Chamber and committees

It is fine—it was answered earlier.

This touches on Sarah Skerratt’s point about a broader approach than farming-specific CPD. I have become aware of the mental health challenges for farmers and other people who live and work rurally. Does the Government need to be aware that the scope needs to be broader? Given that we are in a just transition and that people will have to learn a lot, mental health needs to be addressed.

I hear the importance of the 5 per cent of 25 per cent—[Inaudible.]

In our papers, we read that the James Hutton Institute questions whether

“support for agriculture is the most effective or efficient way to address issues facing rural areas. As such, the Bill provides a foundation for agriculture and environmental policy not rural policy more widely.”

We see that there are lots of opportunities now in community ownership, community woodlands, community renewables, nature restoration projects, and soft infrastructure that we desperately need for training and facilitation. I wonder whether the agriculture budget is the most important or appropriate source of funding for rural communities if we are going to be clear that there is an agricultural, farming community but also a wider community? There is an interconnection, but do we need to look at the support payments that are coming for agriculture and growing food and then at other things? Another opportunity that is coming is with the community wealth building bill. How can we make that work for communities? Of course, I hear from the local action groups about how important that money is and how transformative the 5 per cent is, but I wonder whether we could look at how we do that differently.

I will go to Sarah Skerratt and maybe Rob Clarke from Highlands and Islands Enterprise.

As the convener said, we are moving on to the theme of powers to provide support. Part 2 of the bill gives Scottish ministers the power to establish a new funding and support system for Scottish agriculture. I have a number of questions in that area, some of which we started to touch on under theme 1, so I might not rehearse that.

As the convener keeps saying, we are now at the business end of this process, so I am interested in hearing whether you believe that the powers in the bill will enable ministers to ensure that there is a just transition not just for farmers but for the wider rural community. That comes in the context of the Cabinet Secretary for Transport, Net Zero and Just Transition’s recent announcement on the climate adaptation plan. Do you think that the powers will be enough to get us to where we need to be for both farmers and rural communities?

I have a couple of more detailed questions. I will ask them both and then direct them at folk—I just want to let people know that they are coming their way.

For Douglas Bell and Theona Morrison, I have a question on tenant farmers and crofters. The bill creates powers to support

“the use of land for woodlands where that use is ancillary to the farming of the land for other agricultural purposes.”

I presume that that might include support for the croft woodlands that are being called for as well as agroforestry, parkland and silvopasture. I am interested in hearing your thoughts on whether tenant farmers and crofters benefit from that kind of support. If not, what can we do to ensure that they get it?

That was my first question. I have another question relating to just transition that I will direct at Theona, again, and Steven Thomson. I think that both of you have already touched on the issue of support not having been provided for small-scale local fruit and vegetable producers. It has been coming up in conversations that I have been having all across my region, and I would be interested in understanding whether you have any sense of the importance of that sector to rural communities, food security and local economies. Are there enough provisions—enough hooks—in the bill to ensure that we can bring that support forward?

That is very helpful.

Phil Diamond, have you been able to engage?

If the ability to go into the building to remediate all those things that you listed had been in place as part of the pilot, you would have gone ahead with that to demonstrate a whole experience of a building being completely remediated. Is that the idea?

That has been a helpful opening discussion on the scope of the bill and what it includes and what it does not include. Some interesting points have emerged.

We will move on to questions from Willie Coffey.

I am getting confused. We talked earlier about the scope of the bill, and now we are talking about PAS and whether that is what we would want to use. Does PAS just look at fire safety? Earlier we were talking about the need to look at cladding in order to move that forward, and now we are talking about PAS, which looks at the whole fire safety of a building. Am I getting that right?

Do we want to use PAS to look at the whole building, but use the triage approach that Phil Diamond suggested to get on with the cladding part of it, while we understand that there are other pieces that we might need to come back and do? Could you explain a bit more?

Will you say a little more about the difference between data capture and a survey?