Judiciary and Courts (Scotland) Bill: Financial Memorandum
The second item on our agenda is consideration of the written evidence that we have received on the financial memorandum to the Judiciary and Courts (Scotland) Bill. As members know, we decided to adopt level 1 scrutiny, which involves seeking written evidence with the intention of forwarding it to the lead committee.
I have some concerns. There are comments in the submissions about unquantified costs, about the fact that there has not even been a "detailed discussion" yet, and about the figures being "as accurate as possible" and that they could be
"in the low tens or hundreds of thousands of pounds at most".
It concerns me that it is stated on page 3 that
"the figures contained in the Memorandum are indicative at this stage and will require to be further developed and refined … to ensure that they take full account of the identifiable additional cost heads".
The submission includes quite a list.
Similarly, paragraph 3 on page 4 states:
"The consultation did not include any details of financial projections."
There are other such comments. It strikes me that there has been a loose approach to financing the bill. I am quite concerned about that.
I wonder whether the committee should seek further evidence, for example by writing to the bill team or calling for oral evidence. I am concerned about the accuracy of the figures, because the memorandum seems to be hedging bets and there is a great deal of dubiety. I would like a much tighter financial memorandum. I am open to suggestions from committee members.
I suggest that we ask the officials to revisit it: this is not an acceptable standard for a financial memorandum. To paraphrase the words of the old song, we will send them home to think again, and give them another opportunity to submit written evidence. If we are not satisfied with that, we will call them before the committee.
Or we can ask them to explain why they cannot submit more evidence. We will write to the bill team—is that acceptable to committee members?
Members indicated agreement.