§ 88. Mr. David Steelasked the Secretary of State for Scotland if he will publish in the OFFICIAL REPORT lists of those bodies who made representations in favour of and against the changes outlined in Clause 3 of the Administration of Justice (Scotland) Bill, respectively.
§ Mr. Gordon CampbellClause 3, as it appeared in the Bill when the Bill was originally published, was objected to by a large number of organisations. In that form it was supported by the official Opposition.
The Government introduced Amendments to the Clause allowing parties to contract out of recourse to the courts and the amended Clause was accepted by the Committee without a Division.
Representations against the amended Clause have been received from the Law Society of Scotland, the Scottish Office of the Confederation of British Industry, the Scottish branch of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, the Scottish section of the Federation of Civil Engineering Contractors, the Institute of Arbitrators and the Glasgow Chamber of Commerce.
The Scottish Law Commission has intimated that it is content with the amended Clause, and the principle of recourse to the courts on questions of law in arbitrations is advocated in the leading textbooks on the law of arbitration in Scotland.