Social Inclusion, Housing and Voluntary Sector Committee, 06 Oct 1999

Meeting date: Wednesday, October 6, 1999

Official Report 148KB pdf

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Voluntary Sector

We agreed at the last meeting, after we had had an informative presentation from the Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations, that we had to have a structure for taking forward the points that were raised, some of which are short term, some of which are long term.

We have the paperwork in front of us.

I do not.

Neither do I.

Oh, sorry. I have it in front of me. That must be the privilege of being convener. It was circulated, apparently. Perhaps people who are not comfortable with information technology do not get these things.

The paperwork is a useful reminder of what was raised at the last meeting. The feeling is that some points need to be pursued, particularly some of the more substantial points, such as charity law—we need to take a view on that.

Some of my points will be fairly obvious. The SCVO representatives outlined five priorities. The first was charity law reform. It is clear that the current investigation that is being undertaken by the University of Abertay Dundee charity law reform unit will be the main part of the Executive's plans for reform. I suggest that we ask Martin Verity, the committee clerk, to find out when that report will be available and that any discussions that we have on charity law reform should flow from the report.

We will put that as a standing item on the agenda.

Another priority that was mentioned was the financial impact on the voluntary organisation of criminal record checks. I think the figure was £3 million—or was it £10 million?

It was £3 million.

Thank you, Karen. The matter will be debated in the Parliament tomorrow afternoon as a result of Andrew Wilson's motion. If the minister responds positively, the issue might take care of itself.

The minister raised that issue when we had a debate in the Chamber on the voluntary sector. She said that she was going to monitor the situation closely; £3 million is an awful lot of money for voluntary organisations to pay.

What is important is not just the initial £3 million cost, but how long those checks remain relevant. How often will organisations have to conduct the tests? Alex is right: we might get some detail on the matter in tomorrow's debate.

Alex has given us a helpful suggestion. We will come back to the specifics.

Last week's meeting was constructive and the SCVO gave us helpful suggestions about what we should consider.

How would other members of the committee feel about setting up a sub-group to do work on the voluntary sector? I am conscious that we have a heavy work load, but many members have a great deal of interest and expertise in the voluntary sector and may want to continue with that work, alongside the work of the committee. They could do in-depth, detailed work on matters such as Scottish Criminal Record Office checks and charity law. That would help to take the work of the committee forward.

The Executive considers SCRO checks to be a matter for the Minister for Justice, rather than for the Minister for Communities, so anything Jackie or Wendy say on them is fairly irrelevant.

Karen's suggestion is very good. I want to highlight two issues that came up in the discussion, apart from those that have been mentioned. The first relates to the practicalities of longer-term funding and the red tape that people have to negotiate to obtain it. We could look at what we can do to help. The second issue concerns the new deal and the effectiveness of some of the training programmes. That is a rather more esoteric matter, but we could come up with ways of exploring it.

Do you see this as a longer-term project?

It seems to be my role to bring us back to what we have already agreed. There are many issues that we want to consider, and once we have agreed a programme on the key areas and priorities—as we have—we should stick to it. There is a danger that setting up a number of working groups outwith our key priority areas will dilute the work that is taking place elsewhere.

I think that we can deal with some of the voluntary sector issues by having the convener write to ministers and by keeping a watching brief. However, to do those issues justice, we should probably set up a sub-group as part of our programme for next year, once we have heard more about the charity law situation. In the meantime the convener could write to the Executive about, for example, the new opportunities fund, to ascertain the Scottish perspective on that. I know that people have many interests and a great deal of experience to bring to the debate, but that will not take the committee forward in the way that we would like, if it detracts from our priorities.

I disagree. It would be helpful for us to set up a sub-group on the voluntary sector, as that would be one way in which to progress work that cannot be progressed at meetings of the full committee because of the pressure on our agenda. When the sub-group is established, I hope that it will focus on the central issue—bringing stability to voluntary organisations' funding. They are reft with instability at the moment, and this committee should address that as a matter of priority. The sub-group could take the issue on and report back to the committee on what has been achieved.

We have a number of options. Far be it from me to try to broker a compromise—

That is usually my role.

It is not usually mine, I can assure the committee. We could appoint a reporter, as we have done for housing, to co-ordinate the different aspects of the issue. That would have the advantage of getting round the technical difficulty of formally establishing a sub-committee. I am not necessarily against that, but if we choose that course we will have to make a formal submission to the Parliamentary Bureau and obtain its approval. John might still favour our embarking on that process, as it would not prohibit our doing work in the short term. However, as Fiona said, it would take us a while to get started. I have an open mind.

I agree with Fiona: the committee has some important priorities, but SCVO gave us an excellent presentation and is now looking to us to act. The committee cannot at the moment concentrate on the issues that SCVO raised, but we could make progress by setting up a sub-group, which people could feed into from time to time.

There are technical difficulties with setting up a sub-group. Some members may be talking themselves into this, but we could appoint a reporter to do what is necessary in the short term to keep track of the issue. In the longer term, we may have time to address it properly. That is most likely to be the case after Christmas.

Again, I will take on Alex's mantle and negotiate here. We should appoint a reporter today to pursue short-term issues in particular. It might be that I will write to people and that we will wait for the results of the investigation by the University of Abertay Dundee. We may have to come back to some of the bigger issues—long-term funding is a huge issue. We should certainly flag up at the conveners committee that we are beginning to think along these lines. We should bear in mind that we may get refused by the Parliamentary Bureau. Appointing a reporter will at least get us started. Is that okay?

Members indicated agreement.

Karen has just talked herself into a job.

I am sure that Robert and others have experience as well.

Lloyd will lead for us.

Yes—sorry, Lloyd. It is understood that reporters will always consult committee colleagues.

In short, there will be a sub-group.

I know—we have ad hoc groups, sub-groups and all sorts of groups.

I will summarise what we have agreed to do at the end of the meeting. Karen, you will consider the short term and the long term and keep us right about what needs to be done.