Agenda item 7 is our annual report. Members have a copy of our draft annual report for the parliamentary year from 11 May 2011 to May 2012, which is paper J/S4/12/19/3. Do members have any comments? I remind you that we are still in public.
I have a comment on the absence of any specific comment—
You have the wrong paper. The one that we are looking at is white.
Yes, I know—sorry.
It is all right. We are all with you there, Rod. It has been a long haul.
As far as I can recall, there is an absence of any specific paragraph that deals with human rights. In the light of some public controversy about that, it might be appropriate if we mentioned the committee’s human rights work.
Absolutely. The committee would probably agree with that. I do not prickle easily, but I rather prickled at the comments that have been made about this committee not taking into account human rights. We will put something in and get back to you. We will extend the report and generalise it.
I have a comment on another matter.
We are finished on that point, so we will move on to the next one, which is from Graeme Pearson.
We spent some time discussing deaths abroad and the impact of fatal accident inquiries. I made contact with you, convener, about a response from the Government on the timetable that it has mentioned in previous years. Would it be appropriate to put a paragraph in the report that says that we have discussed the issue and that we are keen to get that response? Is it there? Have I missed it?
We could put something about that in paragraph 21.
Reference is made to the issue in the third line of paragraph 20.
We could say that we want more clarity about the timetable, because there is an existing rule in Parliament—it might be a protocol; I do not know—that if the Government is to introduce legislation on an issue, neither a committee nor members can do anything on it. Therefore, we would like more of a timetable.
That would draw a comment from the Government; it would indicate that we are not leaving the issue alone but are coming back to it. I would be grateful for the inclusion of something along those lines.
We might also want to say—I will take guidance on this—that we are finding it hard to do any inquiries because of the amount of legislation that we are having to deal with, and that we would like some space to hold some short inquiries. We appreciate that the Government has an obligation in regard to legislation, but we can put down a marker in our report—as previous committees have done—that we might find it extremely hard to fit in an inquiry before the session comes to an end, given that it is not possible to get much done in the final year of a session. Would members like to include such a remark?
Is that not an issue that you should raise in the Conveners Group?
Raising it in the Conveners Group makes no odds because, at the end of the day, it is the Parliamentary Bureau that puts the stuff in front of us. Having too much legislation to deal with has been a huge issue for the Justice Committee over the years. I think that we should keep making the point.
I agree with Alison McInnes that the issue should perhaps be raised in another forum. As I understand it, the purpose of an annual report is to go over what a committee has done during the year. Although we have been pressed for time to do our own inquiries, we have done some good stuff on female offending, in particular, and we might do something on the work of speech and language therapists with young offenders.
Where is that?
There is a bit in the report on our inquiry into female offending, but my point is that—
I am sorry to interrupt, but the report covers the period up to 10 May 2012, whereas our session with speech and language therapists took place in the current year. I understand what you are saying, but our report covers the period from 11 May 2011 until 10 May 2012.
I agree, but what I am saying is that, as a newbie on the committee—along with quite a few other members—
You are not a newbie any more—you are experienced.
I might not have got the balance right, but I assume that the scrutiny of Government legislation forms a large part—if not the primary aspect—of our role.
The committees have a dual purpose—they act as standing committees and as select committees. It has always been difficult for particular committees to find space to do inquiries. In its legacy report, the previous Justice Committee moaned about the issue.
My point is that the implication of doing that is that we would be saying that we would like to have more time for our own work at the expense of having time to scrutinise Government legislation; perhaps you are saying to the Government, “Don’t legislate so much.”
I think that the Government could take its foot off the pedal a wee bit occasionally; it is desperate—
That is not the type of message that I would like to give out. The Parliament is here to make legislation.
I can see that I am dissenting from the Government position, as usual. If you do not want such a comment to be included in the report, we will not put it in. I have put my view on the record, even if we do not put it in the report.
I do not think that the issue is about dissenting or not dissenting; it is about whether we should be making legislation, regardless of who is in government.
Can we look forward to an SNP split?
The committees were seen as a counterbalance to the Government because, apart from the Opposition, there is no other check and balance to hold the Government to account. We perform that role during the legislative process, but there was also supposed to be space for committees to do their own thing—I am not talking only about the Justice Committee—and we must not let that role erode over time, whoever is in government. I say that to Graeme Pearson.
I am on your side.
Oh dear. I am worried.
I do not disagree with you, convener.
Could we put in a line to say that the pressure of legislation makes things difficult? Can I coax you to agree with that? I am missing Lewis Macdonald, who is good at wooing.
I do not know whether you need to coax me, convener. However, I remind you that we recently solicited a piece of work regarding unfulfilled work of the Scottish Law Commission, which would suggest that we want more legislation. It is a question of striking the right balance, and it is perhaps also about making more time available and the competing demands of other—
It is about finding space for us. If we decide to introduce a committee bill, it will be us doing it and not the Government. It is a question of what we have time to do.
Sorry, convener, can I go back to the annual report, please? That is what we are discussing.
Yes.
Can you clarify whether there is anything in paragraphs 15 or 16 that says that we held the informal meeting with the UK bill of rights team? That should be mentioned, whether or not the term “evidence session” is used.
Yes. I am happy to put that in, and we will extend it to cover the way in which we deal with all legislation that comes before us. The claim was that, when we consider in the round all the material that comes before us, human rights are somehow not just parked but dismissed. I was pretty cross about that claim, because members of the committee pay due attention to human rights. We should include the informal evidence session that some of us attended, but we should also mention the generality of how we deal with the issue in relation to all the legislation that comes before us.
Sorry, convener. Perhaps I have not been clear. I think that the report should say that we met the bill of rights team.
Yes. We are going to say that.
Okay. Good.
Am I right that members do not want to include anything about the committee being pushed for time to do our own thing?
I am not dead against that. I was just making the point.
Margaret Mitchell has been waiting to get in.
I am grateful to you for allowing me to do so. I am only substituting today, but I was previously a member of the Justice Committee, and throughout the current and previous sessions of Parliament, regardless of which party has been in power, there has always been tremendous pressure on previous Justice Committees to be legislative machines and to consider large amounts of legislation. Two crucial things have therefore not been given the priority that they should have had. The first is post-legislative scrutiny. I do not know whether the committee has carried out any of that yet. It is crucial, but it is one function of the committee that is not given the attention and time that it should get. The Parliamentary Bureau should recognise that when it decides which committees will consider bills.
I agree. Margaret Mitchell and I have both been conveners, and we have both been here for a while. What concerns me is that, over the past 13 years, the balance has shifted and the committees have less time to do their own thing.
I bow to your greater experience.
We will certainly put in something about human rights, and also something about trying to get a balance to enable the committee to do some of its own work. Whether we decide to do a committee bill or an inquiry, we need to have time to do it. That is work that we are supposed to do. We will e-mail the wording to members sometime today.
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