Local Government and Transport Committee, 07 Oct 2003

Meeting date: Tuesday, October 7, 2003

Official Report 379KB pdf

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Subordinate Legislation

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Police Pensions (Scotland) Amendment Regulations 2003 (SSI 2003/406)

There are four items of subordinate legislation, the first of which is the Police Pensions (Scotland) Amendment Regulations 2003. No motion to annul has been lodged and no members have raised any points with regard to the instrument. Is it agreed that we have nothing to report on it?

I would like to raise a point about the instrument. The wording in the parent act appears to provide for questions to be referred to a single medical practitioner rather than to a board of medical practitioners. The Subordinate Legislation Committee asked for clarification on that and, as members can see, the Executive's answer is that questions could be referred either to a board or to an individual. That worried the Subordinate Legislation Committee somewhat because we thought that if there was a board there should be some provision for the resolution of a dispute if medical practitioners differed. There seems to be no such provision. Furthermore, the regulation makes provision for an appeal to be made to a tribunal on the decision of a medical practitioner, rather than a group. The Subordinate Legislation Committee thought that that represents an inconsistency, so I thought that I should bring it to this committee's attention.

My other point is about consolidation. This regulation and many others need to be consolidated; the Subordinate Legislation Committee thinks that it is about time that that happened. It is getting to the point where regulations are no longer clear, and the Subordinate Legislation Committee thinks that that is quite a big difficulty.

Thank you—it is good to have the convener of the Subordinate Legislation Committee with us. I am sure that you will keep us on our toes in the years ahead.

Indeed I will.

We shall note the points from the Subordinate Legislation Committee's report that Sylvia Jackson has drawn to our attention. Other than that, are we agreed that we have nothing to report on the instrument?

Members indicated agreement.

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Road Works (Inspection Fees) (Scotland) Regulations 2003 (SSI 2003/415)

Again, no members have made any comments on the regulations and no motion to annul has been lodged. Do members agree that we have nothing to report on the regulations?

Members indicated agreement.

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Road Works (Recovery of Costs) (Scotland) Regulations 2003 (SSI 2003/416)

The position is the same—no member has raised a problem with the regulations or lodged a motion to annul them. Do members agree that we have nothing to report on the regulations?

Members indicated agreement.

The Subordinate Legislation Committee made one or two points on the regulations, but they are fairly minor.

Are you simply drawing that to our attention?

Yes.

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Road Works (Reinstatement) (Scotland) Amendment Regulations 2003<br />(SSI 2003/417)

No member has raised issues about the regulations and no motion to annul has been lodged. However, I advise members that the Executive intends to produce new regulations because one or two issues of incorrect drafting—I think that that is the correct term—have been identified. One flaw was drawn to the Executive's attention by the Subordinate Legislation Committee and the Executive identified another potential flaw. My recommendation is that we do not report anything on the regulations, but that we allow them to proceed with the understanding that the Executive will soon produce alternative regulations.

The previous Local Government Committee dealt with instruments that had to be sent back and forth. Where it is agreed that an instrument is defectively drafted, it seems to be madness that the defects cannot be corrected before final approval of the instrument, rather than producing a separate order. I hope that the Procedures Committee will take that matter on board.

The problem is that, with instruments that are considered under the negative procedure, the committee can either take no action and so allow them to pass, or lodge a motion to annul them, which causes them to fall. Some instruments contain drafting errors that are not sufficiently serious to affect the policy effect of the instrument. The situation might be unsatisfactory, but it is probably the best that we can do.

I understand the procedure. I am suggesting that the Procedures Committee consider whether it is possible to amend the current rules so that drafting amendments to correct technical defects that do not affect the policy can be made when instruments go through the Parliament, rather than the Executive's producing new statutory instruments, which takes up additional drafting and committee time. The procedure of producing another statutory instrument to correct minor technical faults that are spotted by the Subordinate Legislation Committee and accepted by the Executive seems to be unnecessarily cumbersome.

I can offer a point of clarification. As Iain Smith says, there are issues about the fact that the Executive has to produce another instrument, but on certain occasions the Subordinate Legislation Committee clerks pick up such errors and changes are made before the instrument is considered. That happened this morning, which was good. We are trying our best to develop more informal discussion between the clerks and the drafting people at the Scottish Executive, but resources seem to be an issue.

Do members agree that we have nothing to report on the regulations?

Members indicated agreement.