The Scotsman Investigations: Quangos
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00:00Hello and welcome to The Scotsman. After what's been a couple of huge weeks in Scottish politics,
00:16we are here to announce and talk about a new five-part series that The Scotsman will be
00:21launching. It's on quangos attached to the Scottish government, something that we think
00:26is important to cover as a title, and I'm joined by our investigations correspondent
00:31Martin McLaughlin. Martin is taking a lead and is covering this full investigation, looking
00:39into the quangos that are attached to the Scottish government, various arm's-length
00:43companies that we thought was important to look into their background, how they operate
00:48and just how much they receive in terms of funds, etc. Martin, thanks for joining us.
00:56Can you talk through just why you decided to do this particular series for The Scotsman?
01:01Thanks Dale. Yeah, this is a series ultimately about transparency and accountability in the
01:06public sector. Every other day the Scottish government itself is subject to robust scrutiny
01:12and coverage and there's been no better example of that in the past few weeks and the demise
01:17of the Bute House Agreement, everything that followed. But unfortunately the same can't
01:20really be said for the expanding network of national devolved public bodies that really
01:26have major impacts on all our lives and day-to-day decisions. There's been occasional parliamentary
01:33curiosity about quangos. At the moment the Finance and Public Administration Committee
01:39at the Scottish Parliament is looking into the number of commissioners and ombudsmen,
01:44but there's arguably never been a more important time to look at the wider network of quangos
01:49and how they're going about their business. We have a new administration coming in and
01:55they're going to encounter the same difficulties that Humza Yousaf's administration had, namely
02:01Scotland still has a budget deficit of more than £19 billion and you know the public
02:06sector in its current shape or form is arguably going to have to change quite drastically.
02:12So the series is looking at the finances, but it's not just about numbers. Many of these
02:17quangos, as I said, perform vital functions and the people in charge of them are well paid to do
02:22difficult and often thankless jobs, but many of them and their executives are also sometimes
02:29quite embroiled in scandal and I think there are questions about the proportionality of their
02:34remuneration and the spending of their organisations.
02:39Martin, I know some of our viewers and readers will be sitting there thinking
02:43what's a quango exactly and although we discussed this when we first talked about doing this series,
02:49can you just talk us through what the term actually means, what we're talking about?
02:53The million dollar question, Dale. It's one that sparked debate for the best part of half a century
02:59going back to Margaret Thatcher's time and before that. There is no definitional consensus as to
03:07what a quango is and for that reason there are many different answers to the question of how
03:12many there are in Scotland depending on who you speak to. That also means that these organisations
03:18don't often get the scrutiny that they should. One general take on it is that a quango is a body
03:25with public functions that is funded by taxpayers but it's not directly controlled by central
03:31government. So a good example of that would be a regional health board like NHS Lothian.
03:36Another take on what a quango is describes a body that's either funded by taxpayers or
03:41ultimately owned by the government with ministers overseeing key appointments to
03:46that organisation's board. But the reality is there are many semi-autonomous bodies in Scotland
03:53that share the functions and characteristics of quangos without being a quango. So Martin,
03:59when you went and sort of compiled the list that you're going to cover throughout this series,
04:04how did you decide what made the cut, what you classed as a quango and what you didn't?
04:09Well helpfully Dale, the Scottish government has compiled its own directory of national devolved
04:15public bodies that spans about over 120 organisations across 10 categories. So you've
04:21got big heavy-hitting well-known executive non-departmental public bodies like Creative
04:26Scotland, NatureScot, VisitScotland, advisory NDPDs like the Scottish Law Commission,
04:34big public corporations like Scottish Water and there's a small army of executive agencies,
04:39non-ministerial offices, health bodies, commissioners, ombudsmen. But that's not all,
04:44we even have less well-known entities like regional transport partnerships,
04:49tribunals and there are some public bodies which don't fall into any of the above categories. They
04:55include the likes of Scottish Police Authority, the Drinking Water Quality Regulator and to be
05:01honest some organisations that I hadn't heard of until I started looking at this,
05:05the Office of the King's Printer for Scotland for example which is responsible for overseeing
05:11Crown copyright in government publications. So the Scotsman's analysis throughout this series
05:18covers a wide array of organisations. You'll be able to read every part of our investigative
05:25series at thescotsman.com, five parts as we said where Martin will cover the full gamut of
05:31operations and he will look closely at how much these quingos are paid and what their output is
05:36as well. You can read them as I've said at scotsman.com or by picking up a copy of the paper
05:43and follow us on Facebook, Instagram and X for all the very latest. Martin,
05:49thanks for joining us and please do read the series. Thanks Neil.