5. 4. Statement by the Chair of the Public Accounts Committee on Committee-led Inquiries

Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 3:35 pm on 1 February 2017.

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Photo of Nick Ramsay Nick Ramsay Conservative 3:35, 1 February 2017

I’m about to. As you can see, Members, we are a committee of robust members, and robust views, and when we agree and when we work as a team, actually, I think we’re at our best, because, believe me, the Members on the Public Accounts Committee in this Assembly really do know their own minds. I would say in terms of—. I quite agree with you about tweeting, and in fact we did have that discussion, and I think probably other committees have had that discussion as well during this Assembly. I don’t think it’s helpful that, during a committee, whether that’s in the private or the public session, tweets go out before the committee as a whole has had an ability to consider the evidence. Often, in this Chamber, as the Presiding Officer knows from her experience, we can have robust debates, and you do get partisanness, or however you call it; of course you do. But the committee is not there for the same purpose entirely that this Chamber is. It isn’t there purely for us to make party-political points. Of course, Neil McEvoy can make party-political points, you can make party-political points, I can as well, but, at the end of the day, does that help the operation of that committee? Does that help us within the remit of that committee to hold those organisations to account? I don’t think it does. And I think that we need to remember what this Assembly is all about, why we got elected to it. There is a time for us to take each other on, but there’s also a time for us to work together to take on vested interests wherever they might be, in whatever sector they might be. And that’s the job I mean to get on with.

So, I have no problem with Members tweeting their thoughts once committee meetings have finished, and they wouldn’t listen to me if I told them not to. I don’t tweet as much as most. But I think, yes, this is a really serious job, this is a really serious committee. I’m delighted to have every member of the committee working with me. Let’s move this forward. We are a team. Let’s just get to where we want to go. We all want to go to a place where we are ensuring value for money and efficiency for the taxpayer. Many of us choose different roads to get there, but, at the end of the day, we’re going to get there, and, before Mark Isherwood starts going on about co-production, I will finish my comments.