Brexit Bill will be challenged by us

Last week’s weather was certainly strange with much disruption in our own community and in communities right across Scotland.

Amongst many cancellations, one that made me smile was when a delegation from the Greenland Parliament changed their mind about visiting the Scottish Parliament because of our weather!

I was supposed to be in Ireland at the start of this week, but the weather put paid to that visit too.

The visit was for interparliamentary discussions; Brexit on the agenda, of course.

As I’ve said before in this column, I am sure there is deep concern amongst politicians of all stripes, from Ireland and Northern Ireland, about the effect Brexit will have on the Good Friday Agreement and the peace process.

Latest UK announcements about the Single Market and the Customs Union have offered no comfort about borders with Ireland when the UK leaves the European Union.

Hard borders, soft borders, land border and sea border – no answers and no confidence that the Prime Minister Theresa May and her team actually have any answers.

You’ll have heard much talk about the UK Government’s EU Withdrawal Bill.

This is the legislation that takes back the powers from the European Union. There are 111 of these powers – in agriculture, the environment and public procurement, for example – which are devolved and currently within the remit of the Scottish Parliament.

The Tories, including their leader in Scotland, promised that these powers would return to Holyrood but, lo and behold, they reneged on that. They’ve passed a Bill in the Commons which opens the door to a potential ‘power grab’, with powers being returned from the EU to Westminster.

This will give the power to UK ministers to make changes in devolved areas without any involvement of Scotland’s Parliament. Unacceptable, surely, to all elected members at Holyrood and those elected to serve Scotland at Westminster.

Unacceptable, surely, to anyone who believes in democracy, never mind devolution.

The UK Government had promised to amend their original legislation to make sure that the devolution settlement in Scotland, and indeed, Wales, was respected, but they did not do so.

That is why the Scottish Government introduced the Continuity Bill last week as an alternative to that UK Government EU Withdrawal Bill. Our Bill, supported by the Greens, the Liberal Democrats and Labour, aims to assert Holyrood’s control over these 111 powers. It enables current EU regulations in those areas to be rolled over into Scots Law to make sure there are no ‘gaps’. Wales, whose devolved government is Labour, has introduced its own Continuity Bill.

The Lord Advocate, Scotland’s most senior law officer, advised the Scottish Government that because EU law will cease to apply from Brexit day, anything that takes effect from then on is within the competence of Holyrood.

We are quite within our rights to protect the powers we have and stop our powers being eroded and the SNP will always stand up for Scotland.

The Scottish Government has clearly stated that their preferred option is to work with the UK Government and reach agreement. Talks, however, have been ongoing for the past year; there was the promise of amendment that came to naught and nothing since has inspired any confidence.

Time is running out and under their own legislative timetable the UK Government now only has until March 12 to satisfy the demands of the Scottish and the Welsh governments to a level that would allow them to recommend acceptance to their respective parliaments.

The convention is that the devolved parliaments give permission to Westminster to legislate on their behalf.

So, what happens if our Parliament refuses Westminster that permission? Well, any delay to amending or passing the Withdrawal Bill in Westminster will throw the UK Government’s whole Brexit programme into even more disarray. It won’t stop Brexit, but failure to get the consent for the Bill from devolved administrations will be yet another problem for the UK Government to try and fix.

The next few weeks will certainly be interesting.

Talking of interesting, I mentioned Greenland earlier – did you know that as an autonomous state within the kingdom of Denmark, Greenland negotiated terms to leave the European Union whilst Denmark remained a full member?

We are quite within our rights to protect the powers we have and stop our powers being eroded...