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Our second item is to take evidence from the Scottish Executive. I welcome Nikki Brown and Daniel Kleinberg, who are officials from the Europe division. They are here to talk about the Executive's project on building a bridge between Europe and its citizens.
And Westminster.
And the Forth and the Tay.
We are happy to have the chance to speak to the committee today. If it would be helpful, I will start by giving a brief outline of the project. We have also included more detail in the note that we have sent to the clerks; I understand that it was circulated to members today.
Thank you. Before I open the meeting up to questions, will you tell me when the policy paper was put together? The committee has waited for some time since its first request for information about the project.
The paper brings together a number of projects that have been worked on for some time but which have not previously been publicly announced. Tom McCabe wrote to the committee with an undertaking to come back to you with information on the project.
I am pleased to see the emphasis on participation by young people, but I do not see any mention of the Scottish Youth Parliament. Will it be involved? The Scottish Executive briefing note mentions that a
Parliament's external liaison unit is co-ordinating the details of the our voice on Europe event and has made it clear that it intends to involve the Scottish Youth Parliament in the run up to it. Therefore, the Scottish Youth Parliament should be at the event, although your question would properly be addressed to the ELU.
I emphasise that ministers think of the project as a communications project. The emphasis is on what methods of communication work and why, rather than on the content of the communication.
I know, but it would be better if you had specific examples of how communication was made and what it achieved. It would make more sense to people if they could see concrete examples of how good communications can result in improvements in their quality of life.
Indeed—the case studies are meant to pick up concrete examples. However, because the project examines how communication has happened in Scotland and what good practice—and, if we find it, not-so-good practice—can teach us from the Scottish experience, it makes sense to us to choose a number of examples from Scottish policy making, some of which will have a European angle and some of which will not.
I identify with Dennis Canavan's comments, particularly on outcomes and quality of life.
Clearly, the better regulation agenda is extremely important; ministers do not want to forget it completely. Ministers expect part of the communications project to be about the Lisbon agenda and economic development. Scotland's experience of implementing European policies that benefit business and economic growth has been reflected in better communications.
That is interesting, especially when we consider current levels of economic growth—although I am told that the news is a bit better this week. We will wait and see.
It is good to see Mr Gallie looking for ways to promote Europe.
I am looking for facts, not fictions.
Absolutely—I agree with you.
Because it is a communications project, we will not be considering the overall success or otherwise of the Lisbon agenda. We will consider the issues in a Scottish context—within the framework of economic development in Scotland and the smart, successful Scotland policy—and we will examine specifically how the devolved Administration can communicate better and, in so doing, better pursue Europe-level policies and objectives. It is likely that we will look at a small business users group and at how we can go about communicating policies in a Scottish context. This may come back to Mr Canavan's point: we intend to discuss with the European Commission the things that work when communicating with people every day. We will discuss the salient points about the successes or otherwise of Europe-level policies.
That is important. Too often, people think that Europe is about foreign affairs. If we can make people understand the relevance of Europe to their everyday lives, it will be a step forward.
The policy forum is where we hope to engage with stakeholders. As you rightly suggest, it is not easy to catch the people who do not always show interest, and it is unlikely that the Executive will catch them directly, so we plan to ask for nominations from representative organisations such as the Scottish Council for Development and Industry, so that we can be in touch with organisations at one remove.
Cannot you think of a better name?
Margo MacDonald will think that it refers to her.
We took evidence from Liz Holt on the plan D agenda, but the boundaries between the different groups are not sharp. It is all about dialogue and debate and about how we can communicate European issues better. Liz Holt was clear that Parliament and the committee have roles to play. Is there anything we can contribute to your project? Could our ideas ride piggyback on your ideas?
Yes. The project recognises that the Scottish Parliament has a clear role to play, given that it provides so much of the consultation machinery in Scottish policy making. We will work jointly with Parliament on the youth forum event. We are also hoping that Parliament officials will contribute to the final report a chapter that will set out how consultation works in Parliament.
We have spoken to Elizabeth Watson and the committee clerks about an official-level contribution that could showcase some of the efforts that Parliament makes—as a corporate body rather than politically—to encourage participation and engagement. We hope to be able to work with them to produce a chapter on that for the report.
The committee has written to other committees to discuss how they engage with and involve citizens. I presume that we could feed in the results of that information-gathering exercise.
That would be extremely helpful.
It is interesting that your paper mentions many of the things that the committee discussed when we thought that we would respond to plan D. You will have seen from the Official Report of our previous meeting that we now realise that we will be responding to the communication strategy, so there will be no duplication of work. We are pleased that the Executive took on board all our suggestions.
Thank you very much. I apologise for my being late. I found out only a short time ago that my services as a substitute were required.
I am sorry—I welcome Richard Lochhead, who is substituting for Margaret Ewing.
I would have enjoyed the first agenda item, had I got here in time, but the committee seems to be making good progress.
Today we are talking specifically about the communications project, which aims to draw out good practice of consultation from policies that have previously been implemented in Scotland. There is broad recognition in Brussels that innovative methods have been used for consulting on domestic policies, such as the anti-smoking legislation and antisocial behaviour orders. Through the project, we are aiming to draw out lessons from those consultation exercises, which have engaged with ordinary Scots.
Yes, but the briefing note from the Executive states that 53,000 people responded to the Scottish Executive's consultation on smoking in public places. I presume that there was such a large response because the Scottish Executive produced a consultation document, put it on the website and so on and people could send in their comments by post, e-mail and the like. Will a similar mass communication exercise be conducted as part of this project?
No. We have previously run consultation exercises in which we have sought people's views on Europe. The Eurobarometer surveys show the results of some research. A lot of work has been done to poll Scots on their views on Europe, but such an exercise is not envisaged as part of this project, which will focus on communications. However, there will be public events at which young people, for example, can air their views.
You will not get anything like 53,000 responses, which the anti-smoking legislation attracted because people were strongly pro or anti that legislation. However, although some people feel strongly anti-Europe and others feel strongly pro-Europe, for a huge mass of people there is a big question mark over the European Union and they are not enthusiastic one way or the other. Those people must be encouraged to express a view and to engage in the debate.
One part of the project that will begin to address those questions—although those are obviously bigger, Europe-wide issues—is the policy forum. It will attempt to canvass the views of people who are affected by the EU's decisions but who are not necessarily engaged with the policy process. They will be asked about how European institutions could, perhaps alongside devolved Administrations, at least communicate more effectively what is going on and try to involve people. However, by definition harder-to-reach people are harder to reach.
Ms Brown put great emphasis on the mechanics of engagement. I draw from that the inference that the Scottish Executive thinks that, by and large, the traditional means of engagement with the public are in some way deficient.
The experience in Scotland in the early years of the Scottish Executive and the Scottish Parliament has been that it is possible to use a wide range of methods of engagement. Some of those are traditional methods, but others are not. The point of the project is to consider the methods that have been used and to establish what has worked in what circumstances.
What are your criteria for determining whether one method of engagement is more successful than another? The briefing note refers to the fact that 53,000 people responded to the anti-smoking legislation consultation. Is the criterion numerical? Is it the case that because more people respond to an exercise it is judged to be better engagement than if fewer people had responded?
The measure of success will depend on the policy—it will depend on whether it was a policy of broad or specific interest. If it is a policy of specific interest, the measure of success might be what changes were made to the policy as a result of points that came from particular quarters.
I do not want to single out the consultation on the smoking ban, but if a consultation attracts 53,000 responses but there are only half a dozen important issues in the responses, it might well be that there is a lot of repetition. Thousands of people might sign petitions and make the same point over and over again. Is that a more significant form of engagement than when there are only 100 responses but they are of exceptional quality?
Not necessarily. We want to consider a range of different ways of trying to get people involved and engaging with them. We will consider case studies that involve public meetings, focus groups, citizens juries or citizens panels, stakeholder workshops, web responses and written responses. We do not intend to say that 53,000 responses is good and that 100 responses is bad: we want to know what examples—depending on the policy—of how to get people involved and engaged the Commission or other European institutions might look to Scotland to provide.
That is interesting. Indeed, you seemed almost to imply that the Scottish form of engagement—or the more recent innovations in different types of engagement in Scotland—is somehow more valid than or superior to what is done elsewhere and that the rest of the European Union can therefore draw lessons from what is happening in Scotland. However, the project is still a work in progress. It involves a number of events that may or may not be successful. If some of the events are not very successful in terms of engagement, will the Executive tell the European Union about them, too?
If some of the events are not successful, we can look at why that was the case and see what lessons can be drawn.
The underlying assumption seems to be that there is a holy grail of how to do public engagement and that, here in 21st century Scotland, we have nearly attained it. Dennis Canavan hinted at this. We know that 53,000 people were fiercely interested in the debate on the ban on smoking in public places but, when it comes to the future of the European Union, many ordinary people find the issues too abstract. That might have nothing to do with the validity of the mechanics of the engagement.
Ministers have said that the fact that the European Commission has identified Scotland as an area of interest is not a sign that we have all the answers or that what we are doing across the piece is somehow more successful in league-table or any other terms. They have not used that sort of language. The intention is to find the areas where we see best practice and use it to help the European institutions to work with the devolved Administrations in future. The intention is to provide a toolkit and not a league table.
But will best practice be measured by the numbers involved?
No, not necessarily. You gave the example of 53,000 people participating in the consultation on the ban on smoking in public places, but there are many other ways of looking at whether a consultation was successful. The intention is to take a range of different approaches and say what worked and what did not.
Thank you. Before I draw the session to an end, I have some concerns to raise. We keep talking about the launch of the project by Margot Wallström and Jack McConnell and about the ask-Jack-and-Margot event and all the rest of it.
How about the waffle breakfast?
Oh, Phil.
I will start with the timescales. Work is under way. We have been working with analytical colleagues in the Executive to look across the piece at theories of engagement and civic participation. We are doing that as part of planning the events that will inform the final report. The work on building a bridge will conclude when the report is produced in the autumn—probably around October.
The Executive is currently running its budgeting exercise for the coming financial year. Colleagues are aware of the importance of the project and of the sort of scale of money that is needed to deliver the outcomes that we are looking for.
You said that the Executive would work jointly with the Parliament, which does a lot of work on Europe. The our voice on Europe event is the kind of event that the Parliament runs around Europe day. Will the Executive rather than the Parliament fund the our voice on Europe event, given that the Executive is taking credit for it as part of the building a bridge project?
We are funding the event jointly with the Scottish Parliament, on an equal basis. There will be matched funding.
I thought that matched funding had stopped.
I want to pursue the question about the budget because, with respect, I do not think that the officials answered it. Given that the project was launched six months ago and a series of events is planned, an indicative, ball-park figure must have been calculated. It would be interesting for us to know what that figure is. The officials must be able to tell us whether Margot and Jack are going to hire Murrayfield or a village hall in Auchtermuchty.
The ask-Jack-and-Margot event will build on the events around the country in which the First Minister already participates.
That event was just one example. You are planning events, so you must have a rough idea of your budget.
Will people who attend the policy forum have to pay for their accommodation and travel, or will the Executive provide funding to cover such expenses?
We are looking at the possibility of offering support in cases in which support is needed to allow people to attend.
When will you be able to tell us what your budget is? The voluntary sector could make an important contribution to the policy forum but I suspect that the sector does not have the money to send five people to Brussels. If the event is to take place on 9 June, people need to know soon how they can get involved and what financial support they can expect to receive.
We acknowledge the importance of financial support. We will be happy to give the committee details of the budget, when the budget has been set.
Will the budget be set in time to be able to use it?
Yes.
That concludes our questions. I thank Nikki Brown and Daniel Kleinberg for their time. I remind members that at the meeting on 28 February the committee agreed to respond to the European Commission's white paper on a communications policy—the theme is broadly similar to the theme of the building a bridge project. We will consider a draft response in June.
The European Council called for "a period of reflection" and plan D is supposed to address the problems that have arisen because the Dutch and the French rejected the proposed constitution for Europe. People are kidding themselves if they think that communication is the answer—that is kidology. We have lost sight of the real problem, which is that the people of Europe appear to be disaffected with Europe. How do we get to the bottom of that? The issue is results, not communication.
While the convener is out of the room, I will respond and then let other members in if they wish to speak. I understand Mr Gallie's point, but my understanding of my discussion with Mr Duncan was that he felt that not enough time was assigned to the event in Brussels but that it was part of a process and was not a one-off. Further events and discussions are planned. I think that we should listen to all that, after which I would be happy for the committee, if members are agreeable, to send a report to the Commission. However, I do not think that we should send a report based on one afternoon event at which an officer felt there was insufficient time in which to discuss the issues.
That is my point. The whole thing was a farce. That was a key conference, but what happened was that three working-party groups were set up and given half an hour each to discuss the key issues. Four hundred representatives from across Europe attended at God knows what cost, but they had a debate of only one and a half hours. It was a major conference, which was associated with the assessment of plan D, but it started from the baseline that the French and the Dutch were totally wrong and just did not understand Europe. The arguments went on from there. The whole thing is a shambles and a farce. I think that we should have the guts to stand up and say that that is the committee's opinion.
That is not my opinion, I must say. You will recall that I suggested at the beginning of discussions on this matter that we produce a wide-ranging paper. As there was not full support in the committee for doing that, we decided to go down the lines of the communications strategy.
Did the Commission organise it?
I think that it was the Committee of the Regions.
It was and I accept the responsibility for making the suggestion that was attributed to the clerk.
I would be happy if the committee could write and report our—
The alternative is that we have something like a three-day conference, but people would find it difficult to attend that. Realistically, it is difficult to know how to organise these things. Either one tries to do it in a day or a day and a half, or one does it over three days, but it is difficult to get people to commit for that length of time. It is not all about being in one place at one time. I think that there are other opportunities, such as using the internet and sending reports to the Commission. Not everything has to be done in an afternoon in Brussels.
I can imagine 5 million people in Scotland all looking at the internet and making their comments. What we are about is identifying with people in Scotland rather than identifying with the people who are involved in the Committee of the Regions and that kind of thing.
I want to draw this to a close because that is to do with the Executive's building a bridge project; the meeting in Brussels was about plan D. What we are responding to is the communications white paper. I bring this spat to a close now. I am not going out to the toilet again, if this is what is going to happen.
It would not be a European and External Relations Committee meeting if Phil Gallie and I did not get a chance to have a little debate on the merits or otherwise of Europe.