Seòmar agus comataidhean

Good morning. I thoroughly enjoyed your report. I have a daft wee question about something that tweaked my interest. You referred to Moore, who used the term “bureaucratic entrepreneurship”. That struck me as quite the oxymoron. Before I ask my main questions, can you give me a bit more about what on earth he meant by that?

There is an idea, linked to empowerment and accountability, which was brought up earlier. When I was reading your report, I thought about the cultural hierarchy within the wider decision framework being underpinned by relative power bases, which vary, depending on the seniority and power base of the relevant minister. That relates to where that minister fits into Government and the power base of whoever is the ultimate accountable authority. It would be useful to hear your general reflections on how that power can inhibit decision making, particularly in a wider context when a decision requires to be made quickly, which, as we know, also affects the processes.

You point out that, if civil servants were seeking clarity, they would need to know that the issue was considerably more complex than it might initially have appeared. That is part of the challenge in getting value from our inquiry. We need to understand the culture and the extent to which such activity is prevalent. Frankly, given what you said about risk taking, it is easier to just come back with a paper. We are talking about civil servants here, because ministers will take advice and accept advice. The issue is about not just capacity but the skills base among civil servants—you made a comment about being agile earlier—and continual improvement, because this is very difficult.

That was a very fulsome answer.

I would like to hear from Malcolm Bennie, too. Feel free to comment on the GFIB as well, if you want to.

Good morning, everybody, and thank you for coming along. I know that my colleagues will have a lot of questions to ask, but I want to start at the centre. I was so struck, Adam, by your submission, which I know from my personal representation absolutely strikes a chord in the heart of the community. I point out, in particular, the issue around housing. How can you attract people if there is insufficient housing, too many flats and so on?

I was also struck by the disconnect with the submission from the Scottish Futures Trust, which identifies that a lot of good stuff is going on—a lot of good stuff is going on with the council, too. From a local community point of view, what would you like to happen that would ensure that you feel that you are genuinely at the heart of a community-centred just transition that can fan out with all the other good work that is going on? What would you like to see happen?

You have probably given me enough to go on. I want to bring in our other two witnesses, too, to get their reflections. Many initiatives have already been put on the record. We have talked about the flood prevention scheme, which I agree has very good comms. From the perspective of your respective agencies, what would you like to be done differently in order to square off the disconnect between the community’s perceptions, which have been so elegantly articulated, and the activity that is going on now, both in the short term and in the longer term?

There is a perception in Grangemouth, to which you have alluded, that the community bears the cost of the industry without getting the value of it. Some people hold the perception that the council does not give sufficient focus to that and that, inadvertently, its focus is on things that protect industry. They would argue that even the flood defences are about protecting industry rather than necessarily having the community at the heart of the project.

I have been aware of that perception since I was elected to represent the area. Has it changed? What active steps has the council taken to address it as part of the activities on a just transition? You are clearly aware of that perception.

Yes.

I have to fess up and say that I find the thread of John Mason’s questions very interesting—I do not know whether that is good news or not.

As I have been listening to all the questions, I have been thinking that, in general, the fulsome reports that have been provided are a very good thing. However, in our job of scrutiny as a committee, we are trying to manage and get oversight of different things. We have the initial, up-front estimates and then we have any revisions, where we are able to factor in actual spend plus the new estimates, then we have a final sum-up position, and then Daniel Johnson comes in and says, “Aye, but what about the year to date?”

When was the last time you thought about how you present these reports to the Finance and Public Administration Committee so that we are able to ask some of those questions? I appreciate that, with some of these questions, we are not really comparing eggs with eggs; we are throwing in bananas as well. It is about considering best practice in presenting public accounts. When was the last time that you reviewed what you do against what happens elsewhere? I fully accept that there are additional complexities around the fiscal framework, but do you routinely review what you are doing and ask whether you are acting from the point of view of giving maximum transparency, to enable the sort of questions that have come out today?

The committee can discuss that afterwards. It is reasonable for this committee to expect to get complex reports that include a summing up that the public might find accessible; there are enough of us here who would be comfortable reading something like that.

You were asked earlier about in-year budget pot switching—realignment, if you like. You commented on the fiscal framework. That ties in with the existing estimating processes. In your role as someone who sits above those processes, and given those variants, when did you last assess how effective your estimating processes are? What, if any, weaknesses have you highlighted and how will you address those? Because of the realignment, this must be about more than the fiscal framework. As the convener commented at the start, it is also connected to estimating.