Official Report

Welcome to the 13th meeting this year of the Subordinate Legislation Committee. We have received two apologies: Murray Tosh is in Cork and Sylvia Jackson is stuck on a train.

We are to look at the delegated powers in the Criminal Procedure (Amendment) (Scotland) Bill as amended at stage 2. I suspect that, as a practising member of the Faculty of Advocates, I technically have an interest in the bill. If I do, then I declare it now—although I do not think that there is much in the bill that would interest me very much in that capacity.

The first powers to which our attention is drawn are those under section 10A, which introduces new section 81 to the Criminal Procedure (Scotland) Act 1995. New section 81 is to do with procedures for when a trial diet does not proceed, and new section 81(7) is on the form of notice that applies to that. Are there any comments on that? It is not a matter that need detain the committee, I think.

Members indicated agreement.

Section 12A inserts new section 72G into the 1995 act. It is to do with details relating to court procedure, and it makes sense to deal with it in the way that is proposed.

Members indicated agreement.

Section 12 introduces new section 90B(8A), which deals with a procedure as to how reluctant witnesses are to be dealt with. Are there any comments on those provisions?

We are happy with them.

We are quite happy with them—they are fine.

Happiness is abounding this morning.

Section 14 is on bail conditions, and on something called remote monitoring. In the past, we have found that such matters have been dealt with in an over-complex way. Do we have any comments to make now?

No—we welcome the new draft.

The committee will recollect that we were generally content with the delegated powers in the bill. However, a number of amendments were made at stage 2, and therefore the bill has had to come back to us so that we can consider the changes. The Executive has given us a memorandum explaining the background to some of the changes, and we need to consider other amendments.

The first amendment was to sections 22(1) and 22(4), which were on the power to prescribe the content of the register of sites of special scientific interest. Are there any comments on that?

I do not think that there is anything in those sections, or indeed in the rest of the bill, that need detain us.

Splendid—thank you. The only other matters that we need to consider relate to section 42, and a change to paragraphs 11B and 17(aa) of schedule 6. Do I take it that Mr Morgan has the mind of the committee and that we do not need to be detained on any of that?

Members indicated agreement.

We move on to Executive responses. We raised certain matters under the draft regulations. It has been suggested that we might feel able simply to draw the attention of the lead committee and the Parliament to the draft regulations, on the ground that their meaning could have been clearer. We could also point out the clarification that we have been given. Do we need to do any more on the draft regulations?

No.

Do we wish to do anything under the order, having got the Executive's response?

We should simply draw what has happened with the order to the attention of the lead committee and the Parliament.

Yes, we will draw that to their attention.

The Executive has acknowledged and moved to correct two defects in the regulations that we pointed out. We will simply draw the matter to the attention of the lead committee and the Parliament.

Members indicated agreement.

No points arise on the instruments.

Somebody say something.

The regulations breach the 21-day rule—as do a number of the other instruments. However, the excuse that has been given, which was that the results of national negotiations and discussions were being awaited, was reasonable.

An informal letter will deal with that.

Are there any comments on the order?

You might be sorry that you asked, given the number that could be made.

In my experience, this is probably the worst instrument that has come to our attention.

What are we going to do about the order? Twenty different points needing clarification from the Executive have been pointed out to us.

There are 20 substantive points detailed in the legal brief.

And then there are about another 150 minor points.

We could do one or two things. We could go through the points now, or we could take them as read, send them all to the Executive and then deal with them when they come back.

We should write to the Executive formally on the 20 substantive points, also pointing out the more minor points in our letter. There are about four and a half pages of mistakes listed in our legal brief. Frankly, that is an unacceptable level of error.

I totally agree. However, rather than talking all those points on to the record now, we will wait until the responses come back to us next week.

I congratulate the people who found all those errors, but the problem is that, despite what I am sure were their best efforts, they might not have found all of them. It is like proofreading, as I was saying before the meeting: the fourth person proofreading something might still find mistakes. It would not surprise me at all if one or two points have been missed. Given the huge number of mistakes that have been found, it would be understandable if that were the case.

The committee will give the impression that we are not exactly over the moon about the level of mistakes in the order. We would like pretty clear answers on what we are raising.

On what went wrong.

There are one or two things that could be raised.

Four points are raised by the legal brief: the breach of the 21-day rule; the discrepancy between the explanatory note and the substantive provisions of the regulations; the timing of the commencement of regulation 2(4); and the making of formal amendments to the punctuation of the principal regulations. The last of those might not seem particularly serious, but it is nonetheless worth drawing the Executive's attention to those matters.

If the fourth point was the only one, we might deal with it in a different way, but we should raise the four points with the Executive.

Point (c) on that list, on the timing of the commencement of a provision, seems rather bizarre. All the other provisions take effect on 6 April—why should one be commenced on 1 April? I believe that, although that has been pointed out to the Executive, it has decided to stick with that inconsistent date. We should pursue that with the Executive again. It does not seem sensible to commence most of the provisions on 6 April and one provision on 1 April.

Doing so would mean that ancillary provisions relating to the "relevant child" would come into force on 1 April, before the substantive provision.

There is a breach of the 21-day rule, but I think that we will accept it.

Okay—we accept that in this situation.

The comments that we made on the previous regulations also apply to these regulations.

It is the same point—we have accepted a similar breach before.

Nothing has been identified on the regulations.

We should congratulate the Executive for putting right the breach of the 21-day rule so quickly.

Indeed.

I will take the five food protection regulations en bloc on the basis that they are pro-forma revocation orders and we have identified nothing unusual or noteworthy.

We raised previously the issue of maps being attached or not attached to revocation and partial revocation orders. I believe that we wrote to the Executive on that. Have we had a response? I notice that there are maps with these orders.

There are maps.

Yes, but in the past the provision of maps has been inconsistent.

The Executive has not responded to our formal letter.

However, it has put the maps in with the orders.

No points arise on the instruments.

Does anyone have any points to raise on the order?

Part I of the schedule to the order refers to a paragraph in schedule 4 to the Licensing (Scotland) Act 1976, which paragraph was repealed by the Law Reform (Miscellaneous Provisions) (Scotland) Act 1990. I wonder what the Executive is trying to do there.

If anything. We will write to the Executive and ask it to clarify those points.

No points arise on the orders.

Meeting closed at 10:41.