St Andrew's Day Bank Holiday (Scotland) Bill (External Research)
I welcome Dennis Canavan. As always, please participate fully in the discussion, Dennis.
Thank you.
This is the follow-up to the committee's decision to commission some external research on the costs and benefits of a bank holiday. There are issues around the definitions of costs and benefits and bank holidays, but that is really for the consultants to decide.
As the committee agreed, we consulted the Executive officials who are handling the bill. They are in general agreement with the terms of reference. I have also spoken to Tom McCabe, the Minister for Finance and Public Service Reform, to ensure that he is happy with the way in which we are progressing. That was an informal discussion but he indicated that he was. His officials have obviously briefed him.
Given the sensitivity of this, it is important that we move forward on this piece of work with agreement between the committee and the Executive. That will be beneficial for future discussions and decisions on the bill.
We are suggesting—as is normal practice with external research—that once we have agreed the terms of reference, the project will be monitored by a steering committee of officials, so that politicians will be taken out of the management of the exercise. We suggest that at least one official from the Executive be involved in the steering group, and the Executive is happy—in fact, I would say keen—for that to happen. I suggest also that, given the fact that this is a member's bill, it would be useful to have someone from the non-Executive bills unit on the steering group. NEBU is responsible for drawing up or making any changes to the bill, the policy memorandum, and so on.
If Dennis Canavan would like to nominate somebody from his office to be on the steering committee, that would also be reasonable. We are trying to ensure that all parties—the Executive, the committee and the bill's promoter—move along together in this exercise.
We need to look at the social benefits and costs as well as the economic benefits and costs. Clearly, this is a social as well as an economic matter. That should be addressed, if the committee agrees.
With those comments, I open the discussion of the paper that has been circulated.
Thank you for inviting me to address the committee, convener. I am grateful for the time that you and the committee are giving to this matter. I agree generally with the points that are made in the paper that has been circulated. Your comments suggest improvements to the paper in two main areas. First, you would seek to ensure that the research covered the social as well as the economic impacts of the bill; secondly, you suggest that the steering group membership be broadened slightly to give it a bit more balance.
The second sentence in paragraph 6 of the paper refers to an official of the Scottish Executive being on the steering group, but the next sentence talks about Executive "officials"—in the plural. I have no objection to the Executive being represented on the steering group—there might be advantages to that—but, bearing in mind the fact that the group will be discussing a member's bill, it would help to give the group a bit of balance if a representative from NEBU were included. I also suggest that Maureen Conner, my researcher, be on the steering group. She has probably done more research into this subject than anyone else in the Parliament and she would have a lot to contribute.
I have two other suggestions. First, the paper talks about comparisons with two or three other countries. I hope that that will not be two or three in the literal sense. I suggest four countries for comparison—the United States, Ireland, Australia and France—all of which have at least one national day and some of which have more than one. All of them are comparable in some way with Scotland.
Secondly, I have today e-mailed the committee a copy of a letter about my bill from Mr Martin Bell. I ask members of the committee to consider Mr Bell's letter. He is not Mr Bell the former MP; he is a different Mr Bell. His letter is a good read and would be informative for all members of the committee.
I am sure that we can circulate that letter to committee members. I do not know what is in it.
I want to take us back a step. The research is based on the presumption that we are able to get Scotland to have a holiday on a given day; it does not address how we would ensure that businesses and schools would take a holiday. I would welcome your comments on that, convener.
The major themes of much of our discussion have been whether any legislation could translate into practical effect, given its limitations in bringing any of the options into play, and whether there are other ways in which the Parliament and/or the Executive could catalyse or facilitate discussions about further moves towards organisations observing St Andrew's day as a holiday. Those issues are outwith the scope of the research. Somebody who reads the options in the committee paper in isolation could be forgiven for thinking that it is within the gift of the Parliament to make each of those options happen—unless we expose the fact that that is not the case.
Perhaps we should add clarification for the purposes of the consultants. One of the things to establish is whether, if St Andrew's day was designated a bank holiday, companies and individuals would take a holiday. On existing bank holidays, a lot of people do not take a holiday. I would have thought that that is one of the first things the consultants would have to determine. In my view, we also need consultants who have international offices and who can look at what happens elsewhere. The Irish, for example, generally take St Patrick's day as a holiday; other countries have a national day that is not a designated holiday, which is along the lines of what we have at present. The consultants would need to consider both approaches.
Possibly. Susan Deacon and I have not discussed the matter, but we take broadly the same view. If we are to have the research done, it should consider the practical implementation issues. We should build that into the brief.
Shall we agree to build that into the brief? We want to work with the Executive and with Dennis Canavan to take things forward on the basis of consensus, and that seems a reasonable point to make.
I am happy for the research to consider the economic and social benefits that may come from such a holiday or from the different scenarios that are outlined in the committee paper, but I would like to clarify that "social benefits" will include cultural benefits, which are an important aspect that should not be left out. I would like the research to consider the social and cultural benefits that could be gained from such a holiday.
I would have stuck the cultural benefits in with the economic benefits, but there you go. Let us get them in.
The more detail we include in the brief, the less scope there is for people coming back and saying that we did not look at this or that. Those suggestions from Susan Deacon and Michael Matheson seem fair and reasonable to me. Are they agreed, along with all the other points members have made?
Members indicated agreement.