Chamber and committees

Welcome back. Our second panel will also be giving evidence on the UK internal market. The committee will hear from Michael Clancy, director of law reform at the Law Society of Scotland; and Jess Sargeant, a senior researcher at the Institute for Government. I welcome you both to the meeting. We will move straight to questions from the committee.

I will open with a general question about the impact of the UK internal market and of agreeing to UK common frameworks on the Scottish Government’s commitment to align with EU law. Could we start with Ms Sargeant on that?

Yes.

Thank you. We will move on to questions from the committee.

I have a very quick question on the frameworks. You said quite confidently that they have been developed and are being delivered, but that we will not really understand how they are working until we are further down the line. Does it concern you that what we are hearing that other areas such as the economy and civic Scotland do not feel that they have been included in their development, and they do not feel that there has been transparency in how the frameworks have come about? Whose responsibility is it to inform wider civic society in the UK about the frameworks and the impact that they will have?

I thank both our witnesses for your attendance at the committee this morning. I close the public part of today’s proceedings.

Our previous panel represented Alcohol Focus Scotland, the Food and Drink Federation and Scottish Environment LINK. One of the concerns that they raised in their submissions involved dispute resolution. In the context of the frameworks, is it clear to businesses how dispute resolution will take place in the future, and is it clear where the challenges are likely to be? Will they be against the common frameworks or against the legislation itself? Are you able to comment on that?

My apologies, Mr Clancy—you wanted to come in on a previous question that Mr Cameron asked. Do you want to do that now, please?

Mr Cameron has some more questions, so maybe it has not.

There is a Government relationship there, but there is also the relationship of the Parliaments. I may have picked this up wrong, but I thought you said that the parliamentary partnership assembly structure had been confirmed in the UK. Is it still possible that the PPA delegates could include people from the devolved legislatures?

I thank everyone for observing our remembrance day two-minute silence.

We return to Mr Clancy.