Rural Affairs, Islands and Natural Environment Committee

Meeting date: Wednesday, December 1, 2021

Official Report 721KB pdf

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United Kingdom Subordinate Legislation

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Sea Fisheries (Amendment etc) (No 2) Regulations 2021

Agenda item 2 is consideration of two notifications from the Scottish ministers for consent to two UK statutory instruments. I refer members to papers 3 and 4 and to page 17 onwards in our pack of papers.

Under the protocol between the Scottish Parliament and the Scottish Government, the consent notifications have been categorised as type 1, which means that the Scottish Parliament’s agreement is sought before the Scottish Government gives consent to the UK Government making secondary legislation in areas of devolved competence.

Do members have any comments on the consent notification for the Sea Fisheries (Amendment etc) (No 2) Regulations 2021?

I have a couple of questions, but I do not know whether we can write to ministers or, indeed, how the process works. I note that the instrument

“Increases the amount of seabass that can be landed as bycatch”,

and I seek some clarification on that increase. Secondly, I have some questions about the fact that it

“Revokes a closed season for fishing sandeels”.

I refer you to paragraphs 7 to 10 on page 22 of our pack of papers, which set out some questions on which I was going to write to the Government for clarification. I will ensure that the questions that you want to ask are included in that letter.

Is the committee content that the provision set out in the notification will be included in the proposed UK SI and that I will write to the Scottish Government, seeking clarification on the questions set out in paragraphs 7 to 10 of paper 4?

Members indicated agreement.

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Wine (Amendment) Regulations 2021

With regard to the Wine (Amendment) Regulations 2021, I wrote to the cabinet secretary, asking for an amended notification, as I felt that the level of information that we received was not sufficient to inform the committee’s considerations. A response was received yesterday and members have been sent a supplementary paper. I am now content that the information that the Scottish Government has provided is sufficient to inform parliamentary scrutiny.

As members have no comments to make, is the committee content for the provisions set out in the notification to be included in the proposed UK SI?

Members indicated agreement.

In the letter that I received from the cabinet secretary, she apologises for not providing the full 28 days for parliamentary scrutiny and says that the reason was confusion at official level about whether the SI met the criteria for a type 2 notification. I intend to write to the Scottish Government to ask for some form of guarantee that such confusion will not happen again and that the committee will not be left with so little time to scrutinise any future instruments properly.

Is the committee content to delegate authority to me to sign off a letter to the Scottish Government to inform it of our decisions today?

Members indicated agreement.

That concludes today’s business. At next week’s meeting, we will take further evidence on the climate and nature emergencies and consider subordinate legislation.

I thank everyone for attending.

Meeting closed at 12:30.