Review of SPCB Supported Bodies Committee Bill Proposal
The next item of business is a debate on motion S3M-4243, in the name of Trish Godman, on the review of Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body supported bodies.
If the furniture is now in place and her lectern has been suitably adjusted, I call Trish Godman to speak to and move the motion.
I am pleased to present to Parliament the Review of SPCB Supported Bodies Committee's report, which recommends that there be a committee bill to harmonise the SPCB-supported office-holders' terms and conditions of appointment and to enhance their governance arrangements.
Before I explain why we need such a bill, I thank all those who contributed to the process. First, I thank my fellow committee members for their valuable contributions in developing the committee's report. Secondly, I thank the committee's clerks and legal advisers, who worked hard to support committee members. Yet again, I am reminded of the fact that this place would not run without the help of our committee clerks. Thirdly, I thank those who responded to our general call for evidence and all those who gave oral evidence to the committee.
On 13 November 2008, the Parliament agreed to establish an ad hoc committee, to be known as the Review of SPCB Supported Bodies Committee. It was not considered appropriate for the Government to review and to recommend changes to the bodies that are sponsored by the corporate body, as such bodies are properly a matter for the Parliament.
The committee's remit was:
"To consider and report on whether alterations should be made to the terms and conditions of the office-holders and the structure of the bodies supported by the SPCB; to consider how any proposals, including the addition of any new functions, for future arrangements should be taken forward, including by way of a Committee Bill, and to make recommendations accordingly."
Having set out the background, I turn to the committee's recommendations. In reaching our conclusions, we were mindful of the recommendations of several previous reports: the previous Finance Committee's seventh report in 2006, on its inquiry into accountability and governance; Audit Scotland's report, "Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body Ombudsman/Commissioners Shared Services"; Professor Crerar's report, "The Crerar Review: The Report of the Independent Review of Regulation, Audit, Inspection and Complaints Handling of Public Services in Scotland"; the Scottish Government's report, "Fit For Purpose Complaints System Action Group—Report to Ministers", which is also known as the Sinclair report; and the Scottish Commission for Public Audit's first report in 2008, on its review of the corporate governance of Audit Scotland.
We received some thought-provoking suggestions from the corporate body. The Scottish Government added suggestions to transfer other bodies that might come under the SPCB's support. We also sought and received considerable oral and written evidence. As members will appreciate, at 5 o'clock each Thursday night, we all rushed home to read all those papers.
In summary, the committee recommends a number of changes to the accountability and governance arrangements for office-holders; it also recommends that a new standards and public appointments body be created and that all functions of the Scottish prisons complaints commissioner be transferred to the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman. We recommend that the corporate body should continue to sponsor office-holders and that it should set office-holders' terms and conditions of appointment, including setting and reviewing their salaries. To enable the corporate body to undertake its role effectively—and in the light of the Finance Committee's recommendations of 2006—we recommend that the governance arrangements for the office-holders should be brought into line with those in the legislation that established the Scottish Human Rights Commission. That means that proposals covering expenditure, the appointment of staff and the location of offices will be subject to the approval of the corporate body. There should also be a requirement that strategic plans covering three to four business years be laid before Parliament.
To enhance the accountability of the office-holders' operational work, we recommend that committee scrutiny be undertaken at least once a year. We have invited the Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee to consider any necessary changes to standing orders. In evidence to our committee, the office-holders indicated that they would welcome more opportunities to work with the committees of the Parliament.
We recommend that the proposals in the Crerar and Sinclair reports that relate to the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman should be implemented, but we consider that they should be introduced by the Scottish Government as part of its Public Services Reform (Scotland) Bill. We also recommend that all functions of the Scottish prisons complaints commissioner should be transferred to the ombudsman and put on a statutory footing. Other ancillary amendments will be required to assist with the interpretation of certain provisions in the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman Act 2002. Those provisions fall to be covered within the proposed committee bill.
On structural changes, we recommend that the posts of Scottish Parliamentary Standards Commissioner and chief investigating officer—both part-time posts—should be combined into a single post and joined with the post of the Commissioner for Public Appointments in Scotland in order to create a new commission under the governance of the corporate body.
On the reporting arrangements for the standards commissioner, we recommend that no changes be made. Investigative reports on members of the Scottish Parliament should continue to be sent to the Parliament's Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee. Reports on councillors and other elected members should be sent to the Standards Commission for Scotland. The Parliament's Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee will continue to have an identified commissioner who will report to it. Our proposed changes in the area will increase the capacity and expertise that are available to that committee.
We were invited to consider merging Scotland's Commissioner for Children and Young People and the Scottish Human Rights Commission into a rights body. We deliberated about that particularly long and hard. The evidence that we received was finely balanced, but after careful consideration we were not persuaded that creating the proposed rights body was the correct thing to do at this stage. However, we urge the children's commissioner and the Scottish Human Rights Commission to collaborate where possible, and we have invited the Education, Lifelong Learning and Culture Committee to consider whether there are any overlaps in the work that is undertaken by the children's commissioner and children's organisations, to ensure that public funds are not spent on duplicating work.
We recommend that the Scottish Information Commissioner, the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman and Scotland's Commissioner for Children and Young People should remain as stand-alone posts but that they should be subject to enhanced scrutiny by the corporate body.
In summary, we believe that our recommendations will improve the accountability and governance of the SPCB-supported bodies and deliver benefits to the public through better performance and easier access to the services that the bodies provide. Over time, they are expected to reduce expenditure. Our report has cross-party support and I hope that it will receive unanimous support from the Parliament at decision time.
I move,
That the Parliament agrees to the proposal for a Committee Bill, under Rule 9.15, contained in the Review of SPCB Supported Bodies Committee's 1st Report, 2009 Review of SPCB Supported Bodies (SP Paper 266).
I thank the convener and members of the Review of SPCB Supported Bodies Committee for all their hard work and careful consideration of the often complex issues that they had to deal with. We are grateful for the Parliament's work on seeking to achieve a robust and proportionate scrutiny system and I am pleased that the committee has considered how to improve the Parliament's relationship with its bodies.
All but one of the six SPCB-supported bodies that are under discussion today were established by the previous Scottish Executive as a direct result of Government policy. Clearly, there will be circumstances in which proposed improvements will impact on the statutory responsibilities of Government-supported and SPCB-supported bodies.
I echo Trish Godman's comment that we did not begin the discussions with a blank sheet of paper. We have the 2006 report by the Finance Committee, Professor Crerar's independent report, and the report of the fit-for-purpose complaints system action group, which was chaired by Douglas Sinclair, the chair of Consumer Focus Scotland. That group worked with stakeholders to produce practical recommendations on how the complaints system can be streamlined and made more accessible to the public. I am pleased that the Review of SPCB Supported Bodies Committee firmly endorsed what Douglas Sinclair's group identified as the way forward: a strengthened role for the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman, with the SPSO leading the way in developing effective complaints-handling systems.
The committee recommends that, at stage 2 of the Public Services Reform (Scotland) Bill, the Government should include provisions for a new complaints-handling process. The fit-for-purpose complaints system action group's report was clear about the benefits for both consumers and service providers of simplifying the multiple complaints systems. Complaints processes that are easy to access, understand and use will help the less articulate and less confident to have the confidence to complain, and simplification will also have benefits for service providers.
However, we also need a strong ethos throughout our public services that regards complaints as opportunities for learning and empowers complaints handlers to resolve as many complaints as possible at the first level, the first hurdle and the first goal, because the sooner complaints are resolved, the greater the saving to the public purse. Subject to the Parliament's agreement, the Government is therefore happy to propose such provisions at stage 2 of the Public Services Reform (Scotland) Bill. The creation of an easier, shorter, quicker and wholly user-focused approach to complaints about public services in Scotland should be a priority for us all.
Last November, the Government said that it would put its proposals for the improvement of complaints handling to the Review of SPCB Supported Bodies Committee for consideration. The proposals, which emerged from a broad consensus, include structural changes to the SPSO, Waterwatch Scotland and the Scottish Prisons Complaints Commission. I understand from the evidence that was given why the committee considered the transfer of complaints from Waterwatch to the SPSO a finely balanced issue.
It would have been useful to consider the benefits to users in the wider context, and the overarching benefits to the alignment of complaints-handling processes across all services. Those benefits could include simplification of the landscape for service users, a reduction in overall costs, and ensuring that lessons that are learned from complaints about one service lead to improvements in all services. In that wider context, we still believe that our proposal to transfer Waterwatch's complaints functions to the SPSO and its representative functions to Consumer Focus Scotland is a sensible rationalisation that accords with both Professor Crerar's view and Douglas Sinclair's work.
The Government also believes that the transfer of prison complaints to the SPSO might fit better in the Public Services Reform (Scotland) Bill than in the Review of SPCB Supported Bodies Committee's bill. However, we will be pleased to continue to discuss the best way forward as the two bills reach stage 2. Our rationale is simply that it is sensible—and easier for service users and the wider public—for all improvements to complaints handling to be dealt with in a single bill.
I remind the Parliament that the process began early in 2006. More than three years later, we owe it to the public to build on what has already been done and to deliver tangible benefits to the way in which they engage with public services. Now more than ever, in these difficult economic times, we need to think about the needs of our country of five million people and ask how we can have fewer organisations, reduce duplication and have less bureaucracy in order to deliver better services for the people of Scotland.
I am happy to support the motion.
I am happy to contribute to the debate, just as I was happy to contribute to the work of the Review of SPCB Supported Bodies Committee. I did not always go to the committee with a spring in my step, but I recognised that it had an important role to play. I thank my fellow committee members for their forbearance during some of the discussions, which came close to being tortuous.
I particularly thank the convener, Trish Godman, who kept us focused on the need to come to some conclusions and reminded us of the significance of our role. Like her, I thank the witnesses, who raised important issues, and particularly the clerks. I do not think that I have ever been on a committee where there was such a degree of support through well-organised materials that illuminated the difficult issues and made them accessible to us.
The committee dealt with important issues, but because we were dealing with structures, it was sometimes difficult to grasp the significance of the debate and gain clarity about what the structures and roles actually are. However, I believe that we produced a comprehensive and considered report. Although Bruce Crawford identified some areas that he wants to pursue further, I am confident that we tried to come to the right conclusions. Of course, a further opportunity will be afforded to the Parliament to explore the issues.
It is often more difficult than one imagines to act on an aspiration to declutter. It is certainly the Government's experience—and probably that of previous Administrations—that bodies tend to come into existence for a purpose. We cannot assume that they are surplus to requirements without identifying what their purpose is and how else services might be delivered. Also, we should not presume that big organisations will always deliver most effectively. There are diseconomies of scale as well as economies of scale, and we have to test that as we pursue conclusions.
Does the member agree that the Review of SPCB Supported Bodies Committee should be particularly commended for its decision to retain the office of the children's commissioner and to treat its work as distinctive?
I will come to that contentious issue shortly.
First, I want to make the point that people sometimes need to be close to the ground and the issues in order to be able to respond. A generic complaints body will not always be able to address people's specific issues. If we are going to have big bodies, they must still be close and sensitive to those who are pursuing complaints.
There is an interesting issue to do with the independence of commissioners, which we wrestled with. The instinctive desire to separate off bodies and make them independent of the political process is partly a product of the lack of confidence in politics and politicians that exists, yet, ironically, we have probably all expressed our concerns about the House of Lords precisely because it is not an elected body. We somehow manage to carry both things in our heads at the same time. We must find the right balance between independence and accountability, about which we must have an on-going debate and dialogue.
On the rights bodies, I think that my party would want to emphasise an important issue to do with individuals pursuing complaints about individual breaches of their rights. It is incumbent on us to recognise patterns of disadvantage and inequality. It is not just a matter of addressing individual issues; general messages should be considered in progressing policies.
On access, it is fair enough to say that there should be a one-stop shop, but we must understand the disadvantages for some people of such an arrangement. The issue should not be about rewarding the capacity to complain; sometimes we have to engage with communities and discuss with them the complaints that they might have. There is a responsibility on people to reach out into communities; they should not just be recipients of complaints.
Robin Harper referred to the particularly important issue of the children's commissioner. I recognise that the corporate body had a particular role in that respect, and I welcomed its provision of a proposed structure against which we could focus the debate. There is a symbolism about the children's commissioner and a strength of feeling among particular groups and individual MSPs about the importance of sustaining that role. However, I also recognise that it was legitimate to discuss its role. It is important that the commissioner clarifies the role, and that the body is seen as challenging the Government, not just in relation to what we aspire to, but in relation to the gap between what a Government claims that it cares about and what it delivers through its budgets and priorities. The Scottish Government is often found wanting in that regard. It cares about a lot of things, but we should consider its budgets and what it prioritises. We want an on-going dialogue with the children's commissioner about that level of engagement. We also want a recognition that, although the commissioner is a voice for children, children's experiences can be very different. It is important to consider the inequalities and disadvantages that young people face, and their disparate experiences.
I again thank those who were engaged in producing the report. I recognise that the debate is on-going and that it does not sit comfortably in any box. There are lots of shades of grey. The Parliament and the committee have recognised that. We have tried to set up a structure that is not for all time, but which is underpinned by an understanding that, in time, organisations must become sufficiently flexible to be able to reflect on their own structures and on how they fit in with other structures across the landscape in order to meet needs.
I, too, begin by thanking the clerks and all those who gave evidence to the Review of SPCB Supported Bodies Committee over several months. I also thank committee colleagues for their convivial exchanges. We are particularly indebted to the clerks, because the brief that we were working to and the wide range of both possibilities and probabilities on which we could have settled meant that they had to do their best to discern and anticipate the collective mind of the committee. Given that the individual minds of committee members were not that much clearer for long periods, that was an unenviable task. However, the clerks managed it with patience that was impressive to behold.
The committee met with the views of various interested parties ringing in our ears. I applaud the resolve, certainty, determination, passion and good humour with which some people advocated their positions. I instinctively sympathised with some of them, but it seemed at times that the arguments were of the "The country's gone to the dogs" and "There's nothing worth watching on the telly these days" variety. In other words, certain assertions were made, but they were not always evidenced or proven by the examination of the witnesses.
As well as the big-ticket considerations, we were persuaded that many of the general housekeeping recommendations to do with length of service, termination and subsequent employment were appropriate. I think that most members would have drawn the same conclusions. Those recommendations were not of the racy variety, but they will nonetheless be important to those who currently hold office and they will be potentially influential in attracting their successors. Some of the existing provisions are certainly too restrictive. I think that the committee struck the correct balance through collective agreement.
Certain other potential consolidations were not without appeal, but they floundered in the face of practical obstacles. The future disposition of Waterwatch Scotland, to which the Minister for Parliamentary Business referred, is an example of that. The proposal to amalgamate Waterwatch Scotland and the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman was not without appeal, but because Waterwatch investigates both public sector and private sector complaints, with the latter supported by an industry levy, it was difficult to see how such an amalgamation could be achieved. Merging the public sector element while leaving the private sector element elsewhere would not have enhanced consumer understanding or operational efficiency. However, I note the comments that Bruce Crawford made about that.
The committee settled on consolidations that it thought enhanced public access and scrutiny and simplified operational structures. Perhaps we could have gone further. Arguments occasionally lay in the balance, and in future sessions, members may well wish to review matters again in the light of the operational experience that will arise should the recommendations in the committee's report be implemented. In that regard, I fear that I may disappoint Robin Harper with the remarks that I will make about the proposal to merge the Scottish Human Rights Commission and Scotland's Commissioner for Children and Young People.
Without being unkind to either body, I am not sure that the evidence that was presented on the current operational functions of those two organisations was in itself persuasive. The SHRC is hardly established, and in any event has so structured itself that an early accommodation of the SCCYP would be a fairly substantial, if not insurmountable, difficulty. In the case of the SCCYP, arguments were presented that demonstrated commendable operational practice, but they did not in themselves reinforce the need for a separate commission or commissioner, although SCCYP's work is seen as a benchmark internationally. I think that if we started afresh, Parliament would most likely have recommended the establishment of a rights commission, but we are not starting afresh. Given that both organisations are operationally incompatible, it was not certain what the consequences would be if a merger were forced on them, or whether a shotgun wedding would have been operationally efficient in any definable or quantifiable sense.
The committee was not convened to speculate on the hypothetical, but its members were aware of public suggestions that further rights commissioners may be established—for victims and for older people, for example. The creation of further rights commissioners did not excite—I am choosing my words diplomatically. It was not for the committee to set out in its report the work of the Parliament in any future session—indeed, now may not be the time to do that—but I at least believe that there will probably be merit in the Parliament specifically examining the arrangements again in the medium term. In the light of more substantial evidence and a more precisely defined proposition for further rights commissioners, an alternative structure may well prove more compelling at that time.
A report has been presented to the Parliament that will not meet the expectations of everyone in every respect; indeed, it possibly does not meet the expectations of every member of the committee. However, in the circumstances, in the face of the evidence that we heard, and in the light of the competing conclusions that were reached, the committee agreed the report. The report need not be an end in itself, but for the moment, and with the support of Parliament at decision time today, we support the early implementation of the report's recommendations by way of a committee bill and through other Government legislation, as comprehensively detailed by Trish Godman.
Finally, I offer Trish Godman my congratulations on and gratitude for her patience and courtesy as convener of the committee.
I, too, was a member of the Review of SPCB Supported Bodies Committee. I thank its convener for the way in which she brought together the committee and held us in an exercise that proved to be more difficult than many of us had envisaged when we were nominated to serve on the committee. In particular, I thank the committee clerks. The volume of material that supported the original establishment of the bodies under consideration and which we were required to consider was substantial, given that each had been created by a separate act of Parliament.
I think that we were surprised in some ways by how difficult the process proved to be—Jackson Carlaw alluded to that. The witnesses felt passionately about the bodies to which they were attached; in the earlier sessions of Parliament, many of them had given evidence during the process by which those bodies were created, and they felt very committed to them.
We were considering a range of issues, and I found that the most difficult one was that, although the committee was not asked to in any way consider the functions of the ombudsmen or commissioners, it became clear that the committee could not recommend a change to the structure without giving due consideration to whether such a change would affect the proper discharge of the duties that had been imposed by the Parliament. That was an overarching point.
Unlike Johann Lamont, I found unhelpful the decision by the SPCB not simply to give evidence on the workings and the financial controls of the bodies of which it was the sponsor and about which it was, therefore, uniquely qualified to give an opinion, but to publish a report setting out how the bodies should be reorganised, even though it had not taken any evidence on the matter.
I am aware of the authority that Parliament gave to the Review of SPCB Supported Bodies Committee. However, I remain unaware of the authority that Parliament gave to the SPCB to publish a parliamentary report on the matter that would pre-empt the report that we are debating this morning. The SPCB is an important body and, following the publication of its report, many witnesses who took part in the process in which I was engaged were very unclear about whether that meant that Parliament had already given its opinion.
Moving on, however, I must say that we should not diminish the administrative matters that came within the terms and conditions of the review, such as the need for accountable officers and the question whether the bodies had effective financial controls. Those issues were relatively non-contentious but of great importance; I think that the committee gave them due and proper consideration and that the recommendations that it made in relation to them will make a substantial difference to the effectiveness and operation of the bodies.
The evidence on the cost savings that might be achieved as a result of merging the bodies was less persuasive. One of the main difficulties was the lack of evidence to support the proposition that, if the bodies were merged, it would be perfectly possible to retain their separate functions. For example, a real distinction can be drawn between examining a matter of maladministration in a public body and examining a breach of standards by either a parliamentarian or a local councillor. The former involves a test of competence on behalf of a corporate entity, while the latter founds upon the probity, honesty and integrity of an individual in public life. I regard those matters as entirely separate, and believe that it is necessary to keep separate the proposed public life and appointments commission from the SPSO, as is recommended in the report.
I also found difficult the question of merging the posts of human rights commissioner and children's commissioner. Although, clearly, a case can be made—indeed, it was made—that human rights embrace the rights of the child, the evidence was less than persuasive that the existing internationally recognised functions of the children's commissioner would be adequately preserved in any merged body.
Therefore, as Jackson Carlaw and Johann Lamont said, we came to the view that, for the present, those bodies should remain separate. However, the need for closer collaboration between them is great, and I share Jackson Carlaw's view that the prospect of other rights commissioners being established was not persuasive.
The arguments were finely balanced, but I think that the committee's conclusions were right. The report might not have produced the recommendations for the merging of bodies that some people anticipated, but it has made a valuable contribution to the way in which the bodies operate and to the question of how the powers of the SPSO can be extended, particularly in view of the Crerar and Sinclair recommendations. The report is a significant piece of work, and I look forward to the bill being presented to Parliament.
As members are aware, the Scottish Parliamentary Standards Commissioner and the Office of the Commissioner for Public Appointments in Scotland have a direct reporting relationship with the Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee, of which I am a member. That committee considered the recommendations of the Review of SPCB Supported Bodies Committee at its meeting on 9 June and agreed that I should speak on its behalf in the debate. I thank the officials and my fellow MSPs who were involved in the piece of work that we are discussing. We are dealing with business that, while somewhat dry, is very important to the running of the Parliament.
I will focus my comments on the proposed changes to the roles of the standards commissioner and the public appointments commissioner. The Review of SPCB Supported Bodies Committee proposes to combine the posts of the standards commissioner and the chief investigating officer. By happy coincidence, the current standards commissioner, Mr Stuart Allan, is also the chief investigating officer, which means that, in a sense, the proposal to combine those posts has already been achieved. No doubt we will learn useful lessons from Mr Allan's experience in the two posts.
The Review of SPCB Supported Bodies Committee proposed that that combined role should result in a single post of investigations commissioner, and that that commissioner should be joined with the commissioner for public appointments. The Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee considered the proposal, and, as it is consistent with the evidence that we presented to the Review of SPCB Supported Bodies Committee, we welcome it as a sensible step towards sharing offices and support staff. Although we note that the cost savings for the standards commissioner are likely to be minimal, we think that the office will benefit from the increased support that will be available under the proposed arrangements.
The Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee also welcomes the recommendations that the investigations commissioner and the public appointments commissioner should report to that committee on their respective remits. We note the recommendation that each commissioner would have a lead responsibility for either the investigations commissioner post or the public appointments commissioner post. It was not clear whether it is envisaged that the two commissioners could perform each other's functions if required.
We did not have any general concerns with the potential for those roles to be interchangeable. I note, however, that further consideration might need to be given to the current parliamentary approvals process, given that, at present, the Parliament approves a specific named person to be the standards commissioner or to be the public appointments commissioner.
One other area on which the Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee wished me to comment involves freedom of information. Under the recommendations, the chief investigating officer, the Standards Commission for Scotland and the public appointments commissioner would be subject to the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002, although the standards commissioner would not be. The committee agreed that that issue might need to be considered further as part of any proposals for shared office working. No doubt other things will come to light if we are looking to merge three different statutory frameworks. The committee is happy to contribute to the sensible resolution of each of those issues.
The Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee broadly welcomes the Review of SPBC Supported Bodies Committee report and looks forward to considering any proposals that might require changes to the code of conduct for members or the standing orders.
Unlike most of the previous speakers, I was not a member of the Review of SPCB Supported Bodies Committee. That was probably a deliberate move on the part of those who allocated members to the committee, given that I have some well-recognised concerns about the way in which the various commissioners and the empire of commissions—if I can put it that way—have sprung up in the Parliament.
Nonetheless, I acknowledge that the Review of SPCB Supported Bodies Committee, the Finance Committee and the SPCB have done valuable work by dealing with some of the more unacceptable aspects of the way in which the commissions operated previously. It really was unacceptable that the commissions that were set up were left free and unfettered to decide where there were located. That is why the Scottish Information Commissioner ended up in a castle in St Andrews and why the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman and Scotland's Commissioner for Children and Young People ended up with expensive premises. There are areas in Scotland that deserve the services of those people, but they are not located there. I would have far more interest in listening to concerns about poverty or inadequate services if the people who were expressing them lived closer to where the real problems in service delivery exist.
It seemed impossible for the Parliament to give the commissions any direction about how they were to report back to Parliament on what they did. Previously, in the negotiations that took place, or appeared to take place, between the commissioners and the SPCB, it was almost a case of the commissioners saying, "We'll tell you how much money you can give us, and there's nothing you can say about it." All that seems to have been changed, which is a positive development that was needed. I am grateful to the Review of SPCB Supported Bodies Committee for finalising that process.
As Johann Lamont pointed out, there is a balance to be struck between accountability and independence. We fight shy of dealing with where that balance should be. It is easy to be fought off by the commissioners who insist on the propriety of their position and the absoluteness of the independence that we have to accord them, and who do not accept that we in the Parliament are elected to have an overriding interest in public accountability, of which we are the custodians.
I do not regard the recommendations of the Review of SPCB Supported Bodies Committee to be finished. The financial circumstances under which we will be working in the next few years will require us to look again at this issue. To be blunt—I have been in local government, so I have faced up to this—the choice is between providing real services to help children and funding the bureaucracy that deals with the rights of children. Those are the choices that we in government have ultimately to make.
It is not impossible for this jurisdiction to make the kind of decisions that were made by the New Zealand Parliament, which has said that it will put a limit on the number of commissions and sort out the overlaps in their remits. I will not name names, but we have commissions that are still looking for a function; they are going round the country trying to find issues in which they can take an interest. I do not think that the Parliament should fund that automatically; it should certainly debate that and hold those commissions properly to account.
Scotland's Commissioner for Children and Young People, the Scottish Information Commissioner and the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman must be operationally independent, but it is not in the interests of the Parliament, or the people whom we represent, to write them a blank cheque—we cannot be seen to do so.
There are ways in which groups can be pushed together. The fact that something is established and that pushing two bodies together might cause problems is not necessarily a good reason for not doing it. Rather than finding ourselves in a financial crisis and looking at this issue again, we should have a rolling process of looking at what commissions and commissioners do. The committees of the Parliament have an important role to play in not simply accepting that the commissions have an automatic right to exist but scrutinising constantly whether they are doing the job that they were set up to do, or whether that job is still required, whether in a policy or financial context.
I commend the work of the committee, but we must keep this matter under review. We in the Parliament must not be frightened to acknowledge that we are the people who are elected and who are directly accountable to the electorate and that, in the end, the commissioners work through us on behalf of the people of Scotland—not the other way around.
When we were asked to be members of the Review of SPCB Supported Bodies Committee, we were advised that it would be a short-term committee and, in fact, we completed our work and deliberation in a matter of months. However, in that time we were presented with a huge array of written and oral evidence, so I pay tribute to the clerks who helped us put it all into context to inform our decisions.
Contrary to what Ross Finnie said, I believe that the SPCB proposals, which Tom McCabe presented to the committee, were helpful in giving us a template to measure where we were going. I understand where Ross Finnie is coming from, but I put on record my thanks to Tom McCabe and the SPCB for taking the time to produce the template and giving us evidence, which I found helpful.
Given all the evidence and paperwork that we received, it would have been easy for us to become trapped like goldfish in a bowl, swimming around endlessly but getting nowhere. Our convener, Trish Godman, and our deputy convener, Jamie Hepburn, ensured that our efforts were not wasted. We have produced a report that, in the main, is supported by all members of the committee.
The committee worked well together and we were in broad agreement on the majority of issues. However, it would be remiss of me not to concentrate for a few minutes on one of the issues that split the committee: there were three votes for and three votes against the proposed merger of Waterwatch Scotland with the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman to form an all-encompassing complaints commission. The original idea behind the SPSO was to create a one-stop shop for complaints, which would allow ease of access for the public. However, in recent years, we have departed from that original concept by creating a number of different bodies to deal with complaints.
The proposal to merge Waterwatch and the SPSO was not motivated by a desire to save money; it was about improving service for the public. Our complaints-handling system should involve less duplication and bureaucracy, which might mean fewer organisations. Some of my constituents have said that when they make a complaint they are bounced between the local authority and the water authority. Who deals with the complaint? Is it Waterwatch or the ombudsman? If the two bodies are pulled together, the system will be much cleaner and more accessible to the public.
I appreciate the concerns of some members of the committee regarding the public's need for an ombudsman that can deal with complaints fully by drawing on detailed knowledge and expertise. However, I believe that the skill that is currently deployed in the SPSO in relation to a wide range of public services is no different to that which is deployed in the types of process that are undertaken by bodies such as Waterwatch.
I am certain that if we were to merge the functions of Waterwatch with the role of the SPSO, we would provide the public with a more straightforward, effective and efficient system without compromising service. I believe that that would be in keeping with the recommendations of Professor Crerar, Douglas Sinclair and the previous Finance Committee.
I respect the committee's decisions, but I think that this issue would benefit from further scrutiny, either at a later stage in the proposed bill or at some future review. One thing on which we are all agreed is that ours will not be the final review. The subject would benefit from consideration by fresh bodies on any future committee. Our report took us some distance; indeed, it took us as far as we could go while also maintaining consensus. I commend it to the Parliament.
I apologise to Ms Godman for missing the first minute or so of her speech. I assure her that I will catch up on it later in the Official Report.
On behalf of my colleagues on the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body, I thank the committee for undertaking the inquiry and producing a detailed report and recommendations. The task was perhaps more onerous than it appeared at first.
Hear, hear!
I am sure that all committee members agree with that. We are genuinely grateful to the committee for taking on that task and producing the report.
I am grateful to all committee members for the courtesy that they showed me when I gave evidence on behalf of the corporate body. I listened to what Mr Finnie said on the matter and have this to say in response: the corporate body was invited to give evidence and we sought to do that in a comprehensive manner. We could have avoided some of the more difficult questions. However, my personal view is that a tendency to do that is devaluing public life. We therefore decided to address some of the difficult areas. I hope that that was of benefit to committee members.
With the Government looking at public sector reform, it seemed appropriate for the Parliament to consider whether changes could be made to the structure of SPCB supported bodies. Driving the SPCB proposals were two underlying principles: making access to services as simple as possible for service users; and achieving public services that provide the best value for money.
Achieving value for money is especially important given my firm belief that, before the Scottish Parliament is very much older, incredibly difficult public expenditure decisions will need to be made. It is possible to maintain the principles that lie behind the creation of these public services while facing up to hard financial facts. Some of the questions that we are addressing today may need to be revisited in the not-too-distant future.
For the purposes of today's consideration and taking account of the two principles that underline the corporate body's approach, the committee has delivered recommendations to improve the structure and governance of SPCB-supported bodies. It is worth remembering that those bodies now require funding in the region of £7.5 million.
We were pleased to see the report's recommendation of the realignment of the various standards functions into a single commission. We believe that that will be of public benefit. It will give people a single access office when they seek advice on issues that relate to the standards of elected members of the Scottish Parliament or local authorities in Scotland.
We support the proposal to amalgamate the functions of the Scottish Prisons Complaints Commission and the ombudsman and to give additional powers to the ombudsman to oversee all public sector complaints processes. That will ensure greater clarity and simplification, thereby reducing any perceived inconsistencies in the approach that is taken throughout the public sector. Those additional powers may have short-term cost implications, but they will provide considerable benefits to the public in the longer term. The SPCB will work jointly with the Government and the ombudsman's office to achieve the aims that the committee has set out.
As members are aware, the corporate body put forward a proposal to amalgamate the children's commissioner and the Scottish Human Rights Commission. Although we considered that there could have been benefits in such a merger, not least in protecting what the bodies do and who they do it for, we accept the committee's recommendation—based on the evidence that it received—to leave the bodies as they stand. We fully support the recommendation for a more co-ordinated approach to working between the two bodies. That will facilitate a more streamlined approach to rights in Scotland, avoid some duplication and may facilitate some savings.
Members may not be surprised to hear that the corporate body is pleased that the committee recommended enhanced governance powers for the SPCB in terms of the bodies that it supports. I refer in particular to the sharing of premises, staff and services with a view to providing savings to the public purse. Some work has already been done in that regard, but those formal powers will assist us considerably in our future considerations.
From our experience over the past few years, the corporate body is acutely aware of its responsibilities in holding office-holders to account on their budgets and the terms and conditions that they offer to their staff. That said, we have always recognised that we cannot interfere with the independence of the office-holders with regard to the functions that they undertake. We are pleased therefore that the committee has recommended that other committees of the Parliament should engage actively with the office-holders. In that way, the Parliament can learn lessons from some of the decisions that office-holders have reached in the past and will reach in the future—taken together, those decisions can contribute to the effectiveness of our public services in Scotland.
The SPCB is supportive of the proposals. If the Parliament agrees to legislate to enact the recommendations, we will work together with the office-holders to ensure a smooth transition, as quickly as possible.
First, I turn to the issue of financial control, which Des McNulty, among others, raised in the debate and of which committee members were acutely aware. I find it difficult to read the recommendations at paragraphs 107 and 109 without believing that they will place considerable restraint on office-holders. Tom McCabe recognised that. Having uniform provision across all the bodies will require
"the office-holders proposals on expenditure to be subject to approval by the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body".
Some office-holders already have that, but it is not uniform across all the bodies. As a committee member, I was acutely aware that that had to be a uniform requirement and that the corporate body, as the sponsoring body, had to have greater control of, as Tom McCabe said, the appointment of advisers, the budget and the location.
The report contains substantive proposals, some of which are already in the public eye; others are more hidden away. Issues that capture the headlines include the function of these bodies and whether they ought, or ought not, to be merged, but the report contains a substantive body of work that will improve hugely the financial reporting and accountability of each commissioner.
Gil Paterson made a good point about the mergers of the posts of the chief investigating officer and the Scottish Parliamentary Standards Commissioner.
More important is the recommendation that the adjudication of any complaint that is found remains to be determined by an independent body. In the case of a councillor or other public official, a complaint will be determined by the SPSC and in terms of members of the Scottish Parliament, it will be determined by the Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee. That important principle required to be preserved.
All committee members said that the report proved to be a much more difficult exercise than we had envisaged at the outset. That said, it is helpful that we all believe, on balance, that the broad thrust of the report is fair, including the recommendations on the way in which these bodies should operate in the future. If the bill goes forward, the terms, conditions and functions of these bodies will be radically changed. That will lead to a much more effective and efficient distribution of these bodies.
Even having heard the debate, I remain of the view that the committee's conclusions should be supported. I hope that the Parliament will do so having looked at the evidence that the committee adduced in coming to its views, including on a committee bill. Some suggestions that we heard were not evidence based. The committee has produced the evidence and those who care to look at it will find the arguments persuasive. They support the conclusions that the committee came to, albeit that some were narrowly reached and were made on balance. I respect the views of committee members who differed. Those views should not be ignored. Indeed, we should take account of them if a bill is to proceed through the Parliament.
Like Des McNulty, I come to the debate not as a member of the Review of SPCB Supported Bodies Committee but as a veteran of the Finance Committee's inquiry into the corporate governance of and issues around commissioners and ombudsmen back in 2006. I rather wonder whether I am falling headlong into Joe FitzPatrick's invitation for fresh people to look into the issues. I will tread carefully.
That 2006 accountability and governance inquiry was long running, and it was quite controversial at the time. If memory serves me correctly, it achieved what would be considered unachievable these days: it united me, Wendy Alexander and John Swinney in unanimously supporting the Finance Committee's recommendations. That is some mean achievement. It is nice to see some of those recommendations flowing through into how we are considering the roles of commissioners and ombudsmen now. The committee inquiry in 2006 was a long one, as I have said, but it would be fair to summarise it in a very short way: the situation that we discovered was a guddle. It had been created not through any particular intent; things had arisen in an ad hoc manner, and that had led to a complicated and inconsistent set of arrangements.
I agree with what other members have said about the issues being difficult. I have also sat through the Scottish Commission for Public Audit's inquiry into the corporate governance of Audit Scotland. Admittedly, that is a rather different office, with certain statutory conditions attached to its work, but we have wrestled with difficult issues around how to preserve independence while also considering appropriate terms of office and how to restrict outside interests that might be perceived as giving rise to a conflict of interests. Such decisions are difficult, and there is perhaps no right or wrong answer—we simply have to try and find the best answer that we can.
I wish to go back to some of the issues that Des McNulty raised, in what I thought was an excellent speech, following on from our inquiry back in 2006. It struck me at that time, particularly when we were considering some of the decisions that had been taken about location and budget, that a perception was growing that any attempt to challenge decisions that had been made by a body or commission that had been set up by the will of the Parliament was somehow an attempt to interfere with its independence. I simply do not accept that assertion. Things have perhaps improved since, but I got the impression at that time that there was a reluctance on the part of the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body to go too far, particularly in challenging some of the budgetary arrangements that had been put in place by commissioners and ombudsmen. There was perhaps a feeling that we needed to tiptoe around such issues.
In his speech today, Des McNulty talked about the balance between independence and accountability. It is entirely appropriate to acknowledge that we can have independence without forgoing any attempt to restrict the finances that go to organisations. The issue for bodies will be that they will have to prioritise and make judgments as to how to deploy the resources that they are allocated. Reducing the resource that goes to a body does not in itself restrict its independence.
The Parliament and its corporate body could exempt the organisations concerned from the looming public sector spending squeeze, to which Tom McCabe alluded, because the Scottish Parliament's budget is top sliced, but it would be wrong to do so. As Des McNulty said, the choice is effectively between helping individuals and funding organisations that sometimes provide advocacy for individuals.
It is important to consider the remit of the Review of SPCB Supported Bodies Committee. The committee did not—and was not asked to—consider the desirability or need for some of the organisations and commissioners, although we might need to reconsider that question in the future. No doubt some people will view the committee's report not just as a justification for not merging the children's commissioner with other organisations, for example, but as a validation of bodies' continued existence. That is not what the committee was asked to do, and it is unfair to characterise its remit as such.
Johann Lamont made a valid point about diseconomies of scale, and we need to be careful that we do not automatically make the assumption that larger is better. Equally, we must be keenly aware of the difficulties of ensuring that public money is spent appropriately. We should not fall into the trap of assuming that, simply because we have set up commissioners and ombudsmen in the past, they should somehow be exempted from the difficult decisions that will fall across Government.
To use Jackson Carlaw's expression, much of what the committee considered was not of the racy variety. I am not sure whether I would recognise it if it were of the racy variety, but I agree that many of the matters that we considered were simple and straightforward things that had to be addressed. Location, the management of budgets and the opening out of commissioners' roles to public and parliamentary scrutiny are subjects that people can agree on, and I do not think that anyone in the chamber wishes to give anybody a blank cheque, but we must recognise that organisations can be killed in a variety of ways—we have to be honest about that. If we do not think that an organisation should exist, we need to have a debate about that, rather than killing it by reducing its budget over time. People may express entirely reasonable concerns about that.
The Scottish Government clearly wishes to pursue some issues relating to the decluttering of the public landscape, and it might not be entirely happy with the committee's conclusions in that regard. It is entirely the Government's responsibility and opportunity if it wishes to introduce a bill to address that. A consideration of all the options is in no way precluded, and Government back benchers can decide on them as they choose.
On the role of the Review of SPCB Supported Bodies Committee and its conclusions, I make it clear to my good friend Des McNulty that he was not excluded from anything. Indeed, if I had realised the extent of his interest in the matter, I for one would happily have stood aside and allowed him to take on the very enjoyable experience of working our way through the 75 million folders full of papers. No one attempted to pack the committee in any way. Actually, most people who came to the committee did so with scepticism in their mind—I certainly did. Entirely sceptical towards most things about life, I was equally sceptical about the role of commissioners, and I was open minded about the options that were being identified by the corporate body.
Once we looked into the issues, however, it became very evident very quickly that they were not as simple as people had thought. There was a clear presumption among the parties of a certain direction of travel that the committee was going to follow. It did not turn out to be as easy as that when we started to deal with the realities of making the arrangements work for people who wanted a good complaints procedure, and who wanted some work to be done around the commissioners' roles that might not fit with that function.
People working in the bodies concerned would understandably argue for their organisation and for its role. There is an innate conservatism on the part of people who are in position and who want to protect what is already there. Far more telling, at least to my mind, was what other parliamentarians were saying, not because they were frightened of the commissioners, but because they saw a distinct and genuine role for the children's commissioner in particular. They were reluctant for that role to be given up. Although members wanted a decluttering of the landscape, with no presumption in favour of the various bodies for ever more, they made a telling case for the children's commissioner. It was not argued that the post should be left frozen in time from when it was first created, but the point was made that there was something significant about it that chimed with what was going on in other parts of the United Kingdom.
I do not think that it was fear of external organisations that led the committee to the conclusions that it reached—and those conclusions are not for all time and forever. Rather, it was a matter of recognising a political debate that we almost had to adjudicate upon. On balance, we came to the conclusions that we came to.
We recognise the reality for some, particularly in relation to complaints handling. The degree to which somebody is satisfied with the structure of a complaints procedure is determined by their capacity to get the result that they want from it. Inevitably, we will not make everybody happy through the process that we have identified, but we have tried, on balance, to get things right, with a body that is accessible but sensitive to specific complaints.
Referring to a point that Bruce Crawford made, we might have all the structures and commissioners in place, but if the people who make the decisions do not have respect for those to whom they are delivering services, and if they do not have respect for the rights and entitlements of people in our communities, they will not make any procedure fit and they will not make any service work.
The big picture is about how we ensure that people who are charged with responsibilities meet people's needs, take account of people's rights and entitlements and deliver services in a way that addresses people's concerns and is respectful, so that people are not pushed down the complaints road. That is the bigger challenge, in which we are all involved.
The committee took its role seriously and during our debates many members abandoned assumptions that they had held. Our recommendations represent a serious attempt to acknowledge that there is an issue and to come up with a balanced conclusion. I hope that members acknowledge that if the Parliament agrees to the motion in Trish Godman's name, the committee bill that will be introduced will provide us with a further opportunity to explore the issues.
The debate has been good, valuable and important for the Parliament. It is appropriate that from time to time we review all the actions in which we are engaged and the structures that exist. It is equally important that we review the purposes of the structures that we have created, to ensure that they are fit for purpose and serve the people whom we serve. I took that point strongly from Mr Finnie's speech. The process of developing governance in Scotland is always unfinished and it is good to see the process move further forward.
I make it clear to Johann Lamont, who expressed doubt about this, that the Government supports the report of the Review of SPCB Supported Bodies Committee and the proposals that it contains and will want to do everything that it can to assist the passage of those proposals.
A number of important points have been made and I will respond to two such points before I make wider points. I was struck by Des McNulty's speech, which was mirrored to some extent by the speeches of Tom McCabe and other members. It is important to say that the independence of the bodies that we are considering in no way negates their accountability to the Parliament. The difference between independence and accountability needs to be clearly understood. Parliament must be allowed scope to govern the overall size and scope of budgets. That is not about interference; it is about ensuring that we do the job that we are elected to do, which is to ensure that resources are properly used and services are properly provided.
The Crerar recommendation to reduce the overall number of commissions and scrutiny bodies was informed by experience in New Zealand. The Government is committed to a similar model, whereby when a new body is established another one ceases to exist. That principle exists in New Zealand, where there is a focus on the function and purpose of bodies.
As proposals for the creation of new rights commissioners come before the Parliament, we should remember the point that Jackson Carlaw made in that regard. It is not that the idea of new commissioners did not excite Mr Carlaw—I have never, ever, aimed to excite Mr Carlaw and I suspect that that is true of all members. However, the committee referred in paragraph 284 of its report to the recommendations that the Finance Committee made in 2006 and noted
"the need to explore all possible opportunities for an existing body to carry out any proposed new function and make use of existing resources before creating a new body."
As proposals come forward—they are already doing so—I ask all members to bear that key principle in mind. I am glad that the committee made the point again and I pay tribute to the committee and its convener for doing so and for the high quality of their work.
When it gave evidence to the committee, the Government made clear our stance on the potential to create a more streamlined landscape. We wanted a better co-ordinated and more proportionate approach to conduct and standards in public life, which would be balanced with the need to save resources. We were very much in accord with the SPCB's proposals, but it was clear to everyone that it is for the Parliament to take a view on the distinctiveness of commissioners' roles and performance.
The committee recommended that the Scottish Government include the necessary provisions for a new complaints handling process in the Public Services Reform (Scotland) Bill. I am happy to confirm that I will lodge amendments to the bill at stage 2 that will fulfil that requirement, subject to the Parliament's agreement. It is clear to us all that the creation of an easier, shorter, quicker and wholly user-focused approach to complaints about public services in Scotland should be our priority, because such an approach will not just place an empowered user at the heart of the process but lead to a more effective use of public resources. If more complaints are resolved at the first point of contact, there will be less need for more expensive and difficult upper-tier complaints handling work and organisations should work more effectively.
An encompassing, design-authority role for the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman will take all complaints processes out of organisational silos and away from the complex landscapes that have bedevilled all previous efforts at reform. Johann Lamont drew attention to the fact that the approach represents neither rocket science nor new thinking. All Governments are attempting to take such an approach, but it is difficult to do.
Let us remember what is at the heart of the issue. As members know, each complaint is individual and unique. Each complaint has a human face and represents, at the minimum, disquiet about a service or organisation. As every elected representative knows, sometimes all that is required is to say, "Sorry." We need that human focus in our work. The complaints system is also the interface between the state and the citizen, and it must be efficient, effective and properly tuned. The proposals will take us down those lines.
I noted Joe FitzPatrick's point about Waterwatch Scotland. I think that the Government's proposals in that regard were the right ones. We wanted a co-ordinated and coherent approach across all public services—that aspiration was behind the proposal to transfer prison complaints. We will support the motion in its entirety, because we do not want our preference in relation to Waterwatch to disrupt the process. However, we will consider the matter and ensure that it gets the further attention that it needs.
The report considered the governance of the Parliament—how we look after ourselves. We must show that our attitude to governance is rigorous and comprehensive. We must show that we are always concerned with improving and strengthening governance and with improving our relationship with the Scottish people. We must show that our proposals add value to the procedures that deal with all elected representatives and that our proposals demonstrate the integrity of the system and the people in it. The Government will back the report's recommendations in that regard.
The work of the committee and its clerks was thorough. The report is well thought out and will allow us to make further changes. It is not the final word but it represents a significant step forward. There are points of difference between the report's authors and the Government, but I stress that they relate to issues that are finely balanced, as many members said, and which we can discuss.
Overall, the Government endorses and agrees with many of the recommendations and looks forward to working with the corporate body to make the changes and improvements that will help to simplify not only the complaints handling process but the complaints landscape, to address the ultimate goal of the work, which is to continue to improve our public services so that we reduce the need for people to complain in the first place. We look forward to the constructive work that will go ahead and hope that a committee bill will be introduced.
I thank the convener of the Review of SPCB Supported Bodies Committee, Trish Godman, my other colleagues on the committee and the committee clerks. I also thank the people who submitted evidence to the committee and members who have spoken in the debate.
I am glad that there is widespread support from members of all parties for the broad sweep of our proposals. That reflects the manner in which the committee worked. Disagreements about the wider issues that we considered were relatively minor, and there are points of detail that we will consider further if the Parliament agrees to the proposal to introduce a committee bill. Overall, the committee has made sensible and measured recommendations for change. I encourage members to support the motion.
Bruce Crawford talked about the impact on Government bodies of proposals that arise from committees' work. I hope that the Government's work to reshape the parts of the public landscape for which it has responsibility will tie in with the committee's work. I was glad to hear Mr Crawford and Mr Russell suggest that that would be the case.
Mr Crawford and Mr Russell reiterated the Government's belief that the functions of Waterwatch Scotland should be transferred to the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman and Consumer Focus Scotland. The committee considered such a transfer of functions and thought that the issue was finely balanced, as Joe FitzPatrick said. I look forward to hearing the Government's arguments as it pursues the issue.
Johann Lamont made the point that the argument for creating one-stop shops is not convincing—there must be a coherent rationale for moving to merged bodies. Overall, the committee took that approach—Jackson Carlaw and Ross Finnie articulated well the committee's thought process on that—which is why we recommended the merging of some bodies but not others.
However, as Trish Godman said in her opening remarks, some rationalisation is proposed. The committee considered 10 bodies, including four that the Government supported. Of those 10, we recommended that five be merged, which would reduce the number of bodies to seven. That would be achieved largely by the creation of a new body called the public life and appointments commission Scotland. I was disappointed that my committee colleagues did not share my enthusiasm for the alternative title of the Scottish public life and appointments tribunal—SPLAT for short—but I forgive them. The committee's merger proposals would affect 50 per cent of the public sector bodies that we considered and reduce their number by 30 per cent, so there would be some rationalisation.
Gil Paterson spoke about the creation of the public life and appointments commission. The key question is whether merging existing posts into that new body would improve the accountability of elected members, councillors and parliamentarians to the public. The underlying tasks of the posts that would be involved in the merger are similar in that they are to investigate admissible complaints that members of the Scottish Parliament, councillors or members of devolved bodies have breached their respective codes of conduct or other applicable rules on behaviour and standards. I therefore believe that the proposed rationalisation is sensible, and I was glad to learn from Gil Paterson that the Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee seems to concur with that view.
Jackson Carlaw spoke about the decision to retain Scotland's Commissioner for Children and Young People and the Scottish Human Rights Commission as separate bodies. We were presented with a valid argument for merging those bodies, but the committee considered that the SCCYP has undertaken valuable work in support of children's issues, which has been recognised internationally, and that there was no case at this stage to merge the bodies. I am inclined to agree with Jackson Carlaw's observation that our decision might have been different if we had started with a blank page, but of course we did not. However, it is worth saying, as Mike Russell did in a similar vein, that the committee's position is that future proposals for new offices—there are current proposals in that regard—should be accommodated within the current landscape, if possible.
I turn to previous reports that the committee considered and which informed much of our work. We agreed with the recommendations of the Finance Committee's 2006 report "Inquiry into Accountability and Governance". Our proposals include implementing those recommendations as they relate to the accountability of the bodies concerned. We also noted the Audit Scotland 2006 report "Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body Ombudsman/Commissioners Shared Services", which recommended that the SPCB should retain responsibility for the bodies concerned. Again, we seek to implement that recommendation for holding the bodies to account for the effective running of their business operations. However, we are clear about the need to protect the office-holders' independence in undertaking their functions. I think that that deals with some concerns that Des McNulty raised.
If Parliament agrees to the motion, the recommendations requiring legislation will be incorporated in a committee bill that should be introduced by the end of this year, accompanied by a financial memorandum that will cover all the costs involved. Not all the recommendations require legislation. The report highlights those that we consider do require legislation, but other recommendations are directed at a range of bodies. For example, the SPCB is recommended to use the services of its audit advisory board to determine and review the salaries of office-holders; recommendation 12 suggests a close working arrangement between parliamentary committees and office-holders; and, as a matter of best practice, we recommend that there should be at least annual scrutiny.
I trust that the Parliament will welcome the committee's report, which is based on substantial amounts of evidence gathered during our deliberations and informed by previous committee inquiries. The committee's deliberations have, if nothing else, served as an audit of the operations of the various SPCB-supported bodies that the Parliament has created. It was right to do that and it is clear from the work that was undertaken that the framework that the committee report proposes will ensure a series of offices that are fit for purpose for Scotland in the coming years. I agree that matters may have to be considered further, but I also agree with Joe FitzPatrick that fresh faces will be required to do that. However, I have no hesitation in commending the committee's report "Review of SPCB Supported Bodies" to the Parliament.