Meeting of the Parliament 28 January 2026 [Draft]
Deputy Presiding Officer, “gull management fund”—I have waited years for those three words to cross my lips.
I want to speak about amendment 148. I know that my colleague Douglas Ross is keen on accuracy in the chamber, so I will ask some simple questions. Perhaps he could respond to them during his summing up.
Subsection (1) of the section that amendment 148 would insert would require
“an analysis of the total annual spend”
to be undertaken. What would be the cost of doing that?
Subsection (3) of that section would require
“a fund (to be known as ‘the Gull Management Fund’)”
to be established. That would need to be sufficient for local authorities to mitigate
“the impact of gulls in the local ... area”
and to respond to
“the consequences of gulls in the local ... area”.
How much would that cost?
Subsection (5) would require
“an annual review of the operation and use of the Gull Management Fund”
to be undertaken, and, under subsection (6), there might require to be
“an increase in funding for the Gull Management Fund.”
I know that a fund of £100,000 would not be enough, because the member has already said so. I will be happy to take an intervention on my comments after I make my point. It is important that the financial memorandum that accompanies the bill suits what would be done under it. That is critical, because we are talking about public money. However, I do not know what impact amendment 148 would have on the financial memorandum.
I will take it a step further. It is too late for him now, but had Mr Ross brought this as a member’s bill—it would have been quite a good idea for such a bill—he would have been required to have a financial memorandum to accompany it.
My problem comes when things are being asked for at stage 3 and there are costings involved. I require the member—not on the face of his amendments, but in his submissions to the chamber—to present the costings that will be required to be provided by the Government.