Seòmar agus comataidhean

Yes, convener. I briefly emphasise the point about what seems to be a grey area. The Cathkin Braes country park BMX trail, for example, was done as a result of planning permission for the Commonwealth games. I am astounded that such a development does not require planning consent. If a ski slope was developed in Glenshee, for example, planning consent would be required. There should be further investigation into where we draw the line. Why are councils not looking at that issue, perhaps not in relation to legislation but as a gap? There is also the issue of enforcement when people just do stuff without seeking planning permission.

I would like some clarification. During opening remarks, there was consensus about the importance of Scotland’s ancient woodland. For the record, I am directing the question to the witnesses from NatureScot, Scottish Forestry and Confor. Do your organisations agree that the current protection regime is insufficient? I would like to have the answer explicitly established and to hear each of you agree or disagree.

Do your organisations agree that the current protections are inadequate? That is the nub of the petitioner’s issue.

Yes—that was very helpful.

That is helpful. The issue with restocking is that, if someone has felled a load of trees that have been around for centuries, it will take another 100 years for the landscape to recover. It feels like the damage is done permanently, at least in a human’s lifetime.

I will put on record a written question that I submitted to the Scottish Government:

“To ask the Scottish Government whether it will consider providing grants to support taxi drivers to upgrade their cars to sustainable, low-emissions vehicles.”

I understand that one of the big issues that taxi drivers in Glasgow currently face is the imminent implementation of a low-emission zone in the city centre. Certainly, the petitioner, Unite—the trade union that represents taxi drivers in the city; I am a member of Unite, just to declare an interest—has indicated that the LEZ could significantly affect the already difficult situation that the taxi trade faces, reducing numbers further or killing the trade in the city altogether.

Anecdotally, I can say that it is very difficult to get a taxi in Glasgow, especially on weekends, when it is busy.

The Scottish Government response to my written question was:

“The Scottish Government currently offers a number of funding schemes, through Transport Scotland, to support businesses (including taxi owners) make the shift to low and zero-emission vehicles. Applications for these funds can be made through the Energy Saving Trust who administer the schemes on our behalf.

Available support includes:

• the Switched-on Taxi Loan scheme which offers an interest free loan up to £120,000 to enable taxi owners and operators to replace their current vehicle with an eligible ultra-low emission vehicle.

• the Low Emission Zone (LEZ) Retrofit Fund for taxi owners operating within LEZs. This provides up to 80% grant funding to replace existing diesel engines to meet the Euro 6 standard for driving within a LEZ. The grant provides up to £10,000 per wheelchair accessible taxi installing re-powering technology, or £5,000 per taxi installing exhaust after-treatment systems.

• the Low Emission Zone (LEZ) Support Fund, which is available to eligible microbusinesses and sole traders (including taxi operators), operating within a 20km radius of Scotland’s LEZs. The fund provides a £2,500 grant towards the safe disposal of non-compliant vehicles as an incentive to take older, more polluting vehicles off the road.”—[Written Answers, 6 January 2022; S6W-05239.]

Those are the schemes that are available. The first one, the switched-on taxi loan scheme, sounds as though it would more than meet the cost of a vehicle replacement, but the other ones do not seem to come close to meeting the capital outlay that a driver might face in trying to replace a vehicle that does not meet the standard, so I think that there is a gap there that needs to be interrogated.

What was the landowner’s motivation for felling the trees?

What was your favourite thing about COP26?

Oh, right—I did not see the bouncy castle. I am gutted that I missed that. I saw the big giant planet that span round. That was really cool. I thought that that was really interesting.

Another thing that was really cool was that I got a reusable water bottle when I visited COP26. I think that everybody who visited Glasgow for the conference got one, so when you submitted your petition, I thought, “Why don’t we give our own children the same thing? Why are we giving all these VIPs metal reusable water bottles?” Do you think that it was a bit of a double standard? Is it important that we set an example and that, if we did it at COP, we should do it for kids as well?

That is fantastic. Did they agree that bringing reusable water bottles into schools was a good idea?