The National Assembly's Constitutional & Legislative Affairs Committee have the unenviable task of sifting through the labyrinthine secondary legislation (order, regulations, rules etc.) introduced by the Welsh Government - which is how they run the country in practice.
Most secondary legislation is made up of fairly short documents and is relatively uncontroversial. The Committee's job is to – in shorthand – point out any details/errors that need to be flagged up for AMs and the Welsh Government.
The Welsh Government had trouble drafting and passing regulations relating to the replacement for Council Tax Benefit (Council Tax Reduction Scheme) last year, which resulted in a recall of the Assembly during the Christmas recess.
This year, Local Government Minister Lesley Griffiths (Lab, Wrexham) introduced two sets of regulations relating to the Council Tax Reduction Scheme:
- Council Tax Reduction Schemes and Prescribed Requirements Regulations 2013 (pdf)
- Council Tax Reduction Schemes (Default Scheme) Regulations 2013 (pdf)
Both have been introduced so that all Welsh local authorities continue to provide some sort of Council Tax relief from next April. That's because a "sunset clause" was inserted last year – with agreement from opposition parties - in order to get 2012's regulations passed.
The Committee were, however, somewhat annoyed with what was presented to them.
The documents themselves are lengthy tomes, with both sets coming in at over 550 pages combined. As you can imagine it's not exactly bedtime reading, and those who digest such things as part of their job have my condolences.
The Committee flagged up 18 errors in the first (pdf) and 20 errors in the second (pdf). Most of them were simple drafting mistakes, but the following was picked out for special scrutiny in both sets of regulations, and I suspect wasn't the only "delight" :
“The capital of an applicant who is a pensioner, calculated in accordance with this Schedule, is to be treated as if it were a weekly income of—
(a) £1 for each £500 in excess of £10,000 but not exceeding £16,000; and
(b) £1 for any excess which is not a complete £500.”
That's Numberwang!
This apparently relates to the means test used to determine how big a council tax reduction a person's entitled to. The committee are said to have wanted means testing simplified into a separate 8-page order, but the minister rejected that as the rules - as they currently are - were too complicated and wide-ranging.
Apparently though, the 1999 equivalent of these regulations really were just 8 pages long. It shows you how much these things can snowball.
The committee described the regulations in less than flattering terms, such as :
"completely impenetrable....even to lawyers with a background in statutory interpretation"
"impossible to fathom the policy intentions"
"the user (reader of the regulations) is sent on a ridiculous hunt for a simple definition of 'quarter'"
The Pythonesque references to Montserrat :
"Quite what relevance a 'person in Great Britain who left the island of Montserrat after 1 November 1995 due to the volcanic eruption' has to council tax in Wales in 2013 in anyone's guess."
Then there's :
"The Welsh Government has, quite rightly, advocated accessible legislation. These Regulations show how not to achieve that."
In Assembly terms, that's quite a tongue-lashing. I don't think I've come across such strong rebukes in a committee report before.
More seriously, the committee said local authorities and organisations like the Citizens Advice Bureau (CAB) could find it difficult to determine if they're applying the rules correctly, and it'll be even harder for members of the public to determine if they're receiving the right council tax deduction.
Lesley Griffiths and her department shouldn't be criticised too much, and she has plenty of valid justifications for the "impenetrability" of the regulations.
Regulations relating to welfare and council tax generally are this complicated. That's down to decades of chopping and changing by different governments, as well as the micromanagement of deciding precisely who is entitled to what and on what terms - described as "accretions" by Committee chair, David Melding AM (Con, South Wales Central) at the final meeting to approve the reports.
In the minister's formal response (pdf) she points out that the 2013 regulations are, in fact, a significantly simplified version!
In addition, she believes the likes of the CAB will have no difficulties in interpreting the regulations as they helped prepare them in the first place. Though she concedes that members of the public could have problems understanding it, it's likely members of the public will seek help from someone who does understand the regulations anyway.
The minister also said her department offered to give the committee's legal officers "technical briefings", which were refused. It's a fairly damning indictment of the regulations if technical briefings are required for trained and experienced lawyers to understand them.
I imagine such meetings would've resembled a game of Mornington Crescent.
AMs were effectively backed into a corner on this, and had no option but to approve the regulations as they are, otherwise it could've put the Council Tax Reduction Scheme at risk next year.
Coincidentally, Eluned Parrott AM (Lib Dem, South Wales Central) - who's a member of the Constitutional & Legislative Affairs Committee - has written an important article on Click on Wales.
She raises concerns that Welsh Government are manipulating procedures relating to secondary legislation, effectively turning - on paper - sensible and uncontroversial laws into "enabling acts" in terms of policy, increasingly concentrating powers with the executive.
That sounds a bit....Carmarthenshire.
As I said, it's perhaps the biggest story of the week you haven't noticed.
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