At its meeting on 2 February 2021, the Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee considered the delegated powers provisions in the Budget (Scotland) (No.5) Bill ("the Bill") at Stage 1.

The Committee submits this report to the lead committee for the Bill under Rule 9.6.2 of Standing Orders.

This Scottish Government Bill was introduced by the Cabinet Secretary for Finance, Kate Forbes MSP, on 28 January 2021. The lead committee is the Finance and Constitution Committee.

The Bill authorises the use of resources for the Scottish Administration and certain bodies whose expenditure is funded directly out of the Scottish Consolidated Fund for the financial year 2021/22. The directly funded bodies are the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body and Audit Scotland.

The Bill provides authorisation for the use of resources up to a specified amount for the purposes set out in schedule 1 (for the Scottish Administration) and schedule 2 (for the directly-funded bodies). Provision is made for accruing resources separately to non-accruing resources in accordance with section 1(2) of the Public Finance and Accountability (Scotland) Act 2000.

The Bill confers one power to make subordinate legislation on the Scottish Ministers. The Scottish Government has prepared a Delegated Powers Memorandum which sets out the reasoning for taking the delegated power in the Bill and the procedure chosen.

The Committee considered the delegated power in section 7 (Budget Revision Regulations) and determined that it did not need to draw the attention of the Parliament to the provision.