Member

There was a concern that the amendment raised complex constitutional questions about the balance between Parliament and the judiciary, and that this procedure might fundamentally unsettle the balance in our constitution. I believe that there can be no risk of it causing any kind of constitutional difficulties. That parliamentary procedure is adopting, with some necessary modifications, procedures that are still on the statute book; namely, the Private Legislation Procedure (Scotland) Act 1936 and the procedure for Bills to confirm ministerial orders that are subject to a process called special parliamentary procedure under a 1945 Act. The parliamentary procedures proposed by the amendment would take considerably less time—estimated to be between four and eight months—than the alternative, which is a judicial review of a decision to make the DCO, followed by a redetermination of the DCO application in the event of a judicial review being successful. As has been observed, such processes can take several years.