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That is for consistency; the view is that there would be a firewall. The repeal would mean greater accountability and consistency in the implementation of the legislation. That is the thinking behind it. [Interruption.]

Carole Ewart is pointing out to me that other regulators investigate themselves, so it is not a new approach—it would adhere to that general principle.

The examples that were used would all be covered in other ways. I cannot envisage why the power would be required, but, if the Scottish Government had strong views on the matter, it could lodge amendments at stage 2. The evidence that we have taken and the views from stakeholders show that the power is not required. There is strong support for its removal.

The position is very similar to the other examples that have been put to me. Although I hope that it would never be used, this is another provision that is intended to be a deterrent and to help drive organisations to deliver on their legal functions and statutory obligations.

Yes.

A large part of the cost of the bill will lie with the Information Commissioner. That has been fully costed, because the commissioner will be the main driver of the implementation of the bill. Many people in the FOI community would say that the bill will not cost anything, because it simply requires organisations to do what they should be doing anyway. For example, in relation to training, there is already a statutory obligation on public authorities to update training on an annual basis. Some people would argue that the bill should not require any more money, because that work should be happening anyway.

However, we have not framed the financial memorandum on that basis, and we recognise that how organisations respond will vary. Some organisations might spend a huge amount of money on trying to implement the bill, but others will not. That is why the Information Commissioner’s role in relation to the codes of practice is important in making it really clear to organisations what they require to do to comply with the legislation.

We hope that, if the bill is enacted, the Scottish Government will deal with those matters more speedily and that designation will speed up. We even hope that the discussion that is taking place today will help to speed up the process of designation.

However, as you know, there is also a new mechanism in the bill that would allow a parliamentary committee to get involved, should it choose to do so. I will use the care example that is currently being looked at by the Scottish Government. The Scottish Government may come forward in the next session of Parliament with proposals to designate parts of the care sector as FOI compliant. It would be quite a big political issue if the Scottish Government were to fail to do that, and a committee of this Parliament—it would be likely to be a health committee—could decide to use its time to consider the issue. It could put out a call for evidence, take evidence from all parties, including the Scottish Government, the sector and campaign groups, come to a view and make a recommendation to Parliament, which could then debate the issue. Obviously, changes to standing orders would be required to enable that to happen.

That would require a committee to decide that it was going to use its time in that way, so it would be likely to happen only for a big political issue. I hope that the fact that the Scottish Government would know that there might be enhanced scrutiny when ministers failed to act would help to drive designations.

So, you are referring to the designation of a new body?

Okay. The whole purpose of section 5—and, indeed, the whole bill—is to increase accountability and to drive designations. The reports are intended to drive awareness of the designation of bodies and to create the parliamentary space for such a discussion to take place. The policy intention is to incentivise the greater use of ministers’ power to designate. The intention of the 2002 act was always that bodies delivering public services would comply with freedom of information requests, so the reports would be a regular opportunity to review the Scottish Government’s work to deliver that.

Is the legal change that you were referring to the designation of a body following a vote by the Parliament?

I think that that kind of detail would have to be put into standing orders. The advice that we got was that it would not be appropriate for that level of detail to be included in the bill.

It may well differ from one designation to another. If there was a view that the designation of a body needed to be done speedily and the matter was discrete and capable of being curtailed, it may be that the implementation could happen in a very short time. For other matters, it would be different. I think that that would have to be laid out in the proposal that was put before the Parliament.