Seòmar agus comataidhean

Our second agenda item is to take evidence as part of our inquiry to feed into the consultation on the UK Government’s review of the United Kingdom Internal Market Act 2020.

Before I introduce our witnesses, I should state that there is an active court case that is relevant to the committee’s inquiry—Biffa Waste Services Ltd v the Scottish ministers. Given that the case is currently active, we have sought the Presiding Officer’s permission to be able to refer to the deposit return scheme exclusion process today. The Presiding Officer has permitted discussion of the policy issues in order to enable scrutiny, while indicating that we should avoid direct comment on the specifics of the active case. Any reference to the matter should be made within those parameters, and direct discussion of the active court case is to be avoided.

I welcome our first panel. Marc Strathie is senior policy adviser for devolved nations at the Institute of Directors Scotland, and Mags Simpson is deputy director of policy at the Confederation of British Industry Scotland. We are also joined online by David Thomson, who is the chief executive of the Food and Drink Federation Scotland. I extend a warm welcome to you all.

I will ask an opening question. The committee has previously recognised that there are significant challenges in managing the tension that exists in any internal market between open trade and regulatory divergence. What are your views on the impact of that tension on businesses? What opportunity does the review of UKIMA provide to address that tension?

We will go first to Ms Simpson.

Thank you. I will bring in Marc Strathie next.

Going back to the answer that you gave to Alexander Stewart, David, I note that transparency is an issue that we find very frustrating as a parliamentary committee. Such processes are done through the common frameworks and mainly involve civil servants, and there is not an opportunity to ask UK ministers about decisions that are made in Scotland. I am a bit concerned about what you said regarding the common frameworks. I understand that they were designed with stakeholder engagement in mind and that industry experts or professional experts were to be involved in the common frameworks that were relevant to their areas. However, from what you said, it sounds as if that is not greatly understood and you do not know how such experts are chosen. Is that the case?

I have a final question about the significant differences between how the UK internal market and the EU market operate, specifically in the areas of subsidiarity and proportionality, which govern the exercise of EU competences but are not included in UKIMA. Do you have any views on including subsidiarity and proportionality tests in UKIMA as part of the review?

Good morning, and a warm welcome to the 11th meeting in 2025 of the Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee. We have received apologies from Keith Brown, and we welcome back Jackie Dunbar.

Our first agenda item is to decide whether to take in private at future meetings our consideration of a draft submission to the United Kingdom Government’s consultation on its review of the United Kingdom Internal Market Act 2020 and our consideration of a draft report on part 2 of the review of the European Union-United Kingdom trade and co-operation agreement inquiry. Do members agree to do so?

Members indicated agreement.

The committee report in 2022—oh, sorry, David Thomson. I omitted to bring you in.

We have heard an awful lot about having certainty and clarity in these areas being the most important thing for the economy and for business. However, some of the decisions that have been made demonstrate that we now have a situation in which, for as long as the English market is analogous with the UK market, because of how the structures work, a lot depends on relationships. We would all welcome better relationships, but that seems like a pretty precarious thing on which to pin our hopes for the future.

If the system was being designed from scratch and things had not developed in this way, would there be an argument for equality between the negotiators? We have heard UKIMA described as driving a coach and horses through the devolved settlements of both nations. Could something be done to strengthen and equalise the negotiations at that level?

We have talked about the office for the internal market, which can give advice, but none of the Governments concerned is compelled to heed that advice. Is a regulator or an arbitrator necessary so that there is a body to make a decision when there is gridlock? That is just an option.

I will leave it at those two questions at the moment.

That concludes questions from the committee. I thank you all for your contributions.

I suspend the meeting to allow for a change of witnesses.

Welcome back. I am very sorry to say that we have lost Christina McKelvie, who was a very dear friend and colleague to everyone in the Parliament. Given the circumstances, we have decided to suspend today’s proceedings and close the meeting. The cabinet secretary has agreed that we will, through the clerks, send him the questions that we would have put to him, and he will respond to them in order to allow us to continue our work.

I know that I speak for everyone in the room when I say how sad we all are about the circumstances. We will miss an exceptional, empathetic and brave woman in this Parliament.

That is always helpful, thank you. I move to questions from committee members.