Chamber and committees

Does that mean that aviation emissions are going to drop—just as they are going to have to drop on the A9 and A96 and in farming and every other sector of our economy—or are they going to grow?

So it could be that other sectors or other parts of the transport sector might need to have steeper reductions in emissions in order to deliver the benefits that aviation—[Inaudible.]

I am content with that course of action. It is a slightly odd situation because of the defence-related nature of the chemical’s use. There is a lack of transparency there. Bob Doris’s points on that are well made. Perhaps there will be an issue about ensuring that there is adequate opportunity for scrutinising how the Ministry of Defence applies environmental management and wider health and safety requirements.

We are taking it on trust that there is a defence-related use of the chemical and that it will be dealt with in a responsible way, but there is no real way for us to scrutinise that. It is worth putting on the record that this is not the only area that I have come across in this committee and in predecessor committees where environmental regulation has come up against a defence exemption. You are left wondering what the actual protocols and protections are for workers and the environment in the Ministry of Defence and related industries.

What route do Scottish Government ministers have to remove that air quality legislation from schedule 1? My understanding is that, in effect, it is a shared area of policy between the UK and Scottish Governments. What is the mechanism for removing it? Will it now go into a common framework conversation? The clock is ticking—as I understand it, we only have until 31 October at the latest, and there are summer recesses. We do not want this to fall off a cliff. What does the conversation look like?

Am I right to say that PFOA is what is known as a forever chemical and that those are being banned under the regulation on the registration, evaluation, authorisation and restriction of chemicals? Is PFOA scheduled for withdrawal from the market under the REACH regulation?

I presume that the Scottish Government is in contact with Environmental Standards Scotland. We received a letter from it that details particular concerns about what the loss of the national plans might involve, and particularly the removal of the public duty.

Has there been a discussion specifically about the loss of the air quality plan? You said that the UK Government’s position is that it is in the schedule so it is going.

Good morning, everybody. Are we still on track for a November launch date for the climate change plan?

With previous plans, it has been very difficult to understand what is happening in some sectors, as there has been a lack of data and information. It is felt, rightly or wrongly, that, because there is a lack of data on farming and land use, for example, and a lack of clarity as to what individual actions will do to reduce carbon emissions, certain sectors are almost being given a bye or being let off. In other sectors, however, such as transport or heat in buildings, it is very clear what certain actions will do to reduce carbon emissions. How do we bring the data up to a point where we can understand exactly what is happening across different sectors and exactly what the various measures will achieve? There seems to be a bit of fuzziness in some areas around what making a change might result in—people are not exactly sure.

Generally speaking, PFOA is not available in a wider market. There is just the single exemption that we are discussing today, so I will turn to that matter. Is it the case that the Ministry of Defence or defence-related contractors apply for exemptions from environmental regulation? On the face of it, if you are a civil contractor wearing protective clothing, the use of PFOA in that clothing would be banned, whereas if you are working in a defence-related sector or industry, its continued use is allowed. Therefore, there is a bit of divergence between the situation for people who are working in defence-related industries and the situation for people who work in civilian areas, where there is no exemption for that chemical. It might be a minor divergence, but I wonder how those issues are discussed and resolved. Is it something that you just have to accept—that is the decision that the UK Government has made on that—or is there a protocol with the MOD or defence sector more generally around lower or different environmental standards?