Scottish Parliament to debate Holyrood report
MSPs will have the opportunity to comment on the building of the Scottish Parliament in a specially extended debate this afternoon.
Lord Fraser’s report into the building of the Scottish Parliament will ironically be one of the first debates to take place in the disputed building.
Four and a half hours have been set aside for the debate, which is likely to see strong criticism of the Executive from opposition parties, a robust defence, and calls for a radical reform of the civil service.
Ahead of the debate, there has been some controversy about the decision of First Minister Jack McConnell not to speak in the debate. His official spokesperson has repeatedly denied that he is running away from a confrontation, stating that Mr McConnell feels that he has already said enough on the subject.
Instead, the Finance Minister Andy Kerr will speak for the Executive.
The SNP’s deputy leader, and leader in the Scottish Parliament, Nicola Sturgeon will be in Inverness today for the opening of the SNP’s annual conference, so transport spokesman Fergus Ewing is expected to open for the SNP.
Aside from stringent criticism of the planning of the Scottish Parliament before the election of MSPs, he is expected to re-iterate his party’s calls for a truly devolved Scottish civil service, distinct from Whitehall control and fully accountable to the Scottish Executive.
He has tabled an amendment motion which in addition to the previous points, also calls for “a presumption in favour of disclosure of information in relation to the use of public money in public sector contracts and that civil servants’ advice to ministers is not protected by the 30-year rule, and calls upon the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body to take every possible step to ensure the recovery of any costs incurred as a result of negligence or breach of contract”.
Scottish Conservative leader David McLetchie has tabled an amendment to the debate regretting that Lord Fraser’s report “fails to place due emphasis on the principle of ministerial responsibility and accountability.”
He is expected to argue in the debate that whilst the report contains practical recommendations for future public procurement, “the evidence demonstrates that the whole sorry saga was a consequence of poor political decisions made at the outset and in particular the desire to press full steam ahead with no thought for the cost. That is the nub of the matter and in making a judgement to exonerate ministers from accusations of bad faith and deception, Lord Fraser has forgotten that ministerial responsibility goes way beyond this.”
“Our amendment seeks to restore this balance by giving ministerial responsibility its rightful place and I urge members to support it.”
