Education and Skills Committee

Meeting date: Wednesday, June 15, 2016

Official Report 321KB pdf

Convener

The second item on the agenda is the most important one: the choice of convener.

The procedure is explained in paper 2. The Parliament has agreed that only members of the Scottish National Party are eligible for nomination as convener of the committee. I understand that James Dornan is the party’s nominee for the post. Do we agree to choose him as our convener?

Members indicated agreement.

James Dornan was chosen as convener.

In that case, James, congratulations. I will vacate the chair and hand over to you for the remainder of the meeting.

Thank you, Colin. I thank all the members of the committee for agreeing my nomination as convener of the Education and Skills Committee. I look forward to working with them all in this role and to working well collectively on the important subjects that we will need to address over the next five years.

I pay tribute to my predecessor in the role, Stewart Maxwell. He was and is a close friend and colleague of mine and I had the pleasure of working for him for a number of years, so I know how committed he was to education. As a substitute member of the Education and Culture Committee, I saw the good job that he did as convener. I have big shoes to fill in that role. I also thank all the other members of the predecessor committee for their excellent service.