Chamber and committees

So all the local authorities engage in that work.

Thank you—that is helpful. We move to questions from Sarah Boyack.

I am conscious of time, so it would be helpful if we could have succinct questions and answers from now on.

No one else seems to have a question, cabinet secretary, but I would like to ask you a final one. Our role as a parliamentary committee is to scrutinise the Scottish Government’s policies and decision making, but are we moving to a situation where, with executive decision making at Scottish Government and, in particular, UK Parliament level, our opportunity to scrutinise policy decisions could be lost?

Good morning, and a very warm welcome to the third meeting in 2022 of the Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee. We have received apologies from Mr Ruskell.

Under agenda item 1, the committee will take evidence from the Scottish Government on the evidence that we heard during the committee’s United Kingdom internal market inquiry. We welcome to the meeting the Cabinet Secretary for the Constitution, External Affairs and Culture, Angus Robertson; Donald Cameron, deputy director, constitution and UK relations division; and Euan Page, head of UK frameworks.

I invite the cabinet secretary to make an opening statement.

I move now to Ms Boyack. If members have any more questions, they should put an R in the chat function, please.

Thank you, cabinet secretary. The committee has no further questions. I should also point out that we will actually be seeing you again next week, so that will be your sixth time in front of us. I thank you and your officials, Mr Cameron and Mr Page, for attending.

Before I close the meeting, I should say that, when I spoke on behalf of the committee in yesterday’s parliamentary debate on committee budget scrutiny, I omitted to thank the members of the committee, my deputy convener Donald Cameron and, indeed, our clerks for their support in the budget scrutiny process. I do so now, and my thanks are on the record.

Thank you.

I remind members that the Finance and Public Administration Committee is leading on scrutiny of the shared prosperity fund. I do not want us to step on its toes in our questioning.

Thank you, cabinet secretary. We will move to questions, and I will start by asking about the submission from the Law Society of Scotland, which refers to a Scottish Parliament information centre briefing on common frameworks that addresses the question of what new governance arrangements will be needed to make common frameworks work. The SPICe paper states:

“when more decisions are taken through intergovernmental forums ... accountability and parliamentary scrutiny can suffer.”

That increases

“the importance of ensuring that intergovernmental bodies are transparent and accountable.”

What is your view on that issue? How do we ensure that the common frameworks process is transparent and accountable to the Scottish Parliament and its committees?