Chamber and committees

I have a brief observation. I understand the points that people are making about retrieving birds but, to be clear, the bill is not about birds—it is about mammals. As interesting and useful as those points are, the bill would not touch on them, as far as I understand.

Could you elaborate on what you have said? Is it more normal for quarry to be walked up? What proportion of rough shoots involve people walking up the quarry, rather than dogs?

My question is for DS Telford, who has raised some interesting questions.

DS Telford, I realise that you are not here to say what the law should be, but we have discussed whether some of the complications that you have talked about would exist if a limit of two dogs was applied to rough shoots so that there could only be two dogs at a shoot. Whether that proposal is right or wrong, I am interested to know, given that we have discussed it, whether you think that it would be a simpler and more enforceable solution.

However, you would not be open to vexatious allegations in the hypothetical situation in which you had only two dogs.

Cabinet secretary, I appreciate that we are here to talk primarily about the report but, in your opening remarks, you mentioned that, if Scotland was not carved out of the retained EU law bill, we would need to look at—I think you said—“totally new” approaches for keeping pace with some areas. Has there been any indication whatsoever from the UK Government whether it intends to do any such carving out? If not, what might be other options that the Scottish Government would have to pursue, and what would be the likely scale of the task?

On the back of that, can you take us through the issues that were considered in reaching an approach whereby there is a difference in the number of dogs that can be used for rough shooting and the number that can be used for other types of shooting, if that is a correct reading of things? Was the safety of wild mammals the primary issue that you considered when you considered this area of the bill?

I am not against that, but I just want to check something. You mentioned a follow-up session earlier. Are we now talking about the same thing?

That is on 23 November.

No. I mean when the bill was drafted, did the Government consider that attempting to make further allowances around rough shooting would undermine parts of the bill? Was that an issue that you considered?

My question is about the comments that Police Scotland has made on enforceability. You will be familiar with the issue that we have just discussed around what constitutes a pack, but there are other enforcement issues. Police Scotland said that it feels that most people—I think that those were the words that were used—would obey the law, but will those comments be considered when, for instance, guidance or licensing schemes are being formulated?