Equal Opportunities Committee, 02 Nov 1999

Meeting date: Tuesday, November 2, 1999

Official Report 232KB pdf

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Correspondence

We have received quite a lot of correspondence; if members are interested in looking at it, they should contact the clerks, Martin or Rodger. It includes a couple of invitations and if members are interested in those they should also contact the clerks.

Before he left, Malcolm Chisholm asked me to ask whether there had been a decision on Disability Scotland. He has been approached to chair the afternoon session of the symposium in Stirling and wants to know whether he can attend on our behalf.

Yes, I am happy with that.

A few meetings ago, when Jim Wallace came to speak to us, we agreed to send him a letter expressing concern about the handling of the consultation process and the lack of consultation. Have we had any response?

No, we have not. However, the letter did not get sent until recently. That was a hiccup on my part. As soon as I get a response, I will circulate it to members of the committee.

I should perhaps mention that I went to the Communication Workers Union conference on Saturday. The committee was asked to send someone to speak on disability and I did that.

Thank you very much.

It would be wrong for the committee to meet today without referring to the recent debate in the press about the Act of Settlement 1701 and the discrimination at the heart of it. I am raising the issue, because I want to know whether the committee should take a position on it, or whether it should be referred to the reporters group for consideration. The act represents discrimination and bigotry that is intolerable in today's society.

If the committee was going to discuss the issue, I would rather it was as an agenda item, as agendas are in the public domain. It would be unfair to discuss issues of public interest without the public's prior knowledge. I would prefer the reporters to prepare a report for the committee or for the committee to put the issue on the agenda for a future meeting so that any interested members of the public could be present. Major items are not taken as any other committee business for that very reason.

The committee agreed that the issue of sectarianism would be raised with the race reporters group. Perhaps Michael Matheson and I could discuss that at the race group's next meeting.

Are all members agreed? That is agreed.

Is there any other business?

I have a very brief report on the Women in Scotland Consultative Forum meeting that I attended yesterday. Would you prefer that in writing?

It is up to you.

I just want to get on the record the fact that a number of women MSPs—including me—attended the forum. The event was attended by more than 200 women from a range of organisations at the sharp end of working with women, particularly with women experiencing male violence. Jackie Baillie gave a presentation and Dr Fiona Mackay of the University of Edinburgh spoke on the impact of the increased number of women in the Parliament. Although women's representation in the Parliament may be high, the question is how such representation impacts on decision making.

Wendy Alexander spoke at the beginning of the afternoon and Jackie Baillie stayed for the whole day, which sent out a positive message about the organisation's importance. There were a number of workshops on issues such as violence against women, health, social inclusion and poverty, and children and families. Although I was able to attend the violence against women workshop only for a short time, to say that the discussion was lively would be an understatement.

Some issues that we might want to examine, such as disaggregated statistics, emerged from the meeting. The minister was certainly positive in her response to that problem. The committee is pursuing the matter of women in public bodies. Someone made the point that the voluntary organisation Engender carries out a gender audit and that perhaps the Government should take over such work. We might want to raise that issue with the Executive.

There was a discussion about the rights of groups to bid into the domestic abuse service development fund. Those who attended wondered whether such funding would apply only to what might be characterised as domestic violence in the home or whether organisations such as Rape Crisis and SAY Women could also apply. Jackie Baillie thought that that was a question of identifying need and making a case and that there would be no unnecessary restrictions on who could bid into the fund. However, someone made the point that this pot of money could set groups against one another. The minister said that she would consider that.

At some stage, we will need to discuss the role of the Women in Scotland Consultative Forum and how this committee and the Executive can work with it. I told the forum officials that any committee representation at forum meetings would be informal—committee members would not attend as delegates. We need to ensure that we hear what these women are saying and feed that information back to the committee.

Does the committee wish to designate a member who would attend these forum meetings?

Our small women's group felt that that would be useful.

I represented the committee at a Capability Scotland conference on the new reasonable adjustments element of the Disability Discrimination Act 1995. The main part of the conference was a presentation by some legal experts on the legality of that element; the presentation contained some practical examples of reasonable adjustments. I can pass on to Martin Verity the name of the organisation that gave the presentation, as it might be a useful point of contact for the briefings that Michael Matheson mentioned.

I think that our business is concluded. Thank you very much.

Meeting closed at 12:05.