Examination of Witnesses (Questions 1-19)
SIR KENNETH
CALMAN, MR
JIM GALLAGHER
AND MR
DAVID MIDDLETON
11 JUNE 2008
Q1 Chairman: Good morning, I would like
to welcome the witnesses to our session; perhaps you could introduce
yourselves for the record.
Sir Kenneth Calman: My name is
Kenneth Calman, I am Chairman of the Commission on Scottish Devolution.
My colleagues are David Middleton and Jim Gallagher, one from
the Scotland Office and the other from the Ministry of Justice.
Q2 Chairman: Before we start on the
detailed questions would you like to make any opening remarks?
Sir Kenneth Calman: Just a few
if I may. First of all, thank you very much for inviting me. The
Commission is beginning its work, it is about two months into
it and I will be happy to return at any time should you wish to
meet me again. You will be pretty clear about the remit which
came from a debate in the Scottish Parliament on 6 December last
year. I was appointed on 25 March and we have had a couple of
meetings of the Commission since. We are an independent commission
reporting to the Scottish Parliament and the UK Government. We
will be meeting on a monthly basis but with a lot of work going
on, not surprisingly, in between, usually in the form of task
groups and, in the very near future, taking evidence in a wider
way across Scotland. We have as a Commission gelled very well
over the last couple of meetings. We have now five task groups
looking at particular issues which we can go into should you wish
me to, and they again are working quite hard. One of the major
issues for us is engagement and how we can engage with the public
in Scotland, and we have got a number of ways in which we can
do that, so again I can discuss it with you should you wish me
to say anything further. Consultation therefore will be quite
important. We have a group looking at the principles, on what
basis will we make decisions; we have a group looking at functions,
devolved and reserved; we have a group looking at intergovernmental
relations and an important group on financial accountability.
That group has just been set up, indeed the first press release
is out this morning in relation to the membership and composition
of that group. These groups we think are going to be important
but, clearly, part of the function is to get evidence and take
evidence in from the wider public in Scotland and specific bodies.
I have already written out to organisations, we have a website,
people contact us should they wish to do so and we look forward
to getting that evidence in. The timescale is that we hope we
will have an interim report by the end of this calendar year,
that will define the broad themes and remit, and then beyond that
the report will conclude some time in 2009, the exact date is
not clear until we see just how much work is required to be done.
Perhaps I could stop there?
Q3 Mr Walker: Very quickly, we have
got the make-up of the Commission here in front of us and there
is a number of the great and the good on it. It seems very Scottish-centric;
I represent an English seat in Broxbourne but who is representing
my constituents' interests on this Commission because my constituents
have a view on Scottish independence as much as people in Scotland
do to be perfectly honest.
Sir Kenneth Calman: That is a
helpful point. We are not considering Scottish independence, which
is quite an important point, this is a commission looking at the
Scottish Parliament and devolution.
Q4 Mr Walker: Or devolution, whatever.
Sir Kenneth Calman: For me it
is quite an important distinction, which may come up in other
questions; I just want to clarify that first of all. The answer
is that we will be taking evidence from within the UK as well
as within Scotland and many of the task groups we set up will
have people outwith Scotland being very much part of that, but
the remit is about the Scottish Parliament which is why the composition
is as it is.
Mr Walker: Again, I just want to come
back to this because you cannot separate Scotland from England
at the moment bearing in mind we have the Barnett formula and
large sums of money are sent to Scotland, and some Scottish Members
of Parliament might argue that large sums of money are sent down
to England, but that is a debate for another time.
Mr MacNeil: Correct, you are learning.
Mr Walker: I am surprised, to be perfectly
honest, that it is so Scottish-centric this list, and dare I say
a little disappointed, but I shall allow the Chairman to move
us along now.
Q5 Chairman: Are you satisfied with
the terms of reference the Commission has been given?
Sir Kenneth Calman: Yes, we are,
I think because we conceive them as fairly broad terms of reference.
They are about the Scottish Parliament, they are about reviewing
how it has worked over the last 10 years, they are about looking
ahead to whether the devolutionary settlement should change and
widen, for example, and it covers financial accountability issues
which Mr Walker raised. It is therefore a pretty broad remit and
within that we can cover quite a lot of the issues which you and
others will raise.
Q6 Chairman: Can you, for the satisfaction
of my friend here, tell us that you will be consulting some people
from England as well?
Sir Kenneth Calman: Absolutely,
there is no question about that. Indeed, one of the things which
will be very important will be to get a view from outside Scotland.
Q7 Chairman: Particularly, of course,
you need to consult the Members more because we have only one
representation there in Scotland.
Sir Kenneth Calman: Absolutely,
yes.
Mr Walker: Funnily enough, Chairman,
we have literally dozens of Scots representing English seats.
It is strange that, is it not? How many English people get invited
up to Scotland but we are very accommodating with Scottish politicians
who want to represent English seats.
Chairman: Charles, you are telling us
that there are more Scots representing seats in the House of Commons.
Q8 Mr Walker: I am making mischief,
Chairman, and I must stop.
Sir Kenneth Calman: The answer
is that we will be consulting widely and we have already written
to the First Minister and got a helpful response from him.
Q9 Mr Devine: You are talking about
consulting widely and you are going to consult organisations;
how are you going to do that consultation? You mentioned websites
and you mentioned various other things but what short, medium
and long-term strategy do you have and, in fairness, who are the
organisations? In fairness, Charles does raise a legitimate point
in as much as people in the United Kingdom should have an input
into this debate.
Sir Kenneth Calman: I have agreed
with that. First of all, I have written to over 200 organisations
already; some of these are Scottish, some of these are wider than
that, and we are beginning to get responses in.
Q10 Mr Devine: Like whom? Trade unions?
Sir Kenneth Calman: Yes.
Q11 Mr Devine: Community groups?
Sir Kenneth Calman: Yes. I can
give you the list if you would like.
Q12 Chairman: Can you tell us then,
when you say that you have written to 200 organisations are there
any ethnic minority organisations amongst them?
Sir Kenneth Calman: I am sure
there are. I will get the list shortly but it is on the website;
I thought you would have read it all. It is all available. Issue
one, if I may put it that way, is a quick letter out to a wide
range of organisations to get initial feedback, and we are beginning
to get that. Issue two is to set up a much wider range of consultation,
partly to be seen around the country, so we will visit places
around the countryside—Stornoway, Irvine, there are good
places to go to—and meet people. What we wanted to do however
was to have a slightly clearer view of the kinds of questions,
and that would be exactly the same in English terms, simply to
say "Talk to us" is one way in which that could be done
but the second way is to be much clearer and much more focused
about the kinds of questions, so there is a big strategy to take
this out across Scotland and beyond.
Q13 David Mundell: How are you going
to ensure that you get a representative sample of views because
you will be conscious of the so-called National Conversation.
It has a website and the people who email it tend to be the same
people who email our Scottish national newspapers during the middle
of the night and are not necessarily people whom one would find
representative of people in Scotland.
Sir Kenneth Calman: First of all,
as far as the National Conversation is concerned, I certainly
found it a very useful document and one which we will certainly
use, particularly the bit in relation to devolution, it is really
quite helpful. We are very conscious of the blogs and the kind
of information that comes through that, but they represent a legitimate
position and so we will read that. What we would like to do is
say "do not just tell us about this Commission but try and
focus it a little bit more so that we have actually got some things
to answer". Similarly, as we go around the country taking
evidence it will have to come from either specific groups which
we might do—local trades unions, local workforces for example—and
have open meetings too. It is a combination of all of that; we
would like to know what people think; it is actually quite important.
Q14 Ms Clark: We are obviously taking
evidence from you today but how are you planning on taking evidence
from Members of Parliament, because obviously if you like we are
the other half of the picture because we represent constituents
in Scotland and have responsibilities for a wide range of matters
at the moment. How are you going to structure that?
Sir Kenneth Calman: First of all
it is very nice to meet my MP. We will do that in several ways,
both in the Scottish Parliament and in the Westminster Parliament,
which is why I began by saying we would be delighted to come back
again. We want to do that, again with a slightly more focused
range of questions that you can look at and give us some advice
on. The relationship between the Scottish Parliament and Westminster
is important; indeed, one of the tasks that I did not mention
is one which Jim Wallace will chair, looking at intergovernmental
relations, and your input into that will be very helpful.
Q15 Mr Devine: Can I ask one question?
I am assuming with the 200 organisations and bodies that you have
written to, you have written to the Scottish Affairs Select Committee?
Sir Kenneth Calman: We will do
that, yes. This was a quick letter out to say we are here.
Q16 Mr Davidson: That is a "No"
is it?
Mr Gallagher: The answer is "No"
to that, yes.
Sir Kenneth Calman: The answer
probably is "No" but we will be very happy to write
to you.
Q17 David Mundell: Can you expand
again on the five "task groups" on functions, principles,
engagement, financial accountability and institutional arrangements?
How do they relate to the totality of the terms of reference,
what will each of those groups be doing and how will the main
Commission relate to the groups?
Sir Kenneth Calman: We realised
early on that the people involved with the Commission were fairly
busy and, therefore, to have weekly meetings was not going to
be all that helpful. What we thought we would do is have long
meetings about a month apart and in between a lot of work could
be done, and that work could be done through a series of task
groups. These are first of all fairly loosely constructed, in
other words any member of the Commission can go to any task group
if they wish and, secondly, some of them—the financial one
is a good example—will have external members, not members
of the Commission. We want to, as we develop, continue to include
and encourage people from outside. Of the five groups, first of
all the principles one was really the beginnings of a debate that
we were having ourselves about if we were to recommend changes,
whatever these changes are, on what principles would we base them,
so that is that group. The second group is on engagement and indeed
on the website later on today you will see the way in which they
have developed that further and, as I mentioned before, that will
be in terms of contacting people around Scotland and England and
visits et cetera. The functions group, which is chaired by Professor
Sir David Edward, will be looking in detail at the Scotland Act
Schedule 5, what is reserved and what is not reserved, and to
look at that in detail to see if there were any changes in the
light of experience that might change. The financial accountability
one, chaired by Shonaig Macpherson, will have an expert advisory
group related to that, an independent expert advisory group, chaired
by Professor Anton Muscatelli, who is currently the Principal
at Herriot-Watt University, with a distinguished panel of external
economists and financial people who will help the debate. That
financial debate we think is quite an important part of the Commission's
work. It will be broadly based and I have no doubt we will get
questions raised about all sorts of financial issues over the
next few months. Then the last one is with Jim Wallace, looking
at the intergovernmental relationships, how do the Westminster
and Holyrood Parliaments interact; the interactions with Europe,
for example, are obviously quite important and as part of that,
quite clearly, the Scottish Affairs Committee and Members of Parliament
here will be very important for that function.
Q18 David Mundell: Just on that particular
point, what level of engagement have you got with the Scottish
Government because clearly they would be an important contributor
to that level of discussion, of whatever political persuasion?
Sir Kenneth Calman: I agree. I
have written to the First Minister, I have got a helpful letter
back, I will want to follow that up because their experience over
the last year has actually been really quite interesting in terms
of how things have developed and we would like to tap into that
expertise.
Q19 David Mundell: In terms of the
further workings of the Commission, will further groups develop
on an ad hoc basis?
Sir Kenneth Calman: We have added
a task group every time we have met and as things develop we can
see how that will need to be taken forward. I do not know what
the next one will be but it helps us to work because people can
get away in smaller meetings, collect evidence and bring it back
to our main Commission meetings. That is the process.
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