Hansard

I thank my colleague Andy Wightman for his hard work on the bill.

I served as a councillor on Fife Council from 1995 until I was elected as an MSP in 2011. Many of my fellow MSPs share the experience of having been elected first as a local councillor, then later as an MSP. Most of us who have that experience have seen the relationship between local government and the Scottish Government at first hand and from both sides of the fence. We have seen the tensions that can arise when one political party is in government, and a different political party is in control in a local authority. We have formed our own perceptions of the strengths and weaknesses of our current system of local government, and of its relationship with central Government.

My constituency includes the town of Kirkcaldy. The first mention of its town council was in around 1582, and in 1644, it became a royal burgh. Therefore, it has a long tradition of local government. As a result of local government reorganisation in the 1970s, the town became part of the Kirkcaldy district in 1975. In 1996, Kirkcaldy District Council became part of Fife Council, through the 1990s reorganisation.

Burntisland is also in my constituency, and its history of local government is even longer than that of Kirkcaldy. It became a royal burgh in 1541, and its local government shared the same fate as Kirkcaldy, which shows the demise of local decision making. Local government does not stand still—it evolves over time. Part of that evolution is the relationship with central Government.

The bill has a European dimension, because it concerns a European charter. Kirkcaldy, which has a population of around 49,000, is twinned with Ingolstadt in Bavaria, which has a population of 127,000. Our respective civic leaders and community groups have been visiting one another since 1962. Burntisland is twinned with Flekkefjord in south-west Norway, which has a population of 9,000. That relationship began in 1946, so it is even older than that between Kirkcaldy and Ingolstadt. Both twin towns sit in local governance systems that are very different to those of Kirkcaldy and Burntisland. Such relationships remind us that other places approach local government differently; therefore, we must always ask ourselves whether we can learn from others and make improvements for ourselves.

I have reviewed the evidence that has been submitted to the Local Government and Communities Committee, and it seems as though we are already bound to comply with the charter, given that it is an international legal instrument. However, no means exist to ensure compliance, and it is not part of our domestic law. The UK Government expressed its support for the European charter by signing it in 2009. As I understand it, the bill would import the charter into Scots law, so it will have direct effect.

The Local Government and Communities Committee received submissions on the bill from a range of sources, including a number of our local authorities, the Faculty of Advocates, the Law Society of Scotland, COSLA and Reform Scotland. The evidence that was submitted to the committee revealed to me that incorporation of the European charter into Scots law has long been argued for by COSLA. COSLA was involved in drafting the charter back in the 1980s, and its 2014 commission on strengthening local democracy recommended incorporation into Scots law.

Beyond COSLA’s legitimate interest in the matter, in 1999, the consultative steering group on the Scottish Parliament argued for incorporation of the charter, and in 2019, when it published its 20th anniversary report, it expressed regret that that had not happened.

In 2015, the UK all-party parliamentary group on reform, decentralisation and devolution commissioned an inquiry to consider how devolution across the whole United Kingdom could be better achieved. The group’s final report recommended transposing the European Charter of Local Self-Government into primary legislation.

I was particularly encouraged that the Local Government and Communities Committee expressed in its stage 1 report that it does not expect the bill to be “disruptive”, and that it

“would act more as a spur for local and central government to cooperate effectively, to make better laws and policies, and to avoid conflict.”

If the Scottish Parliament can enact legislation that will improve relationships between local government and the Scottish Government, I am in favour of it in principle. I am pleased to note that the Scottish Government has expressed support for the bill.