Hansard

First, I will address some of Douglas Lumsden’s questions, and points that were raised by Sarah Boyack.

Douglas Lumsden asked about a memorandum of understanding, which is still to be negotiated, agreed to and established. He asked about the ministerial forum on CCUS—I called it the “working group”. My officials have had some initial meetings on that, but it has not yet been formalised.

I will also address Douglas Lumsden’s remark about the provisions for hydrogen production and transport. We wanted to have the consent of Scottish ministers in relation to clause 154, but that was not agreed to. That is unfortunate, because at the moment the language is about consultation of Scottish ministers. We will have to beef up the ministerial forum so that it is, in effect, consent by another name.

We have really worked together on the bill. There have been a lot of negotiations between UK Government ministers and Scottish Government ministers. I hope that that is the spirit in which we will continue.

Sarah Boyack mentioned amendments that the Labour Party put in place: we broadly welcomed most of those amendments. It was nice to hear her recognising some of the work that the Scottish Government has done in order to get some amendments over the line that will be good for Scotland and its people. On hydrogen—I hope that this is where she was going with the comments that she made about it—we need more agreement on hydrogen standards and labelling, particularly when we talk about exporting it. The people who want to buy the hydrogen that is produced in Scotland want green hydrogen. We need to get those standards agreed, so I am glad to hear that Labour supports us on that.

I will wind up, Presiding Officer. Notwithstanding the issues around the negotiating tactics, which is a wider issue—I understand why the Welsh Government has not given consent because of that—much that is in the bill is long overdue. The stated aims of the bill are to increase resilience and reliability of energy systems across the UK, to support delivery of the UK’s climate change commitments and to reform the UK’s energy system while minimising costs to consumers and protecting them from unfair pricing.

I agree with Sarah Boyack that the bill could have gone further. Perhaps certain things will go further in the future, but I hope that everyone agrees that despite the negotiations and some of the tactics around them, and despite the bill’s limitations, the bill is in Scotland’s best interests. I hope that everyone votes to agree to the consent motion.