Examination of Witness (Questions 160-161)
28 MARCH 2006 MR
BARRY K WINETROBE
Q160 Chairman: The committee members
are very pleased that you have taken a great deal of interest
in our inquiry. Would you like to comment on any of the views
expressed by previous witnesses?
Mr Winetrobe: I do not think so.
You have had a very good range of witnesses for the purposes of
your inquiry, up to today, and that like perhaps people here and
in Scotland when we first read the Scotland Office's submissions,
we thought "this is a bit negative". Maybe it was not
quite so negative. I tend not so much to agree with the people
from the Scottish Parliament that actually they were more supportive
of these proposed changes than appeared at first glance. I think
it was possibly just that Westminster/Whitehall mindset and that
there was a fear, whether within the Scotland Office or perhaps
from other parts of the government machine of: do not have any
hostages to fortune; do not make any promises on process or practice
that might in any way potentially compromise the Government's
complete freedom to run its legislative programme as it sees fit
and feels is necessary. From their point of view, that is perfectly
understandable. Therefore, issues of a second stage at the Scottish
Parliament or things that might kick in at the very end of process
down here, close to Royal Assent, obviously are matters that everybody
recognised right from the very beginning were not going to be
very sympathetically looked at because that is just not a real
option. I look forward to reading your report. I think there is
great potential and optimism for some small steps to be undertaken
that will not shake the rafters of this place. As I say, to some
extent my interest in it is in what it says for the whole issue
of co-operation between Scotland and the United Kingdom, both
at government and at parliament level, that shows that when both
parliaments and both governments are all willing to look at something
objectively, there are ways in which things can be improved without
anybody winning or losing or giving ground or losing face, and
so on. To that extent, although it has been a horrible five years
in some respects about Sewel, it has been a very good learning
process for everybody in both places. I think the whole system
of governance in the UK has come out of it better. Depending on
what you suggest, the most important thing then is what the Government
and Parliament here decides to do with that. I think that gives
great hope for the future.
Q161 Chairman: Mr Winetrobe, thank
you very much for your evidence. That concludes our questions.
Before I declare the meeting closed, do you wish to say anything
in conclusion perhaps on areas not covered by our questioning?
Mr Winetrobe: No. I think we have
had a very interesting discussion, at least from my point of view.
Chairman: Thank you very much for your
evidence. That will be extremely useful when we compile our report.
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