Thank you, convener, and good morning to everyone. I am pleased to be here this morning to support the committee’s consideration of the draft Crofting Commission (Elections) (Scotland) Amendment Regulations 2016. The regulations are made by the Scottish ministers in accordance with powers conferred by paragraph 7(1) of schedule 1 to the Crofters (Scotland) Act 1993. I will provide a brief overview and outline the reasons why the amendment regulations have been prepared. Thereafter, my officials, Gordon Jackson and Judith Brown, and I will answer questions.
The regulations amend the Crofting Commission (Elections) (Scotland) Regulations 2011—the principal regulations—which set out the arrangements under which elections to the Crofting Commission are conducted. Of course, a member of this committee, Stewart Stevenson, as the then Minister for Environment and Climate Change, was responsible for the 2011 Regulations—not that I mention that to pass the buck in any way.
The amendments to the principal 2011 regulations relate to candidate eligibility; absent and proxy votes; the filling of vacancies; the retention of documents; election expenses; and consequential amendments to and revocations of provisions of the principal regulations. I will cover each of the headings in turn—there is quite a lot to cover, but I will try to be as brief as possible.
On candidate eligibility, the 2011 regulations set out the grounds on which a person is disqualified from being a candidate at an election. That includes disqualification where a person is found by the commission to be in breach of the residency duty—which is to live within 32km of the croft—without having obtained consent from the Crofting Commission.
The amending regulations add further grounds of disqualification from being a candidate. That applies to persons the commission has decided are failing to comply with the duties under the act to not misuse or neglect their croft, and to cultivate and maintain their croft. The amending regulations place all three duties—residency, misuse and cultivation—on an equal footing in terms of candidate eligibility to stand for election.
The 2011 regulations allow voters to have their ballot paper sent to an address other than their registered address—the absent voters list. They also allow voters to have their ballot paper sent to a proxy—the proxy list. The regulations place a deadline on when a voter can make such arrangements. However, voters can also apply to be removed from the absent voters and proxy lists, and the principal regulations place no deadline on that. The amending regulations introduce a deadline, which is to avoid scope for errors in the issuing of ballot papers. That new deadline provides the registration officer with a week in which to amend the crofting electoral register, which must be supplied to the returning officer not later than four weeks before the day of the count. The deadline is reflected in an amendment to the election timetable.
As it stands, the only way to select a replacement commissioner, should an elected commissioner vacate their post part way through their elected term, is for Scottish ministers to appoint a replacement. The amending regulations allow for the filling of vacancies that arise among elected members by candidates who polled the next greatest numbers of votes behind the elected member. That process will be repeated until a person accepts the invitation or until the list of candidates is exhausted. If the list of candidates is exhausted, the Scottish ministers will then be able to make an appointment.
The amending regulations also allow the Scottish ministers to leave a vacancy unfilled, in the case of a vacancy arising less than a year before the next election, provided the Crofting Commission remains quorate.
The amending regulations allow for the retention of certain documents for a period of five years. That is a consequential requirement of the new provision regarding filling vacancies which, in order to operate, requires certain information about the last election to remain available.
The amending regulations increase the 2011 limit on election expenses from £600 to £700 and require all candidates to make a declaration of all payments that are made and to present all relevant bills and receipts.
The amending regulations include a number of minor amendments that are consequential to the other changes that are being introduced. They also revoke two provisions that were included in error in the principal regulations. Regulation 11(2) of the principal regulations is revoked to make it clear that non-business days should not be discounted from the election timetable when referring to periods of weeks, which will make the election timetable clearer to the reader. Regulation 49 of the principal regulations is also revoked as it referred to information that was relevant to the single transferable vote system, whereas the Crofting Commission elections operate under the alternative vote system.
I confirm that a public consultation on proposed changes to election arrangements took place from 18 March to 22 June 2016. The consultation paper, the responses and the analysis report have been published on the Scottish Government website. I also confirm that an equality impact assessment has been completed and that no equality impact issues were identified. In terms of financial impact, no business and regulatory impact assessment has been prepared for the regulations, as no impact on business, public bodies or the third sector is foreseen.
I apologise for the length of my opening statement; I sought to cover a number of disparate aspects of the proposed regulations. I thank you for listening, I commend the amendment regulations to you and I am pleased to try to answer any questions that you might have.