Procedures Committee, 26 Jun 2001

Meeting date: Tuesday, June 26, 2001

Official Report 185KB pdf

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Joint Committee Meetings

Agenda item 2 concerns the implications of a recent joint meeting of the Justice 1 Committee and Justice 2 Committee, which had to be cancelled because of quorum problems. That caused a degree of adverse comment in the press.

I think that we should commission the directorate of clerking and reporting to analyse the issues and make some recommendations about how we might deal with such circumstances in the future. In particular, I would like to consider the quorum of joint committee meetings and the circumstances in which committees move from formal session to informal session. An issue of confidentiality arose in the case of the meeting of the justice committees, with the result that people who were seated in the public gallery—I do not know how many there were—had to be cleared from the meeting. I would also like to consider the Official Report of joint sessions because, once the meeting stopped being a joint committee meeting and became a joint informal committee briefing, the opportunity to have an Official Report of proceedings was lost.

There may be other issues that do not immediately occur to me, but I thought that we should commission an issues paper in the first instance. That will allow us to examine those aspects of the problem that are highlighted by officials and to think laterally about the implications of what is drawn to our attention.

Assuming that members agree to commission an issues paper, I am happy for other points that may occur to members about the implications of that meeting to be included in the short list that I just gave.

I agree with your view, convener.

Have you spoken to or heard from the conveners of the Justice 1 Committee or the Justice 2 Committee?

No. Although there has been time for the conveners to reply to my letters, I have not received a reply from either of them. To be fair, that is probably due to pressure of work.

I do not think that the issues have arisen specifically from the work of the Justice 1 Committee and the Justice 2 Committee, although it is clear that those two committees are among the committees that are most likely to meet jointly. Broad procedural issues are involved and I am keen to receive the views of the Justice 1 Committee and Justice 2 Committee conveners in the fullness of time. As far as I know, they are the only conveners who have been through such an episode and I have no doubt that they will have views about it.

How often do those committees meet jointly? What is the purpose of such joint meetings? Is it to set the committees' agendas or to discuss work load?

I can clarify that the joint meeting on 1 May was held for the Justice 1 Committee and Justice 2 Committee to consider the budget process. Although those committees split the work load of the Justice and Home Affairs Committee, both committees decided that it was the duty of all MSPs to scrutinise the Executive's budget and that therefore members of both committee should come together to undertake that specific task. Apart from that, I am not sure whether the committees meet on an ad hoc basis.

It is possible that the two committees hold joint meetings to set their agendas and to discuss work sharing issues.

I am not prejudging whether the quorum should be counted as a quorum of the joint membership or whether the quorum of each committee should be counted separately. I expect that that issue will be raised and that we will discuss it.

I should point out that there are opportunities for joint committee meetings, although those opportunities have not been heavily used. It is important that we cover the theoretical possibility of a joint meeting between the Transport and the Environment Committee and the Rural Development Committee at which issues to do with environmental pollution and agriculture could be discussed. For example, those committees are discussing holding a joint investigation into fish farming, and there is scope for joint meetings. We must clarify the circumstances in which joint meetings take place. We must also consider the fallback position. If we decide to insist that each committee's quorum must be met, what happens to business if there is a quorum of one committee but not of the other committee? Should that business be lost? Should people be sent away?

I want to examine the whole process, because it is clear that the Parliament did not look good as a result of that episode. We must be careful to manage the process better in future, if we can.

Will the issues paper consider the work load of the Justice 1 Committee and the Justice 2 Committee? I do not know whether that falls within our remit.

I am not keen to consider the committees' work load. We will consider the procedures for joint meetings, and I would be reluctant to consider work load unless those committees suggested that issue to us.

You mentioned that the committees met jointly to discuss a specific piece of business. That sounded odd to me. The reason for creating two justice committees was that the Justice and Home Affairs Committee was overburdened and overworked, but holding joint meetings defeats that purpose, as the Justice 1 Committee and the Justice 2 Committee will have to get together to discuss an aspect of the Parliament's work.

That is in the nature of things such as the budget, which applies to the work of a whole department. Both the Justice 1 Committee and the Justice 2 Committee could be involved in budget scrutiny. The handling of legislation or investigation of the justice system could be allocated to one committee, but we would not argue that only one committee should consider budgetary issues. Gil Paterson raises a much broader issue than the one that we are considering. As I have said, I am keen that we should focus not on the relationship between the Justice 1 Committee and the Justice 2 Committee, but on the relationship between committee A and committee B in the event of a joint meeting being held.

There have been other joint meetings of committees, none of which ended up in the situation that has been described. Early in the session we considered the Public Finance and Accountability (Scotland) Bill, which involved the Finance Committee and the Audit Committee meeting jointly. They did not have any difficulties, but they could have had. I am happy to go along with the recommendation.

The recommendation is that we commission an issues paper and reconsider the matter in the fullness of time. Are members happy with that?

Members indicated agreement.