Chamber and committees

The deputy convener has a question.

I am happy about that—and thank you, Jim, for saying that you are not an investigative arm of the committee. That is useful to know.

You are convinced that you have enough time, with all your parliamentary commitments, to do it.

I put the same question to Emma Harper. We share the chairing of another cross-party group.

I have never disagreed with any of the cross-party groups—it would be a brave MSP who did so. However, I always like to put on record that the number of cross-party groups in the Parliament is huge, and I question in my mind whether all MSPs have enough time to meet all their cross-party group commitments. I will not vote against it—I will vote for it. However, I have that real concern, which might be borne out when you see the reports from the cross-party groups, when they come in—on time, possibly, although they do not always. I will leave that question hanging.

Having shared many discussions with Peter Chapman, I am always very conscious that there are different dialects. I will leave it there because, if I said anything out of turn, Peter would probably jump on me.

I ask the same question of everyone. There is a huge number of cross-party groups in the Parliament, and I know that each of you has commitments to those cross-party groups. In fact, I think that there are almost more cross-party groups than there are MSPs. I want to be sure in my mind that you both feel that you have enough time to give the group the attention that it so clearly deserves.

I am sure that it will be fun and worthwhile; it is simply about making sure that the commitment is right. I am sure that you are also aware of the reports that have to be submitted to the Parliament. I will leave it there.

Agenda item 2 is an evidence session on the legislative consent memorandum on the United Kingdom Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill. I refer members to the briefing papers from the clerk and the Scottish Parliament information centre.

The bill?was introduced to the UK Parliament on 11 May 2022. On 27 July, the Scottish Government lodged a legislative consent memorandum on it, which said that the bill touches on devolved legislative or executive competence in three main areas, including on environmental law through the proposed introduction of environmental outcomes reports. Those will be the focus of our scrutiny.

Today, we will hear the views of three witnesses. I welcome Lloyd Austin, convener of the Scottish Environment LINK governance group; Robbie Calvert, policy, practice and research officer at the Royal Town Planning Institute; and David Melhuish, director of the Scottish Property Federation. Thank you all for accepting our invitation. We are delighted to have you here.

We have around 60 minutes for this evidence session. I remind members that I am a qualified surveyor and that I have a planning interest behind me from when I was in private practice.

Thank you for that, Jackie.

I do not necessarily have concerns; I may be delighted that the precautionary principle is there, because it overrides a lot of decisions relating to environmental law. I would argue that it is actually a good thing and the fact that it is in UK and Scottish legislation strengthens the position.

I have picked up on three areas. You feel that the word “consult” in clause 121 is not sufficiently strong; you are concerned that there are regulations that you have not seen that could be worse but are not definitely worse; and you are worried that the regression clause—clause 120—is not strong enough. If there were more detail on those areas, would that address your concerns? You could give a yes or no answer, but I suspect that you will not.