Chamber and committees

There has never been acorporate policy in the Scottish Government advising staff that a formal minutemust be produced for particular telephone calls.

Officials offered verbaladvice to Mr Salmond, at his request, confirming that, as MSP for theconstituency where the development was proposed, he was entitled to representproperly the interests of his constituents and to speak to the developer and toany other relevant parties. They confirmed that his constituency interest meantthat Mr Salmond was debarred from any potential Scottish ministerial planningdecision. They also set out their understanding of the procedural implicationsof the resolution of Aberdeenshire Council’s Infrastructure Services Committee.

I had no such discussionswith the First Minister.

I informed Mr Salmond afterI had made the decision to call in the planning application.

Yes.

No.

The phone call was notformally minuted, a record is kept on file showing that the Cabinet Secretaryfor Finance and Sustainable Growth had agreed to call in the application.

I refer the member to the answerto question S3W-7663 on 20 December 2007. All answers to written parliamentary questions areavailable on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can befound at http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/webapp/wa.search.

No.

We are giving considerationto the publication of information under Freedom of Information legislation thatrelates to this question. I will write to advise when this procedure has beencompleted.