Chamber and committees

We would be happy to do that. Earlier this week, I had a useful and fruitful conversation with my counterpart in the UK Government, Alex Norris. There is a lot that we agree on. I take this opportunity to make it clear that we still have no intention of creating a requirement for people to show ID to cast their vote, and I pressed that point with Mr Norris, as I do not think that that should be a requirement in UK elections, either. We do not have responsibility for legislating for that, but I made it clear that I see no necessity for that requirement. That is the Scottish Government’s perspective, and I hope that the UK Government will act accordingly. However, when we can work together on these things, I am absolutely committed to doing so.

I am open to persuasion on that. Again, it is for the committee to consider from whom it wants to take evidence. It might be useful to hear the perspective of returning officers on the matter. As you have accepted, the bottom line, which we must press, is that there is no desire to reduce the quality of support that is available. On the contrary, we want to enhance it. However, if in the process of conversation with all stakeholders it is felt that that could offer a degree of reassurance, I am open to hearing that.

One of the things that we were asked to do, which we will be doing, is to bring forward an amendment to make it clear that pilots can focus on registration issues. I know that there is interest in that area. I have spoken to the Electoral Reform Society about that. It is keen on there being a pilot, although it would not necessarily have to be the Government that ran it. I am wide open to considering that. I do not know whether such evidence has been given directly to the committee, but some electoral registration officers have expressed concerns about the quality of the data, depending on the source that it is drawn down from, such as whether it is still current and up to date.

There are issues around registration that might lend themselves to being looked at in a pilot. As a Government, we have not said that there definitely should be a pilot on automatic registration, but we want to make it clear that that is something that could be piloted.

That is a reasonable point. I suppose that there is a certain tension—or a balance to be struck—between saying, “Well, we want to see if this works, so we have to pilot it in a certain area” and the fact that we would be adding a feature or a facet to electoral registration in only one or more areas, not across the entire country. That would have to be considered as part of any pilot.

That is largely with the members—it starts with them. I am happy to hear what people think. I am torn between two options—actually, I am not torn because, instinctively, I quite like the overnight count. I do not know what others round the table think, but I am willing to bet that they also like the overnight count. However, we have heard that there might be practical considerations in that regard, and we have to take those seriously and consider them. That also needs to be balanced against the practical experience that, as far as I can see, there have not been significant difficulties with overnight counts thus far. The perspective is being articulated that it might be more appropriate to do the rest of the count the next day, so we have to consider that, but I need to be persuaded of its merits. I am keen to hear what other members think.

At this stage, no, convener, but I am very grateful for the opportunity to speak with you about the matter. As much as I am giving my perspective, I am genuinely interested in other people’s perspectives as well.

That is the point that I was trying to make in response to Mr Kerr, although I was clear that I could not do it in a month. I do not think that that would be a reasonable timescale in which to do the issue justice. However, what Ms Gosal raises is a perfectly legitimate thing for us to consider, and I am absolutely committed to doing so.

I take the point and will come on to it. However, in the first instance, it is important for us to reflect—collectively, I hope—on the fact that international students are very welcome in Scotland. They play an important part in our university communities and, indeed, in our wider society.

I am alert to some of the challenges that Mr Marra refers to. I take those challenges seriously, and we have to be cognisant of them. We are committed to developing our international education strategy, and a core part of that has to be how we make it clear that the sector can be resilient in the face of any particular type of shock that you may refer to. We are alert to and conscious of that, and we want to work with the sector to ensure that that resilience is embedded within our institutions.

That reflects the scale of the challenge that we are trying to respond to. We have to respond to it on the basis of all of the constraints on public finance that I have referred to. That is a challenge in terms of not just revenue budgets but capital allocation. What I have asked for, and what I have discharged SFC to come back to me and lay out, is a plan to respond to some of those challenges. What are the priorities for the coming period? I know that the committee spoke to the SFC about that. The SFC will take that forward and will make a series of recommendations to me, and it will be incumbent on the Government to consider them.

I recognise the scale of the challenge. It is not something that I am pretending is not there. There are various reasons why it exists. The primary one, by my estimation, is that we have a series of buildings that were built around the same time and, as a result of that, are maturing at the same time. I go back to the point that I made in response to Mr Marra. We have a track record of investing in the college estate. I have already laid out our commitment to what Mr Marra rightly referred to as one project. I was not shying away from its being one project, but it is one very important project, and it is a serious financial commitment from the Scottish Government to continue to invest in and improve the college estate in Scotland. However, I am looking forward to the SFC informing us how we should respond to the significant challenges ahead of us, and we will then need to consider how to respond to its recommendations.

That is something that colleges themselves would have to speak to and justify. We do not direct or dictate. We are not involved in the process of pay settlements in the college sector. I think that it is right, though—you will see this reflected in our own public sector pay policy—that, particularly where we are dealing with constraint in public finances, the people who are at the bottom of the salary scale should be prioritised ahead of those at the top of the scale, if I can put it in that way.