Chamber and committees

I would hope that members of the Government would be involved in the cross-party group. Indeed, we intend to invite a Government minister to one of our proposed early discussions. It would be for the Government to recognise the CPG, attend its meetings and listen to and respect its work.

I would hope that the CPG, in acting as a forum for discussion of policy ideas and programmes that could be pursued to tackle the nature and climate emergency, would be of benefit to officials, Government ministers and others. We want to make the group a success and an important forum where ideas can be discussed. Government, individual MSPs and stakeholders can learn from one another.

It would be up to members of the group to discuss that with regard to the early agenda topics. Some topics have been discussed already. There is quite a lot of interest about land use and about the marine environment—in particular, about how blue carbon can both restore marine environments and lock up carbon. I would urge you to come to a meeting. If you want to have a discussion that covers lowland land use as well as upland land use, I am sure that that would be very welcome.

Clearly, there are topics that apply to the whole of Scotland, and we are trying to have a broad, well-rounded conversation about what the solutions and challenges might be.

I am trying my best to sell it.

Scottish Environment LINK, as it is formally known, is the umbrella body for the environmental NGOs in Scotland. It is a very experienced and well-resourced organisation, and it has staff who would be able to discharge the duties of the secretariat, working with my office. I am pleased to have worked with Scottish Environment LINK in the past, and I think that it has the confidence of all the members of the group.

What key things would you wish to see in a delivery plan for freshwater? I will put the same question to Calum Duncan.

Is there something more fundamental about the way that Government and agencies work within the permanent architecture of civil servants and agencies such as NatureScot? Is the strategy prepared enough to tackle a nature emergency? It is still a biodiversity strategy and does not encompass the entire Government.

Indeed. Thinking back to what the witnesses on the first panel said, it is a concern that, although a biodiversity strategy was established previously, the delivery plans did not flow from it so that we could act. Has that been the issue up until now? Is there concern that, although a strategy may be set up that looks great, with some specific points within it, the meat of the delivery can then drift?

This is my final question. Is there policy coherence within Government organisations such as Marine Scotland?

Does anyone have any brief comments to build on their previous points?

We have already had some comment about alignment and policy coherence. What more should the biodiversity strategy do to direct that, or is that not a matter for the strategy but for another approach in Government? I will start with Professor Morgera.