Chamber and committees

I have no additional remarks, convener. I will press amendment 30.

Amendments 33 and 35, which seek to set standards for monitoring and data logging, including against agreed national metrics, would help put into place proper measurement of the progress on community wealth building, and would also give us the data to understand the starting points and disparity between Scottish regions.

I support amendment 82, in the name of Sarah Boyack, on reporting on impact. However, I am not convinced of the value of an independent review on top of all the reporting measures, so I will not support amendment 83.

On amendment 54, I think that Richard Leonard has the right idea, but surely the reference to “details” in the amendment would undermine commercial confidentiality. After all, co-operatives are still commercial enterprises and have the same confidentiality needs as other businesses. I hope that the member will consider revisiting and altering the amendment for stage 3.

As for amendments 55 and 56, again in the name of Richard Leonard, I do not think that annual reviews are a good use of resources. You would just have finished one report and then would have to start another, and that would impede progress.

I move amendment 33.

11:30

I have no further remarks, convener, but I will withdraw amendment 7.

Amendment 7, by agreement, withdrawn.

Amendment 8 moved—[Lorna Slater].

Thank you.

Like other colleagues, I have lodged amendments in this group to add detail to the measures that are to be taken. Through the amendments, I explicitly call out fair work, community transport, support for co-operatives and community energy. In the interest of time, I will highlight only a few of the amendments.

On my amendments 2 and 14, it looks as though the minister has lodged amendments 75 and 87 to cover the same ground, so I am content not to move those amendments.

Amendment 36 seeks to clarify that commissioning and procurement are separate but related activities to ensure that local authorities are fully able to include commissioning in their wealth building planning.

Amendments 31 and 37 relate to when local authorities and public bodies dispose of land and other assets, and it seeks to ensure that they must think of something other than getting the most money. They must also consider how the asset fits into the community’s vision for itself and the common good. That is vital to local authorities being able to implement each community’s vision for itself.

Amendments 4 and 16 seek to include the consideration of local climate resilience and mitigation in community wealth building, for example through distributed or local power generation to ease local generation in the case of storm damage to the grid; or through flood protections for the community and of community land.

Amendment 22 seeks to recognise the importance of constructive and collaborative joint venture opportunities between communities and public bodies. If the amendment were agreed to, that would be an important step to formalising those relationships and creating new opportunities, but I am interested to hear what colleagues have to say on the amendment, and we will then consider whether to move it.

On amendment 43, I say to the minister that I am not sure that legislation is needed for the Scottish Government to work with the UK Government, and I would like to hear the Scottish Government commit to undertaking such work. If the minister is able to commit to that, I will not move amendment 43.

I am content with and will support many of the amendments from my colleagues in this group, but there are a few that I find problematic and cannot support. In the interest of time, I will highlight just a few of those, in the hope that we can revisit them at stage 3.

The first half of Richard Leonard’s amendment 50 is fine, but I cannot support the second half. My understanding is that the whole point of the Scottish National Investment Bank is its independence and freedom from Government interference in its investment decisions. It is right that that is so. Any attempt through legislation to get the Scottish Government to lean on the bank would undermine its independence, and I will not support any amendments that seek to do that. The only exception to that will be Richard Leonard’s amendment 51, which is sufficiently vague not to undermine the bank in that way. [Laughter.]

I have no further remarks, convener. I press amendment 6.

Amendment 128 seeks to ensure that local authorities consider the use and disposal of common good land and assets when developing their action plans. As other members, including Rhoda Grant, have highlighted, common good land and assets will be significant in relation to the development of those plans.

I would like members to particularly consider amendment 38, the purpose of which is to ensure that local democratic organisations such as community councils and development trusts, organisations that are already working on community wealth building in the area and key private companies such as major local employers are included. A key concern that was flagged by stakeholders in the committee’s stage 1 evidence sessions is that existing organisations, such as community development trusts, that are already working on community wealth building and that have substantial local knowledge and experience can be completely excluded from the development of action plans. The development trusts that we heard from specifically asked that they be included, and it seems counterproductive to ignore the experience and expertise that they can bring to the process.

It also seems sensible to include private firms that are substantial local employers or landowners. I think that Murdo Fraser’s amendment 18 attempts to do something similar.

I think that Sarah Boyack, through amendment 91, is looking to do something similar to what I am trying to do through amendment 38, but I think that her wording is too broad. My amendment describes democratic community groups, which include community councils, so it is more specific and representative.

I do not disagree with the intention of Paul Sweeney’s amendments 125 and 129, but they would be in slightly odd places in the bill, so the matter could perhaps be reconsidered at stage 3.

I think that the annual reporting requirements that are set out in amendment 65 would be too onerous, so I will not support that amendment.

My amendments in the group are intended to make the Community Wealth Building (Scotland) Bill more robust and to ensure that it adheres coherently to the principles of community wealth building.

By structuring the statement’s objectives around the community wealth building pillars and connecting it to the national performance framework, amendments 30 and 32 intend that the bill will hardwire community wealth building into Scotland’s broader economic, social and environmental architecture.

I have a particular interest in amendment 70. A bill with a single purpose is much clearer and easier to implement than one with two possibly conflicting purposes. The goal of pursuing economic growth is to maximise gross domestic product, which is very much at odds with the goal of reducing inequality and supporting the little local guy against big corporations.

No witness at the Economy and Fair Work Committee identified economic growth as a useful metric for measuring community wealth building, so I argue that it has no place in the bill. We are trying to grow something entirely different here—resilience and local wealth. We are not just trying to maximise GDP, so why reference something that can be measured only in GDP? We know that GDP is not an effective measure of community wealth building. If we measure the wrong thing, we get the wrong outcomes, so why not remove it from the bill altogether and remove the confusion?

In amendment 40, I am explicitly picking out the development of community-owned renewable energy, given the size and importance of that sector to communities across Scotland, not to mention the opportunities that it offers.

Amendment 21 would change “may” to “must” to ensure consistency and impact across Scotland.

On amendment 79, not all local authorities currently even comply with their statutory duty on common good land and assets registers. Without a deadline for that compliance, they have just failed utterly. They have had 10 years to do this, and it is time to press them on it.

On Sarah Boyack’s amendment 73, individuals also need to build wealth, not just businesses and organisations. When individuals own shares in a local enterprise or take dividends from a community energy project, they are sharing in the wealth, which I think is right. Unfortunately, I cannot therefore support Sarah Boyack’s amendment 73.

I move amendment 30.

On the Government’s amendments 76 and 88, I would like members to pay close attention, as I am particularly worried. My concern is that their phrasing may cover external and foreign investment, which is exactly the opposite of community wealth building, the whole point of which is for communities of Scottish people to acquire assets and build wealth, not to bring in external people who will invest and acquire assets for themselves. On the face of it, those amendments appear to totally undermine the purpose of the bill, and I strongly request that the Scottish Government does not move them but reconsiders the wording before stage 3; otherwise, it risks undermining the bill altogether.

I agree with the idea in Paul Sweeney’s amendment 119, but I am not sure that he has put it into the right part of the bill, so I will not support the amendment.

On amendment 120, I am unclear about what Paul Sweeney proposes. Is it that ministers lean on credit unions to make potentially bad loans? That would not make sense. I would support an amendment that supported new credit unions, the expansion of credit unions or the engagement of community groups with credit unions, but I cannot support amendment 120 as worded.

I have no further remarks to make, other than to press amendment 33.