Meeting of the Parliament 21 May 2025
I extend my apologies to everyone in the chamber for being late to the debate.
I am grateful that today we are discussing and debating the need to empower Scotland’s islands. During the four years and a bit that I have been in this role, I have recognised that Scotland is not an island nation, but a nation of islands. As colleagues have said, every single island in Scotland is different and unique. I have found that an incredible thing to understand, having travelled from the southern tip of the Western Isles to the northern tip in my very first summer recess, and having travelled to Orkney in that same recess. I took in a lot of islands in that time, and I really saw the differences.
I want to convey to members that it is fantastic that we have had power devolved to Scotland, and we now have that power. However, I want to see power devolved to our island communities at the most local level. If communities are going to tackle the climate and nature emergency, they must have power in their hands.
As I have just said, each island is different, and they face very different circumstances. When I went to the top of a tiny hill on Benbecula and looked down over the sunlit water, I noticed that Uist looks like fragile lace that has been laid across the Atlantic Ocean. The island may be completely overtaken by flooding in the not-too-distant future, and the local authority is having to consider how it will handle rehousing people.
I want us to get to a point where we are designing Scotland with islands and rural communities first. We need to start to think about policies for our island and rural communities that are different from those for urban parts of Scotland, because the circumstances are very different.
Having said that, I will go back to my notes.
Scotland’s inhabited islands are at a critical point in their 5,000 year history, having supported communities since at least the late stone age. In many places, the effects of climate change and depopulation could bring their long human history to an end. Rising sea levels, increasingly extreme storms and the unpredictability of our weather patterns could push island populations to the brink over the next few decades. Their resilience to handle what is likely to be significant change has been undermined by years of little recognition and support from the UK and Scottish Governments. That has already damaged the social fabric of islands and communities by drawing young people and local talent away to the central belt and beyond.
The Scottish Government has begun its journey towards rectifying that situation. I welcome the policy efforts, particularly the islands plan and the carbon-neutral islands project. I have met a number of the carbon-neutral islands project teams. The work that they are doing is fantastic, and it is great to see that the Government recognises the need for multiyear funding for the project, as that will allow us to roll out the work that it is doing to other communities. That is a good starting point when it comes to addressing the challenges that are presented by the climate emergency and depopulation, but we need more changes to be delivered more rapidly.