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That is not the case with the Subsidy Control Bill, which will open us up to legal challenge from other parts of the UK if we continue to provide the type of income support that I have talked about, because that conflicts with the principles that have been outlined in the bill. That is where the problem lies.

I would be happy to write to the committee outlining our concerns about specific parts of the bill, if you would find that helpful.

I do not know whether there are particular issues in that regard. Perhaps my officials have further information on food regulation.

That is one area on which I would be happy to follow up with the committee after the meeting.

We also have other important markets to which we now no longer have access, unfortunately, because of Brexit. Again, that is why we had the common frameworks process, with which all Administrations engaged in good faith. That process is about helping to manage policy divergence, which is not a threat to any one Government—there was divergence when we were members of the EU. All that we ask for is the ability for Scotland to continue to do that.

If the Subsidy Control Bill is passed in its current form, it will constrain our policy choices in the future. For example, we have support payments for our less favoured areas that do not exist in other parts of the UK, and our ability to continue to offer such payments might well be put at risk, given the powers in the bill as it is currently drafted.

It is not only the Scottish Government that is raising those concerns; the same concerns have been raised by the Northern Ireland Executive and the Welsh Government. They, too, are seriously concerned about the powers in those two pieces of legislation, which completely undermine the collaborative work that we have all done to establish the frameworks. That might lead the devolved Administrations to lose faith in the process altogether, because the UK Government is trying to retain control of those powers and to constrict our policy-making powers.

No—that is one area, but it is a fairly substantive area, given the size of the payments involved and the fundamental nature of the support for our whole agricultural sector.

We have already committed to maintaining that level of spend throughout this session of Parliament. I know that the committee is aware of the work that is under way with the implementation board to help to design and develop our future policy.

It is not possible for me to give the committee the full financial impact. The problem with the Subsidy Control Bill is that it could constrain our ability to make future policy decisions so, sadly, it is not possible to quantify the impact. When I spoke about figures earlier, I was talking about the scale of the overall investment that we make in our agriculture sector and the fact that our policy choices about how to direct that investment are constrained.

Absolutely. Some of the concerns that I have outlined about the Subsidy Control Bill and the United Kingdom Internal Market Act 2020 are shared concerns. That is why we have continued to raise them with the UK Government.

I will further explain some of the impacts that we can expect from the Subsidy Control Bill. Agriculture is fully devolved. Farmers and crofters in Scotland face challenges that do not exist elsewhere in the UK, but the principles that are set out in schedule 1 to the bill put at risk our ability to develop future policies that are tailored to address those challenges. For example, the incoming coupled support payments play a vital role for many of the businesses that operate in some of our most remote and constrained areas, but they would be incompatible with the principles that are proposed in the Subsidy Control Bill, particularly those about encouraging a change in the economic behaviour of the beneficiary.

Agriculture is carved out of many subsidy control regimes and is covered by the World Trade Organization agreement on agriculture, so it does not make sense for it to be included in the Subsidy Control Bill. The UK Government told us that a consultation was undertaken and that the vast majority of respondents agreed to agriculture’s inclusion in the bill. We have asked for that consultation information to be shared with us but, as yet, it has not materialised. At first, we were told that it could not be shared because of data protection legislation. We asked for anonymised examples to try to understand the rationale for including agriculture in the subsidy regime, because it is unusual for it to be included in that way.

The Subsidy Control Bill could also prevent us from retaining alignment with the EU if schemes that we want to develop and adopt are incompatible with the UK regime. The Minister for Business, Trade, Tourism and Enterprise, Ivan McKee, and I had a meeting with the relevant UK minister this week to discuss some of the significant issues that we have with the bill and to try to better understand the rationale for some of the decisions that have been taken. It is unusual for agriculture to be included given that it is carved out of so many other regimes and that there is sector cover for it under the WTO agreement on agriculture.

That is an absolutely critical point, which we continually re-emphasise to the UK Government. We highlight the parliamentary processes that we have in place and continually make the point that it is hugely important to recognise those processes to enable the scrutiny that you need to undertake. I can only apologise for the late notification that you get, particularly with some pieces of secondary legislation. Again, some of those issues are outwith our control. We try to keep the committee up to date and informed as much as we can. However, there are occasions on which we get information at the last minute or when decisions are taken that completely change initial policies.

There was an instance of that just before Christmas, with the official controls regulation and some of the changes that are proposed on that. Discussions took place at a meeting that was attended by the devolved Administrations, only for a huge policy shift to then become apparent, which we were asked at very short notice to sign up to and agree to. The committee will be aware of that, because you had the various notices from me that then had to be revoked and changed.

That is just the environment that we are working in. However, we take every opportunity to remind the UK Government of the essential parliamentary scrutiny processes. Some of that is outwith our control. We genuinely try to give the committee information as and when we receive it to ensure that we allow as much time as possible for scrutiny. However, that is not always within our remit.

No, and that has been part of the problem. We asked for the consultation responses to be shared with us but we were told that they could not be, for reasons of data protection. We followed up by asking for anonymised responses so that we could understand the rationale for people asking for agriculture to be included. After the meeting we had on Monday, we were told that that information will be shared with us, but, as yet, we have not received it.