I am very sympathetic to any means of replacing commercial fertiliser, which has emissions associated with it and is very expensive, with organic materials that can be put straight on the soil. I absolutely understand that point. With Mr Carson and SEPA colleagues, I need to bottom out the reporting and monitoring requirements. We need to ensure that what we put on our soil is right, because it might end up in our rivers and other watercourses, so we need to have a mechanism for recording that. My door is open to the convener to talk about that particular issue because, if there are blocks to that being done, I would like to know about them.

I agree with your first point; in fact, I was ready to say that I totally agree with you, convener. It is important that we take evidence on all aspects of a bill throughout its passage, but we have seen, many times, amendments being lodged to various bills—not just this one—that would effectively add arms and legs to them. Nevertheless, I do respect members’ right to put forward the issues that have been raised with them by stakeholders.

I do not accept, however, that no progress has been made in protecting the marine environment. In fact, when I speak to many of the amendments in this group, I will explain what is taking place and where there is duplication. The point that I was making is that people might think that things are not happening fast enough, but adding reporting requirements and duplicating administrative burdens will not accelerate action; it will, in fact, do the opposite—that is the point that I was making.

Amendment 17, in the name of Sarah Boyack, would require Scottish ministers to publish a national marine strategy for protecting and restoring Scotland’s marine environment. Although I understand the intent behind the amendment, I am afraid that it is unnecessary, as it would lead to duplication and would risk undermining our existing legal framework. The Marine Strategy Regulations 2010 already require the development and implementation of a marine strategy to achieve and maintain good environmental status in marine waters. Scottish ministers are already subject to statutory obligations under those regulations, which are complemented by the Water Environment and Water Services (Scotland) Act 2003 to provide integrated management of estuarine and coastal waters, including environmental objectives, pollution control and monitoring.

A national marine strategy under amendment 17 would be limited to the extent of the Scottish Parliament’s legislative competence, unlike the marine strategy under the 2010 regulations, which is not limited in that way. As a result, amendment 17 would complicate rather than enhance marine governance, diverting resources from delivery into administration through overlapping systems and additional and unnecessary reporting requirements. For those reasons, I ask Sarah Boyack—

I thank Maurice Golden for trying to help my party to deliver its objectives, not for the first time—wry smile.

The national marine plan will consider and react to consultation and feedback. It goes back to my point that I sense that quite a lot of the amendments are intended to prompt action because people do not see things happening fast enough. However, the vehicles required to take those actions already exist. I point to the fundamental issue that, if the amendment were to be agreed to, it would cause serious problems with the Marine (Scotland) Act 2010, because it would not dovetail with it.

I get the general point. I understand that people want action to be accelerated. I do, too, but difficult amendments will have the unintended consequence of taking away from that action. Data collection in the marine space takes time, which is probably more the reason for things not happening fast enough for people. It is not about a lack of relevant regulation or legislation; rather, it is about getting the data collection in place, getting many stakeholder views, and ensuring that we collectively move forward.

The debates on the amendments can draw out the point that people want to see faster action. My point is that quite a lot of the amendments would slow down progress, because they would add administrative burdens. We must ensure that we have robust vehicles in place, but not a crowded situation that has unintended consequences.

I understand the general point about people wanting to see accelerated action.

With regard to the previous question about who would enact everything associated with the BBNJ, it is the UK Government. We would scrutinise the devolved areas on which it impinged, and Parliament would scrutinise that as part of having a consent mechanism embedded in the bill. I cannot pick out a potential scenario and predict what would happen and how the UK Government would respond to it. It is an impossible question to answer.

At the moment, we cannot agree to part 2, because the schedule will impose obligations relating to the collection and utilisation of MGR and associated DSI from a BBNJ. That includes—

In reality, most of the actions that are associated with the bill will be exercised by UK Government ministers. We do not have any problem with that. It is just a case of them having our consent to do so. In emergency situations, such as conflict between marine craft, the UK Government has responsibility.

The consent of Scottish ministers is the issue here, not the deployment or the response.

Subject to negotiation.

That discussion might more be one to have with the UK Government, but Scottish institutions are included in the explanatory notes for the bill. As the guidance is developed after the bill is passed, we want to ensure that the Scottish Government has engagement with all stakeholders that might be affected. The UK Government is running a public consultation, which was published on 21 November and which closes on 19 December, on the implementation of part 4 of the BBNJ agreement, as it relates to licensable marine activities. We were involved in what the consultation looked like, so it is a joint consultation. For information, I say to anyone who is watching this evidence session and is concerned about licensable marine activities that they have until 19 December to put their points. However, once the bill is enacted and we have a better understanding of where we have got to on consent, we will want to ensure that all our Scottish stakeholders have the opportunity to be involved in the guidance that we put together.

A requirement to be consulted is not worth pursuing, because what does that mean in practice? We could just be told what is happening quite quickly before something is agreed, or whatever. With the BBNJ bill, you can see how late it was when we were able to find out that devolved competences were being looked at.

It comes back to the fundamental point that, in the future, in areas known and unknown, a secretary of state could in effect leapfrog the Scottish Parliament. Well, they would not be leapfrogging the Scottish Parliament because, if we consent to the bill as is, that would be perfectly legitimate. However, we cannot consent to the bill as it is. We need consent so that we have the protection of devolved competence and we cannot be leapfrogged in future situations.