“Modern apprenticeships”
Item 6 is a section 23 report entitled “Modern apprenticeships”. We have a written submission from Skills Development Scotland. Do members have any comments?
Sorry to be the awkward one again, but I was a bit disappointed in the response that we got from Skills Development Scotland. The need to align modern apprenticeships with the Government’s priorities formed quite an important part of the report. The cabinet secretary responded to that point very well. Audit Scotland said that there was insufficient information on the priorities, but Skills Development Scotland simply says:
“SDS’s role in Modern Apprenticeships is primarily to administer the funding for training on behalf of the Scottish Government and ensure Scottish Government programme priorities are met.”
I do not think that that is enough. I am not impressed.
SDS kept telling us that the programme was demand led, but it has given us no idea of when the work will be completed. I think that the committee would be failing in its duty if we did not ask for a bit more information, rather than being fobbed off with a simple sentence such as that. I think that SDS should be doing what the Government and Audit Scotland expect it to do, and I do not think that that one sentence is good enough. I was disappointed in that.
Are there any other comments?
Has SDS answered what we asked it?
Not entirely. For example, we asked about the objectives of the modern apprenticeship programme and the relative priority of each objective. We have not been given a great deal of information on what the priorities are, and I think that more information would be helpful. We need more clarification on that. The work that SDS has undertaken with the Scottish Government to develop outcome measures and assess the long-term benefits of modern apprenticeships has been going on for some time but there is no indication of when it is going to be completed.
Did we ask about that in the letter as well?
I think that it would be helpful if SDS would tell us when that would be completed.
I apologise for missing the first session on the report—I am a bit off the pace on it. If SDS’s role is just to administer a scheme, that raises the fundamental point that that could be done in a different way rather more effectively. The feedback that I get from my part of the world is that SDS is a top-down, bureaucratic organisation that does not add value to a really good programme that is delivering, right across Scotland, as many modern apprenticeships as we want. I think that there are better ways to do things, but this is probably not the occasion on which to raise that subject.
I am with Mary Scanlon, in that I think that there was a fairly woeful answer in response to the objectives point. Frankly, if SDS is just an administrator, I think that there are better ways to do that job and achieve an awful lot more for public money in the ways that we want.
Not only did SDS not answer the first question, but it did not answer the third one, which was a significant question that asked about
“who is responsible for acting on and reporting concerns about training provider performance”.
I brought along Audit Scotland’s report, which states on page 34:
“There are no equivalent independent reviews of the quality of training provided by other (including private) training providers”.
The report states that there are concerns about apprenticeship assessments. However, I think that SDS chose to bypass that issue as well.
I am not impressed and I do not think that we got the information that we asked for. The information that we got certainly does not take modern apprenticeships any further forward.
Can we agree to seek further information? We will write to SDS for some of it and to the accountable officer in the Scottish Government. We will probably need more information and clarification on what the priorities are. We could also ask when the work on developing the outcome measures on the long-term benefits will be completed.
There is also the point about training provider performance.
Sorry—yes.
Those matters were all picked up in the letter to SDS, which I think was right. However, can we set this in context? The “Modern Apprenticeships” report was one of the most positive reports that we have seen from the Auditor General about the performance of Skills Development Scotland. That is the context that we should recognise.
We are simply writing to ask for clarification. No other comments will be associated with that at this stage.
Is that agreed?
Members indicated agreement.
“Managing early departures from the Scottish public sector”
Agenda item 7 is consideration of the section 23 report “Managing early departures from the Scottish public sector”, which is a joint report by the Auditor General and the Accounts Commission. Members have the written submission from the Scottish Government. Do members have any comments?
Yes. I have a number of observations to make, which I would welcome clarification on. The first is about confidentiality clauses. Clearly, there is an issue about the growing use of confidentiality clauses in recent years by the Scottish Government, particularly in the NHS. The Cabinet Secretary for Health and Wellbeing has finally acted to stop the use of those clauses, but that applies only to the NHS.
Confidentially clauses are used throughout the public sector. I will give some figures. Since 2007 the police have used 203 compromise agreements at a cost of £2 million; Scottish Government directorates had 173 such arrangements at a cost of £3.5 million; and local authorities had more than 10,000 at a cost of £32 million. I would be interested know whether the Government’s intention is to apply the rules about confidentiality clauses to those bodies or simply to the NHS.
The Scottish Government letter to the chief executives of Scottish public bodies has, in annex E, a list of the bodies that are covered by the revised reporting arrangements, which includes the Scottish Police Authority and the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service, but not Police Scotland, the universities—which have used confidentiality clauses widely—or the Scottish Government itself and its direct agencies.
There is an issue in the guidance around the difference between
“voluntary resignation secured by a financial consideration”
and a settlement arrangement. On page 3 of the letter, paragraph 1, which starts
“The proposed process is as follows”,
has a sentence further down that is italicised within brackets and which says:
“(N.B. These materials may also be used to submit cases for voluntary resignation secured by a financial consideration”—
that is, paying somebody off to retire—
“however the reporting arrangements do not apply to voluntary resignation).”
The unnumbered paragraph after paragraph 7 states that
“voluntary resignation with a financial consideration ... must be approved”,
but it does not look like—it is difficult to be clear about this from how it is written—such cases have to be reported to Parliament. The next paragraph states that they should be reported to Parliament only “as required”.
Settlement agreements now have to be reported to Parliament, but it seems that voluntary resignations with a pay-off do not have to be reported to Parliament. That strikes me as a bit odd, to put it mildly. I would like further clarification on all my points, if that is possible.
11:45
Members should note the statement on page 5 of the letter, which says:
“The presumption against inclusion of confidentiality clauses in settlement agreements also applies to other public bodies. To this end we will develop, in consultation with public bodies, a draft optional confidentiality clause which should only be inserted on the request of either party ... and then explicitly agreed with both parties”.
It states that that is going to be developed, but the point is that last year the cabinet secretary issued guidance on confidentiality clauses that was not followed. I think that every compromise agreement, with the possible exception of one, included a confidentiality clause. I suggest that it will take quite a robust intervention to end the practice. People talk about it as if it is a historical practice that has been around for ages or has always been around, but the point is that its use is growing and has grown remarkably in recent years. I think that it will take explicit action in each sector to stop it growing, as happened in the NHS. A petition was presented to Parliament that highlighted its misuse, and I think that stopping its growing use will take more than just suggesting that there is a
“presumption against inclusion of confidentiality clauses”.
That is not working so far.
I understand where Ken Macintosh is coming from on some of this, but the way in which some organisations are incorporated and organised—the universities, for example—means that there is no mechanism by which the Scottish Government can enforce rules about confidentiality clauses without introducing primary legislation. They are a different type of body and are not part of the public sector—or at least they do not consider themselves to be public sector bodies. That is the wider context.
I also understand where Ken Macintosh is coming from with regard to the unnumbered paragraph following paragraph 7 of the letter. However, does the Parliament really want to know about
“the voluntary resignation of an employee outwith any ... scheme”?
I am not sure that, as a parliamentarian, I want to know about that. That is just the normal voluntary process.
I would want to know about voluntary resignations with a pay-off.
Yes, but that is not what the paragraph says. It says that
“the voluntary resignation of an employee outwith any existing ... scheme must be approved”
by the head of department and the Scottish Government finance business partner. My point is that I do not think that the Parliament needs to know about such matters.
Further on, the Government’s letter refers to
“the number of Settlement Agreements entered into across the Scottish Administration and the costs involved”
and says that
“The Scottish Government will not, however, disclose the terms or circumstances”.
of those cases. The Scottish Government will disclose information about voluntary resignations with costs only “as required”. My question is: as required by whom?
I get that point.
The point is that if you do not know that something is going on, how can you ask about it?
Can we seek clarification on the points raised by Ken Macintosh? We can come back to the committee with the response. Is that agreed?
Members indicated agreement.
Thanks for that. We now move into private session.
11:48 Meeting continued in private until 12:07.Previous
Public Audit Committee Report