Committee Effectiveness - Short Survey

Page 2 – About you

Q1 – Standard privacy notice

Q2 – Standard publication question

Q3 – Name

Q4 – Email address

Q5 – Are you responding as an individual or on behalf of an organisation?

Page 3 – Organisation details

Q6 – Name of organisation

Q7 – Information about your organisation

Page 4 – role of committees

Q8 – Have you engaged with or followed the work of Scottish Parliament committees before? (yes/no skip logic, No answer would lead to a ‘survey done’ page saying “thank you for your time, it’s important that we know whether we’re reaching new audiences or not” or something similar, and the standard submit response design)

Q9 – How have you engaged with the work of Scottish Parliament committees? (tick as many as apply)

• I have followed some committee work in an area of interest to me, for instance by watching news reports or reading news articles or social media posts.
• I like to stay up to date with what multiple committees are doing.
• I have watched a committee meeting, either online or in person.
• I have read one or more committee reports.
• I have responded to one or more committee calls for views or surveys.
• I have written to one or more committees.
• I have met members of a committee at an engagement event or visit.
• I have taken part in a participation session with a committee, such as a workshop, lived experience panel or people’s panel.
• I have given evidence to a committee in a formal meeting on one occasion.
• I have given evidence or engaged with one or more committees multiple times.
• I have followed up to see how the Scottish Government has responded to committee work that I have followed or taken part in.

Page 5 – the work of committees

The work of committees is often referred to as scrutiny. This means that committees are looking at things like:

• Plans for how things are done (policies and strategies).
• How well they are done.
• Whether those things are what the public and organisations have asked for.
• Whether things are done fairly (equalities).
• Whether public money is being used effectively.

To do this, committees do carry out several types of work. 

Q10 – Which do you think is the most important thing for committees to spend their time on? (choose top 3, in order)

• Investigating current or topical issues.
• Examining proposed laws presented by the Scottish Government.
• Examining proposed laws presented by non-Government members (private members bills, such as the Period Products (Scotland) Bill).
• Examining the Scottish Government’s proposed spending plans (the Budget).
• Examining the work of public bodies and commissioners.
• Reviewing existing laws and how well they work.
• Examining petitions made by the public.

Q11 – If you have engaged with or followed committee work before, would you like to tell us more about your experience? (free text)