Petition
Fishing Industry (PE804)
Our first item of business today relates to our consideration of petition PE804. Members will remember that the committee decided to invite the petitioners and a United Kingdom Government minister to appear before the committee. The invitation was sent to Douglas Alexander, who was Minister of State for Europe at the time, because our interest was constitutional. His office contacted the clerks to say that our letter had been passed to Ben Bradshaw as fisheries minister. I understand that Mr Bradshaw is still the fisheries minister. We are still waiting for a response.
Meanwhile, an e-mail that was sent by a Scottish Executive official to the Scottish Fishermen's Federation was passed to the petitioners, who in turn made it available to Phil Gallie. Mr Gallie brought it to the committee's attention at a previous meeting and it was agreed that the matter would be put on the agenda for today's meeting.
Members will find in their papers copies of the e-mail and a letter from the Scottish Executive that sets out its position on the matter. I invite comments from all members of the committee, but obviously I will start with Mr Gallie.
Once again, I come back to the contents of the e-mail and I refer in particular to the comment:
"In a political move by the SNP, Holyrood's European Committee voted (narrowly) to ask Ben Bradshaw to give evidence to them".
The e-mail was sent by an official in the fisheries division of the Scottish Executive. The comment that I quoted is factually wrong. It was not a political move by the Scottish National Party. It was a move by me to push and give a fair hearing to a petition that has 250,000 signatures. The SNP backed my move, but so did Dennis Canavan, who is an independent, so it was not a political move by anyone; it was a parliamentary move by parliamentary members of this parliamentary committee. On that basis, the official got it totally wrong.
The invitation should have gone, as I understand it did, to Douglas Alexander. It was made quite clear that this was a constitutional matter. I accept that the Environment and Rural Development Committee did not want to take forward the petition on the basis of its being about fisheries, but we raised a constitutional issue. On that basis, the official's response is totally wrong.
As I said last week, it is wrong for an official—with the backing of a minister or whatever—to get involved to this extent in something that is parliamentary business and not Executive business. My objective in continuing the debate is to get perhaps an apology from the Scottish Executive Environment and Rural Affairs Department and, more important, an acknowledgement that such intervention will never again take place. I accept that Westminster ministers who are asked to come here will have close alliances with ministers in the Scottish Parliament. That is nothing more than I would expect and I do not mind that contact being there. However, I do not expect civil servants in the Scottish Executive to go out and promote that contact. It should be the other way around. The Westminster minister should say, "I have an invitation. What are your views?" That would be a different matter altogether.
I share Phil Gallie's concerns about the choice of words and the accuracy of the contents of the e-mail from Barbara Strathern. She refers to
"a political move by the SNP".
The clear implication is that it was a political ploy. I have been in active politics for more than 30 years and I think that I can recognise an SNP ploy when I see one. In this case, there was no SNP ploy or move. Phil Gallie proposed inviting a UK minister to give evidence and I voted for that. I cannot remember whether both of the SNP members of the committee voted for it, but it certainly was not a political move by the SNP.
The civil servant stated that the committee
"voted … to ask Ben Bradshaw to give evidence".
Technically, that is not correct either. In fact, we asked Douglas Alexander to give evidence. She also said that we asked Ben Bradshaw
"to give evidence to them"—
that is, the committee—
"on the back of legal advice that it would be theoretically possible."
That statement is incorrect; we received legal advice not on whether it was possible to invite a UK Government minister, but on whether it was legally possible to withdraw from the common fisheries policy. To say the least, it was indiscreet of a member of the Executive's civil service to write in such terms.
It is worth pointing out that there are several precedents of UK Government ministers giving evidence to Scottish Parliament committees, including our committee. I remember that Hilary Benn spoke to the Parliament and gave evidence to the committee over a videolink. Douglas Alexander has also visited the Parliament on occasion.
My colleagues are making a bit of a meal out of the matter. The e-mail says:
"Holyrood's European Committee voted (narrowly) to ask"
the minister to give evidence. If we want to nit-pick about inaccuracies, I could say that the decision was taken on the convener's casting vote after a dodgy vote—we have talked about the fact that a casting vote should not have been needed. Members who found themselves in a minority accepted the situation and said with good grace that we should by all means hear from the Cod Crusaders, despite the origins of the thing. To start raking over such matters now would be ill-advised.
As a fisheries minister many years ago, I encouraged officials to maintain a close and candid relationship with industry bodies and in particular with the Scottish Fishermen's Federation, to let them know what was going on and to keep them briefed. I am delighted that ministers continue to advise their officials to do that, that a close relationship exists and that the Scottish Fishermen's Federation is kept advised about the Environment and Rural Affairs Department's thinking. If this slightly contrived row about one word in one e-mail shut down useful open government relationships between the SFF and the department, that would be a pity.
When we saw the e-mail before, I had no idea who Bertie, Mary McAllan and Frank Strang were, so I did not know where the e-mail had been. I wondered whether it was sent to a Westminster department and I was incredibly concerned about that. We have received further information that the e-mail was sent to the Scottish Fishermen's Federation. Despite the inaccuracies in the e-mail, that information puts it in a slightly different light, because an official would not send the SFF an e-mail without assuming that it would probably see the light of day somewhere. In such circumstances, it is not the private or sinister e-mail that I had initially wondered about at our previous meeting.
The question is where we go from here and how we move on. The e-mail represents an official taking action—I presume that it was on her own behalf—to keep the Scottish Fishermen's Federation informed of developments. I do not particularly like some of the wording in the e-mail, but I do not know whether we can reasonably do anything further about it. My conclusion is that we should note it and move on to discussing the petition.
As John Home Robertson said, we voted on the issue. Some of us were not keen to undertake the work, but when we realised that the vote was not competent, we decided in good faith to proceed anyway and to take evidence from the petitioners. My view is that we should note the e-mail and move on.
Before I bring in Jim Wallace and Bruce Crawford, I caution the committee against dragging up the issue of whether the vote was relevant or not. As convener, my view is that it is of no interest whatever to an Executive official how a decision was made and whether a vote was narrow or not. A decision was made; that is what matters, and that is what the e-mail relates to. Can we keep to the matter in hand?
On a point of order, convener. If we want to get into this discussion, the decision was not correct.
In my opinion, that is entirely irrelevant to the subsequent discussions.
That might be your opinion, but it is a matter of fact that the vote was incorrect. However, we have accepted that an honest mistake was made and that we should carry on and take evidence.
Mr Wallace, can we please keep to discussion of the matter in hand?
I had not seen the e-mail the last time we discussed the issue, and when I saw it, my initial reaction was, "Is that it? What is all the fuss about? It is making a mountain out of a molehill."
The first paragraph is not particularly well worded but, as David Wilson explains in his letter to you, the e-mail was part of the process of open communication between the Scottish Fishermen's Federation and other stakeholders. Phil Gallie overeggs the pudding when he suggests that somehow the Executive was trying to shift Whitehall in one direction or another. There is nothing in the e-mail that is meant to stop Ben Bradshaw or any other minister from giving evidence. The e-mail says,
"We and Defra are considering."
David Wilson's letter says:
"SEERAD officials were and remain very clear that it is up to Whitehall and Westminster to decide how to respond to the Committee's invitation."
No doubt that is what Whitehall and Westminster will do. We would be very surprised if there were not some communication between the relevant departments north and south of the border, but the e-mail does not indicate that there was any attempt to shift Whitehall in one particular direction. The sooner we move on and hear the petitioners' case, the better.
First of all, I am a bit uncomfortable about naming officials in this process, so I do not intend to get involved in any of that. I also leave aside the previous arguments that have taken place in the committee, to which I was not party. I heard what Dennis Canavan and Phil Gallie said about it not being an SNP political move; of course, the SNP is never political but there are occasions when we would expect such exchanges to be political.
What is a bit more worrying is the official's concern in the e-mail about blurring the lines of accountability between the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and the Holyrood committee. There is actually a blurring of the lines around what an official and a minister should be doing. In a political context, it would be entirely appropriate for a minister to speak to an outside organisation to try to discourage the idea that a DEFRA minister should appear before the committee. However, regardless of whom the e-mail is going to, I am not sure that it is entirely appropriate for an official to argue that DEFRA should not attend a committee; to do so has nothing to do with an official and their job. Therefore, there is a cultural issue to do with what civil servants are and are not asked to do. There has been a blurring of the lines, but I do not know whether it is worthy of any further action.
A suggested course of action might be to drop a note to the minister saying that we accept that political things do go on but we do not expect civil servants to be involved in them. I would entirely encourage opening up the lines of communication between officials and the Scottish Fishermen's Federation in those circumstances. The passing on of information is important, but an official should not take a political position which, in effect, is what was beginning to happen during the exchange in question, and that concerns me.
The question is whether there is something fishy about the e-mail.
Somebody had to say it.
Members have tried to get to the merits of the e-mail, but to me it shows a civil servant who has not quite grasped what the politicians are up to—long may that continue.
Convener, I support you in your desire to draw a line under the past in respect of the transient member—let us call him that—of the committee. However, I want to respond to what Phil Gallie and Dennis Canavan have said, as they have been a bit disingenuous. Although I did not approach you or anyone, I was angry when, shortly after the committee meeting, Richard Lochhead issued a press release drawing attention to the decision and naming several MSPs on the committee—including me—who, in his view, had voted the wrong way. Being a politician, I assumed that that had something to do with the Moray by-election for which he was the SNP candidate, although perhaps I am now being disingenuous.
If people think that this civil servant has crossed the line from the professional into the political arena, the Presiding Officer has made it plain that it is in the hands of members to draw the matter to the attention of Mr Elvidge. I do not think that the committee should associate itself with such a move; we should merely note the position.
Dennis Canavan and Phil Gallie will be the last two members to speak on this before we wrap the discussion up, as time is getting on.
I have three quick points to make. First, I do not think that the committee should do anything that could damage communication between the Executive and the Scottish Fishermen's Federation. I would like that communication to continue. However, I do not think that there should be political spin in the communications that are sent from Executive civil servants to organisations such as the Scottish Fishermen's Federation.
Secondly, I would not like us to get involved in a witch hunt of Barbara Strathern. If she reads the Official Report of the meeting, she will perhaps, on reflection, agree that her choice of words was indiscreet to say the least.
Thirdly, could we politely ask the Scottish Executive what communications it has had with DEFRA concerning our request for a UK Government minister to give evidence to the committee? I would be concerned if a similar e-mail was sent from the Executive to DEFRA with a similar political spin. The clear implication would be that it was an SNP trick that the minister should not fall for and that he should not bother coming to give evidence to the committee. Can we politely ask for copies of all the communications from the Executive to DEFRA—or to Douglas Alexander's office—concerning our request for a UK Government minister to give evidence to us?
Okay. We have that on the table.
It would be interesting to see the documents that Dennis Canavan mentioned in his last comment. In analysing the e-mail, I acknowledge that there is nothing in it that says that the Executive had been approached; there is a suggestion that it might be helpful for DEFRA to see the Executive's lines. What were the lines for? Were the lines to inform the DEFRA minister? It was the Minister of State for Europe whom we wanted to talk to.
I go along with what John Home Robertson said. The involvement of the SFF and other fishery bodies is good if relations can be built up between the Executive and others. I was at the Clyde Fishermen's Association lunch on Saturday at which an Executive official from Ross Finnie's department was present and made a major speech. That is fine. Those are good lines. However, what I expect from Executive officials is accuracy all the way. I feel that the e-mail did not present an accurate account of what had happened and what should be happening.
I feel strongly that the committee's work should not be interfered with by ministers. They should express an opinion if we have invited someone to give evidence and that individual goes back to them with a query, but it should not be the other way about. That is a point of principle on which every member of the committee should agree.
Other than that, I am happy to go along with Dennis Canavan's suggestion. The last thing that I want is a witch hunt, but I do want lessons to be learned. If ministers are made aware that the committee is less than happy about what has happened, I will be happy with that. I am sure that they will get the message around their departments and that such a thing will not happen again.
Phil Gallie said one thing that is not accurate. I know that he would not want to mislead the committee, but he implied—or perhaps expressly said—that the e-mail, which says
"I thought it might be helpful for you to see our lines on the issue",
was sent to DEFRA. The e-mail was sent to the Scottish Fishermen's Federation and not to DEFRA.
No, sorry. What I said is that the comment,
"I thought it might be helpful for you to see our lines on the issue"
suggested to me that those lines had gone further than simply being communicated to the SFF. I said that there was a suggestion. I did not say that that had happened. I suggest that, if Dennis Canavan's request is complied with, the question will be answered once and for all.
We have been around the houses on the matter. I have been quiet; I sat back and listened, as a good convener should. However, there is something that no one has mentioned but which bothered me. I think that it is the thing that bothered me the most. Again, it is a suggestion and it is about a way of reading things. Point 5 in the Executive's response states:
"The sending of the e-mail to the SFF was in line with the Executive's established practice of sharing information openly with key stakeholders."
That is fine. I do not think that anyone has a problem with that, but I do have a problem with the culture that exists within the Executive if it was thought acceptable for phrases such as
"In a political move by the SNP",
the Tories or whoever to be in communications. I feel strongly that Executive officials should be above making such comments to people outwith the organisation.
I would like to ask the Executive to confirm that it is not part of its
"established practice of sharing information openly with key stakeholders"
for officials to give opinions on why things were done or to be concerned with how narrow a vote was. A decision of the committee, regardless of whether the vote is unanimous or is decided by the convener's casting vote, is a decision of the committee. I would like the Executive to confirm, at ministerial level, that it is not part of the culture of the organisation to encourage political statements from officials.
I think that the letter from David Wilson does exactly that. The final sentence of the note is:
"It was in no way intended to interfere with the business of the Parliament."
It is clear that there was no intention to interfere with the work of the committee or the Parliament.
Unintentional behaviour can sometimes interfere with things.
Convener, I think that we have been round the houses on the matter. Everyone has said at one stage or another that the important point is, one day, to get down to dealing with the merits of the petition. I suggest that we move on to the next item of business.
We still have on the table Mr Canavan's suggestion that we request information from the Executive about what was sent to DEFRA.
Can I put a counter-proposal, in that case? Frankly, we have flogged this thing to death. There is a risk that this could jeopardise candid dialogue between stakeholders and have a detrimental effect on the behaviour of civil servants, who are trying to operate open government. Everyone has said what they have said. I do not want to make a meal out of the matter. To continue the discussion by having further correspondence would not serve a useful purpose.
Mr Canavan, do you wish to make a formal proposition?
I would still like to pursue the aspect that I mentioned and to put in a polite request to see the communications between the Scottish Executive and DEFRA.
Is there a seconder for that?
I second it.
Is there a counter-proposal?
I think that Jim Wallace has already moved that we go on to the next item of business.
Mr Canavan's proposal was on the table before that was moved, so I ask that we wrap this up quickly and then immediately move on to the next item of business.
Is there to be a vote on Mr Canavan's proposal?
Mr Home Robertson has already said that he wishes to make a counter-proposal.
I just want to vote against his proposal.
The question is, that Mr Canavan's proposal be agreed to. Are we agreed?
No.
There will be a division.
For
Canavan, Dennis (Falkirk West) (Ind)
Crawford, Bruce (Mid Scotland and Fife) (SNP)
Fabiani, Linda (Central Scotland) (SNP)
Gallie, Phil (South of Scotland) (Con)
Against
Gordon, Mr Charlie (Glasgow Cathcart) (Lab)
Home Robertson, John (East Lothian) (Lab)
Jackson, Gordon (Glasgow Govan) (Lab)
Oldfather, Irene (Cunninghame South) (Lab)
Wallace, Mr Jim (Orkney) (LD)
The result of the division is: For 4, Against 5, Abstentions 0. Therefore it is agreed that we will take no further action on the matter.
I am a little bit concerned that the committee has started to get bogged down in voting on everything. For a considerable time, we tried to reach a consensus on matters and to move forwards but, now, we tend to vote on the minutiae of what we are going to do next, such as writing letters. That is not in the committee's interest. We have taken a vote today and the matter is decided, but I hope that we can move forward more constructively in future, because we have always worked towards consensus and members have always had the opportunity to have their say. We can go on having votes ad infinitum, but that will not further the good working that the committee has had in the past.
Ms Oldfather's comments will be noted. It is up to individual committee members to decide how they want to proceed as members of the committee.
Convener—
No, Mr Gallie, I will not take any more comments, because I promised Mr Wallace that we would move on immediately to the next item of business and I will not break my promise to him.