Chamber and committees

Good morning, Deputy First Minister. I put it on record that I understand and accept that your job is much more difficult because of the difficulties that have been introduced by the Westminster Government, particularly with regard to the forecast. I absolutely understand why you prefaced your remarks with reference to that.

In the debate on the Scottish Government’s programme for government at the start of this session, you mentioned two interesting things to me, namely that the Scottish Government is challenged with trying to improve economic growth, particularly by increasing productivity, and that you feel that the size of the Scottish working population in relation to total population is a major problem—I think that those were the words that you used. That latter point has been a focus of the Scottish Fiscal Commission for some years now.

Notwithstanding all the challenges that we face, could you say something about your economic plan to try to develop issues relating to growth? What will the Scottish Government prioritise in trying to improve our economic growth and our productivity?

I was interested in what you said in response to Mr Greer about the need for a grown-up discussion in Parliament about what we bring in through revenue and what we spend. I do not think that there is any doubt that increasing transparency and accountability in this Parliament is essential. I think that it was two weeks ago that we had witnesses in the committee who were very keen on that idea.

In fact, a couple of the witnesses were suggesting that we should have a finance bill to enhance that process and I am interested to hear your views on that. It comes on the back of the national performance framework, which is obviously centre stage to the Scottish Government’s delivery. We have had a lot of debates about how easy it is to measure the outcomes when you have specific policies within the national performance framework. How easy is that process? Are you minded to be fairly favourable towards the idea of a finance bill that could help to enhance scrutiny and openness?

On that point, I think that we have accepted that there was a slight issue about scrutiny and, rightly, you have given the reasons for that. However, it raises a slightly wider point, which the DPLR Committee has raised with regard to other issues: namely, that if there is a problem about the timescale, because of recess or other factors, it is important that there is effective scrutiny. Can you assure us that that general issue of scrutiny of such technical matters will be dealt with by the Scottish ministers?

Thank you. It would be very helpful to have that information.

Continuing on the point that Ms Barbour made about public understanding of tax and willingness to pay, nobody likes paying tax, but I think that economists call it a “good tax” when people understand it, recognise what benefits it will produce and know how it is being spent.

That follows on from the question that the convener asked. If the devolved taxes working group was to be re-established, would you advise that we keep the remit of that group the same as it was the last time, or would you like the remit to be expanded to help with the business of understanding tax?

That is interesting. You mentioned in your submission that you had noted the cross-party suggestions that we might have a finance bill. If we were to have a finance bill process, how would that articulate with the devolved taxes group? Do you see them working together or as being entirely separate?

Thank you—that was extremely helpful. I am persuaded of the need for a finance bill, which I think would enhance scrutiny and help people to understand a bit more about where their money is going to be spent, which is crucial.

Audit Scotland has said a lot about enhancing transparency and scrutiny. Auditor General, is it your opinion that we should look at introducing a finance bill?

I have one question, Ms Flanagan, which is on the back of Michelle Thomson’s first question to you.

I know what you are saying about the fact that some councils are not terribly keen on sharing services because they feel that that would dilute their best interests when it comes to delivering services. In the areas and councils that have delivered shared services, has there been an audit of how much money has been saved by having joint services? It would be helpful to know whether it is good practice, and having the information that Michelle Thomson asked about would be helpful to the committee.

Again, that is an interesting answer. Audit Scotland has quite rightly suggested that we need to improve scrutiny in this Parliament and to have greater transparency around a whole lot of things, but particularly tax and spend. If the devolved taxes group did its job properly and its report came—let us say—to this committee and then went to the Scottish Government, that would not necessarily compel it to be part of a chamber process with stages 1, 2 and 3, whereas a finance bill would compel that. I am interested to hear whether you think that we need to have both of those together or whether we could operate with them being separate.

Thank you.