Meeting of the Parliament 17 December 2025
I did not realise that there were limitations to the scrutiny of Parliament. I did not realise that it was somehow out of order for a cabinet secretary to be brought to the chamber to account for his failings in the discharge of his responsibilities, according to no less an authority than the Auditor General for Scotland. Historic Environment Scotland is a non-departmental public body and the Cabinet Secretary for Constitution, External Affairs and Culture is the responsible minister. He appoints the board and oversees the sponsorship relationship. He is accountable to this Parliament for how that system of governance operates, and I think that Richard Leonard knows that.
In that context, the Auditor General has identified a failure by the Scottish Government to appoint an accountable officer. That is a clear statutory duty, and Parliament must be able to examine, in the chamber and through the committee structure of the Parliament, how that duty was allowed to go unmet and what damage that failure has caused. That is a responsibility of the cabinet secretary that cannot be delegated away; it cannot be blurred by process or shifted on to civil servants.