Seòmar agus comataidhean

Agenda item 2 is an evidence session following our inquiry into the role of local government and its cross-sectoral partners in financing and delivering a net zero Scotland.

The committee reported to the Parliament in January after a major inquiry that lasted over a year and which ranged over a variety of issues relevant to local government. On 14 March, we held a debate in Parliament to highlight the conclusions of the inquiry. We received a response from the Scottish Government on 20 April and agreed to invite back the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities and its partners in sustainable local governance to share their views on the response and the way forward.

I am pleased to welcome Councillor Gail Macgregor, environment and economy spokesperson, COSLA, and leader, Dumfries and Galloway Council; David Hammond, representative of the Society of Local Authority Chief Executives and Senior Managers and head of sustainability, corporate property and transport, North Ayrshire Council; George Tarvit, director, Sustainable Scotland Network; and Silke Isbrand, policy manager, environment and economy team, COSLA. Unfortunately, due to an accident at the weekend, Silke Isbrand is joining us remotely. I hope that you are fully recovered and fit—I would not say fighting fit—for this session.

I thank you all for accepting our invitations. We are delighted to have you here.

I think that Councillor Macgregor wishes to make a short opening statement.

Everyone is ducking.

I agree.

I am concerned that a 168 per cent increase suggests that there are problems with fish health and that we are just using more antibiotics to cover it up, which could be to the detriment of our need for antibiotics.

You are saying that you are content to let mortalities increase by 35 per cent. The industry will say that it is producing more fish and that therefore accounts for more mortalities. However, compounding an error surely is not the way forward. I do not understand any industry that would accept a 25 per cent mortality rate. I understand that, with farming, there is a certain amount of mortality, but are you really happy with 25 per cent? Do you think that that is good for the environment around our coastlines or good for the industry?

I have two questions. My first question is about waste. One thing that has been clear in the industry is that the use of antibiotics has gone up by 168 per cent since 2017, and they are mainly used at sea. Are you comfortable that the industry is using such a high level of antibiotics at sea and that one of them, oxytetracycline, is one of the main ones used to treat human diseases, which is building up the risk of overuse of antibiotics? Are you concerned about that?

I can put some flesh on the figures that Christine Grahame referred to, just to help you, cabinet secretary. In 2016, 22,000 tonnes of salmon died in fish farms. In 2021, the figure had risen by 35 per cent to nearly 30,000 tonnes of fish. If you were to put that on lorries that were touching each other nose to tail, they would stretch for nearly 11 miles—that is 11 miles of articulated lorries of dead fish.

In its report “Salmon farming in Scotland”, the Rural Economy and Connectivity Committee said that mortalities were “too high” and made some recommendations in that regard. I have looked at the information that you provided to this committee, and I do not see that any of those recommendations have been taken on board. The suggestion from the industry was to move fish farms further offshore to prevent gill disease and infections. Another suggestion was not to allow farms where there is high mortality to continue—they are still continuing—and another was to consider a red, amber and green system for farms that are performing or not performing whereby, if they got to amber, they would have to reduce their production, and, if they got to red, they would have to cease it. Do you not think that those were wise recommendations by that committee that would protect the industry from itself? Will you push forward those recommendations?

Okay. I will leave it there.

However, I will leave that hanging and move on to my other question. The report by the REC Committee, which I was part of, stated:

“SEPA are neither adequate nor effective.”

You have made a comment in the charts on recommendations 62 to 65, which covered SEPA, but it does not cover the real problem that the REC Committee identified, which was that SEPA was not carrying out enough inspections, and particularly unannounced inspections. Do you have any evidence that, since the REC Committee’s report was published, SEPA has carried out more inspections? If so, have more of them been unannounced, so that fish farms have not been prepared for its visits?

I thank the committee for allowing me to attend. Before we start this session, it is important that I refer to the register of members’ interests. I would like everyone to be aware that, as is stated in the register, I am the co-owner of a wild salmon fishery on the River Spey, along the east coast of Scotland. As such, I have been managing inshore fisheries for over 40 years. The migration routes for smolts leaving and salmon returning to the River Spey are along the east coast of Scotland, where there is no significant salmon farming that affects those fish. I therefore do not believe that salmon farming has any impact on my interest as the proprietor of a wild salmon fishery, but I am keen to make everyone aware of it. I want to be open and transparent about that interest, convener.