Transport and the Environment Committee, 17 Apr 2002

Meeting date: Wednesday, April 17, 2002

Official Report 337KB pdf

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Subordinate Legislation

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Financial Assistance for Environmental Purposes (Scotland) Order 2002<br />(SSI 2002/83)

I welcome members of the press and public to this meeting of the Transport and the Environment Committee.

Item 5 is consideration of two negative instruments. The first is the Financial Assistance for Environmental Purposes (Scotland) Order 2002. No members have raised points on the order and no motions for annulment have been lodged. The Subordinate Legislation Committee considered the order at its meeting on 12 March and raised no points. We are invited to agree a report on the order. Do members agree that there is no need to draw the order to the attention of Parliament?

I agree, but I would like to make a comment. The order arose because people were almost ignoring something that they knew was being introduced—the obligation to collect and dispose of chlorofluorocarbons from refrigerators. Other obligations are coming down the line to deal with such things as end-of-life vehicles, so this is an object lesson in how not to deal with legislation that we know is approaching. We should flag up the fact that other things of which a committee dealing with environmental issues should be aware are coming down the track, and we should ask what preparation is being made for that legislation.

I agree with those comments. Do members agree the report and agree that there is no need to draw the order to the attention of Parliament?

Members indicated agreement.

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Control of Noise (Codes of Practice for Construction and Open Sites) (Scotland) Order 2002 (SSI 2002/104)

No members have raised points on the Control of Noise (Codes of Practice for Construction and Open Sites) (Scotland) Order 2002 and no motion for annulment has been lodged. We are invited to agree our report on the order.

I note that infringement of the codes on noise regulations is not an offence. A complaint has to be raised before any sort of enforcement action commences. That begs the question of what monitoring is done. In the course of our inquiries as reporters on the opencast sites, Nora Radcliffe and I have had the apparent lack of systematic monitoring and flagging up of problems raised with us. It is interesting that the Executive note on the order spells out that we do not have an offence as such. We could perhaps ask the Executive about the prospect of introducing an offence in this area.

I would not want to do that on the back of this piece of subordinate legislation. Nora Radcliffe and you might want to incorporate that idea into the work that you are doing as reporters on the question of opencast. I suggest that you present to the committee your comments, which I am sure we would be willing to consider.

Are we agreed that there is no need for the committee to draw the attention of Parliament to the order?

Members indicated agreement.