European Committee, 12 Dec 2000

Meeting date: Tuesday, December 12, 2000

Official Report 181KB pdf

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Convener's Report

The first item is the issue of objective 3 funding in the voluntary sector. A letter to the minister on concerns that have been expressed by voluntary organisations has been circulated. Many of the organisations are worried and not just about the technical problems that have arisen in the way in which the bids are developed. I know that that has been addressed, but we must consider the issue.

There are also concerns about the way in which the funding has been profiled and where the priorities have been identified. Many organisations are seriously concerned about their future if those concerns are not addressed. What does the committee think that we should do? It would be helpful to seek some information from some of the worst-affected organisations and feed that into a structured report to the Scottish Executive. I do not know whether the issue will allow us to run for long as it is starting to have an impact now. The sooner we comment, the better.

There is a lack of information about when the whole structural fund—not only objective 3 issues—will come into play. Many hoops had to be jumped through in relation to objective 2 and a lot of organisations are uncertain about when they can apply and when they will get their money. We should be direct and ask the Executive to give a proper timetable of when it expects some of the structural funds to be agreed to. We must remember the fact that, although the EU envisaged that 1 January 2000 would be the kick off, many states have not kicked off. On the LEADER + initiatives, the Executive is nine months behind England in consulting. That should not go unnoticed—we should pursue the Executive on that.

There are two aspects. We can ask the clerk to come back to us with a timetable for our scrutiny and review of all structural funds issues. We need to consider that early in the new year. The specific issue that affects many voluntary organisations needs to be examined and I know that a number of those organisations have written to the Executive. Would it help if the committee undertook a short inquiry into the matter, taking evidence and eliciting information from the organisations, which could be brought together in a report?

We are talking about a perennial problem for the voluntary sector. If the problem is not late applications, it is late payments. They are always left with a question mark over funding. We need to get to the bottom of the matter. However, time is short. Do we have any written information that we could use in a letter to the Executive? It would be useful to get a reply to such a letter to find out what might be happening.

I have already written such a letter, which I copied to committee members. However, there does not appear to be any movement at the moment. More and more organisations are expressing concern and we need to get to the bottom of the matter.

To which minister did you write?

I wrote the letter at about the time of the changes to ministerial portfolios. I wrote to Jack McConnell, but the letter has been passed to Angus MacKay. Peter Peacock is aware of the issues and I have told him that I expect a reply. Are we content to wait for that reply? I received a response, but it did not go into the significant issues.

Further to that, I must say that I agree with what Jack McConnell said. The committee has certain responsibilities, but we must also pass information to other people. The voluntary sector is very much in the area that is covered by the Minister for Social Justice's portfolio. The voluntary sector is under pressure in a number of ways, not only in relation to structural funds, but in relation to the Scottish Charity Law Review Commission, the Scottish Criminal Record Office checks and so on. There appears to be a need for the committee to communicate directly with Jackie Baillie, but I do not know whether we have time to do anything other than write letters.

The matter relates specifically to Angus MacKay and Peter Peacock. It is not within Jackie Baillie's remit.

I want simply to back up that point. I do not think that Jackie Baillie is responsible for sorting out the problem. However, if it is not sorted out and the voluntary organisations do not receive their funding, MSPs and ministers will have to deal with demands from those organisations for a temporary solution to be put in place. We should do whatever we can to speed up matters and to get an answer.

At least two local authorities have already indicated their concerns to us. I suggest that we write to the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities, the Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations and some of the main voluntary sector organisations to get some information. Once we have that, I will seek—in consultation with the clerk—to come up with proposals on where we go from here.

We could put a straight question to Angus MacKay and Peter Peacock. We could ask them where the issue comes on their priority list, given the resources that their department can call on.

I have circulated the response that we have received from the European Commission to the report on our inquiry into football transfer fees. We are still waiting for a formal response from the Scottish Executive. However, our report seems to be consistent with what is being considered elsewhere. Does the committee agree to note the Commission's response?

Members indicated agreement.

Would not it be a good idea to let the people who gave evidence to the committee on the matter know about the Commission's response? This is very important—the Commission is saying that it is possible to have a transfer system that meets the needs of football, but which does not fall foul of the basic principles of European Union law.

I have already spoken to the clerk about circulating all the correspondence that we have received to those who gave evidence to us.