Seòmar agus comataidhean

The next item on our agenda is take evidence on the Scottish local authorities remuneration committee—SLARC—recommendations for councillors’ remuneration and expenses from two panels of witnesses. On our first panel we are joined in the room by Jane O’Donnell, who is chief executive of the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities; and by two former members of SLARC, David Heaney and Martin McElroy. We are also joined online by Angela Leitch, who is a former convener of SLARC. I welcome the witnesses to the meeting.

I invite Angela Leitch and Jane O’Donnell to begin by making short opening statements.

Thank you very much.

Thank you very much for that detail. Jane O’Donnell, do you want to come in on that?

I come back to Angela Leitch with a bit of a practical question. When you wrote to the cabinet secretary, you mentioned that SLARC completed its task with only six members rather than seven, which had been the original intention. I am interested to understand the reason for that and the impact that it might have had on the committee’s work.

Under the circumstances, you managed to do a good job, so thanks very much for that. Willie Coffey has some questions.

I think so, too. The final question was about the next steps and I think that Jane O’Donnell nailed it there when she talked about wanting the recommendations to be fulfilled.

I thank the witnesses so much for coming in, and thank Angela Leitch, too, for joining us online. The evidence has been very helpful.

I briefly suspend the meeting to allow for a changeover of witnesses.

We will now go online. Emma Roddick has a question.

Thank you. That is very helpful. Willie Coffey wants to come in on the same issue.

At the end of the day, however, remuneration is quite an important part of people’s considerations. Thank you for giving evidence this morning, cabinet secretary.

I briefly suspend the meeting to allow the cabinet secretary to leave the room before we move on to our final public agenda item.