Meeting of the Parliament

Meeting date: Wednesday, March 16, 2011

Official Report 956KB pdf

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Public Records (Scotland) Bill: Stage 3

The next item of business is stage 3 proceedings on the Public Records (Scotland) Bill. In dealing with amendments, members should have the bill as amended at stage 2, the marshalled list, which is SP Bill 56A-ML, and the groupings, which the Presiding Officer has agreed. The division bell will sound and proceedings will be suspended for five minutes for the first division in the proceedings. The period of voting for the first division will be 30 seconds. Thereafter, I will allow a voting period of one minute for the first division after a debate and all other divisions will be 30 seconds.

Section 1—Records management plans

Group 1 is on the “agreement” of plans, rather than “approval”. Amendment 1, in the name of the minister, is grouped with amendments 2 to 4.

Amendments 1 to 4 follow on from amendments that were agreed to at stage 2 that replaced references to the keeper of the records of Scotland approving plans with references to him agreeing plans. Amendments 1 to 4 pick up on remaining instances of the terms “approval” and “approved” and change them accordingly.

The amendments address the concerns of the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities that the language of the bill focused too much on failure. They change the emphasis to one of collaboration and improvement. The amendments have no effect on the situation of the keeper, who will still require to be content with plans, otherwise he will return them.

I move amendment 1.

Amendment 1 agreed to.

Amendment 2 moved—[Fiona Hyslop]—and agreed to.

Section 4—Agreement of plans

Amendment 3 moved—[Fiona Hyslop]—and agreed to.

Section 5—Review of plans

Amendment 4 moved—[Fiona Hyslop]—and agreed to.

Schedule—Authorities to which Part 1 applies

Group 2 is on a minor and technical issue. Amendment 5, in the name of the minister, is the only amendment in the group.

Amendment 5 is a technical amendment that updates a reference in the schedule. The schedule currently refers to

“Safeguarders Panels (that is to say, panels established under section 30(1) of the Children’s Hearings (Scotland) Act 2011 ...)”.

That reflected the Children’s Hearings (Scotland) Bill at the time when the Public Records (Scotland) Bill was introduced. After the introduction of the Public Records (Scotland) Bill in October 2010, the Children’s Hearings (Scotland) Bill was modified at stages 2 and 3 so that the Children’s Hearings (Scotland) Act 2011 now makes provision for a single safeguarders panel, in section 32. Amendment 5 will change the entry in the schedule to reflect that.

I move amendment 5.

Amendment 5 agreed to.

That ends consideration of amendments. That must be the quickest we have ever got through a bill.