Rural Affairs, Islands and Natural Environment Committee

Meeting date: Wednesday, May 18, 2022

Official Report 621KB pdf

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Subordinate Legislation

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Animal Health and Welfare (Scotland) Act 2006 (Consequential Provisions) Order 2022 [Draft]

Item 2 is evidence from the cabinet secretary on the Animal Health and Welfare (Scotland) Act 2006 (Consequential Provisions) Order 2022. The instrument is subject to the affirmative procedure. I refer members to paper 1.

I welcome Mairi Gougeon, the Cabinet Secretary for Rural Affairs and Islands, and her Scottish Government officials, Fiona Eddy, who is the deputy head of animal welfare policy, and Grant McLarty, who is a solicitor.

I invite the cabinet secretary to make an opening statement.

I am happy to appear before the committee to discuss the order. As the consequential amendments in the order are not contentious and seek to tidy up existing legislation, I do not intend to address the committee for very long.

The order seeks to amend and repeal primary legislation and to amend and revoke secondary legislation. The changes that the order delivers are consequential to the Animal Welfare (Licensing of Activities Involving Animals) (Scotland) Regulations 2021 and to provisions in the Animal Health and Welfare (Scotland) Act 2006, which I will refer to as the 2006 act. The provisions in the 2006 act were commenced last year by way of a commencement order.

The licensing regulations and the relevant provisions of the 2006 act came into force on 21 September last year. The Animal Health and Welfare (Scotland) Act 2006 (Consequential Provisions) Order 2022 ensures that existing legislation reflects the recent changes and, where appropriate, substitutes references to now revoked or repealed legislation with references to the licensing regulations.

I highlight that it was not appropriate to bring into force the provisions of the 2006 act that repealed various acts of Parliament until the new Animal Welfare (Licensing of Activities Involving Animals) (Scotland) Regulations 2021 were made. When the regulations came into force, we were then able to commence those provisions of the 2006 act in order to repeal the enactments, because they were then superseded by the licensing regulations.

Now that the enactments have been repealed and new provision has been made in the form of the licensing regulations, the Animal Health and Welfare (Scotland) Act 2006 (Consequential Provisions) Order 2022 will ensure that the statute book is updated accordingly.

I will end my remarks there.

Thank you. As there are no questions from members, we move to item 3, which is formal consideration of the motion to approve the instrument. I invite Ms Gougeon to move motion S6M-04393.

Motion moved,

That the Rural Affairs, Islands and Natural Environment Committee recommends that the Animal Health and Welfare (Scotland) Act 2006 (Consequential Provisions) Order 2022 [draft] be approved.—[Mairi Gougeon]

Motion agreed to.

Is the committee content to delegate authority to me to sign off our report on our deliberations on this affirmative Scottish statutory instrument?

Members indicated agreement.

That completes consideration of the affirmative instrument. I thank the cabinet secretary and her officials for attending.

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Non-Commercial Movement of Pet Animals (Scotland) Amendment Regulations 2022 (SSI 2022/131)

Item 4 is consideration of a negative instrument. I refer members to paper 2.

Does any member have any comments on the instrument?

I have one slight concern about something that is touched on in the committee papers regarding the use of the enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay test, as opposed to the other test referred to, which takes longer. I would like clarification that the Government is content that we are not at any greater risk of rabies coming into the country by using that test, which has a shorter timescale, for animals coming from Ukraine.

I would be interested to know who is responsible for paying for the extra test.

That is fine. We can write to the cabinet secretary asking for clarification on those points.

As there are no other comments, I will briefly suspend proceedings to allow our next set of witnesses to join the meeting.

09:06 Meeting suspended.  

09:15 On resuming—