Meeting of the Parliament

Meeting date: Thursday, June 15, 2023

Official Report 1072KB pdf

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Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body Question Time

Good afternoon, colleagues. The first item of business this afternoon is Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body question time. I invite members who wish to ask a supplementary to press their request-to-speak button during the relevant question.

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Passholder Secure Entry System (Access Difficulties)

To ask the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body whether it will provide an update on the efficiency of the passholder secure entry system to the Parliament, in light of reports that passholders are experiencing difficulties in gaining access. (S6O-02390)

Since April, we have had around 800 passholders attending Parliament on business days. Although I recognise that there have been a few instances of passholders experiencing difficulties, those have all been resolved. If anyone is having persistent problems with their pass, I urge them to contact the pass studio, where staff will be happy to discuss any particular issues with the passholder and to provide support.

I do not know whether the system records how often someone fails to get access, but, one day last week, it took me nine attempts. I tried each of the turnstiles twice, and it kept turning me down. Since I lodged this question, a number of MSP colleagues and Parliament staff have told me that they have had similar problems.

I do not know whether the advice would be to have your fingerprint removed from the pass and a new fingerprint taken, which some people have done and could be one answer, or whether there is some other way to take this forward.

I thank the member for raising the issue. I appreciate how frustrating it is to have intermittent difficulties with the system, and I appreciate the member raising the fact that he has spoken to other members and passholders who are experiencing the same. I encourage him in the first instance to book an appointment with the pass studio so that staff can check the pass. I will also ensure that the contractor is made aware of the intermittent issues and ask whether there are upgrades that could address any potential glitches and speed up the process.

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Car Parking for MSPs and Staff

To ask the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body when it will next review the car parking arrangements for MSPs and staff. (S6O-02356)

As the member will recognise, the increased security measures for the car park were recommended by Police Scotland following a terrorist attack in the United Kingdom in 2017. The car park was updated in 2021. Although there is no intention formally to review the car park arrangements, the operation of the car park and the experience of its users are constantly reviewed and monitored, as we seek to balance the need for security with the ease of use for members and their staff.

SPCB members will know that, some time ago, I wrote to the chief executive and to them about the difficulties that were being encountered on exiting and entering the car park at that time. Fairly frequent malfunctions of the barriers were making entry and exit extremely slow. Things improved markedly, mainly as a result of careful and judicious manual operation of the entry and exit system, but in recent weeks the process has again become exceptionally slow—although I have to say that I think that it has been a little better in recent days.

Could I get confirmation, which I think will also be of interest to many other members, that the more efficient manually operated system will be in place from now on, so as to avoid lengthy delays, especially underground when several cars and motorbikes are waiting, with the car fumes that that entails?

I understand that the member has a letter with the corporate body at the moment, to which we will respond as soon as possible. It is fair to say that there have been teething problems with the vehicle entry system, and those have been dealt with by facilities management and the contractors.

If the member is asking whether we intend to remain in manual mode, I have to say that that is not the intention. It is more secure to operate the system as it should be operated. There is one outstanding issue to resolve with the entry gates, and that is in the induction loop system. Work to resolve that issue will be disruptive, but the plan is to take it forward during the summer recess. That will lead to a reduction in the need to operate in manual mode and will restore the integrity of the system. It is about ensuring that we have the level of security that is required.

I know that that is not the answer that the member is looking for, but the intention is to move away from operating in manual mode.

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Children and Young People (Visits)

To ask the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body what action it takes to ensure that children and young people from across Scotland can visit their Scottish Parliament. (S6O-02391)

The SPCB provides a school engagement programme through its public engagement services office. We offer schools free sessions and tours at the Parliament. Understandably, Covid changed things for schools and our service. We now have a digital schools service, as well as having restarted our team that visits schools across Scotland. Those services are popular and are especially appreciated by those who do not want to travel to Edinburgh or who, for a number of reasons, find coming to Edinburgh to be too challenging.

Across our services, we have reached schools in 69 out of 73 constituencies, and we are continuing to improve ways of maximising our engagement with schools. Children and young people also visit the Parliament to take part in committee meetings, meet their MSPs and take part in our engaging events programme.

I appreciate the good work that the Parliament and the education team do. Like me, members will have visited schools in their constituencies and seen the interest that children have in the workings of our Parliament. I have been disappointed on a number of occasions that the young children I have visited have not been able to visit Parliament due to cost constraints. They find the cost of transport to be very expensive. Is there anything that the Scottish Parliament can do to assist pupils in less well-off areas or rural areas who find travel to Parliament too costly?

We are continuing to review how best to deliver our education services in the most effective and inclusive way post-Covid. It is important to the SPCB that we can ensure equity and meet the aims of our public engagement strategy to break down barriers for those who are least likely to engage with us and that we take into account other commitments, such as reaching net zero and ensuring the most effective use of our resources.

There are many factors around distance travelled and deprivation that we would want to consider. From our evaluation forms, we know that 25 per cent of schools say that cost is a factor. To date, the SPCB’s approach for those who cannot travel to Edinburgh to visit us has been to provide targeted services in schools. Our outreach and digital services are popular and remove other significant barriers, such as time away from the classroom.

The SPCB is happy to explore whether, as part of that review, offering some sort of subsidy is within its power and helpful to meeting our engagement goal of inclusivity. It is important that we consider the feasibility of any subsidy within the context of reviewing our education service as a whole in the context of our wider corporate commitments, including public engagement and sustainability. We will ask officials to engage with schools from across Scotland, and we will look to other legislatures to ensure that any decision takes account of the needs of schools alongside our service capacity to support those needs.

In the recent memory of the institution, has there been any attempt to organise a parliamentary week or a parliamentary fortnight across all the schools in Scotland that would allow us to promote the activities and work that go on in the Parliament and, in effect, to reverse the situation that has been described in relation to visits by taking the Parliament into the classrooms of Scotland?

In the answers that I have given, I have said that the Parliament endeavours to do that all year round. However, Stephen Kerr has asked me a specific question, and I would be happy to inquire into that with the corporate body and report back to him.

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Scottish Parliamentary Business (Public Access Apps)

To ask the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body what the newest developments are in the creation of Scottish Parliament apps to allow the public easier access to parliamentary business papers and other resources. (S6O-02389)

The corporate body does not develop mobile applications, but we utilise several mobile apps to help to deliver services to the public. The latest development in that area involves officials working with suppliers to establish how we can bring access to broadcasting material via an app that will be available to the public to download. That app will allow the viewing of live proceedings as well as archived material.

The main source of information about parliamentary proceedings remains the website, which has been designed to be accessible and compatible across different types of devices, including mobile phones and tablets. Members of the public with any device with a web browser and internet connection will be able to access all parliamentary business papers and other resources from that website.

I do not think that that is a satisfactory line that we should be taking. I know that the corporate body will be aware of my very keen interest in apps that can be downloaded from the various stores that exist. I welcome the fact that Maggie Chapman has been able to tell me that work is on-going on a broadcast app. We should all be motivated to try to make it easier for the people of Scotland to access Parliament and view its proceedings.

Can Maggie Chapman give me some assurances? First, when we are developing those apps, will there be space in that development work to create access to business papers, such as the Official Report, and a digital annunciator that would allow someone that accesses the app to see the current business of Parliament—who is speaking at any one time and what is being debated?

Secondly, one of the problems with the website access to Scottish Parliament TV is that there are too many clicks and it is too difficult to find. Will there be a single-click access in the app that Maggie Chapman has already mentioned in her first answer to me to allow a viewing of live broadcast?

Thirdly, might it be possible to trial a pilot version of the app that Maggie Chapman has described, or of the ones that I have described, later this year?

I take Stephen Kerr’s point about the multiple clicks that you often have to go through on the website. We can take that point back to the web developers and maintainers to see whether we could make that process much more streamlined.

On the specific question about different apps, one of the reasons for which we do not go down the route of having different apps that members of the public and, indeed, members, have to download from the app store, Google Play or other providers, is that it would require constant interaction and engagement with those providers to ensure that those apps and their updates are compatible with our systems, which would lead to security concerns. That is one of the fundamental reasons why that is not the preferred method of app provision for systems in Parliament, whether for our own use as members or for the public. However, I hear what Stephen Kerr has said about the business papers and the digital annunciator, and we can certainly take those points forward into conversations that we have about this.

I will have to come back to Mr Kerr on the pilot scheme; I am not sure at this stage how far we are in the developments. I know that next week Mr Kerr is meeting our head of digital services, who I am sure will be able to pick up some of those points as well.

That concludes Scottish Parliament Corporate Body questions. There will be a brief pause while the front-bench members change before we move to the next item of business.