Justice and Home Affairs Committee, 07 Dec 1999
Meeting date: Tuesday, December 7, 1999
Official Report
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Scottish Parliament Justice and Home Affairs Committee Tuesday 7 December 1999 (Morning)
[The Convener opened the meeting at 09:59]
I bring the committee to order. We are quorate, so we shall begin.
Members may have noticed that this morning's agenda is uncommonly light for a Justice and Home Affairs Committee meeting. Provisionally, we had agreed to take evidence today from the Federation of Small Businesses on the Abolition of Poindings and Warrant Sales Bill. However, on Thursday the FSB had still not confirmed that it would be coming, although its attendance was pencilled in. We were not advised until Thursday afternoon that it had decided that it was not yet in a position to give evidence on the bill and would be unlikely to be so until January. Regrettably, because we did not get that advice until late on Thursday and the deadline for getting papers to the printers was later the same afternoon, it was absolutely impossible to replace the FSB's evidence with another item. That is why today's meeting did not start until 10 o'clock and why the agenda seems a little light. I am sorry about that. There was nothing that we could do, given the time constraints on Thursday.
I can now confirm that there will be no committee meeting next Wednesday because of the extension of parliamentary business into Wednesday morning. We have, however, confirmed that we will be able to meet on Tuesday afternoon next week. We have taken a three-hour slot, from 3.30 to 6.30—whether we have an agenda that will run for three hours is another matter. However, the Minister for Justice has confirmed that he will be available between 3.30 and 4.30. He will appear before the committee for one hour, during which we can pursue our interest in the prisons issue. I ask members to be punctual for next week's meeting. Be here for 3.30, because we have only one hour with the minister and we do not want to waste any of that time.