Chamber and committees

I would be happy to come back to you with further information on that and to keep the committee apprised. That may be an area for further monitoring and review as part of our consideration of the frameworks.

That is no problem. It is really frustrating that we are still in that place. I have been liaising with the UK Government on that, but we remain in dispute over the exact responsibilities in relation to organics. However, I do not think that that hampers too much the work that we would be looking to take forward through the framework.

George Burgess may want to come in on that.

That is set out in some of the frameworks, which recognise how that could be dealt with and which also set out the trade-specific engagement fora that there are. Again, it might be helpful to have an illustrative example. We have been through the process with some free trade agreements. I will hand over to George Burgess, who can give a bit more detail of that.

Euan Page would like to come in on that.

The role of ESS is to assess compliance with environmental law. The frameworks, in and of themselves, do not alter that or the role of public bodies that would be engaged in doing that. If any legislative changes were due to be made, I imagine that ESS would have an interest in that, but I do not know how much of a role ESS would be expected to have in relation to the frameworks or what input it would be expected to have.

I have mentioned previously how we inform the committees of work that is undertaken in the interministerial group. For example, we have the communiqués, and we also send over a note of some of the items that have been discussed.

The exclusions process, in particular, would involve the Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee. Parliament is notified at the point at which the secondary legislation goes through. That is the only example that I have. I do not know whether my officials have any information about whether there is any earlier engagement than that with the committee.

The Parliament’s role in monitoring and reviewing frameworks is an important part of the process. The various Governments in the UK have been discussing what that might look like. Again, I am keen to hear from committee members what such scrutiny can or should look like. If members think that the process can be improved upon in ways beyond those currently set out in the frameworks, I am open to consideration of those.

Euan Page might want to come in on that.

As you have set out, it is a really positive model that we would like to think could be used more widely as we engage on such issues.

George Burgess wants to come in.

Good morning, everyone. Thank you for inviting me to give evidence on common frameworks.

We are coming to the culmination of a process that started all the way back in October 2017, with the agreement of the framework principles by the joint ministerial committee on European negotiations. I know that there have been concerns about the delays during the development of the frameworks, and I share the frustration of the Parliament and, indeed, stakeholders at the time that it is taking to finalise and deliver them. However, the most significant factors in causing those delays lie outside the Scottish Government’s control, and I am, of course, grateful for the committee’s patience on that. Despite those frustrations, we remain committed to working collaboratively with the United Kingdom Government on common frameworks, on the basis of consensus and in line with the framework principles.

The frameworks, including the ones that the committee is currently scrutinising, are being established to manage policy divergence on the basis of agreement and in a way that respects devolution. They have been operational on an interim basis since the end of the transition period, and they will, of course, remain provisional until all four UK legislatures have completed their parliamentary scrutiny.

It is important to note at this point that the frameworks are policy neutral. They are intergovernmental arrangements for managing policy divergence and are not, in themselves, policy innovations.

The fundamental reason for putting the frameworks in place has not changed. When we were taken out of the European Union, after the 2016 referendum, we accepted that there would be some areas in which the practical, regulatory and market implications of that decision would need to be managed. The frameworks offer a model by which to manage such implications by agreement and collaboration between equals rather than by imposition. That approach could be usefully applied to intergovernmental relations in the UK more widely, but, sadly, that is not much in evidence in other UK Government efforts.

The United Kingdom Internal Market Act 2020 is a glaring example of the UK Government’s willingness to drive a coach and horses through the devolution settlement when it suits it. We remain fundamentally opposed to that legislation, which continues to pose a significant threat to the implementation of the common frameworks. I am sure that we will pick up on that issue later in the evidence session.

Several of the frameworks that were published earlier this year fall under this committee’s remit. As I have said in previous sessions with the committee, I am committed to being open and transparent in relation to the common frameworks and to working with the committee as much as possible during the scrutiny process for the frameworks.

Well, that is the thing. I do not think that I have contradicted myself. It is a really strong model, and, if all the Administrations commit to adhere to the process that we have set out, as we have done, it could work well. However, the problem is that we have seen the process undermined. I talked about the example of the exclusions process—it was the first time that we used it, and it did not work perfectly, so I hope that lessons will be learned from that.

If we all adhere to the process, it will be a good process and model. The point is that we need it to be adhered to. We cannot have the process undermined by the introduction of legislation that constrains the policy choices that we can make. That is the complete opposite of what we all committed to through the common frameworks process.