Seòmar agus comataidhean

That ends consideration of amendments at stage 2. I thank the minister and her officials for their attendance today.

The result of the division is: For 2, Against 3, Abstentions 0.

Amendment 49 disagreed to.

Amendment 41 moved—[Siobhian Brown]—and agreed to.

Section 74, as amended, agreed to.

After section 74

Amendment 42 moved—[Siobhian Brown]—and agreed to.

Before section 75

There will be a division.

Against

Balfour, Jeremy (Lothian) (Con)
Mundell, Oliver (Dumfriesshire) (Con)

Abstentions

Grant, Rhoda (Highlands and Islands) (Lab)
Kidd, Bill (Glasgow Anniesland) (SNP)
McMillan, Stuart (Greenock and Inverclyde) (SNP)

Okay. Thank you.

Thank you very much for that, minister.

I thank the minister and her officials for their evidence. The committee may follow up in writing if we have any additional questions that arise from the meeting.

I will suspend the meeting to allow the witnesses to leave the room.

Just for clarification, Mr Mundell is referring to section 20(6)—that is subsection 6 of section 20—not section 26.

Under item 2, the committee will take evidence on the Regulation of Legal Services (Scotland) Bill from Siobhian Brown, the Minister for Victims and Community Safety. The minister is accompanied by two Scottish Government officials: Jamie Wilhelm, who is the legal services regulation reform manager, from the justice directorate; and Leanna MacLarty, who is a solicitor from the legal directorate. Good morning to you all.

I remind all attendees not to worry about turning on their microphones as broadcasting will deal with that. I invite the minister to make some opening remarks.

Welcome to the 30th meeting in 2023 of the Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee. We have received apologies from Mercedes Villalba. I remind everyone to switch their mobile phones and other electronic devices to silent.

The first item of business is to decide whether to take items 5 and 6 in private. Is the committee content to do so?

Members indicated agreement.

That concludes the public part of today’s meeting.

Thank you, minister. Section 5 of the bill gives the Scottish ministers the power to modify the regulatory objectives and professional principles for legal services that are set out in sections 2 to 4 of the bill. The committee heard evidence from the Law Society of Scotland and from the Faculty of Advocates that that provision should be removed from the bill. Their reasons included that it is, in their opinion, unforeseeable why or when those objectives and principles would require to be modified and that, if that were necessary, such objectives and principles are too important to be modified by secondary legislation.

What are your thoughts about those observations? Can you give the committee any examples of when it might be necessary to modify those objectives and principles?