Hansard

I thank Martin Whitfield for giving me the opportunity to speak a little more—I will not speak for long—about the legislative consent motion. I should say that it was the Government's preference for there to be a section 30 order to transfer responsibility to this Parliament to legislate on the matter. That was the approach that I and the Government would have preferred but, unfortunately, the UK Government would not agree, which is regrettable.

I am genuinely grateful to Tracy Gilbert MP for taking the bill forward. It is important that we make it as straightforward as possible for voters in Scotland to be able to apply for a postal or proxy vote. This bill, should it pass through the UK Parliament, will achieve that.

I thank Martin Whitfield and the Standards, Procedures and Public Appointments Committee for the report that has been laid before the Parliament. I am sure that everyone has read it as assiduously as I have. The committee has considered the matter at pace. I am grateful for that.

Mr Whitfield made the point that, this morning, the Government received a copy of a letter from the Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee, which asked a couple of questions. As Mr Whitfield mentioned, I responded to that letter today. I would have been very happy to go to the committee to speak to the matter, but it wrote to me and I responded today.

I will place on record some of the points that were raised by the committee, and how I responded. First, the committee asked how it will be decided which Government will exercise the delegated powers that are set out in the bill. I say to the Parliament that the Scottish Government intends to make the regulations under the power in the bill. Those will be subject to agreement by the UK Government, but they will be laid in the Scottish Parliament in the usual way.

The committee also asked how scrutiny by the Scottish Parliament of the policy position of those regulations will be ensured when the power is exercised by a minister of the Crown. The Scottish Government intends to exercise those powers to implement online applications for absent voting in devolved Scottish elections, and we would expect any future changes by a minister to be the subject of engagement and agreement. The Scottish ministers would seek to ensure that the Scottish Parliament had the opportunity to assess any changes in good time. We recognise the importance of parliamentary scrutiny, and we will make sure that that is possible in this case.

With that, I urge the Parliament to agree to the motion in my name.