Convener's Report
The final item of business today is the convener's report, which is much smaller than it was last time. There are three items to consider.
The first is a letter—which members will have read—from Lord Grenfell, chairman of the House of Lords European Union Select Committee. The letter updates us on how his committee proposes to develop its scrutiny of subsidiarity. He tells us that the Conference of Community and European Affairs Committees of Parliaments of the European Union—COSAC—has agreed to UK proposals that, under the Amsterdam treaty, national Parliaments should do more to scrutinise subsidiarity issues. He invites this committee to inform the Lords' and Commons' European committees of suggestions that we might have for European legislative proposals on which we would welcome subsidiarity and proportionality monitoring at whatever stage the legislation might have reached. We are also asked whether we would like to receive updates on COSAC's work in that area.
As members know, the constitutional treaty contains an early-warning mechanism on subsidiarity issues, which seems to be an alternative route.
We would wish to legislate nearer to home where appropriate, so I think that we would like to do as Lord Grenfell suggests, but it would be best to defer a reply because I hope to receive a detailed briefing on the matter when I am at the Parliament office in Brussels next week. We will thereby be able to explore all the implications and possible procedures. I would like to have that meeting, study Lord Grenfell's letter further, send a holding response at the moment, and then come back to the committee.
We could then get round to abolishing the House of Lords in the interests of subsidiarity.
I will do that on the Tuesday.
I agree with the convener and accept that we need more time. Were we involved in that conference of European committees?
The conference is open to national Parliaments. In the past, Jimmy Hood's House of Commons European Scrutiny Committee has been supportive of, and has welcomed, input from our committee. However, Phil Gallie's question has been asked before by a number of the other big players in Europe, such as the Catalans, the Basque region and some of the German Länder, who have been interested in contributing to COSAC. The Executive of COSAC has always resisted that because it does not want to extend involvement to regional Parliaments such as ours.
However, we can usually have input into the conference through the House of Commons and House of Lords committees. COSAC is a useful organisation that does a lot of useful work. Although I share Dennis Canavan's concerns about the democratic aspect of the House of Lords, the House of Lords European Union Select Committee does a lot of good work on Europe and has in the past been involved in scrutiny. I find Lord Grenfell's letter helpful.
I am sure it is opportune to reflect on how we can contribute more. More input to the legislative process is what we have been asking for—it is what we proposed to the UK Government during the future of Europe debate. I remember that when Jim Wallace was a minister we debated in Parliament how we could have early involvement in the legislative process. Although the European constitution has gone, this is a democratic element of it that we could hold on to in the United Kingdom. Not all member states will do that, but there has been an indication from UK Government ministers that they are willing to be supportive, and it is clear that the Commons and the Lords are keen to involve us.
I have a quick comment. Irene Oldfather used the words:
"Although the European constitution has gone".
However, the final sentence in the letter from the House of Lords is about the debate on the future of Europe. It says:
"This would in turn facilitate further decisions on the future of the Constitutional Treaty."
That committee suggests that the European constitution has not gone and that concerns me.
Okay. I record that this committee asked formally for observer status at COSAC but was refused.
Really?
Yes. I understand that one of the reasons why we set up the network of regional parliamentary European committees—NORPEC—was so that we could network with other regional Parliaments.
Do I have the committee's agreement to seek further information about subsidiarity before we come back to it?
Members indicated agreement.
The second item in the convener's report is interesting. It is to consider an update from the Scottish Executive about the proposed European institute of technology. Members will note in annex B correspondence on the subject between the Executive and the committee.
A copy of the letter that was sent to the minister by the convener of the Enterprise and Culture Committee is in annex C. Phil Gallie mentioned earlier that he was surprised by some of the responses. I was also surprised to read the Executive's letter because I have seen the responses that were received by Alyn Smith MEP from some of the institutions concerned. We did not get those responses in time to circulate them to the committee, but they were certainly positive, so I am surprised by the seeming contradiction.
With that in mind, the minister is coming to our next meeting to give us evidence on structural funds. Is the committee content to discuss with him the proposed technology institute and the associated correspondence?
Will you let us see the letters to which you referred?
Yes. We have copies here. Although it was too late to circulate them to members, I wanted to have them here because they paint a different picture.
It would also be useful to have an objective note on what we think the Commission's position is on the proposal.
I said at the previous meeting that all the communications so far from the Commission about the matter have suggested that no decision has been made and that the matter will not be decided on until the spring council meeting next year. In a way, we could be building up a head of steam for no reason if the spring council does not agree to go ahead with the institute. I gather that there is not universal support for the proposal.
I have absolutely no problem with asking the minister about the matter at the next meeting, but Jim Wallace is right that it would be helpful to get a clearer idea from the Commission about whether it is looking for support in principle at this stage or trying to identify locations for the proposed institute. We should find out how other countries are responding.
The third and final item in the convener's report is to draw members' attention to my letter to the Scottish Executive on the agriculture and fisheries council that starts today and continues until Thursday. The letter asked what the Executive's baseline is for the negotiations. I asked the Executive to assure us that that baseline would be fed into the UK view. Margaret Ewing was particularly worried that Scotland's views were not being properly represented by the UK. When we get the retrospective response, we might find out the respective positions of the UK Government and the Scottish Executive.
As there are no comments from members, I declare the meeting closed.
Meeting closed at 16:32.