Today I spoke in my capacity as Convener of the Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee during the debate on the EU Continuity Bill.
This Bill confers wide powers on Ministers and consequently is of great interest to my Committee. What I find unacceptable is the tight timetable for considering this Bill. This timetable has imposed significant restrictions on the ability of this Committee to apply thorough scrutiny to the Bill.
We all take our jobs seriously and my fellow committee members – my impressive deputy convenor Stuart McMillan, Alison Harris, David Torrance and the irrepressible Neil Findlay – will do it as thoroughly as the limited time allows.
The Committee took evidence on the delegated powers in the Bill from the Minister for UK Negotiations on Scotland’s Place in Europe at its meeting yesterday morning.
The Committee sought to answer the same questions it seeks to answer on all bills:
- Is it appropriate to confer these powers on the Scottish Ministers?
- Are the powers appropriately framed?
- Do the powers match the policy intention as expressed in the Delegated Powers Memorandum?
- Are the powers subject to an appropriate level of parliamentary scrutiny?
Having taken that evidence the Committee agreed to draw a number of the powers to the attention of the Parliament and wrote this morning to the Presiding Officer.
Normally we would do a detailed report, as we did with the UK Bill. That’s what should be happening here.
We will follow the progress of the Bill over the next two weeks. But we should have had longer.
You can watch my full speech above.