Health Committee, 20 Apr 2004

Meeting date: Tuesday, April 20, 2004

Official Report 124KB pdf

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Annual Report

For item 3, I refer members to paper HC/S2/04/10/2, which has been circulated. Under standing order 12.9, each committee must report to Parliament its activities in each parliamentary year. The required figures in paragraphs 10 and 12 of the paper will be inserted once we have completed the year.

We will go through the paper in the usual way—paragraph by paragraph. I take it that paragraph 1 is fine and is signed off. Members' silence about paragraphs 2 and 3 indicates assent. Paragraphs 4, 5, 6 and 7—which all present facts—and paragraphs 8, 9 and 10 are also agreed to.

I know that concern has been expressed about the number of Scottish statutory instruments that the committee is seeing, so I asked for a comparison with the SSI figures from the former Health and Community Care Committee. At the same stage in the previous session, that committee had received 84 SSIs, whereas we have had 110. That figure is not within our control, of course. At the same stage, that committee had received 24 petitions, whereas we have had 30. We are slightly ahead, but such figures seem to be a Health Committee burden.

The number of petitions is a matter for the Public Petitions Committee. If we feel that we are receiving too many, we could make representations to that committee's convener to refer petitions elsewhere if other committees are not as burdened. However, sometimes a petition's subject makes it extremely difficult to refer it elsewhere.

I understand that we want to be as positive as we can about how busy the committee has been, but the overemphasis on SSIs and petitions, which take—

Unfortunately, Duncan, SSIs are not within our control. That matter should be taken up with the minister.

Can we just count up the numbers? It would take 10 minutes.

What else would the Public Petitions Committee do with petitions on health issues but send them here?

I agree. I just thought that I would be helpful and show how things were running this year in comparison with last year. Perhaps I was taking a hostage to fortune.

Are members content with paragraph 11, which deals with petitions?

Members indicated agreement.

Are members content with paragraph 12?

I am content with the first two sentences and the last sentence of paragraph 12, but I feel that the rest of the paragraph is opinion. I would rather stick to the facts.

The rest of paragraph 12 reads:

"In the vast majority of cases, items were considered in private because they related to consideration of draft papers, or because individuals who could be identified were being discussed".

I thought that that was a matter of fact.

I disagree: it is a matter of opinion. The first two sentences and the last sentence of paragraph 12 are a matter of fact; the sentence that you quoted is a matter of opinion.

Perhaps we could put in a comment that the committee considered that the items

"related to consideration of draft papers"

and so on. It was a committee decision.

No. The committee decided to move into private session. In the sentences that you quoted, an opinion is being expressed that I certainly do not agree with. In this factual report to Parliament, I am quite happy to say that the committee met so many times; that

"One meeting was held entirely in private";

and that so many were held partly in private; and that

"All the formal meetings were held in Edinburgh."

Those are facts. The other statements in paragraph 12 are not facts. They are opinions, and I do not agree with them.

I do not want to get into a discussion about semantics with you, Mike, but I will have to. On occasions when the committee went into private session, either we were or were not discussing draft papers or either we were or were not discussing individuals as "possible witnesses". That is not a matter of opinion; it is a matter of fact. However, I am in the committee's hands about what we do with this sentence. I do not want to go to the wall over it.

I think that it is a matter of fact. We should just accept that that is what we have done.

In the end, it was a committee decision. Mike Rumbles has made it clear that he wants absolutely everything to be held in public.

I have never said that.

You have more or less said that.

I ask members to speak through the chair, not to each other.

Unless Mike Rumbles puts his name to it, I say that all committee members have their say about an issue and then make a decision as a committee. That is a matter of fact.

Can anyone propose other wording?

We could include the phrase "for reasons that were agreed by the majority of the committee". Would that be a statement of fact, Mike?

Yes—I am content with that.

So are we suggesting that the sentence should read "In the vast majority of cases, for reasons that were agreed by a substantial majority of the committee with one dissenter, papers were considered in private"? The report will then show that you dissented alone, Mike. Are you happy with that?

I am happy with the form of words that Duncan McNeil just set out. I am not happy with—

I am afraid that the phrase "the majority of the committee" might suggest that there was a four-five split in the committee when in fact only one member dissented. It is important to highlight that.

But you can look up the Official Report. Am I missing something here?

I will not go to the wall on this matter; I do not care. We will just put "the majority of the committee".

I suggest that we put "for reasons that were agreed by the majority of the committee".

Okay—that paragraph is dealt with.

Before we leave the matter, I want to make one comment. I certainly do not wish to be rude—or to be perceived to be rude—to the convener or any other committee member. However, when we move into private session, I will not remain in the meeting because, for the reasons that I outlined earlier, I feel very uncomfortable about participating in closed meetings. I want to ensure that no one feels that I am trying to insult anyone and that no one misunderstands my motives.

Do I take it that you do not intend to sit through any of the committee's private sessions?

Not today.

With respect, I think that you have a duty to the committee and your position on the committee to take part in the committee's proceedings. However, that is a matter for you.

It is indeed, convener.

I want to put it on record that when the committee makes its decisions the rest of us are generally temperate about them. Sometimes we like decisions and sometimes we do not but, to be quite frank, members should sit through proceedings on which the majority of the committee have decided.

As with most matters, convener, you are entitled to your opinion, as I am entitled to mine.

I seek clarification, because I do not understand why Mike Rumbles is taking such a stance only for today. Surely such a stance would apply every time the committee was in private session. That will have issues for the committee's work load and it raises a question about our being minus one committee member for parts of the meeting. The rest of the committee really has a right to know about the implications.

May I reply, convener?

Yes—you certainly have the right to reply.

Shona Robison is absolutely right—it appears that she has misunderstood what I have said in committee this afternoon. What I have been trying to do, as constructively as I can, is comment on the agenda. On today's agenda, item 4 is a private paper from the convener on the work force planning committee event. Item 5 is, in effect, a budget process briefing and item 6 is consideration of possible witnesses for the Breastfeeding etc (Scotland) Bill. If we want to discuss those items in private none of them should be on the agenda.

I would be very happy to come to a meeting that was not a committee meeting of the Parliament. The standing orders state that committee meetings of the Parliament should be in public. I would be happy to come along to a briefing session at which no decisions were being taken. My concern—and the point that Shona Robison is making—is that we are perhaps taking decisions in private that are not available to be understood by the public. It states clearly in the standing orders that Parliament should be open and transparent. The whole point of that is that we should be accountable, in open session, for the decisions that we take.

I am only one member of the committee, and I have tried to make the points as constructively as I can. I have not had support—I understand fully that people have different views from mine. I am not trying to force my opinion on anyone else, but I am trying to make the point that no committee meeting of the Parliament should be having such briefing sessions because it sends out the wrong message to the people to whom the Parliament belongs.

Before Duncan McNeil comes in, I want to make a distinction between informal briefings and the kind of briefing session that we are discussing. Informal briefings—which, I have to say, are not always well attended—are very different from this kind of briefing session, at which the committee will be required to take decisions that will bind it. It is different from simple knowledge gathering. The purpose of the kind of briefing session that we will have today is to inform the committee on how it should progress the committee's work and where it requires expert advice. That is very different from what Mike Rumbles referred to—there are two types of briefing session. Unless Duncan McNeil feels an urgent need to contribute now, I do not want to prolong the debate. What we are doing is nothing unusual for committees, certainly not to the extent that we require to address it as a foundation for the work ahead.

I will not prolong the debate, but I have a couple of points to make. I suggest something slightly different from Mike Rumbles, which is that the committee could have a briefing session to address some of those matters, and then go into a formal session that would allow it to have a brief discussion and a vote. We are all concerned that the committee's debates should be open and accountable. The committee can perhaps discuss, in a briefing session, how it can overcome a situation that bogs it down in every meeting. I accept that Mike Rumbles feels strongly about the issue, but every meeting of the committee is dominated by it. It does not serve anybody well, and the committee needs to resolve it.

I would also say—now that I am on my horse—that different arguments have been put up for each of today's sessions. I am a bit disappointed that Mike Rumbles takes the blanket view and will not be present for any of the sessions. He made half a point when he talked about the committee's discussion in private of public events—that irks me a wee bit, too—but he seems to take a different position on other issues. I ask him to consider which of today's private sessions he could stay for, and I ask the convener to set up some sort of informal session in the near future in order to allow the committee to get to the heart of the matter and to overcome some of its problems.

As I have made plain, there are different kinds of briefing sessions. In today's more formal sessions we are required to make decisions. Having been on the committee that piloted the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Bill, no one could be keener on openness and accountability than I am. Heaven forfend that a parliamentary committee should not be open and accountable. However, there are issues that constrain the committee and which would even imperil some of its work. The committee would not particularly want ears in the Executive to hear about the committee's methods when the committee is holding the Executive to account. Those are the reasons behind our proceeding in private. I therefore conclude the debate. That completes our business in public—we now move into private session.

Meeting continued in private until 16:49.