Chamber and committees

My final question is a bit hypothetical, although much of what we have talked about has been hypothetical. In an ideal world, the frameworks will work perfectly and there will never be a need for the Westminster Government to exercise executive power. My understanding is that, under the Scotland Act 1998, committees of the Scottish Parliament are empowered to scrutinise the Scottish Government, but how can such scrutiny take place if an executive power is used in a devolved area at Westminster? How would the Parliament and its committees consider that? Might it mean a change to the devolution guidance notes?

Thank you. I will bring in Ms Sargeant to comment on those points.

Good morning, and welcome to the ninth meeting of the Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee. We have received apologies from Maurice Golden MSP and Mark Ruskell MSP.

At 11 am today, we will pause for a short act of remembrance, which will take place throughout the Scottish Parliament. At that time, we will observe a two-minute silence.

Our first agenda item is an evidence-taking session for our inquiry into the United Kingdom internal market. The aim of the inquiry is to consider the UK internal market’s implications for Scotland, including how devolution will work, going forward.

In our first panel of witnesses on the topic, we will hear from: Alison Douglas, who is the chief executive of Alcohol Focus Scotland; David Thomson, who is the chief executive of the Food and Drink Federation Scotland; and Vhairi Tollan, who is the advocacy manager for Scottish Environment LINK. I welcome you all and thank you for your submissions.

I remind committee members that, if they wish to direct a question to a particular member of the panel, they should say so at the start of the question. We are constrained by time, so I ask witnesses and my fellow committee members to be succinct, where possible.

All the submissions highlight the risks of the UK internal market and the risk that Governments might be more hesitant to consider innovative policies for tackling particular issues—a deposit return scheme, for example—in order to avoid competitive disadvantage to Scottish businesses. The risk is that there might be lower regulatory standards in order to retain a competitive internal market in the UK. How could we prevent that from happening?

I am afraid that we are not yet finished. I have a few final questions.

The committee has a specific role to play on this matter, but other subject committees of the Parliament will be able to scrutinise certain areas, too. Going back to our discussion on the interparliamentary forum on Brexit, I should say that we have dropped the reference to Brexit from its title, and I also point out that it will be meeting on 10 December. That was an informal arrangement by different legislatures that came about so that they could work together. Does there need to be a more formal position for such for a at the moment? Does guidance on transparency and scrutiny, certainly for select committees across different areas, needs to be more formalised?

I am sorry to interrupt but we are going to the two-minute silence. I have another question for you, so if you could stay with us, that would be helpful. We are pausing now for a two-minute silence. I ask members to stand if they are able.

I do not think that there are any further questions from the committee. I thank you all, Ms Douglas, Mr Thomson and Ms Tollan, for your contributions this morning.

It is worth noting that the arm’s-length external organisations are quite different across the country. I have experience of trying to drill down into such areas, so I know that it can be problematic. Ms Boyack has a final supplementary question.

Mr Ruskell has one small very final question.

That is helpful—thank you. I do not know whether your officials want to say anything on three-year funding.

I have a supplementary question. Mr Robertson, you mentioned the round-table session that we had with smaller cultural organisations. It was a very diverse group of cultural organisations, many of which also work in the wellbeing area of community involvement. One thing that they pointed out was that other funders have been very dynamic in their response to Covid—they have been proactive in contacting organisations and keen to get help out the door. However, many of those cultural organisations feel that they are at a distance from Creative Scotland and do not have the same relationship with it. Will you ask Creative Scotland to reflect on that?