Official Report 308KB pdf
Pingat Jasa Malaysia Medal (PE991)
Good morning, everyone, and welcome to the 18th meeting of the Public Petitions Committee in 2006. I have received apologies from John Farquhar Munro, who has amendments to the Crofting Reform etc Bill that are being discussed elsewhere. He will try to join us if he gets through them, but he might not be able to attend this morning.
I am holding up the pingat jasa Malaysia medal, which comes in an attractive box with the Malaysian crest on the front. Inside the box is the medal, a miniature medal and a medal ribbon. On the inside of the box lid is a metal plate with an inscription, details of which I sent in with the petition, so the members will have that in front of them. The medal also comes with a citation, which I submitted with the documents that I sent in later, so members can read that at their leisure.
Thank you. I invite members to ask questions or comment on the information that you have given us.
Good morning. I thank Andrew Nicoll for submitting the petition and for his presentation. I found it most odd that citizens of other Commonwealth countries are allowed to wear the medal, whereas British citizens are not. Why has that discrimination, as you described it, taken place?
The civil service in Whitehall has been obstructive and has not helped to find a solution to the problem, which is why I brought the petition to the Scottish Parliament. The Governments of Australia and New Zealand asked the Queen for permission for their troops to accept and wear the pingat jasa medal.
What reason was given for the decision change that meant that you were refused permission to wear the medal, even though the rules seemed to have been relaxed to allow you to wear it?
The rules.
What rules? I still do not understand the reason for the decision—I want to press you on that.
It is a bit complicated. The honours and decorations committee's 1969 regulations are in two parts: part A covers persons in the service of the Crown; and part B covers persons who are not in the service of the Crown. The first section says that it is the wish of Her Majesty the Queen that her subjects do not accept or wear a foreign medal without her permission—I stress "wish".
We will take your word for it.
The five-year rule has been broken many times. The 1969 regulations did not say anything about double medalling—the idea that if a person has a British medal for their part in a campaign, they are not allowed to accept a foreign medal. That is rubbish, because people who served in Korea got two medals: the United Nations medal; and the Korean medal. In Northern Ireland you must have a general service medal to be able to get the accumulated service medal. I could give you other examples, but I will not waste your time.
What would happen if a person wore the medal anyway? I am not suggesting that, as ex-servicemen, you would do so, but what would the ultimate sanction be?
We have dealt with the civil service and individual ministers, who said that a person who wore the medal without having the authority to do so would be grossly discourteous to Her Majesty the Queen.
Good morning, gentlemen. I have read the background papers, listened to the evidence and found that quite a conundrum is involved. John Scott picked up on quite a few issues, but I would like to clarify matters. People in Australia and New Zealand, which are Commonwealth countries, are allowed to wear the medal. Our briefing paper says that the Governments of Australia and New Zealand approached the Queen to ask whether their ex-servicemen could wear it. Has the Westminster Government asked the Queen whether you should be allowed to wear the medal?
We sent a petition to Her Majesty the Queen and were told that she had read it. Indeed, she sent us a letter in which she stated that, because of her position as constitutional head of state, she must deal with matters through her ministers. She therefore sent the petition to Margaret Beckett at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. We believe that Margaret Beckett has not yet seen it. It filtered its way down to the honours and decorations committee, which made the non-wearing rule in the first place. We submitted a rebuttal to that committee in June this year and asked whether it would reconsider the matter, but it will still not give us any answer. Nobody will tell me who made the order that we cannot wear the medal. Did the Queen or the honours and decorations committee make it? I suspect that, because we have not been told who it was, some individual who had no right to do so made it, rather than the Queen.
You mentioned a quango in your submission. Were you referring to the civil servants?
I meant the honours and decorations committee, which is an unelected quango.
Obviously, you lodged the petition to find out what the Scottish Parliament could do. Do you want the committee to ask the Scottish Executive or the Scottish Parliament to approach the Parliament at Westminster on the issue?
I think so. We are simply asking for fairness, democracy and someone to approach the British Parliament so that Scottish veterans will be authorised to wear the medal. No law exists that says that we cannot wear it. The rules that have been quoted are non-statutory. Our elected Parliament in London has not considered the issue and the civil service will not answer any questions. It is obstructive and fabricates things. The situation has got to the stage where the civil service has written to us to say that it will not answer our letters any more.
I will come to other members in a minute, but I want first to ask for clarification. We are trying this morning to find a way to address your concerns. You have suggested that we write to the Scottish Executive to ask it to take the matter up with Westminster. In the information that you provided us, a paragraph says that the Foreign and Commonwealth Office—the people whom we would contact—
We can wear it without authority, but that would be grossly discourteous to Her Majesty the Queen.
That is the point I am trying to get at. Sandra White asked whether you wanted us to take the matter to the Government, but it has already made it clear that it has no objection to your wearing the medal. The person who has the objection is the monarch, or someone on her behalf who has made the ruling. Therefore, taking it to the Government will not take the matter forward, and I am trying to find a way that allows us to take it forward. Have you any suggestions other than approaching the Government, which has already made it clear that it has no objection to your wearing the medal?
I came here because I believe that we have our own people's Parliament in Scotland. The rule is a breach of our democratic rights. It is also a breach of our basic human rights for someone to prevent us from wearing something. The Government told us that there are no laws to say that we cannot wear the medal only because we told it that. The Government did not say that in the beginning, when there was a strict rule that we could not wear it.
Again, I understand what you are saying about the democratic process, but even if both the democratically elected Parliament of Scotland and the democratically elected Government at Westminster said that you should be able to wear the medal—which Westminster has said—the reality is that you do not want to offend the Queen, who says that you cannot. How, through our taking the petition through the democratic process, can we convince the Queen that she should allow you to wear the medal?
We are here in frustration at not being able to find out what is going on and at not being told that it was the Queen who decided that we cannot wear the medal. If someone tells me that the Queen says that we cannot wear it, we will know what we are doing. However, nobody will tell us that, so we have come to the Scottish Parliament. We are not an independent country—not yet, thank you—but I think that the Scottish Parliament should take the side of the Scottish veterans.
Have you asked your MP to take the matter up in the House of Commons?
David Mundell has been working on the issue from day one. Recently, he asked the Prime Minister a question about a document that is held in the Cabinet Office. The document is allegedly signed by the Queen and it concerns the recommendations that were made on the pingat jasa Malaysia. We asked to see the document, but our request was refused. The question that David Mundell asked was:
Is Mr Mundell aware of your petition? If so, does he support it?
Yes. We got Alex Salmond to sign it, but I did not ask Mr Mundell to sign it because he is in the Parliament in London and I was coming to the Scottish Parliament.
Mr Salmond is an MP as well. Why did you ask him but not Mr Mundell?
Let me just—
I want to pursue the point that you made in your answer, Mr Nicoll. Is Mr Mundell continuing to pursue the matter with the appropriate ministers in the Westminster Parliament?
Yes. There are many, many people doing that, so—
So Mr Mundell is pursuing it.
Yes. I quoted the answer that David Mundell got for us on 7 November. He has been acting on our behalf recently.
First of all, I think that you are right. Like so many things that come from the Westminster Government, its position on the matter is nonsense. I doubt whether the monarch even knows about it. It is some civil servant in London who is preventing you from wearing the medal.
The PJM comes with a citation, which is stamped by the high commission of Malaysia in London. I have a copy of it here. If you had a fortnight, I would read the whole thing, but instead I will read the final paragraph. It says:
That is what I wanted to get on the record.
I have just come back from Malaysia. I spent two weeks there last month along with 72 other veterans who served there 50 years ago. We had a wonderful trip. Quite honestly, the fact that we are not officially allowed to wear the medal is a slight on the Malaysian Government. I accepted the medal with pride at a reception in Kuala Lumpur, as did 35 other fellows who served in Malaysia at the same time. We were met with warmth and courtesy everywhere we went. It is disgraceful that our Government is slighting the Malaysian Government by not allowing our people to wear the medal officially.
I agree that it is a slight on the Malaysian Government, but I think that it is also a slight on the British service personnel.
There is a civil servant in London who sat on 10,000 applications for this medal for three and a half months.
He refused to put them through to the Malaysian high commission for no reason other than that he could.
There is great resentment in Malaysia on this matter. I do not need to remind anyone that we need all the Muslim friends that we can get.
I apologise for having missed your opening statement, gentlemen. I am sorry if, in answering my question, you have to repeat something that you have already said.
On their medal bar, someone would wear their British medal first.
There are exceptions. There are several examples of dual medals.
Sure. I see that you cite the examples of Australia and New Zealand. However, is it not the case that the PJM is the primary medal for them because they do not have an equivalent?
They have Australian medals for service in Vietnam, Malaysia and so on. I could not be 100 per cent certain about that, but I think that that is the case.
So, in those countries, the convention is different from the one in this country, which says that you should wear your British medal.
In those countries, they are being led by intelligent people. Here, we are being led by idiots.
I am trying to establish what the difference is rather than solicit subjective comments that do not help your case. If we understand what the problem is, we are more likely to arrive at a solution. Is it the case that, in this country, there is—and has been for decades—a convention that a British medal takes precedence over a foreign medal that has been awarded for the same service?
No. There is a five-year rule, which has been in place for a long time. We have asked for the files on the five-year rule and they refused to give us them—they told us to go to Kew and do our own research. Eventually, we found out that the files had been booked out to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. Then, the file concerning the five-year rule disappeared. At this time, therefore, we cannot say how long the five-year rule has been in place. However, we can tell you that the double medal rule was introduced only in November 2005 when Jack Straw deposited documents in the House of Commons library. Although Her Majesty the Queen was told that that rule was a long-standing rule, it had been in place for only three weeks or so before the Queen signed her recommendation. The short answer to your question is that the relevant rule is not a long-standing one.
I asked the question because I know that a member of my family could not accept an award that he was offered by a foreign country because he had received a British award. I hesitate to give his age, but I know that the rule has been around for a considerable period.
Yes. It put in the request in February 2005 and withdrew it for some reason—nobody seems to know why—before resubmitting it in March 2005. Three months before that, Baroness Symons had said in the House of Lords that we were not going to get the medal.
The very latest e-mail that we have suggests that, as of 3 November, the honours and decorations committee is still considering the issue.
We have been considering our rebuttal and our petition to Her Majesty the Queen since June and we are told that there might be a decision by the end of November.
Excellent, so the right people are looking at it as we speak.
The wrong people are looking at it.
No, the people who have the power to make the kind of decision that you want to be made—rightly or wrongly, that power belongs to them and nobody else—are looking at it.
The people who decided that we should not wear the medal are now being asked to review the decision. So the police are policing themselves.
One is hopeful, though, that the strength of your argument might persuade them to make a different decision.
Linda Fabiani has an interest in this matter. Do you want to make some comments, Linda?
Thanks, convener. Brigadier Fairgrieve talked about the trip to Malaysia in October—
Actually, I was a second lieutenant national serviceman. I do not profess to be a brigadier.
Really? It must be because you look so distinguished sitting there.
It is kind of you to say so.
Am I right in thinking that Allan Alstead is a brigadier?
Yes.
That is where the confusion comes from, obviously. Discussing this matter with Brigadier Alstead, I was fascinated to learn of the trip in October. Seventy or so veterans travelled to Malaysia along with members of their families—I understand that your son was there, Mr Nicoll. They went to Kuala Lumpur, Malacca, Johor and Singapore. They were welcomed and shown respect by people in Malaysia, who feel that the fighting in the emergency in the 1950s gave them a democracy and made the countries what they are now and, indeed, ensured that they were friends of the United Kingdom.
If I may add one small point, 95 per cent of the people who have been presented with this medal are national servicemen.
On that point, my father served in Singapore and Malaya with the King's Own Scottish Borderers and would be entitled to receive this medal if he were still alive. I fully appreciate exactly where you are coming from.
This medal is available to the next of kin of people who have died since the emergency or who died during it. You would be able to get it for your father, if he served after 31 August 1957, when Malaya was made independent.
Thanks for that information.
I, too, apologise for arriving late and missing the petitioner's statement. I notice in the papers that you have kindly supplied to us that the then Minister for Trade, Ian Pearson, said:
I would endorse that.
I endorse Helen Eadie's suggestion. She laid out what Mr Pearson said. The letter from Mr Coney, from which Linda Fabiani quoted, was sent on 7 August 2006. It makes it clear that wearing the medal without the Queen's permission would be discourteous. We need clarification on that, so I support sending the petition and the Official Report of the meeting to the committee on the grant of honours, decorations and medals and to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. We will await their replies for the petitioners, who need an answer.
My late uncle served in the Malayan emergency but, personal considerations aside, I think that the petitioners have made a powerful case. I am always wary of people asking the Scottish Parliament to express a view on something that is clearly being pursued at Westminster. That is not because I have constitutional misgivings but because I take the practical view that if every piece of work that was being pursued at Westminster were duplicated here, that could clog up the system.
I entirely endorse that well-made point.
I should also point out that a documentary made by the BBC team that accompanied us on our expedition to Malaysia and Singapore will be shown on BBC2 at 8 pm on 27 November. It might embarrass the honours, decorations and medals committee in London somewhat.
Let us hope so.
Perhaps we should broaden things out by writing to the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association, which might be interested in this matter. If it notes the anomalous position in which you find yourselves, it might—if it sees fit—be able to contribute to the debate by letting the committee on the grant of honours, decorations and medals know its view.
That is another good suggestion.
I support the recommendations made by Helen Eadie and other members and Charlie Gordon's comments. However, I hope that when we forward the petition to Westminster we do not get back a letter that says simply, "Thanks very much. The matter has been noted." Instead, I hope that, by submitting the Official Report of this evidence and showing our support for the petitioners, we can get across to the Westminster Government that we want a constructive response.
I am more than happy to include in our request for information a note that we are seeking a full response, not just an acknowledgement. As we will also send a copy of the Official Report, the honours, decorations and medals committee will be aware of how we arrived at our decision to write to it and should take cognisance of the fact that we are doing so on behalf of British ex-servicemen. If it does not consider the Scottish Parliament worthy of a reply, it should at least show some courtesy to the people who served their country.
Thank you. You have been very helpful.
Thank you for listening to us. The rest have not listened to us, but you have.
Christian Sabbath (PE992)
Our next new petition is PE992, by Hugh M Cartwright on behalf of the synod of the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland, which calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Executive to consider and debate the need for a weekly day of rest from work throughout Scotland and to encourage business and commerce to close on that day, which would be appointed the Christian Sabbath. I welcome to the committee the Reverend Hugh Cartwright, who is supported by Alexander MacLean. You have a couple of minutes to make a brief statement to the committee, after which we will discuss the petition.
We are grateful to the committee for agreeing to hear the case presented in this petition, which has been submitted on behalf of the synod of the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland. Initially, the synod had hoped to ask the Scottish Parliament to legislate in favour of the first day of the week, the Christian Sabbath, being a weekly day of rest on which business and commerce would close. On being advised that that is a reserved matter on which the Scottish Parliament cannot legislate, the synod agreed to petition the Parliament to debate the need for such a day and to urge business and commerce to close down on it. We even hope that the Parliament will be minded to recommend that the Westminster Parliament legislate to that effect.
Our parents and grandparents worked hard to grasp the many benefits and comforts that we now enjoy. They experienced many hardships—the 1930s depression, two world wars and rationing, for example—but endured their trials with fortitude. In the past decade or so, stress has been one of the main causes of absenteeism from work. It affects many employments and has a detrimental knock-on effect on family relationships. We do not believe that it is mere coincidence that stress, which was not a significant factor or diagnosis in past generations, has affected today's society to such an extent. Previous generations enjoyed a weekly day of rest, which people now lack. Nowadays, people are very busy; one day follows another with relentless pressure and there are few opportunities for rest, relaxation or time to stop and think clearly. One effect of stress is that people do not think rationally; they lose their perspective on and purpose in life.
Thank you very much.
That underlines the fundamental problem, which is that departing from the original creation mandate leads to all sorts of complications and means that one person's enjoyment causes another person to work. The biblical position—and our position—is that the six days that people have provide ample opportunity for working and recreation.
I come from a farming background. Animals must be fed, so I would appreciate your views on how the welfare of animals would be addressed.
Mr MacLean will speak about stress; he brought that up.
I have a printout that is to do with a report that was prepared for Channel 4. It says:
I say from the start that although I do not share your beliefs, I fully respect your right to hold and articulate them and to petition the Parliament in support of them.
We believe that only necessary work should be done, so no one would do unnecessary work. We would not regard that as a hardship. However, it is important to have a specific day—although it might be difficult for you, with your way of life, as it is for me with mine, to have any day off. Apart from any religious consideration, having a single recognised day on which people are not involved in work or disturbing others with their work helps families and communities.
As politicians, we must deal with the practicalities of any legislation that is introduced. You ask that legislation be introduced to ensure that the Sabbath is held as a day of rest. If such legislation were introduced, what would be the sanction for not adhering to it?
We are obviously referring to bodies that provide shop work and other work of that nature. We would not want to go down the line of imposing sanctions on individuals. It is clear that the Parliaments here and at Westminster are willing to pass legislation that many people find increasingly intrusive in their lives. We believe that we have divine authority behind the legislation that we propose, which would be beneficial to everyone. Many bills are being passed here and at Westminster that, in the opinion of many people, intrude on their lives, in that they place restrictions on them. We are opposed to the imposition of any restrictions that do not come from a higher authority, by which we mean the word of God. We unashamedly base our proposal on divine and biblical authority. Our aim is to point out that, in general, society's experience is that following the lines that are laid out in the Bible is beneficial to individuals, families and society.
It is true that we live in a 24/7 society, but there was a great deal of stress around many years before society was modernised. You mentioned having a day of rest on a Sunday but, if I am not working, my Sundays are spent visiting family and friends. If it were to come about that no one could work on Sunday, how would that affect the economy of Scotland at large? Would the prohibition on working mean that people would not have transport services, for example?
A total close-down would have advantages for the economy. First, it costs a lot more to keep a business running for seven days than it does to keep it running for six days. An added advantage is that power savings would be made, although that is not one of our objectives. If people lived their lives recognising one day in seven as a day of rest, they would not need to be involved in work on that day or to have other people do things that we might not consider to be work but which might be considered to be required. Campbell Martin and the convener both said that there are certain things that they would want to do on a Sunday. We think that the activities that people could do on a Sunday should be heavily limited. If there were limits on what people could do, there would be rest for other people. If everyone wants to do their own thing, there will be no rest. For example, if Sunday is used as a day for social activities rather than as a day for working, for example, there will be no rest. That is why we advocate having a day of rest throughout the country.
You mentioned power, but sometimes shutting something down and having to build it back up again costs more, so I do not agree with that part of your argument.
We are asking for a shutdown in trade and industry. The petition does not go further than that; it just deals with people who work for their living and are required to work on the Sabbath day.
I have two questions. Given that employment is reserved to Westminster, have you made representations to Westminster parliamentarians and what was their response? Who else have you raised your petition with?
The petition has not been raised with anyone outside this Parliament. Our synod makes representations to the Westminster Government on various matters including Sabbath observance, but we made no specific request to others because we thought that the Scottish Parliament could deal with the matter. It was only when one of your officials pointed out that the Parliament could not deal with it and suggested another avenue that we decided to submit a petition. It would be helpful for the Scottish Parliament to discuss the situation in Scotland even though only Westminster could legislate. However, we are not asking for legislation in the petition.
I was interested in the European dimension in your submission. You mentioned that there has been legislation in mainland Europe to keep a day of rest. I have travelled in most countries in Europe and I have not noticed such legislation; shops and businesses throughout Europe are open on Sunday. What is the legislation in mainland Europe that makes the situation there different from the one here?
I was in Rome a year ago and it was very noticeable in the area around our hotel that there was little activity on the Sabbath. Many of the shops were closed and it was obvious that the shops that were open were not Italian shops.
I accept entirely your acknowledgement that we live in a multicultural society and your recognition that although you would prefer Sunday to be the day of rest, you are open to the possibility of making it another day. I will press you slightly on that.
From a social and family point of view, the importance of having one day of rest is that if everything were to more or less shut down, people would be liberated from their various duties on other days.
Surely being Christian is about more than just respecting the Sabbath.
It is, yes, but that is one of the planks of it.
I have a final point. I hear what you say about exceptions and I know that you are talking only about trade and industry, but the reality is that people working in all the emergency services—police, the fire service, the ambulance service and hospitals—would require to work, so a quite substantial chunk of people who do a job for our greater good could not take the Sabbath off.
Yes, those people would have to work, but they would have to do less work than they do at present if, in general, society was resting from its everyday activities. If there were no football matches or work going on, the police and others would face less strain on that day. It is obvious that the police, firefighters and other medical people would have to work, but currently we make them work more than they should have to because of our seven-day society.
As has been mentioned, the ability to legislate on the matter is reserved to Westminster. Although a bill that seeks to restrict the opening of shops on Christmas day and new year's day will come before the Scottish Parliament shortly, there is a fine distinction to be made, because the bill is about restrictions on shops opening and not about the regulation of work, per se, which is what the petition addresses, which means that the matter is reserved to Westminster. When members make recommendations, they should bear that in mind.
I suggest that we copy the petition and the Official Report of the meeting to Westminster and thereafter close the petition. We cannot legislate on this and it is simply a matter of ensuring that the petition gets to the inbox of the appropriate people at Westminster.
As I said, I do not support the petition but perhaps the committee should pursue it a wee bit further and not close it at this point. I accept that the matter is reserved to Westminster and that the petition should be forwarded there. However, would it be possible to ask the Scottish Executive what its position is on encouraging business and commerce to close for one day per week? Surely the Executive, as the Government of Scotland, would have a view on that.
That thought occurred to me; we should establish the Executive's position if nothing else.
We will then write to the petitioners with the responses and seek their comments.
If on any occasion the Scottish Parliament debates a subject that is reserved, do those views get passed on to Westminster? That is really what we were asking.
That does happen, and that is why the present wording of the petition was suggested.
I just wanted to check that it was possible constitutionally—
It is possible for the issue to be discussed.
If our additional information is to be passed on, I should perhaps point out that it contains a couple of typing errors. First, the title of the document refers to "THE SCOTTISH PALIAMENT" instead of "THE SCOTTISH PARLIAMENT"; and secondly, the first sentence under the heading "ECONOMICALLY" begins
We will clarify that. Thank you very much.
National Tourism Website<br />(Public Ownership) (PE1015)
The next new petition is PE1015, by Alan F Keith, on behalf of the Association of Dumfries and Galloway Accommodation Providers. The petition calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Executive to return the national tourism website, call centre and booking system to public ownership. Before it was lodged formally, the petition was hosted on the e-petitions system, where it gathered 693 signatures and 20 discussion comments, 19 of which supported the petition.
On behalf of the organisation that I represent, I thank the Scottish Parliament for establishing its petitioning facility, without which it would have been much more difficult to bring the matter to its attention.
Thank you. Do members have any comments?
If the website is in effect nationalised, the Scottish taxpayer would be landed with a loss-making operation. Would that be wise?
The fact that the scheme is making a loss has to be seen in the context that it incorporates a website, booking system and call centre. If the website, which is what we are most concerned with, were separated out, that would not in itself be a high-cost operation. The booking technology could readily be left to the private sector, given that many private sector businesses have such facilities. The cost of taking the website back would not necessarily be high.
Your petition is not really about the concerns of accommodation providers that have not bought into the national system, with its attendant commission charges. You are saying that there is a flaw in how we market Scotland as a destination, which is why you want to break up the company.
Our petition is about both those issues. As accommodation providers, we are concerned that the system has harmful effects, particularly on small accommodation providers, but we also believe that it has a general impact on tourism throughout Scotland.
The Minister for Tourism, Culture and Sport announced up-to-date figures a few weeks ago during stage 3 of the Tourist Boards (Scotland) Bill, which was a tidying-up exercise that took account of the operational situation that has been in place for about 18 months. Given that those figures were encouraging, do they not counter at least one of your arguments?
You are probably referring to the percentage increases in bookings, which are not meaningful unless the base is also expressed. There is no information about the levels of bookings; there is only information on the percentage increases. We do not believe that the amount of business, particularly from online bookings, is significant.
Do you have information about the cash value of the sales that lie behind the figures?
We have figures for the overall value of business that has been contracted. For 2005, VisitScotland.com quoted £12 million. Although the money is claimed to be generated, there is no evidence that it is new to Scotland. It is in effect displaced; it would have come to Scotland but it was routed through a sales operation that precipitated much of it.
I pass on Alex Fergusson's regrets for not being here, for family reasons—he would otherwise have been here to support you.
Perhaps, if that could be done. However, because the company in question has been given the job of producing bookings—that is how it earns its revenue, as a profit-making company—the way that the website is set up leans towards the company's need to generate bookings to acquire business, so I do not think that any change to the website could be imposed on the company without its business suffering.
How do we reconcile that fact with the survey by ORC International in June 2005? VisitScotland commissioned ORC International, an independent market research agency, to conduct customer satisfaction research, which said that 88 per cent of customers were content. We want you to discuss or refute that.
I would not refute it, but 12 per cent were dissatisfied, which is an extraordinarily high level of complaint. If 12 per cent of my guests were dissatisfied with my service, I would be out of business as an accommodation provider.
Fair comment.
More than 15 years ago, I ran a small business as an accommodation provider, so I understand your frustrations about wanting to ensure that small accommodation providers get a share of the business. Anything that we can do to help direct more business towards small accommodation providers will be good not only for you but for Scotland.
Most providers already involve themselves in e-commerce. Very few do not have at least e-mail, and a large percentage have their own websites. Of course, e-commerce works when a booking is enabled by an e-mail—
I apologise for interrupting, but I do not want an e-mail address; I want each provider to have a website, so that customers can see what the place and its rooms look like and what facilities there are. I am thinking in particular of a couple of superb websites for places in the Aberfeldy area, which give users a virtual reality tour of the accommodation. Could we not get support to expand that technology for small businesses across the board?
I agree. Many providers already have those facilities—it would be unusual for them to have an e-mail address without a website—but I fully support anything that encourages more businesses to develop their websites. However, it is frustrating to a provider who has spent money and, in some cases, obtained Scottish Enterprise grants to provide the technology that the national website does not easily link customers to their website.
That is perhaps an argument for improving the VisitScotland linkages rather than for nationalising the system. There are aspects that could be explored more readily.
In the past four years, we have made every possible approach to our local tourist board network and to VisitScotland.com to seek better links, but VisitScotland.com steadfastly refuses because, as it says, it is a commercial business and needs to drive customers to its booking centre. It admits that, in effect, it needs to divert customers from direct contact with providers.
Thank you for your explanation and the papers that you have provided. I have a couple of questions, but I think that we should clarify how VisitScotland.com is made up. It might just be me, but I find it confusing.
I am a self-catering accommodation provider. In my experience and in that of other self-catering providers in Dumfries and Galloway, the number of bookings that have come via VisitScotland has decreased hugely since the inception of the new website. I am the area tourism partnership representative for self-catering—sorry, that is a bit of a mouthful—and I have had feedback from people who say that they are getting no bookings or very few indeed, whereas in the past they got a lot of bookings and referrals via the tourist information centres and the old Scottish Tourist Board website.
The feedback that we are getting is that the number of referrals—which are not bookings, but links to a provider's website—and of resulting inquiries from the VisitScotland.com website has dropped considerably.
Can you give a reason for that? Is it the reason that I cited—that there is competition—or is there another reason for the decline since the VisitScotland.com website was set up?
I believe that the principal reason for the reduction in referrals is that the contact details are not conspicuous. The reason for the reduction in bookings is a bit more difficult to identify. Prior to the setting up of the PPP, the bookings that providers received were virtually all on-tour bookings from TICs. Advance booking was never promoted by the tourist board and never sought. The system was there, but it was rarely used—advance booking was not pushed or sold. The TICs were the source of bookings. People who were travelling would go to a TIC to get a bed for the night. The level of that kind of business appears to be dropping, although that may be because of the increased use of mobile phones, which means that people make direct calls using their phones and information from the internet. That could be why some of the sources are drying up.
I am interested in the petition and your presentation. I will pose a few questions for clarification. I have been hearing criticisms of VisitScotland.com for a long time. I myself have been criticised for raising issues about the new contract that VisitScotland entered into with another provider.
I do not believe that it can correlate that.
So 500 hits does not equate to 500 customers coming to the UK.
That is correct.
How does VisitScotland.com ensure that your business can be easily located from its website?
I do not think that there is a record-taking process that tracks someone going to my website from VisitScotland.com. I have heard of no such statistics being produced.
Providers can determine how many referrals have come to their websites via VisitScotland.com, but I do not think that VisitScotland can track that information.
Many visitors complain about the difficulty that they have in finding individual properties' websites when they go on to VisitScotland.com to find properties in Ayr, Dumfries or wherever. It is difficult to go through the process to get to the locality that they are looking for.
Typically, people who call me to seek accommodation will say something like, "At long last, I've managed to find your telephone number. It has taken me a good half a dozen tries to find it via the VisitScotland.com website."
If, at the end of the day, there is an agreement that there should be more local control of VisitScotland or some other, similar, agency, how will we ensure that the standards are adhered to? There is a vetting system and accommodation inspection by the tourism industry. Who would do that if we disposed of VisitScotland?
We are not proposing to dispose of VisitScotland. We are concerned with VisitScotland.com and the company that runs the website, eTourism, which has no remit with regard to quality control. The petition has no axe to grind in relation to quality control.
Does your petition suggest that owners of properties should be members of VisitScotland as well as the new organisation that you propose?
There are no members of VisitScotland. Since the area tourist boards were dismantled, businesses simply buy products from their local network. They participate in quality assurance work, which is delivered by the same organisation. At the moment, to be listed on the website, you have to be quality assured. That is a separate argument and is not one that I wish to take up at the moment.
There is a difficulty looming there.
If the website is simply transferred to public ownership and run by VisitScotland, the database would not change. The same businesses would be shown on the website. However, the way in which the website is run could be altered so that consumers could readily find details of the businesses. After all, that is what the consumer wants. We know, from anecdotal evidence and common sense—from speaking to our guests and to other businesses who have spoken to their guests—that many consumers want to contact the businesses directly. They do not want to go through an intermediary. It is difficult to quantify the degree to which small businesses—rather than big hotels—are being harmed because of the present arrangement, but it is significant.
I agree that most customers would want direct contact with the provider, but VisitScotland has an interest in not allowing that to happen because of the fee structure that exists.
Yes.
I have been listening with great interest, because constituents of mine have raised concerns that are similar to yours. I get a sense that you are concerned less with the form of ownership of the website and more with getting the booking system right. Would that be a fair comment?
From our understanding of the way the website is set up, we cannot see how it could be got right without its being taken out of the control of the company in question, because of the profit motive. The website is designed to collect profits from making bookings. Therefore, the company wishes to channel business through its call centre. It is not interested in transferring an inquiry to the business unless it goes through the process by which the company can extract a payment. If the customer is simply put in touch with the business, that is a loss-making call. Sometimes, the call centre does that, but only if it perceives that a booking is of low value and will be time consuming and difficult to deal with. In such circumstances, it will pass it on to get rid of it—but it will try to keep any high value bookings.
I understand that. Equally, however, as accommodation providers, you are making a profit in the process. The key for me is to do with whether you are maximising that profit because of the system. Have your bookings gone up? Are you experiencing more trade than you normally would at this time of year? Like others, I have received press releases saying that the bookings in my area are up 50 per cent, which is good news for the industry. Is that rise coming through in the form of bookings?
Like similar businesses in my region, my business has experienced a drop in occupancy levels. Not all businesses have suffered, but my experience appears to be general. I have not taken any business via visitscotland.com, nor am I on the website, because of the terms and conditions it imposed on accommodation providers at the outset.
Have you looked at comparable businesses that have used the booking facility? Have they experienced an upsurge in business as a consequence of having the one gateway?
My business takes bookings from VisitScotland.com and we have experienced a decline. The statistics that were gathered by Taylor Nelson Sofres show a small drop in the occupancy figures in Scotland this year, contrary to the statement that you have mentioned.
Alasdair Morgan has joined us and has indicated an interest in the petition.
I congratulate Alan Keith, who has been a thorn in the flesh of VisitScotland.com for some time. More positively, he has brought together a disparate, geographically wide-flung group of people. I would not have gone as far as he has in the wording of the petition because there might be substantial contractual penalties in seeking to terminate a contract early. Also, it is easy to forget how unsuccessful the Scottish Tourist Board was at getting any national system together for a substantial period.
I ask members for suggestions about how we can take the petition forward, given the amount of evidence we have received.
It is a worthwhile petition. As I have a background as an accommodation provider, I support the issues the petitioner has raised. We could get views on what the petitioners have said from VisitScotland, the Association of Scotland's Self-Caterers, the British Hospitality Association, the Federation of Small Businesses in Scotland, the Scottish Tourism Forum and the Scottish Executive. It would be good to let the petitioners see the responses from those bodies, then get feedback for the committee.
I agree with Helen Eadie. As I was in the industry once upon a time when we had the old STB, I am disappointed to hear that the situation has not improved. We never had bookings through the STB and I thought that the problem had been sorted. In honesty, I am affronted to read in the submission that a loss of £7.6 million has been created by VisitScotland. As Alasdair Morgan said, there is an underlying issue here that needs to be looked into. It may be that a committee inquiry should be undertaken into the matter.
I would like to comment on what Alasdair Morgan said. Regarding possible penalties, the company in question—the major partner, Atos Origins—effectively bailed out recently, having let its shares go at nil value. In the accounts it is stated as having written off—I believe that that is the correct interpretation of what it said—£4.4 million plus £1.25 million interest. That is what it classes as restructuring. That is private sector money, which it has lost. The loan to VisitScotland—or Tourco—of about £2.4 million is still outstanding.
That is all valuable information. We will send that, as part of the Official Report, when we write our letters to all those organisations. We will let you know what the responses are from those bodies, and we will welcome your comments on them. We will consider the matter again in due course.
I have one final point, if you will bear with me. You have referred to organisations such as the ASSC. We are a member of the Scottish Tourism Forum. I attended a meeting of the forum as a delegate. Small providers are poorly represented in any organisation. Because they are small and widely spread, there are a limited number of representatives in any organisation who will stand up and speak for them. That is why we have had such a good response—via e-mail or our database—to the petition, which has engaged so many of them. The responses that we have received in e-mails all sing the same tune.
Is there an association that would represent you more accurately, which we have not yet identified?
We are a member of the STF.
I was wondering whether there is another organisation, as we have already agreed to write to the STF. You can comment on any response that we get from the STF, which might indicate that it has not represented the minority group to which you refer. Is there another organisation to which we should write, which we have not identified but which is more representative of the types of provider you represent? If you can tell us of such an organisation, we will write to it.
A bed-and-breakfast organisation has been set up, but it is at a very early stage and it has only a small number of members—around 100. There are many local organisations in different regions that have been set up separately and are working to support accommodation providers in general or just bed and breakfasts, but most providers are not members of any of those organisations.
Okay. We will wait for responses from the organisations to which we have agreed to write and it will then be for you to comment on those responses. We will take your comments on board when we receive them, in due course. Thank you for bringing your petition this morning.
Thank you.
Succession (Scotland) Act 1964 (PE994)
Petition PE994, by Margaret McCabe, calls on the Scottish Parliament to review the Succession (Scotland) Act 1964 in relation to the statutory right of surviving children to part of the deceased's moveable estate. Campbell Martin has indicated that he is interested in the petition.
Yes, convener. The petitioner, Mrs McCabe, is in the public gallery today, supported by Sandra Denholm. The situation in which Mrs McCabe found herself because of the Succession (Scotland) Act 1964 was traumatic for her. She did not take lightly the decision to petition the Parliament; she did so in the knowledge that, whatever the outcome might be, it will not benefit her. Her situation—albeit that it was traumatic for her—has been resolved.
Do members have views on how we should respond to the petition?
I have a lot of sympathy with the petitioner, but the issue raises questions about the legal advice she and her now deceased husband received when they made the will. Why were they not advised about what the law says? It is worrying if a member of the legal profession does not give appropriate advice.
I agree with Helen Eadie. I am dismayed at the apparent lack of quality in the legal advice that was given. The 1964 act is very clear. It has been well known for many years that the law distinguishes between heritable and moveable assets. I would have thought that that was common knowledge rather than knowledge that only the legal fraternity can impart. If the lawyers have failed to make that clear, they have singularly failed the family.
Accountant in Bankruptcy (PE1008)
Our next petition is PE1008, by James Ward, who calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Executive to review the operation of the Accountant in Bankruptcy, particularly in relation to the implementation of section 187(1) of the Social Security Administration Act 1992.
The issue has excited much debate in the Enterprise and Culture Committee, which is considering the Bankruptcy and Diligence etc (Scotland) Bill. Michael Matheson and I lodged amendments on bank arrestments; his amendments covered all benefits, whereas mine covered housing benefit because I was concerned about of the threat of homelessness.
Are members happy for us to do that?
Referendum on Self-determination (PE1014)
Our next petition is PE1014, by Neil Caple, on behalf of Independence First. It calls on the Scottish Parliament to consider and debate what moves it could make to ensure the early presentation to the people of Scotland of a referendum on self-determination. Before being formally lodged, the petition was hosted on the e-petition system, where it gathered 1,333 signatures and 132 discussion comments.
First, I ask whether there is anyone here to present the petition. I note that Neil Caple wanted to make a statement to the committee. Did he subsequently say that he did not want to come along?
No. I did not ask him. The petition is straightforward and there was no requirement for him to come along and give additional information. The petition speaks for itself.
I am not challenging that. I am just asking the question because Mr Caple ticked the box on the form to show that he wanted to come and make a statement to the committee. I thought that perhaps he was ill. I did not know whether he was here.
Almost all petitioners tick the box, but I have to decide whether they are required to come and give additional information. Because Mr Caple's petition is fairly straightforward, there is no requirement for him to come and give additional information.
I was just asking for clarification. The situation has arisen on numerous occasions and I always ask why there is no one here. I accept your explanation. I might not agree with it, but it has clarified the matter for me.
I will make my position clear, Sandra, as you made yours clear. Starting next April, we will have a debate called an election. Political parties will stand for election and some of them will stand on their proposal to hold a referendum on independence. If the outcome is that those parties win, they will be able to take up the issue and debate it where it requires to be debated. However, the present Scottish Executive does not support independence. I do not see why the Parliament should use time to debate something that will be debated next April. The petition is about publicising an event that the petitioner wants to take place after the election. I think that we should let the election take place and debate the matter after that.
This might come as a surprise to you, convener, but I do not agree with you. I agree to a certain extent—I hope that the matter will be settled next May, but I hope that we will have a pro-independence majority in the Parliament at that time. With the greatest respect, you are being a wee bit disingenuous in that people do not vote only on the constitutional issue. We know that they vote on a range of issues rather than on a single issue. The petitioners are asking for all the other issues to be stripped out, leaving a simple question.
I have always believed that clarity and transparency are essential in politics, so to hear some of the disingenuous comments that have been made is quite amusing. I do not intend to debate the terms of the petition. I simply say that, at the most recent, and very democratic, opportunity that people had to voice an opinion on the matter—the general election—the share of the vote for parties supporting independence dropped substantially. That might be an uncomfortable fact, but it is a fact nonetheless. I think that we should await May with interest. In the meantime, I recommend that, as legislation in this area is reserved, and as people had an opportunity at the general election to do something about it and chose not to, we should agree to note and close the petition.
I second that. Clearly, the petitioners could lobby Westminster parliamentarians. I am never surprised—because it is the usual suspects who bring such petitions to the Parliament—that, although such people know that they could lobby Westminster members, they simply refuse to do so. Instead, they choose to use the option of petitioning the Scottish Parliament. This Parliament has powers to hold referendums on devolved matters but, as Jackie Baillie has pointed out, self-determination could be regarded as requiring a change in the constitution, so it is a matter for the United Kingdom Parliament. I whole-heartedly support what Jackie Baillie and the convener have said.
I have always supported Scotland's right to self-determination. It might well be that some kind of referendum will be held one day. The petition is quite interestingly worded, as it refers to
We know Sandra White's position. Is she going to tell us something startling—that she does not support independence?
I was going to speak to the petition. I thought that we were here to do that, rather than to grandstand. The issue will be decided at the election. I am not talking about the SNP, Labour or any other party—I am speaking to the petition. I do not even know Mr Caple. The comments of Helen Eadie and others were pretty disingenuous. The Scottish Parliament has a Public Petitions Committee and people are within their rights to bring any petition before it.
That is why we are discussing the petition.
That is why I am speaking to it. I am not grandstanding on any political issue. As Campbell Martin said, the petitioner is calling on the Parliament to
The organisation that submitted the petition is called Independence First, which hardly indicates that it takes a neutral position on the outcome of the referendum that it seeks. If it seeks a referendum, there is an opportunity for that referendum to take place following next year's election. Different political parties will have different platforms. Some will argue that a vote for them amounts to a vote for independence in a referendum and that the question of independence should be decided by the outcome of the election. The platform of some parties will be that there should be a referendum at some point in the distant future, whereas others will take the position that they are totally opposed to a referendum. At the moment, it is the will of the Parliament not to have a referendum—that has been clearly stated.
The petition is asking us to debate how we might have a referendum. I am making the practical point that Sandra White could give effect to the petitioner's wishes by having her party group request such a debate in its allocation of parliamentary time. The SNP can do that tomorrow, if it wants. The petitioner is asking us not to hold a referendum but to have a debate.
I was going to conclude on that point. At the moment, the Executive has clearly ruled out holding a referendum. Regardless of whether it is legally permissible for the Scottish Parliament to hold a referendum, the Executive has said clearly that it will not happen while it is in government.
Does that mean that we cannot get an answer on the petition?
No. Political parties in the Parliament that wish to hold a referendum could have the matter debated, but it has been made absolutely clear that the Scottish Executive will not have it debated. There is no point in our writing to the Executive in order that the Executive may tell us exactly what we already know.
I refer to the wording of the petition. It calls on the Scottish Parliament
Irrespective of the merits of any petition, the Public Petitions Committee is not a posting box that passes petitions on to others without first considering them substantially. I have made a recommendation. We should now decide what we want to do, irrespective of the Scottish Executive's view.
Jackie Baillie has recommended that we note and close the petition. I do not think that we will get any further by continuing to debate it. If we vote on Jackie's proposal, Sandra White can choose to support or not to support it. We do not need amendments to a straightforward proposal.
I do not have an amendment. What about the recommendation that I made? You could vote against that—I presume you will, anyway.
What is your recommendation?
My recommendation is to write to the Scottish Executive and ask what its legal position is on a referendum.
Okay. I think that we should deal with Jackie Baillie's proposal. If her proposal to note and close the petition has the support of the majority of the committee, that will be the committee's decision on the petition. If Jackie Baillie's proposal is not agreed to, I will then take Sandra White's proposal and we can decide whether to take the matter to the Executive.
No.
There will be a division.
For
The result of the division is: For 6, Against 3, Abstentions 0.
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Current Petitions