Care sector - proposed Freedom of Information extension: consultation advisory subgroup 3: May 2025

Attendees and apologies

External stakeholders:

• Organisations and role
• Glasgow City Health and Social Care Partnership
• Scottish Care
• Common Weal
• Alzheimer Scotland
• Transparency International (UK)
• Scotland Excel
• Social Work Scotland
• UNISON Scotland
• Coalition of Carers in Scotland

Internal stakeholders:

• Scottish Government Improving Public Engagement Division (IPED) officials
• Scottish Government FOI unit official

Items and actions

Items and actions

Welcome

The Chair welcomed all participants to the meeting.

Minutes of previous meeting

The minutes were approved.

Matters arising from previous meeting

No matters arising from the previous meeting were identified.

Discussion: Approach to engagement in the consultation process

It was noted that the two other CAG sub-groups had each commented on the approach to consultation in the course of their deliberations.  In particular, sub-group 1 had discussed the question of whether a traditional written consultation was a suitable vehicle for engaging stakeholders on the issue in question and whether a workshop/series of workshops offered a better approach.

An overview of advice received by the FOI Unit from Scottish Government Digital Communications colleagues regarding approaches to consultation was provided. 

Key points were:

• There could be value in the idea of delivering some workshops, but important to be really clear about the purpose of them and of the various logistics involved.
• Whilst possible to rely entirely on other methods of consultation besides traditional written approach, there could be risks associated with doing so.
• Digital Comms definitely in favour of moving beyond written consultation, but cautious about dispensing with it altogether.
• Recommend we keep written consultation short, and to use mainly quantitative questions to ease cost/time taken for analysis.
• Workshops, particularly those involving non-organisational stakeholders, can be resource intensive and can ask a lot of those taking part.
• There is a need therefore to be clear about what we want out of them, to explain their purpose clearly and to think about how to encourage people to take part.
• Working with stakeholder organisations can be a useful approach.
• NCS Lived Experience Expert Panel may also be of help.

There was general agreement in the group that a formal written consultation remains necessary.  However, other actions may significantly add value alongside this.

There was some discussion of the possibility to employ alternative methods of gathering views, such as use of telephone surveys.

Some caution was expressed about the steer towards a short consultation, with mainly qualitative questions.  It was suggested that the issues around FOISA extension are in fact somewhat nuanced and complex, and that it could be a mistake to sacrifice depth of discussion for simplicity.

Separately, a view was expressed that FOI may not be at the forefront of the minds of those seeking greater transparency and access to info in the sector.  Also, the consultation when launched will be competing for attention with other, higher profile sectoral issues.  It was suggested therefore that consideration should be given to the title and emphasis of the consultation, to give greater weight to discussion of transparency and access to information as concepts rather than to ‘Freedom of Information’.

In relation to this, caution was expressed by others in the Group about the risk of asking people very wide questions regarding transparency, to discover that the changes desired are in fact outside the ambit of the consultation.

Another perspective highlighted that the value of FOISA consists of the requirement for designated organisations to answer questions, rather than in a mere right to ask questions.  The legal obligation to be transparent is key.

There was a discussion around how to identify and reach the desired audience for the consultation.  The need to engage the workforce, and the role of SSSC, was discussed in that connection.

There was a discussion of the concept of ‘duty of candour’ and whether this had relevance to the wider issues to be discussed in the consultation.

Action 1: SG FOI Unit to outline a draft communications plan for comment

Action 2: All group members to report back on how their own existing networks might be used to highlight and promote the consultation, including their capacity to host stakeholder discussions etc.

Any other Business

N/A