Chamber and committees

At the same time, however, they are not the experts. You and others have huge experience and you draw on the history of education for centuries. Surely children cannot be in that position and make the decisions. When I was at school, for example, I would have been very happy to have had no exams, but if there had been no exams, I would have learned virtually nothing, because I would not have had that driver. Is it, again, a question of listening to children, rather than their making the decisions?

You mentioned business and employers. Is it, again, the case that their voices should be heard, rather than their being on the board?

We have heard in evidence that other countries have a variety of awarding bodies, whereas in Scotland we have only one. I think that that point came from the Stirling centre for research into curriculum making. Professor Priestley, can you confirm first of all whether that is the same thing as the Stirling network for curriculum studies? Are both of them you?

Perhaps I can put a counterargument. Do you not think that pupils, families, schools and employers would be confused if we had a lot more qualifications out there?

I will not continue that debate with you, but I still have to wonder. It is one thing for Glasgow university to be able to assess qualifications; it is quite another for me to do so, as an employer with three staff. I find it confusing as it is.

Professor Donaldson, do you have any thoughts in this space?

Can you not have dividing walls within organisations? I am on the Finance and Public Administration Committee, too, and we are very worried about the number of public bodies that there are. We are recommending a stop on new commissioners and all that kind of stuff. I would be very reluctant to have another body.

Mr Black, do you have anything to add?

That was helpful. Thank you.

I suppose that that goes back to the culture, which Pam Duncan-Glancy asked about. Is that what we are really looking for, rather than legislation?

The Children and Young People’s Commissioner Scotland has its own particular angle on things, but it says that the proposals

“simply slot children into an adult-centred governance structure in a way which is tokenistic”,

rather than having children at the centre of things. How do you respond to that?