Chamber and committees

It is important to look at the situation as well as the context in which we find ourselves with regard to our Nordic neighbours and councils and structures across the European continent. Some of our councils are too small to be strategic and some are too large to be local.

As you said, the grid is reserved, and it is important that we work with our UK Government colleagues to ensure that the right planning is in place across Scotland. Indeed, electricity is not consumed where it is generated, and over the past decade we have seen the resulting constraints on our own renewable energy system across hydro, solar and onshore wind in Scotland. That reflects the UK Government’s back-to-front approach of building generation capacity before investing in the transmission infrastructure that is needed to support it.

Given that we have already seen a back-to-front approach on renewables, we need to ensure that anything new that is coming down the track does not incur the same issues. I have looked at Ireland with some interest, especially over the past six to 12 months, because clearly there are issues. You raised the 22 per cent figure, which gives me concern, but it gives me greater impetus to ensure that we, alongside the UK Government, start to discuss those matters.

I am very clear that AI data centres will not and should not push up costs for communities across Scotland. We have already seen that happen with our renewables system, and unfortunate choices by the UK Government, such as not yet decoupling gas from electricity prices and not introducing regional pricing, have left us with a system in which communities in the Highlands and Islands, including my own, experience some of the highest levels of fuel poverty despite hosting Viking Energy, which is one of the largest onshore wind farms in Europe.

Let us not make the same mistakes when it comes to data centres. A couple of technological solutions could be considered as part of the wider picture. There could be private connections, and there could also be an effort to use data centres as a form of demand response for the grid during times of curtailment. Some interesting guidelines are being developed by the Office of Gas and Electricity Markets at the moment. It is consulting on a proposal to introduce a fee for direct connection to the grid system, specifically for data centres, of between £250,000 and £700,000 per megawatt. It will be quite interesting to follow that proposal as it progresses.

Clearly, we need data centres in order to digitise many parts of our society, from health to universities to tech to innovation to invention and also, potentially, public sector reform. However, we need to get it right for Scotland, and I would certainly prefer to create a home-grown solution rather than taking one from elsewhere, because we have a very unique set of circumstances in Scotland, and we should not forget that that is why the data centres have come knocking in the first place.

I support the Deputy First Minister writing to the committee, because we want to create space for ideas here, and we rely on members to work with us to come up with good ideas.

Having lived and worked in Norway for almost half a decade, I know it does that quite frequently across its private and public sectors. Norway tries to increase the crossover in a very systemic and structured way, so that it is able to create a society that understands the dilemmas and challenges from either side of the low fence. It has systems and processes that allow it to be able to recognise the issues on both sides. Ms MacCallum’s is a very interesting idea, and we should explore it.

I will just supplement that. Tension can bring real benefits if it is approached in the right way and with the right mindset. What we, as a society and as citizens, experience is that we do not live our lives in silos of education, health, transport or social care. Our lives are more complex than that.

More information will come out over the next three months as we make progress, but we, as a Government, in looking at our budgeting process and the PSR agenda, are trying to move away from a very vertical, siloed approach towards a more bundled perspective with greater horizontal integration.

This is about looking at things in the round, considering what can be controlled at national, regional and local levels, having those discussions and then asking where decision making sits locally and how delivery can be executed regionally. It is also about trying to move away from the very siloed perspective that has developed over many years. We have created a lot of process and structure that has become habitual and is now acting as sand in the wheels. Ms Campbell makes a very good point.

Local development plans are an important way of democratising our planning. They do exactly what I was suggesting to Gary Bouse, by enabling planners to create spaces and to put development at the heart of communities.

At a conference two months ago, I met many local development plan leads. We will make progress in the next couple of months. It would be remiss of me to give a date for when we will see all the plans in place, but local development officers and leads play an important role in local democracy, in what local government will look like and in the execution of public sector reform. That is a ready-made solution at the heart of our local authorities, with links to Government level. It is important to consider local development plans as we move ahead with PSR.

I go back to Simon Sinek’s golden circle: I want to start with the why—why we need to get this right—then we will look at the what and the how. I want to get my colleagues around the table, along with our officials, and we will get experts in, too. That process is under way. I will not sit here and talk about the national end point, but it is absolutely top of the agenda.

You can see the strength of feeling around the country on the issue as well. I go back to the role of Government, which is to see that strength of feeling and to be able to act pragmatically and calmly to take the best approach for our communities and our people.