mative procedure is appropriate for the first use of the power, that it should also be applied to future exercises of the power. It's quite conceivable that future exercises of the power will provide for significant and material increases in fees and charges and it would seem appropriate for regulations providing for such increases to be subject to the affirmative procedure. Equally the scrutiny applied to regulations should be proportionate. Therefore regulations that provide for less significant increases in fees and charges are more appropriately subject to the negative procedure. Accordingly, the committee agreed yesterday to lodge amendments to apply the sifting process to regulations under section 19 so that Parliament can take an informed view of the appropriate scrutiny procedure to attach to the instrument based on the content of that agreement, so I move amendment 65. Thank you very much, and I call on Ross Greer to speak to amendment 44 and the other amendments in this group. Thank you, Presiding Officer. Happy to move amendment 44. Graham Simpson has already covered the principles of the arguments that were making here, so I'm not going to repeat that, but it's nice to say that I was very happy that Parliament at stage 2 through the committee did agree that it was the appropriate level of scrutiny for the changes that are going to be made through this process, and specifically that means that it should be Parliament through our committees that decide what instrument that should be. I have brought amendment 44 to define a more workable process for this. It addresses some of the concerns that were raised at stage 2, very valid concerns, not by those who disagreed with the principle—the principle is something that we all agreed to—about how workable we could make this. That was originally proposed. Very fair concerns were raised that that would cause significant delays for instruments coming through, particularly negative instruments on very minor changes of which we're all expecting a substantial volume at certain points in this process. We found a solution to that, which extends the scrutiny process by taking that 15 days, extending it to 20 days, within the DPLR committee's existing 20-day scrutiny period. Given the instrument that it should take and scrutiny of the substance, how they dovetail we believe that to be an appropriate solution. Members also notice that there's a new provision in the new 14A. It's also addressed by amendment 66 that specifies that the urgency provisions in section 13.1 can override the sifting arrangements. This was intended in the original 14A, but it wasn't explicit. Making it explicit is an improvement. It's also an improvement that is safeguarded. I don't think any of us would be comfortable with the urgency provisions, but we recognise their necessity. An amendment that I lodged and was passed at stage 2 to section 31 gives Parliament the opportunity to suspend those urgency powers if it believes they've been used inappropriately. This is a safeguarded process. There were areas where we disagreed with some of the concerns raised. I did not believe that it would be appropriate to remove the superaffirmative procedure from this. This should be an option that is available to committees. It's ultimately for that committee's judgment whether or not that is an appropriate procedure. I hope that members will recognise that what we've done is take the principle agreed to at stage 2 and create a more workable process for it through amendment 44 at stage 3. I call on Neil Findlay to be followed by Daniel Johnson. Thanks, Presiding Officer. We support amendments in this group as they provide for enhanced scrutiny of regulations by this Parliament. We note the letter and the comments by the convener of the delegated powers committee on these amendments and support the establishment of that sifting procedure where the committee has a say and can change the process and enhance scrutiny provided by the use of affirmative procedure and the increase in the number of days. In relation to fees and charges, I understand that where those are minor, that negative procedure would be more appropriately. The delegated powers committee takes the role of this Parliament and ensuring the scrutiny of legislation very seriously. These changes are about standing up for Parliament over ministers. Briefly, in support of these amendments, in the stage 1 debate I said that I thought that it was important that if we are seeking to protect devolution, that is much about how power is exercised as much as we concentrate on what powers we have. The proposals that Ross Greer and the committee have brought forward to enact and implement a sifting committee are very sensible ones because they give the power to Parliament and ensure that the powers being exercised by ministers that were previously democratically exercised powers in the European Union are exercised democratically in this place are very important and for those reasons I very much support those amendments. Thank you very much. I call on the minister, Michael Russell. I accepted, as Ross Greer has indicated at stage 2, the principle that given the exceptional circumstances of Brexit, the Scottish Parliament should have a role, a strong role, determining what procedure Brexit-related statutory instruments should be scrutinised under. I also emphasise the need to ensure that such a sifting process which we accepted would be flexible and proportionate enough to allow the Government to plan its legislative programme with an appropriate degree of certainty. Presiding Officer, the whole business of this legislation is to try and find a middle way between Brexit itself and the great burdens it places upon this Parliament and upon this country, something that the people of the country did not vote for and the time available. We have to find a way through that and, therefore, striking a balance is the issue. I am pleased to acknowledge that amendment 44 from Ross Greer which would replace the amendment that he made at stage 2 in our opinion strikes the right balance. I am grateful to him for developing an approach that preserves the role of Parliament in determining whether an instrument has been laid under the appropriate procedure while making the provision more workable in practice. I have to say that there were hard negotiations to go through to achieve that, but in the end we got an amendment that works and that is why it was tabled within due time. The specific issue that Ross Greer's stage 3 amendment addresses is to align the sifting process with the delegated power and law reforms committee's other scrutiny functions that once an instrument has been laid. That ensures that the timescales for laying and scrutinised supporting legislation remain manageable. Ross Greer's amendment also ensures that there is an option to disobey the sifting process in genuinely urgent cases. I believe that that is a sensible provision to include, albeit one that I hope we will not have to use. Finally, members will want to be aware that Ross Greer's stage 3 amendment puts in place a much stronger framework for parliamentary control than the equivalent of the UK withdrawal bill, which gives the UK Parliament only an advisory role. For those reasons, I welcome amendment 44 and encourage members to support it. Members will note that Graham Simpson sent a letter to the Presiding Officer yesterday proposing an alternative approach. He wishes to retain the pre-laying sift approach that Ross Greer introduced at stage 2. I believe that that would be a mistake. It would require a 15-sitting day sift to be allowed for all statutory instruments that are developed under this bill before they can be laid regardless of their significance. That is disproportionate. It would make planning the programme of support that legislation required as a consequence of a Brexit being imposed upon us, extremely difficult and potentially unmanagable. Building in a 15-day pre-laying period, along with the possibility of every instrument being upgraded to the enhanced affirmative procedure would make the scheduling of the already complex programme of legislation required and ultimately very difficult for either Government or Parliament to predict or plan for. Let me give you two facts on this. 15 days for 300-plus instruments equates to 900 more weeks in a timetable which we already know and which is already bearing down upon us. The second one is, as Ross Greer has indicated, the 20-day period is an extension and the 20-day period is not merely for considering whether sifting takes place or not. That was something within the letter that I respectfully disagree with. The 20-day period can be used for considering, of course, as well. Ross Greer's approach via amendment 44 is the efficient, flexible, proportionate approach without any loss of parliamentary control. In fact, it increases parliamentary control and meets the very objections that the Delegated Powers Committee had. I would encourage members to oppose Graham Simpson's amendment 65. The Delegated Powers Committee has also tabled amendment 44A which seeks to apply the sifting procedure to section 19, the part that provides for fees and charges in connection with the functions of Scottish public authorities. That would ensure that section 19 instruments are also subject to the sifting procedure. I have been in correspondence with the committee about this matter, which members may not know. I have pointed out that the model for procedures and changes in this bill is initial use being subject to affirmative procedure, so members are absolutely in charge, and subsequent adjustments, which will, in the greatest part, be very minor to negative procedure. The financial memorandum sets out in paragraphs 20 to 22 the guidance for calculating fees and charges and notes that bodies sponsored by the Scottish Government should and must comply with the processes set out within the Scottish Public Finance Manual. As the fees and charges regime set out in the bill, bills on standard forms and fees and charges levied will be calculated in the standard way and, of course, it is a continuity bill as they are now. According to the robust governance and guidance set out in the Scottish Public Finance Manual, the Government's view is that the provision of the bill is appropriate and sufficient and I encourage members to oppose amendment 44A. The Delegated Powers Committee has also tabled in manuscript amendment 66 that it can exist even if amendment 44 is not accepted. I would support that on a contingent basis, but I would strongly recommend members support Ross Greer's amendment 44, which was come to after a great negotiation and in fully respectful of the stage 2 process and all things flowing from it. That would provide a better solution to the very difficult circumstances in which this Parliament finds itself. Thank you, and I call on Graham Simpson now to wind up and to press or withdraw his amendment. Thank you very much. I can thank everyone who's spoken in this section. Mr Russell talks about striking a balance. This is what we're trying to do. First of all, I commend Ross Greer for bringing amendments in the first place because what Ross Greer is trying to do is to ensure effective scrutiny so as to be congratulated for that. That's what my committee is all about. The discussion that we had yesterday was the first opportunity that the committee had had to actually look at this amendment the very first. I had seen the wording over the weekend but as far as I know, I don't think the committee had. Yesterday was our first meeting so it was the first meeting that we had the opportunity to consider it and discuss it. We came to the conclusion that the amendment before us in Ross Greer's name would have the unfortunate effect of not allowing enough scrutiny time to deal with SSIs. I said earlier that we were unanimous at that point. The committee was unanimous. That situation changed. The deputy convener changed his mind as did one of his colleagues. Unfortunately, this appears to have happened as a result of some strong-arming by ministerial colleagues. Order. Let's listen to Mr Simpson. It's a most unfortunate episode. Order, please. Let's listen to Mr Simpson. Stuart McMillan. I thank Mr Simpson for taking the intervention. The discussion that we had in private session yesterday was very much thorough as I will agree to. However, Mr Simpson will also be aware that there was some very important information that was withheld from the committee during our discussion which has a consequence. Therefore, the decision that I took and my colleague took was very much not based upon the full facts of the information that should have been presented to every single member of the committee. Graham Simpson. The so-called pertinent information was that I had a conversation by telephone with Mr Russell on Friday in which he told me that they planned to back a further amendment. I had not seen the wording of that amendment. I have covered that. My conversation with Mr Russell was Mr Russell telling me what he was proposing to do. Clearly, the time and place to deal with that as a committee is when the committee meets. That's what we did yesterday. That's the position. I am moving the amendment. Thank you. The member has moved the amendment. The question is that amendment 65 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? We are not agreed. We will move to vote. Members may cast their votes now and this is a one-minute division. The result of the vote on amendment 65 in the name of Graham Simpson is yes, 60, no, 68. There were no abstentions. The amendment is therefore not agreed. Can I call amendment 66 in the name of Graham Simpson? Graham Simpson to move or not move. The question is that amendment 66 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? We are agreed. I call amendment 44 in the name of Ross Greer. Ross Greer to move or not move. Moved. I call amendment 44A in the name of Graham Simpson. Graham Simpson to move or not move. Moved. The question is that amendment 44A be agreed to. Are we all agreed? We are not agreed. We will move to vote. Members may cast their votes now. Amendment 44A. The result of the vote on amendment 44A in the name of Graham Simpson is yes, 59, no, 69. There were no abstentions. The amendment is therefore not agreed. Ross Greer to press or withdraw. Amendment 44. Moved. The question is that amendment 44 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? We are agreed. I call amendment 45 in the name of Neil Findlay. Neil Findlay to move or not to move. Moved. The question is that amendment 45 be agreed to. We are not agreed. Moved to vote. Members may cast their votes now. The result of the vote on amendment 45 in the name of Neil Findlay is yes, 59, no, 69. There were no abstentions. The amendment is therefore not agreed. I call amendment 46 in the name of the minister. Minister to move formally. Moved. The question is that amendment 46 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? We are agreed. I call amendment 8. I call amendment 8 in the name of Mike Rumbles. Mike Rumbles to move or not move. Not moved. We turn now to group 10. I call amendment 47 in the name of Neil Bibby. Group to the amendments 50 and 52. Neil Bibby to move amendment 47 and speak to all amendments in the group. Thank you, Presiding Officer. I wish to formally move amendment 47 in my name and speak in support of amendments 50 and 52 in the name of the minister on the same issue. Last week I moved a number of amendments in the name of the minister on the same issue. Last week I moved a number of amendments during the bill's stage 2 proceedings at an extended session of the Finance and Constitution Committee. The purpose of those amendments was to ensure that any regulation making powers granted to Scottish ministers as a result of this bill would not remove or weaken EU-derived rights and protections in relation to five key areas. For the record, these are related to employment, equalities, health and safety, consumer standards and the environment. There is real concern that Brexit could undermine those rights and protections that we currently enjoy as members of the European Union. Let's be clear that cannot and should not be allowed to happen. Although my amendments were not moved, the minister did give a commitment to find a way of ensuring that the concerns raised by myself and others, including Patrick Harvie, would be addressed at stage 3. Amendments in group 7, as well as the amendments in this group, are a result of that process and of constructive dialogue with the Harvie, which I welcome. Amendment 47, in my name, would expand section 16 of the bill on explanatory statements. When Scottish ministers lay an instrument or draft, it would be required to make a statement explaining what effect, if any, it would have on rights and duties relating to employment, health and safety and matters relating to consumer protection. The sifting process envidges by a number of members and by the Scottish Government would be informed by those explanatory statements. That would help to determine the best level of parliamentary scrutiny to apply to any instruments or drafts that are laid. Some members may recall concerns at stage 2 about whether similar amendments encroached on reserved areas. My stage 3 amendments therefore make clear that the requirement to make such an explanatory statement applies so far is in within devolved competency. For clarity, devolved competence is defined as being within the meaning of section 54 of the Scotland Act 1998. In addition, there is an additional reporting requirement on Scottish ministers covering rights and duties in relation to employment, health and safety and consumer protection. Those amendments therefore enhance scrutiny and, in my view, provide further assurances to those who are rightly concerned with safeguarding EU-derived rights and protections and therefore remove the amendment in my name. Thank you very much. I call the minister to speak to amendment 50 and the other amendments in this group. I thank Neil Bibby for amendment 47, which I think sensibly strikes the right balance between making sure that we have powers that are sufficiently flexible for the task ahead of us, but we also do not forget when we use those powers to be mindful of the important values set out in Neil Bibby's amendments. With those amendments made, the section 16 explanatory statement will become a powerful tool in ensuring that Parliament is able to give the appropriate amount of scrutiny to any instrument before it. It will cover matters such as equalities, employment rights, health and safety as well as set out the purpose and effect of each instrument. Some of the matters that are covered are at least to a significant extent reserved. It is of course unlikely that any instruments that are laid by the Scottish ministers could have any effect on those matters. However, it is possible that devolved provision might have a peripheral effect on such matters. It is right that the explanatory statement should explain the position if that is the case. Given the specific focus of the amendments on those matters, I think that it is appropriate in this case that the amendment makes clear that the statement applies only so far in devolved competence for the instrument to have any such effect. That is the right way of ensuring that every instrument receives the scrutiny that it deserves. My amendments 50 and 52 are consequential on Mr Bibby's amendment 47. They ensure that the statements required by amendment 47 are treated in the same way by the bill as the other elements of the statement set out in section 16. I therefore recommend that the chamber votes for all three amendments in this group 47, 50 and 52. Thank you very much. Much like the earlier discussion on the different approaches that political parties have taken in relation to the environmental arguments at another point in this bill, again we saw a stage 2 process where two different proposals came very much trying to achieve the same essential objective. I had moved an amendment that was modelled on an amendment with those two different proposals. I had moved an amendment that was modelled on an amendment that was discussed at the UK Parliament in relation to the EU withdrawal bill. Neil Bibby came with an amendment that I think had some greatest specificity in how it was framed. What we've ended up with is some discussion between, I know that Neil Bibby and those other colleagues in his office have worked hard on this alongside the Government. I'm very pleased that there is an agreement on how it is that we should set out a wider set of social rights in this bill. I'm glad that the minister will be accepting it. I'll certainly be voting for it. There's one other point that I'd like to make and it is about the wider agenda of rights, not all of which are actually covered in this bill. The minister knows that I had considered lodging an amendment in relation to the convention, the UN convention on rights of persons with disabilities but I concluded that there wasn't an appropriate place for it to fit within the bill. The minister knows that that's a convention that does interact with EU law, which the UK Government has in fact signed it but not implemented it domestically. I would encourage the minister in his contribution in this debate simply to reassert whether the Scottish Government continues to endorse that convention and will he write to the Parliament at some point when the question has been considered as to whether in fact legislative implementation in domestic law will be necessary in relation to that convention. To give the minister that assurance and also to say that it fits well into the process that I was challenged about by Mr Finlay and by Johann Lamont so that he's considered as part of the process of those things that we need in relation to as we move forward. Patrick Harvie is supporting Neil Bibby's amendment. Thank you very much. Neil Bibby to wind up to press or withdraw. I'll just press the amendment. Thank you very much. The question is that amendment 47 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? We are agreed. We turn now to group 11 and I call amendment 48 in the name of Donald Cameron, grouped with amendments 51 and 53. Donald Cameron to move amendment 48 and speak to the amendments in the group. Thank you, Presiding Officer. Hopefully, I can be very brief here. The purpose of this amendment is to ensure that where instruments are laid during a period of recess, Scottish ministers are held accountable for that and must explain why this has occurred. During stage 2, the minister stated that we need to recognise that it is almost inevitable. I think he said that we will need the Government, that is, we'll need to lay some instruments in recess and it would be appropriate for the bill to set out more about what should happen in that instance. As a result of that, I didn't move an amendment that made provision for recess and the Scottish Government has suggested a reworded version, which is in my name in amendment 48. I welcome that constructive engagement and move amendment 48 as well as amendments 51 and 53, which are technical updating amendments all in my name. Thank you very much. I call on James Kelly. Briefly, those amendments are all sensible and cater for the Government providing an explanation where instruments have got to be laid during recess. I think that this is a reasonable precaution for this Government or any future Government and is sensible and will support all amendments in the group. Thank you. I call the minister. I welcome safeguard to the bill as I said at stage 2 in response to Donald Cameron's original amendments. Regulations under the continued bill will be made against a very hard deadline that is out of our control and with a backdrop of uncertainty. In those circumstances, it would be appropriate for the bill to set out more about what should happen when regulations under the main powers and the bill need to be laid during recess. Those amendments achieve that. I thank Mr Cameron for working with us to bring those forward. The question is that amendment 48 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? We are. I call amendment 49 in the name of Tavish Scott. Tavish Scott to move or not move. Move. Thank you. The question is that amendment 49 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? We are not agreed. We will move to a vote. The result of the vote on amendment 49 in the name of Tavish Scott is yes, 59, no, 68. There were no abstentions. The amendment is therefore not agreed. I call amendment 50 in the name of the minister. Minister, to move formally. The question is that amendment 50 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? We are. I call amendment 51 in the name of Donald Cameron. Donald Cameron to move. The question is that amendment 51 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? We are. I call amendment 52 in the name of the minister. Minister, to move formally. The question is that amendment 52 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? We are agreed. I call amendment 53 in the name of Donald Cameron. Donald Cameron to move. Moved. The question is that amendment 53 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? We are. I call amendment 54 in the name of Neil Findlay. Neil Findlay to move. Thank you. The question is that amendment 54 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? We are not agreed. We will move to vote and members may cast their votes now. The result of the vote on amendment 54 in the name of Neil Findlay is yes, 59, no, 69. There were no abstentions. The amendment is therefore not agreed. I call amendment 9 in the name of Mike Rumbles. Not moved. I call amendment 55 in the name of the minister. Minister, to move formally. Moved. The question is that amendment 55 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? We are agreed. I call amendment 10 in the name of Mike Rumbles. Not moved. I call amendment 56 in the name of Mark Ruskell. Mark Ruskell to move. Thank you very much. The question is that amendment 56 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? We are agreed. I call amendment 57 in the name of the minister. Minister, to move formally. Moved. Thank you very much. The question is that amendment 57 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? We are agreed. We turn now to group 12. I call amendment 58 in the name of Ivan McKee in a group of its own. Ivan McKee to move and speak to amendment 58. Thank you, Presiding Officer. I move and speak to amendment 58 in my name. The purpose of this amendment is to provide more clarity around the meaning of exit day in the bill. It is concerned with the way that the bill works at the point that the UK leaves the EU. That is an issue that was discussed at stage 2 of the bill, where there was some concern raised that the possibility existed that Scottish ministers could somehow set a different date for exit in this bill than applies in the UK Government's EU withdrawal bill. That, of course, was never the intention but a mechanism has to be put in place to ensure that where the date currently set in the UK bill changed, then the date in this bill would have to reflect any such change. At stage 2, Neil Findlay's amendments to the definition of exit date were agreed by the committee. That replaced Scottish ministers' ability to set exit day in regulations with a definition set out on the face of the bill, namely the day that the UK leaves the EU. I am grateful to the minister for working with me on this amendment, which gives more detail about what is meant by this. It links the definition in the bill to the point in time that the EU treaty stopped applying in the UK as a consequence of UK withdrawal from the EU. That ensures that the bill is tied to the legal process by which Brexit will take place. It does not remove anything from Neil Findlay's amendment to the bill. It augments and expands on it. That ensures that whatever is provided for in the withdrawal agreement, however the UK leaves the EU will be reflected in this continuity bill. I urge members to support this amendment. Adam Tomkins, to be followed by James Kelly. When the bill was introduced into this Parliament, section 28 provided that exit day means such day as the Scottish ministers made by regulations appoint. They explained that they did not really mean that because they did not want to appoint a day for exit day and they accepted an amendment or an amendment at any rate passed at stage 2 so that section 28 of the bill now reads that in this act exit day means the day that the UK leaves the European Union. That is entirely appropriate, that is as it should be and nothing more needs to be said. Contrary to what Mr McKee just said his amendment complicates the matter. It complicates the matter unnecessarily. It makes the matter less clear, not more clear. All that needs to be said is what is said currently in section 281, which is that exit day means the day that the UK leaves the European Union and for that reason this amendment should strongly be resisted. James Kelly. Arise to oppose amendment 58 in the name of Ivan McKee. Stage 1, there was concern about the definitions in relation to exit day and the way the bill was drafted left the interpretation for that in the hands of Scottish ministers. Stage 2, that issue was addressed following an amendment from Neil Findlay that made it clear that exit day is when the UK leaves the EU. I think that that is quite a clear definition that we have got as we enter stage 3. The clauses that Ivan McKee adds in relation to the treaty of the EU and the treaty of functioning of the EU only add further confusion and a potential conflict. The clear definition that we have got is drafted now is the one that is legally watertight and should remain and therefore oppose amendment 58. Thank you. Let me deal with Mr Tomkins' point first of all. I cannot imagine why that should be strongly resisted except to say that I am not sure that anybody in Let alone Scottish Fishermen would believe a word the Tories said about exit day these days. I am surprised by the position that Labour Party is taking. I have to say that we did accept and absolutely have been very helpful to an amendment from Neil Findlay but we did think and I said during stage 2 process that we might need some small and technical changes to that. That reinforces our amendment but it does make the necessary changes so that we fully understand the issue to do with EU treaties. This is entirely consistent with making it as clear as possible that we are not setting exit day. Exit day is set elsewhere. We do not want exit day. I would rather not have exit day but if we are going to have exit day there has got to be tied down very clearly and it is tied down both in Neil Findlay's amendment and amendment 58.  Thank you very much. The question therefore is that amendment 58 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? We are not agreed. We will move to our division. Members may cast their votes now. This is a one-minute division. The result of the vote on amendment 58 in the name of Ivan McKee is yes, 68, no, 59. There were no abstentions. The amendment is therefore agreed. I call amendment 11 in the name of Mike Rumbles. Mike Rumbles to move on. Not moved. I call amendment 12 in the name of Mike Rumbles. Not moved. Sorry, we turn to group 13 now. I call amendment 16 in the name of Murdo Fraser, grouped with amendment 17 and Murdo Fraser to move amendment 16 and speak to both amendments. Amendment 16 and 17 deal with the question of regulations being introduced by Scottish ministers in what are described in the bill as urgent cases. As drafted, section 31 provides that those regulations shall cease to have effect at the end of a period of 28 days unless those regulations are approved by a resolution of this Parliament. So, as drafted, this is granting powers to ministers to making emergency powers which will have immediate effect but will then require to be approved by Parliament and if that is not done then these regulations would cease to have effect. My amendments do not object in principle to ministers having this power but I feel that the period of 28 days to get parliamentary approval is simply too long. This is an issue about proper parliamentary scrutiny of ministerial powers. At stage 2 I moved amendments suggesting that the periods of 28 days in section 31, subsection 4 be reduced to 14 days. This would still give Scottish ministers the power to make these regulations in urgent cases but would require them to be approved by Parliament within 14 days which struck me as a reasonable period striking a balance between the need for parliamentary scrutiny and the freedom of ministers to act in urgent cases. At stage 2, the minister said that he would want to consider the matter further and I agreed not to push my amendments. At that stage, his official submission came back with a suggestion that the Government would be prepared for 21 days. That seemed to be a reasonable compromise and being a seeker of consensus at all times. I therefore brought forward my amendment 16 which is proposed to reduce the period to 21 days in subsection 5 and there is a consequential amendment in amendment number 17 which would bring subsection 4 into line with that. I am happy to move amendment 16. Thank you very much. James Kelly. Thank you, Presiding Officer. I wish to support both amendments in this group. Obviously, it relates to the scrutiny in relation to urgent cases. I think that Murdo Fraser makes a reasonable point that 28 days is perhaps too long bearing in mind that this urgent cases and 21 days is more reasonable. The Government also does have the option to seek parliamentary approval prior to that time. I would urge support for both amendments. Thank you, Presiding Officer. Michael Russell. Members in the chamber and those who might still be observing from outside the chamber will regard the outbreak of consensus as to be unique and almost a step too far to the Fraser and myself. James Kelly agreed on the amendment but still be it. I thank Murdo Fraser for allowing me the time to reflect on the time period in the provision. At stage 2, as I indicated, I saw in a great harm in the amendments, it was never intended that the time that had to be taken could be taken but 21 days strikes the correct balance. It allows a reasonable period of time. It allows Scottish ministers to make instruments of reasonable certainty but it gives the Scottish Parliament the opportunity to scrutinise the instrument and schedule the necessary vote. I was not convinced that 14 days could have achieved that balance so I am grateful for Murdo Fraser in promoting this and I think that 21 days is about right. I recommend that the chamber votes for two amendments by Murdo Fraser. Words I never thought I would hear myself saying. Murdo Fraser, to wind up and to press or withdraw? 16 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? Yes. I call amendment 17 in the name of Murdo Fraser. Murdo Fraser, to move. Moved. The question is that amendment 17 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? We are agreed. I call amendment 59 in the name of the minister to move formally. The question is that amendment 59 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? We are agreed. We turn now to group 14. In the name of the minister, in a group on its own, minister to move and to speak to amendment 60. Thank you. Amendment 60 in my name is a short and practical amendment, one that I hope that could be supported across the chamber. As I have often pointed to section 37 of the bill and the ability to repeal this act as evidence that this Government's good faith in seeking an agreement over the UK withdrawal bill. If that does not prove possible, I have said that the second best option involves both Governments working together on the continuity bill and the UK EU withdrawal bill can work together in Scotland in as complementary way as possible. The bills were designed in that way. I have explained on a number of occasions that subject to a number of limited policy differences, this bill has been carefully drafted to mirror equivalent provisions in the UK EU withdrawal bill. This amendment is further evidence of our good faith in seeking that outcome. It would allow the power to make ancillary provision in section 32 of the bill to make provision in consequence of or in connection with on the EU withdrawal bill when it is passed and any other legislation which is also aimed at preparing our laws for the consequences of EU withdrawal. Members have raised concerns at each stage of this bill about what would happen if the EU withdrawal bill was amended in a relevant way after this bill passed to the Scottish Parliament. I remember Tavish Scott raised issue at stage 1, Murdo Fraser asking probing questions about it in committee, was raised by the Delegated Powers Committee as well. That amendment responds to those genuine concerns. It would mean that in this situation we could come to Parliament with regulations which would make provisions ensuring that despite those amendments the two bills were still able to work together. We have no information that suggests that that may happen. That amendment would mean that if the operation of the two bills together in some way unanticipated proved awkward or required some fine tuning, and this is about fine tuning in order for it to work best, with the proposal in regulations to address that. It remains the case, and I really stress this, that any exercise of the powers would require to be consistent with the policy that has already been given effect to in the bill, as the power must be exercised for the purpose of giving full effect to this bill. At stage 2, Liam Kerr amended the ancillary provisions power, so they are unusual. It requires ministers to be satisfied that the use of the power is necessary before making provision under it. Ministers will not seek to reverse that at stage 3, and the same limitation will apply to the power when it is used for the new purpose. Ministers will have to be satisfied and the test will have to be applied that making provision of the sort and visits by this amendment is necessary before they can put anything to the Parliament. This is a sensible, modest amendment aimed squarely at the very serious, practical difficulties the Parliament might face under a possible scenario over the next 18 months trying to prepare for the consequences of Brexit. James Kelly. Thank you, Presiding Officer. In evidence to stage 1, at the finance committee, Michael Clancy of the Law Society made the point that it was important that this legislation, any legislation passed here, needed to be consistent with the appropriate sections of the EU withdrawal bill Westminster. That was a relevant point. From that point of view, sympathetic to amendment 60 was put forward by the minister this afternoon. However, I am also aware that the Delegated Powers Committee has expressed some concerns about the overarching reach of amendment 60 in terms of using granting and the potential for the Government to use too much power. Although I am convinced by the case that the minister has made I would ask for some reassurance in terms that the powers won't be overreached. It's just the minister to wind up to press or withdraw. I'm happy to give the minister that assurance. I read what the convener of the Delegated Powers Committee has said and what he's drawn attention to. That amendment was proposed directly in response to concern raised by members and by the Law Society. I take that point from James Kelly. They made good points. Brexit will be complex. We want to go with a single statute. We always have, because we recognise that operating in two acts has potential problems. If those two bills have to be operated together, however, they need to do so well. In our view, the new amendment is limited in the same way as the other ancillary powers, perhaps actually more so, but I'm happy to give James Kelly the assurance that he seeks. It's limited right to address the concerns raised by members and the Law Society which is being sought in this ancillary provision. I take it that the minister is pressing the amendment. Yes, I move. The question is that amendment 60 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? Thank you very much. I call amendment 61 in the name of Tavish Scott, already debated. The question is that amendment 61 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? No. In the minister division, this will be a one-minute division. It's amendment 61. The result of the vote on amendment 61 in the name of Tavish Scott is, yes, 65, no, 63, there were no abstentions. The amendment is therefore agreed. I now call amendment 62 in the name of Jamie Greene, already debated. Jamie Greene to move or not move. For the four mentioned reasons, not move. Not moved. The minister is moving it. The question therefore is that amendment 62 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? We're not agreed, we'll move to division. Members may cast their votes now. 30 seconds. The result of the vote on amendment 62 in the name of Jamie Greene is, yes, 90, no, 36, there were no abstentions. The amendment is therefore agreed. We turn now to our final group, 15. Anna Sarwar on its own. Anna Sarwar to move and speak to amendment 63. Thank you, Presiding Officer. Seeing as this is the final group, I'll hold the chamber for as long as I like then. I'm not used to being popular anyway, so it's... I want to move this. Generally, I'll be brief, it's to put a duty on the Government to conduct an independent evaluation on health and social care off Brexit. This is an amendment that was moved by Westminster by Joanna Cherry, supported by more than 60 organisations in Scotland, including Campbell Scotland, the Genetic Alliance, Scotland Scottish Care, the SCVO, the other ones that are the main sponsors of the bill. What it is is a recognition that Brexit will impact on our public services, on the funding for our public services and on the workforce of our public services. We were promised £350 million extra for our NHS if we had voted for Brexit, but the reality is that Brexit will impact on our economy, on our tax receipts and on funding available to our public services. I also want to put on record my thanks to all the EU citizens who work in our health and social care system. We owe them a huge thank you. The sad reality is that we already have workforce pressures before Brexit, but Brexit will emphasise those workforce pressures and put more pressure on already overworked and undervalued staff. As I say, this amendment seeks to put a provision into Parliament to have that assessment and for that assessment to be shared with this Parliament and with the public. I hope that people in the chamber will support it today. Thank you very much and I call on the minister. Thank you, Presiding Officer. This is an appropriate amendment to end this consideration because Anasawa has rightly indicated that Brexit will touch people's lives and will touch those lives very directly. It's interesting to reflect and concerning to reflect the issues that we've had raised in this debate and over the last three weeks. We've not just touched on the legality or otherwise of Brexit. We've not just touched on the legality or otherwise of this bill. We've not just touched on scrutiny. We've talked about, sometimes in detail, issues of the environment, animal sentience, issues of employment rights, human rights, issues today of employment and disability raised by Patrick Harvie. Now we're touching on healthcare and workforce rights. We can go through the whole process of Brexit and realise again and again that this is profoundly disturbing and profoundly damaging. We will have to take exceptional actions in Scotland in order to defend ourselves against something that we did not vote for. That weighs forward in terms of the membership of the single market and the customs union, but we can have that debate elsewhere. What this amendment illustrates is the real difficulties with which we are faced through no cause of our own and I just want to stress that very clearly. Scotland voted against Brexit and we should always remember that. I thank Anasawa for this amendment both for what it says and for the wider issue it raises. The Scottish Government is concerned about the impact of Brexit on the social care in the country. It supports conducting an independent assessment of those effects and other effects elsewhere. It is concerned about the effect on the workforce and the services that individuals will be able to access. I do wish that Mr Sarwar had lodged the amendment at stage 2. I know it very, very close-day mirrors and amendment at Westminster from my good friend and colleague Joanna Cherry. I'm sure her wording was absolutely perfect in the Westminster circumstance but in the Scottish Parliament circumstance I had worked with a member to provide an improvement in the way that we've done with other members. I'm not convinced, for example, that the period of one year from Royal Ascent is the right timescale. In many cases, the regulations required to be made under the bill won't have been made. None are likely to have been brought into force but those are perhaps more minor points. The Government will support this amendment. It's vital that the Parliament, Government and the public have the best quality information about the consequences of EU withdrawal. I've published those, most recently, in the latest version of Scotland's Place in Europe. It is the UK Government, the Tory Government that's tried to keep it secret by refusing to publish their own assessments. I support the amendment. I hope that the chamber does. Thank you very much. I ask Anas Sarwar whether he wishes to wind up, press or withdraw. Moved. The question is that amendment 63 be agreed to. Are we all agreed? Yes. We are agreed. On that end, consideration of amendments. As members will be aware at this point in proceedings, I'm required understanding orders to make recommendations. I'm not sorry to say those things but I'm not sorry to say these things. Those are some of my comments and I hope that the Parliament will not be just saying that I'm not sorry to say these things but I'm not sorry to say those things. I'm not sorry to say those things but I'm not sorry to say these things. I'm not sorry to say those things That's good. I'm required to understand or to decide whether or not any provision in this bill relates to a protected subject matter. That is whether it modifies the electoral system and franchise for Scottish parliamentary elections. In the case of this bill, in my view, no such provision does that. Therefore, the bill does not require a supermajority at stage three. I'm minded at this stage to take a ten-minute comfort break and to resumes at twenty past six. It is suspended for 10 minutes, so it resumes at twenty past six. 1, 1, 1, 1, 3, 6, in the name of Michael Russell, on UK withdrawal from the European Union legal continuity Scotland Bill. Before I invite Michael Russell to open the debate, I call on the Deputy First Minister to signify Crown consent to the bill. I call on John Swinney. Michael Russell 9.11 of the Standing Orders. I wish to advise Parliament that Her Majesty having been informed of the purport of the UK withdrawal from the European Union legal continuity Scotland Bill has consented to place her prerogative and interests so far as they are affected by the bill at the disposal of the Parliament for the purposes of this bill. I invite members who now wish to speak in the debate to press their request to speak buttons now. I call on Michael Russell to speak to and move the motion. Minister, seven minutes please are thereabouts. On 27 February, which seems an impossibly long time ago now, I came to this chamber to set out the Government's reasons for introducing this bill. In the three weeks and one day since then, the bill has been scrutinised by five committees of this Parliament. Over 230 amendments were considered at stage 2 during not one but two unprecedented evening committee sessions. The amount of time spent at stage 2 was longer than, for example, the Social Security Bill. We have just considered a further 65 amendments at stage 3. We now hear—I am sorry—for a further evening session to pass this bill on the timetable set out by the Parliament on 1 March. I said in our stage 2 debate another procedural innovation that the Parliament had risen to the occasion and I repeat that sentiment this evening. I want to put on record the Government's appreciation of the efforts of many people that brought the bill to the successful conclusion. Let me start with the Parliament's staff, those in the chamber office and the clerks of various committees who organised evidence sessions at short notice and received and processed the amendments at stage 2 and 3. The team at the Finance and Constitution Committee did an outstanding job in guiding the committee and other members through the complexities of the stage 2 amendments. We all owe a particular debt to the convener, my good friend Bruce Crawford, for his absolutely masterful chairing. I want to record my appreciation of those involved in the logistics, the security staff, catering, the official report, television and audio teams and other facility staff necessary to make this chamber work. All of them rose magnificently into the occasion, including the management of the Parliament under the clerks of Paul Grice. Finally, I want to thank other members for their contributions. We are all aware of the unusual features of both the legislation and the procedure. Members have ensured that both were tested to ensure that they are justified, sometimes using the great deal of imagination, one might even call it ingenuity. I believe that the bill that emerges is improved as a result of all our efforts. Let me remind members why this bill is necessary. Some nine months ago, the UK Government introduced a bill that would affect directly the competence of this Parliament and the Scottish Government. In effect, the bill sought to turn the clock back to 1973 and allow the UK Government and it alone to redesign devolution, as if the UK had never been in the EU or common market or European community. I will leave aside the difficulties of travelling time, as the late Stephen Hawking once observed that, if time travel is possible, where are the tourists from the future? However, it was clear at the outset that the provision was never going to get the agreement of any devolved administration worth its salt. It was obviously, to quote the unanimous viewer of the Finance and Constitution Committee, incompatible with the devolution settlement in Scotland, not just in Scotland but also in Wales, where our colleagues in the Welsh Government and the Welsh Assembly took a similarly robust view of the UK Government's proposals. Indeed, one of the features of this process has been the close working of the Welsh and Scottish Governments. I want to pay particular tribute to my colleague Mark Drakeford and members of this Parliament and Assembly and indeed members and peers at Westminster's from across the political parties. All have sought to address the concerns about devolution raised by the UK bill. However, despite the near unanimous calls for change to respect the principles of devolution, the UK Government has yet to agree amendments to get the consent of this Parliament or the Welsh Assembly. Healths are alternatives, the continuity bills, which would ensure that Scots law continues to operate effectively following withdrawal should the Parliament be unable to consent to many provisions of the UK's bill. We now invite the Parliament to pass this bill this evening. In parallel with our colleagues in the Welsh Assembly, whose bill is also completing its parliamentary stages, as I speak, it has indeed just gone into stage 4. I am not proposing that we have a stage 4. Indeed, I understand that, in the past few minutes, its bill has been passed. In asking the chamber to support the bill, I want to emphasise what the Government has made clear from the outset. Our aim remains to reach agreement to satisfactory changes to the UK's bill. That would be the best path, because it is desirable to have the relevant powers all in the same place. Perhaps more importantly, because reaching agreement would send an important signal. It would show that devolution will be properly respected. It will acknowledge the constitution under which we live. It would show that the different Governments in the UK can sit down and negotiate to reach a mutually acceptable outcome and have been trying to do so. It would show that this way of doing business, rather than imposition, should be the norm, no matter the political composition of the Governments or their constitutional preference. I remain hopeful that an agreement can be reached. The Deputy First Minister and I have all made clear that that is our firm objective, and we will do our best to achieve it. Passing the bill will be an important sign that the Parliament is resolute in defending devolution. It is serious in its consideration of the issues at stake, and it will give us an important alternative in the negotiations that remain ahead of us. I will give way. I am very grateful to the minister for giving way. The minister will know that there are grave doubts about the legislative competence of the bill. Will he, in order to clarify and clear up those doubts authoritatively, and that can only happen in one place, and that is the United Kingdom Supreme Court? Will he undertake that the Lord Advocate should refer the provisions of this bill to the UK Supreme Court for a definitive ruling on its legislative competence? I have to say that the Scottish Government, of which the Lord Advocate is a member, has no grave doubts. It has no doubt that the bill is competent. That is absolutely clear to us. There is no need to challenge this bill in the Supreme Court. The right way ahead for any part of these islands is to accept the democratic will of this chamber if the bill passes this evening, and then to work closely together, Government to Government, to ensure that we either have, as I have indicated, an agreement between Wales and Scotland and the UK and possibly Northern Ireland if they have a working assembly again, or to allow those bills to operate in parallel, and for the UK Government to withdraw those sections of their bill that do not get legislative consent. That is the clear democratic way forward. I urge that clear democratic way forward on all the Governments of these islands, and I move the motion in my name. I would like to open with a point of consensus. My friend and colleague Murdo Fraser were always looking for consensus, and I would like to echo on behalf of the Scottish Conservatives the remarks that the minister correctly made thanking the Parliament and its staff for rising to the significant challenge of legislating for this bill in the absurdly restricted amount of time made available by the Government. I think that Parliament did rise to the challenge very successfully at stage 2, Presiding Officer. Perhaps, however, a little less so at stage 3. This afternoon, I think that we have heard a number of quite disturbing incidents. We have had amendments that appear to have been agreed with the Government that turned out not to do what was promised, and we have had serious allegations—very serious allegations—of Government ministers, and I quote, strong-arming members of a key scrutiny committee to this Parliament. Those allegations will no doubt be for others to investigate, Presiding Officer, but whatever the full position, whatever the full picture, these and other related incidents serve only to reinforce the core point that we made about this bill when it was introduced. It is bad law, Presiding Officer, which we have been asked to make badly. This bill is unwelcome and it is unnecessary. We have resisted it at every stage of its process, and we will vote against it tonight. The first reason, Presiding Officer, is because there are grave doubts about its legislative competence. Mr Russell's response to my question a few minutes ago was extraordinary. Competence is not a question of democracy, Mr Russell. It is a question of legality. The only place that can authoritatively rule on the legality of this legislation is the United Kingdom Supreme Court. The Lord Advocate should have the courage of his legal convictions, and he should use his powers under the Scotland Act. He should use his powers with respect under the Scotland Act to refer the provisions of this bill to the Supreme Court. There is first the point of its compatibility with European law, which is the point that the Presiding Officer wrote about in his opinion on legislative competence. In addition, Presiding Officer, this bill in section 33 modifies protected statutes contrary to schedule 4 to the Scotland Act. That is unlawful. In addition, Presiding Officer, this bill trespasses on reserved matters contrary to schedule 5 to the Scotland Act, in, for example, section 17, and also in the amendment agreed earlier on this afternoon in the name of Mr McKee, which is just one of the reasons why that amendment should have been strongly resisted. The Scottish Government likes to talk about respecting the devolution settlement, but it does not respect the devolution settlement willfully to enact law in this Parliament that is beyond the limits of our legislative competence. That is not respecting the rule of law and it is not respecting the British constitution and it is not respecting the devolution settlement. I give a way to the Deputy First Minister. Mr Tomkins does not accept that, for this bill to have been presented to Parliament by the Scottish Government, we would have to have sought the authority of the Lord Advocate, Scotland's principal law officer, before we could introduce such a bill to certify its legislative competence, and the Government sought that and secured that from the Lord Advocate. Of course, that is a matter of fact, Mr Swinney. As Mr Swinney well knows, that is a matter of fact, but there is more than one legal opinion about this. There is also the legal opinion of the Presiding Officer, and there are also the points that lawyers who have scrutinised this bill during the course of its rushed reckless passage through this Parliament have identified, including the ones that I have just mentioned. The only place where this can be authoritatively and determined is in the United Kingdom Supreme Court, and any Lord Advocate who was really confident about his opinion that these provisions are within confidence would have no hesitation, but to refer those provisions to the Supreme Court for a ruling. This bill is known informally as the continuity bill, but it is real purpose, and it has been exposed time and time again during the rushed proceedings on this bill. It's real purpose is not continuity. It's real purpose is to sow the seeds of division within the United Kingdom. It's real purpose is to create legal chaos and legal confusion. This was revealed even in the Government's own policy memorandum accompanying the bill, which said at paragraph 20 that this bill will, and I quote, add to the complexity of Brexit. It said, and I quote from the same paragraph, that this bill will present serious logistical challenges. That is what the Scottish National Party has been about in these proceedings, and that is why we have resisted this bill at every step of the way. In addition, the extraordinary power grab in section 13 of this bill, a provision that enables Scottish ministers to act in all manner of ways, without adequate parliamentary scrutiny, notwithstanding the valiant attempts of members across the chamber to improve what is an odious provision, will make Scotland a rule taker, will make Scotland bound by a European union of which we will cease to be a part. That cannot be consistent with democracy and it cannot be consistent with the rights and interests of this Parliament, either. What we should have been doing, Presiding Officer, instead of debating this unnecessary, unwanted and unwelcome legislation, is thinking hard about how we are going to negotiate and navigate and enforce the common frameworks that the minister and I and everybody in this Parliament agree should be agreed and not imposed as we move forward to the post-Brexit scenario. What we should have been doing, instead of debating this reckless legislation in this reckless way, is figuring out how we are going to make the best of the post-Brexit landscape, seizing the opportunities that Brexit presents us with. How are we going to design an agricultural support mechanism that suits the interests of farmers in Scotland? What are we going to do in terms of taking environmental protection forward post-Brexit? At the UK level, what are we going to do in terms of ensuring that we have appropriate industrial policy with appropriate state aids and appropriate public procurement rules? For the last 46 years, we have not been able to debate any of these questions anywhere in the United Kingdom because they have been done for us by the European Union. Brexit means that we take back control of these issues and these are the issues that we should have been debating instead of this reckless and unnecessary legislation. The First Minister is very difficult to hear if members yell. Mr Swinney, no-one is above the chair in this chamber. I now call Neil Findlay to open for Labour, please. It is always depressing to follow Boris Johnson, Presiding Officer. This bill has gone through Parliament at breakneck speed. From the outset, many of us have not, if we be honest, been comfortable with how it has been handled, how it has been rushed. We do not think that, despite the cabinet secretary's claims to the contrary, this bill has had to scrutinate the deserves from members or indeed the wider community who will be affected by it. However, we are where we are and with those concerns and with the caveats that we have raised from the outset of this process, we will give cautious support to the bill at decision time. I echo the cabinet secretary in terms of the commitment given by the staff of this Parliament. They always go beyond the call of duty. I would particularly like to single out in our own Labour staff, Madeleine Grieve, who has done a power of work on this for us. That was and is an avoidable situation. If we cast our minds back to December, we were assured by David Mundell, the Scottish Secretary, that the UK Government would make changes to its own bill and house the commons in to address concerns about the impact of the EU withdrawal bill on devolution. He said that we have been very, very clear. The committee's stage of this bill is about listening. It is about adapting to issues that have been brought forward. We have listened and will bring forward amendments to clause 11. It is going to be amended because the Scottish Conservatives have come forward with practical amendments to the bill. Adam Tomkins himself said that the bill needed to be amended to comply with the devolution settlement. The Finance and Constitution Committee of this Parliament unanimously called for the EUWB to be amended in the House of Commons to resolve those outstanding issues, but no amendment came forward in the Commons. The Labour Party put forward amendments in the House of Commons on 16 January, amendments that would have protected the devolution settlement and established a dispute resolution procedure. Yet every single Scottish Tory MP trips through the lobbies and reneged on their commitments. It looks like it is not only the Scottish fishermen who have been deceived by the Tory party. Today, the issue still lies in the House of Lords. While I am frustrated that it lies there in the hands of the unelected, I am hopeful that we will see some common sense prevail and that the devolution issue is resolved and a dispute process is put in place. We want that to work. We want devolution to work. We want everyone involved to make the retention of jobs and our trading relationships across Europe a top priority. We want to build prosperity so that we can share more equally. We believe that a customs union with the EU allows us to do that, but, of course, those areas where common frameworks should be developed with their neighbours on this island. Yesterday, along with my parliamentary colleague, Keir Starmer, I met the Scottish Whiskie Association. We agree with them that there are areas where cross-Europe and UK-wide framework agreements make business and regulatory sense. One example is in labelling. The Whiskie Association has worked very hard for years to ensure that consistent EU rules on production and labelling are in place and enforced. That has helped the sector to grow and succeed as a major export to many EU and global markets. It is in the interests of business, employees, trade unions and communities and the respective governments that common approaches are taking and developed in a respectful and collaborative manner. Let's end the frustrating stand-off and get on with it. Throughout this process, Labour has sought to play a positive role, but we have, at times, had to drag information from the minister and the Government and, at other times, we have had to act to rein in his ambition to grab powers from this Parliament and into ministerial offices. Members across the chamber have tried their level best to make this messy bill better, but we should not easily forget that it is the Tories who have gotten us into this mess, and time is running out for them to get us out of it. Thank you very much. I will call Patrick Harvie to open for the Green Party. Please, Mr Harvie. Thank you, Presiding Officer. I am unclear on the timing of speeches. Thank you very much. I am going to have to disappoint Mr Finlayon for just a little more than a minute. I think that Parliament has done its job fundamentally over this process, a process that we did not wish to face, a process that is inevitably imperfect, but I think that Parliament has done its job. I do not think that we should be here at the stage 3 debate, rehashing debates about competence or about whether it is an emergency bill. We have already agreed to the emergency procedures, we have already agreed to the general principles. Parliament has decided that this bill should be considered. Frankly, if its competence is ultimately challenged, I want to see the Scottish Government defend this bill robustly once we have passed it. Let us recognise, instead of rehashing that debate, the work that has been done since the introduction of the bill under extraordinary pressures of time. We have maximised committee scrutiny as much as humanly possible. We have maximised the chamber debating time with innovations to the emergency procedure. We have shifted the balance within the bill, taking some power that would have gone to Government and ensuring that it goes to Parliament instead. We have made significant changes to the contents of the legislation. Both Mr Kelly and the minister are right that this could not have been done without the support of a great many people. The committee clerks, the legislation team and a great many others, including our own teams within our party groups, who I know across party have worked hard not just to put forward our own propositions but to try and achieve consensus. Some of the most important changes that we have achieved in the bill have been done by cross-party agreement. That is the way that this Parliament was always supposed to work in the first place. We were never built as a Parliament like the bare pit of the House of Commons, two sides opposing each other, swords lines apart. The idea of this Parliament was always supposed to try to cultivate some cross-party agreement. We often fail on that, and our politics often falls back into tribal lines. On that occasion, we have managed on some significant issues of policy to achieve agreement with the Government where possible and to push the Government beyond its comfort zone on a few points as well. As a result of that, serious regulation-making powers in the bill have been restricted, both in timescale and in scope, and major improvements have been made in relation to environmental principles, social rights, scrutiny and challenge. They not only improve on the bill as it was introduced, but they clearly improve on the UK legislation that we would have ultimately been forced to accept, or that we would have given the UK Government a pretext to impose on us without legislative consent if it had not been for the introduction of that continuity bill. Over the months and years to come, we will no doubt disagree on many issues. We will disagree when Conservatives, such as Adam Tomkins, who voted remain because he knew the damage that the Brexit crisis will cause, now chance take back control. We will disagree with that. We will disagree with Labour MSPs who promise a deal that will secure the exact same benefits of membership of the single market but are not willing to commit to freedom of movement as one of the fundamentally important benefits of being in the single market. I will disagree with those in the SNP, for example, who have never supported international agreement on the control of fish stocks and seek to achieve changes that I will not be able to support as part of that. There will be a great deal that we disagree about. Fundamentally, I will disagree with those who say that we should give up the ghost, give up the principled position that the clear majority of people in Scotland voted for. We should oppose Brexit, we should respect the way that they voted, we will disagree on that as well. However, I am delighted that there has been enough of a measure of agreement on changes that were necessary to this bill. It is a better bill that will be passing than the one that was introduced, and I will be voting for it. I think that this Parliament is a stronger Parliament because people like Adam Tompkins are in it. He brings a wealth of experience and a range of what other people in other walks of life have called hinterland, which I think is very important, but I profoundly—and there is a but, Adam. Boy, there was a but after that speech, but that speech was one of the worst that I have ever heard in this place. At no time did Adam Tompkins do the decent thing at the start of that speech and say why we are here. Many of us have been raising that from the first moment that the minister had to bring this bill in front of Parliament. None of us—well, most of us would not rather be here at all—would not rather be leaving the EU. I mean to hear people making the great claim about how great Brexit is going to be when we leave. My daughter's generation, who is 26 years old, her whole generation do not think that this is right. It is not just her, but it is her first cousins who live in the south-west of England as well, who also do not think that this is right. For that generation particularly, this is a bad day, and it will be a bad day next March when we do leave this European Union as well. That is why we are here. Brexit in terms of the vote of the United Kingdom has happened, but we are also here because the Governments have yet to reach agreement across the UK. I profoundly hope that this continuity bill will be redundant at sub-stage. I hope that we have to see and know more of it. However, when will agreement on the frameworks be reached? I took heart from the language that the First Minister used in London last week when she said language around consent could not unreasonably be withheld. I hope that the UK Government moves towards that. Mike Russell mentioned in his remarks earlier on today about the amendment in the House of Lords from Lord Mackay of Clash Fern, which looks at mechanisms involving a member of each Government across the United Kingdom. There is a serious person who knows his way around the constitution or unwritten or written of this country, looking at ways in which this can be made better. I wish that people in his own party in London would take those kinds of proposals and take them on and take them forward. A couple of final points, Deputy Presiding Officer. First, Mike, the minister said that he rightly made much of those who have helped all members get where they are today. He made a remark about the ingenuity of some amendments. I have to confess that the ingenuity of most amendments, certainly from my side, came from the brilliance of the clerks of this place in interpreting my, unbelievably, inact and even exact language into what subsequently and probably quite warringly became law at some points. However, I would like to particularly thank clerks of both Bruce Crawford's committee but also the clerks who work in our parliamentary offices who did a heck of a job in no time at all and also Matthew Clark and my own staff who stayed up as late as everyone else seeking to make this happen. Also, yes, as others have said to the members of this of this Parliament, stage 2 was intensely challenging but I actually felt having been through many stage 2s in this place that that was one of the better stage 2s that we have had. More members did turn up. Some didn't but more members did. The minister took a lot of the arguments on the section 13 that was the cause of so much concern at the early stages of this bill. He did so in a productive way, some because he just lost a vote but might also be the first to accept that in the Parliament that we are. In others, he came back with amendments at a later stage and I believe that members on all sides of this chamber take some credit for the way in which that happened. Finally, this Parliament, whatever takes place in the coming weeks on frameworks and in the coming months on other aspects of the negotiations that the United Kingdom Government are having with Brussels. This Parliament will have a huge workload after March 2019 and during the transition period that follows for the subsequent number of months. I just trust that all of us are ready for that because we are certainly going to need to be. Thank you very much. Open debate, speeches of four minutes. I call Ivan McKee to be followed by Murdo Fraser. Thank you, Presiding Officer. Normally, members state at the start of their remarks how pleased they are to speak in a debate, but I must say that today, for me, that is not the case. We do not want to be having this debate. We did not want Scotland and the UK to be facing economic and social uncertainty and costs that Brexit will bring. We did not want to have to spend considerable time and resources in this place debating the UK and Scotland's withdrawal from the EU, a distraction from our work in moving Scotland forward. We would have preferred the UK Government not to have pressed forward with the EU withdrawal bill absent our amendments. Amendments are necessary to protect the devolution settlement and we would have preferred to have reached a negotiated solution with the UK Government in the form of common frameworks, something that we all agree is necessary but, on the basis of consent, not just consult and, hopefully, there is scope to reach that agreement in the coming days and weeks. Presiding Officer, this is a situation that we find ourselves in and we have to make the most of it. The continuity bill is required to put in place a necessary legislation to ensure that powers over devolved matters are decided in this Scottish Parliament. It ensures legal continuity of those powers and it prevents power over devolved matters being exercised by Westminster, and this is important on a number of levels. First, it supports the enshrinement of the devolution settlement, the basis of all the work that we do in this place, the principle of what is not reserved is devolved. It prevents setting a precedent of devolved powers being controlled by Westminster under the guise of Brexit or any other. Secondly, it is important to recognise that the matters that we are debating and the laws that we are passing here today are not some dry legal argument about the constitution. They have potentially very real consequences for people across Scotland. We have heard on the health and sports committee of the risks to our Scottish national health service that has been dragged into a UK-wide trade deal in the post-Brexit world of the distinctive Scottish approach to delivering healthcare, different from the increase in marketisation of service provision in England being compromised in that process. Of public health measures that we have taken are hoped to take in future to place restrictions on harmful products, alcohol, tobacco and the foods at the root of our obesity epidemic being constrained to protect multinational commercial interests as part of those trade deals. In this area and in many others, critical issues to the people of Scotland, the bill is intended to provide some protection by resisting steps to move the power to legislate over those devolved areas to another place. The way that the bill has been progressed through its stages by the minister and his team deserves commendation. As a sheer scale of the number of amendments and the length of the debate, it is both stage 2 and stage 3 that makes it clear that everyone has had their chance to make their case and that sufficient time has been made available to scrutinise the bill. In summary, the bill is necessary to protect the powers of this Parliament. It is the backstop that provides some protection for us from the Brexit chaos that is consuming the UK Government. The timing of the bill being brought forward now is necessary to ensure that those safeguards are in place in sufficient time. However, we should also not lose sight of the bigger picture. By intent or by omission, the actions of the UK Government represent a significant risk to the devolution settlement. It is our duty and our responsibility as members of this Scottish Parliament to protect that settlement. I shortly expect that we will pass this bill and pass it by a significant majority. We will show that the Scottish Parliament, representing the Scottish people who elected us, is standing up for Scotland, making sure that their voice is heard. I urge members to vote for this bill. I call Murdo Fraser to follow my new baby, Mr Fraser. This is not a piece of legislation that the Scottish Conservatives ever wanted to see. We made it clear from the start that we considered this bill to be unnecessary and beyond the powers of the Scottish Parliament. Nevertheless, we engaged fully in the legislative process. At stage 2, I and my Conservative colleagues put down a long list of carefully considered amendments that are looking to improve the bill. Although the majority of those were rejected by the committee, I am pleased to say that, in a number of cases, our amendments were accepted. We saw a similar pattern this afternoon at stage 3, where we made serious attempts to improve the bill, although we remain very concerned about aspects of it. It is our view that this is simply bad law, although it is better than it was when it started. We heard throughout the process from the SNP that the devolution settlement must be respected. We heard that from the minister at the start of the debate. However, the SNP Government has ignored the opinion of the Presiding Officer of the Parliament that the bill is beyond the Parliament's powers. We have also seen the SNP Government rush the bill through Parliament as emergency legislation, which has meant that, despite the best efforts of the Finance and Constitution Committee and all the members here today, it has simply not been given the level of scrutiny that it deserves, nor has it been the opportunity for external stakeholders to have their view. It has been treated as emergency legislation when there is no emergency air. I am sorry, Mr Harry, but I have only got four minutes. If you wish, I give you a little extra. We are not due to leave the EU for another year. I will give away a moment. Patrick Harvie. I am grateful that Mr Fraser knows that he has successfully improved and I supported some of his amendments. He says that the bill still fails to respect devolution. Does he acknowledge both that there is nothing in our rules that has been broken in this process or in the introduction of the bill and that the UK Government has still failed to come up with any changes that are acceptable to this Parliament to its legislation? Can I say to Mr Harvie that there might be nothing in our rules that have been broken, but the Presiding Officer has made a ruling on the legality that the Scottish Government has ignored. I do not think that that is respecting the Scottish Parliament when it does that. We have heard a lot from the Scottish Government on the subject of power grabs. Let us just be absolutely clear on one point. Every single one of the powers that we are now talking about are powers that the Scottish National Party wants to see retained in Brussels and not devolved at all. If they had their way, we would be re-entering the EU and every single one of those powers that they are claiming is the subject of a power grab would be returning in their entirety to the EU. When the Scottish National Party speakers complain about powers being retained in Westminster, they need to be honest with the Scottish people because they in fact want every single one of those powers sent back to Brussels and not exercised here at Holyrood. That includes powers overfishing that they want to see retained in Brussels with a common fishery policy. We are quite clear what we want to see. We believe in devolution. We believe in subsidiarity. We believe in powers being exercised at the lowest possible level, but we accept that, for the UK domestic market to work, there need to be common frameworks aggrieved. We need to have a situation where, for example, Scottish farmers can sell their produce freely across the whole United Kingdom because we have common standards on food quality and labouring. That is why common frameworks are important. That is why the immediate unrestricted devolution of all powers coming from Brussels simply does not make sense on any level. Even the SNP accepts in principle the need for common frameworks. The key difference between the Scottish Government's view on that and the UK Government's view is that the Scottish Government is now demanding a right of veto on the terms of common frameworks. A right of veto is not just on common frameworks as they affect Scotland, but it is affecting Wales, Northern Ireland and England, too. It is no surprise that the UK Government finds that prospect a difficult one to accept. Let me just close by reflecting on why we are where we are. Ever since the Brexit referendum result, we have had a SNP flailing around trying to find a political message to dry up support for a second independence referendum. They thought that the outcome of the EU referendum with Scotland voting a different way to the rest of the United Kingdom would lead to a public clamour for a second referendum, and it simply has not happened. There is no evidence whatsoever of any public sympathy for the SNP position. The default public view in relation to Brexit, even from those who voted remain, seems to be, let's just get on with it. For the desperate shrieking that we hear from SNP politicians about power grabs, the very introduction of the bill is all about one thing, Presiding Officer, and one thing alone, stoking a constitutional grievance against the United Kingdom to promote a second independence referendum. For that reason, every unionist politician in the chamber should stand together in rejecting it. I would say to my colleagues in Labour and to the Liberal Democrats, do not be fooled by what you are hearing from the SNP. Do not vote with them in support of this ricking bill. Stand with us, stand with the unionist majority in Scotland, stand with those against a second independence referendum and vote down this bad law. Mr Fraser, more than gave your time back, I call Neil Bibby, please to be followed by Mike Rumbles. Thank you Presiding Officer. Can I first echo what other members have said in thanking all the parliamentary and committee staff, as well as their own party grouping staff, people like Madeline Grieve, for all their support and hard work during this process. The continuity bills passage through the Parliament over these past several weeks is entirely without precedent. Brexit is entirely without precedent. Never before have we had to transpose EU law into Scots law in this way. Never before have we considered legislation of this kind, a failsafe to protect the devolution settlement and in such a short space of time. This is uncharted territory. This bill is not normal and it is not perfect, but it is necessary. If no agreement can be reached with the Tory Government on the withdrawal bill, if the withdrawal bill is not successfully amended in the Lords, if this dispute over devolution itself and the authority of this Parliament cannot be resolved through agreement and consensus, then we must be prepared to act. As members have said, we must be prepared to put forward an alternative. That is why the continuity bill is necessary. It is our alternative, and it is an alternative and prepared to support at decision time. Presiding Officer, it is no secret that I and many others have reservations about various aspects of this bill. We have made the case for transparency, restraint and enhanced parliamentary scrutiny consistently throughout this process. At every stage, we have been clear that the regulation-making powers that the bill confers on to ministers must be tested. At every stage, we have sought to amend the bill and to improve it. The bill before us this evening is not the bill that was first introduced. It has evolved and it has been refined. Today, we agree to an amendment in my name that puts in place new reporting requirements on ministers covering employment rights, health and safety and consumer protection. We agreed further amendments on environmental standards. We have built in requirements for transparent reporting and additional scrutiny throughout. We agreed that section 13 of the bill, easily the most controversial section of the bill, would be subject to the affirmative procedure. We have recognised the role of the Parliament in making provisions corresponding to EU law following exit day. None of that makes the bill perfect, but it does make the bill better. It goes some way to addressing the concerns that members have expressed about concentrating too much power in the hands of ministers. Of course, even now, we may find that provisions contained within the bill are not implemented. That this contingency legislation remains a contingency. That the intransigence of the Tory Government comes to an end and common sense prevails. That an agreement on the withdrawal bill is reached and is amended and that continuity bill becomes redundant. If the Tory Government will not amend its withdrawal bill to take account of the concerns expressed by every one of the parties represented in the Scottish Parliament, we will have no option but to put in place our own alternative continuity arrangements. That means empowering ministers to act whilst ensuring that they are fully accountable to this Parliament. My Labour colleagues will cautiously support this bill, as Neil Findlay says, on the basis that it has been improved. We all recognise the benefits of negotiation and the need to reach an agreement between the UK Government and the devolved Administrations. The solution to this impasse that we now face could be non-legislative. I could be in the form of a sunset clause that has been mentioned in the past few days or so-called standstill agreements where the appropriate powers are devolved but the Governments agree not to diverge until a common framework is agreed. Just as Parliament has scrutinised this bill closely and has won assurances that there will be further scrutiny in the future, so too must this Parliament have a role in scrutinising the negotiations and any deal that is agreed. However, the negotiations will fold. This Parliament must not be sidelined or marginalised by either of those Governments. Thank you. I call Mike Rumbles. We follow by Ash Denham and Ms Denham. We have a last speaker in the open debate. Mr Rumbles, please. When the Scottish Government introduced this bill, the Presiding Officer, as the neutral chair of our Parliament, declared that the bill was beyond the competence of our Parliament and therefore, if passed, is not law. The Scottish Government's senior law officer, the Lord Advocate, advised the Government that, in his view, this bill was a competent bill and would be lawful if passed. It was at this point that the Scottish Government should have recognised that, since, to say the least, there is legal dubiety about this bill, it would have been wiser not to have introduced it in the form it is in in the first place. However, it was introduced in the form it is. It progressed through stages 1 and 2, and now we have the final and important stage 3 vote. I believe that the Presiding Officer's ruling and it is not advice, it is his ruling, that this is not a competent bill, cannot simply be ignored now we are at the stage 3 vote. I won't, I want to make this point, I'm not finding this particularly easy but it's a point that I want to make. That's the point at which we passed this tonight. If we pass it tonight, if this Parliament passes it tonight, after 30 days, it will be sent to Her Majesty for royal assent. The Presiding Officer has made it clear that, if we pass this at stage 3, it is not law. I want to make this absolutely clear I want to make this absolutely clear that I do not comment on anyone else's decision to vote on this bill one way or the other. As MSPs, we all know that we must take individual responsibility for the way we individually vote in our Parliament. However, I believe the bill will be referred to the Supreme Court and the likelihood is that it will be found to be illegal as beyond the competence of our devolved Parliament. This is not funny, this is a serious point. No, I believe that our devolved Parliament's reputation will be greatly damaged and I'm not the only one that believes that, because of this referral to the Supreme Court and damaged unnecessarily, I will not be ignoring our Presiding Officer's ruling and therefore I want no part of voting for what I believe to be an illegal bill and that is why I will be voting against this bill at decision time. Thank you Mr Rumbles. I call on Ms Denham and then we move to closing speeches. The UK's continuing bulbengold attempts to negotiate withdrawal from the European Union has indeed been a sight to behold. A very unedifying spectacle of a weak and divided UK Government lurching from crisis to crisis. Not content with lowering our international standing at every possible opportunity, approaching negotiations with the 27 carried out, armed only it seems with the much derided cake strategy. The UK Government then decided to introduce its EU withdrawal bill to Westminster, drafted in such a way as to put them on a collision course for a constitutional crisis at home. This is the situation that the Scottish Parliament now finds itself in. The conclusion that must be drawn from this is that the UK Government either wants to roll back devolution or it simply fails to properly understand devolution and neither of those is good. After all, this is a UK Government that, despite repeated explanations, simply cannot seem to grasp the sheer enormity of the gulf between the meaning of the word consult and the meaning of the word consent. Now, those words may be indistinguishable in Whitehall, but in Edinburgh we can see there is a clear and understandable difference. It is the difference between devolution, as we know it, and an assault on Scotland's Parliament. The Scottish Government, faced with the mounting prospect of a no agreement scenario, really had no viable alternative. It has done what any sensible, any responsible Government would do and embarked on contingency planning in the shape of the Scottish continuity bill. It is to the credit of the Scottish Government that it has engaged with all the constructive criticism of this bill. The Finance and Constitution Committee on which I sit has waded through over 200 amendments over hours and hours, even though many of those submitted by the Conservatives who are making noises from a seated position at the moment were not designed to improve the bill but were wrecking amendments meant to derail it. The minister has listened to the debates and to the critiques and adapted the bill accordingly. Many of the constructive amendments have been accepted through the process, and the bill is now stronger and better, I believe, as a result. I am glad that the Conservatives' trivial party-plittle games did not succeed in derailing this bill, because Scotland is watching. It did not approve of what I saw, which was gleeful in schoolboy antics at a time when Scotland's future and the living standards of millions are on the line. It is certainly not for the Tories to decide to hand back the powers of this Parliament when devolution is the settled will of the Scottish people. In this entire circus that we call Brexit, from the offices of Whitehall, the committees and debates of Westminster to the negotiating rooms of the EU, Scotland is but an afterthought if it is even thought of at all. This is the only place where Scotland's interests are put first, the only place, and that is what we are here to do, and the Tories should learn that lesson. The UK Government should not be afraid or unwilling to engage with the devolved nations, and the fact that it is not able to do that means that we must act on our own behalf. This Parliament should not make any apologies for this piece of legislation if passed this evening and for standing up for Scottish interests. I am disappointed but not surprised to see that the Tories have once again fallen in behind their Westminster bosses. Their repeated platitudes about bringing powers home, taking back control or speaking for Scotland ring very hollow when they are so eager and happy even to serve up the powers of this Parliament on a silver platter. I made that very point one year ago in this chamber to howls of outrage from the benches over here, and yet—and yet—here we are—the Tories have shown again their true colours. I will be very pleased to support this bill this evening. I call on James Kelly to close for labour. Mr Kelly, please. Thank you very much, Deputy Presiding Officer. Let other speakers, I would like to thank the work of parliamentary staff, particularly clerks and support staff on the Finance and Constitution Committee and all the party staff. I also pay tribute to MSPs who have scrutinised the legislation, which has gone through, as Neil Findlay said, at break next speed. It is not an ideal way to do legislation. There have been shortcomings in the process, but, as Tavish Scott highlighted, we ultimately agreed to that emergency process. There is therefore a responsibility on Parliament and Parliamentarians to do the job properly. I believe that, on the whole, they have done that. I think that it is important to recognise that it is the disarray in the Tory party that has brought us here. In fact, it is the disarray in the Tory party that has created this whole European crisis. Do not forget that the reason we ended up with any EU referendum was because David Cameron had to try to placate those in the Tory party who were unhappy about the then current EU policy being pursued by the Government. That drove us to a situation on 23 June, when the country voted for Brexit, something that David Cameron did not think was going to happen. He thought that he could gamble and get away with it. We see that right up to this day. Again, the division is a failure of the Tory party, Tory MSPs, Tory MPs and Government ministers to get an agreement on clause 11, put the Scottish Government in a situation where they had to bring forward this emergency legislation. Ultimately, we had some reservations at stage 1. The bill is not in any way perfect, but certainly Scottish Labour will support it because it protects the devolution settlement as opposed to the clause 11 power grab, which is dangerous. I think that there are some serious implications going forward. We heard from Mr Rumbles that we have another division in the Liberal group tonight. I would not fancy being chief whip in that group. However, I would say this in terms of what Mr Rumbles pointed out. The reality is that we have reached the end of this process and we still have different legal opinions from the Presiding Officer, the Lord Advocate and also different legal experts. There is a danger that the issue is going to end up in court, which is regrettable and not something that I am sure that the Parliament would like to see. John Mason? I thank the member for giving way. I do not always agree with him, but I think that he is making a good point here. I mean, would he agree with me that Mr Rumbles' argument was not really that strong because lots of bills and acts have been challenged in the courts? James Kelly? Yes, I think that that is true. I still do accept that it is potentially a difficult issue for the Parliament and that it could end up in the courts. Added to the fact that we have a situation where we have potentially got two competing sets of legislations. We have got the continuity bill here, an EU withdrawal bill at Westminster, and that is going to create a real kind of sense of crisis, which is a real problem. As Neil Bibby said, the bill evolved. We support it from the point of view of protecting the devolution settlement. I am sorry, I have not got time, but there are also important changes that were made in relation to the regulations that were set out in the bill. In section 13, there was too much power in the hands of ministers and not enough in the power of Parliament. Some of that has been redressed throughout the process. I also think that there have been some important amendments that have been put forward in relation to the environment and animal sentinence and the Anasarwar amendment on health. That is a bill that has been evolved. Fundamentally, it is not an ideal situation to be in, but Labour will support it, because ultimately we support protecting the devolution settlement and we will not support a situation still advocated by the Tories at Westminster, which undermines that settlement, so we will support it come decision time at half past seven. Thank you very much, Mr Kelly. I call on Donald Cameron to pose for the Conservatives. Mr Cameron, please. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I would like to begin by paying tribute to the moving and principled speech of Mike Rumbles. He said that he was voting against a bill, and he is not doing so for party political reasons but for the respect that he has for the Parliament, the Presiding Officer, and the concept of legislative competence. If only his words would shake other parliamentarians from their stupa. I would like to concentrate on two points, Deputy Presiding Officer. The keeping pace power and the complexity of having different legal regimes for devolved and reserved areas. On section 13, this has been undoubtedly improved. It could not have started much worse, to be frank, and the minister acknowledges that it has conferred a very broad power, but it remains a striking political choice by this Government, which goes well beyond the UK bill. It is simply not necessary. We already have ability to make primary legislation and the Government can make secondary legislation within devolved areas. That power exists. We can quickly legislate in whatever way we like. We do not need this power. It remains an extraordinary and audacious attempt to accrue power to the executive. On the legal complications of the UK bill sitting alongside this bill, let me give one example. In both this bill and the UK bill parties, we will be working across devolved and reserved areas with 16 different definitions of the law. We will have a definition of EU-derived domestic legislation, direct EU legislation, retained EU law, retained case law, retained domestic case law, retained UK case law, retained general principles of EU law, devolved EU-derived domestic legislation. I could go on. This is a recipe for disaster. More potently, the Scottish Government's very own policy memorandum to the bill says that it will add complexity and present serious logistical challenges. It underplays this. In my view, it is a constitutional and legal horror show of epic proportions, welcomed with glee, welcomed with glee by the legal profession, I'm sure, but no one else. This has not been helped by the fact that this is emergency legislation. I have no hesitation in continuing to decry that disgraceful decision. We simply have not had enough time. The fact of the matter is that this bill has seen insufficient scrutiny and insufficient debate, which is nowhere near enough time to discuss something that will have major constitutional ramifications. We have had to rush through hundreds of amendments at stage two. This tells you everything that you need to know about this Government's attitude. Even today, with 64 amendments, we have only had a few hours to get through them all. It has had absurd results. We have seen a situation earlier when the Scottish Government moved Mr Green's amendments. We have had assertions about what happened in the delegated powers and law reform committees. This is what happens when you legislate with undue haste, Deputy Presiding Officer. We are making a mockery of ourselves, despite my disappointment at how this process has been carried out. I pay tribute, Presiding Officer, to the clerks, the parliamentary staff and everyone who has been involved in getting this bill together. It has involved late nights and early starts, and those individuals have gone above and beyond the call of duty. I thank them for that. Stage 2, especially, was convened heroically by Bruce Crawford. In the spirit of generosity, I thank the minister for conceding to some of our amendments. It remains our intention to vote against this bill. If it is to be passed by this Parliament, it is, of course, preferable that the bill is passed in a better state than it was originally in. That I am confident of, but the fundamental facts remain. If it is passed as it is likely to be, we are about to put on to the statute book legislation about the constitution of dubious legality—and it is a matter of legality—rush through this Parliament, which will complicate the Brexit process and not simplify it. Let me close, Presiding Officer. There has been much talk about the devolution settlement. Let me say this. The member is closing. Mr Crawford, sit down. There has been much talk about the devolution settlement. Stop. Please sit down. The member is closing. There has been much talk about the devolution settlement. Let me say this. You do not protect that settlement by defying the Presiding Officer on legislative competence. You do not protect that settlement by ramroding this bill through Parliament on the false pretence that this is some kind of national emergency. You do not protect that settlement by imperiling negotiations between our governments at a critical time by passing this wretched, reckless and lamentable legislation. Thank you. I call Michael Russell to close with the Government. Minister, if you wish, we can take it up till decision time. Can I, on a personal note, just start by making another set of thanks? I've reserved this to the very end. I want to thank my bill team particularly. There's a tradition in the civil service that if you get caught in a photograph in the press, you have to buy people cakes. I'm intending to buy them a very large drink tonight because they have certainly managed to help me out on every possible occasion. They've helped individual members out in the chamber, particularly with amendments. I'm grateful for the work that they've done over the last two weekends in trying to get this bill to the good stage that it's in now. If I'm doing so, I'm going to thank my private office, my constituency office and my parliamentary office staff, all of whom have supported me. It has been an unusual month. It's also been unusual because I have lived to my 65th year to find myself described in terms— well, I'm not yet 65 and I'm looking forward to Mr Finlay celebrating my 65th birthday probably by burning me an effigy, but that doesn't really matter too much. That was last year, good. He'll done a better effigy, but I've come to my 65th year to eventually be described in terms that were usually applied to punk rockers, because Gordon Lindhurst called the actions that I was taking in this bill as having the whiff of anarchy and lawlessness. I've long aspired to those things, and now I have them. My friend Rosanna Cunningham finds that remarkable, but that was at stage 2 and is on the official report. As is tonight, the mild-mannered Mr Cameron, who used the word horror show, disgracedful, mockery, defiance, railroading—there were many others as well. I really think that the Scottish Tories should calm down, because they should also think about language, because they keep talking about a good Brexit. There is no such thing as a good Brexit. Perhaps we could mitigate the damage that Brexit is going to do. Perhaps through membership of the single market and the customs union we could maintain some essential links, but for our agriculture, for our health sector, for our higher education sector, for our hospitality sector, for our environmental sector, for our employees, for ordinary citizens, perhaps not for millionaires, there is no good Brexit. You can't assemble about these matters. You can't fail to tell the truth. Brexit is the wrong thing for Scotland. This is the wrong thing for everyone living in Scotland. I think that perhaps the thing that I find hardest to take in all of this is that people who knew that up to and including on 23 June 2016, they haven't forgotten that. They know that that is still true, but now they are saying something opposite for purely party political reasons. They are going to damage Scotland absolutely irrevocably for a long period of time because they are doing things that they know are wrong. Just let that sink in. They are doing things that they know are wrong. What can we do? I hope that, as much together as we can—I have worked hard over the past few weeks to try to make sure that there is a consensus in this chamber—we should first of all defend the democratic rights of the people of this country, and that means, at this stage, defending devolution. We should insist that the UK Government listens to and recognises the views of Scotland and the need for differentiation. We should find ways to preserve our membership of the single market and the customs union as the least bad option, and we should never give up on the obligation to observe the mandate of the 2016 referendum in which Scotland rejected Brexit. Those are things that we should do, and we could do together. What we shouldn't do is pretend that Brexit will be good for Scotland. It won't. We shouldn't shrug resignedly and say, well, there's nothing can be done because there are things that can be done. We shouldn't connive with or enable those who wish to reverse devolution as a way of getting Brexit, because that is what we have seen over the last four weeks. That is a big issue, because up until the last four weeks, the Tories have—I have worked with some of them on this—tried to defend devolution, but now their actions over the past four weeks and their continued actions and their rhetoric are of a party that has decided to roll back devolution, a party that has decided to obstruct anything that defends devolution. Of course. Patrick Harvie. I'm grateful. I'm curious to know that the UK Government has been well aware that we're on course to pass the bill at stage 3 tonight. Have they, at any point, indicated the remotest hint of a clear proposal for changes that they will make to their UK-EU withdrawal bill that are compatible with devolution? Is there any movement that we should be aware of from the UK Government that shows that they are remotely interested in the devolution settlement? I'm going to try and be helpful in this situation. What I'm going to say is this. Today starts a new chapter in this story, and I'm addressing the issue by saying this. Today starts a new chapter in this story. The Scottish and Welsh Parliaments will, I hope, by the end of this evening—the Welsh Parliament has already decided—the Scottish Parliament in a few moments will decide—we will be armed with an alternative to the way in which the United Kingdom Government wishes to treat devolution. We will not go naked into the Westminster negotiating chamber any longer. We have an ability to negotiate based on an alternative that we have put in place ourselves. We can, and we will, make this bill work if we have to. We will—and I made this commitment earlier this evening—protect the issues and the key issues in this bill that we are focused on. Now the ball is firmly in Westminster's court. If they want to come to the table and discuss the issues that I hope they do, they know that we have the alternative, and they know that we are able to operate that alternative. Let us now see what takes place. No, I won't. It has, Presiding Officer, been a long three and a half weeks. It has been a long few months as the possibility of this bill became more and more likely. But there is much still to be done, and there is a key message that needs to go out from this chamber. Brexit is bad for Scotland. We need to go on making that point, because that is the basic point. We need to stop the damage that Brexit is likely to do to Scotland. We need to make it absolutely clear that those people who seek to impose Brexit on a country that did not vote for Brexit are the people who are doing down Scotland, damaging Scotland and damaging every sector of Scotland. By their works, you will know them, and the works are the works of the Tory party. Thank you. That concludes stage 3 of the continuity bill. The next item of business is consideration of four business motions. Motion 11215, to revise business tomorrow. Motion 11161, setting out a business programme, and motions 11162 and 11163 on timetables for two bills. I would ask any member who wishes to speak against those motions to say so now. I would call on Joffith Patrick to move the above mentions and motions. And no member has asked to speak against the motions. The question is that motions 11161, 11161 to 11163 be agreed. Are we all agreed? We are agreed, thank you. The next item of business is consideration of five parliamentary bureau motions. I would ask Joffith Patrick on behalf of the bureau to move motion 11164 on committee meeting times, motions 11165 and 11166 on designation of lead committees, and motions 11167 and 11168 on approval of SSIs. We turn now to decision time. The first question is that motion 1116, in the name of Michael Russell, on the UK withdrawal from the European Union legal continuity Scotland Bill at stage 3 be agreed. Are we all agreed? We are not agreed. We will move to division and members may cast their votes now. The result of the vote on motion 1116, in the name of Michael Russell, is yes, 35, no, 32. There were no abstentions. The motion is there for agreed and the UK withdrawal from the European Union legal continuity Scotland Bill is passed. I propose to ask a single question on the five parliamentary bureau motions. Does anyone object? The question is that motions 11164 to 11168, in the name of Joffith Patrick, be agreed. Are we all agreed? We are agreed. That concludes decision time. I now close this meeting.