Chamber and committees

Would you express the same justification in relation to a suspended sentence? Let us say that a judge has looked at a situation and deemed imprisonment to be the appropriate measure but has decided that, in the circumstances, there should be a suspension. There are questions whether that would trigger the provision in the bill. What is your view on that?

I invite you to go the other way on that. I imagine that I know what your answer will be, but the right to a fair trial might, in fact, apply if an appeal is successful and there is a retrial, and the public might be influenced and think, “Ah well, they’ve been kicked out as an MSP.”

That is all right. I just thought that it would be useful to have that on the public record.

The sentence is the trigger, not the simple fact that somebody has been convicted, albeit that the person ceasing to be an MSP, as well as the subsequent petition, might well affect any retrial. You are saying that, if it was the other way around, it would be a political decision and would not be covered by article 6. On the criminal side, you are saying that consideration of the events of losing a seat is outwith the bill’s scope, although I am not saying that you do not have concerns in that regard.

I will try to approach the question in a different way and see whether that assists. It is poor questioning rather than putting you in a difficult position.

You agree that the bill is, in effect, about individual members of the Scottish Parliament. Is it about misconduct? Is it about ensuring effective representation, which was one of the suggestions that you made in your opening remarks? Is it about empowering the constituents of an MSP? What is the purpose and key part of the bill? Is it about misconduct, effective representation or additionally empowering voters?

Is that the case even though, as a member, you arrived because of your membership of a political party and because you appeared on a ranked list?

So, in your mind, at a constituency level, having an individual name appearing on the ballot paper and the electorate voting for that person because they are identified very clearly, they are associated with a known political party and they have chosen to do that is no different from literally a party name appearing on the regional ballot. Are you satisfied that there is enough similarity between those two events that the process should be as similar as possible for a departing situation?

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.

This is, of course, an evidence session rather than a session to decide whether we are going one way or the other. This is an opportunity to gather evidence so that the committee can then answer the questions that are being posed. To be fair to Emma, that is why she asked.

My other question relates to completion of rights of appeal. There might be situations in which someone is imprisoned but there is still a right of appeal. What is your view? Must the rights of appeal be exhausted, notwithstanding the fact that the person might be incarcerated during that process? Or is it the incarceration that triggers the provision, even though a conviction might subsequently be quashed on appeal?