Justice and Home Affairs Committee, 22 Feb 2000

Meeting date: Tuesday, February 22, 2000

Official Report 66KB pdf

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Scottish Parliament Justice and Home Affairs Committee Tuesday 22 February 2000 (Morning)

[The Convener opened the meeting at 10:02]

We are quorate, so we shall start. I have some news for members. Items 1 and 2 on the agenda, in respect of the statutory instruments that were before us, were going to take up an hour and a half of this meeting, before we went into private session to deal with the draft report on the Abolition of Poindings and Warrant Sales Bill. At 5 o'clock last night, the Executive informed us that it was withdrawing the statutory instruments, so that agenda item now falls.

I have had a letter about it from the minister, Angus MacKay. Have all members got copies?

Yes.

I will not read it out then.

It is unfortunate that the news came as late as it did. We could have covered other issues, since this was a non-bill meeting. The short notice, between 5 o'clock last night and 10 o'clock this morning, meant that we could not get anything else on to the agenda. It leaves us with the likelihood of a short meeting, but I notice that no members are crying into their water at that prospect.

The item on domestic violence, which we had flagged up as a matter that was going to be on today's agenda, is not on the agenda because the meeting that had been arranged between Maureen Macmillan and the Minister for Justice was cancelled at short notice. Can I take it that the minister cancelled it at short notice?

Yes.

A pattern is developing.

It was cancelled because of the emergency debate.

Yes. It was cancelled because of the debate on the Lord Advocate.

The cancellation of the meeting meant that there was no point having that item on the agenda either. We will bring it on to a future agenda, as soon as the meeting with the minister has taken place. I understand that no date has yet been set.

That is right. We are waiting for word about that.

Next week, the committee is back to consideration of the Adults with Incapacity (Scotland) Bill at stage 2. If members have been checking the business bulletin, they will realise that the Executive amendments have now appeared and are there for members to examine.

We have next Tuesday and Wednesday morning to deal with part 5 of the bill and the amendments. The deadline for the submission of amendments is at 5.30 this Friday. If all the amendments are not dealt with on Tuesday next week, the committee will meet on Wednesday. That would extend the deadline to 5.30 on Monday for amendments, but members should treat 5.30 on Friday as the deadline.

As perhaps one of the simpler members of this committee—

I would never have said that.

You often say that, Roseanna.

Not in those terms.

Would it be possible to get a list of all outstanding amendments, as they now stand, sent out to members, along with current suggested groupings? I recognise that things can change up to Friday, but it would give us a chance to get our thoughts together.

I will ask guidance from the clerk on this. In the normal course of events, members would get the marshalled list of amendments, but I appreciate that we do not get those until quite late in the day. I do not want to put too great a burden on the clerks this week. If a preliminary list can be prepared, the clerks will do that, as long as members do not think that it is the final list. They must still keep an eye on additions to the list.

Like most members, I put in a lot of effort on working on the amendments and the groupings at the weekend. It would be helpful to know what they are in advance of the weekend.

If the clerks can manage it, they will produce a preliminary list this week, so that members can spend their weekends perusing the amendments.

Since we do not have items 1 and 2 to deal with, we now move on to item 3, which is the consideration of the draft stage 1 report on the general principles of the Abolition of Poindings and Warrant Sales Bill. At the previous meeting we agreed that this would be in private, as is our normal practice.

Meeting continued in private until 10:50.