Environment and Rural Development Committee, 25 Jun 2003
Meeting date: Wednesday, June 25, 2003
Official Report
275KB pdf
Work Programme
The second item on the agenda is the work programme. There are two papers in front of the committee. The first is from me and is about our work programme and commitments, and the second lists possible topics for us to discuss.
There are several key points that I would like to recap for members. We will be meeting weekly for the duration, on Wednesday mornings, and we have space for a short inquiry before stage 1 scrutiny of the nature conservation bill. We will have a chance to talk more generally about research at our away day. I suggest that we agree to take evidence from the minister at our first evidence session to find out what his intentions are under "A Partnership for a Better Scotland". We will also need to deal with Scottish statutory instruments.
I suggest that we wait for formal referral from the Public Petitions Committee before we start work on any of the outstanding petitions, each of which could require us to do a lot of work. I would rather that we had a steer from the Public Petitions Committee on that. Members will note that we will come back to the matter of budget scrutiny in more depth at our away day in August. There are quite a number of issues that we will need to get to grips with then.
The key things that we need to decide today are the first topics for inquiry immediately after the summer recess and any longer-term external research priorities. We have had a paper from the Scottish Parliament information centre. I suggest that we deal with the national waste strategy as a four-week piece of work, and that we ask SPICe to do research for us to build up to some longer-term work on sustainable development and the European environmental action programme. Those are more substantial pieces of work that we would find difficult to pack into four weeks. We can discuss those further at our away day.
Do members agree to my recommendations for the away day?
Members indicated agreement.
Do members agree on our inquiry topics and research agenda?
Members indicated agreement.
Finally, we must decide where we are to have our away day. We do not have any costings, so I hope that the clerk can come up with some figures for us. I know that all bar one of the members will be there, and there are different views on where we should go, from the Highlands to the central belt. I shall ask the clerk to come up with some costings that I can circulate to members with recommendations about where we should meet. Are members happy to put their trust in me on that issue?
Members indicated agreement.
Thank you very much.
I assume that everyone is happy to invite the Minister for Environment and Rural Development to our first meeting after the summer. Is that agreed?
Members indicated agreement.
That completes our work programme discussion.
I note that one of the subjects mentioned in today's committee papers is implementation of the mid-term review of the common agricultural policy. The minister might want to give a statement to Parliament, but if that is not appropriate by the time we get back into our programme, he might want to report back to the committee, so it might be appropriate to ask him whether he wants to do that at the same time as he gives evidence.
That is a good idea. The minister is not with us at the moment; he is still debating the matter somewhere in Europe. It would be useful to get an update to kick off the discussion, so we should flag up the issue.