Once the Parliament has met and selected a Presiding Officer and deputies, as well as a candidate for nomination as First Minister, it must begin to consider the formation of committees and the selection of committee conveners. This blog explains what committees are and how they are formed.
What are committees and what do they do?
Committees are made up of small groups of MSPs from across different political parties to examine particular subject areas. Each committee has a remit and can consider anything within its remit. Committees are designed to:
- hold the Scottish Government to account
- hold inquiries
- examine bills and decide on amendments
Committees can also introduce committee bills and consider petitions suggested by the public and referred on by the Public Petitions Committee.
What types of committees are there?
There are two main types of committees at the Parliament – mandatory committees and subject committees. Mandatory committees are required by Standing Orders (Rules 6.1 to 6.11 and Temporary Rule 4 which is in place until 2 October 2026). At present the mandatory committees are:
- Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments
- Finance
- Public Audit
- Equalities and Human Rights
- Public Petitions
- Delegated Powers and Law Reform
- Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee (this committee is named in Temporary Rule 4 as amending Rule 6.8 which provided for a Europe and External Relations Committee).
Rule 6.1.5 of Standing Orders provides that:
…the Parliament shall, on a motion of the Parliamentary Bureau, establish the mandatory committees mentioned in Rules 6.4 to 6.11.
Subject committees are also established on a motion of the Parliament, usually a motion of the Parliamentary Bureau. In theory, however, any MSP is able to lodge such a motion and can therefore propose the establishment of a subject committee.
How are committee remits decided?
The remit of a committee refers to the area or areas it covers. The remits of mandatory committees are set out in Standing Orders, but the Parliament can add additional matters to a remit. This is provided for in Rule 6.1.5A. As such, the Session 6 Finance Committee also had responsibility for public administration and was named the Finance and Public Administration Committee and the Public Petitions Committee was the Citizen Participation and Public Petitions Committee.
Subject committees tend to cover areas like health and justice and often shadow Ministerial portfolios, although they do not have to.
As explained earlier, all committees hold the government to account, undertake inquiries and consider legislation within their remit. This can create a challenge for committees, particularly where there is a large volume of legislation.
Committees at the Scottish Parliament are different to examples in some other parliaments where there are subject committees, as well as specific committees established for each piece of primary legislation. Remit considerations were, therefore, considered by the Session 6 SPPA Committee during its inquiry into strengthening committee effectiveness, including whether committees should retain their multi-faceted roles. The SPPA Committee concluded that:
We do not think that a solution would be to split the committee’s functions and create separate subject and bill committees. The evidence shows there are strengths in combining committee functions. This enables members to build up a specialism and expertise in specific subject areas, which will assist committees’ performance.
However, we are clear that the system needs to build in more flexibility to respond to topical issues, allow for more inquiry work and make the most of committees’ scrutiny function. We recommend that when the Parliamentary Bureau proposes the establishment of committees to the Parliament at the start of a Session that it takes these factors into account in the remit of each committee.
The report from the SPPA Committee also stated that:
We recommend that early in the next session the Parliamentary Bureau considers recommending to the Parliament the formation of time-limited committees during the parliamentary session. This approach could enable the Parliament to manage the peaks and troughs in the legislative programme more effectively. It would also enable the Parliament’s committees to respond to high profile issues that cut across remits, or to conduct work on specific areas of post legislative scrutiny.
Some of these time-limited committees could be formed to look at specific Bills. We consider this approach would be utilised most effectively on legislation of a cross-cutting nature that would fall beyond the remit of one committee. This would alleviate the challenge of conducting scrutiny on a bill where expertise may lie in multiple committees. It may also negate the need for secondary committees to consider legislation.
Other time-limited committees could be established to consider specific inquiry issues, whether these be of a topical or cross-cutting nature.
The SPPA Committee also suggested that time limited committees could be used for post legislative scrutiny, for the “consideration of the impact of a particular Act, or to review the legislation in a particular policy area”.
Rule 6.13 relates to questions of competence for committees (i.e., questions over whether a subject matter is within the remit of a committee) and states that the Parliamentary Bureau shall be the decision maker, in consultation with the Conveners Group, should a question of committee competence arise.
The Conveners Group is made up of all the conveners of the Parliament’s Committees. It is chaired by the Presiding Officer or a Deputy Presiding Officer. Chapter 6A of Standing Orders sets out the rules for how Conveners Group works. Generally, the Group meets to:
- discuss issues affecting committees
- communicate between committees and other parts of the Parliament, such as the Parliamentary Bureau
- consider how committees are working
- approve committee meetings outside of Edinburgh and committee travel outside of the UK.
Do committees have to reflect the balance of parties in the Parliament?
Yes, committee seats have to be allocated on a roughly proportional basis. This is because schedule 3 of the Scotland Act 1998 provides that:
The standing orders shall include provision for ensuring that, in appointing members to committees and sub-committees, regard is had to the balance of political parties in the Parliament.
Rule 6.3 of Standing Orders addresses committee membership with Rule 6.3.4 providing that:
In proposing a member to be a committee member, the Parliamentary Bureau shall have regard to the balance of political parties in the Parliament and, where that member has expressed an interest in serving on that committee, to that member’s qualifications and experience as indicated by that member.
The 2023 Guidance on Committees states that:
In practice, the number of seats for each party on each committee is decided on a roughly proportional basis. This gives the larger parties a share of seats on each committee that matches as closely as possible their share of seats, while smaller parties may have a single seat on some committees and none on others. Where there are independent MSPs in the Parliament, the parties may agree to offer some or all of them seats on committees.
Who decides committee membership?
Parties choose which of the MSPs in their group they would like to represent them on a committee. It is then for the whole Parliament to agree or disagree to the membership of a committee.
The Guidance on Committees published in 2023 explains that:
It is primarily for each business manager to advise the Bureau which members of his or her party are to take up the committee places allocated to that party. In this way, most discussions about committee membership take place within the Bureau and, if they are resolved successfully, it may be possible to have a single, unopposed motion for Parliamentary approval. However, it is also possible for any member to propose amendments to the Bureau motion when it is taken in the Chamber.
Can Ministers be members of committees?
Technically Ministers and junior ministers can be committee members although this has never been the case to date. The Guidance on Committees (2023) explains:
There is no formal bar on ministers being members of other committees, but in practice, no member appointed as a Minister or junior minister has also served as a member of a committee at the same time, and members newly appointed as Ministers or junior ministers have immediately resigned any committee memberships they hold.
Ministers and junior ministers cannot be members of the Public Audit Committee. Similarly, the Convener of that committee cannot be a member of the party of Government. Rule 6.7.2 of Standing Orders provides for this.
Do the Presiding Officer or deputy Presiding Officers sit on a committee?
The Presiding Officer does not serve on a committee. Deputy Presiding Officers have, however, served as committee conveners, members and substitute members.
What are the rules on committee size?
Committees can vary in size and have done throughout different Sessions. The Guidance on Committees published in February 2023 states that:
In Sessions 1, 2 and 5, most committees had seven, nine or eleven members; in Session 3, most had eight members; in Session 4, most had seven or nine. In Session 6, the mandatory committees have five or seven members and the subject committees between six and ten.
In previous sessions, Standing Orders (Rule 6.3.2) provided that:
Each committee other than a Private Bill Committee or a Hybrid Bill Committee shall have at least 5 but not more than 15 members.
The Session 6 Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments (SPPA) Committee did, however, consider committee size through its inquiry and report on strengthening committee effectiveness (published in October 2025), recommending that:
smaller committees should be established at the start of the next session… a change is made to Standing Orders to reduce the maximum number of members for subject and mandatory committees down from fifteen to ten members…committees should normally have a maximum of seven members.
The Session 6 SPPA Committee was of the view that such changes would “still leave flexibility to ensure that smaller parties are represented on committees and committee places are still allocated broadly in line with the balance of political parties in the parliament.”
The SPPA Committee set out proposed Standing Orders Rule Changes related to committee size in its report Standing Order rule changes arising from the Committee’s report “Strengthening committees’ effectiveness”. The suggested Rule changes contained in the report were considered by the Parliament on 19 March 2026 and motion S6M-21053 was agreed. As such, Standing Orders have been changed to reflect that the maximum number of MSPs on a committee should be 10. The change came into effect on 11 May 2026.
Is there a rule on gender balance on committees?
To date there have been no rules about gender balance on committees. The Session 6 Scottish Parliament Gender Sensitive Audit led to the introduction of two new Standing Order Rules. One means that at the point a committee is established the Parliamentary Bureau should try to ensure it reflects the gender balance of the Parliament.
6.3.4B When a committee is first established, the Parliamentary Bureau shall normally ensure that the proposed membership reflects the gender balance of the Parliament. Where a proposed membership does not do so, the member of the Parliamentary Bureau moving the motion shall explain the reasons for this.
The second rule means that single sex committees are not allowed.
6.3.4A In proposing a member to be a committee member under Rule 6.3.4, the Parliamentary Bureau must ensure that, in so doing, the result would not be that all members of a committee would be of the same sex.
The full background to these changes and the text of the changes are set out in the SPPA Committee report Standing Order rule changes arising from the Committee’s report ‘Strengthening committees’ effectiveness’. The changes were agreed by the Parliament on 19 March 2026 and came into effect on 11 May 2026.
Timetable for the establishment of committees
Standing Orders provides that the Parliamentary Bureau proposes the establishment of mandatory committees by means of a motion. The timetable for the establishment of these committees is provided by Rule 6 of Standing Orders.
The Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee and the Finance Committee must be established within 21 sitting days of a general election. Other mandatory committees need to be established within 42 sitting days of a general election. Sitting days are days on which the Office of the Clerk is open but which are not in recess or during dissolution.
There is no set timetable for the establishment of subject committees, although each committee usually has one or two meetings between its establishment after a general election and the Parliament’s summer recess which generally begins in late June (although it is for the new Parliament to agree recess dates).
Sarah McKay, SPICe research