Chamber and committees

One of my officials will give you a full update. A great amount of work has been done by us, including my predecessor and the officials who have been involved, to get to the stage where we are now. You will remember that we were not in a good place in 2018 with regards to these kinds of issues. Things are a lot better now, and we are sitting here with just this one outstanding commitment.

Susan Herbert will give us an update.

No problem. We will do that, convener.

As a member of the committee, you will be aware that the Moveable Transactions (Scotland) Bill has been introduced. At one point, I was calling it the unmoveable traction bill because it took us so long. I think that, the first time that I came to the committee, I said that we would be working towards it, but there was then a delay of about six months. However, it is a highly technical bill, and we had to get it into a good place to ensure that it was sorted. The Trusts and Succession (Scotland) Bill is also coming to the committee, so, on the whole, we have managed to keep the committee reasonably busy with Scottish Law Commission stuff.

With regard to how we go about taking on the work, there is a list of stuff—I do not think that “stuff” is a technical term; there is a list of potential bills—on which the Law Commission has produced work. As and when, we will look at what the priority is and what the Government needs to do to take that forward.

Susan, do you have anything to add to that?

I do not want to make a commitment today, but I am quite happy to take that issue away, have a look at it and write to the committee further down the line about whether we find that to be possible or, if not, why we cannot do it. Just give me some time to have a look at it.

On framework bills and the type of bill that we choose, there is no exact science. Nine times out of 10, it will be the traditional method, but on this occasion it is a framework bill because this is a more radical and new way of looking at an issue. It is such an important issue—we are talking about a national care service, which will touch so many people’s lives. It is important to ensure that we have that level of engagement.

This is a different way of thinking and a different way to look at how we design something, because scrutiny will come from this committee as the process goes forward. It will come from other committees, as well—the last that I heard was that there are about seven committees feeding into the process for the national care service bill. Once we get to the stage where we are pushing it forward, we will be pretty confident that we have something that is robust enough and that will deliver what people want. That is the most important thing for us.

With regard to the type of bill that we will use in future, it will depend on the circumstances. Do you think that I will be coming forward with hundreds of framework bills as of today? No, I will not; which bill we use will depend on the circumstances and how we can deliver the legislation to ensure that it can do what it needs to do. At the end of the day, it is not about us but delivering for people out there in the real world.

It really depends on—I am trying not to be political—

Yes. I could say that I can write to you after the summer recess, which could mean after this summer recess, or it could mean the one following that.

Yes, we are. I am laughing because I had to ask a couple of weeks ago who my counterpart is. We have been ensuring that we do that because we know how serious the situation is. We have been trying to reach a position where everyone is working together. Although there are policy differences, we are trying to make this work.

The review is on-going. We provide the Parliament with a substantial amount of information, and we are committed to ensuring that the Parliament receives information within the timescales that it needs it.

The review is getting to the stage where we need to engage more with the committee; I think that my officials will be doing that in the not-too-distant future, which will give us some ideas as to how we take this forward. It is important that we ensure that we have got ourselves into a place where we can have those discussions with your committee clerks and my officials and take this forward.

It is more common. Officials regularly get information 24 hours before a bill is published—and that is if they are lucky; they might get it an hour or so before, including any of the detail that they need. That automatically fires the starting gun and makes it difficult for us to get ourselves into a place where we can have a robust argument or look at the detail and find out how it affects us here.

That is difficult, and it is being made worse because we used to be able to build up relationships outwith the politics—which is a situation in itself—like the relationship that my officials have with your clerks or the one that I have with the committee. When you continue to deal with the same people, it is simple to do that. However, for example, over the past year and a bit, I have had to deal with three different ministers at Westminster on the election side of things.

That means that the chances of being able to break down the political barrier and have a working relationship with someone in Westminster at a political level becomes more difficult. Sometimes it is by having that open working relationship that we can solve some of the issues, as we can say, “We’re just gonnae get this job done. We might not agree on the policy issue, but let’s try and get the work done.” However, we are very rarely able to have those conversations, because there has been such a turnover of ministers in Westminster.

From the officials’ point of view, it becomes extremely difficult for them to get to the stage where they can work up a case for whether the Government is for or against anything that is going on, and do so in the robust manner that your committee would expect to be able to scrutinise.

I will bring in Susan Herbert, who might be able to hit some of the technical aspects.