Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government has only recently been made aware of a review and quite astonishingly has not been invited to make any representations regarding a review of the Merchant Shipping (Ship-to-Ship Transfers) Regulations 2010, as amended. It is understood that the UK Department for Transport has undertaken a minor review to consider the cost, safety and impact on the environment of ship to ship oil transfers, and whether the regulations were meeting their proposed intention. The UK Department for Transport has now informed the Scottish Government they will publish their findings in March. In response Scottish Ministers have written to the Department of Transport requesting that the Scottish Government is consulted on the review before the findings are published. To do otherwise would be to deny the elected Government of Scotland, and Scotland’s Parliament, which is responsible for our marine environment, a say on an issue of importance to our environment and Scotland’s people.

Correspondence received by the Scottish Government addressed to Ministers are added to and processed via the Ministerial and Corporate Correspondence System (MACCS). MACCS records the type of response required, i.e Ministerial Reply, Diary Request or Official Reply. MACCS has limited functionality as a management information tool, therefore we are unable to provide detailed information on subjects raised by members of the public to each SG Minister. However we can advise that since May 2016, in excess of 32,000 pieces of correspondence have been added to MACCS made up of 7,000 Ministerial replies, 6,500 diary requests and 18,500 official replies. There have been a number of topics the people of Scotland have written about in high volume to Ministers since May 2016, such as the EU Referendum result; Brexit and its impact; use of electric shock collars; protection of wild animals in travelling circuses; retention of ferry routes; the Named Person Scheme; and fox hunting legislation.

I refer the member to the answer to question S5W-06053 on 26 January 2017. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.parliament.scot/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx

The Scottish Government is not a formal consultation body for Ship to Ship Oil Transfer Licence applications under the Merchant Shipping (Ship-to-Ship Transfers) Regulations 2010, as amended. Scottish Ministers have written on a number of occasions to the Secretary of State for Transport requesting devolution of this reserved function, including two letters in 2016. In 2007, Scottish Ministers wrote four times to the UK Government's Secretary of State for Transport with regards to concerns over ship to ship oil transfer proposals in the Firth of Forth.

Assessment of potential impact of proposed ship-to-ship oil transfer licence applications, including compliance with the EU Habitats Directive is a matter for the competent authority. For ship-to-ship oil transfer licences that is currently the Secretary of State for Transport, although Scottish Minister's argue such powers should be devolved to the Scottish Government. Ship to ship transfers in offshore waters are not currently regulated. Again, this is an area that is reserved to Westminster. The Scottish Government is not aware of historical ship to ship transfer applications for other chemicals in Scottish territorial waters.

We are currently involved in detailed discussions with the UK Government, and the EU, about an appropriate response to the US Government’s initial request for information, including the need for clarification on a number of issues around domestic legislation on seal management.

The ruling has a 5 year exemption period that means it will not come into force until 1 January 2022.

The draft Climate Change Plan sets out policies and proposals to meet our ambitious emission reduction targets out to 2032.

Policies are hard and fast action – things we are doing now, or will do soon. Where budget is needed now it has been allocated in the Government’s 2017-18 Budget. A proposal is considered to be a suggested course of action, the details of which might change as this course of action is explored and evidence is gathered. Any required funding – which could be significant - will be the subject of future Budget decisions.

Previous reports on proposals and policies (RPP1 and RPP2) were produced using a bottom-up approach that identified abatement for individual policies and proposals from sector specific emissions projections. This approach was unable to consider cross sectoral interactions. For the draft Climate Change Plan, the Scottish Government has taken a different approach by using the TIMES model.

The draft Climate Change Plan used the TIMES whole-system energy model to help us understand least-cost ways of achieving emissions reductions by assessing how effort is best shared across the economy. This approach allows us to develop an optimal pathway for meeting Scotland’s emission reduction targets consisting of a carbon envelope for each sector, along with suggested policy outcomes needed to live within the carbon envelope. The draft Plan sets out the package of policies and proposals that are expected to be required to deliver the policy outcomes needed for each sectoral carbon envelope.

In the draft Plan, instead of abatement numbers, the verification of the projected emissions of a particular policy or proposal will be provided by the delivery of the policy outcomes – real life changes on the ground, such as penetration of low emission vehicles. The impact of policies in delivering outcomes and the overall performance on emission reductions will be reviewed regularly through the Plan’s monitoring framework and the greenhouse gas statistics.

Scottish Natural Heritage currently has no plans to publish a report on the cycle of site-condition monitoring on amphibians which is due to end in 2018.

The Scottish Government is engaging with local authorities and other key stakeholders to identify an early adopter to apply an interim National Low Emission Framework (NLEF) approach to put in place Scotland’s first low-emission zone by 2018. A number of local authorities have already expressed an interest in their Local Air Quality Management 2016 report to explore the feasibility of a low-emission zone.

The Scottish Government provided funding to collect National Modelling Framework (NMF) traffic data for Glasgow and Edinburgh in 2016, with similar data to be collected for Aberdeen and Dundee in early 2017. Informed by the NMF outputs, local authorities will use the final NLEF appraisal process during late 2017 to both identify the most appropriate location(s) for a LEZ, and underpin a Traffic Regulation Order to support LEZ enforcement.

I refer the member to the answer to question S5W-06502 on 6 February 2017. All answers to written parliamentary questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.parliament.scot/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx