Education, Culture and Sport Committee, 23 Apr 2002

Meeting date: Tuesday, April 23, 2002

Official Report 224KB pdf

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Work Programme

We continue in public session to consider the committee's work programme. Members should have a copy of the document in front of them and also a copy of the additional paper on a matter that was raised last week. Do members have comments on the proposed work programme as it is set out?

As I noted last week, I am concerned about the lack of the arts and culture in the work programme.

We are caught in a slight procedural anomaly and I want to make a suggestion about it. We need to do something on the arts and culture. Because of a variety of circumstances that we will not go into, Cathy Peattie cannot present the large amount of work on traditional music that she has prepared. That is because she is only a substitute member of the committee. Apparently, substitute members cannot do certain things.

However, as Cathy Peattie has substantially finished that work—or is in the process of finishing it—could the task not be passed to another member of the committee? Perhaps the deputy convener or Jackie Baillie could present the work in their own name but with a full acknowledgement of what was done by Cathy Peattie. Cathy could contribute to the discussion and we could then make progress on an item on which we wanted to make progress last year.

The work that I was involved in is only an example. Several other members are also involved in pieces of work. The expectations of various organisations throughout the country have been raised about the committee's on-going work. I had to leave the work that I was doing, but it could be pulled together and completed quite easily. I do not care who presents it.

However, this is the Education, Culture and Sport Committee. That is the perception that people have of us. People out there expect that we will complete the work to which we have committed ourselves. Whether or not I am on the committee, we must bear in mind the broad remit of the committee. I am concerned that we might lose that remit.

Will Martin Verity clarify the situation? Do we invite Cathy Peattie to submit what she has done so that we can put it on the agenda? It would then be owned by the committee anyway. I do not think that there would be any technical problem with that.

Yes. That would be possible.

I welcome that, but the reason that I raised the issue is that I think that we should be considering language, music, culture and the issues surrounding a national theatre. We have discussed all those issues and agreed to deal with them again. My concern is not whether I am on the committee or someone else is but that we might lose sight of those things.

Okay. Let us try to find solutions to that concern.

I am conscious that we have a full work programme. We can get over the technical issues about what the committee should and should not deal with but, on a practical note, where do we build into our work programme the consideration of the arts that many members would like to have?

The reality is that we have a substantial work load. We must deal with the free school meals bill, the children's commissioner bill and the purposes of education inquiry. If we want to do a subject justice, we should not simply tag it on the tail-end of an agenda. That points to the possibility—depending on whether the Executive introduces one bill or two—that we could build in time to do something after the summer. The committee agreed that it would consider its work programme over the course of the summer recess. That might be the most appropriate time to build in something about the arts.

I agree that it is not appropriate to tag items on, but I remind the convener that, during the consideration of our work programme last year, there was a lot of discussion about the importance of including on the agenda those issues that I have mentioned. I am concerned that those issues might get lost. I know that we are about to consider the issue of football, but it seems to me that we should look at the arts if we are considering including other items on our agenda.

Members will not expect me to disagree with Cathy Peattie in the slightest and, indeed, I agree entirely. I simply tried to make a helpful suggestion.

I appreciate that.

Let me try again. We need to take the report on traditional music that Cathy Peattie has done and get it on to the agenda before the summer. We need a chance to discuss the report to see if we need to take further action, which I suspect will be the case.

Irene McGugan's report on language has a strong cultural dimension. I understand that Irene McGugan could present her report in September after the recess. The committee agreed that, for our final year, we would deal with a major cultural topic but we seem to have lost the topic to another committee. We therefore need to agree on what the cultural topic should be and to discuss it over the next few weeks so that it can form part of our work programme that will start in September.

I entirely concur with Cathy Peattie except on one detail. The committee's remit also includes sport. We have a responsibility to examine sports issues and some of them are major issues. The committee's brief is too wide. The Parliament needs a separate culture committee. Frankly, I think that the Executive does not organise culture properly. However, having said that, we are probably stuck with what we have until next year. As we have a heavy legislative work load and also have our purposes of education inquiry, the compromise that has been suggested is probably the best that we could do.

I agree with Mike Russell and Jackie Baillie. There are great difficulties with our work load and what we face until the summer. Members will remember that, when I raised the issue of consideration of the McCrone settlement about a month ago, I flagged up that I could not see a way of dealing with it until the autumn. I thought that our work load looked fairly tight. It is important that the committee gives culture and sport proactive treatment. Time has been given to those issues, but generally they have been treated in a reactive way when we have had to deal with panics or crises.

Mike Russell mentioned a main cultural topic. It is important that we try at least to revive the consensus for a national theatre and I hope that that issue can be given serious thought for the next session. I am concerned that the issue may be allowed to drift and I hope that we can do more to explore what can be done to see a national theatre to fruition, as there is cross-party support for it.

Given Helen Law's comments on the bottom-line figure for the McCrone settlement, the distribution of funding requires further examination, although not the examination that she wanted to see in the committee. We should keep an eye on having the McCrone settlement reviewed in September or October and consider bringing Councillor Law or other COSLA representatives and relevant witnesses before us.

The McCrone settlement must be considered before it is too late. I reiterate that I am concerned that the closer any review of the McCrone settlement is to a parliamentary election, the less likely it is that there will be an objective view from the committee. It is likely that members will take positions that are closer to their party's view. That would be regrettable if the committee were trying to reach a consensus.

The committee has the message about more focus on culture. We will get the paper on traditional music developed before the recess.

There are three matters to consider: cultural issues, the McCrone settlement and sport. The obvious sport issue that has been around for a while is sport in schools. One or two members have mentioned to me that we still await a response from the Executive and I have raised concerns with the minister. A discussion has emerged in the past fortnight about the future direction of Scottish football. I am considering the discussion paper and am conscious of time. If we want to do things properly, we should not kick the issue into the long grass. We need to have a strategic discussion. I do not know how we can do that in our overall post-summer programme.

The away day event in which we interacted with ministers was valuable, but I do not know whether we have time prior to summer to organise something like that. Do members think that it would be worth while to do that as soon as we come back after summer? Should we try to fix up something for the remaining nine months of the committee?

A single day away would certainly be useful. Perhaps two days are not needed, but certainly an evening and a day would be useful. That would give us a chance to do certain things. We should have that as early in September as we can to look at the last year. We need to find our way to that today.

On the cultural side, we identified that there is no possibility of adding anything between now and summer. On the away day, it would be useful if a member's paper—perhaps an initial rapporteur paper—informed us about general issues in Scottish football, including how sport in schools impinges on football. We might not want to take up the issue, as there are difficulties, but we might take it up. I think that Frank McAveety would be the ideal person to do that.

I concur with Brian Monteith on the McCrone issue, but I think that he is too hopeful in believing that there would be no positioning on the issue. We are close enough to an election for such positioning on the issue, which is a political one. However, hope springs eternal and we will see what happens. The McCrone issue should be considered next session, but we must agree first on our work programme. Let us do what we have to do—with the agreed addition—and have an away day early in the new session or in the week before we return so that we can consider those issues.

We can explore that option and consult committee members for firm dates, recognising that members will also have family commitments at that time.

I want to put on record my opposition to the idea of more parliamentary resources being put into more papers on the issue of Scottish football. If further work is done on the issue of school sport, soccer in schools could be considered. However, this is a slow-moving committee and should not commit resources at this time to such a fast-moving issue as Scottish football. I concur with the Executive's view that Scottish football is a commercial consideration. Although the committee cannot do much on the sport aspect of football, members, as parliamentarians or as party spokesmen, are free to do something. However, the committee can review the issue when we return in September.

I wonder whether members would be happy with having a seminar in the last week of the recess. That date would be helpful for business planning.

Yes.

Do members have comments on Brian Monteith's most recent contribution?

I take issue not only with what he said, but with how he said it. This committee is not slow-moving and works well together. We have our differences, but we have achieved much. Our work programme speaks for itself, as does the number of hours for which we meet. More important, I find fascinating the philosophy that states that parliamentary committees have no role in commercial affairs. That is an extraordinary separation of issues, and it is simply not true.

The appropriate parliamentary committees should deal with commercial issues.

That is simply not true. In those circumstances, although I am not proposing an inquiry, I am not ruling out having one.

To keep the football metaphor going, we have a crowded midfield and are trying to find space to get in the real strikes. I am conscious of the time that we have spent on the issue, but I agree with Brian's comment about Scottish football being a fast-moving issue, as the past fortnight's events prove. However, perhaps the committee should respond to such fast-moving events. The events of the past fortnight and the language that has been used are symptomatic of the self-interested attitudes in Scottish football. The Education, Culture and Sport Committee's strategic role means that we cannot ignore the wider issue of the future of Scottish football.

The committee has the opportunity of going to Aberdeen. Given the comments that have been made in the media and the fact that a senior figure in Aberdeen Football Club has been involved in the Scottish Premier League debate, we could facilitate exploratory discussions on the issue. Brian Monteith, as a parliamentarian, is welcome to join me in such discussions, perhaps as a redoubtable wing-back.

I thought that I would be left-back, given the committee's perception of me.

Or sweeper.

Can we move forward? We have a commitment to consider a paper on the position of traditional music in the arts. We must also organise our diary commitments for the recess to enable us to have our seminar.

There is also the languages paper at the beginning of the new session.

That would also be helpful. Perhaps that can be done early in September.

I trust that members are happy with that work programme. I conclude the public part of the meeting.

Meeting continued in private until 16:44.