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Will the minister take an intervention?

I have a lot of sympathy for the principle behind amendment 302, but I want to confirm that it will not be pressed at this stage, given that it is premised on the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body making the appointment recommendation. Amendments in that regard have not been moved, and we are taking that debate outside proceedings ahead of stage 3. The principle is useful to debate, but what is currently in amendment 302 would not be applicable to the system as it stands.

I am grateful to the cabinet secretary for indicating her willingness to work with me ahead of stage 3 on these proposals. I would just like to test her appetite for the specific element of amendment 78 that relates to having someone on the advisory council who would represent the interests of the inspectorate’s staff. I am particularly interested in the Government’s position on that, because I think that there is broad consensus on other elements of the proposals. When we were debating similar issues in relation to qualifications Scotland, there was not quite consensus in that regard—although the proposal was somewhat different—so I am keen to check the cabinet secretary’s position, in principle, on involving inspectorate staff or those who represent their interests.

That is a fair point, which is why I landed on the phrase “have regard to” in amendment 6. It would therefore not be a requirement that qualifications Scotland follow the specific priorities set out by the Government of the time; instead, it should “have regard to” them.

After all, there are a number of challenges here. There is the core democratic challenge of Governments, which is that, regardless of their political hue or ideology, they have a democratic mandate to pursue whatever course of action they want. However, another challenge is this: if priorities are not set out by the Government, who does set them out? We in the Parliament might have reached as close to a consensus as possible on a whole range of issues—my example of life sciences is probably one area that we would all agree should be a strategic priority for Scotland—but somebody needs to set out the priorities.

Let me take, for example, an area that has been recently discussed. There are thousands of gas boiler engineers in Scotland who at some point over the coming years—we disagree on the timescale—will need to be retrained. Alongside being a gas boiler engineer, they will also need to be qualified in the installation and maintenance of, say, heat pumps. Therefore, we must ensure that our qualifications system provides for them and their long-term economic security.

The same could be applied to other areas. The film and television industry is a good example of an area where the SQA has been nimble and responded not just to the needs of industry but to other public bodies.

It is not unusual for us to hear, often in private, criticism from officials of other public bodies in Scotland that they have not had the engagement that they needed from the SQA and have not been able to update qualifications—nor, indeed, to develop new ones—to meet the needs of a particular sector of the economy. The screen sector is one for which, in recent years, there has been excellent collaboration between the SQA and Screen Scotland; I want to make sure of an underlying principle to mainstream that approach across the piece, to make sure that qualifications Scotland plays its role in those wider efforts.

I agree with all the cabinet secretary’s amendments in the group. I congratulate in particular the young people, their parents, carers and the organisations that work with them, who campaigned for the British Sign Language provisions that the cabinet secretary has taken forward. The efforts that they have made are worth all our congratulations.

I turn, very briefly, to Pam Duncan-Glancy’s amendments. I agree with her amendment 234. It aligns with my amendment 6 and my amendment 35, which is in another group. I absolutely agree with her amendment 235. If the SQA had been keeping up to date with developments in pedagogy, our qualifications system—certainly, our exam system—would look very different to the one that we have at the moment, which is, in its fundamental principles, almost entirely unchanged from the system that was first set up in the Victorian era in order to have a national exam system in Scotland.

I have concerns about Pam Duncan-Glancy’s amendment 240, because, to me, “simplifying” and “ensuring ... coherence” are different aims. I can get behind the principle of coherence, but I am wary about what “simplifying” means; I think that it means something different to each of us—certainly, from discussions in the past, I think that the cabinet secretary and I have different ideas on the desirability of a simplified system and perhaps on which qualifications are no longer necessary, which is why I am wary about putting such a provision in legislation, certainly without expanding or clarifying what “simplifying” means. The drafting of amendment 240 says “simplifying” rather than “simple”; are we to be in a never-ending process of trying to simplify the system regardless of how simple it becomes? I am therefore not particularly convinced by amendment 240 at this stage, to be honest.

I have already said that I strongly agree with the principle of Pam Duncan-Glancy’s amendment 237, but we need to make sure that it cuts both ways. I agree with her amendment 239 and with Stephen Kerr’s amendment 236.

Again, my amendments in this group are about increasing transparency and confidence that qualifications Scotland is engaging with the advice that it receives. I should say that my amendments 36 and 37 and Pam Duncan-Glancy’s amendments 283 and 284 do essentially the same thing, mine for the interest committees and Ms Duncan-Glancy’s for the advisory committee.

The amendments would require qualifications Scotland to publish the advice that it receives and the response that it has produced. That is about trying to increase transparency, and it would give those involved on the interest committees and on the advisory committee more confidence that their advice was being taken seriously, even on occasions when that advice was not necessarily taken on board. It is critical for those in the system more widely, including learners and practitioners, to see that advice and how the body is responding to it.

One of the criticisms of the SQA has been that it does not take on board advice from those with direct knowledge of how to deliver the qualifications or experience of undertaking them. Increasing transparency in that regard would, I think, result in greater buy-in and trust across the system.

I move amendment 36.

In conclusion, I confirm that the basis on which I would be happy not to move my amendments—and I suggest that the same is true for others—is that the cabinet secretary confirms that the Government accepts the principle of co-design as part of the process.

Yes, but I want to make a point and raise an issue first.

I like the points about monitoring compliance in amendments 261 and 271. Although I am wary about creating an unequivocal requirement to comply, the monitoring points have value.

Amendment 285, which would require the organisation to publish a report in instances in which the charters had not been complied with, has a lot of value. I am wary that the organisation, by not complying, would be breaching its legislative duties, but there should be transparency around situations in which it has not complied. In such situations, the organisation should explain why it believes that non-compliance was necessary and should be held to account as appropriate.

Martin Whitfield made the point about this being a one-off exercise, and I do not think that it is a particularly onerous one. I am seeking clarity from the member. I think that there is broad agreement about the educational benefits of having the unique learner number and data sharing, but the real challenges are around the practicalities of data sharing and the data and privacy rights of the individuals concerned—the learners. Will the member clarify that the suggestion is not for the strategic advisory council to consider those questions? I suggest that that is outwith the expertise that the individuals who we are proposing to sit on the advisory council will have. They would be focusing solely on the educational benefits of such an approach, not on dealing with practical and legal questions around data sharing and privacy rights.

I agree that that is a significant challenge. However, I suggest that a wider challenge is that we are just over a quarter of a century into devolution, and Parliament should have had a wider discussion about its ability to effectively scrutinise and hold public bodies to account before now. I am glad that we are starting to have that discussion, and I understand the issues of precedence that the amendment potentially sets.

My main motivation in lodging amendment 60 is to put that challenge to the Government and to seek its reassurance about how it will avoid the situation that we have been in up until now, in which a public body—in this case, the SQA—has been so resistant to parliamentary accountability that, at points in the past, the committee has genuinely entertained the idea of simply not inviting it back, because we questioned the purpose of bringing it in, in terms of the value of its evidence to the committee and its disregard of the recommendation that the committee made in response. As I have said, my main motivation in lodging the amendment is to put that to the Government and to seek its response as to how we will ensure that qualifications Scotland does not repeat those challenges, that it submits itself to appropriate parliamentary scrutiny and that it gives due regard—even if that is not the language used in the legislation—to the recommendations put to it by Parliament.

I turn briefly to the other amendments in the group. I agree with the cabinet secretary’s amendment 59, which is quite simple and contributes to the transparency objective that I have been pursuing elsewhere.

Although I am keen on Pam Duncan-Glancy’s amendment 242 in principle, I am a little wary of the specificity of the reference to quarterly meetings and of putting that into legislation. It is quite a rigid requirement. Bodies that I have chaired in the past have been required by their own constitution to meet a certain number of times a year, but there were various points in the year when we realised that it would have been more hassle than it was worth to have a meeting, because the previous one had been sufficiently productive or for other such reasons. I am broadly content with the amendment, but I would be open to a bit more flexibility being brought in at stage 3. I will close there, convener.

I move amendment 57.

I take on board the cabinet secretary’s point about amendment 60, and I will restrain myself from giving a much longer response to the interventions of Liz Smith and Martin Whitfield on the wider question of the performance of the Parliament, parliamentary scrutiny and our capacity to do that. Having written most of the Green group’s response to the work that Mr Whitfield’s committee is currently doing on that, I welcome that work, as he may have been able to tell from the tone of some of my contribution.

I am happy not to press amendment 57 and not to move amendments 7 and 8 in relation to consultation, and to continue speaking to the cabinet secretary about that. The key point that I was looking for was an acknowledgement of the need in some circumstances for that wider consultation, not just consultation with the committees. The cabinet secretary has acknowledged that and, if we can come back at stage 3 with something satisfactory, I will be happy with that.

As I have said, I will not move amendment 60.

I will move amendment 58 and press it to a vote, because the requirement that it would place is not onerous. We are already placing into legislation the requirement for the strategic advisory council to give advice, so it is proportionate to place a reciprocal requirement on qualifications Scotland to respond.

Amendment 57, by agreement, withdrawn.

Amendments 7 and 8 not moved.

Amendment 58 moved—[Ross Greer].