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I have not yet had a response specifically from the Church of Scotland.

We have engaged with stakeholders. You mentioned a consultation. I am talking about on-going stakeholder engagement, which I have had and which I think I narrated in response to Ms Hyslop’s question.

Equally, we have spoken to the Church of Scotland, the property law committee of the Law Society of Scotland, the Scottish Land Commission, the Scottish Property Federation, Scottish Land & Estates and Community Land Scotland. We have reached out to all those organisations and have informed them of our plan to lay the SSI. I do not know whether my officials have had responses from them that give us the thumbs up. I have not, but I am still convinced that what we have done is the right thing to have done.

It has been part of the conversations that we have had.

What I am proposing does not change the provisions as they were. When the controlling individual has to register, they will have to register their associates, as well.

I considered all the options that the Church of Scotland and other denominations put to me. Those included a full exemption from the register and an amendment to schedule 2 of the RCI, which would have created special treatment for “the main Scottish churches”, as they put it. That in itself is a vague term. However, there were other reasons why that was not acceptable, including the fact that that would immediately raise concerns among other stakeholders that were being treated differently from religious bodies. Consistency is important.

I considered all the Church of Scotland’s suggestions, and I continue to liaise with it. I think that that approach is appropriate, and I hope that it will help it.

Thank you very much, convener.

I am here to speak to legislation to address the concerns of some stakeholders who are in scope of the register of persons holding a controlled interest in land—the RCI. The policy intention of the RCI is to ensure that there can no longer be a category of owner or tenant where, intentionally or otherwise, their decision making or their control over a piece of land or property is obscured.

As members will know, the register stems from the Land Reform (Scotland) Act 2016. The principal regulations that established the register were passed unanimously by the Parliament following scrutiny by the Environment, Climate Change and Land Reform Committee via the super-affirmative procedure. Members of this committee will also remember unanimously passing amendment regulations in November 2021. I am very pleased to say that the register went live on 1 April 2022, as planned.

Despite the long-running and quite deep scrutiny, some stakeholders have raised concerns with me in recent months about the cost and administrative burden of compliance. I should be clear that there is no cost to make a submission to the register and that the process is fairly straightforward. However, preparation work is involved and, in practice, some within the scope of the register will instruct a solicitor, which, of course, carries cost.

From the engagement that I have had with stakeholders, the administrative burden arises principally where there is a substantial volume of titles and where there is a complex ownership structure. The register exists to try to shed light on and provide transparency on such issues.

I have listened to the concerns and, in response to them, I have laid the Scottish statutory instrument that is before the committee, which is to offer a one-year extension of the period for registration before the penalty provisions come into force. The period will therefore be extended from 1 April 2023 to 1 April 2024.

Extending that period will allow the register to continue with its integrity, and it will also allow a period in which the administrative task can be stretched and therefore ease the burden and spread the costs. I am particularly mindful of the requirement to do that as the third sector and charities face considerable strain just now because of the pandemic, Brexit and the on-going cost crisis. As the third sector and charities work really hard to support people in our communities to get through the cost crisis, I am mindful that I do not want to exacerbate any pressures on them.

I hope that the committee will support the regulations. I am happy to answer questions.

Yes—absolutely. Our consultation on the bill has concluded. We are still considering all the responses to that and formulating how we will take the policy forward. I suppose that we are at a delicate part of policy development, and I cannot say too much beyond what was in the consultation. However, the three principal provisions of the bill are to do with making the land rights and responsibilities statement statutory, having land management plans that will allow communities and landowners to collaborate on what land is used for and, of course, a public interest test that will, I hope, inject a degree of regulation and transparency into what is, thus far, a very unregulated market.

It is about consistency. The register is live. Organisations are registering now and will continue to do so. I should say that, with the extra year, the Registers of Scotland will continue to work with stakeholders to support them to make the registrations. Of course, that will fall short of the provision of legal advice, as must be the case, but we will do everything that we need to do to support them.

On your question about companies, one policy rationale for the act, which I was not involved with, was about avoiding duplication. Companies were not involved in this because of what they are required to submit to Companies House. I cannot remember what the name of that register is, but perhaps my colleague Paul Richardson will know.

Let me be clear: I thought that the original year was sufficient; the extension is an allowance for the concerns that have been raised with me.

I would never encourage anyone to fill out a public register with anything but the utmost accuracy. Four bits of information are required: the details of the recorded person—that is, the owner or the tenant of a long lease; the land details; the ownership details; and the associate details. I would not necessarily expect all the complexities of legal title to be narrated, but individuals should seek legal advice on that. That is not something that the Government can provide.

I think that including them in primary legislation is an indication that it would intend to use them at some point.

Secondly, in terms of any indication that we have had about how, specifically, the powers might be used, I know that the regulation of seeds is potentially an area in which there has been some indication that an early piece of work might be done. Perhaps my officials will say a little bit more about that. In essence, placing certain seeds on the market is currently organised on a GB nations basis. Changes to that, to account for this bill, might be one of the early moves of secondary legislation.