Scottish ministers have paused a central plank of the Good Food Nation law. A new revocation regulation, made on 11 December and coming into force on 15 December, cancels the 16 December start for Section 6 of the 2022 Act. The earlier Commencement No. 4 order had fixed 16 December as the appointed day for Section 6 to take effect.

Section 6 is the “effect of plan” clause. It would require ministers, when exercising specified functions, to have regard to the national Good Food Nation Plan. In short, it gives the plan legal weight inside government decision‑making rather than leaving it as guidance.

The change is technical but not trivial. It removes the immediate legal duty on ministers to consider the national plan in set areas of policy. The revocation instrument is recorded by legal trackers as published on 12 December, signalling the government’s intention to hold off activating Section 6 for now.

For context, ministers only recently set 16 December as the start date through S.S.I. 2025/291. That order, signed by Mairi Gougeon on 23 October, was clear that Section 6 would commence on that date before this week’s reversal.

Parliament had also been scrutinising draft regulations to spell out which ministerial functions would be caught by Section 6. The Rural Affairs and Islands Committee took evidence on 3 December, with officials indicating those rules were intended to start on 23 December alongside the finalised national plan. After the revocation, the timetable for those “specified functions” is now uncertain.

Most of the machinery around planning and reporting remains live. Key parts of the Act governing how the national plan is prepared, laid and reviewed have already been commenced in stages during 2023 and 2024, so work on the plan itself can continue even while Section 6 is paused.

Government papers show the draft national Good Food Nation Plan was laid before Holyrood on 27 June 2025, with committees expecting a final version by the end of December. The immediate effect of today’s move is that, even if the plan is published this month, ministers will not yet be under a legal duty to have regard to it when taking decisions covered by Section 6.

Why it matters for readers north of the Tyne as well as the Tweed: Scottish producers supply schools, hospitals and councils across the North. A paused duty at ministerial level does not change purchasing rules overnight, but it does soften the immediate legal pull of the national plan on Scottish government choices that ripple through public procurement and grant schemes. Buyers and suppliers from Cumbria to Northumberland should carry on with current frameworks, track any revised start date, and check tender language for references to Section 6 once a new commencement order is tabled.