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I welcome our first panel to the second of four evidence sessions on the Environmental Assessment (Scotland) Bill at stage 1. Our three panels today include representatives of environmental organisations and organisations that have undertaken, or are likely to undertake, environmental assessments.
Will you elaborate on your reservations about the pre-screening process? If there was a registration scheme for anything that had been pre-screened out, would that mitigate what you might consider to be the downside of having a pre-screening process?
Essentially, our point of view is that pre-screening is a little pointless. The stated function of pre-screening is to try to reduce the administrative burden. From talking to a number of the responsible authorities that will produce the plans, programmes and strategies, I know that there seems to be an assumption among those that are enthusiastic about SEA that they will probably use the pre-screening mechanism just to verify decisions that they have already made. The extent to which pre-screening will reduce the perceived administrative burden is probably quite modest. Our concern is that the mechanism would be used and exploited as a loophole by those who do not want to have to do SEA. Given that the bill is based on consultation and transparency, pre-screening stands out as an odd mechanism, in that a responsible authority will be able to evaluate its own plan, programme or strategy, decide that it does not have to do SEA and then not tell anyone about that decision, which there will be no opportunity to challenge.
I concur. As it stands, the pre-screening proposal would be counter to the aspiration that SEA should be an open and transparent process, particularly as there would be no opportunity to challenge pre-screening decisions and no information would have to be provided on why such decisions were taken. Pre-screening is not necessary, given that the screening process can fulfil its purpose.
My question has probably partly been covered. I was rather alarmed to read your criticism of the present system of environmental impact assessments, which you say are
My judgment is based partly on personal experience and partly on a five-year review that the European Commission undertook into how the EIA directive was being rolled out in every member state.
As you said to Nora Radcliffe, you feel that having an independent body to oversee the process would be part of the answer.
Essentially, the problem with the concept of minimal effect is that it has not been used in legislation before. Environmental impact assessment legislation has been debated at length because of the concept of significant effect, and how we define "significant effect" has become an Achilles' heel of environmental impact assessment work. The same burden would be placed on defining "minimal effect". Our recommendation is that, rather than try to define "minimal effect", which will mean all things to all men, you should simply remove the requirement for pre-screening, so that you no longer have to define "minimal effect".
You think that that would solve the problem.
It would solve one of the definitional problems, yes.
I concur with that. If you take out the pre-screening process, you will no longer have concerns about different interpretations of such a definition, which does not seem to have been tested in law previously.
However, even if there is no pre-screening—or any kind of screening—somebody will come up with the answer that there is minimal effect; and if everything is screened, there will still be minimal effect in some way. If "minimal effect" cannot be defined before screening, how can it be defined afterwards?
The concept of minimal effect is introduced in the bill only for the pre-screening exercise. In the screening exercise, what is sought is significant effect. We already have one definitional problem with the phrase "significant effect"; the bill would add another difficult-to-define term relating to environmental effects.
I just do not see your problem with minimal or insignificant effect. I presume that, if what is significant can be defined, what is not significant can also be defined.
I would criticise the use of the term "significant" as well, as it is problematic. However, it is in the directive, and to meet the obligations of the directive the bill has to cover what is in the directive. Our concern about the phrase "minimal effect" is that it has not been tested in law, whereas there is a significant amount of guidance and advice relating to significant effect. We also think that the phrase "minimal effect" is attached to a process that is essentially pointless. You could get rid of both a definitional problem and a pointless administrative exercise by getting rid of pre-screening.
At the screening stage, there is a requirement to publish an explanation of why a decision has been taken and an opportunity for that decision to be challenged whereas, at the pre-screening stage there is not. Someone could decide that something had a minimal effect, but they would not have to give information on why they had made that judgment and there would be no opportunity for someone to challenge the decision. At the screening stage, that information has to be made available, and if someone disagrees, they can challenge the decision.
Surely, at the pre-screening stage, it could be decided that something had a minimal effect and it could be put on a register that the decision had been made.
I agree that we could reach a compromise and at least have a register outlining which strategies, plans and programmes had been considered and pre-screened. Many strategies, plans and programmes might come up again in future and it would be useful to have an idea of how they had been considered previously.
Yes—we do not want people to do work that is obviously unnecessary.
I am concerned that we should get to the heart of this now. We are setting up a superstructure for an important part of environmental proofing, but other bodies—such as the Executive's sustainable development directorate—already exist. You want a series of ways in which to register and monitor the SEA process, but that will have to relate to the work of the sustainable development directorate. Should the monitoring process drive the work of the directorate, or should the directorate have some part in the monitoring arrangements?
We have questioned the current proposals for the SEA gateway because of our concerns about independence and transparency. Many of the current programmes and plans have come from groups within the Executive. If one body decides how satisfactory an SEA has been, and the same body decides whether something can or cannot be challenged, issues of transparency and independence arise.
Have they? The directorate is at such an early stage of development that it is hard to say.
You cut right to the heart of the issue when you suggested at the beginning that we are setting up a process that could bring enormous environmental benefits. It could also save us an enormous amount of money. On the last page of my written evidence, you will see our estimate of the cost of rectifying the environmental damage done by the planting in the flow country. It is a very conservative estimate, but we think that it will cost around £41 million. That figure excludes the cost of land acquisition and it is likely to double in the next five years. That is an example from one policy decision in one policy area; if we extrapolate, we can see that the potential savings are gigantic.
Are you saying that we need an authority for SEA as well as the sustainable development directorate?
Yes.
You are beginning to suggest the creation of a plethora of bodies that will attempt to do the same sorts of tasks. All right—someone must initiate policy, but a department will do that. Would developing the sustainable development directorate to monitor the process not be far better than creating the separate body that you propose?
The proposal concerns the functions. As long as the body in which the functions lie has some distance from decision makers and that body undertakes the functions, putting it in the sustainable development directorate might be an option.
I will draw an analogy. The Scottish Executive inquiry reporters unit offers a similar function in planning as a separate entity, but it is part of the Executive, which has a commitment to deliver on planning issues. A similar body could fulfil the requirement for a high-quality SEA administrative and co-ordinating body.
I question that. The reporters unit exists because planning is a quasi-judicial issue. That is not necessarily what we are considering. With our witnesses last week, we explored where we are now, where the bill will take us and the process of going from kicking off with the Environmental Assessment of Plans and Programmes (Scotland) Regulations 2004 just last year to aspiring to an all-singing, all-dancing bill that will require all public authorities to implement SEA on everything. How is the knowledge captured? How do we push people ahead?
Our evidence is based largely on the four key functions that we think are needed. Dividing those functions among separate bodies may have advantages, because an arbiter does not necessarily want to provide advice. It is critical for the four functions to be enshrined in the bill as part of the bill's delivery mechanism. Otherwise, the underpinning administrative process that we need will not exist. We must have a public register, an arbiter, someone who monitors and controls quality and someone who can provide guidance and advice.
That does not automatically lead to an independent process, does it?
There are many attractions to having an independent process, especially if it involves an arbitration function.
I agree entirely that we need to think about how to administer the key functions. There might be some compromise that does not involve setting up an entirely separate unit but, to our mind, that would be the best way to ensure efficient co-ordination and ensure accountability and transparency so that, if there were questions on a judgment, it would be clear that there was a level of independence. It would also be the best way to ensure that there is strong independent monitoring of the reports that have been produced. As we have heard previously, that is necessary to avoid some of the issues that have arisen with the EIA process.
You said that there were issues with, and court cases on, the EIA process in England, but you did not say that there had been any issues in Scotland.
They were English decisions, but the Executive sent an advisory note to all heads of planning detailing the nature of the decisions and indicating that, because the legislation is essentially the same in England, the decisions also applied in Scotland and, therefore, the heads of planning should be cognisant of them when they make planning decisions.
It might be useful to have a look at the European Union review to which you referred—I do not think that we have seen it. We could examine the gap between SEA and EIA and consider what lessons could be plugged into the bill. That would be useful.
The bill provides for a number of exemptions—for example, financial programmes and the Ministry of Defence are exempt—and I am interested in your thoughts on those. In particular, it seems at the outset to be quite difficult for the Ministry of Defence to apply SEA, but is that the case?
We have not commented specifically on it in our written evidence, but I took part in the Ministry of Defence's strategic environmental assessment of the strategic defence review. In that review, the MOD was considering what to do with the defence estate and used SEA as a mechanism to help it to make better environmental decisions about what to do with its land, so it found the process quite useful. That was the MOD's choice; there was no obligation on it to do that.
I can think of no reason why financial and budgetary plans should automatically be exempted. Such plans should be subject to the same screening process. The Executive has already committed itself to considering the sustainable development implications of the spending review, and I would have thought that undertaking an SEA or a similar assessment would complement that commitment.
Is it, in essence, a matter of applying SEA to the financial and budgetary plans that are derived from policies or is it the other way round—that is, a matter of budgets setting out the framework whereby policies can be introduced? There seems to be a chicken and egg question—a bit of confusion about what comes first and how we analyse it.
That is right. Spending plans often make specific commitments and have a huge influence on the plans that are developed at the next step down, so if a decision has already been made at a spending level, some steps have been taken towards influencing the plan, programme or strategy that will be developed. Therefore, it would be appropriate to do strategic environmental assessment at a higher level on some occasions.
I imagine that having an SEA of any budget proposals would enhance parliamentary scrutiny by making the decision-making process a little clearer. I find the Executive's budgetary process somewhat impenetrable, and having an SEA of it would help me to understand better how decisions have been made.
That is a challenge with which the committee has had to wrestle on numerous occasions.
No. One of the surprising differences between the regulations and the bill is that the bill introduces SEA for all strategies, plans and programmes that are developed by public sector bodies, but excludes private bodies that undertake public functions, unless they are subject to the mandatory requirements of the directive. I checked with the Executive and that is the policy intention. It is probably easier to illustrate that with an example, but you will hear from Keith MacLean from Scottish and Southern Energy later and I am sure that he will give you more evidence on this.
Why is that? Is it because they do not fit into the form of words about the setting of a framework for development consent? Is that how those plans and programmes are exempted? I do not understand at what level the decision is made.
It is a bit technical. There is a definition of public, which is broad, and there is a definition of public bodies, which is narrower and specifically excludes private bodies that undertake public functions. The bill moves beyond the mandatory requirements of the directive to cover all the strategies that are captured by the partnership agreement commitment, but private bodies that undertake functions of a public character, such as SSE and ScottishPower, are excluded. Obviously, there is lots of mandatory SEA activity in the energy sector, but, as you say, the key test is whether a strategy sets a framework for future development consents. I argue that a strategy that comes from SSE, as a private body, does not set a framework for development consents. It sets out a list of things for which it may seek development consent from someone else, but SSE is not setting a policy framework. The wording in the bill seems specifically to exclude private bodies that have public functions.
So, for example, the decision to upgrade the Beauly to Denny transmission line does not constitute a framework from which specific planning proposals can flow.
The individual project will be subject to project EIA, but the decision to upgrade that line as opposed to other lines will not be subject to SEA. It will get some scrutiny from the Office of Gas and Electricity Markets, which is the regulator, but under the bill there is no obvious obligation for the decision to upgrade the line to be subject to SEA.
That is a good example. We can use it as a test or a case study and see whether other witnesses give us the same answer. That will tell us whether everyone understands the bill in the same way. We will speak to Keith MacLean from Scottish and Southern Energy later and we will have the minister in front of us in a couple of weeks' time. There is an issue about where SEA stops and environmental impact assessment starts. We want to get to the heart of the question about duplication: how does SEA help the process up front, so that inquiries and decisions are not duplicated? We need to test that.
I have concerns because the consultation bodies are currently limited to the Scottish Environment Protection Agency, Scottish Natural Heritage and the Scottish ministers—who cover the function of Historic Scotland—but the list in schedule 2 to the bill of impacts that are supposed to be considered includes health and transboundary impacts, for example. It would be useful if a body—whether or not it was the co-ordinating gateway or independent body—had the capacity to draw in additional consultation bodies when, for example, it thought that a proposed plan, programme or strategy should involve consultation with a body on a health issue. It would be useful to ask SEPA about the extent to which it is comfortable with covering the health remit. I mean no disrespect to SEPA, but my provisional discussions with it suggest that it has limited resources and limited capacity to cover such issues, and it would be useful if a body such as Health Protection Scotland—which now exists in statute—could be consulted on proposals. I understand that that would be necessary in order to demonstrate that the requirement to consider the issues that are listed in schedule 2—which include health and transboundary impacts—has been fulfilled.
Would the Executive not pick that up by following its own sustainable development indicators? That particular example would be picked up by EU environmental regulations on carbon emissions.
There is a commitment to look at the Community's wish that the directive should consider EU and United Kingdom objectives, but I am concerned that there is no commitment to ensure that commitments and targets at the Scottish level are assessed. The impact of meeting some objectives might be considered, but I am not convinced that that is enough. For example, if there were to be a major transport programme that would particularly affect urban areas, would the current assessment be enough to determine whether that programme would have a detrimental impact on health as a result of increased concentrations of PM10 in a particular area? If there were a requirement to consider whether EU limit values would be exceeded and it was therefore possible to veto a plan, programme or objective on that basis, that would assist, but that possibility does not exist at the moment. We should consider the compatibility of the programmes that we are drawing up with the commitments that we have made, for example to EU directives on air quality and climate.
You mentioned human health, and population has been mentioned too. Why is that?
In schedule 2, the impact on population is one of the characteristics that plans, programmes and strategies must be assessed against. There was a question in my mind about which authority it would be appropriate to consult about that. I am not sure that SNH, SEPA and Historic Scotland alone would be able to provide the required input. I cannot give an example off the top of my head of a strategy, plan or programme that would be affected, but if that is one of the criteria that must be considered as a result of the directive, I am not sure what body would be best placed for consultation.
Okay. We will probably have to raise one or two issues with the minister. For example, I have not heard of Health Protection Scotland.
Apparently it was set up very recently—within the last year.
That makes me feel not so bad.
Meeting suspended.
On resuming—
I welcome our second panel of witnesses: Professor Alan Alexander, chair of Scottish Water; Geoff Aitkenhead, asset management director at Scottish Water; Craig McLaren from the Scottish centre for regeneration at Communities Scotland, where he is director; and Gordon Wilson, who is a corporate planner at Communities Scotland.
I understand that Scottish Water has a statutory duty to deliver sustainable development. Is that correct?
Yes.
Why, then, are you not already undertaking SEA?
It is important to point out immediately that we have a statutory obligation to do that, but that we have to take into account the environmental impact of everything that we do in relation to the planning process. I would argue, first, that the individual environmental impact statements that we have to make for every planning application amount to assessing the environmental impact of the entire programme. Secondly, and perhaps more important, there is a sense in which our capital investment programme—the most significant programme in this context—is actually not owned by Scottish Water. We are the delivery company for it, but it is owned by a much broader group of stakeholders, including the regulators and the Scottish Executive.
The only other thing that I would say is that you will be aware that we have raised concerns in our submissions about duplication of effort. We could argue at this stage that elements of the SEA philosophy are already being practised, and we need to be clear as we go forward about the added value of SEA and about what is already happening through the quality and standards process, through the forthcoming water framework directive processes, particularly the river basin management plans, and through the development of structural and local plans. We must ensure that we all have a common understanding of what SEA adds to those.
Obviously, there are plans and programmes into which other stakeholders, including ministers, have input. What is your involvement in those plans and programmes? Do you assist in the making of decisions regarding, say, infrastructure plans and programmes? Do you have an opinion on certain elements of those plans and programmes?
Yes. We played a full part in the quality and standards III process that was set up by the Executive and which involved a wide range of stakeholders, in particular SEPA, which was the promoter of the environmental improvement programme that we implement, and the drinking water quality regulator, which was the promoter of the public health programme.
Presumably, that will throw up options that will have differing environmental impacts. Unless you apply SEA to your own thinking, how do you know what the environmental impact of different choices would be?
So far, a lot of that work has been done at a project level, project by project. As Alan Alexander has already said, we routinely carry out environmental assessments and prepare reports for planning authorities in particular, and conduct full environmental impact assessments when we are required to do so.
Presumably, though, by the time that you get to an EIA stage, you have already determined the route that you are going to go down. At that point, the issue will be to do with the detail of that project and the choices that you will be able to make at a project level about the mitigation measures that will be put in place and so on. I am asking about your decision to go for a particular route. That is beyond the EIA and is pushing more towards SEA again. How do you analyse the environmental consequences of your decision to go for something like a development in the first place?
It is important to understand the roles of the various players. As we said in our submission, we believe that the quality regulators have the initial role in terms of the cost-benefit analysis.
That makes sense. It replicates the points that were made in the discussion that we had with the previous panel about the need to work out who does SEA and at which point the environmental impact assessment comes in, so that people are not duplicating the same process. Your understanding would be that SEA would kick in at the point at which the policy framework requirements—or, in your case, the quality and standards III objectives—are set and that at that point, you would run every outcome through an EIA process.
It is important to emphasise that nothing that is put in place at the strategic level relieves us of our obligation to conduct EIAs in respect of specific projects. I emphasise again that we are concerned that if we do not get the differentiation between the two levels right there will be duplication of effort and greater expenditure than is necessary. As a tightly regulated business, we do not have anything in our regulatory settlement to pay for more than what we are statutorily obliged to pay for.
We will check that understanding with the Minister for Environment and Rural Development when we hear from him. We have private and public sector comparators and we want to ensure that everyone has the right understanding of the bill.
As you might have heard from my questioning of the previous panel, I was concerned that they had said that the environmental impact assessments were not robust enough. What is the use in having SEA if the EIAs are not doing the job properly? I would like you to comment on that and on the pre-screening process, which I see that you are in favour of. You argue about definitions, but from the opposite perspective to that of the previous panel. You say that the word "significant" needs to be defined properly, but you are quite happy with the word "minimal." Do you think that it is possible to know what a minimal impact would be, but not to know what a significant impact would be?
I will start with the question about the robustness of EIAs, which are carried out to allow us to understand fully the environmental impact of a project and to explore ways of delivering a particular output. The EIAs of which we have experience are produced by specialists—we always employ specialists to do such work for us—and are subject to what I believe is robust scrutiny through the planning process. In our view, the environmental impact assessments that we carry out are sufficiently robust for the purpose for which they are intended.
How many strategies or plans would fall at the pre-screening stage? How often do you think that there would not be some kind of screening, because something was thought to be of minimal impact?
That is difficult to foresee, but I suspect that it would not happen often.
I kick that question across the table to get the perspective of the Communities Scotland witnesses. Do you have a take on the pre-screening issue and on where SEA and EIAs kick in?
We see pre-screening as a positive step forward from the point of view of asking organisations to consider programmes and provide an internal audit trail as a justification for their actions. We appreciate that there are issues about the definitions, which you have discussed in detail this morning. The pre-screening process would certainly help us to integrate the SEA principles into the organisation as more staff take on the idea of reviewing the environmental impact being the important issue that the bill aims to ensure that it becomes.
I will touch on the crossover between EIA and SEA. Communities Scotland is very different from Scottish Water and many other organisations in that, as an executive agency, we must deliver ministerial policy. We do that not directly but through a range of other organisations. Our housing functions are delivered mainly through registered social landlords and our regeneration functions are generally delivered through community planning partnerships. We manage, monitor and set criteria for programmes, but because we do not deliver the programmes on the ground, EIA does not directly affect us.
Do you anticipate that SEA will kick in for you?
Yes. We carried out pre-screening on our corporate plan, for example, and concluded that it would be subject to SEA.
Gordon Wilson said that the benefit of pre-screening is that it provides "an internal audit trail", whereby organisations must justify why they are not including a plan or strategy in the SEA process. Would you have a problem with such information being logged in a register, so that people could see what was included and what was not?
We would have no problem with that. We recently had to come to terms with the coming into force of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002, and we are building more and more freedom of information into the organisation's activities.
In its submission, Communities Scotland says:
Obviously, ministerial policy is set by ministers. Our job is to work with ministers to ascertain how we can implement policy. It is our job to come up with solutions for the implementation of policy locally, in conjunction with the range of different partners that I mentioned. Our role is to do with the practical implementation of policy, rather than the development of policy.
Is that what differentiates Communities Scotland from Scottish Water? You expect to undertake SEA and you say that you are already doing so. How and by whom is that activity being monitored?
We are still in the early stages. We are monitoring the process, to ascertain the resources that it will need. The first thing that we did was consider whether some of our key plans would be subject to SEA, which is why we carried out pre-screening on the corporate plan. The process is on-going.
What stage is the SEA process at in your corporate plan?
The corporate plan was exempt from the SEA regulations, because discussions around it started prior to their coming into force, but as the corporate plan developed, we were very aware of the SEA principles. The plan is being published today and will be available to members through the Scottish Parliament information centre in the next couple of days.
You are at such an early stage that I cannot envisage how we might question—
Sorry, but may I add a comment about housing policy? The setting of ministerial policy would involve discussions between us and Scottish Executive colleagues about principles of policy to do with affordable housing and homelessness, for example. We would then work with Executive colleagues to consider how to meet the prime targets over the next three years.
Will your revised sustainable development policy be subject to SEA?
It is likely to be.
Is that as much as you can say just now?
We are at a very early stage, to be honest.
I think that witnesses from both organisations have picked up on the impact of the bill on staffing, given that staff will have to undertake the process, make the right decisions and be accountable for their decisions. To what extent will guidance or the SEA gateway help you to make internal, strategic decisions about staffing in relation to the delivery of SEA? What resources will you need to allocate, to ensure that staff are geared up to implement the bill? You made cautionary remarks along the lines of, "We know that resources will be needed, but we do not know how much." Have you thought about how you will implement the provisions of the bill when it comes into force, and is timing an issue? We got the impression from COSLA that it would help if the training was required later rather than sooner. You have clearly thought in great depth about how the bill will apply. What is your conclusion about how you can make it work?
In a sense, later is always better than sooner, especially when people are operating in a tightly regulated environment. I make that point seriously. Any additional work that the bill will lay on Scottish Water will fall mainly on our operating budget, if we get the levels right. If the SEA were done at the strategic level by the stakeholder group, much of the implementation would be done at our level. We need guidance to tell us how much we will be involved, which is why we are in favour of pre-screening. We need to reduce the amount of work that our people do.
I tend to agree with what has been said. We have not assessed the impact, in pounds and pence, on staff time, but we realise that, to be sure of implementing SEA as intended across the raft of programmes and plans, the whole organisation will need to adopt the principle, so that it becomes second nature to staff and is not something that is imposed once a year or whatever, but is intrinsic to their work as they carry out their various roles. We are conscious that we will need to take a broad-based approach and that, initially, we will have to work closely with Scottish Executive policy colleagues. Therefore, there will also be an impact back within the Executive. It is difficult for us to cost that because discussions are at an early stage.
I have a resource-related question. Both your organisations have obviously thought a lot about implementation of the bill. How far do you see it as being an in-house function and how far do you feel that you will have to bring in consultants? Related to that, do you have any feel for the training opportunities for your staff and whether there are courses available that would allow you to train your staff to take up these responsibilities?
As I said earlier, our experience of environmental impact assessments to date is at a more detailed level, with regard to planning applications. To date, we have used external consultants and specialists to carry out that sort of work. I think that that will continue in future, until we understand fully our role in SEA and can give some consideration to building the capability within the business. In the short term, I see such work being externally resourced, but training opportunities may well flow, in the future, if we think that we need to build capability within the business.
I will answer the question on training. As Gordon Wilson says, we are trying to mainstream SEA across the organisation. We are trying to ensure that our staff are more aware of environmental and sustainable development issues, and we have piloted some training on that, along with colleagues in Scottish Natural Heritage, Scottish Enterprise, SEPA and other organisations. There is a one-day pilot programme to increase awareness of environmental issues and sustainable development.
As far as consultants are concerned, we are conscious of our current budgetary restrictions and are looking to carry out as much of the work as we can in-house. When we set off down the road of SEA, we thought that it would be too much for anyone to get into. Although there might be external options that we could consider, what happens is that the person who reads up on such matters almost becomes the in-house expert on them.
I do not know whether this is related, but are you concerned about the collection or availability of data to underpin all your environmental assessments?
That is a significant issue for Scottish Water, because much of what we do results in long-term benefits to the aquatic environment. Measuring the prospective benefits of a piece of work and monitoring its actual benefits require some extremely complex water-quality modelling work of the marine environment and inland waters. We look to SEPA in that regard, because it has a particular skill and competence in such work. The data requirements are quite significant.
That might also be an issue for Communities Scotland. Because we are very much geared up for reporting on ministerial targets both internally and back to the Scottish Executive, we have well-honed internal processes for those specific areas. However, as we pointed out earlier, our work cuts across quite a range of relationships and we might well have to gather data to validate whether we are implementing the SEA directive effectively or will meet our statutory obligations at a later date.
I want to pursue Nora Radcliffe's point about costs. I appreciate that SEA and EIA can be conducted on different tiers and that SEA needs to be conducted at the level of the stakeholder groups that you work with. However, you seem to be concerned about costs. Regardless of whether SEA is initiated by a stakeholder group or is conducted in-house, the costs of implementing it might well be similar. After all, you will still have to feed into the process significantly.
That issue must be considered from the perspective of how we control costs which, as a regulated business, we must do. Our economic regulator sets tough targets, which means that we have to minimise the cost of everything we do. Although things have to be done effectively, they must also be done as economically as possible. As a result, we have an interest in ensuring that Scottish Water does not do anything more in-house than it has to do. I am being as blunt about it as I can.
You will be aware that, under the Water Services etc (Scotland) Act 2005, the water industry commission will have to have regard to the sustainable development guidance that is issued to Scottish Water by the minister. Surely the WIC is going to view your sustainable development duty within that context.
I hope so. The determining principle is funding; if we are funded to do something, we will do it, but if we are not funded to do it, we cannot do it. You are right; if economic regulation works as it should, all the obligations that fall on Scottish Water should be funded, but we need to be sure that we are obliged to do only the things that we are statutorily obliged to do.
So the key thing in relation to the bill is to work out whether Scottish Water is carrying out a ministerial function or is a consulting authority.
Absolutely.
Therefore the guidance will be absolutely critical; it will not be in the bill. There will have to be discussion between the Scottish Executive and all public sector bodies about training, how the guidance will work and how we equip agencies to pick up the guidance and run with it.
Yes, and until we have clarity, it is difficult to answer the kind of questions that Maureen Macmillan and Nora Radcliffe were asking about what it will cost us. We just do not know.
We will attempt to find that out from the minister.
I seek clarification. When Q and S III and priorities were being discussed, was SEA never mentioned as being part of what would have to be included?
Yes, there was a discussion about SEA in the early stages of the Q and S III programme.
Of the possible financial implications as well?
They were not discussed in great detail, perhaps because of the lack of understanding of the things that we have been discussing this morning.
Thank you all for giving us your submissions in advance. It has been helpful to hear about work in progress and to see how you are beginning to think about how the bill will work and how you might make it be of benefit. That was one question that we did not ask you; do you think that the bill will be helpful and worthwhile, given that you already have regulations? No one has come out and said no, although you have had the opportunity.
Any concerns that we might have are procedural rather than substantive. We are very much in favour of the principles behind the bill.
It sounds as if Communities Scotland is doing the work already and the question is just how best to do it in the context of the new bill.
Meeting suspended.
On resuming—
I welcome the third panel, which comprises Dr Keith MacLean, head of sustainable development at Scottish and Southern Energy; Dr John Hartley, director and principal consultant at Hartley Anderson consultants; and Liz Bogie, senior manager of knowledge management at Scottish Enterprise. Thank you for the helpful written submissions that you have provided.
I apologise for being late.
I do not see a conflict between sustainable development and economic growth. There will be many win-win situations, and the forthcoming green jobs strategy will highlight some of those situations. That strategy has also strengthened the smart, successful Scotland strategy by emphasising the positive links.
If it serves only to add bureaucracy, is SEA required?
The Scottish Enterprise submission makes it clear that we are very supportive of SEA and that we welcome its introduction and expansion in Scotland. We think that it will bring significant environmental benefits. If SEA is carried out at strategy, programme and plan level, it will introduce the environmental focus at the right level. It will also ensure that a range of options are considered at the early stages of development. Therefore, retrofits, which were sometimes required in the past, will be avoided.
There seems to be some difference between Dr MacLean's submission and the RSPB Scotland submission. Dr MacLean seems to say that Scottish and Southern Energy is a body that exercises functions of a public character and which would therefore be captured by SEA. Is that correct?
The submission made the point that SSE would like to have the clarity to which Sarah Boyack referred. With regard to the directive, the work of SSE is largely that of a private company carrying out a public function. We are not totally clear how the bill will extend requirements to SSE, but there is a potential issue for us, particularly for the transmission and distribution work that SSE carries out.
You make a distinction in your submission between the policy of the renewables obligation Scotland scheme and the project-based EIA proposals that are put forward as part of planning applications. I will ask you about the Beauly to Denny power line, which we have already touched on, as an example of such a project.
You raised a lot of points there.
Is your specific proposal for a Beauly to Denny pylon line upgrade derived from a plan on how you will upgrade transmission networks in Scotland?
The proposal is derived from the need to provide additional capacity to deal with the applications that have been made. Many projects are now being built because they have had permission to proceed. According to our licence condition, we have to provide connection and capacity if projects request that of us.
Does that provide a framework for development proposals that then go through the planning system?
No. The process is still entirely reactive: we cannot control it ourselves. We believe that an SEA would be appropriate and have been pushing for that. We believe that it is important that aspects such as transmission, which are in effect ancillary developments to many of the generation projects, are taken into account in the production of a policy that is assessed for its environmental impact. In the absence of that happening, we try to include some strategic assessment in our project-specific EIA, in that it covers the needs case, which refers back to the policy and the market that is driving the developments.
I am still not clear about what an SEA would do. If the statement were made: "There shall be an upgrade of the grid and these are the environmental implications", what detail would you expect an SEA to go into? Would it go into details such as whether cables should be put underground or go through settlements, for example, or would it be much more general?
I would not expect it to decide in detail where transmission lines should go. The policy aspiration in Scotland is to generate 40 per cent of energy through renewables by 2020, although the detail is as yet undefined. That is pretty much where it stops. The environmental implications of that policy in terms of its effects on generation projects throughout Scotland—particularly the follow-on consequences of the transmission developments that will be required to support the policy and of any other infrastructure requirements—have not been determined.
You are saying that an SEA should have been performed on the renewables obligation Scotland scheme.
Had the legislation been in place, the ROS would have fallen under it. That would have resulted in a more detailed policy that took the issues into account up front, rather than one that required them to be taken into account over time. SEA would have been appropriate for that policy and made it better.
So it would be possible to perform a strategic environmental assessment now on wave and tidal power, before people become involved in developing it.
I believe that the Executive is looking at carrying out SEA work on marine developments at the moment.
How do you view your position in comparison with that of Scottish Water, which commented on the receiving of instructions and the fact that it is a tightly regulated organisation? In many ways the functions that you carry out are similar, because you have to deliver services in what is almost a monopoly.
In many ways, we are as heavily regulated as Scottish Water is in carrying out our transmission and distribution activities. We support Scottish Water's position that the environmental impact assessment of individual projects is its direct responsibility. If we were involved in policy development, we would expect, as part of a wider stakeholder group, that that work would be covered by SEA. However, when it comes to the delivery of a project on the ground, there is already more than adequate coverage of environmental impacts through EIA legislation.
So the bureaucratic burden could become onerous.
That is our big fear.
To sum up, you fear the wrong organisation undertaking SEA at the wrong stage of development.
Yes. We also share Scottish Enterprise's view with regard to ensuring that we do not allow a bureaucratic process to get in the way of development.
I echo what was just said. The policy decision was to promote renewable energy development in Scotland. When that decision was made, an SEA should have been done. That would have flagged up the key issues such as access to the grid and capacity. It would not have fixed the precise route or construction methods, but it would have flagged up the range of issues, which would have allowed the public to have an input. EIA deals with the detail of the routing and the construction method. Perfectly adequate legislation is in place for that.
I will move on to the scale on which SEA should operate. Scottish Enterprise's submission talks about the need to ensure that SEA is undertaken at the right level. In her first response, Liz Bogie said that she did not want to do anything that would prevent Scottish Enterprise from being a nimble organisation and expressed reservations about gold plating Scottish Enterprise's work.
We have examined SEA for the past two years and tried to get our heads round it and to understand its benefits and how we will implement it in the network. A document such as our operating plan, which might be a natural subject for SEA, covers a huge range of activities and geographies. One of our concerns and uncertainties is that most experience of SEA relates to land use and land planning. When we move on to matters such as the skills and learning agenda, careers guidance and business development, it becomes more difficult to find case studies and to consider how SEA might be applied.
Listening to Communities Scotland made me think that it was taking ownership and trying to work out how SEA will become a benefit to its work, whereas SEA comes across as being much more of a threat or a potential threat for Scottish Enterprise. How do you turn that round? One of your comments is that emphasis should be placed
We are supportive of SEA. We have been considering it for a couple of years and have had sessions with other public sector organisations and Elsa João from the University of Strathclyde to try to get the best understanding that we can. However, there comes a point when we must decide whether we have enough information to do some sensible pilots that will help us to move forward or whether we still have too little information and too many uncertainties. Until reasonably recently, we felt that there were too many uncertainties for us to be able to do anything helpful. However, we are getting to the tipping point at which we have a level of comfort, but there are still issues with definitions and exactly how many of our plans, programmes and strategies will be covered by SEA.
You suggest that we should establish a strategic steering committee—no one else has made that suggestion, although there is clearly a big issue with how everybody takes SEA on board and learns from one another. Such a committee would provide a way for all the key public sector organisations to share their expertise and work with the gateway, but would a formal committee be necessary, or is it more a matter of networking and having a regular opportunity to raise problems and challenges and to work out how to solve them? Will you say a bit more about that proposal? It is an interesting idea.
We come at the proposal from two angles. One is the need for a good practice network in which to share issues, problems and solutions. A natural group for us to share issues with would be the regional development agencies in England but, because of differences in SEA legislation, there would be limits to how well we would be able to learn from one another. The strategic steering committee would be very much about sharing good practice, sharing knowledge and tackling issues together. The witnesses from Communities Scotland mentioned training, and the steering committee would also be about joint training programmes on sustainable development, such as those in which some of the public sector has already been involved.
That fits in nicely with a previous comment that the gateway could provide guidance and have an overview while the Scottish Executive's sustainable development directorate could perform a monitoring role. Is your point simply that somebody is required to fill those roles so that bodies can be brought into the SEA process?
That is right.
Do you envisage the Executive's sustainable development directorate filling that role? You talk about the need to bring together the environmental aspects with the economic and the social. That is what sustainability means, so would it make sense to bring a strategic steering committee under the remit of the sustainable development directorate?
It might well make sense. We would need to consider how best to bring to the table all the key players that need to be round it, but I am not in a position to comment on whether the sustainable development directorate could do that or whether it would be a useful function for the directorate. However, we need to ensure that all the voices are heard and that all three legs of the sustainable development stool are represented so that we have a nice steady stool, not a shooglie one.
Your written submission seemed to be defensive on economic growth. I presume that you are talking about gross domestic product rather than any other sustainable measures.
GDP is one of the measures that we used. It is a headline indicator for us and we accept its imperfections, but CO2 emissions are also an indicator.
The convener pointed out that you highlighted the need to focus on the plans that have the most environmental impact, but surely we also need to consider those that have the least environmental impact. My understanding is that SEA is about the need to understand the environmental impacts of the direction in which the Government is pushing continued economic growth. Are you keen for all plans to be assessed?
Before you answer, Ms Bogie, I should point out that I was quoting from the submission, which talks about environmental benefits. My point was that we need to consider the full impact of plans and not only the benefits.
The submission says that you
Behind the statement that you quoted lies the desire to find where we can make the most difference. We are saying that, if a plan or programme could have negative environmental impacts, how could SEA spin it towards positive impacts? If we could do that, we could make a huge difference. If the impacts were already reasonably positive, SEA might make only a marginal difference. We want to focus on where we can make the most difference.
Is it still important to consider the plans and programmes that will have a negative environmental impact?
Absolutely. We were not saying that we should not do that; we were saying that we should focus on where we can make the most difference. We are not saying that we should simply focus on the plans and programmes that will have positive impacts anyway. We want SEA to lead to the biggest changes and the most positive outcomes.
You might not get instant answers, but it is worth while going through the process.
Surely, if you incorporate environmental awareness in all your skills and learning training, it will have a huge impact. We are not asking people to go down the traditional route; the bill tries to make people think about many different routes. That is the whole point. We need to consider the big impacts and the little impacts. If we think about climate change, we need to consider every improvement that we can get.
Just over a year ago, we mapped out the environmental industries in Scotland. We wanted to get a feel for how many companies there were, how big they were, what issues they thought were important, where they saw growth potential and where they saw barriers. We specifically wanted to find out about skills issues, but very little information came back.
That is interesting. In evidence that we heard on climate change, environmental skills in housing were often mentioned. I suppose that it depends on what question is asked.
It also depends on the definition of environmental industries.
Nora Radcliffe asked about timescales. Dr Hartley, you mentioned timescales and consultations. Can we square the circle?
I am sensitised to the issue because industry often looks for precise guidance on how long it will take before it knows the direction in which it is going, and whether such-and-such a project will get the go-ahead. The way in which the bill is drafted leaves it rather too open. There is Cabinet Office guidance on the duration of the public consultation period, which is 90 days. I do not suggest that you just accept that without thinking through what it means, but from an industry standpoint it would be helpful to define the normal consultation period for a plan or programme.
That is a good point on which to finish. I thank the final panel of witnesses for coming in this morning, and being prepared to pick up all the questions that we have been testing out on everyone else, to see whether you would come up with the same answers.
Meeting suspended.
On resuming—
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