186.Section 33 of the Act deals with section 17A of the 1996 Act, which contains a regulation making power to establish a register of persons competent to shoot deer. Section 33 amends section 17A to enable regulations to also provide for the registration of authorisations for specified activities.
187.Section 33(2)(a) allows for the establishment and operation of a register of persons, who are (either or both):
	competent to shoot deer in Scotland, and
	authorised to carry out one or more of the specified activities.
188.A “specified activity” is defined in a new subsection (8), added by section 28(4). A specified activity is an activity which requires authorisation under sections 5, 17ZA, 18 or 19. The definition is by reference to the need for permission from SNH to carry out the activity via an authorisation, rather than by reference to the criteria for determining whether the authorisation should be granted (or lack thereof).
189.The effect of the amendment in section 33(2)(a) is that once the register is set up, a person will be able to apply to SNH for inclusion on the register for two things: (a) for being fit and competent to shoot deer and (b) for authorisation to carry out one or more of the specified activities. During the application process, a person can indicate what they want to be registered for (e.g. being fit and competent to shoot deer, or being fit and competent to shoot deer as well as to carry out night shooting and shooting during close seasons, or all of the specified activities).
190.A person applying for registration only as fit and competent to shoot deer would simply need to satisfy SNH that they are fit and competent to do so and follow any registration process set out under the regulations. If the person wanted to later add an authorisation to carry out one or more specified activities, they would be able to apply the authorisation to be added to the register. As they would already be on the register as fit and competent to shoot deer, they wouldn’t need to satisfy SNH that they were fit and competent (due to the operation of section 37 of the 1996 Act), only that the criteria in the relevant authorisation section (if any) are met for each specified activity that they are seeking to add to the register.
191.In the case of a person applying for authorisations, it is expected that most applicants would also be applying for registration as being fit and competent to shoot deer because most of the specified activities involve shooting. In this scenario, the application would have to address two things: (a) whether the person is fit and competent to shoot deer and (b) whether the test in the relevant authorisation section is met for each specified activity that the person is seeking to be registered for. No assessment as to fitness or competence for the purposes of the specified activity authorisation(s) would be necessary because it would already be being assessed as part of the shooting registration. Once a person is on the register as holding an authorisation for a specified activity, they will not need to subsequently go back to SNH to get an authorisation for each specific occasion of carrying out the specified activity. If they wish to apply for another authorisation for a different specified activity, they will be able to apply for that additional authorisation to be added to the register. As with fresh registrations, they can be considered fit and competent as this has already been assessed as part of the shooting registration.
192.There may be a small category of people who are not on the register and wish to apply for an authorisation without also needing to be fit and competent to shoot deer: those who only apply for registration for the specified activity of driving deer using a vehicle. In this situation, SNH will have to assess two things: (a) fitness and competence to carry out the specified activity (as the person is not already on the register) and (b) whether the test in the relevant authorisation section is met.
193.Despite the Act setting up the mechanisms for a register recording authorisations to be implemented, the ability for a person to obtain a one-off authorisation outside of the registration process is also retained. As the registration process will take some time to complete, it may not be appropriate for authorisations which are only needed for a very limited or specific purpose or timeframe. For example, an executor who has no need for an ongoing authorisation but needs to be able to act for some reason or a pest control company based in England that has been brought in to supplement local resources. As the new section 37(1A), inserted by section 35(3) only states that a person “may” be considered fit and competent by their inclusion on the register, it does not limit the ways in which a person can be considered fit and competent for the purposes of authorisations for specified activities. In the case of someone not already on the register, that person could still be assessed to be fit and competent specifically for the purpose of the authorisation. Here, SNH will need to assess (a) whether the person is fit and competent and (b) whether the test in the relevant section is met. The ability to issue these one-off authorisations allows for urgent, one-off authorisations to be issued without going through the full registration process.
194.While most of the authorisation provisions require SNH to apply a statutory test to determine whether the authorisation may be granted (for example sections 17ZA and 19), others do not (section 18 for example). In the former case, SNH will have to apply the relevant test when assessing the appropriateness of granting an authorisation during the registration process. In the latter case, there is no particular test that must be applied but SNH may, if authorised by regulations under section 17A, set standards which must be met by an applicant during the application process. For example, SNH may make a decision that a person applying for authorisation to take or kill deer at night will need to demonstrate a particular level of competence before the authorisation can be granted. The level of competence may be specified in regulations under section 17A and applied during the registration process.
195.Section 33(3)(a) harmonises the language used in referring to the register, while paragraph (b) changes subsection (2)(a)(xiv) to allow for consequential modification of sections 17ZA, 19 and 26ZA. Sections 17ZA and 26ZA are new provisions covered by the register and regulations which need to be included, and section 19 is an existing provision which is now covered by the register and regulations. Section 33(3)(b) changes subsection (2)(a)(x) to clarify that the regulations require information other than the required information (number of deer of each species and of each sex) to be provided in cull returns (including cull returns which show the number of deer of each species and of each sex which are planned to be killed).
196.Section 33(3A) adjusts the definition of “cull return” in section 17A of the 1996 Act. Paragraph (a) inserts “taken or” before “killed” in order to be consistent with wording elsewhere in the 1996 Act and paragraph (b) allows cull returns which show the number of deer of each species and of each sex which are planned to be killed to cover a period of up to 5 years (previously these kinds of planned cull return could only cover prospective periods of one year).
197.Subsections (5) and (6) of section 33 change the cross heading and section heading respectively. Both are changed from “Register of persons competent to shoot deer” to “Register of authorised persons”, to more accurately describe what the section is now doing.
The Act Authorisations for particular activities Section 33 – Register of authorised persons