Hansard

As members have explained, this has been a long and twisting road. I am afraid that I have not been able to follow every turn—I am not on the Finance Committee—but I am pleased at the destination at which we have arrived.

When the original model was proposed, I had two worries about it. First, although the theory was that we would have Government forecasts on which the commission would then comment, it seemed as though SFC members were to act more as advisers to the Government, and there was to be constant interaction during the process. That may have meant that it had influence, but it also reduced its independence. That was a flaw in the model.

The more fundamental flaw was the commission not being involved in the forecasts. We were told that there is not a single fiscal commission anywhere that looks only at official Government forecasts, so that needed to be sorted out.

David Bell made an interesting comment about why that was necessary:

“I think it is essential that the forecasting is done outside Government, then you will know if they are wrong, which is probably going to be true, they will be honestly wrong rather than dishonestly wrong.”

I suppose that a more neutral way of putting that is that Governments tend to indulge in optimism bias. Therefore, I am pleased that the commission will now have an enhanced role. It is going to be reviewed—that is good—and that there can also be external evaluation of the commission’s work. Perhaps we can have a mechanism to do evaluation through local or international experts, as the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development recommends.

Beyond that, I am slightly worried about the overemphasis on checking, which we still hear from the cabinet secretary. I may have it wrong, but it appears that forecasters will be appointed and the SFC members will check them, which seems to me to be rather overengineered. I was also slightly surprised to hear that the Scottish Government will have its current forecasting capacity checking the SFC. That departs from the OBR model, so we need to keep an eye on it. One reason for that is that there will be increased expenditure; if all that capacity still exists in the Scottish Government and there is now to be extra capacity in the SFC, that will have financial implications.

Tax will be critical, but the commission will also have a role in relation to the new social security powers. The main issue that could be controversial between the two Governments in the next five years relates to spillover effects. The cabinet secretary pointed out in one or another of his committee appearances that information from the OBR and SFC would be helpful in resolving any controversies on those.

John Mason said that he is not excited by Jackie Baillie’s amendment and claimed that none of us is, but it is an important amendment. I hope that it will be revisited in due course. Many European countries have one or another of the responsibilities that are referred to in it.

I am particularly interested in an assessment of the long-term sustainability of the public finances. It is not one of Audit Scotland’s functions to project five years ahead what we know about policies and tax. The cabinet secretary says that I and everyone else can hold him to account on that, but we cannot. We do not have that information unless we have experts projecting over five years, as the OBR does. One of the problems is that there is almost a prejudice against the OBR among some members of the Parliament. The OBR produces good reports on financial sustainability five years ahead; I do not see why the Scottish Fiscal Commission should not perform the same function.

Although I welcome the changes that have been made in the bill, I hope that it is not the end of the process. I am sure that members who are coming back after the election will keep a close watch from inside the Parliament. I—and, no doubt, Gavin Brown—will keep a close watch from outside.