 I welcome members to the 15th meeting in 2015 in the Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee and, as usual, remind everyone present to switch off mobile phones as they may affect the broadcasting system. We have today received apologies from Cameron Buchanan. The first item is for the committee to agree to take agenda item 4 in private. This agenda item is a complaint across party group. The members agree to take this in private. The second item for the committee today is to take evidence from Dave Thompson on the proposed cross-party group on religious freedom. Dave Thompson is sitting in the witnesses chair and I invite David to make a brief opening statement on the purpose for the group. Thank you very much, convener, and good morning members. Yes, this group came about initially after a meeting on 25 February, which was held in the Parliament, which was sponsored by myself and chaired by the moderator of the Church of Scotland, the Reverend Chalmers, and about 50 people attended from a wide range of different faith groups. I had hoped to move things on more quickly following that meeting, but various different things intervened, including the general election, a change of moderator at the Church of Scotland, the recess and so on. It took me a wee while to get to the point where I could submit this application to the committee. One of the main things that was discussed in February was the general issue of intolerance, mainly towards people of a religious faith but also towards others as well. We had a range of speakers at that meeting, a very wide range, including people from the American and Canadian embassies and various different faith groups, giving us their own particular experiences in relation to intolerance towards faith. The refugee crisis has highlighted the issue of religious intolerance, and we all know what has been happening in places such as Syria. I believe that it is very important that we promote tolerance among people of all faiths and of none at all. Anyone is welcome to join the cross-party group, whether they have faith or not, because what we would hope to do is to foster discussion among everyone to ensure that there is tolerance going into the future. You will see the list of proposed members. That is not finite. We would welcome people of other faiths and none, as I say. You may have noticed that, although there are a couple of organisations linked with the Roman Catholic Church, the Church itself is not down as a member. I have a quote here from the Reverend Thomas Boyle, who is the Assistant General Secretary of the Bishops Conference of Scotland, where he says, "...in addressing the Congress of the United States of America, Pope Francis said, a delicate balance is required to combat violence perpetrated in the name of a religion, an ideology or an economic system, whilst also safeguarding religious freedom, intellectual freedom and individual freedoms." That is the end of the quote from Pope Francis, but Reverend Boyle went on to say, "...dialogue helps to overcome any form of extremism, and inspired by Pope Francis Wards, we welcome the establishment of the cross-party group on religious freedom. We look forward to co-operating with the group and supporting it in its work." They will now be formal members. As I say, I hope that the group will encompass many more people as it moves forward, if you approve it. As I am a member of the committee, I thought that, on that occasion, I would not take part in the discussion in relation to formal approval of the group, and I will leave it in the hands of my committee colleagues to make that decision. Thank you very much. That is very helpful. There is maybe just a couple of things from the convener's chair that I will say before opening it up for discussion. I think that the Parliament on 9 September 1999 had a very interesting discussion that touches on this, on the subject of how the Parliament would deal with time for reflection. At that time, Tom McCabe made a contribution that suggested that we should reflect those of religious belief and those of none. That is particularly opposite this week because, of course, our time for reflection leader this week was a secularist rather than someone of faith. I think that it is perfectly clear that, while considering whether to approve a cross-party group or not, we neither endorse nor reject the purposes of group, which can be very narrow, and indeed we can have groups that take conflicting views on different sides of important arguments, so that is not a matter that we are likely to give much weight in coming to a conclusion. The other thing that it is worth saying is that the committee has previously expressed some concerns about whether, at this late stage in this session, we should be approving other groups. Without pre-empting in any way what position the committee might take on that, I will invite the committee at the end of our discussion on whether to approve this group or not to put on the record that it would be our plan not to approve any further groups, and that is without prejudice to any groups that are brought forward might be. On that basis, colleagues, let me just open it up for colleagues to ask David any questions they feel they want to ask. I do not think that we are here to judge whether things are good or a bad thing, to be quite honest, but I would like to say that I do believe that anything that fights intolerance is something that is a worthy thing of supporting in itself, but our purpose is to decide whether or not a group should be formed. Another thing I would say is that we have a particular problem of intolerance within religious groups in Scotland, and one of the benefits that might come from this holistic view you are taking, those with religion are not to be involved in it, I think would be a good thing in itself. Having said that, for my part, although it is late, I would find it very difficult to, when we are talking about people's rights, this is a rights issue in my view, it is a religious right, and I would find it difficult, although it is late, I heard what you said convener, although it is late in the day and we are looking at restrictions in terms of just in time rather than on what is going on. I would be minded to say yes, it would seem a bit strange that folk are asking on the basis of getting together and fighting intolerance that we would restrict it because of a time bar. I have similar concerns around the timescales and I wonder if you could give us a bit more information on how many meetings you would intend to have because given how late we are in the session and when we will be rising next year for the election, we do not have a great deal of time for planning meetings and I wondered if you had considered any other ways to raise the profile of this issue? I am very aware, as a committee member, of the issues around registrations being proposed late in the session. We would propose to have a couple of meetings before the Parliament goes into disillusion in March, one probably near the end of November and one in February would be what we would be planning. I think that that would be valuable to allow us to decide exactly the subjects that we will follow through and discuss and deal with and allow us to lay the foundation for hopefully a reconstituted group after the election in May. Can you cover the point on whether you consider any other methods to raise the profile of the issue without setting up a cross-party group? There have been various things held in the Parliament over the past eight years that have been a member that have related to religious issues, some of them straight praise issues such as the Scotland United and Prayer for the Parliament events that take place twice a year in the member's restaurant, which are very well known. There are a number of other things like that. The first formal meeting that we had was last February, and that was a meeting to gauge interest. As I said, there were over 50 people. I have the complete list. I will not read through the whole thing to you just now, but it is available if members wish it. There was a very full discussion from a panel of five people on a variety of different issues. The advantage of having a cross-party group is that it gives it a certain formality. It is associated with the Parliament, although it is not anything to do with Government or anything like that. I think that it would allow us to discuss the issues in a way that an informal ad hoc group just would not be able to operate. I do not think that the issues would get dealt with in such a thorough way that a cross-party group can deal with those issues. As I understand it, rule 6.22 of the code concerning cross-party groups requires 10 days advance notice to be given to the standards clerks of the intention to hold a meeting. I believe that your own group held a meeting on 15 September, but the standards clerks were not. Can you perhaps explain what happened there? I have been made aware of that. I thought that that had been done. That was a mistake. I know the rules and I put the cross-party group in consumer affairs before a couple of meetings ago and it complied fully with that rule with the notification. I am not sure how that happened. It was an error, but I would say that I think that the purpose of that rule is to ensure transparency and to ensure that people know what is happening and what is being proposed. This is maybe in mitigation, apart from anything else. I did ask a question in Parliament on 2 September to the Minister Marco Biagi, who included a question to him on whether he would support the creation of my proposed cross-party group on religious freedom. His answer was to the effect that the Government would support any group such as that. After that, I put out a press release, which was sent out widely. It was not widely covered. It was covered in some areas. If part of the purpose of the rule is to ensure wide knowledge of what is proposed, then, in a sense, I think that we might be complied with it there. I accept that the strict formality of the notification to the clerks in writing did not take place. Although I know that my assistant has spoken to the clerks and did speak to them before the meeting on 15 September, I believe, but it is a mistake for which I apologise. I am not interested, and I do not think that Parliament is interested in whether there were press releases or even matters relating to that on the floor of the chamber. All the effect of that is that we know that we did not know, because we did not know, because it was not in the formal process that relates to cross-party groups. I ask whatever the outcome of today's deliberations that you and your colleagues take very serious account of that. The rules are there for a purpose, and we have all agreed to those rules. It is very important. I do not want to minimise the importance of that right at the outset of consideration of this group. In a sense, convener, you have preempted what I was going to say next, which was that, with no detriment to Mr Biaji, he is not concerned with the application of those rules. We are. Given that you did have that exchange with Mr Biaji and you released information to the press, how was it notified to members? An email was sent round all members, inviting them to show an interest. Every member got the opportunity to do that. I do not have the dates off the top of my head, but it was done more than once. If there are no further matters in taking evidence from Dave Thompson, I will move to agenda item 3. I will ask Dave Thompson to remain at the other end of the table. This continues to be in public for your entitle to be here and hear what has to be said. I note your previous intention to resile yourself from the discussion that we are about to have. Agenda item 3 is for the committee to consider whether to accord recognition across party group on religious freedom. Gil has indicated that he is willing to support that, and I take it nothing that I am getting a nod. Are others wishing to put anything on the record before we formally decide? I propose that we agree to accord the cross-party group on religious freedom recognition. Members agreed to that. We agreed. Before we leave agenda item 3, I return, as I said, to seek the agreement from the committee that we are not minded to accept any further applications in this parliamentary session for new cross-party groups. On the basis purely that there is now insufficient time for these to operate effectively. We would hope that our successors, perhaps in this committee and in the Parliament to be elected next year, take note of that when they are looking at cross-party groups. That is helpful. Thank you very much indeed. We now move into private session. We will return to public session for agenda item 6.