I think that that relates to Mark Ruskell’s question about the direction of travel in capital spend.
May I briefly go back to agriculture? It is carbon intensive by its very nature, and we have substantial spend on it through CAP payments. Again, I think that that financial support has largely been welcomed. I am sure that Fergus Ewing in particular would be more than happy to go through the environmental considerations on that, but those CAP payments are a major financial intervention, and the fact that the sector is so carbon intensive explains that outcome.
On how we are locking in effects in infrastructure, we are partly guided by the infrastructure investment plan, as I said. It sets out the infrastructure that is required, but it is, of course, published at a certain point in time, and there have been more developments on the environment and our understanding of the low-carbon agenda since the infrastructure investment plan was last set out. We also have the national planning framework, which I know Mr Stevenson is very familiar with. There are a range of policy guides that take us through our infrastructure spending.
There are then the factors of demand and the financial circumstances in which we find ourselves. For example, a change to rail financing has come from the UK Government. Those things are all material considerations in the year-to-year capital budget. In aspiring to meet our target for new homes, we are leveraging in over £800 million for housing. We have to look at the totality of demands and policy commitments around the capital budget.
We have undoubtedly been delivering in terms of the trajectory of spend on energy efficiency. It has been welcomed that we have more than doubled the spend on active travel. The rail investment is significant, with the spend on electrification of rail, and we are proposing to continue investing in low-carbon transport. There are specific funds for that.
Although we are being guided by the infrastructure investment plan, there have been other interventions that have enhanced our position with regard to investment in low-carbon spend in the capital budget.
One amendment that the committee asked for, and which I have made, is the inclusion of financial transactions in the analysis. They are now part of that figure, which the committee should surely welcome, given that it made the request. I am just trying to evidence how we have been mindful of this issue in our decisions on capital, but I would point out that some capital spend is deemed to be neutral. One good example is digital; we can quantify the immediate effect of the initial investment on emissions, but we should also point out the huge long-term benefits of having a more digital economy with the reduction in the need for people to travel and in other more harmful impacts on the environment.