Examination of Witnesses (Quesitons 1-19)
MR JACK
MCCONNELL
MSP
23 APRIL 2008
Q1 Chairman: Ladies and gentlemen,
before we begin may I ask everybody to turn their mobile phones
off or put them on silent?
Jack, thank you for coming today. This is an
innovation in the hearings that the Committee has held over the
years. In the previous Parliament, we expressed a view that when
somebody was appointed to an ambassadorial post or to be a high
commissioner, and did not come from the diplomatic service, we
should hold a hearing about that appointment, but events meant
that it was not possible to do so before the 2005 election. Given
that your appointment was announced such a long time in advance,
we have had an opportunity to bring in this innovation. As you
are probably aware, the Cabinet Office is currently considering
the question of appointments to public bodies. As a Committee,
we are of the view that appointments in the diplomatic service
should be included in that category.
We sent you a questionnaire and you very kindly
replied on 17 April. Some of the questions that we raise will
no doubt relate to those points. May I begin by asking you to
set the scene for the discussion by taking us through the sequence
of events leading up to the announcement by the Prime Minister
that you will be the next High Commissioner to Malawi? How did
that evolve?
Mr. McConnell: Thank you for the
opportunity to be here. It is a pleasure to be part of an innovation,
and I hope that what I am able to say is useful for the Committee
in every respect. This may be a useful experience for the Committee
as things move on in the future.
When filling in the questionnaire, I tried to
remember precise dates, but it was difficult to do so. I am pretty
certain that the initial conversation between the Prime Minister
and myself took place in July last year, when he put to me that
this would be an opportunity and a job in which I could serve
the Government and the country well. I thought about it for two
or three weeks and consulted a few colleagues privately. I indicated
to the Prime Minister in August that I would be honoured to accept
the position. We then discussed timing.
At that time, I was considering my position
in the Scottish Parliament and my future. I decided in early August
that I would resign as leader of the Labour party in Scotland
following the election result last year. I decided that I wanted
to make that position public in advance of the Scottish Parliament
resuming after the summer recess. There were some other discussions
between the Prime Minister and myself about a date on which there
would be an announcement. It was finally announced on 15 August.
That is what I recall. I am certain that there would have been
discussions in Whitehall at the time, given the need for such
discussions, but I was not party to them.
Q2 Chairman: Are you aware of anybody
else being considered for the position before the Prime Minister
spoke to you?
Mr. McConnell: No, I am not.
Q3 Chairman: Are you aware of any
process that took place before you were approached?
Mr. McConnell: No. I never
asked about process. I assumed, from what the Prime Minister said
to me at the time, that the reasons why I was being asked to consider
the position were, first, my Government experience, and secondly,
my interest in Malawi. He has a passionate interest in Africa—I
knew that obviously—and he felt that I could do a job for
the Government there. What other considerations he had, or which
other people may or may not have come into his mind, are not things
about which I would have asked him at the time.
Q4 Chairman: We will come on to specific
questions about Malawi, but on the general point of appointment
processes, do you think that it is right that there is this kind
of informal arrangement whereby—whoever the individual,
I am not commenting on your appointment—the Prime Minister
approaches someone and says, "Would you like to have a job
for the next x number of years?", and the job is not advertised
or open to any formal process?
Mr. McConnell: The Government
have a pretty open policy of sometimes recruiting people with
appropriate skills and experience into senior posts in the civil
service or the diplomatic service. That is a stated policy of
theirs. They have the right to do that under the diplomatic orders
from 1991, and successive Prime Ministers have chosen to do so.
It is not for me to express an opinion as to whether they should
follow the same process at all times. I would imagine that from
time to time they choose different processes to select people
for those kinds of positions.
Q5 Chairman: You are not the first
active politician who has been appointed as an ambassador or a
high commissioner. We all know about Peter Jay, and under a Conservative
Government there was Alastair Goodlad, and then Paul Boateng and
Helen Liddell from the last Cabinet before the 2005 election.
There are others who went off to serve, even during the Wilson
Government. Do the Foreign Office need to develop some formal
criteria to govern how appointments of non-diplomats are made?
Mr. McConnell: I am not sure that
I have the experience to express an opinion on that. There may
not be written criteria for such appointments, but I imagine that
the kind of criteria considered either by a Prime Minister—or
for that matter by the Cabinet Secretary or the head of the Foreign
Office—in any discussions about such an appointment would
be fairly obvious, and would include someone's experience, their
personality, the nature of the position and the challenges that
are coming up. I do not feel qualified at the moment to express
an opinion as to whether or not there should be criteria, and
what those criteria might be.
Q6 Ms Stuart: Let me venture a prediction.
The Foreign Office has made a commitment to bring more and more
outsiders in, but whenever they do so there is an application
process, because no one would suggest that it is obvious that
they have the necessary skills. If we make non-political appointments
like that, there will have to be a process of defining skills.
The Committee has just conducted an inquiry on the Overseas Territories
in which people said that when governors were appointed they did
not know what their skills were. I think that there will be a
greater process of accountability. Given what you have just gone
through with your appointment, you must have some idea of what
processes it would be appropriate to look at. We are into new
territory, so it is your chance to set the scene and explain how
you think greater accountability might take shape.
Mr. McConnell: I understand that
point. I have had similar discussions in the Scottish Parliament
over the past few years, and I understand the Committee's interest
in this issue. I am also aware that inside the civil service,
and certainly inside the diplomatic service, appointments are
made to most positions following an indication of interest either
from people at a more junior level or from individuals who want
to move across. However, many, many appointments are made inside
the civil and diplomatic services by the most senior manager identifying
someone whom they wish to take on, and recruiting them into that
position. That happens across the civil service, in every department.
I understand the desire for criteria, but the current absence
of criteria is not necessarily inconsistent with the way in which
appointments are made in the civil service and the diplomatic
service at the moment.
Q7 Ms Stuart: I am sure that there
are criteria in the civil service—I would be extremely surprised
if that were not the case. However, the logic of your thought—you
say that you are content with appointments without criteria—almost
suggests an act of political patronage. That is the way he picks
his Cabinet Ministers; in a Cabinet reshuffle, you do not have
to recruit people. The logic would only work if your appointment
fell with that Administration, and a new, incoming Administration
chose a new high commissioner to a country. However, that is not
the case, is it? You have a fixed term.
Mr. McConnell: There would be
a contract with a term of appointment, that is certainly true.
Can I just make clear my view on the criteria? It is not that
I do not think that there should be criteria; I do not have a
view on whether there should be criteria. I do not think that
it is really for me to comment—it is entirely for the Committee
and the Government to exchange views on that matter.
Q8 Sir John Stanley: Mr. McConnell,
I think your appointment breaks new ground in one respect. I am
trying to do this from memory, but as I recall all the previous
political appointments to diplomatic posts have all been in what
might broadly be described as major countries: John Freeman to
India, Sir Christopher Soames to Paris, Peter Jay to Washington,
Alastair Goodlad and Helen Liddell to Australia, and Paul Boateng
to South Africa. Yours, if I recall correctly, is the very first
appointment to a country, which—with the greatest respect
to Malawi—would not describe itself as a major country in
political, economic and strategic terms. Is this a new policy,
as far as the present Government are concerned? Is this going
to open the way to a significantly larger number of diplomatic
appointments being filled politically? If that was the case, I
think that there would be rising concern in the professional diplomatic
service about that particular trend. Would you like to respond?
Mr. McConnell: I have not heard,
privately or publicly, any suggestion that that would be the case.
I understand the fact that this appointment is—you are right—slightly
different from previous appointments, in terms of the nature of
the posting, but at no time has there been any public hint—or
privately, in discussion with the Prime Minister—that it
would lead to a significant number of, or even any, additional
appointments beyond what has been the norm or the accepted number
in the past. If you look back through all those appointments,
the number of former politicians who have been appointed either
to head of mission posts or governorships has pretty much been
one or two in each Administration. I do not think it ever went
above two, if we look back over the past 40 years. My understanding
is that the term of office for at least one of the incumbents
will end next year, and therefore that the general position of
two will still be in place, so I do not think that there is any
suggestion that there would be an increase. However, that is not
something on which I feel able to be definitive. You would really
have to ask the Government about that matter.
Q9 Sir John Stanley: It is the case
that diplomatic posts have been offered as consolation prizes,
if I may put it like that, to individuals who have suffered road
blocks or disappointments in their career in this country, and
that is certainly true of an appointment to which I previously
referred: Alastair Goodland's appointment as High Commissioner
to Australia followed circumstances in which he was expected to
become a commissioner in Brussels but that did not happen. Do
you think that your appointment is a consolation prize?
Mr. McConnell: I do not think
so, and I certainly hope that no one would view it that way. I
do not think that it is viewed that way in Malawi. If the Prime
Minister wanted to offer me a consolation prize for last year's
election result or if I was looking for one, there are other,
less serious jobs that might have been suggested, if I may put
it that way. The High Commissioner's job in Malawi is to represent
this country in one of the 10 poorest countries in the world.
It is a serious job and I take it very seriously. I do not view
it as a consolation prize, I do not think that the Prime Minister
did so and I certainly do not think that the Government of Malawi
do.
Q10 Mr. Keetch: May I follow up the
point that Gisela Stuart made about the political nature of your
appointment and the consequences of a change of Government here?
If there had been a general election last year and if a Liberal
Democrat or Conservative Government had come in, the Foreign Secretary
of the day might not have wanted you to go to Malawi. If there
is a change of Government at Westminster during your term of office,
is there any provision in your contract for the incoming Foreign
Secretary to be able to remove you, or would you find it uncomfortable
being in such a situation in Malawi with another party in power
in Westminster?
Mr. McConnell: I cannot imagine
circumstances in which that situation would become uncomfortable,
but if it did so, either for the Foreign Secretary or for me,
there are ways in which those things can be discussed in the diplomatic
service and the Foreign Office. However, I cannot imagine circumstances
in which that would be the case. Obviously, I speak regularly
with colleagues in the Government and I have spoken regularly
with my future colleagues in the Foreign Office since the announcement
last August. I have also spoken to colleagues at a senior level
in other parties about the nature of the job, their ambitions
for Africa and their interests in Malawi, so I do not anticipate
any problems with that whatsoever.
Q11 Mr. Keetch: Although it is possibly
not the case in relation to the high commissionership in Malawi,
had you been appointed to NATO, the UN or to one of the more major
posts that we discussed earlier, as a point of principle there
could well be a conflict of interest if someone of one political
colour is appointed if the colour of the Government back in the
UK changed. Do you recognise that that could be the case?
Mr. McConnell: I recognise that
that could be an issue, but I also think that it would be a pretty
bad situation if someone outside the diplomatic service were appointed
to those positions who was not aware of the sensitivity of those
circumstances and was not able to deal with them. I would imagine
that anyone who is appointed to those positions, whether Chris
Patten in Hong Kong in 1992 or me in Malawi in 2009, would be
perfectly able to make judgments about who they can and cannot
work with. You do not take on a position like this without being
serious about it and being willing to work with the Government
of the day, and I am.
Q12 Sandra Osborne: In relation to
Sir John's point about this particular country not being one of
the big ones, as you and I both know, Malawi has strong historic
links with Scotland, through our colonial past, and, even today,
through the Church of Scotland. Do you think that that had any
bearing on the Prime Minister's decision to appoint you, in addition
to your own experience in Malawi?
We already have a different Administration in
the Scottish Parliament from the UK Government. As I understand
it, the Malawi links and the Malawi project took place on a cross-party
basis and the present SNP Administration intend to continue with
that. Do you see any problems for your role in dealing with the
current SNP-led Executive?
Mr. McConnell: I do not want to
put words in the Prime Minister's mouth, but obviously he would
not have offered me this position if it were not for that development—the
renewal of that link with Malawi over the last three years—and
had it not been successful. He is an admirer of what we did and
what we continue to do in Scotland in the link with Malawi. He
raised that with me at the time. He feels that the UK Government
should support that link and that this is a way of doing so. As
well as representing the UK's interests in Malawi, there would
be an opportunity through the High Commission to provide continuity
of support to the Scotland-Malawi link.
On the second point, one of the remarkable features
of the renewal of the Scotland-Malawi link has been its all-party
nature. The Conservative, Ted Brocklebank in the Scottish Parliament
describes the Malawi link as the best thing that the Scottish
Parliament has done since 1999. He may not think that the Scottish
Parliament has done many other good things, but members of all
parties have been very supportive of and active in pursuing the
link.
Since last August, I think that I have shown
an ability to work with the new Ministers on this link, which
perhaps relates to the question about working with different Administrations
in the UK. I work closely with the new Minister with responsibility,
Linda Fabiani. I have even had the pleasure of a discussion with
the new First Minister on the topic of Malawi. I work with the
other parties in the Scottish Parliament as well as with my own
party. On this issue, it has been possible to be non-partisan,
non-party political and to show that the link, in many ways, is
about the people of Scotland and Malawi, rather than necessarily
about the Government.
Q13 Mr. Purchase: To follow up on
that, Mr. McConnell, most political parties have a number of factions
that, from time to time, provide troublesome episodes. You were
general secretary of the Scottish Labour party at one point. Did
you ever have a problem carrying out an instruction with which
perhaps you did not agree? You might get a good many from here
that you do not agree with, but it would be interesting to know
how you dealt with that at a personal and political level.
Mr. McConnell: I am sure that
the Committee will have some information on my background. Most
recently, I have been in charge of my own destiny. When I was
First Minister, I was the boss, and therefore I could direct things.
Prior to that I spent two and a half years as a member of the
Cabinet, working under Donald Dewar, whom I greatly admired, although
we did not always agree. I was his Finance Minister and I carried
out his wishes—working under Henry McLeish, despite the
fact that he and I had hotly contested an election for the position
and I had lost. I also worked as Education, Europe and External
Affairs Minister for Henry McLeish; I think that everyone would
say that I did so successfully.
Prior to that, as general secretary of the Scottish
Labour party, at times I was able to take executive action under
my own steam, but at other times an executive committee or the
general secretary of the party in the UK would make the decision.
Prior to that, I was a mathematics teacher and my principal teacher
set the tone for the business of the department, and I did what
I had to do. So I am perfectly able and I am looking forward to
this position. I am perfectly able to be Britain's representative
in Malawi, be high commissioner, run the office and be in charge
there, but I am also entirely capable of working under the direction
of the Foreign Secretary and the Foreign Office, which would be
in overall control of the direction of travel.
Mr. Purchase: Thank you.
Q14 Mr. Hamilton: Apart from your
well-publicised knowledge of Malawi, what personal qualities will
you bring to the post of High Commissioner?
Mr. McConnell: I hope that I would
bring my experience first of all. That would be not only as First
Minister of Scotland, but previously as the Minister responsible
for external relations under both Donald Dewar and Henry McLeish.
In all those positions over eight years, I had extensive contact
with embassies and high commissions abroad, and I probably dealt
with more than half the British embassies in the European Union.
I dealt with the Canadian High Commission, the Washington Embassy,
consulates elsewhere in the US, the Embassy in China, the High
Commissions in Australia, South Africa, Malawi and elsewhere.
I have experience and knowledge about how Britain is represented
overseas. Despite having represented the devolved Government,
I have an ability to work with those representatives in a flexible,
positive and constructive manner. I have experience of leadership
and of Malawi that I would bring to the job, and I hope that I
would also bring a personality and style that would be good for
the British Government, good for Britain and good for Malawi.
I have a constructive, honest relationship with the Malawi Government
that has never caused any of us any difficulties but has in many
ways been helpful for both countries.
Q15 Mr. Hamilton: We will explore
your knowledge of Malawi a little later, but if this had been
an open competition for the job, how would you have pitched your
bid for it, apart from the points that you have just made about
your obvious experience and connections? What else would you throw
into the ring?
Mr. McConnell: Perhaps I could
go back to Sir John's point about the comparison between the posting
in Malawi and postings elsewhere. If I had applied for this job,
I think that in the interview I would have brought a knowledge
of Malawi, an enthusiasm for the position and a desire to throw
myself into it with energy and determination, that might have
been a bit different from many others. I can honestly say that
I am excited about the prospect of taking on this role. For someone
who has previously been in a senior political position, with a
variety of life experiences, coming into this kind of position
is a bit different and unique, and it would be noticed in that
respect. Therefore, I would be very effective in the role in Malawi
as a result.
Q16 Mr. Hamilton: British diplomats
and the diplomatic service are well recognised and well known
for being entirely politically impartial. You are still a member
of the Scottish Parliament. When will you resign your post as
an MSP? I know that we have touched on this already, but how will
you reassure people who might believe that you will be politically
partial because of your previous role and experience?
Mr. McConnell: On the first point,
I have not yet agreed a starting date with the FCO. As announced
by the Prime Minister last August, it would be some time after
January next year. Obviously, that decision would come before
any decision to leave the Scottish Parliament. On the point of
political impartiality, it has not been easy to be, at least to
some extent, politically impartial in the new environment in Scotland
over the last 10 months. I have many opinions about what is going
on here and there, but I think that most observers of the political
scene in Scotland over the last 10 months would say that I have
managed consistently from 15 August last year to take a step back
from party politics and to work with people from different parties
on issues that I care about—not only Malawi but one or two
other issues as well—and to try to build bridges.
I have also had appropriate conversations with
the Conservative Front-Bench International Development spokespeople
about Malawi and about their views. I also had considerable discussions
with Sir Menzies when he was leader of the Liberal Democrats,
which is one of the reasons he is not here today, so I think I
have made a pretty clear effort since last August to be as non-partisan
as possible and that is how I wanted it to be.
Q17 Mr. Hamilton: You have made clear
a lot of the skills and abilities that you will bring to the post,
but clearly, the skills sets that career diplomats have are different
to yours—they must be. Have you made any arrangements with
the FCO to learn some of the skills that you will need as a diplomat,
which you may not have already acquired through your experience
as First Minister and in party politics?
Mr. McConnell: Yes, I have. To
give you an example, it is planned that whenever we set a date
for me to start in Malawi I will spend a period in advance of
that shadowing an existing High Commissioner in a similar sub-Saharan
African country. A lot of thought has been given to this, both
by them and by me.
Q18 Mr. Hamilton: Will some of the
training, or some of the skill acquiring that you will need to
do, happen after you take up the post? Is that how the Foreign
Office works, or would it expect you to undergo a lot of the training
before you take up the post and then be left to get on with the
job?
Mr. McConnell: I think the most
important elements would take place beforehand.
Q19 Mr. Horam: Why do you want to
carry on as an MSP?
Mr. McConnell: I think in any
walk of life—not only in politics, but in business and in
other organisations—if you have been in the central leadership
position of any organisation it is difficult for your successors,
and probably also for yourself, if you hang around too long. That
is why people who have chaired the board or been chief executive
of a major company do not then become deputy chief executive or
a member of the board and it is why senior politicians move on
as well. I think that is right. I have tried not to be a constant
presence looking over the shoulder of Alex Salmond, whether I
agree or disagree with what he is doing.
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