Hansard

As convener of the Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee, I have the responsibility of lodging and speaking to motions seeking the Parliament’s agreement to the committee’s recommendation of a sanction when the committee has concluded that a breach of the code of conduct has occurred and that a sanction for that breach would be appropriate. The code of conduct sets out the rules that the Parliament has agreed should apply to all MSPs in carrying out their parliamentary duties. It also sets out the processes for enforcing the code in the event that a complaint is made about our compliance with the rules.

Over three meetings in December 2025, the committee considered a report submitted to it by the Commissioner for Ethical Standards in Public Life in Scotland following an investigation of a complaint about Ash Regan MSP. The complaint was that Ash Regan had breached section 9.1 of the code by disclosing details of her complaint or intention to complain about Maggie Chapman MSP prior to lodging a complaint with the commissioner. That was on the basis of a social media post in respect of a letter that Ash Regan sent to you, Presiding Officer, on 22 April 2025.

The committee considered carefully the commissioner’s report, representations by and on behalf of Ash Regan and the terms of the code of conduct. Full details of our consideration are set out in our report to the Parliament, which is referenced in the motion.

The committee was unanimous in its decisions and conclusions. In reaching its decision, the committee considered the terms of Ash Regan’s letter to the Presiding Officer, Ash Regan’s subsequent social media post, the commissioner’s report and representations made to both the commissioner and the committee by Ash Regan.

The committee was not persuaded by the proposition set forth by Ash Regan that she did not intend to make a complaint. The letter to the Presiding Officer includes statements such as “formally raising concerns” and

“respectfully request that this matter be considered by the relevant parliamentary authorities”.

The committee further noted that email correspondence to the Presiding Officer and to the clerks of the committee referenced a “formal complaint”. The committee considered that any objective reading of the letter, covering emails and social media post would be that there was, at the very least, an intention to make a complaint about the conduct of Maggie Chapman. For those reasons, the committee agreed with the commissioner’s conclusion that Ash Regan’s conduct in posting her letter to the Presiding Officer on social media constitutes a breach of section 9.1 of the code of conduct.

The purpose of the provision at section 9.1 of the code is to protect the integrity of the system for investigation and consideration of complaints about MSP conduct, which is a matter to which the effective conduct of the commissioner’s investigations and the position of all those involved in the complaints process are relevant.