Official Report 701KB pdf
Welcome back. Agenda item 3 is consideration of a legislative consent memorandum on the Absent Voting (Elections in Scotland and Wales) Bill, which is a private member’s bill that has been introduced in the House of Commons by Tracy Gilbert MP. The bill relates to absent voting at local government elections in Scotland and Wales and at elections to the Scottish Parliament and the Senedd. It will give the Scottish and Welsh Governments powers to introduce regulations that enable applications for postal and proxy votes for devolved elections to be made online using the online absent vote application—OAVA—service, which has been developed by the UK Government.
Members have a note from the clerk, which includes a copy of the memorandum that has been lodged by Shona Robison, the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Local Government. It was lodged on 12 June 2025 following consideration of the bill at committee stage on 11 June 2025. Consideration at report stage is scheduled for 4 July 2025.
The Minister for Parliamentary Business wrote to the relevant UK Government minister on 30 May 2025, before the date was set for the committee stage. In that letter, the minister noted that a date for consideration of the bill at committee stage had not been set, and he expressed his
“concern over the limited time now available for the Scottish Parliament to give its consent and also that”
he
“will now be obliged to ask it to do so to an expedited timetable”
in order for the Parliament’s consent decision to be given before our summer recess.
The Scottish Government recommends that consent be given. It is anticipated that the Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee will consider the LCM at its meeting on Tuesday 24 June 2025.
If no members wish to make any comments or ask any questions regarding the memorandum, I propose that the committee writes to note the concern that we will have to expedite the provision of the LCM because of when our summer recess starts. When it comes to Westminster, the lodging of LCMs sits outside the control of the Scottish Government and the Scottish Parliament.
Are members content to support the LCM but to defer publication of the committee’s report until after the DPLR Committee has had the opportunity to consider it next Tuesday?
Members indicated agreement.
Are members content to delegate authority to me to sign off the terms of the report?
Members indicated agreement.
Excellent. We will now move into private session.
10:42 Meeting continued in private until 11:08.