Chamber and committees

I am not sure that I am clear on exactly what you think the impacts will be of the delayed climate change plan. We will have to have new schemes to support low-carbon beef production, and the suckler beef climate group has reported on those. There will almost certainly be conditionality in the environment aspects of legislation, so there must be an impact on your development of that. If we do not see a climate change plan being laid in November, what is the likely impact on developing agriculture policy?

I mean the Bew review money.

To finish this section on marine, there has been—as you will be aware, cabinet secretary—a two-year research programme into the cockle population in the Solway Firth, and I believe that a report will be published very soon on the sustainability of the stocks there. On receipt of that report, will you be able to set out the Government’s approach on any future commercial cockling in the Solway?

In the previous programme for government, there was a commitment to look at extending the 2021 statutory animal licensing framework, and the Government consulted between July and September last year on its proposals. However, the current programme for government makes no mention of it, and there has been a cut in the budget for animal licensing. What are your plans in that regard, given the consultation that was carried out last year?

You will be pleased to hear that this is my final question. In your introduction, you touched on the fact that the natural environment bill might include policies that would influence the creation of another national park. I presume that that is because there is no time for the National Parks (Scotland) Act 2000 to be amended. What additional policies do you see the natural environment bill containing that would pertain to national parks?

That concludes our questions for today. I thank the cabinet secretary, the minister and their officials for attending. We move into private session.

Our next item of business is an evidence session on the Scottish Government’s policy priorities and its programme for government commitments that are relevant to the committee’s remit.

I welcome to the meeting Mairi Gougeon, the Cabinet Secretary for Rural Affairs, Land Reform and Islands, and Jim Fairlie, the Minister for Agriculture and Connectivity. Joining us from the Scottish Government are George Burgess, the director of agriculture and rural economy; Donald Henderson, the deputy director of the nature division; Malcolm Pentland, the deputy director and lead for marine economy and communities; and Iain Wallace, the head of the operations portfolio at the marine directorate.

We have about two hours for discussion. Before we begin that, I ask the cabinet secretary to make a brief opening statement.

Thank you very much, cabinet secretary. We have questions about various themes that touch on the priorities that you have mentioned.

Will you give us an idea of the timing of the crofting bill, when we are likely to see the good food nation plan and when the natural environment bill will be introduced, to give us an indication of what our work programme might look like?

We move to a question from Rhoda Grant.

We will move on to discuss agricultural support reform, starting with a question from Rachael Hamilton.