Chamber and committees

I have chosen my words carefully. I have confidence in the leadership of Historic Environment Scotland under the chairmanship of Sir Mark Jones. I have already taken the earliest opportunities to strengthen the board by making sure that it has board members who have experience that the previous board members did not.

It is in the nature of these things that all such organisations have a rotation of board members and senior leadership teams. I imagine that everybody wants to make sure that Historic Environment Scotland, under new leadership, has the appropriate people in place. I will be advised by Sir Mark Jones on that point. I have not been presented with any suggestions about the board that he leads. I will leave it for Sir Mark Jones to speak for himself and for how the board is now operating.

Mr Bibby has identified how changed the circumstances were after the shortest possible period of time under the new leadership of a new chairman of the board. I credit that change to Sir Mark, and it is the reason why I have such a high degree of confidence in him.

No, it is about a more profoundly important point, which is that investigations are under way. The committee knows that. I will not prejudge any investigation or any conclusions that it may reach.

My words have been chosen very carefully. I await the report from David Martin, as I am sure do Mr Bibby and the committee. That will help me to reflect on the question that Mr Bibby has asked more generally about where Historic Environment Scotland and its leadership are today compared with where they were last year.

I say again that I will not generalise about every board member, every member of the senior leadership team or the chief executive. Given that we are dealing with an independent organisation that operates under statute at arm’s length from the Scottish Government, it is important that the organisation should be able to get on with what it is supposed to be getting on with and that any lessons that emerge from the investigations should be acted on.

It is not inappropriate for me to meet the chairman of the board, who I have met twice; nor is it inappropriate for me to meet the chief executive, who I met in one social setting but not in a formal context. I will be advised by Sir Mark on that point. I have said to him that, if he wishes for me to meet the board and feels that that would be appropriate, I will consider doing so.

Nothing has been raised with me that I should specifically act on beyond ensuring that the Scottish Government’s sponsorship team is in contact with Historic Environment Scotland. Mr Hogg has a range of examples in which the team has intervened.

Given the nature of the investigations and complaints at a senior level in Historic Environment Scotland, my locus for intervention has been to ensure that I have acted to deal with questions that have been raised about the leadership. Mr Hogg may want to share with the committee a number of ways in which the Scottish Government has shown an interest in and concern about financial management issues at Historic Environment Scotland.

He has two days a week, I believe.

That has to be seen in the context of ensuring that there are new board members with specific skill sets who can work with and help him—in particular, that there is a new chief operating officer, who is able to pick things up.

I have said to Sir Mark in the conversations that I have had with him that, if he has any requirement—personally or more generally—for any strengthening of the change that he is currently having to make at Historic Environment Scotland, he will be supported by the Scottish Government.

Shona Riach would have been my senior official at that stage.

I am sorry, but speaking for myself, given that that was the question, I recall that, when the process around a new chief executive officer was under discussion, part of the conversation was that it would be a good thing for there to be a new chief executive officer who would be able to deal with reform questions in Historic Environment Scotland and that there was a requirement for reform. That, as a matter of record, was part of the consideration, when the process with regard to the chief executive was under way.

I agree with the Auditor General about the complexity and sensitivity of the situation.

We are dealing, on the one hand, with an organisation that was created in statute by Parliament. I was reminded that a number of committee members, including you, convener, and Neil Bibby, were on the committee that considered the bill that created Historic Environment Scotland. George Adam was, too—my apologies, Mr Adam. Therefore, there will be good institutional memory in this committee about the fact that Historic Environment Scotland was created as a body independent of operational control from the Government.

That arrangement is fine if serious problems do not emerge in the arm’s-length body. We are dealing with this matter here not just because of the Auditor General’s report, but because there has been significant whistleblowing and media coverage of a whole range of issues within Historic Environment Scotland that have led to a particularly complex situation.

That has led to me making decisions where I have a direct locus in relation to leadership. There is now a new chairman of the board, a new chief operating officer and new board members, and an investigation carried out through an external investigator, David Martin, has begun.

On the point about an accountable officer, it is important to be aware that, at the heart of the timeline, the chief executive officer—who is the accountable officer—of Historic Environment Scotland was prevented from returning to work by the HES board. That is important in terms of the hierarchy of priorities for understanding what happened during this particularly vexed period.

The legal position in all of this is also very important to bear in mind—quite apart from the ability to have a 360° view or 10/10 vision in hindsight—when it comes to whether people are off work, how long they are off work for, whether they are suspended and how long all of that takes.

Understanding the legal underpinning of the accountable officer role is also very important. The legislation requires that the accountable officer be a member of HES staff. That is point 1. Therefore, the first option in dealing with this issue of an accountable officer who is not in the office is to try and enable them to return to work when they are ready to do so. Between June and September last year, the chief executive officer and accountable officer made clear to the Scottish Government and to the board that she wished to return to work but she and the board informed the Scottish Government that the board was preventing her from returning to post and that that was the situation for the majority of the five and a half months of her absence.

From June onwards, the board’s position was that if the chief executive officer and AO did not accept an extended period of leave, it would suspend her. That suspension finally happened on Friday 5 September. If people have looked closely at the timeline, they will have noticed that that is the last day in office of the former chairman of the board.

Given the impact of losing the services of the chief executive officer and AO, Scottish Government officials repeatedly asked for clarification from the HES board about the legal basis and reasons underpinning its decision that she should not return to work.

Members of this committee will be aware that the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service, the United Kingdom’s independent public body providing authoritative guidance on fair workplace practice, makes clear that suspension should be used only as a last resort.

When it became clear in June of 2025 that, because of the board’s continued stance and despite the chief executive officer’s wish to return to work, a period of extended absence was possible, the Scottish Government considered other options. I am happy to go into that, because the Scottish Government did pursue options for a replacement of the accountable officer.

I was not in office throughout that period, so I am not in a position to have enough information to hand about that. I am conscious of there being a number of issues being reported back to me—in particular, throughout last year. Some of the issues were reported through the Scottish Government sponsorship team or shared by whistleblowers and so on, and they often related to issues that go back to before last year. When all of this started is, no doubt, an issue that David Martin will be looking at as part of his review.