Quangos are the hidden hands of government in Scotland; agencies which nobody voted for but hold far more power than is healthy, much of it leeched from local accountability. Once again, the failed governance of Scotland’s ferry network has highlighted this but the quango issue goes much wider and deeper than that.

This week, the Cabinet Secretary for Transport, Fiona Hyslop, has faced bitter criticism from the Western Isles for reappointing the Copenhagen-based chair of Caledonian MacBrayne, Erik Østergaard, who has been to the islands once since being leveraged into the job, and two board members who have, quite literally, never set foot in a CalMac port.

She also re-appointed the chair of Highlands and Islands Airport Limited, Lorna Jack, who presided over a multi-million debacle, now abandoned, aimed at centralising air traffic control in Inverness. There is not a solitary resident of the Highlands and Islands on the board of Highlands and Islands Airports Limited - absolute par for the course.

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The same belief in remote control extends far beyond the islands. Take national parks. It is difficult to find anyone in Dumfries and Galloway who wants one, not least because management would be in the hands of yet another quango. Who do they tell this to? Why, NatureScot, of course, a tame quango which has been appointed “reporter” on the plans by the Scottish Government.

Your police station is closing? Don’t bother your local councillor, since elected representation on police boards was replaced by a ministerially-appointed quango, the Scottish Police Authority. The former general secretary of the Scottish Police Federation, Calum Steele, wrote in The Herald recently: “'One of the biggest weaknesses with the SPA is the absence of any democratically elected representation holding the police to account”.

And so on through the card. Over vast areas of Scottish life, democratic accountability has been replaced with quango rule. This is one reason there has been such strong resistance from local authorities to plans for a National Care Service. Once again, councils would cede another function where accountability must count for something.

If our quangos were independent-minded bodies, led by respected individuals with relevant expertise, there might be a case for them. Nothing could be further from the truth. The trick perfected by the current Scottish Government - though they were not the system’s creators - is to stuff these organisations with trusties whose only qualification is that they will not cause them any trouble, or else they can forget about the next appointment.

The Water Commission for Scotland is a good recent example and not a bad starting point to trace how that network operates. So egregious was the failure of its board to anticipate an accident waiting to happen, the chairman and veteran of the circuit, Donald Macrae, eventually walked the plank. But what of his fellow ministerial appointees?

With no sense of irony, Jo Armstrong - a former Scottish Government civil servant - was found a billet as chair of the Accounts Commission, no less; doubtless in recognition of her rigorous scrutiny of the Water Commission accounts. Her predecessor, Ronnie Hinds, has switched across to become interim chair of the Water Commission. Please keep up.

Time was up for another less than vigilant Water Commissioner, Ann Allen. Fear not. She was promptly re-appointed to the board of Crown Estate Scotland while also chairing Architecture and Design Scotland and sitting as a trustee of the National Museum of Scotland. The fact she has a full-time job at the University of Leeds is no obstacle to her polymathic appointability.

Back in 1995, the Nolan Committee Report on Standards in Public Life came up with a well-intentioned plan to take appointments out of political hands and create an “independent” process. Unfortunately, the actual outcome was to put even more power into the hands of civil servants who were enabled to weed out whoever they do not want while the same names recur time and again.

The SNP certainly did not invent this process, though under them it has become a key mechanism for centralisation and control. I first came across it as a minister in 1997 when it quickly became apparent that the dirty work took place at the cross-roads when applicants were dubbed either “appointable” or “not appointable”. It required mighty battles to overturn these classifications. I don’t think these happen now, as the objectives of ministers and civil servants have merged. No trouble-makers - and especially islanders!

I remember noticing that one individual of no obvious distinction was being put forward as “appointable” to every reasonably well-paid quango post that became available, regardless of subject matter. So much so that I decided on principle to appoint him to none of them. That didn’t last long. Twenty-six years later, he is still on the circuit.

The Scottish Parliament needs to get to grips with the problem of quangosThe Scottish Parliament needs to get to grips with the problem of quangos (Image: Getty)

Another curiosity of the process is that its beneficiaries often act as “independent” panel members in making other appointments. So while the façade of independence is maintained, there is never the slightest risk of anyone potentially awkward getting through the system. I doubt if anyone can name any quango figure of the past decade in Scotland who contradicts that conclusion, whereas in days of yore big people were appointed to major public roles in the expectation they would make waves. It’s called democracy.

The result of dull conformity is, of course, that very expensive mistakes are made. I am certain the ferries debacle would never have developed as it has if there had been relevant expertise - and democratic representation - on the boards of Caledonian MacBrayne and CMAL, the procurement quango, but that is the last thing Transport Scotland would have allowed.

Opposition parties at Holyrood need to grasp that the quango whole is greater than the sum of its parts or of individual scandals. None of the functions I have referred to could not be better performed with strong elements of accountability through elected local authorities.

As Churchill observed, democracy is the worst form of government apart from all the others that have been tried. Government by quango is not exempt from that conclusion.

Brian Wilson is a former Labour Party politician. He was MP for Cunninghame North from 1987 until 2005 and served as a Minister of State from 1997 to 2003