is vitally important, as is the message, that if you get a modern apprenticeship, then it's a passport to a lifetime's appointment. First Minister's Questions. We now move to the next item of business, which is a debate on motion number 10088, in the name of Neil Findlay, on a motion of no confidence. Members who wish to take part in the debate should press the request-to-speak buttons now, and I call Neil Findlay to speak to it and move the motion. Mr Findlay, you've got nine minutes. Thank you very much, Presiding Officer. As the Scottish Government's mental health strategy states, mental illness is one of the greatest health challenges we face. But with appropriate and good quality treatment and support, people can cope, can learn to manage their condition and make a full recovery. Government policy is rightly geared towards shifting the balance of care from institutional settings towards more community-based provision where treatment is delivered at home or in the community. All of the major stakeholders are signed up to this policy, or at least we thought they were. Over the last week, through a freedom of information request, my colleague John Pentland had submitted 18 months ago and, following a ruling by the Information Commissioner ordering the release of the papers, we have established that one of the key players who is supposed to be driving this policy was not signed up to it at all, or at least he was not signed up to it when he thought it impacted upon his own constituency. That player was, of course, the Cabinet Secretary, the man in charge of the policy. Presiding Officer, as far back as 2006, NHS Lanarkshire identified a need for change in the way it delivered mental health services. Years of consultation and planning and work with clinicians, staff, patients and voluntary organisations followed. A consensus emerged that a two-site plan with acute beds located at Hermeyr's and a much-needed intensive psychiatric care unit at Wishaw complemented, essentially by community-based provision, was the best way forward in delivering much improved services. That plan would help achieve waiting times targets, reduce admissions of young people into non-age-specific inpatient beds, extend CAMHS provision beyond the age of 8S16, address the mental welfare critique of NHS Lanarkshire, being the only mainland board without a dedicated intensive psychiatric care unit, and provide a safer and more sustainable medical rota to deliver care. That was approved by the then Cabinet Secretary for Health, Nicola Sturgeon and, as we know today, by Lanarkshire Link and its members, the leading mental health organisation in the area. Then, following the Cabinet reshuffle on 5 September 2012, Alex Neil replaced Nicola Sturgeon's cabinet secretary. He acted immediately and then, on 15 September, advised civil servants that he was reviewing the NHS Lanarkshire proposal and a final decision would be taken soon. On 18 September, the then head of NHS Scotland, Derek Feeley, advised Katrina Borland, director of health and workforce planning, that Alex Neil is, in a quote, mindy to review the decision on Lanarkshire's mental health proposal. On 26 September at 9.43am, Mr Neil's private secretary advised civil servants that Mr Neil is clear in his view that acute mental health facilities should be retained in both Wishot and Monklands. The cabinet secretary has asked that he seek agreement from NHS Lanarkshire to reconfigure their plans accordingly. In other words, he scrapped the proposals endorsed by the stakeholders and by his predecessor, Nicola Sturgeon. Later that day, I replied to Richard Lyle MSP in his chamber, the cabinet secretary said, and I quote, he believes that NHS Lanarkshire is revising its original proposal for mental health in Monklands with a view to retaining an acute mental health facility at the hospital. Of course he believed that he was reviewing its proposals because he was the person who had earlier constructed the board to do so, but the plot thickens. It has now been revealed at 9.44 that very day. Several hours before the cabinet secretary answered Richard Lyle's question, Ian Ross, chief executive of NHS Lanarkshire advised the cabinet secretary that I quote, there is no alternative option which can deliver the same benefits within the funding. Any changes to this plan would need to be explained to the key stakeholders including service users and carers who are fully supportive of the proposed developments. It was only later that day, after all this involvement, that the cabinet secretary decided to take a step back because, as he said, there could be a perception of a conflict of interest. Presiding Officer, there was no perception of a conflict of interest, there was a conflict of interest. Alex Neil had already made a decision that ran contrary to the policy that he was now in charge of promoting. So, let us review the evidence and charges against the cabinet secretary. Well, he initially asked Nicola Sturgeon when she was in post to delay any decision until after the council elections and then until after his holiday, thus putting the needs of mental health patients behind his party and personal interests. He reversed the decision endorsed by Nicola Sturgeon to go with the consensus on how to improve services. A decision that NHS Lanarkshire's chief executive said would result in, and I quote, a less than optimal service for patients who might be cared for there. He ordered the retention of facilities known to be riddled with his besties. He worked against the interests of the people of Lanarkshire by pretending to be their saviour when all along the clinical evidence was clear that the proposed changes were in the best interest of mental health patients. He actively opposed his own Government's policy of shifting the balance of care, the very policy that he was now in charge of, and he breached the ministerial code by failing to recognise the conflict of interest between his role as a minister, promoting Government policy and his own constituency interest, and only stood back after he had made his decision to reverse his predecessor's decision. Crucially for members of this chamber, we believe that he misled Parliament by stating that he believed that NHS Lanarkshire would review a decision that we now know he had already taken. I take no pleasure in moving this motion. We have been forced into this position by the Cabinet Secretary and the First Minister, who in the last week have singularly failed to come up with or even tried to come up with a credible answer to the charges laid before them. I say to the other parties that this Parliament has a duty to demand integrity in our political system. The dogs in the street know what Alex Neil has been up to, he has been caught holding the smoking gun, and the First Minister and his deputy know it. We believe that he has misled his constituents, we believe that he has misled this Parliament. It is for all of those reasons that we are moved to propose a vote of no confidence in Alex Neil, the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Wellbeing. I think that some facts would be helpful to this particular debate. Upon his appointment as health secretary on 5 September 2012, Alex Neil examined a number of key areas in his portfolio, something that is entirely reasonable. On the morning of 26 September, having reviewed proposals for NHS Lanarkshire's mental health services, the cabinet secretary informed officials of his reservations about the health board's plans. That afternoon, he answered a supplementary parliamentary question in which the future of mental health services at Monklands hospital was raised. He made clear that the health board were reconsidering their plans. On 5 November 2012, Alex Neil replied to a letter from Labour MP Pamela Nash about the future of mental health services. He informed her that he had shared his reservations with the NHS board. On 14 November 2012, Siobhan McMahon asked Alex Neil an oral question about mental health services at Monklands. She stated in her question that the cabinet secretary has recently intervened in the provision of mental health services by NHS Lanarkshire. The Evening Times reported the facts on 24 January 2013, when they quoted in full a Scottish Government spokesperson laying out all of the detail. The spokesperson said, and I quote, On 26 September, Mr Neil asked officials to make his long-standing concerns about the proposed reconfiguration of mental health services across Lanarkshire known to the NHS board. His view was that acute mental health facilities would be best retained at Wishaw General and Monklands hospital and with a unit at Hermeyles. On 26 September, after answering an oral question, Mr Neil was concerned that, as Monklands was in his constituency, there could be a perception of a conflict of interest. To address that, he agreed that all matters relating to Monklands should be dealt with by the Public Health Minister, Michael Matheson. The facts were laid out yet again on 17 February 2013, when the First Minister responded to a complaint under the ministerial code, and yet again on 5 March 2013, in an extensive release of FOI material to Labour MSP John Pentland. Throughout the process, the facts have been cleared for all to see and a matter of public record. Alex Neil intervened and made his views known. The health board then had to come forward with a revised plan, not just for Monklands but for the whole of NHS Lanarkshire. He made clear in an answer to the question on 14 November that the plan required ministerial approval that decisions would have been made by me in order to avoid any perception of a conflict of interest. I will give way to Mr Finlay. Given that Mr Matheson was the deputy when Mr Sturgeon made her decision, then the deputy when Mr Neil made the decision, what was your view at each of those occasions? I think that if we deal with the facts, Mr Finlay, we might actually make some progress in this matter. That was just inventing things for the purpose of getting a few headlines, but those are the facts and they are a matter for the public record. The reality is that, in other cases, as health secretary, Alex Neil will take decisions that are about health services that affect NHS Lanarkshire and its provision. On 17 December last year, he established the expert governance and improvement support team to help the health board make patient safety and quality care improvements. That decision included Monklands hospital in Alex Neil's constituency. If we follow Labour's bizarre logic, we should have been calling for a vote of no confidence when he made that decision as well. These are decisions about the whole of NHS Lanarkshire. The effect is half a million people, almost one in ten of the entire Scottish population. As you know, it is important that ministers not only avoid actual conflicts of interest, but also the perception of any conflict. That is why, after he was asked a supplementary question in this chamber on 26 September specifically about mental health services at Monklands general hospital, Alex Neil chose to take advice from his officials. He then followed that advice and removed himself from the process to ensure no suggestion of a conflict of interest. That was entirely appropriate and he reported that to Parliament on 14 November and 19 December 2012. However, it does not change the fact at the very heart of this issue. There was no conflict of interest because this issue was about more than just Alex Neil's constituency. It was about what was best for the people and the patients of NHS Lanarkshire. If you want to move on to that issue, Minister, can you tell us when Nicola Sturgeon signed off the option appraisal, which chose option 1 as the best option, on what basis did you and Alex Neil choose option 4, the worst option as the best option for the people of Lanarkshire? You are interested to know the view of NHS Lanarkshire and the option that was proposed. That is the option that you have taken forward for the most contemporary provision of acute inpatient care in custom designed environment, as well as freeing up resources to put into the community. That is the option that the Cabinet Secretary chose. Part of the mental health services plan, the ward in question, ward 24, has been undergoing a refurbishment to improve the facilities for patients and to include asbestos being removed from ward 24 earlier this year. It should be emphasised that this issue of asbestos is not unique to Monklands and it's a legacy from decades. There are very strict regulations enforced by the health and safety executive in the control of asbestos and they make clear and I will quote from the regulations, asbestos is not dangerous when disturbed, is only dangerous when disturbed, if it is safely managed and contained it does not present a health hazard. That's exactly the approach that NHS Lanarkshire took. As well as the wellbeing of patients of Lanarkshire, we're at the very heart of Alex Neil's actions of this matter and it's instructive to look at what those patients themselves said about the proposed closure. This is from a letter written to the Scottish Government in September 2012, when the closure proposals were being considered from a patient treated for mental health issues at Monklands and the patient wrote, We felt our voice should be recognised. The closure of these words could cause many mentally ill patients to take our own lives. That heartfelt plea sat alongside the views of doctors, NHS management and others. It is in balancing all of these opinions that Alex Neil made his intervention. You will need to make progress. You can disagree with that. You can argue that you will have come to a different conclusion. That's your right to do so. Indeed, we know that Labour did come to a different conclusion over previous NHS Lanarkshire closure proposals. Had Labour won in 2007 election, it would have closed the A&E department at Monklands. Labour told us that there was no alternative. Well, since July 2007, when this Government saved Monklands A&E, there have been 437,000 attendees, 67,000 in 2013 alone, almost half a million A&E attendances proving there was an alternative to Labour's NHS closure plans. The facts are straightforward. Alex Neil made his views known. He weighed up all the options and all the opinions. He did so without fear or favour. If Labour wished to argue against that decision, that's their right, but that's not what they're doing. They're throwing everything they can at demand. Their objective is not to hear about what's the quality of services that are being provided in Lanarkshire. This is about getting at the health secretary. This may be the third motion of no confidence in his Parliament's short history, but it's not the first. It's the first that I can think of that any health secretary has been attacked for not closing a hospital ward. It's the first time that a health secretary has been attacked for saving part of her NHS, but then there is no scare story that the Labour Party is too silly for the Labour Party, no smear too low for the Labour Party, no accusation to base that they would not seek to use against this SNP Government. That's what we've seen today, and I would urge Members to reject this motion. A motion of no confidence is a very serious matter and not one that we take lightly. After our careful consideration, the Scottish Conservatives will be supporting calls for Alex Neil to resign. This is for a simple reason. We believe that it cannot be acceptable for a minister to come to the chamber to come to this Parliament and allow Parliament to be misled. We've all seen the evidence, but it's worth going over it once again. On 26 September 2012, Alex Neil told Parliament that he believed that NHS Lanarkshire was revising its plans on mental health services at Monklands. A few hours later, he announced that he would be removing himself from the formal decision making process surrounding the plan because of his constituency interests. That was all accepted in good faith, but thanks to a freedom of information request, what we now know is that five hours before addressing Parliament, Alex Neil's private secretary had emailed a civil servant in the health department. It could not have been clearer. Sent to health officials in the Scottish Government, it declared that Mr Neil was clear that the mental health facilities should be retained. It concluded that the cabinet secretary has asked that you seek agreement from NHS Lanarkshire to reconfigure their plans accordingly. Astonishingly, Michael Matheson was even copied into this email. So in the morning he was made aware of the decision to retain Monklands, the decision had already been made by his superior. That very afternoon, he was told that the decision over Monklands was being delegated to him. Of course, it is the right of every member of this Parliament to oppose decisions that affect their constituents, be they ministers or not. Nor do we disagree that, as a newly appointed minister, Mr Neil was within his rights to reconsider decisions taken by his predecessor. The issue here is not about the rights and wrongs of closing medical facilities at Monklands, nor is it about Mr Neil's competency in his job. The issue at hand is a cabinet minister who ordered his officials to do one thing in the morning and then decided, consciously, not to reveal that fact to Parliament in the afternoon. Presiding Officer, I would suggest that this is a very sad instance of a minister deliberately allowing an untruth to gain credence in order to avoid difficult questions about his own position. Mr Neil should have told Parliament that afternoon that he had just told NHS Lanarkshire to, and I quote, reconfigure their plans. That he didn't was not just a dereliction of duty, it now looks suspiciously like a tacit admission he knew he was doing something underhand and wrong. It is as simple as that, and the fact is that the investigation carried out by the First Minister into this case has failed utterly to address that point. The First Minister says that the health secretary acted perfectly properly. His defence of Mr Neil goes on to note how Mr Neil was concerned over a conflict of interest. That nowhere, nowhere in the First Minister's letter exonerating Mr Neil is the key point raised, that by the time Mr Neil was raising his concerns about a conflict of interest, his wishes had already been made clear to NHS Lanarkshire. Nowhere is the acknowledgement of the facts, the fact that Mr Neil's decision had made the decision and he tried to wash his hands of it. Now, by refusing to sack his health secretary, the First Minister is putting politics above this Parliament. At this whole episode, it is symptomatic of the SNP's disregard for this Parliament, particularly in the run-up to the independence referendum. It gives us, on this side of the chamber, no pleasure to conclude that, in this instance, the cabinet secretary deliberately ensured that Parliament was misled. By having clearly done so, we can no longer have confidence in his duties and so we support the motion of no confidence. I will now move to a very short open debate. I call Bob Doris to fall by John Pentland. Both of you have got no more than four minutes. The same opening comments that integrity applies to every member of the chamber, including our Opposition members. I feel that they have not passed that test here this afternoon. We have been asked to make a judgment on the appropriateness of Alex Neil staying as Cabinet Secretary for Health and Well-being. Let me tell you about my experience of the Alex Neil that I know as Cabinet Secretary for Health and Well-being. He is the man who has worked in partnership with this Parliament's Health and Sport Committee to develop a vastly improved system of access to new medicines in Scotland for end-of-life and often and ultra-offin conditions, valuing people and changing their lives meaningfully for the constituents right across Scotland. Let me tell you about the Alex Neil that I know. He is the Alex Neil who has introduced a workforce planning tool, which is seeing nursing numbers increase right across Scotland, making sure that they are in the right place, the right job. I hear heckling, but I have to say that the constituents that I represent prefer a quality NHS rather than the bluff and bluster of the Labour benches. Let me tell you why I think that bluff is bluster and it is political opportunism. Let me refer to the Evening Times article of January 24, 2013. On September 26, 2012, Mr Neil asked officials to make his long-standing concerns about the proposed reconfiguration of a mental health service across Lanarkshire, known to the NHS board. His view was that acute mental health services facilities would be best retained at Wishaw General and Monkleth's hospital and with a unit at Hare Myers. In other words, the exact same content that was in the email is now apparently a smoking gun. There is nothing new in any of this. Let me say to you that Alex Neil, with this information available, was perfectly fit for purpose 15 months ago. He was fit for purpose as a health secretary 10 months ago. He was fit for purpose as a good-quality health secretary 5 months ago. The only thing that has happened in the last week is the Labour Party's grandstanding for cheap party political points. Let me tell you something that I also know about health boards. I, as deputy chair of the Health and Sport Committee, had a robust evidence session with health boards looking at their budgets just the other day. Health boards are not shrinking violets. They will say what they think and they will make it clear. No decision was taken by Mr Neil. His position was well known. It was public 15 months ago that he sought to seek agreement with NHS Lanarkshire. However, if there was no agreement to be sought, that decision would have been taken by Michael Matheson, our Minister for Public Health. There was no conflict of interests. Let me tell you one final thing. I know that the Labour Party may have an view of government where they just rubber stamp things, they go into robotic mode, they do not take a view where they think for themselves. I assume that someone held up a sign saying clap there because they were certainly not thinking for themselves. I expect a Cabinet Secretary for Health to take a strategic view of mental health services across Lanarkshire, across the 500,000 patients in Lanarkshire. He did that. He made his views knowing. Please stop barking the member and let us hear what he has to say. As I said to Lewis MacDonald just earlier on in a previous debate, the louder the Labour Party speaks, the more they realise they are on shaky ground and there is nothing true in what they say. Because time is short, I will say to you that the people of Scotland value Alex Neil as health secretary. On a week-out basis, he is improving Scotland's national health service, yet that party opposite and in conjunction with her better-together friends and the Conservative party would rather make the patients right across Scotland suffer for a cheap party political stunt and make no mistake, that is precisely what this vote of no confidence is. On Pentland, you have got four minutes, Mr Pentland. Lanarkshire's mental health plan was about far more than two words at once, but that was Alex Neil's main focus, even as Cabinet Secretary. Using the making, this was a plan for the whole of Lanarkshire. It was backed by the service users, carers, clinicians, NHS managers, council partners, voluntary organisations and also on several occasions by the health secretary at that time, Nicholas Sturgeon, who saw the improvements that this robust plan would bring across the board, including to Monklands. He saw the bigger picture. The plan would have funded a new IPCU for Lanarkshire, the only mainland board without one. It would also have supported development of intensive home treatment and young people services. It greatly would have expanded community mental health and provided a safer and more sustainable medical rotor. There was no alternative option, which could deliver these same benefits, but they are not my words. That is what the chief executive Ian Ross wrote in an email at 9.45 on 26 September 2012. Alex Neil chose to ignore this advice and vetoed the plan, with no reason given. When he asked the question in the afternoon on mental health services in Monklands, he did not even tell Parliament that he had rejected it. He said that NHS Lanarkshire was reconsidered. They were not reconsidered. They were reconfiguring their plans on his instruction. How do we know this? In an email that morning, Alex Neil had told them to pick the worst of four options. That email took us 18 months to extract from the Scottish Government. Now we know why they have fought so hard to keep that a secret. But there is much more. The pretense in manipulation was not an isolated incident. We have an email saying that he was signing off lines in October and a letter he wrote in November. More importantly, his diktat of 26 September was not rescinded. In one email, he even states that the strategy was ready to go, but due to concerns raised by Alex Neil, he directly asked Tim to defer taking it to the board until after the local elections at which point it would be approved. We could have had the best plan before May 2012, but over a year later, what do we get? We get a poor substitute. Since the original plan was kicked into the touch by the Cabinet Secretary, I have heard that problems include a patchwork community service, staffing problems, difficulties with junior doctors training, unused capacity at Wishaw, and what about the recurrent costs in Stamford? Instead of the money freed up to address these issues. Most of all, this worse option does not provide the service that the people of Lanarkshire have a right to expect. We have strong evidence and believe that Alex Neil has misled Parliament. He has also betrayed the public and the health professionals with a scandalous political fix. He should resign or else the First Minister, rather than trying to defend him, should sack him. I now call the First Minister to wind up the debate. First Minister, seven minutes. Thank you, Presiding Officer. Can I take us into three areas of this debate? First is the question of transparency. I am going to spend some time on it because I want to be able to establish to this chamber that what Richard Simpson was disagreeing with me about First Minister's questions was fact erroneous in his part. We can remove the question of transparency, and then we can get to the issue of principle as to when and when not a Government Minister is able to intervene and to take action on a matter that affects their constituency. Thirdly, let's look at the rights and wrongs of the issue. Let's look at the patients in Lanarkshire. Finally, let's look at the competence of this health secretary. The reason that I was disagreeing with Richard Simpson is that I can establish beyond any doubt that the whole detail of this area of decision making was in the public domain. I have here the press lines issued to the Sunday Herald on the weekend of 1 December 2012, which were reported in the evening times of 24 January 2013. I will have them put into the records so that every member in this chamber can see them. It goes into great detail of what happened on the day of 26 September. It says that the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Well-being, Alex Neil, is not currently looking at proposals from NHS Lanarkshire on the provision of mental health services. Previously, on 26 September, Alex Neil's Cabinet Secretary for Health had made his concerns about the proposed reconfiguration of mental health services across Lanarkshire known to the NHS board through Scottish Government officials. I think that I will read the quotation and then I will give way to Johann Lamont. With over 500,000 people residing in NHS Lanarkshire's area, Mr Neil addressed his concerns and the service changed to the region as a whole. He was clear in his view that acute mental health facilities would be best retained at Wishaw General Hospital, Monkless hospital, with a unit at Hare Myers hospital. On 26 September, Mr Neil also answered an oral question, where in the supplementary he was asked specifically about mental health services in Monkless hospital. After answering the question, Mr Neil was concerned that, despite Monkless hospital serving people across Lanarkshire that was located in its constituency, there could be a perception of conflict of interest. To address that, he arranged that day with the director-general of the health portfolio, Derek Feeley, that all matters related to Monkless hospital should be dealt with by the Minister of Public Health, Michael Matheson. Before Johann Lamont intervenes, let me say that this totally disproves the Labour Party assertion that all of these details were not in the public domain. Just in case Johann Lamont did happen to buy her copy of the evening times on 24 January, all of this is contained in the FOI response to John Pentland of 5 March 2013. All of it. Therefore, all of this information was available in the public domain, which puts a very severe question mark, both on labour allegations and lack of transparency. When, in this week in particular, this should suddenly be presented as if it was a contemporary issue, Johann Lamont? Of course, we have been waiting for 18 months to get the freedom of information request that you, Government, have resisted. So, this is not about Alec Neill expressing a view. Can I ask the First Minister that when he cleared his Minister of any wrongdoing, was the First Minister aware of Alec Neill's email of the morning of 26 September directing the Lanarkshire health board to reconfigure its plans? Of course there was. Johann Lamont has just told us that this information was in the public domain and in the FOI response, not of the last couple of weeks but of 5 March 2013. All of this information was contained. John Pentland did not reveal to Johann Lamont the details of this, then perhaps she should address communications within the Labour Party, as opposed to the scariest attacks on the health sector. Can I just point out that the information commissioner himself conceded that the Scottish Government information and documents goes a substantial way towards fulfilling the public interest in understanding the issues relating to this code. It goes a long way in detailing the chain of events following Mr Neill's appointment. The information commissioner obviously looked at the documents that were revealed, even if the Labour Party did not manage to do so. Is the First Minister aware that, after the information that was given on February, March 2013, further information came from the commissioner identifying quite clearly that Mr Neill had instructed Lanarkshire health board to reconfigure the plans for mental health services in Lanarkshire? The member, the benefit and the doubt, because his colleagues probably prevented him hearing it. In what I have just read out, it contains the paragraph. With over 500,000 people resident in the Lanarkshire area, Mr Neill addressed his concerns and the service changed to the region as a whole. He was clear in his view that acute mental health facilities would be best retained at Wishaw General, Monkless hospital and the unit in Hermars hospital. You had the information, you just did not have the competence to bring it to this chamber. Given that John Lamont actually tried to address those questions of process, I hope that now hearing that will have satisfied at least some of his reservations, because I will go through the other instances where it is quite clear that this information has been in the public domain for some time. Can I address the issue of principle in terms of the ministerial code? That is what I had to look at, not the issues of policy, which are hugely important to the people, but the ministerial code is the issue when a constituency interest is validated. It is not the case that a minister cannot take decisions that affect his constituents. I have a transcript here of Neil Findlay on the radio this morning, who said that any minister who is in a position where they have a constituency interest and acting as a minister has to make that position known as early as possible and withdraw from it. That is not the case, Mr Findlay. I am First Minister of Scotland. If I withdrew from every decision that affected my constituents, then I would not be making many decisions as First Minister of Scotland. For example, the Aberdeen peripheral route is an issue that has a massive effect on my constituency. As an MSP, as a First Minister, I have campaigned in favour of that route. It is a huge public investment. I rejoice in the fact that it is going forward. I cannot withdraw or resign from making a decision about it because it happens to go across my constituents. It affects people throughout the whole of the north-east of Scotland just as the mental health facilities in Larrickshire affected people throughout the whole of Larrickshire. I will gladly do so. I am perhaps too generous with the Labour Party—that is one of my weaknesses, Presiding Officer—and this information was transparent and in the public domain. Unfortunately, the Labour Party, through a communications failure, did not manage to tell each other that it had the information. That is the best possible reflection that you can put on it. It is not the case that ministers cannot make decisions that affect their constituents. Of course they can make such decisions. Mr Neil went through the correct processes. When a specific question was raised about Munklands hospital, he asked the advice of his officials. Let me repeat the point of Michael Matheson. When was the last time a minister was attacked and had a motion of no confidence put against him because he had saved the hospital facility vital for the people of Larrickshire? The provision in Larrickshire is excellent in mental health services. We know the views of the patient and we also knew the views of the Labour Party. The last thing in the mind of the Labour Party in bringing this to this chamber was the welfare of the people of Larrickshire. It was the proximity of the elections and it is not the confidence in Mr Neil, it is the confidence of the Scottish people that this administration will invest in. I rise to sum up this motion of no confidence in that at Neil, the Cabinet Secretary for Health, Sport and Well-being. I do so with a measure of sadness, but also a measure of anger. Sadness because I believe that had the Cabinet Secretary admitted his error in wrongly using his new position as Cabinet Secretary to instruct a health board, he would have done it. Against its wishes, against the wishes of its stakeholders, against the decisions of the previous Cabinet Secretary and the Deputy Minister, and in the interests of his own opinion as a constituency MSP, had he come to Parliament and admitted his error and apologised and withdrawn his instructions to a Larrickshire health board, then this would have done it. The First Minister and Bob Doris, I was refused by every single speaker. No one took an intervention from me, however I will take one from you. I take the intervention because of the spirit in which Mr Simpson has started his remarks. He disagreed with me when I said at First Minister's questions that this information was in the public domain. I have now read out that information, including the sentence that he was clear in his view that would be best retained in the free hospital. You must know, and I am putting it on the record, that that is contained. Will you withdraw that accusation and therefore go ahead on a reasonable basis? I will compensate you at the end of your speech. The First Minister and Bob Doris asked the question, why is this motion of no confidence being brought forward now? Why not at the time of the offence or when the initial emails were available? The reason is that it took us 15 months and an information commissioner decision against the government to release the information. It was the additional information which led us to take this action. So what were the actions which the government fought so long and so hard to conceal? First, the Lanarkshire health board undertook a robust, inclusive and exhaustive consultation, which, if the government were not satisfied with it, why did it approve the results? The decision was about modernising its mental health services. It scored four different options for change, and the best-scoring and highest-ranked option supported by the patient groups and clinicians and management was approved by Nicola Sturgeon as cabinet secretary. The announcement from the board should have occurred at the August board meeting, but it was delayed to September to allow Alex Neil as the local MP to MSP to return from holiday and to comment and to announce a number of further additional new services that would come to Monklands at the same time as the closure of the substandard as best-osridden wards was announced. However, that was not to be, because Mr Neil was then appointed as cabinet secretary on 5 September. He did not immediately recuse himself from this issue, which necessarily involved his constituency directly. However, that in itself is not an offence. That is not an offence. He is perfectly entitled as the new cabinet secretary to call anything in for review. At 9.43 am, on 26 September, an email was sent to Lanarkshire health board, who was keen to confirm the previously agreed decision on mental health services. That email said, and I quote, Mr Neil has seen and noted both, and is clear in his view that the acute mental health facilities should be retained in Wishaw and Monklands with a unit also at Haier-Miles to serve South Lanarkshire. The cabinet secretary has asked you to seek agreement for NHS Lanarkshire to reconfigure their plans accordingly. Not a review, not a consultation, not a calling in, an instruction from the cabinet secretary to keep those units open. Not only that, his instruction actually raised the fourth, the worst of the options. There is a disservice to the people of Lanarkshire as a whole. We believe that the cabinet secretary misled Parliament in his response to the parliamentary question to Richard Lyle on the same afternoon. Having issued that instruction in the morning, he then said he believes that NHS Lanarkshire is revising its original proposal. What does he mean he believes? He knew because he had instructed them to do so that morning. He then recused himself appropriately at that point, but not when he should have done. But he had already copied Michael Matheson into his instructions. As a Deputy Minister, you tend to follow your bosses' suggestions, but when it is given as an instruction, you certainly follow it. Had he apologised for issuing the instruction issued privately in the morning, had he apologised for then saying something that we believe misled Parliament in the afternoon and at the same time withdrawn his instruction, I am fairly certain that Parliament would have been generous. The cabinet secretary even continued, however, after having recused himself to be copied into emails on the issue, to write to the local MP, Pamela Nash, on the issue, and in one email from a server-servant was referred to as having to sign off on the issue. Therefore, there was a continued involvement of the cabinet secretary even after he had recused himself. I said at the outset that I was both sad and angry and I have explained why I am sad, but I share the anger of the stakeholders who were appalled at the outcome of this cavalier decision that the cabinet secretary had dictated. I want to quote from some of the comments made from the 800 members of Lanarkshire Lynx who were involved in the consultation that we are not important and it does not matter what we say, we are not listened to, very angry. I feel my time and effort is as valuable as Mr Neil's. We have put a lot of input into this consultation only to be let down again, angry and hurt. After two years of consultation and hard work, it has all been turned around and back to square one, so it has been all this work for nothing. Why should you change things that people have already decided upon? This is not about the cabinet secretary's performance, as Bob Doris would have us suggest. We have actually worked well with the cabinet secretary since his appointment. This is about a bad decision, badly made in what was a clear failure to separate personal interest as a constituency MSP from his role as a minister. It was, I regret to say, an abusive power compounded by misinforming Parliament, continued involvement and then prevention of release of the emails which had to have an information commissioner to release them. He therefore must see that his position is untenable. He should do the decent thing now and resign. MSPs in this Parliament have a duty and responsibility, irrespective of party, to uphold the integrity of the Parliament. I hope that, when it comes to a vote at 5.30 tonight, members will reflect on this. That concludes the debate on the motion bill confidence. The question on this motion will be put decision time when we next move the next side of business. It is a debate on motion number 10090 in the name of Rosanna Cunningham on the courts reform Scotland bill. Members who wish to speak in the debate, please press your request speak button now and I will give a few moments for people to change their seats. Can I now call in Kenny MacAskill to speak to and to move the motion in the name of Rosanna Cunningham Cabinet Secretary, maximum 10 minutes but less would be better if possible. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I am delighted to open this stage 1 debate in the courts reform bill. I would like to record my thanks to the Justice Committee for their consideration of the bill and to the many stakeholders that have contributed. It was back in 2007 when my predecessor, Cathy Jimison, asked Lord Gill to undertake a review of civil justice. Lord Gill and his review team undertook an extremely comprehensive and thorough review over a period of two years with over 200 consultation responses. The review reported in 2009, making over 200 recommendations to improve what they described as, and I quote, the slow, inefficient and expensive, close quote, Scottish civil justice system. The bill takes on the majority of Lord Gill's recommendations and will put in place reforms that he recently described as being 50 years overdue. The main principles of the bill are that the right cases should be heard in the right courts, that unnecessary delays and disproportionate costs to users should be minimised and that the efficiency of the courts should be increased. I am pleased that the committee welcomed the general principles of the bill and broadly agrees with many of the proposals, including the creation of summary sheriffs, simple procedure, increased specialisation and that the exclusive competence of the sheriff court should be increased significantly in order to deliver the reforms. In personal injury cases, for example, the vision is that there will be dealt with in a new national specialist personal injury court by specialist sheriffs with procedures that facilitate swift and appropriate settlement at a more proportionate cost to litigants. Personal injury litigants will continue to be able to raise their claims in their local sheriff court if that meets their needs, and there will be a renewed focus on specialists at this rival level, and the Lord President will be able to designate areas such as family law, commercial law or personal injury as specialisms. Turning to the exclusive competence of the sheriff court, there have been some calls for a lower figure than 150,000, and we will consider all views, although we believe that 150,000 is set out by Lord Gill in his review as the appropriate level, which is why we consulted on that level and included it in the bill. It is important to ensure that any new level set for cases raised in the sheriff court reflects the fact that, at present, too many low-value cases are being raised unnecessarily in the court of session. This results in increased costs for all parties involved and deters other kinds of litigation from being raised there. It is also important to ensure that the exclusive competence level allows a suitable amount of business to transfer to the new specialist personal injury court. As regards attempts to lower the exclusive competence at the lower level, the less chance we have of delivering more proportionate costs to litigants. Lord Gill's review chose the figure of 150,000 on the basis that, on average, the sum sued for at the beginning of a case is three times higher than the settlement figure at the end. Those who have advocated a lower limit from 20,000 to 50,000 have based those on the sum settled. That would be unworkable. The sum settled is not known at the beginning of a case when a decision needs to be taken on which courts it is to be raised in. Sheriff Principal Taylor stated to the Justice Committee that a limit of 50,000 would mean, on average, cases of a value of around 17,000 would continue to be heard in the court of session. There are those who say that we will see a deluge of cases descending on sheriff courts. That is simply not the case. The personal injury court will be up and running to coincide with the raising of the exclusive competence. Lord Gill told the Justice Committee that, when I quote, I am absolutely certain that the capacity exists in the sheriff courts to absorb all of the business, even with the closure of the outlying courts. I end quote. Figures provided by the Scottish court service suggest that approximately 2,700 cases will transfer from the court of session. Compare those figures to the case load of 72,510 civil cases in the sheriff court in 2012-13, a decrease of around 10 per cent from 2011-12, and 43 per cent are over 50,000 cases since 2008-9. However, despite that fall in the sheriff courts, a court of session case load has remained relatively stable, with personal injury cases making up almost 80 per cent of all cases in the general department. The vast majority of PI cases will settle before they actually come to a court hearing. Lord Gill has said about PI cases, and I end quote, only a tiny fraction of the cases that are in the court of session ever get to proof. He goes on to say that they are settled and dealt with administratively, and that is it. He also added, if that is the situation, they can be dealt with equally well administratively in the sheriff court at much lower cost and where the infrastructure is also in place. We have heard some concerns that litigants will no longer be guaranteed automatic sanction for counsel in those cases that will now be raised in the new personal injury court. Under that bill, complex cases will be able to be remitted to the court of session where sanction for counsel is automatic. In my experience, as best as cases are often very complex, we would expect that they will be remitted to the court of session. However, as Sheriff Principal Taylor said to the committee, even if they were not remitted, they would almost certainly merit sanction for counsel. You mentioned the issue of the specific victims and you and others in this Parliament have done a lot of work for those specific victims and their families over the years. What extra measures will you take to ensure that their interest is not diminished in the face of the power of the insurance and the quality and money that they will spend to defend cases? I think that that is a fair point. It is important to put on record that the whole purpose of Lord Gill's review is to ensure that we get access to justice because it is slow, inefficient and costly. I have narrated the matters there and it is also important to point out the additional point that was made by Sheriff Principal Taylor. Not simply as I say that cases such as asbestos are complex would go to the court of session as he sees it, but also Sheriff Principal Taylor that we will be responding on in due course has made it quite clear that sanction for counsel applies not simply in cases on the basis of their length or, indeed, of their complexity, but it should also apply in respect of equality of arms. Therefore, if an insurance company or another party to the action turns up with their QC or their advocate, then it is important and, indeed, equality of arms and fairness indicates that there should be parity in that would mean an extension is what he is looking at, not simply length and complexity but equality of arms. I would hope that those points would reassure Mr McNeill who makes a valuable point that is echoed by, for example, Clydeside Action on Investus, who I think all of us in this chamber know does an outstanding job. I expect to announce the Scottish Government response to Sheriff Principal Taylor's review before stage 2 of the courts reform bill. The review recommends that the sheriff should be able to ensure, and I referred to what I said earlier, no party gains an undue advantage by virtue of the resources available to them. Sheriff Principal Taylor also told the Justice Committee that it is very rare that science for counsel is refused in the sheriff court. In addition, we have agreed to bring forward amendments to the bill to ensure that the test for remitting cases from the sheriff court to the court of session where counsel is automatic is not too strict. In relation to workplace injuries under section 69 of the Enterprise and Regulator Reform Act, a reserved piece of legislation, the strict liability of employers for workplace accidents is removed, the STUC argued that it will make harder to bring workplace injury cases. I have had discussions with the STUC and we are considering what, if anything, we can do to mitigate the effects of the change that has been brought in by the Government in Westminster. We have taken on the views of the stakeholders and we are actively considering the report from the Justice Committee, and I am happy to continue engaging in discussions with Clydeside Action, the STUC and others reflecting views as the bill progresses. However, we cannot undermine the fundamental principle in this bill to deliver efficient and affordable civil justice as Lord Gill attended. To sum up, Lord Gill has stated that the system is ready, litigants will benefit from these reforms, these reforms are long overdue and this bill will ensure, I believe, that our civil justice system becomes more accessible, affordable and efficient. Deputy Presiding Officer, I commend and move the motion in my name. Many thanks. I do have to advise the chamber. We are very tight for time now, Colin Christine Grahame, to speak on behalf of the Justice Committee. Maximum seven minutes please. Thank you very much, Deputy Presiding Officer. I welcome the opportunity to speak on behalf of the Justice Committee on this significant and complex bill, but thankfully without huge controversy. As the cabinet secretary has said, it broadly implements recommendations from Lord Gill's Scottish civil courts review, and I want to thank those who provided written submissions and gave oral evidence to the committee on this bill. 71 written responses, six supplementary submissions and evidence over five meetings. I also want to thank the Finance and Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee for their report. Finally, I want to thank Team Justice Committee, because we have all been through together, and thankfully, frankly, with the prospect of stage two on the criminal justice bill and this, we would have been on our knees. We even got out yesterday for a change to visit the High Court and the Court session, which makes tangible some of the proposals in the bill, and I think it was a very interesting day. We are not going to have many more. The committee welcomes the general principles of the bill. There is no doubt from the evidence that we heard that reform of the court service is long overdue. However, in certain areas, we remain to be convinced that some of the measures will achieve what they set out to achieve. That is us doing our job in my book. I will highlight, if I have time, four key areas in the bill where the committee has specific comments to make. First of all, on the privative jurisdiction of the sheriff court. As we know, the bill proposes to increase the amount of threshold of the sheriff court from five to 150,000 following the Guild review. Much of the evidence that we heard supported the principle of raising the threshold, however, many witnesses felt that that 150,000 was a bit too high. The committee noted that, in Northern Ireland, the courts hear cases with a value up to 30,000 whilst in England and Wales, cases cannot be raised in the High Court unless of a value of 25,000 or more. In evidence, some witnesses argued for a staged increase, with figures of 30,000 and 50,000 being suggested. However, Lord Gill himself made clear to the committee his view that 150,000 is an appropriate limit. The committee supported the proposal to increase the privative jurisdiction of the sheriff court, but considered that the jump to 150,000 may be too great a leap. We did not support staged increases, but we have recommended that the Scottish Government considers introducing a lower limit. We heard evidence also about the impact of a higher monetary threshold on access to council. The Faculty of Advocates expressed concern—you would expect that—about the impact that this would have on the bar. Some junior members of the faculty highlighted that the work that would be transferred out of the quota session would be work undertaken traditionally by junior members of the bar. The concern raised was that they might then decide to look for other work, thereby draining the profession of talent. Well, they were speaking up for their profession quite rightly. In his view, Sheriff's Principal Taylor recommended that the existing test or sanction referred to by Cabinet Secretary should be expanded to include a general test of reasonableness and the need to regard to the resources deployed by the other party to the case. I think that an issue raised by Duncan McNeill is known as the equality of arms factor. We think that that makes sense. We have therefore recommended that the Government brings forward an amendment at stage 2 to introduce this new test. We certainly agree with the remit of cases between courts general support for this proposal and the bill, ensuring that cases are heard at the appropriate level. The bill introduced a new test of exceptional circumstances for allowing the Court of Session to take into its count its business and operational needs before the case is remitted. We heard concerns from witnesses about this. The Faculty of Advocates, for example, suggested that this test was far too restrictive, although a forum of insurance lawyers argued that discriminating between cases on grounds of operational needs may not achieve the stated aim of access to justice and could lead to a lack of consistency in the way that cases are dealt with. Significantly, concerns were raised by Lord Gill about the appropriateness of a court refusing a remit on courts business and other operational needs quotes. He suggested that this test may breach ECHR. The minister subsequently advised that she reflected on those concerns and will consider the level of test with a view to bringing forward a stage 2 amendment and we welcome this. In general, the committee considered that a test for remitting of cases is a necessary safeguard to ensure that the most complex and serious cases can be heard in the most appropriate court with the most appropriate level of legal representation. On the personal injury court, the Gill review recommended the creation of a specialist court for personal injury based at Edinburgh Sheriff Court to reduce the pressure on sheriff courts. The review expected that personal injury claimants would still have the right to sue in any sheriff court with jurisdiction. The bill makes provision for the Scottish ministers to give effect to this recommendation by secondary legislation. It allows for the establishment of a specialist personal injury court in Edinburgh and or other locations and for other types of specialist courts referred to by the cabinet secretary to be created such as a commercial court. The policy memorandum envisages that two specialist sheriffs would be required to staff the new court and there is widespread support in evidence for the creation of a PI court. However, concerns were raised about the capacity of the new court by, among others, the IAS, the Law Society and the Faculty of Advocates. Having noted the concerns of witnesses, we have recommended that the court be established before the new level of privative jurisdiction is introduced so that it is fully equipped with electronic and administrative systems to ensure it can work properly. I want to go quickly on to appeals because I think that that is an important point that we made. The bill allows for a nationwide sheriff appeal court to sit as a bench of one. It also allows appeals to be heard either by sheriff principal or sheriffs of five years standing who would sit as appeal sheriffs. Their judgments would be binding across Scotland. Those provisions differ slightly from the Gill review, which considered that the sheriff appeal court should sit as a bench of three, with at least one being a sheriff principal. In evidence law, Gill accepted that the Scottish Government had reached a different view. When pressed, he confirmed that his personal view would be to have at least one sheriff principal sitting, even when considering procedural matters. We have welcomed the establishment of the sheriff appeal court with decisions binding on sheriffs and justices of the peace across Scotland. However, we consider that all appeals should be heard by sheriff principal rather than sheriff. In conclusion, when we had the opportunity to get a breath of fresh air yesterday out in the court of session and the High Court, we were able to visit the judicial institute learning suite where judges are trained to go through continuous training. I think that we found that very useful in looking at whether we are going to have specialist sheriffs in the future. It is also clear—this is where I found that I had lost touch. It is incredible for you to understand that, but I have lost touch—that in the courts nowadays there is a great deal made of electronic devices. We had the screens, we were seeing appeals coming from elsewhere. This will all ease pressure on the courts. That puts into the context of the court reform bill, and the committee supports the general principles. I had to get a re-visit in. Many thanks. I now call Nalyn Murray, a maximum of seven minutes. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I start on behalf of Labour members of the committee by thanking both the clerks and all the witnesses who came to give evidence to us. Let me assure the Scottish Government that Labour agrees that the Scottish court system requires reform. As the cabinet secretary said, it was Kathy Jimison when she was justice minister who instigated Lord Gil's review. Constituents and their solicitors tell us about their frustrations as cases such as those concerning family law, death eviction or anti-social behaviour take months to come to court and then are not taken on the expected date because the courts are too busy and criminal cases take precedence over civil cases. Those pressures are exacerbated in some cases by the influx of business from nearby courts, which have been recently closed. We agree that action needs to be taken. We are supportive of the creation of the post of summary sheriff to hear several cases under £5,000 in value and summary criminal cases, enabling more experienced sheriffs to deal with more complex cases and relieving some of the congestion in the system. However, it will take 10 years for the complement of 60 sheriffs to be appointed, as it is suggested that appointment will only be made when an existing sheriff retires, other than stipendary magistrates, will probably transfer across. Congestion in the sheriff courts is likely a brief one. Colleen Murray, for taking an intervention, could you advise whether the committee sought views on the concerns that have been raised in certainly my constituency about the removal of honorary sheriffs and the impact that that will have potentially on the impact of access to justice? Colleen Murray. That was part of our report. We did look at that issue. Congestion in the sheriff courts is likely to persist for some—I only got what I need. I need a shot there, just to say it's a must-see shot. The congestion in the sheriff courts is likely to persist for some time. We are concerned that, if the requirement for corroboration is abolished as the Scottish Government intend, more cases are likely to come to the sheriff court and exert even more pressure on already's creaking system. The bill replaces summary calls and small claims procedure by one simple procedure for cases under the value of £5,000. We support that, but we do not consider a simple procedure to be appropriate for certain categories of cases, even if their value is less than £5,000, such as personal injury cases and some domestic abuse cases. The bill sets out provisions for a new appeal process in part 2, establishing a new sheriff appeal court to hear summary criminal appeals and civic appeals from the sheriff court. As the committee said, while the Scottish Labour also supports the creation of the new appeal court, we share witnesses' concern over the estimate that 95 per cent will be heard by a bench of one rather than three is proposed by law. Gailness, in fact, would mean that 19 out of 20 cases, a single sheriff, would make nationally binding decisions that could determine case law across Scotland. We also share witnesses' concerns about a number of other issues, firstly the effect of section 39, which raises the exclusive competence of the sheriff courts by 3,000 per cent from £5,000 to £150,000. Cases brought to the sheriff court automatically have the right counsel, that is to employ an advocate. Cases brought to the sheriff court do not, and counsel must be applied for. The Scottish Government estimates that this limit will result in 57 per cent of cases that are currently going to the sheriff court, leaving the court of session with 2,000 cases. However, three quarters of the cases going to the court of session are personal injury cases, and the court of session hears around a third of all personal injury cases in Scotland. The Association of Personal Injury Lawyers estimates that, as a result of the 150,000 exclusive competence, 96 per cent of personal injuries would go to the sheriff courts, representing a significant reduction in the business of the court of session and an additional strain on the sheriff courts despite the creation of a specialist court. We believe that 150,000 limit is too high in relation to the average income in Scotland, where the male average full-time annual income is 29,300 and the average female is 23,600. Claims for loss of future income due to accident at work, for example, are unlikely to be five to six times the annual salary. A case brought by an employee relating to a loss of income is unlikely to go to the court of session and have the automatic right to counsel. Moreover, if an advocate is employed, the worker runs the risk of having to pay additional expenses out of any award they receive. The high figure for preventive jurisdiction compounds the problems already caused by section 69 of the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Act, which removes employer liability for a breach of health and safety regulations. The employer, however, or their insurance company, is far more likely to be able to employ the services of an advocate or QC. The loss of automatic right to counsel could result in inequality of representation and discrimination against the employee. Amendment to the legislation is necessary to guarantee equal access to representation. We also suggest that the exclusive competence of the sheriff courts in Scotland should be set at a similar level to that in Northern Ireland or possibly England. We are also concerned, too, about the resources allocated to those reforms. The bill introduces a specialist in personal injury of sheriff court. Again, we support that. However, only two sheriffs will be allocated to this court, which is likely to sit in the court of session. We question whether that will be sufficient, given the number of cases likely to transfer. We also consider that the implications for commercial cases have not been adequately considered. Currently cases of value of £5,000 and over can be taken in the commercial court in the court of session. The bill does not establish a specialist commercial sheriff court and therefore cases valued at less than £150,000 will be taken in the local sheriff court. In some places there may be a specialist commercial sheriff but in many parts of Scotland there will not. That was likely to disadvantage rural areas such as my own. We have serious concerns about the accuracy of the financial memorandum with the relation to the estimated fee income, the stated level of savings to the legal aid board and the savings from judicial salaries. I know that my colleague Malcolm Tism, who sits in the finance committee and has taken evidence on that, will give more details of those concerns at his speech. We feel that the Government is introducing important reforms without having identified a funding to support them. Finally, it is disappointing too that the Scottish Government's response to Sheriff's principle James Taylor's review of expenses and funding of civil litigation in Scotland has not been published in advance of stage 1 consideration of the bill. There are areas of overlap between those recommendations and this bill and it would have been helpful to have known if and how the Government intended to take some of those things forward. I hear that it will come out before stage 2 but, quite frankly, bringing it out before stage 2 is too late. We should have had it before stage 1. We will support the bill at stage 1. We will be hoping, of course, that it will be amended but we do consider that the financial memorandum needs to be revisited. The bill represents years of endeavour by the Scottish Civil Court's review, led by Lord President Gil, and seeks to implement overdue reforms to Scotland's civil courts. Crucially, it is intended to improve access to justice and the efficiency and effectiveness of the court system. As such, the Scottish Conservatives will be supporting the general principles behind this legislation but the improving access to justice criterion is the key measure by which the bill's provision must be assessed. To start with the positives, the creation of the new judicial appointment of summary sheriffs is good news as is the proposal to increase sheriffs specialisation and the proposal to create a new simple procedure. In terms of judicial review, a three-month time limit and the introduction of a permission stage with the section 85 real prospect of success test was subject to conflicting evidence. Those provisions potentially reduce access to justice. Therefore, both the Government and the committee need to revisit this issue to ensure that the bill adequately balances the importance of judicial review as a remedy for individuals and community groups with a need to ensure that it is not being misused. Furthermore, the bill's sheriff appeal court proposals radically depart from the Gil review recommendation by proposing that the majority of cases before this court should be heard by a single sheriff instead of before a sheriff principal or where appropriate a bench of three sheriffs principal. As a consequence, the bills would merely substitute one sheriff opinion for another, worse still. The appeal sheriff, who may or may not be a senior sheriff, will effectively be writing the law for the whole of Scotland. Given the financial memorandum clearly states that if a significant number of appeal cases required a bench of three, there would be an impact on the costs associated with the bills. It would be a grave mistake indeed for the Scottish Government to depart from the Gil recommendations merely to save it. However, it is the proposal to raise the threshold below which most actions must be raised in the sheriff court from 5,000 to a staggering 150,000, which is the most contentious. While the Government has now indicated that it is open to reconsidering a lower threshold, it is worth assessing why this change is both welcome and necessary. The current threshold does need revise to ensure that low-level cases are not routinely heard in the court of session, but the bills of 150,000 threshold would result in the transfer of thousands of cases to the sheriff court at a time when 10 courts are closing. That is unsustainable, especially given the evidence that some of our courts are already suffering unacceptable delays. Only last week it was reported that cases in Hamilton, GPaycourt, which has absorbed business from the closed motherwell court, were suffering a nine-month delay with fiscal so-pressurised and under-resourced that they do not have time to speak to defence agents at intermediate-dive stage. Consecently, numerous cases are unnecessarily pursued to trial. In addition to that, East Lothian faculty or procurators have highlighted delays at Edinburgh GP court, where trials are being set down as late as March 2015. Access to justice is self-evidently not being served here. In those circumstances, approving the transfer of thousands of cases more to the sheriff court would be an act of absolute folly. That threshold would also compromise access to justice, particularly for victims of complex but less costly personal injured cases, as the bill makes no provision for individuals to employ counsel, regardless of the fact that their opponents can and will employ said counsel. As a result of that inequality, the number of cases that settle will decrease if the business is transferred to the sheriff court and costs are likely to increase as more civil business proceeds to trial. Astoundingly, the evidence relied upon to propose the £150,000 limit was weak being anecdotal rather than empirical. The Scottish Government has not produced any further evidence to support that such a massive increase is in the interests of justice. Not surprisingly, the robustness of the financial memorandum has been questioned by both the justice and financial committees, especially as it asserts that the bill can be implemented with no new resources. That is simply not credible and is why the Scottish Conservatives will be voting against the financial memorandum. In light of those concerns, a further evidence session on the effect of court closures, the bill proposals and on resources should be held with those at the co-face, namely the Crown and Court Service staff. In conclusion, while Eric McQueen, chief executive of the Scottish Court Service, assured the committee that everything would be fine because sheriff courts were running 2,500 less sitting days a year compared to four years ago, what he failed to mention is that court closures are currently going on. That will result in a loss of nearly 2,000 sitting days. If our justice system is to be able to cope with the changes that are introduced by the bill, and given that the Government has now adopted further court closures' need to parliamentary rather than committee approval, surely Parliament must now be given the chance to vote on the court closures that were forced through last year. Many thanks to turn to the open debate. We are very tight for time. Maximum four minutes please, Christian. I'll add to be followed by Graham Pearson. Thank you, Presiding Officer. This is an important debate and I wish we would have more time to debate it today. Yesterday, like our convener said, we went uptown and it was a breath of fresh air. I was very impressed. I would like to take this opportunity to thank the Lord President, Lord Gil as the Chairman of the Institute, Lord Malcolm, Sheriff Walsh and Sheriff Duff for their welcome. It was a privilege to see the high quality training environment that exists now for our judges. The judicial institute is fit for the 21st century with training using new technologies and facilitating collaborative learning. I was really impressed to hear and see the judicial system reforming itself and reflecting the aspirations of the Scottish people in modern Scotland. The Court Reform Scotland Bill was introduced to respond to the same aspirations. Presiding Officer, this bill is seeking to implement the recommendation of the review led by Lord Gil. The tone of his conclusion was strong. Scottish civil courts provide a service to the public which is slow, inefficient and expensive. The court system has to be reformed both structurally and functionally. Committee members agreed with most of the bill, as we heard early on, and we support its general principles. On page 30 of our report, we stated that on balance, we consider that the proposed increase in the preventive jurisdiction of the Sheriff Court from £5,000 to £150,000 may be too great a leap. Let me repeat that statement again, Presiding Officer, £150,000 may be too great a leap. I was one in the committee who was not convinced that £150,000 is too great a leap. This is why the paragraph 144 starts with the words on balance and why we thought of quantifying the first instance with the words may be. On the 22nd of April, Sheriff Principal Teller came to the committee and made his point very clear. He said that those who have a particular axe to grind will have us depart from the bill in a number of areas. One such area is that of the Sheriff Court having a preventive jurisdiction of £150,000. Sheriff Principal Teller, the Royal President, Citizen Advice Scotland and the Consumer Champion, which all said that £150,000 is appropriate and will seek an insurance from the Scottish Government today that all views will be considered. Let me be clear, we have heard a lot of talks of that data and percentages to justify reducing the proposed threshold when we took evidence. But Sheriff Principal Teller answered those from the outset. He said in a poll to the committee when selected that figure was approached, my approach was not to consider what percentage of cases should be moved from the Court of Session to the Sheriff Court. Sheriff Principal Teller added, my starting point was to settle on a figure for cases that I consider to be appropriate for determination by a Sheriff. And more importantly, the Sheriff Principal concluded with a foreign statement, it's a judgment call. A judgment call, President Officer, one that I can understand because the chamber might recall I spoke in another debate about the difficulty of the Scottish legal system to accept file reaching reforms. I agree, President Officer, with Lord Gill as well when he stated that the present limit is at a ridiculous and I might add that it should have been increased a long time ago. Citizen Advice Scotland briefing couldn't be clear when it states reducing the limit from the £150,000 proposed could in practice undermine many of the proposed reforms to cause structure and specialisation. Here we are, President Officer. The question remained, his £150,000 too great a leap. I personally don't think so. This is why I ask the Scottish Government today as a minister who is closing today that all of you should be considered on the matter. Scotland outdated civil court system must be replaced with one that is most effective and efficient. I'm delighted, President Officer, that members of the judges committee all support general principles of the bill. Thank you very much. I'm afraid that every second counts in this debate. Four minutes please. Graham Pearson to be followed by Roderick Campbell. Presiding Officer, thank you for allowing me to contribute this afternoon. I'm pleased that section 69 of the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Act 2013 has been mentioned on at least two occasions this afternoon. The onerous responsibility is placed on litigants in pursuing cases where they've been injured at work, set a context for some of the concerns that have been expressed this afternoon in terms of the changes proposed in this bill. Let me say first and foremost that, like the cabinet secretary, time is overdue to reform the courts and the Scottish Labour Party supports the principles that lie behind this bill. Trade unions and many witnesses offered evidence that, in civil cases and personal injury cases, the proposals within the bill overlooked the likelihood of an inequality of arms in relation to proofs, heard at the sheriff court where bill criteria prevent parties from accessing the services of an advocate in cases that fall short of the £150,000 in terms of privative jurisdiction. I'm pleased that the cabinet secretary has indicated that he is examining that approach and seemed in his presentation to offer confirmation that no such inequality will occur post the introduction of an act and it would be useful to hear in summing up a confirmation of that fact. There is a recognition of considerations within the bill of complexities affecting decisions in respect of where a case may be heard. What is absent is an acknowledgement that sums much less than £150,000 can have a life changing impact on many working families and they rely on an outcome within the court in order to give them some form of confidence for the future. In many cases, an advocate is what they would seek to represent in their views. Although organisations such as which have suggested a much lower figure, it is obvious that, at next stage, flexibility in this approach will be essential. I'm sorry, I'm short of time. Role of the advocate in terms of this process is important. There's no doubt that the Dean of the Faculty of Advocates has raised an important issue about the forensic skills that are developed by junior advocates, analysing, understanding, assessing multifaceted and complicated facts and their ability to present those facts prior to any court case has been indicated. The court cases are settled without a hearing due to the skills that are demonstrated by advocates at that stage of the process. Anything that reduces the opportunity of advocates to develop those skills is not something that one would look forward to in terms of developments for the future. Finally, I must comment on the committee considerations of issues raised in connection with this nation's responsibilities in terms of the Ahouse convention. Its sympathetic calls for introduction of environmental tribunal for Scotland is something constituents across the south of Scotland particularly would welcome. I example a Dr Rachel Connor, who has tried hard to obtain information from a range of public authorities in respect of environmental impacts affecting her home and many others in the communities that she represents. However, she is only one example of the need for such a tribunal to decide such impacts. In conclusion, in the time available, I am supportive of the work done by the committee. As usual, I am astounded at the patients in which they have followed through in these matters and I close at that stage. I am afraid that, if members go over by a few seconds, we will lose members out of the debate. Roger Campbell will be followed by Alison McInnes. I refer briefly to my register of interests of members of the faculty of advocates. As the convener has suggested, there is no disagreement about the greater part of the bill. We need a court system that is fit for purpose. The current system, as the court review concluded in 2007, is slow, inefficient and expensive. Some changes proposed such as sheriff's specialism and the introduction of summary sheriffs carry wide support. The facility to hear generally routine matters at an appropriate level and the freeing up of sheriffs for the less serious criminal workload seems sensible. It is proposed, of course, that summary sheriffs will take up to 10 years to be fully established and we heard evidence that summary sheriffs will offer flexibility. I am sure that there will be variations in their operation across Scotland, in particular in more remote parts of Scotland. The use of technology provides opportunities, however, to substantially reduce the expense and the time incurred in the court process and clearly must be at the forefront of any court reform, together with procedural rule changes encouraging case management. While more work will be passed to summary sheriffs, sheriff courts will in turn receive work currently heard in the court session. I was struck, however, by the agreement that it could not be delivered by a sheriff court operating as it does at present. Across the board from the Lord President downwards, we heard concerns about the expense and inefficiency caused not only by criminal work taking precedence in the sheriff court but by the routine frustration of civil cases being heard over many diets and not being resolved at one sitting. Indeed, some of the concerns expressed on the change in the privative jurisdiction seemed to be based on this experience. In relation to the proposed specialist PI court, my impression is that this will be welcome provided that it is properly resourced. It does, I believe, need to replicate the best features of the current chapter 43 procedure in the court of session and if it can do so more economically, so much the better. In relation to the proposed change to the privative jurisdiction, I think that the committee were right to express its reservations. In particular, as the proposed change for non-personal injury cases, paragraph 98 of the financial memorandum suggests that the savings to the public purse will be marginal. We also have no information on the geographic spread of approximately 700 cases, which would be transferred to the sheriff court on this basis. Of course, this particular matter was not specifically dealt with in the GIL review. I think that, by common consent, the commercial procedure in the court of session works well. Sheriff Principal Taylor made the point in evidence that Glasgow Sheriff Court dealt competently with commercial cases exceeding 150,000. I am sure that that is absolutely true, but those changes will not affect that. What they will do is prevent, in the absence of a national commercial court, such as the proposed specialist PI court, it will prevent people in Wiccaw, Strenra, with cases of a monetary value less than 150,000, having the option of having their case heard in Edinburgh unless it were deemed to fall within the test for remit. In that connection, I am pleased by the Government's comments as to remit and, I think also, as the Lord President said in oral evidence, some oversight by the court of session of decisions on remit might not be inappropriate. As to the Sheriff's appeal court, I think that the committee's report says it all. As to judicial review, the bill proposes quite substantial changes. It is certainly sensible to have some time period for bringing a petition, even if many of our witnesses thought three months was too short. I think that we should bear in mind that judicial review is comparatively rare, particularly outside immigration and asylum cases. I certainly believe that any preliminary hearing for leave to bring a petition, the test should not be set to a narrowly. Finally, the elephant in the room question of sanction for counsel. I accept the need to curb disproportionate costs being incurred and I also welcome Sheriff Taylor's proposed revised test. I also heard the comments of the minister in oral evidence at the committee on the history of the fact that he advocates comments on previous reforms, which I understand and share largely. Nevertheless, I remain concerned that current proposals may well be to the detriment of the junior bar. The net result may simply be to encourage the already substantial growth of larger firms as solicitors at the expense of the bar. That, I suggest, may not necessarily represent best value for court users in the long term. Thank you, Presiding Officer. Thank you. I now call Nelson McInnes to be followed by Sandra White. Following his review of the civil courts, Lord Gill described the existing system as failing to deliver justice expeditiously, economically or efficiently. Scottish Liberal Democrats agree that many of his recommendations compel Parliament to modernise Scotland's court structures and procedures and equip them to better respond to the demands that are placed upon them. However, in the very few minutes available, I would like to focus on just some of the issues that the substantial package of reforms has inevitably presented. Among the most contentious are the proposed jurisdictions of the court of session and the sheriff courts. It appears that there is now a consensus that increasing the privative jurisdiction of the sheriff courts to £150,000 sets the bar far too high. While transferring some of the business from the court of session is not at all objectionable, it is too significant a leap from the existing 5,000 threshold and considerably higher than the equivalent limits elsewhere in the UK. The evidence that informed the revised jurisdiction was scant and Spice said that even what there was should be treated with care. Furthermore, organisations from unison to the faculty of advocates are worried that the proposed shift in business will remove the right for many litigants to be routinely represented by council, with implications not only for access to justice but for the possibility of attaining early and efficient settlement of cases. I am grateful to the minister for indicating that she is open to considering a lower limit at stage 2. During our stage 1 deliberations, I also queried the appropriateness of section 88 subsections 4 to 6, three tests to help establish whether to remit a case to the court of session. I am pleased that Lord Gill subsequently agreed that they were too high and almost certainly in breach of the European Convention on Human Rights. Again, I appreciate the minister's commitment to heed this advice and to bring forward amendments at stage 2. I suggest that we must also return to other issues, including the need to ensure sheriff specialisation is properly developed in rural areas and whether the limit for bringing applications for judicial review may be overly restrictive, particularly in light of the fact that the Scottish Government has confirmed that it is their understanding that this time limit will supersede the time limits contained in the Scotland Act 1998 and the Human Rights Act 1998, so that judicial reviews on human rights grounds will have to be brought within three months rather than the current time limit of one year. The committee and my colleagues Liam McArthur and Tavish Scott are concerned about the impact of the abolition of honorary sheriffs, crucial in the absence of a resident sheriff, concerned about the impacts that that could have on island and remote communities, but we believe that robust alternatives must be established to prevent the further erosion of locally delivered services. Indeed, it would be remiss not to note that more local courts will shortly close. Courts in 10 towns have already shut, Stonehaven, Arbroath and Cooper follow next Friday. Whether the remaining courts, such as Aberdeen, already close to capacity, will be able to cope with the increase in business that this bill could initiate, and the influx of business from the closure of their neighbours remains to be seen. Many of the recommendations of the Guild reviewer sound, there is broad consensus on the need to address the disproportionate cost of litigation, increased specialisation amongst court and judges and improve efficiency through adopting a case management approach to the conduct and disposal of court business. However, I do share the concerns expressed by the Finance Committee in its report that the quote they say, the financial memorandum is at best incoherent and at worst sorely deficient. The committee's observations on the need to clarify how the purported costs and savings will be achieved, for example in the specialised personal injury court and legal aid must be heeded. I'm therefore disappointed that the Scottish Government hasn't provided an update, let alone a full response to the committee's concerns prior to this debate. In its absence, Scottish Liberal Democrats will support the general principles of the bill, but cannot endorse the financial memorandum on the basis that it hasn't been shown to be sufficiently robust. Thank you so much. I now call on Sandra White to be followed by John Pentland up to four minutes. Thank you very much, Presiding Officer, and I thank the previous speakers for their very comprehensive contributions. In fact, they have left me very little to say or to add. However, I'll do my very best. I want to start my comments on the personal injury court and my personal interests and how it will enable access to justice, for in particular, closed-side action on its basis. The concerns that were raised in regards to access to council, and I welcome the comments from the minister to the committee. If I could just be able to read a couple of those comments out. Roseanna Cunningham, the minister mentioned at the committee that I want to say very clearly that in creating the new personal injury sheriff court we are creating a venue where such cases will be able to be raised and dealt with more quickly and effectively by specialised sheriffs using new personal injury procedures and be heard at a more proportionate cost to the family's concern due to lower lawyer fees. Where families are faced with more complex cases, they will still be able to raise their cases in the court of session and get access to council where this is appropriate. I think that that's a very important point. I do thank the minister for the contribution and also thank the cabinet secretary for reiterating that in his comments earlier today. I think that it's very important that we put that on the record and let the people know exactly what a personal injury court actually stands for. A number of my colleagues at the Christine Grahame and Christian Allard had mentioned about the visit to the justices courts in Edinburgh yesterday. I do want to take this time to thank the clerks of our committee for organising that and the courts for facilitating the visit. We did see modern technology in action, TV video links, very impressive and the excellent work being carried out by all within the courts from judges down to clerks where they were working together. I believe that that is what modernisation is about. In fact, I think that Lord Gill had mentioned when we went to the judicial learning suite. This was a first and it was very much envy throughout the world the way we were modernising the court system, very forward thinking and so much so that it is actually being replicated in Islamabad and I think that we should be very proud of that. The Scottish court system has been put out there at the front and the reason I mention this so much, apart from the fact that all the other issues had been covered previously by previous speakers, is that it was not just impressive but it showed you how we can modernise the courts. This is what this bill is all about, access to justice for people but also the modernisation of our courts which has been said by all speakers previously is badly needed and as Lord Gill has said, 50 years behind the times. Having that visit had never been there before I was very impressed by the work that was being carried out not just by the courts but by the judges also. It is a world leader in Islamabad and other countries are replicating this system. It shows that this system has worked for that area when we move forward and it can work for the whole court system within Scotland as we move forward also. I really do myself look forward to carrying the proposals of this committee and this bill through the rest of the Parliament and I am sure that the modernisation of the court system will be welcomed by everyone. Thank you very much. There is general support for court reform. Yes, we want to modernise Scottish courts. Yes, we want to make the system more efficient and yes, we want it to be less expensive and more accessible to users. But it is not the stated aims that need scrutiny. It is the measures that are supposed to deliver them. I am therefore concerned that some of the proposals in the bill appear to erode rather than strengthening the user rights. This can be addressed at stage 2 and I would hope that the Scottish Government will be consensual in accepting opposition amendments. One of the main disputed areas is the value of the cases to be moved from the court of session to the share of court which was reviewed by the share of principle Taylor. With regard to the private, the privative jurisdiction of £150,000 he admitted that it was not chosen with regard to percentage of cases that would be moved from the court of session to the share of court. He referred to it as a judgment call. It was just what he considers appropriate for the determination by a share of. In other words, it was the highest amount that would be appropriate for the share of court, not an amount chosen with consideration to the practical consequences for functioning of courts. He also told us that while the average sum sued for was over £150,000, the average sum that the pursuer receives was less than a third of that. You can see from these figures how many cases would transfer and the pressure this would put on the share of courts. There are significant doubts about whether funding and resources are adequate to back up these proposals, which could lead to court users' experience, delays when using the system and other adverse impacts. I therefore call on the Scottish Government to give assurances that it will address this issue in the figures in its financial memorandum, which are shown to be overly optimistic. We must also address the issue of inequality of arms. Restricting litigants' access to council is a widespread concern, and many people would be happier if this legislation was amended to ensure that it does not introduce obstacles to achieving equality of arms. Trade unions and solicitors have argued that, particularly in personal injury cases, victims of every workplace injury and disease must be entitled to raise their actions at the specialist personal injury court and have the automatic right for the presumption in favour of accessing a representation by the council. There were also strong arguments that, as best as cases, 95 per cent are worth less than £150,000 that should be dealt with by the court of session, given their complexity. The complexity of cases is not necessarily driven by their value. Presiding Officer, in conclusion, we need to ensure that litigants can still access representation by council when they need it to prevent the balance tipping in favour of defending employers and insurers. I know Colin Nigel Dawn to be followed by Malcolm Chisholm. Presiding Officer, I do feel as though I'm something of an interloper here, not having been on the Justice Committee through this, but it's a fascinating subject and there are a few points that I'd like to make, particularly from the perspective of the Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee. Can I start by observing that the builders, as I understand it, talk specifically about personal injuries court but does not talk about other specialist courts, merely facilitates them. We did on the Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee a challenge whether or not that should be subject to some consultation. The Government came back very robustly and said, no, we felt that the court service should be able to establish their own specialist courts as they felt fit and they would do their own consultation. Can I say in retrospect and on reflection that seems to me to be entirely appropriate? I take Rod Campbell's comments earlier about the fact that there might be a commercial court in Glasgow, but regions might struggle to get that kind of service. In that case to me it would be entirely appropriate for the Lord President to set up a commercial court maybe for the time being in Aberdeen or wherever in order to deal with those things and he really doesn't need our advice on how to do that. I'd also just like briefly to reflect on the Sheriff Court appeals system. I have to say that it seems to me that it's a very good thing that that should be binding nationally. There's really very little sense in holding on to the idea that a person will make appeals only for their sheriff. But I do just wonder whether the idea of a single sheriff on the bench at appeals is really the right way to do it. I think history tells us that appeal cases often are improved if there are three members of a bench. I recognise there's a cost implication, but I suspect that might be where you'd want to go with appeals. Lastly, Presiding Officer, I just reflect on the fact that it's Citizens Advice Scotland who point out how important it can be for there to be in court advice. A way of avoiding the litigation, avoiding the lawyers, is actually to get people talking to each other sensibly beforehand and I commend to the Government that it might do all it can to make sure that there's more of that. Thank you. Thank you. Now I call on Malcolm Chisholm to be followed by John Finnie up to four minutes. Presiding Officer, I was on the financial committee looking at the financial memorandum of this bill and it seems to me there were three major mysteries about the financial memorandum and a few minor ones. Firstly, there's going to be a loss of fee income and yet it seems we're told there's going to be negligible effect from that. Secondly, there's going to be an increase on the sheriff's court workload, but again there's going to be no negligible effect. Thirdly, there's going to be a big reduction in the legal aid budget for no obvious reasons. So taking the first issue of fee income in section 75 of the memorandum, we're told that 80 per cent of personal injury cases will go to the sheriff's court. The Association of Personal Injury Lawyers actually thinks that it's higher than that at 96 per cent, but sticking with the figure of 80 per cent and in accordance with the freedom of information request by the same association, it seems that £1.1 million will be lost in fee income through that change because much less is charged in the sheriff's court than the court of session. So the committee was wanting to know whether the result of that would be an overall increase in court fees and obviously there would be concerns about that. In terms of the increase in sheriff's court workload, again the committee felt that there was a mystery about this because we were told by the bill team that there would be no increase in sitting days at the sheriff's court, but of course the intention behind removing, creating the £150,000 threshold is to remove a substantial part of the court of session business. So there does seem to be a contradiction there and Margaret Mitchell in great detail described the pressure that the sheriff's court is already under, it's overcrowded, there's closures to come, of course cases were told expecting to last for four days, I rarely heard on consecutive days. The reduction in the number of cases that were also told about by the cabinet secretary today does not correspond to the amount of judicial time spent there. That's another point made by the Association of Personal Injury Lawyers who point out that the 36 per cent reduction in the number of cases flagged up by the Government is mainly debt or repossession cases that are usually undefended. Many complex cases will transfer to the court of session. For example, I was told very recently of two medical negligence cases in the court of session that have two judges and three to five weeks to be heard and that kind of case would transfer to the court of session. There's a great mystery about the workload on the court of session and how that is going to be managed. The other mystery, of course, is to do with the legal aid savings. We were told that a lot of that was to come from a 50 per cent reduction in the use of counsel, and yet the cabinet secretary said today that it is very rare that sanction for counsel is refused in the sheriff's court. He was very reassuring about the concerns raised, for example, by Clyde side action on Asbestos, and indeed by people in my constituency who have claims for Asbestos harm. He was saying that they would get counsel, and yet a lot of the savings from the legal aid budget are because of not having counsel anymore. Over and above that, of course, most of those costs are recovered and they are not against the legal aid budget in any case. There's a great mystery around the savings on the legal aid budget, and we were very concerned that the bill team could not answer our questions about that. I think that I've got very long left, so just three minor points. Substantial costs in creating a new training programme for specialist sheriffs was flagged up while the whole IT budget for the specialist personality court only £10,000. Finally, no proposal to reduce the number of judges in the court of session. There will be any savings from moving that business out of the court of session. John Finnie, after which we will move to closing speeches. Thank you, Presiding Officer. It's a welcome focus for the Justice Committee to be looking at civil rather than criminal matters, and I support the principle of the balls like my colleagues do. I also support the specialisations that are to take place on the summary sheriffs. Some of the specialisations, particularly domestic violence and family law, are going to require a great deal of specialism. I think that it was unhelpful the term that they were classed with as low value. I think that we need to be very careful with our terminology, and we heard that very graphically from Scottish Women's Aid. It was 1587 that the Scottish Parliament gave the accused the statutory right to be represented by council. That was 150 years before that right was afforded at the jurisdiction immediately to our south. Even earlier that in 1424, the Scottish Parliament enacted legislation requiring the appointment of advocates to represent poor litigants. Now, the Faculty of Advocates tell me in a document the principle that legal representation should be available to all who need it is built into the DNA of our society, and I don't think anyone would dispute that. The purpose of this legislation was to improve the efficiency, effectiveness and proportionality. As we've heard from a number of speakers, it's certainly the view that the Court of Session operates very effectively. We've heard some, Lord Gill, about the sheriff courts and clearly we've heard concerns about that. I would have to say that it's not simply about the technology, not least because with a personal injury court it's like that it's going to occupy the same building, it is going to be about the procedures that are going to be adopted and we have heard that those are expected to result in cost savings. Sanction for Council is an issue that's of a great story and it's a key aspect of the evidence of the Scottish Police Federation. The Scottish Trade Union Council talks about the imbalance that is inherent in the employer-employer relationship nowhere more so than in health and safety. Now they also acknowledge that that imbalance is in part addressed by health and safety laws which we know are reserved and a court system that ensured workers had access to best representation and we're certainly never going to be quote outgunned in terms of representation. So what we've heard from the Cabinet Secretary on equality of arms is certainly welcomed. There's been some discussion about section 69 of the Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Act. I see that as a further attack on workers' terms and conditions. We know that there's no simple health and safety cases at this time. I welcome the personal injury court. I welcome the discussion that I think needs to be on-going about the sanction for council, the complexity of cases, the length of cases and the equality of arms. I think we often have discussions about what should be on the face of the bill as distinct from guidance and I'm very keen that we don't have to rely on benevolent interpretation of guidance so I certainly will be coming forward with a proposal to have a statutory presumption in favour of sanction for council in work related instances. In the very short time that's left can I commend the fact that our report talks about environmental justice court. Can I encourage the Scottish Government to stick to a 2011 manifesto covering that particular issue? It's been responded to in answer to my colleague Patrick Harvie. I think it's very important that we adhere to the artist convention. I think the most important thing is that our civil justice system serves the people but also that we don't throw out the baby with a bathwater as regards that we've had from the various people and not least the advocates. The rural dimension has been considered my colleague Liam McArthur. I can assure him that it was addressed there. It needs to be accessible to everyone regardless of location and I'm content that we're going to address these matters on an ongoing basis. Thank you very much and we now move to closing speeches and I call on Annabelle Goldie up to four minutes please. Thank you Deputy Presiding Officer. I remember even then that our Sheriff Court model attracted widespread admiration because of the flexibility of jurisdiction which it offered and because of course the local provision of justice. I think that's what many of our constituents expect from the justice system they want an accessible and workable court system. That assumes that there are sufficient courts in Scotland to enable cases to be heard without litigants or witnesses or the accused having to rack up expense to get to those courts. I think that this is a very important backdrop to the bill and a number of members have already alluded to it. It's worth bearing in mind that Lord Gill brought forward the proposals which are the basis for this bill in 2009 when we had many more courts operating in Scotland than we do now. Already we've lost three Sheriff Courts and six district courts and just over a week we'll lose a further three Sheriff Courts with their related district courts and four more district courts. That amounts to one-fifth of our Sheriff Courts, many of them in remote areas. Yet the very changes proposed by this bill will create expanded and busier Sheriff Courts. I think that there is a serious disconnect and I've noted the opinion of Lord Gill with my respect highly but can I ask the Scottish Government what survey has been made of the remaining 39 Sheriff Courts to assess the capacity of the infrastructure for a major expansion of cases and what assessment has been carried out of the likely number of sheriffs necessary to serve this additional case load? I have to say, Deputy Presiding Officer, without answers to these basic questions there can be no guarantee that this bill, if enacted, can be implemented in practice. Has there been any revisal of the closure proposals given the new anticipated workload and the greater distances confronting members of the public in accessing their new Sheriff Court? Given the explicit reservations about the robustness of the financial memorandum which, with the interest of time, I won't repeat and with what may be further as yet unquantified costs my party is unable to support the financial memorandum but we shall support the bill. Can I just deal with a couple of specific aspects? The creation of a sheriff appeal court to hear appeals from the decision of sheriffs in civil and summary criminal matters may sound logical if it is an appeal court. The Guild review recommended that such cases should be heard by three judges but that is not what the bill is delivering and the financial memorandum assumes 95 per cent of appeals will be heard by one judge only. Further, such a judge need not only have been a sheriff for five years. I don't like this. The current system of appeals the sheriff principle is better than that proposition. If we are to have a sheriff appeal court it must have a panel of three judges who should be elected from existing sheriff principles and another sheriff or sheriffs with expertise appropriate to the case. In conclusion, I raise the matter of judicial review. Can I just say that this process may be the only means of challenge left to an individual who feels unfairly treated by the relative might of officialdom and if we are serious about achieving fairness and addressing inequality we should be vigilant about the rights and interests of the individual. The cost of a judicial review application will weigh heavily with any litigant. No one will undertake this course lightly. I think that a three month time limit may be completely insufficient for investigating and preparing such a complex application and also for investigating if the applicant can afford the process. I fear that restriction weighs the scales against the individual or the state which, in my opinion, is regrettable. I also think that because that can be the last bastion of justice for the individual why is leave of the court required to take a judicial review application. I would urge the Scottish Government to seriously reconsider extending that three month time limit and removing the requirement for permission being necessary to take a judicial review application. Many thanks. In my closing speech I want to concentrate on a few issues that have been pertinent to the discussion today. The first is the accuracy of the financial memorandum that my colleague Malcolm Chisholm described first of all that the calculation regarding the fee income is dubious. The court of session collected £2.2 million in fees in 2012-13 from 2,801 personal injury cases to 1,873,492 from 3,240. On the basis of that the Association of Personal Injury Lawyers has estimated that there will be a loss in fee income of £1.145 million if, in fact, they are estimate in terms of the numbers of cases which transfer is 96% there would actually be a loss of £1.4 million. The financial memorandum takes absolutely no account of the loss of income to the courts and, in fact, the possible effect on court fees. The figures for the savings to the legal aid board are also suspect. 96 states that the Scottish legal aid board paid £3.1 million for council in 2012 and £2.4 million in 2012-13. Paragraph 97 says that 50% savings on expenditure could be made as not all cases which transferred to the sheriff court or to the public purse. As Malcolm Tism said the savings for the judicial salaries in the financial memorandum are also questionable. Paragraph 83 says that there are potential savings in the legal aid board and in the financial memorandum there are potential savings in the legal aid board and in the financial memorandum there are potential savings in the legal aid board Paragraph 83 says that there are potential savings of £57,000 through making personal injuries sheriffs rather than outer house judges Paragraph 112 states that are current savings in judicial salaries of between £162,000 per annum will be made through the employment of appeal sheriffs instead of inner house judges but these judges are still going to have work to be employed, they will still be sitting in a court session on the high court, they may have less work to do overall but they will still have to be paid so I cannot see really how those savings will be realised. Roddy Campbell mentioned the issue about the resourcing of the special personal injury courts, I still question whether only two sheriffs will be sufficient the ratio of judges to cases brought in the court of session is 1 to 154 currently there is a sheriff court the ratio of sheriffs to cases is 1 to 556 but however even on the Government's own estimate of 2,000 personal injury cases transferring from the sheriff courts one sheriff in that court might potentially have 1,000 cases to deal with so many personal injury cases proceed timidly in the court of session if a date is set for hearing both pursuer and defendant know that the case will probably be taken on that date and I have been told that this helps concentrate minds and generally results in a settlement before proof is taken however in the sheriff courts cases are often not taken on the date set and there is not the same stimulus to settle out of court so I think the problem is that if the specialist injury, a personal injury court is overloaded because of insufficient for cases not to be taken on the date set and the assumptions about high proportion settling before the proof will not be realised. Graham Pearson, John Fennie, John Pentland all talked about the exclusive competence of the sheriff court and equal access to representation. The STUC several trade unions, APIL the Faculty of Advocates, a law society all of these have raised the issue of equal access to representation and evidence and although the employee could apply to the sheriff for access to council indeed sheriff Taylor committee that he could not remember turning down an application for council this is a new regime, it's a new system and there's absolutely no guarantee of equality of arms in the legislation as it stands. The limit of 150,000 also refers to the amount pursued not the amount awarded which will usually be considerably less as we've heard and in most cases personal injury cases settle out of court for about 48% of the amount pursued however the award for expenses will depend on the settlement and this is less than £150,000 and the award may be based on the sheriff court level rather if sanction for council is not awarded therefore the winning party may have to pay the additional expense of council from the award rather than the bill being picked up by the losing party. The association for personal injury lawyers suspect that this risk will result in claimants in pursuing sums of considerably more than 150,000 opting to go to the sheriff court rather than the court of session even though they are above the exclusive competence limit. Sheriff Taylor indeed represented that the bill be amended to expand the test for granting sanction for council to include a general test of reasonableness. Some witnesses such as the STUC have called for automatic access to council in the new personal sheriff court. Others such as Thomson's and Clyde's election and specimens have suggested that the pursuers in certain types of cases should automatically be entitled to representation by an advocate and I look forward to the committee testing some of these suggestions at stage 2 as we go forward. Alison McInnes made reference to remitting cases to the court of session. The current test for remitting cases refers to importance or difficulty of the case but the bill replaces this with a test requiring the sheriff to remit a request a remit and then actually as it's written enables the court of session to take account of its business and operational needs as we've heard and evidence lord Gill stated that test of exceptional circumstances was too high and he expressed concern that section 88.6 would allow the court of session to refuse a remit basically on the grounds that it was too busy. He suggested that this would be in breach of ECHR the minister confirmed by letter that the Scottish Government accepted this. I'm pleased that that has been accepted but it is actually disappointing again that substantial drafting error has been made in a bill as it's introduced and I think that suggests a sort of sloppy approach to the way in which the bill has been drafted and finally I think there are issues around the judicial review period of three months it may well be too short as we've heard and evidence from many representing people's human rights and so on. It may not give communities long enough in cases like ours to put together their arguments and I think we probably need to revisit the judicial review limit as well when we come back at stage 2. Many thanks and I'll call on Rosanna Cunningham to wind up the debate. Thank you Presiding Officer and I should open by declaring an interest as a former practising member of the faculty of advocates and I think currently still a non-practising member of the faculty. As the First Minister said last week lord Gill's aim in proposing the reform is to make justice more accessible to more people and to lower the cost of getting justice. The reforms are intended to make the administration of justice in Scotland more efficient, to make it more accessible to ordinary people and at proportion at cost. The fundamental principle of this bill is for the right cases to be heard in the right courts and currently the choice of court is almost invariably not made by the litigant but by his or her legal adviser. Some cases are routinely taken to the court of session needlessly increasing legal costs to litigants so the proposed changes do bring benefits to litigants. In terms of delivering reduced costs for litigants Labour made it quite plain when they commissioned the Scottish Civil Courts review in 2007 that one of the four key issues to be reviewed was the cost of litigation to the parties. The raising of the exclusive competence of the sheriff court is essential to deliver better access to justice and I am glad that the committee acknowledged this although I accept that there is a variance of opinion on what that should be. The cabinet secretary has already discussed the position on sanction for counsel in asbestos and other complex personal injury cases. Complex personal injury cases will be able to be remitted from the sheriff court to the court of session. Sanction for counsel in the sheriff court whilst at the discretion of the sheriff is very likely to be granted in complex cases and especially in those cases where the other side has employed counsel. We will bring forward amendments to ensure that the test for remitting cases where counsel is automatic is not too strict. Whilst the rules on sanction for counsel are for the Lord President, the court of session and the Scottish Civil Justice Council to consider, I should make clear that there is no intention that the test suggested by Sheriff Principal Taylor's review in relation to workplace injuries the cabinet secretary has indicated that he is open to further discussion with the STUC on issues of concern to them including the principle that personal injury cases under simple procedure will have specific rules. The point that John Finnie made may not in fact be competent because health and safety is a reserved matter and that's something that needs to be kept at the forefront of our minds. Regarding the concerns about a single appeal sheriff, the Government continues to believe that given the procedural nature of these civil appeals an appeal sheriff will be suitably qualified to hear the appeal. However, the quorum of the court will be for court rules and the decision on which appeal sheriffs will form the judicial complement of the sheriff appeal court in individual cases will be a matter for the president and vice president of that court. I have very little time if it's brief. In that event, what is the role of the sheriff principal going to be? That will be a matter for that court to consider that it will be a matter for the president and vice president of that court so it may be in an individual case that it will be considered that the sheriff principal will be sitting on or otherwise. The committee has asked for further information on court's capacity and today Margaret Mitchell raised the spectre of thousands of cases transferring at once, but they won't transfer all at once. If cases have started in the court of session they will stay in the court of session. It is new cases that will be raised in the sheriff court. We've heard about the dramatically falling numbers of civil cases in the sheriff courts. Indeed, recently released statistics show that there has been a substantial reduction in the number of civil cases being heard at sheriff court level. A drop of around 8,000 cases between 2011-12 and 2012-13 and a drop of over 50,000 cases since 2008-09. The transfer of those cases should also be seen in the context of other improvements such as better, more streamlined processes in court and better case management. Margaret Mitchell also raised the issue of court closure as I simply reiterate that they result in the redistribution of only 5% of sheriff court business to other nearby courts, with staff and judiciary also transferring. Fluctuating demand can be managed and the Scottish court service has stated that these changes will result in more efficient and effective court services. I do want to take just a little time to respond to some of the points made during the debate. Liam McArthur and indeed Alison McInnes raised the issue of honorary sheriffs. Well, Liam McArthur knows because I have written to him in this regard that we will not abolish honorary sheriffs until alternative arrangements are in place. There has been some considerable discussion of the financial memorandum. The memorandum notes that savings are expected to be generated from efficiencies released. Those reforms are about a reorganisation of the existing resources of the courts as well as doing things in the most efficient way possible. Whilst we have included figures in the financial memorandum on the upfront investment required, for example, in the Scottish Civil Justice Council, we do not expect any significant additional investment to be necessary. The policy on court fees is to move towards full-cost recovery over time and this is regardless of the courts reform process. The last round of court fees orders in 2012 included an above inflation rise with that portion contributing to those upfront costs. The next fee orders are expected to be laid in 2015 and these will be consulted on before being scrutinised by this Parliament. Eric McQueen stated to the Justice Committee that the Scottish Court Service does not expect to see a large overall increase in the total amount of fees recovered for the cost of civil business. Lord Gill has said from the work that has been done by the Scottish Court Service and the Scottish Civil Justice Council, I am absolutely satisfied that the reforms can be adequately funded. They are part of the long-term planning of the Scottish Court Service. To deal with just a couple of very specific issues raised, Markham Chisholm brought up a couple of points. He talked about there being a no increase in sitting days but that is compared to the figure for 2011-12 which was used in the financial memorandum and this is because there has been a decrease in the civil caseload since then. SCS have confirmed that this level of sitting days would be sufficient for the expected level of business. He also talked about in the financial aid bill, how can it fall if SCS is rarely refused but SCS is rarely refused when needed and that is the current position. It will be likely in the future that that will continue to be the position. John Pentland talked about there being no percentages considered in the choice of £150,000 as a limit but Lord Gill estimated that that would take around two thirds from the general department of the court of session and 25% from the commercial court so there are some percentages available. Graham Pearson raised the issue of advocates being necessary even if it is only for the point of settlement rather than a proof but both the Faculty of Advocates and the Association of Personal Injury Lawyers have agreed that there was no evidence that cases settled earlier in the court of session than the Sheriff Court so that would suggest actually that an advocate isn't essential in that regard. I am conscious that it is time to sum up. Reforms are about a vision for the future of the courts in Scotland. It is one where cases will be dealt with expeditially and that will save money for litigants and it's one which I hope the profession will embrace. I commend the motion. That concludes the debate on the Court's Reforms Scotland Bill. We now move to the next side of business which is consideration of motion number 9375 in the name of John Swinney on the financial resolution for the Court's Reforms Scotland Bill I call on John Swinney to move the motion cabinet secretary. Thank you. Does anybody wish to oppose it? Elaine Murray. The Scottish Government has brought forward a bill that is part of the process of reform of the Scottish judicial system. We agree with some but not all of its proposals and we will support it at stage 1 in the hope of amendment. But we are not content that it has been accompanied by a sloppy financial memorandum which contains information from third parties and which does not even seem to have been checked by ministers and their civil servants. We appreciate that these are straight in financial times. However, the Scottish Government has chosen to bring forward this bill and it should have given careful consideration whether sufficient resources were available to ensure its success. If all that bill does is to place additional pressure on the already overloaded sheriff courts, it will have failed its policy attention and the intention of Lord Gail's reviews. It is not good enough to vaguely say that court fees can be used to cover additional costs. We believe that the Scottish Government should withdraw its financial memorandum, do its homework, come back with a revised memorandum which has been properly researched and properly costed. Cabinet Secretary, do you wish to respond? I will, Presiding Officer. First of all, can I say that the Government takes very seriously the preparation of financial memorandum on bills and they are subjected to extensive consultation with a range of interested parties and we listen carefully to the feedback as we have had recently from the Finance Committee about issues in connection with financial memorandum and that is only served to reinforce the determination of the Government to ensure that financial memorandum is produced in an effective fashion. On this particular bill the Government worked extensively with our partners on the making justice work 1 board to develop the business cases for the various reforms that have been taken forward in the bill. These business cases were used to develop this financial memorandum which