 Rhefn gennych chi i gwaith i gweithio gwyntiau 27 ym 2018 i gwaith unrhyw ddodol iawn. Mae gennym ni'n ffwrdd i'r gwaith cyffredinol, a hynny'n amser fel gyfan, i chi'n pr()i yn gwych â gweithio. Mae gwaith i gwaith 5, 6 a 7 a'i gwaith, fel hynny o'r gwaith unrhyw ddodol iawn, oedden o'r pilfu yn cyffredinol i ei gael ac oedd chi'n dweud hynny fel Lord y similarly ar y Secondary Legisl Does the committee agree to take these items in private? Okay So we move on to Agender item two and we have got before us Graeme Da, the new Minister for Parliamentary Business and Veterans To welcome He's going to provide us with an update on the Government's Secondary Legislation program He's accompanied by Steve McGregor from the Absandto and Legislation looking Colin Brown from the Scottish Government Legal Directorate and Luke McBratney from the Constitution and UK Relations Division. Minister, I believe that you have got an opening statement. A brief one, thank you convener. Obviously, this is my first time before the committee and I very much welcome the opportunity to engage with yourselves and I look forward to working with you over the coming months. This committee has a pivotal role in scrutinising the delegate powers that ministers and others are given through new acts and, indeed, using the use of existing powers. That, I suspect, can be a technical and laborious role at times, but it is an absolutely essential one and I commend the committee for the regular it brings to the task. I say that both as a minister and someone who, until quite recently, was a convener of a committee whose work was greatly aided by yours. The standard of legislation brought forward by the Government is generally high, but I fully accept that there can be exceptions to that. I offer today an assurance that I will always seek improvements in performance in this area and reflect the issues that are highlighted by this committee and others. In terms of the challenges coming down the track, we Brexit looms large. Whilst the full legislative implications of that remain unclear, we can be certain that Brexit will require better planning, quality assurance and explanation of the Government's SSI programme. That is a challenge that Mr Russell and I are jointly tackling with officials. I will give it there, convener, because I am sure that you have a number of questions for me. We do, and a lot of them relate to Brexit, as you might imagine. Thank you very much for that, which is very useful. We will go into the questions and start with Stuart McMillan. Thank you, convener. Good morning, minister, and welcome to your new role. Certainly, minister, can you provide the committee with an update on any discussions that you are having with the UK Government on areas where the UK-wide approach to secondary legislation might actually be more appropriate? Those discussions are on-going across the Scottish Government. There is a protocol in place for a notification to be sent to the Scottish Parliament if the Scottish Government is considering consenting to the UK Government-making provision in a statutory instrument. The first notifications were sent at the end of last week. Those discussions are taking place between individual ministerial portfolios in the relevant departments, and we in the centre of the Government are co-ordinating that work. Luke might talk a little bit about some of the criteria that underpin those discussions, but where there is an opportunity to work with the UK Government to make corrections ahead of Brexit? We are looking at that as a survival option. The Scottish Government recognises that we are dealing with a programme of legislation arising from EU withdrawal, both the notifications being issued in relation to UK SIs and SSIs in the Scottish Government, which will be of an unprecedented level of scale, pace and complexity. We also want to protect as much parliamentary and governmental time as possible for non-Brexit related legislation. We have, therefore, as Stephen indicates, agreed an approach with the UK Government where we will be able to consent to legislation being made in devolved areas by them. The minister wrote to the convener of this committee and to the convener of the Constitution Committee last week to set out the rationale for the Government taking this approach. Thank you for that, minister McGregor. You just mentioned consent notifications from last week. You also mentioned the issue of having dialogue to potentially change if there was a particular issue. How is that dialogue going? Have you found any particular problems so far? It is still early days, but it gives a flavour of it. We have regular discussion with colleagues in Cabinet Office and DEXU about the process. There is a very high level of awareness within the UK Government about the need for the Scottish Parliament to be able to scrutinise those notifications, and they are building that into their timescales as best they can. We are continually trying to get more information about what the Scottish UK Government is working on. We are trying to get as much draft information as we can in order to provide the Parliament with as much information at an earliest point as we possibly can. I think that that is reflected in the fact—or success of that so far is reflected in the fact that we have been able to send some notifications at the end of last week, which is—in the Evelyn Scottish Parliament—to see what is coming through the pipeline effect of the whole month ahead of these instruments getting laid in the UK Parliament. The process that we have put in place has given us a very early indication of what the UK Government is planning to do. We would like to know more. We would like to know more earlier, and we would just have to continue that dialogue with the UK Government to get as much information as we can. Essentially, between September and November, will be the period in which the bulk of the notifications come through. We anticipate right now—this is a moving feast—about 110 Brexit SSIs. Those will be contained within about 30 to 50 notifications. The notifications will go out September and November. As Stephen said, some of those have gone out already. November to December will be when the material starts to meld, running through to March. We are aware, obviously, of the last laying dates. We will be doing everything that we can to meet those, but we certainly cannot guarantee that there will not be some last-minute ones. That is essentially where we are at the moment. Obviously, the Cabinet Secretary touched upon the notifications last week in his statement in the chamber. Your answer has been quite helpful, but it might be useful if you could certainly come back to the committee, or even write to the committee on a regular basis, just in terms of how that is progressing, because, as you said yourself, there is a moving feast. That is a very good point, and I am happy to commit to that, because it is essential that we work closely with the committee and the others at the Parliament to work our way through the process. I would also welcome members' views on the nature of the notifications, the details that are contained within them. I am happy to take any suggestions away to look at that, because we are in the business of trying to provide you with as much advanced notice and information as we possibly can to smooth away the way for your work to take place. On that point, the issue of the heavy legislative lifting has been discussed in the past. As the consent notifications will be considered by the subject committees, can you, Minister, to provide the relevant committees with the summary of how many consent notifications they might be expected to scrutinise to help them to plan for their workload to overcoach in the next few months? The answer is yes, but not quite yet. We are working our way through the nature of the 110s and where they would sit. That process has not been completed as yet, but as soon as we have that information, it will be shared with the committees and the committee. Alison Johnstone I feel that you were answering quite a lot of my questions there, to be honest. Back to the SSIs, when does the Scottish Government intend to begin to lay them? Have you any more specific dates or do they all require to be considered by Brexit day of the 29th of March? I will cover the first part and the second part. I feel that the timing says that the first tranche will be SI notifications, so things that the UK Government might be best placed to make the fix. That is because, as I explained earlier on, we are effectively getting notifications a month in advance and then putting them into their Parliament. In September, October and November, the bulk of the work will be SI notifications, and then transitioning into November, December and January, where we think that we will get the bulk of SSIs. As the minister says, we are keenly aware of last-lane dates and want to do everything that we can to get as much work done as early as we possibly can. I appreciate that. You asked about prioritisation. There will have to be a process of prioritisation applied to these instruments. The way to think about this is not to focus on whether this is no deal prioritisation or not, but this is about March 2019 prioritisation. There will be a group of the fixes that are absolutely essential to make, where, for example, a system of laws, a scheme or a field of regulation would be broken entirely if no preparations or changes to the law were made in anticipation of EU withdrawal. It is obviously proper that the Government focuses on those areas first, given the scale and pace of the legislating that I mentioned. For example, where you were talking about an important regulatory function ceasing to be able to be exercisable, the Government will be making whether, by notification to this Parliament that a UK-wide approach is being taken or whether by its own SSI, the Government will be taking the steps required to address those deficiencies in legislation by March 2019. There will be other areas where Brexit has rendered a function, has made it so that a function works in a different way, works in a suboptimal way, but continues effectively to operate. An example might be, and I should caution the committee that this is only an example, that certain judicial posts currently cannot be held by somebody if they are a judge of the European Court of Justice. Obviously, that does not make sense if the UK is no longer a member of the EU, but it is not exactly a fatal blow to the scheme of judicial appointment. That might be a deprioritised fix, and it may well have to be addressed ultimately after whatever the important date is, whether that is March 2019 or later. Just going back to the consent notifications, I do not suppose that you have a rough guess of how many would be applying to each various committee in this Parliament? That follows on from Mr McMillan's point. Right now, we do not let something work through, and as soon as we have that information, we will look to share that, because I recognise that committees have to plan their work programmes. To risk a repeat myself, we absolutely will share that ASAP. Mr McBratton, you mentioned quite obviously that there are some pieces of legislation that you are going to have to do. Do you know the numbers there? No, we do not have those sort of numbers at the moment. The Government intends to address all of the consequences of EU withdrawal. That is not about cutting off the matters that will be addressed and those that will not be addressed, but it is about establishing the order of priority in which they are addressed. To come back to the committee and follow on from the earlier question with updates, if that is what you would like, and have that continuing dialogue. Okay, I appreciate that. Thank you. Mr Finlay. How is this impacting on the normal work of government? It would be unrealistic to suggest that it is not impacting. It would be unrealistic to suggest that it will not impact on the work of the committees, but we are applying as much resources as we can to dealing with this and being pragmatic in common sense in our approach. We are working with the UK Government where that is appropriate to make the progress that we need to. We are bringing forward SSIs as we need to do those. I assure Mr Finlay that we are coming at this with the best of intentions and the best efforts to minimise the impact on the work of the Parliament. We see the same level of non-Brexit related instruments coming through. We are working through that information, so what we want to give the committee is not just the picture of what Brexit SI notifications and SSIs are coming, but all SSIs are coming through the system. Historically, it has been about 200 to 300 domestic SSIs, so I can call them that. We have very preliminary information that suggests that, if we continue as we plan to do, it is about the same volume again, but we have not had the chance to work out how those figures fit across individual committees or to go through a process of prioritisation in the same way that we are doing with Brexit work, so that is a discussion that we need to have with the minister. Once we are able to show those projections to the committee, we intend to do so. Shouldn't you see any big dip in that workload that we have seen previously? There are fluctuations across the SSI programme every year. Sometimes it is more, sometimes it is less, and that is just a product of the type of work that we are bringing forward, but at the moment it is looking similar to the previous years. In terms of the Government, it was provided with cash in order to prepare for Brexit. Where has that money gone? To pick up that point, the chancellor set aside £1.5 billion for additional funding in each of the years 2018-19, 2019-20. For that, the Scottish Government received £37.3 million of consequentials for 2018-19. That has made up a £35.8 million resource, £1.6 million capital. The Cabinet Secretary for Finance, Economy and Fair Work has made initial allocations of £26.6 million resource and £0.5 million capital funding, which are supporting the preparation work that they are doing, and there will be further announcements linked to the budget. That is a global figure, but what are we doing with the cash? Can we give examples of that? To be honest, that is not an area for us to get into more sort of delivery of the legislative programme, so I think that is something that we would have to come back on if that is okay. We will write back to the committee with as much information as we can. Is your question kind of related to staffing? Yeah, I mean the resources that we are spending £10 million on stamps, are we spending them on lawyers, are we spending them on policy experts or where is the money? Once the final details are announced in the budget, we can write with that, provide that detail. In the meantime, I will proceed to come back with any information that I can, and that is helpful. Thank you, convener, and good morning. May I also take this opportunity to welcome the minister to his new position? Clearly, there has been much discussion about instruments arising from the EU withdrawal act. I wonder if the minister or his officials could update the committee on any other Brexit-related legislative activity that will be forthcoming, such as from the trade bill. The main other area of activity is UK primary legislation, and obviously the trade bill is currently before the Parliament in legislative consent memorandum has been looked at. The next one is the agriculture bill, which the UK Government has just introduced. We expect that there will be more UK primary legislation relating to Brexit in the future, potentially by the turn of the year, but we do not know exactly what that might be and exactly when it might come. One example would be the fisheries bill, which I think the UK Government has said that it is working on, but we do not have timings on that. Is there any expectations with regard to delegated powers that hinge upon devolved competencies in that legislation? The committee will be from its consideration of the EU withdrawal bill. I am sure that you are familiar with the Scottish Government's position on delegated powers as it relates to preparations for EU withdrawal. The Government's position will be the same, and it has been expressed to the UK Government that, when similar issues arise in Brexit-related legislation, the expectation is that devolved competence will be respected when it comes to the allocation of delegated powers. Clearly, from what we have learned from the EU withdrawal act, it is that the UK Government is unwilling to respect devolved competencies when it does not regard that as being in the UK's interest. When this legislation is inevitably passed out at Westminster, in terms of the workload for this Parliament on devolved areas of potential arising, such as ASIs and SSIs, is there any understanding of how that can impact on the workload of the Parliament and the Government? I would again simply point to the experience that this committee and other committees have had with the EU withdrawal bill and act as an example of the way that the Government is seeking to protect the devolution settlement and in particular respect the role of this Parliament while faced with the undoubted, large practical challenge of making the necessary preparations for EU withdrawal. I will ask you about a slightly different thing that you will be relieved to hear. You will know Minister as a former convener that there has been a frustration among conveners and others about the accessibility of some of the documents that we get relating to SSIs. Now, you are predecessor committed to looking at this. I do not know how far he has got. You will also appreciate that we are in the same boat here as former journalists the need to present things in plain English. We often do not get that. Is that something that you are committed to pursuing? Yes, we have had several conversations with officials as I was appointed. My predecessor committed to doing that and had done substantial groundwork in that area. I have very much reinforced that. As a former convener, I share your and other conveners concerns about the nature of some of the explanatory notes that are overly explanatory at times and the lack of plain English. There is substantial work going on to try and ensure that we make this as easy as possible for committees. For example, what we are looking at is, in addition to what is contained within the instrument, perhaps a covering letter that explains in two or three paragraphs specifically what the instrument does. That is not to insult the intelligence of committee members. It is simply to be helpful, because we have all at times read explanatory notes and had to go back and re-read them. It is a legitimate complaint that the committees have had. It is something that we are very much looking forward to fixing. I am not going to sit here today and say that we will get this absolutely right in one go. As Mr Fitzpatrick had indicated previously, I am not quite happy because I think that we would resolve that issue. I am certainly willing to hear from committees of any examples of poor practice, poor presentation, so that allows us to focus in on that and look to improve the nature of the instrument and the way that it is presented. I am very much hearing what you are saying on that issue. Okay. Given that everything comes through this committee, I am sure that we can provide examples, but it is just to be helpful that we need to work together on that. In the spirit of constructive engagement, I completely wait your commitment to working with you on that. If you have something to draw up my attention, do so. That is very useful. I have one final question. It is back to Brexit, I am afraid. Given the number of additional Brexit-related instruments are you concerned that officials might force officials to speed up drafting to get things through and that mistakes could occur? I certainly hope not. There is a lot of work going into ensuring that we do not see a dropping of standards through the workload. Human nature being what it is, people will make mistakes. It happens, we all do that, but we are acutely aware of the stresses on the system to produce good quality drafting. I cannot sit here today and say that there is not going to be any problems and I would not do that, but we are committed to getting that right. We put in as much resource and effort into doing that. Given evidence to the committee before about improvements in the quality assurance mechanisms being applied inside government to the process of drafting, I can reassure the committee that there is no intention to compromise on any of them simply because of the Brexit workload. The same quality assurance processes that the committee has taken evidence about before will apply to every single Brexit instrument that comes before the committee. However, as the minister says, we are dealing with an unprecedented workload and that will inevitably have some consequences on the instruments that the committee sees. It might be clear with the approach just to get it right first time, so we are not tying up your time and I was having to revisit instruments. Okay, thank you. Members have any other questions? No. It has been a short session, but a useful one, getting to know your session, if you can call it that. I thank you for your time and I will suspend the meeting briefly so that you can leave. Okay, we will move on to agenda item 3, instrument subject to affirmative procedure. No points have been raised on the draft renewables obligations Scotland amendment order 2018 and the draft early years assistant best start grant Scotland regulations 2018. Is the committee content with these instruments? Yes. Okay, agenda item 4 consideration of an instrument subject to negative procedure. No points have been raised on SSI 2018-267. Is the committee content with this? Yes, it is. Okay, and I will move the meeting into private session.