Official Report 295KB pdf
The second item on today's agenda is consideration of the admissibility of a petition by Captain John Carter. The petition calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to introduce legislation to regulate claims management services to ensure that customers are given statutory protection. Do members have any comments on the admissibility of the petition, bearing in mind rule 15.5.1(c) of the Parliament's standing orders?
I should say at the outset that Captain Carter came to me for advice on this matter. I advised him to submit a petition to the Public Petitions Committee, so it would perhaps be better if I did not take part in this discussion.
I appreciate your advising us of your involvement.
Another petition on the subject of no win, no fee arrangements is in front of the Justice Committee at the moment. I therefore suggest that there are two ways of dealing with Captain Carter's petition—well, there are three ways, the third being not to deal with it all. The first would be to refer the petition to the Justice Committee so that it could be dealt with alongside the other petition, consideration of which has been deferred for a while because Lord Gill is examining the issues as part of his review of the court system in general.
Whether the petition is admissible or not, the question is whether it is appropriate for us to refer it to the Justice Committee. I feel that it would be appropriate to refer it, especially in the circumstances described by Nigel Don.
There is a straight admissibility issue for the committee to determine. Only the Public Petitions Committee can make a decision on admissibility at this point. If the committee decides that the petition is admissible, it could at some future point decide what action to take on it. However, at the moment, the committee has to decide whether—under rule 15.5.1(c) of standing orders and under the Scotland Act 1998—the petition comes within the competence of the Parliament.
Even if we ruled that the petition was inadmissible, could we still draw it to the attention of the Justice Committee?
It would not be a petition if the committee agreed that it was inadmissible under standing orders. No petition would exist, so there would be no petition to pass on to the Justice Committee.
Right.
If, as Nigel Don says, the Justice Committee is considering a closely aligned issue, what we do now is not quite as important as it might otherwise have been. I therefore suggest that we go along with the view that has been expressed by the clerk—that the petition is inadmissible.
The proposal from Marlyn Glen is that we accept that the petition is inadmissible under standing orders. No one seems to want to offer a different perspective. Do members accept that the petition is inadmissible?