 oherwydd gyda'r cyfaddol. Yn gyfnod, dwi gael a chael wasanaethau byddai rhywbeth, eich ddwylo sicrhau yn ymweld i'r bwysig i chi'n graff diwyddoedd fel oeddwn i'ch gwrth i chi'n gwneud am y cyfaddol sy'n ôl, ti'n gweithio'r cyfarfod yr olai i chi, ac mae'n fawr i chi beth mai fyddai'r cyfrannwyr y llyfr gyffredinol i chi yr un gyfwyn fydd yn ddiw iliwyr o'r ddylch i'r cyhoedd y holl۔ Mae'n fath o ddim yn adnodig gwaith o'r gweithreol Cwmwyrd, o'r ddechrau i'r arm endingoliadau cymwyng yng Nghymru. Mae'n ddyn nhw'n cymwyngen nhw'n cymwyngen nhw'n cymwyngen nhw'n cymwyngen nhw, a gen nhw'n cymwyngen nhw nhw'n cymwyngen nhw nhw, a chyflohau sy'n cymwyngen nhw'n cymwyngen nhw nhw. Mariwol sy'n gyfrifio'r dyn nhw'n cymwyngen nhw nesifau of ideas, expertise and population to every corner of the globe, but, more recently, visitors, travellers and immigrants have made a huge contribution to enrich our nation in turn. The CPA itself, as I was saying earlier to the Secretary General and our speaker, has made a huge difference to us here in Holyrood because it has provided us with a platform to engage with the wider world and to promote the Scottish Parliament itself. Today, I would particularly like to also thank Dr Mr Imran Ahmad MP, a member of the CPA International Executive Committee, who also joins us. The Scottish Parliament has a strong record in working closely with other parliaments on parliamentary strengthening across the globe. We have a unique and special relationship with the National Assembly of Malawi, which has been sustained now over 12 years, with members and officials working with our counterparts on a number of projects aimed at building capacity and strengthening parliamentary democracy. We have worked with Malawian officials to develop a framework for revising the standing orders and assisting the assembly in drafting its strategic plan. We have also provided opportunities for young Malawian parliamentary officials to come to Scotland and work with their Scottish counterparts as part of the CPA Scotland branch interns programme. I am pleased to say that the Scotland branch has been involved in a number of CPA programmes, including hosting the 19th Commonwealth parliamentary seminar a few years ago. Our members have participated in election-observing missions, post-election seminars, younger members from the Scotland branch have participated in youth parliaments as mentors, and Kate Forbes, for example, attended the recent CPA youth parliament in British Columbia last November. Members of the Parliament have also participated in CPA study groups. I think that one of my deputies, our Deputy Speaker Christine Graham, was a member of the Freedom of Information Study Group in Ghana a few years ago. The recommendations of all those groups are widely distributed to commonwealth branches and provide a valuable resource to parliamentarians. Patricia Fergs, when we were just talking about Patricia, one of our former MSPs established, she helped to establish the Commonwealth Women's Parliamentarian Steering Committee for the British Island and Mediterranean region in 2013, and this Parliament hosted the first CWP regional conference in March 2014. Patricia was also vice-chair of the CWP international steering group, and her contribution, I think, was much appreciated. Margaret Mitchell, Miss Army here, is our current representative on the CWP regional committee, and last month Margaret attended a CWP meeting providing CWP participants with an opportunity to take stock of gender representation in commonwealth legislators and to recommit to energising the CWP to take action to better promote and support women parliamentarians. A quality of opportunity, I should point out, is one of our four funding principles here in the Scottish Parliament. We take it very seriously indeed throughout all our functions. Over the years, the Scotland branch has developed close links with the devolved parliaments in the UK, as well as excellent relationships with parliaments in Africa, Asia, Australia, Canada and New Zealand. I have been proud to meet and host a number of commonwealth speakers since I was first elected as the Presiding Officer last year. In fact, I am looking forward to meeting the speakers of the legislative assembly of Manitoba and the federal parliaments of Canada next month. This year, I am aware that Bangladesh will host the Commonwealth Plenary Conference in September 2017. November? I have a date that is already strong. We will have to re-jig our diaries for that to make sure. I would like to take this opportunity to convey our best wishes to you, Madam Speaker, for our successful conference. I would also like to take this chance today if I may to welcome the consul generals to Bangladesh and India who have joined us today. I know that, this morning, Linda Fabiani MSP, another of our Deputy Presiding Officers, accompanied our distinguished guests during visits to Sturbridge Primary School and Holyrood secondary school, where they delivered the CPE roadshow to over 300 pupils. I believe that, along with Mr McHann, Linda and you have formed a double act, which is now going to be touring the schools of Scotland. I would congratulate you on that. In fact, I would like to congratulate you on this whole initiative. Increasing young people's awareness of Parliament and democracy is hugely important throughout the Commonwealth, particularly given the average age of the members throughout the Commonwealth. It is also an issue of particular importance to me. It is one of the areas in which the independent commissioner primary entry form of established will look at this whole idea of engagement and engagement with young people in particular. Once our commission has reported, we may be looking to the Commonwealth and to other partners in the Commonwealth to see what knowledge, information and experience we can learn and share with them. I am about to introduce Dr Chowdry to speak. I will have to run off very soon, but I have to prepare for the business in the chamber. I am pleased to know that Margaret Mitchell has agreed to take over chairing duties when I do so. I will be able to leave you in safe hands, but I am not leaving just yet. However, I would like to invite Dr Chowdry now to address members of the Scottish branch of the CPA. Dr Chowdry. Honourable Speaker of the Parliament of Scotland, honourable members of Parliament and particularly members of the CPA branch in the Scottish Parliament, I am deeply honoured to be here this morning, not morning anymore, it is afternoon, amongst the honourable members of the Scottish Parliament, I convey my best wishes on my behalf and on behalf of my delegation to all of you and I bring with me the best wishes of the people of Bangladesh and the parliamentarians of Bangladesh. It is indeed a rare privilege to visit the Scotland Parliament in the beautiful city of Edinburgh and to have the opportunity to share my thoughts with you. I am also very delighted to meet the members of the CPA Scotland branch and I want to thank the host for organising this event. Let me seize this opportunity to congratulate the members of CPA Scotland branch for the excellent partnership and cooperation with the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association. As we all know, that Commonwealth Parliamentary Association is a unique platform of more than 180 parliaments and legislatures in 52 countries across nine regions of Commonwealth. Commonwealth Parliamentary Association works to uphold the values of Commonwealth by strengthening democracy, promoting good governance and rule of law. It aims to mobilise parliaments to advance democratic governance and ensure institutional and professional development of its members. Embracing diversity is the strength and beauty of CPA. It, actually the different parliaments from different regions, this is a unique platform to share the good practices that build up over time through the democratic practices in these parliaments and also to share the experiences, set benchmarks of good democratic governance and to establish a network for exchange of ideas and expertise and interaction on a range of parliamentary issues between varied jurisdiction. Scottish Parliament has been an active partner in CPA's endeavour to achieve common goals, share ideas and expertise. Over the years, through its membership with CPA, the Scottish Parliament has developed strong relationships with many Commonwealth legislatures and has had valuable exchanges, like with Chyber, Bakhtunkhwa, Malawi, as mentioned by the Honourable Speaker of Scotland Parliament, Tasmania, Belochistan, Northern Territory. As part of the British Islands and Mediterranean region, the Scottish branch has taken part in many regional conferences, like the one in Jersey last year and Gibraltar this year. CPA has taken up a broad range of interesting programmes, but I must mention that the Commonwealth Women Parliamentarians, the CWP component of the CPA, is also a very vibrant and active component and the CPA Scotland branch send delegates to the term terennial CWP conference on political violence against women that took place in December 2016 in London and also in the recent strategy session at Wilton Park, which alongside the CWP chairperson set the direction of travel for CWP going forward. The new strategy will focus on the establishment of an alumni for CWP, so the gender equality, the women parliamentarians participation are also high priority agenda of the CPA and a lot of interaction is being done on that front with the Scottish Parliament component also. Some of the very interesting programmes which have been undertaken by the CPA for making CPA more relevant to its diverse membership and I will just touch upon a very few ones. One is the CPA parliamentary fundamentals programme, flagship accredited course for parliamentarians in collaboration with top Commonwealth universities. Then we have the CPA masterclasses, a series of parliamentary masterclasses in procedural key policy and corporate areas. Commonwealth parliamentary lecture series, this is also a new programme, establishment of a renowned person's lecture series annually commencing with a theme around Commonwealth political values officially launched in December in London by Baroness De Souza, former Lord Speaker. CPA regional hot topics forums on key policy issues. This is run by CPA region where high level panels discuss the hot topics of the day relevant to their region. So it has all these programmes have been designed to facilitate more participation of the regional parliaments and also the strengthening of CPA's technical assistant programme is one of the other important programmes and the one that I would really take a lot of pride in introducing is the CPA youth road show on parliamentary democracy. It is felt that there is a lack of awareness of the Commonwealth in general and the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association in particular in the local communities and outside of parliaments across the Commonwealth. So to change that a recent survey which actually said that the UK children by the Royal Commonwealth Society that only 23% of young people could actually correctly select three commonwealth nations and nearly 50% said they had not learnt about the Commonwealth in school. So to introduce the youth to the concepts of working of parliaments to have an understanding about what Commonwealth means, what it means to belong to Commonwealth, what are the values that it upholds and nurtures and so this programme has been set to give an introduction to these young leaders and youth groups in different educational institutions who are brought to the parliament and they have a very interactive session with the parliamentarians to have an understanding about the working of parliamentary democracy and Commonwealth. So these are some of the programmes which have been very recently adopted to make CPA more relevant. The idea is to make CPA more relevant to its diverse membership and to reinvigorate the association to equip it to meet the challenges of the 21st century. So I would very humbly like to say that let us all work together to address the challenges and achieve the common goal of empowering our people, the 2.4 billion people of Commonwealth, family of nations. We must remember 60% of this population are youth, promise and potential of the future of Commonwealth and there are women, there are youth and it is therefore important for parliaments to work together to ensure inclusive democracy. Gender equality is an essential precondition of sustainable and equitable development. Poverty eradication, elimination of inequality, ensuring food security are some of the common goals and critical challenges where the parliamentarians have a very strong role to play and we would like to facilitate the CPA platform as a forum where the parliamentarians across the region can come together to work on these issues, to empower our people to make a difference, a positive difference in the lives of the people and to make this world a better place. Thank you. Thank you very much Madam Speaker, indeed. Thank you for those words, indeed, for outlining a number of themes which I think will chime with the work of all parliaments here on gender equality, inclusiveness, on working with youth and on tackling poverty. So thank you indeed. Thank you indeed for being our guest today. I'm not sure whether I'll have a chance to welcome you to the chamber this afternoon but I'd be delighted to do so if you're going to come and watch proceedings. I'd now like to take a chance. I'm going to, I'm afraid because of the time, I'm not going to be able to stay to host the question session but now, like if I can, to ask Mr Agbarcan, Secretary-General of the CPA to speak to delegates and then perhaps with Margaret hosting to take some questions afterwards. Thank you. Yes, if you come over here, I think that's probably the best thing I'll do. Thank you very much Mr President of the branch and also Presiding Officer and thank you very much honourable members for the opportunity to augment and develop what Dr Chaugie has said as a Secretary-General of the Association. I'm very proud to be here at your parliament because we are the only inter-parliamentary organisation that includes subnational parliaments within its memberships and that is a very important aspect of the breadth and depth of our association. Dr Chaugie talked about the diversity. Many of our members are state parliaments, devolved parliaments or territory parliaments. These are not national parliaments so as an association we are very inclusive and that's the really important point about being a member of the CPA as the CPA branch of Scotland. So what does that inclusion mean and how does that help you as being a member of the CPA branch? Firstly, I want to talk about the values which we have heard about your branch in terms of reaching out and having that relationship with Malawi and also I've read through your international strategy, it's a very impressive strategy and actually epitomises precisely the collegiality of the family of nations. Monday the 13th of March was Commonwealth Day and we're very proud to be here in Commonwealth week. What is the message of Commonwealth Day? The message of Commonwealth Day from Her Majesty the Queen is a peace building Commonwealth. What does that mean from Her Majesty? She said quite simply it means respect and understanding for one another, working together we build peace by defending the dignity of every individual and community, by upholding justice and the rule of law and striving for societies that are fair and offer opportunities for all. We overcome division and find reconciliation so that the benefits of progress and prosperity may be multiplied and shared amongst us. That is precisely what we see is happening at the CPA branch of Scotland. We see that collegiality, we see the sharing and exchange of best parliamentary practice between yourselves and other Commonwealth parliaments already happening and through that peace building is essentially about the respect and understanding of others and that is a reflection of our celebration of diversity amongst our parliaments and the diversity amongst the Commonwealth. How do we actually underscore that diversity? How do we bring it together and translate it into something valuable within the CPA? We bring it together through our values because we are a values-based organisation. We're an organisation which as part of the family of the Commonwealth is underscored by our values set out in the Commonwealth Charter of 2013 and those values go fundamentally to the role and purpose of the CPA. The core value of democracy, the value of the separation of powers, human rights, rule of law, this is the glue. These are the elements which hold us together through that diversity as a shared group which is seeking to promote the values of the organisation and through our various products within the CPA so we talk about toolkits, we talk about guidance and through that exchange of views we share in the benefits and we disseminate those values and seek to live by those values. So the breadth and depth of the CPA is emblematic of the charter and what we are seeking to do. The network of the CPA means that whether you are the smallest parliament and some of our parliaments are incredibly small in Montserrat we have about seven to eight members through to some of our largest branches. We operate on a basis of equality and that is central to the way in which we exchange our views and also how we use those views. So I have with me a the benchmarks for the code of conduct of members. That is a very important tool which is a product of the CPA coming together of its members from the largest, the smallest, the medium-sized parliaments and parliamentarians from every region of the Commonwealth to discuss what are those standards and that document has now been agreed and is disseminated to its members. That's an incredibly important document, it's an incredibly important tool I would say for any parliament and parliamentarian to have the distillation of best practice brought together in a toolkit which you can turn to as part of the association's work in terms of setting standards and disseminating the values which on the pin our charter. At a time of political uncertainty both at home and globally I would say that there's no greater role right now for parliamentarians to demonstrate the values of tolerance, inclusion, peace, democracy, rule of law and equality and it right here in Scotland to see how that is working through as the Mr President mentioned the commission on parliamentary reform looking out to see how parliament can be much more open and also accessible to all sections in society is very much the core of democracy and deepening that democracy through transparency and accountability to all groups and it's very impressive and I commend Scotland for doing so likewise the international strategy I noted in 2015 to 2016 there were over 55 inward visits and also these very strong bonds with Malawi and Kyber Provincial Assembly and many others that help to exchange best practice and develop ways in which we can make our parliaments more effective to meet the needs of the myriad stakeholders of the public outreach that you're doing here on your parliamentary days is also one of the core elements of what the CPA is about. Dr Chowdhury talked about the importance of meeting the diverse needs of all of our citizens and you are embracing this very actively and we commend that. Commonwealth women parliamentarians youth are all strands of the work which we are trying to pull together in a much more coherent way. One of the really important developments in the last year and a half at the CPA is how to measure the difference we are making as an organisation. We have never sought in any statistical manner or any scientific way to actually evaluate and measure the impact that we are making and as a public service organisation essentially committed to good governance using public taxpayer's money it is essential we demonstrate the difference we are making. So we have developed a measurement and evaluation tool for each of the strands of our work and from the end of this year at the annual conference that will be coming up in DACA as Secretary-General I will present the first performance review report of the difference that we make with our programmes. So these are all initiatives Dr Chowdhury talked about the new programs which are still being rolled out through to the end of this year. I commend all the work that Scotland branch is doing for the CPA. The Presiding Officer mentioned Patricia Ferguson, she was a strong supporter of CWP's work, Commonwealth Women Parliamentarians but many many of you around the table and former parliamentarians have also been very strong members of the CPA. We stand very much in solidarity with what you are doing. You are doing very many of the things which underscore what a peace building Commonwealth is about and I thank very much Mark Mitchell for allowing me the opportunity to have a few words with you about other areas of our work. So I'm open to receiving any questions and developing any of the themes which you wish to. Thank you very much. We will be very short of time because we are on a very strict timetable to five to two and then we have to pack up so I thought it might be very good if we introduced ourselves around the table. We had elections last year and there was a huge turnover of MSPs there and I think we've been genuinely delighted at the interest, the new intake of MSPs have taken in the Commonwealth and the CPA in particular so it might be quite good. We've got a mixture of existing members or members who have been returned and new members. If we did just a very quick introduction round the table if we could start with Maurice Corry. Maurice Corry, I'm a list member for Wets of Scotland. Hello, I'm Alexander Stewart, Conservative member for Midscotland Fife and I have the remit of international development for the Conservative party. Rhoda Grant, Labour MSP for the Highlands and Islands. Stewart McMillan MSP for the SNP and for the Greenock and Inverclyde constituency. I'm Tavish Scott, I'm a member of the Scottish branch and I represent Shetland. Hello, John Meebough, MSP for Lovian. John Mason, MSP MSP for Glasgow Shettleston, which is in the east end of Glasgow where the Commonwealth games were. Edward Mountain, Conservative member for the Highlands and Islands. I guess, as John took the liberty of mentioning something to do with the Commonwealth, I guess I'm the only member of this Parliament who's served in a Commonwealth military training team. And that's us Margaret Mitchell. I think Dr Shadir, we took from you. Imran, I'm a member of Parliament representing the Awami League in the Parliament in Bangladesh. And also the Executive Committee member of the CPA. I was introducing our members but of course it's a pleasure to see you. We took very much from your talk Dr Shadir and also the Solicitor General. The fact that we are such a diverse different group of parliamentarians from so many different legislators and yet coming together we can find common ground, we can share our knowledge of what's going on in our parliaments and how we tackle the different issues. So it's up to the members here to now use the fantastic opportunity that we have here of having Dr Shadir here and the Solicitor General who only took up his post in December. I think you'll agree Dr Shadir, he really has hit the ground running since then. Asante has been a fantastic ambassador for CPA even in these short months. Do you have any questions in particular from the floor? John Mason? Young people have been mentioned already in the addresses and I do think that that is a challenge and I just wonder if you have any ideas how we can get young people enthusiastic about the common wealth. Some of us who are older kind of grew up with it kind of in the background but it does seem to be a bit of a challenge to get young people engaged. Okay. Yes, it will go on automatically. Thank you very much. I think that's a very relevant issue that you have raised. It's interesting that now the entire focus globally is on youth and we see that the common wealth day celebration also embraces the participation of youth and in many other different global dimensions also we find that. And when we bring the youth together for example in our own this parliamentary road show on youth that we have been conducting in my parliament we did the inaugural and I could see immense response of the young generation of the young people to be able to come and talk and to share their thoughts and ideas and I think it's a very welcome move on their part that they actually want to engage so I think that is the strength to our efforts because if we you know identify that all we need to work in this particular area but there's not enough response from the people or the group that we want to engage then it will not be a good effort but here we see a lot of enthusiasm curiosity and the wanting to be engaged so and I feel that as parliamentarians we should facilitate these opportunities more maybe we can do it in our own constituencies and see how the children there they are responding and how they engage so I think the strength of the the idea of engaging youth lies very much with the youth themselves who are so willing to be a part of politics and to have an understanding about working of these democracies. Tavishkel. I wonder if I can ask if you believe that the principle of parliamentary democracy and the principle of how parliaments operate across the Commonwealth is at least questioned by the use of the mechanism called a referendum. Well it's a very it has a very serious jurisprudential aspects to this and a lot of this discussion if we really want to engage at a length the recent issues which have been posed in different parliaments that we see that if for example for the way I look at it the Brexit issue there has been a referendum on that but then again it has been put before the parliament so it raises a jurisprudential question that whether the verdict of the people on the one hand and the representatives of the people who are in the parliament they are also in the parliament through the verdict of the people so they are actually representing the people but the verdict of the people are now again being the other vote will be through the parliament so how do we actually accommodate these tensions the inbuilt mechanisms how to handle all this and I don't think that there's any one answer to these issues these are all very hard questions and it has to be resolved or discussed at a length on the basis of the political philosophy and the underpinning of the political philosophy and how to deal with all this the issues of separation of powers the working of the state mechanism with the harmonious cooperation between the three organs of the state and much more. Alexander Stewart The theme of the peace building commonwealth I think gives us a massive platform to go out there and engage and I'm delighted to hear what you're doing to engage with use around because I think they are the future and if if they understand what your values and views are then they can promote in so many different ways across so many different sectors but it's how to get that message across from what we do here to what's happening in other parts of the commonwealth. That is the important thing that CPA can actually facilitate and that is the bonding that we want to create through our platform and I was sharing with my secretary general that let us not just do this program on an isolated basis like in the parliament in Bangladesh or in the Scottish parliament or elsewhere but then also allow some of these youths to come from each parliament together in a bigger platform where they can have an interaction among themselves to have a feel and understanding of how the youths in the different parliaments different regions are thinking so maybe at a higher level we can you know graduate this program so that is in our thought and I think it's very important that we engage and connect this the youth groups in different regions to share their thoughts on many many different issues that concern them and that are vital for their own lives and to bring about the positive changes in their lives. Okay, Rhoda. I think what surprises me when I speak to other delegates from CPA how much we have in common as well as what is different and I think some of the work the CPA has done reflects a lot of the things that we need to do involving women now involving young people. I suppose one of our problems is involving there's almost a generation that has passed that is not really involved and engaged with politics and I think then we see strange electoral things happening when they become involved and that sounds a bit but they're left behind they don't see that politics represents them and I'm wondering if that is an issue in any of the other CPA countries and indeed if they're how do we I suppose reconnect with those people so that they feel part of it and try not to just break it up and throw it away because it's not working for them. I think that's a very important point that you make that why would they come and connect if we just want them to come and connect that is not enough they have to feel from within themselves that it has some meaning for them it has some some benefit some kind of reward for them to be connected with this process what does politics offer to them why do we need to come and discuss all these issues in the parliament what changes are you going to offer me are you going to make my tuition fees less are you going to allow me to have better access to public educational institutions are you going to give me better employment opportunities so you really want the parliamentarians I think will need to look at these issues from the perspective of the youth how it is meaningful for them what is it that they are wanting and we must also bear in mind that that is my feeling my understanding that the the way the ICT the information communication technology is advancing it is also opening many doors for these young generation and now they all have the cell phones they're connected with the internet and all this is a whole new different world for them so we also have to have a proper understanding of that world if we want to relate to them if we want to understand their language so I think it's important for us as politicians and as parliamentarians to understand the language of the youth in order for us to be able to deliver something for them or to shape our policies or to have the policy responses framed in a way that can serve their interest Maurice Corry following on on the the youth theme which you've just touched on does the CPA have a urasmus type of education exchange for university students or if it doesn't would you consider this type of education exchange for the future I think is a very good suggestion it doesn't at the moment to that effect it doesn't have but we can always design something and see how that model can be implemented throughout the different regions and how the parliaments in different regions would respond to adopt that kind of a program and I would like to very humbly say that of course the Scottish parliament is also free to give your suggestions to CPA as to the agendas that we have thought are important and we have highlighted but of course your inputs and your valuable thoughts would enrich us and allow us in CPA to work in a better way so please feel free to share your thoughts with us and see how we can design new models okay and I think something that comes loud and clear from the participation in CPA is the networking the relationships and the friendships that are made that then allow communication with different countries parliamentarians they are sharing their best practice and learning from that so the wilton park international working group was mentioned I have to say that was such a huge success just so many people coming together with our common goals establishing links and then going on to look at not just the increased representation of women but once you achieve that goal where do we go from there and and certainly there were key priorities mentioned there not least violence against women leadership and empowerment gender budgeting so much there we can learn from each other so as well as youth then the common wealth and the CPA is making great strides and there's a fantastic vehicle for that I think we've we've all learned so much today and just been so fortunate to have the opportunity to listen to Dr Chowdhury and to meet the new secretary general and I hope the fact that this is live streamed and it's then available to look at will raise the profile of the common wealth parliament parliamentary association of course the best way that people learn about it and our parliamentarians learn about it is actually by attending conferences and and going to seminars and we do have a real challenge in the parliament with minority government especially for opposition members where every vote counts so we hope that visits like today will strengthen the resolve of the parliament to value the CPA and make sure that our members are free to attend these conferences and bring back this wealth of information and share our good practice with other members throughout the common wealth so can I ask you to join with me and thank Dr Chowdhury very much and to Secretary General for the Words and for the huge privilege and in this very important week of choosing to come to Scotland and support ICA. We assure you that CPA only resonates your voices and reflects your thoughts and we are always open and we want to build this partnership even stronger and hope we can work together in achieving the goals that we set for ourselves thank you chair thank you all thank you very much thank you right that's us