End of Term

Last day before the recess - which is not a holiday but a period when the Parliament does not sit. I will be away for a wee bit but mostly working out of my constituency office in Dunoon but travelling extensively across the constituency as well as attending the summer Cabinets which are in Skye, Orkney and Renfrew.

My last task today was a legislative one. Actually the whole sitting week has been devoted to legislation, with no less than three Stage Three proceedings in the Chamber on the Police & Fire Bill, The Long Leases Bill and the Welfare Reform Bill. These are three line whipped sessions and the Police & Fire Bill voting lasted for most of the day with 78 amendments.

But there is another type of legilsation as well called secondary legislation. I proposed this piece, which changes the list of fundable bodies in Further and Higher Educaiton ( a comparatively minor tidying up measure but necessary none the less) at the Education Committee on Tuesday and then signed it today after the Parliament had approved it at Decision Time as follows:

The Presiding Officer: The next question is, that motion S4M-03523, in the name of Bruce Crawford, on approval of a Scottish statutory instrument, be agreed to.

Motion agreed to,

That the Parliament agrees that the Fundable Bodies (Scotland) Order 2012 [draft] be approved.

The formal signing of such instruments, as it is known, is something Ministers are required to do from time to time. Given that it puts things into law you might have thought it was surrounded with at least a little ceremony. But actually your office just give you the papers (and a pen if you can't find one) and then takes the document away , sending it back to the Government's Legal Department. Something must then happen to the formal signed copy, but I have to admit I don't know what !

This statutory instrument however has a wee touch of history about it as it will be the last one I sign as "A Member of the Scottish Executive" - the legal description at present. Next week that changes to the "Scottish Government" , a term now formally sanctioned by the recent Scotland Act. Of course we have been using it for the past 5 years, but only now has Westminster grudgingly conceded it.

Anyway, a busy few days ahead in Argyll, with the prospect of further torrential rain. The summer is turning out to be as bad as last year and the year before - maybe July will be better.