Official Report 103KB pdf
Scottish Legal Aid Board (Employment of Solicitors to Provide Criminal Legal Assistance) Amendment Regulations 2003 (SSI 2003/511)
Item 2 is an Executive response. The issue was discussed last week, when I was not chairing the committee, so I need members to take the lead on this. It is recommended that we report on consultation.
We discussed the matter last week and we raised it at this morning's legal briefing. The Executive's response does not answer the fundamental question about consultation. The fact that it says that it has consulted the Scottish Legal Aid Board in this instance is insufficient, as an awful lot of other people are stakeholders—I think that that is the common phrase—in the procedure and would be affected by the regulations. It is important that those people are consulted as well. The basic point that we raised remains, and I would be unhappy to let the matter lie. We should take the matter up further, either by writing to the Executive, if we have time, or—at the very least—by drawing it to the attention of the lead committee.
I do not think that it is sufficient that the Scottish Legal Aid Board, which has a vested interest in the matter, should be the mechanism by which other people's views—if they are noted at all—are filtered and sanitised before they reach ministers.
I just think that SLAB is a wonderful acronym, given the other contexts in which we use the word slab. I agree with what has been said.
Because of time pressure, the point will have to go in our report now; however, we could also write to the Executive and put the issue on the list that we are accumulating.
That list is becoming longer and longer.
Yes. Are members agreed to follow option (a) in relation to item 2?
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