Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee

Meeting date: Tuesday, June 14, 2011

Official Report 348KB pdf

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Interests

Welcome to the first meeting of the Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee in the fourth session of the Parliament. I remind all those present that mobile phones and BlackBerrys should be switched off and not just put on silent, because even on silent they can interfere with the sound system.

The first item on the agenda is the declaration of interests. In accordance with section 3 of the code of conduct for members of the Scottish Parliament, I invite members to declare any interests that are relevant to the remit of the committee and I remind members that any declaration should be brief but sufficiently detailed to make clear to any listener the nature of the interest.

I will start and then we will go round the table. I have no interests to declare that are relevant to the operation of the committee, other than those that are in my entry in the register of members’ interests.

I am in a similar position, as I have registered my main interests in the register of interests, but I will run through them very quickly for clarity. I am a vice-president of the United Kingdom Trading Standards Institute. My voluntary interests are that I am a member of the GMB union, An Comunn Gàidhealach, Inverness Credit Union, the Scottish Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, the Church of Scotland, Oxfam, Christian Aid, Marie Curie Cancer Care, Save the Children, Compassion UK, Smile Train and the Co-operative Group.

I, too, have already registered my interests with the clerks to the Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee. I highlight for the committee and for any other listeners that I have property interests. I doubt whether they would ever be relevant to the committee, but for the purpose of absolute transparency I state them publicly today. In terms of voluntary interests, in addition to the voluntary registration of property, I want to say that I am honorary president of a fundraising committee to build a church in Bulgaria and that I have added to my register the fact that, like the convener—although he is not the convener yet—I am a member of the GMB, which is a fine union. I am also a member of the Co-operative Party, the Fabian Society and one other organisation, which will come back to me—I am sure that it is not too important that I mention it now.

I do not believe that there is anything that I need to register at this meeting, but to err on the side of caution I will mention a couple of organisations of which I am a member. I am a member of the Educational Institute of Scotland, which is, of course, just as good as the GMB. It is important that I say that on the record—not that it is as good as the GMB, but that I am a member of it. I am also registered with the General Teaching Council for Scotland.

Like my colleagues, I do not think that I have any interests relevant to this particular committee, but for clarity I point out that I am a director and company secretary—purely in a voluntary capacity—of East Ayrshire Citizens Advice Bureau. I was previously a manager of East Ayrshire Citizens Advice Bureau and any remuneration was on the basis of being a manager. On a voluntary basis, I am a member of the trade union Unite, I have a long-standing involvement with the citizens advice service and I was previously a director of Citizens Advice Scotland.

I do not think that I have anything to add either, but I will go through what I have registered. I am still a councillor in North Ayrshire and I am a member of Unison. I have a property in Irvine that is not my principal home and I am a director of North Ayrshire CCTV Ltd.

Like others, I do not have an extensive list of interests that I should declare at this meeting—everything is contained in my entry in the register of interests—but I should put on record the fact that I am still self-employed as a consultant providing education and economic consultancy services for a range of private sector and public sector organisations. I will do that until I complete the projects that I inherited before I was elected—I do not foresee that lasting beyond the recess. I direct people to my entry in the register of interests in respect of potential conflicts with overseeing public appointments, as I have worked as a consultant for a number of public sector organisations, including the Scottish Further and Higher Education Funding Council, Scottish Enterprise, the Scottish Government, Highlands and Islands Enterprise, Careers Scotland, Skills Development Scotland, National Museums of Scotland and three local authorities—City of Edinburgh Council, East Renfrewshire Council and Fife Council. At this stage, I do not see any other potential conflicts of interest.