Scottish Executive Partnership Agreement
I welcome to the meeting Ross Finnie, who is the Minister for Environment and Rural Development, his officials and members of the public. We will take evidence on the Executive's commitments in "A Partnership for a Better Scotland", relevant extracts of which were circulated to members. I invite the minister to kick off and lead us into a discussion. We wanted to have you at our first meeting after the summer recess and we are glad that you could attend.
When committee members were gracious enough to invite me to join them for lunch last week, I suspected that there was a catch. There is no such thing as a free lunch, so I realised that my attendance at a committee meeting was imminent.
I am grateful to have the opportunity of sketching how I expect the commitments in the partnership agreement to be developed. I will make a brief presentation that draws together the various strands in the agreement in so far as they impact on the committee's work.
The partnership document does not have separate sections on the environment and sustainable development. Instead, environment commitments appear throughout the document, often highlighted by a symbol. That approach is important, because it elevates the environment and shows that it is not just a narrow focus for me as Minister for Environment and Rural Development. The approach acknowledges that the environment transcends all departments and all ministers, so at the start of the document we reaffirm our commitment to sustainable development and to environmental justice.
A key element is our commitment to strategic environmental assessment. As members know, we plan to go further than the European directive. The matter is complex, but we are determined to deal with it in that way. In that sense, Scotland will take a lead. We have begun work on the complex issue of dealing with those elements throughout the Executive.
In environmental justice, we propose more rights for the public. We shall consult on new environmental information regulations to increase public rights to access such information and on access to courts for non-governmental organisations on some environmental matters.
In the previous parliamentary session, we set out ambitious targets on waste, and the clear task in my department is to ensure implementation of the national waste strategy and to ensure that the targets that we set out in the previous session will be achieved.
The first bill that I will ask the committee to consider will be on nature conservation. We have had a satisfactory consultation and we will take on board many of the excellent points that consultees made. I acknowledge the considerable contribution that they all made. The bill will provide stronger protection of our natural heritage and will ensure that the system of protection is more open, transparent and comprehensible.
On genetically modified organisms, we have committed ourselves rigorously to apply the precautionary principle. We will be pro-safety, pro-environment and pro-consumer choice.
In the previous session, the Parliament passed the Water Environment and Water Services (Scotland) Act 2003. A clear and important commitment for the Parliament will be to put in place the elements of that act in the time frame that the act requires.
We shall continue our commitment to Scottish Water by retaining it in public ownership, improving its efficiency and improving its quality and standards of service. New regulations and a grant scheme to assist users of water supplies that are not connected to the public system will be implemented next year, which I hope will improve the quality of life in rural Scotland.
We will develop a strategy for the management of our coasts by 2006 and will consider whether a national coastline park might offer advantages. I hope to work in close collaboration with the committee on that topic. In a similar vein, we shall look at the case for marine national parks and consider what form of park might be suitable for Scotland.
We shall improve air quality by grant-aiding the cost of fitting vehicles with emission-reduction equipment. We shall also help to establish a sustainable market for alternative clean fuels through the PowerShift and autogas+ programmes.
We will continue to deliver the vision that is set out in "Rural Scotland: A New Approach" by mainstreaming rural issues in the formulation and delivery of policies across all Executive portfolios. The partnership document reflects our commitment to rural Scotland and we will continue to pursue our commitments. We will support innovation and enterprise in our rural communities. We will provide more resources to address transport needs in rural areas by extending the rural transport initiative and improving air, ferry and bus links. We will encourage rural community planning partnerships to work together to share ideas on rural development. We will increase the availability of affordable rural housing and protect and develop rural services, such as community health facilities.
The Deputy Minister for Environment and Rural Development, Allan Wilson, and I will continue to liaise with portfolio ministers who have the responsibility for delivering some of our commitments. We will ensure that the needs of rural communities are acknowledged, understood and met. We will also continue to seek independent advice from the Scottish national rural partnership on the effectiveness of our delivery. We will monitor progress towards delivery of the partnership commitments in rural areas and disseminate that through an annual report, which we will publish in spring 2004 and each year thereafter.
Strategies on food and agriculture were worked up in the previous session and we must ensure that we continue the drive to deliver those. We will have a more detailed discussion later this morning on the common agricultural policy reform package, which is the result of months of tough negotiations. However, I think that the package contains the foundations and flexibilities to give a boost to Scottish agriculture. The package will provide a framework to allow progress in aspects of our forward strategy, which proposed an innovative approach to delivery through the suggestion of embracing land management contracts.
Land management contracts are a mechanism for delivering support payments to farmers and we will continue to work that up. The key to developing LMCs is accessing sufficient funding that can be deployed flexibly to pay for the different outputs. The CAP reform regime provides opportunities in that direction and we will consider that mechanism in consultation with others. We also have a specific commitment to encourage sustainable agricultural activity within our 13,500 hill farms and we plan to continue to do that, using the less favoured area support scheme.
The food strategy aims to provide targeted support to projects that encourage greater sourcing and processing of Scottish produce, help to achieve sustainable growth through co-operatives and market initiatives and encourage the sale of local produce to local consumers. Quality assurance and improved labelling are also priorities.
Protecting and improving the environment are also a key feature of our agricultural plans. The CAP reform package makes compliance with legal standards for environmental protection—and, indeed, for animal and plant health and animal welfare—a condition for the receipt of financial support. I believe that that sits comfortably with the initiatives that we have taken or are driving forward.
We used the agricultural strategy to generate the important environmental report "Custodians of Change", which set out an agenda for bringing about environmental benefit. We are engaged in implementing that agenda. Important elements within the agenda are the national strategy for farm business advice and skills, which also extends into environmental practice; the diffuse pollution initiative, which the Scottish Environment Protection Agency operates to determine the extent of diffuse water pollution; and developments on waste management through regulations that incorporate farm dumps within the landfill regulatory regime and amend the waste management licensing regulations.
I recently announced improvements, which I hope the committee welcomes, to the agri-environment schemes. The improvements allowed me to offer funding this year to nearly 99 per cent of those who applied under the rural stewardship scheme—which I think is a huge improvement. That is coupled with the important announcement that we will allow those who are leaving the environmentally sensitive area scheme to have automatic access to the rural stewardship scheme. That extension will help to preserve the benefits that have been built up over the years in the communities where the original scheme operated.
Organic food continues to be an important issue, and we have taken action to implement our commitment to increasing the production of organic food. Our proposals—which are, sadly, still subject to European Commission approval although I expect them to get parliamentary approval—will improve and extend support to farmers who are converting to organic production and will provide new funding for capital costs.
Animal health and welfare are another important area, and we have committed ourselves to introducing a protection of animals bill during this session. The original intention was to draft a bill that would seek to improve the welfare of commercially farmed animals but, following consultation, we are considering extending the bill's scope to include a wider range of animal health and welfare issues.
We have also published an outline animal health and welfare strategy, which has a UK basis as we are a single epidemiological unit. Nevertheless, we are absolutely clear that the strategy will have a Scottish implementation plan. I hope to bring the strategy before Parliament by the end of the year. Animal disease surveillance is mentioned specifically in the partnership agreement, and we are working in a United Kingdom framework to produce a UK surveillance strategy. The strategy will build on existing surveillance agreements and will place greater emphasis on the dissemination of surveillance information.
On sea fisheries, we are committed to focusing on reform and the implementation of the reforms that have been achieved in the common fisheries policy. Under that commitment, we have undertaken to do three things: first, to maintain the specific common fisheries policy measures that benefit Scotland; secondly, to improve governance; and thirdly, to promote sustainable development. We have protected relative stability, the Hague preference and the Shetland box. We have taken steps to progress regionalisation by promoting regional advisory councils for the North sea. That is taking some time and is proving a little slower than some fishermen in Scotland would wish. Nevertheless, the Executive has been working hand in hand with them to advance the initiative.
Regrettably, the prospects are less secure for the development of our white-fish fisheries. The present rumours are not hopeful and suggest that this autumn's scientific advice may confirm that cod and haddock stocks continue not to be in good condition. Sustainable development implies a fundamental process of balancing the need to take seriously the environmental advice that we receive with the need to sustain communities that are dependent on fishing activity. We are at the early stages of trying to work out how we will negotiate with Europe this autumn. We are pursuing a lot of work in that area and have a long way to go.
Inshore fisheries are recognised, both from a commercial point of view and, crucially, from an environmental point of view, as being of increasing importance. I recognise the fact that a more strategic approach is required if we are to conserve that important resource. Our aim is to identify how we can do that. Because of the difficulty in enforcing regulatory orders, we have made a commitment to provide for greater involvement of the Scottish Fisheries Protection Agency in that work.
We have developed a strategy on aquaculture, but we have a lot of work to do to ensure that the 33 priorities for action that are highlighted in that report are addressed and that the strategy does not become simply a piece of paper that sits on a shelf. Many of those action points are aimed specifically at reducing the environmental impact that is associated with the industry. It is, therefore, crucial for us to make progress on that work.
We are also committed to promoting access to freshwater fisheries for salmon and freshwater fish, commensurate with the need to ensure that such fisheries are sustainable and to improve the management of those fisheries. To that end, we have engaged stakeholders to establish the size and potential for growth of the freshwater angling sector.
We will consult all sectors—aquaculture, freshwater fisheries and sea fisheries, with a particular reference to inshore waters—on the need for primary legislation and we will produce proposals in the light of that consultation.
We are determined to make a difference and to increase the economic, environmental and social benefits of Scotland's trees, woods and forests through the implementation of the Scottish forestry strategy. We intend to get the best out of our forests through the management of that huge natural resource by providing incentives through the Scottish forestry grants scheme and by working together with a range of partners to implement the strategy.
Finally, one must remember that my department has the benefit of having much of its work underpinned by good science. The agriculture sector, land use more generally, conservation and biodiversity, the natural environment and rural development are all important areas, and are very much underpinned by the high quality of our Scottish agricultural and biological science base. That is achieved primarily through our funding of the Scottish agriculture and biological research institutes, in pursuit of the research strategy that we published in 1999, which we fully implemented. The SABRIs began to undergo rigorous peer review this year. We will publish a new research strategy for the period beyond 2007. However, I remain of the view that policy development must continue to be based on good scientific research.
That was a quick canter—as brief as I could make it—through some of the main issues. It drew together strands from other departments but focused on much that passes through my department. I am happy to take questions.
Thank you for your comprehensive overview. The work will keep you and your officials busy, and we will be kept busy with scrutiny throughout the session.
We have a half-hour session before we move on to the common agricultural policy mid-term review. Everyone has a question. We will try to work through all members.
I have a series of short questions—to which I hope we can get short answers—to help me understand something a little better. The commitment to 40 per cent renewable energy by 2020 is laudable, but I worry that it may not be achievable. When you say 40 per cent, what projections for electricity demand in 2020 are you working on? Of what is it 40 per cent?
I have two quick answers. I know that this will be to your enormous disappointment, but in order that the energy division within the Scottish Executive can act in a co-ordinated way, renewable energy is now the fiefdom of the Enterprise, Transport and Lifelong Learning Department, so I am not familiar with the detailed answer to the question. However, I take your point. The Executive consulted on the issue. It is important to note that before we arrived at that figure there was extensive consultation of the industry. We did not simply pluck a figure out of the air; we sought views from the industry.
The big issue is not demand but the drive to induce technological development, not so much on the wind side but in the provision of wave and tidal power. That is why the Executive is committed to the intermediary technology institutes and to the experimentation in Orkney, and why we believe that if the Executive gives a positive response, leadership and direction, and states that it wants that level of renewable energy, there is a real incentive for people to invest in the research and development and technology that are necessary to make that viable. There are great prospects for Scotland.
I have several questions, convener. Do you want me to ask them all at once, or do you want to come back to me later?
I will let everyone have a first round, and then come back and see how we get on.
To start with I have a couple of questions on transport. I received a letter this morning from an Inverness hotelier, who complained about the lack of integrated transport in the Highlands and Islands. Transport services in rural areas are not well enough integrated. What does the Executive propose to do about that? I recognise that you are not the Minister for Transport, but transport has an impact on rural development.
I also want to pick you up on affordable rural housing, which is a tremendous issue in the Highlands and Islands. What contact does the Environment and Rural Affairs Department have with the Development Department and Communities Scotland? What will happen in situations such as those on the edge of small towns or villages, where, because SEPA will not give permission for another septic tank and Scottish Water will not provide sewerage, housing developments are prevented from going ahead?
There are three questions there. On transport, in the partnership agreement and elsewhere one of the issues that we must resolve is the framework that we need to have. The Minister for Transport will undertake consultation on what kind of strategic authority is needed. Where strategic passenger authorities exist, some people claim that they work, but others say that they do not. The issue concerns who takes responsibility for ensuring the integration that is sought. Simply leaving it up to the respective operators does not work. That is one of the issues. An even bigger issue for strategic passenger authorities is the way in which investment is co-ordinated at several levels including the operational level. We will come back to the committee with our thinking on that.
I give you an assurance that the rural policy team in my department collaborates closely with the Minister for Communities on affordable rural housing and I discuss the issue with her. Over the past few years, we have progressively increased the budget provision for Communities Scotland in relation to rural areas. It is never enough, but we have made some significant improvement in that spending.
The water sewerage issue is being looked at across the piece by both SEPA and Scottish Water. The huge investment—the detail of which was published yesterday—is primarily targeted at ensuring that we raise the standard and meet certain legal requirements. It does not deal with the issue of the constraints on development, whether in the Highlands, the Borders or elsewhere. That is a matter on which we have asked Scottish Water to report back to us. Previously, we thought that some of the £1.8 billion would address some of those problems. However, it has become increasingly clear that that sum will do no more than meet basic legal minimum requirements by reducing the amount of leakage and renewing facilities that are below standard to get us up to the minimum standard. That is a separate issue on which Scottish Water will report back quite soon.
Thanks for that detailed prediction.
I have two questions. First, what efforts have been made, with the UK Government and the electricity companies, to strengthen the electricity grid, given that we are in the process of development of and research into the scheme that the minister mentioned in the Orkneys? Have undersea cables been discussed with the UK Government as an important addition to strengthen the grid?
My second question relates to improving quality of life. What measures does the Executive use to determine economic and non-economic elements in that area? Is the same methodology applied across Executive departments?
For reasons that I explained in my first answer, I am not up to speed with the most recent discussions. However, we were notified at an earlier stage of the absolute importance of Scotland and Scotland's position, the condition of the grid being part and parcel of the British electricity trading and transmission arrangements. The way in which those arrangements are structured—in terms of the sharing of costs for the provision of additional capital to strengthen the grid—and the way in which the proposed arrangements might interface with the current renewables obligation certificates will be critical. If there were a dysfunction between those, that could act as a positive disincentive to the production of renewable energy. Unless we ensure that the BETTAs are cross-border arrangements, we will not gain access to the sharing of cost on a national basis. Discussions have taken place to try to secure the necessary infrastructure improvement to the grid. Those discussions, as you rightly pointed out, will be important for the delivery of the improvements.
We use indicators for a variety of purposes, including the measurement of quality of life. You will be aware that we published indicators for sustainable development last year. I made it clear at the time that they were very much a first stab, and they proved to be enormously difficult to get off the ground. Indeed, if we examine what is done in other Administrations in the United Kingdom and in Europe, we discover, when we peel away the results, that establishing indicators is a development process.
I cannot remember the time scale, but I think that I am obliged to come back to this committee or another one to indicate what progress has been made on the indicators and to take on board suggestions on practical ways in which the current indicators could be improved, or on how the list of indicators could be improved without becoming unmanageable. I think that I am committed to coming back on that in the new year. Therefore, the committee will get a chance to feed in what I take are its concerns about how the measurement is being done.
That will be useful and we will programme it into our timetable. It is useful to have notice of that. Next on my list is Nora Radcliffe. I reassure members that I am working round the committee in order.
I want to pick up and take a wee bit further the research into indicators. "A Partnership for a Better Scotland" talks about meeting the distinct needs of rural communities. Can the minister expand a bit more on what we are doing so that we can be sure that we are picking up the distinct needs of those communities and that our tools for measuring rural deprivation are adequate and effective in a context that is different from urban deprivation?
That is one area of concern. Do you want me to run through my various points on different matters, convener?
No. I will let you pick only your top other one.
I would like a bit more information about environmental courts and the minister's thinking on what we mean by that. It is all very well having legislation in place along with sustainable indicators and all the rest, but we must have sticks as well as carrots. The bottom line, if we are going to exercise sanctions against people who do not put all those things into practice, is getting time in court. At the moment, we are competing in the ordinary courts with such matters as serious crime against the person. How do we free up court time to have the sanctions taken seriously?
On the rural deprivation question, some but not all members will be aware that we have devoted considerable resources to that issue within my department and in collaboration with the Minister for Communities. We are trying to develop a range of indicators that would give us a better opportunity of identifying and defining deprivation in rural areas. Indeed, we are at an advanced stage in the finalising of those indicators.
A component of the deprivation index that applies in urban areas—the Carstairs index—simply says that if someone possesses a car, they are given a lower rate in the deprivation index. Given that more people go into debt in rural areas to acquire a motor vehicle because that is their only means of transport, it is clear that that kind of index is wholly inappropriate for rural areas. That kind of simple illustration drove us to develop our own indicators, and we are close to finalising that process.
The work on the indicators has been difficult because, as members will know, there tend to be pockets of deprivation in urban areas, whereas deprived rural areas tend to be close to, and closely integrated with, areas that would not be described as deprived. Therefore, it is more difficult to identify deprived rural areas. I think that members of the previous Rural Development Committee highlighted that point. We have had to engage with people in the academic world who have expertise in that area. We are at an advanced stage in the process of obtaining a range of indices that will enable us to recognise where rural deprivation exists. I hope that those indicators will be a huge improvement and will assist us both in policy development and in making decisions about funding allocations.
Deprivation is one thing. A realistic estimate of the cost of service delivery in rural areas is another. Is work being done on that issue?
Yes, that is a continuing process. The Scottish Executive Environment and Rural Affairs Department—both ministers and officials—is engaging with every other department on policy delivery. The general policy is agreed, but we are asking about the way in which it is delivered and the mechanism for delivery, and whether that mechanism gives rise to additional cost. Because we have a set of ministers who are much more acutely aware of the rural dimension and who can be badgered by SEERAD, the issue of service delivery is progressively becoming part of our thinking.
We are in discussions about justice with the minister responsible. As has been said, there are issues associated with establishing a system that would give more prominence to environmental matters. Our discussions with the Justice Department are at an early stage.
I want to touch on two areas: fisheries and agricultural support. I welcome the statements in the partnership document about inshore fisheries and the minister's introductory remarks on that issue. I want to catch up on the point that we have reached with regional management advisory committees for inshore fisheries and with legislative proposals for the reform of the Inshore Fishing (Scotland) Act 1984. The conservation measures that have been introduced, such as the reduction in the number of scallop dredgers, have been widely welcomed.
The minister will be surprised to learn that I want to ask about the point that we have reached with the reconfiguration of the less favoured areas support scheme. He will also be surprised to learn that I am seeking a northerly and westerly bias in that reconfiguration.
Needless to say, I am not.
In the interests of good manners, I will not enter into that debate. I will simply say that Alasdair Morrison is talking about a further redistribution of LFASS funding. The facts show that, in aggregate terms, even the previous reorganisation of LFASS shifted resources to the north and the west.
In my introductory remarks, I said that we need to take a much more strategic approach to the management of the inshore fishery resource. The department is committed to working up draft proposals for bringing together the various strands of work on inshore fisheries. We want to consider whether that can be achieved under the existing regulating order legislation, but we are all slightly sceptical about that. Regulating orders can be effective, but they are difficult as they tend to deal with specific areas. As a consequence, they do not provide an overarching view of the inshore fishery. However, we do not want to dismiss the possibility of using existing legislation, because there may be a mechanism for amending it that does not require us to resort to entirely new legislation.
Even if we have a more holistic form of inshore fisheries management and a better regulatory orders system, we must still deal with the issue of enforcement. As Alasdair Morrison is aware, there is a slight disjunction between the powers that are invested in the Scottish Fisheries Protection Agency and those of a regulating order. There is a great deal of work to do, but we will consult communities. The section of SEERAD that deals with inshore fisheries has been much encouraged by what is contained in the partnership agreement and is keen to develop some of that thinking.
Alasdair Morrison talked about a reconfiguration of the LFASS. I would be cautious about using that form of words. There are proposals to make adjustments to the scheme, but for a variety of reasons—not least the common agricultural policy reform that we will have to manage—we are not contemplating a major reform of the LFASS. Across Scotland, including the crofting counties, we have already had two changes. If we move from the hill livestock compensatory allowance to the LFASS and then to a different LFASS, we will introduce a degree of uncertainty.
However, changes are being contemplated and discussed with Europe. Jim Wildgoose, who is with me this morning, has been in Europe to discuss those changes. The aim is to deal with the obvious anomalies that have arisen in some parts of the crofting counties. There is no homogenous mass that we could pick up as being treated oddly, but there are pockets in the extreme west and in Easter Ross—the problem is not uniform and that has a lot to do with stocking densities. Some time ago, we gave a commitment to the Scottish Crofting Foundation that we would try to deal with the anomalies, but there are budgetary constraints within the scheme. I must try to resolve that issue.
I have a quick comment and two questions. The minister said that good science had to underpin the Executive's decision making. Under the heading "Supporting activity", the partnership agreement mentions planting trees as carbon sinks. I suggest that the minister should get a tutorial on the carbon cycle—I am prepared to provide one after the meeting if he wishes.
But not now, thank you.
The minister mentioned that renewable energy production is no longer within his department's remit, but I presume that energy conservation is. To follow up on what Alex Johnstone said, to achieve a sustainable energy generation policy, we do not have to simply replace fossil fuel generation with renewable energy generation, but to reduce our energy demand. Near the end of the partnership agreement, there is a commitment to
"take measures to reduce energy use".
Will the minister confirm that that matter still falls within his department's remit and say what the measures will be?
Secondly, what does Mr Finnie understand by the precautionary principle that he said he will apply in relation to GMOs?
I am grateful that the tutorial on the carbon cycle will be deferred until the end of the meeting.
On every issue that relates to the environment, I have a cross-cutting role to ensure that our environmental commitments are met. As I made clear in my opening remarks, in the partnership agreement we tried to do things a bit differently and to recognise that every minister has a contribution to make in achieving our several environmental ambitions.
In the first session of Parliament, legislation was passed that will improve the thermal capacity of buildings, but the Minister for Communities must keep that matter under constant review and consider how to improve the thermal capacity of new buildings and buildings that are refurbished. The Minister for Transport also has to deal with issues that relate to the reduction of energy use, as does my department. Issues also arise in relation to the sheer administration of the Scottish Executive—it is important that the Executive's energy contracts are placed with renewable energy providers, that our buildings meet the required standards and that we give attention to the reduction of energy use.
I have a role in reducing energy use, although I am not the only minister who has such a role. Either through the Cabinet sub-committee on sustainable Scotland or through myself or my deputy, we will seek to ensure that we do not lose sight of our aims. The same goes for the Minister for Health and Community Care—I could give a range of examples.
Our view on the precautionary principle is that we should proceed on the basis of applying the principle at each stage of a development. Eleanor Scott referred specifically to GMOs. All those developments have begun in laboratory circumstances and, with each, we have taken the same approach of setting tests that must be met before one receives a certificate to move to the next stage of the process. In this case, that would mean that one would move through part A of European directive 2001/18/EC to part B and then to part C, which would involve the granting of a commercial certificate. However, we do not have commercial certificates in this country. Criteria are set at each stage, which means that we do not simply say "The first stage seems okay" and then go to the end of the process. Instead, we move forward on a particular basis.
European directive 2001/18/EC says that we should be clear on scientific grounds about the next stage of progress. I have made it absolutely clear on behalf of the Scottish Executive that, as long as we do not have the results of the field-scale evaluations of the crops that were being tested, the precautionary principle is quite plain. Even though the directive does not provide for such evaluations, we carried them out nevertheless. It would be quite against the precautionary principle to grant approvals for crops that were so tested without having the benefit of those results.
I have a few questions on rural transport. First, on rural railways, it has been difficult to develop new railway lines because of the difficulty in dragging Railtrack and Network Rail to the table. What can you do to support that process and to enable integrated rural transport and, in particular, rural rail development to take place?
Secondly, the biggest hostage to fortune in the partnership agreement is the statement on rural roads. How much is needed to ensure sufficient resources for the non-trunk-road network and how much has been secured for that network in subsequent years? Moreover, given the proliferation of opencast and mineral extraction in my own and other constituencies, how will that money be allocated?
I am grateful that, as far as rail development is concerned, you recognise the difficulty in getting the various parties together. Although the Minister for Transport's own people deal with studies across Scotland, we perform a useful and practical function in funding and supporting rural transport support schemes. Those schemes are very small scale, which does not quite answer your question. However, a body of evidence emerges from such activity. It is all very well saying that we do not have any new railway lines, but we need a slightly more detailed assessment of the situation before we invest any money. We make a valuable contribution by continually engaging with the transport section of the Enterprise, Transport and Lifelong Learning Department, passing on to it our experiences of various local rural transport schemes that have become essential and adding to the body of knowledge and understanding about any greater problems. That did not happen at the start, but it does now.
As for funding allocations to roads, I have to say with respect that I do not have those details to hand, but I will be happy to supply them to Karen Gillon and the committee. The Minister for Transport might even do so.
After listening to colleagues' questions, I have two questions of my own at the end of this session. First, from your response to a number of questions that we have asked, it is clear that another ministerial colleague is responsible for delivering on the partnership commitment. Who is responsible for holding ministers to account and evaluating how effectively they are implementing environmental commitments? Does responsibility lie with you as Minister for Environment and Rural Development or with the sustainable development committee?
Well, the answer is yes to the second part of your final question. However, the responsibility for co-ordination clearly rests with me, because I have been asked by the First Minister to perform that function. Moreover, notwithstanding the fact that the First Minister will chair the sustainable development committee, co-ordinating what is required to deliver whatever comes out of it will also fall to me.
I hope that we have been making some progress on those matters since the Scottish Parliament was established, but such things do not happen overnight. The Executive has been keen not to operate in old-fashioned silos, in which departments do not even talk to each other. That gives completely the wrong signal to officials, and we are therefore trying to break down that culture at ministerial and official level to try to ensure far greater cross-fertilisation of requirement and delivery. I have a co-ordinating role, but I will also be dependent on huckling colleagues and friends to deliver. That will look good in the Official Report. I will probably get a letter from another minister tomorrow.
I welcome warmly the strong commitment that you made at the start of your speech to the partnership agreement's commitment to strategic environmental assessment, which I note goes beyond the European Union requirement and includes strategies. Do you have a view on the pros and cons of primary versus secondary legislation? We had a briefing on secondary legislation at our away day last week. Once a piece of secondary legislation is drafted, it is not amendable. Might there be benefits to a short framework bill that would send a clear political message to all public bodies and could be followed up by more detailed secondary legislation as appropriate?
Yes. You have managed, not surprisingly, to put your finger on all the issues with which we are trying to wrestle right now. I am conscious of the perceptions and issues that surround the difference between subordinate and primary legislation. At the moment, I want to be clear that we have to scope out precisely what we meant. It is quite clear in general terms. The directive is clear that strategic environmental assessment arises only from a legislative requirement. We want to go beyond that. It also only applies to practical plans. We want to extend that, as you know, to strategies and development. We will perhaps apply different final implementation criteria to that, but it is crucial that we change the culture of Government and developmental processes so that environmental considerations are at the top of the agenda.
Going round departments and probing how we would not only implement the directive's basic requirements but take the directive forward—in the absence, sadly, of some of the directions that the European Commission had promised in relation to guidance on certain elements within the directive—has proved to be an interesting exercise. You have made a helpful suggestion, about which I had been cogitating, of having a framework bill. It is not yet clear to me whether, if I go down that route, I will end up by missing the directive's implementation date or only add to the burden. In other words, are we better doing it as a big bang, or can we do it in the way in which you suggest?
There is no question of any slackening of our commitment—far from it. We have actually made substantial progress throughout the Executive in beginning to get the detail of what we require to give effect to our commitment, but we do not know what the best way of dealing with that is. We do not know whether it should be a two-stage process. I want to get that scoping right so that I do not plump for what looks right and then discover that it will diminish the impact of what I am trying to achieve. I am keen to be clear that the objective that is set out in the partnership agreement is what I will end up with.
I am sorry to be slightly vague about that. A lot of work is going on to flesh out the two or three lines in the partnership agreement in a way that I hope the committee will find helpful.
We have run slightly over our deadline. Members will not be surprised to hear that I am not going to go round the committee and let everybody ask a supplementary question or raise another issue. The discussion gives us a sense of the range of interests that we have on the committee and the number of issues to which we will have to return later in the year.
I thank the minister and his officials. I also want to flag up that we are keen to see their time scale for the legislative programme as soon as that is humanly possible. Obviously, I do not ask for that today, but it would be helpful to allow us to programme the committee's work so that we can engage with members of the public and conduct effective scrutiny. I leave you with that detailed thought.