Stuart Alan to be appointed as Holyrood Standards Commissioner

Stuart Alan, the Chief Investigating Officer to the Standards Commission for Scotland is to be approved today as the new Standards Commissioner for the Scottish Parliament on the retirement of James Dyer. Mr Alan, will still continue his role at the Standards Commission while also working as Holyrood Standards Commissioner (will be kept busy considering the shambles at Holyrood ! – Ed)

Press Release from the Scottish Parliament :

PARLIAMENT TO APPROVE NOMINATION OF NEW STANDARDS COMMISSIONER

31 March 2009

The Parliament will be asked to approve the appointment by the Scottish Parliament Corporate Body of Stuart Allan as the new Scottish Parliamentary Standards Commissioner.

The current post-holder, Jim Dyer, reaches the end of his second and final term today after six years in post.

The motion nominating Mr Allan will be debated by Parliament on Wednesday 1 April and the nomination follows an open recruitment process to find a successor to Dr Dyer.

The Parliamentary Standards Commissioner has powers to investigate complaints of alleged breaches of the Members’ Code of Conduct and has statutory powers to summon witnesses and compel evidence.

Mr Allan has significant experience of investigating complaints about standards.

He is currently the Chief Investigating Officer to the Standards Commission for Scotland. This role sees him investigate and report on cases where councillors or members of devolved public bodies may have contravened the relevant codes of conduct.

Subject to Parliament’s approval, Mr Allan will carry out both roles on a part-time basis. The Parliamentary Standards Commissioner works between five to ten days a month.

Biographical Information

Mr Allan qualified as a solicitor in 1973 and has spent his career in the public service.

He has previously acted as an adviser to a number of organisations including Cosla, the Scottish Office and the Assembly of European Regions.

He has also acted as Returning Officer and Regional Returning Officer at local government, Parliamentary, Scottish Parliamentary and European elections.

Mr Allan was appointed the first Chief Investigating Officer by Scottish Ministers in 2001 under the Ethical Standards (Scotland) Act. In 2004 he was re-appointed for a second term and in 2007 for a third. He will demit office in January 2010.

Scottish Parliament Standards Commissioner wants public denied right to make complaints against politicians

One thing you would never imagine hearing might be an Ombudsman or some regulatory body demanding that people not be allowed to make complaints against a service they are using .... but Jim Dyer, the Standards Commissioner for the Scottish Parliament is demanding just that.

Little wonder then that standards at the Scottish Parliament are so low ?

However, if you have a scandal or a complaint against an MSP revealing dirty dealings, then better to take it to the press than take it to Mr Dyer ... or you might manage both and make a fool out of his office too if he writes a glowing report on a bent politician exposed later in the media ....

The Scotsman reports :

Public 'should keep complaints about MSPs' service for elections'

MEMBERS of the public should not be able to complain about their MSPs if they are dissatisfied with the service they receive, Holyrood's standards watchdog claimed yesterday, writes Hamish Macdonell.

Jim Dyer, the Scottish Parliament's Standards Commissioner, said voters could get rid of MSPs at election time if they did not like them, but should not be able to table formal complaints just because they did not agree with the way an MSP dealt with a problem.

Dr Dyer said some people had unrealistic expectations about what their MSP could achieve for them and, because of Holyrood's list system, they could go to one of several other MSPs if they were dissatisfied with the service of an individual.

He said: "Anybody who has dealt with complaints in any kind of public service knows there is always a small group of people who have an unreal sense of injustice about something. They have a very great difficulty in stepping back from it.

"They might range from people saying, 'I wrote to my MSP a month ago and I haven't had a reply', to people saying, 'My MSP has dealt with this for four years and now they are saying there is nothing more I can do about it'."

Dr Dyer stressed that he felt it should be a matter of principle that the service provided by an MSP should not be judged by a standards commissioner or even the Presiding Officer, who handles such complaints.

He said: "The appropriate place is at the ballot box and possibly, because of
the list system used in the parliament, by party leaders."

Earlier, when he addressed Holyrood's standards committee, Dr Dyer said: "I'm not saying MSPs shouldn't be accessible and shouldn't conscientiously represent their constituents. "They are answerable to the electorate and I think the standards system should be reserved for issues of propriety and conduct, issues of transparency over financial interests and that sort of thing."

However, Graham Blount, of the Scottish Churches Parliamentary Office, told the committee : " I don't think you can say (to a constituent who has a complaint about an MSP] that the next time there is an election then you know what you can do. There should be an avenue for complaint."

The standards committee will produce a report on the complaints procedure against MSPs. A decision on the way forward will then be made by parliament.