Legacy Paper
We still have technical problems with item 2, so we will take item 4. We considered an earlier draft of our legacy paper and another draft has been circulated—I hope that it is close to being the final draft.
The clerks have endeavoured to make the changes and corrections that were suggested at the most recent meeting at which members discussed the legacy paper. I hope that we have done that adequately and to members' satisfaction.
We have fleshed out recommendations for future work that a successor committee might undertake. They are set out in paragraph 25 and I ask members to pay particular attention to the bullet points, which are members' suggestions for a work programme that a new committee might want to take on board.
The rest of the paper is pretty much the same as the previous draft, except that in annex A we have fleshed out the proposal for a skills summit, as Mr Fraser wanted us to do. I have not produced a full programme that includes potential speakers, but I have tried to give an overview of what might be considered in a skills summit. I have also provided details about the proposal for an event with the Scottish Trades Union Congress, which the committee thought would be a good idea.
This is probably the first time that members have seen the supplementary information in papers 7 to 10. Paper 7 contains all the information from the Executive on the inquiries that the committee has undertaken in the second parliamentary session. If members remember, the committee agreed to ask ministers for an update on the main conclusions and recommendations from the inquiries. Those are set out in the table in paper 7. There is an additional paper setting out the feedback on the committee's report into sport, which arrived after the papers had been sent out.
Finally, papers 8 to 10 are the clerks' notes on the various round-table discussions. I suggest that members should not treat them as committee reports, in the sense that they do not represent the committee's views. However, if members feel that we have missed anything from those papers, or if they would like more emphasis on any points, we would be happy to take that on board. The round-table discussion that is missing from the notes is the one on sport that took place earlier today. Although we will not be able to perform a miracle and have that ready for members by the time that we reach the next item on the agenda, we will type it up soon. Standards are clearly slipping as we approach the end of the parliamentary session.
Just as an aide-mémoire for our successor committee on the way in which to deal with the clerks' notes, they are not something of which we approve or disapprove; we all know that they are done with the usual professionalism of our clerking team.
We note the notes.
The main issue is the legacy paper. We should bear in mind that the paper is purely advisory and that it will be entirely up to our successor committee—or committees—to decide whether to take any of our advice or none of it. The key issue is whether we are happy with the advice that is provided in the draft. Do members have any comments?
I have three points. There has been a lot of formal and informal discussion about our legacy paper, so if there is a good reason why my points are not in it, please tell me. We were asked to pay particular attention to the topics on page 7 of paper 6. We identified previously that we had not been able to devote time to science and science policy, but that we wanted explicitly to identify that area.
Is that agreed?
Members indicated agreement.
That was easy.
My other two points are more about process and the lessons that we have learned as a committee. I wonder whether it is worth including a point about opportunities for cross-sectoral or thematic discussions. I shall explain what I mean. Another committee of which I am a member, the Audit Committee, has spent a lot of time talking about that. One tends to spot recurrent themes in many different sectors. Today was a good example, in that many of the issues that were discussed were almost directly paralleled in our round-table discussion on the arts. There are wider issues, for example about how we develop facilities and communities and how we pool budgets and so on. For all that we have said elsewhere that there is scope, and perhaps a need, to narrow or reduce the committee's remit, one of the strengths of having a wide remit is that we can identify such themes. If colleagues agree, it is perhaps worth noting in the paper that there could be scope for building on those sectoral discussions to bring together some of the sectors. That is one suggestion.
In a similar vein, my final suggestion relates to a recurrent theme in the committee, which has become more of a recurrent theme in and around the Parliament. I refer to the Executive's involvement, relatively late in the day, in discussion about members' bills. Sometimes there is a good reason for that. The Executive perhaps feels that it is right that members' bills—because they are members' bills—should be allowed to run free from Executive involvement and interference. However, the experience of this committee in particular—I think that we previously reached a view on this—is that earlier involvement would have been beneficial to the overall quality and outcome of the discussion and parliamentary consideration. I wondered whether there was room for a line in the legacy paper to that effect.
We have written to the Executive about that, particularly with regard to the St Andrew's Day Bank Holiday (Scotland) Bill. I think that we drew some of the issues to the attention of the Procedures Committee as well. Is everybody happy for us to add in a line to that effect?
Members indicated agreement.
I think that I am right in saying that our correspondence is always available for anyone who wants to see it. Is everybody happy to include a line on cross-portfolio thinking or joined-up committee thinking—however the clerks want to phrase it?
Members indicated agreement.
Are there any clerks' notes on the round-table discussion on social enterprises?
Yes, there are notes. We did not specifically produce the notes on that batch—we were referring to the round-table discussions that we held recently. If the committee has no objections, there will be no problem in making the notes for the round-table discussion on social enterprises, which was held under the auspices of the business growth inquiry, part and parcel of the legacy paper.
I would appreciate that.
Yes. Every member of the public can access the notes under the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002. We are not disclosing anything that cannot be disclosed.
The notes are published as evidence for the business growth inquiry; it is just a case of extracting them and putting them alongside the round-table notes. The information is all in the public domain.
I am sure that every member of all our successor committees will read all the notes in great detail before they meet. Is everybody happy to agree the legacy paper?
Members indicated agreement.