Chamber and committees

I am speculating because we do not actually know. However, you said that you will write to us with the details.

I move on to another item. You mentioned earlier the need for clarity when you lay instruments. At committee recently, we had an interesting discussion about what constitutes dancing. You will recall that, if you are dancing in a nightclub, you do not have to wear a mask. Of course, we do not yet have a proper definition of a nightclub, let alone dancing. The Government came back to us and said that dancing is a form of exercise, so it will fall into that category. As Craig Hoy then pointed out, somebody could be dancing in a supermarket aisle and could take their mask off. That is why there is a need for clarity. Have you defined what is meant by dancing?

That was the problem with the way that the law was framed, which was why we raised the issue. We are joking about it, but it is a serious matter that, when we write law, it needs to make sense and be understood, and there should not be loopholes.

I found Graeme Dey and his predecessor, Joe FitzPatrick, to be very good to work with. When they appeared at the committee, we had a very cordial relationship and they knew the committee’s requirements.

We had some correspondence with you last week about the vaccination passport debate and the proposal from the Scottish Government to introduce a requirement for vaccine certification at certain events. You will have seen our annual report from the previous parliamentary session in which we expressed some concern, shall we say, over the number of made affirmative regulations that were being approved. For anyone who is watching, I note that that is when the Government brings in a law without its having been scrutinised by the Parliament; the scrutiny comes later. Most parliamentarians accept that there has been a need to use that procedure during Covid, but there has been a large number of such instruments.

We wrote to you about the proposal for vaccine passports. That might not be the term that you use, but that is the term that I use. We know what we are talking about. You wrote back to us on 9 September—it was a quick turnaround—and in that letter you said that if there were to be regulations, which there would have to be if the proposal comes in, your view is that the made affirmative procedure should still be used despite there being weeks to prepare. Is that still your position?

Do you anticipate all of those coming in this calendar year or within the next 12 months?

I am sure that we can improve as we go along. Others might want to come in at this point, convener.

Right—okay. I will move on to my final question for now, although I have more questions later.

As you mentioned, we have highlighted that we are not persuaded by some of the reasoning that the Scottish Government has provided for breaching the 28-day rule for negative instruments. Will you expand on what work you are doing to ensure that such breaches occur only when absolutely necessary?

It sounds as though there might be some movement and that you might not necessarily use the made affirmative procedure.

I want to query an aspect of the Town and Country Planning (Miscellaneous Temporary Modifications) (Coronavirus) (Scotland) Regulations 2021 (SSI 2021/292). As you will be aware, under coronavirus legislation, the requirement to hold public consultation events on potential building developments was suspended; in other words, such events did not need to be held. The regulations continue that suspension until 31 March next year. Given that we are now allowed to attend all sorts of events, such as concerts, football matches and weddings, I query why anyone should not be allowed to hold a public consultation event.

We have not had an explanation for that, so the committee should write to the Government asking for one. We could also write to the lead committee, which I think in this case would be the Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee. There is a related regulation that we will consider later—SSI 2021/291—so we could perhaps include that in the letter.

Convener—

We are not quite in private yet. I apologise, but I want to raise an issue.

We know that we are to have a debate in the Parliament on vaccine passports. I do not actually know what we will debate yet, because we have not seen any details. Frankly, all that I have to go on is what the First Minister announced last week and what I have read in the press. We will have a debate and vote and I imagine that, for such a significant measure, regulations will be laid at some point.

There is a process issue. A lot of the coronavirus legislation has gone through under the made affirmative procedure, under which the law comes into force and then the Parliament has a look at it. A lot of planning has clearly gone into vaccine passports. The First Minister said last week that, if MSPs approve the proposals, she would like them to come in at the end of this month. Therefore, there is time to do what I would describe as proper scrutiny. I argue that the regulations should be laid before they come into force and that we should use a process other than the made affirmative procedure.

Given the lack of clarity, the committee could write to the Government to ask what its plans are. We do not want to know about the detail of the plans—that is for a policy committee to scrutinise—but we want to know how the Government plans to proceed and what process it plans to use. We could also flag that up to the COVID-19 Recovery Committee, which I think will be the main policy committee.