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I would now like to move on to item 6 on the agenda, which is a discussion of the future work programme of this committee.
I seek guidance on the legislative aspect of those subjects. The land reform proposals will come before Parliament in any case. Does it therefore follow that the consideration of forthcoming land reform legislation will be out of our hands as far as timetabling is concerned? Are there any other bills that will come before this committee?
I agree. I would be interested to hear other comments on land reform and on whether it would be appropriate for us to wait until the bill is laid before us.
We decided that the Scottish beef industry should be one of our priorities. In the light of today's evidence, perhaps we should widen the scope of our investigations.
Yes. This morning, I found myself apologising to my colleague, Alex Fergusson, because he suggested that some time ago and I bombed him out—I think that that is the expression he used.
The Scottish fisheries strategy is also an important issue. Perhaps, after a short investigation, we should subsume the shellfishing issue into that subject, especially if we are going to conduct major investigations over the next four years.
It is ironic that, since we first discussed the matter on 5 August, the beef industry has become the best sector of British agriculture to be involved in. That has come about quite quickly, which shows how rapidly the structure of agriculture is changing at the moment. Members of the committee will agree that the evidence of the two witnesses whom we heard today lends powerful weight to the argument that we should be considering the state of Scottish agriculture as a whole, rather than just the beef industry.
If our mentioning the beef industry set a precedent, I hope that our hearing evidence about the sheep industry will have the same effect.
On 5 August we discussed some specific aspects of the beef industry, as well as a wider range of issues connected with the industry.
At that time, we invited the chief medical officer to comment on the issue of beef on the bone. Do we want to add the sheep industry problem to our list as a further priority, or do we want to take the previously identified priority and widen it to cover the sheep industry? Do we want to define the priority as the livestock industry or as the whole of the farming industry in Scotland?
I think that we should define it as the farming industry. As has been said, the whole industry is intertwined: when one part goes down, that has knock-on effects on the others. If we are going to consider this strategically, we will have to take everything together.
I very much support that. If we are considering only the very short term and a specific issue such as the cull ewe scheme, we can, to some extent, compartmentalise things, but if we are considering the long term, we cannot unravel all the different aspects of the industry.
Ultimately, we need to have information on the sheep industry. We can treat each issue as it arises and we can still have our short investigations—such as the one that we are having today—which will form part of our overall look at farming in Scotland. When other issues arise in the future, they should be considered as part of our overall strategy.
How do we wish to define the item in our list of priorities? Do we define it simply as the Scottish farming industry?
That is a very broad category, but I agree that the different aspects of the industry are indivisible. The overall state and structure of the agriculture industry is a large topic, which we might want to spread out over time.
Given what Richard said about our information being likely to be the summation of a series of individual investigations into specific areas, the Scottish farming industry—if we have identified it as one of our priorities—would remain one of our priorities throughout the four-year period of this committee.
Would you use the term farming as opposed to agriculture?
That is a fair question.
The term agriculture would cover all aspects.
There is a danger that we become an agriculture committee. We need to watch the language that we use and hold on to the whole of our agenda and all our priorities.
Yes. As a farmer myself, and remembering that this whole sector was once considered as the agriculture and fisheries sector, I am aware that I have to resist any temptation to creep—deliberately or otherwise—back in that direction. That point was well made, Cathy, and it is one that we have to keep in the front of our minds all the time.
The No 1 priority that we identified at the beginning was employment, poverty and housing, and—apart from our very good briefing—we have not had the opportunity to debate any of those issues. As the situation in the farming industry is causing an increase in unemployment and worse poverty among people in rural areas, those issues may now be even more pressing. They are slipping down the agenda. We have pre-set dates for other aspects of our agenda, but no date has been set—even tentatively—for us even to start to consider the issues that we identified.
Are there any other comments on the land reform part of that?
I think that Irene's first point is important. What the briefing on employment, housing and poverty highlighted most of all was the enormous ignorance on those subjects and the amount of work that needs to be done to get a full picture. We have major agenda items pencilled in for the next two meetings but there is no reason why we should not begin to consider those issues methodically at the third meeting on our schedule.
Are there any suggestions on how to pursue that? It is a sound proposal. I am not comfortable with defining the route that we should take and am open to members' guidance.
I presume that the best method would be to invite written submissions from bodies and individuals who are interested in those subjects, pick, perhaps, the more interesting submissions and then take oral evidence from those people.
We must ensure that the information that we gather is appropriate. It must take into consideration all the things that we have been discussing today and their implications. I would be loth to invite one or two folk along and ask them for their views. I would like to initiate—I am not quite sure how to do this—ways of research into the issues that would give local people the opportunity to put forward their ideas. That would give us a bit of reality; otherwise, we could simply do things from an office somewhere.
Any other comments?
Presumably we will consider the overall title of a big investigation that we want to undertake—in this case employment, housing and poverty—and then seek to identify priorities within that. Would that be a way forward?
I think that it would be.
Would there be any merit in linking in some of the work that has been done around social inclusion, for example? Much of that work centres on urban areas, but there are similarities with what happens in rural areas. We might want to involve Jackie Baillie; we could ask her questions and trawl as much information as possible.
There are academics and others who have made rural disadvantage their specialism. They would be some way down the track in terms of having the information or at least of helping us to determine how to get the information that perhaps is not readily available but which we want.
Given that the schedule that we are considering will cover a couple of meetings, would it be appropriate to proceed initially by asking for submissions, as was suggested, and then to make that an agenda item for the next meeting? That would give us a rough indication of the submissions that have been received; we could decide how to proceed on that basis. Our specific intention would be to identify those who can give us the evidence that we require at a meeting as soon as possible after 5 October.
I concur with that. There are two categories of witnesses. Reflecting on what Irene said, I think that it would be helpful in the first instance to have witnesses from an academic perspective or witnesses from rural communities who have personal experience of these matters. We want to move on to how the people who are spending our money are using it to tackle the problems. That involves Scottish Enterprise, Highlands and Islands Enterprise, Scottish Homes and those in the Scottish Executive who deal with social inclusion, local government and housing. Towards the conclusion of the investigation I would like the ministers to come to the Rural Affairs Committee to tell us what they are doing to tackle poverty, poor housing and poor employment prospects in rural Scotland.
I agree with everything that Lewis said, but I think that, rather than decide just now to invite submissions, it might be useful to ask the clerk to bring back a note suggesting those from whom we are likely to want submissions. We would ask the clerk about sending them a draft letter so that we know what we are doing and whom we are contacting.
I am anxious that that would extend the lead-in period by two weeks. Do you have any suggestions about how we might proceed more quickly?
I raise the point so that we are clear that we have one strategy for undertaking investigations, as opposed to taking a decision within a few minutes and agreeing to send out a letter. We should have a note of how we are going to proceed with the whole investigation, and that should include a list of those to whom letters will be sent requesting submissions. If we could see that before the letters go out, we could be sure of having our strategy right before the investigation begins.
I am anxious that no organisation or individual who feels that they have something to contribute should be denied the opportunity at this early stage. For that reason, I am not entirely averse to the blunderbuss approach of asking for anyone to write to tell us what they think. We may proceed at the next stage by the method that Richard outlined.
How do you intend to invite people to make submissions if you are looking for as wide a spread as possible? What would the mechanism be?
The method that we have used in the past—it might be suitable for this—is that the clerking team sends out a letter immediately to those whom they have identified as relevant. The text of the letter and a list of those to whom it was sent is then circulated to the members of this committee, who can let the clerks have further suggestions of organisations or individuals that should be contacted. That way, anyone we suggest can be included without the need for a meeting.
I suggest that if the committee agreed to a press release on the subject, that would enable those groups that are not on our database to comment, too.
I agree. We are anxious not to get only the usual people who respond. Their information is important, but I want to ensure that communities can say how the issues are affecting them. We need to have as wide a spread as possible.
Would it be appropriate to ask for a press release to be drafted? Normal practice is for me to see a press release before it goes out. I suggest that it would be appropriate for Cathy to see it, too. You would like to see it too, Irene?
Yes.
It would not be the hardest thing to e-mail it to the entire committee, would it?
It is far easier to get agreement among two or three than among 11.
I support that way forward. I would, however, like an idea of how we are going to proceed with an investigation of that size. It would make sense to put out the letter seeking submissions and issue a press release; we would choose a few of the key submissions in the main areas for investigation and then produce a report.
Depending on the response, I would hope to be able to progress to defining key areas at the next meeting.
Time scale is important, too.
Can we make the press release and the letter available on the Parliament website?
We will try.
Although we have decided to extend the inquiry to the whole of agriculture in Scotland, Richard pointed out that the chief medical officer is coming to speak to us on the subject of beef on the bone on 5 October—we hope. Would it be appropriate to do anything else on the beef industry on that day, or do we wish to hear the evidence of the chief medical officer in isolation?
We should stick with that day's agenda.
Agreed. As I said before, we have in front of us a list of the materials that have been supplied to us and those that will be supplied in the near future. I invite committee members to identify any additional information or inquiries that they require on the priority topics.
I think that that might be a bit precipitate, given that the consultations will be put together in the form of a draft bill anyway and we will get the opportunity to comment at that time. It might be better to wait until the department has finished collating the responses to the consultation before we comment.
That view is broadly correct, but my understanding is that the land reform bill proposals will be part of a rolling programme of land reform. It would be useful if the committee were briefed on where those proposals fit in to the wider project of reforming Scotland's land laws. We will have a role in dealing with the legislation, and I would want to concentrate on dealing with them in committee formally, but there is room for examining other aspects of the land reform proposals through briefings.
Are there any other comments on land reform? I am always keen to hear every voice. We must decide whether we are to comment at this time.
My comments do not apply only to land reform but to all the other consultation papers that have a rural dimension. On transport, for example, we will not be the lead committee, but there will be a rural element and we will have to scrutinise the proposed legislation in great detail. That will allow us to have an input, either as individuals or collectively, before the final details are in the bill; we will be able to influence legislation at an early stage.
My understanding is that the legislation would, at that stage, be a draft bill, which would have to go out for consultation again.
It occurs to me that we have said on a number of occasions that members have a dual responsibility: they must work together as a committee and discharge their party political responsibilities outside the committee. Would it be appropriate for us to comment individually in our party political roles, and then comment on the draft bill at a later stage in our committee role? Irene, do you have any comments?
I would be happy with that.
At this point, we have the opportunity to identify any work papers that we would like to be prepared. Are there any investigations that we would like the Parliament's information centre to carry out?
To what extent should we take those SPICe papers to be authoritative—the be-all and end-all of information—on their subjects?
We have to accept that the SPICe papers contain the information that is available and are prepared by an individual who has done a professional job. However, we should also use information that we gather from the public domain and continue to rely on our own experience.
The reason I ask is that during today's visit to the Scottish Executive rural affairs department, I talked to an official about one of the SPICe papers. He pointed out that, while it was not incorrect, several things that would play a considerable part in any discussion of the subject had been omitted. I wonder whether there should be a back-up to the documents. Perhaps experts could be available to add to them as necessary.
The relationship between this committee and those who produce the papers is such that, should any member feel that there was an omission in a document, it would be in order for that member to contact the author of the paper.
We have tried to give the committee advice from the Parliament's information centre and from the Executive. At times, differences will appear between papers from those sources. The SPICe papers will be revised, I believe.
Alex, do you have a specific proposal for a revision?
No. I was talking in general and will provide proposals later.
We have spoken about priorities and I want to run through the topics listed to decide what research papers we want.
Local authorities and local enterprise companies might have useful demographic information, particularly about employment. Some local authorities keep information on housing and poverty in their areas.
Would it be appropriate to trawl for information or statistics on employment, housing and poverty in rural areas?
Yes. Also, as Irene said, some of the information produced by on-going academic studies would be useful to us.
I am sure that many academic studies have collated such information. We have only to identify those studies.
We should be given what has already been written and find out what else is available.
Yes, I also think that we should find out what information is available and then make that available to committee members.
When we have read the submissions, we will know what issues to highlight and what information to send for.
We are probably talking about pages and pages of statistics that will become relevant when we decide how to proceed. However, at this point, it would be appropriate to find out where those statistics are and how they can be made available.
If you like, to provide us with back-up information when we start to trawl.
Does any member wish to raise any other points about employment, housing and poverty? I understand that the SPICe team is keen to schedule its work, which is why the team wants to know what information we may require in future.
I do not think that we can take a sensible look at Scottish agriculture without examining how we can restore beef export markets.
I am concerned that time is passing and that little or no progress has been made on the restoration of the beef export market. Many of the problems associated with that situation exist in Scotland. We need to identify both what those problems are and what methods the Parliament can employ to help the restoration of the export market. It would do a service to the industry to keep the issue in the public eye and would hopefully give us a chance to define what problems are standing in the way of beef exports.
I agree with that. I think that this is a chicken-and-egg situation waiting for a virgin birth to happen. There are no facilities in Scotland to prepare beef for export because there is no market for beef exports and there is no market for beef exports because there are no facilities to prepare beef for export. We need to find out whether we can do anything about that situation.
Do we need to commission any further research on that topic?
It would be useful to keep up to date on any developments in the beef export market. I believe that the market is zero at the moment and that nothing has moved since 1 August. We should be kept up to date with any changes in that situation.
The matter seems to have faded away after all the publicity that was generated by the lifting of the ban, and other issues have taken priority. Given that the issue is not receiving as much publicity as it should, it would be interesting to know what the latest position is. Is it possible for SPICe to conduct some research into the current position of the beef export market?
Perhaps we should consider the situation in a month or two, by which time the industry—particularly the slaughtering end—will have had time to work through the options and will know whether it will be able to make progress on the issue in Scotland.
I would be interested to know whether progress has been made in that area, as the issue has certainly faded from public interest.
It would be worth asking the Meat and Livestock Commission, our agent for selling beef abroad, how negotiations are progressing with various European meat importers. The organisation should also be able to give us fairly up-to-date figures or some hope about when active export might happen.
I understand that the SPICe team has met the Meat and Livestock Commission, which has been doing the rounds. That means that we will be able to elicit information from the MLC on the subject.
We should be conducting an continuing investigation into Scottish agriculture.
We have spoken about land reform proposals. On 21 September, we are to investigate the prohibition on shellfishing, and that has been added to our list of priorities. Members may want SPICe to get involved in investigations in that area. Would it be more appropriate for us to decide that at our meeting on 21 September?
Yes.
During September, we are to receive briefings on transport in rural areas and on the strategy for Scottish forestry.
You jumped over the reference to the fisheries strategy.
Oh, sorry.
There was a reference to the Scottish Executive rural affairs department's intention to arrange a briefing for MSPs on fishing matters. Is that for all MSPs or only for members of this committee?
Last week, the department said that one or two members of the Parliament had approached them for a briefing. The department felt that it would be more appropriate to plan a presentation for all MSPs with an interest in the subject, not just for members of this committee. I do not yet have a date for that.
The fishing industry remains one of our highest priorities. Would members like any investigations of the industry to be conducted, by SPICe or by this committee?
The briefing from the department will set some of the parameters for the things that we may want to look into in detail.
We note what Lewis Macdonald has said.
Is there a difference between the treatment of formal and informal meetings outwith Edinburgh?
We have already held an informal meeting of the committee. It would be appropriate to consider an informal meeting when, for example, we are invited to meet the NFU, something we are about to deal with.
An informal meeting still requires expenditure that has to be approved, but I think would not fall under the rule that says that the bureau must approve the location of any committee meeting.
Yes and no, I think.
At the conveners meeting perhaps it should be made clear that the Rural Affairs Committee, of all the committees that should meet outside Edinburgh, has the strongest case.
The committee of conveners is meeting at the moment, and we are represented there. However, I have already made that point and I will continue to do so.
We should welcome the clear statement that requests are dealt with on their merits, rather than one per committee, and endeavour to make sure of the application of that.
I notice that there is a reference to one meeting outside Edinburgh per committee, but that the words "for example" do not appear. Is there a move—
No—what the conveners group has said is that it is not taking that view; it will not limit committees on an across-the-board basis but will look at each proposal on its merits.
Many of the reasons that are given for meeting the committee are to discuss issues of local concern. Could you ask those individuals and organisations to give more specific subjects? If we knew exactly what they wanted to speak to us about, it might fit in with what we are doing; otherwise, we could miss something important.
I suggest that we ask those individuals and organisations to outline their areas of local concern and that we tell them that they will remain on our database and will be approached on any subject on which they might be able to help us. Their invitations could be taken up in due course, if they become relevant to an investigation. I believe that that will encourage them to become involved in the processes of the committee, but will avoid the problems of funding our travel around Scotland. It is a long-term aim of mine that the committee be seen to move round Scotland; the Highlands and Islands, in particular, needs to feel that it is part of the processes of the committee.
And the south of Scotland.
And the north-east—we could have a good argument about this. It is important that everybody feels included by the committee. Where necessary, I will be happy to argue that the committee be funded to travel anywhere in Scotland.
The letter has just arrived.
Here we are. That was a neat move by the fax machine. The letter was sent to me and was faxed on to the clerking team. It is from P M Loggie, policy manager for the NFU, and is an invitation to visit pig units in the Edinburgh area. I have had further phone communication about that, and the people involved understand that the committee is under pressure of time. They would be grateful for the opportunity to come here and make presentations to us if that were considered more appropriate.
No.
Would it be appropriate for us to contact the Scottish Fisheries Protection Agency and get possible dates with a view to arranging a visit by members of the committee?
We have attempted before to organise a date for a meeting with Jim Walker and the office-bearers of the NFU, and failed to do so. We now have an open invitation, so that if we can arrange a date, they will try to fit in with it. Does the committee want to arrange a date in the current parliamentary year?
Would it be appropriate to arrange an evening that can be fitted in with parliamentary business?
I do not know what members' domestic arrangements are. Would a Tuesday or a Wednesday evening be preferred? There are bids for Tuesdays and Wednesdays.
Let us have a show of hands.
There is a definite preference for Wednesday evening. We will see whether that can be arranged. Members of the Sea Fish Industry Authority wish to brief the committee on the authority's role and work. Do we want to visit them, or would the committee prefer someone to come to the Parliament?
I have a query about Jim Walker and the NFU, and the same query about this. If it is useful for us to see them in situ, and there is a real reason for doing that, that is fine, as long as the clerk is satisfied that there is a good reason for going there and that we will learn things there that we would not learn here.
Should we make contact with Alasdair Fairbairn to agree an appropriate date and to ask whether he would prefer to come here or for us to go to him?
The letter from the pig farmers and the subsequent discussion have resulted in them volunteering to come and make a presentation. Shall we make further contact with them to establish a suitable date? The person who spoke to me today said, "Any time, any place."
We will make further contact to arrange something.
The pig farmers are due a lot of support. It is one of the agricultural sectors that does not get any state subsidy or support.
The content of the presentation is likely to be an explanation of the pig farmers' position.
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