Environment, Climate Change and Land Reform Committee
Meeting date: Tuesday, March 16, 2021
Official Report 472KB pdf
Contents
- Attendance
- Decision on Taking Business in Private
- European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018
- Subordinate Legislation
European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018
Exemptions from the Official Controls at Border Control Posts (Amendment) Regulations 2021
Agenda item 2 is an evidence session on a United Kingdom statutory instrument. Members will be aware that a revised SI protocol has been agreed between the Scottish Government and the Scottish Parliament. The aim of the revised protocol is to enable committees to scrutinise Scottish Government proposals to consent to UK SIs on all devolved matters formerly governed by European Union law. The original SI protocol applied only to scrutiny of the Scottish Government’s proposals to consent to SIs that fixed deficiencies under the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018. Our new SI protocol continues to apply to those technical changes and ensure continuity of law, but also extends to proposals to consent to SIs that introduce new regulatory or governance regimes, or implement policy choices.
The committee received notification of this SI only last week, and members have some questions. To help us with those we have with us Jesus Gallego, deputy director of agriculture and rural economy in the EU exit unit and deputy chief veterinary officer. Good morning, Mr Gallego.
We will move straight to questions. Could you outline why there is a need for urgency and what is behind the late notice of the SI?
It is purely to follow the UK Parliament’s timetable. We received the instrument late, and we made it available to the committee as soon as we had it. Unfortunately, that was only 10 days before the laying date.
The issue is process, rather than anything that might have a practical consequence if it was not done. It is because dissolution is imminent.
That is absolutely right. It is purely a process matter.
Other members may have questions.
From your perspective, is the protocol working?
We have had repeated problems with adhering to the timetable for notifications, because of the lateness of notifications from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, which is responsible for the majority of the SIs that we in the agriculture and rural environment part of my unit are involved in. As you will be well aware, this is not an isolated incident. The situation is frustrating for everyone, and I know that it is frustrating for the committee. We have done our best to give the committee as much notice as we can, but the timing of these instruments depends on the UK Government.
It is concerning and it is frustrating.
I have a question about the detail of the change in border controls for animals that are to be tested on. What are the practical changes as a result of the SI? Does it mean that instead of having vets at border controls there are vets at facilities that are doing animal testing?
In practice, there is little impact. For animals that, before the end of the transition period, were coming from the European Union, there is no change at all, because they never had to go through a border control post; they went straight to the approved laboratory premises.
For third-country animals—there are not many—that come into UK and Scottish establishments, because those establishments are approved and operate under a biosecurity regime that was in place before the end of the transition period and continues to be in place, there is in practice a very low impact on animal health. Such facilities operate under official supervision from an official veterinarian, which is also how the border control posts operate.
The derogation has the advantage of not imposing an unnecessary burden in relation to animals that, because of the nature of their use, are of high health status and are under much stricter levels of supervision than farm animals or pets would be. It is appropriate that there is not an extra layer of supervision in relation to those animals at border control posts. Those facilities are also under the supervision of an official veterinarian appointed by the Scottish ministers and have to comply with strict biosecurity conditions, including the provision of quarantine facilities and separation of the animals from other animals when they arrive. Those conditions are higher than those that livestock and pets would be subject to, even if they went through a border control post.
I would like to ask about the broader context of animal testing. Are the regulations being made in a context in which we expect animal testing in science to reduce, or do you expect it to increase? You will have heard some of the concerns about the UK registration, evaluation, authorisation and restriction of chemicals—REACH—regulations and whether they could require repeat animal testing.
The use of animals in research is a reserved matter so, ultimately, the policy around the regulations is for the Home Office. The expectation from an animal welfare and veterinary perspective is that the use of animals in research would be minimised and for scientific developments to lead us to a reduction in the need for the use of live animals. That is an expectation and a hope rather than a policy, because it is not our policy to make.
I see that no other members have comments to make.
We hear loud and clear that the lack of notice is causing frustration at the Scottish Government level, but we understand that you are largely content with the impact of the SI. Thank you for your time, Mr Gallego.
Agenda item 3 is consideration of a number of notifications from the Scottish Government in relation to consent to UK statutory instruments, including the one that we have just discussed.
Fluorinated Greenhouse Gases (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2021
Storage of Carbon Dioxide (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2021
Climate and Energy (Revocation) (EU Exit) Regulations 2021
REACH etc (Amendment) Regulations 2021
We have a number of comments to make about the process. The notifications coming in today relate to amending instruments that make technical fixes to flaws in SIs that we have already looked at. We are again frustrated about the lack of information on frameworks surrounding the SI notifications, which is a common theme of the past couple of years, not just for this committee but other Scottish Parliament committees. The frameworks that underpin the issues raised by SIs are not developing at the pace that we would like and we are certainly not getting information on them.
We have received a letter from the cabinet secretary about the Scottish Government’s frustration that EU REACH was not adopted when it could have been. The cabinet secretary has flagged up to us that the chemicals industry is now heavily involved in trying to ensure that the REACH regulations do not have an adverse financial effect on the industry.
Do members have any comments to make in relation to the SIs? The Scottish Government does not object to their content, but I know that members have comments to make on the process.
There seems to be a consistent theme and I am pretty fed up with it. At times, it feels as though we are being treated as a community council, and the only thing that we can do is to write an occasional letter to the UK Government or to the Scottish ministers.
An example of that is the F-gas statutory instrument. The notification was not clear about where the powers would be transferred to and that is simply not good enough.
The REACH regulations are not available, so we have the policy intent but not the SI itself.
At times, the process is meaningless. The committee is struggling to understand the impacts of the regulations and whether they have been properly drafted, as many of them have not been over the past year.
The point that I would make about the REACH regulations is that there is a strong industry lobby and we are trying to make sense of the ways in which the industry wants to reduce costs. It is important that the Scottish Government has a view on that. I was disappointed to learn from the cabinet secretary that the Government does not have a view and will not take a view until after the election. It is important that the Government engages with the issue and with the Parliament, particularly as there are strong industry lobby groups that are calling for changes that may or may not be in the interests of the environment.
We are in a bit of a mess and we are not left with much alternative but to keep writing the letters.
You raise a good point about the fact that some of the SIs that have come to us in the past have turned out to be flawed. The role of parliamentary scrutiny is to identify flaws, so if we do not have the information to do that, mistakes will go through. We have a responsibility to scrutinise things properly, and if we cannot do that, mistakes will go through and yet more SIs will have to come in, for which we do not get relevant and comprehensive information.
I echo and reinforce the points that you and Mark Ruskell have made. It is disheartening to spend time as a committee member who has committed to trying to get to grips with these often important SIs—particularly those in relation to withdrawal from Europe—when they come late, which puts Scottish Government officials in a difficult position and puts pressure on the committee. Our role of scrutiny is fundamental and it is hard to carry it out in the situation in which we are put.
It is important that we highlight our concerns about the delays, both in our legacy report and in writing to the UK Government—I know that these conversations become somewhat tedious, given that we were talking about writing such a letter last week. I understand that last week’s letter might not have been sent, so perhaps when we write we could be even more robust on the matter, because I would not want a new committee to be put in the same position.
09:15
I clarify that we have started to draft the letter to which you are referring, which is for the minister for devolution, Chloe Smith. We express our general concern about the amount of notice of and information on SIs that is being given to the committee. The letter has not gone yet, so we have a chance to include today’s comments about SIs.
As Mark Ruskell said, we write letters and nothing seems different. That has been the case, not just for weeks or months but for the past couple of years, and the situation has not changed. As members rightly pointed out, statutory instruments that provide for technical fixes as a result of our leaving the EU will not stop being made in the next couple of months or so, and nor will the common frameworks stop being developed. We are looking at a timeframe of well into the next parliamentary session.
We have flagged up the issue in our legacy report. The committee that takes over from us will have to keep a close eye on the situation. We hope that our concerns, which are shared by the other devolved Parliaments—the Welsh Parliament has the same issue—lead to solutions and some fixes to the procedures. Members have made their points and we will discuss the letter that we want to send to the UK Government.
Are members content that we write to the Scottish Government to confirm that we agree that consent be given in relation to the UK SIs that are referred to in the notifications and the SI that the Scottish Government representative joined us to talk about?
I see that members are content.