Referendum
Section 109: Legislative competence: supplementary
410.The purpose of this section is to allow amendments to be made to Schedule 7 to the Act, so as to enhance, restrict or change the Assembly’s legislative competence to pass Acts.
411.Subsection (1) provides that Her Majesty may, by making an Order in Council, add further subjects and headings to Part 1 of Schedule 7. The Order in Council may also remove or change subjects or headings already listed.
412.Her Majesty may also amend Parts 2 and 3 of Schedule 7, which set out general restrictions on the passing of Bills, and exceptions to those restrictions respectively.
413.Subsection (2) provides that Orders in Council made by Her Majesty amending Schedule 7 can also make changes to enactments, including Acts of the Scottish Parliament and instruments made under those Acts, prerogative instruments, and other instruments or documents, where those changes are appropriate in connection with the amendment to Schedule 7.
414.Subsection (3) provides that Orders in Council under this section can make provisions which apply retrospectively.
415.For example, this power could be used to clarify the extent of a subject in Part 1 of Schedule 7, where there has been a legal challenge to the validity of an Act of the Assembly made in relation to that subject, and there is a need for legal certainty about the extent of the subject.
416.Subsection (4) provides that, except in relation to the first Order in Council amending Schedule 7 a recommendation to Her Majesty to make such an Order must only be made if the draft Order in Council has been approved by the House of Commons, the House of Lords and the Assembly.
417.Subsection (5) makes it clear that if a change is made to Schedule 7, and thus to the Assembly’s power to pass Acts, the change is to have no effect upon Acts already passed (or approved, in the case of Acts which have been reconsidered and amended) by the Assembly. They will remain law. This is subject to any retrospective provision that may be made in the Order in Council.