Chamber and committees

It is a pleasure to close the debate for Scottish Labour. Much has been said in the debate on which my party can agree.

As has been mentioned, 10 December is the anniversary of the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights by the United Nations. My colleague Pam Duncan-Glancy has already highlighted the themes of dignity, freedom and justice for all, and noted how those are currently threatened here.

Much has already been said about human rights, and several members, including Alex Cole-Hamilton and Karen Adam, have saluted human rights defenders. I will use my time to focus on the context of those rights. I will turn first to their universal nature.

The UDHR was the first major attempt to enshrine human rights around the globe. It builds on the rights in the UN charter to detail the rights that every human being should be able to expect, and it was the beginning of international human rights law as we know it today.

We all know that the work to develop and recognise international law has not had a straightforward path. In the aftermath of the second world war, that was a revolutionary act. It was an attempt to ensure that the crimes that had been committed in the preceding decade would never be repeated.

While we mark the beginning of this era of international law and universal rights, I fear that we are sleepwalking into the end of it, and it pains me to see the UK Government playing its part in that.

The disregard for international law since Brexit has been clear for all to see: we had a UK minister acknowledging that the UK Government’s legislation would break international law in a “specific and limited way”; we have an existential threat to the Human Rights Act 1998; and the Northern Ireland Protocol Bill is threatening to tear up an international treaty. Further, as the Scottish Refugee Council told the cross-party group on Europe earlier this year, the UK Government seems to be trying to ensure that the refugee convention has no effect. What conclusion are we supposed to draw from a Government that behaves in such ways, if not that it has a dismissive attitude to international law? I fear that it does not realise the signals that it is sending to the rest of the world.

To ask the Scottish Government whether it will provide an update on any progress that has been made in finding a solution to save the Belmont Filmhouse in Aberdeen and the Edinburgh Filmhouse and Edinburgh International Film Festival from permanent closure. (S6O-01644)

I appreciate all the efforts that have been made through various avenues to find solutions to the problem for Edinburgh Filmhouse, in particular, but its closure illustrates that the culture sector faces a much wider problem. The perfect storm that the sector faces this winter means that significant parts of Scotland’s cultural landscape are in danger of being lost—perhaps permanently. As I highlighted recently, that would be a great shame after the considerable effort that was made to get them through the Covid pandemic.

Will the cabinet secretary work to see that other institutions like the Edinburgh Filmhouse are not in danger of failure in the coming months?

I am grateful for the opportunity to reflect on the cause of climate justice, the legacy of COP26 and the discussions that have recently taken place at COP27 in Egypt. At COP26 in Glasgow last year, I was glad to be able to meet with many representatives and delegations from around the world. I had a fruitful discussion with the Bangladeshi delegation about the challenges that Bangladesh faces and the way in which Scotland and countries in the global south can work together on climate change.

That includes using Scottish technology and expertise to assist with climate mitigation, which is increasingly important for countries such as Bangladesh and Pakistan, both of which have seen devastating floods this year. Weather events that, only 20 years ago, might have been considered to happen once in a generation or in 100 years are now being seen every year. The need for the accelerated timetable of the conferences is shown by the accelerated progress of climate disasters around the world.

I will return to the theme of mitigation shortly, but I want first to consider COP27. The parties have finally reached an agreement on a loss and damage fund. The work on that, which began in Glasgow last year, acknowledges internationally what has been an obvious truth to many participants for years—namely, that the countries that contributed the least to climate change are the ones that are now being largely affected by climate change’s devastating impact.

We should not underestimate the importance of that acknowledgement, as it is the necessary starting point for climate justice. Through that framework, loss and damage can be calculated and mitigation can be funded across the world. It is a big step, but it is not the only step that is needed for climate justice. I am sure that there are arguments yet to come about the amount that is in the pot and the time that it will take to release funding to countries in need.

Another truth that runs parallel to the one that I have just mentioned is that the global north has benefited greatly from the fossil fuels that have caused the damage, and, as a result, it is now in the best place for a green transition. Therefore, the other hand of climate justice must be to ensure that the countries of the global south are not locked out of the transition and have access to renewables.

Unfortunately, I fear that that part of climate justice is in danger of being lost. Despite all the progress on loss and damage at COP27, we saw no further progress on phasing out fossil fuels. I fear that, without that other side, we will never know true climate justice; instead, we will simply be asking the global north to subsidise the global south while it makes the same mistakes.

That is where the issue of climate mitigation comes into play. We must now take mitigation incredibly seriously because, in the absence of agreement on reducing fossil fuels, it will be more necessary than ever before.

When we see the scale of the damage caused by this year’s floods, we get an idea of what we might be facing in the future. Climate refugees already exist, but their numbers might become greater than we dare to imagine if we do not take mitigation efforts seriously.

The cross-party group on Bangladesh recently heard that there could be as many as 18 million climate refugees from Bangladesh in the coming decades if the worst climate effects are realised. That is the equivalent of the population of the Netherlands becoming refugees. We are fooling ourselves if we think that such large flows of people from climate-hit regions will not have a significant impact on the rest of the world.

It is in all our interests that that does not happen. That means a relentless focus on climate mitigation, but it also means reducing the use of fossil fuels and allowing the global south to have its own part in the green revolution. I greatly hope that COP28 regains that focus on reducing fossil fuels, for all of us.

Will the member take an intervention?

The committee has heard all too often that a variety of organisations do not collect data on ethnicity. That often makes it much harder to find areas in which outcomes are significant for minorities. Is there a way that data on client ethnicity can be collected sensitively by VoiceAbility for future annual reports?

Jonathan Senker.

Thank you very much.

To ask the Scottish Parliamentary Corporate Body whether provision can be made for access to the room for contemplation for evening events held during recess. (S6O-01572)

When I hosted an event for faith groups during the October recess, attendees were forced to pray in the reception, as they were not able to access the room for contemplation. I understand that parliamentary opening hours are curtailed during recess but, as long as members are able to host events that extend outside those hours, surely it makes sense to allow members and their guests to have access to the room for the duration of such an event.