Four weeks gone and this was in many senses a workaday week for Holyrood: Labour’s attention on party rows elsewhere, committees getting to grips with their subject matter, more questions regarding indyref bookkeeping, a soundbite-based FMQs and a row over Brexit.
Following the welcome signs that some SNP backbenchers are realising that robust scrutiny of Ministers with whom you share a party membership is not a treasonable offence, attention is starting to be drawn to other parts of the parliamentary process. For example, whether the opposition should be guaranteed a quota of oral questions. While the process is randomised, this does mean that the questioning can at times appear favourable to the Government, as Wednesday’s questions on Education & Skills revealed. Though 20 questions are selected, the first from a non-SNP member was seventh this week, in a session that would only reach question eleven, on a portfolio that only comes around once every six sitting weeks.
After last week’s kafuffle over the voting buttons and the Government’s squeaky escape on a casting vote from the chair, this week the opposition parties managed to inflict a defeat on the Government on the closure or downgrading of local hospital services. The Government amendment was defeated by 64 to 62 and SNP members then abstained on the final vote. It doesn’t bind the Government into doing much, but it does reveal the potential power of the opposition parties when coming together on an issue.
After months out of the limelight, the news that Glasgow MP Natalie McGarry has been formally charged with embezzlement of campaign funds grabbed the headlines on Tuesday, followed later in the week by news of another investigation, this time focused on Dundee MP Chris Law and his Spirit of Independence tour. With some members of the Westminster group reportedly campaigning for the reinstatement of Michelle Thomson to the SNP whip, this weekend’s NEC meeting will surely want to keep their distance until there’s no risk of contagion.
On a brighter note for the SNP, the First Minister’s position on Brexit negotiations is on more solid ground and gets the backing of today’s Herald leader column. In a row clearly initiated to deliver headlines ahead of the Conservative party conference, David Mundell claims that the First Minister and the SNP are “pursuing a shameless strategy to use it [Brexit] to further their overriding cause of independence”.
In a direct challenge to this, the Herald argues “There could not be a clearer example of Scotland voting one way and being forced to accept a different outcome than the EU referendum. If it is believed, as the SNP believes, that Scotland should control its own destiny and that our nation faces a democratic deficit, what clearer example could there be to develop these themes than in the Brexit debate? The SNP’s prescription to address that can itself be debated but it seems obtuse to deny the political consistency of Ms Sturgeon’s position.”
In terms of legislation, the Scottish Government’s consultation on a Child Poverty Bill closes today. The consultation process was truncated to eight weeks to enable a Bill to be introduced in early 2017. Though it won’t make any headlines, housing organisations have also welcomed the Scottish Government reassurances this week that legislation will be brought forward to secure the borrowing potential of registered social landlords, key partners in the delivery of affordable housing targets.
And lastly, returning to the topic of questions, the frequency of those being lodged by another Mundell was a topic for comment by my colleagues this week… as well as Gail Ross’s less-than-subtle reaction to her Committee convener’s comments. We can’t stop watching.