Meeting of the Parliament 22 April 2015
Before I start, Presiding Officer, I wonder whether you will indulge me, since this is my first opportunity to speak. I want to record a personal message of sympathy for the family of my friend Tom McCabe. He was a good friend and a good colleague.
I want to say something similar to what Cameron Buchanan said. At present, when a complaint comes in in respect of a member’s interests, the Commissioner for Ethical Standards in Public Life in Scotland conducts an in-depth investigation, and if a breach is found there is an automatic referral to the procurator fiscal. I have raised that issue in committee since the first session of Parliament, but this is the first time that I have brought it to the chamber. I am conscious that no matter how trivial the matter is, there is no discretion at the hand of the commissioner. As has been pointed out, since Parliament started in 1999, there has been almost no comment on matters that have been referred to the fiscal. In a political sense, that is a problem for members, because some people think that when someone is referred to the fiscal there is no smoke without fire. That is something that we should look at.
Just a few weeks ago, such a minor breach was brought to and dealt with by the Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee. That minor breach was investigated thoroughly by the commissioner, and because it was agreed to be a breach it was passed to the fiscal’s office, although no action was taken. Yet again, the fiscal’s time was wasted, in my view.
We have a commissioner who completely investigates all such matters—it is not the case that he sees them as trivial; if he finds on investigation that a breach has been committed he has to move it on—so I think that it would be much better to allow the commissioner, who is already doing that good work, to have discretion to deal with minor breaches as he does now, but to report directly to the Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee for sanctions. I am confident that the commissioner has the expertise and experience in that regard. The committee is fully supportive of the strongest possible system of standards, and my colleagues have adequately described that. In no way is the committee reducing accountability and transparency for the public. I support everything that has been said and the committee’s report.
I certainly do not want to weaken in any way the robust standards regime that we have. It speaks for itself. I do believe, however, that it is worth considering the matter and that we should ask the best people to look into it. For me, the best people are the commissioner and the Procurator Fiscal Service, who can give their considered opinions. There might be good reasons why the way in which we do things at present is the only way—I do not know. There may be a legal or administrative imperative whereby we would damage the system if we changed it in any way. If that is the case, I would not support the change, but I would certainly be grateful for the benefit of the knowledge of the commissioner and the Procurator Fiscal Service, and would ask them to consider the matter on behalf of Parliament.
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