Chamber and committees

Do any of the other witnesses have ideas on how that should be approached? Alan, I saw you making eye contact during that answer.

Oh, I apologise—did you just cover that, Jeremy? I have a few questions, so I will move on to financial implications.

Do you agree that the bill proposals will not result in any additional costs for local authorities or charities? I ask Alan Eccles to answer first.

On that theme, do the witnesses have any concerns about the proposal to publish unredacted accounts for all charities, regardless of size? Witnesses last week suggested that there could be a threshold to ensure that charities with smaller incomes were exempt. Would you support such a measure? I will go to Alan Eccles first.

We now move to theme 3, which is on information about charity trustees. Evelyn Tweed has the next questions.

Pam Duncan-Glancy has a supplementary question.

Thank you, Martin.

If you have further questions, Emma, on you go.

I have a few questions before we finish. I apologise that we have run on slightly—we have had so much to get through. Do you have any concerns regarding the appointment of interim charity trustees, and are you satisfied that there is enough clarity around that provision? Should there be a dispute mechanism—

I thank all the witnesses for giving evidence this morning. I will briefly suspend the meeting to allow for a change of witnesses.

Welcome back, everyone. I welcome to the meeting our second panel. Dr John Picton is a senior lecturer and member of the charity law and policy unit at the University of Liverpool; Nick Holroyd is a member of the Faculty of Advocates; Gavin McEwan is an executive committee member of the Charity Law Association; and Keith Macpherson is a member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Scotland charities panel. All our witnesses have joined us in the room.

As I did for the first panel, I will quickly mention a couple of points about the format of the meeting. Please do not feel that you have to answer every question if you have nothing new to add. We have a lot to cover, so I ask you to keep your questions and answers as tight as possible.

Again, Pam Duncan-Glancy will begin the questioning.

Please continue, Emma.