European and External Relations Committee, 02 Mar 2004

Meeting date: Tuesday, March 2, 2004

Official Report 288KB pdf

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Item in Private

Good afternoon. I welcome everyone to the fifth meeting this year of the European and External Relations Committee. Apologies have been received from Irene Oldfather. As yet, no substitute members have said that they will attend.

Agenda item 1 is to ask the committee to agree to take item 7 in private at the end of the meeting.

I do not see why we should.

If you hold on a second, I will clarify what item 7 is about.

Item 7 relates to the committee's trip to Barcelona to participate in the network of regional parliamentary European committees. As members are aware, two committees are currently members of NORPEC: the Scottish Parliament's European and External Relations Committee and our equivalent committee in Catalonia. The purpose of the visit is to consider the future of NORPEC. As the only matter for discussion today is the travel arrangements and so on, it might be worth while considering the item in private. That is why item 1 has been put on the agenda. Does anyone have any objections?

Considering agenda item 7 in private would put the committee in a bad light if the travel arrangements were seen to be questionable. Taking items in private is against the Parliament's policy; the idea is to have as much as possible in the open. Our travel arrangements will make the news only if we try to hide them from the public.

I have considerable sympathy with Phil Gallie's point. In general, the Parliament's committees should meet in public. I have been a persistent complainer about two committees—the Parliamentary Bureau and the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body—that never meet in public. We have seen how the SPCB got itself into one hell of a mess over the Holyrood project, which was partly as a result of holding private secret meetings behind closed doors. Like Phil Gallie, I do not see anything private about our travel arrangements to Barcelona. To be consistent, I would have to support Phil Gallie if the matter came to a vote.

I have no intention of putting the question to a vote. Anyone else who has a strong view either way should speak now.

Some committees follow a convention in this regard and, given that the matter concerns only travel arrangements, we would not have had to include it on the agenda at all if we had wanted to hide anything. The purpose of the visit is on the record; all that remains to be discussed are the travel arrangements. I am happy to do so on the record, if members want to do so.

Thank you, convener.