Confidence in transparency is generally not helped by a lack of confidence in someone obeying the rule of law. It is nearly a year since the Supreme Court judgment on 16 April 2025 in For Women Scotland Ltd v the Scottish ministers. Whether it is raised in the debating chamber or a committee, the official Scottish Government line—I am paraphrasing—is “We are working hard to obey the law”, which is another way of saying “We are still currently breaking it”. That strikes me as somewhat Trumpian. It was only yesterday that LGBT Youth Scotland—which is, of course, funded by the Scottish Government—put out guidance contrary to the Supreme Court ruling in that it did not comply with the School Premises (General Requirements and Standards) (Scotland) Regulations 1967 or the Equality Act 2010. What on earth is going on? Why can the Scottish Government not obey the law?

What assessment are you making in relation to further court cases coming forward? Obviously, we have a court case in train at the moment in relation to men in women’s prisons, but, as I understand it, other court cases are being developed. There was a section 35 order in relation to gender recognition, and the costs for that are about £1.2 million, plus there is the Sandie Peggie case, which has cost about £400,000 so far. Other court cases will come forward while this issue is not addressed. Are you making an assessment of the potential costs, given the critical public finance constraints?

Okay. Thank you.

My last wee question is about an issue that I have brought up previously. There are quite limiting rules for SNIB in relation to its ability to recycle financial returns from successful investments into new deals. The Economy and Fair Work Committee has already written to the Treasury on that and got a perfunctory response, so we have had to write back. SNIB is another example of where we could try to find ways to stop inhibiting the ability to generate growth in the economy. That matter is not even in your portfolio, but I wonder whether you could comment on it.

Yes—you have changed some of the Scottish Government rules.

Thanks.

I can see that the global situation will be on the risk register, but I am talking about the plans themselves. I am sympathetic to the point about what the Government can and cannot put in the SSR, because the only thing that we can be certain about is that it will be wrong—that is just the way it is. However, the impacts might quickly flow in for some near-side projects. As well as putting the global situation on your risk register, are you considering the potential impact on plans that are in train and, critically, on budgets?

I completely agree, because if what is needed in the face of such uncertainty is growth, the fiscal framework—or, more specifically, its limitations, particularly the lack of borrowing powers for capital, which is quite fundamental—restricts the Scottish Government’s ability to encourage growth.

I want to ask about a few other things that sort of fold into that. The first is flexibility in funding. Two weeks ago, in our evidence session with Police Scotland, we were told that when the forces merged to establish Police Scotland, the organisation lost its power to borrow and to hold reserves. The witness mentioned that Police Scotland was discussing the issue with you. Those aspects were described as

“incredibly important tools for us”.—[Official Report, Finance and Public Administration Committee, 24 February 2026; c 26.]

Following on from that—although it did not come up in that evidence session—is the issue of flexibility for colleges. The sector believes that it is being restricted in its use of, for example, the college transformation framework funding to focus on encouraging growth.

It would be useful to get a quick update on both those issues.

I hope that you are successful in achieving the mooted £1.5 billion saving, because it certainly shows the audacity to pursue change that I want to see. However, I notice that you have not mentioned anything more about risk appetite or cognitive diversity in your senior leadership team. One of the civil service’s greatest strengths has been its attitude to risk, but it could also be one of its greatest weaknesses, given some of the challenges that are coming out of left field—you have mentioned some of them already—such as climate change and artificial intelligence. Are you consciously considering those issues as part of any culture change that will enable delivery?

I will carry on because I want to cover a couple of themes, the next of which is transparency. You are accountable for ensuring transparency in the civil service, as well as for acting personally and making decisions transparently. You will be aware of increasing concerns about transparency. Yesterday, The Scotsman’s Catriona Stewart wrote an article that noted that the UK Government had answered an FOI request in full but that the Scottish Government had redacted an identical request entirely, bar the words “Dear Andrew”. I understand the difference between the various legislative regimes and acts, but do you understand that the optics are poor?

My substantive point is about the Scottish Information Commissioner. You will have seen his letter, in which he made three points: more information was redacted than he expected in the delayed 281/2025 release; he has not yet received a response to his letter of 2 February, which was 36 days ago; and the disjointed and “chaotic nature” of Scottish Government responses is troubling and merits further investigations in order to ascertain whether he needs to open a “third intervention”, which would this time be at the Scottish Government’s expense. What on earth is going on?