Chamber and committees

But it is a track that is in existence and we have figures for injuries and deaths when there was racing there and they are slightly higher than the average across Great Britain. What is the difference in the inherent risk? If you are a dog and you are racing at Thornton, what is the difference in the risk of leg breaks or other injuries that could be life threatening? What is the difference between racing at Thornton compared to racing at a GBGB track elsewhere in the UK or at Shawfield?

Where is your evidence for that in stats and figures?

There are limits. We no longer send children up chimneys to clean them because there is an inherent risk in that.

I think you know that that is not what I am saying.

I think that you said at the outset that you are not persuaded by the argument that the petitioners have brought forward and this committee has been considering for some time now.

You said that you were not persuaded at this point and that you did not feel that the proposal was proportionate. That was your starting point. Where does public opinion sit within this? We have spoken at length about the small number of people who own and race dogs at Thornton, but public opinion is strongly behind a ban on greyhound racing, which is what the petitioners want. The petition itself was the most signed petition in the 25-year history of the Scottish Parliament. Where do you think public opinions sits?

To go back to the legislation that was passed in the previous session of Parliament, which prohibited the performance, display and exhibition of wild animals in travelling circuses, at that time—and I think Mr Voas will know more about this, given that he worked on the Wild Animals in Travelling Circuses (Scotland) Bill—there were not any wild animals in travelling circuses in Scotland, or there were very few. Arguably, as there were not many animals involved in that, it probably was not the biggest animal welfare issue in Scotland at the time, but there was strong public support for a ban on the use of wild animals in travelling circuses and, to give the Government its due, it moved forward on that legislation, which was considered by the Environment, Climate Change and Land Reform Committee and passed by Parliament. What do you think about public opinion? Does that have any bearing with this Government?

Thanks to Monica Lennon for championing a range of different, really important approaches, which are being driven by communities and social enterprises. Some of the work that has been happening around Scotland on nappies over the past 20 years is really valuable. There is certainly more that can be done to promote best practice and to ensure that it is rolled out across different councils.

Maurice Golden makes an important point. We have had 20 years, particularly on nappies, and evidence has been brought as to what the most effective way forward is to reduce waste and to treat the inevitable waste that we will continue to get from disposable nappies. We have also had evidence on what is driving behavioural change and what the barriers are to that. It is important that the Government reflects on all of that. The most appropriate way to pursue the work on reusables is through the route map, which is where the discussion with Monica Lennon and Lorna Slater got to.

Social enterprises are doing incredible work. We have some good examples of amendments being lodged involving nappies and mattresses. We could lodge a whole range of other amendments here: I would highlight bikes as being massively important, with social enterprises taking bikes out of landfill, doing them up, selling them on and generating skills and training. Those bikes can then be used in schools for bikeability training. There are lots of examples, and another one is furniture.

The question is what it is appropriate to do in the bill. Although I am reassured by some of the comments that the previous minister made about the route map, I am wondering, ahead of stage 3, whether there is an appropriate anchor in the bill that ensures that local authorities and the Government are doing the planning around reusable items. I do not have clarity in my own head about what that might look like.

I do not think that it is the amendments that are before us from Monica Lennon, but there is something in there around having certainty that local authorities are carrying out appropriate planning on reusable items. For me, part of the discussion that is needed in the time that we have between stage 2 and stage 3 is about what might be appropriate in the bill.

Will the member give way?

I live in a rural area. There is a difficulty in carving out a particular type of property from the enforcement provision. It needs to be applied proportionately and in a way that recognises that communities are different and that waste collection is different.

We heard throughout the stage 1 evidence that, when local authorities are doing their educational piece and looking at how they support householders, that is important work, and applying a sanction is an absolute last resort. I appreciate that there are complexities with tenements, but there are complexities and risks of contamination with any form of bin collection at a road end or bin collection with shared use. It is good practice to work these things through. Local authorities are generally good at that, and it would be difficult to carve out a particular exemption.

I accept a lot of the arguments that members have made on standardisation, but is there also an element of responding to innovation? Recycling technology will, presumably, improve over time. In the future, there might be an economic argument for introducing kerbside collection of certain materials that does not exist now. There might be a need to segregate materials in the future.

I am not sure what that would look like, but baking standardisation into law feels a little bit excessive. A code of practice that could be developed further with local authorities might be the most appropriate way to drive things forward. I am a little bit nervous about saying that we must use a specific colour and size of bin. In my local authority, collection systems have changed over time due to the price of recyclate, not because of any lack of willingness to standardise. Perhaps it is a hostage to fortune to bake in a fixed model, because that is what we think will drive things forward.