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Josh Doble, do you want to come in?

I am aware of a discussion at the moment in Aberfeldy about woodland crofts. Would that be part of the forestry plan with Forestry and Land Scotland, or does it belong in the local place plan, the land management plan or all three? There is a question in my head about how to make sense of that.

Josh Doble, do you want to come in?

Thank you.

Linda Gillespie said at the start of the meeting that the bill focuses less on urban areas, which takes us to the issue of local place plans. I can imagine having a local land management plan for the estates surrounding a village and a local place plan for the village. That plan might or might not incorporate land that is owned by a local estate and it might be relevant for housing. Some of those issues were highlighted in the committee’s trip to highland Perthshire. It feels as if that could start to get a bit messy and that we need some clarity about where democratic influence lies. Do you have any thoughts about how to bring those things together?

We have covered thresholds in some depth, convener, so I was going to move on from that.

Can I just wrap up on the criteria?

On land management plans, I am interested in getting your views on what good consultation actually looks like. As Jon Hollingdale has pointed out, we already have forest strategies; there is also a forest licensing process that communities input to and there are local place plans.

Is there good practice when it comes to meaningful consultation in which communities feel that they are actually participating in decisions, instead of just being asked, “What do you think of this?”

Is there a risk that the bill will set up a tick-box exercise? How can we make the process appropriate, meaningful and participative, so that communities actually feel that their objectives are being met?

I am happy to speak to amendment 62. The climate change legislation relies heavily on the advisory body, the UK Climate Change Committee, which we all recognise provides really invaluable formal advice as well as really invaluable informal advice to Government and this committee. It is fair to say that, over the years that the CCC has been in operation and since the Parliament and Government have engaged with it, there have been issues relating to its capacity and resources and, because of that, with how responsive it has been in providing the advice that is needed at the right time, given changing circumstances.

If we think back to 2023, when the climate change plan was delayed, Chris Stark was vocal in saying that the delay had thrown out the CCC’s work programme as well as the window that was available to it to provide advice for the Scottish Parliament on our emissions reduction progress. In effect, we have been in a position in which the level of advice that the Parliament was expecting has not been available, because of the CCC’s capacity and its work programme.

We were in a similar position with the Climate Change (Emissions Reduction Targets) (Scotland) Act 2019, in that the CCC was unable to provide formal advice on the 2030 target because it was still completing its work on the peatland inventory. When we set the targets for 2030 under the 2019 act, we did not have full advice from the CCC. That was not the CCC’s fault; it was to do with its capacity and work programme.

I lodged amendment 62 because the UK Withdrawal from the European Union (Continuity) (Scotland) Act 2021 provides that, whenever Environmental Standards Scotland produces its annual report, it must communicate a statement to the Parliament on whether it has adequate resources to discharge its responsibilities. We cannot require something similar from the UKCCC because of how it is set up, although I think that it would be preferable if it could publicly talk about any capacity or resources issues that it has. My amendment is competent in that it requires the Scottish Government to report on whether there are capacity issues and to consult the CCC in doing that.

It has been useful to understand the timescale for the appointment of the panel. However, regardless of whether we annul, we will still have a panel in place, and I am not convinced that having guidance for the appointment of that panel will change the fundamentally flawed system that was put in place by the 2019 act. I do not think that the guidance will make much difference. We have heard today that it will not make a difference to the timescale that SPT is using in working out its proposal.

The Government keeps trying to bang a square peg into a round hole. I appreciate that the issues of the complexity, difficulty and risk of having a panel were not foreseen when the bill was going through Parliament some time ago, but the Government should now rapidly reflect on those concerns and bring forward a system that offers genuine certainty while being fair and robust.

We heard evidence from an adviser to the Welsh Government, who suggested that Scotland might become a backward-facing outlier because of its commitment to the panel system. I do not think any of us want to go there. That was not foreseen during the passage of the bill in 2019, but that is where we are now. We must look at experiences elsewhere in these islands, and across Europe, to see what works in getting franchising over the line, reducing the risk to transport authorities and getting a fair decision. I struggle to see how having a panel, with or without guidance, will achieve that, because it will not fundamentally change the system that we have.

It is regrettable that we are where we are today, and that should give the Government pause for thought. I fear that we will go down a route that will not get franchising over the line and, because of that, I am prepared to support Mr Lumsden’s motion to annul.

Will the cabinet secretary take an intervention?