The last item on the agenda is the written agreements with the Scottish Executive. The draft agreement and minister's letter have been circulated. if members have those in front of them, I would like to go through them on a paragraph-by-paragraph basis.
Do we want to look at the letter first?
Right, let us start with the letter.
I want to raise the point about large capital project. The minister says that he takes
Well, it does not, really.
Surely the letter refers to dealing with an extremely large budget which runs into hundreds of millions of pounds. In such cases, £3 million is a relatively small proportion. However, if a department has a small budget of £5 million for example, £3 million is a huge proportion. Surely that is what that part of the minister's letter means.
No, I do not think so. He says:
I beg your pardon, convener, but before we discuss the details of this, can I ask your guidance on what happens in areas of continued disagreement? There are a number of issues, some of which we will go through, on which the committee disagrees with the Executive, or disagreed previously. They have not been changed, and, having read the agreement, I do not agree with the statement that 98 per cent of them are unchanged now. What do we do about that? Where do find resolution?
We can, despite the time limits, raise such issues next week, as the minister will be at the meeting. If we continue to have disagreement after that, the answer to that is that I am not sure.
I think that it would be unsatisfactory to go on from the budget to issues of disagreement next week. We should do one thing at a time. We may have to invite the minister to come on another occasion, before we go into recess.
Before we go into recess?
If he wants the things agreed.
He does. It depends how strongly we feel about points in the draft agreement. Let us go through the letter first, and then look at the agreement itself. We will see how strongly we feel about the issues and find out if there are points of substantial difference.
I do not think that it is clear, but I think that the minister is trying to be helpful, to be fair to him. It is just a question of whether we want to specify a figure lower than £3 million as being large. That is what it comes down to. I am open about it—£3 million is a fairly arbitrary figure.
To be fair, it is difficult to come to a definition. If we want to define a large variation in a variable budget, that enters the realms of deciding whether it is, say, 0.5 per cent of the budget. Formulations of that sort do not work in these situations. I do not think that we can add much, to be honest.
So you think that we should leave it at £3 million?
If we cannot find a better figure. I can think of projects in the great scheme of things which had a value of £27 million. That figure would be relatively modest in the context of a large budget. What is £27 million of capital project in the context of a health budget of £3 billion or £4 billion?
I do not really think that this is an issue, convener. We can put this in the context of the budget head within which it lies.
I do not imagine that our legitimate line of inquiry will be thwarted because a figure happens not to pass a test of £3 million.
We will leave that, then.
The minister seems to have been very co-operative on the format of budget bills' supporting documentation.
I take a different view.
What?
I am on the paragraph at the top of page 3.
The sentence starting
Sorry?
The paragraph goes over from page 2 to page 3.
The minister says that
It is not clear to me what is meant by the information being "made available separately." Do you understand what that means? It could just mean producing another document. I am referring to the last sentence of the paragraph on the format of budget bills' supporting documentation, on page 3 of the letter. That does not say that the information should not be made available; it says that it should be made available separately.
I will express this point as constructively as I can, but it is misleading to produce a budget document in cash terms. The first question that any person asks is, "How much has health spending increased?"
Well, it says
Yes, but the problem comes in making the information available separately. We would then have two volumes of financial documents. I would like us to look at the health budget, for example, for the last financial year and the next financial year in both cash terms and real terms. It is like wallpaper: it is fundamental to what you look at on the wall. We would not have that if there is a different document—not just an appendix but a different document—for the real-terms figures. If we did that, we would be doing nothing to raise the quality of debate and nothing for the public.
I agree with John Swinney and Andrew Wilson on this. It is quite clear: the information will be made available to us separately. In the previous sentence, the minister says that
I did not read the letter in that way. It was not my understanding that the public would get certain information and the committee would get information beyond that. I would not be happy if that were the case.
It would also be unacceptable if there were two public documents—the cash-terms document and the real-terms document.
I disagree. It would be acceptable to have two public documents. One would be a summary of the budget proposals for people who wanted to see only the general trends; they could pick it up without having to go into detail. The document containing the breakdown that we would be looking for would include information from the shorter document; it would be left for anoraks to pore over that rather than—
That is my reading too. We can ask the Minister for Finance about the documents next week, but I assumed that they would be the equivalent of the budget document and the red book, which is another public document. If a document is available to the Finance Committee, it will be available to everyone.
We have two lads, John Swinney and Ken Macintosh, setting out the stalls of the two opposing arguments. We need to ensure that we produce a single document that any organisation can pick up—they will all want to look at the document in Scotland—or that any person can go into the library to read. The red book is extremely complex and takes in taxation statistics and so on, which we do not want. We are talking the same money—the document must be produced for public consumption and it must deal with real-terms spending.
Will committee members be satisfied so long as the documentation is provided publicly?
Ken Macintosh—not me—introduced the argument about the red book. The Government has just announced a consultation exercise on spending plans that does not take inflation into account. To me, that is a fantasy. If I published a document that did not take inflation into account, the Minister for Finance would take me apart, limb by limb.
That is quite clear—the committee has made that view clear.
I do not think that there is any disagreement. Rhoda Grant and Ken Macintosh made the point about trends—one cannot discern a trend unless one has the figures to show that there has been, for example, an increase of 4 per cent. That is doing the work for the public. I am not hung up about having reams of information, as John Swinney said. I want the basic information set out clearly—real-terms figures with year-on-year changes in money terms and in percentage changes.
So, are we saying that we do not mind a separate document, so long as it is a public document and is provided alongside—
That is meaningless. It would benefit the public purse if we sent out one document that contained the information in cash and real terms.
And the year-on-year changes.
If we are going to make the documents public, we should make them available separately, as Rhoda suggested. I do not feel that it would be useful to produce a large document with very detailed figures. Instead, we should have a summary and then provide the additional details in a separate document.
John, you made the point that some members of the public are very knowledgeable on this subject; that is true. However, other people will want to read the documents and take what they can from them. I see no difficulty in bringing out two documents.
I suspect that people who work in a health trust, for example, whatever their role, would be able to understand whether inflation has been taken into account in the Government's spending figures.
I understand what is being said. However, we seem to be arguing about whether the figures should be in one book or two. The minister spells out his commitment in his letter. He says that the figures should be comparable
He does not say that.
Well, he says that the figures will be available to us, which means that they will be publicly available.
Ken cannot have it both ways. We have accepted that the Minister for Finance should lead the consultation exercise on the budget. However, if that has been agreed, we are entitled to say what sort of information should be publicly available. Anyone who logs on to the Government's website to look at the Government's spending plans will find a document with pie charts and no real-terms factors. That is what has happened to date and it is not acceptable.
We are getting totally bogged down. If there are to be two documents—a summary and a more detailed document—both should be in cash and real terms.
"Serving Scotland's Needs" contains the detailed spending plans in real and cash terms, but it does not provide the year-on-year changes that were requested. John and Keith are making the point that a document that provides the information only in cash terms is misleading and another that provides the detail and the year-on-year changes is accurate. What is the point of having two documents doing two different things? If we are to produce a summary, that is fine, but we should provide real-terms information and some basic year-on-year changes. People can then get stuck into the more detailed document. However, both documents must give consistent information that people can understand. It is difficult to see why anyone would be against greater clarity.
The documents are not misleading.
Yes they are.
The minister has made it quite clear that he will not mislead us.
Saying that he will not mislead us is not enough.
Andrew's dislike of certain documents does not mean that those documents are misleading. The documents fulfil a certain purpose; in many ways, they are policy documents. One can describe policy in whatever terms are necessary to get the argument across. Just because one does not agree with the way that a policy is described does not mean that a document is misleading. We insist on publishing comparable figures, and I do not see what fault can possibly be found with that. If we can have those figures, anybody can have them.
I am sorry to have to say this, but I must. Ken Macintosh mentioned the concern about increased burdens on local authorities. In a policy document, the Government might say, "Blah, blah, blah. We will pass the function of the Children (Scotland) Act 1995 on to local authorities and we will pass the responsibility for community care on to local authorities." However, the budget figures show only a 1 per cent increase in cash terms for local authorities. In real terms, local authorities are wrestling with increased burdens and less money. Local authority leaders logging on to the website would find a whole range of Government policy announcements in that document and a whole financial statement in cash terms.
They would be able to find all the information that you are talking about in the document that is before us, would they not?
In the foreword—
We are getting bogged down in this discussion and we must try to draw things together. We want to agree on the format of the budget documents. The document says:
I am comfortable with Keith Raffan's explanation that, wherever information is being presented and however detailed it is, it should be presented in cash and real terms.
Unfortunately, we are rather bogged down at this stage. At the last meeting, the committee suggested a change to the document from which the convener has just quoted. To the point on
The question is whether the committee is prepared to tell the Government, "Yes, you can go out and spin a document that is a political policy statement in the best light possible for your own interests." The alternative is that we put the real story in real terms for those who are intelligent enough to get down to the nitty-gritty. Our argument must be that whoever picks up the document—the man in the street, a pensioner or someone from the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities—should be able to read the truth up front in a form that tells them exactly what the policy means for their daily lives. We cannot back away from that.
It is important to get this straight, and we need the help of a special adviser to do it. I am not happy with some of the Executive's documentation; we have to pin it down. The social inclusion document referred to the record since 1997. The Scottish Executive has not been in power since 1997 and I am not interested in what the UK Government is doing. The documents must be factual—we do not want spinning, party political documents.
Both documents should be compatible; we should be able to read them in tandem. Someone from local government should be able to read the section in the budget document that gives the trends for policy and be able to follow that up in the other document. We are at cross-purposes. We are not talking about a document that gives the wrong impression. We are talking about a document that is easily read, which details trends and the policy behind it, and which gives the figures.
For the third time this morning, Rhoda Grant has hit the nail on the head. We are arguing about the consultation document. In fact, we cannot determine what is in the consultation document—although we can and will criticise it. We are considering the budget documents and whether we want to ensure that the figures are in them. Am I right?
Yes.
I shall help you to wind up, convener. Can we reassert that we would like to see in the budget documents year-on-year changes in cash and real terms?
We can reinforce that point.
The Executive can do what it wants with the consultation process.
The clear view is that we should reinforce that point to the minister—he may be willing to concede it.
Have Andrew Welsh and the Audit Committee given any indication of the points that they want to add?
I am not sure.
The Audit Committee is not going to look at the documents until the turn of the year. I do not get the impression that there is any haste to agree them, as budget documents in this format will not be produced until the next financial year. The committee can take its time.
The letter seemed to cover everything in the documents. I am not proposing that we go through them paragraph by paragraph.
Are we going to move on now? I have one remaining point.
Is your point related?
Yes. I was taking a comfort break when you skirted over page 2 of the letter, which deals with page 4 of the document.
Which document is Andrew Wilson referring to?
I am referring to page 4 of the draft agreement on the budgeting process, which deals with the thorny issue of what happens with the Parliament's budget. Last time, our request under paragraph 14 was for the sentence to read:
So, you are suggesting that we take out the "but"?
Yes—from "but" to the end of the sentence.
A full stop should be inserted after "budget", the "but" should be deleted, and the following sentence should begin: "The Executive may table".
No. From "but" to "necessary" should be deleted. It was not an erroneous "but".
The sentence should end with "budget". That reinforces the point that we agreed before. The Executive's added phrase presumably refers to the second last paragraph on page 2 of the letter. [Interruption.] I have been advised that the financial issues advisory group report recommended that the Executive should have the opportunity to lodge such a motion.
The FIAG report was written before the absolute disaster of the first few months of the Parliament. The motivation behind the suggestion, which found agreement at our previous meeting, was that we did not want an unholy scrap between the Executive and the Parliament over the Parliament's budget.
What has changed to paragraph 14 on page 4?
The question is what has not changed. We asked that the reference to the Executive being able to lodge a motion to debate the Parliament's budget be removed. That power is provided for in standing orders, so there is no need for it to be in the written agreement.
So you want to take out the second last sentence.
No. We will put a full stop after "budget" and delete the rest.
So we will delete
Yes. The final sentence stands.
The drafting has improved since last time, when it seemed set to cause a disagreement; here it is much more benign. However, the position—which we agreed was unhelpful—stands. That is why we have instituted the process of getting a similar written agreement with the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body and so on.
I do not think that this is a huge issue. The paragraph says that the Executive may lodge a motion; it does not say that it will lodge a motion—that is an option.
Presumably the provision is designed to enable a bit of flexibility.
On whose part?
If that phrase were not included, would the Executive be precluded from lodging a motion to discuss these matters if it thought it necessary?
That is the point. We said at our previous meeting that we did not want the written agreements to have gratuitous references to the all-pervasive power of the Executive.
So the Executive could still do it if it were so minded.
Exactly.
That was very much our approach in the discussion that we had with Robert Brown, Paul Grice and Stewart Gilfillan. We wanted the corporate body to be clear what the Parliament's requirements were, and for those requirements to be reasonably debated without the Executive's involvement.
I have always been worried by this power. Frankly, it puts the Executive in a position vis-à-vis the Scottish Parliament that the UK Government is not in vis-à-vis Westminster. There could be a set-piece battle, but Parliament should not be subject to the Executive and its whips. Although I am part of the partnership, I think that Parliament should be supreme.
If the Executive believes that the Parliament's budget is excessive or wants to score political points by cutting the Parliament's budget to spend more money on health or whatever, should we ask the corporate body and the Executive to discuss the problem and come to an agreement without lodging a motion?
We could influence matters at that stage. The point is that the power exists, so there is no reason for the Finance Committee to tell the Executive that it should go ahead. There is no reason to make the power more explicit than it has to be in the written agreements between the Parliament and the Executive.
This is not a major issue; we should reach some consensus. Do you want the committee to retain the position that it has adopted until now?
I suggest that we replace
That is a good idea.
Presumably that would refer to discussions between the corporate body and the Executive.
Exactly. That form of words is not perfect, but it is better.
Is it better than not having the phrase at all?
Yes, as it puts pressure on the Executive to discuss ways of addressing the problem other than by lodging a motion.
You have already conceded that the Executive could do that anyway, Andrew. It is better that we include it in those terms.
There is also a threat to the Parliament, however—the Executive is saying, "We will lodge a motion unless you give in."
But the Executive can lodge a motion anyway—we are saying that the motion should be a last resort rather than a warning shot.
The suggestion is that a motion to discuss these matters could be lodged following discussion with the corporate body. I am coming round to the view that we should delete the added phrase, as that is the tidiest way of achieving the meaning that we want. If the Executive wants to lodge a motion, it can do so.
I move that we delete that phrase.
I cannot see any way around this issue, as there is no agreement other than maintaining the committee's position. Is that acceptable?
Members indicated agreement.
I do not propose to go through the draft agreements, as I think that we have covered the points in the letter. Unless members feel particularly strongly about specific points, I propose to draw discussion on this item to a conclusion.
Before you do, Mike—and I am sorry to be a constant pain—I want to raise an issue about the fourth bullet point on page 2 of the agreement on the format of the budget documents. I am delighted that the Executive has fulfilled, to an extent, the request that we made at a previous meeting for a statement about the public-private partnership and private finance initiative projects to list the costs of servicing those projects on an annual basis. The problem is that we did not want the word "sector" included, because that information already exists—we sought more detail on a project-by-project basis. Perhaps we could seek further clarification—unless I missed it in the letter. I see no reason why we could not have information on that basis, particularly from here on in, as the minister is already committed to providing such information where necessary.
Would a list of projects and their servicing costs achieve that? How feasible is that?
The Executive has that information. It is a question of—
It is a question of demand and resources.
I suggest that the information should be grouped by sector, which would allow us to look at projects—such as schools, for the sake of argument—in a grouping. That would give us the details and some kind of comparison.
That is a helpful idea.
So we want to insert the word "grouped" between "costs" and "by"?
We also need an expenditure plan that lists individual projects and servicing costs, grouped by sector. If the Executive were not specifically required to list individual projects, it could lump together all the health projects, for example, which is not what we are after.
So there are two words to be inserted: "individual" and "grouped". That concludes that item and, indeed, the meeting.
Is there an item for any other business?
No.
So I cannot raise another point?
No, I am afraid not.
Why not?
There is no item on the agenda for any other business.
On a point of order, convener, I want to raise a couple of points. They may be points of information that I could raise separately with the clerk, but we should have an item for any other business on future agendas. Other committee members may find it useful to know about the points that I want to raise.
Under standing orders, Keith, the agenda must be published in advance. An item on any other business would not meet the requirements of the standing orders. I am quite happy to conclude the meeting now so that, if you want to, you can raise those points informally.
I have two points for information—
I close the meeting formally and discharge the official reporters.
Meeting closed at 11:44 .
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