“Managing increasing prisoner numbers in Scotland”
Under this item, we will consider a response from the relevant accountable officers on the Auditor General's report, "Managing increasing prisoner numbers in Scotland". The responses are very good and very full. It is apposite that Mike Ewart, the head of the Scottish Prison Service, commented this week on contradictions in legal responsibilities and described how he manages competing responsibilities. There is clearly a major problem.
I agree that the response is comprehensive and helpful. Rather than dealing separately with the issue, Robert Gordon and Mike Ewart collaborated on a joint response, which was useful. As for where we go from here, we are in danger of straying into policy issues and it is more appropriate to pass the matter to the Justice Committee, which is considering the whole issue of prisons, particularly the question of capacity. I endorse your view, convener, that having noted the response, we pass it on to the Justice Committee.
I am sure that my colleagues on the Justice Committee will be delighted when a new report arrives.
It strikes me that some of the responses are loaded with jargon. There are acronyms in every second paragraph. For example, one response states:
Notwithstanding, an attempt has been made to answer questions about fairly complicated issues. I accept what you say about jargon. The public sector often uses jargon when it tries to describe things, but it is clear that there has been an attempt to focus more on policy issues.
I assumed that jargon and terms such as "proactively", "on an on-going basis", and "Cognisance is also taken" came from Robert Gordon and the facts came from Mike Ewart.
That might be unfair. All civil servants are pretty well versed in the school of jargon.
Policy issues are for policy committees, but it is difficult to consider policy if the answers to questions are vague. Under the straightforward heading:
I note the points that you have made, but I think that some of those issues are on the policy agenda.
I will provide a little assistance to the committee by linking some of the numbers together, which is what we do best. In "Managing increasing prisoner numbers in Scotland", we mentioned the last projections of prisoner numbers that the Government had. At that time—it was 2007—the Government projected that the number, including home detention curfew prisoners, would reach 8,100 by 2010-11 and 8,500 by 2016-17.
It is clear that prisons are overcrowded and that there is a massive accommodation problem. If open prisons are to be used to house prisoners because of overcrowding elsewhere in the system, where does that leave the concept of open prisons? That leads me to ask the simple question: what are prisons for? I hope that the appropriate committee will pursue that.
Fortunately, that is not a question for us. Others can wrestle with it. Do we agree to note the responses and pass the report to the Justice Committee for its consideration?
“Financial overview of Scotland's colleges 2006/07”
The next item is on responses to the report "Financial overview of Scotland's colleges 2006/07". Again, we have received fairly full information. The police investigation at Kilmarnock College is continuing, so we cannot go into any of that. I am not sure that there is much else that we can do. I do not know whether the Education, Lifelong Learning and Culture Committee is looking into any of the aspects. If not, my inclination would be just to note the responses.
One point arises from Philip Rycroft's letter. He said that the Association of Scotland's Colleges published guidance on college boards and management in June. When we addressed the issue, we looked into how robustly management boards were holding college principals to account. It might be worth asking for sight of that guidance if it is now publicly available.
We can do that and hold the item until the guidance is made available. Is that agreed?
I presume that the minister will be keeping an eye on developments.
Ultimately, it will be the responsibility of ministers. As far as committees are concerned, it would be the Education, Lifelong Learning and Culture Committee.
I understand that that committee is likely to take some evidence on funding in the higher education sector as part of its budget scrutiny this year.
Are we sending it the information that we have?
Yes.
We will hold the item until we receive the information that Murdo Fraser has requested. However, the issue that he mentioned is about more than just funding; it is about the ability of boards to hold college principals to account and about what happens if a board fails. There is some information from the Scottish Further and Higher Education Funding Council on that, so we will hold on to the item for now.
“Improving the school estate”
The next item is on the response to the report "Improving the school estate". Frankly, the response is somewhat disappointing, but I do not think that we can do much more at this stage. We may return to the item once the further work has been produced.
It is all tied up with much wider political issues about the Scottish Futures Trust. I suspect that there is not a lot that the committee can do to progress that. We just need to keep a watching brief on the matter.
Apart from the spelling errors in the letter from the director general, education—that is astonishing; I do not know where he went to school—my main concern is that the chairman of the Scottish Futures Trust was appointed without use of the Nolan procedures and without open competition, but that is nothing to do with the committee.
That is nothing to do with this item.
I am not sure why you use the word "disappointing", convener. There is now £2 billion of committed investment in schools, there have been seven major local authority building projects since May, another four are in the pipeline and so on. The response provides information about what is on-going, so I am not sure that the use of the word "disappointing" is appropriate.
The school strategy would need to be examined. There still seems to be a lack of clarity about exactly what is being done and whether some of the work that is now being done is a continuation of work that was previously initiated and is now coming to fruition. Nor is there clarity about when the next phase of the work will be commissioned and when it will start. We cannot do much more now but, as Murdo Fraser says, we should keep a watching brief on the matter and return to it as required. Is that agreed?
“Dealing with offending by young people”
The next item is on the response to the report "Dealing with offending by young people". It is another item that we have probably taken as far as we can.
“Overview of Scotland's health and NHS performance in 2006/07”
Do we agree to note the response?