Meeting of the Parliament 24 September 2019
I cannot help but agree with Bruce Crawford’s point, because I cannot help but notice that there are twice as many people in the chamber as there are in the public gallery—and there are only 25 of us in the chamber. The debate might not be setting the heather on fire, but that does not mean that it is not important—especially today. A Scottish Parliament committee has given a comprehensive and useful report on the implications of EU exit for devolution, and has undertaken helpful scrutiny of post-Brexit work.
Of course, the best means of ensuring continued application of those principles, in a UK setting, is for Scotland and the whole UK to remain in the EU. I agree with the First Minister, who said earlier that Scotland’s interests would be best served by our being an independent EU member state. In that context, frameworks are not our choice, but they are an unfortunate necessity, and are one of the many constitutional consequences of Brexit, many of which are difficult to cope with. What we have here is something that we have been able to build slowly, piece by piece.
The Scottish Government remains wholly opposed to a no-deal exit, but we must prepare Scotland for all eventualities. In that spirit, we also need to prepare Scotland for any type of deal that takes place—even though we do not want it and will not support it—so we need to have working relationships as a result of that deal.
The principles that the JMC(EN) published underpin the frameworks. The frameworks are not complete. On the point that Bruce Crawford made in the early part of his speech, frameworks are not the whole deal or the real deal; they are frameworks, on which we hang other things that will, in the end, produce a complete picture of how we will work together in certain areas.
All such frameworks must be agreed, not imposed, and they must recognise and respect devolution. That is a crucial issue for the Scottish Government. We will agree to frameworks only when they are in Scotland’s interests, as is normal for any country. We will agree to a thing only if we feel that it is in our interests.
There are quarterly reports from the UK Government on frameworks, as part of the agreement on building the frameworks.