Chamber and committees

That is helpful.

The bill gives OSCR the power to appoint interim charity trustees. Have you any concerns about that, given that it is a fairly large power? Is that an appropriate power?

I just covered that in my question, convener.

That is a fair point.

When OSCR was set up, one of the first things that it was supposed to do was review every Scottish charity to see whether it was fit for purpose. That has taken a long time, mainly due to a lack of resources, and I am not absolutely sure how well it has been achieved.

How confident are you that it is possible to implement what the bill asks with the resources that OSCR has? Are we in danger of setting the organisation up to fail?

We have two lawyers and a lecturer in the room. Are you happy with the definition of a “connection with Scotland”? Should it be tighter or will it help us to move forward?

John Picton, from the point of view of good practice, should we ask OSCR to do more investigation, or is the balance about right in what we have at the moment?

I have a final question for you.

When OSCR was set up, the first appeal was to a separate tribunal. Appeals now go to the First-tier Tribunal for Scotland. This question might arise from ignorance on my part, but have we ever legally disbanded the tribunals that were set up under the 1995 act? For clarity and for the sake of tidying up, would the bill be an appropriate place to do that?

Thank you. Allan Eccles, do you have an answer?

I ask the question because there is the issue of whether the buck is being passed to the courts. Ultimately, will the matter have to be decided when someone takes their case to a hearing? Under the primary legislation, are we passing the buck to the judiciary, or is that being unfair on us?

Good morning, panel. Obviously, you have heard these questions before, as they are the same ones that I asked the first panel. My first one is on data protection implications. Does Keith Macpherson have any comments on the data protection stuff?