WESTMINSTER'S Foreign Affairs Committee has cancelled a session in Edinburgh next month because the Scottish Government refused to attend to give evidence on the inquiry by MPs into the impact of Scottish independence on foreign policy.
The Herald was told the committee has been trying for five weeks to arrange an evidence session with the SNP administration but Holyrood was proving "unco-operative" and had failed to confirm Fiona Hyslop, its External Affairs Minister, would attend on November 13.
It is believed the Scottish Government wants to hear the evidence from other witnesses first before having one of its ministers cross-examined by MPs. It is now thought a new date will be arranged with the session taking place in either Edinburgh or London. However, the committee's final session is traditionally with a UK Government minister.
Richard Ottaway, the Conservative chairman of the committee, asked if he felt the committee had been snubbed by Holyrood, told The Herald: "I'm disappointed. However, I remain optimistic a meeting can be agreed."
A Scottish Government spokesman said: "These claims are wrong. Given there are a number of live Westminster committee inquiries into an independent Scotland, we have proposed Scottish ministers' evidence should be heard towards the end of the live evidence proceedings. We have offered to go to London if it helps."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article