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Yes. When we consider the legislative options, I would take that back to the cabinet secretary.

If the regulations are to be annulled, I assure you that the rest of my day will be scrapped—let me put it that way. We will go away and have a long and detailed conversation about what will happen next. If the instrument was annulled, the panels would still be implemented and they would then be decided on entirely by the traffic commissioner, without any input from us. That would be the net result.

We would then have to consider whether that was a road that we were prepared to go down or whether we had to stop the approach in its entirety. That is why I am saying that we would be going back to square 1.

It will be sometime in 2026-27.

I will not give any commitment about what I will do if the instrument is annulled. The only commitment that I can give you is that, if it is not annulled, I will certainly bring the guidance back to the committee so that you can scrutinise it. Other than that, I cannot give any other commitment.

I will restrain myself, convener.

I was not even sitting in the Parliament in 2019, so I cannot answer for the decision-making process at the time, but I trust the parliamentary procedure, and I trust that the people who look at regulations or acts as they are going forward do their due diligence. Therefore, we are where we are.

As for whether we should continue with this, we face a stark choice—either we do not continue with it or we do. If we do continue with the regulations, franchising will happen more quickly. If we do not continue with them, we will have to change primary legislation, which, as you know, is not the simplest thing to do and will require a great deal of time and energy.

I am comfortable that it would be the traffic commissioner for Scotland, on the basis that we will be allowed to create a memorandum of understanding and guidance.

I remember the second part of your question now. The Secretary of State for Transport appoints the traffic commissioner for Scotland based on the fact that there are both devolved and reserved matters in traffic legislation in Scotland. I voted to come out of the UK in 2014. The result of staying in the UK is that, in 2024, we still have tie-ups with another Parliament. Therefore, we live within the bounds of what we voted for in 2014.

The proposal is not about taking powers away from the Scottish Government or from the Scottish Parliament. This is about the reality of the position that we are in: the traffic commissioner looks at reserved and devolved matters, so it is the UK Government’s right to say that the traffic commissioner for Scotland will be appointed by the secretary of state. One of my officials sits on the panel that will go through the process of employing someone in that role. Ultimately, it is a UK Government decision, because we voted to stay in the UK in 2014.

Would I personally do that? I would not answer that question right now; I would go back and have a much broader look at everything right back to 2019. I have to be absolutely honest and say that I have not gone back and looked at the debates or the amendments or anything that was done leading up to the 2019 act. However, I reiterate that we are where we are today. Either we pass the regulations or we do not. On what will happen after that, we will just have to see where we go.

SPT is aware that the SSI is on-going. My expectation would be that, if it was concerned, it would reach out and make its issues known.

I think that you are alluding to due diligence not having been done by the Government. I do not think that that is the case. We learned late on Friday that there was a motion to annul, so we are now sitting here on Tuesday morning. I spent my time speaking with officials and asking what the issues and problems are, how we could get around them and what the implications will be. Let us assume that we will get this SSI done and we can continue, but if we do not, we will have to go away and give it further consideration. I would not do that over one weekend; I would ensure that we give it proper consideration.

Good morning. Thank you for inviting me to discuss the regulations. As we know, franchising is an important tool for local transport authorities to improve services in their area. However, it is also a significant intervention in the local bus market. The franchising provisions in the Transport (Scotland) Act 2019 set out a new franchising model that seeks to deliver greater scrutiny and transparency in the franchising process. A key aspect of that is the inclusion of a final approval stage that is external to the authority, which assesses the proposals before the franchise can take effect. The act provides that safeguard to ensure that local authority transport authorities’ franchising proposals have been carefully considered.

Rather than providing for the decision to be made by the Scottish ministers, the 2019 act provides for an independent panel to be appointed by the traffic commissioner, with the intention of depoliticising the final decision-making process. Those measures were included in the Transport (Scotland) Bill at its introduction, they remained throughout the bill stages and they were agreed to by Parliament. Parliament also agreed that detail about the operation of the panels would be set out in regulations. The regulations that we are considering set out that detail and are fundamental to the operation of the franchise process in Scotland, not least because they will give local transport authorities certainty about how their franchising proposals will be considered.

The regulations make provision on a range of administrative and procedural matters in order to provide clarity and legal certainty on how panels should operate, and they include eligibility criteria that preclude the appointment to a panel of anybody who might be employed by operators that are affected by franchising proposals or who could otherwise not act impartially in deciding whether to approve a franchising framework. The approach is designed to secure the independence of the panel’s decision making. The regulations and the 2019 act provide guidance to panels on what they must consider when assessing a local transport authority’s franchising proposals and provide further clarity on what is and is not relevant to the panel’s decision making.

We have engaged closely on the development of the regulations with key stakeholders, including local transport authorities and the traffic commissioner’s office, and their involvement has been crucial in creating procedures that will ensure that the approval process is transparent and impartial. There is a keen appetite among a range of parties and stakeholders—including MSPs, some of whom are sitting here today—for franchising to be available to local transport authorities.

Calling for amendments to legislation or failing to pass the regulations will result in Scotland falling further behind in delivering franchising to improve services for passengers, as any proposal that would seek to significantly amend the panel process as set out in the 2019 act would require primary legislation. As committee members know, policy development of that sort can be significant and would not be completed before the end of this parliamentary session. As I have said, the regulations make important provision on the operation of panels as envisaged by Parliament when it passed the 2019 act, and annulling them could result in local transport authorities deciding to delay any franchising proposals, because of legislative uncertainty.

I am happy to answer any questions that members might have.