Meeting of the Parliament [Draft] Business until 18:01

Meeting date: Tuesday, December 9, 2025

Official Report 1039KB pdf

Point of Order

On a point of order, Presiding Officer. On 25 November, during the urgent question on a national grooming gangs inquiry, I asked the minister who was responding, Natalie Don-Innes,

“whether the Scottish Government will release all correspondence between it and Professor Alexis Jay”.—[Official Report, 25 November 2025; c 77.]

At the time, the minister said that she did not have that information available but would write to me. The minister wrote to me this afternoon. In her letter, she says:

“I explained that I did not have this information available at the time and committed to providing it in writing.”

However, her very next paragraph states that the Scottish Government will now treat the request as a freedom of information request, because it has had similar freedom of information requests on the topic. She concludes her letter by saying:

“We expect this information to be published by the end of this year.”

I have so many concerns about that. Is it right that the Government can commit in the Parliament to provide information to a member who has requested it and then change that commitment to say that it will be part of a response to a freedom of information request? Is it acceptable for the Government to say that it will provide the information by the end of this year, which could possibly be while we are in recess, when there is no opportunity for the Parliament to scrutinise it?

I am further concerned that the Government has inserted a statement on the national grooming gangs inquiry, or the efforts that it will take forward regarding that, for next Wednesday and that, potentially, we will not have crucial information that was promised in this chamber because the Government is treating my request as a freedom of information request, which may not be answered until the end of the year.

I make a direct plea to you, Presiding Officer, as you are our representative in this Parliament. We MSPs are seeking to get answers that would allow us to respond to our constituents. Can you use your influence, or any powers under standing orders, to tell the Scottish Government that it is completely unacceptable to promise one thing and then change it, and to urge the Government to provide the information as a matter of priority, because it is needed now, not, as it suits the Government, by the end of this year?

The “Scottish Ministerial Code” states:

“The Scottish Government should be accountable to the Scottish Parliament”.

As a matter of courtesy and respect, I would expect that, when a minister cannot provide information in answer to a question in the chamber, and when the minister has committed to providing that answer in the chamber, they should undertake to provide such detail to the member as soon as it is available.