Having heard the honeyed tones in which the Minister opened the debate for the Government, I feel a bit guilty about having to say that I still have severe reservations about parts of the Bill.
Not all the Bill applies to Scotland, but the main part of it that does is on energy. It is a great shame, as the hon. Member for Birmingham, Northfield (Richard Burden) said, that we had so little time to debate those issues today. We had serious concerns about some of them, but we were not given the opportunity to debate them fully. However, that is the way it goes.
On Second Reading, I referred to two issues with fracking in Scotland: drilling under people’s homes without consent and the complexities in Scots law in relation to that. I am pleased that the Government have moved on those issues. I welcome the Government amendments removing Scotland, but I remain concerned that they have not taken the obvious action of moving licensing powers from the UK Parliament to the Scottish Government.
All powers relating to fracking lie with the Scottish Government, apart from the crucial power of licensing. The UK Government say that they intend to move those powers under the Smith commission proposals after the next general election, but with the best will in the world the process of getting that Bill through both Houses will take some time, and it will be some considerable time before the powers are with the Scottish Parliament.