 Ben, r реб writesen i тыch yn buddillen nillai gwirionedd continued o gyllidegol yn L-M telefiol f ac yma ar 8 yw'r dyfodol yw'r cyfnod ddraff yw'r cyflwyniad o'r ffordd i'r cynhyrch cyfnodau yn y cymunedau, beth mae'r cymunedau wedi'i ddod yn y dyfodol o'r gwrthol. Fodd rydyn ni i'r ddysgu'r ddraff wahanol o'r ddraff? Fodd rydyn ni i'r ddraff wahanol o'r ddraff yw'r ddraff. Ydw i'r ddraff yw'r ddraff yw'r ddraff yw'r ddraff yw'r ddraff yw'r ddraff yw'r busgu the Greenhouse gas emissions trading scheme amendment order 2022 draft. I welcome Michael Matheson MSP, cabinet secretary for net and zero energy and transport. Good morning, cabinet secretary. He is joined by Matthew Costello, head of carbon markets and DTS, and online is Mariana Cover, policy officer, domestic climate change division, energy and climate change directorate, Scottish Government. Good morning to you all, thank you for joining the committee this morning. This is a joint instrument between the four UK administrations. It is laid under the affirmative procedure, which means that the Parliament must approve it before it comes into force. I invite members to take note that later in this meeting we will be taking a negative instrument, which is linked in policy terms to this affirmative instrument. Following this evidence session, the committee will be invited at the next agenda item to consider a motion to approve the instrument. With that in mind, I now invite the cabinet secretary to make a brief opening statement. Cabinet secretary, over to you. Good morning. Thank you very much. I'm pleased to give evidence today to support the draft affirmative instrument to amend the Greenhouse gas emissions trading scheme order 2020. The UK ETS is a key policy for meeting Scotland's ambitious emissions targets. The scheme is a cap and trade system designed to limit overall emissions in the covered sectors and incentivise cost-effective decarbonisation. When the scheme was established in January 2021, the legislation dealt exclusively with the issues essential to its initiation and continued operation. At the time, ministers from the four Governments agreed to defer implementing some technical and operational aspects that were not immediately essential, with the intention of adding further provisions during the first year of operation. That is the purpose of the affirmative instrument that I am presenting today and of the negative instrument that is laid simultaneously in Parliament. To be clear, the provisions in the affirmative instrument are designed to support the continued smooth operation of the UK ETS and deliver the existing policy intentions rather than fundamentally changing the way that it functions or applies in Scotland. In broad terms, the instrument aims to clarify the powers of enforcement granted to the regulators, in Scotland's case, SEPA, and some of the enforcement actions available to them. It also extends enforcement powers to the registry administrator, which is the environment agency. It makes an offence to intentionally obstruct a regulator in exercising powers of entry. It prevents double counting of excess emissions penalties that apply for some operators. It gives the regulator powers to impose civil penalties on operators who fail to return allowances to which they are not entitled. Finally, while I am unable to go into specifics today, given the ongoing discussions with the other Administrations, I am confident that in the coming months we will be in a position to publish a joint consultation to explore further policy reforms to the UK ETS, as well as the common framework agreement. At that point, I would be more than happy to return to the committee should we wish or to discuss matter in greater detail. Thank you very much for that statement, cabinet secretary. We will now move on to questions from members. I see that Mark Ruskell has a question, so Mark, I will hand over to you. Thank you, convener. A couple of quick questions from myself. First, is the UK ETS performing as we would hope that it would perform? Secondly, there was discussion about a year or two years ago about UK Government introducing a carbon tax. I am not sure whether that was ever put to bed, whether that was still under development or whether our UK ETS effectively removes that option off the table. On the first point, it is performing in the way in which it was intended. Also across the four nations, there have been discussions in recent months to consider whether we had to make some adjustments to it and there was a decision made across the four nations not to make any adjustments to the capping levels, given some of the pressures that sectors are experiencing with energy prices. By and large, it is operating in the way in which it was intended. It clearly has to change and adapt for the future, which is the work that we are taking forward on a four nations basis. As I mentioned, we will hopefully be in a position where we can consult on that in the months ahead. By and large, it is operating in the way in which it was intended. In relation to a UK carbon tax, I am not aware of whether the UK Government are at on the implementation of a carbon tax. It clearly would have potential implications for the ETS. Given the discussions that we have been having with Bays over the future of the ETS, at no point has it been flagged up that there might be a carbon tax coming in that would render the ETS scheme no longer viable. On the basis of the discussions that we have been having with the UK Government, there has been no indication of implementing a taxing regime that would replace the existing ETS. What that effectively does is that it aligns us more closely to the EU emissions trading scheme. I do not know of Matthew for anything further you would add to that. Are there any other questions from members? There are no more questions, so we will move to agenda item 3, which is the formal consideration of motion 02605, calling for the net zero energy and transport committee to recommend approval of the greenhouse gas emissions trading scheme amendment order 2022. I therefore invite the cabinet secretary to speak to and or move this motion. Thank you very much. Let me just check to see if there are any further contributions from members. I do not think there are. Cabinet secretary, would you like to sum up and make any final comments on the instrument? Nothing further to add to that. That is great. The question now is that motion 02605, in the name of Michael Matheson and MSP, be approved. Are we all agreed? We are agreed. Thank you very much. The committee will report on the outcome of this instrument in your course and I invite the committee to delegate authority to me as convener to approve a draft report for publication. Thank you very much. Cabinet secretary, thank you for bringing this motion to the committee. I will now briefly suspend the meeting for the next agenda item and allow officials supporting the cabinet secretary for the next agenda item to join us. Welcome back for our next agenda item. We will take evidence from the cabinet secretary in relation to the draft budget, which will be finalised in the days and weeks ahead. We have Scottish Government officials joining us and joining the cabinet secretary. We have Kerry Twyman, Ian Freeman, Simon Fuller and Ross Miller. Thank you for joining us this morning. Cabinet secretary, I believe that you would like to make a short opening statement. Thank you for inviting me to give evidence on the net zero energy and transport portfolio budget for 2022-23. The portfolio draws together many of the key strands required to deliver on this Government's ambitious and world-leading plans around climate change. The portfolio budget and policy areas will ensure significant progress is made in delivering the commitments that are embedded in the programme for government and the Bute House agreement, enabling the Scottish Government to successfully meet its natural climate targets and protect the natural environment whilst continuing to support the most vulnerable in society and deliver a safe, accessible and affordable public transport system. Our ambitious 2022-23 budget requires a sea change in the direction of government expenditure with re-prioritisation towards programmes that underpin or move to a green agenda, covering all aspects of the portfolio, the natural environment, public transport, active travel, energy and climate change. In the budget, we are spending over £3.4 billion on transport, including investment of almost £1.4 billion to maintain, improve and decarbonise Scotland's rail network, and £414 million to support bus services and their users through concessionary travel schemes, including the extension of free bus travel for young persons aged under 22. We will provide a record level of investment in walking, wheeling and cycling, increasing to £150 million, an increase of 30 per cent from the 2021-22 figure. We are also providing record investment to protect and restore nature, including our peatlands, and to tackle the causes of biodiversity loss. We will also continue to support our forestry bodies to deliver the woodlands creation target, which will see 15,000 hectares of new planting in 2022-23. We recognise that substantial investment is needed to deliver our waste and recycling targets, and in this year's budget, we are investing over £43 million to drive Scotland's circular economy, which will reduce reliance on scarce resources and reduce waste. We are committed to taking strong action to meet the climate challenge, and we are investing almost £50 million on climate action, including £28 million for the just transition fund to accelerate the development of a transformed and decarbonised economy in the north-east and at Murray. Finally, we will continue to provide significant budget for energy to support heat decarbonisation, to make our homes and buildings warmer, greener and more energy efficient, including increasing funding to help support the fuel pool through heat transition. The portfolio's budget delivers on an ambitious agenda, but it is not without risks such as the on-going impact of Covid on the public transport system, and the uncertainty around demand-led schemes such as the under-22 concessionary travel scheme. I can, however, reassure the committee that I will continue to re-prioritise within my budget to not only mirror legal, statutory and contractual commitments, but to achieve value for money against the backdrop of a challenging fiscal position, and I am more than happy to respond to any questions that committee members may have. Thank you very much, cabinet secretary. We will now move on to questions. Let me have the first question. As you will know, this committee is undertaking a major inquiry into the role of local authorities and cross-sector partners in delivering net zero. Last week, the president of COSLA warned that the Scottish Government budget settlement for local authorities will lead to a reduction of a quarter of a billion pounds in core funding, which they have expressed concerns about in terms of their ability to deliver their responsibilities. A few weeks ago, we heard from five different council leaders representing local authorities across Scotland about the challenges that they face in delivering net zero targets. Let me highlight brief extracts of the evidence that they provided. They agreed that councils should drive delivery of net zero, but they need finance with which to do that. Another said that we do not have enough funding in place to move forward at the pace that is required. The leader of Highlands Council said the following, we have had 10 years or more of cuts to local government budgets. What is missing is the resource within local government to respond to net zero targets. Do you recognise the significant capacity, resource and financial constraints at local government level? Do you share the concerns of various council leaders that budget cuts will significantly impact their ability to deliver national net zero targets? On your last question, no, not necessarily, but I recognise the pressures that the public sector is facing, not just at a central government level but also at a local government level. The particular challenges that that creates for our colleagues in local government. As the finance secretary said last week, we have delivered as fair a funding package for local government as we are able to do in the challenging financial environment that we are operating. It is also worth keeping in mind that local authorities have faced financial challenges for a number of years and have been making very good progress in tackling climate change and some of the reductions that they have seen in the emissions that they have committed to, which have been significant over recent years. I recognise and understand that there will be challenges for them, but that does not necessarily mean that they will not be able to make progress on tackling climate change. If I pick up on a couple of examples of where local authorities will benefit from investment, for example on active travel, which will have a significant benefit in local communities, it will help to tackle congestion potentially in towns and cities across the country. The budget line in that area is increasing substantially in order to support the roll-out of active travel. Alongside that, the investment that we are putting into the decarbonisation of hearing systems and improving energy efficiency will have a marked improvement on the social housing stock, some of which local authorities are responsible for managing as well. Again, that is an area where budgets are increasing in order to help to improve tackling issues around decarbonisation of hearing systems and energy efficiency. I understand and recognise the challenges that they face, but I do not accept that that does not mean that they will not be able to make progress in tackling some of the climate change challenges that we face. Also, some of the investment that we are making at a national level will have benefits at a local level as well. Thank you for that, cabinet secretary. You mentioned decarbonisation of heating, and that is another area that local authorities gave evidence on. Let me provide you with some of their feedback on that. The local authorities told us that there has been a lack of strategic consultation and dialogue with the Scottish Government in this area. There is a lack of detailed guidance on what is required of local authorities. We heard concerns over the scale of investment projects that are available within local authority areas, as well as the expertise that is available to meet the 2030 targets and concerns over the ability to attract private sector investment that will be required in this area. Do you recognise the concerns and what urgent steps are being taken to address those issues? Some of the local authorities expressed serious doubts as to whether they could meet the 2030 targets that have been set by the Scottish Government in this area. What role will the public energy agency and the green energy task force play in assisting local authorities to meet those targets? Let me unpack some of the issues in there. We have not long published our heat decarbonisation strategy, which was formed following a public consultation, including with our colleagues in local government, who had an opportunity to feed into that particular process and are able to continue to feed into our policy development in this area. I do not accept the idea that local authorities have not had the opportunity to help to feed into national policy direction and our national strategy because it was an open consultation for them to participate in and to feed into, which they have been able to do. The second thing is that we commissioned some specific work that was carried out, which involved housing associations. If I recall correctly, it may have been the chief executive of Inverclyde council to look at the specific challenges that local authorities faced around the heat decarbonisation agenda. That was a report that was submitted to the Scottish Government last year, which fed into the development of our strategy. Again, it has been involved in helping to formulate that policy and not thinking about it, and some of the challenges that we face on it. The other point that I would make is that I recognise the scale and nature of the challenge is extremely significant for not just local authorities but our social housing providers. There are hundreds of social housing providers across the country who will all face similar challenges, which is exactly why we committed to setting up the public energy agency to help to support local authorities, to help to support social housing providers, to bring together the skills and expertise and to develop the advice and information that they require to assist them in moving forward with the whole agenda, and to ensure that we do not find ourselves in a situation where we have 32 local authorities all trying to do different ways in reinventing the wheel over and over again. That is one of the purposes behind the public energy agencies, to help to co-ordinate that, provide the expertise and help to provide the guidance and support that is necessary. Your final point on the green finance and task force that we are setting up, I hope that in the next couple of weeks we will be able to set out the details of both its remit and those who will be members of it. Again, that has specifically been designed to look at how we can lever in external financial support alongside public sector investment in the heat decarbonisation agenda to support colleagues in both the public and private sector of housing. They have an opportunity to feed into that process, and I would expect local authorities to have a role in that task force to ensure that their voice is heard, right at the very heart of developing recommendations for a Government and taking it forward. One very brief question on the public energy agency has additional budget being provided for that agency in the current Scottish Government budget. It has been managed internally within our existing budgets. There is no specific ring-fence budget for it, but it has been managed within my portfolio budget, and it has taken for account within our budget lines for this financial year. At the moment, and for the time being, a virtual agency, does it have dedicated staffing and dedicated resource? There will be a dedicated team within the Scottish Government helping to draw that initially together, with a view to ramping it up and developing the agency to be much more stand-alone, if you like—not entirely separate from Government, but stand-alone so that it can actually carry out its work. That is a couple of years away yet from the work that is necessary to get it up and running. Thank you very much. Let me pass over to Fiona Hyslop. Thank you and good morning. We have faced a twin crisis of climate change but also biodiversity, so I want to focus on the natural resources budget. The allocation is £29.8 million, but it has got to fund local nature networks, the restorations of Scottish rainforests, commitment to 30 per cent high target for land for nature by 2030 and a nature restoration fund, which is £13.5 million, which is almost half of that whole fund. That is in addition to reform of other areas, particularly in terms of wildlife management and development of a new biodiversity strategy. Those are wide-ranging and there are multi-year commitments. It would be helpful to the committee if it could provide some kind of breakdown of spend in this particular area in 2022-23. Also, because of the importance of the biodiversity crisis, how do you see the profile of spend in this area over the next few years? I agree with the twin crisis that we face in terms of nature loss alongside climate change. Climate change is driving quite a significant part of nature loss, of course. I think that the first thing that I would say in terms of our budget line on biodiversity and natural infrastructure has seen a significant increase in funding over the recent years. It is a 55 per cent increase overall that we have seen that includes what will be £55 million of new funding to extend the nature restoration fund to £65 million, which, as you rightly say, is a multi-year fund. The fund will work across Scotland. The objective is to help to create green jobs to reinvigrate local communities, to reinforce Scotland's green recovery and to support large-scale multi-year multi-partner projects, which can deliver transformative change. Part of the reason for this being a multi-year funding package is to give the sector reassurance of the level of funding that will be available in future years to allow some of those long-term projects to be taken forward, because many of the nature-based projects are long-term projects. Therefore, a funding profile that gives assurance around that is the approach that we have sought to take with it. If there are further breakdowns on how that nature restoration fund will be utilised at a lower level, I would be more than happy to take that away. I do not have that to hand, but I would be more than happy to take that away and try to provide more detail if that would be helpful. I will pick it up correctly. The £13.5 million is for this coming year, but there is a commitment of that larger £55 million to give certainty. That is helpful. The second area that I want to look at is in relation to peatland restoration. The UK Climate Change Committee stated in its 2021 annual progress report that the pathway requires 50,000 hectares of peatland to be restored per year from 2022. Currently, the commitment is 20,000 per year. How has that advice from the UK Climate Change Committee been factored into this year's funding allocation for peatland restoration, and again some indication of what that might mean in future years as well? Our commitment is to deliver 250,000 hectares of peatland restoration between now and 2030, which is, on average, about 20,000 hectares a year that we are committed to taking forward. In 2020, we announced what was a 10-year package of funding to help to support that of some £250 million to deliver on that target. The budget this year provides some £23.7 million for peatland restoration, which is an increase on the last year's budget of some 8 per cent. Since 2012, we have invested around £30 million. The figure of 50,000 is not taken for account into this year's budget because our target is the 250,000 hectares between now and 2030. We have asked NatureScot to carry out some analysis around the proposed figure that has been set by the Committee on Climate Change to consider whether there are other innovative ways in which we could help to expand the existing target that we have in order to address the target that has been suggested by the Committee on Climate Change. That work has just been completed and submitted to Government, which we are presently considering the recommendations of, which will then consider whether we have to make further investment and whether we have to change our approach to peatland restoration from where we are at the present moment. The year's budget is based on our 250,000 hectares target and pending the recommendations from NatureScot will then look at whether we need to take further measures in order to help to extend our target and how we could go about potentially doing that. I am sure that the Committee would like to hear about that report when it is available and how you intend to fund it, because clearly your budget meets the targets that you have. Are those targets sufficient for what is required? That is the issue about the climate change target, as opposed to the budget. I think that a colleague might want to come in and convene it back to you. Thank you very much Fiona. Mark Ruskell has a supplemental mark. I would certainly be good to take some more evidence on that NatureScot report. However, as I understand it, the peatland restoration budget was underspent this year. Is there an issue here that we can keep putting more money in? If there are other reasons why landowners are just not signing up to spend the money or there is a lack of skill workforce or lack of equipment or whatever, we are going to continue to not meet the target for other reasons beyond budget. I think that you raised an important point here. There is a capacity issue within the peatland restoration sector and that is that it is a fairly new sector. There is a limited number of companies or businesses who operate in this sector. There is also a very small window in which peatland restoration can take place each year, which means that very often businesses who are involved in peatland restoration do, as an add-on to other things that they are involved in, because it is not sustainable on its own right. I think that it is a period in the September-October period when the work has to be carried out. It is a sector that is growing and there are limitations on the skills that are available in the sector because of that and because it is not viable as a business on its own, given a very short time frame in which peatland restoration work can be carried out. There are capacity issues in the industry. I am not so sure whether there is much to do with those who are not willing to take up the opportunity to restore peatland. I am not saying that it is not an issue, but I am not so sure that that is one of the main issues. I suspect that a big part of that will be access to skills. Business is able to flex into doing peatland restoration work for a very short period of time each year, which means that it will take equipment away from the other things that it would normally do for that short window when it can be carried out. I have several quick questions on data and measurement. First of all, how do you measure how far towards the 2030 climate goals the spending decisions that have been made in the 2022-23 budget will actually take Scotland? There is a carbon assessment for the budget that is carried out, which is a statutory requirement for each budget that is published. The other part is the way in which we measure our progress against our climate change targets is through our climate change update plan and the various portfolio envelopes that need to be progressed in order to make sure that we are on track for 2030 and 2045. A combination of the carbon assessment, which is carried out for the budget and our monitoring evaluation process for the climate change update plan, which we carry out going forward. If you will be aware of the work that the Fraser Band of Allander Institute is carrying out to look at how we can get greater transparency around the contribution that budgets make to meeting our climate change targets, it would be extremely helpful if we had a more robust and effective system for being able to monitor budget impact on our climate change targets and, hopefully, the work that the Fraser Band of Allander Institute produces will help us to develop a framework that will give us more transparency for the committee and for accountability to the Parliament, but it will also give us greater insight into its direct impact. I would say that broadly the two areas that we rely upon at the present moment, both the update plan and also the carbon assessment that was carried out for the budget. I am very grateful. Taking it back a stage, you talked about moving funds to support the green agenda. It is related to my friend Mark Ruskell's questions earlier, more generally. How do you measure or project what the prospects of achievement of each project will be and whether the funding is sufficient to deliver that? Similarly, how do you measure or project the opportunity cost of the reduction in investment elsewhere? If you take something like the budget assessment around capital spend, I think that it is around 92 per cent of the capital spend within the budget is viewed as being low impact or neutral in carbon, which is an overall reduction in carbon impact in a positive way. That comes through the carbon assessment process for the budget itself. When it comes to individual projects, let's just take up peatland restoration. Our commitment to delivering on 250,000 hectares is part of the sectoral envelope that we have for, meaning our 2030 target, and is part of our climate change plan. Part of the assessment that the various envelopes went through in developing the climate change plan had to assess the impact that individual policies would have in order to see whether they would align with needing to get to 75 per cent by 2030. That figure of 250,000 hectares was viewed as being one of the contributors to meeting that particular target. I think that there is a link between the budget and the policy. The policy is set within the climate change plan and the budget in helping to finance that. The carbon assessment that is carried out for the budget allows some insight to that. In terms of whether removing funding from one area will have a positive impact, for example, if we remove funding from a policy area that we know will contribute adversely to climate change, it would seem to me that it is self-evident that it will use that funding for measures that will help to tackle climate change and achieve our target, then it is self-evident that will have a positive outcome for us and contribute towards meeting our targets. However, it is always very difficult with individual projects to be able to pin down exactly the net benefit that will come from a particular project, for example, as people in restoration. We know that there is a positive impact and there is a level of assessment, but it can be very difficult to pin that down over time to how we shift money around in the budget and why that has made a bigger contribution in the money that we have taken away from another area. I have one further question. You mentioned in your opening remarks, cabinet secretary, the allocation of £20 million of the Just Transition Fund. Can you help the committee to understand what or who precisely is that paying for or going to, and what are the measurable year one outcomes of that £20 million? The fund does not sit directly in my portfolio, so it sits in finance's portfolio, but the £20 million is some of the initial allocation to take forward work in developing the action plan that will deliver the transition plan for the North East and Murray. We have given a commitment to take that forward on a co-production basis so that local stakeholders are able to shape how that funding will be used. Some of it will initially be to help to carry out that work, but the way in which that money will then be allocated and utilised will be informed by the co-production basis that is going to be taken forward and the input from local stakeholders and how that will be shaped. I would expect the details of that to be set out in the next financial year. Thank you very much, Liam. Natalie Dawn will be followed by Monica Lennon. Natalie, over to you. Good morning, cabinet secretary. I note that we have £43 million going into Scotland's circular economy for this year's budget, but we have some concerns with funding outwith the Scottish Government's control. The circular economy investment fund and the resource efficiency programmes are set to finish this budget year. As far as I am aware, there is no plan for how that funding is going to continue post-EU exit. Can you advise what impact would a drop-off of funding have on the circular economy and what the Scottish Government is doing to avoid a stalling of that? Also, what asks of the UK Government in relation to the shared prosperity fund that we have? Well, in the last EU multi-year financial framework, Waste Scotland received that £34 million of European regional development fund. Right now, Zero Waste Scotland is taking forward work to try to identify how it could bridge that loss of potential funding going forward, while there are ways in which it could lever in private sector funding to try to help to close that gap. As it stands at the present moment, there is a lack of clarity on how the shared prosperity fund will operate in Scotland, where its priorities will be, how they will be informed, who will set those priorities, will the Scottish ministers have a role in setting those priorities, will it be a lower level of funding than was previously available under the EU regional development funding? There is a lot of uncertainty around that. This is an area in which we need to see more progress. We are not in line with the targets that we set. That is why we committed the extra £70 million to investing in a circular economy and recycling in particular, and we need to see further investments being made in the public and private sector. Until we have clarity on how the shared prosperity fund will operate, potentially that could be a significant loss to the sector if there is not funding available to replace the £34 million that was previously provided under the European Union funding scheme. At this stage, we still do not know how the UK Government intends to operate the shared prosperity fund and what role the Scottish ministers will have in setting its direction in Scotland. Potentially that would be a negative impact to the sector. It is extremely concerning. You mentioned zero waste Scotland, so funding for zero waste has been relatively stable on last year with a slight increase. We are rapidly approaching the 2025 waste targets across landfill recycling and food waste. In some areas, progress has been slow, for example in relation to the 70 per cent recycling target. Within the committee's inquiry, we have heard from local authorities that there are difficulties in relation to recycling and the circular economy. Even last week, we were discussing the difficulties among the private and financial sectors and the need for a more central support, more cohesive approach. What are the top priorities for public and private investment in the coming year to ensure that we have a chance of meeting those 2025 targets? I recognise that we have a significant work that we need to do to get ourselves back on track in meeting those targets. They are tough targets, rightly so, and we need to do better in making sure that we are achieving them in my colleague Llanar Slater's working hard in order to help to ensure that we are taking forward the right measures to do that, which is why we have set out the commitment to developing our waste route map in order to make sure that we are very clear on the tangible progress that we will make over the next couple of years in order to get us on track. When you say that the budget in zero waste has been relatively stable, the budget is 8 per cent higher than it was in 2020-21. We have been increasing our level of expenditure in this area over recent years. Alongside that, we also made the commitment of £70 million for the recycling improvement fund, of which some £20 million was allocated last year. We also made a number of local authority partners to take forward strategic investments in recycling infrastructure. It is not just about finance, so the issue that I have about the circular economy is that we also need to see it as an economic opportunity. There are clear environmental benefits that we get from greater recycling, but we also need to look at the economic opportunities that are associated with them. Through the route map, we are looking to develop and the work that we are taking forward in the full around the circular economy and our intended circular economy bill is all about making sure that we see not just environmental benefits, but also the economic benefits that can come from developing and expanding our circular economy overall. Thank you, cabinet secretary. I have no further questions, convener, thanks. Thanks very much, Nassily. Let me bring in Monica Lennon to be followed by Jackie Dunbar. Monica, over to you please. Thank you. Good morning, everyone. Cabinet, 2022-23 budget document set out a commitment to allocate £23.5 million for the green jobs fund. We had a session last year with Scottish Enterprise. I wonder if you can provide an update on how green jobs are defined for this purpose, how the funding will be allocated and, further to that session with Scottish Enterprise, can you give an update on how many applications have been received through the green jobs fund and how many have been successful? Good morning. In terms of the green jobs fund, it is in two parts. There is some £50 million that has been baselined for our enterprise agencies and there is some £50 million that we hold at a government level where we are undertaking work with businesses to set the criteria, which would allow businesses then to start applying for it in a new financial year in order to make sure that it is aligned with the needs within the sector. I should say, convener, just for the record that this is not an area of policy that sits in my portfolio, so it sits with the finance secretary, but the approach that has been taken is to have it in two tranches, part run by the enterprise agencies and part at a national government level and the work to set the criteria. The application process has been taken forward just now through engagement with the business sector in order to make sure that it is a fund that it feels aligns with the skills that it requires in order to help us to deliver more green jobs. I cannot give you the figures in terms of the enterprise agencies, but I would be more than happy to take that away, convener, and to respond on writing to the committee if the committee would be content with that to respond specifically to the point that Ms Lennon is making. On the issue around the definition of green jobs, there is no clear definition of what a green job is. There are competing views on what should be defined as a green job, so we are undertaking some work in the Scottish Government through engagement with a variety of stakeholders to try and arrive at a shared and agreed position around what could be classified as a green job. There may be, for example, what we might classify as a green job might not necessarily be reflective of what other countries would consider to be a green job. We need to make sure that we have an inclusive definition, but that is a piece of work that has been taken forward just now, so that we have a shared and agreed understanding of what would be classified as a green job, which will allow us to understand the progress that we are making in delivering greater numbers of green jobs. That is helpful. I appreciate that it is not all within your portfolio, but knowing that there is a consistency approach and some clarity is helpful. Just last night, BBC disclosure documentary Dirty Business exposed the harmful impact of waste crime in Scotland to both people and the environment, and we know that it is costing the public more than £50 million a year. Cabinet Secretary of State has had a very difficult time, as you know, and the full financial impact of the cyber attack on the environment regulator is still not clear. However, we do know that it has experienced serious operational disruption and the loss of internal systems and data. In this context and in the context of the climate and nature emergency, is it appropriate for the draft budget to dish out a real terms cut to SEPA of more than 7 per cent? I did not see the programme myself. I intend to watch it. I know that SEPA is promoting it just to highlight the complexities and the challenges within the sector. It would be fair to say that the change in the movement in SEPA's budget is a reflection of a capital uplift that it received last year, which was a one-off uplift. That is why there is a realignment within its budget. If you look at its overall budget for the coming financial year, if you take out what was that specific capital uplift that it received, its budget still continues to rise. It is also worth keeping in mind that about 50 per cent of SEPA's income comes from its regulatory function and the charges that it applies for its regulatory function. It would be wrong to characterise it as though it is a cut to its budget. It is a movement in its budget because last year it received a capital uplift specifically for a couple of projects that only sits within that single financial year. In relation to the cyberattack, SEPA continued to make good progress in recovering from the cyberattack. There has been a range of assessments carried out on the impact that it had on its operations and its recovery. One of the things that we are ensuring that we do is that we learn the lessons from the experience of SEPA so that other public sector and private sector organisations can learn the lessons from what was a very serious and sustained cyberattack on the organisation. That is taken through our cyber network, which is a piece of work that is led on by the Deputy First Minister to ensure cyber resilience across the public sector in general, but also with the private sector. It is a very strong partnership and part of that work is about making sure that lessons are learned and that it will also help to support other public sector agencies and private sector companies to learn the lessons and to put in place the measures that can help to minimise the risk of them being exposed to a similar attack in the future. I would like to reassure you of the work that we are doing to try to make sure that we learn the lessons from the SEPA attack across the public estate and also for the private sector in Scotland. That is very important. If I may bring that back to the budget, is there any provision in the budget in ensuring the cyber security of public bodies? A lot of the work that is done around cyber security is business as usual for public agencies, and it will be part of their IT infrastructure funding. It would be part of what they allocate for their IT infrastructure, but there would not be a specific ring-fence budget set by government that is for a public agency to use for cyber security. It would be for that public agency to determine what they need to use for their budget for cyber security purposes, if that makes sense. There is some work that is taking forward. I think that it may sit within the justice portfolio around cyber security, and the work that we do with the National Cyber Security Centre. There is work that we do through the Business Resilience Centre, which is based at Stirling University, to help to support businesses in cyber security. It gets funding from the Scottish Government, but we are certainly a partner in it in helping to support it. There is not a specific budget that is just headline cyber security, and that would be part of the wider IT budget lines within any public agency. Thank you, cabinet secretary. Back to you, convener. Thank you very much, Monica. Let me bring in Jackie Dunbar to be followed by Mark Ruskell. Thank you, convener, and good morning, cabinet secretary. Before I ask my questions, I wonder if I could ask a supplementary on the cyber security stuff. My apologies if this is not your remit, but you were talking about the public agency and local authorities and what they need to do with the cyber security. Does the Scottish Government ask them to report back to you so that the Scottish Government has assurances that they have business continuity plans and disaster recovery plans in place for that? I am aware that that is not always the case. We are stretching my portfolio responsibilities here, but I am more than happy to take that away. There is a system, so there is a process for agencies to business continuity plans and also to have recovery plans in place. I have been more than happy to take that away and come back to the committee with some more detailed written information on that. When I was just a secretary, I was involved in the cyber attack that the NHS faced not just here in Scotland but across the whole of the UK. There were a number of hospitals, NHS facilities that were targeted. I remember dealing with the Home Secretary at the time around some of our approaches to trying to tackle those issues and the role that the National Cyber Security Centre has in helping to identify risks and to provide advice and information. There was a whole range of work that was carried out off the back of that particular piece of work, but I have been more than happy to come back to the committee with more specific details around the internal processes for managing cyber security within public agencies. If I can move on to my questions regarding the transport part of your remit. The STPR2 has got 45 recommendations, and one of them is to achieve a 20 per cent reduction in car kilometres by 2030. I am used to miles, I am not quite used to kilometres yet. I think that we all recognise that reducing car travel is going to require a step change in how we use our public transport and we also need to significantly increase the amount of trips we take by using our bicycles if we have them or on foot. How does this year's budget differ or compare to previous budgets? I am aware that, in the 10 years between 1999 and 2019, the distance travelled by the car actually increased, so I would be interested to hear what the difference is in this year's budget. You will be aware that we set out—I think that it was in the 13th of January—the strategy that we have for tackling reducing car kilometres by 20 per cent, and that set out a range of actions that we will be looking to take forward in order to achieve that. I think that one of the most significant areas of investment that will help to tackle the issue is the provision of active travel infrastructure. I am a big believer that, if you put the right active travel infrastructure in the right place, people will use it. Experience in other parts of the world would bear that out, which is why you will see in our active travel investment a significant increase in active travel investment and a commitment to deploying 10 per cent of our transport budget by the end of this parliamentary session, which will see more than £300 million a year being invested in active travel infrastructure and active travel programmes. That is a massive increase over a relatively short period of time. Active travel infrastructure will make a significant impact, I believe, in helping to reduce car miles, particularly the use of cars for short journeys. I do not say that because I think that everybody will just jump in their bikes. The reason I say it is because I also think that, if you design, develop active travel infrastructure in the right way, it can produce and deliver better communities, better areas for people to live in. If you look at some of the big active travel infrastructure that has been built in recent years, it has had a transformational effect on some of the neighbourhoods that have benefited from it. I often refer to, as a very good example, as the south city way in Glasgow, which I have regularly used. It has transformed that area in a positive way. If you look at Suckey Hall Street in Glasgow, it has transformed Suckey Hall Street into a much better, more pleasant place. It can help to not just tackle car use, but it can also help to create better environments and better communities as well. The other area where it is important is that we need to make sure that we are seeing better provision of bus services. About 80 per cent of all public transport journeys are carried out in a bus. It is the most flexible and adaptable form of mass transit that you can quite literally get, which is why we made the commitment to the bus priority partnership programme in order to make sure that bus services are seen as much more of a priority to create these rapid corridors that can be utilised in a way that would help to improve reliability and speed of bus journeys as well to make bus travel more attractive to people. When you hear stats such as the average speed of a bus going through somewhere like Hope Street in Glasgow, it is something ridiculous. It is like four miles per hour. Why is that? It is because of congestion. Very often other problems in the road that actually inhibit it would then mean that buses are the ensign that has been unreliable and they are too slow etc. Bus prioritisation. We are seeing that being taken forward in some local authority areas already. I think that it can make a big difference in making bus a much more attractive option. As you mentioned in STPR2, we have set out some really bold ideas and visions around things like the Clyde Metro, the rapid bus transport up in the North East and Edinburgh, the mass transit programme, all of which could actually have a play a big part in helping to support people who are making a transition from using their car, particularly for shop journeys to using active travel or public transport. Of course, as of yesterday, we are under 22, but we are able to travel free on buses again, helping to embed behaviours in our future generation to make greater use of public transport. Again, that can help to support us in making better use of public transport rather than car journeys. On the next question, we are, hopefully, emerging from the coronavirus pandemic. How is the Scottish Government intending to support the rail and bus companies through the next year or so in regards to their recovery and to increase the number of users? We are in the recovery phase from the pandemic, although we are still in a pandemic, but we want to see recovery back on to our public transport system. Clearly, the reductions in numbers that we have seen in passenger numbers over the course of the pandemic have had a significant financial impact on the sector, which has resulted in the need for a significant level of financial investment from the Scottish Government to help to support the sector. Railways are very resource intensive. It is expensive running railways. They are fixed assets and a lot of money had to be provided in order to help to sustain and support services even at a reduced level. In this year's budget, we have still taken account of some of the potential Covid impacts on fare box for both bus and rail. That has been taken into account in our existing budget in the present draft budget. There are risks. We are in the realms of the unknown here, so we can see in rail the ledger journeys of returning pretty much to the levels that they would have been at—probably not quite there, but it is similar to where they would have been at pre-pandemic, but commuter journeys are nowhere near that as well. We are seeing some level of recovery there. It is probably recovering quicker than rail, but it is not back up to pre-pandemic levels. There are still financial pressures on the public transport network as a result of the loss in fare box revenue. We made on the course of the financial year, so depending on what recovery in the public transport system looks like and the fare box recovery looks like, we might have to flex some of our budget in order to take account of that. We are in the realms of the unknown here, because we do not know how quickly the recovery is going to be and to what extent it will take place over the course of the next financial year. That is all the questions that I have, convener. Maybe picking up on those themes around transport, you mentioned the roll-up of under-22s, concessionary travel, huge investment, £130 million allocated in this budget, and the direct support that is going to the bus companies, which is £54 million up to £99 million. A lot of people write to me about the quality of bus services and services that are going to be closed. I always point out that the Government is investing a lot in concessionary travel and keeping services running during the pandemic. A lot of people get back to me and say, well, that is great, although the amount of money that is being invested, why do not you just nationalise it? What is your response to that view? The response is that there is not an easy answer to what is a complex issue, and that is that there are something like over 250 different public bus providers in Scotland providing access to public bus services. When somebody says to me, why do not you nationalise them? That is nationalising over 250 businesses, which comes at a significant cost to the taxpayer as well. People think that we will just take it into public ownership, and that is the answer to it all. We need the capital and the revenue to do that as well, and we do not have that to make that possible. That is why, in order to try to address some of those issues through the Transport Act, we made provision for a range of different measures. There are bus service improvement partnerships, and there is a range of options that are available to local authorities, which includes local authority run bus services. A local authority to do that would have to capitalise a company for the purposes of achieving that. That comes at a cost to the taxpayer. It is not cost neutral, but it would have to come from somewhere else to buy over. The bus company or to buy the buses and to then run it. The franchising mechanism, which is available as well. There is also the mechanism for joint partnerships between public and private as well. There are a variety of different models that are available there, which I believe that deployed in the right way could help to address some of the issues that your constituents raise with you. At the same time, we recognise that the idea of simply being able to nationalise over 250 companies overnight and run it as a national bus service comes at a very significant cost to the taxpayer. Finances are not available for that. We need to see more progress being made in the pillars that are available under the Transport Act and to help to support local authorities on how they can go about improving bus services. We will have to look at some cities where that has already happened, out with Scotland. If you look at places such as Leeds etc., they have been able to transform their bus services and the quality of their bus services by giving it greater prioritisation in having a much closer bus partnership locally in order to make sure that it is much more reflective of what local needs are. One of the tools in the budget is the community bus fund and the availability of that to start to move those services more in the direction of serving the public interest and being controlled by that public interest. Will that be available in the next year? Is that available for councils to bid into and to do that work? I do not know off the top of my head exactly where we are in local authorities bidding into that fund, but I would be more than happy to take that away and I can come back to the committee in writing to give you more details on it. It is the sort of thing that the local authorities would be able to tap into for particular provision around local bus services. However, if you have one big local authority that decides to do something significant, it could potentially call upon all that fund. We need to make sure that the fund is accessible to all local authorities and that it is not quite simply eaten up by one or two local authorities looking to take for big projects and proposals. A couple of other points directly related to the budget. There has been some criticism from the rail unions about a decline in capital spend on rail for this year. Is this a similar situation to SEPA that there was a one-off spending at some point and that budgets are going to increase or does that represent a decline? It is a reflection of where Network Rail sees themselves as being out in control period six and the projects that they can take forward in control period six. As you will be aware, there has been a significant amount of capital projects that have had to stall or be stopped during the pandemic period and the way in which the rail system operates is within control periods. It is more a reflection of where Network Rail thinks that they are in control period six and what they can deliver over the course of the coming years in the projects that they had intended to deliver in control period six. That is largely where they think that there are efficiencies that they can achieve and how they are actually taking forward some of the projects that they will be taking forward in control period six. Overall, the budget is very clear in terms of continuing to invest in railways in order to improve them, decarbonise them and to speed up the network, particularly to our southern cities. Another issue that colleagues have mentioned is heating buildings. The renewable heat incentive ends at the end of March. I understand from installers that there is a bit of a rush on at the moment for people to apply for RHI and to get installs under way. The question is what happens after that. Is there going to be a huge demand for grants or loans that are going to come through EST in that period after March, where suddenly there is nothing in place? Part of this is tied up with the warm home discount scheme, which we have been pursuing with the UK Government on what the future of the scheme should look like, how it should operate. For some time now, we are actually over the course of the last year, and we have only started to get a response from the UK Government on this issue. I hope that we will be in a position in the course of the next couple of weeks to give a clearer indication to the sector on what will happen post-April. Part of that is tied up with some of the work that we have been doing around the warm home discount scheme, which is operated by the UK Government, and the reforms that it is planning to carry out to the scheme in England and Wales. We want the system to operate in a way that is much more aligned with Scotland's needs, but it would appear that the UK Government is not prepared to allow that to happen. Finally, what we are seeing globally is a massive investment in green recovery. The European Union has its green new deal package, similar levels of capital investment in the US. With this budget, we are seeing real-term capital decline in capital investment over time. Does that tie one hand behind our back, so to speak, in terms of meeting climate targets? If we are trying to get the most out of the capital budget, it is declining. The capital budget that we have in this budget is reflective of the cut that we have experienced in our capital spend overall. It is almost over 9 per cent of the cut in our capital expenditure from the UK Government. There has to be a gift somewhere, so we have to re-prioritise. I hope that you can see that we are pivoting our capital investment into the areas that can help to support that green recovery in a much more significant way. We have sought to protect and invest in those areas, so we are going back to things such as the capital investment that we are putting into the circular economy or the investment that we are putting into the decarbonisation of properties at £1.8 billion. Again, the investment that we are putting into active travel infrastructure and what we are trying to do is to rail into decarbonisation of our rail network. What we are trying to do as well as having to sustain a cut in our capital budget is to pivot our capital investment into the areas that will help to deliver on a climate change agenda. Yes, it has an impact when capital is restricted, but we are trying to balance out in a way that makes sure that it helps to deliver us on our climate change ambitions. I firmly believe that the priorities that we have set out in this budget demonstrate that very clearly and also highlight the Government's real intent to make sure that that is the direction of travel going forward. We have got a bit of spare time left over, because your answers have been so concise, which is always very welcome. I have a couple of follow-up questions from members. While we have a view at the committee, it would be good to get your response to the UK climate change committee's updated report that was issued in December last year. Some of the main highlights were concern over a lack of detailed policy guidance from the Scottish Government in terms of how net zero targets will be implemented and delivered, and some concern expressed over the credibility of the Scottish Government's climate change plans. How would you respond to those concerns? We are carrying out a piece of work to look at how we will respond formally to the Committee on Climate Change. I had a meeting with them directly to discuss some of the challenges that they have rightly put to us on our targets and our policy direction. If I give you a recent example of setting out more detail, one of the areas of challenges around was, for example, the reduction in car kilometres by 20 per cent. Since then, we have published details on how we want to progress that and move that forward. However, what we will do is we will provide a more detailed response to the requirements or the points that have been raised by the Committee on Climate Change. I think that the updated assessment from the Committee on Climate Change highlights is that, in the whole issue around climate change, we have gone through a process of deciding what the targets should be and then setting targets. We are now much more into the delivery phase of things. That is when we need to take forward the measures that we will deliver on the targets that will be set. That involves making some difficult decisions. That involves pivoting away from some of the traditional ways in which we have used capital into areas that previously were not as high a priority. That is a good example of ring-fencing 10 per cent of the transport budget for active travel infrastructure. It was not long ago that investment in active travel infrastructure was probably in the tens of millions, not in the hundreds of millions. It is much more into the delivery phase. The challenge that we are getting from the Committee on Climate Change now is that we want to see much more in the way of detail around delivery. We are concerned about that, and we will be looking at responding to some of the points that they make in looking for us to provide more detail around how we will deliver some of those commitments. Just to follow up a budget question and the question on that, the wider investment in net zero targets. Looking at the budget allocated to the Scottish National Investment Bank in 2020-21, it was £241 million. Next year, it is declining to £215 million. I appreciate that the bank is not entirely within your portfolio, but in previous committee sessions you have said that you have a regular dialogue with the finance secretary in relation to the bank's objectives. Why is that decline then in the bank's budget? It does not sit in my portfolio, so I do not know the rationale behind that. However, what their profile investment is and what they require, you will also be aware of it. I am more than happy to take that away and to get full of details for you. You may also be aware that the bank is going through a process of looking at how it can raise private finance and leave it in private finance to the bank's process, which is quite a detailed regulatory process that it is undertaking. I would hope that, in the course of the next year, it would be possibly longer than the next year. Over the next couple of years, we will see more private finance being able to be levered into the Scottish National Investment Bank. However, I am not excited specifically on the reasons for that, but I am more than happy to come back to the committee on writing, given that it is not something that sits directly in my portfolio. Let me bring in Fiona Hyslop. Thank you, cabinet secretary. You will be aware that we are conducting an inquiry into the scale, shape and importance of local government in delivering net zero. We have heard evidence from them about how they are working with the private sector and their concerns around their own budget. However, clearly, much of your portfolio budget will end up going to local government. There are probably three different areas. One is where they are distributing and distributors on behalf of the Scottish Government. One is where net zero projects or funds that they can bid into that are directed by the Scottish Government. A third area might be, and I am not sure whether that exists, where discretionary funding for net zero can be given to local government to do what they think is best in their area. I am not suggesting that they will be able to off the top of their head, but it is very welcome if they can. It gives an indication of how much of their budget is in those three areas. However, it would be very helpful if officials could work with the committee to get a sense and scale of how much of the budget, ideally from this coming year. However, if they cannot do that perhaps from this current year, is going to local government in one of those ways. Is that something that will be possible? It would involve a bit of work, but I think that it would be helpful because of the importance of local government in meeting net zero targets. You are right. I am not able to give you that all off the top of my head. Part of the reason for that as well is because some of it will actually span other portfolios. I am thinking, for example, particularly in the Inshawnor Robison's portfolio, there will probably be elements of her portfolio that will help to support us in net zero objectives that OCE investment will give to local authorities. However, I would be more than happy to take the points that you have made away, the three points that you have made away, to see whether we can provide you with more detail if that would assist the committee with its inquiry and to come back to you on that if that would be useful. Thank you very much. That is very much appreciated. The other question that I wanted to ask in relation to what we are looking at is that we have heard from community organisations and, say, town centre development trusts about their difficulty in accessing funding for their projects from local government, but there are funds from national government that they have been able to bid into. Is there anything within the budget for the forthcoming year that you can point to saying that this will be where community organisations will be able to bid into? Particularly for capacity building and revenue for staffing to help them in some of the projects that can lead to very creative, but also involved projects that bring people with them, in particular towns across Scotland? Just so that I am clear then, in terms of town centres, are businesses that are finding it difficult to secure funding for decarbonising their businesses if they are based in a town centre? Part of the funding around the heat decarbonisation fund is that it is not just for housing, it is also for non-domestic premises as well, which might be a route for some businesses in towns and city centres. That is from, say, community development trusts that are leading projects within their own communities. Some of it might be house, some of it might be working with businesses, but those very localised projects struggle to get funding from local authorities, that is what they have told us, but they have said that in the past they have been able to bid into national government funds, which must be in their portfolio. We would be interested to know what funds will be available for those community development trusts and others to bid into, and it is not just about capital projects. Those are volunteers, so resources and revenue for staffing can help to deliver on-the-ground projects that could not end up being—if you were trying to do heat pumps across a whole town, you might need some town leadership from the community development trusts and others to help to lead some of those projects. Some of them might be very small, but some of them could potentially develop, I know from my own experience and constituency, into something quite significant. Another example could be about things such as district heating systems, so in trying to facilitate and bring that together, it would require some resource support to try to get all the different interested parties together to take forward a scheme of that nature. Why do not I take that away as well? I can come back to you with more details on some of the specific funding pots that may be available at a national level that community-based organisations could apply to. You will be aware of the climate hubs that we are creating, which is to try and help to create a much more sustainable approach to changing local communities to tackle the climate emergency. The first of those two are already up and running, and we have plans to roll out further climate towns. That might be one of the routes for some towns in some communities, but it might not always be the case. I can get further details on those for you and other funding pots that might be available, but I also think that it is worth thinking about some of the other funding pots that may not sit in my portfolio that can help to deliver programmes that assist us in meeting our net zero targets. It will not all come through my portfolio. Some of it will sit in other portfolio areas, but I can take that away and ask officials to pull together some of those details for you. Thank you very much, and Blackburn in my community is one of those climate towns that you referred to in times of cocaps. Just to pick up on something earlier, cabinet secretary, you asked about the heat and building strategy and the £1.8 billion by 2026. The capital spending review states that the Government will invest £1.6 billion to decarbonise heat and buildings. Can you explain to the committee why there is that difference? In any event, which portfolios are going to get that money and can the committee have a detailed breakdown of the proposed spending profile to 2026? Sure. The £1.6 billion was on the basis of the draft heat and building strategy at that time, and following the consultation and engagement around that, the revised figure was £1.8 billion. Some of that sits in my portfolio, some of it may sit in the housing portfolio as well, but I would be more than happy to come back and give you, as you asked for, a much more detailed breakdown on how that will be broken down between the portfolios, if that would be useful. I do not have that to handle with Kerry You of details on that. I do not have the further detail, but we can come back on that. I think that the committee would be very grateful, cabinet secretary. Finally, if I may, Natalie Don asked what I thought were very good questions about the lack of progress on a circular economy. In your answers to her, an intended circular economy bill. I think that that was first proposed in 2019 and was restated in the 2021 programme for government. Can you give the committee any update on when we can expect to see the circular economy bill? You will be aware that we would do that bill on the basis that it was criticised on the basis that it was viewed as not being ambitious enough and driving forward a circular economy sufficiently. The decision was made to withdraw and to reintroduce a piece of legislation. That is part of the background to the bill itself. I would expect that bill to be an early part of this parliamentary session. I cannot say much more than that because we have to go through a process in government in green landing slots for bills coming into Parliament and for our future programme for government, but I can assure you that it is one of the priority bills in this parliamentary session. Given the importance of making progress in this particular issue, I am very much of the view that it needs to be one of the earlier bills in the Parliament. I would hope that, without going much further, it would reassure you that it will be one that will be in the first half of this parliamentary session. Just a supplement on that, cabinet secretary, in the area of heat and buildings. Last week, the committee heard from private capital providers what one of the concerns expressed and expressed by local authority leaders is the potential lack of scale across some local authority areas that would attract global capital and private capital. A potential lack of data in terms of what assets exist and where those assets are would be the starting point in terms of local authorities identifying their housing stock that needs to be retrofitted. There seems to be a lack of progress on both points. What role can the Scottish Government play in helping local authorities to get that data and that inventory of assets that will need to be converted by 2030? Is there a mechanism in place or plans in place that would allow the Scottish Government to look across local authority areas and suggest a combination of assets to attract private capital? I appreciate that there is a bit in there, but given that the target is 2030, there is not a huge amount of time. Was the lack of data an issue for the private sector companies or the potential investors? Yes, it was. I would expect local authorities to have a reasonable understanding of their housing stock where they should have a good understanding of their housing stock as should social housing providers in general. They will have the knowledge of which those who have retrofitted energy improvements carried out to them, whether that be through the area-based hearing schemes or other schemes. They should have a level of that data. I wonder whether the issue may be that there is data that some of those private sector investors are not able to access or get an understanding of, rather than that there is just no data there. I will take that away and check that for you, convener. The second issue here is about scale. This is an issue that I have discussed previously with some potential private investors who have said that we need scale in order to make the type of capital investment that we believe is necessary to make it financially valuable to deliver a programme. One of the areas that we are alongside the financial task force that I mentioned earlier on, we will be able to look at is what we need to put in place in order to help to lever in some of that private sector investment. Some of that might involve, for example—I have discussed this in my previous portfolio when I was a minister responsible for cities—how can we bring together some of our cities to form alliances or partnerships in looking to try and help to put forward joint proposals that would give the sector the scale that they are looking for? The Edinburgh and Dundee or the Glasgow and Aberdeen-type partnership has shared prospectus in going to the private sector to see whether it is of a scale that they could deliver on. It is a reasonable challenge from the private sector, and it is an issue that has been raised with us. It is an issue that the financial task force can look at, and we need to think about how we can create the right type of partnerships to assist with that. The final point that I would make is that that is one of the areas that the public energy agency can help and support with, so that where there are local authorities or social housing providers, some social housing providers might only have a couple of hundred houses. They will not have the scale to get the level of private sector investment that they are looking for. They might get the public sector investment, but not necessarily the private sector investment. Do we need to bring some of them together to offer it on a scale that can then attract the level of private sector investment? Again, that is a role that the agency can help to support us in going forward in the years ahead, just given the scale of what we have to achieve there. I appreciate that response. Just to clarify, the concern over data was partly private sector capital, but it is also a recognition by local authorities that they still have a bit of work to do in terms of that data. I think that that was full circle back to the initial discussion that we had about a lack of resource and expertise at local authority level. Do you see a role of the Scottish Government or the public energy agency in actively getting involved to assist local authorities? I guess that that goes back to the point about the scale of investment in the public energy agency, the amount of resource in the agency, and the fact that it will take a couple of years to get up and running to full tilt. My concern would be that that will take us to 2024-25, which means that the clock is ticking very quickly down to the 2030 target. Is there any plans to accelerate the public energy agency to make it a real urgent priority? I do not think that we need the agency for the purposes of getting the data. Local authorities should be able to draw that data together. However, let me take away the point that you are making. If there is a lack of data there, why is there a lack of data and what would need to be put in place in order to improve the quality of that data? Would there be a need for resource to be provided in order to allow local authorities and social housing providers to deliver that data? I would like to think that social housing providers to the housing association that will be in a different place from local authorities, because very often their housing stock will be of a much smaller level as well. I might be wrong there, but I would like to think that that would be the case. It would have a much more detailed understanding of the improvements that have already been carried out. However, let me take that away and let's try to find out why there is a lack of data and what could be done to try to improve that. I agree with your point. I think that the danger is that we wait for the public energy agency to get up to tilt and help to co-ordinate some of that when we are losing time here. There are investors that are looking to make investments just now if they can get access to the right information and data, so we need to take that challenge on. However, I am happy to take that point away and let's try to get a bit more of a detailed understanding and also what we can do to try to help to address the issue as well. That would be great, cabinet secretary, that's appreciated. It goes back to your point that perhaps the first 50, 60, 70 per cent has been done. However, as you well know, 100 per cent of the assets need to be financed, so it's not a case of most of them having covered data. All of it needs to be covered. I get the point that you are making. I think that it's a reasonable challenge, so I'll take that away. That brings us to the end of questions and our allocated time. We very much appreciate your time, cabinet secretary. We've covered a lot of ground. Thank you to you and your officials for attending committee this morning, and I will now briefly suspend the meeting for the next agenda item. Thank you. Just to make everyone aware, I'm going to be putting on the next panel's cameras. Both supplementals. Okay, welcome back everyone. Agenda item 5 is our first consideration of evidence on the draft of the Scottish Government's fourth national planning framework, NPF4 for short. A number of committees are joining in scrutiny of different elements of NPF4. Our focus today is on how effectively NPF4 addresses energy policy, particularly in the context of the national commitment to achieve net zero by 2045. I'm pleased to welcome the following witnesses to our committee meeting this morning. Dr Nile Kerr, Interdisciplinary Research Fellow, Energy and Climate Policy University of Edinburgh, Morag Watson, director of policy Scottish renewables, Elizabeth Leighton, Secretary at Climate Emergency Response Group, and Kirstyn Land, senior external relations manager, SSEN Transmission. Welcome everyone. Thank you very much for taking time out to join the committee this morning. Thank you to those who have provided submissions to the Parliament's call for views, all of which have been noted. We will now move on to questions. Let me start with the first question, which I would like to put to each of our panel members. One of the main themes running through NPF4 is to prioritise localisation across a number of policy areas. The committee is undertaking a major inquiry into the role of local government in delivering net zero targets. I would like to ask each of you how important will local authorities be in meeting net zero targets across areas, including transport, procurement, circular economy and decarbonising heat? What do you see as being the main challenges faced by local authorities in meeting these targets? Let me go in the order that I introduced the panel, so that would be Nile first, Morag, Elizabeth and then Kirstyn. Nile, over to you please. Yes, hello. Thank you for the invitation to give evidence to the committee on the question of the role of local government. Currently, I guess the committee is already aware that there are local heat energy efficient strategies that are being piloted and designed for local authorities alongside the Scottish Government, so it is set up for local authorities to have a key role in heat caramelisation energy efficient planning in Scotland. As you are also probably aware, local government returned the necessary budget and expertise to be able to address the achievement of heat caramelisation. It has a focus on social housing, which is an area that it has a key role in helping to achieve heat caramelisation. There are various aspects of heat caramelisation, not least private housing stock, whether that is owner-occupied or rented, that local authorities have little control over, especially with the existing stock. This is an area where there is going to have to be a significant contribution at the national level. Regulations are associated with funding and financial incentives to implement the necessary changes. The local strategy approach is seen in a formal approach to local strategies in other countries. One of the countries that I am looking at at the moment is heat caramelisation in the Netherlands, where a very similar approach to local planning of heat is taking place is a formal requirement for municipalities to prepare their strategies there as well. That very closely mirrors the situation in Scotland. We had to sum up a critical role as part of local heat and energy efficiency strategies, but there are pretty obvious limitations to what local authorities can do to achieve the full extent of the target on their own. There is a really important role for national and local government to work together, and that is a key feature of heat caramelisation. Generally, there is the need for co-ordination in various parts of government and various public agencies. The same question to Morag Watson, please. Thank you, convener, and good morning committee. It's nice to be speaking to you all. We share the concerns that were voiced extensively in this morning's session around the capacity and the budgets that are available to local authorities. We have a very key role in us meeting that zero, particularly around the areas that you outlined. Research that we have carried out in Scottish Renewables is looking specifically at the planning aspect of what local authorities do. It has shown since 2011 that the number of planning staff in local authorities in Scotland has dropped by 20 per cent. Our main anxiety going forward where we go from here is around how local authorities will be able to cope with a huge upswing and activity that there is going to need to be if we are to achieve our net zero goals. Given the organisation that I speak on behalf of, I will stick to renewable energy to illustrate the issue. We currently have eight and a half gigawatts of onshore wind in Scotland. By 2030, to keep us on track for net zero, we will need 12 gigawatts in addition to the eight that we already have. We have around half a gigawatt of solar, and we will need four to eight gigawatts by 2030. In offshore space, we will be going from one gigawatt to 11 gigawatts, and all of that has to come onshore. All of those projects need to go through the planning systems of which local authorities are a key part. Given that they are already overstretched at the moment, if we see this big upswing in work, we have deep concerns around that. We also have very deep concerns for local authorities around the staff that they actually have and the experience of them. We are seeing many of the experienced planning officers retiring the new people coming into the system. They are so pressured that they do not get out to do the professional development that they should have done in the past. We see a shortage of ecologists, landscape architects and all sorts of specialist skills leaving local authorities struggling. They have a very key role to play. They are very important stakeholders and partners in all the work that we will be doing, but we have deep concerns about their capacity to take on what we are going to have to do with the situation that they are currently in. Thank you very much, Morag. For that response, the same question to Elizabeth Leighton, please. Hello. Thank you for inviting me—oh, on behalf of the feedback there, okay. Inviting me along, Secretariat, for the Climate Emergency Response Group, which is a leadership group of business and civic leaders, including my colleague Morag Watson, who have come together to urge the Scottish Government to take a more urgent and ambitious response to the climate emergency. In September, we published a report that included 12 proposals that could be taken for it immediately. One was on planning and one was on the local government role and delivery, so it is very pertinent to this discussion. Absolutely local government is critical to achieving our net zero ambitions. They are estimated to have powers over about a third of the emissions in their area, so transport, housing, and planning. That pivot to delivery that the cabinet secretary was speaking about in previous sessions is absolutely reliant on local authorities being equipped and having the capacity and resources to do their job. In the area of planning, that was one of our main recommendations about making planning fit for our net zero future was gearing them up in this year of 2022, so that planners, councillors, reporters, and the whole planning system actually have the capacity and expertise that is fit for purpose. It is not that we do not, in a sense, know the answer to this question, because a very good piece of research was done for Skills Development Scotland that identified the fact that it said the evidence and data suggests that this sector may struggle in the future to attract and retain a sustainable workforce for the planning service and that this would put at risk achieving national objectives, including achieving net zero emissions by 2045, and that report includes an action plan about how to address this published in February 2021, what has happened with the action plan and what has been done. As you yourself were saying earlier, convener, the clock is ticking. This is an urgent issue that needs to be addressed now, so we need emergency measures on addressing that gap in capacity, as well as longer-term skills development over four or five-year horizons to fill those gaps. Thank you very much, Elizabeth. The same question to Kirsten Lann, please. Good morning, committee. I am here today on behalf of SSEN Transmission. We are the company that owns, operates and develops the transmission network in the north of Scotland and the remote Scottish islands with the aim of delivering a network for net zero. We are a regulated business, so our key role is to connect the renewable energy that is needed to support the UK and Scotland's emissions reductions targets, connecting that energy to the grid and taking it to where it is needed all across GB. Our network area in the north of Scotland, in particular, will play an outsized role in meeting the UK and Scotland's renewable energy targets, contributing up to 10 per cent of the UK net zero target, according to our analysis. Through the current price control realty 2, we are planning to invest at least £2.8 billion between now and 2026, potentially increasing to over £4 billion, to deliver our network for net zero in the north of Scotland. We are also looking to double our workforce between now and 2026. However, as has been referenced by a number of other panel members, delivery timescales are incredibly challenging, and the levels of investment that are required to support net zero will be absolutely unprecedented. I think that our network has probably not seen that level of investment since perhaps the 1950s, so there will be a significant investment needed in Scotland's grid infrastructure between now and 2030 to deliver those targets at scale and pace for net zero. Planning will play an absolutely pivotal role in that. Just to echo the comments that other panel members have made before me, I think that successful delivery of MP4's net zero objectives will be absolutely dependent on a supportive planning process that is responsive to the levels of investment that are going to be required to achieve Scotland's climate goals, and I think that having adequate levels of planning resources is going to be absolutely vital to unlock that. Obviously, there is recognition within the MP4 document that increases in planning fees are planned to help address the issue, but we feel that increasing fees on its own will not support better quality and timely decision making without further investment and resource and skills planning. As Morag mentioned, the trend is that the number of planners is decreasing at the moment, and we are already feeling the impact of that in terms of the consenting timescale for our current projects. I think that the other thing that would be really helpful with the fee increase for planning fees is to have those ring-fenced so that they stay within local authority planning teams, and we think that that could perhaps directly improve planning determination outcomes. Thank you very much for those opening remarks. Let me pick up on two issues raised. First of all, concerns on planning capacity and expertise at local authority level, mentioned by Morag Elizabeth and Kirsten. How much will that be a bottleneck in terms of approving the various projects and capacity that will be required to meet targets, and what needs to be done in terms of better resourcing local authorities to help them to reach net zero targets? Dr Kerr, I know that you have looked at decarbonising heat in other countries. The evidence that we have heard from local authorities indicates concerns about reaching the heat and buildings target for 2030. Some of them said that might not be achievable at all. Do you share those concerns? If so, what practical policy measures need to be put in place to help local authorities to meet the 2030 targets for heat and buildings? First question on planning. Let me go with Morag Elizabeth and then Kirsten. Over to you, Morag. Thank you. In terms of how we address this, we know that our colleagues at the Royal Town Planning Institute are already researching into what the skills demand is going to be going forward for the planning system, and they are calling for a strategic skills and workforce development plan for Scotland, and we fully support that call. We are looking for that to come forward. We have already heard this morning from the cabinet secretary that there is a very constrained financial situation that we find ourselves in due to the pandemic and many other factors. While it is desirable that local authorities should be funding for this, we understand that that is not always as straightforward as we want it to be. One of the things that we see in the planning system is that there can be a lot of repetition. Sticking to the area of renewables, what we will see is that the time frames in planning take so long that, by the time you have gotten your onshore wind farm consented, the model of turbine that you have got in your consent is no longer on the market, newer models are available and you have to go back to the planning system to get it reconcented with the turbines that are now available. We will see churn going through the planning system. If we can streamline our processes more, our planning system is predictable and can deliver consent rapidly. We would take a lot of the strain off the planning system by having to go back and revisit planning applications again and again. The other thing that we are doing research with at the moment and working with colleagues in the Scottish Government on is how we reduce planning timescales. We need to start front-loading what we are doing and pre-application consultations. That means that everybody has had a chance to comment on an application before it actually goes into the system and any changes they would be asking for can be made pre-application stage. What we are finding at the moment is that people are waiting to comment when the application is actually live. That means that the application then has to go back to the drawing board to take in their comments. That again takes up a huge amount of capacity in the system. If we can unlock that and stop using capacity just to go back over the same ground again and again, that would make a sizable difference in our planning system. Thank you very much, Moragher. That was very helpful. Elizabeth, the same question to you on planning. Thank you. I support what Moragher said about the RTPI work that they have been involved with with improvement service and skills development in Scotland. I mentioned that report on the workforce planning but, obviously, that is more of a medium to long-term answer. What can we do in the meantime? I think that some learning can be done from Covid and how resources were accessed and people were redeployed, people were brought in from other professions to support the Covid response. I think that some of that has to be considered for the planning workforce, which is declining, as several have mentioned. There are other ways to do some of the work in preparation to make planning decisions easier. For example, the local heat and energy efficiency strategies that have been mentioned will be so critical to guiding planning decisions. Many of them are still not in place, and local authorities have given evidence to the committee to say how difficult it will be to complete that task by the expected date. More support needs to be given to them now, not waiting for the public energy agency to be in place but up front to make sure that those are in place as soon as possible because they will guide many of the decisions where they have not a lot of expertise on energy master planning. The same would go in terms of heat networks. Here is another example of where the heat partnerships could assist with building that expertise and sharing that resource across local authorities. Another need will be guidance and how to do carbon assessments and assess whether a project will be resilient to the impacts of climate change. That guidance could be brought into play relatively quickly by using some of the guidance that is already being used for city and growth deals that is being used with project managers. That would be useful for planners. It is making use of what we have now, rather than duplicating or reinventing the wheel, working regionally and in partnerships and coming up with those immediate solutions, as well as resourcing that longer-term workforce planning. I do not have a huge amount more to add to what has been said already by fellow panel members. I think that it is probably a key bottleneck for us to pick up on the skills point in terms of having expertise within local authorities and differing between local authorities. For us, that hits home in terms of the biodiversity site for our developments. We are committed to delivering a greener grid. We tend to focus on habitat restoration and creating biodiversity growth as we invest in our network. Through that, we are committed to delivering biodiversity net gain on all of our new sites by 2025, targeting a no net loss at the moment. We find that when we are engaging on biodiversity with local authorities, because the skills availability is very varied, there are no guidance at the moment to give local authorities a direction in terms of what standards of biodiversity should be achieved. We are experiencing a real inconsistency approach, so we are getting different expectations of different local authorities, and it differs from project to project on what should or should not be delivered. At the moment, policy 3, the nature crisis is drafted in the NPF4 document. There is not an agreed set of standards that is outlined in there, and we think that that should change. There should be a bit more of a direction within the NPF4 document so that it can give local authorities that guidance. We are already experiencing that impact quite greatly on our projects, and the inconsistency creates delays as people have different expectations about what should be delivered. I think that greater clarity in NPF4 would definitely help to reduce that bottleneck. Thank you very much, Kirsten. That was very helpful indeed. Dr Kerr, I ask you a question on heating buildings, but feel free to respond to the question on planning if that is something within your remit. I will focus on the question of targets that you put for heating buildings. It is fair to say that the targets, particularly for 2030, are usually ambitious. I did a little bit of work recently. I looked at heat carbonisation policy, well, things like incentives and regulations, but also targets in different European countries. From that, Scotland has, in that selection of countries, the most ambitious heat carbonisation targets for 2030. It is also starting at quite a low base in terms of the amount of properties that are currently using low-carbon heat. We have had incentives, such as the regular heat incentive, in place on various schemes to support heat networks in place for years, and that has resulted in a certain amount of uptake, but the more nearer the amount of uptake that will be needed to achieve the 2030 target. The point is that the target is undoubtedly hugely ambitious and will be difficult to achieve. I suppose that the more interesting question is whether an highly ambitious target for 2030 is something that helps to promote effective implementation of the things that we need to do ultimately for 2045. There is a moral imperative to implement heat carbonisation and to decarbonise it as quickly as we can to address climate changes immediately as we can. I think that there is also a belief that there will be potential economic gains from moving quickly on carbonisation. That, as Scotland is moving particularly quickly, it can seek to develop the industries and the companies of the future and achieve economic impacts and export potential from these technologies. The two key heat carbonisation technologies that will be playing most of the role in the 2020s are heat pumps or some form of electrite heat networks. The carbon gas in the gas screen is not something that is proceeding to have much prospect of being introduced until possibly the 2030s, if it is to be introduced at all. Heat pumps and heat networks are both technologies that are well established in other parts of the world, so the economic impacts that could be secured in Scotland from their implementation are not clear. There are various other countries that are more well versed in putting in heat networks and the companies that exist within those looking to implement in Scotland. As I said, the targets are definitely hugely ambitious, some of the most ambitious in Europe, particularly for 2030. There is a moral imperative to try to achieve them, but the economic impacts that can be achieved from moving particularly quickly are up for debate. There are technologies that will be introduced in the 2020s, but there are perhaps not technologies that Scotland is leading in. Although there are other technologies, supplementary technologies such as energy storage technologies and the use of data to improve heating technologies and performance heating technologies, which is an area where Scotland possibly can excel and produce some companies that are valuable and create economic impact for the future. That was very interesting and helpful. Let me bring in Fiona Hyslop. Good morning. I would like to address policy 19 in the national planning framework 4. I will come first to Moira Watson and then to Kirsten Land. Scottish renewables in their submission are clear that they do not think that this policy will ensure a place to support continued expansion of low-carbon and net zero energy technologies. You go as far as to say that there is a fundamental mismatch between the Scottish Government's energy policy, particularly the offshore wind policy statement and NPF4. Can you please expand on that and then I will come to Kirsten after that. So, Moira Watson first. Thank you, Deputy convener. As we said in our submission, we have been absolutely clear and unequivocal about this, that the draft text of the national planning framework 4 as it stands will not deliver the level of renewables deployment that we need to keep us on track to achieve net zero. What we will say about the NPF4 is that the high-level principles are excellent. The key principle that addressing climate change and nature recovery should be the primary guiding principle in all decisions and plans is exactly what we need. Throughout the NPF4, it asserts the key role of more renewable energy in delivering net zero. We absolutely agree with that as well. Where the problem comes is when you start to look into the detailed text of the document. For example, around climate change and nature recovery being primary guiding principles, there is nothing in the document that provides any guidance to a planning decision maker about how you should operationalise that and what that should mean in practice. When you start to look at the text around renewable energy in particular, it is often ambiguous, a lot of it is contradictory, it is unclear and when you compare what is in policy 19 with what are in other policies, particularly around scheduled ancient monuments, forestry and peatland. Those policies are in conflict rather than trying to work together. That is why we are saying that there needs to be a fundamental rewrite of several sections of national planning framework 4. If they are to deliver the ambitions and, as I say, to reiterate, we are fully supportive of the ambitions of the national planning framework 4, but we are extremely doubtful that the text as written will deliver what ministers are aspiring to do. Can I come to Christine Land, what her views are? Yeah, I totally echo that. I think that there are some really positive things in the draft. Morag obviously talked about the sort of overarching objectives and we certainly welcome recognition with an MPF 4 of planning's role in tackling the climate and environmental emergency, which is mentioned throughout the document. We are also really supportive of the inclusion of renewable energy and transmission infrastructure as national developments, which I think helps to strengthen their role in tackling the climate emergency. As Morag said, where we have specific concerns is the detail of the specific policies in the document, which will ultimately be what determines how successful MPF 4 will be on delivering for our future low-carbon needs. A significant investment in renewable energy and grid infrastructure will be needed. An MPF 4 will need to lay the groundwork for a very clear and responsive, flexible and well-resourced consenting process, so that the timely delivery of that infrastructure can be delivered at the pace and scale to meet net zero. I think that, just to echo Morag's point, the way that it is currently drafted, it does not quite deliver that. The policies on wild land and green energy are quite contradictory, which is the feedback that we have had from our generation customers, which is very unhelpful to them from a decision-making perspective and creates huge blockers for further renewable energy development. As a stakeholder-led business that is connecting renewable energy in the north of Scotland, we recognise and advocate on behalf of those industry concerns regarding the misalignment between what is proposed, particularly in the onshore wind policy statement and MPF 4, which sends a really conflicting message to industry and also planners, which any uncertainty will create risk to net zero delivery. From a transmission perspective, the policy that we are particularly concerned about is the forestry and woodland policy, which, the way that it is currently worded, there is absolutely no flexibility at all, would make it extremely difficult for us to deliver our critical grid investments due to the extent of woodland coverage in our operational area. We think that re-wording and re-drafting will be required in several policies in the document, just to give a much clearer direction and support of net-zero targets and just be a bit more clear in terms of supporting net-zero goals. Just a short fill-up on this, you referred, Cerson, to the national development sites. Do you think that they are too restrictive? For example, Cromgey First's Negport, as I mentioned? We are quite supportive of the ones that are listed. Our key focus was obviously ensuring that the transmission network retained its status because we think that it will be critical in supporting the transition to net zero as a backbone to connect to the renewables that are going to be needed to support that. I think that perhaps comments on other national developments might be better for other panel members, but I do not have any other additional comments. I will turn to other panel members and I will come first to Dr Kerr and then to Elizabeth Leighton, on policy 19. It is the alignment with pursuing net-zero along with other requirements in relation to Nature Scotland, Immunity and Historic Environment Scotland. How can we ensure that NPFO supports that simultaneous assessment? Perhaps the early intervention and work with Historic Environment Scotland has already happened, for example in major transport schemes. Should that be applied to energy aspects? How should small-scale renewables be assessed and viewed in designated areas and should support be given to community-owned projects? How does that help or assist that, or what improvements are needed to help small-scale renewable projects? First, to Dr Kerr and then to Elizabeth Leighton and feel free to comment on anything that you have heard. I have been focusing on policy 11 with respect to heat and cooling. I am prepared for that and haven't maybe got so much to say on policy 19. There are things to say on co-ordination with respect to heat carbonisation, but I can save those for later time. I am happy to pass on to other areas, but co-ordination with other areas is more in principle. What if you have an over-action views and then other members can think up in specifics? There are a few things to say in relation to focusing on heat carbonisation and co-ordination, which is an important part of that. I think that the draft may overlooks it at the moment. It is something that Chris Tom might want to speak on as well, but there is no reference to the rule of electricity networks in heat carbonisation at the moment. In the heating section, it discusses how heat networks will be implemented and how new developments will be considered their proximity to the heat network, but the targets for 2030 will involve a huge amount of electrified heat, predominantly E-pumps, if they are to be achieved. The implementation of hundreds of thousands of E-pumps will require an electricity network that is able to accommodate that. There is expectation that there will probably have to be some degree of network reinforcement. As I said at the moment, the draft talks about heat networks, but it does not seem to make any reference to the importance of the electricity networks being able to provide electrified heat. As I said, if targets are to be achieved, there will be hundreds of thousands of properties using electrified heat. The other thing that is possibly missing in terms of co-ordination is the new-build heat standard. It is for new developments, new domestic properties and non-domestic properties to be using low-carbon heat by 2024. As I mentioned, the draft is the underpinning policy for low-carbon heat networks to be connected to new developments. It is not mentioned at all at the moment, so if that connects to the point or the coordinating point on the electricity networks, that if new developments are to be used low-carbon heat from 2024, there may need to be an electricity network in place that can accommodate at least the potential of heat pumps in individual buildings or heat pumps running a heat network for these new developments. That is the point on co-ordination that, from my point of view, this planning framework is all about connecting different areas of government, but that is something that is not really addressed in the planning framework at the moment. The point on the role of electrified heat and connecting the role of electricity networks with new developments is the key co-ordination point that is missing from the planning framework at the moment. If I can come to Elizabeth Leighton later, she can maybe comment, if you can, about that co-ordination. If we wait for everything to be aligned and co-ordinated, we might not actually get started on what we need to do, so a general view on that would be helpful. Anything you have about how we can help to support small-scale developments and whether NPF4 encourages that or what needs to be done to help to improve that? I agree completely. We cannot wait for everything to be perfect to get on with it. I will speak about the point about buildings and historic environment-designated areas. I think that that is a bit of an odd man out in the national planning framework, as it does not really seem to give a nod to the change that has been made of giving significant weight to the climate emergency and planning decision. The thresholds that are placed in terms of historic assets places seems unnecessarily restrictive, and unlike some of the other sections of referring to no adverse effects, rather than other language used elsewhere about no unacceptable adverse impacts or setting it in the wider public interest in addressing the climate emergency. It does not seem to chime with the heat and building strategy, which says that there is a review of permitted development rights under way and work on developing approaches for historic buildings and places to transition. I would have liked to have seen it to have been much more indicate that there was a shift in how we were going to respect the culture and the integrity of our historic places, but at the same time acknowledge that they need to adapt for climate impacts as well as in terms of reducing their emissions and that they can. I would think that Historic Environment Scotland would support that. I would like to see change there and clarity provided that on that, so that planning for zero emission systems, particularly micro-renewables in conservation areas, should be much easier and more of a given, more of a presumption in favour of that than all the hurdles that people have to go through now that seem rather out of date. That is in terms of the co-ordination question. On community projects, again, I am not aware of much mention that is made there in terms of community assets, but I would imagine that clarity on making it easier for those groups to apply for planning if there is more upfront support and assistance so that they can get through the planning process more quickly and easily, but that would be important. A final point on clarity is setting that it is not just the language that is in the NPF for the actual words like must versus should and will versus may that we would like to see stronger language, but also being aware of the co-ordinating with targets and other Government strategies that can enable and give confidence to planners behind their decisions in favour of net zero. For example, in the green policy 19, if the Government had a target for solar as they are consulting on now for onshore wind, that would strengthen the case for planners to make those decisions and acknowledge that significant weight to the climate emergency. Thank you very much and I know that Historic Environment Scotland has founded a global heritage network on climate change, so perhaps they are more willing perhaps than people might perceive, but I will pass over to the convener now. Let me bring in Liam Kerr to be followed by Natalie Dawn. I will direct two questions to Dr Kerr, but if anyone else wants to come in after he has answered, just indicate if you would. Neil, you talked of heat networks and policy 11. Policy 11 appears to prioritise heat networks or what people may know as domestic heating over other technologies. I think that there is an actual presumption against domestic biomass where heat networks are available. In your view, does this strike the right balance between heating technologies and site-specific solutions? Does it sufficiently recognise other solutions for heating that may be more financially viable or indeed practical? I think that as currently written refers to heat networks on Julie, but the way that I understand heat policy and other Scottish documents, there is not such an emphasis on heat networks. There is reference to multiple different options, but I think that it is a problem with the draft text at the moment. As I mentioned earlier, there are policies such as the new build heat standard. The policy is that, from 2024, consented new buildings will have to have no carbon heat, and that could take a variety of different forms. There are heat networks, transfer heat network zones, and that is referred to in the planning framework. If you are in a heat network zone, there is a presumption that you use that network. It seems to me that the initial policy to think about is the new build heat standard and that new buildings consented from 2024 should be using some form of low-carbon heat. Whether there is much competition between biomass systems and heat networks, there are a couple of things to say there. The advice from the committee on climate change is that heat networks are more efficient at their operational costs and upfront costs per household attached in heat dense areas. They are much more likely to take place in heat dense areas, so generally we are talking about cities or perhaps large towns. In other countries, there are heat networks in all sorts of different parts of environments. In Denmark, there are heat networks in many small towns. The way that heat networks are thought about in this country at the moment is in heat dense areas and cities. The advice from the committee on climate change is that biomass systems should not be implemented in urban environments, partly to do with the local pollutants that are emitted from biomass borders. Biomass borders are meant to be reserved for rural areas where heat pump is not considered appropriate. There is also the potential to use biomass systems to run heat networks, which is happening in Denmark and in Sweden, where there are carbon capture and pollutant capture considerations. The main point is that, in the draft document, there is an undue emphasis on heat networks as a low-carbon heat option, and there are different options that need to be considered. We need to be made reference to, as I talked about electrified heat, and you have talked about biomass heating systems. The new build heat standard allows the opportunity for many different types of low-carbon heat and there seems to be an undue emphasis on heat networks currently. One more point that I would like to make on the new build heat standard, which is a little bit of a divergence, but it is an important thing to remember with the new build heat standard. The policy, as far as I understand it, is that, by 2024, new buildings consented from 2024, we will have to use low-carbon heat. As far as I understand it, that allows the potential for a building to be consented prior to 2024, which we then built after 2024. There are examples that have been raised with the UK Government of High House Builders in 2018. We are building two 2013 standards in about half of the developments that they were carrying out. That was to happen with the new build heat standard in Scotland, i.e., five years after the regulations come in, new developments were still being developed to the old standards. That would have pretty serious implications for achieving the zero-carbon homes 2030 standard. It is a point about the policy coming in 2024, but it is only being for buildings consented then. The implications of that might be that new developments are not fully low-carbon for seven years after 2024. The implications that that has for the very ambitious 2030 targets is something that needs to be considered. Thank you for that. I cannot see if anyone else wants to come in, so I will pose another question and perhaps we can co-ordinate that shortly. You referred, Neil, earlier on to how industrial developments with waste or surplus heat are expected to be co-located with areas of demand. Demand, of course, we know that a significant proportion of that will be domestic heat. In your view, how can we strike a balance between using sources of low-carbon heat and building houses where people actually want to live? Just thinking about your last answer, is that addressed anywhere else? I think that what I am hearing from you, as we have seen in, for example, Scottish Renewables submission, is that there is a feeling that this has been drafted somewhat in isolation. Is there anything else that we need to be aware of in this space? I will take that before anyone else comes in. On the point of co-locating with waste heat, waste heat is regularly identified as one of the lowest-cost, if not the lowest-cost option for supplying heat to heat networks here and in various parts of the world. It is not something that has taken advantage of properly in Scottish or UK heat networks. One of the parts of the paragraphs in the planning framework refers to co-locating future potential waste heat sources, the heat demand, to ensure that that waste heat source can be used to run a heat network and supply low-carbon heat to the properties. There are a couple of things to consider there with regard to future developments that the main waste source heat in Scotland, or the largest one, is waste water treatment. You may not want to site new waste water treatment plants near to heat demand for various reasons. The other thing to think about is the production of hydrogen, which I have been reading about, which may result in large amounts of waste heat. That is perhaps something that could be cited near to sources of heat demand. The production of hydrogen, perhaps for use in industry, produces a lot of waste heat and therefore helps to feed the heat network nearby. That provides low-cost heat source for the heat network, but it also possibly provides a source of revenue for the hydrogen productions. In hydrogen production, there are various kind of visual considerations as to where the production may take place. There is a potential for waste heat from that, which could help to provide synergies for the low-carbon heat networks. I am very grateful. I believe that Elizabeth Leighton may want to come in on this point. Yes, it is coming in more on the previous point about the heating and cooling and the number of technologies that are addressed. I just wanted to raise our attention to the fact that we know that the Government is planning to introduce regulations not just for new build but also for existing properties to transition to zero emissions heat. That is yet another reason why it is important that individual technologies and the full range of technologies is not neglected in policy 11 or on heating and cooling, on historic assets and places, on policy 28 or policy 19 in terms of green energy. That is yet another example of alignment with strategies that need to be made. That is very helpful. Morag Watson. Thank you. I will throw some light on how the heat is being treated in planning and what we are looking for. We are looking to other Government documents to do strategic thinking about what technologies should be used where for doing decarbonisation and what we are looking for the NPF4 to do is to provide that enabling policy framework for gaining consents for whichever projects are most appropriate and the most appropriate spot. The reason that we are seeing a lot coming through on heat networks in NPF4 is that they are a relatively new development in Scotland and we are aware that many planning authorities have not dealt with applications around them. We are looking for the NPF4 to create that guidance and framework for a planning decision maker when an application comes forward but what we would not be looking for the NPF4 to do is to attempt to provide any kind of strategic guidance as to which is the most appropriate technology. In policy discussions, we are hearing that things begin to be conflated. We would expect building regulations to deal with what heating should be used in a new property. We would expect committed development rights to enable what needs to be retrofitted to an existing policy. When it comes to bringing forward a large new scheme that will need planning consent, we would expect the national planning framework to be the enabling framework to enable that to happen. We would expect Government's heat strategy overall to be doing that analysis of what is the most cost-effective and net-zero responsive way to decarbonise our heat demand. What we are seeing in those policies is that they are beginning to conflate together and we do not feel that that is helpful. I am very grateful to the panel. No further questions. Thank you very much, Liam. Let me bring in Natalie Dawn, please. Natalie, over to you. Thanks, convener. My questions are direct to Kerstin and Dr Care for my first question. It is quite general. Obviously, the national spatial strategy focuses on different areas in Scotland. I am just wondering what your views are on what impact the strategy will have on energy production and consumption. Do you think that it will support a radical reduction in greenhouse gas emissions? What do you feel that the key barriers are to delivering the six principles of the strategy, and how do you feel that promoting and supporting active travel and decentralising energy networks can be delivered justly? We are supportive of the spatial strategy, particularly the inclusion of the transmission network on the spatial strategy map, which includes the progression of future remote island links, which we think is going to be really important. It is probably quite important to note that the project shown on the map does not include all the strategic transmission investments that are going to be necessary to support Scotland's net zero ambitions, such as reinforcements to the grid network in Argyll and Skye, the East Coast HPDC link and many others. That will obviously change as well as things move forward and as the need for other reinforcements in the network come forward as we make the journey towards net zero. I think that it is very important that there is a bit of flexibility there. I think that the priorities that are listed for the spatial strategy are probably the right ones. The overarching objectives of the MPF4 plan are a whole that we are wholly supportive of and we think that they are the right things to focus on. It is more the detail of the specific policies that we have concerns with because they do not align with the messaging that is in things such as the spatial strategy and the other parts, the action areas of the document. That is all that I have to say. I would not be so familiar with the principles of the spatial strategy, so I will just focus on the point about the just transition. Something that has been mentioned occasionally but maybe not properly in the meeting so far is the targets for fuel poverty, which has been recently revised with a new definition and a new target date for achievement. However, there have been some form of target for fuel poverty in Scotland and the rest of the UK for probably 20 years now and it has not really had a huge amount of impact. The definition has been revised and that sort of affects how it is recorded and reported. The general thing is about the population of Scotland that is considered to be in some form of fuel poverty. How we address that in a very similar timeframe to how we at the same time move to do carbon heat makes what is a significant challenge even more challenging. I suppose that the point is that it is really important to recognise the scale of the challenge because that will help to focus minds and think about the most effective means of achieving both affordable energy and low-carbon energy. It is just the point that there are fuel poverty targets alongside low-carbon targets and the achievement of both is going to be incredibly difficult, but the scale of the challenge should hopefully allow minds to be focused and to think of perhaps somewhat radical ways of how heat and energy in general is paid for and how the system is run because it might require some quite radical thinking to achieve both targets simultaneously. I will direct my next question to Elizabeth Morag, but if you want to pick up on any of my previous points, feel free to. In terms of the spatial strategy, do you feel that the priorities that are set out for each of the five areas are appropriate, given that all the spatial principles that we have touched on already also apply to those areas or regions? Do you feel that there is a risk or a lack of clarity for the public and private sectors and communities as well? How do you feel that that should be overcome? The clarity issue is one that we have quite majored on quite strongly because we think that, in addition to the actual framework itself, there is a lot that the Government can do to show leadership and provide that clarity and certainty not just for the planning system but also for the investors, as you said. With the spatial strategy but also with the national developments that are in the framework, we think that there is a need to align infrastructure investment plans and the ones that we have already, but going forward Scottish budgets to show that there is a genuine plan and commitment to taking those forward and working with the private sector to do so. We already know that, in previous national planning frameworks, some of those national developments did not come forward and some, indeed, are carried forward to this one. So we think that that would be very important in terms of providing that clarity and bringing in the private investment. I think that that is all I will have to say on that. Thank you, Elizabeth. Thank you. Again, Natalie, picking up on your question about the ambiguity around it. We have no concerns per se about what is in the spatial strategy but, when you look across them, they are quite inconsistent. Some mention renewable energy, some do not. As Kirsten has already said, there is some very major part of the grid infrastructure that are not there. When you look at the sections of the NPF board document in comparison with all the other sections, it is not clear how they relate to each other. Having looked at those sections, again, it is not clear how someone who is making decisions in the planning system could view those and take what is in those sections into their decision making. That would come to another overarching concern that we have about the NPF4 in general. There are many important priorities in there. As has already been mentioned, there is fuel poverty, there is the need for decent homes, there is the need for a just transition, there is the need to protect the environment, and there is the need to address climate change among many others. However, there is absolutely no hierarchy anywhere in the document to give any kind of guidance of how you balance out those things. We want all those priorities to be delivered, but we want them to be mutually reinforcing. We do them in a joined up and coherent way, but at the moment there is nothing to join them up and create that coherence. We are in danger of all our priorities that are so important to us, competing with each other and beginning to undermine each other rather than being a mutually reinforcing thing that delivers the Scotland that we all want to see, which is low-carbon. It is a thriving nature. Our communities are thriving. We have community wealth, we have a just transition. People are no longer living in fuel poverty, but we are not seeing how that all comes together in a coherent way from what is currently there. We think that it can. It is just that potential has not yet been realised. Thank you both. That is very useful to know. I will pass back to the convener now. We know that there are 18 national developments proposed, including key developments for the energy sector. I was reading Scottish renewables written submission to the committee, which Elizabeth Latton just touched on the point that several national developments from NPF 3 have been carried forward to NPF 4. I will come to Morag first, but Scottish renewables say to the committee that designation as a national development provides negligible benefits within the planning system and sites those projects from NPF 3 have been carried over as further evidence that national development designation does not work as a planning mechanism. I will come to Morag just to get you to elaborate on that and to ask what you see as being the key barriers to the national developments being realised. Thank you, Monica. That just picks up on the theme that is developing through this. It is very welcome that we have national designations to reinforce their importance, but it does not really follow through into the planning system of how does that get treated in the planning balance. If you are a decision maker and one of those developments is coming in front of you, how should you treat it differently from any other consenting application that comes forward? That is not clear. We have this category into which we put things, but it is not clear what that category means. What we have seen in the past, as you very clearly said, is that things that were under national planning framework 3, as those national developments, still have not been consented and have not been done. You would think that being a national development would confer some kind of advantage in the consenting process, but case evidence would be that it does not. That is something that we would be looking to address in the MPF4. If those things are of national importance to us, we should have a process by which they are treated as nationally important. It weighs somehow in the planning balance. It is obviously open to debate as to how it should weigh in the balance and how much weight should be afforded to it, but it should certainly have some kind of weight attached to it, which it does not appear to do. I have already mentioned Elizabeth Leighton, so can I turn to Elizabeth Leighton next, please? Yes, just to say that the national developments are not in the programme for government, they are not in the infrastructure investment plan. Only a few exceptions to that, such as digital fibre. It makes you wonder how that is going to happen. What confidence does that give to the planning system in terms of the significance of those and addressing the concerns that Morag was raising? It is important to see the framework in the context of those wider decisions by Government in their budget statements or in the forthcoming national economic transformation strategy. It is particularly significant in that case. Do those all add up to the same picture that is being promoted to give that confidence to the planners but also to investors? Thank you very much. Thank you for the same question. Can I turn next to Dr Care to get your view on that? In your opinion, how important are those national developments in relation to energy production and consumption in terms of, hopefully, radically reducing greenhouse gas emissions? Dr Care, please. It is not something that I am aware of, but it seems that the points that Morag is making seem very sensible. If projects that were national developments in 2013 are not yet in development, that seems that some serious consideration needs to be given to the way that the designation carries, but it is not something that I am particularly expert on. Thank you for that. Can I then come finally to Kirstan land, please? Just to get your thoughts on that, Kirstan, you are still on mute, so you will have to repeat your answer again. Sorry about that. I just wanted to say that I support the feedback that other panel members have given so far. As a businessman, we are obviously very welcoming of the fact that transmission infrastructure has been included as a national development, because it gives added strength or weighting within MPF4 as a type of development that is going to be fundamental to support net zero delivery. My point comes back to the policies again, because the way that the policies are kind of drafted in MPF4, some of them are creating blockers for national developments to go ahead, the way that they are drafted at present. You can see within those policies that there is potential for direct inconsistencies between them, but some are not very detailed in terms of what they are trying to deliver, which makes it difficult from a decision-making perspective and provides inconsistency. In particular, I talked about the policy for trees, woodland and forestry previously, but that will certainly be a huge blocker for transmission infrastructure as a national development, the way that it is currently drafted. Although we try to, if we have to remove a tree, we always look to replace any trees that we remove and we also try to not remove any trees if we do not have to. We are very supportive of a desire to limit any impact on forestry, and woodlands absolutely support that, but there is no flexibility in the wording of the policy at the moment. It could be possible—it is not always possible—for us to not develop in an area that is woodland, because just in the nature of where we develop our projects in the north of Scotland, there tends to be woodland cover in our operational area. I think that the lack of flexibility in some of the policies is already creating a blocker to the development of national development projects. Within that policy, in particular for woodland, I think that there should be an exclusion made for essential infrastructure, obviously where there is a locational need, if there is no other option and if no other site is suitable. At the moment, there is no recognition of that within the MPF4, and it would be helpful to do that in the context of net zero delivery and delivery of national developments in the future. Thank you. I can return to one final question. I will aim this one at Morag Watson, because Morag used earlier on that we need to start from loading on how planned decisions are made and how the public engage. Can you elaborate on that and what is the missing link? From my understanding, we have been talking about front-loading and planning for a very long time now, so what is missing? Is it resources or is it something else? One of the key things that we are hearing, particularly from the statutory stakeholders, is that it is a capacity issue for them. We just do not have enough time, but it does end up being one of those catch-22 situations. In planning, there has always been a pre-consultation phase where it would be normal for our developer members to go to those statutory consultees and to the community and to test the idea with them to hear their thoughts on it. Based on the feedback that they get, you redesign your scheme so that you have addressed concerns that people had before you even go into planning. When we are constrained, there is a requirement for those statutory consultees to respond to planning applications but not to pre-consultation. Obviously, they have to meet their obligations, so they will put their emphasis on what they have to do, which is to respond to a planning application. The catch-22 then comes in that that planning application is not quite what they would have wanted had they been able to engage in the pre-consultation stage. It probably would have been a lot closer to what they wanted, but because that is not what happened, you then, as I said earlier, go back through the process that has to be revised, resubmit it, everybody has to look at it again. If there are more comments from another statutory consultee, another set of adjustments needs to be made and it all goes round again. We just end up in this loop of going over the same ground again and again as we make adjustments to meet everybody's needs. That could be prevented, but at the moment, it is a capacity strain, but then it creates a bottleneck further down. As I said, a catch-22 at the moment would be to find ourselves in. That is helpful. I know that, for the national development, that status means that the principle of those developments will not need to be agreed in the later consenting process, but they will still have to have relevant statutory consent. On paper, it looks like it should be a quicker process, but there might be other reasons why some projects are not getting off the ground. Points of time, so I will hand back to the convener. Next up is Jackie Dunbar, to be followed by Mark Ruskell. If I can go back to a question that was touched on earlier for more clarity, on the Scottish Government's offshore wind policy statement, some of the panel said that they agreed that changes were needed to be made to align the NPS4 and the OWS, but they did not say what they thought those changes should be. If I could dig down a little more, I am sorry, I cannot remember which panel member actually said that it needed change. Can I ask Morag for her comments on that first place? Absolutely, yes, I can respond to that one for you. What we will see in the future as we move towards net zero is that our offshore wind industry becomes the backbone of our energy generation infrastructure. What we will see is that all of that has to come on shore. There will also be operations and maintenance centres and so on happening. Particularly when we have looked at the strategies and the spatial area plans that are in the NPS4, they have often not included the huge amounts of development that is going to be happening offshore adjacent to those areas. As Kerstin has already said, grid infrastructure is going to be important. As we bring all that electricity that is generated, particularly in the north and north sea, into the east coast, there will need to be grid infrastructure that will then transport that electricity to where it is needed. Again, we are not seeing that coming through in that joined-up thinking of just what we will need to consider as we move towards 2045. Maybe that is an unfair question, but how do you see that developing, what is needed for that to happen? Right. In terms of strategies written into the national planning framework for, we need to particularly get it down on. Simply included in the policy is the first step to make everybody aware and the planners aware that this is happening and this is going to be something that we will develop over time. As we have said in many other places, there needs to be guidance on how that should be treated in the planning balance. That offshore generation capacity is going to be key to Scotland's low-carbon energy generation in the future. It is also key to our just transition, as we transition from a fossil fuel-based energy system and much of our economy, depending on that, into renewables. Again, this will be a very new thing for our planning decision makers. It will often be something that they have not come across before. What they will be looking for is the NPF-4 to provide them with guidance on how they should be thinking about it, what kind of decisions are they expected to make around it and how should they weigh those decisions against other considerations in the planning balance. That is what is missing at the moment. I agree with everything that Morag has raised. We are obviously the company that is responsible for connecting the projects, but Scotland is going to be a huge focus for us as a business. The co-ordination point is particularly important to connect the projects in the most efficient way, but to produce impact on communities wherever possible. I agree with what Morag has said. I think that that is right. I can touch on that as well. Do you think that we should need some regional framework, or should it be all-national? Some regions may need a difference to others, as far as what I was trying to get at. NPF-4 does touch on that a little, but it seems to have split up different regions with different priorities in the document. From looking at the detail in NPF-4 at the moment, we did not have any huge concerns about what was proposed, but I would say that that there are certain generic priorities that are featured in some of the areas and not others. For example, by a diversity, it is only referenced in a couple of the action areas and it is not in all of them. The transmission infrastructure is not referenced across all, but it is only referenced in the islands, which makes sense. That is obviously a key focus in terms of improving resilience and supporting their journey to net zero too, but we think that perhaps that should be recognised across all of the action areas in Scotland, because the transmission network will play such a key role in that transition to net zero, and I do not think that that is recognised at the moment. Mark Ruskell, please. If I could just follow on from that, I might turn to Kirsten first. Previous iterations of NPF-4 have had specific transmission projects such as Bule Denny being cited as national developments. It seems that NPF-4 is a bit light on specific infrastructure projects that are needed and where they are going to be. 25 gigawatts from Scotland, 10 gigawatts of onshore wind, I do not know from solar, maybe six gigawatts from solar. As a transmission business, are you looking at this and thinking that, actually, there are about five bits of major chunky transmission infrastructure that needs to be written in to this NPF, or is the wording in here the detail in here enough at the moment? It is important that the wording remains quite flexible, because, as you say, there is going to be a lot of investment required in the transmission network. We obviously know what projects we have as priorities just now. We are keen to take forward as a business, for example the East Coast HVDC link, which will be absolutely crucial to deliver Scotland projects. We have investments in our Gail and Skye that we are looking to take forward the connection of the islands and Western Isles and Orkney, which is key for us to do. The key thing is that, as further investments come forward and as further projects need to come forward in order to meet renewable targets, we might find that there are more projects that come on board that we need to progress as well. At the moment in the plan, there is not so much name reference but drawn on the map in terms of projects that, for transmission, are key, but there are also ones that are not included on there that are equally as important. Keeping that flexibility is right, because it gives us that flexibility to progress the other investments that need to happen. If we just list the key projects, that could potentially be problematic for future investment. Is there a potential conflict? Is there a potential limit on capacity for transmission? You might have projects competing against each other on-shore versus offshore versus solar. Is that a realistic prospect or does NPF allow everything to be built out? It obviously depends on a project by project basis. We are hugely reliant on the planning process in order to take forward our projects and ensure that they are delivered in a timely way. It is obviously one of the factors that we have in delivering the projects. As long as NPF 4 is supportive of the delivery of transmission infrastructure, it is making a couple of tweaks in terms of rewording to some of the specific policies in there, particularly by the diversity side and the woodland policy in particular, would make a huge difference in just trying to remove some of the blockers. I think that that can be delivered if the NPF 4 is just tweaked a little bit. I don't know if Morag wants to come in on that specifically. Thank you, Mark. One of the things that we have been calling for that we really think the NPF 4 needs to do is that it needs to have a much stronger relationship with other Scottish Government policies, particularly around energy and net zero. We are expecting the NPF 4 to govern planning for 10 years, and we know that in that 10 years there is going to be a lot of dynamic change. As new information comes forward from the Climate Change Committee on advice and research, how we are moving towards net zero is going to have to evolve and change. One of our key concerns around the NPF 4 is that we start to put specific things in there, but as more data comes forward, we realise that those things need to evolve and change. The NPF 4 needs to be flexible enough to accommodate that change going forward. One of the things that we think is very helpful is that the Scottish Government is starting to set targets, so it is consulting around one for onshore wind, for example. We know that it is starting to look at a strategy for solar energy in Scotland, which would hopefully bring forward a target. Again, that gives our planning decision makers an understanding of the scale of what it needs to happen. Likewise, it gives us an opportunity to monitor how we are progressing towards those targets. Is planning an enabler, is planning a blocker? Again, if it proves to be a blocker, that gives us the opportunity to evolve all our policies and advice to make sure that it no longer becomes that way. As Kerstin says, as a business, SSEN has a very clear plan of what infrastructure is needed. Through the Scotland process, for example, we know what the pipeline looks like going forward. We will know what the pipeline looks like going forward for onshore wind, and we need to be able to support and facilitate those things rather than planning becoming a blocker to them. If I could just stay with you more agon, I think that it was in Scottish Renewables submission that you were talking about visual impact being perhaps the main reason why renewables are turned down. From an industry perspective, what changes are you looking for in the way that projects are assessed and who is responsible for that? Is it NatureScot? You mentioned very briefly wild land earlier on. Are you looking for a change in the way landscape is assessed? It seems that that is the major contention. If there is a contention, because public support is very strongly in favour of onshore wind, that is the main reason why projects are being turned down or why it is taking a long time for them to get through planning. What kind of changes are you specifically looking for? That is a really interesting question. When we look at why planning applications, particularly for onshore wind, are turned down, the vast majority of them are turned down on visual impact. For us Scottish Renewables is that the industry body has commissioned independent research, the UK Government has commissioned independent research, and it has consistently found that the public support for onshore renewables, particularly onshore wind, sits around that 70% to 80%. Again, when we have specifically surveyed people who live within five miles of a wind farm, we find that there are very high levels of public support, so people do not seem concerned about how they look. Recently, a report came out from bigger economics specifically looking at the question of having wind farms' present impact on tourism, because we know that that is again a big concern about how they look, and they found that there was no relationship between the two. Tourism had gone up in areas where there were more wind farms, so it weighs disproportionately in the planning balance. That brings me back to the very first point that I made to the committee. There is no guidance in the NPF for how we should be considering climate change, the combined emergency in the planning balance. We know very clearly that we need more onshore renewables to hit our targets, and we know that we are going to need to consent them, but if we keep refusing them based on a minority of people who object to how they look, we are never going to get there. The Scottish Government itself says in the NPF for that we must radically change the planning balance. That is what needs to happen. We all agree that it has said all the right priorities about how it needs to be rebalanced, but, again, back to that original point, there is no guidance on how that should happen and how a planning decision maker should do that. It is essential that we get that guidance in so that we stop having this very disproportionate skewing of the planning balance decisions. In terms of the materiality of climate change vis-à-vis landscape, is that the primary way to rebalance decision making? Or are there other aspects? It has been proposed in the past that community economic benefit could be a material consideration in planning. Material consideration in planning is a very interesting one, and it comes up a lot. Essentially, for people who are less familiar with the legal decision making around it, material considerations are a group of things that get placed in the decision making basket and balanced up against each other. To date, that has been a very prudent approach in our planning system, but now that we are in a climate emergency, as Elizabeth MacDonald said, we need to move to an emergency balance in how we think. Climate change is not equal with all other considerations. It is a serious threat to us as a nation and more widely. As a nation, we were one of the first on the earth to declare a climate emergency, and we are taking that very seriously. That needs to be reflected in our planning decision. We cannot treat climate change as just the same as all other considerations any more than we can do so with the biodiversity emergency. As the Scottish Government has said, they need to be the prime considerations in decision making, but we need guidance on what that means. We need to start consenting things that will move us towards net zero, and there is also the question mark of whether we cease to consent things that increase our emissions. That is where the decision making around balance and guidance needs to come. Just a couple more brief questions. It was just a wrap-up question. Again, if I could stay more longer, I will invite others to come in if they want to wrap up on anything that I have asked. You mentioned earlier on to colleagues about local planning and some of the constraints there and the capacity and resources of local planning. Is this an issue also with section 36, section 37 planning as well? With Government planning processes, is it just about local authorities and their role as planning authorities for smaller developments that do not meet that threshold? We have seen a big issue with timescales in the section 36 process. There is guidance on how long the public local inquiry should take. There is no guidance on how long it should take the reporter to write up the report once the public local inquiry has taken place. We have no timescales for how long it should take the minister or the cabinet secretary to then decide based on the report that they have received from the reporters. During the pandemic, we saw that decision making stretched from nine months to 27 months to make a decision after a public local inquiry. At the moment, the timeframe for making a decision around planning from the first conception of a project to consenting is seven years. We have eight years to hit our onshore wind targets. The two just do not go together. In England, for example, there is a three-month timeframe for the reporter to write the report, and then there is a three-month timeframe for the minister or the cabinet secretary to make their decision. We think that it would be exceptionally helpful if we had those kind of timeframes established in Scotland. Do you have any project that is investable if it takes seven years to get a decision? I just wondered if Niall or Elizabeth had anything to add. I know that this is not perhaps directly in your area of expertise, but if you wanted to come in on any of those, Elizabeth. Yes, just quickly two points. One is on this balancing language. I pulled out a couple of points on what is actually in the text of the MPF4. It talks about what should not be supported. The level of emissions is the minimum that can be achieved for the development to be viable, and it has also demonstrated that the proposed development is in the long-term public interest. One might question how could something that is going to increase our emissions or not really support our transition to net zero, not be in the long-term public interest. I think that that is an example of the type of language that is not as helpful as it could be of giving a strong push on what significant weight being given to climate emergency should be. That is an example there. I wanted to give one other example. That would be about the leadership issue and giving more confidence to the planning system. We have called for the Scottish Government to make a statement that they will call in major developments where they believe that climate impacts have not been properly considered. That would be in terms of emissions reduction but also in adapting to climate impacts. We think that that would send a very strong message to the planners to know that if they are making decisions that they think are risky in terms of the way that we think of planning now, that they are going to be backed up. Or if they do not, if they go with business as usual, that they are going to be called out. I think that that is a really important leadership rule for the Government to take. I do not know if Nile has anything to add to that. If not, I will go back. I have no specific points to pick on those issues. Dr Kerr, I have a very brief final question for you. The Scottish Government has created the Public Energy Agency to help to implement the heat and building strategy. However, as we have heard today, it is a virtual only agency that has no additional budget or resource and will not be up and running until 2024. Very briefly, is that enough in your view, is that enough resource and support to help to meet the 2030 heat and buildings targets? I think that it is fair to say also a point that was made with respect to this earlier, is that the other things are on-going, they do not rely on the national public agency to happen. I hope that that would be the case. There are Scottish incentive schemes coming in and they do not rely on the national public energy agency. However, bearing in mind what I was saying about the scale of the challenge for new carbon and for a few poverty targets, I think that a really important point for people to be aware of is the scale of the challenge. With that in mind, perhaps it might be more critical that a co-ordinating body—whether that is a public energy agency or what exact form that takes—could be prioritised, could be brought in quicker, perhaps. However, it is important to think about what exact rule that body will have, and that is something that the Scottish Government is doing at the moment. However, considering the scale of the challenge and if that body is going to play a critical role, it is fair to say that that body should be in as soon as possible to play a critical role. That brings us to the end of questions and our allocated time. Thank you to the panel once again for joining us this morning. Thank you for your time and enjoyed the rest of your day. Next week, the committee will have one more evidence session on NPF4, looking at transport, the environment and the circular economy. We will then share our findings with the lead committee towards the end of this month. Thank you very much. We will now move straight into the next agenda item, which is consideration of one negative instrument, the greenhouse gas emissions trading scheme, amendment order 2021. Like the affirmative instrument that we considered earlier, this is a joint instrument between the four UK Administrations. It amends the UK-wide emissions trading scheme established by the greenhouse gas emissions trading scheme order 2020. This is a negative instrument laid under the negative procedure, which means that its provisions will come into force unless the Parliament agrees a motion to annul it. No such motion to annul has been laid. I refer members to paper number six from the clerk. I have to put on record that paragraph 10 requires a correction. The Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee considered the instrument on 18 January and determined that it should formally draw the Parliament's attention on the ground of a defect in the drafting of the instrument. However, it also welcomed an assurance that the Scottish Government was working to correct that with other Administrations. Do members have any comments on the instrument? No comments. I therefore invite the committee to agree that it does not wish to make any further recommendations in relation to the instrument. Are we agreed? That is agreed. Thank you very much. I now close the public part of the committee meeting.