Chamber and committees

I guess the concern is that there are opportunities for members to lodge amendments as a bill progresses through the Parliament, and members have lodged amendments at the last minute, at stage 3, to previous bills, so there could be a designation process for a Galloway national park under legislation that does not currently exist. Surely that is not the optimal way to deal with designation or legislation. I know that, as it stands, the bill does not change a huge amount, but it could look quite different by the time we reach the end of the bill process. There could be the addition of new aims and objectives, different ways to deal with fixed penalties or whatever. Surely you agree that that is not the optimal way to deliver a new national park.

That is everything about the birds and the bees. Thank you, Mark.

Agenda item 2 is an evidence session on the Natural Environment (Scotland) Bill with stakeholders representing national park authorities and local authorities that cover part of a national park.

I welcome to the meeting Grant Moir, who is the chief executive officer of the Cairngorms National Park Authority, and Gordon Watson, who is the chief executive officer of the Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park Authority. Joining us remotely, we have Mark Lodge, who is a senior planning and strategies officer from Argyll and Bute Council.

We have approximately 90 minutes for the session. Before we move to questions, I remind you that you do not have to operate your microphone. We have a gentleman here who will do that for you.

I will kick off with the first question. Do you support the introduction of statutory nature targets, recognising that those targets will be set in regulation? At this stage, how do you think the targets might impact you as public bodies?

We have a supplementary question from Emma Harper.

Mark Lodge, will local authorities that do not cover national parks be at a disadvantage in that, although they will have to make the same efforts to ensure that targets are met, they might not receive the funding that national parks receive?

I will ask a final question about part 1 of the bill. What are your expectations on consultation prior to the first set of targets being introduced? We are not quite sure about the timing of their introduction. I believe that a 12-month period is specified, but there is nothing that suggests that a public consultation will be required. From the perspectives of national parks and local authorities, what level of consultation should take place before the first targets are set?

The national parks have a framework or template for consultation because they consult quite regularly. However, for local authorities, does the bill need to set out exactly how the Government should consult the public, or do they have a clear idea of how consultation should be carried out?

National parks were landscape designations, and they focused on biodiversity. What happens when it comes to renewables and plans for 210m turbines? This may not be about non-regression, but, if independent reporters suggest that an impact is unacceptable, should the Government be able to overrule them? Should the Natural Environment (Scotland) Bill deal with that sort of impact? As far as I understand it, national parks do not have any wind farms but there will be times when they have to deal with applications for overhead power lines and so on. Given that there is a race to having ever more renewables in our rural landscape, if nothing is set out and if there are none of the safeguards that Grant Moir touched on, do we need to focus a bit more on scenarios where Government ministers can effectively overturn independent EIAs? My question, which may be for Mark Lodge as well, is whether there should be some sort of safeguard or an explanation of the pros and cons of an application being approved.

I am very conscious of the time—you have been very generous with yours—but I would like to ask a couple of questions before we close the evidence session. I will ask them all together.

The bill seeks to amend the National Parks (Scotland) Act 2000, so we have had legislation on national parks for 25 years, but there has not been a full review of the effectiveness of national parks over those 25 years. There is annual reporting, but there has not been a significant review of performance, with a cost benefit analysis, to see whether things could be done differently. Given that a number of proposals in the consultation are not being taken forward, we have a new climate change plan and we have the Agriculture and Rural Communities (Scotland) Act 2024—a whole lot is going on—is this the wrong time to be introducing new legislation on national parks?

A designation process is also being carried out in parallel to consideration of the bill. We are asking people in Galloway to comment on national parks, but they are not sure what the legislation will look like if the designation of a national park is made. Is this the wrong time to be introducing the bill? Should we have carried out a review and considered the other pieces of legislation that are coming forward before potentially revisiting amendments to the 2000 act in the future?

I appreciate that.

That concludes our evidence session. I thank the witnesses for being so generous with their time. We have run considerably over the time that we thought we would need, so we appreciate their attendance.