Hansard

Thank you, Presiding Officer. I will try to address as many questions as I can in the available time; quite a few were raised.

First of all, I listened with great interest to the debate, and I am thankful to members for expressing their support. Sarah Boyack made the important point that these are kleptocrats who raised their money by fleecing the Russian people of billions of pounds, at a point in their history when they needed that money for their own public services. We should bear that in mind.

Over the past two weeks, we have been witness to the shocking actions of Putin’s regime, and I take on board Stephen Kerr’s point that it is Putin who we should keep in our sights. That regime has worked against the people, democracy and sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine. The chamber stands resolute against that unwarranted aggression.

The reforms to which the LCM relate are intended—I would say that they are required—to help counter the illicit financing of land and property ownership across the UK by kleptocrats and oligarchs who support Putin’s regime.

Listening to Michael Marra, I thought that we were about to break into a verse of “This Land Is Our Land” as he made his comments. In relation to his point on Scottish regulations—I think that he was referring to the duplication of regulations, to which I referred in my opening speech—that will be a matter for the responsible minister, Màiri McAllan, to look at as she takes things forward. She will be paying attention to what was said here today. That also applies to the point that Sarah Boyack made about the sea bed. Those things can be looked at, as can the issue of the grace period being reduced from 12 months to six months.

Some of the issues around prominent persons are really in the gift of the UK Government, and not the Scottish Government, to deal with.

We want to see maximum transparency. A provision is coming forward in our own bill, which was long planned and will help us in relation to that issue. That, of course, can be looked at again by this Parliament—there is no inhibition on the Parliament looking at that.

In relation to Michael Marra’s amendment, I should say, just to be clear, that the UK Government did not ask to go back beyond 2014; in fact, I think that it is unlikely that it would agree to do that. However, there is no inhibition on us agreeing to the amendment, which I am happy to do. Perhaps, given that Donald Cameron has expressed his support for it too, he can have a word with his colleagues in London about it. That would add additional weight to it.

I also listened to the points that Michelle Thomson made. My colleague Ash Regan is also in the chamber and will have heard Michelle Thomson’s comments in relation to the Law Society and SLPs.

As I have said, the reforms to which the LCM relates are intended to deal with the illicit financing of—