Meeting of the Parliament 01 June 2016
Thank you, Presiding Officer, and congratulations on your appointment. I also congratulate the cabinet secretary on her new remit.
Let me say how pleased I am that my first speech in the chamber in this session is on a number of subjects about which I care passionately. In the previous session of Parliament, I was closely involved with issues such as climate change, biodiversity, land reform and the circular economy—I was a member of the Rural Affairs, Climate Change and Environment Committee for four years, and I was parliamentary liaison officer to cabinet secretary Richard Lochhead and environment secretaries Aileen McLeod and Paul Wheelhouse. That was a privilege, despite the many challenges that come with the rural affairs, climate change, food and environment brief, which have been evident over the past few weeks and months.
The decision to keep responsibility for climate change at senior cabinet secretary level is very welcome and will enable the Scottish Government to focus even more strongly on the issue. Some critics would have us believe that Scotland has been failing on climate change. Opposition parties, especially, repeat the mantra that we have missed our targets, and I am sure that we will hear more of that in today’s debate. However, the fact is that there has been a 38 per cent reduction in emissions since 1990, and figures show that Scotland continues to outperform the rest of the UK.