Meeting of the Parliament 26 June 2024
As other members have, I record my thanks to Scottish Parliament staff, particularly in the Scottish Parliament information centre, for supporting the Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee. I also thank all the members of the committee and Scottish Government officials for their support.
I was pleased to hear Lorna Slater making a contribution. I also thank Gillian Martin for being generous with her time at short notice to work not just with me but with many colleagues around the chamber.
Scottish Labour believes that the bill as amended is stronger and better than it was when it was introduced, which is testament to cross-party working by members. That is why I am a little surprised that Maurice Golden does not seem to be his usual enthusiastic self today. Perhaps a bit of tiredness has set in. Every party in the chamber has added to the bill, which is a good thing.
At every stage of the bill, Scottish Labour has made sure that innocent householders will not be criminalised for the actions of others or for making the simple mistake of putting the wrong thing in the wrong bin, which is important. We have also tried to embed incentivising good behaviour and creating opportunities.
In closing the debate for Scottish Labour, I want to reflect on what my amendments and my colleague Sarah Boyack’s amendments contribute. I think that they strengthen the bill, particularly in relation to provisions on due diligence, human rights, environmental impact and global supply chains. All that is important. Our approach will also ensure that the secondary legislation to come will be strengthened in relation to reducing carbon emissions and on exempting food from the provisions relating to unsold consumer goods.
I thank the Government for working constructively with us, but we are disappointed, in the sense that we would have liked the Scottish Government to strengthen the bill further around reuse and the just transition, because some stakeholders wanted closer alignment with the just transition principles in the Climate Change Act 2008. Our amendments would have helped with that, but we will continue to work with the Scottish Government to do more.
I am pleased that the Scottish Government has committed to work on improving access to reusable nappies. We will see that in the route map and, I hope, in the co-design process with local authorities. I hope that the minister will establish a short-life working group to work with the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities and other partners to build on the findings of the James Hutton Institute’s report and the work that has been done by North Ayrshire Council.
We are very short of time, even though we did a lot of work on the bill. It is fair to say that some stakeholders have been concerned that the Government was not being ambitious enough; we have just had a debate on the climate emergency. We are putting faith in the Government on the circular economy, but we hope and expect to see action through the strategy and the route map.
It is important to say that we welcome the clarity around funding, but the matter requires the right framework and a fair approach as well as the right funding, because local authorities in particular need to be empowered to take the work forward.
I will end with the words not of circular economy guru Maurice Golden—he is a bit tired today—but of Ellen MacArthur, who said:
“If we could build an economy that would use things rather than use them up, we could build a future.”
I hope that those words will resonate. There is an opportunity before us to create a new economy in which we use rather than use up.
I thank the Presiding Officer for her generosity, and I look forward to working with the minister.
17:51