Chamber and committees

I thank members for explaining the reasons for their amendments. I will address them in groups, according to their intention.

Amendments 61, 62 and 66 all serve the purpose of improving transparency and effectiveness in how the strategic advisory council will operate. The amendments will make the council much more impactful to better shape qualifications Scotland’s decisions. That includes amendment 62, which seeks to ensure that

“members of staff of Qualifications Scotland”

are not

“members of the council.”

For that reason, I support Mr Greer’s amendments 61, 62 and 66.

Also to support the effectiveness of the council, I have lodged amendments 63, 64 and 65. Together, those amendments ensure that regulations will be made to ensure that the council consults partners as part of its formulation of advice. Naturally, that includes qualifications Scotland and its interest committees, as well as others that it views appropriate to consult.

I listened to Mr Greer’s comments on amendment 9, but I think that amendments 63, 64 and 65 achieve a more desirable effect. However, having listened to his contribution, I am prepared not to move those amendments if he is content to work together on a stage 3 amendment that we can both support. His amendment requires the council to consult with those who are taking and teaching qualifications. That creates unnecessary duplication and detracts from the purpose of the council, which is to give strategic advice.

The engagement between the council and the interest committees will also canvas views from children, young people and other learners and teachers. I am not able to support Ms Duncan-Glancy’s amendment 252 for that reason. I also cannot support Ms Duncan-Glancy’s amendment 251, which requires consultation with Education Scotland, given that we would expect Education Scotland to be represented on the council. However, I accept that we are all looking to ensure that appropriate consultation takes place and I am happy to work with members to try to come to a mutually agreeable solution in advance of stage 3.

I am happy not to press the amendments that I set out. I ask members to do the same to create space for that discussion.

Mr Greer raises an important point on the timetabling of qualifications and the hours associated with those qualifications. I raised the same point with the SQA some years ago, when I was sitting on that side of the table along with Mr Greer and Ms Smith. Mr Greer is absolutely right to raise points about the SQA and Education Scotland not having good working relationships in delivering those qualifications. However, part of the challenge is how we have teachers embedded in those organisations.

During discussions on the first group of amendments, I spoke about some of the work that I have introduced in relation to the schools unit in Education Scotland. We have a headteacher in there who has been seconded out of school and who will be in charge of leading that qualifications work. It is hugely important to have qualified teachers on the ground informing what we are doing in all aspects of qualifications reform. That is also why we have headteachers working to lead the curriculum improvement cycle, which is also relevant here.

I hear the arguments being put. I also know that the background to the bill is the lack of trust in the qualifications body among the teaching profession and parents, carers and young people who have come through the system. It is about rebuilding trust. Some of the changes that we have introduced in relation to the schools unit and to working differently with our teachers on curriculum improvement address some of that.

Putting that wording into the legislation is perhaps overly prescriptive. I am not necessarily sure that it is required at this time, although I am listening to the arguments.

I have said that I am happy to have that discussion with Ms Duncan-Glancy ahead of stage 3, although it is fair to say that the way in which the amendments are drafted, particularly in relation to Education Scotland, is going to be problematic, because it does not have its own legal personality separate from that of the Scottish ministers. We need to be careful, because Education Scotland is not established in statute. The way that the amendment is drafted would not have the effect that Ms Duncan-Glancy desires, although I am supportive of the requirement in principle.

Amendment 233 would require qualifications Scotland to work with others, as opposed to the bill’s current reference to

“the desirability of working ... with others”.

The amendment goes further than is necessary and weakens qualifications Scotland’s ability to make judgments about who it should work with. I think that the existing wording of the bill would still achieve what Ms Duncan-Glancy wants. I understand the point behind amendment 233, although I do not support the amendment itself. There are amendments in groups 8 and 10 that I do support and that will go some way towards assuring the member that qualifications Scotland will work effectively with others in the system—for example, the amendments that would require qualifications Scotland to have regard to other public bodies throughout the Scottish education and skills system, such as Education Scotland, Skills Development Scotland, the Scottish Funding Council and the SCQF Partnership. I hope that I have given Ms Duncan-Glancy a level of reassurance and that I have persuaded her to reconsider moving amendment 233.

I thank Ms Duncan-Glancy for her amendments on qualifications Scotland’s responsibilities to work with others, and I agree that it is an important matter for us to consider. Amendment 232 specifies that qualifications Scotland must work in collaboration with Education Scotland. That fully aligns with my intention for increased consultation and I support the intention behind the amendment. However, Education Scotland is an executive agency of the Scottish ministers and statutory functions should not be conferred on such agencies, because they do not have their own legal personality separate from that of the Scottish ministers. In legal terms, there is, strictly speaking, no basis on which the duty would operate.

Similarly, I note that amendment 243 seeks a reciprocal arrangement for Education Scotland to work with qualifications Scotland, although the requirements are slightly uneven because a more qualified duty would be imposed on Education Scotland. For the same reasons, I support the principle behind amendment 243, but it will need to be reworked. I will be happy to work with Ms Duncan-Glancy to adjust those amendments for stage 3 and I ask that she does not press or move those amendments.

The regulations have not yet been brought forward, and I am keen to work with members to ensure agreement on what they specify.

On the other part of the question, we have talked about the parliamentary scrutiny of qualifications Scotland, and we will, additionally, talk about that in greater detail in later groups.

I am listening to Mr Kerr develop his point. He talks about greater clarity, but the SCQF provides that clarity at a national level, encompassing all qualifications. He is seeking to duplicate—I think that that is the point that Mr Adam was making—by having another framework embedded, as I understand it, within qualifications Scotland, and that would create more confusion. Does Mr Kerr agree that more challenge in how qualifications are interpreted will be created by duplicating something that already exists?

Will the member take an intervention?

The member talks about moving functions and its associated costs, and I alluded to staff costs and staff terms and conditions in my commentary. Has she given any thought to how long the process would take? I am very mindful of the need for this bill to take effect and have an impact in our schools, where it should be having an impact, as quickly as possible. This is fundamentally about driving reform forward.

Some of the challenge that I face as cabinet secretary is that, as we have heard from Mr Mason, any reconsideration of establishing a new body not only would come with associated costs but would take time. Has the member scoped the time associated with moving staff across and the duration of the delay to education reform that that might create?

We are all in agreement that it is paramount that the board of qualifications Scotland is set up to lead the organisation in order to better support teachers and practitioners and to support those taking qualifications. We must also be alive to what the role of the board of an NDPB involves and ensure that it has the appropriate balance of skills to enable it to deliver on its corporate governance requirements.

Board size is an important element to get right. If a board is too small, we limit the skills and experience, and if it is too big, we create a board in which efficient decision making and corporate responsibilities are at risk. Bearing in mind those two requirements, I have reviewed the bill specifications on the range of skills required and members’ amendments in that respect and have lodged amendments 41 and 42 to increase both the minimum and maximum number of other board members—that is, membership that is not the chairing member, the accreditation convener and the chief executive. The amendments propose an increase of one, to seven and 11, respectively, increasing the total board size from a minimum of 9 to a minimum of 10 and from a maximum of 13 to a maximum of 14.

Ms Duncan-Glancy’s amendments 211 and 212 seek to increase the minimum board size to 13 and the maximum to 15. I have reflected on that proposal, and I am content that it would be sensible for the sake of flexibility to set the maximum at 15, as Ms Duncan-Glancy has proposed, instead of 14, as I had initially proposed. Given that the amendments are direct alternatives, I ask members to support my amendment 42, as it will support the direction of travel to a higher maximum, but I also ask members to support amendment 212 to ensure that the maximum is ultimately set at 15—that is, 12 members in addition to the three named positions.

I have some concerns about Ms Duncan-Glancy’s amendment 211, which seeks to increase the minimum ordinary membership to 10. The amendment would create a minimum membership of 13 in total, when we take the appointments of a chairing member, accreditation convener and chief executive alongside it, as opposed to a minimum of 10 total members, which would be achieved through my amendment 41. The main concern that I have with the amendment is that it risks creating a large minimum board, which will require careful risk management when it comes to public appointments and maintaining a legally compliant and quorate board in the event of members unexpectedly ending their appointment.

That happened quite recently—in 2023—in the SQA, which has a much lower minimum board membership. Members unexpectedly stood down, and permission was then required from the Commissioner for Ethical Standards in Public Life in Scotland to rush through an appointments round to ensure that the board remained quorate. With that in mind, I urge members to support amendment 41, as opposed to amendment 211.

Amendment 213 requires consultation with the board as a whole, rather than just the chair, if the power is used to change the size of the board in the future. Although I find it unlikely that a chairing member would not engage with their board on decisions of such scale, I am content to support the amendment.

With regard to the board’s composition, there was a good discussion at stage 1 on whether a learner—more specifically, a young person—should be appointed to the board. Currently, the provisions focus on having knowledge and experience of the views and needs of those taking qualifications rather than on specific age-related criteria. The current provisions do not exclude a young person from being appointed; indeed, it is long-standing public appointments policy that anyone over the age of 16 can be appointed to a board.

As it was the intention behind the current provision in the bill to enable a wide scope of potential candidates to be appointed, be they someone with experience of taking a qualification or someone with experience of advocating on behalf of learners, without limiting it to those criteria, I am sympathetic to Mr Greer’s amendment 28, which seeks to ensure that someone under the age of 26 who is or has recently taken a qualification is appointed to the board. The amendment recognises the importance of ensuring a wide scope of potential applicants by not confining it to too young an age.

However, as this is a type of amendment that would, albeit in a positive way, seek to discriminate on the basis of age, we would have to be satisfied that it would be compatible with equality law, if it did proceed. I see the value in having a young person with experience of taking qualifications on the board, and we would be happy to work with Mr Greer to ensure that efforts were made to promote and encourage applications from those under 26. I therefore ask Mr Greer not to press the amendment and to work with me and other stakeholders to consider how we can best do that effectively.

More broadly, I recognise that more should be done to strengthen the relationship between the board member appointed to reflect the interests of learners and the wider education system. That is why, if Mr Greer were interested, I would be keen to work up a stage 3 amendment to require such an individual to consult directly with learners and those who represent them as part of their statutory board duties.

In lodging amendment 29, Mr Greer also seeks a change in respect of consultation. I will wait to hear his rationale for that, but, on the surface, it is something that I might be able to support. I will come back to it in my closing remarks.

Ms Duncan-Glancy’s amendment 214 requires someone taking a qualification offered by qualifications Scotland to be appointed to the board. Again, although I see the value of such experience, I have two concerns about the amendment. The first is that the duration of qualifications varies from as little as a few weeks to as long as a number of years, and that creates challenges with maintaining board membership once those qualifications end. The second concern relates to a clear conflict of interest, as I do not think it appropriate for an individual who is taking a qualification offered by qualifications Scotland to have a non-executive leadership role in the organisation. I therefore ask Ms Duncan-Glancy not to move her amendment, noting my commitment to Mr Greer to work on something that, I believe, will have the same effect.

With regard to the teacher voice on the board, ensuring that qualifications Scotland is led by the experience of those who deliver learning, teaching and training for qualifications is an absolute priority. That is why the bill explicitly requires that a number of teachers, and college-based teachers, be on the board. That said, I recognise that increasing the proportion of teacher experience on the board would be desirable—although I am mindful of doing so in a way that does not limit the other range of valuable skills that are required on the board.

I note that Mr Greer has lodged two packages of amendments as options for improving that proportion. Amendments 43 to 46 work together to ensure that there is always a minimum of five teacher or college members on the board and that there must be a balanced proportion between teacher and college members where there is, at most, one more than the other. That teacher or college experience could come from any of the members on the board, including the chairing member. The amendments also ensure that, should the board size change, more than one third of the membership will always be teachers or college lecturers.

I have interpreted the alternative amendment 27 as taking a slightly more limiting approach that could impact on access to other skills being on the board. I understand that it will require there to always be a majority of members who are teachers or college teachers in the “other members” section of the board—that is, the section that does not include the chairing member, the accreditation convener or the chief executive.

That could have two effects. Mr Greer will agree that the first is especially undesirable, as the current board size would mean that there could be a lower minimum of just four teacher or college members. His alternative, which I am supporting, ensures that there will be five. The second is less desirable from a corporate governance perspective when it is read alongside the other specified criteria in the bill. It would mean that there is a risk that there could be insufficient seats on the board for the wider skills that would be needed to lead the organisation, because of the number of seats that are filled by teachers and other learner or staff-focused members. Taking all that into account, my preference would be to support amendments 43 and 46. I encourage members to do that.

I note that Ms Duncan-Glancy has lodged two amendments to support teacher members on the board. Amendment 215 would ensure that any teacher members who are appointed are teachers from schools. I see no issue with supporting that amendment, as it is the intention that they would be delivering qualifications in schools. If amendment 43 is accepted, amendment 215 will be pre-empted, but I would be happy to support making that change at stage 3.

Amendment 216 requires there to be a board member who is representative of a teaching trade union that operates in Scotland. As I have said many times during the progress of the bill, we must be mindful of the requirements for public body appointments, which come with the duty to govern effectively the organisation to which people are appointed, regardless of other roles that they might hold, so they should not represent the interests of other organisations while they are on the board.

I do not want to run the risk of creating a form of representative board model for qualifications Scotland. It was a representative board model at the SQA that was deemed to be one of the key sources of the failure that led to the awarding and examination issue in 2000. That drove forward urgent legislation at that time to change the board model to that which the SQA stipulates today. It meant that the board was specifically focused on corporate governance as well as the relevant education and skills experience. I therefore cannot support amendment 216. I encourage others to reject the amendment, noting that Mr Greer’s amendments, which I have referred to, should provide additional reassurance that qualifications Scotland will have sufficient teacher and college experience on the board.

I do, however, believe that there is good cause to strengthen the relationship between qualifications Scotland and the teaching unions. That is why I would be interested in lodging an amendment at stage 3 that would require the teaching and college board members to lead the board’s engagement and consultation with teaching unions. If Pam Duncan-Glancy sees that as something that we could work together on, I ask her not to move amendment 216.

Coming to the voice of staff on the board, throughout my engagement with SQA staff I have listened carefully to their desire for a more robust mechanism for qualifications Scotland. I understand that the trade unions that act for SQA staff would like to see board membership for them—a request that mirrors Ms Duncan-Glancy’s amendment 217. I have considered that option carefully and I remain sympathetic to it. However, I have concerns about the application of direct staff roles in a non-departmental public body, given the associated corporate governance implications for how a trade union would work in practice for the operation of the board and, importantly, for the individual, given the focus and nature of the operational responsibilities of an NDPB and the need to navigate potentially significant conflicts of interest.

The function would not move from Education Scotland but from the SQA. However, as I think the committee heard in evidence from the previous chief inspector, there is a broader issue, in that the scope of accreditation does not apply to all qualifications at present. Government amendment 73 seeks to consider whether accreditation needs to apply across the board. There are arguments in favour of and against that. The submission from the SCQF Partnership that I think the committee received this week talks about some of the challenges in taking an evidence-based approach. More broadly, there is a requirement for us to look at the budget associated with the matter, which we expect would increase. We expect that any movement of the function from the SQA would be associated with increased start-up costs, which I will talk about in more detail.

If we left the accreditation function within qualifications Scotland, it would benefit from the transitioning shared services arrangements that I think that Mr Rennie also spoke about. It is an unaffordable option at this time, when the education budget is already stretched, as members are aware. Therefore, I ask Mr Rennie not to move his amendment 167 and related amendments. For the same reason, I ask Mr Kerr not to move his amendment 316, which has broadly the same effect as Mr Rennie’s proposals by conferring the accreditation functions on the chief inspector.

For similar reasons, I cannot support amendment 287 in Mr Rennie’s name, which seeks to move the accreditation function to the SCQF Partnership. Members know that moving the location of the function to the partnership was previously given full consideration. However, a number of risks were identified with that option at the time. I note that, as I mentioned in my response to Mr Kerr, the SCQF Partnership has since reaffirmed those challenges and risks in a letter that it sent to the committee last week. In that letter, the partnership highlighted the confidence that it has in the current arrangements and committed to working with qualifications Scotland to further improve the bodies’ shared confidence in each other.

Another crucial factor was the identity of, and distinction between, the SCQF Partnership’s rating function and the SQA accreditation function. Unlike the SQA function, the rating function covers all types of qualifications, including degrees and diplomas. It recognises and measures learning differently, using a system in which credit bodies allocate credit points depending on how long it takes to achieve that learning.

Another important consideration is the organisational status of the SCQF Partnership compared to the accreditation function. The partnership is an independent, registered charity, and there are clear benefits to maintaining that independence, which stakeholders recognise and support. That independence is not recognised by Mr Rennie’s amendment, which would create an ability for Scottish ministers to determine the SCQF Partnership’s functions.

That difference in status also risks the accreditation function no longer being strategically accountable to Scottish ministers as it currently is by being a non-departmental public body function. That means that it will be more challenging to ensure that accreditation meets the needs of the Scottish Government’s priorities for qualifications. For example, if the accreditation function were to move to the SCQF Partnership and an incident or issue were to arise, Scottish ministers would be limited in their ability to intervene to address it. Without that accountability to ministers, the level of accountability that the accreditation function would have to the Scottish Parliament would be significantly reduced from the current arrangements.

I turn to the issue of staffing, which I think that Mr Rennie also spoke to. The move would significantly change the employment status of current accreditation staff. They would no longer be public servants; instead, they would be employed by a charity. The risk is that that does not take account of the loss of skills and expertise that might occur if staff do not want to move, given that change in employment terms.

Other factors include disruption to services and concerns around the capacity and resource of the SCQF Partnership to meet the needs of both functions. Therefore, I ask Mr. Rennie not to move amendment 287 and the related amendments.

I turn to Ms. Duncan-Glancy’s amendment 291, which seeks to locate the accreditation function within Education Scotland. Members know that Education Scotland is an executive agency of the Scottish Government. Therefore amendment 291 would bring the accreditation function under closer control of Scottish ministers, which I do not think that members would want.