Committee
Public Petitions Committee 22 February 2011
22 Feb 2011 · S3 · Public Petitions Committee
Item of business
Current Petitions
School Bus Safety (PE1098 and PE1223)
Keith Brown said in his letter that he is going to write to formally request the transfer of powers, which is a step forward.I do not know whether what I will suggest is possible, but I am sure that the clerk can tell us. For a number of petitions at our last meeting, we asked whether we should get a minister in quickly, given that we are running out of time before dissolution, and we might want to do that for even more petitions today. Can we put aside petitions for which we are thinking about bringing in the minister? If we have, say, five such petitions, we know that we cannot fit in five separate sessions. We could agree to bring in the minister for this petition, for example, but somebody could feel strongly about doing the same for another petition later when it would not be possible because we would not have any other dates in the diary. Can we identify whether there is more than one petition for which we want to bring in the minister?I do not have a problem with inviting the minister to come to speak to the committee about this issue. However, he said that he would write to get a transfer of powers, and he could easily tell us about the response to that in a letter. I am worried that inviting the minister to speak to the committee on one petition when that is not necessarily required will mean that we will not have the option of inviting him to speak on other petitions. However, we could consider having an evidence session on several petitions at the end. Does that make sense?
In the same item of business
The Convener
Lab
Our first petitions today are on school bus safety. PE1098 was submitted by Lynn Merrifield, and PE1223 was submitted by Ron Beaty. What are members’ views o...
Bill Butler (Glasgow Anniesland) (Lab)
Lab
PE1098 and PE1223 are important petitions. At the previous meeting at which we considered them, we wondered whether we would get an update from the Minister ...
Nanette Milne (North East Scotland) (Con)
Con
Have soundings been taken on whether it will be possible to get a meeting with the minister?
Fergus Cochrane (Clerk)
I have not taken any soundings, but I know from speaking to the clerks to the Transport, Infrastructure and Climate Change Committee that the minister is giv...
The Convener
Lab
It is a bit frustrating when we discover that the minister must write a letter requesting the transfer of powers. I agree that we should get Keith Brown to c...
Anne McLaughlin (Glasgow) (SNP)
SNP
Keith Brown said in his letter that he is going to write to formally request the transfer of powers, which is a step forward.I do not know whether what I wil...
The Convener
Lab
I think so. The issue for us is how long we would want that meeting to last. My concern is to get as much progress as possible with petitions such as this on...
Bill Butler
Lab
It would be an advantage to have the minister here, and he would not need to be here for too long. If he communicated with us in writing, we could not follow...
Cathie Craigie (Cumbernauld and Kilsyth) (Lab)
Lab
That is the point that I was going to make. Anne McLaughlin’s suggestion is sensible and practical, but we could be accused of not having considered every pe...
Nigel Don (North East Scotland) (SNP)
SNP
I will take us back from that discussion, because we know what we are doing, and look at the papers that are before us. I commend Aberdeenshire Council for t...
The Convener
Lab
With an election coming up in May, the danger is that, whoever is the next transport minister—it may or may not be Keith Brown—there could be quite a hiatus ...