Chamber and committees

Thank you for that.

Dr Elliott, you were nodding vigorously. What are your thoughts on that? In addition, will you expand on the issue of the strategic state? You mentioned the word “strategic” in response to the first question and, in your submission, you talked about the “strategic state”.

Dr French, you say in your submission:

“there is little evidence the NPF has been meaningfully incorporated into organisational routines within those organisations, or in changing decisions, promoting learning or altering policies.”

How can we ensure that that takes place?

People were earning more than £200,000 a year on a day-rate basis for the project. How many people were working on the project? Based on £850 per day, that works out to 1,100 person days. If you work on £300, the figure is 3,000 person days. I imagine that the real figure is somewhere between that. How many folk were working on the project on an on-going basis? How many specialists were needed?

I will open the meeting up to questions from colleagues. Daniel Johnson will be first, followed by Michelle Thomson.

I am a big fan of decluttering, I must say.

Excuse me? A faster pace? It took three or four years to develop the website.

I think that, in relation to normal procurement in the real world outside this building, a website can usually be produced in a week or a month—when I look around, I do not see anyone saying that it will take three or four years. There seems to be a lack of reality here compared to the rest of the world.

Jackson Carlaw talked about having a website that makes it easier for users who are less familiar with parliamentary processes, such as members of the public, to find and understand information. However, as an MSP, I find the current website more difficult to manage than the one that we had before. The very fact that you have to go to the old website to look at the Official Report is a complete nonsense.

What do people in this Parliament and in the general public actually want to use the Parliament website for? They want to look at the Official Report, committee reports, questions, motions and parliamentary bills. You tell us that this is an incredibly complicated and sophisticated technological solution to some indecipherably complex problem, but people simply want to know who submitted a motion on what, who asked a question on what, and what bills are coming up. Are we really expected to believe that we got value for money in a £3 million project that took years to complete and is, frankly, a camel—that is, a horse designed by a committee. To me, it is a mess, and I know that other colleagues feel the same way. Is this really the best that we can do for the huge amount of investment that went in?

I will bring in Liz Smith, who will be followed by Michelle Thomson.

My final question before I open questions up to committee members is to Ms Wallace.

We were in Dundee last week. Although there was a lot of enthusiasm there for the NPF, one individual said to me that the problem that they had with it was that it was yet another series of things that Government expected them to do. We spend a lot of time having meetings and we have this and that set of objectives. They can be overlapping and not quite contradictory, but a huge amount of energy is taken up in asking what we prioritise. How do we cut through the Gordian knot of all the different objectives that have been given to local authorities and other organisations so that people can see more clearly and help effectively to progress the aims of the NPF?

The next item is to take evidence on the Scottish Parliament’s website as part of our scrutiny of the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body’s budget.

We are joined today by Jackson Carlaw MSP, member of the SPCB. He is accompanied by Scottish Parliament officials Michelle Hegarty, deputy chief executive; Alan Balharrie, group head of digital services; and Susan Duffy, group head of engagement and communications. Good morning and welcome to the meeting. I invite Mr Carlaw to make some opening remarks.