Meeting between Minister for Public Finance and Cabinet Secretary for Wellbeing Economy, Fair Work and Energy: FOI release

Information requested

“All information held regarding the meeting/video conference involving Public Finance Minister Ivan McKee, Neil Gray MSP and the latter’s constituent on 20/6/24, including – though not limited to:

1. how the meeting was arranged

2. minutes of the meeting, and

3. what actions were subsequently taken by the minister.”

Response

1. I enclose a copy of the information you requested. This comprises 11 documents numbered 1 to 11.

2. The meeting followed an initial Ministerial Correspondence Case where Mr Gray MSP had written to Mr Arthur, then Minister with procurement responsibility, on 6 February 2024 asking the Scottish Government to look into using the Preston Model to ensure local SMEs benefit from local procurements. A series of exchanges took place involving Mr Arthur, Mr Gray and Mr McKee when procurement responsibility passed to him. A meeting briefing document was prepared and shared with
Mr McKee prior to the meeting that took place on 20 June 2024. All the above information is enclosed in Documents 1 to 8.

3. You asked for Minutes of the meeting. These are enclosed in Document 9.

4. You asked for what actions were subsequently taken by the minister. In relation to action 1 from the Minutes, the Scottish Government is investigating opportunities to drive advertisement of subcontracting opportunities and has engaged with colleagues. An early draft internal paper is enclosed in Document 10. In addition, the Scottish Government included wording highlighting the advertisement of subcontracts via the Public Contracts Scotland website on Scotland’s Heat Network Fund’s website. This can be found under ‘6. Positive and significant economic impact’ which is the main source of guidance for applicants. For ease, the wording included is:

‘For projects led by public bodies, the Public Contracts Scotland website should be used to advertise contracts as per the Procurement Reform (Scotland) Act 2014. Projects are encouraged to go beyond the minimum obligation to advertise prime contracts via this route and extend this to advertising subcontracts on the PCS where possible. This is not intended to cut across any supply chain arrangements that the prime contractor may already have in place but, rather, to offer more opportunities to local suppliers including SMEs, the third sector and supported businesses to win contracts within the heat network supply chain.’

5. For action 2 from the Minutes, please see enclosed in document 11, the Scottish Government does not hold any information further to this.

6. For action 3 from the Minutes, Scottish Government officials met with Scottish Enterprise contacts in a meeting about this week commencing 15 July 2024. The Scottish Government does not hold any further information.

7. Following action 4 from the Minutes, an internal Scottish Government Management Information Platform meeting took place. Whilst no minutes were taken, it was discussed that there are limits to how useful the Procurement Management Information Platform mapping of Living Wage accredited suppliers would be. This is because Living Wage accreditation is not equivalent to Scottish Government Fair Work First in procurement policy on payment of at least the real Living Wage. Over time information on the platform may help streamline reporting on payment of at least the real Living Wage.

8. While our aim is to provide information whenever possible, in this instance we are unable to provide some of the information you have requested because an exemption under section 38(1)(b) (personal information) of FOISA applies to that information. The reasons why that exemption applies are explained in the Reasons for not Providing Information section below.

REASONS FOR NOT PROVIDING INFORMATION

The Scottish Government does not have the information

The Scottish Government does not have some of the information you have asked for regarding actions from the Minutes of the meeting. Specifically:

‘Mr McKee is planning to rationalise funding streams across SG departments and is keen to see organisations thinking strategically. For example, using relevant funding to create district heat networks, rather than on individual heat pumps.’

‘Respond to correspondence to Mr Fitzpatrick and Ms Martin dated 3rd April.’

This is a formal notice under section 17(1) of FOISA that the Scottish Government does not have the information you have requested.

An exemption applies

An exemption under section 38(1)(b) of FOISA applies to some of the information you have requested.

‘Personal Information’ has been withheld under section 38(1)(b) to documents 1 to 11. This includes full names, addresses, telephone numbers and the first parts of email addresses.

This exemption is not subject to the ‘public interest test’, so we are not required to consider if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption.

About FOI

The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at https://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.

FOI 202400442649 - Information Released - Documents 1 to 11

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