Recommendation 18

In relation to Bills containing framework provisions, we would urge successor committees to press the Scottish Government for reasons as to why important detail is not being set out on the face of the Bill and then to reflect on whether these are satisfactory. Committees should also consider whether especially important and widely-drawn powers in Bills should be made subject to a super-affirmative procedure. Overall, the increased use of framework provisions creates a risk of a "missing middle" in Parliamentary scrutiny: the period between the Bill being passed and subordinate legislation then emerging sometime later as the "finished product" in a policy development process in which the Parliament and its committees may have played little part. We recommend early reflection in the next Parliament on how to respond to this at an institutional level. Committees should also be vigilant in relation to subordinate legislation which itself delegates key detail about its operation to guidance or codes without drafts of these being made available for scrutiny with the instrument. In relation to subordinate legislation generally, committees should, whenever necessary, press the Scottish Government for a consistently good standard of accompanying documentation.