Chamber and committees

This is, indeed, a short debate, but I echo Sarah Boyack’s comments about its importance. The cabinet secretary might wish to consider whether, in due course, the Government might bring forward a longer debate in which we can consider the issue, probably in the aftermath of COP28.

I, too, offer my thanks to organisations such as SCIAF and Oxfam, principally for the work that they do on climate justice but also, in the context of the debate, for the briefings that they provided, which make for very grim reading.

There is no doubt or dispute that the climate emergency and crisis that we face is a global one. In recent weeks, we have had immediate evidence that there is not really a part of the world that the climate emergency does not touch. However, I think that everybody recognises that there is a gross imbalance in the way in which those effects are manifesting themselves now and will manifest themselves in the future.

There are economic impacts. Christian Aid has set out some of the impacts that we are already seeing in respect of gross domestic product per person and the reductions in the global south. There are also health impacts, given the excess deaths that there have been. Figures from the World Health Organization are truly alarming, and they are set to get even worse. There is the loss of things such as heritage, culture and community, which are very difficult to regain and rebuild if they are lost.

I have had the privilege to be one of the co-conveners of the Scottish Parliament cross-party group on Malawi over a number of sessions. Malawi is not the country in the global south that is worst affected in this regard, but we have seen the devastating impacts that floods and droughts have had over the years and their effect in diverting funds away from building resilience and encouraging diversification in crop production, for example, into the immediate and urgent life-saving efforts that are required on the back of such devastating floods and droughts. For every step forward that we take, we seem to take five, 10 or 15 steps back. I do not think that the experience in Malawi is different in any way from that in other parts of the global south.

On the strides that were taken forward in COP26 and COP27, the establishment of the loss and damage fund is significant. I pay tribute to Nicola Sturgeon for her personal efforts and those of the Government that she led in getting to that stage. That was a significant diplomatic success. However, she is equally right to point to the stalling of the progress that we saw last year, whether that relates to the World Bank’s administration or who pays for what and to what extent. There has been a loss of momentum, and it is very difficult to regain momentum when it has been lost.

Earlier today, the chair of the UK Climate Change Committee, Chris Stark, spoke to the Conveners Group in a private session. What he said was not very different from what he has been saying in public, so I do not think that I am breaching any confidences. He talked about the fact that Scotland, the UK and other countries in the industrialised north have gone through a kind of sugar-rush phase in which they rushed to set ambitions and targets, but they now seem to find themselves in a buyer’s-remorse phase in which they are struggling to work out how they can realise the ambitions and meet the targets. That was not a particular criticism of any Administration; it was a recognition of the fact that the easy thing is setting the targets and the hard thing is following through on that. We see that with the loss and damage fund, as well. As Chris Stark indicated, COP28 is likely to return to energy transition, emissions reductions and adaptations, so the moment to capture and embed our work on loss and damage could be lost unless we get the progress that is needed over the coming weeks.

I finish by echoing Nicola Sturgeon’s call to have the scale of the funding allocated met not through loans and saddling the global south with yet more debt, and by making a plea to the cabinet secretary that the Scottish Government steps up its own commitment to those funds.

I thank Maggie Chapman for allowing us to debate the issue. I hope that we can return to it at some point in the not-too-distant future.

Good afternoon. The first item of business is portfolio questions, and the first portfolio is constitution, external affairs and culture. I remind members that questions 1, 3 and 6, as well as questions 2 and 8, are grouped. I will therefore take any supplementaries on those questions after the questions themselves have been answered. Any member who is looking to get a supplementary question in should press their request-to-speak button during the relevant question. I make the usual appeal for brevity in questions and answers.

There are a lot of supplementary questions, and I will get in most, if not all, as long as they are brief.

I am sorry, Mr Dornan, but we are unable to hear you. I do not know whether it is to do with your microphone or whether it is an IT issue.

That concludes the debate on ensuring that Scotland’s skills system is fit for the future.

I advise members that there is no time in hand and that that will be ruthlessly enforced. I call Angus Robertson, who has up to five minutes.

Briefly.

Cabinet secretary.

I call Alexander Stewart to speak to and move amendment S6M-10917.1. You have up to four minutes, Mr Stewart.

Speak through the chair.