Examination of Witnesses (Questions 320
- 321)
TUESDAY 14 SEPTEMBER 2004
MR RICHARD
ALLAN, MR
IAN SCOTTER,
MR JONATHAN
BLACKIE AND
MR ANDREW
CAMPBELL
Q320 Chairman: Do you think you will
be able to find one?
Mr Scotter: I will certainly go
back and look and find out if there are.
Q321 Mr Sanders: What role would
you expect special advisors to play in elected assemblies and
how useful are they likely to be as a means of bringing stakeholder
expertise into regional policy-making?
Mr Scotter: We see them as a very
important way to bring stakeholder expertise. The draft Bill sets
out a variety of ways in which stakeholders could be involved.
There is the co-opting them to commit to the review and monitoring
committee or its sub-committees, or taking on people, special
advisers, in various roles in order to bring particular expertise
to the work of the assembly either through the executive or through
the review and monitoring committees. So what we are offering,
what the Bill offers, is a framework under which assemblies can
decide what is the best way to bring stakeholder expertise into
their work and to pick up the ones which are suitable, firstly,
in general terms for the region and, secondly, suitable for a
particular issue within the region. So we will try to give the
assembly all the ways it should need to involve stakeholders.
Chairman: On that note, I thank you very
much for your evidence.
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