Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee, 15 Jan 2008
Meeting date: Tuesday, January 15, 2008
Official Report
168KB pdf
Code of Conduct
Agenda item 3 concerns the written evidence received from members in response to the committee's review of section 8 of the code of conduct for members of the Scottish Parliament. I thank all the members who provided written evidence to the committee. The responses have provided us with useful evidence of how section 8 impacts on MSPs' working practices.
Committee members will also have received the Scottish Parliament information centre's briefing note on ethical standards and complaints procedures in other Parliaments around the world. It has helped to illustrate other Parliaments' practices.
Committee members will recall that we agreed to consider responses from interested stakeholders and members of the public at our next meeting on 5 February.
I invite members to comment on the responses that we have received so far and the general conclusions that have been drawn from those responses, as detailed in the paper. I ask members to try to steer away—as one or two respondees did not—from particular cases or, if you like, beefs from the past. We should stick to the general principles of what we are examining.
I note my disappointment that only 10 of the 129 MSPs commented, although it is evident that some of the business managers canvassed the views of the rest of their groups and responded as such. We can say, "50 per cent said this and 50 per cent said that," but the sample is not a representative one that enables us to see the bigger picture.
Christina McKelvie is right to make that point. Unfortunately, it always seems that we all have opinions to give over a cup of coffee but when it comes to putting them down on paper we are a little bit shy. I know that the response from Jackie Baillie is on behalf of our Labour group and I suspect that some of the other business managers also responded on behalf of their groups, so that is perhaps an excuse for our colleagues.
The convener is right to point out that people strayed a little from the remit. Some folk, in fact, went on a bit of a rant. If we want to go into more detail on the matter, we might want to have some discussions with the Presiding Officer and the business managers. At the moment, there is not much to take forward.
That is right. When we discuss our work programme under agenda item 7, we will consider who to invite to come back and whether we should invite all members or just those who contributed. The current item is on the agenda just to allow members to make any comments on the submissions that we received.
The comments on the number of responses are right, but I understand that the response is par for the course for such consultations. Our group did not take a group position, so we cannot hide behind that. As a member of the committee, I took a self-denying ordinance not to muddy the waters by responding, but I do have views on the matter, obviously.
As there are no further comments on the responses, are members happy to move on? We will consider the matter again under a later agenda item.
Members indicated agreement.