Education, Culture and Sport Committee, 20 Sep 2000

Meeting date: Wednesday, September 20, 2000

Official Report 156KB pdf

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Committee Business

The next item is an update on forthcoming business. There are a number of items relating to the inquiry into school exam results. Towards the end, I will ask that the committee go into private session, because we need to discuss the appointment of an adviser. Are there are other points before we go on to that?

Yes. Yesterday, I mentioned to you that the European Committee was taking evidence on football transfers. Have you had an opportunity to discuss the matter with the convener of the European Committee? Can we have some input into its report, or will we at least be able to consider the European Committee's report once it is completed?

I know that you attended the meeting yesterday.

As did Fiona McLeod.

I am sorry—I did not know that Fiona McLeod was there, too. Did you feel that you were able to make a contribution?

Having read the Official Report of the European Committee's previous meeting, which I sent to you, convener, I was, to be honest, rather surprised that at no point in the discussion did it occur to any member of any party that there was a committee with responsibility for sport. The European Committee proceeded to take evidence from what I felt was a rather restricted number of people—I made that point at yesterday's meeting. It was no surprise to me that there was consensus among the witnesses in the evidence that they gave.

There was an opportunity for Fiona McLeod and me to ask questions, but I had a large number of questions that went unanswered. I am not convinced that the European Committee will take any more oral evidence. It will prepare a report, presumably drafted by the clerks, which will be discussed in private before it is published. It seemed to be the committee's intention to forward the report directly to the European Commission.

As a matter of courtesy, this committee, as the committee with responsibility for sport in Scotland, should at least be given the opportunity to comment on the draft report, so that our views can be considered. We can obtain the written evidence from the clerk and the oral evidence from the Official Report. That would allow us to spend half an hour discussing the matter if we decided to do so.

I am cognisant of the fact that we did not take up the issue ourselves—and did not even consider taking it up—because of our pending reviews of a number of matters, most importantly of the Scottish exam situation. It would probably have been difficult for us to do what the European Committee has done. I am not complaining that the European Committee has done the work—that is fine—but it is important that we, as the Education, Culture and Sport Committee, are involved, so that we can have some say.

Perhaps I can help. I am deputy convener of the European Committee. I thought that Brian Monteith was complaining that he had not been consulted when he mentioned a lack of courtesy. For the record, the reason why the European Committee moved so quickly on the issue was that we were concerned at the short time scale. Indeed, we scheduled an additional meeting to take the evidence.

There was no suggestion of cutting out any other committee from dealing with the matter, but it is a matter of European legislation and it was therefore perfectly appropriate for the European Committee to deal with it. I spoke to the convener of the European Committee after the meeting yesterday and there is no difficulty with this committee commenting on the report if it wants to. I am sure that the convener and the rest of the members of the European Committee would be delighted for that to happen.

We must consider the draft report. Yesterday, I asked the convener of the European Committee to ensure that this committee be included in the long list of people to whom he is sending the report. However, when I think about it, it is more important that we see the draft report.

The European Committee was asked by the witnesses to state clearly to the European Commission that Scottish football does not want the end of transfer fees. I have concerns about that. The matter goes beyond Europe and raises issues about football and sport in general in Scotland. We could be positive about what is happening and look forward to a better future which would ensure that funds are channelled into youth development by design rather than by chance. It is important that this committee examines the draft and comments on it.

Following Brian Monteith's representations to me yesterday, I spoke to Hugh Henry, the convener of the European Committee. He gave an undertaking that this committee would be given the opportunity to consider the report. I do not think that there would be a problem with our seeing the draft report. At that stage, we could decide whether we want to make any comments or suggestions from the perspective of our remit for sport.

Brian Monteith alluded to the fact that the time scale will be fairly tight, but there is a recognition that, even during the inquiry into school exam results, there will be a need to deal with other items of business. While I do not want to make football transfers a major item on the committee's agenda, it might be possible for us to examine the draft report and make any comments in a time scale that is feasible.

I take Cathy Jamieson's point about the deadline, which originally was set for today. The goal posts have now moved, if only by a matter of just over a month—much speed is needed—but that allows us to co-operate with the European Committee.

If the committee is agreeable, we will ask the European Committee to provide us with the draft report. If members want to make any comments, they can let me know and we can put the item on a future agenda.

Are there any other items?

Do we have a new time scale for the Hampden report?

We do not. Last week, I met Jim Hastie from Queen's Park FC, who was concerned about our delay in publishing our report on Hampden, because of the difficulties that that might cause. He will put those concerns in writing to me and I will bring the matter back to the committee so that we can address the difficulties that people feel they might have. We do not want anybody to suffer because we have had to delay the process. It is likely that once we have all the information on the schools exam inquiry, we will be able to give a more definite response on when the report will be back on the agenda.

When you put Jim Hastie's concerns on the agenda, will you also suggest a draft timetable, addressing those concerns?

Yes. Once all the evidence has come in, we will have an idea of how long the inquiry is likely to take us, and we can then put that back on our agenda. When I get the letter from Jim Hastie, I shall ensure that it is circulated to everybody.

We now move on to the inquiry into school exam results. The written evidence from the Executive, local authorities and agencies that have been directly approached is due on Friday 22 September. Evidence from the Scottish Qualifications Authority is due on Monday 25 September, and evidence from the general public is due on Friday 29 September. The indications are that the evidence is substantial; it is several inches thick at the moment, but very soon we shall be measuring it in feet.

I must therefore decide how to pass on that information to all the members of the committee. I want to ensure that all members have all the information that has been provided, but I need feedback on the most accessible way of doing that. The interval between the clerks receiving the evidence and our beginning to discuss it next Wednesday is very short. We must ensure that people have as much time as possible to read the information, to inform any questions or discussions. Individual members can speak to the clerks about how they would like to receive that information, but I invite members to make any other comments that they may have.

In an ideal situation, all members would have copies of the evidence in their local offices. However, I would be just as happy to access it here if that is more convenient for the clerks. I assume that, once we have appointed an adviser, we will have a summary or index of the evidence that has been submitted. We will need copies of the crucial submissions, but we might not need copies of all the hundreds of individual submissions.

Mike Russell suggested colour-coding the evidence, and the clerks are considering that. That might help us to divide evidence into various categories, to make it easier to access.

It is difficult to decide which pieces of evidence are more important than others, but I would certainly like a hard copy of the written submissions from all the people who will be giving oral evidence.

Hard copies of everything will be available, but what might be difficult is getting copies to all members.

We expect to receive written evidence tomorrow from a variety of organisations. It should not be too difficult to collate that, and we shall put it in folders with file dividers, so that members can see which agencies it is from. We shall also provide an index, and leave gaps for evidence that arrives late.

We are concerned about the quantity of evidence that might come from the Executive. If current estimates are to believed, it could amount to several thick lever-arch files, and that would make quite a heavy box to dispatch to members. We could have it sent out by courier on Friday evening, but if it arrives at members' homes on Saturday morning, they will have to bring it back to Parliament themselves. It would help the clerks if members could indicate after the meeting whether they would like the information to be sent by courier to their homes, or whether they would prefer it to be left in their parliamentary offices.

Thank you. That is helpful. Does anyone foresee difficulties with that?

We also expect a memorandum from the Executive, which will refer to all the written evidence. There would be no difficulty in sending that out on Friday. If members had the memorandum, it would lead them into the evidence when they collect it.

Last week, we mentioned appointing a computer systems adviser. We have not made much progress on that, and Camilla Kidner does not have additional information at this stage. We wonder whether we should wait until we have appointed our main adviser before appointing a computer systems adviser, or whether we should go ahead with the appointment anyway. Are members content to leave that decision until we have more information?

Members indicated agreement.

As there are no other points on the inquiry, we shall move into private session.

Meeting continued in private until 11:13.