We will start the meeting. I am told that the Glasgow train is running late. It is of course a weekday, so that is bound to be the case. We are expecting the members of the committee who are not here yet to arrive shortly.
I welcome the opportunity to contribute on behalf of the Executive to the committee's further consideration of parliamentary questions and related issues. I welcome the continued co-operation of Executive and Parliamentary staff in the process; those close working arrangements have provided—I hope they will continue to do so—a constructive approach to the many issues that are under consideration.
What is your view on the level of use of the directory? I take it that every phone call, e-mail or letter to a civil servant is now logged. I thought that the level of use was remarkably low.
We agree. Something like 112 inquiries have been logged altogether. I must admit that I thought that the number might have been higher over the period in question, but it has not been as high as we expected. The level of abuse has been very low, however, and I do not think that—as far as the Executive is concerned—there are any problems in continuing to operate the system.
Is there a lack of awareness of the facility or is the problem that members prefer to use questions because they are in the public domain?
I suspect that low usage of the directory is the result of several factors. As the convener said, members might prefer to ask parliamentary questions because such questions are in the public domain. However, a variety of other avenues are available to members. I suspect that members are using the business directory only when they are unable to access from another source the information that they require.
Has the Executive analysed the sort of inquiries that are being made, in order to satisfy itself that those inquiries are urgent? I ask because on the three or four occasions that I have used the facility, my inquiry has usually related to planning matters and I have e-mailed the chief planner to find out what the development department is doing about a notifiable planning application. I cannot say that any of my inquiries were urgent, but I cannot think whom else I could have asked to get the information that I wanted within a few days. I am not sure that I met the criteria that the minister set out in her introductory remarks but, equally, I am not sure that I did anything wrong. I believe that I did the appropriate thing in the circumstances. Do you have a view on that?
I do not think that we would have a problem with members using the directory as the convener described, but these are still relatively early days. I am concerned that members are not as aware of the facility as they might be. We might, with the committee, want to highlight again its existence to members. We will continue to monitor use of the facility and would be happy to report back later to the committee with further information on how and why it is being used.
Most MSPs who have used the facility have used it only once. The reason for that could be that the directory is very difficult to navigate. Could the Executive examine that?
The layout of the directory has not been flagged up to me as a problem, but we could check whether that is a reason for low usage. As I said, I suspect that it is more likely that members use the facility only as a last resort.
I am one of the incompetent MSPs who have not yet used the facility. Do members receive written replies to inquiries?
That depends on the nature of the request. If members ask for a written reply, they will almost certainly get one. Some verbal requests have been dealt with within a very short time, through a phone call back to the member concerned. However, a written reply is certainly one of the options that is available. Mr Robson would like to make a point.
I do not know what the protocols are within the Executive, but if any of our witnesses wishes to contribute he or she needs only to gesticulate.
The great majority of requests have been dealt with in less than half an hour. That suggests that there is a rapid turnaround. The information that I have indicates that 5 per cent of requests took between two and five hours to answer and that a large majority of inquiries were dealt with on the day they were received. That suggests to me that members are not being inhibited from using the business directory by the mechanics of the system. However, it does not throw any light on why members have tended to use the directory only once.
That is helpful. Like the convener, I think that the fact that members are supposed to use the facility only if they need information urgently acts as something of an inhibition. What does "urgently" mean? I was merely speculating that one reason for the disappointing take-up might be that members like to receive information in writing. A quicker, but unwritten, response might not provide members with what they really want. If the reply is wrong, members want to be able to hang the Executive at a later date. That is what politics is partly about.
If there were any doubt about the substance of a question, our preference would be to respond to it in writing. We would also prefer questions to be asked in writing in the first place. However, sometimes small issues are raised that can be dealt with fairly quickly over the telephone.
As the second most frequent user of the facility—far be it from me to be average—I can say that members do not receive written replies to their inquiries. That is fine, because I have used the facility to elicit factual information.
Lewis McNaughton—I am sorry, I mean Andrew McNaughton. Who is Lewis McNaughton?
He is a clerk to the committee.
Guidance on how the process should be managed is available on the Parliament intranet homepage, which leads to our directory. Whenever a question is dealt with by an official, he notifies the minister's private office of what he has done and of the answer that he has given. Although an answer might be given over the telephone, ministers are advised of and alerted to what has been said, so that they are aware of what contact has been made. In a notice that is attached to the directory, members are informed that officials should deal only with factual information. If a member's query relates to a policy issue, it should be directed to the minister's office.
Will guidelines exist setting out what you have just said, to ensure that no frustration is created in future?
What I said is set out in guidelines at the point where members have access to the directory. We could issue, or ask the committee to issue, a notice to members to remind them of that. However, we think that that is made fairly clear at the point where members access the directory and seek to locate a particular official.
Asking parliamentary questions is a key part of calling the Executive to account, which is a key responsibility of the Parliament. I was concerned by what the minister said about advisory costs for answering questions. That raises a serious question: what price democracy?
For the time being I would like us to stick to asking questions about the directory. We will come to other issues later.
It is for MSPs to determine whether they want to use the directory to obtain factual information, or ask parliamentary questions. As part of your review, have you considered—apart from inquiries made through the directory—what parliamentary questions have been asked in order to assess how many of them could have been dealt with through use of the directory?
It is hard to judge whether some questions could have been dealt with through the directory because we do not know how quickly members need the information. That is one of the criteria that we hope members will bear in mind when using the directory. Members must be free to use whatever method they think appropriate. The idea behind giving members access to the Executive directory was to allow them to obtain information as quickly as possible, in a way that would not normally be available.
I would like to ask Hugh Flinn about that. I remember a survey that the chamber office carried out shortly after the establishment of the Parliament, which showed that very few questions required simply factual answers. Virtually every question that contained a factual element went on to tease out a policy issue. Do I remember correctly?
That is also my recollection. The survey was carried out over the relatively short period of one or two months, but it showed that the great majority of questions were about more than just a factual element. In most cases, the factual element was part of a more complex question.
If most members' questions concern policy areas, we should probably not be worried about misuse of the exchange, because it is being used appropriately. Perhaps we should advertise the exchange better, so that people know that it can be used to support MSPs' work—particularly factual work for their constituents. Are there any concerns about the use of the exchange?
We have no concerns about use of the exchange. It is one of a range of options that are available to members. Fiona Hyslop is right to say that members choose the approach that is most appropriate to the issue they want to take up.
Members have no further questions on that—we are all quite happy. We can consider later whether we want to do anything to advertise the facility. No doubt the Executive will, in the fullness of time, let us know of any further monitoring information.
Let the members ask questions first.
I shall start by probing the distinction that the Executive memorandum draws between executive NDPBs and the advisory NDPBs. Some executive NDPBs seem to carry out functions for the Executive. Indeed, the memorandum points out that, ultimately, ministers are answerable for the actions of those bodies. I understand why one would not want a parliamentary question to be asked about the supply of surgical dressings in a local cottage hospital, but members might feel that a question to, for example, Scottish Enterprise or another national NDPB might raise pertinent public issues.
As Tom McCabe said on 1 May, the Executive draws a distinction between executive agencies and NDPBs. Executive agencies are part of Executive departments, whereas NDPBs are not. Although we have always thought that it is appropriate that responses from executive agencies are incorporated into parliamentary questions, we do not think that that should be the case for NDPBs. That has been the Executive's position all along and we have not seen anything that would convince us to change it. Only ministers can answer parliamentary questions. A question to the chief executive of an NDPB is not really a parliamentary question—that is the distinction that we have drawn throughout on this complicated issue.
I appreciate the difference between an executive agency and an NDPB. I refer to the Executive's publication of June 2001, "Public Bodies: Proposals for Change". In annexe A, the Executive classifies NDPBs, further breaking down the category into executive NDPBs and advisory NDPBs. The executive NDPBs are those that carry out functions for the Executive. They are much closer to the Executive and are more akin to executive agencies. In the final bullet point on the characteristics of executive NDPBs, the document states:
The main distinction is directed at questions relating to operational matters for which NDPBs have a responsibility—as do executive agencies. Questions on those operational matters would more appropriately be directed to the chief executive of the specified body. It is true that ministers have a policy interest in the work of the executive agencies, as well as in that of the NDPBs, and that they may consider in certain circumstances that it is appropriate for them to respond. However, because of the distinction, we consider that it is only right that NDPB chief executives should reply on their own behalf on operational matters, reflecting their greater distance from the Executive.
Does that mean that, if I ask a question on the operation of an executive NDPB, a judgment will be made on whether the question raises purely operational issues—in which case, the answer will be that I should write to the chief executive of the NDPB—and if I ask a question on other matters that are acknowledged to raise general policy issues, an answer might come from a minister?
That would be right, yes.
Does that distinction exist anywhere in guidance? Should I be aware of that?
We have internal guidance on that.
Yes, but is there guidance for members on that, with regard to the framing and lodging of questions?
I am not aware that there is specific guidance for members. Perhaps the chamber office has addressed the matter in its guidance on parliamentary questions.
The chamber office representative is not being drawn. It might be worth considering that in drawing the distinctions. If we understand the distinctions, we might live with them more easily.
There is a wider issue of democratic accountability regarding NDPBs. As the convener said, a minister is ultimately responsible for an NDPB, yet does not answer any questions about it, which is nonsense. The idea that scrutiny of a body's annual report and accounts teaches us a great deal does not accord with my experience. Annual reports are written to conceal unpleasant information. Lanarkshire NHS Board is not going to record in its annual report the fact that more people die of disease X in Lanarkshire than anywhere else. However, that is the sort of information that we would like to know, so that we can deal with such problems.
It is possible for committees to invite chief executives or senior officers of those organisations to appear before them, so that they can scrutinise them in that way. There are other ways of doing it, but as Mr Tosh indicated, we can examine the guidance that is given on questions and try to make it a lot clearer than it is at the moment.
I will cut to the chase. Is not it clear that the Executive is just ducking its responsibility, especially in relation to health boards?
Not at all. Members, rightly, would criticise the Executive if it chose to answer on behalf of those organisations on every occasion, because clearly that is not the way it is meant to be. Such bodies are meant to be open to scrutiny in other ways, so I reject that suggestion.
But health trusts and health boards are dancing to a political tune, and responsibility for that tune lies with the Executive. Should not we be able to ask the piper exactly what the position is, rather than the monkey?
Obviously, every opportunity that is normally available to members is available with regard to policy issues. Your argument is not relevant. Ministers come to the Parliament and are held to account in a way that never happened before, which is one of the huge advantages of devolution. Your argument is not fair.
The distinction between policy and operational matters is important, but it is often clearer when spoken about in the abstract than when translated into practice. Do you agree that one of the things that has characterised the post-devolution period in Scotland is that the nature of the Executive's responsibilities means that a great deal of attention is focused not just on policy as it pertains to public services, but on the delivery of policy? Indeed, the current First Minister has placed particular emphasis on that. Does not that require the Parliament and the Executive to revisit what we recognise as policy issues, as distinct from operational issues? Is not it the case that where the line was drawn historically is no longer appropriate for this Parliament and its areas of responsibility and interest?
Yes. We should keep that boundary constantly under review. Perhaps it has moved from what was considered to be the boundary in the past. We can examine that, but it is difficult to do that where operational issues impact upon policy or policy impacts upon operational matters. It is not always easy to define whether something falls into one category or the other, but I hope that ministers, when questions are put to them, will err on the side of involvement, rather than non-involvement. In other words, if a question has a policy implication, I hope that the minister will err on the side of answering, rather than not answering.
I wish to pursue that point. Patently, no consensus exists in this Parliament on where that boundary lies. Is that the problem? I accept absolutely the fact that the boundary could never be drawn with precision, but it seems clear, whether we examine parliamentary questions, other aspects of the Parliament's operation, or ministers' practices—that is, the issues on which ministerial statements have or have not been made—that there is no consensus on the distinction between policy and operational issues. It might be helpful, therefore, for us to consider jointly how greater clarity of understanding could be achieved. Members sometimes feel let down by the lack of an answer to a question, purely and simply because they do not recognise where the boundary is drawn. I am not familiar with the sort of philosophical analysis on that that has been set out for us this morning, which may or may not be valid. Do we need to work more to clarify that issue?
Yes. Further examination of the issue would doubtless be useful. If the committee wished to do that, I would have no objection. I do not think that we will ever arrive at a positive conclusion; the matter will always be open to debate. One minister may make a judgment that another minister in the same position would not make. There may be a role in examining the issue for the Parliament's chamber desk; I am not sure.
I have a final question on a different but related topic. If NDPBs, executive agencies et al are expected to be directly accountable for their actions in the way that the ministers have described this morning—in the main I have no difficulty with that—significant changes will be required to the practices of those bodies. The document "Public Bodies: Proposals for Change" sets out a number of aims and aspirations for the practices of public bodies. Could you give us some examples of steps that have been taken by the Executive since the publication of that document to increase the extent of direct engagement with NDPBs or executive agencies, and examples of measures to improve accountability and the sharing of information?
I am afraid that I cannot do that offhand, but I will look into the issue and write to you and the convener about it. I just do not have that information to hand.
We are identifying the problems of living in a quango state, in which the Executive does not have direct and immediate responsibility. We are grappling with the policy perspective.
Practices do not differ. There is common practice, but people read the words and interpret them slightly differently. That is the result of normal variations in human behaviour. Guidance on the practices exists; it is just a question of how people interpret it. If people take a decision on one occasion that clearly errs in one direction, they might, in the light of their experience, change their view on a subsequent occasion.
I wish to develop that point. The committee's inquiry is about the principles of transparency and accountability in the broadest terms. We are asking whether the Parliament is operating effectively under those principles.
It is possible to devise new systems. The Executive does not suggest that it has a monopoly of wisdom in that area. If the committee produced a new way of working, I am sure that the Executive would be happy to consider it.
An answer often depends on what question is asked. The way in which some questions are framed will elicit detailed responses; other questions will not elicit such responses. Some questions are incredibly vague and it is difficult to work out exactly what a member is looking for. Sometimes, the chamber desk might try to elicit more information from a member about what is required or the appropriate minister might write to the member and ask them to come and talk about the matter. There are other ways of obtaining information, but much depends on how a question is framed.
Have you heard whether the NDPBs feel that they cannot give fuller answers because of the structure? Have the NDPBs said that they have had communications from MSPs saying that it would have been more helpful if information could have been more widely disseminated?
We have received no such information. As far as we are aware, the NDPBs seem happy to respond on operational matters in their own way. Departments with a responsibility to oversee NDPBs keep in regular contact with them and exchange information. We have had no such feedback.
Would you be happy to discuss the matter with the NDPBs if the committee wanted to explore the issue?
We would, if the committee wanted us to. I am sure that the committee would want to make contacts with NDPBs, too.
I have an observation rather than a question. An example of a difficulty that I had in getting information might be helpful. The example relates to the roll-out in my area of the free central heating programme. I lodged a question on the matter, but the Executive could not answer it. I then wrote to the Executive and it could not answer. My query was forwarded to the Eaga Partnership, which gave me a helpful response in the end. The agency went to some trouble to pull together the statistics, which obviously were not easily accessible. The outcome, although it took many months, was satisfactory. I received the answer that I sought, but there was frustration before that. Members often interpret such delays as civil service or Executive obfuscation, but the simple fact of the matter is that the Executive is not directly responsible for certain bodies and therefore can have difficulty in replying on operational matters. To avoid wrong motives being ascribed in respect of operational matters, guidance could be given to the NDPBs on answering questions, or perhaps to MSPs about which NDPBs it would be best to write to directly. That would be helpful.
You have used an interesting example. I have been chasing the same agency. I asked when a central heating installation would be put into a particular house. Clearly, that is an operational matter and I understood that I should go straight to the Eaga Partnership with the question. Equally, a question about whether there should be a central heating installation programme would be a policy question for the Executive. Matters become difficult if someone asks whether there should quality control of the installation of central heating systems. Is that an operational or a policy matter? Policy would suggest that there should be quality control, but quality control is clearly an operational matter. I do not know whether I could ever give a definitive answer in respect of quality control.
You have shed further light on the subject and the difficulties that are sometimes involved in framing a question to get a speedy response. The point that I was trying to make was that it took me months to get a response, yet I did not think that the question was particularly difficult. In the end, the question was not a policy question. If we had a more transparent system, such frustration would be avoided. If there were clear guidelines for MSPs and agencies, the delay and frustration could have been avoided.
I, too, have had dealings with the Eaga Partnership but I was lucky. I did not think of going to the minister first—I went to the partnership that was mentioned on the leaflet that the local authority in an area that we share had carefully concealed in its local office. My assistant found it.
It was possibly the same case.
It probably was. I had questions about the pace of the roll-out of the programme and the partnership's sub-contracting practices. I was concerned that there might be blockages if the agency did not sub-contract to local agents. I am going into the story to make the point that both matters were operational, but related to the performance of the whole project. It is a pity that 129 MSPs have to get such information through individual approaches. If there was a more elegant mechanism, such issues might be centrally cleared and put in the public domain so that members, their researchers and third parties who read the written answers report could see what is happening. I will leave that issue sticking to the wall. The exchange has been useful.
Can anyone confirm a recollection? At Westminster, if a minister replied that they had asked the director of the Scottish Tourist Board—as it then was—to reply to a question about tourism, the letter from the Scottish Tourist Board would be put on the record. Is that correct?
My recollection is that the letter would not be put in the Official Report. Currently, if the minister responds to a parliamentary question by saying, "I will write to the member," the reply does not go into the Official Report.
If the reply did not go into the Official Report, the minister would say, "I have placed a copy of the letter in the House of Commons library for everyone to look at." Does that happen here?
When the minister responds in writing to a member's question, a copy of the letter is placed in the Scottish Parliament information centre so that it is widely available to all members. However, the reply does not feature as a formal part of the written answers report.
Are copies of responses from quangos sent to SPICe?
No.
That is a defect. In that respect, we are less open than Westminster, which I thought was physically impossible.
When the chief executive of an NDPB responds, he might be happy for a copy of the letter to be placed in SPICe.
Yes, but the member who asked the question must rely on the goodness or sense of public responsibility of the person who responded. The point is that the practice at Westminster, on which we might have sought to improve, is not being followed here.
We can consider that matter in the context of a general review of the guidance. We will consider ensuring that the practice at Westminster is followed so that when an NDPB responds to a member, it offers to place a copy of the response in SPICe as a matter of course.
I am surprised by Mr McNaughton's blanket statement that the practice is not followed. I can think of a number of instances in which it has been followed and the relevant information has been sent to SPICe. However, there is no question but that the practice is not consistent, which takes us back to the matter of consistent practice among ministers.
I accept that there might be variations in practice.
Janet Seaton has been desperate to say something for a while. I hope that the briefing that she has received from the Executive has not deflected her.
Perhaps I can clarify the matter, which was about Westminster. I used to work at the House of Commons library. Chief executives' letters are put in the library but, as Mr McNaughton said, they do not appear in the Official Report. That has not been the practice here. There is no promise to put responses to questions to NDPBs into the reference centre. That happens only accidentally.
We have exhausted that line of questioning, which has produced a lot of meat for the committee to discuss in future. We might seek further clarification of some of the issues that arose.
A number of factors have caused the cost of parliamentary questions to come down. One reason is that the number of questions is now much greater and they cover a much wider range of issues and subjects, which means that it is possible to consider the system in more detail than it was with the earlier sample. Another reason is that the Executive's tracking system provides a more detailed analysis.
The Daily Record might be distressed to find that the cost of replying to Fergus Ewing has fallen by a third overnight.
To make an absolute judgment on that, I would have to look at the questions. I ask the committee to consider the issue in the light of experience. Such situations occur only in a few instances. Recently, a member lodged 65 questions on one topic, which might have been more easily dealt with by meeting the minister to resolve the issues. I appreciate that questions are not always asked only to glean factual information; there is often a political reason for asking them.
I am obliged to the minister for the letter—which committee members have seen—in which she drew my attention to the case that she mentioned. I have considered those 65 questions closely. I found that they were answered by four separate ministers, which indicates that the questions were to a degree cross-cutting. The practical difficulty is that if the Executive had decided to answer only 30 of the questions—because to answer more than that would have taken more than the 20-hour limit and would have involved unreasonable costs—the member involved might simply have passed the other 30 questions to a colleague to ask in his place.
You are correct that that might happen, but it is also possible for members to amalgamate questions. In a recent example, a member queried how material to encourage awareness of breast cancer had been drawn up. The member's next question was about how the material was assessed. Those two questions could easily have been one question and the cost of answering one question would have been less than the cost of answering the two questions, even though they were related.
I would not be surprised to discover that, in the example that you gave, the two questions had begun life as one question, which the chamber desk thought could be usefully split in two. That has been known to happen.
According to the table in the paper on the costs of parliamentary questions, no question cost more than £470 to answer. In the face of that evidence, why is there a limit? If very long questions are such a rare occurrence, there is no need for an advisory cost limit.
The cost limit is purely advisory. You are right to say that the limit will be reached on few occasions but, on very rare occasions, questions will reach that limit. The point of the limit is to allow us to identify clearly when that is the case.
We received the paper only this morning and I am concerned about the talk of limits. I understand from your opening statement that you would not preclude answering any question because of cost. Will you affirm that?
That is the case. I have already said that today.
I am also concerned that a third of the costs that are mentioned in the paper are secretarial and office costs. I understand from paragraph 7 of the summary report that those include accommodation. Are costs for Victoria Quay taken into account in the costing?
Executive overheads are taken into account.
They include accommodation, most of which will be at Victoria Quay.
They could include accommodation, but that is not necessarily mostly at Victoria Quay.
Is the preparation of an answer to an oral question more expensive than the preparation of an answer to a written question?
The study examined 500 written questions. It did not consider the detail of oral questions. The turnaround time for oral questions tends to be quicker than that for written questions and the costs will be proportionately lower.
A written question can be asked to elicit information, but it can also be asked for political reasons. That is part of the Executive's accountability to the Parliament. We should question any idea of limits on the cost of democracy. Oral questions tend to be a different animal. They are a public part of accountability. A similar study to find out how much the preparation of an answer to an oral question costs—including costs such as accommodation—might be helpful. Then we would have an idea of how much time goes into preparing ministers to answer at Executive question time. Would that be possible?
It would be possible, but it is important that the committee bear in mind the fact that the number of written questions far exceeds the number of oral questions. The problem arises because of the sheer volume of written questions. The Executive undertook the study because members were asking questions about the cost of questions. We have undertaken the exercise and arrived at the cost limit to be able to fulfil our obligation to members.
There might be political elements to questions. Members approach SPICe to get information on an issue that they perhaps want to pursue for political purposes. At what point and how often does SPICe contact the Executive to try to get that information? When SPICe contacts the Executive on a particular issue—health, for example—does the Executive have a system to bring that contact to the attention of the appropriate department? Is there a link between the question that is asked of SPICe and the Executive department to which it is passed on? Does it get passed up the system to ensure that the department knows that a member is asking questions about an issue?
Perhaps Janet Seaton has comments to make on the matter. My understanding is that SPICe contacts the Executive for further information on questions that it is asked and relays the information back to the member. It is also my understanding that the Executive does not know which member is asking the question of SPICe. That is a matter between SPICe and the member.
That is correct. We contact the Executive if we need to but we never reveal who has asked us. Members take that into account when they decide whether they would like to ask us to get the information or whether they want to ask for it directly.
I return to the average cost of answering a question. I fully appreciate the minister's point that the study was done because the information that it gives was asked for rather than because the Executive views the matter as one of pounds, shillings and pence.
Derek Grieve will be able to go into that in more detail. I suspect that the proportion is due to the fact that some of the information is already available in a form that can be readily disseminated as an answer to a question. The cost is an average, not the cost of a specific question. Some questions will no doubt cost considerably more than £65 and others will cost considerably less.
The breakdown of cost is, as the minister explained, an average. It might be useful for me to explain how we identified and tracked the costs. Every time that officials opened a parliamentary question on our electronic tracking system, they were prompted to record how long they had spent working on that question, as well as details of their grade and location. That held for every entry into, amendment to or viewing of an answer to a written parliamentary question. That information has been collated.
I am grateful for that explanation, but if we consider the matter from the systems management point of view, 6,000 contacts with 500 questions sounds like an incredibly over-engineered system. Is there scope to refine the process not only to reduce the costs, but to make the system more efficient overall and so put less pressure on all concerned?
A number of procedures are built into the process to allow us to ensure that questions are answered timeously and to ensure that, if it appears that that is not the case, the question concerned is flagged up and taken on to the next level so that performance is kept up to date. There has been a lot of concern about the time that questions may take to be answered. As a result, we have adopted measures such as introducing the tracking system.
I am grateful for that clarification. Having cast doubt on the number of contacts that are made, I want to ask about one particular contact that is probably quite important, which is the minister's involvement. I am struck by the fact that the descriptions of the process in the paper and this morning do not address the minister's involvement in the consideration of questions. In fact, the implication is almost that the process is quite depoliticised, with the minister simply putting his or her initials to the answer. Clearly, post-devolution, there is much more to the matter than that, because ministers are now very aware that they are accountable for a particular answer.
It is absent; it was not taken into account as part of the process. Obviously, you will know that the time that a minister takes to consider a question varies very much depending on the question and the answer. You are absolutely right to flag up some of the elements that are taken into account and some of the conversations that go on; however, they were not taken into account in arriving at the figure mentioned in the paper. I understand that those elements are not taken into account at Westminster either.
I wonder whether, in the interests of improving democracy and saving people's time, the Executive would consider being more proactive. Someone mentioned the member who asked more than 60 questions about a matter and asked whether, in that case, it would have been better for the minister to have a meeting with the member. Would not it be sensible for the Executive to contact the MSP and arrange a meeting? MSPs would have the right to refuse, and anyway, we do not want to blandise—or emasculate—them, but such an approach would be more sensible if that is what the member wanted.
That happens fairly often. A minister will either contact a member and offer to meet them or will write to the member to suggest that they meet or enter into fuller correspondence about an issue. Sometimes we might even go back to the chamber desk and say, "This question mentions ‘the conference that took place in 2001'. What conference does the member mean?" As I said, members' questions are not always that clear. As a result, such an approach is much better and needs to be encouraged.
I apologise for running past the advertised finish time, but to round things off, I want to ask about the calculation of the 20-hour limit in relation to a single question and to a group of questions. Might the people who deal with answers be asked to estimate whether answering them would take 20 hours, or would an axe fall, in the sense that someone would simply say, "That's it. I've done my 20 hours. I've done 20 of the 60 questions, and I'm not doing anymore"? How on earth would such a system work? If a member decided that, because of the 20-hour limit, it was not worth asking any more questions, someone else would surely ask the same questions, because the member who wanted the answer would be bound to know someone who would do that for them. How would you work out when the 20-hour limit would come into play?
As I have said several times, the limit might not necessarily be used. We are minded to introduce it only as an advisory limit. It is fair to say that it is often clear which questions will call for a more substantial amount of work than would usually be carried out. In those cases, the amount of work would be measured against the limit, but we have not done that yet. It would be interesting to see how it works. I suspect that the limit would be used in that way.
Thank you very much. I think that we have exhausted our discussion of those issues, but I am sure that we will want to explore other questions a little further when we have a chance to look back over the exchanges in full. At this stage, I thank both ministers and their advisers and civil servants for their time and for the co-operation that we have received, not just this morning but in general, as we tease out these matters and others that are outstanding on our shared agenda. I thank everyone for their attendance and participation.
Meeting closed at 10:45.