Meeting of the Parliament 17 February 2026 [Draft]
I may not use all of that time, Presiding Officer. I am not sure that I have a huge amount more to add beyond what I said in my opening speech, but I will reiterate that, if we do not progress with the bill, it will be a missed opportunity.
There is probably more consensus on the topic than some of the more extreme rhetoric might suggest. I know that there will always be those who think that the Government of the day is somehow overly secretive and corrupt and all the rest of that kind of stuff. That hyperbole is nonsense. I think that most of us know that it is nonsense. However, the current Government has been slow to act and it is regrettable that it has taken a member’s bill to try to move things on.
I think that there is consensus across the chamber that we need a regime that is fit for the 21st century—I think that that was the phrase that Mercedes Villalba used—and that the system that we have at the moment is not such a regime, whether that is in relation to the changing patterns around the outsourcing of public services, as was mentioned, and the scale of the data that is collected and the nature of that information, or whether that is in relation to the issues not just to do with our current use of AI but to do with what we will encounter as AI proliferates further through our society, which, again, will change the expectations and needs of the FOI regime.
In addition, I think that our cultural expectations as a society have been changed by the Covid-19 pandemic, among other things, and the whole inquiry process that came out of that. More people have reflected on, considered and changed their views on what information should be kept, and what information should not be allowed to be kept, about us as individuals and as communities.
What is the balance between transparency and confidentiality, and how can we have an FOI regime that ensures that the powerful are held accountable for the way in which they exercise their power? All those things have changed since the system was designed, and they will continue to change. That is why we need to enable the powers to adapt and continue to develop the FOI regime to be used more flexibly—and, I say again, to be used by Parliament, not just at a time when Government is ready. There will continue to be a tension between the urgency of action and the need to take time to consider all the details and issues that members have raised.
I close by saying again that, if this opportunity is missed and we are left with the expectation that a committee bill in session 7 is the vehicle for FOI reform, it must be taken forward with momentum. It will have to be a year 1 commitment, not a year 5 commitment, in the next session of the Scottish Parliament. I hope that the minister, in closing, will be able to give a clear commitment on behalf of his party. What will it be saying in its manifesto in a few weeks’ time about its commitments not only to legislate, if it is in government, but to do so on a cross-party basis across Parliament?