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Hearing resumed at 1.54 pm.

1. Lord Fraser: Can I thank you, Lord Elder and Ms Alexander, for coming along today. We consider it might be helpful to you both to be both present while the evidence of one is being given, and if at any time, Lord Elder, you feel that Ms Alexander is in a better place to answer any particular question, do feel free just to indicate that, and I hope that she will accept that it will then be for her to answer.

2. Mr Campbell QC: Thank you. Sir, before asking Lord Elder any questions, I should inform you that it has come to my attention, and it is my understanding that a point of order is to be taken in the Scottish Parliament this afternoon in respect of the issue as to the disclosure of unbroadcast material by the BBC. I have no knowledge of the nature of this point of order, but having undertaken yesterday to inform the Inquiry if there were any developments in this regard, I do so now and I respectfully suggest that you take no action in this respect.

3. Lord Fraser: I am grateful to you, Mr Campbell. Thank you for advising me. I await with interest the outcome of that debate in the Parliament. I think we’ve already made clear our desire to see those unbroadcast tapes.

4. Mr Campbell QC: Thank you. Lord Elder, thank you for coming, I appreciate, in circumstances of some little personal inconvenience. I wonder if I might ask you simply for the record to tell us your name and your history so far as working with or for the Labour Party is concerned.

5. Lord Elder: Thank you. Murray Elder. I worked first for, in terms of employment of the Labour party or people in the Labour Party, first for John Smith in 1980 to ’84. I then became research officer in the Scottish party from ’84 to ’88. I was then the Scottish secretary of the party from ’88 to ’92, at which point I became John Smith’s chief of staff in London. The period I was in Keir Hardie House in Glasgow, I was obviously working very closely with Donald Dewar. I then, after doing a number of other things, went back to work for Donald when he was Chief Whip in the run up to the ’97 election for about a year, and when he became Secretary of State for Scotland, I became one of his two Special Advisers.

6. Mr Campbell QC: Along with Ms Alexander?

7. Lord Elder: Indeed.

8. Mr Campbell QC: After the —

9. Lord Elder: Also, it is fair to say I worked with her as my successor as research officer in the party, so we worked together then.

10. Mr Campbell QC: Since the premature death of Donald Dewar, have you been a Member of the House of Lords?

11. Lord Elder: I’ve been a Member of the House of Lords since 1999.

12. Mr Campbell QC: Thank you. I wonder if I could ask you just to speak to the window if you like, or to the wall behind me, so that we can all hear you, because I’m slightly deaf and I’m losing some of the words.

13. Before we start to look at issues surrounding Holyrood, I wonder if you could tell me, in opening, something of the work of Special Advisers at the time of the, or around, the May 1997 election, so that we have an understanding of what you were doing in Donald Dewar’s private office up to and past the election.

14. Lord Elder: Well, I think, up to the election it was simply a case of trying to get the Labour Party elected. It was a purely, sort of, organisational campaigning role. Immediately we got into the Scottish Office, I think, certainly as far as my input was concerned, Donald appreciated having Special Advisers he could speak to directly and openly on any matter that was coming up, and to take advice from, irrespective of what advice he was getting from the Civil Service. We saw — both of us, I think — all documents that went to the Secretary of State were also copied to the Special Advisers, so we were as well briefed as he was, and he expected us — certainly in the preparation of the White Paper and the Bill process, and most of the big policy developments where Donald was involved. I think you will find, and looking through the documentations, as I did over the weekend, in almost all instances both Wendy and I were at meetings and were copied in on the key documents, so he used us to cover the field and to be advisers to him personally.

15. Mr Campbell QC: And from what perspective would you advise him? After all, he had a gang of civil servants round him, from the most senior level to the office boy. Why did he need Special Advisers?

16. Lord Elder: I don’t think the question is why did he need Special Advisers; I think why are Special Advisers considered necessary?

17. I think it is quite helpful for any Secretary of State to have a perspective other than that of the Civil Service, and to be able to discuss Civil Service briefing with someone who is coming from the same political background as they are. I think that was true of Donald. I think, in fairness, it has been true of almost all Cabinet Ministers of both Conservative and Labour Governments for many years. Indeed, there were Special Advisers in the 1970s; and that continued through the Conservative years. It has become a quite well established part of the British political system.

18. Mr Campbell QC: Did you have in St Andrew’s House the facilities to, as it were, install yourselves after the election? Did you have an office and a desk and a secretary?

19. Lord Elder: Yes.

20. Mr Campbell QC: So you weren’t just floating about, waiting to be called on by the Secretary of State?

21. Lord Elder: No. As I say, his predecessor had special advisers. There was a room in St Andrew’s House and a room in Dover House in London. For those who moved up and down as we did, indeed there were facilities. Finally, as Donald used the Glasgow office more, there was an office there as well.

22. Mr Campbell QC: As between you and Miss Alexander, did you have a clear division of responsibilities?

23. Lord Elder: In terms of separation of the Departments under the Secretary of State, yes. But in terms of the work the Secretary of State was doing on matters himself, I think, as I said, we both saw all the papers. I tended to cover education matters. Wendy Alexander tended to cover health matters. There were distinctions within. Certainly as far as the White Paper was concerned and the production of the Bill, I think there was no distinction between us.

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24. Mr Campbell QC: Thank you. You were a member of the Constitutional Convention I think; and the Labour Party representative on it — at least, for some time.

25. Lord Elder: I was indeed.

26. Mr Campbell QC: Without drawing the document out, the final report of that Convention recognises the need for a building to house a new Scottish Parliament, does it not?

27. Lord Elder: The final report of the Constitutional Convention, I am sure, does. I was involved in the Constitutional Convention when I was the Scottish secretary of the party. The Convention — because Labour did not win the 1992 election, I think the original timetable had seen the Convention drawing to a close in 1992 — in fact went on for a further five years. So the period you’re talking about is one where the main people would have been George Robertson and Jack McConnell. But yes it did.

28. Mr Campbell QC: I would like to know whether in your recollection it was any significant part of the thinking of the Convention as to either where the Parliament building would be located, or how a building would be procured for that purpose.

29. Lord Elder: In the Convention processes up to 1992, I don’t think it was. I think the reason for that probably was that there was an assumption — that really wasn’t particularly well questioned — the building that had been prepared in the 1970s, after the referendum in 1979 — or at least started the preparation for — would be available and could be used. I think that was a sort of background assumption. Indeed, looking through some party papers, I see that shortly before the 1997 election when Gordon Brown, as Shadow Chancellor, is addressing, I think, a Scottish Parliament meeting of some sort in the Old Royal High building he starts by saying:

30. “I hope this is the last time a political speech is made here until such time as this is serving as a Parliament.”

31. So I think there was an assumption that it would be the Royal High building.

32. Mr Campbell QC: I think the final report of the Convention in 1997 or 1996, as it was, said:

33. “A building is ready waiting on Edinburgh’s Calton Hill.”

34. That is a reference to the Royal High School building?

35. Lord Elder: Yes.

36. Mr Campbell QC: So was that assumption then carried into the election programme and the manifesto for that election?

37. Lord Elder: I don’t remember there being any specific mention of the building in the manifesto. You must remember, although I was working for Donald then, he was Chief Whip, not Shadow Scottish Secretary. So he was not responsible for the production of the Scottish manifesto. But I don’t remember the building being specifically in the manifesto I must say.

38. Mr Campbell QC: I am thinking about the business of devolution. How closely linked was that business — the character of the proposed devolution settlement — to the Convention’s final report?

39. Lord Elder: Very closely.

40. Mr Campbell QC: We come to the election of May 1997 when the Labour Party is successful. What was the principal driving force, the principal target, for you Ministers, civil servants, after the election?

41. Lord Elder: I think for Ministers across the board, it was probably to get in charge of their briefs, because not all of them inherited the briefs they had had in Opposition. Indeed, although Donald had been Shadow Scottish Secretary for many years, in the immediate run to the election — in fact, from 1993 onwards — he had been Social Security and then Chief Whip, so he had been out of direct line Scottish politics for a bit. So there was that. But there is no doubt that, as far as Donald was concerned — and, therefore, as far the Special Advisers were concerned — a phenomenally high priority was given to the detailed work that was required to produce the White Paper on Scottish government. And I still think, looking back on it — and it is quite impressive, looking at the papers again — the speed with which a very complex White Paper was produced, through the Westminster processes and through the Scottish Office processes, was really quite formidable.

42. Mr Campbell QC: There was, shortly after that election, formed a Cabinet Committee, which we have come to know as DSWR, chaired by the former Lord Chancellor, and the initials standing for Devolution for Scotland, Wales and the Regions, containing senior Cabinet members. Was it always the case that Donald Dewar attended that as the Scottish Secretary and, therefore as a senior Cabinet member?

43. Lord Elder: It may be that there was a meeting that he couldn’t go for some reason, but I can’t offhand remember that. It was a hugely high priority, and I think he attended every meeting.

44. Mr Campbell QC: That was a meeting of senior political people?

45. Lord Elder: Yes, of Cabinet members.

46. Mr Campbell QC: Was there a shadow Committee called DSWR(O), which was a meeting of officials?

47. Lord Elder: Indeed.

48. Mr Campbell QC: And did those two Committees together, as it were, drive the priority for devolution — setting the big parameters, the big targets?

49. Lord Elder: I think the driving force for the White Paper, I have to say, came from within the Scottish Office. DSWR were, of course, the Committee who had to approve a final White Paper and therefore had to be comfortable with the arguments and also to take on board comments of other Westminster Departments. But the driving force for the White Paper came from within the Scottish Office.

50. Mr Campbell QC: At DSWR, would the Secretary of State have to fight his corner for, for example, wishing to express which bits of constitutional arrangements were to be devolved and which were to be reserved? Is that what that Committee was about?

51. Lord Elder: That is what that Committee was about, yes.

52. Mr Campbell QC: We can see — and I’m not going to trouble the Inquiry again with taking you through the many versions of the White Paper that there were — but, in relation to the building, we start off with the general indication that a building will be necessary and that the Old Royal High School is available, but without any figures being put on it. Quite soon into the process — within two or three weeks — we see the same sort of remarks confined to one building but with indicative costings in the form of an annex, which is attached to a travelling draft. Do you know, Lord Elder, where the indicative costings came from, which appeared in these early drafts of the White Paper?

53. Lord Elder: They came from the Civil Service. They were simply the best figures they came up with.

54. Mr Campbell QC: Were you interested to know or concerned to know how they came up with them and whether or not they were backed by professional advice, for example?

55. Lord Elder: I am not sure it ever appeared on paper, but in the context of what the Scottish Office had in terms of immediate experience they had just — as they would have put it — built Victoria Quay. They had been responsible, therefore, for quite a big building project, and there was an assumption that there was a level of expertise in terms of costing new buildings and regeneration of buildings in Edinburgh.

56. Mr Campbell QC: Inside the Scottish Office?

57. Lord Elder: Inside the Scottish Office.

58. Mr Campbell QC: OK. As the White Paper evolved, it became quite clear that there was increasing concern not only about the question of location, but about the indicative costs, which had been foreshadowed in one way or another. The annex disappeared from drafts; there were broad ranges of figures put into successive drafts; and when we got to 22 July 1997, two days before the launch of the White Paper, there was a broad range between £10 million and £40 million. Can you just say anything at all about how, in the Secretary of State’s mind, it was necessary to be less precise as time went on? That is what appears to have happened.

59. Lord Elder: I don’t think he was being less precise; I think there was an issue about by that time. Looking through the papers again, I couldn’t tell you exactly which paper, but it is interesting that the 10 figure comes straight from these papers, and the 40 figure is interesting because it is higher than anyone was suggesting before the election as a cost. So it was a probable range; and I think the questions about the annex were, in a sense — the initial reason for it being dropped was that the original wording in the White Paper was very much making clear that the Old Royal High building was what was intended, and it was no longer appropriate to put it in these terms when the Old Royal High building was beginning to be questioned.

60. Mr Campbell QC: We know that the Secretary of State paid a visit to the Royal High School — an official visit, I think, with yourself, on or about 13 June 1997, quite soon after the election; and he returned from that visit unhappy with the prospect of that as a Parliament building. Do you recall that visit?

61. Lord Elder: Yes, I think it was 30 May.

62. Mr Campbell QC: You may be right; I’m sorry.

63. Lord Elder: I think it was really the initial meetings that I remember on the White Paper were quite often in London.

64. Mr Campbell QC: I stand corrected, you are quite right: it was 30 May.

65. Lord Elder: Really that was the first opportunity to think about the building. I mean, we were by then already a long way down the production of the White Paper, which was being hugely demanding. But we went on 30 May to have a look at it, yes — and I do remember it well.

66. Mr Campbell QC: He is recorded as being unimpressed. Is that a fair —

67. Lord Elder: I think that is a fair reflection, yes.

68. Mr Campbell QC: And yourself?

69. Lord Elder: I hadn’t, until I went there, realised the complexity of the site: the number of separate buildings; the range of historic building, which there were reasons to keep; and thoroughly unhistoric buildings, which were not obviously useful. I do remember it being remarked that the main teaching block was a state of the art 19th century boys’ school and it was not entirely obvious what the usefulness of that would be. I think I remember particularly as we were being taken round, we were being told what the plan had been in the 1970s; and as Donald, as I said to you, had been Chief Whip in the run up to the election, and was used to being able to see what was happening in the Chamber, walk out his door, be in Members’ Lobby and get a grip on things in, you know, 15 seconds, the prospect of finding that the proposed place for the Whips’ Office were the two little sub-temples at the far outreach from the main building. I’m afraid Donald did rather take a dim view of what it would be like going from there into the main building on a wet February morning to see what was going on. There were a lot of issues about unconnected builds, with no pathways between them. None of them were particularly suitable certainly for disabled access; and the Chamber itself, whether you liked it or not, had remarkably little room immediately adjacent to it, which is really one of the requirements, I think, of a parliamentary building.

70. Mr Campbell QC: But like it or not, this visit was paid without any formal assessment of the building or any projection as to what was done with the building to make it more suitable.

71. Lord Elder: At that stage, there had not been any work done. Subsequently, work was done, yes.

72. Mr Campbell QC: Thank you. I think the Secretary of State would then have received a series of position papers and statements of possibilities from staff in St Andrew’s House, showing options at Leith, at the Royal High School, incorporating St Andrew’s House, at Haymarket. How large in the thinking did the actual accommodation question loom as time went on?

73. Lord Elder: It became more important; but it became more important partly because the White Paper was done and dusted quite quickly; and therefore that is the high priority in terms of settling the governance questions. The question of the building became a higher priority — I think that is entirely fair.

74. Mr Campbell QC: Would it be fair to say that it was somewhat relegated until the White Paper was through? Although we can see that work was going on on it, but it was a secondary issue.

75. Lord Elder: Work was going on on it. I think “relegated” is unfortunate. The priority — just as in the run up to the election, the priority for people who had been in this argument in the late 1970s, and who had hoped that the Constitutional Convention would lead to a change in Scottish government in 1992 — the priority was to win the election. Having won the election, the absolute priority was to get the whole issue of the settlement agreed, and to move forward as quickly as possible to a White Paper, referendum, Bill, Parliament; and to move that process on as quickly as possible. I make no apology for that. The priority in that regard was the White Paper. DSWR was at that stage, I think, meeting twice a week. It was a formidable workload in itself. Donald did say to me on one occasion:

76. “Wouldn’t it be great if all we had to do was run Scotland.”

77. The amount of work that went into the White Paper process was absolutely formidable.

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78. Mr Campbell QC: I take that from you, and I understand it.

79. I am interested, Lord Elder, in this question of speed and momentum, which we have covered with earlier witnesses; and I would like to show you in succession a number of documents please, just to set the context of this. If we could have SE/1/091 please, to start with.

80. What you are going to be shown in a second is a page from what, as I am instructed, is the final draft of the White Paper. It will come in a second, with any luck.

81. The page deals with part of Chapter 10, which if you would take it from me is headed “Implementation and Costs”. It was later re-christened “Making it Happen”. The bit that deals with “Implementation and Costs” at 10.17 says this:

82. “It is not possible to say precisely how much the accommodation would cost until a final decision is made on where to locate and how to build or refurbish the Scottish Parliament building, and on the most suitable funding option. However, the capital costs of establishing the Parliament are estimated to be between £10 million and £40 million.”

83. Skipping the next sentence:

84. “These costs, which will be met from the block are modest when compared with the annual current Scottish Office budget of £14,000 million. The Government believe at around £10 a head …”

85. And so forth.

86. Now, that was the White Paper, Lord Elder. When Mr Dewar drafted a speech on 22 July that same year, those figures appeared again in the final draft of the speech. In the speech, as delivered, the figures disappeared. I wonder if you can account for that change.

87. Lord Elder: I wasn’t aware that that had happened, and I can’t account for it. No. I mean, he may just have decided not to leave them in. I don’t think it was anything more than that. That 10 and 40 figure, from memory — although I expect Wendy Alexander will have this more precisely — the 10 to 40 figure lasted quite a long time in the documentation.

88. Mr Campbell QC: That is certainly borne out in the documentation.

89. Lord Elder: If it was left out that was not because there was any other advised figure going to him that I’m aware of or saw that suggested the 10 to 40 was incorrect.

90. Mr Campbell QC: That wasn’t my suggestion; I’m trying to be straightforward and neutral about this. I wonder if you can comment on the suggestion that the figure was left out because it was thought unwise for some reason to be putting figures — after all, these are large sums of money — to the electorate in the White Paper.

91. Lord Elder: But the figure was in the White Paper.

92. Mr Campbell QC: The figure was in the White Paper?

93. Lord Elder: Yes.

94. Mr Campbell QC: I’m sorry you’re quite right. Why was it in the drafts leading up to the White Paper that figures were in and then they were taken out? Was there a concern that by putting figures to the electorate — which is what I meant to ask you before — was there a concern that by putting figures to the electorate, they would be in some way scared off the devolution idea?

95. Lord Elder: I’m sorry, I don’t quite follow you, because the 10 to 40 million figure was in the White Paper — it was in the public domain.

96. Mr Campbell QC: But the annex wasn’t in it? It’s my fault; let’s reel back. The annex was not in the White Paper; the figure of 10 to 40 million was in the paper. Why was it that the Secretary of State didn’t put it in his speech?

97. Lord Elder: I’ve already said I don’t know. I think if a figure is published in a White Paper and much commented upon in the papers, missing it out of a speech does not sort of remove it from the public record.

98. Mr Campbell QC: I just want to establish to see whether there is any significance in that apparent dichotomy. But if there isn’t, we can move on from it, thank you.

99. Lord Fraser: In a second. Lord Elder, as you have explained, an oddity of this is the 40 million figure does appear in the White Paper, but as I understand it, in an earlier draft attached to the White Paper was going to be an annex giving a range of costs; and why I say it was an oddity is that the range of figures to be provided in the annex, which broke it down in some detail, the top figure of that was actually lower than 40 million — it was something like, I think, 35.4 million.

100. Lord Elder: Yes 35.

101. Lord Fraser: Do you understand how that came about?

102. Lord Elder: The initial annex was all about the Old Royal High building. The annex sort of came and went. I think whatever happened in the annex, the figures we ended up with were, on advice, the best possible range. If the difficulty is we were afraid of putting figures in the public domain, then we should have stuck to the lower figure rather than 40. This has got to be seen I think as a pretty fair reflection of the figures. I suspect Miss Alexander will have more to say on this.

103. Mr Campbell QC: So there was nothing in my point — badly put, but my point nonetheless —that there is an apparent discrepancy between the speech and the White Paper?

104. Lord Elder: No. I don’t believe there was.

105. Mr Campbell QC: Let’s move forward then to think about site selection, if we may. 24 July was the date of publication; we move to the referendum in September. After September, the issue of site selection appears to have been worked on quite vigorously by professional staff within the Scottish Office, and a variety of papers were put up. It’s not possible, quickly to summarise those, but do you recall there coming before you essentially three choices in various forms right up to October of 1997 — that is to say, Haymarket, Leith and the Old Royal High School and St Andrew’s House?

106. Lord Elder: Yes, although as I remember, I cannot tell you exactly where. But going through the papers again I thought it was interesting in the context of all that has been said that actually retaining the Royal High as a minimal option was there quite late — certainly in early September, there were still, at that stage, being looked at four options — and it was only —

107. Mr Campbell QC: As a minimal option?

108. Lord Elder: Yes. And it was kept in at the request of the Secretary of State.

109. Mr Campbell QC: That means as a temporary option, does it?

110. Lord Elder: It was minimal and would have been seen as temporary I think, yes. I think that was part of the problem.

111. Mr Campbell QC: There is some evidence in front of the Inquiry that in the middle of June — 11 June — Mr McLeish suggested that there would be some merit in leaving to the Parliament the specification of its requirements and putting off the decision about a building and its location until the Parliament was formed. Were you aware of that?

112. Lord Elder: I did not remember such a memo existed, but I saw it at the weekend, yes.

113. Mr Campbell QC: Was it taken further?

114. Lord Elder: I can only say that also looking at the papers at the weekend, there is practically no meeting which discusses this, which is not attended by — which the Secretary of State holds — which is not attended by Henry McLeish; and so I’m not quite sure why a memo was sent. It may be that there was one meeting he wasn’t at and he wanted to put that on the record. But it was certainly a matter that was discussed.

115. Mr Campbell QC: There is a view that it should be for a Parliament to define its own requirements; and that all things being equal the Government, which would, in the natural way of things, be the outgoing Government, should have left those decisions for the new Parliament. Was that any part of Donald Dewar’s thinking?

116. Lord Elder: I do not remember that view being expressed at the time. I accept it is now a view. In particular, I know that the meetings on the site, which he had with political leaders of the other parties, I do not remember that being raised by them as an issue.

117. Mr Campbell QC: My question was: was it any part of the Secretary of State’s thinking that that might have been an option?

118. Lord Elder: I don’t believe so. The idea that the minimal option should be looked at, just as a minimal option — I don’t know that it was necessarily saying it became later a temporary option where the Parliament would decide. It was there. I know the figures look slightly surreal these days given the nature of this Inquiry. But the point at which that minimal option went — the paper we had before us, which looked at the four options, the minimal and in many ways unsatisfactory option for a range of reasons, came in at I think £42 million. Leith was 48; Calton Hill was 55. It was a great deal of money to spend on an unsatisfactory minimal option when, on the figures available and on the advice available, a complete and new building could be produced for a small amount more. That did not seem value for money.

119. Mr Campbell QC: I don’t think we’ve yet quite got to the bottom of understanding why it was that it was felt necessary by the Secretary of State and Scottish Ministers to move so far with the programme before the handover date and the formation of the new Parliament. If I could just try to summarise it, you had a White Paper successfully produced in a very short time, with very high quality contributions. You had a referendum result, which had gone your way. You were therefore armed with all the political muscle and impetus that you could possibly need to move forward into 1999 and the handover. What was the imperative for deciding on a building?

120. Lord Elder: There was a sense of momentum. Most of the people who were involved in this debate in 1997 had been involved in this debate for more than 20 years, and there had always been an assumption that we would get the Parliament up and running in good form as quickly as possible. It is well to remember that the timescale that we were talking about then in terms of the building and the timescale we were talking about in terms of the Parliament more or less came together. The intention was that the Parliament would be elected in May 1999 and that there would be a nine-month or perhaps even a year period — I can’t remember — before they assumed all their powers. So we are into 2000. When we got into the Scottish Office the estimate for the production of a building was the middle of 2000, so it was possible at that stage to have the Parliament established, the Bill through, the election and, by the time they got their powers, a Scottish Parliament building. That seemed a very satisfactory, complete package if you like for the old regime to leave to the new. I think had it been part of the consciousness that in fact the building would be many years down the road — I don’t know how that would have affected things. But the basis on which we were taking the decision was that the Parliament and the Parliament building could come together at the same time.

121. Mr Campbell QC: There is some suggestion that whereas Gordon Brown had got some considerable plaudits for giving in the immediate aftermath of the General Election victory of 1997 authority to the monetary committee of the Bank of England over interest rates. I think the phrase that came into the language — maybe because he promoted it — was “he hit the ground running”. Donald Dewar was subsequently described over the devolution matters as having “hit the ground strolling”. Did that offend him, and did that play any part in his desire to race at this?
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122. Lord Elder: I’m sure it annoyed him. The White Paper stands up very well. It is a good document; it is a complex document, negotiated at the highest speed with a lot of Government Departments. There were a lot of very technical matters in it that, I have to say, took up a lot of time. The financial arrangements, for example, were extremely complicated, and that White Paper was produced really within, what, six or seven weeks of coming to power. Now I don’t think anyone was saying, when that was launched, first in London and then in Edinburgh, that there was any question of Donald Dewar hitting the ground strolling. That was a formidable piece of work, and I think Donald, by that stage, had been around a long time. He had seen a lot of things, and he was just simply prepared to do what he thought was right and not be too bothered about what the press were saying, or others.

123. Mr Campbell QC: You have partly answered Lord Fraser’s question, but you haven’t dealt with the implication, if I may say so, in this question that there was concern that the devolutionary process, aside from the White Paper, didn’t have momentum, didn’t have legs. What I would like to know is this: part of the package, as we have been told by yourself and other witnesses, part of the package is a Parliament building. How could you possibly know, the tight group of you round Donald Dewar, how could you possibly know what a Parliament would need for a new Scotland, for a new type of democracy, a new type of election system, an unknown number of MPs, no officials and no clear leader for a site at that stage? How could you possibly know what this new institution would need?

124. Lord Elder: Well, I don’t think anyone was claiming that we had got perfect vision, but I do think that over 30 years a great deal of thought had gone into precisely these questions. One of the objections to the Old Royal High as a debating chamber was precisely that it was built in the same kind of adversarial context as was Westminster — two sides looking at each other. Now Donald was well aware of all these issues. The group set up under Henry McLeish to look at arrangements for the Parliament was set up early and was up and running and looking at exactly these things. If you take advice from other Parliaments, if you visit other Parliaments, you take the other political parties on board, I don’t think you can say that the Secretary of State was simply, slightly arrogantly, saying that he knew best. There was a huge amount of advice going into the business of how the Parliament would be run, and none of the people involved in that process, to my memory, and none of them, apart from that one memo from Henry McLeish, none of the other political parties, no-one else was saying “It is absolutely wrong you should be doing this; you should leave it to the Parliament.” They were all saying, “Let’s get on with it.” There may have been disputes about sites, disputes about other things, but nobody was saying, and other political parties were not saying, “It is fundamentally wrong for this to be going ahead at this speed.”

125. Mr Campbell QC: Well, I understand that. I am simply questioning the assumption that you could have known what might be required from an institution not yet created. It seems to me that it must have involved a degree of foresight, an almost uncanny degree of foresight, on your part in projecting forward, extrapolating from your own experience, very considerable no doubt, in projecting forward to be able to say with that degree of certainty — certainly you had the political certainty because you had the electorate behind you — that with that degree of certainty “This is what we will need.”

126. Lord Elder: Well, I am not sure who else we could have asked given that we had got the other political parties and other people from sort of civic Scotland on board to discuss these issues and to take account of them in terms of setting up the Standing Orders of the Parliament and give advice on that, and that was going on at the same time. It is not, you know, it is not the first Parliament. It is the first Parliament in Scotland for 300 years, but there is a bit of experience even with PR systems.

127. Mr Campbell QC: Let me put to you the cynics’ view since we are exploring this. The cynics’ view is that it would have been a mistake to leave matters because the institution was entirely unknown in its composition. There were no officials; there were no Members; there were no Standing Orders; there was nothing. To hand it over, as it were, to a non-existent institution would have been an even more serious mistake. It would have been a recipe for disaster.

128. Lord Elder: Well, I think I detect where that view is coming from. I have to say that I do not remember that being in any way part of Donald’s decision-making process.

129. Mr Campbell QC: It doesn’t have to be a contempt for the incoming Members, but it might amount to a concern about their ability to hold on to and manage something evidently so complex. There is a wide gap between those two.

130. Lord Elder: Indeed, but I think that with the benefit of looking at the papers over the weekend, one of the things — I mean, eventually the project was handed over to the Parliament, and it is quite clear from some of the memos coming up from the project manager, although not, interestingly, going to Ministers — was that there were already serious doubts when it was still in the control of the Scottish Office. Now, it doesn’t seem to me that you can draw the conclusion, that anyone can sensibly draw the conclusion, that the difficulties emerged at handover.

131. Mr Campbell QC: I wasn’t asking you to, but since you raise it, were you satisfied on Mr Dewar’s behalf or on your own behalf that you were getting a proper flow of information from the project managers once the project got legs and started to go?

132. Lord Elder: I think at the time we did not believe we were not getting adequate information. I have to say I was surprised by the forcefulness of the comments in the papers I have looked at over the last week, which, as far as I could see or detect, did not come in any way to Ministers or, as a result, to special advisers. So there were serious doubts being expressed. Now you ask if I thought at the time we had adequate information. The answer to that: yes. I was surprised at the extent to which the project manager took a pretty adverse view to what was going on in terms of delays and problems with costs and problems with management. We were not aware of that.

133. Mr Campbell QC: These were papers not coming to you?

134. Lord Elder: And not marked as going to Ministers either.

135. Mr Campbell QC: No. How necessary is it for Ministers and their advisers to get the gloomy news as well as the good news?

136. Lord Elder: Oh, it is absolutely vital.

137. Mr Campbell QC: Is it defensible to shield Ministers from that sort of bad news when the subject of the information is something that is central to delivery of a manifesto commitment?

138. Lord Elder: The question, I guess, is: would Donald Dewar and the people round about him have taken a different view if they’d known more? I am certain that they would have taken a different view and been much more concerned and much more determined to find out what was going on and, in that sense, shielding Ministers was thoroughly unhelpful because they were acting on partial information.

139. Mr Campbell QC: I wonder if you can say something, Lord Elder. I am going to try to confine myself to about an hour of questions, and so if I dot about a bit, forgive me - I wonder if you can say something to the Inquiry of Mr Dewar’s character in relation to the delivery of large-scale projects. He has been described variously as generous, on the ball, parsimonious, mean, thrifty, thrawn, aesthetic — all of those adjectives have come out in the last couple of days, and I dare say in certain circumstances they would all fit. What I want to try to get a handle on is: what was his sensitivity with public money; what was the nature of his sensitivity?

140. Lord Elder: I think one of the things — it is very difficult to read the papers that have been made available to the Inquiry for the first six months, nine months, until the site is chosen and not be really quite impressed by the care and the attention to detail and the attention to value for money that Donald expresses. In that sense, yes, he was hugely careful with other people’s moneys. It was a duty, and I think there was no suggestion at any stage that a further inquiry on the environment or anything else should go down to make a proper decision. He never cut corners; he absolutely accepted the advice and sought out as much detail as possible at every stage; and was very conscious; and in a sense, the figures I was quoting earlier about minimal Calton Hill was about value for money. Is it value for money to pay 80% of the cost of a new building on something that is minimal and temporary? Now, that is a very reasonable decision for Donald to have taken, and I think it does show the attention to detailed. I think, reading these papers again really brings that home.

141. Mr Campbell QC: How important in the process to Donald Dewar was the delivery of a significant building? Architecture-speak calls them signature buildings, and very often that is associated with the skills of the designer, but I think you know what I mean: a significant public building. How important was it to Donald Dewar to say “We must have not only a building that is fit for a purpose, because after all we can do that in an aircraft hangar or a shed; we must have a building which leaves its mark on this generation.”?

142. Lord Elder: That certainly wasn’t part of his thinking when he became Secretary of State, because we just hadn’t got there. I think there were other issues, which related to this. One of the problems with a development at St Andrew’s House was that it would probably still be called St Andrew’s House. There would be nothing new about the Government of Scotland; it would just be that there would be an assembly in the middle of St Andrew’s House. So I think there was an issue about making a clear statement that this was different. Now, you could do that by moving to Leith rather than staying at St Andrew’s House, but that having got to the point at which you have decided on an historic city centre site, and you are having an architectural competition, then of course Donald was interested in making sure that that building added to Scotland and added to Edinburgh. Now that is not a comment on cost; that is a comment on quality and style.

143. Mr Campbell QC: How soon did he decide that, irrespective of location, there should be an architectural competition?

144. Lord Elder: I don’t know, and I am not sure that I am able to help there. I think, in fact, looking at the papers, the first time it is mentioned, it is suggested by Magnus Linklater in a newspaper. At some stage, obviously, he decided that that was a good way forward. It was a good way forward for a number of reasons: one of which was that it was possible to involve a wide range of people in Scotland in what was happening. I mean there were exhibitions about the designs and so on once we got there, and that he thought was great because a lot of people went along to look at them. So it was an evolving process, but I cannot say at what stage he actually made the decision.

145. Mr Campbell QC: How important to him was that sense of inclusiveness of the public?

146. Lord Elder: Oh, I think it was important, absolutely important, and I think he was impressed by the fact that a lot of people went to see these.

147. Mr Campbell QC: Before October 1997 was there any sense of disappointment that there were only three sites — none of which was entirely satisfactory?

148. Lord Elder: Yes, I think there was but there had been quite a wide trawl of possible sites, and these were the ones that were available.

149. Mr Campbell QC: Was there any suggestion from the late Secretary of State that alright, these are three respectable choices, but I want something better so let’s wait and something will come up?

150. Lord Elder: No. Something did come up, but I have no doubt that had it not done so then, the decision would have been made to go ahead. I mean, by that stage it was Regent’s Road and Leith really that we were down to.

151. Mr Campbell QC: So speed was still a priority before Holyrood appeared?

152. Lord Elder: I think you could have waited a long time for a site to appear, and if you have decided to go ahead, you’d do it on the best available sites and the best available options.

153. Mr Campbell QC: So the answer is yes.

154. Lord Elder: Yes.

2.45 pm

155. Mr Campbell QC: Speed was still a priority. One can see that the impetus might be interrupted if the three candidates are all khaki brown and none of them is bright red. You might want to wait for the bright red one to come along.

156. Lord Elder: I think the only one that was really ruled out was Haymarket. I think if there had been three candidates with the constraints and problems of the Haymarket site, then it would have been different. But actually Regent’s Road and Leith in their very different ways would have been manageable.

157. Mr Campbell QC: It has been suggested a number of times that Calton Hill, whatever its physical limitations, might also have had the limitation that it had become something of a totem for the nationalist cause. The word shibboleth has been used from time to time. I am never quite sure what it means, but I want to know from you please whether it was any part of Donald Dewar’s thinking that not to go to Calton Hill would be a useful political strike against the nationalist cause.

158. Lord Elder: No, I don’t think it was any part of his thinking at all. I know the “nationalist shibboleth” phrase has emerged, but as a person I have to say, who knew Donald very well, I find it very difficult to think of him saying that. I can think of other people who I can hear saying that, but I can’t think of Donald Dewar saying it. I have really no doubt that he never said it, and I can detect no evidence: indeed, in the papers, at the point at which it looks as though the old St Andrew’s House minimal option is about to drop out, it is the Secretary of State who puts it back in. Now that is not consistent with taking a view that this is not something that politically he didn’t want.

159. Mr Campbell QC: There was a degree of consensus campaigning for a Scottish Parliament with the Nationalists and the Tories and an assumption at that time that the Old Royal High School or the Regent’s Road site would be the chosen site. That is right, isn’t it?

160. Lord Elder: I think it is right to say, because nobody had really thought about it, that the assumption was that it would be the Old Royal High School. I would like to make the distinction between the Old Royal High School site and the Regent’s Road site. The Regent’s Road site was a very different proposition. Now, if there was anything important in people’s minds about the Old Royal High School, it was the actual debating chamber, and the Regent’s Road site had moved beyond that. That would not have been the debating chamber.

161. Mr Campbell QC: Yet Alex Salmond tells us that he felt let down by the dropping out of the Old Royal High School. Is he right to feel let down?

162. Lord Elder: Sorry, Who felt?

163. Mr Campbell QC: Alex Salmond tells us later that he felt let down by the dropping out of the Old Royal High School site, because he had been taken along with the assumption that it would be the site. Was he right to feel let down?

164. Lord Elder: Well, after the site had been dropped he was involved in discussions with Donald about sites, and I don’t remember Donald ever coming back from one of these saying, “Oh, I’m having a terrible time because Alex is insisting it should still be the Old Royal High.” There were discussions about sites; there may have been disputes about them, but I don’t remember the idea being expressed that the Old Royal High building had got to be it.

165. Lord Fraser: I think it was at a relatively late date, namely in December 1997, when, as I understand it, the Secretary of State telephoned Mr Salmond and said “I’m adding Holyrood to the list which will take it from three to four.” Alex Salmond, not without some perspicacity, said, “Well, if you have got three, and you add a fourth, it is pretty obvious to me that you intend to go there.” It was after that that relations deteriorated. Do you recall that?

166. Lord Elder: I don’t recall that. No.

167. Mr Campbell QC: Do you recall Holyrood coming forward?

168. Lord Elder: Yes. I couldn’t put a timing on it, and I am surprised in the papers that a letter came in as early as the beginning of October, because my kind of folk memory was that initially there had been a phone call from S&N (Scottish & Newcastle) saying “Look, this site is going to be available, would you like to think about it?”

169. Mr Campbell QC: You were told about that by civil servants, were you?

170. Lord Elder: Yes. What I don’t know is the timing, and it’s quite significant. It’s quite interesting. That although the letter comes in at the beginning of October, I think the first mention of it, which is a slightly Delphic comment, is actually early December saying “another site of which Ministers are aware”. Now I know there was a question of commercial confidentially, and therefore it was probably not appearing much on paper, but I couldn’t say when in that two-month period it actually became known to Ministers.

171. Mr Campbell QC: It does seem odd to me that the letter of 3 October from D M Hall saying, “The site is there, it’s available, and would you like to talk about it?” It does seem odd to me that it’s two months before it comes into ministerial papers.

172. Lord Elder: I agree. I have no explanation for that. I have no memory at all of having seen that whole letter until this weekend. My memory is that there was a phone call reported to us from S&N saying it was maybe available. I have no idea when that was, but I would have expected references to it, to that phone call, appearing immediately, even if slightly Delphically, on papers; and, therefore, the implication might be that that came quite late. It was one of these moments when I was going through a file genuinely surprised to come across a piece of paper like that, because I think I would have remembered.

173. Mr Campbell QC: Now, you have expressed your own surprise. Would that work for the Secretary of State as well?

174. Lord Elder: My own surprise? I don’t know whether or not the Secretary of State saw that letter.

175. Mr Campbell QC: No, sorry, it’s a bad question. You say you were surprised not to see something before early December. Can we assume that the Secretary of State saw nothing before early December either?

176. Lord Elder: Well, what I can’t remember — and I am not trying to mislead anyone on this — I can’t remember when in that two-month gap we heard. I am sure that when the Secretary of State heard, I heard, but I can’t remember when it is. All I am saying is that I didn’t see, and I am therefore absolutely certain Donald didn’t see that letter.

177. Mr Campbell QC: But you would have heard at the same time as he heard that Holyrood was a candidate?

178. Lord Elder: Yes, was a possibility.

179. Mr Campbell QC: Well, possibility, candidate. Can you recall his response when that news came forward?

180. Lord Elder: That it was interesting. By that stage a lot of work had been done on the other sites, and a lot was known about them, and to make Holyrood a contender a huge amount of work had to be done very quickly to bring it up to the same level of knowledge. But he wanted that done.

181. Mr Campbell QC: That sounds as if you were working to a timescale. I will help you with the dates, just to put it in context. 3 October is the D M Hall letter; 16 December is the first minute in which Holyrood appears as a possibility; and 8 or 9 January is the announcement. Now, were you working to a timetable to announce on 8 or 9 January, come what may?

182. Lord Elder: No, I don’t think we were, but I think what Donald was not prepared to do was make a decision unless the right amount of work had been done on Holyrood to convince him that it was a credible option. Now in fact —

183. Mr Campbell QC: Sorry to interrupt you, but why did you say then that you were moving towards a decision, you had to move quickly towards a decision and do a tremendous amount of work on Holyrood in order to catch up with the other sites? What were you catching up for?

184. Lord Elder: Well, I didn’t actually imply anything about a timescale. A huge amount of work had to be done so that we would be at the same level of knowledge on Holyrood as we did on the other two sites. Now that seems to me — I mean you can’t make a decision choosing one of three if you have got extended knowledge on two and partial knowledge on the third. So, at some stage a lot of work had to be done on Holyrood to get it up to a point at which you could then look at the three things on a comparable basis.

185. Mr Campbell QC: I understand that entirely, but was the Secretary of State working to a date for an announcement? You say not.

186. Lord Elder: I don’t remember him doing so, but I mean —

187. Mr Campbell QC: He could have said, “I’ve got another site; I’ve told the other parties; the exhibitions went out to the public; and he could have said “I’m going to wait another month.” Why did he not do that?

188. Lord Elder: I think if he hadn’t been satisfied that he had the right amount of information on Holyrood, he would not have announced. So he would have waited.

189. Mr Campbell QC: I am very sorry, but that isn’t an answer to the question either. Why did he not just wait, and take a deep breath and then make the announcement, say, a month later when he had public reaction to that information about all three or four sites? Are you telling me that he had enough information by early January despite the short timescale?

190. Lord Elder: Yes, I believe he did.

191. Mr Campbell QC: Which included Christmas and the New Year?

192. Lord Elder: Which included Christmas and the New Year and a great many meetings. I mean I do not believe he would have gone ahead on the basis of partial knowledge. He was not — there is nothing in any of the papers to suggest that that was his style. I accept that it is a short timescale, but as long as he could satisfy himself and the Department could satisfy him that they had done the right amount of work on Holyrood, he would be prepared to go ahead. But I repeat, and it may not be an answer to the question, that had he not had that information, I do not believe that he would have gone ahead with the announcement.

193. Mr Campbell QC: What was his style of decision-making, Lord Elder? Would he have sounded out senior officials and colleagues in the ministerial team as well as you, Ms Alexander, before coming to a decision, or would he have gone into a darkened room and thought about it for a while knowing he had all the information and then say: “Right, that is the decision.”?

194. Lord Elder: No. None of these decisions were taken undiscussed and widely discussed. Of the ministerial team the one who was most involved inevitably and properly was Henry McLeish; Henry McLeish and the Special Advisers and officials. And there is no suggestion again, which I was pleased to see because it is my memory, that anything was done without comprehensive advice and great care being taken on the advice.

195. Mr Campbell QC: What did Holyrood have for Donald Dewar that the others didn’t have? Perhaps I can ask you this way: what was it, do you think, that induced him to put it back on or put it into a shortlist, given that it had been excluded earlier?

196. Lord Elder: It had been excluded as much as anything else on non-availability, and the timescale. I mean —

197. Mr Campbell QC: Is that your recollection?

198. Lord Elder: My recollection is that S&N said they could not clear the site until quite late in the process. Now we were committed at the early stages still in having this Parliament building up and running in 2000. It slipped to spring 2001; it slipped to the summer; and it slipped subsequently. But as I remember, the S&N site was not going to be cleared till 99, and that was not consistent with the 2000/2001 finishing.

199. Now there were other problems with the site. There was a huge transport issue, but there was a big transport issue with Leith. There were big transport issues with Regent’s Road, because almost certainly Regent’s Road would have ended up being closed. None of them were easy from that point of view. There were environmental considerations, but my memory is that whatever else was said about it, the initial position was that S&N did not expect to clear the site in time to hit the sort of timetable we were talking about in terms of building a completed Scottish Parliament building.

200. Mr Campbell QC: I’m still not sure that I understand the imperative for a decision early in 1998 at a time when it seems to have been recognised that temporary accommodation was going to be necessary for some time. Sorry, that is a statement not a question — my fault.

201. Was there anything else which made you feel the Secretary of State is in a hurry to get to a decision on this — perhaps to kill off public debate, perhaps to satisfy the newspapers, I don’t know?

202. Lord Elder: No I don’t honestly think there was. I think the last lot of papers I was able to look at, in the sense of just before I left the Scottish Office, were still saying that the building would be produced on cost by then, I think, summer 2001. Now that was in 1999. In 1998 there was certainly an expectation that it was going to be earlier than that. I just don’t think that the issue of delay really was one that was much in Donald’s mind.

203. Mr Campbell QC: Did you have contact with the late Secretary of State over Christmas and New Year 1997/98?

204. Lord Elder: I don’t have a diary to hand, but I am absolutely certain I did, yes.

205. Mr Campbell QC: You didn’t go abroad on a holiday or take a long time off, did you?

206. Lord Elder: No.

207. Mr Campbell QC: Was that an unknown concept at that time?

208. Lord Elder: Well, no, no, no, no. It was an unknown concept for the Secretary of State; it was not an unknown concept for me, but as far as I remember, I was there, and there were a lot of decisions taking place. Probably, I think, over that period we were in and out of Meridian Court in Glasgow much more than through to St Andrew’s house, but there was a lot of coming and going.

209. Mr Campbell QC: In the immediate days prior to taking a decision about Holyrood, was it the subject of discussion with you, Ms Alexander and the Secretary of State? Did you discuss the options over and over again? Did you have plans in your office? Did you look at the models? How did you… how did he go about actually coming to a final view?

210. Lord Elder: Well, at the end of the day the Secretary of State had to make a decision. That is what Secretaries of State are for in the old regime. Yes, we discussed at length. Yes, he discussed with officials, with people from the Architects department, with the people from the Planning Department, with the senior civil servants and with the Special Advisers, but at the end of the day, he actually had to make a decision. It was certainly not done without a huge amount of discussion and a huge amount of detailed work.

211. Lord Fraser: Can I just ask you one question while Mr Campbell is looking at that.

3.00 pm

212. I have been invited by the First Minister to look into this, building on the work of the Auditor General. And I am sure you are conscious that in September 2000 he produced quite a detailed report on the establishment of the Scottish Parliament. One of his observations at page 21 is this, and I quote:

213. “Although it was systematically researched, the £50 million estimate still reflected only a notional design for the building”

214. that is, for the Holyrood Parliament in the beginning of 1998.

215. It pre-dated the competition to appoint the design team for the new Parliament, which commenced in January 1998, and led to the appointments in July 1998. Then, importantly, it also pre-dated the elections for the establishment of the Scottish Parliament in May and June 1999. Inevitably therefore there was no opportunity at this early stage to take account of the expectations and the direct experience of the main users — namely, the Members of the Scottish Parliament — nor to draw on the knowledge of the actual operation of the new Parliament.

216. I’m still a bit surprised that the proposal that Mr McLeish made — “let’s provide them with an appropriate temporary accommodation and let them work out what it is they need” — wasn’t followed through. Because what we know is that very shortly after there was the handover to the Corporate Body, that is when costs really began to get out of control because the Parliament said, “That’s not the way we want to work. We want to have more Committee Rooms; we want to do this, we want to do that. We want a greater circulation area.” And the cost went up colossally. It doesn’t seem to me it follows from all this that the cost now might have been any lower than it looks like it’s going to turn out to be, but it would have been for the Scottish Parliament to make its own decisions about this and I’m surprised that the Secretary of State was so intent on moving ahead with this when, as you say, there had been a lot of new Parliaments built recently, and as I understand it, the greater experience is that it’s left to those Parliaments to determine their own working arrangements, and their own working arrangements will dictate what space they need.

217. Lord Elder: Yes, I take your point, but I think the way we chose to go down was a wholly legitimate one, which was to discuss in the widest possible way what people thought the expectations would be and … I think the Secretary of State always saw it as a kind of package that you would do White Paper, Bill, referendum, Parliament. And, as I say — if I’m repeating myself, I am sorry but the … this is a well-rehearsed theory now. I have to tell you that I have no recollection, other than that Henry McLeish memo, of other political parties saying at the time, or anyone within the Labour Party saying at the time, publicly or at length, “this is how we should do it”. They were perfectly content to see the Parliament go ahead on that timescale.

218. Lord Fraser: He said, slightly ruefully I thought, this morning that when he raised this issue, apart from in his minute, it was rejected by others as a non-runner, and he couldn’t quite remember who it was who’d said it to him, but among a fairly wide grouping — I think the two of you were included as the possible commentators on this to say it was a non-runner.

219. Lord Elder: Well, I don’t remember saying it was a non-runner and I think the idea that the Special Adviser says something is a non-runner, therefore a Minister keeps quiet about it, seems to me not to be based on my experience. I would think if it were a runner and had been pressed, it would’ve been a runner. But I think, you know, the minimal Calton Hill option was at that stage — and I appreciate that when you look at these figures now, you kind of think that they’re some sort of computer virus which has added ‘0’ to everything.

220. So it is slightly surreal that if you look at these figures now — the figures on which we were making decisions — the minimal Calton Hill option was 80% of a new-build option, and it didn’t seem sensible to spend that amount of money on a short-term solution.

221. Lord Fraser: Thank you.

222. Mr Campbell QC: How strong an influence was the line being plugged by the Conservative Party during the Scotland Bill that there wouldn’t be a Parliament ready for the new Scottish Parliament? There wouldn’t be a Parliament building ready.

223. Lord Elder: I had forgotten that and, I have to say, am somewhat amused to see it in retrospect. I don’t remember that pressing on Donald’s mind. The Conservatives, having been complete opponents of the whole scheme for as long as anyone could remember, this sudden cry that it’s all a great disgrace because you won’t have a Parliament finished didn’t seem … I think, was not going to make a huge impact, and I don’t remember it making a huge impact, although in retrospect it’s quite funny.

224. Mr Campbell QC: Well, it might have been designed to goad Mr Dewar. What I would like to explore with you is that he was sufficiently goaded to keep this process on the go, on the move, irrespective perhaps of the quality, or the quantity, of the advice he was getting in relation to the different sites.

225. Lord Elder: No, I don’t … I know Donald well enough, knew Donald well enough and knew him closely to be able to pick out what goaded him and I actually don’t think, on devolution, the Tories making that argument after 30 years of stolid opposition to everything he’d been trying to do was something that was going to goad him into doing anything.

226. Mr Campbell QC: Just a couple more general questions for now, Lord Elder, if I may. Were you involved, as special adviser, in the whole question of the architectural competition — the designer competition?

227. Lord Elder: I was not part of the … no, I mean, I was aware it was happening, but it was being dealt with by, you know… separately, I was not involved in that closely.

228. Mr Campbell QC: But you were still Special Adviser when that was all happening?

229. Lord Elder: Yes.

230. Mr Campbell QC: Did Donald Dewar take a part, perhaps on your advice, in the question of the appointment of the selection panel?

231. Lord Elder: I don’t remember advising on that. There was advice up, as to possibilities, I’m sure, in the Civil Service, but Donald made the decision on that.

232. Mr Campbell QC: And did you get to know Señor Miralles?

233. Lord Elder: I didn’t.

234. Mr Campbell QC: You didn’t?

235. Lord Elder: I didn’t. I’m not even sure that I met him, to be honest.

236. Mr Campbell QC: Did Mr Dewar get to know him quite well?

237. Lord Elder: Indeed.

238. Mr Campbell QC: Did you form any impression about the quality of the relationship between them?

239. Lord Elder: From memory, I think they got on well. I think Donald did say that. I mean, at a personal level, but I think there were probably already some difficulties emerging in terms of timing and other things. I think Donald had to argue his corner on that. But I think personally they got on quite well.

240. Mr Campbell QC: Sir, with your permission, I’d like to leave that there for the moment. I am reluctant to say to Lord Elder that I would like him to come back, but I can’t rule out the possibility. But, if I can avoid it, Lord Elder, I will. I am much obliged to you. Thank you.

241. Lord Elder: Thank you.

242. Lord Fraser: Thank you very much. I think we’ll just remain here and allow you to change places if that’s what you wish. Yes.

243. Mr Campbell QC: Sir, thank you for that opportunity just to discuss the timetable issue with you. Ms Alexander, good afternoon. Thank you for coming. I was a little over my hour with Lord Elder and I will want to stop at about five to four, if that’s all right with you.

244. Ms Wendy Alexander MSP: Sure.

245. Mr Campbell QC: Could you quickly summarise for us your name and political experience.

246. Ms Alexander: Wendy Alexander. I was, as Murray indicated, the Research Officer in the Labour Party between 1988 and 1992. I then worked in the private sector for the five years subsequent to that. Donald Dewar invited me back as his Special Adviser on 2 May, the day after Labour was elected. I served in that position for 18 months, until December 1998 when I resigned as a consequence of becoming a parliamentary candidate for the Scottish Parliament elections. I was subsequently elected in May of that year and have served as an MSP since.

247. Mr Campbell QC: Thank you. And as a Minister for a period?

248. Ms Alexander: Indeed, for three years, resigning on, I think, 6 May 2001.

249. Mr Campbell QC: Thank you. Thinking back to 1997 and the progress of the White Paper.

250. Ms Alexander: Yes.

251. Mr Campbell QC: I don’t want to trouble you with looking at all the drafts.

252. Ms Alexander: Sure.

253. Mr Campbell QC: But I would like to look at the central issue, which is the estimation of cost for the building as it appeared initially in the drafts of the White Paper, changed its shape, disappeared finally in Donald Dewar’s speech but remained in the bracket £10 million to £40 million in the White Paper. Can you say anything about those estimates?

254. Ms Alexander: Sure, let me try and do that. On the day Donald was appointed — 2 May — two days after that, on Sunday 4 May, he, Murray, I and a number of others were given a copy of the brief for incoming Ministers. That included a table on the costs for devolution in total; that was, the Parliament building, MSPs, the Secretary of State and extra civil servants. The significance of that table is, I think, literally down to the last syllable. That does not change right through until the draft that is presented on 13 May. And as you indicate, in that period there were White Paper drafts on 27 May, 6 June, 10 June, 11 June and 13 June covering those. And that is the fabled annex, as I say, covering the Parliament building, but also all these other additional costs. What happened, and I think the chronology here is critical, as we’ve discussed, Donald took a visit over to the Royal High School on 30 May.

255. For reasons that we might go into later, he, from that point, thought that it was important to look at alternatives. Critically the minute — and all of this is in the record — whereby he established that was at a meeting on 13 June, where with a meeting with the accommodation people and not with the White Paper team, he said that he wants to look at alternatives and the White Paper should express that. So despite all these many drafts, which many of us were involved in changing many times, that table that we inherited on the day we arrived did not change.

256. On 13 June, Donald had a meeting and there had already been the earlier minute after the visit on 30 May, saying, “I want to look at alternatives.” He indicates he wants to do that; that happens on 13 June. On 13 June, he is issued with a subsequent copy of the White Paper. He takes it home over the weekend and he asks that the table should be deleted because that table referred only to the site at the Old Royal High.

257. Mr Campbell QC: Yes.

258. Ms Alexander: And clearly that is no longer his position. His position is that the White Paper — and it was, of course, a White Paper not a Green Paper — should say we’re looking at alternatives. What then happens is that there is a subsequent submission that comes up to him on 25 June suggesting that there should be a range of costs. I think the phraseology used is “there’s a danger of estimates when work is at a very early stage”. It could lead to spurious accuracy and it recommends to him that the precise estimates won’t be possible and therefore there should be a range in the White Paper to cover capital costs. What subsequently happens is that, on 2 July, I believe, officials prepare such a draft. It gets submitted to Donald on 3 July and he accepts it. It was officials who suggested the range of 10 to 40. Well rooted in the other correspondence.

259. I should simply say that the range of £10 million to £40 million comes from two other minutes which I think it’s very fortuitous are now available in the public record: one on 6 June and one on 12 June, where there’s very helpfully an annex that outlines the cost. The important fact being that the £40 million was associated with a new-build building and, as has been pointed out, that was significantly higher than the figures that the previous Administration had put in the public domain about what we thought might be the likely costs of the Parliament.

260. Mr Campbell QC: But the key thing to understand about that is, if I’m getting you correctly, is that the 10 to 40 million range is not in any sense a scientific or a professional assessment. It’s simply a figure derived conventionally from the cost of building conventional-type space.

261. Ms Alexander: It was taken from the minute that was provided on 6 June and then subsequently on 16 June, I believe, which did indicate a notional cost for a new building as being up to £40 million.

3.15 pm

262. Mr Campbell QC: So if we nowadays talk about between £40 million and £400 million, the lower figure there was not in any way related to a designed building.

263. Ms Alexander: I believe not, no. It was a notional cost of what a new build would be, as opposed to the Old Royal High, which was in play at that stage and stayed in play until September.

264. Mr Campbell QC: How long after that was it that you were presented with a range of options in terms of sites?

265. Ms Alexander: Well, there were already, just in terms of the site issues, there were suggested to Donald in June four options. They were the Old Royal High School, St Andrew’s House with a central courtyard, new build at Leith and Victoria Quay with a Chamber added on. There was then a new paper. What Donald obviously indicated was that we need to assess the sites over the summer. The White Paper reflected that. As is known, he actually announced the search for a site in advance of publishing the White Paper. Then, in September, there was the first of the serious options, appraisals that came up. And there then were another two: one on 8 October and one on 12 December.

266. Mr Campbell QC: Were you working to a timescale to deliver a site?

267. Ms Alexander: Not at that stage. I think there’s maybe just one other thing that I would want to note on the White Paper process. There were three drafts that went round DSWR [Devolution to Scotland, Wales and English Regions]: one at official level; one to Ministers; and also the final version. They obviously had all of these various options in them at various stages and there was no suggestion by people from outside to comment thereon. So really, we get into the summer period and there were a series of alternatives to be assessed. The main paper of September suggested what was called “Calton Hall minimum”, which was described or seen as low-cost and probably temporary. Calton Hill is option 2, Leith is option 3 and Haymarket is option 4.

268. Lord Fraser: Can I just be clear about one thing, just because of a question I asked of Mr McLeish this morning, which I think may have been erroneous. If any outsider — not a Special Adviser, Minister or official — had wanted to understand that the Secretary of State was on the search for an alternative site to the Royal High, you’re saying that there was a press conference or a press release prior to the White Paper which gave an indication of this?

269. Ms Alexander: Indeed. I mean, the critical … I think this is actually quite an important point in the chronology, Lord Fraser. The issue over those months of the White Paper was did the White Paper faithfully reflect the Constitutional Convention scheme? Because the idea was, the debate was London would block it; it wouldn’t be true to the Convention scheme.

270. There were two significant ways in which the White Paper as published on 24 July differed from the Convention scheme, one of which was that we were now looking at a range of sites and the other one was that Donald had taken a decision which I think probably was the most fundamental to the whole process of devolution. Instead of specifying the powers that would come to Scotland, it would be what would become widely known as the “reverse-powers scheme”.

271. So, since they were the two departures from the White Paper but the desire was that when the White Paper was published it should be hailed by the entirety of the Scottish community — pro-devolution — as faithful, make the announcement about us looking at other sites in advance of the White Paper coming out. And that did indeed happen at early July. I think that may explain why, in the speech, that was a matter that Donald only dealt with in passing because he had already had a major press conference in Edinburgh a week before, saying, “We’ve decided to look at a range of sites because of the problems with the Old Royal High School.”

272. Lord Fraser: Well, I am afraid I put that wrongly to Henry McLeish today, because I thought the first time an outsider would have been aware of a shift would have been what was in the White Paper. But you’re saying it was actually a week or a couple of weeks earlier than that?

273. Ms Alexander: I think 9 July was the day on which the press conference was held, or perhaps 16 July. But, no, it’s in the public domain and, indeed, the records are there of what was said at that time.

274. Lord Fraser: Thank you.

275. Mr Campbell QC: Can I ask you before we get on to the choice of Holyrood as a location, you have spoken a little bit about DSWR and the things it discussed and the way in which it was decided to present the reverse-power theory, and so on. What would you say to the suggestion that both location and cost were being managed in some way from London?

276. Ms Alexander: I mean, the record simply demonstrates it’s nonsense, and I advise people to look at the record. This is where I make the important point: the version that went to officials in London had just the Old Royal High School option in it. In the intervening five days before it went round all Ministers in Whitehall, Donald had had his meeting on 13 June and said, “I want this to reflect that there’s a range of options and not just the Old Royal High School.”

277. So the version that was discussed by Ministers first didn’t have the annex that still implied it would be in the Old Royal High School. Then at the next meeting of DSWR, it reflected what actually appeared in the White Paper, which was, “We’re looking at a range of sites and therefore, depending on funding, it will be between £10 million and £40 million.”

278. Now, it is simply extraordinary, in that period where officials at Whitehall Departments and their Ministers had seen three drafts, that there is no comment of any kind whatsoever that I have seen on the record, or interference. Indeed, my recollection at the time was that there was no outside interference at all.

279. The one issue which is recorded in the documentation is that the Treasury, as Henry pointed out this morning, were keen that the White Paper should make clear that it would be funded out of the block, as Henry indicated. Donald hung back on that, not because he felt that he shouldn’t pay for it but because the Welsh were still pursuing a battle as to whether they should pay for their own Parliament, and, indeed, before it was published, that sentence was included. But in so far as there was any interest by other Whitehall Departments at DSWR or in these various drafts, it was that one issue that Scotland should pick up the tab.

280. Mr Campbell QC: Was Ron Davies putting pressure on Donald Dewar to hold back until he had sorted out the Welsh arrangements?

281. Ms Alexander: That is my recollection. Although it is not recorded in the papers. It’s not covered significantly in the papers that are now available and I hesitate to rely on recollection, but I think there is tangential reference to that bit. It is immaterial in the sense that the final version of the White Paper did make clear that the costs would be borne in Scotland. And that had always been Donald’s instinctive view, as reflected in the papers.

282. Mr Campbell QC: I asked you a question about working to a timetable, which you didn’t, with respect, quite answer.

283. Ms Alexander: Sure.

284. Mr Campbell QC: Were you working to a timetable for delivery of a decision about a location?

285. Ms Alexander: I think there were various timetables and they all slipped. I think how Donald would describe it would be that he made clear he himself took a decision on 30 May that he wanted other alternatives looked at. In the first week in July, he made that public, and he did not reach a decision on site until early January. So therefore there was a period of between seven and eight months of private consideration by Donald and more than six months of public consideration of sites in Scotland.

286. Mr Campbell QC: Yes, I understand that. Why was it thought necessary to deliver a decision on location so early in 1998, when Holyrood had come on board comparatively recently? Why did he choose then to deliver a decision? Why did he not wait, think more carefully about it and approach it in what seems … sorry, can I just take this question again?

287. Ms Alexander: Sure.

288. Mr Campbell QC: It seems to have been, with respect, quite an unholy rush to get to a date for a decision in early 1998. Now, I may have characterised that wrongly. That’s how it appears to me from the papers. There is a tremendous momentum from November–December right through to early January. Why was that?

289. Ms Alexander: Can I answer one question prior to that? It seems to me, listening to the evidence this morning, there are two questions: why wasn’t there a temporary building accepted and why was Holyrood chosen? Could I answer the first question as to why we didn’t accept a temporary one first?

290. Mr Campbell QC: I will come back to my own question but please go ahead.

291. Ms Alexander: On the temporary solution, which I think with hindsight is a wholly fair question to ask, and therefore I want to try and reflect what in rereading the papers I think Donald’s thoughts were. After 300 years, to ask Scotland to wait a further three years would have been a difficult decision to make. At that time he thought it was three years, because we are in 1997 and the Parliament wasn’t to have its full powers until 2000. He himself, in those papers, talks about the need for a permanent accommodation for a permanent Parliament.

292. Whilst, with hindsight, it may seem odd that decisions were being made for MSPs, it was of course the case that their Standing Orders were being decided by the Consultative Steering Group, their financial arrangements being decided by FIAG [Financial Issues Advisory Group] and the user brief being discussed at the Consultative Steering Group.

293. So I think there was a sense that he wanted to deliver permanent accommodation for a permanent Parliament, but he did consider temporary options. The critical one that he kept in play was indeed the Old Royal High School option. On 4 September, which I think was the critical meeting, the cost prepared for what was described as a “temporary solution” or a “marginal solution” was £44 million versus £55 million. I think Donald’s concern was, and he said this explicitly, how he could justify spending £44 million on a temporary solution when he could have a permanent solution for £55 million. He was, I think, throughout this process incredibly concerned about cost, and at that stage he was looking for a low-cost option. Indeed, when he chose the Holyrood site, it was the low-cost option.

294. Mr Campbell QC: You have given me an answer to a question which I didn’t ask you, which was about whether or not it would’ve been better to go for a temporary home. I understand that; I am grateful, because I would’ve come to it anyway. But what I really want to try to pin down is this announcement on 9 January 1998. Why did he choose then to go for a decision?

295. Ms Alexander: I think because it had been under debate for seven months at that point, and I think he thought that there was no more information useful to him, based on the criteria that he used at the time. He had at that stage decided that — and he offered this in the documentation at the time — he wanted something that was purpose-built, that had the cheapest capital cost, the cheapest revenue cost, was city centre, a historic site and something that wasn’t just an extension of the old Government of Scotland, which is what the pure St Andrew’s House option would be.

296. I think those are policy matters and not ones which … he’d already had independent cost estimates from DLE [Davis, Langdon & Everest] and, since he was choosing the lowest-cost option, I think he felt secure in that choice. It is clearly obviously not proven to be the case.

297. Mr Campbell QC: No. What was Mr Dewar’s reaction when Holyrood became available? Perhaps I should ask you in this order: we know from the record that it was first intimated to officials to be available in early October. First of all, it was two months before it seems to have emerged in minutes. Can you account for that?

298. Ms Alexander: No.

299. Mr Campbell QC: Did you know about it before that?

300. Ms Alexander: As indicated by Murray, I have some recollection of being told that there was a telephone call about a commercially confidential site. I also, like him, think I never saw the letter of 6 October and can’t account for the lapse of time. As we have already discussed, the first minuted evidence is in early December, and that indicates that it was already known. I’m sure I would have known of it then, and I certainly recall being first made aware of it informally because of the commercial confidentiality surrounding S&N’s [Scottish & Newcastle] disposal and potentially alternative uses.

301. Mr Campbell QC: It was put into the public domain by means of a press briefing on 8 December 1997 and there was a press release which accompanied that. That means, Ms Alexander, that from 8 December to 8 January is one month only, including the long public holiday. Did Mr Dewar have enough information gathered over that month or at other times to make an informed decision about Holyrood?

3.30 pm

302. Ms Alexander: Well, as I say, I think the decisions he used was he wanted purpose-built, and that was something that was true of some options and not for others. He did want a city-centre site, a historic site, and he wanted the Parliament, the Executive arm of Government, separated from the parliamentary arm. He had in front of them — and as I say, I think it would be very useful this being on the public record — all the cost documentation that was made available to him; it included estimates surrounding VAT, fees, many other issues and, indeed, independent cost estimates by the cost consultants who were employed by the Scottish Office at that time.

303. I think the one real anxiety which emerges in the papers is surrounding transport considerations, and that was more so true of the Haymarket site, and there were transport considerations affecting all sites.

304. Mr Campbell QC: Can I show you, please, document SE/2/796.

305. This is a minute from Mr Thompson, Mr Dewar’s Private Secretary, which includes you and Lord Elder. It would appear that you’d had a meeting to undertake to discuss:

306. “whether to undertake detailed feasibility studies of the Holyrood site for the Scottish Parliament.”

307. There’s a statement that Ministers concluded that:

308. “the site offered a possibility of a purpose-built Parliament building on a city-centre site at a competitive price and acceptable timescale. They, therefore, wish to consider it alongside other sites.”

309. Ministers decided that it should be included, and the Secretary of State wanted to speak to key players. SE/2/797 is the press briefing, and the next page is the draft news release.

310. Do you agree with me that it appears from that minute that no extensive work-up had been done in relation to Holyrood by 8 December? I’m looking at the first paragraph:

311. “whether to undertake detailed feasibility studies”.

312. Ms Alexander: I don’t think I’m really in a position to judge what the extent of the feasibility studies were, but certainly it appears from this that there had not been huge amounts of work done at that stage. Although, as I say, the evidence elsewhere suggests that it had been known to the Department for some time. I can’t comment on what is not minuted.

313. Mr Campbell QC: So, since we do know that the announcement was made a month later, it must follow, mustn’t it, that whatever work was done, to whatever standard, was done in a month, which included the Christmas and New Year holiday?

314. Ms Alexander: I think that’s an appropriate question for an official who was taking it forward, but it does imply that detailed feasibility studies hadn’t been done. Whether less detailed ones had been done is a matter for officials.

315. Mr Campbell QC: OK, thank you. Do you know whether what was ultimately done by 8 or 9 January was of a standard, and to a level, commensurate with the work-ups which had been done in respect of the other sites?

316. Ms Alexander: I do not know that.

317. Mr Campbell QC: If it be the case that it was not, must that not mean that the decision was taken in early January on an information basis which was not a level playing field?

318. Ms Alexander: Sorry, repeat the question.

319. Mr Campbell QC: If it be the case that the standard of study for Holyrood was not to the same level as that for the other sites, by 8 January, must that not mean that the decision was taken on an unequal basis as among the four sites?

320. Ms Alexander: That may well be the case.

321. Mr Campbell QC: Thank you. What was it about Holyrood, as you recall, which attracted Donald Dewar?

322. Ms Alexander: I think the encouraging thing is that we have his own words, and it’s just sad that he can’t be here to say them.

323. He was keen to have a purpose-built building. One of the issues that had bedevilled the Regent Road option was, of course, that the Old Royal High School chamber was not to be used, and since it was a Grade A listed building, it would simply be a rotunda added on to it. So I think Donald was attracted by a purpose-built building. He was certainly attracted, that of the four options presented to him, it was both the cheapest capital cost and the cheapest revenue cost.

324. I think I heard the question asked earlier today: was Donald extravagant? Given how the costs have escalated, that has to be a fair question. I think Donald wanted a bold architectural statement, but not necessarily luxurious. I think this is key in this consideration. Edinburgh has a lot of bold architectural statements, but they are not all luxurious, and that was reflected in issues at later stages, including, amongst others, political parties wanting more extravagant designs than perhaps had been considered.

325. So I think the fact it was purpose-built, the fact it had the cheapest capital cost and cheapest revenue cost, on the evidence that was prepared for Donald, that it was a city-centre site and therefore did not have some of the issues of accessibility of Leith, that it was historic and that it separated the Executive and parliamentary arms of Government, were all key to his consideration.

326. Mr Campbell QC: We must recall, mustn’t we, that at the time of taking this decision, there were, of course, no designs around?

327. Ms Alexander: That is indeed the case. There was of course, though, no indication to Donald anywhere in, I think, the 20 submissions over the period from late May through until January that it could not be delivered. There was a sense that new build might be easier, and both independent architects had been employed on all the feasibility studies and indeed independent cost consultants had been employed for cost. There had been two previous occasions in that six-month period where officials had offered Donald the opportunity to make an early decision, and he had on both occasions indicated that value-for-money concerns had to be to the fore and that there had to be a clear audit trail.

328. Mr Campbell QC: I perhaps put that question slightly unfairly to you. I said there were no designs around but there were, of course, in respect of the larger site at Regent Road and also at Leith and Haymarket. There were indicative sketches, were there not?

329. Ms Alexander: Yes.

330. Mr Campbell QC: That’s right, isn’t it? As far as I know, there were no such indicative sketches for Holyrood —

331. Ms Alexander: I couldn’t comment on that.

332. Mr Campbell QC: — which, of course, was already occupied by a brewery at that time.

333. Ms Alexander, turning on to the selection of a designer, did you take part with Mr Dewar in the design of the mechanism which was to be chosen for selecting a designer?

334. Ms Alexander: There was a ministerial submission that came up that both Murray and I would be copied in on — and it’s on the record — and I think, with retrospect, a very important document, which gave Donald a choice between a design competition and a “designer” competition, as it was colloquially known. The indication was that Donald should opt for the “designer” competition, which gave more chance of controlling costs and the building being procured on time. As a cautious man, he opted for the latter option, and from that point the design team, independent, was appointed and went off to look at that area.

335. I think what in retrospect is surprising is that that submission deals only with the design stage, which then continued through. One of the things, albeit that I left in December 1988, is that there appears to be no subsequent submission on the procurement process to deliver what the designer competition would come up with.

336. Mr Campbell QC: Thank you. You’re getting ahead of me a wee bit.

337. Ms Alexander: Sorry.

338. Mr Campbell QC: So far as the decision to go for a designer competition is concerned, were you involved in, first of all, that choice — that’s to say to go for a designer rather than a design — and secondly, the selection of the people who were on the designer selection panel?

339. Ms Alexander: On the first of these, as I have indicated, I saw the submission. Donald took, as I say, the prudent decision, but the decision was his — as in so much else. I think advisers advise but Ministers do indeed decide. So as I say, he took the prudent decision on that. I was aware of —

340. Mr Campbell QC: Sorry, I’ll just stop you one second. When you talk about a submission there, so that I can be clear, you’re talking about a civil servant’s submission?

341. Ms Alexander: A Civil Service submission to Ministers offering him a choice about how the design competition should be carried out, with two clear choices recommending, “on balance”, I think the phrase was, the more prudent option to maximise the control over the process. That was the one that Donald chose.

342. Mr Campbell QC: Control over that process was important, was it, at least to the author?

343. Ms Alexander: So it seemed, and I think rightly so. I think what was also alluded to at that stage was the possibility of the Parliament, at a subsequent stage, being able to have some input into the design process at the latter stages. There was a recognition that the design might at the margins need to be modified, although, as I say, I would stress that, like the CSG [Consultative Steering Group] considering the Standing Orders, all political parties were being invited to view the user brief and comment thereon. I recall no indication from any of them that they wanted that process halted, with the sole exception of Donald Gorrie. There is no indication around the Second Reading debate that any political party wished to wait until the Parliament was established — indeed, the very opposite. From all the Opposition parties have been suggested a variety of taunts about why it’s not going to be finished for the first day following the shadow period.

344. Mr Campbell QC: Now, did you, as Special Adviser, have any input into the nomination of people to sit on the designer selection panel?

345. Ms Alexander: I was aware of the many submissions that came up and were copied to Murray and I, as with all other submissions to Donald on this matter. I have —

346. Mr Campbell QC: Did you give advice about the appropriateness of “candidates”, shall we say?

347. Ms Alexander: I see no written evidence that that happened. I would hesitate to say that Donald didn’t discuss the matter with me. It was obviously six years ago. There’s written evidence of input. I suspect he probably did discuss that submission with me.

348. Mr Campbell QC: And who administered that process, the process of the designer competition?

349. Ms Alexander: Well, the competition. We were really not involved after the process had been established because the desire was for that to be independent. I imagine the papers then, as I recall, didn’t come to Special Advisers. There would be part of the Civil Service who acted as a servicing team for —

350. Mr Campbell QC: For the competition?

351. Ms Alexander: For the competition.

352. Mr Campbell QC: Right. It didn’t go to the RIAS [Royal Incorporation of Architects in Scotland], for example, or the RIBA [Royal Institute of British Architects], or some outside body to administer?

353. Ms Alexander: I am aware, having looked at the papers this weekend, that there were various people who made comments, but none of that came to me in my capacity as a special adviser. I really don’t feel qualified to comment on it.

354. Mr Campbell QC: I’d just like to backtrack one second and ask you another question about the way in which … what’s prompted me is your comment: “Advisers advise and Ministers decide”, which ought to be a truism, perhaps. When you and Lord Elder gave Mr Dewar advice about important things, never mind the minutiae, would you write that down? Would you minute it?

355. Ms Alexander: Sometimes. Sometimes it would be verbal. I lived in Glasgow, Donald lived in Glasgow, we would very often travel home in the car together. But there were also lots of occasions where, for speed and ease, I would put things on paper. I was very rarely out of the office; I was usually at a desk base.

356. Mr Campbell QC: Yes, and what happened to special advisers’ files once you had departed the scene? Did that advice just go into Civil Service files, into ordinary office files?

357. Ms Alexander: I have absolutely no idea. Although I was somewhat surprised at the slightly erratic nature of the correspondence we now have. I should hasten to add that I think there is nothing untoward about that, except in so far as to say I think the standards of a 30-year rule, which are common in Number 10, is probably something that is being looked at in Scotland for the future. But the time which we are talking about, Scotland obviously didn’t yet have a First Minister.

3.45 pm

358. Lord Fraser: I’m looking back over my notes from yesterday, Ms Alexander. I think it was Mr Brian Wilson who indicated in this matter, while there would be the relatively traditional Wednesday meeting when all Ministers, all Special Advisers and senior officials together would meet. Then the officials and Private Secretaries would be heaved out. It went round the table and asked questions on a wide range of matters. I think Brian Wilson’s evidence came to this: he was aware of what was going on from those discussions, but indicated that, so far as the development of the White Paper and the taking forward of the siting of the Parliament was concerned, there was, as he described it, a “separate” team which you and Lord Elder were parties of and, I think, the civil servant Robert Gordon and some others. Does that square with your recollection?

359. Ms Alexander: In some respects. There were obviously two processes. On the White Paper, all the full copies of the White Paper would go to all Ministers. Clearly the iterations in between the various versions wouldn’t be circulated around to all Ministers. All Ministers got to see all full drafts of the White Paper that would have had the St Andrew’s House only version up until Donald’s meeting of 13 June, and thereafter, also on 3 July, they would have seen the revised version. So that went to everybody.

360. On the business of site selection, as I have indicated, Donald, having put it on the agenda, so to speak, from 2 June, from his visit on the 30th, it remained a live issue of much public and, indeed, ministerial informal discussion for a period of some seven months thereafter.

361. Lord Fraser: So there would be just this team of you, who were more intimately involved with the development of taking forward the devolution process.

362. I think your evidence that the Treasury were insisting the cost of this came out of a block will not come as a surprise to anybody that that was the position that they took up.

363. Part of the evidence we heard yesterday was that the Chancellor of the Exchequer may have had slightly more direct involvement than that, and that was that while the Secretary of State, as you have indicated, wanted a new build, because he wanted to make some sort of architectural statement, not necessarily because of cost and its gilded marble or anything like that. He wanted a new build. The suggestion was that Mr Gordon Brown was urging the use, as Mr Galbraith described it, of a “second-hand” building rather than a new one. Have you any comment to offer on that?

364. Ms Alexander: Let me offer the following comment. There were three options in play in the October–November period. They were: Regent Road, not the Old Royal High School, but Regent Road; Leith; and Haymarket. There wasn’t an MP in Scotland who didn’t have a view on which of those options were appropriate. Indeed, when Holyrood emerged at the beginning of December, I think there continued to not be an MP who didn’t have a view. I think what was different about Ministers and, most critically, about the Secretary of State was the cost considerations relating to those propositions. Of the reasons that Donald cited for his choice about it being purpose-built and whether you wanted a city-centre site, and what the transport was like, and whether you wanted an architectural statement, and whether you wanted to separate the Executive arm of Government from the parliamentary arm, they are policy matters on which, again, every MP, and indeed every member of the public, could have a view.

365. The critical piece of information to which Donald alone, and perhaps whomsoever he discussed it with and the rest of his team were party to, was how did those options stack up in terms of current and capital cost? I have no view as to whether any of the other Cabinet Ministers had special insight into the current and capital cost, although I know it was widely reported that all of them had a view on the sites and those other dimensions.

366. Lord Fraser: I can understand, and I’m not surprised to hear you say that every MP had a view on where the Parliament should be. To be blunt, the Rt Hon Gordon Brown, as Chancellor of the Exchequer, is not just an ordinary MP. He’s the man who holds the purse strings, isn’t he?

367. Ms Alexander: Yes, but it had been clear for some six months that this was something to be paid for out of the Scottish block.

368. Lord Fraser: It has been really helpful that you’ve explained that the submission coming up at the beginning of 1998 was for the choice of a panel to determine the design or the designer. Once the design panel had made their selection, were you reinvolved after that at all?

369. Ms Alexander: I hesitate here because this trespasses on matters that, I think, are for the Inquiry and which I wasn’t copied in on at the time. But as Mr Elder has indicated, it matters that when I had the opportunity for the first time to look at the files this weekend, I think one of the most interesting sequences for the Inquiry is that when the design team made their choice and announced it, several views had been offered internally. It is not clear to me, because I wasn’t a member of the design team, how many of those views were passed on to the design team or in what form. But it is nevertheless known, or at least I understand, that the design team saw — whether they did, it’s not material — that the cost estimates provided by DLE indicated that a number of the design proposals were indeed over the £50 million limit that was in currency at that point. What then happens, obviously, is that, rightly, officials make an attempt to get that on track. They then get into a dialogue with the architects. I think it’s fair to say that the material coming to Ministers gives no indication of that discussion that began in May 1998 and obviously continued long after my departure.

370. Lord Fraser: I have an impression — and it may be entirely erroneous, so correct me if I’m wrong — that Mr Miralles, in a way, blurred the issues, because while he was there to be selected as “designer”, to establish his value as the designer, he actually produced a design. Is that right?

371. Ms Alexander: Yes.

372. Lord Fraser: I’m just interested that you started off by explaining that officials had sought to make a clear distinction between choosing a “design” or choosing a “designer”. And the reason why the Secretary of State chose the latter course was because there was an argument in the submission that you’ve got a better control over costs if you’ve got that designer and then you can control what he actually designs, in cost terms. My understanding is that Mr Miralles, to some extent, blurred the issue because he came along and said, “Here is my design, and that is why I’m the person that you should select.”

373. Ms Alexander: I think it raises two issues for the Inquiry to pursue further, which is what was the process of advice to Ministers following the selection of the designer and the balance of what Ministers, appropriately, were and weren’t told. I would add the caveat here that clearly there are management responsibilities that people have to be given the chance to get on and run. As the Auditor General’s report points out, there has to be an iterative process. I think the secondary issue is what the implied procurement process was, and its relationship to the design process. Really they are not matters on which I can comment.

374. Mr Campbell QC: You could perhaps tell me, just in closing today, if the Secretary of State called for information about possible procurement routes, having chosen a designer.

375. Ms Alexander: Yes he did, on a number of occasions. I think the first minute is 13 June, where he asked for advice on both PFI [private finance initiative] and indeed on the involvement of a private developer. Again, I know that there was some discussion internally on that. The intention was that a submission should come up to Ministers. I myself reiterated the point at a meeting in June. It was queried at that point and Donald affirmed that he wanted such advice to come up.

376. Mr Campbell QC: Which year are we in now?

377. Ms Alexander: June 1997. The first advice which appears to have come up on the official record is on 6 January 1998. I think that probably is something the Inquiry will want to look at further, in the sense that it suggests that there were differences of view about whether private developers and PFI should be involved, but makes clear to the Secretary of State that since work hadn’t been done, and it would take another further two months to do something, it was recommended to him that he should not proceed with that route.

378. Mr Campbell QC: That route or with an examination of that route?

379. Ms Alexander: An examination of that route.

380. Mr Campbell: So in effect, then, by the time we got to January 1998 with the location decision, would it be fair to say that either no decision had been taken or there had just been an exploration of possible procurement routes?

381. Ms Alexander: I think the important minutes are the two minutes in June, where Donald asks for further information, not least because that had been written into the White Paper. It’s an appropriate question to ask about the timing of advice that came up thereafter about possibly pursuing this route.

382. There were, of course, formidable difficulties, which people have pointed to, about the discussions that would’ve needed to have gone on with the Treasury to do two things. One, to ensure that, if you went the full PFI route, whether the asset would ultimately be owned by the provider or, indeed, by the Scottish people. That was a matter of much concern to Donald, and in the submission to him it is suggested that it would ultimately, I think, have been owned by the developer, although this was a period of time where Treasury practice on this was undergoing some change.

383. The other issue which was pointed out at that time was that Donald was keen also to look at joint work with the developer, and also whether you might use the private sector to provide some of the services on site, so therefore allowing at a later stage, potentially, for the Parliament itself to have some influence into the shape of contracts that were drawn up. Clearly there is an issue of making sure that contracts are flexible enough that they can be subsequently altered. But that whole arena appears in the agenda in June and, to my best recollection, and at least on the evidence I’ve seen, isn’t addressed until into January.

384. Mr Campbell QC: After the site’s been selected?

385. Ms Alexander: Yes … no, interestingly, on the same day. There are three minutes that come up on 6 January, and it’s just about at the same period.

386. Lord Fraser: Well, it’s probably not the greatest moment to leave this, but I’m afraid I have to now for other reasons. Can I just say that I’m very grateful to you for coming. I think it’s almost unavoidable that I will have to ask you back. You’ve kindly said that you will do that, and I will make an effort to make it as convenient for you as possible.

387. Ms Alexander: Thank you.

388. Lord Fraser: Thank you very much.

389. Mr Campbell QC: Thank you very much, Ms Alexander.

390. Lord Fraser: We’ll leave that discussion for another time. I think Lord Elder, as Mr Campbell indicated to you, we would hope that he wouldn’t require your presence again. However, I’d be most appreciative if you would hold yourself available, not on any particular date or time. You will certainly be warned.

391. We will now adjourn and resume tomorrow morning at 10.00am. Who are you anticipating as your first witness?

392. Mr Campbell QC: I’m happy to say that Lord Sewel has agreed to come in the morning. I don’t expect his evidence to take terribly long. He’ll be followed by Sir Russell Hillhouse and two members of the Civil Service, Mr Graham and Mr Batho.

Hearing adjourned at 3.58 pm.

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