recognise that, because there are differences, there will be different ways of attracting and engaging people. The proposed strategy is designed to produce much broader equality of opportunity.
The approach sounds much more complex than one based on strict parameters. Did you consult equality groups to ascertain their views on that?
We did. We spoke to the three bodies that now form the Equality and Human Rights Commission. We talked at length about how successful the programmes that have been put in place in the past, not just for public appointments but for gender equality, have been, and about whether it was appropriate to use only the traditional strands as the basis for the strategy.
We took the slightly broader route for several reasons, besides our consultation with the equality bodies. The applicant statistics indicate that, year on year, there has been a significant decrease in the number of applicants since I became commissioner. In the past financial year, there were around 1,300 applicants, whereas in the previous year there were 1,700. That decrease is not confined to the traditionally underrepresented groups—across the board, fewer and fewer people are applying for public appointments. It is important to get the message across to everyone in Scotland, but there will be specific measures to attract people who are currently underrepresented.
That is the right direction in which to move. I looked at the statistics in sections 2.7, 2.8 and 2.9 of the report and was interested to note that the number of minority ethnic members of boards is in balance with the number of minority ethnic people in the community at large, that women are substantially underrepresented and that those with the poorest representation are people with a disability, who account for 20 per cent of the population but only 2.5 per cent of chairs and members of boards. Will your proposals get to people with a disability and encourage them to come forward?
That is a difficult question to answer, not because I do not have some answers but because some of the facts are still to be determined. One issue is whether people are willing to declare a disability. We think that a number of applicants who are disabled fear that declaring that will bar them from the process. That issue must be covered in the communication campaign.
You may find that one of the straplines that I use is, "It's not who you know, it's who you are." That is the new face of public appointments in Scotland. I am trying to make clear to everyone that, no matter who they are or what they believe to be their disadvantage, they will be welcomed as long as they have the necessary skills and ability. Part of the issue is that we genuinely do not know how many people are disabled—we just know how many people declare that. Another part is that there still seems to be a widespread lack of awareness of what exactly constitutes disability. As you know, the legislation has changed and the definitions encompass a much wider field, but people still have traditional beliefs about what disability is.
It is interesting that, in the second stage of our research, which was on people who have expressed interest in the public appointments process, we asked whether people had a declared disability. That part of the online questionnaire took people directly to the definition of disability under the Disability Discrimination Act 1995. We found that 10.8 per cent were then willing to say that they had a disability. The issue is complex. I hope that communicating the fact that everyone is welcome and clarifying what we mean by disability might be two ways of helping.
Hi again, Karen. I hesitate to say that we must stop meeting like this—it was nice to hear your evidence to the Equal Opportunities Committee a couple of weeks ago.
I have some questions about a fairly fundamental issue—cost. The consultation document acknowledges that you have not costed the proposed strategy. In that case, how did you assess whether the proposals will be value for money? Given the absence of a costing, are you confident that those who are responsible for implementation will be able to work within their current budgets?
I will answer the second part of your question first. I am not entirely sure that any specific budgets yet exist for enhancing diversity in public appointments. There is an existing budget for the central team that supports public appointments, which would be available for use for the proposed centre of expertise. That really is a no-cost option, as it involves moving resources from one part of the Scottish Government to another. Many of the recommendations are low cost or would use existing resources. For example, we already have monitoring forms and people analysing them, but I suggest a change to the form to get a much richer data set. That would not increase the requirement for resources or for people to do the analysis.
If, as legislation requires, we carry out an impact assessment of the public appointments process, that will throw up the necessary information to feed into the proposed information or data bank, which will allow targeted publicity and enhance the likelihood of publicity strategies being effective. Another recommendation is for a public appointments hallmark. I have already produced a hallmark and it will be implemented by the central team in the Government and by my Office of the Commissioner for Public Appointments in Scotland assessors. One significant proposal for which I have not been able to provide a cost is the hub website, but I have been told that the minister responsible is looking to develop a website to support public appointments. We know that, in the longer term, that would cut the cost of publicity substantially and increase awareness.
I have not produced costed and detailed action plans because, at this point, I have no idea which of the recommendations will be implemented. If there is general acceptance that my recommendations move in the right direction, the next step will be for the implementation group—if the recommendation to have such a group is accepted—to agree the priorities. The 2003 act gives me no power to implement the strategy, so I cannot say, "This is what you must do." I can simply make recommendations and support the delivery. The implementation group would allocate the priorities and the budget. As with any other part of our life, if there is a limited budget, we must focus on the key priorities.
You mentioned the Government a couple of times. In section 5.3, you recommend a partnership approach and you have alluded to why that is the most effective approach. Have you had a response from the Government on its involvement in that partnership approach?
No.
So you have had no communication with the Government thus far?
Not specifically about the implementation group, but I have spoken to the permanent secretary about the creation of the centre of expertise simply because I know that the Government is planning to reorganise the infrastructure that supports public appointments. Back in April and May of last year, when I heard the plans, I recognised that I had information that might mean that the Government would go in a different direction—if it was made aware of it.
I have spoken to the Government about the centre of expertise, and I have met the new team leader. Next week, I will meet the director responsible. Those people seem to be in favour of what we are talking about, and they see that it mirrors the professional approach that they take to appointing senior civil servants. As such, I have the sense that there is agreement, although I have not had the Government's official response yet.
At what stage do you expect to engage in such conversations?
I have not yet been invited to have a conversation with members of the Government other than the central team. It may simply be that we receive a written response or the Official Report of the debate in the chamber.
And take it forward from there.
Yes.
You have referred to enforcement tools. Have you had any specific thoughts on what they might be?
In terms of my own powers, enforcement could be provided only through a revision of the code of practice. As I said, I do not have authority to insist that certain actions are taken, but I can take action when the code of practice is not complied with in a material regard. My only course of action may be to ensure that my code makes it explicit that certain requirements must be in place to support diversity.
Talking more broadly, legislation now requires an assessment of the impact on diversity at each stage in the process. As I have made the Government aware, that is not happening at the moment. There is clearly wider enforcement that we can look to.
The goal in your vision in the consultation document is that we have a pool of people who reflect Scotland as a nation and our diverse nature. On page 28 of the consultation document, you highlight the challenges in achieving that, such as the vast majority of people neither knowing what a public body is about nor considering applying for a public appointment. You also say:
"In the last three years, one in three appointment rounds generated fewer than 12 applications."
I am sure that a lot of us find that amazing. People are not aware and do not know what a non-departmental public body is.
There are a lot of challenges of education in an awareness campaign. Can you explain how the communications campaign, which is outlined in the document and which you mentioned in your introduction, will address those challenges? How will it attract people from groups who have traditionally shied away from public appointments to apply for them?
There are several facets to the communications campaign. One simple suggestion is the creation of a leaflet that describes what public bodies do and—this is something that I believe people are not aware of—the impact they have on our lives.
When I speak to groups about public appointments—either about the rigour of the process to enhance confidence or to drum up interest in an appointment—I find that people have not made the connection between the board of a public body, such as the local health board, and a role that they might perform. They do not see the direct impact that they can have on, for example, health provision in their area or the raft of other issues covered by public bodies.
I propose some kind of straightforward literature that is widely available through doctors, dentists and community centres and says what a public body does and why it matters to people—why it should not be a case of reading the leaflet and putting it to one side.
Such leaflets could go into a little more detail on the role of board members of public bodies. An important point—I think that I was the first person to do this—is that they could also deal with the question, "What attracts people and motivates them to become a board member?" As previous research had only ever looked at the barriers, I decided that, this time, we should find out from applicants what attracted them to the role. We now have a lot of interesting information that we can include in the leaflet about "The benefits to you". Human beings are still motivated by "What's in it for me?", so it will be helpful to include that information in a publicity strategy. The leaflet should explain what a public body is, what the board does, what I will get out of it and how I get involved.
The leaflet should be supported by a DVD with similar information and by the use of role models, who should be quite different from the traditional middle-aged, middle-class professional male board member that is the public face of public bodies at the moment. The role models could be beneficial in talking to groups and they could appear in the DVD and in the television campaign that I have recommended. Those are some things that we could do.
We should also highlight the support that we can give people to complete the application. For the longer term, I have recommended that we consider different methods of application because—perhaps I should not say this—even I would find it terribly hard to apply for some public appointments. When I look at the language in the ad, I lose the will to live by the time I get to the bottom of the advert, never mind read through the application process. We need to change the language to make the posts attractive. We also need to help applicants to fill in their application forms in a way that presents them in the best light.
The final part of the communication campaign should be to help people to find routes to education so that they know that, if they want to sit on a board in future, they can get help to develop the appropriate skills.
On page 28, under the heading "The Challenges", the consultation document points out:
"Advertisements are presented in the house style of the Scottish Government. … The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development's 2007 guide … highlights the importance of a strong employer brand".
Who currently places the adverts for the boards of public bodies? Are they placed by the Government or by the individual board? If the adverts are currently placed by the Government, should that be devolved down to the boards?
Until now, adverts have been placed by the individual sponsor team for the public body in the different directorates of the Scottish Government. The adverts follow a template that is produced by the Scottish Government and is in the guidance document. The sponsor team simply fills in a number of pieces of information such as the name of the body, the name of the board and the remuneration and time commitment involved. The template also includes all those statutory phrases about governance, responsibility and accountability that really do not encourage people to apply.
A central team is now taking over some responsibility for the advertisements but, clearly, it will not make massive changes until the strategy has been agreed. The advertisements have been the responsibility of relatively junior officials who use a template. I do not suggest that the boards themselves should produce the ad; I still think that that can be done by a central team with expertise. The team also needs links to TMP, which is the company that currently places the adverts on behalf of the Government. Clearly, the larger the contract, the less the Government pays.
Rather than have adverts placed by individual boards, I think that they can continue to be managed centrally, but I fail to see in them anything that attracts applicants to the nature of the responsibility that the public body deals with. "Are you interested in arts?" "Are you passionate about sport?" "Are you deeply involved in the culture of this country?" "If so, why don't you apply?" That does not come across in a Scottish Government ad.
In the Financial Times last week, I picked up an ad for the Appointments Commission south of the border, which is extending its role to cover more than the health service. The ad said simply, "Strategic leaders required" and it had a flock of geese flying—the lead goose clearly being the strategic leader who is good at finding direction—along with just a few phrases about what people would get out of serving on a board. That attracts interest and it costs a lot less because the ad is smaller. Even if we did only that, it would make a huge difference.
I understand that there will be a monitoring form to be analysed for each appointment round. Will you explain when and by whom the form will be completed?
There should be monitoring at various stages. The form to which I think you refer, which is the one that I talk about in detail in the strategy, will contain detailed information about applicants so that, at the end of a publicity campaign, there will be information about the number of men, the number of women and the number from particular groups in society—all the things that we suggest should be in the form. Currently, those statistics are analysed by sponsor teams and passed to the central public appointments team. It is probably for the Government to decide at what level and when the analysis will be done but, if the agreement is implemented, either a sponsor team or a central team will do that work and provide the information to the hub website, where the statistical analysis will be completed.
The strategy talks about taking positive action if, after two years, you find that the level of applications from certain underrepresented groups in society has not improved. What kind of positive action do you intend to take?
It would depend which groups were involved, because the issues for disabled people are quite different from those that women face, for instance. First of all, I would consider tailoring one of the communication campaigns to the group in question, providing education for the group and perhaps, in some instances, examining the barriers. If we find that applications from women have not increased and that the barrier is that board meetings are set at a time when women cannot attend—some evidence is beginning to come through that that may be the case—do we have to tell the Government that being more flexible in the timing of board meetings will enable more people to apply? It is hard to be specific, not knowing which of the disadvantaged groups might emerge in a couple of years' time, but there will be specific routes that we can take to attract them.
In your recommendations on confidence and capacity, you propose that a centre of expertise be established. How will that improve the effectiveness and efficiency of the public appointments process? How will it measure its success in encouraging greater diversity in applications? Will it be more effective than the former public appointments team?
The answer to your last question must be yes and the answer to the first two will probably tell you why.
You ask why a centre of expertise would improve the current situation. As I mentioned, the current situation is that disparate groups of fairly junior civil servants in each directorate prepare the publicity material and administer the public appointments process. Many of them come to the process without any training or education on it, are provided with a 251-page guidance document, work their way through it from beginning to end, just get it right and then move on to a different job. The turnover at that level is high and the professionalism that is demonstrated is not as high as it would be in a central team, because there has been no education or training. You will see that I recommend not only a central team, but a team of expertise that is staffed by people with real experience in recruitment, selection and diversity. That expertise currently sits within the Government's human resources department.
You ask how the centre of expertise would measure its success. That takes us back to your earlier point about monitoring forms. Different statistics will be requested and the centre will instantly be able to monitor the impact of a particular publicity campaign, for example. If all that information sits in a central team, it will be easier to use it across the Government. For example, if somebody is trying to attract applicants from a particular group, the centre could tell them the avenues through which they would be likely to attract people of that type because that knowledge will be in the information bank.
Would it be more successful? I think that it would, because, as I stated in one of the appendices to the strategy, the public appointments team that existed had never been involved in appointments. Its members did not understand the role of non-executive directors in quite the same way that the human resources people do. An added dimension and a level of expertise are now being brought into the process that can only enhance the delivery of public appointments.
Would this team always stay together, or would it be made up of people doing different jobs?
That would really be up to the Government. At the moment, one gentleman is responsible and there are teams below him that look after publicity and collating applications, and measuring applications against the performance criteria. Perhaps that would be the same with public appointments. The team leader was appointed and started the job last month, so we are literally developing this at the moment. I say "we"—I am giving whatever advice I can, but the Government is doing it.
I turn to "Education and Experience". You say in the consultation on the strategy that the education programme is a key priority action. Will you explain how that programme would overcome the challenges that are identified in section 4? How would you encourage participants from the underrepresented sections of the community that we have been talking about to take part in the education programme?
The communications campaign will be the key way of doing that, as well as providing information on the hub website about the education programme, and making that programme as flexible as possible so that people can attend full or part time, do modules or attend the whole programme, or do it online. First, we need to raise awareness of it, and then we need to provide every opportunity for people to engage.
The education programme itself has not been run before—a similar programme is running in Northern Ireland. One difficulty is that, so far, we have not tapped into transferable skills. There are many people in this country who could sit on the boards of public bodies if they recognised that they have the skills to do so. At the moment, there is a bit of mystique around being a board member—people do not understand what they have to be able to do. If you say, "Have you ever analysed complex issues, planned ahead, made decisions, or reached consensus—over planning applications, for example?" people say, "Oh yes—I do that every day."
The education programme is designed to help people recognise the skills that they have and develop those that they do not yet have. We are back to the issue of producing what Cathie Craigie referred to earlier: the pool of talent that will be available to make applications in the future.
You propose to monitor the strategy's effectiveness by measuring progress in a number of broad areas, such as the public's awareness of and confidence in the appointments process. Will you say a few words about why you chose that approach to monitoring, rather than monitoring the effectiveness of each individual action, and how you will be able to determine from doing that the effectiveness of the contribution that each individual makes?
That has been the most difficult aspect of the strategy, because we have not had targets in the past. At one point, there was a target for 50 per cent of the total board population of Scotland's public bodies to be female by the year 2000, but in general we have not had targets of any kind. Determining what targets to set links specifically to my comments about the programme being merit based. We cannot say that there will be an increase in certain board populations, because people will get there entirely on their own merit.
In the general recommendations around awareness and attraction, we have tried to set what are almost overarching, aspirational targets that say, "Let's get some movement by this stage." We will carry out individual monitoring—there will be monitoring of applicant statistics—which will link to monitoring the effect of publicity strategies. We will look at the uptake of the education programme and we will do simple things such as asking people where they found out about it. We will consider how widely used the development and shadowing programme is and we will evaluate the training and development that we are recommending on an individual basis.
I am keen to get feedback on the whole strategy, but on targets in particular. I want and hope to find out whether we have got things right and whether it is appropriate to have overarching, aspirational targets that begin to change awareness and culture. As I have said, we will be able to consider the contributions of programmes from specifics that I receive from other monitoring methods.
If you analyse the contribution of individual measures and are confident that you have done the right things with respect to the education programme, and then find that applications are improving but there is still no material change in board compositions, do you fear that there will be concern among the wider public that nothing has changed?
That would be a concern. I have made it plain that the recommendations that we have just talked about are not the only recommendations that have been made. There is a real need to address the inadvertent stereotyping and bias that are part of the public appointments process. I have evidence of such stereotyping and bias. I have clearly said that we need role descriptions and person specifications for board chairs that make it plain that managing and valuing diversity are important aspects of their roles. Board chairs are involved in the appointments process and I have made it plain that selection panels must have specific appointment-related diversity training to help them become aware of their biases.
You are right. If as a result of the work that I have done, I promote action that increases the number of applicants but board populations remain the same, we will all have failed, but at least we will be able to say where that failure has occurred. We cannot possibly increase the number of applicants without addressing the barriers that still exist in the appointments process.
I want to take things a little further. You said that there was an earlier target for 50 per cent of the total board population of Scotland's public bodies to be female, which is a huge proportion and I applaud that. Now, you are considering a target of 40 per cent of applicants being female, which is a much lower target, and you are still talking about having aspirational targets for the first three years. I do not like to think that you are pulling back all the time, but given the slow turnover of positions, how realistic is that target? We discussed the matter at an Equal Opportunities Committee meeting.
We should consider not only the slow turnover of positions, but the uncertainty about what will happen to at least nine or 10 of the public bodies that I currently regulate. For example, I do not know whether boards will have the same number of board members when they merge as they did when there were two separate bodies. Having the same number of board members might be appropriate so that there is more scope to reflect the diversity of the different communities that are served, but the number of board members could be reduced, so there could be less churn and fewer opportunities.
I return to the earlier target that I mentioned. If we consider the population of Scotland, we might see a target of 50 per cent of board members being women as being reasonable, but no specific action was taken to encourage that. Moving from 30 to 40 per cent in two to three years is probably reasonable, because we now have evidence that women face additional barriers to those that men face when it comes to having the confidence to apply for such positions and the time to attend board meetings and do other board work.
Those issues have almost been put as debating points. I have three consultation events coming up over the next couple of weeks at which members of the public will be asked to talk about the strategy. Whether the figure in question should be higher will be one of the key issues for debate. There is always a danger of setting a high figure that is demotivating. If we said that we want to double the number of female applicants, most people would say that that is not a terribly realistic starting point and would ask how much they could believe in such a target.
The targets are aspirational. How will you claim success if you do not really want to hit the target?
Secondly, if boards combine soon, could that decrease their diversity?
There is a danger of that, yes. It will be important to undertake a full skills analysis of the board members of the merged bodies against the requirements of a corporate body that now serves a variety of constituents. For example, does the merging of the Deer Commission with Scottish Natural Heritage mean that SNH now has to deliver to many more people in Scotland who perhaps did not look to it in the past for the kind of support that the Deer Commission provided? Unless there is consideration at an early stage, the bodies could merge and lose some of their diversity. That is something on which I can comment but that I am not able to influence.
I have forgotten your other question.
How will you measure your success?
We will measure success by some of the figures in the consultation document. You said that the targets were aspirational and asked what we would do if we did not achieve them. I would be disappointed if we did not. Although I have set targets for three years, in some instances we will seek to measure progress year on year. The targets will have to be developed as we go—this is just a starting point. Although the targets are aspirational, I do not think that they are unrealistic.
Thank you.
Hugh O'Donnell has to go to another meeting now. Christina McKelvie has a question.
Good afternoon, Karen. How are you doing?
Fine.
You have just spoken about targets. The main purpose of the strategy is to increase the diversity of public appointments; yet, the targets focus on achieving a certain number of applications rather than a certain number of successful candidates. Why were the targets set for a number of applicants rather than of appointments?
As I said, it is clear that we have less-than-diverse board populations because the applicants are not, in themselves, diverse. Getting many more, different applicants to come forward will help the eventual board populations to be more diverse.
One of the dangers of saying that we must have more of a particular underrepresented group is that the appointments process somehow becomes diluted to ensure that more people from that category sit on a board. That is the last thing that anyone would want. Currently, the boards that I regulate are responsible for spending £11 billion of public funds, and we must be absolutely sure that the people who are on those boards are there on merit. It is almost as though we can take a horse to water but we cannot make it drink. We can make everyone aware of the vacancies and we can make the application process as straightforward as possible and help people to apply, but once they have applied, it must be up to them to demonstrate their merits sufficiently for the minister to appoint them.
So, it is about creating a broad spread.
It is, yes.
We have time for a final question from Dave Thompson.
Section 1.8 of the consultation document states:
"A representative of the public body, usually the chair, sits on the selection panel, along with a senior Scottish Government official and an OCPAS Assessor."
It is fine and well to get more people to apply, but it is likely that after the strategy is implemented the chairs of the various NDPBs will be the same people who are in those positions now and who have been there for a while—the usual suspects, if you like—who will represent a narrower focus. It is also likely that the senior Scottish Government official will be someone who has been in the job for a long time, who usually works with the NDPB and might know the chair very well. I do not know whether the OCPAS assessor will have a particular interest in the specific NDPB.
It strikes me that if those three people are the ones who decide on who goes forward to the ministers, that represents a potential problem in that they are the usual suspects, who will have been in post for quite some time. Not necessarily deliberately, but just by inclination, they might weed out the sort of people we want to attract. I wonder how we can get over that problem, given that those folk will be involved in taking forward the process.
That is a good observation. Recruiting in one's own image is a phenomenon not just in the public appointments process, but in recruitment and selection generally. The need for a chair of a public body to have absolute confidence in the person he or she appoints to support them is perfectly understandable and human nature dictates that we will have confidence in people who are like us, so you are absolutely right.
We are aware of the issue and several aspects of the strategy will help to address it, one of which is the bias awareness training, which we insist should happen for all selection panel members. We are genuinely not aware of our biases and much of the time—when we frame the person specification, for example—we honestly do not recognise what we are doing.
I am being extremely firm on directorates that dust off person specifications from last week, last month, last year or five years ago and say that they will do. They will not do any more. The old specifications are not worded in an inclusive way, and we are trying to increase inclusion not just decrease exclusion. Phrases such as "must be able to demonstrate effective corporate governance skills" mean nothing to 95 per cent of the population. That is where we come in—we will not allow such wording. We put person specs through a discrimination check.
You mentioned the OCPAS assessor, but that person will be a member of my team and I have worked hard recently—and another appointment round is coming up—to bring in a diverse range of OCPAS assessors to ensure that we have real expertise in diversity. For example, Elaine Noad, the former Disability Rights Commission commissioner, is now one of my OCPAS assessors. I have brought in a team of people who understand what diversity is and who are at a level to challenge senior civil servants and be quite robust in their conversations with them, which means that sometimes we are not all that popular.
Your representative on that panel of three will make it clear if they feel that the other two panellists are not thinking in the way that they should be thinking.
Yes.
We must conclude the session because we have a number of other items on our agenda. The evidence that we have taken today will form part of the committee's report to the Parliament. I should have asked you whether there is anything that you want to add to what you have said.
I have just one brief point to make. The strategy is a starting point—no one is suggesting that what it contains will change the complexion of the boards of public bodies. It will be monitored, reviewed and updated regularly. Let us just get started.
Thank you very much for coming along today.
In order to meet the deadline of 7 March, we will need to consider our draft report at our next meeting, which is on 26 February. Do members agree to consider our draft report on the proposed equality strategy in private at our next meeting?
Members indicated agreement.