 I regret that I'm unable to take further members as we must protect time for forthcoming items. The next item of business is a debate on motion 11698, in the name of Claire Adamson, on behalf of the Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee on how devolution is changing post-EU. I'd be grateful if members who wish to speak in this debate were to press their request to speak buttons. I call on Claire Adamson to speak to and move the motion on behalf of the committee. I would like to put on record my thanks to our committee clerks, to colleagues from across other legislators and all those who gave evidence to our inquiry. I welcome the opportunity to open this afternoon's debate on behalf of the Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee, on the report on how devolution is changing outside the EU. This is the third in a series of significant reports that the committee has published on the constitutional change arising from the UK leaving the EU. It is an important report for the Parliament and builds on our previous work on the UK internal market and the impact of Brexit on devolution. I thank my colleagues in the committee for their constructive, consensual approach and perseverance in dealing with some times highly complex and technical issues. It may be useful if I basically remind colleagues across the chamber of the background and context that informed our work in producing this report. While the UK was part of the EU, there was little regulatory divergence within the UK due to the statutory requirement to comply with EU law, covering areas such as animal health, food safety and the environment. Outside of the EU, the statutory requirement no longer applies in Scotland. Consequently, much higher levels of regulatory divergence, both internally and in the UK between Great Britain and the EU, are now a possibility. Northern Ireland, of course, has a different set of rules given the Windsor framework. The key question for us as parliamentarians is what impact those new constitutional arrangements are having on our core legislative and scrutiny functions. Where does responsibility now sit for making law previously made in Brussels? Who decides if UK-wide legislation covering a devolved area is appropriate? How do the public, businesses and other stakeholders know which Parliament and which Government they should be engaging with? What happens if there is regulatory divergence between England, Scotland and Wales within the context of the UK Internal Market Act? If there is regulatory divergence, how does business keep updated and what regulations will apply to them? There are many other questions that we could ask, but that should give colleagues a flavour of the complexities involved. If we find it daunting as legislatures, how can we improve public understanding of the changes in our constitutional arrangements? For example, raising awareness among small businesses wishing to expand and export to new markets, or an environmental lobby seeking to allocate limited resources in influencing the legislative process. We examined those and our report focuses on four main areas—inter-governmental relations, common frameworks, the sole convention and delegated powers. I will focus on the first of those three areas with my deputy convener, Donald Cameron, focusing on delegated powers in his closing speech. The committee notes our advisor Professor Keating's view that there is now a complex landscape of inter-governmental mechanisms that has grown incrementally rather than following a clear constitutional design. We noted that there was considerable clarity, consistency and consensus on how the regulatory environment was managed within the UK prior to EU exit. After EU exit, there has been significant disagreement between the devolved institutions position and the UK Government's position regarding how the regulatory environment within the UK can be managed. The committee notes that this lack of consensus, clarity and consistency has considerable consequences to the effectiveness of this Parliament in carrying out our core scrutiny and legislative functions. Without consensus at an inter-governmental level in areas such as common frameworks and the use of delegated powers by UK ministers in devolved areas, there is a significant blockage to the effective parliamentary scrutiny. With regard to transparency and the timing and the level of information provided to this Parliament as one example, even if there is consensus at an inter-governmental level, there remains the risk that the Scottish Parliament's core functions are being diluted. As we have noted previously, the increased significance of inter-governmental relations within a shared governance space raises substantial challenges for parliamentary scrutiny. We consider that those challenges are structural and systemic and not just the consequences of political disagreements between Governments. Consequently, we recommend the need for a new memorandum of understanding and supplementary agreements between the UK Government and devolved Governments that should specifically address how devolution now works outside of the EU. That should be based on clear constitutional design, including consideration of the principles of subsidiarity and proportionality and give us more clarity. I will now turn to the consideration of common frameworks. We noted that there appears to be consensus among the UK Government and the devolved Governments that common frameworks provide an effective mechanism to manage regulatory divergence within the UK internal market. The committee's view is that there needs to be much greater clarity around how regulatory divergence is a key principle that underpins devolved settlements, how that can be managed through the common frameworks. In particular, there needs to be clarity around the market access principles of the UK internal market act that are intended to work in those circumstances. We believe that there is therefore a need to rearticulate the definition and principle of the frameworks both in light of the experience to date and the new constitutional landscape. I am grateful to the convener for giving way and I am enjoying her thoughtful, substantial speech. I wonder if the committee has given consideration to what should be the respective roles of the UK Government and the devolved Governments in the settling of the contents of common frameworks. It strikes me without there being appropriate opportunities for the devolved Governments to be able to protect the rights of the devolved settlements from a UK Government that, ultimately, as we have found out in section 35, the use of section 35 has a final say over many aspects of constitutional exercise of authority. Unless that protection is given to devolved Governments, the common frameworks will be as meaningless in the future as they are today. I thank the member for his intervention. That is one of the aspects that we have been considering. From the committee's point of view, we were looking at how the common frameworks are developed. We noted that there is now a lack of transparency. It is very much civil service driven and the implications for both parliaments and other devolved parliaments that engage in this process are opaque to us at the moment, so I recognise his concerns. The particular example that he has raised is not something that we considered specifically at this point but may return to us at the committee. The committee believes that there is a need to rearticulate the definition and principles of the frameworks in the light of experience to date and our constitutional landscape. It recommends a memorandum of understanding between UK and devolved Governments that should include a supplementary agreement on common frameworks that should include their clarity, should include their purpose and give further transparency to the process. If I can finally turn to the Sule convention, the consideration of the Sule convention, the committee stated previously that the convention was, quote, under strain following the UK's department partner from the EU. Although the Scotland Act 2016 gave statutory recognition to the convention, it did not alter its status and it did not become judicially enforceable. There continues to be a considerable debate as whether there should be strengthened in law or subject to judicial review or whether Sule can be strengthened on a non-statutory basis or whether it stands and no strengthening is required at all. We note that there is clearly a fundamental difference of the viewpoint between the UK Government's position and the position of devolved Governments regarding the operation of Sule. It is also clear that that has led to deterioration in relationships between the UK Government and devolved Governments. The committee's view is that this level of disagreement or a fundamental constitutional matter is not sustainable, particularly in the context of an increasing shared space and at an inter-governmental level. We note the view of UK ministers that it is, quote, sometimes necessary for the UK Government to act in its role as the Government for the whole of the UK, but we also note the view that it is necessary that the UK Government can fulfil its role of the UK's national government. We are unclear what necessary means within this context and note that this is not stated within either the memorandum of understanding or in the devolution guidance notes. It is also unclear how necessary it relates to not normally and what the threshold for this is necessity in justifying and overriding the devolved consent of this Parliament and the Welsh and other devolved Parliaments. It is essential that we have an opportunity to hear from the UK minister for inter-governmental relations to discuss the findings of this report and his written response to our previous letters. I want to finally mention an event that happened yesterday at Strathbyd University, where we brought together academics, practicing lawyers, former civil servants and post-grad and PhD students from across the islands from Queen's University in Belfast, Durham University and Liverpool University to name a few to discuss the findings of the report and examine those issues in further detail. There will be a published note from that meeting and it will also be a podcast that was chaired by Professor Andrew Tickell with between myself and my deputy convener Donald Cameron. I would also commend those to the Parliament. Thank you very much and I move the motion in my name. Thank you and I call on Angus Robertson up to 11 minutes cabinet secretary. Thank you very much. A happy new year to you, Presiding Officer and to members right across the chamber. Like Clare Adamson, I'm delighted to participate in this important debate about the report by the Constitution, Europe External Affairs and Culture Committee. My thanks to all of the committee members, the clerks, on what is an extremely thorough forensic piece of work and I'd commend it to all members who have not yet read it. The report's conclusion should surprise no one in this chamber. Brexit has ushered in an unprecedented assault on the powers of this Parliament and the whole system of self-government endorsed decisively by people in Scotland in 1997. The Scottish Government was not alone in predicting the negative impact of Brexit on devolved institutions. Indeed, the Welsh Government has also sounded a clear and consistent alarm at the approach of the UK Government's approach to devolution and to intergovernmental relations since 2016. Sadly, those fears have come to pass as the committee report lays bare. The force of the report's conclusion is, of course, made all the more powerful by the fact that it is unanimous. It was supported by members from the Scottish National Party, from the Scottish Conservative Unionist Party and from the Scottish Labour Party. I hope that the willingness to rise above party political considerations evident in the report will encourage colleagues from all sides of the chamber that they will engage in a way that allows this Parliament to speak with one voice on the threat that it faces. The fairness and the quality of the committee's work means that it cannot be dismissed as what some are fond of saying is nothing more than manufactured grievance. It is nothing less than a clear warning of the need for a unified response from this Parliament to the threat that is faced by Scotland's devolved institutions. We, as Parliamentarians, have a shared responsibility, of course. I am grateful to the cabinet secretary for giving wayne. Before he develops his argument, I wonder if I could take him back to his opening argument about the actions of the public in Scotland in supporting the devolved settlement in the referendum of 1997. I think that we are at risk of losing the significance of the democratic consent that was given in 1997 to the settlement, which, in many ways, was reinforced much against my wishes in the referendum in 2014. However, at no stage has the contents of this committee report, and I commend the committee members for what they have said about the attack on devolution that it has made. At no stage has the consent of the public in Scotland been sought for those changes. What is the cabinet secretary concerned about about the implications for the democratic consent of the public in Scotland that was given in 1997, which has been disregarded in the period since the referendum in 2016? John Swinney makes his point clearly and persuasively. I am keen to do that, given that this has been a unanimous report, and there has been agreement across all the political parties on this, that we might hear those points echoed from all sides of the chamber. I have heard in some questions at different points during this Parliament a sense that there is a kind of joint responsibility for bad intergovernmental relations between the UK Government and the Scottish Government. What we see crystal clear in this is that the problem that we are dealing with is the approach of the UK Government. We need the other political parties in this chamber to join with parties in and supporting the Government to make sure that we can support the devolved settlement. To reinforce the point that John Swinney was just making, we as parliamentarians have a shared responsibility for protecting the integrity of this institution, which has served the people of Scotland now for over a quarter century. After all, we are here because the people of Scotland voted for this Parliament. It is their mandate that has given us democratic self-government in Scotland, and there is no mandate, no justification for the steady erosion of the devolution settlement that we have seen since the Brexit referendum. The report recognises the severe strain that the operation of the Seoul Convention has been under since Brexit. It is essential for the effectiveness of the convention that it is scrupulously observed whether there are policy disagreements between the Scottish and UK Governments, especially on matters of significance. The opposite has in fact occurred with the convention being set aside in areas where there are differences between the Scottish and UK Governments, and the powers and responsibilities of the Scottish Parliament are being adversely affected most notably by the internal market act. That is precisely the circumstance in which the convention was intended to operate as a safeguard for devolution. Until 2018, we saw scrupulous observance of the convention from UK Governments—of all stripes. Since then, however, the convention has, in the words of the Welsh First Minister, Mark Drakeford, withered on the vine. It is worth noting that routine breaches of the Seoul Convention are a comparatively recent development. The convention was strictly observed, barring one quickly rectified error for most of the first two decades of devolution. From no breaches in between 1999 and 2018, the convention has now been breached 11 times. Not normally now appears to be emptied of all meaning. Happy to give way briefly. Mark Drakeford, I am very grateful to Angus Robertson to give way. Is that not actually what was sought earlier by the convener for the definition of what is not normal? That period of time up until 2018 was showing the one breach that was almost in error, but that is what not normally means. I encourage him and other colleagues who have views on how Governments in the UK might be improved, that if thoughts are being thought—it has been addressed in part, I believe, by the Brown commission—that it is made explicitly clear that there are to be no exceptions. That would certainly be progress. I have not read that in the commission's conclusions, that it will be an absolute endorsement of the Seoul principle in all circumstances, but that would be extremely welcome. Back to the committee. Forgive me, I am going to overrun, Mr Swinney, if I have taken intervention at this stage. The committee states that it is essential that the opportunity to hear from the UK Minister for Intergovernmental Relations to discuss the findings of the report to date has received no response, despite the urgency of the committee's request and indication of the importance with which the matter is viewed in Whitehall. The report also raises concerns over the rapid growth in the use of delegated powers along the UK Government to legislate in devolved areas. The Retained EU Law Act is just one example of that. That is, as the committee notes well, a recipe for confusion, a lack of transparency and a blurring of the lines of accountability. We recognise the merit in the committee's recommendations regarding new intergovernmental agreements on how the use of delegated powers should work and particularly in recognising the constitutional principles noted by the committee that devolved ministers are accountable to their respective legislatures for the use of powers within devolved competence, and the Scottish Parliament should have the opportunity to effectively scrutinise the exercise of legislative powers within devolved competence. Those principles are fundamental to the effective operation of the devolution settlement. On one level, they are so self-evident that they should not require further explanation. As I have noted, the Scottish Government sees merit in the recommendation that agreement is reached on the use of delegated powers by UK ministers in devolved areas. However, new or revised rules, structures or agreements can only be fully effective if all parties are committed to following them. That means following the rules consistently, not just when it suits. It means respecting the important principles for collaborative working, agreed by all four Governments as part of the review of intergovernmental relations. It means respecting this Parliament and having a shared interest in making the devolution settlement operate as intended in the way that the people of Scotland voted for decisively in 1997. The report argues that there is a consensus among the UK and devolved Governments that common frameworks provide appropriate mechanisms for managing regulatory divergence across the UK. While I acknowledge that the UK Government remains formally committed to the development and implementation of common frameworks, I might respectfully challenge the committee on one point, namely that, if the UK Government shares the view that frameworks offer the right mechanism for managing post-EU regulatory divergence in the UK, then why on earth did it impose the internal market act on this Parliament? The act is incompatible with the principles and approaches of common frameworks, replacing respect for devolution and progress by agreement, with unilateral decision making and undermining devolution by strength. As we have seen, the work of the common frameworks has been undermined most clearly in the example of Scotland's deposit return scheme. Common frameworks and the principles of respect for devolution in the powers of the Parliament that underpin them could be the basis for a respectful and co-operative approach to devolved regulatory policy. They still offer an alternative to the unworkable centralisation, rigidity and disregard for devolution embodied by the internal market act, but only again if all parties are prepared to adhere to the rules. Again, it makes it hard to see, at least at present, how the committee's recommendation of a new common frameworks MOU would operate if some actors are not prepared to play by the agreed rules. In conclusion, the committee is correct to note that all of this means that Parliament faces an unprecedented set of challenges in performing its vital scrutiny role. The scale and complexity of the challenge of adapting to the EU exit was always going to be vast, and the demands on Scotland's Parliament equally so. Where we are today is the result of choices. It did not have to be like this. It was a choice to proceed with the folly of a hard Brexit and to ignore the wishes of people in Scotland. It was a choice to use Brexit to launch a sustained campaign to undermine the powers of this Parliament, and it is a choice to simply ignore agreed constitutional norms, processes and structures wherever and whenever they are considered to be inconvenient. Devolution cannot function as intended in these circumstances, and this Parliament cannot operate as it should. I congratulate the committee again on its excellent report, and I hope that we can work as Parliamentarians right across the chamber, right across the parties, to address the vital questions that it raises. Thank you, cabinet secretary. I can confirm to the chamber that we have no time in hand this afternoon for the debate, so members will have to stick to their speaking allocation. I call Alexander Stewart up to nine minutes. Thank you, Presiding Officer. I am delighted to open the debate on behalf of the Scottish Conservatives. From the outset, I would like to state that those benches are clear about the importance of devolution. The principle of devolution and the location of decisions making is a great importance to the health of any functioning democracy. Moreover, devolution has become an important part of Scotland's political history over the last two decades. During this time, we have seen Governments of different colours in both the Scottish and UK Parliament, and we have seen Scotland take an increasing number of devolved responsibilities. Intergovernmental working between both ministers and civil servants from different Governments has become the norm for Scottish politics. However, since the UK's decision to leave the EU, the previously well understood devolution process has become less certain. There has been an increase in conflict between the UK Government and devolved Administrations. To that extent, that was to be potentially expected, Presiding Officer. Leaving the European Union was the biggest constitutional change that we have seen since the Scottish Parliament was re-established. That was always going to be a test for devolution settlement in ways that had not been treated before. I can make a little progress, so I will come back. In the recent film, I talked about the committee, he said that you have to see Brexit as a breaking point in all sorts of ways. It will require a reconfiguration of how relations are managed. That is why I welcome today's debate, which provides Parliament with a clear set out of the vision of how the devolution should be worked post-EBrexit and the way that we should manage that. As a member of the committee, we will constitute an external affairs in the culture, I welcome the participation of this report and the publication that has shown that the devolution settlement and the changes that we have within the EU, I will take the intervention from. The member had said that post-Brexit was a test for inter-governmental relations and for democracy, and I wondered if he thought that the UK Government had passed that test or failed it. I thank Kate Forbes for her intervention. It is a very good question to ask, because as I have already said, there has been conflict and that conflict continues. I think that the timing is still going forward, and we need to look at what we can achieve in the journey of time. I hope, and it is my aspiration, that we can bridge some of those gaps, but there is certainly still some friction within that process, and that needs to be ironed out. The report provides an important perspective on the challenges facing the devolution settlement, not at the moment, and sets out the possible vision of tackling some of those challenges. The report received input from both the UK and the Scottish Government, and numerous stakeholders also participated. I hope that ministers will be able to consider all the issues that were raised with great interest and in good faith. It is clear that whatever devolution looks like going forward, it will allow disputes to be properly resolved. The continued success of devolution depends on that. Despite the number of disagreements between different levels of government in previous years, the current formula of dispute resolution provides a new way of looking at that. It is important in practice that there has been often a good thing and the right thing to do when you are tackling some of those disputes, to consider the low level and the possibility of the low level. That was talked about by the minister himself. Our committee also heard evidence that, simply refreshing each disagreement in a formal process, would provide good initiative for civil servants to work closely together. The introduction of a statutory footing in various aspects of inter-government relations is something that needs to be raised with disagreements between Governments becoming more frequent since Brexit. We know that. Indeed, the possibility of some more statutory dispute resolutions for the first area has been talked about. Placing those inter-government structures into statute could have the effect of limiting some of that dialogue between the different levels of government. Any failure and any future devolution statement must be at the flexibility that needs to be there. That flexibility can give us the real chance to see things going forward. The convener mentioned our event yesterday, and I commend and congratulate all those who attended the Strathclyde University event yesterday, because it really did bring a focus from not just the academic but from the law and the politicians to talk about what we are doing and how we will go forward. Many of them came up with some ideas and some opportunities as to how that might take place. I am very grateful to Mr Stewart for giving way. I wonder if Mr Stewart would give his opinion on whether, on the question that I put to the convener, there should be changes to the inter-governmental frameworks to enable the position of the devolved Governments to be better able to protect the devolved settlements than has been the case up until now, because ultimately of the overriding power of the United Kingdom Government, if that is not to be the case. The convener answered partly the question that you have asked me as to how that would take place. There has been and there continues to be a need for the UK Government to understand and accept what happens within the devolution process and the way that that is managed. However, I fundamentally believe that we can see a way forward and there must be a way forward to ensure that we can work collaboratively and together in a holistic approach to make things work. The committee report talks about recommendations that it talks about having a new memorandum of understanding that that needs to be developed. I think that that is a good way forward at trying to manage that in order to be successful and the recommendations are positive. It is however an option that we would keep at some of the advantages and the current system, and I think that they are also there to be looked upon. We have already discussed that the internal market is something that I will no doubt continue to be discussed in many speeches this afternoon. Our committee heard numerous options and opinions on the internal market act and how its settlement and how it would manage. The Scottish Government stated in its own evidence that there were a wide-ranging constraints developed within that concept. We have heard today from the cabinet secretary his remarks already about some of that. We have also heard and acknowledged that the internal market will have, and we must understand what that has on the economy. On the issue of the committee, we heard evidence that significant diversions would be expensive for businesses, disrupt supply chains and ultimately reduce choice for consumers. We have also heard in potence what the diversions would mean with the effect of delivering a business on both sides of the border. We have to understand that the UK is continuing to increase and we now see 61 per cent of Scottish exports. We also see about two thirds of imports going back and forward. Those are vitally important as we talk about jobs and trade within the United Kingdom. The possibility of regular diversion between different parts of the United Kingdom, which responds to those different needs and circumstances, is an important principle. However, the principle must not come at the expense of protecting the UK internal market and operating effectively. The operation of the internal market therefore is vitally important to the success on the economy here in Scotland. We also know how devolution will work in the future as to how we will and there may be significant changes compared to where we have been. Devolution has been a success in the past and Brexit is no reason and cannot be seen as a complete failure. Some people believe that, and I have no doubt that we will hear that today, but I automatically think that there are some potentials from where we want to take that. We need to think about the principles of understanding the current devolution statement that will create under Brexit, because the committee also talked about shared space between the UK and the Governments after Brexit, and that is vitally important. In conclusion, along with other members of the European Constitution External Affairs and Culture Committee, I will continue to push for this approach for all levels of government, which are continued to success. By doing that, we will work together, and we can achieve things together in a much better way. Always encouraging interventions, I urge members to try and keep those as concise as possible. I call Neil Bibby up to eight minutes. Thank you, Presiding Officer. I wish you and every member across this chamber a very happy new year. I would like to begin my contribution by joining the convener, Claire Adamson, in thanking the clerks to the Constitution, Europe External Affairs and Culture Committee for their diligent work on drafting the important report that we are discussing today on devolution post-EU. I was not a member of the committee during the stakeholder witness sessions of the inquiry, but I would like to thank all those who gave evidence on this subject last year and commend all committee members who have been involved in producing a consensual report. Presiding Officer, 2024 marks 25 years since the creation of the Scottish Parliament, following the Scotland Act introduced by the last Labour Government. Devolution has of course evolved over that time, with this place gaining two significant rounds of additional powers of taxation and welfare, which have made this place one of the most powerful, devolved institutions in the world. However, as has been said, when this Parliament was created, the United Kingdom was a member of the European Union and no one envisages that changing. Implementing EU law was a legal requirement, and there was, as the committee notes, considerable clarity, consistency and consensus in how the regulatory environment was managed within the UK prior to EU exit. Our withdrawal from the EU has therefore undoubtedly created the most challenging and complex period for devolution since 1999. I am grateful to Mr Bibby for giving way. He made an important point about the fact that there had been two additional tranches of powers allocated to this Parliament, which I would content, and I think that Mr Bibby would agree with me about this, as a result of democratic pressure within Scotland to acquire those powers, as was the 1997 referendum decision. Does he think that there is a real serious democratic issue and problem for Scotland that those powers have been eroded in the aftermath of Brexit and the people of Scotland have not been asked? I think that there are obviously concerns about how devolution has been undermined over recent years post-Brexit. I do think that there is an issue about how we resolve those issues and in terms of that democratic way forward. I do think that the next UK general election and, obviously, the Labour Party will be setting out plans at those elections and I think that there will be a way of helping to try and reset that relationship between the UK Government and the devolved Governments and also resolve some of the issues that we are concerned about. As the Institute for Government has stated, we have been left with a big zone of regulatory uncertainty, which has created a need for greater co-operation between the Government's new institutions and to be frank, a new culture of shared governance. This was echoed by Professor Hugh Rawlings, former director of constitutional affairs at the Welsh Government, who told us that devolution depends on a fundamental level of understanding of trust between the Government. On that, Scottish Labour very much agrees that we believe that the people of Scotland and the rest of the UK will be best served by a culture of co-operation and trust between our Governments instead of a culture of conflict. The people of Scotland have not had that in recent years and the next UK elections, as well as the Scottish Parliament elections. We believe that there is an opportunity to reset relations between UK and Scottish Governments. Scottish Labour recognises that there has been a deterioration in relations between this UK Government and all the devolved Governments post Brexit, particularly under Boris Johnson. However, we also recognise that there has been a poor relationship between the Conservative and SNP Governments even before Brexit, as noted by the Smith commission in this very report. We therefore very much agree with the committee that there must be better inter-governmental and inter-parliamentary relations to deal with the overlaps between reserved and devolved powers. There should be a new memorandum of understanding, but I also agree with the cabinet secretary when it says that when agreements are made, they need to be adhered to. The memorandum of understanding between respective Governments is right to state currently that they will seek to alert each other as soon as practical to relevant developments within their areas of responsibility wherever possible prior to publication. It is very important that ministers as well as civil servants work closely to iron out potential problems before they canonise, but we question whether there really is the political climate and will currently from Government ministers to make this a reality. To help that, we also believe that greater transparency of inter-governmental working can lead to better outcomes and help Parliament to hold Government and ministers to account. It is clear that we need a new approach, a new relationship and new ways of working. As has been mentioned, unlike inter-governmental relations more generally, the sole convention worked relatively well or very well prior to Brexit. Consent was only withheld once out of 140 times between 1999 and 2015, and that one occasion was followed by a compromise. However, it has been breached significantly and on numerous occasions, as the cabinet secretary said, by the Conservative Government in recent years, particularly under Boris Johnson. The Labour Party here in Scotland, Wales and across the UK do not believe that it is acceptable for UK Governments to legislate in devolved areas without consent. We need to see a return to the situation where the UK Government respects and adheres to the sole convention. The best indicator of future behaviour is past behaviour. The Labour Government not only created devolution but defended it and would do so again. However, more than that, we recognise, as the convener said, the need for structural reform and the need to strengthen the sole convention legally. As Professor Jim Gallacher told us, the breach of the sole convention in relation to the UK internal market act was an error of constitutional significance and leaves the argument for strengthening the sole convention on Ansible. That is why the UK Labour Party's commission on the future of the UK, initiated and welcomed by Keir Starmer, recommends the following. There should be a new statutory formulation of the sole convention, which should be legally binding. It should apply both to legislation in relation to the devolved matters and explicitly to legislation affecting the status or powers of the devolved legislators and executives. It should not be restricted to applying normally but should be binding in all circumstances. Again, the next UK general election, whenever it comes this year, will be an opportunity to elect a Labour Government committed to defending devolution and making the UK work better for Scotland now and into the future. We must recognise, too—this is a very important point—as the committee has done, the importance of governance in England, widespread devolution in England as a proposed again by the Labour Party's commission, can change the face of the UK and the context for devolution for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland for the better. I am pleased that the report details the support for common frameworks from the Scottish Government, the Welsh Government and a host of academics. I hear what the cabinet secretary said about the UK Government's position, but they have at least acknowledged the role that they can potentially play. I have to say that I do so particularly because when I spoke in the chamber in the last debate in the UK Internal Market Act, I spoke about the need for new effective and agreed common frameworks to protect devolution and manage potential divergence across the UK. We have a serious issue here and the potential use of new common frameworks are a serious solution with serious support. Clearly, there are concerns about how they can be approved as the report looks at, but we do agree with the committee and the Welsh and Scottish Governments that new effective more transparent, improved and agreed common frameworks should be seriously considered, discussed and taken forward. We also, of course, unlike the Scottish Government, recognise the importance of the UK internal market to Scotland's economy and businesses. We recognise, as the committee has done, that divergence can be expensive for business and we must raise awareness of the Internal Market Act and common framework, since it is crucial that business stakeholders are involved in developing new regulations. I welcome the report and look forward to setting our own plans to support self-government for Scotland and shared government across the UK. Thank you very much, Presiding Officer, and happy new year to yourself and to colleagues across the chamber. I am grateful for the opportunity to debate this report and for the unanimity that the report has been commanded across the committee. Presiding Officer, it is no secret that, in 2016, when the United Kingdom voted by slim majority to leave the European Union, it broke my heart and the hearts of many Liberals across this country, not only because this country's membership of the European Union represented a kind of liberalism and internationalism that is in my bones, but also because we knew the chaos and damage that would be wrought as a result of Brexit. Brexit has placed enormous strain on the British economy, on our society, and, as the committee report outlines, it has placed great strain on the very mechanisms that were designed to underpin devolution. However, it is important that we recognise that there were issues with devolution before Brexit—before Brexit blasted its way into our politics and into our lives. Indeed, the Smith commission in 2015 singled out the problem of weak inter-governmental working, and the relationship between Scotland's two Governments was repeatedly raised as a problem in that agreement. It then stated, and I quote again, that there needs to be greater respect between them than being the two Governments. Anyone who has followed Scottish politics in recent years, and indeed since 2015, would see that our two Governments have failed the measure of the test set to them by that commission. The Smith commission also stated that devolution depends, at a fundamental level, on understandings of trust between Governments. That trust has been undermined by both of Scotland's Governments. I am grateful for the member giving way. I hear what he says, but I am just curious as to whether he will at any point give up on the moral equivalence that he seems to be drawing between the two Governments' concern here, since one Government appears to be restricting our powers and the other Government or the other Parliament rather seems to have to pick up the pieces from that. I am grateful to Alasdair Allan for his intervention. I will certainly cover the substance of that as I expand on my remarks, but I am not trying to draw moral equivalence here. I understand the reckless behaviour of the Tory Government, but it has been reckless behaviour by the SNP Government as well. The faults of this terrible Conservative Government have been legion, and they have undermined devolution. However, the SNP Government loves nothing more than to be affronted by whenever perceived sight they feel from Westminster on any given week, because it is politically expedient for them so to do. That is to be honest, neither the SNP nor the Greens have any interest in reforming either devolution or the United Kingdom. That would undermine their efforts to sow grievance and hostility towards the broken system. In truth reform is the thing that the nationalists fear the most. Both the Conservatives at Westminster and the SNP at Holyrood have put their narrow party interests before country and engaged in petty squabbles in an attempt to fire up their base. That is the sort of tired, divisive politics that we need to grow out of and to leave behind. Only the Liberal Democrats have a plan to deliver the transformative constitutional change that would protect and strengthen devolution. We fundamentally believe that Scotland's future lies in a reformed and federal Britain. That vision is built around the belief that power works better when it is evolved closer to the people that it serves. It means having full proof systems that see the Scottish Government and the UK Governments working together and resolving disputes maturely instead of hunting for friction and sowing grievance. Our reforms would also include a proportional voting system, a written constitution and an end to the unelected House of Lords. Scottish devolution should have been the poster child for a federal vision of Britain. Instead, division has characterised the last 16 years and in no way have commended that vision or the extension of the devolution project to the regions of England. In contrast, the first eight years of Holyrood's existence were characterised by compromise and by consensus. There were years of coalition between my party and Scottish Labour. They led to a great many progressive reforms—I am sorry to provide, Presiding Officer, I am finding it quite difficult to concentrate with the chantering to the left of me here—but the coalition between Scottish Labour and my party led to a great many progressive reforms, including free personal care for the elderly, the creation of the bus pass, the smoking ban, the Macron deal, which transformed teachers' pay and conditions. Let's not forget that devolution must include giving more powers to local authorities. That means rolling back SNP power grabs from councils that have seen communities' assets stripped by this Government. We need to see local power in local hands, and that means properly funding our local councils—not councils on the brink of bankruptcy. Brexit forced a reassessment of the devolution settlement and the ways that our Governments work together, but the ranker and acrimony process caused arguably harm further when our two Governments were forced to work together in the pandemic that followed. Brexit and the pandemic have shown us the deficiencies in how those two Governments work together when left to their devices. It screams of a need for us to further codify frameworks for dispute resolution and for inter-governmental rules of engagement. That needs to be embedded in a properly written constitution for a reformed and federal Britain. Hamilton, we now move to the open debate. I call first Kate Forbes to be followed by Jamie Greene up to six minutes, Ms Forbes. Many of the speeches have already outlined some of the core issues that the report highlights. It is worth noting that the report received unanimous support across party lines. At the end of the day, what we have seen particularly since Brexit, although perhaps that just brought to the fore what was already a risk, is not a question of political disagreement, which will inevitably take place in every democracy, but of structural inadequacies. Although unanimous support for the substance of the report, what we do not have is unanimous support for the resolution. The report highlights loudly and clearly that the legal safeguards for devolution are insufficient. They are insufficient to protect the albeit limited powers and functions of the Scottish Parliament from a hostile Government in London. For those of us who believe—I hope that it is everyone in this chamber—for those of us who believe that Scotland is indeed wealthy enough, clever enough, big enough to make our own decisions about the matters that affect the people of Scotland, the question is how we ensure that our legal safeguards are indeed more robust. I have one answer, which I personally think is the only resolution to safeguard Scotland's power, which is, of course, independence. The question is posed to other parties as to what they believe would be sufficient to safeguard the powers. The second point that I wanted to make is that this is ultimately about democracy and about the citizens of this country. The Scottish Parliament was established by popular support. It retains that popular support. The devolution settlement was designed to safeguard precisely what citizens had voted for in a democratically recognised contest, a referendum. Irrespective of which party is in power, either south of the border or north of the border, irrespective of which party is in power, we have a duty to ensure that the legal safeguards of devolution are sufficient to deliver what the people of Scotland voted for in a referendum that was bigger than any particular party. The third point that I wanted to make, because many members have already alluded to this, is that Brexit did indeed disrupt the devolution settlement. Alexander Stewart called it a test, which I think is an excellent characterisation of it. Alexander Cole-Hamilton just talked about the fact that Brexit had forced a change to devolution. That was true. Whether we had voted for Brexit or not, Brexit had a massive impact because it posed the question to the UK Government as to where they felt power should lie. Critically, it was a question to the UK Government which they chose to answer alone. They did not indeed decentralise the power to answer that question. Instead, they chose every turn not just to centralise power to the UK Government but to erode power that had already been at a Scottish Government and a Scottish Parliament level. That inevitably led to increasing conflict, as others have said. However, I repeat again that this is not a question of politics. Indeed, it is the Labour First Minister of Wales who has so often captured what many of us are thinking. Some of his quotes have already been mentioned on legislative consent. He said, when it became inconvenient for the UK Government to observe Sewell, one of those safeguards, they just went ahead and rode roughshod through it. More recently, I'm afraid, the Sewell convention has withered on the vine. About the Internal Market Act, he said, I would dispute the use of the IMA for those purposes. In that case, that was Scotland's deposit return scheme. If they were to invoke it, there would be serious questions for the UK Government. We will always disagree—indeed, we shoot in Scotland—whether that is outside the Parliament or inside the Parliament along political lines. We will disagree on policies, we will disagree on personnel who should be in power, we will disagree on many things and we will disagree once again in the lead-up to the next election. However, one thing that we cannot disagree on is that devolution is under incredible strain, and talking about it is insufficient. What we need is to ensure that those safeguards are in place to not just protect it but to enhance it. That is the point that I will finish on. Right now, we are doing a disservice to the citizens of this country watching devolution continue to be eroded. They voted for the Scottish Parliament. That is bigger than any party that occupies it. They are supportive of further powers. That is greater than any constitutional position that we may take. The last point is that they expect political parties to deliver for them. Where we see the UK Government riding roughshod over the Scottish Government when it comes to spending money or making decisions, we are at great risk of ballooning bureaucracy that does them a disservice. For those reasons, I support the report. In two weeks of my joining this Parliament in 2016, Scotland was thrust into its second constitutional referendum in two years. Many of us in this chamber bear the scars of debating amendments to the first incarnation of the EU continuity Scotland Bill. I am not going to rehearse that saga or the Supreme Court findings over its legality, but that context is important because it created that post-EU legislative no man's land, which we are yet to resolve as the report makes clear. The whole conversation has often been simplistically reduced to a political one, and I am afraid to say often driven by anti-UK rhetoric. The second EU continuity bill, which Phoenix out of all, while technical in nature, itself was motivated by politics, not required by law. Technically, it did not give this Parliament any new powers. Instead, it gave Scottish ministers the ability to fast-track procedures to adopt EU regulations. It was the vehicle by which this Parliament could directly transpose EU law into Scotland's law. Politically speaking, it was, however, a mechanism by which Scottish National Party ministers clearly could tell Europe that Scotland prefers to align with their direction of travel than that of any Westminster Government, whatever your views on that. That any future approach to the doors of Brussels institutions would be met with an inquisition over how and if Scotland had aligned with European values and standards. The so-called keeping-pace powers of that bill clearly served three potential purposes. Firstly, to lay down the market that Scottish ministers would simply not acquiesce to any perceived power grab by Westminster post-EU, and I contest that any such power grab has taken place. Primarily, because the mechanism for adopting EU laws in the UK never required in-depth-evolve scrutiny in the first place, there simply never was a committee of this Parliament that scrutinised every EU directive before its adoption in Scotland. Secondly, the continuity bill in theory could have facilitated full systematic alignment of EU laws and directives in Scotland and in their fullest interpretation in so far as competency allowed. That has not happened either. Thirdly, however, the powers were simply an enabling mechanism for Scotland to borrow ideas from Europe at will and on a case-by-case basis, which, if I was being generous, is perhaps the most useful and sensible of the three. Let's not forget that when the UK was a member state of the EU, every directive was scrutinised word by word and subject to layers of analysis, raked over by a fine tooth comb in Westminster committees, notably in the House of Lords, where they formed not one but five dedicated committees solely to scrutinise EU law. Of course, the SNP, as is its prerogative, refused to sit in that house and thus deny themselves a seat at that table. In response to the supposed position that devolution is suffering post-EU, let me simply ask ministers this. What has been done with the powers contained in the continuity bill? How much keeping pace has actually been achieved? How many of the 243 current EU directives that are progressing through Brussels are the Scottish Government actively looking at to adopt here in Scotland? We know that civil servants here in Scotland have produced numerous white papers on independence, a hypothetical scenario, but virtually nothing on the current reality that we live in. Not everything coming out of Europe is bad, but not all of it is good either. The problem is how would we know? What is the Scottish Government's position on the new EU toy safety directives? What is its position on the new anti-greenwashing directives? Or the EU directive on data collection for short-term lets? An issue by the way which the UK Parliament has already considered. Which of those policies do we prefer? The UK law that is already enacted? Or the EU one that does not yet exist? What about the European health data directive? Which plans sweeping radical changes to law's governing personal data and sharing across the EU? What is the SNP's position on that? Are we keeping pace? Would we even want to keep pace? We have teams of experienced civil servants from Scotland in Brussels, but I am yet to see a single keeping pace briefing to MSPs from them on what the current legislative analysis is of the EU. Even if we were to accept for the purpose of this debate and this debate alone that Scotland might be better off aligning with some of those laws, you cannot have that debate if the starting position is UK bad EU good. You need a sophisticated lawmaking machine to drive that sort of lawmaking, and I seriously doubt whether this Parliament would even cope under the mammoth weight of onboarding that volume of legislation. We can barely get through our own legislative, domestic agenda. Such is our limited capacity. We have neither the expertise nor the capacity to convert this new constitutional arrangement to devolution's advantage. Rather than running and re-running the very tired arguments between two sides of the Brexit argument or even the independence debate, why are we not using this chamber constructively to identify opportunities for Scotland on how best to use those powers, which hitherto did rest in Brussels, but which now live in our two parliaments? Even the hardest of pro-EU or pro-independence activists, we concede that they have missed an opportunity here in Scotland. The cabinet secretary might even find some enthusiasm for the adoption of the odd EU policy, which is to our collective benefit. I would rather be debating the merits of policy proposals with his Government than to argue over hypothetical power grabs. Call me old-fashioned, Presiding Officer, but this is supposed to be a Parliament, so let's debate the substance of those new laws rather than simply lament their absence. Thank you, Mr Greene. I now call Alasdor Allan to be followed by Alec Rowley up to six minutes. I would like firstly to recognise the considerable work of the SEAC Committee, which reported in October on the changing constitutional relationships within the UK. In its report, the committee concludes diplomatically that, whereas constitutional change prior to EU exit was implemented across the UK on a largely consensual basis, that has not been the case after EU exit. That goes to the very heart of the matter. The kind of changes that we have seen to the way devolution works are not the product, as previous changes were, of some kind of a conversation between the UK Government and its counterparts in Edinburgh and Cardiff. The changes are the work of a UK Government to whom the previous political consensus about devolution does not now wholly extend. It is as well to note in that the view of Professor Jim Gallacher, former director general for devolution at the UK cabinet office, that the UK constitution such as there actually is one has now been stretched in his words beyond breaking point by Brexit. Just to look at one concrete example of all this, as other members have, we look at the Sewell convention. From the re-establishment of this Parliament in 1999, right up until the Brexit referendum, the convention was engaged over 140 times. Only once in that whole period did the UK Parliament even attempt to legislate in a devolved area without Scotland's consent. The Sewell convention is, however, now clearly history. Westminster now regularly seeks to make law in devolved areas whatever Scotland's elected Parliament might think. When taken together with other developments, there is now a clear trend. We now of course see the UK Government spending public money in devolved areas that, in the past, would have been left unquestioning later this Parliament to allocate. The UK internal market act and the subsidy control act place effective restrictions on Hollywood's agency to do things differently. A restriction apparently endorsed today by Alexander Stewart. We have seen a section 35 order made to prevent royal assent to a Scottish bill. Then we have the rule act, which, to be fair, eventually had its so-called automatic sunset clause abandoned when the UK Government finally realised that it was about to unpick so much of the UK and Scotland statute books as to threaten a legislative meltdown. However, it is not easy to avoid the impression that, even after 25 years, there are elements of the Westminster machine that continue not to fully understand devolution. Interestingly, the SEAC Committee report points out that the very lack of clear structures for the governance of England contribute to some of that on-going confusion. Members of the chamber should have seen the warning signs of course some time ago when it became clear that Westminster was regularly unclear about whether it was speaking as the English or UK Parliament. An early example would be when the then-speaker of the House of Commons, John Smith, commented that we have catch Scotland and we will bind her fast. He said that on receipt from us of the Articles of Union in 1707, but I quote the remark because it betrays a view that it is not entirely consigned to history in some quarters and which certainly has an impact on the way in which the rules of devolution shift mid-game in our own day. Indeed, Professor Rawlings told the committee that his quote was a profound ambivalence on the part of the UK Government as to the extent to which the other Administrations had a legitimate part to play in the governance of the UK. Without a shared understanding of what the roles of the various Administrations could be, productive inter-governmental relations were not likely. Anyone might have hoped that there might be a political consensus in the chamber, as there was a political consensus in the committee over the report, that the pressures on this Parliament from Westminster since Brexit do not represent good government. That is regardless of what our individual differing constitutional politics might be. Indeed, there was a time when even the Tory party promoted people who, while politically unionist, would stand up for Scotland's distinctive institutions and her right to pursue policy differently. Sir Walter Scott and John Buchan would be conspicuous examples of that tradition, but I would concede there by no means the most recent. These days, however, the refrain from the Tories in here, with a number of honourable exceptions, is to ask why Scotland should ever do anything differently from England, a question tellingly never posed the other way about. Meanwhile, in the UK Government, we have a Secretary of State for Scotland whose view of this Parliament, I am afraid, is more dismissive perhaps than that of any of his predecessors in that office since the first Earl of Seafield. To conclude, constitutional reform is supposed to be about first principles, but that is not how constitutional change works in the UK. Layer upon layer of new and Byzantine qualifications to devolution have now been laid upon each other in an effort to square the Brexit circle. That Parliament and indeed the Senate in Wales are not even considerations in the mind of the UK Government in any of this, and it is well, Presiding Officer, that we all just say that. Thank you, Dr Allan. I now call Alex Rowley to be followed by Keith Brown up to six minutes, Mr Rowley. Thank you, Presiding Officer. I want to begin by also thanking the committee and the clerks for the work that they have done publishing this detailed report. In reading the report, my first take was that this is a complex and often technical discussion on how two Governments and two Parliaments work together in the interests of the people of Scotland and the UK, and that this is now even more complex post-Brexit. A point made by the committee adviser, Professor Keaton, who said, and I quote, that there is now a complex landscape of intergovernmental mechanisms that has grown incrementally rather than following from a clear constitutional design. As the chair of the House of Commons Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee told the committee, the issue of how devolution works was being looked at by them before Brexit, and it is worth noting that, in his view, little progress was being made. A point also made by Professor McEwen, where she states, changes were already a foot before Brexit came along with the new devolution settlement making things a lot more complex and interdependent given the split between devolved and reserved powers. However, she adds, the impact of Brexit created a completely new constitutional landscape within which devolution is framed. As the committee stated, fundamentally there remains an ongoing intergovernmental disagreement regarding the extent to which the executive and the legislative autonomy of the devolved Governments and legislators have been undermined by the constitutional arrangements put in place post-EU exit. Those things are often complex, often technical, but the key point is that, to make progress and reach agreement, you need to have both Governments being committed to the principles of devolution and to be willing to work together through co-operation to find agreed solutions. A point made many times in this report and the example given by others from Lord Smith, who stated, there needs to be greater respect between both Governments. A point also picked up by Professor Jim Gallacher when speaking about the UK Internal Market Act, where he states that the UK Internal Market Act was an error and that it would have been possible to deal with questions of regulatory diversions and that, in practice, it will be possible to deal with such questions if there is a political will to do so between respective Governments. Sadly, not only has this not happened, but I would suggest that it is often felt like two parties of government determined to use the constitution to create division, conflict and confusion all in the pursuit of their own political ambition. I believe that the people up and down Scotland have had enough of division. Indeed, I believe that people are exhausted with the constant bickering between two Governments and want change in approach, change in attitude and a change in focus. Labour is the party of devolution. Labour in government delivered this Parliament with the backing of 75 per cent of voters in 1997 in the referendum. An enormous majority shown the strength of feeling in the country that Scotland needed a greater level of power and control over issues that impact on the Scottish people. Some who support independence say that devolution is not enough to resolve the issues that Scotland faces and that only an independent Scotland is capable of that. Some who are entirely opposed to independence say that devolution is a failed experiment that the UK Government should have supremacy over all areas of the UK. I agree with the comments made by Anas Sarwar in his New Year's speech yesterday, where he said that devolution was never meant to be about two Governments fighting with each other and ultimately failing Scots. Nor, in my opinion, was devolution meant to be about what flag you stick on a piece of legislation or simply moving power from one centralised institution to another. Devolution is supposed to be the opportunity for the interests and concerns of the Scottish people to be better represented for decisions to be made at the level where they most make sense, whether that be within local communities, local authorities, regions or individual countries that make up the UK or, indeed, at a UK-wide level. That is why Labour is clear that we need co-operation over conflict so that we can build a Scotland that thrives in a coalition of neighbours, not a Scotland that is the only loser in an endless, pointless tug-of-war between two warring parties. All of us here in this chamber, Presiding Officer, have a responsibility to the electorate to ensure that devolution is no longer used as a weapon of division but as a tool for the lover and for the people of Scotland. The people of Scotland deserve no less. Thank you, Mr Rowley. I now call Keith Brown to be followed by John Swinney up to six minutes. Thank you, Presiding Officer. I joined the committee in September last year, so that was after the evidence-taking sessions had taken place, but before the publication of the report. However, I have been a member of the Parliament since 2007, and it is fair to say that the impact of Brexit on the Parliament is clear for all to see. Just as a little corrective to Alec Rowley and Alec Cole-Hamilton, who are trying to portray why they want to excuse what the Tory Government does, but it does. When the Labour Party was in control of this place with the Liberal Democrats and when it was a Labour Government, it made a member of the Jack McCormor report that was commissioned that showed that there was widespread ignorance and indifference across the whole of Whitehall to this institution. That was under a Labour Government during the time that Labour were in power here as well. It is often said that power devolved is power retained. Although that has always been true, it is also true that when the UK was a member of the EU, there was a degree of protection for the rights of parliaments, like ours, situated within larger EU states. That provided a framework of intergovernmental relationships that more or less worked as intended. Of course, my preference has always been for Scotland to be an EU member state in its own right. When I say that I am an internationalist to my bones, I do not mean that, as Alec Cole-Hamilton does, he is an internationalist until Brexit happens and then he gives up on Brexit. I oppose Brexit and I oppose Brexit now. Today, though, it is quite clear that, as expressed in conclusions of part 2 of the committee's report, devolution, as it says, looks very different outside of the EU compared to when the UK was a member state. The committee has noted that there was considerable clarity, consistency and consensus in how the regulatory environment was managed within the EU prior to EU exit, whereas after EU exit, there has been significant disagreement between the devolved institutions and the UK Government regarding how the regulatory environment should be managed within the UK. I have to say that Jamie Greene is utterly deluded if he thought that the UK Parliament would provide a proper scrutiny of EU legislation. There is probably not an academic that he could cite that would back up that point of view. The UK Government has not provided that scrutiny in the past and has done as much as it can to undermine Scotland's ability to do that. I would also add that, as well as a change in the legislative framework, there has been a change in the attitude, as has been mentioned already, of the UK Government. We now have the muscular unionism, which is now the norm. It is actually very redolent for those who can remember it of the mid-1990s, before the Tory Government was thrown out then. That was one of the most strident and least tolerant. I would also add that, as well as that change, we have seen, of course, what has been mentioned by many members, the willingness to override, for example, the CEO convention. I remember the vow that told us that there would be the strongest parliament in the world. Gordon Brown told us, David Cameron told us, and part of that was to have enshrined in law the CEO convention. It moved on within a very short period of time to the Tory Westminster Government saying before the Supreme Court that the CEO convention was merely a self-denying ordinance, something that he could decide if he wanted to observe or not. That is how quickly the evolution has changed under this Conservative Government. Much of the problem, as has been mentioned, comes down to the ad hoc nature of the British constitution, where conventions and general principles apply until, of course, they do not apply. There is nothing hard and fast about how the UK operates, and though we are used to that by now, we should not put up with it. The idea that we should normalise that one of the most important offices of state in the UK, the foreign secretary, is just somebody plucked from elsewhere without being elected, or, of course, the prologue of parliament or the various other rules, which are not really rules. The UK used to always say that it was a model democracy, the mother of all parliaments, and it supported the separation of powers. However, at the same time, it had one position—the Lord Chancellor, who was in the executive, the judiciary and the legislature. There has never been the separation of powers in the UK Parliament. Since the independence referendum, we have been repeatedly told that we are the most powerful devolved parliament in the world. We have heard from the cabinet secretary 11 times that he has run much, much shod over the show convention. In 2016, David Cameron claimed that the Scotland bill once enacted would deliver that very strong, powerful devolved parliament. Speaking to the House of Commons Committee just last July, Mrs Sunak said that, I think, actually, that the Scottish Government, as far as I can recall, when I last looked at this, was probably the most powerful devolved assembly anywhere in the world. It is as if they say often enough and loud enough that people will eventually believe them, but that last quote from Mrs Sunak gives the game away. I think, as far as I can recall, when I last looked at this, probably. I don't know if you could have caveated it any heavier than he did, because the reality is that it is simply not true. This Parliament can and is being overruled by Westminster. The use of section 35 powers has said that I will do yes, if you can be brief. Tim Fairlie briefly. Thank you very much to Keith Brown for taking the intervention. We have had Alec Rowley, we have had Alex Anderson, we have had Jamie Greene all talking about how it is our fault in this Parliament that the devolution settlement is not working. I have got a quote here from the Law Society written evidence to our committee on devolution. We note that there are no domestic legal constraints on the powers of the UK Parliament or the UK Government concerning common frameworks. We note that the devolved Governments will be either bound to such common frameworks because they have agreed to them or because they are bound by law. Does that not just emphasise the fact that power devolved is power retained? That is not briefly, Keith Brown. It is also true, not brief, but it is true. I think that I was just about to mention section 35. The real effect of section 35 being exercised is the chilling effect that it will have on this Parliament and the Government when it considers what future legislation it wants to take forward for the people of Scotland. That would apply to any party in this place as well. Despite all the warm words about how powerful the Parliament is, the Tories in this Parliament have cheered the UK Government on every step of the way. They do not see themselves as representatives of the devolved institution. They see themselves as agents of a Tory party, a Tory Government in Westminster. That is a fundamental betrayal of the electorate that sent them here in the first place. They have cheered every step of the way when we have had the UK Government riding roughshod over the democratic-elected express views of the Scottish people. In the meantime, I support the support, I echo the concerns that it expresses, and I commend the recommendations to the Parliament. I now call John Swinney to be followed by Mark Ruskell up to six minutes. I want to begin by commending the constitution, Europe, external affairs and culture committee on an outstanding report, which I think is a seminal moment for this Parliament and this parliamentary session, for two reasons. Firstly, the convener has managed to draw shades of opinion right across the parliamentary spectrum in a report that unanimously concludes that, as a consequence of Brexit, the powers of this Parliament have been undermined by the actions and response of the United Kingdom Government. I do not say that to be provocative. I say it to recognise and admire the strength of conclusion that has been arrived at by the thinking and the contribution of members from across the political spectrum. The second reason why I think that this is a seminal moment is that we are beginning to confront the democratic difficulty that Scotland finds itself in now. In 1997, the devolution referendum resulted in the overwhelming consent, the utterly gobsmacking level of consent given by the people of Scotland to the establishment of the Scottish Parliament. It was an absolute triumph for the founders and the architects of devolution to attract that degree of consent from the public in Scotland. Arguably, as I said in my intervention to Mr Bibby earlier on, the independence referendum in 2014 indicated, much to my concern and distress, that people in Scotland at that stage did not want Scotland to be independent, so they reaffirmed—I think that it is a reasonable conclusion to draw—their support for devolution. Along comes the Brexit referendum in 2016. The Scottish people vote decisively against Brexit but yet have Brexit forced down their throats by a Conservative Government determined to pursue the approach that it has taken. In so doing, it has undermined the democratic consent given by the people of Scotland in 1997. Now, nobody has addressed that argument yet because the people of Scotland fundamentally have had the settlement that they voted for comprehensively and overwhelmingly in 1997 undermined by a Conservative Government pursuing the implementation of Brexit, which people in Scotland did not vote for. It has had implications for devolution that people in Scotland never consented to. If we need evidence of what that undermining of the devolution settlement looks like, it looks like the disregarding, the rendering as meaningless, the sole convention, after the number of times it has been breached since 2018. The legislative for the internal market act of Mr Greene thinks that the Scottish Parliament would be able, without interference from the internal market act and the UK Government to do all that he was asking it to do, that he is living in fantasy land. All we need to look to is the deposit rate. Mr Greene shouts out to me that we have not even tried. We have tried things like the deposit return scheme. That fell for the deposit return scheme for heaven's sake. Glass recycling is such a constitutional threat that we cannot be allowed to get on with that because of its threat to the internal market act. The internal market act is being used to erode the ability of the Parliament and the confidence of the Parliament to be able to legislate in areas of its devolved competence. As a former minister, I can imagine what the advice will be like to current ministers about the ability to confidently legislate. There will be various caveats being put in by civil servants for good reason because of the precedent set by the malicious actions of the Secretary of State for Scotland in undermining the deposit return scheme. That is when I get to people such as Mr Rowley. He knows that I hold him in the highest personal regard and admiration. I am so disappointed by his speech today. Mr Rowley has tried to take the Alec Cole-Hamilton approach to this debate, which flummoxes me entirely, of trying to equate the determination of this Government to act within its legislative competence with the right of the Secretary of State for Scotland to act in a malicious and unfounded basis in eroding the deposit return scheme. I cannot fathom that. I cannot see how Alec Rowley can equate those two actions. The debate prompts a big question. My colleague Kate Forbes has put this question to Parliament today. What do we do about this? Do we—maybe I have just spent the last four and a half minutes doing exactly that—of returning into our tribal backgrounds and criticise people about it? Or do we step forward as a United Parliament, as this committee has done under the leadership of my colleague Clare Adamson, and say that this is the moment where we all have got to say that this Parliament is in jeopardy? It is under threat. If we do not realise that threat and the scale of that threat and do something about it together without trading our different views—and if it requires me to change my behaviour, I will change my behaviour for the occasion to do it—we have to recognise that this Parliament's powers that our people voted for decisively in 1997 are being eroded in front of our eyes. If there was a different Government occupying that front bench because of the position of the internal market act, that Government would still struggle with issues that I am raising today because of what has been done to undermine devolution by the back door and the people of Scotland have not been asked. The question for this afternoon is whether we are prepared to rise above this. Are we prepared to defend our Parliament and defend the democratic decision of the people of Scotland in 1997? I now call Mark Ruskell to be followed by Jacqueline Martin. Up to six minutes, please, Mr Ruskell. Thank you very much, Deputy Presiding Officer, and I thank colleagues and Clarks for producing this absolutely critical report. In this first debate of 2024, I would like to wish for a return to some form of normal functional relationship between the UK Government and the devolved Administrations across the islands. It is quite clear that when we are in the EU, the EU membership worked for the whole of the UK. It delivered the certainty that business needed. It kept us in a single market with clear rules while protecting and enhancing our rights as citizens. Instead of adopting a steadily growing consensual body of European law, we now increasingly face political turmoil and uncertainty in the UK. As Professor McEwen told the inquiry, issues that are discussed at a technical level under common frameworks can easily become the political. We have already heard an example of that from John Swinney. As John Swinney has just outlined, the devolution settlement, the vast majority of Scots voted for in 1997 and again in 2014, no longer exists. There has been a fundamental shift of power to the UK Government. Ironically, while the mantra of Brexit was about taking back control, the devolved Administrations now have far less latitude for divergence than we had under the UK's EU membership. That in itself is a huge loss, because one of the strengths of devolution has been that big laboratory of ideas—the opportunity to innovate on policy, to test and develop new policies such as the smoking ban at devolved level. I'm concerned that we're now entering a period where there's going to be a real chilling effect on any new policies that are brought forward at the devolved level. With the growing powers that came following both the Kalman and the Smith commissions, the landscape of devolution started to become increasingly complex even before Brexit crash landed. Powers over social security and tax, for example, have been critical in allowing the democratic will of this Parliament to deliver the fairest society that people voted for, but inevitably there has been strain when both Governments have been moving in clearly different directions. Intergovernmental relations have yet to be fully opened up for scrutiny by any Parliament in the UK, which is regrettable because without that transparency, we as parliamentarians can't hold any intergovernmental process or administration to account. I'll give you an example of that out of the 32 common frameworks that are needed now post-Brexit. 27 of them have yet to even been published. We haven't seen them, and that makes clearly the work of parliaments very challenging, if not impossible. I'd like to return back to the issue of deposit return schemes that John Swinney raised and the role of the Internal Market Act, because the Scottish DRS is rightly being scrutinised by our own net zero energy transport committee at the moment, but the refusal of any UK Government minister to engage with that committee makes it almost impossible to understand where the scheme can go next in Scotland. In theory, DRS schemes in Scotland and Wales can proceed without glass. There is an exemption that has been granted under the Internal Market Act for that, but the requirement for devolved schemes to match the rules of an English DRS scheme, which does not even exist, has put an indefinite bloc on any Scottish scheme. The refusal from UK ministers to provide any clarity about their decision let alone their own vision for how DRS should work across the UK has left businesses as much in the dark as MSPs. Meanwhile, empty facilities sit in supermarket carparks across Scotland waiting for that decision, waiting for that clarity or waiting for that certainty. It does call into the question whether the Internal Market Act is fit for purpose. I'm going to quote Philip Rycroft, who many will remember, of course, as a civil servant who is responsible for delivering Brexit. He gave evidence to the committee, and he said that we had a mechanism through the common frameworks to deal with domains where there are cross-border issues and where divergent regimes might have caused problems either side of borders. I've yet to see any evidence that suggests that common frameworks would not have been adequate to deal with those issues. In that context, the 2020 act was a step too far. Absolutely, I agree with Philip Rycroft on this issue, the IMA act was a step too far. Of course, we have an asymmetric devolution settlement in the UK, as Alasdair Allan has already pointed out, where the UK Government is acting both as the Government of England and as the rule maker of a UK internal market. That is a clear conflict. Professor Gallacher spoke to the inquiry about the role that the UK Government has in micromanaging policy for 85 per cent of the population and how that creates a cultural barrier to working with devolved Administrations who, of course, deliver for the 15 per cent. He went on to say that, quote, how change in the governance of England is an essential precondition for effective intergovernmental relations for the rest of the UK. It is clear that a reset is needed. Conventions that held up over the early devolution years were already under strain before Brexit. The SEAL Convention should be the basic foundation for courtesy and respect between Administrations, but it has absolutely withered away. Professor McCarg said that strengthening the SEAL Convention is fundamental, because unless there is some protection for the devolved institutions against the unilateral exercise of Westminster sovereignty, there are no guarantees of anything. When the SEAL Convention does not even apply to far-reaching statutory instruments that can amend primary devolved legislation, we are in the territory of a dangerous power grab. We are seeing the exertion not just of parliamentary sovereignty but parliamentary supremacy by the UK Government, which will continue to erode the very union that that Government has pledged to protect. I hope that this year brings reform and a much-needed reset in UK relations, but ultimately the logic of rejoining in Europe based on solidarity and consensus gets stronger every day. It is the will of people in Scotland that must be able to decide on their future once again. I thank the convener, the committee members and the clerks for their work on this report that is before us today. It is fair to say that this is a debate that I would rather not be taken part in today, because I would rather the need for it, that is Scotland being ripped out of the EU against its will, had not happened. However, we are where we are. Today we are worse off, more isolated and subjected to more and more to the whims of an increasingly desperate UK Government. That is the outcome that a majority of Scots voted against, but which has been mandated by a UK-wide electorate and delivered by a UK Government. Before I go into the detail of this debate, I think that it is important that we reflect on one of the reasons why Brexit happened and why folk voted for it. For a lot of folk, they simply could not see a link between how the EU worked and how it impacted on their day-to-day lives. As we try to untangle the mess that is Brexit and how that mess impacts on some of the more complex aspects of how devolution in this Parliament works, I hope that we can take a few moments to explain how that will impact on the lives of the folk that we all represent. Let us face it as important as conventions and legislative consent mechanisms are to how we work. To a lot of the folk out there in our constituencies and regions, those terms might not mean that much. In practice, the challenges that the report highlights mean that this Parliament and the Scottish Government are now more limited in how they can deliver for the folk of Scotland. For example, if we look at food standards, the Aberdeen-based food standards Scotland, which works to protect all of our constituents, used to have a clearly defined remit within what is devolved. Now, where we are today, this Parliament may not be able to insist on food standards for all products going forward, and in turn that means that food standards Scotland may be restricted in future and being able to safeguard the public. But this issue of different standards extends to more than just food. In my own constituency of Aberdeen-Donside, I have spoken to numerous businesses who are worried about being able to continue to do business with the EU, with the divergence of regulations being a key concern of many. Those businesses, including many in the wider energy industry, who should be helping to establish Aberdeen as a net zero capital, need to be able to do business both within Scotland and across Europe. Those businesses fear that having been cut adrift from Europe, we will now be anchored down by Westminster's internal market act. The scale of the issue means that it risks jobs and livelihoods within my constituency, not just in the immediate future but also in the longer term. I have a real fear that that could undermine Aberdeen's ability to realise a just transition, and that could damage our local economy for generations to come. If we truly want to see Aberdeen establish itself as the global net capital, then we need to offer the sort of clarity and consistency that this report highlights has been sorely lacking since we left the EU. Presiding Officer, as we look back to 2016 for a lot of folk that vote wasn't just about how the EU mattered to their lives. It was about how much power they felt they had over their own destinies. In that referendum, folk across Scotland were bombarded with leaflets and billboards that promised to take back control, and now, after three years of broken Brexit Britain, I wonder if they feel they have more control than they did before the referendum? Do they feel Brexit has worked for them or made any positive difference to their lives? That report highlights that, through this Parliament, through us as elected members and through their own ability to engage in devolved issues, folk in Scotland now have less control than they did in 2016. From everything that I have seen, I believe that Brexit has made us poorer, both financially and socially. It has made it harder to attract the best and the brightest from across the globe to Aberdein, to our universities, to our NHS, to our energy industry, and it has made my constituents' lives worse. The UK Government, whoever that Government of the day may be, for as long as the UK still exists, needs to work with this Parliament to ensure devolution works for Scotland that allows us to do the best for the people that we represent. As we move forward, those folk feel that they have a meaningful say in shaping and determining their own destinies. I now call Martin Whitfield to be followed by Emma Harper up to six minutes, please, Mr Whitfield. I am very grateful, Deputy Presiding Officer, and it is a pleasure to contribute to this debate this afternoon. Like others, I thank the committee, their clerks and, indeed, the witnesses for the extensive work that they have done, not just over the most recent report, but the ones that came before that. I think that it is worth reminding ourselves that engraved on the threshold of the Donald Dior Room in this Parliament is JP McIntosh's phrase, people in Scotland want a degree of government for themselves, and it is not beyond the wit of man to devise institutions to meet those demands. Scottish Labour is the party of devolution, and we will always defend and seek to strengthen it both in government and in opposition, because we believe that the interests of the people of Scotland are best served when both the Scottish and UK Governments work together in a co-operation, but both the Tories and I must say the SNP have been bad for devolution because they have preferred a drive of grievance over effective intergovernmental relations. Let me make some short progress. I think that it is right when we look at some of the very strong contributions that we have already heard today that draw on the report. Indeed, it was Mark Ruskell that so accurately quoted Professor McCard from paragraph 127 of the report. Professor McCard went on to say, we need to try to get back to the situation that we were in pre-Brexit, in which parliamentary sovereignty still existed in principle, but its operation in practice was constrained. I think that there has been a breakdown. It is interesting that the committee and indeed many contributions have talked about the structural failures and the fact that we need to build structure to protect the devolved Parliament, but it comes back to the political interaction there, which has caused that damage to the structural. We keep hearing this rhetoric from all the other parties about how it is the SNP's fault that devolution is not working. However, the NFU wrote to our committee in December 2021 that it says, it is clear the view of NFU Scotland that the principles now embedded in the UK internal market act 2020 pose a significant threat to the development of common frameworks and to the devolved policy. It is not coming from the SNP, it is coming from outside organisations, including the NFU Scotland and the Law Society of Scotland. I am very grateful for the intervention, but that is not what I said. What I said was that there has been a failure of two Governments to create the space in which the school that I am going to go on and speak about, the school convention sits there, but it is the failure of those two Governments to interact to create the space where intergovernmental discussion can take place and move forward. It seems to me challenging that if we have a situation where a group within this Parliament will say that the Scottish Government are not at fault over anything and we have it not at the moment, a group in this Parliament that says that the Scottish Government are not at fault at anything and a group down the road saying that the UK Government are not at fault at anything, then it echoes what a number of speakers have said. We need, and indeed the committee report, a reset. Without that reset, we are not going to get anywhere. We are not going to serve the people of Scotland. We are not going to have the wit to give the power close enough to the people who suffer the consequences of those powers where we can make a difference. Unless we are, after 25 years, mature enough to do that, then I think to talk about the democratic deficit that John Swinney so rightly indicated and pointed out that, in fact, more than the potential is there, we are going to be in a terrible, terrible cul-de-sac that we cannot get out of and we cannot get out of for the people of Scotland. John Swinney. I am grateful to Mr Whitefield for giving way. I wonder then if he will make clear, will the Labour Party, if it is returned to Government in 2024, abolish the Internal Market Act? To that point and to a number of points, and I am conscious of time, I did want to address the Sewell point, which is important, because I think it talks to what Alexander Stewart said in his opening speech, which was, we have a situation where there are unwritten rules, there are spaces in which people who play by the rules can discuss and can meet. The Sewell convention sat in that area where there was an agreement and the cabinet secretary agreed with me that, up until 2018, we had perfect evidence of not normally. We had a convention that was operated because people played by the rules, Government, politicians played by the rules, and that has failed and that now needs to change. To go back to the quote that is enshrined here in this Parliament, we need to be able to pass power down as close to the people that matter, and that includes this place passing power down to local authorities with proper support so that, to answer the democratic deficit, people can see that what they vote for, they can hold that individual, that political party, that group that come together to sit there and be held to account for their actions that they have made. My very last contribution, because I recognise time is tight this afternoon, and I apologise, Deputy Presiding Officer. I think to turn to paragraph 201 of this report is to speak to the heart of what needs to happen. The committee notes the lack of consensus clarity and consistency in how the regulatory environment is now managed, has considerable consequences for the effectiveness of the Scottish Parliament in carrying out its core legislative function and role in holding the Scottish ministers to account, and it is that that we are responsible for in this place, and it is to that that we should speak to. I am grateful, Deputy Presiding Officer. Thank you, Mr Whitfield, and I call Emma Harper up to six minutes, please. Thank you, Presiding Officer. I, too, as all the members have already said, want to thank the SEAC Committee, its clerks and the convener who is here, and the advisers for producing this important report. This report highlights that devolution is under relentless attack from the UK Government, and the committee's inquiry highlights that there are widespread concerns about the future of devolution given the approach of the current UK Government. The inquiry has shown that, since the UK has left the EU, the UK Government has been intent on regulatory divergence across the UK. The committee's report has also shown that the UK Government is disrupting inter-governmental relationships across the UK, but also with European countries and others across the world. The Scottish Parliament was reconvened because the people in Scotland voted for it, but the Westminster Government is rolling back on that democratic process, and that must be called out. The ability of the Scottish Parliament to legislate on devolved matters should be restated. Evidence to the committee indicated that the UK Government viewed itself to be superior over devolved legislatures. However, there must be recognition that there is no hierarchy of Governments, each has its own powers and each has its own responsibilities. There should be a commitment to working together with mutual respect and cooperation among the Governments of the UK as equals. Presiding Officer, I am a member of the British Irish Parliamentary Assembly, and BIPAA promotes inter-governmental relations. It is exactly what the assembly aims to do. We bring Parliamentarians together, the different legislatures in Scotland, England, Ireland, Wales, Northern Ireland, Jersey, Guernsey and the Isle of Man. The members come together to discuss legislation, we share ideas, we hear from experts and we promote good, positive inter-governmental relationships, and we look at current and proposed legislation on how we can improve the lives for our own people in our respective areas. Maybe the UK Government should learn from the BIPAA colleagues and see if we can take forward better inter-governmental work in that way. That is important, but, as the committee report inquiry has shown, the UK Government is systematically working to erode inter-governmental relations and co-operations through its obsession with ideological politics. The committee's inquiry has made clear that the Governments should co-operate through negotiation and consensus using agreed inter-governmental processes such as common frameworks, which others have mentioned, instead of the UK Government centralising and imposing its views using the formal powers of the Westminster Parliament. It is clear that there must be a return to the previous constitutional norm in that the sole convention is always followed underpinned by proper legal duties on the UK Government. Not the current system we have where, should this Parliament, for example, refuse to give consent to a UK statutory instrument, the UK Government just plows ahead anyway. It is not consensus and, again, as the committee stated, it is another example of the UK Government eroding the evolution. Scotland voted overwhelmingly to remain in the EU with every one of Scotland's 32 council areas choosing to reject Brexit in 2016. Contrary to better together promises of Scotland being an equal partner in the UK in 2014, Scotland's wishes were completely ignored by Westminster after the EU referendum. People, businesses and communities in Scotland are now paying a heavy price for a hard Brexit that we rejected that is imposed by a Tory Government that nobody voted for in Scotland. On top of the threat to Scottish democracy, the staggering economic comic cost of Brexit Britain is clear. The committee inquiry has shown that, against our democratic will and against and in the midst of unprecedented crisis, Scotland has been removed from a market worth £16 billion in exports to Scottish companies at a time of Brexit and which, by population, is seven times the size of the UK. The office for budget responsibility expects that the UK GDP to be 4 per cent lower in the long run because of Brexit, equivalent to a £3 million drop in public revenues for Scotland every single year. The Scottish Government modelling shows that the Scotland's economy and social wellbeing are disproportionately impacted by Brexit, with Scotland's GDP set to be £9 billion lower in 2016 cash terms by 2030 as a 6.1 per cent cut compared to the continued EU membership. There is no group of people or sector of the economy that the Brexit-earing UK Government is not willing to sacrifice on the altar of Brexit. The final point that I want to make before that is that I will pick up what Jackie Dunbar said about food standards Scotland. One of the things that in my work on previous rural committee, I picked up the issue of US and UK trade arrangements. The Food and Drug Administration in America have an acceptable level of defects handbook and that is used in the States. That allows a certain percentage of defects in food products. In Scotland we have no sale over trade agreements and the Scottish Parliament has no input or no control and the UK Government legislates that for us. Those are products that I will not bring to the chamber today, but I have raised them in other debates, but there are issues with mould mites, insect parts and rat poo, if anybody wants to talk to me later about it. My final point is that what we need to look at is making a point about disrespect of the UK Government that they have shown to this democratic Parliament. We need to look at what solutions we need to take forward. One of the issues that I have is that there have been numerous examples of cabinet secretaries and ministers on their feet in this chamber stating that they have written to a UK Government minister and had no replies. Indeed, I have written to the Scottish Secretary, who is also my MP in Dumfries and Galloway, on 19 separate occasions and have never once had a reply, even on matters of casework. Maybe I should hand deliver those letters to the Queen Elizabeth House round the corner. It is time for this disrespect to end, and, as the committee report shows, it is time for devolution to be protected. Thank you, Ms Harper. We will now move to closing speeches. I note that one member who participated in the debate is not present for closing speeches, which is a discurtyst to the other members who participated in the debate and to the chair. I call Fausal Chowdry to close on behalf of Scottish Labour up to seven minutes, please. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I would like to congratulate the committee and the clerks of their substantial report. As many others have already iterated, I am glad to see enormous support for us across the chamber. Since the Scottish Parliament was created in 1999, devolution has evolved significantly. Alexander Stewart spoke of devolution beginning an important part of Scotland political history and his right. It is now one of the most devolved institutions in the world. Since its formation, the Parliament was legally required to implement ULO in the devolved areas. Brexit changed this, and as Angus Robertson began by outlining the unprecedented impact that this has had on devolved institutions in the UK. Leaving the EU had considerable consequences for the Scottish Parliament's ability to carry out rightful scrutiny in devolved areas. Now, more than ever, we need competent governments across the UK who co-operate and communicate to overcome this change. As many of my colleagues in the chamber addressed, a key recommendation of this report is the need for improved intergovernmental co-operation. The committee's report outlined that, after the EU exit, there has been significant disagreement between the devolved institution and the UK government regarding how the regulatory environment should be managed within the UK. Since the UK's departure from the EU, there has been a clear deterioration in relation between the UK government and the devolved institutions. Clare Adamson spoke of the structural and systematic challenges that have arisen with the devolution as a result of Brexit. This is true, but years of political disagreement and point scoring has also led to a still relationship between the Scottish SNP government and the UK Conservative Governments. This political quarrel dates back to well before Brexit, and as Alex Rowley spoke of how we now have two parties determined to use the constitution to pursue their own political ambition and foster division. Scottish Labour believe the people of Scotland and the rest of the UK deserve co-operation and trust between our governments, not conflict. Currently, relations between the UK government and the devolved counterparts can be summed up as my colleague Neil Bibby outlined as culture of conflict. A new approach and rebombed relationship between the UK government and devolved institutions is required. The upcoming general election is the clear chance or chance to do this, and Scottish Labour are ready to take charge. Deputy Presiding Officer, transparency is paramount to strengthening intergovernmental relations moving forward. The committee report outlines that we need to see better, more open communication between the UK and devolved governments in areas where reserved and devolved powers interests. Trust and transparency are key to the success of devolution. Alex Cole-Hamilton already highlighted the deficiency of the relationship between the UK and the Scottish government since Brexit. What we currently have two government in the UK who continually refuses to co-operate and communicate with one another, and devolution suffers as a result. Labour are the party of devolution, and we wish to see they have a lot to go. Labour are the party of devolution, and we wish to see that strengthened and not undermined. The UK's departure from the EU directly impacted on many areas of devolved competence. We wish to see UK and Scottish government that work together through this. This can be done in a way that upholds and seeks to strengthen devolution. Sadly, this is not currently being demonstrated by either of the administration in charge. Instead, years of political disagreement have led to the culture of secrecy and distrust. Finally, Presiding Officer, we cannot seek to mend this relationship if the UK government continue to act in areas of devolved competence. It remains unacceptable for the UK government to legislate in devolved areas of competence without consent. Prior to Brexit, the SEAL conversion has been widely upheld and applied by successive UK Governments. Alistair Allyn outlined how, since Brexit, the process has been breached repeatedly, and the UK government seems to consider the SEAL Convention to be a thing of the past. Passage to act such as internal market act highlight the lack of respect that the UK Conservative government now have for devolution. I shared the concern expressed by committee witness that the SEAL Convention needs to be legally strengthened. As Neil Bibby highlighted, the UK Labour Party's commission on the future of the UK emphasised the need for a new, legally binding statutory formulation of the SEAL Convention. This is needed to be protected and respect devolution and authority of devolved institutions across the UK. I now call Maurice Golden to close on behalf of the Scottish Conservatives up to eight minutes. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. As a previous member of the Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee, I start by thanking the clerks and all those who provided evidence to the committee regarding their report on how devolution is changing post-EU and all the previous reports on the subject that have led to this one. A number of members today have identified legitimate challenges to the devolution settlement that has been faced post-EU in the operating environment, and it is right that we acknowledge those. Claire Adamson, speaking on behalf of the committee, highlighted the daunting challenge for constituents and others knowing who is responsible for what, as well as how businesses keep pace in an evolving regulatory environment. Neil Bibby stressed the need for improved inter-governmental relations, as well as a need for increased transparency. Kate Forbes pointed to Brexit disrupting the devolution settlement and spoke about the need for safeguards to not only protect devolution, but enhance it. Martin Whitfield gave a thoughtful and considered contribution, a sort of contribution that leads to a constructive debate, in my view. Jamie Greene's remarks were focused on the continuity bill and on keeping pace powers and asked the Scottish Government to clarify its position on EU alignment, a point that I will return to. Deputy Presiding Officer, when the committee previously looked at this theme throughout 2022, it was clear that devolution and the mechanisms of devolution were evolving. It was also clear that it is taking time for Scotland's two Governments to come to terms with the new constitutional and legislative arrangements that have arisen as a result of Brexit. That is work in progress, but, critically, work is progressing. For example, until 2022, the structures underpinning inter-governmental relations were set out in memorandums of understandings. Now, those have been replaced by the structures and ways of working set out in inter-governmental review. That is a step in the right direction. The committee's adviser, Professor Keating, pointed out that the process is widely regarded as an improvement on the previous system. Professor Nicola McEwen told the committee that, despite not being fully implemented, there had been a big reform of the machinery of inter-governmental relations. It was always going to take time, but, critically, we continue to move in the right direction. As we move forward, legitimate issues regarding the post-EU devolution settlement will continue to exist, but those are not insurmountable. However, all parties have to work together in good faith to resolve those issues. As it is right to hear and acknowledge genuine challenges from the devolution settlement that is facing, once again we have heard time and time again from members this afternoon regarding the usual attempts to sow division and use the issue for political grandstanding. Angus Robertson described Brexit as an assault and blamed the internal market act on the failed deposit return scheme rather than accepting responsibility for a series of hapless blunders from the Scottish Government. A point equally mischaracterised by John Swinney, who also used the terms attack and malicious, and Emma Harper went one better calling it a relentless attack. Alex Cole-Hamilton described it as tired and divisive politics and also presented his view for a federal vision for democracy in the United Kingdom. If we look at the internal market act, my colleague Alexander Stewart highlighted the importance of trade between Scotland and the rest of the UK and the jobs that rely on it, and he recognised rightly that the Scottish Government is quick to attack the internal market act, a harsh line that we have heard repeated today. However, it has a real problem in acting in the best interests of Scotland by accepting the importance of enabling Scottish businesses to trade freely and fairly with the rest of the UK. Furthermore, the SNP has previously claimed that the UK internal market bill would, and I quote, greenlight the UK Government to hope progress in setting of regulations and standards. However, where is the rollback of regulations? In a number of areas, the UK is making even firmer commitments than the EU. Take another area, that of regulatory alignment with the EU. This is another smokescreen for the Scottish Government. The reality is that there have been no major tensions arisen largely because the Scottish Government has only once chosen to align to newly introduced EU law, despite it being its stated default position to do so. At the same point in the future, there will be situations when regulatory divergence is proposed and constructive dialogue is required, and through common frameworks, any tensions within the devolved settlement can be resolved by managing regulatory divergence on a consensual basis. As we have heard throughout this afternoon, there are challenges that still exist as devolution continues to evolve post Brexit. Many of those challenges are legitimate and are recognised by those of us on those benches, but many of the challenges that we have heard this afternoon are manufactured grievance by the Scottish Government. The reality is that we want devolution and we want devolution to work, but can the same really be said for the SNP? They do not want devolution, they want independence. They see devolution as a means to their ends. Just this weekend, we heard from the First Minister regarding his fantasy claims that families would be £10,000 better off under an independent Scotland. That, along with the SNP's fantasy series of papers on Scottish independence, such a complete waste of time and money, the SNP would be far better focusing on how much better off Scottish families could be if they had a competent Scottish Government that focused on the powers available to it through the current devolution settlement. The reality is that progress has been made and continues to be made in regards to an ever-evolving devolution settlement. If Scotland's two Governments can work together collaboratively and constructively, then that would be in everyone's interests, especially those of the Scottish people. Thank you, Mr Golden. I now call on Christina McKelvie to close on behalf of the Scottish Government up to nine minutes. Thank you very much, Presiding Officer, and I wish you and the chamber a very happy new year and much joy in 2024. I start by thanking the Constitutional Europe External Affairs and Culture Committee, its members and clerks, for producing this insightful and unanimous analysis of the steady erosion of the devolution settlement since Brexit, so ably chaired by my friend Claire Adamson MSP. John Swinney and others have articulated that at the heart of the issues it addresses lies a double democratic outrage. A deeply damaging, reckless and unnecessary Brexit rejected by the voters of Scotland being used to usher in a sustained attack on the institutions of devolution, which the people of Scotland endorsed decisively in 1997. Like Keith Brown, I remember that the EU afforded protection for devolved nations like ours. The UK Government is not undermining this place by the back door, but by the front door. That cannot be waved away as scaremongering or stoke engravings. The committee was unanimously clear, and its strength is unanimity. The Welsh Government, a Labour administration with different constitutional ambitions from the Scottish Government, is equally alive to the growing threat to devolution there and agrees on the causes. The now routine disregard of the Sewell Convention, a constitutional convention observed scrupulously by UK Governments of all stripes between 1999 and 2018. The imposition of the Trojan horse that is the internal market act without this Parliament's consent, which reduces our effective powers and allows UK ministers to make further changes unilaterally. I am grateful to the minister for giving way. I am pleased that the minister has made the point about the view of the Welsh Government, because I think in this debate, if we are trying to get to a position of unanimity based on what the convener and her committee have provided as foundations, the position of the Welsh Government essentially reduces the tension of this debate because it makes it clear that, independently, a Labour administration in Wales has come to the same conclusions about the impact on devolution as the Scottish Government has come to and as the committee has come to, is that not a strong foundation for us to try to build some unity in the period going forward? I thank John Swinney very much for that intervention and I agree with him wholeheartedly. Keith Brown also reminded us that the use of section 35 powers in the democratic outrage of denying this Parliament's democratic decisions is an outrage. As John Swinney has just said, the growing threat of UK ministers using delegated powers to legislate and devolve matters by passing democratic accountability in the vital scrutiny role of this Parliament. I also agree with John Swinney on his intervention with the cabinet secretary when he said that no time has the consent of the Scottish people being sought when changes are being made by the UK Government. I believe that anyone who supports devolution in this Parliament, regardless of party loyalty, we should be very worried about these developments. I want to pick up on a point that Alexander Stewart made when he talked about dispute resolution mechanisms. However, wholesale legislation such as the Internal Market Act, without discussion, never mind consent, suggests that whatever dispute resolution mechanisms Mr Stewart refers to, are simply not working. The behaviour of the Secretary of State for Scotland is a bare-faced example of this not working. Jackie Dunbar asks, has Brexit made our lives easier? No. What does taking back control mean? Who knows? It was on the side of a bus and on billboards around the country, but who knows what it actually meant? I know what it meant. It meant taking back control from this place and all of the work that we do here. Emma Harper has suggested that the UK Government takes some lessons from BIPA, the British Irish Parliamentary Association, and its processes. That is something that the UK Government should do, because the Scottish Government welcomes that. We will have a look at that, too. However, like the majority of MSPs in this Parliament, I believe that only independence can offer the protections for the institutions of self-government in this country. I believe that the actions of successive UK Governments since Brexit have shown how vulnerable those institutions are. Kate Forbes picked up on that issue in her contribution. She is absolutely correct to ask what would it take to secure our devolution powers and the legal frameworks that are needed to keep those powers safe. I also recognise that there are others in this Parliament who hold different views on Scotland's constitutional future. Kate Forbes and John Swinney ask, what do we need to do? Let me end with a few suggestions on how we can protect as best we can the powers of this Parliament, even under the current constitutional settlement. Regardless of party allegiance, all of us, as parliamentarians, should be able to support those. Let us call them a reset. First, the preeminence of the Parliament to decide on devolved matters should be restated, even if we still have to acknowledge Westminster's continued claim to sovereignty in all those matters. Secondly, there should be recognition that there is no hierarchy of Governments. Each has its own powers and responsibilities, and those should be acknowledged and respected. They are not currently respected. If I pick up on another point from Alexander Stewart and Maurice Golden on the use of the Internal Markets Act, effective internal markets are based on the principles of proportionality and subsidiarity. Factors are completely lacking in the Unworkable, Rigid, Internal Markets Act. Surely you have to accept that. Thirdly, should there therefore be a commitment to working together with mutual respect and co-operation among the Governments of the UK as equals, that is not a hard concept to understand. It has been called for by just about every single speaker who is speaking in this Parliament today. We, the Scottish Government, agree, and we are keen to do so. That commitment should be demonstrated in actions and behaviours and not just words. We have heard about the behaviour of the Secretary of State for Scotland and the behaviour of others. I have to say that my dealings—and I know that the cabinet secretary's dealings with other UK Government ministers—have been very convivial and proactive. We want to work in those ways, so, flowing from that, the Governments should co-operate through negotiation and consensus using agreed intergovernmental processes like common frameworks. On one point, on intergovernmental processes, one of the things that I wanted to pick up was, yes, we do agree and support and look forward to the review of intergovernmental processes. Of course that is welcome, but no process can be effective without a genuine commitment to conducting those relationships with genuine good faith and integrity. A change of attitude and behaviour is required if there is to be genuine improvement in those relationships. Further than the UK Government centralising and imposing its view upon the formal powers of the Westminster Parliament, I agree with Mark Ruskell that there should be a return to the previous constitutional norm that the SEO convention is always followed, underpinned by proper legal duties on the UK Government. I look forward to the proposal set out by Neil Bibby and his contribution in relation to the SEO convention that it started today. I hope that he is in a position to deliver it. I really do. I believe that there is a lot of merit in that, too. I look forward to what he has got to say about the IMA when he comes to having the responsibility to do something about that. I was an easy question, either yes or no, and it wasn't answered yet. I believe that there is a lot of merit in the committee's recommendations on new agreements and processes to promote a more respectful and collaborative system of intergovernmental relations. Before we consider those, however, we must see existing constitutional norms and rules respected. The rules and democratic decisions of this place need to be respected. The recommendations from the committee need to be respected. We are ready to do that and we are ready to work with the UK Government on it. I would ask all parties in this chamber to work with us on that, too. Donald Cameron, to close on behalf of the Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee. Up to 10 minutes, please, Mr Cameron. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. This has been a valuable and important debate, and it is a pleasure to close on behalf of the committee. I add my thanks to the committee's clerks for all their work on this inquiry and to our advisers, Professor Michael Keating and Dr Chris McCorkindale, and to all those who gave evidence. I should also mention, as the convener has done, yesterday's event at Strathclyde University, which was very insightful and raised many pertinent points. Before reflecting on some of the contributions from colleagues, I would like to do two things. First, and I say this gently, this was a unanimous report, but I urge those here, those perhaps who are listening or watching, or those who are reading the official report later, to read carefully the conclusions of the report. In the passions aroused this afternoon, as always in constitutional debates, on all sides, there has occasionally been a departure from what the report actually says. Some of the language used today attributed to views of the committee does not actually accord with the wording of the report. The views of the committee are in the report and it speaks for itself, and I urge people to read it. Secondly, I will briefly touch on the committee's findings into the use of delegated powers by UK ministers in devolved areas, as the convener indicated at the start. The committee notes that managing a regulatory environment while the UK was a member state of the EU, including enacting a huge amount of secondary legislation on a regular basis. Much of that was related to minor technical matters, and it was routine practice for the Scottish ministers to ask UK ministers to implement EU obligations through GB-wide or UK-wide legislation. UK ministers are therefore, of course, correct in saying that it is long-standing practice for the UK Government to legislate in devolved areas using delegated powers. However, this was on the basis of the devolved Governments asking UK ministers to do so and within the limitations of implementing EU law obligations. Other than the use of the section 2.2 power, the committee notes that it was rare for the UK to legislate in devolved areas using delegated powers before the EU exit process. More generally, our view is that the extent of UK ministers' new delegated powers in devolved areas amounts to a significant constitutional change. We have considerable concerns that this change has happened and is continuing to happen without any overarching consideration of the impact on how devolution works. Our findings show that there has been no attempt to design an intergovernmental agreement that would govern the use of delegated powers to manage the post-EU regulatory environment. Instead, the constitutional landscape is now much more complex, with delegated powers for UK ministers in devolved areas in numerous UK acts and not solely in policy areas previously within EU competence. Unlike the process for the transposition of EU law, there is no generic process or overarching agreement as to how the use of those powers should work. Rather, there is a myriad of statutory and non-statutory requirements for UK ministers to seek consent or consult with devolved ministers or to do neither. We have therefore recommended that, similar to the proposed supplementary agreement on common frameworks, there should also be a supplementary agreement on the use of delegated powers by UK ministers in devolved areas, including the criteria for their use. One of the key conclusions of our work is that a significant risk secondary legislation at a UK level in devolved areas will lessen the accountability of Scottish ministers to the Scottish Parliament. In turn, that will lessen the opportunities for the public and stakeholders to engage at a devolved level. On that basis, there is a need for this Parliament to review how it approaches the scrutiny of inter-governmental relations and the scrutiny of the Scottish ministers in their shared role in the governance of the UK. Our view is that the starting point of such a review should be the fundamental constitutional principle that the Scottish Parliament should have the opportunity to effectively scrutinise the exercise of all legislative powers within devolved competence. Such an approach is consistent with this Parliament's founding principles, in particular that the Scottish executive, as it was, should be accountable to the Scottish Parliament and the Parliament and the executive should be accountable to the people of Scotland. I now address some of the points made by colleagues during this afternoon's debate. The cabinet secretary spoke at length about the Sewell convention, among other things, and I will come to him in a moment. Alexander Stewart emphasised the Scottish Conservatives' support for the principles of devolution. He noted that, within the new inter-governmental relations, the dispute resolution process had not been tested. Neil Bibby stated that Scottish Labour wanted to reset relations between the UK Government and the Scottish Government, and Mark Ruskell made a similar point about a reset. Alex Cole-Hamilton stated that devolution depends on trust between both the Scottish Government and the UK Government, and that he believed that Scotland's future lies in a reformed and federal United Kingdom. Kate Forbes stressed how the debate was about structures more than anything. Jamie Greene spoke, interestingly, about the continuity act of the last session and about the substance of EU policymaking. Alex Rowland concentrated on the Sewell convention and his view that it was under attack. Keith Brown, likewise, spoke about this and referred to the ad hoc nature of the British constitution. Professor John Swinney spoke about powers of this Parliament being eroded and gave us his view that it was time for parties to come together and defend the Scottish Parliament. Jackie Dunbar spoke about her experience of the effects of Brexit in a home city of Aberdeen and referred to a broken Brexit Britain. Martin Whitfield spoke about the need to escape from what he thought was a cul-de-sac and Maurice Golden spoke amongst many other things about what he viewed as a manufactured grievance on behalf of the Scottish Government. It is important to note the views of some of the witnesses to this inquiry. Their views were that devolution was already changing even before Brexit. Professor McEwen told the committee that changes were already afoot before Brexit came along. With a new devolution settlement making things a lot more complex and interdependent, given the split between devolved and reserved powers, it is also important to remember that further devolution has taken place since 1998, notably the devolution of some taxation and welfare powers from the Scotland Act 2016. The chair of the House of Commons Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee told the committee that a lot of issues around how devolution works began before we left the European Union and have remained unaddressed largely since 1998, and that is because of the absence of effective and needful inter-governmental relationships and inter-parliamentary relationships. The new complexity has been recognised and the formal system of IGR has recently undergone a number of reforms, many of which are still being implemented across Whitehall. Professor McEwen argued that their introduction has been hampered by the political volatility since the reform was introduced. That new structure includes a formal dispute resolution process, and the committee noted that that has never been used by the Scottish Government and that that is also the case in Wales. In evidence to the committee, the chair of the Legislation, Justice and Constitutional Committee at the Welsh Senate asked in relation to public disputes between the Welsh Government and the UK Government why those are not being tested through the committee structures that have now been set up as part of the inter-governmental machinery or through the dispute resolution procedure. When will they be tested? Lastly, on the Sewell Convention, the committee has previously agreed that the Sewell Convention is under strain. In this report, the committee agreed that there continues to be many instances where the devolved legislatures consent to the UK Government legislating in devolved areas through the legislative consent process. That includes in some areas relating to leaving the EU. The Scottish Government's position has been made very clear, and the cabinet secretary today quoted Mark Drayford that the view that the Sewell Convention had withered on the vine contrasted the strict observance of the convention before Brexit with that afterwards, and he stated that it had been breached 11 times. It is important, just in the interests of balance and fairness, to note the position of the UK Government, because in his letter to the committee on 4 September 2023, the Secretary of State and Minister for Inter-governmental Relations, Michael Gove MP, repeated the UK Government's commitment to the Sewell Convention. He stated that the UK Government had no plans to change its status and in the same letter set out examples of what he described as successful joint working. In conclusion, this is an important and constructive report, which I commend to the Parliament, and I support the motion in the convener's name. That concludes the debate on how devolution is changing post-EU, and it is now time to move on to the next item of business. There is one question to be put as a result of today's business. The question is the motion 11698, in the name of Claire Adamson. On behalf of the Constitution, Europe External Affairs and Culture Committee, on how devolution is changing post-EU, be agreed. Are we all agreed? The motion is therefore agreed. That concludes decision time, and we will now move on to members' business.