Chamber and committees

This has been a brilliant and illuminating discussion that has given me clarity on some points about which I have been mystified. I have a few questions. I will ask them of you all.

Should the Government require public bodies to procure a minimum percentage of their food from suppliers that are based in Scotland, and a minimum percentage of their food from organic farms?

I will do a preamble to my next question. The response from Scottish Land & Estates to the committee’s consultation notes that

“consumers will need an understanding of what constitutes ‘good food’”.

We have touched on that already. It also states:

“This will require clear labelling and a greater understanding of the provenance of Scottish produce.”

I ask the witnesses for their views on the importance and practicalities of enhanced food labelling, which could include the product’s carbon footprint, the method of production for livestock products, whether the food is ultraprocessed and, potentially, other categories.

I am sorry that I am rattling through my questions. I hope that the witnesses get the gist of them. I can jog their memories.

My final question refers to the Scottish Food Coalition’s consultation response, which stresses the importance of aligning

“Government business and trade policy … with the Good Food Nation goals”,

so that business incentives never encourage movement away from the goals. Do Robin Gourlay and Geoff Ogle agree with that recommendation? Do any of the witnesses have suggestions for how that could be achieved in practice?

I ask Mary Brennan to start by picking up on those three questions. They are about procuring from Scotland, food labelling and business incentives that encourage the good food nation goals.

I have asked all the questions that I wanted to ask, but I can certainly come in with more.

Willie Coffey has questions about urban transformation.

No one is indicating that they want to speak, so I will bring in Paul McLennan, who wants to pick up on the renewables theme.

We will have a few questions from Paul McLennan, then Willie Coffey will come in with a supplementary. We might go over time a little, but I think that we are okay.

Good morning, and welcome to the second meeting in 2022 of the Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee. I ask all members and witnesses to ensure that their mobile phones are on silent and that all other notifications are turned off during the meeting.

The first item on our agenda is evidence on the draft of the fourth national planning framework, or NPF4. This morning, we will hear from Scottish Government officials. This is the first of five evidence sessions that the committee will hold on NPF4. I welcome from the Scottish Government Fiona Simpson, the chief planner, and Andy Kinnaird, head of transforming planning. Thank you for joining us.

We will move straight to questions. I will begin by asking Fiona Simpson, initially, to briefly outline how the Scottish Government engaged with communities and planning stakeholders in the development of the draft NPF4.

It is helpful. I want to pick up on the local place plans, because the committee has some concerns about those, and we have heard concerns about them in talking with stakeholders. A statutory instrument just came to our committee on the issue. How will local place plans be respected and honoured if the local development plans are in place for 10 years? Three or four years into the period of a development plan, a community might realise that it wants some agency and input into how things are being shaped or the response to the climate and nature emergencies. How will that be respected and how will the community be given the power to have its say?

The NPF4 takes a plan-led approach, and there is a lot of focus on planning departments. That is quite concerning, because we have taken evidence from planning stakeholders about the lack of resources. Do you think that planning departments have the required resources to cope with things such as life-cycle emissions assessments? They are already stretched and we will be asking them to do more. How can we ensure that planning departments have the proper funding and enough planners and specialists such as ecologists to look at the aspects that need to be considered? That is the other thing that we have heard about.

Thank you very much, both of you. You have certainly been doing some very thorough work, especially during the pandemic, when activity has been restricted.

I am aware that the consultation is still running, but several stakeholders have questioned the Scottish Government’s running a consultation on the draft NPF4 during the 120-day period of parliamentary scrutiny. You can imagine that that does throw up some challenges. Can you explain to the committee the Scottish Government’s interpretation of the Planning (Scotland) Act 2019 in that regard?

Thank you for that response. We will now move on to a question from Mark Griffin.