 It's good morning and welcome to the committee's 21st meeting in 2019. Can I ask everyone to please make sure that their mobile phones are on silent? We are going to move on to agenda item 1, which is the European Union withdrawal act 2018. This is the sift of two EU exit instruments, as detailed on the agenda. The Scottish government has allocated the negative procedure to both SSIs. Is the committee agreed that it is contempt with the parliamentary procedure allocated to these instruments by the Scottish Government? We are. Thank you. So we move on to agenda item 2, which is the consideration of two negative instruments as detailed on the agenda. No motions to annul or representations have been received in relation to these instruments. Is the committee agreed that it does not wish to make any recommendations in relation to these instruments? We are agreed. So we move on to agenda item 3, and that is we have received consent notifications in relation to one UKSI on pesticides as detailed on the agenda. This instrument is being laid in the UK Parliament in relation to the European Withdrawal Act. Does anyone have any comments on this? No. So the question I have for the committee is does the committee agree to write to the Scottish Government to confirm it is contempt for the consent for the UKSI referred to in the notification be given? We are agreed. Now the Cabinet Secretary is waiting outside, so I'm briefly going to suspend the meeting to allow him to come in so we can move straight on to agenda item 4. So the meeting is now suspended. Thank you. I'm now reconvening this meeting of the Rural Economy and Connectivity Committee, and I could just remind those people who've come in to ensure that their mobile phones are on silent. We now move on to agenda item 4, which is the Transport Scotland build. Today we're continuing our consideration of stage 2 amendments to the Transport Scotland build. I'd like to welcome the Cabinet Secretary for Transport, Infrastructure and Connectivity and his supporting officials. I'd also like to welcome the non-committee members present. I'll explain briefly the procedure now for anyone who is watching. There will be one debate on each group of amendments. I will call the member who lodged the first amendment in that group to speak to and move that amendment and speak to all the other amendments in the group. I then will call on other members who have lodged amendments in that group. Members who have not lodged amendments in the group but who wish to speak should catch my eye. If he has not already spoken to the group, I will then invite the Cabinet Secretary to contribute to the debate. The debate on the group will be concluded by me inviting the member who moved the first amendment in the group to wind up. Following the debate on each group, I will check whether the member who moved the first amendment in the group wishes to press it to a vote or to withdraw. If they wish to press ahead, I will put the question on that amendment. If a member wishes to withdraw their amendment after it has been moved, they must seek the agreement of other members to do so. If any member present objects, the committee immediately moves to vote on that amendment. If any member does not want to move their amendment when called, they should say not moved. Please note that any other member present may move such an amendment. If no one moves the amendment, I will immediately call the next amendment on the marshaled list. I remind everyone that it is only committee members who are allowed to vote. Voting in any division is by a show of hands. I would remind committee members to please keep their hands clearly raised until the clerk has recorded the vote. Clearly raised, I would suggest, is right up in the air rather than just that because that makes it difficult for the clerks. I'm sure everyone will be looking around the table to make sure everyone else is voting as well, Mike. The committee is required to indicate formally that it is considered and agreed each section of the bill, so I'll put a question on each section at the appropriate point. We will not go beyond amendments to part five of the bill today. I'm now going to move to the first amendment, and we are on parking prohibitions enforcement. I'd like to call amendment 145 in the name of the Cabinet Secretary, group with amendments as shown in the groupings. Cabinet Secretary, please can you move amendment 145 and speak to all the amendments in the group? Good morning, convener. The bill is introduced allows a person employed by a local authority or a person employed by a body with whom a local authority has made enforcement arrangements to issue penalty charge notices in connection with breach of the parking prohibitions. Amendment 145 is a technical amendment, which will ensure that authorised enforcement officers can either be directly employed or appointed and engaged otherwise under a contract of employment. Amendment 311 seeks to enable regulations to be made to exempt local authorities without decriminalised parking enforcement powers from the need to enforce the parking prohibition in the bill. Amendment 312 would then permit regulations to set out alternative arrangements for the enforcement of parking prohibition in the bill in those local authority areas. As the bill sets out national parking prohibitions that will apply consistently across Scotland, I do not consider it appropriate to take a power to make separate arrangements for those local authorities that have not yet applied for decriminalised parking enforcement powers. Such an approach would risk creating confusion and undermine the consistent national enforcement of those new prohibitions. It is also unclear from amendment 312 what is intended by way of alternative enforcement arrangements for the non-DPE areas or why the enforcement arrangements set out in the bill may not be appropriate for local authorities without DPE. As I have previously stated, local authorities have the option to either contract enforcement via private companies or enter into an arrangement with a neighbouring local authority for the purposes of enforcement. Amendment 313 seeks to amend section 454 to state that, when local authorities enter into arrangements with third parties in connection with the performance of any of the local authorities' functions, regarding the issue of penalty charges or enforcement and removing or disposing vehicles, the local authority will still be responsible for those functions. The amendment is unnecessary, as the bill confers statutory duties upon local authorities. Although the bill enables local authorities to contract out the performance of some of those duties to third parties, it does not in any way absolve the local authority from legal liability for their statutory obligations as a matter of basic legal principle. Therefore, I ask the committee to support amendment 145, in my name, and I ask Colin Smyth not to press amendment 133 and 132, and Jamie Greene not to press amendment 313. If those amendments are pressed, I would urge the committee to reject them, and I move amendment 145. Thank you, cabinet secretary. I call on Colin Smyth to speak to amendment 311, and any other amendments in the group. Amendment 311, in my name, removes enforcement duties from councils who haven't decriminalised parking enforcement in areas without DPE councils will be required to enforce pavement parking. In other words, just as one type of parking violation without having the power to enforce any other, so they'll be able to ticket a car parked on a pavement but not one parked on a double-year line right next to it. In other words, some councils may have to set up an entirely new team specifically to undertake this one task. This seems completely absurd, and it's my view that enforcement of pavement parking violations should be in line with enforcement of other parking violations. In areas with decriminalised parking enforcement, councils are responsible in areas without the police app. If the Government's position is that any new offences should only be enforced by councils but not the police, then why are they not dealing with the issue of councils who have not decriminalised instead of simply creating this anomaly? Members will recall that the committee raised the issue of the onerous process councils face when it comes to decriminalising parking and urged the Government to look at this process. I'm disappointed that they haven't brought anything forward. Therefore, in the absence of any action from the Government, I have brought forward this amendment. With regards to amendment 312, it's not clear if enforcement responsibilities would automatically fall to the police if removed from these councils. Amendment 312 simply allows the Government to bring forward regulations clarifying this position, i.e. that enforcement should be carried out by the police. I ask Jamie Greene now to speak to amendment 313 and any other amendments in the group. Thank you, convener. Good morning, Cabinet Secretary. My short amendment 313, I think that the Cabinet Secretary in his opening comments quite eloquently described its purpose and its intention. I am pleased to hear the response from the Cabinet Secretary that he feels that there is a strong enough legal basis that local authorities are responsible for the legal administration and responsibility of enforcement. At this point, I stemmed from a conversation that I had about concerns about contracting out of the enforcement to third-party organisations such as the case in private parking, for example, where there are concerns about how those processes might be administered. I am pleased to hear that. On the back of the Cabinet Secretary's comments, I will withdraw that amendment given his assurances and thank him for it. On the other amendments in this group briefly, I am pleased to support the Cabinet Secretary. Colin Smyth's amendment raises a very interesting point. We may get to discuss this later when I bring up some other amendments around enforcement of parking, specifically around schools. He raises a wider issue, and that is a conversation that I hope we have at some point around who is not a case of what is legal or not legal but who enforces what and how easy it is for wardens and decriminalised parking areas and the police to mutually administer any regulations in this bill, whether it is pavement parking, double parking or, indeed, in considerate or obstructive parking in our towns. I think that that has perhaps raised the wider issue, so we will support that for 311 and 312. No other member has indicated that they wish to speak in this section and say, Cabinet Secretary, could you briefly wind up please? To emphasise the point, the decision to decriminalise the enforcement of parking within a local authority area is a matter for the local authority to decide. It stands at the present moment that some 21 local authorities have decriminalised the process. Another two are presently considering that approach. We would encourage others to continue to consider doing that, but it is entirely within their gift to be able to take this process forward, which is a fairly straightforward process for them to do so. It is important that we have a national consistency to the approach that we take in these matters, and that is exactly what amendment I have brought forward seeks to do. Thank you, Cabinet Secretary. The question, therefore, I have, is that amendment 145 be agreed. Are we all agreed? Yes. We are agreed. I am now going to call amendment 146 in the name of Graham Simpson, but I think that Jamie Greene wants to say something on this. Yes, thank you. I have spoken to Mr Simpson and given the apparent lack of support for his amendment 115, he will withdraw all amendments in this park, including 146. I am happy to name them if required, but otherwise just leave it at that. So they are not moved, therefore I am going to call the Cabinet Secretary. I will call amendment 147 in the name of the Cabinet Secretary, who is already debated with amendment 122. Cabinet Secretary, to move formally, please. Moved. The question is that amendment 147 be agreed. Are we all agreed? Yes. We are agreed. The question, therefore, now is that section 48 be agreed. Are we all agreed? Yes. Thank you. We are now moving on to parking prohibition, penalty charges, application of penalty charges, and I am going to call amendment 310 in the name of Jamie Greene, group with amendments 314, 157 and 315. Jamie Greene to move amendment 310 and speak to other amendments in the group. Thank you very much. Those short amendments deal with the penalty charges that are raised as a result of the prohibitions in this part of the bill. The first one, 310, basically sets out the framework of what I think how local authorities should use these revenues for. We discussed this with low-emission zones, and I think that there was wide acceptance that any revenues raised from the low-emission zones should be used and put towards good use. However, in the low-emission zones, there was a structure for setting objectives and that the revenues achieved would be linked to those objectives. I think that that was the right approach that we all agreed on in considering those amendments. In this part of the bill, given that there is a lack of objectives to the prohibitions of pavement and double parking, there is nothing to peg the responsibility of where that revenue goes to. I have listed three categories in subsections, such as public transport services, roads and other transport infrastructure, to try to link it back to the theme and topic of transport, simply to ensure that local authorities spend that money on improving public transport roads and transport infrastructure. That is the main premise of 314 and 315, where technical consequentials are the result of 310. On 157, I believe that we are happy to support the cabinet secretary's amendment. Can I ask you to speak to amendment 157 and other amendments in the group? In section 55, the bill enables Scottish ministers to make regulations regarding the keeping of accounts by local authorities in connection with the enforcement of the parking prohibitions and about the purpose for which any surplus in those accounts may be used. Amendment 157, in my name, is a technical provision ensuring that those regulations may make provision about the publication of a statement of accounts. That ensures consistency in what the statements of accounts should contain and is also in keeping with the regulation making power for local authority accounts for low-emission zones under section 22. Amendment 310, in Jamie Greene's name, would constrain how local authorities could use the income derived from enforcement of parking prohibitions in the bill, providing that this income could only be used in certain transport-related purposes and around the local authorities area. Amendment 314 and 315 would make related changes to ministers' powers to make regulations about local authorities' accounts, removing the power to specify in regulation how a surplus in a local authority account could be applied and adding a new power for ministers to specify the information that accounts must contain at how local authorities have complied with their duties under Amendment 310. I have sympathy with what Jamie Greene is seeking to achieve here, indeed, in making regulations under section 55 of the bill. It would be my intention to specify that surplus on accounts connected with enforcement of parking prohibitions will be required to be used for specified transport-related purposes. In my view, the flexibility afforded by regulations is important to ensure that the transport purposes for which funds can be used are not drawn too narrowly and allow scope to respond to changing priorities. That said, I am happy to consider before stage 3 whether it can be made clearer on the face of the bill that the purposes for which this can be specified in regulations are limited to transport-related purposes. As such, I would ask Jamie Greene not to press amendment 310, 314 and 315, but if they are pressed, I would ask the committee to reject them, and I would ask the committee to support amendment 157 in my name. I have to step with all my political colleagues and almost everybody in the Parliament in that, as a matter of principle, I oppose hypothecation. The reason for that is that I believe that where funds are raised or penalties are implied for public purposes, that is perfectly proper. When funds are spent, they should be allocated to purposes that serve a public purpose, regardless of where the money may come from. There is a practical issue about hypothecation as well, which would apply in this particular case, as it would in others. That is the success of penalty charges should lead to their raising no revenue whatsoever. Therefore, that impoverishes the practical purpose to which one is hypothecating the money. I think that that is always a practical difficulty. I do understand that the introduction of hypothecation in policy areas generally often leads to that being a lever to persuade the general public that the policy intention is a good one, because the money will be spent for good purposes. I am no objection to charges being made for services rendered, of course. Having said all that, convener, I am not intending to make an issue of it when we come to make our decisions, but I do think that, as a permanent objection to hypothecation, I always feel uncomfortable about this sort of thing and will continue to do so. I do not recognise that there are probably only two other people in the entire Parliament who agree with me. Jamie Greene, can I ask you to wind up and press a withdraw your amendment? Mr Stevenson, for his comments, I am still entirely unclear if he supports my amendments or not following his comments. It is very early in the morning to talk about hypothecation of policy, but I am sure that the cabinet secretary is all over this. I appreciate the feedback. I said that those amendments were meant earnestly and in good faith to try and, as Mr Stevenson alluded to, I give the public a general message that the revenues that will be achieved from any such prohibitions will be put to good use. That is an important point, as we discussed with the low-missions zones to take the public with us on this positive journey to improve driver behaviour. Indeed, it is important that they see what the consequence of that behaviour is, both for financial penalty point of view but also where that revenue might be spent. I appreciate that, when you put prescriptive lists on the face of a bill in terms of how money can be spent, it may come across as a constraint. That, of course, is not the intention, but there is an intention to narrow focus the guidance of how that money will be spent if the cabinet secretary is willing and his team to discuss with me and others before stage 3 how we could use the bill to strengthen that reinforcement so that it is not just up to the whim of regulation because, again, we have not seen what that regulation may state, so it is hard to tell if it meets the needs of the intention of this amendment. My office and I will be very happy to have a productive conversation about how we can come up with some words to that effect at stage 3 and that premise would not move 3.10. Thank you. As Jamie Greene wishes to withdraw amendment 3.10, I have to ask if any member wishes to object. No one wishes to object. Therefore, the amendment is withdrawn. I would normally call amendment 148 in the name of Graham Simpson, but I believe that that has not moved, Mr Greene. Is that right? Therefore, I call amendment 149 in the name of the Cabinet Secretary, who is already debated with amendment 122. Cabinet Secretary, please move formally. The question is that amendment 149 be agreed, are we all agreed? We are agreed. We then move on to accessibility of information on parking prohibitions and penalty charges, and I'm going to call amendment 217 in the name of Pauline McNeill, group with amendment 218. Pauline McNeill, can you move amendment 217? Thank you very much, convener, and yes, I'll move amendment 217 in my name. It was recently drawn to my attention in Glasgow that parking penalty notices lack plain English in relation to the reference of the right to challenge and the appeal of the notice. The right of appeal and the right to challenge any decision is essential requirement of any system. The public are suspicious that local authorities are driven by revenue considerations when tickets are issued, so local authorities who issue parking notice are through enforcement should not be perceived as purely a revenue issue, and in all fairness they should design a system that makes it relatively easy for those who believe that they are able to challenge their notice are able to do so. I've gone through all of the visuals that I can get, and I'm happy to share this with the cabinet secretary just to illustrate my point, which is that when a parking notice is issued, it's all geared towards payment methods. There's a tiny little bit of the small print which says notice to owner will be described how to make formal representations regarding the issue of the penalty notice. I do recall in days gone by that your grounds of appeal would be published a bit clearer. I've gone through the various stages as far as I can get to look at the screens and know where does it say that you have the right to appeal and challenge all geared towards payment. In a sense, I'm probing this issue because I hope that the cabinet secretary is making with me on the point of making it relatively easy for people to see what their rights are. I had my researchers check the website to see how easy they found it to find out how to appeal. The evidence that I found wasn't really that easy to find out. It was there, but it wasn't really up front. I just think that it is the right to challenge a decision by a public body, even if it's a parking notice. It's a fundamental right, and amendment 218 is making sure that that information is accessible to those with any disability. Thank you, Pauline. Mike Rumbles, you'd like to say something. Pauline McNeill, perhaps you could address this point in summing up. I absolutely agree with 217. In practical terms, regulations must include provision requiring that notification of a penalty charge. It's available in formats that are accessible to individuals who have a mental disability. If you could just tell us in summing up how that would happen, because I don't understand quite what we're asking for here. Maybe we could come to that in the summing up. Now the members indicate that they wish to speak Cabinet Secretary. Amendment 217.218, from Pauline McNeill's seat, to introduce a requirement that regulations associated with the enforcement of the parking prohibitions must ensure that penalty charge notices contain information on how to appeal and are available in different formats that are accessible to individuals who have a sensory, physical or mental disability. I recognise the importance of making sure that the process of enforcement and appeals, including the information contained in penalty charge notices, is both clear and transparent for everyone. I'm happy to confirm on the record today that the regulations that are to be made will make provision regarding reviews and appeals, including the grounds of review or appeal in connection with the imposition of a penalty charge. The design of the penalty charge notice, which is currently used by 21 local authorities in Scotland, already provides information to the motorist on how to appeal against the issue of the penalty charge notice and what happens thereafter. It's intended that the regulations that are made under section 491 of the bill will make provision to ensure that the content of penalty charge notices for these parking prohibitions contains similar information and therefore do not consider that amendment 217 is therefore necessary. In relation to amendment 218, the regulations will also make provision about the notification of a penalty charge, including the form, content and method of notification, and there is ample flexibility in that regulation making power in section 491 to ensure that accessibility requirements are taken into account in that regard. In addition to that, the committee will be aware that, under the Equality Act 2010, local authorities must make reasonable adjustments to remove barriers that may discriminate against disabled people. Such reasonable adjustments would already include ensuring that penalty notice charges are available in accessible formats such as large font or in braille. I note also that the 2010 act already contains clear definitions of what is meant by a disability, whereas amendment 218 does not. I therefore ask Pauline McNeill not to press amendment 217 or 218, but if they are pressed, I would ask the committee not to support these amendments. The amendment was really essentially driving at what the cabinet secretary has outlined as trying to identify mainly sensory or disability impairments that might make it difficult for someone to understand exactly how to go through the process. I'm content, convener, with the cabinet secretary's response to that, and I'm pleased that that has been addressed further in the bill. Therefore, I will not be pressing my amendments. Thank you, Pauline. As Pauline McNeill wishes to withdraw amendment 217, I have to ask, does any member wish to object? No member wishes to object, therefore the amendment is withdrawn. I therefore call amendment 218 in the name of Pauline McNeill already debated with amendment 217. Pauline McNeill, to move or not move? Not move. Amendment is not moved. I therefore call amendment 311 in the name of Colin Smyth already debated with amendment 145. Excuse me. Colin Smyth, to move or not move? Move, convener. The question, therefore, is amendment 311 be agreed? Are we all agreed? We are not agreed. There is a division, therefore those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. There were five votes for and six votes against, therefore, amendment 311 is not agreed. I call amendment 312 in the name of Colin Smyth already debated with amendment 145. Colin Smyth, to move or not move? Not move, convener. The question, therefore, is that section 49 be agreed? Are we all agreed? I call amendment 150 in the name of Graham Simpson already debated with amendment 115 but understand it is not moved. Therefore, I call amendment 151 in the name of the Cabinet Secretary already debated with amendment 122 Cabinet Secretary to move formally, please. The question is that amendment 151 be agreed? Are we all agreed? We are agreed, therefore, I call amendment 152 in the name of the Cabinet Secretary already debated with amendment 59. Cabinet Secretary to move formally, please. Lift. The question, therefore, is that amendment 152 be agreed? Are we all agreed? We are agreed. The question now is that section 50 be agreed? Are we all agreed? I therefore call amendment 153 in the name of Graham Simpson already debated with amendment 115 but I understand this is not moved. Not moved. Therefore, I call amendment 154 in the name of the Cabinet Secretary already debated with amendment 122. Cabinet Secretary to move formally, please. Lift. The question, therefore, is that amendment 154 be agreed? Are we all agreed? We are agreed. The question, therefore, now is that section 51 be agreed? Are we all agreed? I therefore call amendment 155 in the name of Graham Simpson already debated with amendment 115 and understand that this is not moved. Correct. Not moved. Therefore, I call amendment 156 in the name of the Cabinet Secretary already debated with amendment 122. Cabinet Secretary to move formally, please. Moved. The question is that amendment 156 be agreed? Are we all agreed? Yes. The question, therefore, is that section 52 be agreed? Are we all agreed? We are agreed. The question, therefore, is section 53 be agreed? Are we all agreed? We are agreed. I call amendment 313 in the name of Jamie Greene already debated with amendment 145. Jamie Greene to move or not move? Not moved. The question, therefore, is section 54 be agreed? Are we agreed? Yes. I therefore call amendment 314 in the name of Jamie Greene already debated with amendment 310. Jamie Greene to move or not move? Not moved.— Felly weithio fen先生i i gafodd gyda'r noblegrwyd? Mydddo'r cwestiwn yn ydweud yr Ym1-57 a amgarroedfa? Myddo'r cwestiwn yn digwydd. Mae'n gweld ythegyr yng nghymru, Rydym yn ym3-10. Rydym yn ym3-10, Rydym yn flynyddoedd, rydym yn llygiedad, rydym yn llygiedad? Rhyw y byddai'n cwestiwn yn ym55 a mgarroedfa? Mgarroedfa? Mae'n gweithio ym 5, rydym yn llygiedad? Rydym yn llygiedad?ín ym56 a mgarroedfa? Diolch. Diolch. o phobl o hoffa i gadaelurau o teimlo'r reddynt yn gyffredinol oedd yn ei cyfasidio'r hoffa i gyd-aardd o bobl o'r hoffa i gyd-aardd o hoffa i gyd-aardd o hoffa i gyd-aardd, o fferdd i'r hoffa i gyd-aardd o hoffa i gyd-aardd. Fodd o reflech chi'n g примu hyn o fe gweld hynny, wedi cyd-daeth a'i gwaddu o hyfforddiant arwot i mor gwleitio ti o resilient. Heriad, mae'r Mhwyf amendment 158. Mae gynnwys yn ddenedig ar hyn o gallwn ddarparu ddaeth. Roedd y Minister hwnnw ni bod yn ei cwmatter o'r bysgol ar draws, pan nad yw, ond rydyn ni'n ymddianon ni'n mynd gweld o cwmbllforinh committeenau o hyv pog li allai unigwrs mawr. H dementia wrth gwrs ymdeinol yn y cyffiziwn ar WE57 hwnny'n hyff gearbox, ang�도wnaeth boardyawn Menwyr temperwr 159 a'r cwmysgol ar YmmedgWhy Justowski a fellynd iddyn nhw yn aelio adreffёт crraeg nag phloeddtaethai Boyle gan y Moeddan Fellyarn hwnnw i ddigon peddwod o sig i gyfradys y Clwent amendment 159 be agreed? Are we all agreed? I call amendment 160 in the name of the Cabinet Secretary already debated with amendment 122. Cabinet Secretary, can you move formally please? The question is amendment 160 be agreed? Are we all agreed? I call amendment 161 in the name of Graham Simpson already debated with amendment 115, but understand that this is not to be moved. I therefore call amendment 162 in the name of the Cabinet Secretary in a group on its own. Cabinet Secretary, can you move formally please? The question is amendment 162 is a technical amendment that seeks to ensure that if a local authority is considering exempting a pavement from the pavement parking prohibition or looking to place a traffic sign or a proof device, it should only do so with the consent or in conjunction with the relevant traffic authority should it not be the move. That removes any ambiguity in this area and I therefore move amendment 162. Thank you, Cabinet Secretary. No other members have indicated that they wish to speak, so, Cabinet Secretary, I'm assuming that you don't want to wind up. Therefore, the question is that amendment 162 be agreed? Are we all agreed? We are agreed. The question, therefore, is that section 58 be agreed? Are we all agreed? I therefore call them, we're moving on to sorry, parking on a cycle track and I'd like to call amendment 163 in the name of Colin Smyth in a group on its own. Colin Smyth to move and speak to amendment 163 please. Thank you, convener. I'm happy to move amendment 163 in my name, which looks at addressing an issue arising from the decriminalisation of parking enforcement, which has been raised with me by a number of local councils. Last week at committee, the cabinet secretary confirmed that parking on cycle lanes is banned under the 1984 Roads Act, but there is a problem with the enforcement of the ban. When a mandatory cycle lane has been introduced without a TRO, enforcement cannot be decriminalised. In practical terms, that means that often only the police are able to enforce the ban, even in areas with decriminalised parking enforcement, where the council would enforce other parking offences. That is a clear anomaly. Parking on cycle lanes is a hazard, and it's right that it's banned, but that ban is meaningless if it isn't properly enforced. While appreciating enforcement can be decriminalised through the use of a TRO, that places a significant burden on councils simply to give them the power to enforce something that is already prohibited. This amendment seeks to address that by allowing local authorities to issue civil fines on the ban. I have suggested regulations here, but I am happy to discuss alternative approaches if members believe that there is a different way of achieving the same aim. I tried to submit a very similar amendment, and the legislation team advised that Mr Smith had beat me to it. I am very happy to support the amendment, but I appreciate that if it's technically not the way to approach the issue, I'd be happy to work with other parties and the cabinet secretary on a suitable wording. If Mr Smith is minded not to move, I wouldn't push the amendment, but he does raise a very important point. Parking on cycle tracks and cycle lanes has become an issue that we spoke about at length and how we address that through regulation. To use the transport bill as a method of doing so is an important point to raise. We probably all share concern over it, but it's just the case of how we go about making sure that that practice is properly addressed, and I'm sure that the cabinet secretary will enlighten us. No other member wishes to speak, so Cabinet Secretary, over to you. Amendment 163 calls for a new part of the bill that relates to parking on a cycle track, although I appreciate the intention behind the Collins Smith amendment to encourage more active travel. In my view, that amendment is not required. The Collins Smith amendment is seeking to amend the Rhoads Scotland Act 1984 by inserting a new subsection 6A into section 129 of the act to confer powers on local authorities to issue fixed penalty notices on motorists who park on a cycle track. However, it is an unnecessary amendment as parking on a cycle track is already a criminal offence under section 1296 of the 1984 act. If a local authority wishes to charge drivers for parking on cycle lanes, it can do so by obtaining decriminalised parking enforcement powers. Currently, 21 local authorities have these powers, and they can undertake enforcement restrictions on cycle tracks. I also note for completeness that there are some technical difficulties with the amendment in that it seeks to place the regulation-making power within section 129 of the Rhoads Scotland Act, which deals with miscellaneous summary offences, despite the fact that the amendment does not seek to create a new offence. It instead seeks to enable regulations to be made that can confer power on local authorities to charge motorists. Furthermore, the amendment refers to fixed penalty notices, but those can only be issued in Scotland by the Procurator Fiscal or a police constable, and they are backed with a power of criminal prosecution if unpaid. The appropriate term for a local authority charge is a penalty charge notice. Even if those technical difficulties were resolved, I consider the proposed amendment to be unrequired, given that the powers already exist in both criminal and civil law. Therefore, a DAS calls not to press amendment 13163. However, if press a DAS a committee to reject it, do Jamie Greene wish to make her intervention? If I could. Are you confirming that any form of parking on any form of cycle line where it has not been allowed via a decriminalised process by a local authority is enforceable by either a police officer or a traffic warden in decriminalised parking areas? Does that include both advisory cycle lines and more statutory formal types of cycle lines? No. To be clear, if it is an area that has not been decriminalised, it is a matter for the police to enforce it. If criminal law powers in order to deal with that is in a decriminalised area, it is for the local authority to take it forward through that process. However, local authorities also have a responsibility to make sure that they have TROs in place for the enforcement of that, which is a legal requirement to make the provision enforceable in law. That is why local authorities have to put a TRO in place in order to be able to issue a fixed charge notice. Colin, I am going to ask you to wind up and maybe push that question a bit more during that process. Thank you very much, convener. I think that the cabinet secretary has missed the point of this particular amendment. I am happy for him to intervene to clarify the position, but it is my clear understanding, and it has certainly been raised by a number of local authorities, that where they have decriminalised parking, they cannot enforce that unless they have passed a TRO, a TRO is not required for a mandatory cycle lane, as far as I am aware. However, if they have not passed a TRO, they cannot enforce—I am happy to take an intervention on that. For them to enforce any provision under the decriminalised arrangements, they have to have a TRO in place. They have to have a legal basis in which to enforce that penalty. You cannot have a provision where they simply can issue fixed penalty charges for anything that they choose to consider that they want to issue a fixed penalty charge. There needs to be a legal basis in which for that to be provided. There is no way of getting round that. You need to have a provision in place that gives them the power to be able to issue the fixed charge notice for that particular obstruction on a cycle way or where it is on an area of the street that they are parking on, in which to have a TRO in place. It is a part that they cannot get round. They have to put in place to make it enforceable. Herein lies the anomaly. The Government currently allows a local authority to introduce a mandatory cycle lane without a TRO, but it then says that, unless you have a TRO, you cannot enforce that cycle way. Is the point not that, if the local authority cannot enforce it, the police can enforce it so that somebody can enforce it? Therefore, there is the anomaly that we have a situation where everything else in a local authority area where it has been decriminalised is a matter for the council except for cycle lanes. The question that the Government needs to answer is why does it allow a local authority to have a mandatory cycle lane without a TRO if the Government is saying that you have to have a TRO in order to enforce a penalty for parking in a cycle lane? We are confusing an issue here. That is the need for the councils to have a TRO in place in order to be able to enforce a fixed charge notice. They need to put that in place. For a cycle lane, if it is an advisory, they do not have to have a TRO in place, but if it is obstructed, clearly there is an issue where the police could actually deal with that through criminal law, but where it has been decriminalised, they need to have a TRO in place. That is how the process works and how it operates. There is no way around that particular process. If they do not have a TRO in place for a parking restriction at schools, then effectively they could be in a position where they cannot legally enforce a fixed charge notice. Colin, I want to come back to you to continue winding up and then to enlarge the information given to you by the cabinet secretary, press or withdraw your amendment. Colin, that is very much convenient. The committee has heard on a number of occasions the challenges of the TRO process for local authorities. Indeed, it was one of the explanations given by the Government to knock back a £20 million bill that they would look at the enforcement of that. The reality is with or without a TRO parking and a mandatory cycle lane is banned, but, as it stands, that cannot be enforced by councils even in areas with decriminalised parking enforcement without a TRO. I think that it is an anomaly here. I am happy not to move the amendment at this stage, hoping that we can discuss a way forward on that, but I reserve the right to bring it back at stage 3 if those issues are not addressed, because there are concerns that local councils have raised and I hope that the Government will take that on board. Colin Smyth wishes to withdraw amendment 1.6.3. Does any member object? Therefore, the amendment is withdrawn. We now move on to working place parking and the establishment and review of licensing schemes. I am going to call amendment 7 in the name of John Finnie Group with other amendments, as shown in the grouping. I would like to point out to members that if amendment 8e is agreed, I cannot call amendment 8a. If amendment 8b is agreed, I cannot call amendment 8g. If amendment 8g is agreed, I cannot call amendment 8c. All due to pre-emptions, it will all become clearer when we get to it. I am therefore going to call John Finnie to move amendment 7 and speak to the other amendments in the group. John Finnie. Many thanks, convener. I am very pleased to speak to my amendments in the Workplace Park and Levy. As you will be aware, over the past few months, there has been a lot of coverage in this issue, much of it ill-informed. As we consider the amendments today, it is important to focus on what the amendments do and the positive benefits that the Workplace Park and Levy can yield. Let us take a step back. We are facing a climate emergency, so we need as many tools available as possible to address this. No one is saying that the Workplace Park and Levy will do this alone, but it is clear that there will need to be as many levers available as possible. We also have an issue that local authorities need tools to manage transport in their areas and to raise their revenue to help them to do this. My amendments are based on the principles of localism. It will be for local authorities to determine if they wish to implement a workplace park and levy, and there is no requirement to do so. I will pick up the details of the proposals when I speak to subsequent amendments, but I would like to pick up on some key points. This is a power, not a duty. It empowers local authorities to act and make decisions locally. Those decisions have to be made within a framework set by primary legislation, regulations and guidance. That framework has a key underpinning of requirements of consultation, local impact assessment and investment of funds raised from the levy into local transport projects identified in a local transport strategy. Fundamentally, the proposals address issues that we all agree need to be addressed. The First Minister has declared a climate emergency and we recognise transport's role in that. I will turn to the detail of my amendments. Amendment 7, together with amendment 9, permits local authorities to put in place a licensing scheme requiring any person providing workplace parking at their premises to hold a licence and to pay charges under that licence by reference to the number of parking places provided. That is a premises-based levy. Local authorities who wish to introduce a licensee scheme for workplace parking must have a local transport strategy and must consider that introducing the levy will facilitate the achievement of policies in that strategy. One of the criticisms of workplace parking levy is that it is simply a money-raising measure. That is not the case. The link to a local transport strategy means that a levy can only be introduced with a clearly articulated strategic context. I beg your pardon, amendment 8 defines what constitutes a workplace parking place. Workplace parking places will be identified by a reference to the reason for parking and to who is parking. A workplace parking place will accordingly be a parking place at any premises that is occupied for the purpose of attending a place where the person providing that parking place carries out a business. Business is a wide meaning, encompassing not only carrying out any trade, profession, vocation or undertaking, but also the provision of education and the exercise of public functions. Only parking for business purposes, including parking by-workers, agents and suppliers of the person providing the parking place, is covered. Parking is in purely a personal capacity such as shopping at a local supermarket is not. The amendment also gives Scottish ministers a power to vary those provisions by regulation. That is a necessary flexibility to respond to changing and future circumstances. Amendment 10 is really important, as it sets out the detailed requirements for consultation on a proposed scheme and impact assessments. There has been criticism of the lack of consultation on the proposal and the fact that there has been no impact assessment. I welcome the work that the committee has done with the evidence sessions and the online survey. It was really interesting to hear a nuanced and balanced argument from a range of views, most certainly here. On this point of consultation, can you just clarify and confirm that if we are only enabling the legislation and therefore a council, if we do pass the legislation, would have to then go through its own process, so Glasgow or any other council would then do its own consultation on exactly what they were going to do. Is that correct? That is correct, and I will come on to that. The amendment underpins the reality of the consultative nature of these proposals. There are strong duties on local authorities to consult on a scheme, not just a proposed scheme, but if they wanted to amend or revoke a scheme. There has to be clarity on the objectives of a scheme, the area in which it will cover, exemptions, what people can expect to pay, what the funds will be used on and how it will address the objectives set out in the local transport strategy. There has to be an impact assessment on those who may have to pay charges and on the environment. Amendment 11 gives the Scottish ministers the power to make regulations about the procedures to make, amend and revoke workplace parking schemes. Amendment 12 gives ministers and local authorities the power to have a local inquiry into proposals to make, amend or revoke workplace parking levy schemes. I very much see that as a tool to be used if needed, rather than as a regular part of the development of a workplace parking levy. The amendment also requires that a local authority has to await the completion of the inquiry before implementing any proposal. Something that you might imagine is self-evident, but it is important to spell that out in the legislation. Amendments 13 and 14 allow a licensing scheme to set out procedural matters in relation to grant an issue of licences, licenced conditions and so on, and to specify what must and may be included in licences. I am turning to amendment 7A, 7B, 7C, 7D scoping content of the licensing schemes. I will now turn to amendment 7A and start with my colleague Mike Rumbles. Amendment 7A seeks to ensure that licences are only acquired in order to provide more than 10 working parking places. I do not think that this is appropriate to be as restrictive as this on the face of the bill. Local authorities may, in their schemes, as Nostingham did in theirs, decide that people providing below a specified number of parking places should be exempt. However, whether it is appropriate and what the number should be is best determined with regard to local circumstances. There should also be flexibility to change that number as and when appropriate. Pauline McNeill's amendments 7B and 7C are concerned with specifying particular assessments around displacement, impacts on poverty and implications for workers that a local authority should carry out in advance of a scheme. My amendment 10 requires that, before making, amending or revoking a scheme, a local authority should prepare and publish an assessment of the impacts of the proposal, specifically on persons who may have to pay charges and on the environment. I believe that this addresses the aim of Pauline McNeill's amendments. Peter Chapman's amendment 7D would require a scheme to be reviewed annually. On the face of it, the amendment looks to be a simple tweak to improve accountability, but under my amendment, local authorities will have to set out how they will review the operation and effect of the scheme, and I am minded to let local authorities make that decision. The amendments 8E, 8A, 8F, 8B, 8G, 8C, 8H and 8D are intended to leave out the definition of workplace parking, any parking by what is referred to in the amendment as a go-at-business customer. Those are people who, in the course of their business, park at the premises of another business with whom they are a client or customer. An example might be a property developer parking for a meeting with their accountant. Perhaps Mr Rumble's concern is that this might catch people parking at supermarkets to pick up their shopping, and I covered that earlier, so I hope that that concern has been addressed. That is about parking in the course of business only. It is not clear to me what Mike Rumbles is seeking to achieve with his amendment 8B. If his intention is to remove parking by students and others attending education or training courses, then this amendment will not have the effect because it would still be part of a definition of a workplace parking place in subsection 1 of my amendment 8. However, in any event, there is no obvious reason why students should not be required to park in towns of the city where those levies are introduced. Indeed, young people are a key demographic that we should be encouraging to adopt active and sustainable models of transport. Dean Lockhart's amendment 8E has the effect of restricting the definition of workplace parking to parking by workers and members of bodies whose affairs are controlled by their members. That would mean that charges could not be levied for parking by agents or suppliers of a business, business customers or visitors, or people attending a course of education or training. The question that I would have to ask is why we should exclude those groups. It may be a concern that business customers cover people parking in a local supermarket, but I say again that that is simply not the case. Dean Lockhart's amendment F removes parking provided by a third party from the definition of workplace parking. In practice, that would mean that, if a company leases spaces in another premises to provide workplace parking, no charges would be payable. Again, the question is why. If it is not only against the spirit of the proposal, but it could create a massive loophole. Amendments 8G and 8H are concerned with definitions. The effect of 8G removes bit definitions of business, business customer, business visitor and government department. That is similar to Mike Rumble's amendment 80, but it also appears to exclude parking at premises used by government departments and other public bodies. That appears to be very unfair. What principal reason should there be exempting such bodies from the levy that others have to pay? I wonder if that was the intention of the amendment. Amendment 8H modifies the definition of a worker and would mean that a charge arising from a miscue could only be applied in respect of parking by permanent full-time workers. Aside from being against the spirit of the scheme, it creates potential loopholes and provides a potential incentive for employers not to offer full-time contracts so as to avoid paying the levy. Again, surely, that is not the intention. Mike Rumble's amendment 8D removes Scottish ministers' powers by regulation to alter the circumstances in which workplace is provided. In practice, that would mean that categories set out and amendment 8 were fixed and could not later be adjusted if need be, depending on experience from how schemes are operating without primary legislation. Regulations are subject to scrutiny by Parliament, and amendment 8D would make the scheme inflexible. Amendments 9A, 9B, 9C, 9D—John Mason's amendment 9A is an interesting one—by seeking to extend the powers to make a workplace parking licence scheme to a regional transport partnership, it recognises that transport patterns and issues are not set by local authority boundaries. That is why amendment 8D allows for joint working by local authorities. Does he see any role for RTPs? We had the example that Colin Smyth gave of people coming from one area into a city paying the fee, but where they came from maybe would not benefit. We also had the idea of parking ride and nottingham, where parking ride might be in a separate local authority area, so would that just be a voluntary process? Would he not see the RTPs of any role in that? I think that in any case they have an overarching role with regard to their constituent parts, if you like, but the scheme is very clear that my amendments would allow for joint working by local authorities, and I believe that that better approach is because there are unintended consequences of RTPs. Allowing powers to be exercisable concurrently by local authorities and RTPs could additionally give rise to the potential for confusion and, indeed, duplication, which none of us want. Mike Rumble's amendment C attempts to make a precondition that a local authority can only make a scheme if it is satisfied that there are adequate public transport services in an area. Superficially, that looks attractive, but it falls down in a number of ways. How does one define adequate public transport? Fundamentally, improving public transport may be the objective in the local transport strategy that the scheme is being set up to support, and, fundamentally, the focus should be on local decision making. I have just brief comments that I have got a number to go. I appreciate that this is time consuming. I am being patient these listening. John, keep continuing. Colin Smyth's amendment 9B would make ministerial approval a precondition of a scheme. That goes against the very principle of localism that the scheme is founded on. I believe that the power of local accountable decision making is important, and that underpins my amendments. Jamie Greene's amendment 9D seeks to impose a whole number of conditions on a scheme. Those range from constraints to making of a scheme through to restrictions on how the scheme operates. The amendment is a classic case of unnecessary micro-management. What is wrong with local authorities making decisions on the basis of impact assessments and full consultation? Jamie Greene's amendment 10D calls for a range of reports to be prepared by the local authority. My amendment 10, in subsection 4, already requires an assessment on the effects of persons who may have to pay the charges and on the environment. I cannot see what amendment 10D adds to this. Colin Smyth's amendment 10A requires local authorities to hold a referendum on whether proposed workplace parking licence schemes should proceed, and 10B gives Scottish ministers the power to make provision about the franchise, conduct and administration of a referendum. I have to ask Colin Smyth why he has so little faith in our local authorities. Under my amendments, local authorities will have to consult on the scheme, and they are, as we are, subject to the referendum of the ballot box. Jamie Greene's amendment 10A requires the statement of scheme objectives, says how the authority will use the net proceeds of the scheme. My amendment 10, in subsection 3, already requires a local authority to set out how it intends to apply the net proceeds of a scheme, so that would be an unnecessary duplication. Jamie Greene's amendment 10F and Peter Chapman's amendment 10G seek to add specific assessment categories that a local authority must carry out. Jamie Greene requires this assessment for local businesses and island communities. Peter Chapman's amendment also requires for local businesses and island communities, as well as local authority revenue, schools, public bodies and other statutory bodies and health boards. The requirement to carry out an assessment of those affected by the levy is already there in my amendment, and it is not clear to me what those amendments are. Jamie Greene's amendment 10C requires an assessment of the effects of a proposed scheme on the displacement of vehicles and the resulting effect of residents in or near the area to which the proposed scheme relates. This is an important issue, one that I would expect to be picked up by the assessment of the scheme proposals on the environment, which my amendment already requires. Amendment 12B from Jamie Greene would allow the Scottish Parliament by a majority vote to cause a local inquiry to be held into a proposal for a workplace parking licence scheme, but my view again is that this is a local authority matter best dealt with at local authority level, and we need to respect that. Amendment 13A from Jamie Greene appears to do two things. By removing power from Scottish ministers, the power for Scottish ministers to require or permit licensing schemes to make provisions about reviews of and appeals against decisions in relation to workplace parking licenses, and there would be no provision for such reviews and appeals. The second thing is that it removes the offence of intentionally providing false or misleading information in or in connection with licence applications. That means that there would be no specific offence directed at fraudulent statements in licence applications. Again, I have to ask, does Jamie Greene really want to remove rights of appeal and encourage fraudulent statements? Jamie Greene's 14A seeks to remove the requirement that workplace parking licenses specify the maximum number of vehicle so that it may be part of the premises subject to that licence. That is important for establishing licensing requirements, but local authorities will have to do this in order to run a scheme as a key part of establishing the charged due. As such, I cannot support that amendment. Jamie Greene's amendment 318 introduces a powerful local authority residence to petition the local authority for a review of a workplace parking licensing scheme. Where a petition is signed by more than 20 per cent of residents in the area, the authority must carry out the review. In practice, what does that represent? The amendment appears to be trying to open up another front in the campaign against workplace parking lilies. My proposals are founded on principles of localism, underpinned by consultation, requirements to carry out impact assessments and, fundamentally, the ballot box. I believe that those are the fundamentals that we should be guided by. With those factors underpinning workplace parking schemes, the amendment is at best unnecessary and at worst a way for a minority to frustrate the successful operation of such schemes by local authorities. Convener, that addresses all the amendments in the group, and I move amendment 7. Thank you, Mr Finnie. Just by my calculations, and I understand that you had a lot of grant cover, that, if we all take a similar time, we will be not finished before the planning session this afternoon. Bear in mind that Mr Finnie was introducing a major amendment. There was a certain amount of leeway. If I could ask members to remember that other members wish to speak, and therefore their contributions should be as concise as they can make them. On that basis, I call Mr Rumbles to move amendment 7A. Mike. Thank you, convener. Very brief, I'm disappointed when I've heard from John Finnie because there are some very constrictive amendments here, which he is opposing them all. I just want to make a brief comment. 7A, I'm trying to avoid the risk of judicial review of this legislation because I'm very well aware that, in planning law, in a change of use or other issues of planning, there is a requirement to have workplace parking. If we approve this unamended, then I do genuinely believe that there is a real risk of judicial review, especially for some smaller companies with the supplies to. On 8A, it's all very well for John Finnie to say that business customer doesn't include supermarket customers. We've got John Finnie's word for that, but we're making the law, and the law says it includes the customers of a business. What I'm trying to do is remove that, so we don't charge customers of supermarkets and everything else. We only have John Finnie's word for that, but we have to look at the law that we are making. I won't say much more except that I find it completely amazing that John Finnie does not wish to accept my amendment 9C. The whole purpose of his amendment, the whole purpose of it is 9C, that the local authority proposing to make the scheme is satisfied that there is an adequate level of public transport services. That is the point of John Finnie's amendment. If you won't amend my amendment to do that, it makes this whole thing a farce. No, because I've finished speaking. Thank you. I'm now going to call Peter Chapman to speak to amendment 7D and any other amendments in the group that he wishes to do. Thank you, convener. Very briefly, my amendment 7D simply means that if a workplace parking level is to be introduced, there must be a review done annually on it. I think that this is important to assess the impact that it is having on the local workforce and employers. I don't believe that it's sufficient to allow local authorities to decide when and if the world review what the WPL is achieving. I think that that allows far too much leeway, so I think that an annual assessment is correct. My other amendment 10G simply outlines various bodies that must be consulted on before a local authority can prepare and publish on a workplace parking levee. I think that again this is a very relevant and modest amendment that I would wish that both would be supported. Thank you, Peter. I now call Pauline McNeill to speak to amendments 7B and other amendments in the group. Thank you, convener. Amendment 7B seeks to ensure, similar to Macrombos, that an assessment on the parking levee and parking in the surrounding area is taken into account. That was the experience of nottingham, that there was a considerable amount of displaced traffic as a result of parking levee. If such an assessment is not undertaking, then it can have a quite a serious impact on local people. I wonder why the member feels that needs to be specifically in. If he takes a city like Glasgow when they introduce parking metres, they would be looking at knock-on effect in the surrounding area, the same with the parking around the stadia. Does she not think that we can trust Glasgow to look at the knock-on effect? Here we go. A lot of communities do not want extra traffic orders on their communities, so it is a choice for them. It is not just a simple question of a local authority like Glasgow, saying that, in order to stop displaced traffic, we will impose some restrictions on local communities. It is a probing amendment that I am sure the member will appreciate at this stage. It is one of the issues that nottingham did come up, so it is quite a legitimate one to probe, I would suggest for the committee. Amendment 7C seeks to ensure that an assessment of the parking levee on poverty in the surrounding area is considered and taken into account. In-work poverty remains a serious problem. 182,000 children in Scotland live in poverty despite having one person in their household in work. As the committee has listened to in the evidence session, many people rely on their cars to get to work. Many poor people rely on their cars to get to work because public transport, even in Glasgow, is expensive. A quarter of people living on the periphery of the city already have to catch at least two buses to work. If you have a car at your disposal, it is an easy choice to make. Tens of thousands of people will not be able to afford any more in their cost of living if the levee is passed on. It will result in people—I do not believe that it will result in people getting out of their cars because public transport, even in Glasgow, is not good enough. The connectivity report recently produced acknowledges the fact that we need significant investment, even in Scotland's largest city. If passed, I think that it is perfectly acceptable for legislators like us to provide the broad framework, even if it is passed the law, and that should include principles that we believe local authorities should adopt, such as a poverty impact assessment. As a legislator, I came here to fight on some issues. One of them is poverty. I do not see why we cannot have a principle of that in any framework passed for local authorities to decide on further detail. We have to consider the impact on shift workers and part-time workers. How will the scheme take that into account? I have consulted in numerous workplaces who are concerned about that. On the issue that John Mason raises about regional transport authorities, I think that they are not accountable enough to have such a power, and I would consider that that is not where we should end up on this one. It will be decades in Glasgow before we see the requisite investment with not a coming, having 9 million a year raised on that. It is not enough. You can see that it is going to be a decade before public transport would be good enough, even in Scotland's largest city before people would make the choice not to drive. On the question of the referendum, I would ask John Finnie to say why he has so little faith in local authorities and why he has so little faith in the people to make a decision in their own localities as to whether they want a parking levy or not. I support Jamie Greene's amendment. I would like to just acknowledge it that the welfare and people's standards of living is a matter for this Parliament. If we pass this into law, it is our job to consider the welfare of people in passing legislation. We have heard not very much about how that would be enforced. Perhaps we will hear that further down the line, but I want to hear about how that will impact on people's lives who already face poverty. Thank you very much. I would normally call Dean Lockhart to speak to amendment 80, but he is involved in other business in the Parliament, and Jamie Greene is going to speak to that amendment. Thank you, convener. I will only speak to Dean Lockhart's amendments. I think that is a protocol, and I will come back and speak to other amendments in this group, including my own, when it is my turn to do so. Dean sends his apologies. There was perhaps a lack of understanding as to when we may be addressing this issue. MSPs appreciate having other committee and MSP duties to attend to. He has asked me to reflect upon those amendments with the committee. Amendment E is similar, in some senses, to Mike Rumbles' amendment A. I think that Mr Rumbles had the right intention of leaving out business customers from the levy. It just strikes me as strange that we would want people who are customers of businesses to be part of the levy of the business that they are visiting. It does not really stipulate what the purpose of those visits may be or the length of time they may spend. We would like to take that further to include the suppliers of businesses. For example, many small businesses get parts delivered. I have a few in my constituency. I am sure that Mr Lockhart does, too, where other small and medium-sized businesses turn up to deliver goods or do contractor work for a short period of time to assist that business in its efforts. It would seem unfair for those to be penalised in the same light. I believe that that is the premise behind 8A. The member took her intervention? Yes, happily. You surely are not leading that as an amendment. People turn up for maybe half an hour or even come to prepare an air-conditioning unit and they are going to be expected to pay a car parking life. You surely are not suggesting that. No, I hope not. You are absolutely right. It would seem very unfair to do in place such a charge. I am sure that it would be fair to say that. With respect, we read the amendments to the bill that Mr Finnie submitted and a number of us felt that it was not secure enough in ensuring that business customers would be exempt from the charge. If the minister or Mr Finnie summing up can point us to the specific wording of his amendment that gives us that conference security, then we can take a view to where they move those amendments. In the absence of that, we read the amendments and we took a view that it does not cover that. Indeed, I do not want to end up in the scenario where in your constituency customers turn up to small businesses and are part of the scheme of that business. We want to put it on the faces of the bill that they are absolutely excluded. Why would they not? I hope that other members would agree with me on that. It is not nonsense, Mr Stevenson. If you are welcome to intervene, if you have comments to make. In fairness, Jamie, I would ask you to push on and ignore any comments. To all committee members, this is obviously an interesting subject that has caught the public eye. Making comments under one's breath about other people's views on it is not helpful. I would ask people to refrain from doing that and try to look at the legislation. I would ask you, Jamie, to continue on amendment 80, which you have agreed to speak to. I have nothing for, let's say, on amendment 80e. On amendment 80f, in the name of Dean Lockhart, the sixth and narrowed down the definition of what constitutes a relevant person in the legislation and stipulates that it only applies to the person that provides the parking place in question. This amendment is the route to achieve that. Amendment 8g removes education and government institutions from the definition of businesses. In relation to amendment 80e, it deletes the section defining business customers and clients or customers of the relevant person. I know that we talk in greater detail in the exemption section, so I will leave comments around removals of places to that debate. Amendment 8h is the amendment in Mr Lockhart's name that seeks to ensure that only employees working full-time and permanent contracts are subject to the conditions of the levy. That would ensure that part-time members or short-term contractual staff such as those who are doing day-temping jobs, which is quite common practice in many businesses, would not be subject to the levy. It would, indeed, only relate to permanent full-time members or staff, it seems. Have you made a good way in that point? Yes. How would it affect a job share? A job share in what respect, Mr Mings? Was it that two people did 18 and a half hours each instead of one person doing 37? Indeed. I would argue that you are earning a salary of 18 and a half hours a week. It would seem unfair to be forced to pay the same levy of someone earning 36 hours a week, so I think that the exemption should apply, therefore. I have nothing further to add on those amendments. Thank you very much, Jamie. Now I call on John Mason to speak to amendment 9A and the other amendments in the group. John. Thank you very much, convener. First of all, can I say how much I support the workplace parking levy and the amendments 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13 and 14 in the name of John Finnie? I think it is worth stressing that those amendments do only empower local authorities. It is about decentralising, giving power to local authorities and they may or may not take them up. Some have already said that they will take them up and some have not. The committee was very impressed by Nottingham's example of what they have done and the success of that. We understand that a number of other English authorities are looking at following that model. Frankly, convener, we have to discourage people unnecessarily taking their cars to work, and that is especially the case in city centres such as Glasgow and Edinburgh, and certainly the case for MSPs in this Parliament. Glasgow has very low car ownership, so on the whole, it is not affecting poorer people, it is affecting richer people, this is a tax on the elite, and I would say that this is broadly a progressive measure, and it is something to be very much supported. I especially like the park and ride system that they have in Nottingham, and I think that we do need to do more of that in and around Glasgow. I just wondered if the member thinks that this is an issue for the elite who have cars and poor people do not have cars. Just in case you might be wrong about that, would you therefore support exemptions for those who earn under, say, their living wage, for example? The whole point of this is that this is a levy on the employer. The employer does not need to pass this on at all. For example, in this place, the cleaners and the technical staff do not have parking places in the Scottish Parliament. It is the MSPs that have parking places. You are contradicting yourself because you said that it is not necessarily going to get passed on to the workers, so who are the elite then? If the levy is only to be on the employer, then you are suggesting that it is never going to be passed on, but on the other hand you say, while cleaners do not want to pay it. At present, the people who are generally in the city centres who are getting parking places are the directors, the bosses and those kinds of people. Out of town is different, but in the city centres on the whole it is not the ordinary workers who are getting free parking places. Did Mr Greene want to come in as well? The idea of people watching this thinking that it is only the elite, it is only the directors and rich businessmen who get parking spaces at their place of work must be watching in absolute horror what is being said by this committee. It is absolutely not true that it is only the elite to park at their place of work. Every day, normal workers park at their place of work. Is the member seriously arguing that ordinary workers get free parking places commonly in the city centres? As a member of this Parliament who often works later into the evening, I do not believe that it is just MSPs who get car parking spaces. In fact, often when I turn up on a Sunday evening or a Monday evening or an evening during the week it is security staff and people working in the Parliament who are coming in to help and get the Parliament ready for the next day. They are using those parking spaces, perhaps not during the day but at night, as much as any MSP, and I wondered if he would accept that point. I would accept that they get parking spaces if the MSPs do not require them. The norm is that the parking spaces are for the MSPs and for company directors for these kinds of people. I suggest that, if people are travelling within Glasgow and Edinburgh, there is an extremely good public transport system and people should not normally need to take their cars for a nine-to-five job and just leave the car sitting all day. However, I am not ruling out the fact that, of course, there are people from outside the city, including the convener, who come from a distance and the public transport system does not work. Of course, some people need to use their cars, but the overall point of this levy is to reduce a level of traffic in the city centres that are not sustainable and cannot keep growing and we need to tackle it. If I can move on to my amendment, which is 9A, that was really just to flag up the question as to how the cabinet secretary and the member are moving those amendments. I think that RTPs might be involved, because they are major players in the transport field. I take John Finnie's point that there could be confusion, there could be duplication, so I am not going to push this, and there would have been a lot of successive consequential amendments if I had been pushing it. However, I think that it would answer the question of how we can be more joined up. One extremely good example of park and ride is at Croy between Glasgow and Edinburgh, and that is in North Lanarkshire, but it is Glasgow and Edinburgh that we will be raising the levy. We need to see those councils working together. I accept that the proposal is that they can work together, but I wonder if what the thoughts of the member moving and the cabinet secretary were, which he might comment later on, as to how that might be strengthened and RTPs might be brought into the equation. John Finnie, I now call on Colin Smyth to speak to amendment 9B and the other amendments in the group. Amendment 9B and my name requires park and levy schemes to be signed off by ministers. That is the case with LEZs and other similar schemes, and we provide an additional element of oversight. I note that amendment 9B is supported even by those who support a workplace park and levy such as Friends of the Earth. John Finnie says that this goes against his view that all decisions should be made by local councils, yet the reality is that his amendment provides national exemptions, so it seems that localism is only selected localism. Amendments 10A and 10B in my name would require a ballot to be held to agree the introduction of a scheme. That will democratise the process and ensure it has public support. A similar ballot was held in the possibility of a congestion charge in Edinburgh, so there is precedent. Much has been said about consultation, but if consultation is so important, then why not have the ultimate consultation and let people decide in a ballot to use John Finnie's phrase that he used earlier? Why does those who oppose this have such little faith in the public? Thank you, Colin. Jamie Greene, can I ask you to speak to amendment 9B and other amendments in the group? I will now speak to my own amendments in this group. It is quite a large group, so I will keep my comments to my amendments, but I should add that I will be supporting the amendments in the name of Mike Rumbles, Pauline McNeill and Colin Smith for the majority. On my own amendments, amendment 9B seeks to insert a number of conditions that the local authority must take before setting up a scheme. If you look at what is in C, D, E and F, which I have added to amendment 9, I think that it is right that the local authority should demonstrate the need for a scheme, that it should be able to demonstrate that the displacement of vehicles as a result of the scheme does not increase pollution in the areas to which the vehicles are displaced, that any such workplace parking label will not have a detrimental impact on employment levels in the local authority area, or indeed the economic impact of a negative effect, and that a workplace parking label cannot be introduced in an area where there is also a low emissions on. The reason for that simply is that when we took evidence of what is the point of a label, if the point is to deter people from driving into cities, there are other means to do so. Other cities have successfully introduced congestion charges to try and encourage behaviour of not driving into cities where it is not possible, but if you have to, there is a fee associated with that, such as the case in London. There are also low emission zones, which will tackle the sorts of vehicles that we do not want in our cities. Broadly speaking, there is cross-party support for those measures, but we have always been clear since that was introduced that the Scottish Conservatives are in principle opposed to the workforce parking levy. We see it as a regressive tax on motorists, on workers, and far from what Mr Mason said, it is not just rich directors and business owners who park at their place of work. If we pass this legislation in the amendments that Mr Finnie suggests, then this could theoretically, if established in their local authority area, impact on any worker in Scotland, other than those that we exempt as we go through this process. On my other amendments, amendment D stipulates that local authorities should publish an impact assessment. I appreciate Mr Finnie's intentions on preparing and publishing the scheme and the objectives of the scheme and the assessment of the impacts of the proposal already in 10. Those are very welcome comments. However, I have taken it further and I would like to see on the face of the bill that the local authorities must set out a report detailing the impact that the levy will have on low-income households, on small and medium-sized businesses and the vicinity of the workplace levy scheme and, indeed, persons with disability or impairment. There are three groups that I think we as a Parliament should be talking about when we look at introducing taxes and charges and levies. It is important that that is on the face of the bill that local authorities cannot look past those groups. As it is currently worded, amendment 10 by Mr Finnie does not dictate or state what groups have to be consulted and the assessment that the levy will have on those groups. I think that those are three groups of people that we as a Parliament should be focusing on. On amendment 10, F, the bill additionally adds an assessment on local businesses and island communities. I think that that is important. The committee has spent a lot of time looking at our island communities. I think that it seems right and proper that we look at the assessment of any levy in which a local authority area has island communities would have on those. In my own region, for example, if North Ayrshire Council decided as a result of the neighbouring legislation to introduce a levy, I would like them to perform robust impact assessments on the effect that that would have on the islands of Ireland and Cumbria, where, for example, public transport is limited at certain times of the day only, and many people simply have to drive to their place of work. If you look at the example of some of the distilleries or production facilities on our own, driving to work is simply the only way to get there. I would like to ensure that we do not, as a Parliament, pass legislation that negatively impacts our island communities, notwithstanding the islands bill and the additional duties that authorities have as a result of that. I hope that that is something that members will consider and support. Amendment 11A is a technical amendment in respect of how a scheme may be revoked. Amendment 12B was introduced because I think that if this Parliament does its job and we see that a levy has been introduced and is having a severe negative impact on any particular area of Scotland, then we as a Parliament should be able to ask that local authority to review and indeed have the ability to revoke a scheme where it is having such a negative effect on the Scottish economy. I think that that is a helpful power for this Parliament to have that currently does not exist. Amendment 12A is a technical one to help facilitate that. Amendment 14A would remove requirement for licences in the scheme to specify the maximum number of vehicles that can be parked at any workplace. I do not see any tangible benefit in having a maximum, as is currently drafted in amendment 14 by Mr Finnie, so I would like to remove that cap. On the issue of petitions, I appreciate that there may be some disagreement on whether 20 per cent is a suitable trigger. I am happy for members to amend that at the next stage. However, if it is the view of local residents and local businesses that this levy is having a negative impact on their business, on their communities and on their local authority area, and such is the strength of support that the local authority is simply not listening to review or revocation of such a scheme, I would like to give some power to the people in that respect. If the strength of feeling is such, and I am happy for that threshold to be raised if members feel that 20 per cent is too low, then it is only right that the local authority is forced to review the scheme if local people are telling them, quite simply, stop causing us harm at small businesses. I think that that would be a useful welcome power to give the people in the local authorities. I am happy to leave my comments at that, because I know that other members have spoken at length to their own amendments. Thank you, Jamie. I have two members who wish to speak unless anyone else does at the moment. I am going to call Richard Lyle to start with me. Over the past number of months, I have previously made comments about the workplace park in Levy. Since those comments, I have listened to the evidence that has been put about by various organisations and, in particular, COSLA. I have also listened to the point about the climate emergency and people who are demonstrating outside this Parliament today. I was previously a SNP group leader in COSLA in 2007-9 and previously a councillor for over three decades. I believe in localism and I believe in councils being able to take the decisions on behalf of the family and the democratic process, but I have also learned as a politician, and I am coming up for my 43rd year in politics, where people have made—as I used to do, I used to scare monger, the same as other parties are now doing in this Parliament in regards to this policy. Some of the amendments that have been put in and some of the comments that have been made are totally not correct. Therefore, today, I will be changing my view and I will be supporting Mr Finnie in his, because I believe that councils should have the ability to raise, if they believe. Some councils will use it, some councils won't use it, and I know that, at the end of the day, I will have people who will come back at me, because of the comments that I previously made, so be it. I have been a politician long enough, but at the end of the day, I have made up my mind that I will be supporting Mr Finnie's amendment. Thank you, Mr Finnie. Thank you. Does any other member of the committee wish to say something? I would then like to say something before I ask the cabinet secretary to wind up. It is difficult to position as convener sitting at this table to allow your views to be represented and to represent the views of the committee, and there comes a time when, as convener, you have to take your convener's hat off and say what you believe. I am now taking my hat off as convener and speaking as a member of the committee. First of all, I have listened carefully to the evidence that has been given during the evidence session, and I am thankful as a committee that we were able to take that evidence. It became clear during the evidence session to me that there were three ways of tackling the emissions within towns and villages and cities. Those were suggested as congestion charging, low emission zones and a workplace parking levees. It was also suggested and made very clear during those evidence sessions to me that you could only choose one. You couldn't choose a multiple of them because they were therefore conflicting on each other. Also, listen carefully to the evidence that was given at the committee about from Nottingham. It appears to me that Nottingham is completely different to the majority areas of Scotland when it comes to public transport, in the fact that they have excellent public transport areas and provision in Nottingham, which allows people not to take cars into city centres. I believe that, in Scotland, we are in a different area, areas with large rural hinterlands where people do have to travel into cities and have little chance to take public transport. Indeed, sometimes I know from areas that I have worked in that if you get on a bus to go somewhere that you have to catch that very same bus to get back to where you have come from without interruption to be able to make the right connections. I have a little doubt in my mind that looking around and the way that this will be passed on from the evidence that we have heard that employers will pass on taxation to employees or certainly are some to share it. Therefore, I believe that this becomes a tax on going to work and therefore I don't believe that it's progressive. I think that we've discussed and I've made my intervention during Mr Mason's speech about how people use car parts at odd times of the day when normal workers are not using them so that they can service buildings and make sure that they're working for the next day. I don't think that it's right for those people that work in hours outside normal working hours to have to pay for a tax. I also have listened to what Mr Lyle has said about being a politician. I have not been a politician for 43 years and I will not be a politician for 43 years. In fact, I have got into politics so that I could make and stand on difficult decisions. Therefore, I make it abundantly clear at the outset of this that I do not support the working place parking levy. I don't support any part of it and I don't believe that it will achieve anything from the climate's point of view. Therefore, I will vote for amendments where I see that it will benefit should this legislation be passed but I will not vote for the legislation because I don't think that it's in the interest of people who go to work in Scotland. Having made that statement, I now put my convener's hat back on. I thank the committee members for allowing me to do that and for not interrupting me when I do it. I now call on the cabinet secretary to make comment. John Finnie has set out the case for local authorities to have the powers to introduce workplace parking levies. As we consider the amendments, you can see that this is a carefully crafted proposal, which is very much about empowering local authorities and giving tools to address issues such as the climate emergency. No single action can do that, but we need all the available powers at our disposal to meet those pressing challenges. In the recent debate on stage 1 of the climate change Scotland bill, all parties were clear on the need for action. With opposition spokespersons stating that we face a national environment and climate emergency, we need to take further action and that we should not postpone taking hard decisions. Yet a modest and completely discretionary power for local authorities to act has attracted furious criticism from those very same parties. Turning to other amendments in the group, they appear to me to range from being well-meaning to those that I can only assume are designed to frustrate the proposal. I firmly agree with John Finnie's approach to localism in decision making and I am disappointed at what appears to be a lack of confidence that some members have in local authorities in using these discretionary powers. It is worth restating some of the key principles of John Finnie's amendments. This is a power for local authorities, not a duty. It is underpinned by duties to consult and to carry out impact assessments on persons affected and the environment. It is strategic as it is linked to achievement of activities that is set out in a local transport strategy and funds raised must be spent on the scheme and transport-related activities. On a very point raised by John Mason and the role of RTPs, of course no local transport strategy can be shaped in isolation and the drafting and development of any local transport strategy to support such a proposal by a local authority will require due consultation with RTPs. That is a provision that will be set out in guidance to accompany the legislation. Convener, for those reasons, I support John Finnie's amendments and I cannot support the other amendments in the group. Thank you cabinet secretary and I call on John Finnie to wind up on amendment 7. There has been much discussion and I will just leave the comments as they are. Mike Rumbles, can I ask you to wind up on amendment 7a and ask you to press a withdrawal please? I think that we are making bad law and I think that the deal between the S&P and the Greens budget deal has shackled the committee in our work. It is quite obvious that the S&P members and Green members are not accepting any of the constructive amendments at all. Designed to improve the bill and we cannot do our job. I want to see. I want to see. Would Mr Rumbles share my frustration and the sadness of the way that we are legislating, because we did nothing on this at stage one. This should have been introduced by the Government at stage one so that we, as a committee, would have a proper chance to scrutinise it, to consult with the public, with the businesses and with the people that are going to be affected by the law that this committee is passing. I am deeply saddened by the process that we have gone through to squeeze it in at stage two. I agree with that. I am deeply saddened. When I joined this Parliament 20 years ago, I thought that the great thing about it was its committee work. However, the S&P members are being whipped to support the Green amendment. They are not accepting any amendments. It is quite obvious that they are. It is not playing games. It is too important to play games. We have put down constructive amendments to try and improve the amendment. I plead with the transport secretary because we have tried to be constructive throughout this whole process. This is not being constructive. We are trying to make good law. We might not like the amendment, but we could certainly improve it. Therefore, I want to be able to put those amendments again. I hope that we will have some time to think about those at stage 3. I am not going to move 7A because I want the Presiding Officer to accept my amendments for debate at stage 3, where, hopefully, we can get some constructive changes to the amendment. Thank you, Mr Rumbles. As Mr Rumbles wishes to withdraw amendments 7A, I will have to ask if any member wishes to eject. No member wishes to eject, therefore the amendment 7A is withdrawn. I therefore call amendment 7D in the name of Peter Chapman, already debated with amendment 7. Peter Chapman, to move or not move? I will move, but just before I do that, I would just like that. You can move it or not move it. There isn't a chance to debate it. We've had the chance to debate, so it is just purely an opportunity to move or not move. I ask you whether you want to move it or not move. I will move it. Therefore, the question is that amendment 7B agreed. Are we all agreed? We are not agreed. There's a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. 17. Those against, please raise their hands. There are five votes. Four, there are six votes against. Therefore, amendment 7D is not agreed. I therefore call amendment 7B in the name of Pauline McNeill, already debated with amendment 7. Pauline McNeill, to move or not move. The other question, therefore, is amendment 7B agreed. Are we all agreed? We are not agreed. There is a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. There are five votes. Four, there are six votes against. Therefore, amendment 7B is not agreed. I therefore call amendment 7C in the name of Pauline McNeill, already debated with amendment 7. Pauline McNeill, to move or not move. Thank you. The question, therefore, is that amendment 7B, C, be agreed. Are we all agreed? We're not agreed. There's a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. Those abstentions, please raise their hands. There are four votes. Four, there are six votes against, and there's one abstention. Therefore, amendment 7C is not agreed. Therefore, I call on John Finnie to press all with draw amendment 7B. The question, therefore, is amendment 7B agreed. Are we all agreed? We are not agreed. There is a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. There are six votes. Four, there are five votes against. Therefore, amendment 7 is agreed. I therefore call amendment 8 in the name of John Finnie, already debated with amendment 7. John Finnie, to move or not move. I therefore call amendment 8E in the name of Dean Lockhart, already debated with amendment 7. Jamie Greene to move or not move on his behalf. I therefore call amendment 8A in the name of Mike Rumbles, already debated with amendment 7. Mike Rumbles to move or not move. I therefore call amendment 8F in the name of Dean Lockhart, already debated with amendment 7. Jamie Greene to move or not move I therefore call amendment 8B in the name of Mike Rumbles, already debated with amendment 7. Mike Rumbles to move or not move. I therefore call amendment 8G in the name of Dean Lockhart, already debated with amendment 7. Jamie Greene to move or not move. I therefore call amendment 8C in the name of Mike Rumbles, already debated with amendment 7. Mike Rumbles to move or not move. I therefore call amendment Regardless of the weight and��ude, it is very important that we deal with the difference of the issues that are on the table, came out of Iran, and was why, unlike themselves, government We are not agreed that there is a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. There are six votes, four and five votes against, therefore amendment eight is agreed. I therefore call amendment nine in the name of John Finnie, already debated with amendment seven. John Finnie to move? Move, community. Will not move. It's moved. Call amendment nine A in the name of John Mason, already debated with amendment seven. John Mason to move or not move? Not moved. I therefore call amendment nine C in the name of Mike Rumbles, already debated with amendment seven. Mike Rumbles to move or not move. I thought this was the most constructive amendment, but I'm not moving it, hopefully, until stage three. I therefore call amendment nine B in the name of Colin Smyth, already debated with amendment seven. Colin Smyth to move or not move? I'll move it, convener. The question is that amendment nine B be agreed. Are we all agreed? We are not agreed that there is a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. Okay, there are four votes. Four, seven votes against, therefore, amendment nine B is not agreed. I therefore call amendment nine D in the name of Jamie Greene, already debated with amendment seven. Jamie Greene to move or not move? Not moved. Okay. The question, therefore, is John Finnie to press or withdraw amendment nine, please. The question is amendment nine B agreed. Are we all agreed? Yes. We are not agreed that there is a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. There are six votes. Four, there are five votes against. Therefore, the amendment is not agreed. Sorry. Well, I'm afraid it's a democracy, Mr Rumble, so we go with a democracy. Therefore, I call amendment ten in the name of John Finnie, already debated with amendment seven. John Finnie to move or not move, please. Move, convener. I therefore call amendment ten D in the name of Jamie Greene, already debated with amendment seven. Jamie Greene to move or not move? Not moved. I therefore call amendment ten A in the name of Colin Smyth, already debated with amendment seven. Can we move or not move? Move, convener. Okay. The question is, amendment ten A be agreed. Are we all agreed? Yes. We are not agreed that there is a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. There are four votes. Four, there are seven votes against. Therefore, amendment ten A is not agreed. I therefore call amendment ten B in the name of Colin Smyth, already debated with amendment seven. Colin Smyth to move or not move? Not move. Thank you. I therefore call amendment ten E in the name of Jamie Greene, already debated with amendment seven. Jamie Greene to move or not move? Not moved. I therefore call amendment ten C in the name of Mike Rumbles, already debated with amendment seven. Mike Rumbles to move or not move? Not moved. I therefore call amendment 10F in the name of Jamie Greene, already debated with amendment 7, Jamie Greene to move or not move. Not moved. I therefore call amendment 10G in the name of Peter Chapman, already debated with amendment 7, Peter Chapman to move or not move. Not moved. John Finnie, therefore, I ask you whether you wish to press or withdraw amendment 10, please. Press, convener. The question is that amendment 10 has amendmentably agreed. Are we all agreed? We are not agreed. There is a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. There are six votes, four, there are five votes against, therefore, amendment 10 is agreed. I therefore call amendment 11 in the name of John Finnie, already debated with amendment 11, John Finnie to move or not move. It moved, convener. I call amendment 11A in the name of Jamie Greene, already debated with amendment 11, Jamie Greene to move or not move. Not moved. I therefore ask John Finnie whether you wish to press or withdraw amendment 11, please. Press, convener. The question is that amendment 11 be agreed. Are we all agreed? We are not agreed. There is a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. There are six votes, four, there are five votes against, therefore, amendment 11 is agreed. I call amendment 12 in the name of John Finnie, already debated with amendment 7, John Finnie to move or not move. I call amendment 12A in the name of Jamie Greene, already debated with amendment 7, Jamie Greene to move or not move. Can we not have to not move 12A and 12B? Thank you. I therefore ask John Finnie to press or withdraw amendment 12, please. Press, convener. The question is that amendment 12 be agreed. Are we all agreed? Yes. We are not agreed. There is a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. There are six votes, four, there are five votes against, therefore, amendment 12 is agreed. I call amendment 13 in the name of John Finnie, already debated with amendment 7. John Finnie to move or not move. Move, convener. I therefore call amendment 13A in the name of Jamie Greene, already debated with amendment 7. Jamie Greene to move or not move. Not move. I therefore ask John Finnie whether you wish to press or withdraw amendment 13. Press, convener. The question, therefore, that amendment 13 be agreed. Are we all agreed? Yes. We are not agreed. There is a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. There are six votes, four, there are five votes against, therefore, amendment 13 is agreed. I therefore call amendment 14 in the name of John Finnie, already debated with amendment 7. John Finnie to move or not move. Move, convener. I call amendment 14A in the name of Jamie Greene, already debated with amendment 7. Jamie Greene to move or not move. Not move. The question, therefore, John Finnie, is do you wish to press or withdraw amendment 14. Press, convener. The question is that amendment 14 be agreed. Are we all agreed? Yes. We are not agreed. There is a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. Sorry. There are six votes, four, there are five votes against, therefore, amendment 14 is agreed. We are now going to move on to working place parking exemptions, and I can shortly take a break, but I'm going to call amendment 15 in the name of John Finnie group with amendments as shown in the groupings. I would point out if amendment 15A is agreed, I cannot call amendment 15B due to a preemption. Furthermore, if amendment 16M is agreed to, I cannot call amendment 16AH again due to a preemption. John Finnie, can I ask you please to amendment 15 and speak to all the amendments in the group? Mr Finnie. Thank you very much indeed, convener. Much of the discussion around workplace parking labels has been around exemptions. What will be exempt, why would groups be exempt, and who will apply the exemptions? Excuse me. Amendment 15 sets out the basis for exemption under the scheme. It covers four key areas. It requires that any workplace parking licensing scheme must include any national exemptions set by Scottish ministers, as well as the national exemptions provided for in the bill. The proposed national exemptions in the bill are set out in amendment 16. Amendment 15 also gives local authorities powers to set further exemptions. That is a wide-ranging power, as those exemptions can apply to specific premises, specific number of parking places, persons or motor vehicles. That is really important as it allows local authorities to draw up a scheme in the light of local circumstances. They have a wide scope as to what exemptions they can apply and how they apply them. That approach builds on the flexibility in the scheme, in how a scheme may be applied in amendment 7. I firmly believe that the local level is the place to determine further exemption. It is not the national stage. It is self-evident that important decisions make at local level will be better when meeting the needs of an area. Those decisions will be based on an understanding of local issues and preferred outcomes. My amendments ensure that a scheme can be tailored to meet local needs and circumstances. That is far removed from the rigid one-size-fits-all picture that opponents of the workplace parking levies have painted. Amendment 15 also ensures that only one scheme can cover the same premises at any given time. It gives Scottish ministers the power through regulations to provide for other exemptions or to restrict exemptions. My amendment 27 requires that those regulations be by affirmative procedure. That means that any proposals for national exemption in the future will face full and transparent scrutiny. I firmly believe that the framework for exemptions delivers the clarity that is sought while giving the flexibility to implement local schemes to make local needs. Amendments 15A and 15B are on exemptions for small car parks. Amendment 15A from Colin Smyth seeks to make a business with 15 parking places of fewer or any higher number that the local authority did to examine exempt from charges under any workplace parking levy scheme. Amendment 15B from Jamie Greene seeks to set this at 20 parking places. That covers the same ground as Mike Rumble's amendment 7A that we considered earlier. Colin Smyth wants a minimum threshold to be 15 parking places. Jamie Greene wants 20 and Mike wanted 10. Mike Rumble's variation makes my point that it is best left to the local authority to decide. Why would we apply random thresholds at a national level to a local scheme? Let's leave it to the people who have to design, plan and implement the impact of a scheme and consult in that scheme to decide. Ultimately, they will have to justify their decisions to the electorate. The framework that my amendments provide deliver this clarity and flexibility. I cannot support amendment 15A or 15B. Amendment 16 sets out the national exemptions that should be applied to workplace parking licensing scheme. Those are parking places for blue badge holders and equivalent disabled parking badges, qualifying NHS premises and places at hospices. I would like to address each of those in turn. I am sure that the committee will welcome the exemption for blue badge spaces, as well as protect the rights of disabled people. It also provides an incentive for those with premises liable for the levy to consider making more of such parking places available. Committee members will be well aware that the exclusion of hospitals and NHS premises from the workplace parking levy was part of the budget agreement. The amendment delivers that, but the inclusion of the NHS in my amendment is about more than the budget agreement. It is difficult to imagine a most strategically important and distinctive function than that which is provided by the NHS on a national level. That is something that resonates with the public. I am aware that there are other sectors that also have national significance. It is important to be clear that not having a national exemption does not mean that a workplace parking licence scheme will apply in a local situation. There are a number of steps that will shape that. My apologies if that seems to be self-evident, but much of the criticism of my amendments and the many of the amendments lodged to amendment 16 seem to miss this point. Step 1 is that a local authority will have to decide if they wish to set up a scheme. It is really up to them if they wish to. Step 2 is that the local authority will set out the scope of the scheme. As part of that, they will determine local exemptions. That will then be subject to detailed assessment of the impact on people affected and the environment. Step 3 will be consultation. Finally, if a scheme is implemented, it will be levied on premises, not people. If a scheme is implemented, it will be levied on premises, not people. It will be a matter for the occupiers of those premises whether they pass on the levy if it is applied at all. Underpinning my approach to workplace parking levies is the principle of localism. The national strategic importance of the NHS warrants a national exemption, but otherwise I believe that the decisions on how a workplace parking scheme will operate, including additional exemptions, are best made at local level. The decisions that will be part of a wider strategic vision of the needs of an area underpin by a detailed impact assessment, indeed assessments. My view is clearly that national exemptions should very much be the exception to the role. I accept that there are a lot of interesting exceptions, but the vast bulk of the amendments in this group appear to be a shopping list of additional national exemptions. Some of those are for sectoral groups while others name individual companies. I have no doubt that those amendments are sincerely proposed, but taken as a whole, it appears that they are trying to weaken the provisions so that a workplace parking levy never gets off the ground. That goes against the principles of localism underpin by a strategic approach that my amendment delivers. I would like to say a little more, convener, about the definition of NHS. For the purpose of the amendment, the NHS is widely defined widely. It will include GPs, for example. This represents the continuum of care that the public expects the NHS to deliver. My amendment also includes a national exemption for hospices. Some hospices are on NHS premises, while some are not. To add or distinction between different hospices on where they are located seems to be inappropriate, and I have therefore attempted to make clear that all hospices should be exempt regardless of location. I would like to draw the committee's attention to subsection 2, subsection B of my amendment. That allows for NHS premises that do not deliver NHS services to be liable for the levy. That would cover circumstances where NHS premises were, for example, led to a company that does not directly provide NHS services. I believe that that is right and that the public will view that as right. All the amendments attempt to add to the national exemption range from sectoral groups to different sort of premises in private companies. They go against the principles of localism that underpin the scheme, and I have asked why is there so little trust in local authorities to make decisions at local level. I believe that the framework that I have set out provides the clarity and flexibility that is required to deliver on the ground. We know why I want that. In summary, I would ask the committee to support amendments 15, 16 and 27 in my name. I would ask other members not to move their amendments in this group, but I would ask the committee to vote against them if they are. I move amendment 15. Thank you very much, John. There are eight members who will be given the opportunity to speak to their amendments, and then there will be an opportunity for the committee to speak. I am going to call the cabinet secretary and, just for the committee's thing, I am then going to be unconventional and call a suspension at that stage before we go into a lengthy period of voting to allow people a five-minute break. I am going to push on now with Colin Smyth to move amendment 15A and speak to other amendments in the group. Thank you very much, convener. My amendment adds in a number of additional exemptions to the proposed workplace pack. I have to say, John Finnie once again contradicts himself in the one hand saying that local government should decide what the exemption should be, but at the same time moving a number of national exemptions. It seems that local democracy is when the Greens and SNP decide that local democracy should exist. Amendment 15A in my name calls for car parts with 15 spaces or less to be exempt. Amendment 15B by Jamie Greene makes a similar suggestion, but set in a minimum at 20 spaces. I think that either would be a welcome addition and I am happy to support either of those amendments. It sets a very clear figure for businesses that cover several areas in Scotland to know exactly what their roles are that they will have to play by. Amendment 16A in my name would exempt police premises. We have heard that NHS premises rightly should be exempt because that is a national service. Well, it seems to me that maybe the Greens have failed to notice that the police service is now a national service. Police officers and staff have a unique safety need to use private vehicles to get to work and back, and so it should be exempt from any scheme. Likewise, amendment 16A in my name exempts educational premises and amendment 16A I exempts social worker. The committee received evidence that both of those groups are, for a range of reasons, require the use of a car to get to and from their place of work. Amendment 16A GI looks to exempt shift workers and those working irregular hours who are less likely to contribute to congestion but more likely to struggle to find public transport outwith the normal daytime working day. I have to say it for the SNP to describe social workers, the police, teachers, shift workers as somehow the elite is frankly an utter disgrace. There is a significant number of proposed exemptions in this section, some of which overlap with mine. I think that all those proposed exemptions make a valid contribution. I am happy to support them all, but I think that the sheer volume of legitimate exemptions suggests just how utterly flawed this whole process is. The workplace parking levy is a measure that should have been if those who supported it wanted it to be a bill in itself. But so far what we have seen is a proposal that has been slipped through at the last minute as part of a murky budget deal as an amendment. That means that there is no proper scrutiny by this Parliament on the proposals themselves. That is why I utterly oppose this particular scheme and believe that exemptions should be put in place where we have clearly heard evidence in support of those exemptions. I will now call on Jamie Greene to speak to amendment 15b. I am not going to add too much to what Colin Smith said because it is not often the Labour Party and the Conservatives agree on exemptions of tax or indeed issues of tax. Burn this. That is rather uncalled for, Mr Law. You are welcome to intervene on me if you have got a comment to make. Thank you for that apology. This is important. I think that Mr Rumble summed it up nicely. We are creating the law here. This committee has a duty. I am deeply saddened by the events of today because I do not think that we are making good law. I think that the sheer volume of exemptions here and let us look at the list of exemptions. I appreciate that Mr Finnie made the comment that they were introduced with the well-intended. I am pleased that that has been recognised because that is the case. There may be other amendments that one could argue that we are seeking to disrupt the mechanisms of the levy. People are welcome to their views on that, but those are national exemptions. Where I disagree fundamentally with the approach that Mr Finnie's amendments on this workplace parking levy take is that it will be up to local authorities to decide local exemptions. Therefore, each city who introduces or needs any local authority who introduces a levy should they do so as a result of the legislation can decide who pays and who doesn't. Theoretically, that could end up in a situation where a teacher in Glasgow is liable for the charge but not in Edinburgh or a nurse in Aberdeen is liable but not in Dundee. Where is the fairness in that? That is not about local democracy to me. That is about creating bad law. The whole list that the Scottish Conservatives and indeed others, Mr Rumbles and Mr Smith have a number of other exemptions should be on the face of the bill. Those are the sort of hard-working people and public service workers in Scotland that this Parliament and this committee protect, firefighters, policemen, train drivers, care workers, prison officers, people at park and do charity work in our high streets. Why on earth are we subjecting them to this tax? I think that we should be ashamed of ourselves therefore I support all the exemptions in this group. Thank you, Jamie. I now call on Miles Briggs to speak to amendment 6N and the other amendments in the group. Thank you, convener, and good morning to the committee. Having spoken to a number of people who work in our health and social care sector, I have brought forward a number of amendments and I welcome the fact that John Finnie has specifically also brought forward the amendment with regards to hospices. I was also looking to bring forward one that was not originally included. The amendments that I have lodged to the bill intend to exempt people working in the health and social care from the scheme. Amendment 16.0 would exempt employees working for independent healthcare services while 16P and 16Q cover employees of veterinary practices and people working in Scotland's air ambulance service respectively. I have also sought to exempt adult social care providers through amendments 16R and 16S while 16T and 16U would exempt places of residential care establishments and health-based charities across Scotland. Finally, my amendment 16M deletes subsection 2B from section 16 which stipulates that you must be a healthcare provider to qualify for exemption at the hospital. I think that that is a key point if this bill goes forward, that hospitals like our Parliament require technicians, cleaners and security personnel to name just a few. All provide a vital and key role within the hospital and NHS setting and so it's only right that they are also exempt. Thank you very much, Miles. I now call on Jeremy Greene. Are you going to speak to amendment 16A because Grimms Simpson is, I believe, in a community? Yes, I'm happy to. Members will bear with me. 16A and B in the name of Grimms Simpson who passed his apologies this morning has asked me to move these. They specifically want to exempt industrial sites, heritage and construction sites in the scheme. That's on the basis of a number of pieces of consultation that he and our party have been having with sites. We approached a number of local authority areas and businesses within them, talked to them about the prospect of this levy. We talked to them about the effect it may have on them and their workforce. I appreciate that a comment was made that this is on the premise not the people, but it is inevitable, as was the case with the only other local authority in the entire country that's actually implemented a scheme like this, that some businesses will pass it on to their employees. I believe that they will do so, not out of spite of their employees, but out of a necessity because they simply cannot afford the levy that will be imposed on them. I've spoken to a number of businesses with regards to industrial sites specifically. Let me give you some examples. It's important in the midst of all the politics and the emotion in this that we actually listen to real local businesses. Let me take break Scotland in Newhouse. As a major employer, based in an out-of-town location with a 24-hour operation, we believe that the proposal for the levy would have a negative impact on our employees and people who work under such similar circumstances. The lack of public transport outside major conurbations and the ability to provide suitable, safe and regular alternatives to fit with shift patterns leave people no option but to drive to work, and imposing a tax on them would, in our view, be unfair and punitive. I hope that Mr Llyw will reflect on that. Maybe he can comment on it. Happy to take an invention. That's in my constituency. It's very nice to know that you've contacted a business in my constituency. You also know that North Lancer Council has never, never implemented a car parking charge in the number of years. I'm pleased, but you've just voted to give them the power to do so. Mr Llyw, why aren't you listening? Sorry, in fairness. I'm very happy for interventions to be taking, but can we not degenerate this into a conversation across the committee table? I don't think that's how the committee works, but it's not working like that. Jamie, if you'd like to push on, and if you'd like to make an intervention on a specific point to question Jamie on something then by the committee, I don't think that's how the committee works. I do thank Mr Llyw for expressing his interest in this. I would plead with him. I know that we've voted on a number of these amendments already, but please have a think and listen to these businesses. What about Sutherland Brothers airport industrial estate at Wick airport? We operate on an industrial estate with poor public transport. Our staff have no alternative but to use their car to commute to work. That includes in the early hours of the morning or late in the evenings to get to and from work. Many of the amendments that we're proposing and other parties are proposing are to exempt certain shift workers, certain locations, and I think rightfully so. I appeal to the heart of some of the members of this committee to listen to the businesses in your own patches. Listen to what they're saying. Don't listen to what we're saying. If you don't agree with me, that's perfectly fine and decent. Please listen to the businesses in your own constituencies and regions. They're not happy and we're trying to exempt them as a result of the comments that they've given us. I'm happy to give way. I thank the member for giving way but would he accept that these decisions are all better made by the local authorities because they know the local area better and cities like Glasgow and Edinburgh are more keen on the levee because it's the city centre that are the big problem and many other local authorities, if not all, are less keen on the levee because they don't have city centres. Mr Mason, you're implying that this workplace parking levee will only be applied in cities. It doesn't say that. Nowhere in Mr Finnie's suggested amendments does it state that these levees can only be applied in cities. Now, actually, if that was an amendment that you wanted to bring forward at stage 3, I'd probably support you on that because that would secure these rural and suburban areas where there is poor public transport. In a second, but please let me respond to your first intervention. You are making an assumption that it is only local authorities city councils who would want to introduce this levee. We are giving the power to every local authority in Scotland to do this so that not in cities may have to pay the levee. That's what we're trying to protect for those businesses, those workers. Mr Smith, happily. One of the fundamental flaws is that although this is a power that some people argue will only be imposed by cities, say Glasgow or Edinburgh, the reality is that thousands upon thousands of people from outwith those city boundaries travel into those cities every single day for employment purposes, often from areas such as the Borders to their poor public transport. They will be forced to pay this levee but not a single penny will be spent in their area to support improving public transport. Secondly, they will have no say over this because it will be a neighbouring local authority in a city that will decide despite the fact that they will have to pay. You're absolutely right, Mr Smith. I think that's something we really need to reflect on is that if Glasgow City Council introduced the levee, and I'm sure Mr Mason would support them in that, what about the workers from Ayrshire and Reclyde who have to drive to those premises? Please let me finish. In some of the industrial states, even within cities, cities have industrial states that aren't served by public transport. Cities have people that work evening shifts and work early mornings and have no other means of getting to work. So there's actually not just people who live within the city that you're discouraging from taking their car, you're also discouraging people who have no choice of living peripheral local authorities. The consequence of those actions by a local authority who introduces the levee will be felt by neighbouring local authorities and people who live outwith those local authorities. Mr Love. In a question that I posed to a councillor from Glasgow, there's quite a substantial number of people who travel into Glasgow or Edinburgh who actually pay car parking charges at the moment to go to work. There are some employers that do charge their employers for parking. I think that's out of the discretion of those employers. They obviously know their workforce better. What I wouldn't like to do is give a blanket right that all employers have to charge a parking charge at their place of work. I think... Sorry, but if I look... I'm talking about NCP car parks or parking in Bacannon Galleries or sorry, or a parking metre in a street. So they're not getting charged by their employer. They're actually getting physically at this moment in time charged by the council. Indeed. Are you suggesting that they should also have to pay a workplace parking living on top of the private car parking charges? What I'm saying is that there are people that are paying to park in Glasgow and Edinburgh. That therefore reduces the comment that Colin Smith made, the thousands of people that he suggests are going to be paying this because there are people who are already paying car parking charges at the moment. I'll leave you to that. As I said, we're creating national legislation. We're creating the parameters to levy, which a local authority can introduce that will mandate all businesses within that local authority area to introduce a levy. There's no pick and choose here. The idea, as I said, going back to local exemptions, that one local authority might decide that it's okay to exempt, but another may not, will create a huge unfairness, I think, in our working force. And as I said, going back to Mr Simpson's original amendments, he wants to exclude certain types of sites and locations. I think that it's the right thing to do. Those sites are the furthest away from our cities, the least provided by public transport and tend to have 24 operations or shift workers. As I said, I'll go back to my earlier comments. I've nearly finished, but if it's important. Would he at least agree that we're probably all pretty well agreed that in a village or an out-of-town workplace no local authority, nor us, is going to suggest that there will be a workplace parking levy? So would he accept that we're at least aiming at the same thing and the question is do we have a more centralist approach and decide everything at the centre or do we allow local authorities to make these decisions? I appreciate the tone and candor of which Mr Mason asked that question and I appreciate where he's coming from. But again, for too many assumptions in the statement that he's making, he's saying that no rural authority will introduce a levy. How does he know that? Local authorities are by default political beings and they may choose to do so. And I would say they shouldn't have that choice because of the effect that it will have on their work. I mean it's turning into a lengthy debate. I'm trying to be polite, Mr convener, but it's entirely up to you on time. Can I suggest you, it's up to you, Jamie, how many more you take. One more and then try and wrap it up to allow other members to come in. That may be appropriate. I want to give more advantages because if other members want to speak to the amendments in this group they're welcome to put their hand up and speak to them. I think I've made my point and I would ask members in the committee to reflect upon I think the sensible list of exemptions and give it some genuine thought and please do not vote against exempting some of these workers. It's a great thing to do so please join us in exempting them. Thank you, Jamie. I'm now going to call on Mike Rumbles to speak to amendment 16e and any other amendments in the group. Thanks convener. I will start by saying John Finnie in his introduction kept saying, he said it several times that the levee is on the employer and he's absolutely right. He's absolutely right and I agree with him. Sorry, early on you did. Or maybe that was an aside, John. It's a levee on the employer but there's nothing to stop in this bill for the levee to be passed on to the employee so I think dancing on the head of a pin here. I've also heard him talk again about the principle of localism. I support the principle of localism but I also support what we're supposed to do right in this Parliament. Our job as members of the committee is to make good law and I'm very exercised about this because I think that is a really important job that we do. We all come here from political backgrounds. I happen to be a Liberal Democrat but my job here is to make sure that we pass law which is fit for purpose. It's quite obvious to me that with all the amendments down here we intend to try and improve the bill and it's a great disappointment as I say that whatever amendment is being put forward there is an instruction that this will not be allowed. This is why when the Parliament was set up it was set up without a revising chamber. It was set up I see Stuart Stevenson shaking his head. I was here 20 years ago at Mr Stevenson at the foundation of this Parliament. I ask you not to do conversations across the table. I'm responding to what Mr Stevenson said. Mr Stevenson made a comment while he was sitting down without intervening. I suggest you push on with the point that you made. I remember when we first took our seats here 20 years ago and there was a big debate about whether we should have had a revising chamber and it was decided that we shouldn't have one because the work of the committee was important and the job of the committee members would be to scrutinise the legislation particularly put forward by the Government. We have a bizarre situation where because of a political agreement this amendment that John Finnie is putting forward cannot be touched. I mean this strikes at the very heart of what this Parliament was designed to do and what we're doing is wrong and I'm saying so. No, I've listened to everybody. I haven't intervened other people. I've listened to what other people are saying and I'm deeply disappointed by this whole shameful process in our parliamentary system and I would appeal to the Government to the Cabinet Secretary to think hard on this and to come back and be prepared at stage 3 to accept reasonable constructive amendments that are put forward as us doing our job. The point about my amendments in this section are if we are going to have national exemptions for instance the national health service to me it's logical that you also look round and say what other national exemptions should you have and try to be constructive again I've put some amendments in to give one example of the police service which is a national service and I particularly thought that John Finnie would appreciate that from his work experience and how important this would be needed so I think it's a false idea that okay we can have a national exemption for the national health service but we can't have a national exemption for anybody else that's just not logical where is the logic in this this is bad law we shouldn't be doing this I'm really frustrated and disappointed with this whole process Thank you very much Mike I'm now going to call on Liam Kerr to speak to amendments 16x and other amendments in the group Liam I'm grateful to the committee for the opportunity this morning I've lodged several amendments which exempt key groups from the workplace park in Levy for reasons well articulated by Colin Smith MSP earlier I strongly associate myself with Jamie Greene's comments at the outset In brief, amendment 16x and 16y would see staff working at the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service and Police Scotland exempted from the scheme amendment 16z covers those working in the criminal justice social work services which are carried out by local authorities amendment 16aa covers those working for the Scottish prison service is that these are critical services required to keep the public safe to maintain law and order and promote rehabilitation and it is my view that they should be exempted from the scheme and therefore I move those amendments in my name I'm now going to call on Maurice Corry to speak to amendment 16ab and other amendments in the group Maurice Thank you for the opportunity of coming to speak in support of these amendments The Majesty's Coast Guard service is on a national safety service It is on a notice to move an immediate notice Coast Guard officers have to be in the field Coast Guard ground officers in control have to be available and all need to be available 24 hours and the necessity of communication of working with other emergency and blue light services and therefore quite often many of these are in rural areas and there is absolutely no way at 2 o'clock in the morning when the balloon goes up and they have to be there on time and available to go forward so I move this amendment that they be exempt from any parking charges accordingly Thank you Maurice and I would normally call Alexander Stewart to speak to a member at 16b but I believe Jamie Greene you are briefly going to speak to her I didn't cover that Life Boat Service I won't come back to you Mr Corry one more time No now One more time Again, similarly to Coast Guard Service this is a national service it is critical to our safety of our coasts we are a maritime nation also the other thing is that the Royal National Lifeboat Institution is a charity and therefore there is no way a charity of that size can stand any charges being absorbed by itself if it's not passing them on to the crews so absolutely adamant that this is the crews Life Boats are protected the Life Boat based administration and support and operational staff are protected and also it is necessary for the communications to be with them to be working with other emergency services they have to be on call and immediate notice to move and therefore it's impossible to lie on public transport they need to be available to take their cars to work Thank you very much Maurice and now I come to call amendment 16b normally this would be Alexander Stewart to move it but I think Jamie Greene to move it on his behalf Just briefly I think we've covered a lot of ground already I would pay attention particularly to 16w which it seeks to exempt care workers again I cannot for life me think why we would want care workers as defined to have to pay to work on social hours often at low pay and difficult circumstances I think it's the right thing to do I absolutely support Alexander Stewart's amendment to exempt those workers from the levy I hope other members will agree with me His other amendment I believe is regarding those who work at Scotland's airports as we all know Scotland relies very heavily on aviation connectivity to service our islands I don't see why an air traffic controller or a security worker at Campbelltown or Barra or Kirkwall or Stornaway should have to pay a levy simply for coming and doing what I would consider a lifeline duty to service our remote and island communities and again I would appeal to members who have these types of workplaces in their regions or constituencies to think very carefully about voting against exempting these places Thank you Jamie, the only member so far that's indicated to wish to speak is Stewart Stevenson Thank you very much This is clearly an area where there are genuine and deeply held different viewpoints and that's entirely right and proper I think however members of this committee should be very careful about attributing to others how they have come to their decision based on no knowledge whatsoever in my personal case of how I have reached the decisions that I am exercising democratically as we vote on amendments today I did not start off from a point of view of uncritical support of this like others I have engaged in quite robust debates with a range of people and come to the views that I have and I ask that members respect my individual process and the individual process of anyone around this table holding contrary views to me of views as me and us as individuals and I think it's entirely improper convener for the process by which us as individuals have come to our viewpoints to be traduced in the way that I have heard now turning to more substantial matters convener I think the important thing is to say are local authorities going to behave responsibly or irresponsibly in the discharge of the duties that we are looking to give them under this provision it's not as if we can ask that question in a vacuum such powers have been available to local authorities south of the border for decades so we have a model that we can look at to see if local authorities behave irresponsibly in this regard now if members in this committee and members of this Parliament wish to say that Scottish authorities are simply irresponsible compared to their English counterparts will I invite them to say that on the record I don't happen to believe that that's the case not because they're Scottish but simply because local authorities are the custodians of the interests of local people and they behave in a proper way it's beyond contemplation that people in Campbell town are likely to find themselves subject to this while people in Cornwall in England where their local authority has come to a conclusion they will not make such levies incidentally there are no air traffic controllers at Campbellton or Barra there are air flight information service officers but that's perhaps but it's a very substantial air for all sorts of interesting reasons but bottom line is that I think we should conduct this debate with proper respect for us as individuals and that was the main point I will wish to make in coming to my views nobody dictates to me my views I come to them honestly I may be wrong at the end of the day as all of us can be but I come to my views honestly and independently I would ask members to respect that as I respect the views above everyone else around this thank you very much I'm now going to call Pauline and then I'm going to call Richard Lyle thank you very much I just wanted to briefly address some points in relation to the exchange between Jamie Greene and Richard Lyle because the people of Glasgow if this is passed into law are likely to face a levy in their workplace because that has already been declared by the authorities like Mike Rumbles and Stuart Stevenson in favour of localism too but I do believe that it's the job of this Parliament to set the national policy and we are responsible for the national policy on anti-poverty measures and therefore in doing our jobs therefore I would have thought that there should be some serious consideration given to exemptions I've done some consultation so tenants for example Duke Street which is probably regarded as being pretty close to the city centre the workers there are concerned there are shift workers, part-time workers and actually there are people who use the bus to go on the back shift because they can but in other shifts they can't because it's just not possible to get public transport at certain times at night McVitties in Glasgow is a same company which has part-time workers, shift workers and these are companies which are already concerned about the implications of Brexit so even if the levy is charged on them I think we would be asking committee members to consider the implications all round not just on the workforce but on what is already a very concerned industry sector on the implications of Brexit Edrington which is a well-known company Whiskie company Fabulous company in Drumchappel all over Glasgow and beyond again they are concerned for their part-time workers and this lastly convener has been expressed to me by shop students in those places that they are very concerned about the impact on women workers because in some cases there is a predominantly female workforce many who are single parents and many who have got child care responsibilities who need their cars and they are concerned in most of these cases and I think the shop students are concerned that even if the workplace levy is not passed on to them they do fear that in the subsequent pay-arounds they will effectively pay the price for that to a company has to fork out £400 or whatever the detail is of the charge Thank you very much Pauline I have to agree with the appointment of Stuart Stevenson as I said earlier I made comments on the car park in Levy well before it came in front of this committee well before months before but I am struck by the fact that just because I have listened to the arguments listened to the evidence and changed my view that I am now being attacked but the situation is if I had not and I had been voting with the other members who, the other five who feel that they are not going to listen to I may have been also then attacked by the other five members so sorry sometimes the politician you have to come off the fence I have come off the fence in regards to this and you know I have to say some of these amendments are pure scaremongering scaremongering comments made by Mr Stevenson are correct I worked in Glasgow I paid to park in Glasgow for a number of years when I worked for the Royal Bank I paid on the street or alternatively in a car park I didn't have an individual car park in space and many companies won't have individual car park in spaces for their workers their workers will be paying on street parking or in car parks care workers care workers are out and about visiting the people they look after I don't see where they park when I was a councillor they didn't park in the council car park so they wouldn't get charged for panthymia pure scaremongering so with the greatest respect to Mr Rumbles and others just because I've changed my mind you should also change your mind can I just make an observation and I think it's interesting is that we have two suggestions that people are making out their mind because they're being told what to do and being criticised for making that comment it's then wrong in my opinion for committee members then to criticise other people for the position they're taking we all are entitled to have our opinion and therefore I think we should respect it before I come to the cabinet secretary I again would like to take off my convener's hat and just make an observation is that I think that councils are under increased financial pressure one of the things that happens when councils are under financial pressure is to look at all ways of raising revenue across their portfolios certainly saw it in Highland when looking at car parking fees were being raised on car parks in Highland areas so they do look at opportunities and I think my fear is that when it comes to people who could be swept up in this although councils may say at the moment they don't want to raise working place parking levy they may be forced into doing it as the financial position comes tougher one other comment that I would make is there has been no investigation on the financial case for this because there are some firms that I know of who contact me who pay for their employees to park in public car parking spaces and they don't have the ability to provide them parking spaces and it may be that should this levy come in that those employees will then fall into paying for their parking charges because the companies believe that everyone else pays for it so it's an issue that's been raised Cabinet Secretary can I just call you in now and can I just say to you that as soon as you finish speaking we are going to pause so Cabinet Secretary till the pause is yours as it were okay the amendments in Mr Finnie's name strike a balance between the national and local dimension we have a national framework that allows national exemptions to be applied but as John Finnie said in moving his amendments national exemptions it should be the exception and I agree I believe our role is to set the framework and to then let those who take forward a scheme to implement it on the ground that is why I cannot support amendments 15A and 15B which seek to exempt from charges under licensing schemes any premises with 15 or fewer or fewer than 20 workplace parking spaces those numbers are arbitrary with no reference to the circumstances that a local authority will be trying to address I think amendment 15 has the balance right and would allow local authority schemes to exempt premises and would allow a maximum number of parking spaces as the scheme in Nottingham does and so I'm happy to support the amendment if the amendment is pressed to revote I would encourage the committee to do to support it I would invite Colin Smyth and Jamie Greene not to move amendments 15A and 15B but if they are moved I would ask the committee to reject them amendment 16 has attracted a lot of attention at least when measured against a number of amendments to it I will return to those in considering the amendments and the range that they intend to address on the exceptions set out in amendment 16 I fully support these yes, the exception to hospitals and NHS premises was a condition of our support of supporting the workplace parking licensing scheme and amendments John Finnie made the case for the NHS very clearly in his own contribution and I'm happy to support this approach I also see the merit in including hospices and blue badges in a limited range of national exemptions on similar grounds I agree with John Finnie that national exemptions should be the exception I agree with the principles of localism and believe that significant local decisions are best made locally that will mean that we are informed about those circumstances, needs and opinions amendment 16 has and I believe the commitment to finish this point amendment 16 has and I believe I've got the balance right and I'm happy to support the amendment if pressed to the vote I would invite the committee to support it too I'm not too sure what it was trying to make an intervention two questions one, why did the Government come to a view that it's only the NHS and not other forms of public service workers in similar circumstances and two, does it not agree or why does it not think that if you give the power only to local authorities to create local exemptions then it will create a disparity between local authorities in that some workers will have to pay it in one ear but others not in others how is that a fair policy when as I said a teaching assistant in Dundee in Glasgow does where is the fairness in that the purpose was to give local authorities the discretion to be able to tailor schemes that reflect their local circumstances and that's why the amendments which we support provide that type of flexibility for them to determine what the ACA has been local need keep in mind that there is a significant level of engagement that has to be undertaken by local authorities prior to establishing such a scheme to make sure that they consult with a range of different stakeholders which allows them to consider issues that are raised during that process so there is a very robust duty placed upon local authorities to consider those issues and then ultimately it is for local elected members to come to that decision and our decision to support the issues around NHS is driven by the fact that it is a national service alongside the very specific issues in terms of the number of parking spaces that are very often required at hospitals not only for those but also those who are accessing the hospital itself and on that basis we agreed that there should be a principle of NHS facilities at a national level being a national exemption. The remaining amendments in this group of which there are 37 in total all seek to exempt a sectorial group, specified premises or a company. I was struck when reading these amendments how little they reflect the evidence that this committee provided in advance of stage 2. Not unreasonably we look to Nautim's experience of actually running a scheme. Chris Carter from Nautim told the committee that and I quote the beauty of the workplace parking levy is that it is flexible and allows different exemptions to meet needs. However another strength of the levy is its simplicity. If too many exemptions are introduced it becomes too complicated and a lot of the benefits are lost. However, we have 37 amendments each seeking to add further nationally mandated exemptions. It's almost, if you don't mind me saying convener, you could be left by thinking that some members don't actually want the scheme to work by the range of exemptions they're seeking to put in place. I understand that these are concerns about how a workplace parking licence scheme will be applied. Mr Greene, if you want to take a look at the issue, I don't think it's fair that we talk over each other when people are talking Cabinet Secretary. For me, the place to address these is at a local level except in very specific cases. I am concerned that the amendment seeking to bring in additional national exemptions will have the effect of undermining local decision making and make schemes unworkable and ineffective. As a result, I cannot support these amendments and I would invite members not to move them. However, if they are moved, I would invite the committee to reject them. Thank you, Cabinet Secretary. We are about to go on as Cabinet Secretary has alluded to a series of votes but before we do that the amendments will need to be pressed but I am going to suspend the meeting now for 10 minutes and then I'm going to come back and ask Mr Finlay and Colin Smyth to move on to the amendment. The meeting is suspended till 11 o'clock. I would like to reconvene this meeting of the Royal Economy and Connectivity Committee. Cabinet Secretary had just summed up and I'm now going to move to John Finlay to wind up on amendment 15. Mr Finlay. There's been a lot of discussion on it. I'll just leave it at that. Colin Smyth, can I ask you to wind up on amendment 15a and press or withdraw it? I'll press my amendment, convener. Thank you. Before we go into the votes I'd have to remind members that if amendment 15a is agreed to I cannot call amendment 15b due to a preemption. The question is that amendment 15a be agreed to. Are we all agreed? We are not agreed. There is a division. Those in favour please raise their hands. Those against please raise their hands. There are five votes four. There are six votes against therefore 15a is not agreed. I therefore call amendment 15b in the name of Jamie Greene already debated with amendment 15. Jamie Greene to move or not move. Moved. The question therefore is amendment 15b are agreed. Are we all agreed? We're not agreed. There's a division. Those in favour please raise their hands. Those against please raise their hands. Those who abstain please raise their hands. Therefore, there are four votes four. There are six votes against. There's one abstention therefore amendment 15b is not agreed. Therefore, Mr Finlay, can I ask you to press or withdraw amendment 15? Press, convener. The question is that amendment 15 be agreed. Are we all agreed? Yes. I prefer amendment 15 because the area of addresses on those Rhaol, daeth eno ein schurnau hwnnaeth, gydych yn ddech 완성. D dancing. Rweddai 4 honi a gweithio arulled gyda diolch. Have a mwy atio wath ad ba wiynau'ch nes dangersh Further 6wad F? axeeg yn uch foodsin niwill, wrtherm iddo wedi allan â dnid yn fwyscrydd bawb, pan â Ysbêar Hes твоff mwy i weithio i digonchiad F? o'r llwylau o Cymru, oeddi'r dweud o amweinfaithredu 15 Swt ako'n annes ar gyfer a angen i'n dda? Oeddi'r dweud o'r llwylau? Rwy'n annes. Rwy'n annes, therefore, o'r amweinfaith reiwn i'r gwasanaeth mwy yn cysylltu. Rwy'n annes, ac rwy'n annes. Rwy'n annes. Rwy'n annes, therefore, cyfraithio'r ddraefincio'r ddodigol i'n dda? Ac e'ch gweld i'r ddodigol i'r ddodigol? There are five votes for, there are six votes against, therefore amendment 16C is not agreed. I call amendments 16E, in the name of Mike Rumbles, already debate with amendment 15. Might rumbles to move or not move? Well, I want to bring it back to stage 3 where we might get a fairer hearing, so I will not move. Thank you. Therefore, I call amendments 16X, in the name of Liam Kerr, already debate with amendment 15. Liam Kerr to move or not move? nhw'n llwyddem. Diolch yn fwy o'r ysgoledig? Rwy'n wych. Felly, yn ym allan y fwy o'r ysgoledig, y rhan gael chi'n ddaeth nhw, gallai'n ddifdesion! Rwy'n fwy o'r ysgoledig, byddai'n fwy o'r ysgoledig. Felly, mae'r ddawf yn llwyddem. Rw'n fwy o'r ddawf yn llwyddem. Fynd ym llwyddem, mae'r eysig isa'r ysgoledig. Rwy'n ddysgu'r ysgoledig, i'n dd 등fynu Llyrdi Aelodau, Gwladwn i'n debygio gyda Menwany 15 Llywodraeth Le-Ym Cerdarnor, mae gyda'r Cresnidol y Llywodraeth 16 Y yn ym 17, rydyn ni'n debygio? Rydyn ni'n debygio. A neu'r Cresnidol yn ym 15, elfa ffordd rydyn ni'n debygio, rydyn ni'n debygio. Rydyn ni'n debygio eich rydyn ni'n debygio. Rydyn ni'n debygio, roedd ym 5, rydyn ni'n debygio, mae rydyn ni'n debygio. Le'w rollen ei wneudaduraeth 16 A B yn y name of Morris Corry. We're already debated with amendment 15, Morris Corry, to move or not move, moved. The question therefore is that amendment 16abb agreed, are we all agreed? We are not agreed. There's a division. Those in favour please raise their hands. Those against please raise their hands. There are five votes for, there are six votes against, therefore amendment 16abb is not agreed. I call amendment 16ac in the name of Morris Corry, already debated with amendment 15, Morris Corry, to move or not move, moved. The question is that amendment 16ac be agreed to. Are we all agreed? We are not agreed. There's a division. Those in favour please raise their hands. Those against please raise their hands. Therefore there are five votes for, there are six votes against, therefore amendment 16ac is not agreed. I call amendment 16d in the name of Colin Smith, already debated with amendment 15, Colin Smith to move or not move. Therefore the question is, is amendment 16d be agreed, are we all agreed? We're not agreed. There's a division. Those in favour please raise their hands. Those against please raise their hands. There are five votes for, there are six votes against, therefore amendment 16d is not agreed. I'd like now to call amendment 16l in the name of Mike Rumbles, already debated with amendment 15, Mike Rumbles to move or not move. I'm always an optimist and I'd like to fare a hearing at stage three, so I'm not going to move it now. Okay, can I just say it would help me members if you could just move or not move the amendment, because I then, I'm just saying I've got another 14 so pages before we get to the next bit, so just keep the votes flowing it makes it easier so that it's not moved. Therefore I call amendment 16f in the name of Mike Rumbles, already debated with amendment 15, Mike Rumbles to move or not move. Not moved. I therefore call amendment 16g in the name of Mike Rumbles, already debated with amendment 15, Mike Rumbles to move or not move. Not moved. I therefore call amendment 16v in the name of Alexander Stewart, already debated with amendment 15. Jamie Greene, can I ask you to move or not move please? Moved. The question is that amendment 16v be agreed, are we all agreed? We are not agreed, there is division, those in favour please raise their hands. Those against please raise their hands. There are five votes for, there are six votes against, therefore amendment 16v is not agreed. I call amendment 16h in the name of Mike Rumbles, already debated with amendment 15, Mike Rumbles to move or not move. Not moved. The question therefore is not a question, it's to call amendment 16l in the name of Mike Rumbles, already debated with amendment 15, Mike Rumbles to move or not move. Not moved. Therefore I call amendment 16j in the name of Mike Rumbles, already debated with amendment 15, Mike Rumbles to move or not move. Not moved. I therefore call amendment 16k in the name of Mike Rumbles, already debated with amendment 15, Mike Rumbles to move or not move. Not moved. I therefore call amendment 16o in the name of Miles Briggs, already debated with amendment 15 miles break to move or not move. The question is, is amendment 16 O be agreed? Are we all agreed? We're not agreed. There's a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. There are five votes for, there are six votes against, therefore amendment 16 O is not agreed. I therefore call amendment 16 P in the name of miles breaks to move or not move. The question is, is amendment 16 P be agreed? Are we all agreed? We are not agreed. There's a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. There are five votes for, there are six votes against, therefore amendment 16 B is not agreed. I call amendment 16 Q in the name of miles breaks already debated with amendment 15 miles breaks to move or not move. The question is, is amendment 16 Q be agreed? Are we all agreed? We're not agreed. There's a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. There are five votes for, there are six votes against, therefore amendment 16 Q is not agreed. I now call amendment 16 R in the name of miles breaks already debated with amendment 15 miles breaks to move or not move. Thank you. The question, therefore, is amendment 16 R agreed? Are we all agreed? We are not agreed. There is a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. There are five votes for, there are six votes against, therefore amendment 16 R is not agreed. I call amendment 16 S in the name of miles breaks already debated with amendment 15 miles breaks to move or not move. The question, therefore, is that amendment 16 S be agreed? Are we all agreed? We're not agreed. There is a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. There are five votes for, there are six votes against, therefore amendment 16 S is not agreed. I call amendment T in the name of miles breaks already debated with amendment 15 miles breaks to move or not move. Move. The question is that amendment 16 T be agreed. Are we all agreed? We're not agreed. There's a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. There are five votes for, there are six votes against, therefore amendment 16 T is not agreed. I call amendment 16 U in the name of miles breaks already debated with amendment 15 miles breaks to move or not move. Thank you. The question, therefore, is amendment 16 U be agreed? Are we all agreed? We're not agreed. There's a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. Thank you. There are five votes for, there are six votes against, therefore amendment 16 U is not agreed. I call amendment 16 W in the name of Alexander Stewart already debated with amendment 15. Jeremy Greene, are you going to move it or not move it on his behalf? Pardon me. Can you just repeat the amendment number? 16 W. Thank you. I moved. The question is that amendment 16 W be agreed. Are we all agreed? We are not agreed. There's a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. There are five votes for, there are six votes against, therefore amendment 16 W is not agreed. I call amendment 16 Z in the name of Liam Kerr already debated with amendment 15. Liam Kerr to move or not move. Moved. Thank you. The question, therefore, is amendment 16 Z be agreed? Are we all agreed? We're not agreed. There is a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. There are five votes for, there are six votes against, therefore amendment 16 Z is not agreed. I call amendment 16 AA in the name of Liam Kerr already debated with amendment 15. Liam Kerr to move or not move. Moved. Thank you. The question, therefore, is amendment 16 AA be agreed? Are we all agreed? We're not agreed. There's a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. There are five votes for, there are six votes against, therefore amendment 16 AA is not agreed. I call amendment 16 AD in the name of Jamie Greene already debated with amendment 15. Jamie Greene to move or not move. Not move. Thank you. I call amendment 16 AE in the name of Jamie Greene already debated with amendment 15. Jamie Greene to move or not move. Apologies, I had some technical errors in my notes. Moved. The question is that amendment 16 AE be agreed? Are we all agreed? We're not agreed. There's a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. There are four votes for, there are seven votes against, therefore, amendment 16 AE is not agreed. I call amendment 16 AF in the name of Jamie Greene already debated with amendment 15. Jamie Greene to move or not move. Moved. The question is that amendment 16 AF be agreed. Are we all agreed? We're not agreed. There's a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. There are five votes for, there are six votes against, therefore, amendment 16 AF is not agreed. I call amendment 16 AG in the name of Jamie Greene already debated with amendment 15. Jamie Greene to move or not move. Not move. I call amendment 16 AE in the name of Colin Smyth already debated with amendment 15. Colin Smyth to move or not move. The question is that amendment 16 AE be agreed. Are we all agreed? We're not agreed. There's a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. There are five votes for, there are six votes against, therefore, amendment 16 AE is not agreed. I call amendment 16 AJ in the name of Colin Smyth already debated with amendment 15. Colin Smyth to move or not move. The question is that amendment 16 AJ be agreed. Are we all agreed? We're not agreed. There's a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. There are five votes for, there are six votes against, therefore, amendment 16 AJ is not agreed. I call amendment 16 AK in the name of Jamie Greene already debated with amendment 15. Jamie Greene to move or not move. Not move. I therefore call amendment 16 AM in the name of Mike Rumbles already debated with amendment 15. Mike Rumbles to move or not move. Not moved. I then call amendment 16 AH in the name of Miles Briggs already debated with amendment 15. Miles Briggs to move or not move. I intend to bring this back at stage 3 as it would exempt the lowest paid working in our NHS, but I'd like to move this today as well. Thanks. You're going to move it today. Okay, so the question is that amendment 16 AH be agreed. Are we all agreed? We're not agreed. I therefore call a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. There are five votes for, there are six votes against, therefore, amendment 16 AH is not agreed. The question now is to ask Mr Finney whether you want to press or withdraw your amendment 16. The question therefore is amendment 16 be agreed. Are we all agreed? Yes. We're not. Are we all agreed? Yes. We are agreed. Okay, the next section is working place parking and its financial provisions. I'm going to call amendment 17 in the name of John Finney, grouped with amendments as shown in the groupings. John Finney, can I ask you to move amendment 17 and speak to all amendments in the group? Thank you. Thank you, convener. Amendment 17 outlines how charges arising from the workplace parking licence will operate. The first and key point is that there is a charge on the occupier of the premises, not on individuals who are parking at their workplace. How and indeed if the levy is recovered from those parking at their workplace is a matter between the employer and employee. I'd like to specifically address the power in subsection 1, subsection B, of my amendment, because I think it's key to the other amendments in the group. It's important to be clear that the power for Scottish ministers to specify other persons who may be liable is to allow for circumstances where someone other than the occupier of premises should be liable to pay charges for the provision of workplace parking. This would for example allow for circumstances where parking spaces at an occupier's premises are leased to another organisation for use by that organisation's employees. The person providing those places to their employees would not be the occupier of the premises at which the spaces are allocated, but would have to hold a licence in respect of those parking spaces. Regulations under subsection 1B of the amendment 17 could ensure that that person must also pay charges. The amendment absolutely does not mean that it could be levied on individual employees, since it is restricted to dealing with the recovery of charges imposed under licensing schemes. Under amendment 7, licensing scheme may only impose charges on people providing workplace parking, not on people using it. That is a crucial distinction here. Schemes cannot regulate if or how a provider who is required to hold a licence may choose to recover charges in respect of that licence from anybody else. The majority of amendments in this group therefore appear to be fundamentally misunderstand the purpose of subsection 1B. The practical effect of the amendments will not be to provide exemption to employees or to prevent charges from being recovered in any particular circumstances by employers or anybody else liable to pay them. However, they could prevent charges imposed by schemes from being recovered from people who provide workplace parking, which is surely not the intention. It could be the absurd position under amendment 17f, for example, that a provider of workplace parking could not be made liable for licence charges because they had children under 12. That cannot be right. The amendment allows for local authorities setting up a scheme to have some flexibility in how it is applied, permitting different charges or indeed no charge to be applied in respect of different days, times, persons, premises and vehicles. That will be a very useful tool for local authorities, as they can tailor the scheme to reflect local circumstances and use the scheme to promote other policies. The power to specify different classes of motor vehicles could, for example, support the promotion of ultra-low-emission vehicles, which would already address the issue that was covered by amendment 17r, allowing again for the local authority to take the lead on what is best for the local area. It is not clear to me whether amendment 17t and new are intended to ensure no charges are imposed on respect of weekends or between the hours of midnight 6am, but in any event, this power already permits local authorities to impose lower or no charges on whichever days and whatever times they wish with local discretion again empowered. Amendment 17s seeks to require employers seeking to recover charges from employees to put in place plans to means test those charges. My amendments deliver a scheme that is a charge on people who provide workplace parking, not the people who use it. The reason for that is that the occupiers who are providing the workplace parking and, as a result, it is right that they focus on the impact and result of this parking. My amendments are silent on how, if at all, employers recover the charge from employees, it is a matter for employers whether they recover the charge. Evidence from Nottingham is not that all employers do so. Employers may also decide how to recover charges from employees and how much to recover. Again, the committee has heard evidence from Nottingham City Council that employers subject to their scheme can and do vary the charge recovered depending on factors such as salary of the employee and the location within the scheme area of their place of employment. Is it the case that the member expects that the Government would set a national charge, as was discussed with pavement parking and low-emission zones, via a national regulation, but that companies could, in effect, subsidise the charge that was passed on by making up the difference of what it charges the employee versus what is the company's liable to pay? Is that how the scheme would, in effect, work? I am not sure that I absolutely understand your point, but no, that would not be the intention. Seeking to regulate those nuance matters at a national level would be extremely challenging and may give rise to a greater risk of unfairness than leaving the issue to the discretion and judgment of employers. Amendment 17S requires that employers have a plan for means testing employees, but what should that cover? Income, outgoings, dependence and debts, as well as being extremely bureaucratic, is also extraordinarily intrusive. What if an employee does not want to share details of their private life with an employer? Why should they be compelled to do so? Amendment 18 underpins a key element of my approach to workplace parking levies. Funds raised by the workplace parking licensing scheme can be used for two purposes—the administration cost of the scheme and for the activities to help to deliver the local transport strategy. That is not a simple revenue-raising power, as some critics suggested. Where a local authority is considering a scheme, it will require a local transport strategy. That is not something that a local authority is required to have. However, where a local authority has a strategy, that will be where activities that the workplace parking levy can fund are set out. Where better to have this than as part of a strategy aiming at addressing local transport needs? This should go some way to providing reassurance on the purpose and outcomes of WPL. This builds on the transparent and locally focused approach adopted in my amendments. The amendment allows for joint working by local authorities where this would benefit the area committing funds. There is a flex that transport issues are often framed by travel to work areas rather than local authority boundaries. Amendment 18A would require a financial transfer from a local authority operating scheme to another local authority where a workplace parking licence charge is levied and that charge is passed on to an employee and that employee lives in another local authority. The principle underpinning the amendment appears to be that it is unfair that people who live out with a local authority area should pay towards transport improvements in that area, but that is really unfair. You could equally argue that it is unfair that people from out with an area who use transport, including local roads in an area, do not contribute. There are issues with the amendment as well as the bureaucracy required. Funds raised through charges will be hypothesised into activities set out in the local transport strategy. The receiving local authority may not have a local transport strategy and in any way would not be required to utilise the funds that it receives to improve transport services. It could apply those funds in any way that is of it. Fundamentally—this is all about the climate emergency that we are facing—we need as many tools available as possible to address this. It is disingenuous to claim that people who commute into a neighbouring local authority do not contribute to problems for that authority and do not benefit from transport expenditure by that authority. Amendment 19 gives Scottish ministers largely technical powers in relation to accounts for workplace licensing schemes. That is similar to provisions already in part 1 of the bill on LEZs and part 4 on parking prohibitions. The amendment allows for transparency in the keeping of accounts by local authorities and I would expect that to be uncontroversial. I am move amendment 17. Amendment 17C is drafted to stop companies passing the charge on to workers, some of which I have already spoken to. If one of the issues is about the funds raised by the workplace levy, I would like to draw the committee's attention that, based on noting on which is not a dissimilar size to Glasgow, in the case of Glasgow, £9 million a year is going to take a decade before that fund really builds up to anything that can be spent, and you will note on the connectivity report as a result of that that they have asked for over £1 billion. You can see that it is not going to raise the kind of funds that is going to change the face of public transport, but it is going to cause a great deal of misery for workers. That deals with amendment 17C. I am not clear perhaps if John Finnie apologies to John if I have been confused about this, but my understanding is that money is not ring-fenced. Local authorities, Glasgow in particular, is under a great deal of financial pressure. You could understand why they would use the money to spend on other things that are not public transport, but I would have more respect for the policy if there was a clear attempt to ring-fence the money for public transport, and it does not actually make a great deal of sense to me in terms of the arguments. If it is not ring-fenced for that purpose, it was us trans and their very helpful evidence to the committee. They did agree that there should be discounts for low-paid workers, and they did seem to acknowledge that there should be poverty-proofing in such a policy. To deal with the other amendments, amendment 17A and 17B provide an exemption for people earning less than their living wage, again to protect low-paid workers. The living wage is currently £9 an hour, and nearly half a million people, £470,000 to be exact in Scotland, do not end their real living wage. Low-paid employees may be forced to look elsewhere for work in the worst-case scenario. That is a legitimate argument, Mr Lyle. Amendment 17D provides an exemption for single-parent families. Here, I want to draw the committee's attention to the Child Poverty Act. At stage 3 of that passage of that bill, we agreed as a Parliament to put a measure in to specifically ask the Government to address measures in relation to child poverty and single-parent in particular, and to specify a group within the Child Poverty Act. According to the 2001 Scottish census, there are 170,000 single-parents in Scotland with more than 100 and 281,000 dependent children. Glasgow has the highest rate of lone-parent families. It faces many barriers to finding and sustaining employment. Amendment 17E provides an exemption for—yes, I will take an intervention, Mr Lyle. I am interested in where you get your information from and how you can back up how many people this would affect. How many people would this affect? Any charge. How many people would it affect? How many people in Glasgow who take the bus and go into Glasgow? How many people would this affect? How many people would take the bus? No. How many people would this be your point? How many people would end up paying a parking levy? I am not paying parking charges. Mr Lyle, just hold on. Thousands of people could be. Can I just remind just the etiquette of doing this? It is not a member-to-member conversation. If you would like to make an intervention, Mr Lyle, please make it through the chair and I am sure that Pauline will then answer it. Convener, in answer to Mr Lyle, there are tens of thousands of workers who could be potentially affected dependent as you know it would then be a matter for the local authority. The local authority in Glasgow has already decided that it is going to use it and there are thousands of workers who could be affected by it. Transport Scotland's own figures show that car usage among the low-income households is relatively high. The suggestion that all low-paid workers get the bus is a misunderstanding of the profile of the city. In relation to amendment 7e, there is already an employment gap between disabled people and the rest of the working-age population. Disabled people are twice as likely to be unemployed. I know that there has been discussion about the blue badge scheme, possibly being exempt, but I think that we need to discuss who, if anyone, would be exempt. There is certainly an issue about disabled workers who are able to use their cars and we need to make sure that they do not have further burdens on their daily lives. Amendment 17e provides an exemption for parents with children under 12 or under primary school age. Many parents need to use their cars to do their own before work. Many women in particular—I do not believe that this has been equality-proofed before stage 2—many children in primary school are taken to school by car or van more than in secondary. 29 per cent of primary pupils went to school in Scotland by car or van compared with only 18 per cent of secondary pupils. When many parents are saved as a form of transport, often in primary school, pupils do not use public transport because they are too young. It is a significant issue for parents. I quote that. I would normally ask Miles Briggs to move amendment 17g in his name, but I think that Jamie Greene will be moving it on his behalf. According to protocol, I will only speak to Miles as amendments and keep my other comments to the laughter that other members have had their drewplies to speak to their amendments. I will, hopefully, come back later. On Miles's Briggs amendment 17g, I think that the premise of this is to specify that if someone is providing voluntary services at premise, following three premises—an adult health care premise, an adult social care premise or indeed a hospice—that is to find the summer in which its purpose is caring for the dying or incurably ill, that anyone who volunteers at such a premise would be exempt from being liable for any charges. Again, I appreciate that we have had a long and robust political debate, but I would like to think that anyone who gives up their time to work in these sorts of places—I can declare an interest in that members of my family provide voluntary services at some of these places and do great work, as I am sure all volunteers do—at the very least, those people are not paid for goodness sake. At least, give them some exemption from those charges. Please, can we find at least some moral duty to give volunteers exemption, and I think that that is the premise of Miles Briggs. In that point? Yes, I will, but can I just ask for other members just to let me finish? That would be great. In amendment 16, we have already voted for hospices for them to be exempt. Okay, that is very helpful. I support that. However, Miles Briggs also wishes to add people who volunteer in the other healthcare environments. Can I give an example? Has anyone ever been to hospital and used— To discreet your chances to intervene, rather than making those comments over there, say, by all means intervene and see if the member will take it. Thank you, if I could continue. I just addressed the intervention from Ms Ross. Yes, it is very welcome that the Government agrees that people who work at hospices are exempt. I presume that that will also include those who volunteer, but the addition of these other healthcare premises could include the example of people who provide services at the shops and cafes that many hospitals in Scotland provide. Those people are volunteers. I will just check the name of some of their organisations, but we are all aware of them. We all come across them when we visit hospitals. If I could just finish the point. Those people who perhaps even work full-time hours are unpaid. It may be required to drive to those locations, especially if they are in hard-to-reach areas. I think that that is the premise of Mr Miles Briggs' amendments. I am happy to give way to the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Sport. I ask for all the comments. I do not know if the member is unclear about how the level will apply, because it is applied on the basis of premises. If you are a volunteer at a hospice, if it is being exempt, it is exempt from it because the premises are exempt. If the local authority decides that a particular facility is to be exempt from it, it is exempt. It is a premises levy. It is not an individual levy. Indeed, but these places are not exempt because you voted not to exempt them. What a ridiculous argument to make. You and your members had the opportunity to exempt those types of places. If you want to intervene, do not shout at me from across the room. Hold on. I have said this and I am not going to keep repeating myself. The committee is not conversation. We are trying to get through the legislation. If you want to have conversations across the room, could you do it through the chair to ask me or a member to take an intervention? Shouting at each other across the room, I do not think that it is very helpful. It could lead to anarchy if that was allowed to continue, which I am sure that you will not want to achieve. Mr Greene, if I could continue on what I think is quite a serious matter. The cabinet secretary is right that if a place is exempt, then by default, whether you are paid or otherwise, you will be exempt. However, because the committee has chosen not to exempt those premises, the amendment at least seeks to exempt those who volunteer at those premises as a backup. I implore members to think carefully about the people, the sort of people that we meet in our interactions as MSPs in those establishments, that if they were not exempt because a local authority had chosen not to exempt them, at the very least, it would give those volunteers the opportunity to be exempt. We can at least exempt those types of people who volunteer at those organisations, at the very least, and that can be set as a national standard. It is the right thing to do, and I implore members to support that amendment. Thank you, Jamie. I call Michelle Ballantine to speak to amendments 17H and any other amendments in the group. Michelle. Okay, thank you. I'll try and keep this relatively brief, and I thank the committee for allowing me to speak this morning, and I'll just refer you to my register of interests before I do so. The amendments that I've lodged in this bill seek to secure exemptions from the scheme for individuals receiving benefit payments. 17H secures exemptions for individuals in receipt of short-term assistance, while IJNK, 17IJNK, provide exemptions for individuals in receipt of universal credit job seekers allowance, employment support respectively. Furthermore, amendments 17L, M and N would secure exemptions for individuals in receipt of disability living allowance, personal independence payment and carers allowance. The reason for lodging these exemptions is because I believe people that are in receipt of benefits are already at the lower end of our earning scale and are actively trying to get back into the workplace to increase gradually their work hours, and I think that this does two things. If you provide national exemption, it ensures consistency in terms of those people who are in receipt of benefits to be confident that if they go into the workplace they may not end up having to pay if they part there. Secondly, and I've listened to the arguments very carefully this morning, if you are suggesting that businesses are picking up the tab for that parking, it may contribute to actively encouraging businesses to employ people who might otherwise have difficulty getting into the employment market. Particularly for people who have disabilities who currently do struggle to get employment, it may provide an extra incentive for businesses to employ. I would also add to this, because I do believe that there is a risk, particularly where we are talking about cross-boundary risk. For most of the people who sit within this category, they cannot afford to live in the cities. They are often pushed to the edges or outside of the cities, but they seek employment within the city boundary, and therefore will be potentially caught by this. Secondly, businesses already pay rates on their parking spaces, because that is part of the rateable value of an organisation's premises. What we will be doing is double charging businesses for this. That may be fine if you are a highly profitable service-led industry, but for example, for manufacturing, where margins are much tighter, that will pose considerable problems. It is important that you consider national exemptions on some areas, being one of them. I am pleased that you have welcomed exemptions for the NHS, but many people on benefits, for example, will be questioning why highly paid NHS staff are entitled to a national exemption, where they, on the minimum wages and struggling to get back into the workplace and provide for their families, do not receive that kind of same exemption. Can I just clarify that the member understands that we are talking about the places being taxed here, not the person. As far as the legislation is concerned, it does not differentiate between higher or lower paid employees. It would only be if the employer wanted to pass on or cut the pay or something of the person that would come into effect. I made reference to that in my comments. What I said to you was that a business is not prohibited from passing it on, and my understanding from the legislation that you are putting together here is that it does not prohibit an employer from passing on that cost. Hang on, let me finish. That may well happen. Secondly, if they do not pass it on as a direct charge to the employee, it will inevitably, in businesses with low margins, affect the rates that they can pay. By default, as an unintended consequence of your actions, it will affect the earnings of the lowest paid. Yes, I understand exactly what you are trying to do here. I understand that you are imposing it as a place charge, not as an individual charge, but I say to all of you that, when you make law, it always has unintended consequences. I do not believe that, in some of your debate here, you have considered some of those unintended consequences in entirety, and I do not believe that you have shown adequate understanding of how business operates and the impact that you will have on business, who are already paying for that parking. If it was, say, theoretically reflected in a lower pay increase next year, there is no way that this Parliament can intervene or be involved in that. Effectively, if an employer was to give a lower pay increase other than going below the minimum wage, we cannot possibly enforce that. That is the whole point, is not it? Government's actions have effect in the real world. The consequences of your decision making in this committee and within this bill will have effect in the real world. You are incumbent on all of us when we come to vote on this bill, and it is incumbent on all of us when considering the amendments coming before this bill to consider the potential consequences of the decisions that you make. I have listened carefully this morning to a lot of this debate. Some of it makes good sense, some of it shows a huge degree of naivety around the real world, but I am saying to you that the people who always suffer the most when we make these kinds of laws are the people on the lowest incomes. I am saying to you that if you are seriously sitting here and telling me that you think that it is imperative that there is a national exemption for NHS employees based on their contribution to society, the need for what they do, how can you possibly say that there is no need to actually protect those who are on the lowest, and there is no need within it to try and ensure opportunity and encouragement for businesses as well, because I think that you are really missing the point. I really get your concern, but we are so concerned when your party brought in the bedroom tax, and people had to pay that. Mr Lyle, Mr Lyle, Mr Green, hold on everyone. In fairness, we are looking at the car parking and working place parking levy. To throw comments like that, I do not think that it is helpful. I think that you have come to the end. Sorry, Mr Lyle. Mr Lyle, with the greatest respect to you, as convener of this group, I think that I believe that I show a remarkable amount of impartiality when it comes to things. I do not pass comment, and I would ask if you would respect and treat me the same way that you would with the Presiding Officer, which means that you do not answer back when I am speaking, because I think that that is rude and shows disrespect to the parliamentary system. Now, Michelle has finished her speaking. I am going to call Maurice Corry to speak to amendment 17.0. Thank you, convener. I speak to 17.0, and I also declare that I am an armed forces veteran. This amendment covers both uniformed and serving personnel, regular reservists and cadets, and civilian instructors serving within all our military units and in all military bases and training areas in Scotland, which are Crown property. Operationally, they are there, and many of our personnel have to be available 24 hours per day. At some cases, they are noticed to move at short notice. Therefore, they require their vehicles to attend for duty at all hours and where the public transport is not available or is limited, particularly in rural and out-of-town areas. Therefore, I move amendment 17.0 accordingly. Thank you, Maurice. Can I ask Colin Smyth, please, to move amendment 17.0 and talk to the other amendments in the group? Thank you, convener. I am happy to move amendment 17.0 in my name, which would exempt low earners as defined by ministers and regulations. As it stands, this regressive levy will hit the worst off hardest, and this amendment looks to address this should employers pass the levy on to employers. Let's be clear that this can and will be passed on by many employers. Indeed, the SNP spokesperson for transport in Glasgow City Council, in giving evidence to the committee, argued that it will only work if it is passed on to workers. Let me read what Councillor Richardson said to the committee. Passing the levy on is one of the tools to enable behavioural change. What is being passed on in the levy is the disincentive to drive. Let's be clear that the SNP in Glasgow, if they bring in this levy, will pass it on to drivers. Amendment 17.0 looks to exempt those without access to public transport. It is unfair, in my view, to penalise those with no other option, but to use their car to get to work. Amendment 17.0 would exempt those driving ultra-low emission vehicles. If the purpose of this scheme is to reduce emissions, I cannot see why a person driving an ultra-low emission vehicle should have to pay the charge, particularly when they have already paid the additional expense of purchasing such a vehicle to do the right thing and reduce their emissions. Failure to support this amendment would show that the levy has nothing to do with the environment and simply a budget decision designed by the Greens and SNP to provide a fig leaf to cover up for the budget decision to cut funding to local councils. I will give a way to Mr Mason. I thank the member very much for giving way. Would he accept that congestion is also a problem in the city and even if we fill the city centres with electric cars, we still have a problem? The reality is that, if Mr Mason is saying that he is now opposed to electric vehicles being one of the solutions to emissions then, frankly, we have a real challenge on our hands when it comes to the environment. Amendment 17.0 calls for employers to introduce a scheme so that the amount paid by employees varies according to income such as the one described to the committee by Nottingham Council. That will ensure greater fairness should this levy be introduced. In my view, taxes should be progressive. Amendment 18.0 says that, when the cost of the levy is met by an employee, the money raised should go to the local authority in which they are resident. It is unfair that people living outside cities, often with no good public transport links, should have to pay the levy because of a lack of public transport in their area but not have the proceeds of that levy spent on improving the poor public transport that has meant that they have had to use the car in the first place. That is an issue that I have raised in numerous occasions to this committee. I have to say that the cabinet secretary said that this committee is not listening to the evidence. The reality is that the cabinet secretary is failing to listen to the evidence. There needs to be a solution to this particular issue. Cess Trans provided a solution when they gave evidence to this committee and argued strongly that the levy should be done on a strategic basis so that it deals with this anomaly. I will give the example again. Somebody in the Borders would have to pay the levy because they worked in Edinburgh and have no choice but to use their car because there is no public transport and no money raised in Edinburgh will go to improve public transport in the Borders. The way to deal with that issue is to allow the levy to be done on a more strategic basis. I appreciate that this means looking at transport on a strategic basis, which is something that the Government does often enough. I hope that the cabinet secretary will listen to the evidence that has been given to this committee and take a far more strategic approach to this proposal. I now call Tom Mason to speak to amendments 17T and other amendments in the group. Tom Mason, can I first of all draw attention to the committee to my register of interests, particularly Emma Abedin, city councillor? Exceptionaly, around this table are we ones that people have to deal with this particular act if it comes into being, and no doubt the local government will be pressured to use it in order to supplement its funds that were not received from the central government being short for change this year by at least £26 million. However, I also associate with the words of Colin Smyrn. It smiles in terms of the lack of strategic thought in this total bill. If there is a problem with congestion and it resolves it by congestion, cars parked do not cause any congestion at all. Why put the levee on parking when it should be on road charging if it is going to solve the congestion problem? Certainly trying to tax electric cars does not strike me as being in any sense whatsoever. However, as the amendments are quite small amendments, the first one, 17T, is simply in order to define what a normal working week is. In other words, it is not 24 hours a day, it is just five days a week and only during the day. The second amendment is simply to exempt those institutions which government-inspired institutions. What is the point of charging levee in any way on those if you are going to collect, if you are robbing Peter to pay Paul? It is not particularly central, so any government thing should be exempt. However, if you do this, of course, you are in problems where you have got pork barrel politics in local government, which determines exactly what is going on. This is an opening situation of disharmony in local government. Thank you, Tom and Jamie Greene. I have two members who wish to speak to amendments 17U and other amendments that are not already covered. Thank you, convener. Does that mean that I also can speak to other amendments? There are no other members queuing for moving their own amendments, is that correct? No. If you speak to amendments 17U, I have got you down to speak after Mike Rumble. Mike Rumble will come in first. That is why I want to clarify. I am happy to only speak to 17U in the name of Dean Lockhart, which seeks to amend an exclusion that people who work on sociable hours when public transport is simply not available, not just scarce, between the hours of midnight and 6pm, which should encompass many shift workers who simply have to drive to get to their places of work. I think that this is a sensible amendment. The idea that someone can get a bus 11.30 at night to their place of work in many parts of Scotland is simply not an option. If we are to introduce those amendments, we should acknowledge that there are many people who have to take their cars to work, to work on sociable hours. We should place the importance on shift workers. Those people should be exempt, and this amendment seeks to do so. I hope that it will achieve the support of the committee. Thank you. Mike Rumble is followed by Jamie Greene and any other members, if they would like to indicate that they would like to come in. I have tried in the whole of this bill to put forward amendments that are constructive and helpful to improve the bill. John Finnie's amendments 17, 18 and 19 do improve the bill. I opposed his previous amendments, but if we have to have them in, I will vote for his amendments 17, 18 and 19, because it makes sure that the charges are paid and that the income comes directly to the area that should benefit from it. It makes it clear that it is the occupant of the premises that are charged, so I will support those amendments. I also want to make it clear, because there seem to be some strange comments about this. As I understand it, the whole point of John Finnie's whole series of amendments and the whole point of workplace levy is to make people use their cars less. If you are going to make people use their cars less, that levy will have to be passed on to the drivers, otherwise there is not a point. What is the point if those are not passed on? That is what I accept. If we go down this route, they have to be passed on, and that was the problem. I would be in favour of this approach if we did not put the cart before the horse. If we had areas where we had decent public transport that could encourage people to move from their cars to public transport, if we had that system in place in the first place, then this would be more logical. It is not logical to put in the cart before the horse. I will be voting against all the other amendments in the group from colleagues who have put forward amendments. If they were passed, they would not improve the bill, because the amendments are focused on the occupier of the premises. I know that they are well intentioned, but I will give you an example of Pauline McNeill's amendments. I do not see how we in legislation can prevent a charge of one form or another from being passed on. After all, that is not the purpose of the exercise, so I do not understand that. Another one on Pauline McNeill's 17A regulations into subsection 1B must provide that a person who earns less than the living wages exempt from being specified reliable for the charges. Again, it is the premises that are being charged, not the individual. By the way, you can have very high earners who do not earn. They can take their money in dividends. I certainly will. I lay those amendments because, during the evidence session process, some members were saying that the charges do not need to be passed on. That was said during the passage of the bill. It has been a little bit confusing. I do agree with the member that it seems to me that the policy intention is to pass it on. I laid the amendment to test the argument to see what we are trying to do here, because we need to be clear about the policy intention at least. It seems to me that, if members are saying that it does not need to be passed on, it could be wrong in saying that Mr Mason might have said this. Apologies if he did not. Therefore, if that is the case, what would be the problem in removing the possibilities that companies can pass on to workers? Why do not we just put that in the legislation? I understand where you are coming from in that case. In fact, from what you are saying, it sounds to me that you will not be pressing them. In that case, there will not be a vote on it. To give you an example, your 17D regulations may not apply to a person who is the parent of a child living in a single-parent household. You can have a very wealthy single-person business owner, so why do that? I do not quite understand the point that is being made there. I reiterate the point. I think that the amendments are well intentioned. They miss the point of the bill. As I say it, the whole point of John Finnie's amendment is to change behaviour. It is to move people from driving their cars on to public transport. My problem with John's approach has always been that if we do not have public transport in place, how can you be effective in changing behaviour? He raises a number of points. One is that we at least accept that in the city centres of Glasgow and Edinburgh we do have pretty good public transport and people generally can get there without using their car. Secondly, would he accept that an employer has various options? One is to pass them on, the charge, but one is to reduce the number of parking spaces so that there are fewer cars and there is less congestion. The third one is obviously to absorb if it is a profitable company, to absorb the cost themselves. I thank the member for that intervention. My whole point earlier on, and the amendments that I thought were constructive ones that I put in, was just that very point that John Mason makes. If Edinburgh City Council were convinced that they had a decent public transport service, then they could put that in. My amendment was designed to ensure that it did not go in somewhere that did not have a decent public service because the whole point is to change behaviour. The whole point is to move people out from cars onto trains or buses or whatever it is, public transport. That is why I think we are making bad legislation because we are putting the cart before the horse. I come back to the specific amendments in front of us. I just wanted to say that I will be supporting John Finnie's amendments there because they do improve what the committee has voted for, even though I did not vote for it. That is the whole focus of my attention and the whole process, and the job of the committee is to improve the legislation. I just wish that that member… I said that he is opposed to the other amendments in this area, but he has not addressed the issue. I mean, he mentioned that the cart before the horse rally is, in part of my region, more likely to get a horse on yard and getting a bus through perfectly on it. Those constituents are the ones that will be penalised because they will be paying the levy by travelling into the city to work, but they do not have the public transport. As the bill is currently written, none of the money will be spent on improving public transport in the area. My amendment seeks to improve that by sharing it more widely, and surely that is something that we should be looking to do. I do not see how you can focus on the person paying these rather than the employer. I just do not see how you can get around it because it is too easily to get around it. It misses the whole point of the purpose of John Finnie's amendment to the bill, so I will not be supporting that. I am trying, as I say, to do what I think is the right thing, which is to improve the bill with John Finnie 17, 18 and 19. That does that, even though I do not like what John Finnie has done in the first place, but at least we can mitigate what he has done. I think that he would come to the end of his thing. I have to leave because I have to attend another meeting. I have instructed Jamie Greene on my amendments. Jamie Greene, you want to speak next, so I have no other members to speak. After our short break, there has been an interesting debate about some of the mechanics of how the schemes might work. Mr Rumbles, I appreciate his seeking to improve what has already passed in a sense, and I totally respect his modus operandus. To improve the bill, we would delete 17, 18 and 19, so I will not be supporting any of them. Given the conversation that we are having, let us look at some of the amendments, because we have to vote on some of those amendments if they are moved. Let us look at what we are voting on. It is important that we do that. I will take a step back from this. Some of those amendments are quite interesting and quite helpful. For example, if you take the amendments regarding exemption for people driving electric vehicles, I thought that we were trying to encourage people into electric cars. Why would we then charge them for moving from carbon-based vehicles to electric cars and then charging them for driving those electric cars to work? People will be making those shifts because of other pieces of legislation in the bill in terms of setting up a low-emission zones. Why on earth would we then give them the benefit of not charging them for entering cities through the zones and then hitting them with a charge as they park their electric car at their place of work? How is that going to get us from 0.7 per cent ownership of electric cars in Scotland to anywhere near the levels that Government and probably other members have desires to reach? That, in itself, is something that we definitely should support. We are looking at some of the other sensible amendments. The points that Michelle Ballantyne was trying to make around this argument, around whether this is a levy on places or people, I think that is a key point. I know that Mr Mason spoke about this a few times. There is a point that this is a levy on places, but that is only because that is how it is being constructed. We are creating the law through those processes. This was never in the bill in the first place. Those are amendments to a transport bill that the Government brought forward, so we can amend those amendments. That is what we are trying to do. If we want to make it about people, we can make it about people. It does not have to be about places. The point of many of the amendments that those are discussing, from Miles Briggs, from Pauline McNeill, from Colin Smith and Michelle Ballantyne, is shifting the focus from the place to the person. Ultimately, that is who will be paying the levies. It is people at the end of the day. Whether those people are the employers of small businesses or the workers in those businesses, it is still the people. There are certain groups of people that should be exempt. That is the whole point of those groupings. People who are in receipt of benefits and who also are able to work—I do not have the numbers to hand, but I am sure that there are many thousands of people in Scotland who are in receipt of some form of benefit and are able and do choose to work. Why should they have to pay it? For goodness sake, what about people who are driving adapted cars because of disabilities? Are we really suggesting that we are going to charge them as well? What on earth is this committee doing? Let us have a real long hard look at ourselves. If we are not going to exempt places, then let us think about exempting people and let us think about those people who we want to get into the workplace, not put off. Charging them to park at work is not the way to get them back into the workplace. I will stop my comments there. Amendment 17, in many ways, is a heart of workplace parking licensing schemes. The amendment is explicit that the charge applies to the occupier of the premises, not the employee. As John Finnie has made clear, the powers in 17.1b to specify other persons who can have charges imposed on them is absolutely not about requiring employees or anybody else using workplace parking to pay the charges. It cannot do that. I therefore agree that the amendments in 17.1b, in many ways, are not the way to get them back into the workplace. I agree entirely with what you have said, but surely the intention is to change behaviour, to move people out of their cars and to public transport. Therefore, the intention of this amendment is to make sure that that charge is passed on to the employee, surely? There are a variety of options that are available to premise owners. For example, in Nottingham, the university repurposed a large part of its car park for other use. Employers could do that. They could decide to reduce the amount of parking spaces that they make available, not to encourage people to make use of public transport as well. They could turn it into a green space if they wanted to. There are other options available to employers if they choose to do so. Therefore, I agree that the amendments in this group, which seek to amend or make provision about the exercise of the pills in subsection 1b of amendment 17 in order to prevent or restrict imposition of charges on people who use workplace parking, are misconceived and I therefore cannot support them. Subsection 2 of amendment 17 is very important. It gives local authorities the flexibility to vary how the scheme applies. This is the very opposite of the restrictive approach that has been claimed for the scheme and, indeed, would be imposed on local authorities by some of the amendments proposed today. The flexibility is to be welcomed as it gives local authorities the scope to address. At a local level, many of the concerns that have been raised by varying charges for different days, different times, different premises or different classes of vehicle. It also allows local authorities to act in a proactive way, for example, to promote low-carbon vehicles. Amendment 17 also requires local authorities to consider how they will direct the funds raised by the scheme's when-setting charges. That is also addressed further in amendment 18. That makes crystal clear that a workplace licensing scheme is not simply a revenue-raising exercise. I am very clear that it is our responsibility to set the framework for workplace parking levies and then allow local authorities flexibility to apply those in ways that are sensitive to local circumstances. The provisions in amendment 17 do that. Amendment 18 provides clear direction on how funds raised should be used. It does not say what funds should be used on but requires the local authority proposing a scheme as a local transport strategy and funds raised should go to the facilitation of that strategy. A workplace parking licensing licensing scheme should only be proposed where it is going to help meet wider objectives. As those objectives need to be clearly set out, which is the role of the local transport strategy in making sure that there is a clear strategic objective being set, the objectives and the local transport strategy will be identified and they will be agreed locally. This will in turn inform the scheme, which will, with the exception of the national exemptions, be agreed locally. I am comfortable that amendment 18 sits well with the localism approach. The amendment also facilitates joint working, which I know was a concern for some stakeholders and in allowing for the administration costs of the scheme to be met from the funds raised by the scheme so that it should be self-sustaining. I cannot support amendment 18A, which seeks to require a local authority operating a scheme to transfer any charges recovered from employees' resident in another local authority area to that other local authority, not least because it would dilute the funding available to a local authority operating a scheme to make the necessary improvements to transport infrastructure and services to meet the scheme's objectives, but also because the authority receiving those funds would not be required to apply them to improve transport in its area. However, I am happy to support amendment 19 as a necessary regulation making power, which is consistent with the rest of the bill. As John Finnie said, allowing for transparency in the keeping of accounts in relation to workplace parking licensing. In summary, I would ask the committee to support John Finnie's amendment in this group should they be pressed to the vote. I would invite other members not to move their amendments in this group, but, if they are moved, I would invite the committee to reject them. John Finnie, can I ask you to wind up on amendment 17A, please? I have nothing further to add, thank you, convener. Thank you very much, Mr Finnie, for being so succinct on that. Thank you. Pauline McNeill, can I ask you to wind up on amendment 17C and press or withdraw it, please? Thank you very much, convener. I intend to press amendment 17C, A and B, and amendment D. I do think that there is no point in this Parliament passing laws on anti-poverty measures and not making sure that they are in the framework. The reason that I include the single parents in it is because the single parents are recorded as being one of the groups that profile as being the lowest paid and lone parents, specifically mentioned in the Child Poverty Act for that reason. I will not be pressing 17E and 17F. Thank you. Having pressed amendment 17C, the question is— Sorry? The question is that amendment 17C be agreed, are we all agreed? We're not agreed, there's a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. Okay, there's one vote for, 10 votes against, so amendment 17C is not agreed. I call amendment 17A in the name of Pauline McNeill, already debated with amendment 17. Pauline McNeill to move or not move. The question is that amendment 17A be agreed, are we all agreed? We're not agreed, there's a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. 17A, okay. Those against, please raise their hands. Thank you, there are four votes for, there's seven votes against, therefore amendment 17A is not agreed. Sorry, can I just clarify Pauline, just say I've got it in my brain. Which ones were you not moving? E and F, seven votes E and F. Sorry, the clouds tell me I've got to call them for a valid procedure. So I call amendment 17D in the name of Pauline McNeill, already debated with amendment 17 to move or not move, Pauline. So the question is, is the amendment 17D be agreed, are we all agreed? We are not agreed, there is a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. There are four votes for, there's seven votes against, therefore amendment 17D is not agreed. I call amendment 17A in the name of Pauline McNeill, already debated with amendment 17. Pauline McNeill to move or not move. E, so what should I say? Sorry, my brain must be completely gone. Let me try that again for the record then. I call amendment 17E in the name of Pauline McNeill, already debated with amendment 17. Pauline McNeill to move or not move. Not moved. Okay, thank you. I therefore call amendment F in the name of Pauline McNeill, already debated with amendment 17. Pauline McNeill to move or not move. Not moved. Thank you. I therefore call amendment G in the name of Miles Briggs, already debated with amendment 17. Jamie Greene to move or not move on his behalf. Not moved. Thank you. I therefore call amendment 17H in the name of Michelle Ballantyne, already debated with amendment 17. Jamie Greene to move or not move on her behalf. 17H move. Okay, the question is that's amendment 17H be agreed. Are we all agreed? We are not agreed. There's a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. There are four votes for the seven votes against. Therefore, amendment 17H is not agreed. I call amendment 17I in the name of Michelle Ballantyne, already debated with amendment 17. Jamie Greene to move or not move on her behalf. Thank you. If it's helpful, convener, I won't be moving in the name of Michelle Ballantyne. 17I, J, K, L. I'll call them when I get to them. So I've not moved. I call amendment 17K in the name of Michelle Ballantyne, already debated with amendment 17 move or not move. I call amendment L in the name of Michelle Ballantyne, already debated with amendment 17. To move or not move. Jamie Greene. Roedd almost eisiau wir gofan ar gyfer yr andynt cymaint dynion월.dio wrth gwrs ddifŵr. Ar d Evil Amru motornau Board Ash rzeem Amru motornau Board Morys Corry Psychiatw Forces Morys Corry Morys Corry We are not agreed. There is a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against please raise their hands. There are four votes for, there are seven votes against, therefore amendments 17.0 is not agreed. I call amendments 17.P in the name of Colin Smyth, already debated with amendments 17. Colin Smyth to move or not move. Move, convener. The question is that amendments 17.P agreed, are we all agreed? No. We are not agreed. There is a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Pan ddurdod y Roedd Ddamethon ni'n ddurdod y Roedd Ddamethon ni? Yr hyn o 4 ar draws y mae'r gwylio astudr y ar Dancing Moon wrong ac ddurdod worryant yn 17 toal fadks.焰itation y integr yn bhun o'r maen o ynfath Llywodraeth a Gryffith Gwydig Ch decades yn hynny. Rhyw dweud y oddurdod bheilion inventorol o'r p rewards yn digwyddfa rydym nhw fyŷng b complexion y Cyflogau'r great honna bydd wedi cael bwysig ar�n amser. Ie ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud i'r ddweud ar 22.00. 11 ganodwch ar Twy해�dol uchiau i DJI 31 ychydig y Prifysgol Cymru yn ysglystyr yll sev� Jest 13 ym Ysdaw'r Saya yw hwn o Flandon. 12 wrth yr oedd Pw lengtho ar Flandon. There are four votes for, there are seven votes against, therefore, amendment 17S is not agreed. John Finnie can I ask you to press all with you, withdraw amendment 17. The place can be none. Thank you. The question is that amendment 17 be agreed. Are we all agreed? Yes. We are not agreed. There's a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Almost caught out. Those against, please raise their hands. There are seven votes for. Mae four votes against, therefore Amendment 17W has agreed. I call Amendment 18 in the name of John Finnie. Already debated with Amendment 17 John Finnie to move or not move. Move, Cymru. I therefore call Amendment 18A in the name of Colin Smyth. Already debated with Amendment 17. Colin Smyth to move or not move. The question is that Amendment 18 be agreed. Are we all agreed? Aye. Rushing again. There we go. 18A be agreed. Are we all agreed? No. Roedd ydy'r deyffordd yn ddeifrif y ddeifrif. those in favour please raise their hands. Those against please raise their hands. There are four votes for, there are seven votes against therefore amendment eighteen a is not agreed. John Finnie can I ask you to press or withdraw amendment eighteen. The question therefore is amendment eighteen be agreed, are we all agreed? . Will those in favour please raise their hands? Those against please raise their hands. There are seven votes for and four votes against therefore amendment 18 is agreed. I therefore call amendment 19 in the name of John Finnie, already debated with amendment 17. John Finnie, to move or not move? Move, convener. The question is amendment 19 be agreed. Are we all agreed? Yes. No, we're not agreed, there's a division. those in favour, please raise their hands. Those against, please raise their hands. There are seven votes, four and four votes against, therefore amendment 19 is agreed. I get a break now. I'm going to call amendment 20 in the name of John Finnie. Group with amendments are shown in the groupings. John Finnie, can I ask you to move amendment 20 and speak to the amendments in the group? John Finnie. Amendment 20 gives Scottish ministers the power to make regulations around enforcement of the workplace parking licence scheme. That includes penalty charges that the occupier will be liable for. In practice, that is expected to focus on issues around occupiers not being licensed or providing a higher number of workplace parking places than covered by the licence held. Amendment 21 gives Scottish ministers the power to specify approved devices for the collection of evidence and the process for using that evidence and proceedings related to possible failure to comply with a workplace licence scheme. For example, I understand that in notting a mobile cameras are used to monitor enforcement. Amendment 22 sets out the enforcement and investigation powers available to local authorities, including rights of entry. Those are tightly focused and targeted at investigating breaches of requirements of licence scheme and licence conditions, as well as the serving of penalty charge notices. The powers available include a right of entry and a right to require the production of information and to keep a copy of that information. The power of entry cannot be used to gain access to premises used as a dwelling. Amendment 23 allows a warrant to be obtained from a sheriff to exercise the enforcement powers in amendment 24 in circumstances where access to premises has been or is likely to be refused or where the premises are unoccupied. Amendment 24 sets out conditions for the exercise of powers under amendment 22. It requires that the warrant is enforced at a reasonable time of day. The authorised person enforcing the warrant must provide proof of identity and authorization if requested. The authorised person can take other persons' equipment as required. If they remove any items, they must leave a statement of what is taken and who took it. Where the premises are unoccupied, they must be left as secure as they were in entry. The amendment also creates offences where a person refuses to comply with a reasonable instruction or is obstructive. I must say that I am rather surprised that amendment 24A seeks to remove those offences. With schemes of this nature, any reasonable person would expect it to come with enforcement provisions. I can only imagine that the intent here is to effectively hobble the enforcement of the scheme and thus the scheme itself. I cannot support that amendment. Amendment 25 deals with the powers of entry on to Crown land and requires certain permissions to be attained before those powers can be exercised. That is a standard approach where powers of entry may be exercised in relation to such land. It does not mean that those named would be exempt from the workplace parking licensing scheme. I move amendment 20. Thank you very much, John. I am now going to call Liam Kerr's amendment to 24A, but I agree that you are speaking to him. This is an amendment in the name of Liam Kerr. He is not here obviously, so I will do my best to interpret the amendment in his absence. By leaving out subsections 7 and 8, as Mr Finlay alluded to, he seeks to remove the language around whether someone is committing an offence, how the person commits an offence and what the liability is for the committing of such an offence. My understanding is that Mr Kerr was unhappy with the idea that people will seek orders and warrants to force a way into businesses and that businesses and business owners may be subject to offences under this levy. Indeed, those licensing schemes are set up in a way that could criminalise people if they were deemed not to be enforcing the schemes. I do not think that we should be criminalising our businesses for providing parking. I think that creating an offence in the form of an amendment to a transport bill is a very odd place to start creating such offences that could result in convictions and fines that include the statutory up to the statutory maximum on people. I wonder what effect that has on people's history of criminality, whether it remains on records or whether it has any negative effect on them as individuals or as companies. That is the premise of Mr Kerr. He is not here to speak himself. I am sure that if he is interested in talking to us at stage 3, he might want to explore further. The premise of it is that it sends off a terrible message if we are giving sweeping powers to people with warrants to go in and force their way into companies and businesses simply to enforce this ridiculous tax. The other members indicated that they want to speak. Just for members' information, I tend to press on, which will take me slightly over time to the end of this section, because once the cabinet secretary has spoken and John has wound up, it is just a series of, say, cabinet secretary to you. Amendment 20 to 25, in John Finnie's name, put in place enforcement provisions in relation to workplace parking licensing schemes. Those schemes are to be enforced by way of civil penalty charges. Amendment 20 gives the Scottish ministers the power to set out the detail, or in some cases to allow schemes to set out the detail as to matters such as the level of charges, when those charges should be imposed and reviews and appeals of charges. Amendment 21 is a further power for the Scottish ministers to approve devices for use and enforcement of licensing schemes and for the use of evidence from those devices for enforcement purposes. Amendment 22 to 24 confer enforcement powers in respect of workplace parking licensing schemes on persons authorised by local authorities to exercise those powers. Those powers are narrowly constrained so that they may only be used to investigate breaches of scheme requirements or licence conditions or to serve penalty charge notices. It is anticipated that entry into premises will be arranged by agreement in such cases, but where entry is refused, there is a power to obtain a warrant from a sheriff. I consider the powers conferred by those amendments to be necessary and proportionate in dealing with the issue of workplace parking licensing schemes in order to effectively monitor and enforce any scheme that contains significant safeguards against misuse, and I support the amendments. I do not support amendment 24 in Liam Kerr's name. It is not clear why Mr Kerr would propose that obstructing a duly-authorised enforcement officer exercising powers conferred under an act of this Parliament should go unpunished, while it may be that an offence of this kind would be used sparingly in practice. Without the option, there would be nothing to discourage licence holders and others from refusing to co-operate with those tasked with monitoring compliance with those schemes. I reiterate my support for John Finnie's amendments in this group. I would ask the committee to support them, too, and I would ask Liam Kerr not to move amendment 24A, but if it is moved for the committee to reject it. John Finnie, can I ask you to wind up, please, and press or withdraw your amendment? Yes, indeed. I will not comment. I do press amendment 20. Thank you very much. The question is that amendment 20 be agreed. Are we all agreed? Yes. We are not agreed that there is a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Thank you. Those against, please raise their hands. Thank you. There were seven votes for. There were four votes against, so amendment 20 is agreed. It has been a long morning. There are a series of votes. I would urge committee members to keep their attention for these few votes as we come to the end. I call amendment 21 in the name of John Finnie, already debated with amendment 20. Can I ask John Finnie to move or not move, please? Move, convener. The question is that amendment 21 be agreed. Are we all agreed? Yes. We are not agreed. There's a division. Those in favour, please raise their hands. Thank you. Those against, please raise their hands. There were seven votes for and four votes against, therefore, amendment 21 be agreed. I call amendment 22 in the name of John Finnie, already debated with amendment 20. John Finnie to move or not move. Move, convener. The question is that amendment 21 be agreed. Are we all agreed? Yes. 22. I should pay attention, griddysiwg i'n myself. The question is that Ie drwy priwlede y hub nowat Those in favour please raise their hand. Those against please raise their hands Thank you there are seven votes, four and four votes against therefor amendment 22 is agreed. I call amendment 23 in the name of Jon Finney already debated with amendment 20. Jon Finney to move or not move? The question is that amendment 23 be agreed. Maen nhw'n rai oeddiwch â'u gweithio mewn gymuned. Mae'n rai oeddiwch, mae'n gyflinio'r gymuned. Mae'r gen Chynedd? Mae'r chynedd yn gwybod, maen nhw'n gweithio. Felly mae'n 7, 4 ac 4 oeddiwch â faith ein mened â'r Gweithio 23. Mae'r Glacellau Cymru yn y mwynhau John Finnie, ac mae'n defnyddio unrhyw dzolwch o'r mwynhau. Maen nhw'n gweithio Jan Finnie a'r mwynhau. Mae'n gweithio 24. those against please raise their hands If there are seven votes for and four votes against therefore amendment 24 is agreed I call the amendment 25 in the name of John Finnie already debated with amendment 20 to move or not move move annually Thank you the question is that amendment 25 be agreed Are we all agreed? We're not agreed there's a division those in favor please raise their hands those against please raise their hands there are seven votes for and four votes against Fe oedd Ymlynch Ymlynch 25 gyd yn gwneud. Felly, yn Ymlynch Ymlynch 26, yn y fanaeth John Finney, dypa yn cwrwm ymlynch Ymlynch 7, Cymru yn Ymlynch Ymlynch yw wrth yn yn Paddym 123 eich cynyd�oedd gyda姜ol yn gyweithio,埗 i mi yng Nghymru a rhai yng amateur dd wavingonleu... No, mae wedyn. щicai. Ac mae anodd ddim yn cael ff letr o ceisio rhywbeth yn byw sy'n haydd. Ar suitement yn unedig ynghyrch yn y cael ei wργiad.ull harefi! obsiw Chart�로, ar y canair i'r gweithreistau byddwyr i daihl. Narom i ddeibio'r gwir ministerion a gwennau gyrfa dd cured intestines iawn... Film yn chihael chi. I don't think you've been allowed off. I think you are going to be away, but the point is duly noted. I would like to thank everyone for taking part in this session today. Could I remind members that amendments to the remaining sections of the bill should be lodged by 12 noon on Thursday 20 June with the clerks in the legislation team? Thank you very much. That concludes today's committee business and I now close the meeting.