Justice and Home Affairs Committee, 06 Oct 1999
Meeting date: Wednesday, October 6, 1999
Official Report
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Scottish Parliament Justice and Home Affairs Committee Wednesday 6 October 1999 (Morning)
[The Convener opened the meeting at 10:01]
Fergus Ewing MSP wishes to attend the part of our discussion about the petition from the Carbeth hutters because he had a previous and long-running involvement with their legal argument, along with MPs from a number of parties.
I have an apology from Gordon Jackson as he is unable to be with us this morning.
There are six items on the agenda this morning. Five are matters that have been referred to the committee from elsewhere in the Parliament, although the item on Scottish prisons will be a discussion of the visits that members of the committee made last week to Low Moss and Longriggend. Item 6, "Future Business (in private)", will be a discussion of how the committee copes with possible future business. We have a great deal of business to deal with that is being referred from elsewhere in the Parliament, including the Executive bills we have been alerted to.
The agenda item on future business will include a brief discussion on the following issues, because we need to make decisions on the committee's timetable. We will discuss the future of our debate on prisons, which is to say that having reached a certain stage in our work we will look at where we go from here. We will look at the complaints procedure of the Law Society of Scotland, which we have been asked to do. We have had a letter from Nora Radcliffe MSP asking us to look at the law on vandalism. We have had a letter from Gordon Jackson, who, as I said, unfortunately is unable to be here, asking us to consider looking at civil justice delays. That is in response to a letter that all MSPs will have had from Jacqueline Wardrop, who is concerned about that particularly in the Court of Session. We have had a letter from the Zero Tolerance Trust asking us to widen the scope of our discussions on domestic violence and we will also have to consider how we proceed with the domestic violence matters we have been looking at already. All of those issues are possible items of future business that we must make a decision about how to proceed with.
That decision will have to be made in the context of other business that we know is coming. I had a meeting with the Parliamentary Bureau yesterday. I was asked, along with the convener of the Social Inclusion, Housing and Voluntary Sector Committee, to discuss possible timetabling for the member's bill on the abolition of warrant sales. We have been designated lead committee on that. I believe that the motion to do so will be before Parliament this afternoon.
The Abolition of Feudal Tenure etc (Scotland) Bill is being introduced today. It is clear that we will be designated the lead committee on it. We are already aware that we will consider the adults with incapacity bill. I understand that the introduction of that bill is imminent. My discussion with the bureau was about how we handle the timetabling. The committee is required to produce stage 1 reports on each of those three pieces of legislation. The stage 1 reports will be on the principles of the bills and will be laid before Parliament as a whole, before the stage 1 debate takes place.
We are required to look at each of those bills, to take evidence where we consider it appropriate, and produce the reports. After discussion with the clerk, I have indicated to the bureau that, in my view, we can do that by Christmas. The bureau has asked, and I have agreed, that on at least one of the two Executive bills we will give it sufficient time so that there can be a stage 1 debate before Christmas, so one of the bills will have to be turned around a little faster.
I regard that timetable as reasonable, given that with the two Executive bills there has been fairly extensive consultation and this committee has had extensive informal briefings. However, we will wish to get some of the evidence that we heard informally on to the record in each of those cases. All our discussions about future business, how we plan those meetings and how we fit in the two items of business that we have initiated as a committee—the prisons and domestic violence debates—will have to be in the timetable. Potential future business will need to be looked at in the context of that work load.
All of that will be part of the discussion that we have in private. I am well aware that there is a certain interest in anything that any committee does that is seen to be in private. I remind committee members that the procedure that we are following today is one that we have followed at previous meetings. It is also a procedure that has been endorsed by the Presiding Officer as appropriate for committees.
At the conveners liaison group, both last week and yesterday afternoon, it was made clear that this is an appropriate way to proceed when dealing with what are, in effect, housekeeping matters. The Justice and Home Affairs Committee had already begun to do its business in that way. That has now been endorsed and, indeed, recommended.