Chamber and committees

Yes.

We might not all agree on this one. Our submission is clear that we think that a lot of good work is being done in committees but performance could be better. Some of our suggestions are aimed at improving the effectiveness of the committees.

We might get on to this later, if others are planning to ask about it, but we look at the d’Hondt system for allocating members. We think that committees would perform better if the in-built Government majority was removed, so that there was better cross-party working.

On Ash Regan’s point about post-legislative scrutiny, we believe that the change that was made a couple of parliamentary sessions ago to bring that role into the subject committees was made for very good reasons, because those committees have the expertise to do that scrutiny. However, because of the workload of most of our committees, it is now not getting the attention that it should. Therefore, in our submission, we say that we should go back to having a stand-alone committee on post-legislative scrutiny.

Finally, on effectiveness, we believe that some of the committees are too big. I include in that the Education, Children and Young People Committee, which I convene and of which two excellent members are with me here today—I am not trying to get rid of them. Mr Rennie and Mr Greer are current members, and Ms Webber previously chaired that committee. When you have a 10-member committee and a panel of four or five witnesses, it can be difficult to get through meetings on time, as it proved yesterday, when we went about an hour and a half over time. We believe that all committees should have either seven or five members, as that would allow for more focused questions from the committees.

I returned to the Parliament in 2021 as the leader of a party that had some very new MSPs, and I was keen that the party supported them with committee participation. Although we do a lot in the chamber, and the Parliament does a lot to ensure that members can deliver speeches in the chamber, I feel that individual parties should prioritise committee scrutiny, because our work in committees is as important as our work in the chamber. From the very beginning, there is an onus on the Parliament and individual parties to provide that support.

Ash Regan made a point about members being on more than one committee. A number of members are on two big committees—the Education, Children and Young People Committee and the Finance and Public Administration Committee. I think that Ross Greer and John Mason aid our education committee discussions by drawing on some of their finance committee experience. I do not want to take away from what has been said about the workload, but being on more than one committee can be useful.

Perhaps understandably, we have spoken about scrutiny of the Government, but committees can also do an awful lot to scrutinise outside bodies. One of the most high-profile education committee sessions was an evidence session with the University of Dundee, which took place during what was to have been a free week. Our clerks had had an issue with other witnesses, so we were going to have time off, but I said that we should ensure that we meet every week. During our evidence session, we got answers for people who work at the university as well as for its students. The committee was able to scrutinise the interim principal and his fellow members of court. We also invited local MSPs to the meeting. Committees are important for members who sit on them every week, but, when they are having discussions about issues that are important for regional or local members, those members can come along and take part.

To go back to your question, if, at the start of the parliamentary session, members know that they are not confined to attending just the committees of which they are members but can ask to attend sessions that relate to their areas of interest at, for example, the Public Audit Committee, the Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee, and this committee, that will increase the breadth of knowledge across the Parliament.

I did not want to kick off, because we would still be going in the same direction, but I will.

You asked three questions, convener, and to them I say no, no and no. Let me expand slightly. We have made it clear that we could support the election of conveners only if a fundamental change were made to remove the Government’s in-built majority in the make-up of committees and their membership. We do not think that you could bring in elected conveners by themselves—that would have to happen in tandem with further changes. The reason—

I will come to the question about how we choose conveners, but, first, I will answer another question that you have not asked, which is about the role of the parties in deciding which committees to ask for. That is important and, as the party leader after 2021, I spent quite a lot of time on that.

Through the d’Hondt system, we were going to get the convenership of four committees, but you submit a pecking order. The number 1 committee that I asked for was education—I have now gone full circle and convene that committee myself. I asked for that committee because I felt that education was going to be the big topic of this parliamentary session and I did not think that it had had enough scrutiny up to that point. There are discussions not just about who will be a convener, but about which committees each respective party would like to get.

I also took the decision that no new MSPs, who had been elected for the first time, would take on the role of committee convener at the start of the parliamentary session. I felt that it would be unfair for a new MSP to have that additional burden while they were learning the ropes.

I tried to match up people who had a particular interest with the relevant committee. For example, someone who had previous experience as a shadow cabinet secretary in net zero went into the Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee. We spent quite a bit of time on that. It did not always work out, because some people whom I asked to be a convener declined because they did not feel that it was the right role for them. Four years on, they probably regret that. It was a decision solely for the leader and the chief whip, and it was about trying to match the right people to the right jobs. It is important that we get the right people in those roles.

I have experienced both systems. We must be careful that we do not just say, “Westminster has elected conveners and they seem to have more authority down there,” or, “Westminster has bill committees,” and so on. It is a very different situation. Westminster has far more members—650 compared to our 129.

There would be merit in dividing the two types of business but retaining the same expertise. One of the earlier questions—I do not know whether it was from Rona Mackay or the convener—was whether committees should meet more. Bar Ash Regan, I think that we all agreed that they should. Perhaps the subject committees would meet as normal and then, as legislation came along, they would meet separately. They would still meet and do their normal work on a Wednesday morning, but they would meet additionally that week in order to do bill consideration. When the bill was done, they could go back to meeting once a week. The benefit of that, and why the Westminster system is better, would be that committees could be far more agile and reflective of what was happening at the time.

Many times, the Education, Children and Young People Committee—other Conservative-convened committees have this issue, too—has wanted to get into topical issues, but, because we have bills to get through, there is simply no time for that. When the committees are addressing issues within a week or two of them becoming big issues, the public are interested in what we are doing. At the moment, there is very little interest in what the committees are doing, despite our very good work, because we tend to get bogged down with legislation and are not dealing with the topical issues of the day that are being discussed.

I will try to take that advice by answering in one or two sentences. We are here to scrutinise Government legislation and Government ministers and to look at the topical issues of the day. If we do all three things, we will perform well as committees.

That is the point I am coming on to. First, as Ross Greer has suggested, no one is predicting the next election, but Parliament could end up having a number of smaller parties. Therefore, if we introduced elected conveners, the Parliament could be electing from a choice of one, because some conveners will be from smaller parties that might have only one member on a committee.

The reason why I can confidently say no, no and no to your three questions is because I had some fears about joining a committee that I had no experience of as the convener. I had never done much on education in my time; when I was previously in the Scottish Parliament, I was on the Justice Committee. I felt that I was coming in as a former party leader who did not know any of the other members.

However, although we have had quite strong and robust differences on the committee, I do not feel that, just because I was not elected in a vote in the chamber, my authority as convener in working with committee members has been diminished in any way. The committee members accept that, for the education committee and three other committees, the convener will be a Conservative member, and they will work with the convener to do their job. They are less interested in the convener if they are able to do what they want to and ask the questions that they want to. I do not think that having a vote in the chamber on a convener would change how any of our committee members work, either on their own or combined as a committee.

It goes back to what I said to Annie Wells—those early days are important for building up the relationships. When I joined the Justice Committee, there were members I did not know, but, after a year of being on the committee, I got on better with the members both within and outwith the committee.

Rhoda Grant made a point that I had thought about at the start of the session. It might be just my observation, but Parliament’s committees do not sit outwith the building very much. Committees could do more outreach work and more visits. If, say, the Education, Children and Young People Committee went up to visit Aberdeen and held a session there, that would not only bring Parliament closer to the people who elect us; it would mean that we were out of the building and away from emails and the chamber. It would also mean that the committee members, outwith the time of the visit and the committee session itself, would be doing things together on a more personal basis. It would be less adversarial, because we would not be doing scrutiny or legislation.

We should try to get out of the building—not all the time, but a bit more—to build up those relationships and perhaps change the culture a bit in each of the committees.

Should there be?