Yes. I have a number of observations to make, which I would welcome clarification on. The first is about confidentiality clauses. Clearly, there is an issue about the growing use of confidentiality clauses in recent years by the Scottish Government, particularly in the NHS. The Cabinet Secretary for Health and Wellbeing has finally acted to stop the use of those clauses, but that applies only to the NHS.
Confidentially clauses are used throughout the public sector. I will give some figures. Since 2007 the police have used 203 compromise agreements at a cost of £2 million; Scottish Government directorates had 173 such arrangements at a cost of £3.5 million; and local authorities had more than 10,000 at a cost of £32 million. I would be interested know whether the Government’s intention is to apply the rules about confidentiality clauses to those bodies or simply to the NHS.
The Scottish Government letter to the chief executives of Scottish public bodies has, in annex E, a list of the bodies that are covered by the revised reporting arrangements, which includes the Scottish Police Authority and the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service, but not Police Scotland, the universities—which have used confidentiality clauses widely—or the Scottish Government itself and its direct agencies.
There is an issue in the guidance around the difference between
“voluntary resignation secured by a financial consideration”
and a settlement arrangement. On page 3 of the letter, paragraph 1, which starts
“The proposed process is as follows”,
has a sentence further down that is italicised within brackets and which says:
“(N.B. These materials may also be used to submit cases for voluntary resignation secured by a financial consideration”—
that is, paying somebody off to retire—
“however the reporting arrangements do not apply to voluntary resignation).”
The unnumbered paragraph after paragraph 7 states that
“voluntary resignation with a financial consideration ... must be approved”,
but it does not look like—it is difficult to be clear about this from how it is written—such cases have to be reported to Parliament. The next paragraph states that they should be reported to Parliament only “as required”.
Settlement agreements now have to be reported to Parliament, but it seems that voluntary resignations with a pay-off do not have to be reported to Parliament. That strikes me as a bit odd, to put it mildly. I would like further clarification on all my points, if that is possible.
11:45