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It is not up to me to decide that. I will be here at stage 2, no matter what, with all my amendments, and I will work with any members who want to work with me on amendments to deal with unintended consequences.

As I said, we already wanted to include in the bill a defence of acting under permit, and we also wanted to make sure that any of the regulatory bodies would be protected when working under licence or permit.

You make a very good point. The committee has received a significant volume of responses, which are comprehensive. We will look at those, and the planning minister will take a view, too.

Do you mean so that they can implement the legislation or so that they can respond to environmental events?

If it has been raised by the bodies that they do not have the resources associated with what is proposed in the bill, we will need to look at that but, again, I say that it is not my bill.

Well, you have put it on the record.

We must hope that that is the case.

I was seized of the evidence that the committee heard from academic colleagues on 4 November. They were all asked what events would have been prosecutable in the past under such an offence, and the answer was, “Very few.” That is great, because, in effect, it means that there has not been a seismic event.

We would hope that, if the bill was passed, we would never have to use its provisions, because it would have to be such a severe event. However, the fact that we would not want to ever have to use the legislation does not mean to say that we should not have it in place, because the deterrent effect is important.

The case has to be made that there is a level of harm for which the existing legislation does not adequately provide. A new offence of ecocide needs to address the most extreme, wilful and reckless cases of harm. The new offence should not impinge on the range of activity that is already covered by legislative provisions, but nor should it knock those provisions out. Making a decision on prosecution should not involve having to say, “If we go for ecocide, does that mean we can’t go for a section 40 offence under the 2014 act?”

I and my officials are wrestling with how we can dovetail the offence of ecocide with the existing provisions. We need to ensure that there is clarity on what the bill intends to achieve and on the purpose and nature of the new offence. The proposed new offence is not designed to address the lower levels of environmental harm, but the existing law already covers “significant” events—that is the wording in the 2014 act. It also includes—this is important, too—damage that arises from permitted activities. That is another area of Ms Lennon’s bill that needs to dovetail better with the existing law, because I would suggest that permitted activities must be reflected in the bill as well.

We were already considering the revised EU environmental crime directive under our alignment policy, and the section 40 offence already goes beyond what the previous version of the directive required.

However, the bill, if it were passed, would be a stronger response to the directive’s provisions for qualified offences. We must recognise that what Ms Lennon proposes would make us one of the first countries to have an ecocide offence in law, so we would be going further. However, we might look at how many other countries in the EU and around the world are considering introducing such an offence. There is a considerable movement, and a campaign, in that regard.

We want to maintain our policy alignment wherever possible. One aspect of the directive is that it requires the introduction of higher potential punishments for qualified offences, covering a wide range of existing offences, and an enhanced level of punishment for more serious environmental damage. We have the existing legislation—the 2014 act—which, again, sets a very high bar in section 40, but Ms Lennon is proposing an even higher bar for the most serious ecocide events.

The proposed penalties in the bill go further than the existing penalties. We are already looking at alignment—in fact, we are already broadly aligned—but the bill would take us beyond alignment, and that is no bad thing. We could go further.

That is a fair point. Again, when Ms Lennon came to us about a bespoke ecocide bill, these were points that we put to her. The Government felt that section 40 of the 2014 act already made provision in relation to ecocide. Of course, we also have to reflect on how often—or not—that provision has been used. In the evidence to the committee, there was a difference of opinion on whether there were certain things that that provision should have been used for, but the Government felt that, on balance, reforming the provision would not have put the spotlight on the offence of ecocide in the same way that a bespoke bill would. I am keen to see what Ms Lennon says in response to your question.

As it stands, I am keen to support the bill’s progression to stage 2. There are elements of the bill that I would like to amend so that it is compatible with the ECHR and so that it provides additionality, which is important. I understand your general point in that regard.

I think that you are asking me a direct question about whether I would want to put guidance in the bill. The nature of guidance is that it must be responsive and adaptable, so I would not want to put anything in the bill of that nature that would require primary legislation to change it. Also, I cannot comment on conversations that I have had with the planning minister until I have had them.

However, I think that you are right. You have heard my concerns about some parts of the bill, which I would seek to change, and I have already written to you about them. We must ensure that there is a need for the offence—that the bill provides additionality beyond what is already covered. One area that provides additionality is the penalties that are associated with ecocide. They are severe and extensive. They allow the courts to make a judgment on the severity of the incident or the event, the cost to the environment—if one can ever quantify such a thing—and the clean-up cost or the cost to the public purse in dealing with the impact of that. Of course, when it comes to something such as ecocide, you can never fully recover the loss. One of the strengths of the bill is the penalties that it seeks to introduce.

I hope that that is enough. The main things that I would want you to think about as we leave here are some of the unintended consequences that have been raised by people around this table; the need for additionality; the need for the measures to dovetail with existing legislation; the need for provisions to allow for fair trial and compatibility with the ECHR; and the need for the bill to set a high bar, going beyond the requirements of existing legislation.

I would not want to do anything that constrains the discretion of the courts when they are deciding on the fines. However, you are asking a specific question about a mechanism for compensation, and I will need to take that away.

My official has just pointed me to something about that part of the bill. Can you leave that with me? I need to speak to my officials about the consequences of that.