I welcome everyone to this meeting of the Education Committee. As always, I ask people to make sure that their mobile phones and things are turned off.
In principle, I prefer to take items in public unless there is a good reason not to. From the previous discussions that we have had and given the content of the draft report, I do not think that there is any need for us to discuss the item in private.
I would prefer to consider the draft report in private.
I tend to agree with Ken Macintosh. It is a bit unfair to discuss the draft report in public because there might be differences of opinion between committee members and the advisers.
I would rather consider the item in public. There are no current issues that necessitate our discussing the draft report in private.
There is a principle at issue. It seems to me that drafting matters should be discussed in private but that policy matters should be discussed in public. Of course, the report will be made public anyway and holding the discussion in private might make for more efficiency and speed.
Although at the beginning of the session my view was that draft reports should more often than not be discussed in private, I was impressed by the way in which we did the report on the Education (Additional Support for Learning) (Scotland) Bill—that worked quite well. However, there are more contentious and political issues in the budget report. The argument for considering such items in private is that that can sometimes allow the committee to produce a more powerful report than would otherwise be the case. That is my concern. I am not sure whether the report will cause a lot of controversy, but I am inclined to hold that part of the meeting in private.
I will move that we meet in private for that item.
I register my dissent. I propose that, as happened at the end of the last budget discussion, which was held in private, we reflect at the end of the meeting on whether we needed to have the meeting in private.
Perhaps it would be worth while considering that later in the session when we have undertaken one or two meetings differently. My experience of the Social Justice Committee in the previous session was that it was helpful to consider a controversial report in private so that we could produce a more powerful report at the end of the day. I have not made up my mind totally on the issue. I think that it would be good to reflect on the matter later, but not today.
It is a good idea to reflect on the matter at some point. I, too, register my dissent at holding that part of the meeting in private today.
You are entitled to think the other way, but if members are of a mind and there is a majority in the committee in favour of considering the item in private, we will take that as a decision. I do not think that I am jumping the democratic gun. We will review our procedures at a suitable point later in the session. Is that agreed?
Members indicated agreement.