Chamber and committees

No, because, at the end of the last session of Parliament, I looked at that in depth with my officials and we worked with our colleagues in the water industry, and a number of the necessary regulatory interventions would not have to be in primary legislation. I am getting advice from my officials on exactly what we need to do to secure the outcomes associated with infrastructure upgrade. We need to modernise our sewer network and should divert as many of our efforts as possible into doing that.

10:45

We regularly consider water-related policies to ensure that they meet the public’s expectations. I believe that we should use the legislative framework that we already have to support improvements in the water environment rather than introduce primary legislation. There are a number of reasons for that. First, we do not want to introduce primary legislation for its own sake, because that takes time and it is obviously better to do things more quickly if we can. We also need to consider the implications of the European Union urban wastewater treatment directive. That is an ongoing and complex piece of work that might require a lot of funding. I need to do an analysis of any of the commitments that we want to make in relation to that directive.

Our objectives for the next regulatory period mean that Scottish Water must provide public-facing access to data on all overflows and intermittent discharges in its network. That has been done. I note that, in the past 10 years, £2.7 billion has already been invested in improving the public sewer system and infrastructure. You will not see such investment being done by private water companies—you do not see that level of investment in parts of the UK where the water industry has been privatised. There is a lot more work to do, and a lot more investment has to be made, but one of the many advantages of having a public water body such as Scottish Water is that not one penny goes to shareholders; it all goes back into improving the infrastructure. As I say, an awful lot more money needs to go back into improving the infrastructure, but £2.7 billion has already been invested over the past 10 years. There has been substantial investment.

Of course, as SEPA discovers issues across the country, their causes must be investigated. Some of the issues might involve the need for investment in the sewer system, but a large investment has already been made, and it is of a size that you will not see in areas where there are private water companies.

We need both. I am always open to unlocking and focusing on areas that meet the twin objectives of carbon sequestration and the improvement of habitats.

That is an example of cross-Government working and how the climate change, nature and the environment portfolio reaches into every other Government portfolio. I will take that away and discuss it with my education colleagues. In the last parliamentary session, I worked closely with them on skills issues associated with the energy transition, and this is no different. We have already referenced skills associated with peatland restoration, and I will not argue about the detail with someone who has a master’s degree in hydrology.

First, I will give my thoughts on what you said about the committee’s remit. To a certain extent, that has always been the case. In session 5, I remember sitting where the convener is sitting now, as convener of the Environment, Climate Change and Land Reform Committee, with transport, the economy and housing—all the biggest sources of emissions—being covered by other committees. One of the big differences compared with that time is that, from the Government’s perspective, action on climate change is now a goal of the whole Cabinet, because climate action is one of the First Minister’s four priorities. There has always been recognition that that is needed, but there are now processes in place for each cabinet secretary with responsibility for the emitting sectors that are mentioned in the climate change plan. For the first carbon budget, which covers the next five years, about 40 per cent of the actions in the climate change plan relate to transport, because there are big opportunities to decarbonise the transport sector, as it is one of the biggest emitters.

I do not want to step into the convener’s shoes, but the committee could call the cabinet secretary with responsibility for delivering their part of the climate change plan to give evidence. I have responsibility for land use, biodiversity, peatland restoration and agriculture, among other issues, but Stephen Flynn has responsibility for delivering, through the next carbon budget, the transport parts of the climate change plan that Fiona Hyslop proposed when the plan was finalised, and Stephen Gethins, the energy minister, has responsibility for the decarbonisation of the energy system and the promotion of renewables, which will help us to decarbonise heat in buildings. I am responsible for delivery of the climate change plan at a high level, but the whole Cabinet and the whole Government have responsibilities, and particular cabinet secretaries will be able to give the committee the information that it needs on progress.

I can talk about how I am monitoring progress. When we put together the climate change plan, there was a Cabinet sub-committee on climate change. I have disbanded that committee because we now have a delivery group. I am taking a project management approach to the climate change plan and to delivery through the first carbon budget, and I will be meeting my Cabinet and ministerial colleagues with portfolio responsibilities for actions in the climate change plan.

From memory—Phil might be able to correct me—I think that the change from the sub-Cabinet committee to the delivery group was not in the climate change plan. We made that decision after the election. We have made lots of changes to the climate change plan, particularly the inclusion of much more information about delivery and monitoring. All those things are really helpful for the committee to know, and they also focus our minds, in Government, on delivery.

The constitution of, and remit for, the new group was something that I considered once I returned to post. I decided that the Cabinet sub-committee on climate emergency had done its job. It had produced a climate change plan to which Cabinet secretaries had contributed their actions. That work is done. We are now focused on delivery.

That was probably the biggest change to the climate change plan. The information was available, but it was not included in the plan, so we added quite a lot more of that to it.

That is why it is important that we get the overarching board in place as quickly as possible and appoint the CEO. Obviously, in all the public service reform work, teams in every portfolio are working closely with Ivan McKee’s team. A number of public bodies will be coming together, and there will be legal and human resources arrangements associated with that. The issues that you have put to me are absolutely drilled into, because it is fundamentally important that not only the people who work in the organisations but the public have confidence in what we are trying to achieve.

That line in the PFG goes well beyond my portfolio. Not all of the public bodies that own land sit in my portfolio. Further, a lot of the bodies that are in my portfolio, such as the Scottish Land Commission and the Crofting Commission, are advisory bodies that do not actually own land. They might have the word “land” in their title, but they do not actually own or control any land; they give advice to people who own land, rent land or have tenancies on land.

I think that Ivan McKee is setting out the fact that there is scope to do more in order to prompt a discussion that this committee and others will have. Local authorities and NHS boards own land. Indeed, the Government owns a great deal of land. Members will have their own views about where things can be consolidated, but that issue goes beyond my portfolio.

The reference is to public bodies that are involved in the management of public land assets. That does not concern crofts.

Unless I am unaware of public bodies that own land that is used for crofting—