Planning Application Processes (Menie Estate)
The next item of business is a debate on motion S3M-1712, in the name of Duncan McNeil, on behalf of the Local Government and Communities Committee, on its report on planning application processes in relation to Menie estate.
I thank the clerks and officials who supported us in our work for their support and patience throughout the process.
The uneducated observer might be surprised to learn that much that is contained in the committee's report is uncontroversial and unanimous. The first 138 paragraphs of the report set out uncontested fact. Where the committee disagreed was on how those facts should be interpreted. I will attempt—manfully—to set out the facts and allow the chamber to reach its own conclusions.
We are familiar with the circumstances that led to the inquiry. I will set those out as briefly as I can. On Thursday 29 November 2007, Aberdeenshire Council's infrastructure services committee refused consent for the Trump Organization's planned development at Menie estate. On Monday 3 December, the First Minister met representatives of the Trump Organization, at their request. At 2.20 pm on Tuesday 4 December, the chief planner met representatives of the Trump Organization, at their request. At 3.45 on the same day, the chief planner phoned the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Sustainable Growth recommending that the application be called in; the cabinet secretary agreed. At 5 pm on the same day, the application was called in. Cynics might say that Trump said, "Jump!" and the First Minister of Scotland said, "How high?"
The committee's task was to examine how and why the decisions that I have described were taken. We examined, to quote our inquiry's remit,
"the decision-making process of ministers and officials, the legal advice relied upon and the transparency of their actions."
As controversial as the application was, the decision to hold the inquiry was not—it was supported by the whole committee, various experts and even the First Minister. Only when scrutiny started to bite and committee members started to ask hard questions did the spin machine launch its campaign to denigrate the committee and its work, in a way that was unprecedented in the history of the Scottish Parliament. I am confident that we will hear more of that today.
We had the First Minister negotiating with the committee about when, how and for how long he would give evidence. He even tried to vet the questions that we would be allowed to ask. We exchanged letters with the Trump Organization's lawyers about whether its representatives would appear to give evidence. Civil servants sent the permanent secretary to try to restrict what we could ask officials and how officials would answer. The Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 even had to be used to compel the release of certain documents. Two hundred and forty pieces of information were provided to the committee only after it had reported.
Against that backdrop, the report nonetheless sets out what we managed to discover. What evidence did we finally hear about how the application was called in? We heard that the call-in decision was taken on the back of two short telephone calls between the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Sustainable Growth, John Swinney, and the chief planner. John Swinney is notable by his absence today.
Is the member aware of what is going on at Grangemouth and the pivotal role of the cabinet secretary in that? That is a real issue that affects the people of Scotland. [Interruption.]
Order.
I wish the cabinet secretary every success in his efforts there. I hope that he is serious in his efforts and that he tells the American bosses to get their act together and get the dispute settled.
We heard that the cabinet secretary did not obtain legal advice or written official advice before he made his decision. The minute that recommended the call-in was not seen by the cabinet secretary until after his decision had been made. We heard that the cabinet secretary's decision to call in the application before the decision letter was issued might not have been illegal but was unprecedented. We heard that there was disparity between the reasons that were given for calling in the application and the real reasons. For example, there was a claim that the application had to be called in to maintain the integrity of the planning system, but the appeal mechanism, had the Trump Organization decided to use it, provides ample checks and balances. It was also claimed that there was fear over legal costs being awarded against Aberdeenshire Council, but contrary to the smears that were peddled about the council being in a shambles, it was plain that its decisions were fully competent and that there were substantial planning grounds for refusal.
I ask members what conclusions they would draw from those facts. Would they conclude that ministers acted hastily, that their reasons were not as they stated, and that the cabinet secretary's actions were concerning, surprising and out of the ordinary?
Might the objective observer draw the conclusion, which the report also states, that no minister or official was guilty of breaking the law or the ministerial code?
Alasdair Allan will have his time. He has had a number of weeks in which to set out his alternative conclusions on the evidence and the facts, but he has failed to do so. I will return to that.
When we consider the actions of the First Minister, we find a similar position. He said—this is not in dispute—that he was bound to meet the Trump Organization's representatives as a local MSP, but he was under no obligation to meet them under the code of conduct for MSPs. He told us that he acted within the ministerial code, but we were unable to investigate that as the ministerial code is outwith our remit. The one person to whom he did not speak in that regard was the custodian of the code, who is the permanent secretary.
The First Minister claimed that the Trump Organization did not understand the process, but it had the best planning lawyers that money could buy, whereas he had no special expertise in the matter. Indeed, in its evidence, the Trump Organization roundly rebutted the idea that it was in any way confused about the process. Again, what conclusion should we draw from those agreed facts? Should we conclude that they are hardly in line with a "precautionary approach" and that it is not a wise move for a First Minister to leave himself and his Government open to accusations of irregular practice? Should we conclude that he was acting in a First Ministerial capacity and that the ministerial code needs to be revisited?
We found that, far from taking a precautionary approach, the First Minister was cavalier in his actions. The committee's report states that he
"displayed, at best, exceptionally poor judgement and a worrying lack of awareness about the consequence of his actions."
It might be that an alternative conclusion can be drawn, but we are still waiting to hear it. The Scottish National Party minority on the committee rejected everyone else's conclusions but has been unable to come up with any alternative conclusions in a minority report.
In conclusion, the Government's only defence may be that the ends justify the means, but even that is questionable. Yes, it has succeeded in keeping the development alive, but at some cost—the planning process has been compromised, and the Trump development faces further delay and possible court challenge. If the Government had acted within its powers at an early stage, it could undoubtedly have secured the investment for Aberdeenshire and Scotland.
Will the member take an intervention?
No—you had your chance and you blew it on Grangemouth.
If the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Sustainable Growth had been here and had not been busy elsewhere, he would have had an opportunity, which the Government's representative, Stewart Stevenson, now has—[Interruption.]
Order.
Today, the minister has an opportunity to address the committee's concerns and to act on the report's recommendations.
What is the minister's response to the call for ministers, particularly when they exercise their planning functions, to take significant decisions only on the basis of proper written advice from officials? Will a full audit trail, including full minutes of meetings, be available for decisions involving planning applications?
When ministers intervene in the ministerial decision-making process on planning applications, will they be particularly mindful of the ministerial code? Will they consider how particular actions might affect public perceptions and whether action by ministers or officials has the potential to imperil the decision that is taken?
The ministers' attitude to date has been dismissive, at best, and I look forward to receiving serious responses from ministers to the concerns and recommendations of the Local Government and Communities Committee.
I move,
That the Parliament notes the conclusions and recommendations contained in the Local Government and Communities Committee's 5th Report, 2008 (Session 3): Planning Application Processes (Menie Estate) (SP Paper 73).
I point out to members that because of the debate's capacity to generate some heat, I will keep every speaker strictly to their time limit. I must also ask members not to use the second person, as that tends to add to the heat rather than reduce it.
The Scottish Government never accepted the need for an inquiry into the call-in of the Menie estate planning application, for we were clear all along that ministers and officials had at all times acted properly, objectively and in full accordance with planning legislation, the Scottish ministerial code and all other requirements. Nevertheless, an inquiry by the Local Government and Communities Committee was initiated and, of course, we co-operated with it willingly, comprehensively and constructively.
I am glad that you have clarified the situation. The First Minister welcomed the inquiry, as did all the members of the committee. To suggest that ministers and officials appeared before the committee willingly is simply not true, and the evidence bears that out.
The Government supplied extensive evidence about our actions in relation to the planning application. Indeed, for the very first time, a First Minister appeared before a parliamentary committee. He enjoyed it so much that he went back the following week.
The Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Sustainable Growth gave evidence, as did the Government's chief planner and the head of planning decisions. Evidence was also provided by Aberdeenshire Council, the Royal Town Planning Institute in Scotland and the Trump Organization.
The Government was open and forthcoming on an unprecedented scale. We answered almost 200 parliamentary questions on the issue and replied to dozens of FOI requests, a process that occupied planning officials for hundreds of hours at substantial cost to the public purse.
Whereas we have been open and clear about our actions, by contrast the Local Government and Communities Committee's report is an exercise in confusion, contradiction, speculation and innuendo. It is a report that is lacking in hard facts and meaningful, evidence-based conclusions.
In his speech, the convener of the committee suggested that the Government acted outwith its powers.
No.
He did—I wrote it down.
That said, the report contains one robust and concrete finding. At paragraph 182, the report says that ministers and officials
"acted in accordance with planning laws when issuing the decision to call in the application."
I have been asked about a minority report. The minority report is contained entirely in paragraph 182. It is a shame that with 138 paragraphs of agreement, as Duncan McNeil, the committee convener, drew to our attention, we find ourselves with a difference of interpretation.
One question that you did not answer in the whole inquiry process is why you discovered a conflict of interest only in November and not in May when you were elected. The issue that you must address is the fact that the members who opposed the recommendations did not come to any conclusion at all—they simply said that they did not agree with the rest of us. They have given no alternative explanation.
I note the use of the word "you", Presiding Officer, and I will respond in the appropriate terms. I do not make the planning decision, because of the rules that govern such decisions. There is therefore no conflict of interest for the "you" to whom the member referred.
I repeat: the report says that ministers and officials
"acted in accordance with planning laws when issuing the decision to call in the application."
There was no disagreement from any member of the committee on that key issue. The committee may have split along party lines on many questions, but—as paragraph 182 makes clear—there was unanimity on that fundamental point. No one is challenging the legitimacy and correctness of the call-in.
Will the minister take an intervention?
No. I have dealt with the point.
The result of this lengthy and drawn-out inquiry process is confirmation that the Government did absolutely nothing wrong. We did our job—we did what we were there to do. We acted properly and decisively and wholly in line with planning legislation and all—all—other requirements.
That is not to say that the report does not contain any criticisms. It was inevitable that it would, given that the inquiry was partisan and politically motivated; yet the criticisms in the report are without foundation. They are based on innuendo and accusation and contain inaccuracies that betray a misunderstanding of the planning process and an inability to comprehend and utilise the evidence that was supplied.
Will the minister give way?
One more paragraph and I will come to you.
We are not alone in thinking that. The Royal Town Planning Institute in Scotland wrote to the committee to clarify comments in the report that seriously misrepresent the evidence that it provided.
It is shocking to hear a Government minister accuse a committee of the Parliament of being unable to scrutinise the evidence and draw conclusions. I have one simple question, which the Government has failed to answer throughout all of this. We are all agreed that the project is a major one for the whole of Scotland. Why did the Government not use planning legislation to call in the application before Aberdeenshire Council took its decision? Why?
The Government used planning legislation to call in the application at an appropriate point. [Interruption.]
Order.
I congratulate the committee on moving forward with an inquiry into child poverty, which I understand that it is to undertake. I am sure that it will deliver a very good result; one that will be of rather greater value than the report that is the subject of the debate.
The cabinet secretary wrote to the committee to put the record straight on some of the major shortcomings in the report. Sadly, on the basis of what the chamber has heard thus far, the message does not seem to have got through.
In his response, the cabinet secretary accused the committee of failing to understand the planning regime or, indeed, the appropriate terminology. The cabinet secretary has a cheek. The person who confused the terminology first was the cabinet secretary in his evidence to the committee. If he were to read the report thoroughly, he would find a careful analysis of all the terms that are used in the planning legislation—
Your question is a bit long, Mr McLetchie.
He will find them in paragraphs 36 to 42 of the report, which this minister, ill informed though he is—
Mr McLetchie.
The minister would be well advised to read those paragraphs before he says anything else.
I assure members that, as the 11th planning minister since the resumption of the Scottish Parliament, I take my responsibilities in that regard very seriously and I am fully informed on the relevant matters.
You have one minute remaining.
The report is simply a diatribe that is not grounded in evidence. For example, paragraph 181 totally misrepresents the evidence that was given by the chief planner—
I have no time—sorry.
It confuses the point about definitions. If members do not believe me, they should ask the Economy, Energy and Tourism Committee, which agreed. There cannot be a national development at Menie estate, because the term "national development" will not be used until the national planning framework is finalised and approved. Further, the chief planner did not say that the Menie estate application deserved one-in-a-million treatment. He explained that he had never witnessed a situation in which a local authority resolved to refuse planning permission but several councillors who had been excluded from the decision-making process demanded that the decision be reversed—that was the one-in-a-million occurrence.
In those circumstances, we proceeded in the way—
I am sorry, minister, but we must move on.
That was a shameful and tawdry performance by the minister that showed flagrant disregard for the Local Government and Communities Committee's work. The report, for which I commend the committee, is a forensic piece of work and a damning indictment of the Government's handling of the Menie estate application and, just as important, of the Government's approach to the integrity and independence of the planning system more generally.
I will begin by speaking about that latter context. The SNP started by welcoming the inquiry—superficially at least—but now, as we have heard, its members ritually condemn anyone who dares to question the party's actions and say that they are anti-business or engaged in a political witch hunt. Throughout the inquiry process, the SNP tried to justify its actions by saying basically that the end justifies the means. The end of securing the Trump inward investment was deemed to be worth compromising the integrity of our planning system and risking the charge that political influence was more important than the merits of the application.
Although that argument might work at a certain level, the one area in which it does not work is in relation to the planning system, which above all else must be impartial and fair to all parties that have an interest in the outcome—protester as well as developer, environmentalist as well as economist. Crucially, the system must also be seen to be fair and impartial because, in planning, perception is as important as reality. The potential for a judicial review of a case must never be far from the minds of the ministers who are charged with the responsibility of taking such important decisions. In that context, the primary consideration is that all ministers' actions must not only be fair and impartial, but be perceived to be fair and impartial by the general public. There must be openness and transparency as well as impartiality and integrity, or else the decision is imperilled, as we have seen.
I put on record that I have not disagreed with a word that the member has said so far.
The member will not have to wait too long.
As we have heard, the committee's report, in its condemnation of the "cavalier" and "inappropriate" actions of the First Minister and his cabinet secretary, shows that ministers undoubtedly failed that test. That was not the only test that they failed, but it was the most important. SNP members of the committee did not reach a different conclusion, chiefly because the one in the report is true and indisputable. For all the protestations from the SNP members on the committee, and despite their dissension, they decided not to produce a minority report. Although they were at pains not to criticise their ministers, they could not find an alternative narrative that fitted with the facts and avoided that criticism. They could mount only an incoherent defence of the charges.
How could they find an alternative, when the charges were true? The local constituency MSP rolled up to a five-star hotel in a ministerial limo to meet the Trump team and then handed them the telephone to speak to the chief planner. Is that the conduct of a constituency MSP? He risked the integrity of the planning system and its independence.
Like a latter-day Mississippi gambler, he was prepared to risk it all on the call. If Alex Salmond was the maverick of the piece, John Swinney was the man chosen to sort it out all out: "Got a problem, Donald? Don't worry, John'll fix it."
Of course, that was not the only Donald involved in planning matters.
Sit down.
As the committee took evidence, it became clear that the Government was simultaneously embroiled in another live planning application, this time in Aviemore.
On a point of order, Presiding Officer. Do you agree that an accusation has been made that there was a conversation that was inappropriate under law and that therefore that should not be covered by the member?
I do not quite take the point, but I remind members to observe the rules of courtesy at all times.
I was simply making the point that the planning system has to be seen to be fair. In my view, handing the phone over to the developer does not make that system look fair.
We come to Aviemore—a little £80 million local difficulty for another Donald, Donald Macdonald. This Donald was apparently aggrieved that the upstart Mr Trump was getting all the ministerial attention and fast-tracking, while his application allegedly languished in the planning process. On this occasion, no fewer than five ministers were involved.
Will the member take an intervention?
I would love to, but I am in my last minute.
Mr Russell and I appeared on television together and he knows that he was more than economical with the truth that day. He claimed that the First Minister's involvement was triggered by a request from a cross-party group of MSPs. However, his involvement and that of others pre-dated that request by several months. Donald Macdonald contacted Jim Mather on 26 October 2007 and various meetings have occurred. It is all in the responses to FOI requests. The Government said that it was intervening on behalf of jobs, but all the e-mails from Mr Macdonald saying that jobs were at risk were ignored by the SNP Government.
The committee report is hard hitting and evidence based and contains fair comment. It deserves better than the derisory response of the Government. Alex Salmond has talked this week about jigs and reels, but we must never again be in a position in which a Donald is calling the tune, Alex is on the fiddle and the SNP is reeling in the cash.
Some of the member's remarks bordered on discourtesy. I ask him and other members to think carefully before they use that kind of terminology.
I will do my best to be courteous, as usual.
I commend the work of the Local Government and Communities Committee in compiling its report into the planning application process for the Menie estate. The Government may not welcome the report into the Trump development, but we can be sure that if it was Labour, the Liberal Democrats or the Conservatives who were allegedly indulging, manipulating and interfering in the planning process, the SNP would be first in the queue for—at the very least—a committee inquiry and report to Parliament.
The Planning etc (Scotland) Act 2006 reviewed existing legislation and, just as important, set out a new culture and approach to the planning process. While many aspects of the act are not yet in force, there is still plenty of scope for all of us to change our approach to planning, for example by moving to consensual working and away from the adversarial approach of the past; by moving to upfront, positive and proactive consultation rather than reactive, niggling and negative consultation; by making local authorities an attractive place for newly qualified planners; and by ensuring that every development plan in the country is up to date. It is the responsibility of every elected member and councillor to adhere to and support the 2006 act and the forthcoming guidelines. Like other members, I have been critical of supermarkets and wind farms. In a democratic country, we can express our views on those matters. The structures and processes are in place for an open, accountable and impartial planning system in this country.
Scotland has a commitment to enterprise. This might be the time to remind developers that Scotland is the birthplace of enterprise and the free market. The division of labour, comparative advantage, the natural order, and truck, barter and exchange were all written about here in Scotland in 1776, in Adam Smith's "An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations". We do not need lectures on enterprise, planning or the democratic system of local and national Government. All that that leaves is trust in the process.
The ministers met the developers but did not meet
"all parties with an interest in the decision",
as is clearly stated in the Scottish ministerial code. As paragraph 93 of the committee report says,
"The Chief Planner told the Committee that the circumstances of the application were ‘one in a million.'"
He was not speaking about Donald Trump's chances.
The member said that the minister did not meet all parties who requested a meeting. Can she name a party that was not granted a meeting?
I wish to correct Mr Neil. I said that the minister did not meet
"all parties with an interest in the decision".
That is clearly stated in the ministerial code.
The Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Sustainable Growth gave different reasons for the call-in. It seems clear that the call-in by ministers was not only based on the refusal by the council; it was more to do with the desire to take credit for the development. A more constructive approach by the Scottish Government would have been to make the conduct of the appeals process known to the Trump Organization and to explain
"how this would not necessarily be any longer or more expensive than a call-in process".
That is acknowledged by the committee in paragraph 175. I support the committee's view that
"The appeal mechanism provides the checks and balances required"
in our planning system, as is recorded in paragraph 178.
I found it incredible that the SNP committee members—many of whom, Mr Kenneth Gibson for example, are known to have good judgment—dissented even on paragraphs of factual evidence. How can someone disagree with a factual statement by the Royal Town Planning Institute in Scotland? Members might not agree with the points that were made, but they cannot disagree with the fact that the statement concerned was recorded.
Paragraphs 226 to 231, 268 and 269 refer to the Aviemore case, of which I have personal experience. I was asked to attend an urgent meeting of great national importance regarding the development of the Aviemore centre. If I am told that one of Scotland's premier conference centres and 300 jobs are at risk, with Aviemore facing another setback, I do not hesitate to attend.
You have one minute left.
Even if I had known that Mr Macdonald contributed to the SNP, I would still have attended the meeting, given my local commitment and support. When I was asked to write to Alex Salmond, John Swinney, Stewart Stevenson, Richard Lochhead, the Cairngorms National Park Authority, Highland Council, the Scottish Environment Protection Agency and others within 24 hours, I did so—on time and as promised. I am very pleased that the intervention by me and Rhoda Grant was so successful in removing the planning logjam for the development.
However, I was infuriated that, while I was gathering all the correspondence and seeking advice from Macdonald Hotels and the Parliament in order to release information as requested, and while my colleague Rhoda Grant was attending a family funeral, the Scottish Government was busy instructing David Thompson MSP to submit a motion calling on us to provide the information. Even when MSPs across parties—
You must close.
—do all the right things for business and jobs—
I am afraid that I must call the next member to speak.
The Local Government and Communities Committee has done what parliamentary committees ought to do, which is cast light on the difficult issues that are the subject of their investigations. Their job, and ours, is to hold Government to account for its actions. The attitude that the Minister for Transport, Infrastructure and Climate Change has taken this afternoon is extremely regrettable, given the serious issues that are before the Parliament and covered in the report.
Even since the committee reported, new information has continued to drip out. Freedom of information requests have now elicited the information that Alex Salmond's briefing meeting with the Trump Organization in September 2007 was set up not by his constituency staff but by Geoff Aberdein, his Government special adviser.
Government is about checks and balances. A democratic election process gives Government an authority far beyond that of unelected dictators and despots, but a democratic Government does not have a mandate to do what it likes. It operates within the rule of law and the interplay of institutions. It involves an accountable process of decision making. That was a sophistication too far for Government ministers in their approach to the Menie estate planning application. Flushed with the newly acquired authority of office and believing that the long-awaited SNP millennium had come, they thought that they could do what they liked.
There was a simple scenario as they saw it: a rural council had made a mess of a planning application by a super-wealthy international tycoon—the sort of person whom the First Minister wants to attract to Scotland. Scotland was giving out a message that it was closed for business. Goodness—the SNP's Scotland might be seen as parochial. They thought, "We are not having that." The SNP Government would show the smack of firm government. With barely a pause, one breathless decision followed another. Alex Salmond, surrounded by the trappings of ministerial power and, of course, in his constituency capacity, met the Trump people.
Will the member give way?
Give me a second, please.
Alex Salmond meets the Trump people; talks to the chief planner; hands his phone to the Trump people who, despite having batteries of lawyers and consultants, do not fully understand the Scottish planning system. Within 24 hours, they are in the cosy bowels of St Andrew's house meeting Scotland's top planning officials and, within 45 minutes of that, a decision has been made to call in the application for decision by ministers—a procedure described memorably by David McLetchie as a "wizard wheeze", which itself lands Scottish ministers in the position of appearing partisan. As it happens, there is no discernable difference of timescale or procedure between a call-in and an appeal. It is no wonder that there were concerns about all that, even though the details were unknown at the beginning.
Earlier, Mr Brown suggested that the rule of law might not have been adhered to in this case. Is there any evidence in the report—or does he have any new evidence—to suggest that the rule of law was broken?
Brian Adam should be very careful about his phraseology. The report uses phrases about ministers such as "cavalier", "unwise", "worrying", "lack of awareness" and "poor judgement". That sort of thing, rather than the issue of the rule of law, is the charge.
Two vignettes in particular stick in my mind. The first is the picture of the First Minister of Scotland—who, by the way, was not trying to influence anyone—phoning the chief planner and then handing the phone to George A Sorial of the Trump Organization. The idea of the First Minister of Scotland acting as some sort of junior aide to Mr Sorial is not particularly appealing.
The second was the First Minister saying to the committee convener, "haud yer wheesht". That is symptomatic of the arrogant approach that the First Minister took and, dare I say it, the Minister for Transport, Infrastructure and Climate Change is taking to the committee inquiry, which I remind the Parliament had been agreed by all the parties, including the minister's.
As Duncan McNeil said quite rightly, the committee was agreed unanimously on all the key facts in the report. That is hugely significant, because the report included a whole series of interesting facts that were obfuscated or had to be dragged out of ministers bit by bit, as we saw right through the inquiry.
What does the committee say? It has no fewer than 46 substantial criticisms of the SNP Government. In particular, it had serious concerns about the Scottish Government's decision-making process leading to the ministerial call-in.
The committee was particularly unhappy with the First Minister's actions. Facilitating the meeting between the Trump representatives and the chief planner was "extremely unwise". The committee rejected comprehensively the First Minister's explanations—it was not his "bounden duty" to meet the Trump people. He had no particular expertise in planning law. The committee stated:
"far from taking a precautionary approach"—
as he would have us believe—
"the First Minister was cavalier in his actions and displayed, at best, exceptionally poor judgement and a worrying lack of awareness of the consequence of his actions."
He behaved in
"an unwise and inappropriate way."
It is not our job to debate the merits of the Trump application; it is our job to consider the procedures. The overall picture of the current Scottish Government is not inspiring; it is one of breathtaking arrogance combined with staggering ineptitude, which could—and did—imperil the application. Not for the Government the restrictions on lesser men; not for it the proper balance between competing interests required by the due process of the planning system and by the ministerial code. The Parliament is entitled—indeed, to coin a phrase, it is our "bounden duty"—to hold ministers to account for their actions; check any tendencies to megalomania; protect the integrity of our institutions and, in this instance, of our independent planning procedures; and suggest and require changes in the machinery of government if they are necessary.
It is appropriate to consider the contributions to the debate today. When my colleague Mike Rumbles sums up, he will draw out some of the lessons that come from it. They will undoubtedly include the need for an audit trail for significant ministerial decisions—
We must move on to the open debate.
—and independent oversight of the ministerial code—
Mr Brown, sit down, please.
I trust that this matter has been a salutary experience for this Government.
Order.
Last night, I saw the highly enjoyable Dario Fo farce "Trumpets and Raspberries" at the Royal Lyceum theatre but, from what I have heard, this premature debate outdoes the play, given the ludicrous nature of the plot, in which a dastardly First Minister and his henchman Mr Swinney secretly plot to undermine the integrity of Scotland's planning system for their own nefarious ends.
I realise that Opposition politicians are excited at the prospect of creating a hazy perception of wrongdoing in the Scottish Government, even if no hard evidence is available to support such a belief. It would have been better to have awaited the Scottish Government's response to the committee report before forging ahead with the debate.
Will the member give way?
Will the member give way?
I am deputy convener of the Local Government and Communities Committee, so I had hoped to close the debate for the committee, with the aim of covering the many areas of the report on which there was genuine consensus. However, committee colleagues thought that I should be freed up to make my partisan comments, so the politically more neutral David McLetchie—if members can believe that—will close for the committee.
I will focus on areas of consensus in the report, but first I am happy to allow Sarah Boyack to make an intervention.
My understanding is that the letter of 27 March to the committee convener is indeed the Scottish Government's response to the report. That is what it says in the letter, which I have with me.
The decision to request a debate was made before the response was given. The committee should have decided whether to go forward after receiving the response.
In paragraph 182 of the report, the committee said:
"The Committee notes that the Chief Planner and the Planning Minister (Cabinet Secretary for Finance and sustainable Growth, John Swinney) acted in accordance with planning laws when issuing the decision to call in the application. The Committee notes the evidence of the Chief Planner that he had decided over the weekend of 1-2 December that call-in would be the simplest solution for all parties. The Committee notes that there are no definitive criteria for call-in and that each case is decided on its own merits … The Committee notes the evidence that the planning minister took advice from the Chief Planner in reaching his decision."
In paragraph 208, the committee said:
"The Committee notes the evidence of the Cabinet Secretary that the First Minister had made no representations to him on the merits of the planning application even although it was permissible for the First Minister to do so in terms of … the Code."
I draw Mary Scanlon's attention to paragraph 214, in which the committee noted that Mr Salmond made it clear that
"he had met people from all sides of the debate",
and went on to quote the First Minister, who said:
"Each and every one of those answers made my role as a constituency MSP crystal clear and emphasised that as a minister I am debarred from decision making on a planning application in my constituency."
Will the member take an intervention?
I would have liked to take an intervention from the Liberal member of the committee, Jim Tolson, but he hasnae bothered to show up for the debate.
The report quotes Mr Salmond as saying:
"In every single phone call and meeting, I have gone through the limits that are placed on me by being the constituency MSP. No one can be in any doubt about that whatsoever."
In paragraph 216, the committee said:
"The Chief Executive of Aberdeenshire told the Committee that Alex Salmond always made it clear that he was talking as local MSP and not as First Minister. He did not express an opinion to the Chief Executive about the merits and outcome of the application."
In paragraph 232, the committee said:
"The Committee entirely accepts the right of Alex Salmond MSP in his constituency capacity to meet with anyone he chooses about an issue in his constituency."
In paragraph 241, the committee said:
"The Committee notes the efforts made by Mr Salmond to ensure all stakeholders were clear that he was acting as Constituency MSP for Gordon and not as First Minister. The Committee notes that stakeholders have made it clear they were aware that Mr Salmond was acting as Constituency MSP for Gordon and not as First Minister at all times."
On paragraph 268, there is nothing in the report to suggest that ministers were anything other than fully mindful of and compliant with the Scottish ministerial code. Ministers will continue to operate in that way.
CBI Scotland's director, Iain McMillan, who is no supporter of the SNP, backed the First Minister. He said on 14 March:
"I said previously that this parliamentary inquiry appeared to be little more than a fishing expedition, and this report is not likely to change my mind. No evidence of wrong-doing appears to have been found, despite those involved scrambling around looking for reasons to criticise."
As Duncan McNeil said on the same day, "No laws were broken."
During the debate Mr Kerr was asked to reflect on his comments about fiddling—
On a point of order, Presiding Officer.
Maybe Mr Kerr was confusing Mr Salmond with his own, floundering party leader—
Mr Gibson. A point of order has been made.
Mr Gibson referred in his comments to paragraph 268 of the report. He tried to suggest that that in some way backed up the minister's position. What it in fact does, is recommend—
Order. Sit down. That is a point of debate, not a point of order.
Not every minister is as circumspect in his dealings with Mr Trump as Mr Salmond has been. Freedom of information requests have revealed the extent of former First Minister Jack McConnell's involvement with Mr Trump.
In an active planning application? I think not.
Jack McConnell's personal assistant wrote:
"He thinks he should have a telephone call with Trump."
Touchingly, Mr McConnell even sent Mr Trump a birthday card and said that Mr Trump
"is our most famous Global Scot and that we should continue to court him."
On the call-in, Alex Johnstone said:
"This is absolutely the right decision and I can only hope it is not too late. Last week's decision was, quite simply, the wrong one and does not reflect public opinion. I am delighted by tonight's developments"
from the SNP.
The Evening Express stated:
"First Minister Alex Salmond is spot on in his assessment of yesterday's sleaze row as a descent into gutter politics"
by Nicol Stephen. It continued:
"It is tiresome that Nicol Stephen is hijacking attempts to get the Trump bid back on course to score cheap political points. As a North-east MSP we expect him to represent the interests of his constituents, not sling mud at the expense of efforts to rescue the Menie proposals. Mr Stephen is hardly the one to indulge in such heckling."
Mr Gibson's time is up.
Excuse me, Presiding Officer, but I had a point of order in the middle of my speech.
Mr Gibson, I make it clear that members are all being kept to a strict time limit. I also point out that I curtailed the point of order. It would be better if you sat down.
On a point of order, Presiding Officer. I could not take interventions that I would have liked to take because time was taken up by a spurious point of order. In such cases time should be added, should it not?
Leave the chamber.
I can conduct business without advice from members.
I say to Mr Gibson that the decision on the length of speeches is in the hands of the chair. I have decided to limit all members to the time limits decided by the Presiding Officer.
I shall try and restore some calm to the chamber, because there are significant issues to address. I shall do that by starting with a concession to the SNP back benchers: the committee does not believe that there is evidence that Alex Salmond should be huckled off to the pokey. I do not know whether that is a terribly strong position for the Government to be in, but no one is pretending that the law has been broken. The issue is the quality of the judgment of the ministers involved in the process and the consequences that that has had. Members can rubbish the debate as much as they wish, but the fact is that serious people outside the chamber regard these matters as being of national significance and as having serious consequences. We must listen to those people.
It was important for the committee to take on this job. We know that we have a First Minister who plays the person rather than the ball. We also know that we have a First Minister who resists answering any questions and is keen to blame everyone else for everything that happens on his watch. However, it is deeply depressing that that now seems to be elevated to a Government strategy. The role of committees in scrutinising the work of the Executive is a crucial part of Parliament's work and ought not to be rubbished as a waste of time. The day may come when SNP back benchers find themselves a spine and discover that a committee is a place to hold the Executive to account, even if it is their own Government. Can members imagine the hyper-outrage of the SNP if, in previous years, there had been any suggestion that we ought not to ask questions or hold inquiries? However, that was then, and this is now.
The reality is that the public are interested in the inquiry. Kenny Gibson welcomed it, and who could forget Alex Salmond bouncing into the committee to claim how delighted he was to be there? He was slightly less delighted when we suggested that perhaps his judgment was being called into question and he is slightly less happy now that he has discovered that he has to respond to a serious report about his behaviour.
The Government likes administrative devolution and hates parliamentary scrutiny; it does what it can without accountability to the Parliament. It refuses to make statements, even when instructed to do so by the chamber. Government ministers are serial offenders, but I say to them that accountability goes with the territory. The performance by the Minister for Transport, Infrastructure and Climate Change in responding to a serious report gives me grave cause for concern.
The central charges of the report are that the actions of the First Minister were "unwise and inappropriate" and that the actions of Mr Swinney were in danger of imperilling the development. Taken together, their actions send out the message to big business that it can have preferential access, that planning is for the little people and that the normal rules do not apply to it.
I will not allow others in the chamber to misrepresent this issue as a divide between those who are pro-development and those who are against it or between those who are pro-business and those who are not. It is about how our planning system works and how it can support, develop and acknowledge the role of local communities in shaping those developments, which is clearly not easy.
The key issue, which the First Minister himself accepted, is that the action of ministers has to pass the perception test. The feature of the challenges that the First Minister accepted was about the perception of his role. As has been alluded to already, our former First Minister was challenged on the perception of his role in this development—indeed, he was challenged on the perception of who he chose to go on holiday with. Everyone accepts that the perception test applies, so let us apply the perception test, as proposed by Nicola Sturgeon in the past.
Imagine a First Minister—who accepts that he has never done such a thing in his life before, and who was not on ministerial business and was not in his constituency—arriving somewhere in a ministerial car to meet, at short notice, following a decision of the local authority, representatives of the Trump Organization. He discusses matters with them, phones the chief planner and hands the phone over. A meeting is set up and, subsequently, a "one in a million" decision is made. I have to say that, by this point in the imaginative exercise, Nicola Sturgeon would have been in the stratosphere. However, that was then; this is now.
The First Minister's defence is that he was taking a precautionary approach. If that is the First Minister being cautious, heaven help us when the day comes when he decides to be reckless.
Everyone on the Government benches says that that is okay, because we are open for business. However, it is plain that the First Minister was acting without thinking of the consequences and, terrified that Trump was going to walk, pulled out all the stops and helped a group of developers who would not use the powers and routes that were available to them.
One minute.
In the past, SNP back benchers chided us for not supporting the third-party right of appeal. Indeed, Jim Mather chided me during the passage of the Planning etc (Scotland) Bill, saying that, by not supporting a third-party right of appeal, we were not supporting communities. We resisted the third-party right of appeal because of its consequences for development. However, now we have a Government that thinks that people do not even need to exercise the first-party right of appeal. How far have we come? Where is the balance now?
John Swinney told us that the issue was of national significance, which was not an argument that was deployed later. The one thing that he did not do—this man who knew everything about the planning system—was act before the decision was made, when the process that resulted in that decision was on-going. That would have solved the problem. Instead, however, he chose to do it later.
I urge everybody—
The member's time is up, I am afraid.
At the start of her speech, Johann Lamont said that the issue was quality of judgment. I think that the quality of judgment of the unionist majority on the committee is what needs to be called into question. They are the people who have given an inquiry into child poverty in Scotland a much lower priority than this spurious inquiry.
Will the member give way?
I will later.
Placing child poverty as a poor secondary issue behind this blown-up nonsense is an incredible feat. As someone who served as a committee convener for eight years, I believe that this inquiry is in danger of bringing the whole committee system into disrepute. The role of a committee is to act as a watchdog on the Government, not to engage in a witch hunt, which is what this committee has very clearly done.
Johann Lamont talks about the perception test. The perception out there in the country is that this inquiry is completely spurious, is a waste of time and presents entirely the wrong image about Scotland being open for international business.
I find it amazing that the only charge that there seems to be against the First Minister is that he was acting in a "cavalier" fashion. Can anyone imagine Mike Rumbles accusing someone else of being cavalier? Andy Kerr was cavalier with life and limb when he wanted to close the accident and emergency departments at Monklands and Ayr. That was not just cavalier; it was reckless. Those members have a cheek accusing anyone of being cavalier.
Will the member take an intervention?
I will take a short intervention from the cavalier Mr Rumbles.
On a point of order, Presiding Officer. Will Mr Neil reflect on his comments and lack of courtesy when he suggests that a member might have placed the lives of others in danger?
I am sure that Mr Neil has heard what has been said.
Is Alex Neil's defence of the First Minister in this case simply that he has not broken the law and is therefore not a criminal?
My defence is that the First Minister has acted on behalf of his constituents as he is supposed to. According to the parliamentary code, all members are under the obligation to stand up for their constituents' interests. As the committee said, the First Minister has done nothing wrong under the law or the ministerial code. The only charge that I have heard today is that he has been cavalier.
Will the member take an intervention?
I do not have time.
As the cabinet secretary pointed out in his response to the committee, the report is full of inaccuracies.
Name one.
Name one.
The report says that the chief planner endorsed the suggestion that the development is not of national significance, which is a misinterpretation. Also, despite what the committee alleges, the chief planner did not say that the Menie estate application required
"‘one in a million' treatment".
Those are just two examples.
We heard my good friend Mary Scanlon say that the First Minister refused to talk to all the stakeholders, but the whole point is that the First Minister, acting as the MSP for the area, spoke to everyone who had a declared interest in the project.
The Opposition goes on about access. If the First Minister was at the Scottish Trades Union Congress and happened to take the same position on an issue as the STUC did, would that make him cavalier or guilty of some misdemeanour?
Let us look at the Lib-Lab planning record and at the article in the Sunday papers about a planning decision that was made by Johann Lamont when she was a minister. In order to defend a public-private partnership project, she rejected her officials' advice to call in the application—a very cavalier decision indeed. She then refused to release the information and even got to the point of going to the Court of Session to avoid transparency and to keep the matter secret.
We will be taking no lessons from these unionist chancers on any aspect of the report, which is not worth the paper that it is written on. It is entirely a unionist plot to undermine the Scottish National Party Government. The reason why we are at 40 per cent in the polls and the Opposition is trailing is because the people know a scam when they see one, and this report is one.
In opening, as a precaution, I must declare an interest as I am a member of the cross-party group on golf.
It is fair to say that we know that we have rattled their cages when Alex Neil starts to talk about unionist plots when all there is is a consensual committee report. His party's members could only disagree with the recommendations but did not have the gumption to put forward an alternative view of the recommendations and evidence that we took.
When the Local Government and Communities Committee decided to undertake its inquiry, I presumed that we would find merely that the SNP Government had been a little bit foolhardy or that its inexperience had led it to make some foolish but minor mistakes. I felt sure that there would be little of substance in its actions to criticise. The first evidence session, however, put paid to that idea, as it quickly became clear that that was not the case—something that gave me and other committee members pause for thought.
The discrepancies in the evidence sessions were perhaps the most revealing aspects of the evidence that we received. For example, Alex Salmond said that, at his meeting with the Trump representatives, those representatives were unclear as to the routes ahead and the bulk of the meeting was taken up with Mr Salmond indicating his opinion of what he
"detected about Aberdeenshire Council's wish to revisit the decision that the infrastructure services committee had made."—[Official Report, Local Government and Communities Committee, 16 January 2008; c 512.]
Mr Salmond also indicated that the Trump Organization was
"uncertain about the process of appeals."—[Official Report, Local Government and Communities Committee, 23 January 2008; c 552.]
However, in his oral evidence to the committee, George Sorial, representing the Trump Organization, by contrast confirmed that the Trump Organization had been given a wide spectrum of advice on the issues that might arise. He said:
"There was never any issue relating to our not understanding our options … We were aware of the possibility of appealing from the outset."—[Official Report, Local Government and Communities Committee, 6 February 2008; c 655-6.]
Mr Swinney advised the committee that he thought that the planning system was in danger of falling into disrepute because of the contradictory positions that were being adopted within Aberdeenshire Council. Yet, in a statement that was issued on 20 December, Mr Swinney stated:
"The purpose of call in on this occasion is to provide enhanced scrutiny of a planning application which raises issues of national importance and has been the subject of widespread public interest."
That, however, was further contradicted by the chief planner, who said in his evidence that he wanted to end the "uncertainty" that the situation had caused in the planning process. Who are we to believe?
The First Minister described in great detail how he had taken a precautionary approach in all his activities around the issue, yet he took advice on the protocol that he should follow from the chief planner, not from the permanent secretary—the one civil servant who might be expected to give authoritative advice on that issue.
I want to correct a point that was made by an SNP member earlier. We did not investigate the actions of ministers in relation to the ministerial code because we do not, as a Parliament or as a committee, have that ability. The sole responsibility for ensuring that ministers adhere to the ministerial code rests with the First Minister.
Perhaps the most damning evidence that the committee received was that of the chief planner, who admitted under questioning that the cabinet secretary made the final decision on the matter without a minute in front of him, with no paper trail—that appeared only after the decision had been made—with no legal advice and on the basis of two five-minute phone calls. The Government made much of the fact that this was an important development proposal—it is: no one would disagree with that. Surely, then, it was important enough to justify at least an advice note setting out the pros and cons of the arguments for call-in, yet it did not get even that.
Indeed, on the day when the decision was made, on the afternoon of 4 December, the chief planner—who one might have expected to have been writing a definitive briefing for the cabinet secretary—managed, between 2.20 pm and 3.45 pm to have a meeting with Mr Sorial and his colleagues; to speak on the telephone with Ann Faulds, the solicitor acting for the Trump Organization; to call Aberdeenshire Council for an update; to reconvene the meeting with Mr Sorial; to call Mr Salmond to tell him that the meeting had taken place; to make the decision, following a discussion with his colleague, Mr Ferguson; to call Aberdeenshire Council again; and, finally, to call Mr Swinney to have the conversation that resulted in the call-in. All of that happened between 2.20 pm and 3.45 pm. That is how much concern and interest the Government showed regarding what was described as a "one in a million" application and decision.
A lot of heat but not a lot of light has been generated by SNP members this afternoon. Many of us feel that problems have arisen for the planning system as a result of the activities of the SNP ministers. I say that more in sorrow than in anger. It would have behoved the SNP members of the committee at least to come forward with an alternative report if they could not sign up to the complete committee report. The fact that they did not do that suggests that they had no justification to give.
The debate is about not the merits of a planning application, but the conduct of Government ministers in their dealings with the applicant. The Local Government and Communities Committee's report deserves careful consideration.
From the outset, the Trump application generated a great deal of interest across the region; there were strongly held and often opposing views in the north-east. At the beginning of December, quite a fevered atmosphere prevailed in the north-east, particularly following the meeting of Aberdeenshire Council's infrastructure services committee, when—perhaps understandably—feelings were running high.
At times like that, it is the responsibility of our most senior members of Government to keep a cool head. Surely we can look to the First Minister and his cabinet secretary to be circumspect in their dealings on such a matter. Surely, given the likelihood of their own involvement as the matter unfolds, we can rely on them to do nothing precipitate, to seek counsel and to consider that advice carefully. Unfortunately, we cannot rely on the Government to do that—quite the opposite. When ministers should have been cool, they were cavalier; when they should have been unbiased, they were unwise; and when they should have been prudent, they displayed poor judgment.
The committee report reveals an ungainly scramble by the First Minister to be seen as Mr Fix-it. Our First Minister jumped in at the deep end without a thought to the consequences, and what a splash he made. The new SNP Government has been hungry to make its mark, and to be seen to make changes and cut through red tape. What happened in December demonstrated the dangerous combination that inexperience and arrogance can be. Many commentators have highlighted how that disregard for the proper process put the whole project at risk. The meddling of ministers that the committee's report exposed not only jeopardised the proper assessment of the application, but might have imperilled the legal validity of the outcome.
The committee's report confirms that view at paragraph 242:
"it seems astonishing to accept that the First Minister did not perceive there might be a risk in his actions, that his actions might be open to question and that as a consequence the decision might be open to legal action."
The Royal Town Planning Institute in Scotland commented recently:
"This has been a testing time for the planning system and for those involved."
The institute continued that it had
"provided evidence to the Scottish Parliament's Communities Committee and noted the importance of the scrutiny of all planning cases being politically impartial and according to planning law and planning policy".
I have long championed the role that land use planning plays in delivering more sustainable communities, and I have always believed that we should encourage greater public involvement in the planning process. However, getting more people involved is a slow process. The first steps include building up trust and understanding of the system, and unfortunately the actions of the ministers last December could well have set that back. Our planning system must command trust and commitment and it must be seen to operate without fear or favour. The committee states in conclusion at paragraph 269 of its report:
"The Committee is concerned by Ministerial action which reinforces the view that there is preferential access for some developers and some developments over others and this clearly will undermine confidence in the balance of the planning system."
Finally, I turn to the evidence that the past chair of the Royal Town Planning Institute, Mr Alistair Stark, gave in committee:
"In one sense, we were stating the blindingly obvious to ourselves: if the system is to survive, planning decisions must be open and in the public eye. The minute that we find that decisions are taken for obscure reasons and behind closed doors, we lose the public's confidence in the system. As I said, we were simply stating the obvious".—[Official Report, Local Government and Communities Committee, 30 January 2008; c 644.]
So far, the Government has shown a demonstrable lack of regard for any kind of proper process. It has been willing to take major decisions behind a smokescreen of evasions, and without an accountable process or audit trail. I invite the First Minister to acknowledge the "blindingly obvious" and undertake to learn the lessons that are outlined in the committee report. It is crucial that the Government acknowledges the importance of acting impartially, and from here on demonstrates that impartiality beyond any doubt in all its actions on planning matters.
Whenever I or members of other parties attempted to amend the Planning etc (Scotland) Bill in the previous session to empower communities and restrain the worst behaviour of some arrogant developers, we were told that we needed not to change the bill, but to have culture change in the planning system to stop some developers misusing the special privileges that they enjoyed.
Culture change was promised, but what culture change have we seen? We have seen more centralisation, more attempts to override environmental protection measures and—to be frank—more crawling to the super-rich. When I see a First Minister—Labour or SNP—setting his sights on one of the more tacky and arrogant members of the super-rich and following that person around like a schoolboy with a crush, the only word to describe my feeling is "nausea".
As if that were not bad enough, the justification for how the process has been handled was that ministers were seeking to protect the planning system's integrity. They have achieved precisely the opposite—the planning system has been brought into not just disrepute, but further disrepute. I will give just one example of that. John Swinney cited the
"potential impact on important natural heritage resources"
as a justification for the ministerial call-in of an application that had been refused, but there would be no potential impact on natural resources without the call-in, so that explanation is not credible.
How many developers will be tempted to copy the Trump Organization's appalling tactics now that they have seen how successful they can be? Never mind respect for the local democratic process, participating in the planning system or appealing against a decision, as was the developer's right. Instead, a developer can just issue an ultimatum—give us what we want or we will walk away—safe in the knowledge that the Scottish Government will capitulate within 30 hours, because when big money talks, Scotland's Government comes running. I level that accusation at both sides in the Parliament, because when I hear one party accuse another of allowing special access to big business, all that I see is a chamber full of pots and kettles.
However, I welcome the report and its recommendations—particularly the call, which I and others have made for years, for a review of the ministerial code. It is crucial that that review leads to independent scrutiny. MSPs are held to a code. When breaches of that code are alleged, they are scrutinised by someone who is independent of Parliament and of party politics. The same arrangement should apply to the ministerial code. That would not be difficult or controversial to achieve. All parties, including the party in government, should accept that principle. If we want the planning system to regain a shred of the public confidence that we all say we would like it to have, that should be the first and most urgent task.
I will end, as I have no wish to repeat my points. The process has been appalling. The first and most urgent action that we need to take is to review the ministerial code and establish independent scrutiny, to repair some of the damage that has been done.
It is undoubted that many members' views are coloured by their opinion of the planning application and not the process, which the debate is about. I might have to plead guilty to that. Many of us have been involved as protagonists in favour or otherwise of the development.
My colleague Alex Neil said that he was very concerned about the status of committees as a consequence of the partial, rather than impartial, way in which the report has been dealt with. His point was well made.
Will Brian Adam and the other SNP apologists in the chamber accept that a bit of an issue exists when every other party criticises the Government's actions? Will he address the criticisms in the report?
That is almost certainly the issue that I am trying to raise. It has been suggested that the SNP members of the Local Government and Communities Committee have not provided an alternative narrative and that that is somehow a failing, but I am aware of no other committee that has produced an alternative narrative when a minority view has been held. In fact, I am slightly concerned about the idea that a narrative is needed—that might well be a story, which is exactly what we have. What is presented is not facts or evidence, but opinion.
First, facts have been presented upon which all members of the committee agreed. Secondly, SNP members of the committee made no attempt to explain those agreed facts. Thirdly, does the member accept that the committee made it clear that it was not making a judgment on a development? Indeed, there was probably a range of views in the committee on the development. It is entirely legitimate for a committee of the Parliament to hold ministers to account.
It is indeed legitimate and proper for committees of the Parliament to hold ministers to account, but the manner in which that is done is important. The conclusions that have been drawn represent an interpretation of events. Connotations have been put on the actions and words of ministers and officials that the evidence does not support. I do not see any requirement whatsoever for three members of the Local Government and Communities Committee to produce an alternative fiction, which is what the report represents.
We have heard that external people are concerned about the process. That is true. The great weight of external evidence on people's opinions of the process is that the inquiry has been a fishing expedition that has caught nothing and has damaged only those who went fishing.
Chasing away business was an issue. Does the member share my disappointment that, despite comments from the sidelines, the Confederation of British Industry, the Institute of Directors and the Scottish Chambers of Commerce gave no response to the committee about failings in the planning system? Does he concede that the Trump Organization had no complaint about or issue with the planning process in Aberdeenshire Council?
There is no doubt at all about the views of the organisations that Mr McNeil mentions. They believe that the committee inquiry was about petty and partial political point scoring and not about improving the planning process. The report would have been rather more credible if there had been a little more caution in the approach that was taken.
Will the member give way?
I have given way quite a lot.
The Royal Town Planning Institute in Scotland expressed considerable concern about the interpretation that committee members put on its evidence, and it disputed the material that appeared in the final report. That certainly does much to damage the credibility of the process and of members who were involved in it.
The Royal Town Planning Institute in Scotland said in evidence to the committee that it would not have been beyond the professional capabilities of its members to justify a decision to refuse an application that contravened a local plan and a structure plan. It also said that it was not possible to make an award of expenses against the council where there was reasonable justification for such a refusal by reference to local plans and structure plans. Any suggestion that its evidence was distorted is absolute nonsense. We have a clear demonstration of an organisation that has been got at after the event.
The Royal Town Planning Institute in Scotland wrote to us and expressed its concerns. That is almost unprecedented.
In light of the fact that we are tight for time, I will be brief. We should simply note the report. What is noteworthy about it is that it is not worthy of any committee of the Parliament.
It is clear that this debate has implications for how Scottish ministers should deal with major development proposals in sensitive locations in the future. If Scotland is to benefit from the controversy surrounding the application to develop a world-class golf resort on the Menie estate, the lessons that we have learned must be applied to any future reform of the land use planning system and to the actions of the current ministers with responsibility for the operation of the system.
I am a supporter of the proposed development—that is my starting point. In November last year, I lodged a parliamentary motion welcoming the support of Aberdeenshire Council's Formartine area committee for the Trump development. On 4 December, I lodged a further motion in which I took issue with the decision of Aberdeenshire Council's infrastructure services committee to reject the Trump application. It was entirely in order for me to express those views as a member of the Parliament. It would not have been appropriate for me to do so when I had ministerial responsibility for planning, and the same applies to any minister.
As a constituency member, I had no problem with the decision on 4 December to call in the application when it was announced. At the time, there appeared to be some prospect that the call-in would lead to an early decision by ministers. Sadly, any hopes of an early decision soon unravelled, for the reasons that have been properly investigated and explained in detail by the Local Government and Communities Committee in its report. In the event, it took ministers 85 days to get round to announcing that there would be a public local inquiry into the called-in application—a decision that, according to Aberdeenshire Council, could readily have been made before Christmas. It is a simple matter of fact that ministers' intervention failed to achieve a quick decision. Instead, they got into a state of indecision. It is difficult to avoid the conclusion that the process following the call-in will prove just as time consuming as an appeal by the developers would have been.
Ministers should acknowledge such issues in the context of the objectives that they say they set themselves. If they do so, they can hope to command some respect when making future decisions and avoid the impression that they are making things up as they go along. As the committee showed clearly, Alex Salmond's enthusiasm for the project caused him to act in ways that imperilled its progress. As First Minister, he would have known how important it was to avoid any actions that might give rise to controversy or concern about the integrity of the planning process, but he failed to take the necessary precautionary approach. I say that in the light of subsequent developments, which were entirely predictable given the controversy that already existed around the local authority's previous decision. Alex Salmond's personal intervention was bound to add to that controversy, which made essential the committee's thorough scrutiny of the planning process and how it operated in this case.
The right response from ministers would be for them to acknowledge positively the criticisms and recommendations that are contained in the committee's report. If ministers really want to strengthen Scotland's reputation as a good place in which to do business, they should not appear to regard parliamentary scrutiny of ministerial actions as irrelevant or partisan. They should be willing to recognise the conclusions of that scrutiny and should resolve to seek to do better next time. It is concerning that Brian Adam, who is the Government chief whip, has pursued the argument that parliamentary scrutiny of ministerial actions is in some way a waste of public money or pursued for partisan ends. That argument carries with it a logic that all parties represented in the chamber should reject out of hand.
I suggested that the weight of questions that were asked in the inquiry was a waste of money. It has taken a lot of time and money to deliver the committee's report. Does the member acknowledge that more than a whole year of planning officials' time has been taken up dealing with this matter, when it could have been spent much more usefully dealing with planning applications? The committee's time could also have been spent more usefully.
Mr Adam has confirmed that he regards the committee's scrutiny as a waste of public money and time. That is deeply to be regretted.
In the manner and content of what he said this afternoon in response to the committee's report, Stewart Stevenson provided no reassurance. It is one thing to defend or justify the actions of colleagues but quite another to disparage the legitimate concerns and conclusions of a parliamentary committee. If ministers in a parliamentary democracy have one bounden duty above all others, it is to respect the roles and responsibilities of Parliament and its committees. They should accept the committee's recommendations and respond to them positively and in detail. They should acknowledge that the consequences of their action, unintended as those may have been, have done Scotland's reputation no good, and should seek to ensure that their confusion of roles and responsibilities never again impacts on the planning system.
I call Bob Doris. You have four minutes, Mr Doris.
As a member of the Local Government and Communities Committee, I participated in the Menie estate inquiry. During the inquiry, I asked the chief executive of Aberdeenshire Council whether the council had the power, at the beginning of the planning application process, to vary the council's scheme of delegation. In other words, could the full council consider the planning application? Mr Campbell said:
"Yes. With the benefit of hindsight—which is always 20:20—we could have changed the scheme of delegation at the outset. We have now changed it so that matters of regional or national significance are reserved to the whole council."—[Official Report, Local Government and Communities Committee, 16 January 2008; c 446.]
Based on that response, I suggested that the committee might wish to consider the conclusion that Aberdeenshire Council had since changed its scheme of delegation in the light of its perceived shortcomings following the Trump application. However, not even that uncontentious suggestion was approved by the highly politicised majority of the committee. Partisanship was apparent right from the start and it badly let down our committee.
Will the member take an intervention?
No. The member had six minutes. I have only got four. Please sit down.
I and the two other SNP members of the committee made the fatal mistake of drawing conclusions that were based on facts and evidence. If only the other committee members had attempted to do likewise.
I asked the First Minister what would have happened if the Menie estate application had been approved and he had been contacted by objectors to the plan. Would he have treated the objectors in the same way as he treated the Trump Organization? Mr Salmond said, "Yes, I would." He gave details of previous meetings with objectors, and he went on to say:
"it is my job to help people on all sides of a debate"—[Official Report, Local Government and Communities Committee, 23 January 2008; c 535.]
It is clear that there was no favouritism, no preferential treatment and no wrongdoing. Every witness that was called before the committee was clear that they were dealing with Alex Salmond as the constituency MSP for Gordon and not as the First Minister. Why is that not fully reflected in the report?
Everyone who was involved in drafting the report accepts that the call-in decision was competent, that no rules were broken and that there is no evidence of wrongdoing. Other conclusions that appear in the report seem to have been drafted for future Labour and Lib Dem press releases. Those conclusions bear no relation to the evidence that was taken. [Interruption.]
I and my SNP colleagues on the committee could not accept conclusions that were not evidence based. To do so would be to do the committee a disservice. Committees should scrutinise—they should not fantasise. When I entered the Parliament last May, the good reputation and strength—
Will the member give way?
You are fantasising if you think that you are getting in.
Excuse me. Mr Doris, you are in your final minute, and I will decide when someone sits down. Ms Gillon, would you keep your voice down, please?
The inquiry was a fishing exercise, and what a bunch of anglers we have on the Opposition benches today. I say to them that the inquiry was more about politicking and point scoring. They should not drag down our Parliament's committee system with those things—that is simply not acceptable.
The length of time that the committee took is appalling. The investigation took 22 hours of committee time. That is not acceptable, given that we spent only four hours on fuel poverty and delayed our inquiry into child poverty. That use of time does not reflect the priorities for which I came into politics.
I would like us, as a committee, to move on together. We should put away the politicisation, bury the hatchet and help the people whom I and the SNP went into politics to help.
Some MSPs have been uncomfortable with this important debate, including Stewart Stevenson, Bob Doris and Brian Adam. They are so uncomfortable with what the committee's inquiry revealed that they seek to denigrate the work of MSPs on the committee and they say that the inquiry was a waste of time and money.
The committee's report makes it clear that there are major criticisms of ministers' actions in dealing with the Trump application. As we heard, there are 46 such criticisms of their role—
Not a shred of evidence.
The minister will not listen to the debate. That is the problem. He should listen.
The most important point that the committee makes in the report is that, when ministers deal with planning applications, they should not only act appropriately but be seen to act appropriately. Why is it so important that ministers are seen to act without fear or favour? Because if they do not, they risk undermining public support for a fair and open system, and there is a real danger that the planning system will be seen as having been corrupted.
We cannot have a situation in which people are granted special privileges because they are international celebrities, as is the case with Mr Trump. The committee report makes it clear that special privileges were, indeed, accorded to Mr Trump's application. Of that there is no doubt.
I would like members to imagine the scene. The First Minister is in a room at the extremely plush Marcliffe Hotel, which is not in his constituency. He takes out his mobile phone and rings Jim Mackinnon, our nation's chief planning officer. The conversation goes something like this, "Hello, Jim, it's the First Minister here. Yes, yes, I know I'm the boss, but I'm ringing you as the MSP for Gordon. The Trump team would like to have a meeting with you tomorrow for a briefing on the application process. Yes, I know they've got the best lawyers and the best advice money can buy, but they still want to meet you. No, Jim, it won't be difficult to reach them at such short notice. Hang on—George Sorial is with me now. Stay on the phone and I'll pass you over to him."
I leave it to others to judge whether the First Minister was doing his bounden duty.
Will the member tell us about the phone calls between Nicol Stephen and Tavish Scott about the Aberdeen western peripheral route?
Desperation. [Interruption.]
Order.
I can only guess that if it had been Nigel Don—God forgive me—or another MSP who represents the north-east who had rung the chief planner, they would not have received quite the same response.
The First Minister's response that, by helping out the Trump team in that way, he was only doing his bounden duty is seen for what it is—a nonsense.
I represent the First Minister's neighbouring constituency, where consideration of two planning applications for golf resorts is nearing completion; indeed, the Blairs application was successful today.
Will the member give way?
Listen to this, please.
Between them, those applications involve proposals to build two hotels, two resorts and more than 500 houses in my constituency. Why has there not been the same fuss? First, because both developers have worked with the council and have not taken the take-it-or-leave-it stance that was adopted by Mr Trump's team. Secondly, neither I, as the constituency MSP for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine, nor any of the MSPs for the North East Scotland region, have intervened citing a bounden duty to do so. [Interruption.] No such duty exists. [Interruption.] Quite the reverse—
One moment, please. There are far too many sedentary comments coming from the front bench.
Such intervention is both unwise and, as is evident from Mr Salmond's cavalier approach to planning, completely counterproductive.
Unfortunately, the Trump debacle is not the only case of inappropriate ministerial intervention in the planning process. As Andy Kerr said, five ministers, including the First Minister and Mike Russell—who is present—intervened to ensure that nothing went wrong with the Aviemore application. Incidentally, Mike Russell came to my clinic to make it absolutely clear that he had not intervened in the process, despite the fact that his press release said that he had.
Thanks to the way in which the Government has handled the issue, the perception of developers up and down the land will be clear. They will believe that it is helpful to an application to get an international celebrity on board, or to donate money to a political party. They will also feel that they will certainly be able to get special treatment from this Government. The Lewis wind farm developers might feel that that is where they went wrong and that they will not make the same mistake again.
If ministers have learned anything from this sorry experience, surely they have learned not to give special treatment to anyone. By the way, they must also learn to take heed of the Parliament. They should take heed of the recent resolution—the SNP opposed the motion, but it was carried—that the best way to investigate complaints about the actions of ministers is not to leave things to the First Minister, but for him to appoint an independent person to investigate them. The people of Scotland expect the First Minister to fulfil the wishes of the Parliament on the matter and to do it soon.
I welcome the opportunity that the debate presents to conclude this episode on the planning application at the Menie estate. I will not try to influence the opinion of SNP members. Given that it has wheeled out the Rottweilers, I suspect that the Government's intention is not to change its mind.
However, we have to take into account some comments from SNP members, in particular Bob Doris, who mentioned the actions of Aberdeenshire Council and its committees that led to this event. His attempt to muddy the waters by trying to inject controversy about the nature of the decision is not what the debate is about. Essentially, the report that we are debating is on the Government's handling of the matter.
If that is not what we are here to debate, why is it mentioned in the report's conclusions—not just our version of it?
Not in your version of it?
As an individual, I was one of the people who was very supportive of the application. I avoided—quite deliberately—accepting any invitation from the applicants in order that I could take the opportunity, wherever possible, to support the investment in principle. I did that because I believe that it is of significant regional importance. Once the Aberdeenshire Council committee had made its decision, I welcomed the First Minister's decision to move forward as he did. However, evidence was brought before me that caused me to review that position.
I welcome the Local Government and Communities Committee report, which has opened up in detail the facts that surrounded the actions that the First Minister, and ministers who operate under him, took. Their actions have done more to put at risk this potential investment than they have done to bring it closer to fruition. Furthermore, instead of giving the impression that Scotland is open for business, their actions have given the impression that Scotland is a dark, third-world economy where who someone knows is more important than what they know. It is therefore my pleasure to welcome the report.
Looking at the facts, it is particularly alarming that the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Sustainable Growth, having decided to call in the Trump application after two short phone calls with the chief planner, obtained no further legal advice or advice from officials before making the call-in decision, which he took within five days of the application being refused by Aberdeenshire Council. On the other hand, the decision to call a public inquiry has taken 85 days, and the inquiry will not commence until 10 June, which is 210 days from the date of the original decision. That makes a mockery of the sense of urgency that the First Minister appeared to show at the outset.
The unprecedented nature of the call-in, following Aberdeenshire Council's refusal of the application, suggests strongly that ministers' motivation was that they simply did not like the council's decision. They were prepared to compromise the planning system by calling in the application on a legal technicality instead of insisting that the applicant proceed by way of an appeal. As the committee stated, if the development was of "national importance", surely that was the case before the council took its decision. The application should have been called in earlier.
The Government's actions run contrary to the terms of the Planning etc (Scotland) Act 2006, which are that the planning system must be development-led. The act sets out the clear procedures that are to be followed to ensure that all parties—developers and communities—have their cases heard.
Is the member aware that, in the advice from planning officials to the cabinet secretary, the position was made explicit. The advice sets out:
"We had previously expected that the council would resolve to grant consent, thereby triggering notification".
Clearly, John Swinney's response was to the fact that the application had been refused. That is shown in the advice that he received.
I thank Johann Lamont for pointing that out.
The Conservative members support the committee's conclusion that,
"far from taking a precautionary approach, the First Minister was cavalier in his actions and displayed, at best, exceptionally poor judgement and a worrying lack of awareness"
about the potential consequences of his actions. Furthermore, we support the committee's recommendation that the review of the ministerial code that the First Minister is carrying out should examine the
"appropriateness of Ministerial contact with senior officials in the context of planning applications".
We in Scotland value the fact that our planning system is quasi-judicial and free of political interference. As politicians, we rightly express opinions outside the decision-making process so that policy can be informed and developed over time. The actions of the Executive and, in particular, the First Minister have thrown that previous definition out of context and into question.
At the start of the debate, Duncan McNeil set out calmly and succinctly why the committee became involved in the issue and he then took us through the recommendations extremely effectively. I was deeply disappointed by the minister's aggressive stance, which was unusual for a minister in speaking in a committee debate. It is not up to ministers to decide whether a committee has set itself the right agenda or to dispute whether it can legitimately engage in ministers' activities. That is parliamentary accountability. Anyone who has been a minister will have had tough questions put to them—it goes with the job.
We must deal with the hard facts. The committee members signed up to the evidence that was before them, although they disputed the conclusions that could be drawn. I would have liked the minister to engage seriously with the committee's conclusions, but he did not and does not seem to have taken on board any of the committee's points. That is an outstanding issue. I would like Mike Russell to confirm in his summing-up speech that the response to the report that John Swinney wrote on 27 March is the Scottish Government's full response to the committee. It is patronising and it fails to give the committee credit for understanding the planning system. We expected a more detailed and considered response to such a lengthy inquiry report from a committee. Such reports should not be disregarded just because they are inconvenient to ministers.
The core issue is about the perceptions of how ministers acted—Patricia Ferguson made that point extremely effectively and other members made it time and again. That is a tough test, but there are major issues at stake, including the fundamental integrity of our planning system and Parliament's ability to scrutinise ministers' work. It is vital that, in any planning decision, all parties can be confident that due process has been observed. They may not like the outcome—anyone who has been a minister or been involved in a planning decision will know that unanimity is never reached on the outcome of a planning decision, but people must know that their views were listened to and considered and that the system is fair.
When planning decisions and issues come to ministers' desks, they will by definition never be easy, which is why we must ensure that the process is robust and taken seriously. Local councillors and the Scottish ministers must be politically accountable, because the decisions that are taken affect our communities. The entire planning system is based on the principle that the outcomes, mediated by development plans and guided by national planning guidance, must be in the public interest. The crucial point is that the planning system works on the basis of trust that evidence that members of the public and developers give is considered properly against the policy framework. People must have confidence in the system.
Does Sarah Boyack agree that one consequence that has not received much attention is that we now have a system in which a councillor can be sacked for reaching what others regard as the wrong conclusion? Does she agree that that situation endorses her comments on local decision making?
I agree that there have been a number of unfortunate consequences. Local councillors should have the right to take decisions. If their constituents do not like those decisions, they know precisely what to do with those representatives. The key thing is that decisions should not be taken on party-political grounds. It is entirely appropriate for ministers to take political decisions once they have considered all the evidence from their officials—there is a lengthy process for that in the Scottish Government. It is important that the recommendations of officials are considered. Ministers do not have to agree with them, but they must consider them and be responsible and accountable for their decisions. All parties have to know that the evidence has been properly considered and that the process is robust.
I found Mary Scanlon's analysis and insight into the Aviemore planning application process fascinating and disturbing in equal measure. We would all agree that there are issues about the speed of the process, and that there is always scope for improving the performance of local authorities and statutory consultees—and indeed the Scottish Government. However, the rules and process exist and people have to know that the rules are being abided by at every stage of the process.
Ministers cannot cut corners. The checks and balances exist to protect the process. The ministerial code exists not just to protect the integrity of the planning process but to protect ministers from universal criticism such as they are experiencing today. If they ignore the ministerial code, they do so at their peril. I do not believe that ministers deliberately set out to undermine the planning system, but I urge them to reflect on the unanimity of criticism in the chamber. When Patrick Harvie is on board in respect of a criticism, it is not a unionist plot. I ask ministers to take the criticisms and consider them in more depth.
Alex Salmond's plea that he was acting as a local member and not the First Minister would have had more credibility if he had done what the ministerial code suggests and not got a special adviser involved to fix up his meetings. The code is clear: it is subjective—that is the point of it. If there is any interpretation that the Government has failed the code, it is that it has failed it in planning terms. I am not expecting Mike Russell to eat humble pie—the mood from the SNP will not let us go there—but I ask ministers to reflect on the criticisms and ensure that their future decisions cannot be challenged by members and by thousands of people throughout Scotland. That is the core issue today.
I reiterate something that Stewart Stevenson said at the beginning of his speech. He said:
"we were clear all along that ministers and officials had at all times acted properly, objectively and in full accordance with planning legislation, the Scottish ministerial code and all other requirements."
That was our view at the start of the process, it was our view during the process, and it is our view now. Not a single thing we have heard this afternoon contradicts that view.
I will come to scrutiny in a moment, because I welcome scrutiny. Alas, however, the committee inquiry was not scrutiny. The problem that we have been faced with this afternoon has been the fatal intermingling of opinion and fact. It has not been an edifying debate. As I will say later, it is a debate that will have damaged Parliament, just as the report damages Parliament. Why? It is because of the way in which facts—there is virtually no disagreement about facts—became opinion, which became innuendo. Johann Lamont made that admission during the debate. She started in her inimitable way by saying that she accepted that the First Minister would not go to pokey because of the report and went on to admit that the report is about opinion. Essentially, the report is about style rather than substance; it is subjective, not objective. That is where we have the problem.
Will the minister take an intervention?
No, I want to make progress, because there are facts that need to be dealt with.
Paragraph 149 says that
"it has taken 85 days for Scottish Ministers to come to a different conclusion."
That is innuendo. Here are the facts that lie behind it. First, Aberdeenshire Council had been dealing with the application for a considerable time and was well aware of the issues that it raised. The comparison was between Government decision making and Aberdeenshire Council decision making. Secondly, the council needed only to consider and request its own preferred method for dealing with the application. Thirdly, the Government needed to become familiar with all relevant issues. Fourthly, the Government needed to ensure that the process would be legally competent. Finally—if those four facts are not strong enough—no one should underestimate the impact that the committee's inquiry, the 175 parliamentary questions and the 130 freedom of information requests had on the amount of time that was available.
In a television interview with me on the BBC, Mr Russell said that the Government got involved in the Aviemore case only as a result of cross-party intervention by Mary Scanlon and other members. However, the responses to parliamentary questions tell us that the Government was involved in the case six months earlier than that.
I will come to Aviemore shortly—although of course I reject what Mr Kerr has said. I am surprised that he wants to revisit the matter, following the comprehensive rebuttal that he got in that interview. I will be happy to rerun it for anybody who wants to see it.
Let me deal now with an issue that Mr Rumbles raised—again, it is the difference between fact and opinion. The inference that Mr Rumbles made was that no MSP is able to consult the chief planner, but this very day, Jackie Baillie met the chief planner to discuss a planning issue in her constituency. There is an issue for members to consider—it is about fact versus opinion.
Patricia Ferguson said, obviously referring to paragraph 238, that there is some strangeness in the fact that the First Minister had consulted the chief planner, rather than the permanent secretary. The issue is presented in the report as if there is something odd about that. Who else would the First Minister consult? The chief planner has the clearest understanding of the operation of the planning system and, through years of experience, he can advise on the operation of the ministerial code in the context of planning applications. That point is one of innuendo and opinion, not fact. That is where the problem lies.
Will the minister take an intervention?
No, I will not.
Scrutiny is not damaging: scrutiny is to be welcomed. However, when scrutiny becomes prejudice and is no longer about fact, but is merely about opinion, it damages Parliament. Alas, that is what we have seen today.
The debate is about something very simple: it is the outward and visible sign of the inward and disabling chaos in Labour. I am sorry that the Tories and the Liberals have been sucked into it, but the reality is that Labour is in a dreadful state, and the committee's report is an attack on the people of Scotland's decision to reject the Labour Party. [Interruption.]
Order.
The leader of the Labour Party, in one of her many launches—she has been launched more often than most Scottish lifeboats, and there is a connection there too—claimed that she often considered what she called "a Buddhist mantra" when considering what to say. She quoted a short version of the actual quotation, which is:
"Before you speak, think—Is it necessary? Is it true? Is it kind? Will it hurt anyone? Will it improve on the silence?"
Presiding Officer, as you probably know, that is not a Buddhist mantra; it is a saying of Sri Sathya Sai Baba, who is the guru of the Hard Rock Cafe. Putting that aside, I ask these questions in conclusion. Was the inquiry kind? No, it was not. I do not just mean to the First Minister; we know that Labour members do not like the First Minister, because he is successful. The inquiry was unkind, to developers—[Interruption.]
Order.
The First Minister is among my closest friends, because he has led my party and this country—
Will the minister take an intervention?
Ms Gillon, resume your seat.
The First Minister has led my party and this country to unprecedented success.
Is the report kind? No, and it is unkind not just to the First Minister or to me; it is unkind to officials, developers, planners and civil servants, and it is unkind to Parliament and the country.
Is the report true? No it is not. Those who signed the report fatally confused opinion and fact.
Is it necessary? We welcome the opportunity for scrutiny, but that scrutiny was a fishing expedition, which became ultra vires when it looked at the Aviemore planning application.
Finally, on the Wendy test, will it hurt anyone? It has already hurt somebody. It has hurt the reputation of Scotland. If this process—this triumph of the partisan over the parliamentary—goes on and is carried to its ultimate end, it will damage jobs and families in Scotland. It is damaging the Parliament of Scotland. The silence has not been improved on.
I recommend another conclusion to the Labour Party. Sri Sathya Sai Baba had another thought. He said that discipline trains us to put up with disappointment. This report is about the disappointment of the Labour Party. It is a travesty. Scotland should now move on.
Sarah Boyack said in her winding-up speech that, fundamentally, the inquiry is about the integrity of the planning system in Scotland. It is about the balance that is to be struck by Government ministers between, on one hand, promoting and encouraging economic development and inward investment in our country and, on the other hand, considering how to deal with the consequential planning applications.
No one disputes the fact that the First Minister or any minister of any Scottish Government of any political complexion have key roles and responsibilities in relation to economic development. Of course major investors have to be encouraged, informed and even assisted to make their proposals reality. However, there comes a point at which a line is crossed. That point is when a site for development is identified and the proposal enters the planning process as an application for consideration by the council or, in some instances, the Government. At that stage, the politicians who are involved in consideration of it, be they local councillors or ministers, must be not only above reproach but seen to be above reproach, because the planning system is a quasi-judicial process.
Applications have to be considered by reference to local plans and national guidelines. Judgments have to be made by reference to a complex mix of factors, which are often difficult to reconcile but are grounded in a process that allows everyone to have their say, make their points and feel that their views will be considered properly. We stray from those principles at our peril.
The question that has to be asked in relation to the Trump application is whether, on balance, the decisions by Government ministers compromised the integrity of the system by giving the impression that the Government's overwhelming desire was to facilitate approval, as opposed to consideration, of the application.
Public reaction to the call-in shows that it was popular. However, the reason for the high approval ratings was that it was perceived that the Government had stepped in to save the project and ensure that the Trump Organization would not up sticks and take its money elsewhere. In other words, public approval was based on the public's assumption and perception that the development was now a shoo-in and would now be approved by the Government, and that the bold Alex had stepped in and saved the day. The creation of that perception might make for good politics, but it makes for a poor planning process.
If people think beyond the merits and demerits of the Trump application and look at the wider context, they will be very concerned. The situation should be as much of a concern to the business community, which sometimes takes a rather gung-ho approach to planning, as it is to residents of a community who might well have an unwelcome development landed on their doorstep without their objections being given fair consideration.
I single out the business community, because, as we have seen in other cases, there are often competing development proposals in an area. Such competition needs to be encouraged, but it will not be encouraged if the impression is given that a particular developer finds special favour and is given special treatment or special access.
Let us examine the actions of Government ministers in this context, based on the evidence. The first question in relation to the First Minister is the propriety of his privately meeting representatives of the Trump Organization. We know that Mr Salmond is the constituency member and that he met the Trump representatives in that capacity, despite arriving with all the trappings of ministerial office. However, if we are considering perception, was it really in order for the constituency MSP, who happened to be the First Minister, to meet only the applicant at that time? Mr Salmond was not a councillor, he allegedly had no role in the planning process and, by his own admission in evidence to the committee, he was no expert on Scottish planning. Why was he involving himself in the process at such a sensitive time and acting as a facilitator on behalf of the applicant? I will put the question in another way. Let us imagine that the good people of Gordon did not elect Alex Salmond as their constituency MSP last May. Does any member seriously think that the Trump Organization would have rushed to meet Nora Radcliffe?
Let us consider John Swinney's actions. The decision to call in the application at such a stage was unprecedented in the annals of Scottish planning history, but Mr Swinney took that decision on the advice of the chief planner, not after due and careful consideration of the implications, but on the strength of two five-minute telephone conversations, as we heard in evidence. We were asked to believe that the decision had to be made in that timescale, because there was a serious risk that a decision letter would be signed and the option would be closed off. The pen was poised, the clock was ticking—it was a race against time. What nonsense. On being pressed, the chief planner admitted that the decision could have waited at least another 24 hours, and the chief executive of Aberdeenshire Council said in evidence that it could have taken up to a fortnight to issue the decision letter.
What was the rush? The rush was, of course, created by the Trump Organization, which, in pursuit of its legitimate interests as a developer, had mounted an expert public relations campaign in which it had threatened to pull out of Scotland unless matters were resolved to its satisfaction within 30 days. To put it simply, Mr Swinney and the SNP Government were conned. The Trump Organization was bluffing in a high-stakes game of poker, to get the cabinet secretary to call in the application so that it would not have to appeal against refusal of the application. Instead of calling the Trump Organization's bluff, the cabinet secretary folded his cards. That was a good result for the Trump Organization but a bad result for the Scottish planning system.
The official reason for the call-in was that the application raised issues of national importance. As members pointed out, if the application raised issues of national importance after the council's infrastructure services committee's decision, it certainly raised them beforehand, so why was it not called in earlier? There has been a series of spurious ex post facto justifications and rationalisations for the decision, none of which held up before scrutiny in the committee's inquiries. If members doubt what I say, they should read the facts, examine the evidence and judge for themselves whether the committee's conclusions are fair and valid.
In any inquiry, evidence must be assessed, conclusions drawn and recommendations made. In the case that we are debating, we are asked by the Scottish Government to believe that the actions and interventions of the First Minister, in whatever capacity, had no bearing on the outcome. We are asked to believe that it is reasonable for a planning minister to take a wholly unprecedented decision on the basis of a couple of telephone calls. We are asked to believe that a call-in was justified because it raised issues of national importance after 29 November, although apparently it did not do so before 29 November. We are asked to believe that the Trump Organization's statements that they would not appeal the infrastructure services committee's decision but would withdraw from investing in Scotland unless matters were sorted to their satisfaction had no bearing on the decision to call in the application, because all had been carefully decided by Mr Mackinnon a few days earlier, over the weekend.
Whenever we Scots are presented with a series of spurious justifications and explanations, which stretch the bounds of credulity to breaking point, we make a terse and succinct response: "Aye, right." That, in a nutshell, is the committee's conclusion on the Government's conduct.