Chamber and committees

It feels as though I am rolling back the years. It is nice to be back in the Criminal Justice Committee, having served for five years on the predecessor committee. An issue that exercised that committee was the size, scale and extent of the remand population in Scotland’s prisons and the effect that that was having. If memory serves correctly, it was the subject of our first inquiry at the start of the previous parliamentary session. It is accepted that that is still an issue, so I welcome the broad thrust of the bill and what it seeks to achieve. However, as ever, there are ways in which it could be improved.

Similarly, I welcome the move to involve criminal justice social work in informing the decisions that courts take on sentencing and bail. I echo Katy Clark’s and Pauline McNeill’s concerns about resourcing for that. The criminal justice social work service is already under real pressure and, at the moment, the added responsibilities that are being placed upon it and the timescales in which we would hope it would be able to respond give rise to legitimate concerns.

The Law Society of Scotland expressed those concerns in its briefing for the recent stage 1 debate. Nevertheless, the input of criminal justice social work is exceptionally important and will improve the quality of the decisions that sheriffs and judges are able to make. That said, it could go further, which is the purpose of my amendments 50 and 51. I am grateful to Victim Support Scotland for its support in lodging those amendments.

My amendments aim to augment what is already in the bill, ensuring that the decisions that are taken are as informed as possible. Undoubtedly, criminal justice social work will bear the heaviest responsibility in that respect. However, amendment 51 would allow for information that is relevant to public safety to be provided to the courts by the complainer or by victim support organisations on their behalf. That would allow the courts to make decisions that are in the best interests of both public safety and victim safety while respecting the rights of the accused.

I am interested in hearing the Government’s views on that additional provision. It would not, in any way, dilute what is there but would broaden out the information that is available to the courts in making the decisions that fall to them to make. Therefore, it can only enhance what the bill seeks to achieve overall. I look forward to the debate on that issue.

There is no obligation on criminal justice social work or on local authorities to provide input about any individual case, but the concern is that, where there are funding restrictions, any decision on whether to make an intervention or a contribution may be informed as much by those restrictions as by whether there is a valid contribution to make.

Will the cabinet secretary take an intervention on that point?

I very much share Jamie Greene’s view on the ability to convey the information to the court in a way that does not compromise the victim’s safety or public safety but does inform the court’s decision. I note the cabinet secretary’s comments about engaging in further discussion and I am happy to do that. On that basis, I will not move amendment 50.

Amendment 50 not moved.

Amendment 29 not moved.

Amendment 51 not moved.

I have a final question. Obviously, one of the drivers for the move to remote towers was concern about recruitment and retention of air traffic control staff in certain airports. I and others expressed concern that that was not necessarily an issue at some airports. HIAL has a track record of recruiting and retaining staff very successfully when it has embarked on local recruitment exercises, but when it tried to recruit ready-made air traffic controllers from Sweden and elsewhere as a short-term option, it ended up reaping the whirlwind, because those staff were always going to leave.

Is there an assurance from HIAL that, in going forward with the new model, there will be a return to recruiting from local communities? Not just for HIAL, but across the public and private sectors, that approach has demonstrated itself to be a far more effective way of identifying people. They might be people for whom you might need to provide additional training, but they are far more likely to remain within the organisation for the medium to longer term.

Thank you, convener, and good morning, Inglis.

In response to questions from the committee, you said earlier that, with hindsight, things would have been done differently. I think that we can all be accused of having wisdom with hindsight, but having lived this process for a number of years—if not all five of them—it seems to me that hindsight was not really necessary. Very much from the outset, there were concerns expressed that the cost calculations and estimates were wide of the mark in relation to what would actually be required to deliver the work safely and successfully. They were out of alignment with what many people within the sector were suggesting.

Staff’s concerns about the proposals and the implications for jobs, including in the islands, were evident from the get go. The opposition within local communities, including local authorities, again, was evident. HIAL’s consultants identified the remote tower model as the most complex and risky of the options, yet over the course of the four or five years that I engaged with HIAL, I was told repeatedly and the public were told repeatedly, through public statements, that that was the only viable option to deliver safely and in accordance with changing regulations, the air traffic management system that is required across the Highlands and Islands. I appreciate that we are now in a different place, but it is difficult to accept that one needed hindsight to arrive at that conclusion. There is real anger and frustration that it has taken the best part of five years to get to a conclusion that many people arrived at pretty much from the get go. That is just for the record; it is not a question, but an observation.

I welcome your response to the question that Fergus Ewing asked about the audit. Over and above that, Peter Henderson previously expressed concern that we could find ourselves in a similar situation in relation to centralised radar surveillance. Again, HIAL is taking forward a proposal, and there are concerns among staff at each of the airfields about its implications. Those concerns are not being given due weight; we could, some way down the line, again be dealing with a similar situation, in which HIAL will be forced to reconsider the proposals.

What assurance can you give us that that is not the case and that staff concerns in relation to centralised radar surveillance will be taken properly into account?

I will make a final point to follow up what David Avery said about not having a particular concern about where radar surveillance jobs are based. I understand that, and that the primary concerns are that jobs are secure and well paid, and that training is in place. As representatives of the various communities that HIAL serves, we have an interest in where the jobs are based. If there are not overwhelming arguments for their being based centrally as is proposed, rather than being dispersed round the network, HIAL needs to explain why that is happening. The expectation should be that, as far as possible, HIAL and other public bodies disperse jobs around the region. Peter Henderson has also set out real concerns about the practicability of what is proposed.

I will make a couple of observations before I turn to the issue on which Rhoda Grant was pressing Mr Avery.

I still cannot get my head round the fact that we were told for years by HIAL management that its air traffic management strategy project was the only show in town and the only credible option. It has backed off from that much later in the day than I and many others hoped it would. Mr Avery’s assessment that that is the result of a number of factors is probably fair, but the cost and delivery of the project were always seriously under question, which might well have driven HIAL back to the negotiating table.

However, there has been no reckoning with those who marched us up that hill then marched us back down again. The earlier point about Audit Scotland casting its eyes over the matter seems to be entirely sensible and reasonable. The cost is one component; another aspect is how decisions were made. The cost to the public purse is a real concern. I have had discussions with Audit Scotland, which suggested that that is more a matter for Transport Scotland to deal with. However, in a sense, Transport Scotland has skin in the game, given its responsibility for HIAL. I am keen to understand the extent to which Audit Scotland could provide satisfaction that due process was followed and that public money was not needlessly wasted, as appears to have been the case.

On centralising radar, which Mr Henderson mentioned and Rhoda Grant pursued just now, similar concerns, although they are a little different, are now being raised. Mr Henderson spoke about those concerns. The issue seems to fall into the same category—that is, it concerns a review or a decision that has been predetermined. Although it appears to be consulting more, HIAL is asking how to deliver what it has already determined that it will deliver. I wonder whether work needs to be done to get HIAL almost to go back to first principles.

HIAL might have delivered on that, but the matter is not completely alien to it. If the concerns that Mr Henderson raised are legitimate—they seem to be borne out by evidence—I would hope that the committee and Prospect, in its discussions with HIAL, might be able to persuade HIAL to go back to first principles and determine whether a centralised model for radar surveillance is more practicable and in the interests of the island communities that rely on the lifeline services. Does Mr Avery agree with that? Might Prospect be able to carry forward that approach in its negotiations?

I think that that must be the motivation. We are at an impasse where, in a sense, HIAL was suggesting that installing remote towers was the only way of achieving the modernisation that everybody accepts is necessary for future air traffic services in the region. Having reached an agreement that lifts that immediate threat to jobs, perhaps Prospect feels that things have been moved on. However, there is certainly an anxiety among staff at the local level that HIAL is buying the time that it was always going to need to achieve the remote towers.

I would be interested to know whether Prospect believes that that remains the case, but a number of its members, including staff in Orkney and, I understand, at other airports, remain anxious about the longer-term intentions of HIAL management.

I will be extremely brief, convener. I very much welcome the comments from the deputy convener and Alexander Stewart.

As Rhoda Grant said, local recruitment is essential. HIAL almost made the process an exemplar when it last recruited locally. Since then, it has moved away from that model and sought to hire ready-made air traffic controllers. That was always a short-term fix, and it has left the company with some retention issues.

It would offer staff at various airports some reassurance if HIAL were to embark on a local recruitment drive. The approach has proven to be the best way of not just recruiting but retaining staff. If HIAL management gives evidence to the committee, that is a point that could be very usefully put to them.