Official Report 85KB pdf
Instruments Subject <br />to Annulment
Road Traffic (NHS Charges) Amendment (Scotland) Regulations 2004 (SSI 2004/76)
The legal adviser has provided us with a lot of history about the context of the regulations, which is important when it comes to the consultation process. There are no points of substance on the regulations.
Sea Fishing (Restriction on Days at Sea) (Scotland) Amendment Order 2004 <br />(SSI 2004/81)
The order makes a number of amendments to correct the drafting defects of the instrument that was before us previously. The new order is most welcome. As is customary in such situations, the new order is being made available to the recipients of the principal order free of charge.
For completeness, I think that we should do so. I would also like to put on record the fact that there was no transposition note with the order. We are advised that, in this instance, one would have been very helpful in improving the clarity of the instrument and our ease of understanding. I would like that to be mentioned to the Executive, too.
I seek the committee's guidance. I do not know what more we can do about the issue of transposition notes.
We should simply bring it to the Executive's attention every time one is missing—
—until either they or we give up.
We should include the issue in our list for discussion with Executive officials the next time that we meet them. We can say that there have been a given number of occasions when we have not had transposition notes.
One other point has just occurred to me, although I am not sure whether it will be possible for this to be clarified. I am not clear as to what extent the order will actually be a working document—perhaps not at sea, but it may well be in ports—but it strikes me that some of the amendments that the order makes involve fairly detailed substitutions of little bits of the previous instrument. Although the order has been issued free—for which I am sure everyone is tremendously grateful—people really have to read the original instrument in conjunction with the new one. Is there any way in which it is possible—legally possible, even—to publish an amended, consolidated instrument, with the amendments incorporated into the original? It is clear that that would be far easier for laymen—or fishermen—to understand.
I think that we should raise that very good point, because it is important that we try to make statutory instruments as clear as possible for whoever will use them. We will mention consolidation in our letter. [Interruption.] Our legal adviser tells me that some departments already publish a consolidated version of instruments on their websites. Given the importance of the order in question, we will ask if that can be done in this case.
If we return to the draft Primary Medical Services (Scotland) Act 2004 (Modification of Enactments) Order 2004, that is something that I would save up to take to my desert island to read. I would marry it up against the original acts and put in the changes. It is very difficult to have to go back and forth between two documents. Alasdair Morgan makes a good point.
Instead of making that point just in relation to the sea fishing order, perhaps we will make it a general point. Is that agreed?
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