Hansard

First, I welcome the cabinet secretary to her new role. Scottish Labour will be constructive. We will work to hold the Scottish Government to account. When we believe that more action is needed, we will be absolutely clear about what extra proposals we have to deliver on our climate targets.

I am proud of the fact that the Scottish Parliament passed world-leading climate legislation. I know that my Labour colleagues over the years have made contributions to both the Climate Change (Scotland) Act 2009 and the Climate Change (Emissions Reduction Targets) (Scotland) Act 2019.

However, we are at a point where we need to see the heavy lifting of implementation happen now, and not in a decade. That is why I am keen to amend the motion that has been lodged by the SNP-Green Government.

We need stronger action now—the climate emergency demands it. We need to see action on the recommendations from the UK Climate Change Committee’s recent report and from Audit Scotland’s analysis of where we need more action.

The UKCCC’s report from last year highlighted significant failures in meeting our climate targets. Key areas were identified: making our homes and buildings fit for the future, decarbonising our transport, and action on land management, in particular getting reforestation right and restoring our peatlands. Given last week’s worrying report on the loss of biodiversity, we need action that is joined up so that it tackles not only the climate emergency but the nature emergency.

Audit Scotland’s briefing is also clear that we are not seeing the joined-up action across Government that the cabinet secretary talked about in her speech. There are major failings on the monitoring and co-ordination of work on climate change, and not enough of a focus on risk assessment, which I think is really important. We also need more action on adaptation, to ensure that our communities are given the investment that they need now to address the climate change that is already happening, such as in flooding.

As I said at the start of my contribution, Scottish Labour will be constructive. We will propose changes that we think need to be made, and we will talk to people with experience outwith the Parliament.

A key issue that needs to be joined up with our response to the climate crisis is tackling the cost of living crisis. Those have to be addressed at the same time. We have to make sure that the jobs and the investment deliver for all our ambitions.

On housing, for example, I congratulate Alex Rowley on persuading the Scottish Government to adopt the principles proposed in his Passivhaus member’s bill. However, we need to see a massive step up in making our existing homes energy efficient. That means urgent action right across Scotland, which is why it is so disappointing that, in the middle of a cost of living crisis, when 25 per cent of our children are living in poverty and families cannot afford to heat their homes, last year the SNP-Green Government failed to deliver the proposed £133 million of investment in energy efficiency. That would have been a classic win-win, tackling poverty, creating supply chains and skilled jobs right across our communities and reducing climate emissions.

We need practical action. We also need to see more incentives to support the use of renewables technologies in our homes and communities, such as developing heat networks and using the range of proven technologies to heat and power our homes. It is a massive transition, but we need clear plans and we also need ministerial leadership.

It also means doing heavy lifting such as thinking through how, in practice, we can help tenement and other flat owners to access the investment that will enable them to decarbonise their homes. Families could save hundreds of pounds—£500 on their energy bills—under the plans that UK Labour has been developing to deliver investment for extra insulation in our homes. That would be a commitment if Labour got into power at UK level, and it would benefit us in Scotland, too.

We also need to see a big expansion in community renewables work. Again, the opportunity is there, but we need to see leadership from the Scottish Government, sharing best practice, supporting our councils and giving them the investment that they need to make sure that we can be innovative in planning and investment. The Scottish Co-operative Party has done some fantastic work on how renewables can deliver for communities and how community renewables systems can help reinvestment in communities. Money is being made across Scotland that should be invested into our communities. That would need a lot of work, but we can learn from other countries. We just need to look at what Denmark has done over the years on community heat networks that are owned by councils and on moving to low-carbon networks.

We need a joined-up approach right across our governments—our UK Government, our Scottish Government and our councils—to deliver the just transition that we need. Our green prosperity plan would give us that clean power system right across the UK within seven years, and the new publicly owned energy-generation company would mean that the profits, jobs and benefits of our natural resources in Scotland are not offshored but practically benefit local communities.

There is so much more that we could do now. We just need to look at the ScotWind project, which is a massive missed opportunity in terms of the profits that companies will make, which is so ironic given the SNP’s ambition to learn from our Nordic neighbours. We could be doing that now, not missing the opportunity.

I want to briefly mention the decarbonisation of transport, which was also mentioned in the cabinet secretary’s speech. I was glad that it was mentioned and it is good that our trains and buses are going low carbon, but we need more reliable, affordable and accessible services. People need to be able to get to work, regardless of the time of day, with decent public transport options. However, we have actually gone into reverse because we have seen huge numbers of bus services being lost right across the country. That has been exacerbated by, but is not due to, Covid.

The lack of access to local bus services means that people cannot get to work or access services without using cars. We have to give them that opportunity. This morning, in the Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee, we discussed how the lack of transport services is stopping people from accessing culture and creative opportunities, particularly in our rural areas. That has to be fixed.

In the spirit of being constructive, I ask what the Scottish Government is doing to implement the amendment that Scottish Labour lodged to the bill that became the Transport (Scotland) Act 2019 to support municipal bus companies. We have not seen that progress or additional investment given to local authorities to let them achieve the innovation and services that our communities desperately need. A lot could be learned from what Lothian Buses does that could be rolled out across different areas in Scotland.

As we move to electric vehicles, we need to see more choices for people, such as more car share schemes so that people do not always have to buy a car to use a car. There is a lot more that this Government could be doing. Supporting local authorities is absolutely critical and a joined-up approach is fundamental.

It is not just about councils working on their own. They need support and funding from the Scottish Government so that they can do what they want to do now, not in 10 years. This is an emergency.

I am proposing a member’s bill on wellbeing and sustainable development that will enable us to do more of that joined-up thinking. I thank all those who have contributed to my consultation and I hope that ministers will look at the potential bill because it could also be a game-changer. We need to act now. The Scottish Government needs to act on the Audit Scotland recommendations. We also need to see action on the UK Climate Change Committee’s recommendations. Our coastal and island communities will be particularly vulnerable to the climate emergency, and we need action on flood prevention now.

We are approaching a tipping point and we owe it to young people to secure their future. Last week, I was shocked to read about the extent to which young people are now worrying. Their mental health is being impacted by thinking about the climate emergency. It is their future that is at risk and we as politicians have to act now. We do not have to agree on everything, but we have to try to get cross-party agreement on radical action.