European and External Relations Committee, 01 Feb 2005

Meeting date: Tuesday, February 1, 2005

Official Report 139KB pdf

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Convener's Report

We have had a helpful response from the European Commission to the committee's report on the fisheries control agency. The report, written by Mr Alasdair Morrison, appears to have been welcomed in many circles, which comes as a surprise to none of us. I point out to members that, tomorrow morning, there will be a vote in the European Parliament Fisheries Committee on Elspeth Attwooll's report on the fisheries control agency. I am sure that you will all be tuned into those proceedings but, in case you are not, the clerks will inform you of the upshot of the discussion.

The response is a good example of the open and constructive dialogue that can be entered into with the Commission on matters such as the fisheries control agency. We should use that example as a model for taking forward other projects in the future.

We also need to monitor what happens and ensure that the nice words and good intentions are substantiated by actions. We will await the outcome of tomorrow's vote and track subsequent events.

We have before us a letter from Mr McCabe, the Minister for Finance and Public Service Reform, who also has responsibility for EU matters. It addresses a number of points that were raised when he appeared before the committee on 7 December.

The letter contains a fascinating series of organograms. If members can understand them, they will be doing a great deal better than me. He has addressed a variety of other points about EU enlargement, the Nordic Council and the G8 website, which will be of material influence in our next inquiry.

Do members want to raise any points about Mr McCabe's reply?

The letter from Tom McCabe is not very revealing. On EU enlargement, he almost says that it is impossible to establish the number of EU citizens who have come to Scotland. I find that difficult to believe. Not all that long ago, the First Minister announced a major initiative, the fresh talent initiative. How on earth can the committee monitor the success or otherwise of the fresh talent initiative unless we get some facts and figures, such as the ones for which we asked? It might be difficult to get an accurate figure for the number of EU citizens who have come to Scotland, but surely there is some way of getting an estimate of the number of people in that category.

Secondly, we expressed interest in the Executive's links with the Nordic Council. What are we told? The Nordic Council had a nice junket at Edinburgh Castle, followed by a dinner. That is all very well for those who were invited. The letter states:

"Executive ministers and officials participated in the event".

I am not sure whether they participated in the seminary or just the associated celebrations.

Seminary?

If they participated in the seminary, things are happening that the rest of us have not heard about it.

The seminar, rather. We should try to get more detail about the Executive's links with the Nordic Council in respect of political matters of mutual concern.

Are there any other comments on the minister's reply?

I represented the British-Irish Inter-Parliamentary Body at the Nordic Council meeting at the beginning of December in Stockholm. A copy of my report is available on the external liaison unit part of the Parliament's website. The report has interesting points to make about the Nordic Council and the direction in which it is looking, which at the moment is not particularly this way—it is looking more towards the Baltic than in this direction.

I can see what Dennis Canavan is driving at in his first point, but I do not know how anybody can reasonably be expected to get those figures, unless we start asking EU citizens where they are going when they arrive in the UK, or have Scottish border posts, which I do not think anybody wants.

My goodness. It has not taken us long to get there.

Seriously, how could it be done?

There is a genuine point in the first issue that Mr Canavan raised, which is how we judge the success or otherwise of an initiative—the fresh talent initiative—that is designed to encourage people to come to Scotland. We can certainly write to Mr McCabe again. The committee might want to delve into the matter and determine how we can get a handle on the figures. I am with John Home Robertson, in that I do not have a ready answer on how that could be done, but there must be a mechanism to enable us to judge whether we are making progress. I am happy for us to write to Mr McCabe on that question and to seek further information on the Nordic Council. I suspect that there will be more detail about the Nordic Council in parliamentary questions that have been answered, which I have before me. I will ask the clerks to make the answers to the parliamentary questions available to members so that they can make a judgment on what further information is required.

The final point is that the committee is undertaking a trip to EU institutions on 28 February and 1 March. As was discussed last week, one day will focus on the Commission's work priorities and a number of relevant subjects within that, and the second part of the visit will focus on the representation of Scotland in Europe and on the European Parliament. The final programme will be issued to members on 22 February. The clerks can resolve any operational details.