Code of Practice for Ministerial Appointments to Public Bodies
The next item of business is consideration of motion S2M-2097, in the name of Trish Godman, on the code of practice for ministerial appointments to public bodies. I will allow three minutes for each speech. I cannot give longer, because the level of interest in the debate is higher than the time that is available allows for.
Motion moved,
That the Parliament notes that the Commissioner for Public Appointments in Scotland proposes to adopt, as an interim measure, the UK Code of Practice for Ministerial Appointments to Public Bodies, until such time as a Code of Practice for Ministerial Appointments to Public Bodies in Scotland is agreed.—[Trish Godman.]
It is important to record why we are having the debate. The commissioner for public appointments in Scotland was established by the Public Appointments and Public Bodies etc (Scotland) Act 2003. Under that act, a commissioner was appointed and statutory duties were placed on her to consult the Parliament and the Executive in producing a code of practice for ministerial appointments to public bodies. In addition, she was required to report material breaches of the code to the Parliament.
In February 2003, Peter Peacock said:
"the commissioner will be required to consult extensively Scottish ministers, the Parliament and the public in drawing up the code. Parliament will be able to express its view … clearly and unambiguously."—[Official Report, 5 February 2003; c 17767.]
Although the act became law, neither the Parliament nor the Executive took steps to identify a committee of the Parliament that could be consulted or be the recipient of reports of material breach. In other words, the commissioner had no mechanism for fulfilling the obligations that were placed on her by the act that created her post. That is despite a ministerial commitment that a committee would be established.
To enable the Parliament to express its views clearly and unambiguously, there is no legal alternative to having this short debate. Twenty months after the act was passed, the Procedures Committee is only now considering the mechanism for consulting the Parliament and has still to make a final decision on that. If, in the period between the adoption of the interim code and the putting in place of the final code, a formal mechanism is still not established for reporting a material breach to the Parliament, the Scottish National Party expects a similar debate to be scheduled for discussion of that material breach.
When the Parliament passes legislation, we must act on its implications for the Parliament. We have in place several other commissioners and we must ensure that their mechanisms for reporting to the Parliament are robust enough to allow any actions that are required to be taken timeously.
I am happy to support the motion in the Deputy Presiding Officer's name and to endorse adoption of the United Kingdom code of practice as an interim measure until our code is finalised. The measure is temporary, but it is important to recognise that adoption of the code is a vital further step in our attempt to build confidence in public life, to ensure independence and transparency in the appointments system, to encourage good citizenship, to support those who are willing to play a role in shaping the world around them and to inspire confidence in the meritocratic process by which individuals are appointed to public bodies.
We have come a long way from the Nolan committee—the Committee on Standards in Public Life of the mid-1990s—and the dangerously low levels of public esteem in which public appointments and politics in general were held. Indeed, if the motivation or driver behind the early moves in the process was the desire to tackle the perception of sleaze, the main objective from our perspective is to improve the transparency and accountability of the system.
The Parliament was established on the principles of openness, transparency and accountability. Those principles underpin the code that we are endorsing today and they will inform our discussion of a new code that is specific to Scotland. Scottish ministers are responsible for the appointment of almost 4,000 people to public bodies, which, in turn, are responsible for spending more than £6 billion each year. It is essential that individuals who represent the whole spectrum of Scottish society are encouraged to put themselves forward to fulfil that role and that they are offered the protection of knowing that they were appointed on their merits and as part of a robust process.
With confidence in the system, we can make progress on introducing further improvements in public appointments, such as in the appointment of more women, more people of different ethnic origins and people who reflect a wider age range. As deputy convener of the Parliament's Standards Committee, I look forward to exploring whether there is a role for that committee in developing or scrutinising our new code. However, I am happy to support the motion today.
Not much requires to be said about the measure that we are considering. The proposal is, after all, for an interim code, so we can happily agree to it. However, we must look to the future and ensure that, when a full and finalised code is laid before the Parliament, it is sufficient to enable us to achieve precisely what Ken Macintosh wants, which is that people who are appointed to public bodies come from the widest possible circle and that all sections of the community are represented. In the past, there seems to have been a fairly narrow appointments pool. I refer to those who—surprise, surprise—seem to have connections with the Labour Party in many respects. We must also ensure that the Parliament has the appropriate right to question and take action against any appointments that appear to be suspect. However, we are relaxed about the interim measure.
Like other members, I will be brief. I support the motion, which provides for an interim measure. Various issues underlie the discussion that will no doubt take place in committee and those issues will come back to the Parliament in due course. Trying to widen the pool from which candidates for appointments are made is important. Ken Macintosh touched on some of the issues involved when he mentioned women, ethnic minorities and so on. There should be a wider range of appointments from society as a whole. I am sure that that matter will be discussed further.
The issue is relatively straightforward. Adopting the code of practice for ministerial appointments that has operated at the UK level is undoubtedly a satisfactory arrangement pro tem, but the sooner we move on to the longer-term arrangements in a more considered way, the better. However, for the time being, I support the motion and the interim measure.
I realise that the measure is an interim one, but there is a huge credibility issue even so. It has been recognised that there is a problem with appointments, the result of those appointments and the outcomes of the existing code. I ask the minister, the Procedures Committee or whoever can answer how long it will be before there is a new code that we can discuss. Consider a public body such as Scottish Water. The outcome of the existing code and procedures is that Scottish Water is stuffed full of bankers and corporate businessmen who know the Labour Party. Why do private business representatives and bankers fill up such boards? There is no trade union or staff representation, although they are a huge resource.
The same applies to the Scottish Environment Protection Agency. Scottish Environment LINK is made up of 33 organisations, but not one of them is represented on SEPA's board. We cannot be proud of that outcome. Complete representation is needed, but that cannot credibly happen unless we change the criteria that allow such boards to be stuffed full of corporate businessmen, who make up less than 10 per cent of the population of Scotland but represent three quarters of the appointments to those boards.
We need a credible code. I am not happy about such interim measures. We should have dealt with the matter when we appointed the commissioner. If we do not have a more direct mechanism that allows ordinary people to be represented, the Scottish Socialist Party will challenge the new code when it is introduced.
First, I emphasise the point that Tricia Marwick made about the need to establish a parliamentary mechanism to oversee the appointments process. On 10 September 2002, the then Local Government Committee—which, ironically, was chaired by Trish Godman—was told by the then minister responsible, Peter Peacock:
"Parliament will have … a much more serious role in the appointments process than it has had previously and will have increased powers of scrutiny throughout the process. It will, of course, be for Parliament to decide how it manages its new role. I have suggested that it consider establishing a dedicated public appointments committee, but that is a matter for the Parliament to consider."—[Official Report, Local Government Committee, 10 September 2002; c 3206.]
The fact that we have taken well over two years to get even to this stage is, quite frankly, unacceptable. Sooner rather than later, we must address what mechanism we are to use for scrutinising the public appointments system. As Ken Macintosh and others have pointed out, it is vital that we do so, given the power that such appointees have.
My second point is on the interpretation of the code of practice. The code has already been in operation in the UK, but it has not wheedled out the political bias in the system. Both north and south of the border, we still have a situation in which two thirds of the appointees who declare a political bias belong to one political party. That cannot be accidental. In the Scottish Parliament elections, that party—the Labour Party—received 34 per cent of the vote, but it ended up with 66 per cent of the appointments of those who declared their political involvement.
In her interpretation of the existing code, I hope that the commissioner will take into account the issue of equal opportunities, which is spelled out in the code. Equal opportunities should apply to members of political parties, but a total bias is currently built in for one party. The commissioner should use the code to get rid of that bias. In 2005, the Parliament must take the opportunity to break up once and for all the Labour Mafia that controls too many public appointments in Scotland.
Like members of other parties in the Parliament, I welcome and have always supported the idea of a commissioner for public appointments. It is good that we now have a Scottish commissioner and that we are making progress on a Scottish code for public appointments, but I share Tricia Marwick's concerns about the time that it has taken to get to this stage and about the nature of the interim measure that is to be adopted.
We should remember that there was such support for the idea of a commissioner because there was a feeling that the public appointments system did not have, as Frances Curran and Alex Neil said, the necessary diversity or transparency. I hope that we can quickly make progress on a Scottish code that recognises our distinctive Scottish situation. I recognise the need for the interim measure, but I share the concerns that have been expressed about the way in which we have got to this position.
I call Margaret Curran to respond to the debate. She has five minutes.
I am delighted to speak in the debate and I thank Alex Neil for introducing such a degree of partisanship that he has allowed me to respond in equal measure. It has been a wee while since I have been partisan, so I look forward to doing my best in the five minutes that I have.
Seriously, I appeal to members to support the motion and to maintain a sense of perspective on the issue. It was recommended to us that we take the time that has been taken for the very reason that members have given: the need to widen the basis of public appointments and to introduce more diversity. Anyone who has been involved in decisions on such issues will appreciate that the process is not straightforward. The nature of the exclusion of some groups is such that they do not regularly volunteer and need to be encouraged to volunteer. We should be very careful about that issue.
I want to respond to Alex Neil and to others who were perhaps a bit too cursory in some of their comments. Let us not denigrate political involvement in Scotland. Let us not denigrate those who are involved in political parties but also seek to serve their communities and nation. [Interruption.] God, it is good to be back. It is not appropriate to say to people that their contribution is less effective because they are involved in a political party. I say to Alex Neil, to Christine Grahame—who is shouting at me—and to Bill Aitken that it is not my fault that most of those people support the Labour Party. The fact that those members cannot find people to serve on bodies reflects their policies, not mine.
We have taken this action because we want to widen the base and to involve more women and people from a different background. I say to Alex Neil—I can shout louder than he can—that it was the Labour Party that set up this Parliament. It was the Labour Party that argued for generations that we need to involve more women and people from a different background and that we need the people of Scotland to be represented properly on public bodies. Alex Neil should get a sense of perspective and not blame us because he cannot find people to stand.