Rural Economy and Connectivity Committee

Meeting date: Wednesday, December 16, 2020

Official Report 476KB pdf

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Subordinate Legislation

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Rural Development (EU Exit) (Scotland) (Amendment) Regulations 2020 [Draft]

Good morning, and welcome to the 34th meeting in 2020 of the Rural Economy and Connectivity Committee. I ask everyone to ensure that their mobile phones and house phones—if they are at home—are on silent. The meeting will be conducted in a virtual format. Apologies have been received from Oliver Mundell. Jamie Halcro Johnston is attending as a committee substitute.

Agenda item 1 is subordinate legislation. The committee will take evidence on the draft Rural Development (EU Exit) (Scotland) (Amendment) Regulations 2020, which are an affirmative instrument. The motion seeking the approval of the instrument will be considered under agenda item 2. Members should note that there have been no representations to the committee on the regulations.

I welcome the Cabinet Secretary for Rural Economy and Tourism, Fergus Ewing; Lewis Kerr, who is a lawyer from the Scottish Government’s legal directorate; and James Muldoon, who is head of the Scottish Government’s agriculture support policy development unit.

Good morning, cabinet secretary. Would you like to make an opening statement on the draft regulations?

Good morning, and thank you for the opportunity to make an opening statement. I thank the committee for taking the time to consider the draft regulations, which are very important.

The draft regulations were laid using the powers conferred by the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018 and the Agriculture (Retained EU Law and Data) (Scotland) Act 2020, and they are mainly technical. They will not make any significant changes to the retained European Union legislation that will govern rural development in Scotland and the Scottish rural development programme from 2021. They are designed to maintain the current structure of the rural development programme as far as practicable from 2021, on the assumption that Her Majesty’s Treasury will wholly replace funding that would otherwise have come from the EU through the European agricultural fund for rural development.

The regulations will help to ensure that, for 2021 and subsequent years, we can make rural support payments and continue to operate our rural development schemes in Scotland. That is the primary function of the regulations; they are about process, not policy. By passing the regulations—I hope that that will occur—we will continue to provide some stability and continuity for our farmers, crofters and land managers for the period from 2021 to 2024.

The regulations will also simplify and improve the operation of the retained EU common agricultural policy legislation where appropriate, and will correct outstanding deficiencies that result from the EU exit to ensure continued operation from the end of the transition period.

My officials and I are happy to answer any questions that committee members might have.

Thank you very much, cabinet secretary. At the moment, I see only one question lined up, which is from John Finnie.

Good morning. I have a question about organic farming. I am blessed with having a briefing paper; I appreciate that these matters are very technical.

Regulations 4(6) and 4(7) amend articles 28 and 29 of the rural development regulation so that agreements on agri-environment and climate and organic farming can be made for a period of one to seven years. In Scotland, that refers to the agri-environment climate scheme and the organic conversion and maintenance schemes. Under current EU law, agreements between a land manager and the Scottish Government last for a period of five to seven years, during which time the land manager must carry out specified management interventions to benefit the environment, or as part of converting to or managing an organic holding.

The significant point is that the period is being changed from five to seven years to one to seven years. I did not see mention of the change in the explanatory note, so it is not clear why the change has been made, or what consultation—if any—there has been. In addition, no further information has been provided on situations in which management agreements for fewer than five years are being considered.

Will you or your officials comment on that, please? I have no objection to the change in principle, and I will support the regulations, but some clarification would be helpful.

I will, in a moment, pass over to Mr Kerr, as the solicitor, because Mr Finnie’s question is largely technical, and I would like Mr Kerr to give a technical answer.

Obviously, the Scottish Government has been, and will continue to be, supportive of organic farming. Roseanna Cunningham and I recently discussed the future of the agri-environment climate scheme—or AECS. Mr Finnie is well aware of that scheme, which includes support for organic farming. Obviously, we believe that that should continue to be the case, at an appropriate level.

Without straying into political arguments—I do not think that doing that would be appropriate in discussing this technical amendment—the benefit of the EU programme for a scheme such as the SRDP relates to the long-term nature of that scheme, which is more than seven years long. That long-term nature is consistent with most environment schemes. Indeed, many farming developments take more than one year to come to fruition, so the clarity and certainty of knowing that funding was available over a longer period was a beneficial characteristic of the scheme that we were leaving. It is not yet clear whether a multi-annual approach will be favoured in future. However, as I said, I do not want to stray into politics.

With the convener’s consent, I will pass over to Mr Kerr to answer Mr Finnie’s reasonable technical question.

The Government’s position is to introduce, through the amendments, additional flexibility in the timescales for which the commitments can be entered into. I ask James Muldoon to add a little bit of detail on the policy rationale behind that decision.

Do you want to come in on that, James?

Yes, I am very happy to.

The core reason is the flexibility that was mentioned. The cabinet secretary noted that the SRDP scheme, which is an EU-related programme, provides committed funding for a period of seven years, which allows for a five to seven-year programme to be designed. The policy rationale for changing the period is to allow flexibility for the expected on-going commitment from Her Majesty’s Treasury to provide funding. Although we do not have a seven-year period for that funding, we need to ensure that the flexibility is built in so that we can have shorter-term programmes for that at present.

Does that answer your question, John? Are you satisfied, or do you want to push the matter further?

No. I am grateful to the cabinet secretary and his officials for those responses, and I will leave it at that.

Jamie Halcro Johnston has a question. As the topic is agriculture, I think that he might want to remind members of his interest in that area before he asks his question.

I was ready to do that, convener, but thank you for reminding me. I draw members’ attention to my entry in the register of members’ interests, particularly in relation to my being a partner in J Halcro-Johnston and Sons, which is a farming business.

I have a quick question. One of the changes removes the requirement for the Scottish ministers to amend the Scottish rural development programme by legislation and allows for it to be amended administratively. Will you explain any scrutiny-related issues that such a change might raise?

First, it would be correct to welcome Mr Halcro Johnston to his new responsibilities as the rural economy spokesperson for his party. I look forward to seeking to work constructively with him.

Secondly, most of the decisions that we take with regard to the SRDP are administrative, but the question about scrutiny is apt. Obviously, we are subject to scrutiny right now, and we are subject to it continuously by the committee, as is appropriate. We are also subject to scrutiny in the chamber though oral questions, questions on statements and debates. That will continue.

Generally, scrutiny looks at the principles of what we are seeking to do and the political discussion about what the right choices are. I do not think that there is any suggestion that the passage of the regulations will in any way diminish the Parliament’s ability or right to scrutinise my actions or decisions or those of my colleagues in the Scottish Government.

One of your officials would like to come back in on that point. With your consent, I will bring in Lewis Kerr.

I would like to add a little bit of context about the current processes. Any limitations on the type and frequency of amendments that may be made to the rural development programme remain unchanged as a result of the Scottish statutory instrument. The provision that we are dealing with has come about as a result of deficiency fixes under UK statutory instruments, which effectively step down the legislation-making requirements. Those are currently carried out by the European Commission. The Scottish Government’s position is that that is not necessary at the domestic level and adds an undue administrative burden—hence the amendment.

Does that answer Jamie Halcro Johnston’s question?

It does, convener. I am grateful to the cabinet secretary and to Mr Kerr for that clarification.

There do not appear to be any other questions, so we will move to item 2, which is formal consideration of motion S5M-23437, in the name of the Cabinet Secretary for Rural Economy and Tourism. I invite the cabinet secretary to move the motion.

Motion moved,

That the Rural Economy and Connectivity Committee recommends that the Rural Development (EU Exit) (Scotland) (Amendment) Regulations 2020 [draft] be approved.—[Fergus Ewing]

Motion agreed to.

I thank the cabinet secretary and his officials for their time.