Meeting of the Parliament 28 January 2026 [Draft]
I will speak at length on this group of amendments, because I am glad that we are getting the chamber back to issues that are within the devolved competence of this Parliament.
I will start with amendment 60. Yesterday, in response to a point that I made, the Cabinet Secretary for Climate Action and Energy complained that issues that had been decided at committee were being brought back at stage 3. Well, here we have an issue that was decided at committee in a way that went against the Government. The Government did not gain enough support at the Rural Affairs and Islands Committee to vote down an amendment on this issue, and the amendment was agreed to. The Government lost the vote.
That happened because there was clearly interest in the issue across the political spectrum, and the only party opposing the amendment was the SNP. We had support for my amendment at stage 2 from the RSPB, which urged members of the committee to support it, because it agreed that we need reliable data and up-to-date information. I am bitterly disappointed that, rather than respecting that decision and working with the amendment that was passed by the committee, the Government is trying to override it in the chamber at stage 3.