Scotland can champion a more open and participative lawmaking process:
Scotland can champion a more open and participative lawmaking process:
Citizens as legislators. Citizens should be able to play a direct role in the legislative process: on presenting a petition signed by an appropriate number of voters, citizens should be able to trigger a vote on important issues of devolved responsibility. As we proposed on the one year anniversary of the Independence Referendum, this is the Scottish Greens’ preferred way of deciding to hold a second referendum on Independence. If a new referendum is to happen, it should come about by the will of the people, and not be driven by calculations of party political advantage. In such a referendum the Scottish Greens will campaign for independence.
More effective Parliamentary committees. Committees were supposed to be the ‘jewel in the crown’ of Holyrood when it first started. But successive governments have sought to block scrutiny of its work. Scottish Greens want to strengthen the committee system’s ability to hold government to account and as a first step will call for committee chairs to be elected by Parliament, not chosen by party bosses. A further step would be to establish public scrutiny committees made up of randomly selected citizens; community representatives, local councillors and others; and regular Public Questions session, in which members of the public can pose questions to Scottish ministers.
The public’s voice at the centre of Holyrood. The public should be able to play a role in setting Holyrood’s agenda. As is already the case with Westminster, citizens should be able to push Holyrood into holding debates on issues of public interest by presenting petitions with an appropriate threshold, without the Public Petitions Committee having a veto.