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Thank you for relaying that example; I have come across others. Too often, local authorities rely on the claim that tenants are not circulating sufficient air within the property. Do we need to provide more evidence about the exact source of mould? The dismissal is leaving tenants in properties that are just uninhabitable.

We do not have a committee convener. We decided not to sit on as many committees. We took a different approach from the Greens and decided to focus on areas that we regard as a priority. That means that we are missing out on certain opportunities.

We have got a deputy convener, who happened to be a member of that committee. However, that is probably not as much of a priority as choosing the convener.

Yes.

I think that Ross Greer and I are the only two original members of this session’s education committee left. The membership has rotated a lot—far too much. I know that that is up to the parties, but I think that it means that the committee loses knowledge, and the team that is created also goes. I therefore appeal to the whips not to rotate members so frequently.

I am not casting any aspersions on the current Scottish National Party members of the committee, but when we scrutinised the Children (Care and Justice) (Scotland) Bill, the three SNP members were prepared to step out, not vote with the whip and test the Government minister in a way that I thought showed a committee working at its best. They were not being rebellious; they were just doing the right thing, and that does not always happen. We sometimes see members with the whip in front of them, and they vote in exactly the same way every single time and do not question anything. I have seen both extremes.

My point is that a lot of this is down to individuals. The structure has an impact and it incentivises different behaviours, but, unless you have a culture that is collaborative and unless members of the governing party are prepared to test and challenge, you will get a bit of a stultifying experience whereby nothing really moves forward. When the members challenge, ministers are forced to engage more effectively, and I think that they do a better job as a result. I think that we ended up with a better Children (Care and Justice) (Scotland) Bill as a result of those members behaving differently.

We need some structural reform, but my appeal is for members of the governing party to see the benefit of straying just a little bit from the whip into challenge, rather than just adhering to what they are told to do. That is my advice.

The only other additional potential downside relates to the headspace for members of a smaller committee, who might not be interested in every single issue, however important. With a bigger committee, it is more likely that two or three members will be really interested and will dive right in. Of course, every member of the committee will do their job, but you really want people there who are passionate about the subject. That is a potential downside.

I would still favour reducing the size of committees, because additional members can be brought in and we can get over the proportionality issues. That would mean that people such as yourself, Ms Roddick, would not have to sit on three committees, which I think would dominate a member’s week. Keeping up with the agenda and the papers alone is almost impossible. A smaller committee would get more out of individual members.

I would favour the suggestion. The first benefit would be freedom—that is, having a bit more freedom from the whip. The second would be stability. I think that someone who was appointed or elected as a convener would be there for the five years, and that kind of stability should be a benefit. A third benefit would be the provision of a separate career path for politicians. Instead of their always aspiring to be a spokesperson or a minister, they would see a convenership as a credible career path to pursue. Again, that would mean being slightly freer from the whip.

It would also build in a bit more bipartisanship and collaboration. Members would have to seek the support of other parties, so having elected conveners would bridge the divide a little bit and give a bit of comfort to both sides that the convener would do a fair and reasonable job.

There would be downsides, of course, and Douglas Ross has highlighted some of them. Overall, though, I agree with Ross Greer that, even if only half or three quarters of the committees ended up having a contest, that would be better than what we have now, for all the reasons that I have set out.

I quite like the convener’s suggestion that the committee could adopt a different persona depending on its function, but there is not enough time in the week and there are not enough ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ to have all of that.

As a side point, first, I think that there needs to be a bit of self-control from members on the number of bill amendments that are lodged—I am sure that I am as guilty as anybody else. The number of amendments to the Housing (Scotland) Bill is just extraordinary—your committee, Ms Roddick, is sitting for weeks in order to go through them all. We had a similar situation with the Education (Scotland) Bill, which went on for some time.

Secondly, members introduce their own members’ bills, of which there are a lot. I do not want us to be in a position where we cannot allow members the freedom to do so, but the number of members’ bills has crept up over the years and there are now more of them. There is almost a competition to lodge more amendments and introduce a members’ bill, and it is almost impossible for the committees to give them due attention. Therefore, I think that members need to be encouraged to step back a bit. Of course, you should let them do the important stuff, but they also need to reflect on whether lodging this or that amendment is absolutely essential.

I have never thought of that suggestion, but it is quite a good one. It could be exactly the same people, because you want to include in the questioning and scrutiny of the legislation not just the knowledge that has been gleaned through the pre-legislative scrutiny, but the knowledge from your other inquiries. You could have exactly the same membership but call it something different on the particular day that you are scrutinising legislation. I think that that suggestion could work, so I am sympathetic to it.

My only other point is that I am interested in the non-Government majority, which I think would force Opposition members to behave differently on a committee. We would know that how we voted would affect the outcome of the vote; we would not sit in isolation knowing that our voting a certain way would have no effect on the outcome. With a non-Government majority, the balance of responsibility shifts.

When it comes to legislation, if the Government is unhappy with something that has come forward, it can always clear things up at stage 3 in the chamber. A non-Government majority could force greater collaboration between Opposition and Government. For instance, since the Greens have left government, the Parliament has changed—ministers are much more engaging, and you can see them working the chamber and the tea rooms now. Not having that majority forces ministers to look outwards; it might be the same for committees.

I agree. When I was leader of my party, I did not sit on committees for 10 years, although, initially, I sat on the committee that examined the bill that would implement the Calman powers. Committee participation was an untapped world for me, and I have since enjoyed it. For the reasons that Douglas Ross has set out, I have enjoyed the education, committee, because I have been able to get into a level of detail that I would never be able to in the chamber, and witnesses who attend the committee know an awful lot of stuff. You can gain tremendous knowledge by listening to them, reading the briefings and learning from SPICe, which helps with the rest of your work. I think that committee participation should be emphasised at the start of the session.

Secondly, I am in favour of smaller committees, although there is an issue of proportionality. If committees are smaller, we need to recognise that the very small parties cannot be cut out altogether. We need to have proportional representation across committees. Smaller committees would be more agile and nimble and could get under the bonnet of important issues.

Thirdly, I was in the House of Commons for four years and, for a period of that time, I sat on the Defence Committee. That was a select committee rather than a standing committee for legislation. Labour had a majority Government at the time, but Labour members left their rosettes at the door, so we were able to give ministers a really hard time. As I understand it, their whips did not put pressure on them for doing so, because they regarded it as their job.

That separation between scrutiny of legislation and scrutiny of accountability is a benefit of the Westminster system—I know that we cannot do that here. It is about getting it into members’ minds that they have two separate functions. When we scrutinise legislation, we know that, from a Government perspective, the legislation must get through, and it is the members’ job to vote it through. However, when it comes to the scrutiny of bodies and ministers, members need to act differently, so it is important for them to have two committee functions and roles in their heads.

When I am in committee, I ask questions that I might not agree with. We have been working on the Tertiary Education and Training (Funding and Governance) (Scotland) Bill, and I have been asking tough questions on both sides because I think that it is important to uncover the facts. I will come to a different conclusion at the end—I will not be a Liberal and pick both options; I will pick one side. However, it is important that, when we are going through the initial phase, we interrogate robustly.

Of course, from time to time, everybody plays the political role more than the scrutiny role—that happens with all parties, not just Opposition parties. However, I hope that other members of the committee see the benefit of members who are prepared to get to the facts rather than just take a party position.