Chamber and committees

We will be pegging our levels to the UK Government levels. With regard to the transfer of powers, it was agreed on a cross-party basis to make changes to the Scotland Act 1998 to provide us with those powers.

You are making assumptions that have not been made, so if you have views, I would encourage you, and others, to take part in the consultation that is currently taking place.

As I said, the policy is being led by the Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Local Government in relation to the Exchequer as a taxation measure. I will ask her to provide the committee with information, if that has been produced.

We have a responsibility ourselves to deliver what we set out in the climate change plan and in respect of considering how we drive forward net zero. I emphasise that reaching net zero through carbon emissions reductions runs across all our policy areas with regard to the choices that are made, so we have to co-ordinate. Some points were made earlier about housing and energy, EV charging and other areas, and that shows us why there has to be alignment across Government in a lot of these areas. We take our responsibilities very seriously to ensure that we deliver on the carbon emissions reductions targets for which we are statutorily responsible.

We have statutory carbon budgets, so we are required in law to achieve them over the three periods. We will track delivery and, if we are off course, adjustments will be needed. Given the way in which the legislation has been established, we would need to adapt our transport policies or policies in other sectors to achieve the targets. That is what the adjustments would be.

On whether we can meet the targets, we are in line with what the Climate Change Committee has said. However, there are some differences, which is why the draft climate change plan has a greater focus on transport than on other sectors. Generally, in its advice, the Climate Change Committee anticipates that, as part of the transition, there will be far more of a shift from internal combustion engine vehicles to electric vehicles than was previously thought, so that is reflected in our proposals. That means that there must be a rapid uptake of EV cars and vans in particular, because that is the biggest area, but it is also important that we support the heavy goods vehicle sector to ensure that HGVs can continue that process, which is already taking place. We need to work with private investors and others to do that.

In relation to what characterises the draft climate change plan, as you have correctly identified, it anticipates that there will be far greater take-up of electric vehicles than was previously thought. The balance is more towards the shift to electric vehicles, but there is still a requirement for car use reduction, which is beneficial in lots of other ways. However, there is less emphasis on car use reduction and more emphasis on take-up of EVs.

That poses particular challenges for Scotland, given that we have extensive rural areas and a great reliance on cars, so the budget includes specific measures, which we have already started to roll out, on EV charging infrastructure in rural and island areas.

The opening question was about the context of the plan. We must move smartly and quickly in a lot of areas now in order to achieve the projected reductions that are anticipated in the future.

The previous climate change targets were set by the Parliament. Indeed, the extended targets were put in place as a result of pressure from Opposition parties. We are where we are, and I understand that you would have wanted the climate change plan earlier.

It would be sensible to ensure that all the incentives that are on offer are complementary. The UK Government is currently providing a discount of more than £3,000 for the purchase of electric cars and is running an advertising campaign to help promote that, and the Scottish Government is also embarking on the promotion of EV take-up. Part of that will address the savings that can be made, because that is one of the benefits of having an EV, if you can afford one in the first place. It is important to make it clear to people what they can save in terms of costs at the petrol pump.

Affordability is one of the big challenges, and there are those who might not be able to buy an EV new. That is another area that is yet to be developed. We have previously offered loans to encourage people to buy EVs. Latterly, they have been offered more for second-hand cars and also for vans. Part of our work with the Energy Saving Trust is to try to target EV take-up by those who might not be able to afford a new EV but who might be able to afford a second-hand one.

We have just secured the budget. You will want me to say what I am going to do and how I am going to pay for it. I would say that it is a chicken-and-egg situation, in that we have to have the funds to deliver what we want to deliver. However, we have secured funding that will help us to deliver it.

There are other things that help to encourage a reduction in emissions, such as the bus infrastructure fund, but consumer incentives targeting various areas will make up the vast majority of the work that we will do in that regard. I have not had advice on that yet, so I am not going to tell you what we are going to do, but there could be, for example, a subsidy to encourage take up, and the second-hand market is of particular interest. We also have to look at what the private market is doing and not have the Government cause displacement in that area. In the past, we have had scrappage schemes for taxis and other incentives to help to reduce costs.

The Government will do a variety of things. We have just secured the funding for that—I am confident that we have funding from the budget and the spending review that will help us to do it. As I said, we need to move pretty quickly on the transport side of things.

I will bring in Morna Cannon on that.

That is why we have the rural and island infrastructure fund, in particular, and the mapping of what is needed and where that need might be.

There is also location charging. We could be thinking about the tourist market in rural Scotland, and about encouraging and working with different destinations to have chargers, so that people can pick up their EV at the airport and be able to charge it in the different places that they visit. That is a target. I am also thinking of, say, small bed and breakfasts or other places that would want to encourage people to come, which could have EV charging. They could fit the eligibility criteria for the rural and islands infrastructure fund, too.

You mentioned trunk roads, which brings us back to those more dispersed areas where people might go. The question is: when people are travelling on those roads, will they want to come off them and be provided for? In Dundee, for example, there are numerous privately funded public charging networks alongside Costa Coffees and so on. Increasingly, we are seeing signs that say, “Wait and have a coffee”; in fact, I opened one such site near Glasgow airport, where people can have a Costa coffee. The fact is that the sites that are off trunk roads tend to be shopping centres and so on.

I frequently get asked about the A9. Interestingly, it was originally not supposed to have any service stations on it, so that people had to go into the streets of the neighbouring towns. We have a good map of the availability of EV charging on the A9 corridor—not on the A9 itself, but in Pitlochry, Dunkeld or wherever—that we can provide to the committee. Clearly, if you want to have a Costa Coffee/charging point off a trunk road, that will be market led; it is not something that we, as a Government, would set up, because it would be a private initiative. We are open to that sort of thing, but it would be up to those who were interested in that market opportunity to talk to the local authority about the planning for such a site, as well as to local landowners, in order to come up with a proposition.

When you talk to those who travel the A9 regularly—especially those who are involved in freight haulage—you find that they tend to charge their vehicles before and after the journey. The issue is one of range. Has the range of the vehicles got to such an extent that you can do Perth to Inverness comfortably? That will depend on what car you have, but there is a market solution to be had there. There is certainly a lot of activity and work taking place in that respect.

We need to think about where the Government should step in and where the private sector will step in. We think that there is an emphasis on that in the rural and island infrastructure fund, but there is an open door to anyone who wants to approach local authorities to develop such facilities, as they have done in cities, to a greater extent on trunk road corridors.

I was asking for permission to do so.

You make a good point about using interconnected energy sources within homes. I am not sure about additional incentivisation for equipment. Anyone who has bought an EV will know that equipment can be part of the deal in some cases, so we do not want to displace that aspect. We have, in the past, provided funding to help with some workplace and home charging, and that might be an incentive that we could have for those with driveways. I would put that into the category of potential incentives.

On integration with housing policy, Phil Raines looks at things across the piece and may know whether there is anything in that regard. That would make sense as part of the whole new-build area. However, I am not a housing minister, so I am not going to go into that.

It makes absolute sense to put that in the planning regulations for new builds. I do not want to commit other cabinet secretaries to policy, but the more we can do to make that natural and encourage it from the start, the better. There is the issue of conversion for existing properties and the question of new builds. I am not familiar with the planning regulations for new builds, but we may be able to come back to you on that because it is a good point that has been well made.