Chamber and committees

The Scottish Government awarded £10.8 million in funding through the European Fisheries Fund programme in 2008-09.

The taking of mackerel by Icelandic and Faeroese fishermen has no immediate effect on Scottish individuals, businesses or fishing communities. However, the Scottish Government is doing everything possible to avoid the negative medium-term economic consequences that overfishing of the mackerel stock might entail.

The Scottish Government awarded £17.8 million in funding through European Fisheries Fund programme in September 2010. Future funding levels will be considered in the forthcoming spending review.

The Scottish Government will award £17.8 million through the European Fisheries Fund in September 2010.

The decision to replace the majority of East Coast services between Glasgow and Edinburgh with services operated by Arriva Cross Country is directed by the Department for Transport.

Further to this, the decision is to replace some of the most energy efficient electric trains on the UK network with some of the most polluting diesel trains, as measured by CO₂ per passenger kilometre.

It is unclear at this stage what the environmental impact of these changes will be. However, these services account for only a very small percentage of overall train movements in Scotland. In the context of published figures showing that rail transport accounts for less than 1% of overall emissions in Scotland, I see that the transfer from electric to diesel rolling stock over this route could only have a marginal impact on our plans for decarbonising public transport.

It is important to emphasise that regardless of power source, rail remains the most environmentally sustainable mode of powered transport. This is why we are working to encourage modal shift to rail from more polluting modes of transport.

Scottish Government published its Zero Waste Plan on the 9 June 2010. Annex B of the plan sets out guidance for local authority planning departments on the role of the land-use planning system in delivering waste management facilities. Scottish Government planning officials are working closely with all planning authorities in the preparation of their development plans including matters in relation to waste management. A wide range of stakeholders including planning authorities and Convention of Scottish Local Authorities have been engaged in the current review of Planning Advice Note 63 “ Waste Management Planning.

In addition, Scottish Government will shortly be giving further guidance to local authorities on the use of energy from waste treatment. Zero Waste Scotland and Scottish Futures Trust also provide local authorities with advice and support on procurement and achieving value for money in relation to waste management infrastructure.

The Scottish Government has established the Zero Waste Scotland delivery programme to support the implementation of Scotland''s Zero Waste Plan. The delivery programme provides advice and guidance to all stakeholders involved in achieving a zero waste society, including local authorities.

The Scottish Government works closely with the Scottish Environmental Protection Agency (SEPA) to implement producer responsibility regulations in line with EC Directives on Packaging and Packaging Waste. The producer responsibility regulations obligate producers and suppliers who have a market share of more than £2 million and produce more than 50 tons of waste a year to pay towards recycling the waste they produce. By placing this obligation on producers the regulations provide an economic incentive to reduce and prevent unnecessary packaging waste. More details can be found on SEPA''s website:

http://www.sepa.org.uk/waste/waste_regulation/producer_responsibility.aspx.

The Zero Waste Scotland (ZWS) delivery programme, created to support Scotland''s Zero Waste Plan, provides advice and support to all stakeholders involved in achieving a zero waste society. ZWS works with public agencies on the issue of reducing packaging of goods and supports the UK-wide Courtauld Commitment. Administered by the Waste and Resources Action Programme (WRAP), the Courtauld Commitment is a voluntary agreement aimed at improving resource efficiency and reducing the carbon and wider environmental impact of the grocery retail sector.

The Courtauld Commitment (Phase 1) was launched in 2005 and had 42 signatories representing many key retailers and suppliers. This phase achieved the target of zero growth in packaging by 2008. Courtauld 2 was launched in March 2010 and moves away from solely weight-based targets, aiming to achieve more sustainable use of resources over the entire lifecycle of products, including their packaging. 29 major retailers and brand owners committed to Phase 2. Discussions about the shape of Phase 3 have commenced.

Further details on the Courtauld Commitment can be found here:

http://www.wrap.org.uk/retail/courtauld_commitment/index.html.

As I indicated during the stage 3 debate on the Criminal Justice and Licensing (Scotland) Bill on 30 June, the Scottish Government will bring forward in the near future appropriate legislation to assist sports that may be affected adversely by the introduction of the Knife Dealers Licensing Scheme.

The Energy Saving Scotland home renewables grant scheme has been very successful in stimulating the market for microgeneration technologies and helping over 4,000 householders to generate their own energy. Continued high demand led to an extra allocation in 2010-11 of £1.5 million.

This scheme has not been cancelled. It was a demand-led scheme and all available funding has now been fully allocated. Therefore, as there has been no reduction to the original proposed programme, there will be potential increase in greenhouse gas emissions. In fact, due to the additional funding allocated to the programme the reduction in green house gas emissions will be more than would have been achieved with the original budget. The latest estimate for emissions reductions by the scheme is 140,052.3 lifetime tonnes of CO₂.