Seòmar agus comataidhean

I do not see the rationale for singling out that particular type of land as opposed to other types of land, given that it is already included in the biodiversity strategy. From a policy perspective, I do not think that there is a clear rationale for undertaking a review that solely concentrates on moorland. It goes back to what I said about Ariane Burgess’s amendments and the many other amendments that ask for reviews and reports. The resources that would be associated with all that would take resources away from action.

Rachael Hamilton says that she wants to help the Government, but we could have had a conversation about the amendment before stage 2, instead of its being played out here. I could then have explained all my rationale in relation to it, and we could have saved ourselves from this. I am someone who has to make sure that all the Government bodies under my remit, which have to manage their resources and capacity to do things, are not overstretched by onerous reports and reviews being added to their remit when such work would take away from the action that we all want. So many pieces of legislation are inserting reviews and reports that it is genuinely getting to the point of becoming an encumbrance. On many occasions, I question whether such work adds to the action that we all want. For those reasons, I encourage members not to support amendment 288.

Turning to Ariane Burgess’s amendment 303, although I recognise that effective management of protected areas is essential in tackling the biodiversity crisis, I am not persuaded that nature conservation orders and land management orders are the best way to tackle long-term deterioration of sites that is caused by under or overgrazing or the spread of invasive non-native species. I am conscious of the complexity of the current legal framework that governs protected areas and nature conservation in general.

I would be wary of adding additional complexity, given the considerable risk of unintended consequences that that could bring. For example, amendment 303 inserts a definition of damage into section 23 of the 2004 act, which deals with nature conservation orders. It is unclear what the purpose of that definition is, as the term is not otherwise reflected in section 23 of the act.

The purpose of nature conservation orders is to prohibit operations on land, to ensure the conservation of any natural feature of the land that ministers consider to be of special interest. Changing that purpose so that orders could require active management of the land is not what the orders were intended or designed to do.

Land management orders can be applied to land that forms part of an SSSI or is contiguous to that land. Orders are already able to set out operations that should be carried out on the land for the purposes of conserving, restoring or otherwise enhancing the natural features of the land. Amendment 303 is unnecessary, because there is already provision in place. Land management orders can already be made to tackle issues such as undergrazing or overgrazing, or invasive non-native species. For those reasons I encourage members not to support amendment 303.

Amendment 334, in the name of Rachael Hamilton, seeks to amend the Nature Conservation (Scotland) Act 2004 by inserting a new section 11A that would create an absolute prohibition on energy developments within sites of special scientific interest. The amendment appears to have the intention of providing enhanced protection for SSSIs by preventing any energy infrastructure, including renewable energy installations, from being constructed within their boundaries. That is not legally competent, and it therefore would not achieve its express purposes. The generation, transmission, distribution and supply of electricity are reserved to the UK Government under the Scotland Act 1998. The 1998 act is the very foundation of the Parliament, and I would expect everyone to have a working knowledge of it.

I do not see how it can be made competent, Ms Hamilton, because, in effect, it asks the Scottish Government to prohibit something around which there are already reserved powers, regulation, and environmental assessment requirements, which are probably some of the strongest in the whole of the UK. We can talk about whether those requirements are robust enough, and we can talk about whether we have all the levers that Ms Hamilton would want me to use but, as it stands, I cannot see how the amendment could be made legally competent. By all means, if you want to come to see me about any of your amendments, my door is always open—it was open before stage 2. I will close my remarks there. I have been accused of patronising people. I am simply stating facts about the separation of powers. For those reasons, I encourage members not to support amendment 334.

Good morning. It is not entirely clear to me what Ariane Burgess is seeking to achieve with amendments 67 and 67A. The scope of the review that is being proposed is unclear. There is no agreed or statutory definition of nature restoration or rewilding, which makes it difficult to understand how such a review would align with our existing suite of protected areas legislation.

In addition, a wide range of land types and activities could fall within the scope of any such review, as the amendments do not set any limits on the extent of areas to be restored or rewilded to improve biodiversity. It could capture everything from creating a native wildlife area in an urban garden to landscape-scale nature restoration projects such as Cairngorms Connect.

I am not certain that such a review would necessarily help us to improve or drive forward our biodiversity ambitions. It is better to focus on delivering for nature restoration and taking the action that we know will achieve the outcomes that we need to see. A plethora of additional reviews, reports and additional labour-intensive requirements of that type will stretch the capacity that we want to use for targeted action.

Reviews have their place in some circumstances, but we need to ensure that they are targeted, focused and necessary or they risk diverting resources from taking action that helps us to tackle the nature crisis and reduce biodiversity loss.

For those reasons, I encourage members not to support amendments 67 and 67A.

I now turn to Rachael Hamilton’s amendment 288. As she mentioned, it is similar to an amendment that she lodged during stage 3 of the Land Reform (Scotland) Bill last month—an amendment that the Parliament did not support. I have no doubt that all committee members appreciate, as I do, the importance of moorland habitats. However, I agree with what the Cabinet Secretary for Rural Affairs, Land Reform and Islands said when speaking to that amendment, which was that it is

“not helpful for moorlands to be considered in isolation from other ecosystems”.—[Official Report, 4 November 2025; c 246.]

It is clear to me that the restoration and regeneration of Scotland’s ecosystems, including but not limited to moorlands, are at the heart of the Scottish biodiversity strategy, given that that is one of the six key objectives within the strategy and a number of the actions within it are targeted at ensuring that the management of moorland helps to sustain healthy biodiversity. Therefore, I do not believe that the amendment is necessary. It calls for another review, and I, again, question whether resources should be diverted for that purpose. Instead, we should be focusing on strategic actions for all ecosystems that will help to secure the biggest biodiversity benefits and help us to tackle the nature crisis.

I have to say that I have taken legal advice on every single one of the amendments, and this amendment is simply not legally competent. We could get into a big debate about energy and energy infrastructure. I know that people want to do that in the wider space of the Parliament, but I am talking to this amendment, which is not legally competent. Therefore, I would—

Yes, and then I am going to conclude.

Yes, I can explain it. I want to separate out the desire to give greater protection to SSSIs. Fundamentally, I agree that they should be protected. It is untrue to say that a Scottish Government minister has the ability to control what happens in energy developments because they have the final consent. The associated regulations and the consenting powers under sections 36 and 37 of the Electricity Act 1989 operate by executive devolution, to the final consent. They do not—[Interruption.] You have asked for an explanation, and I would like to give a full explanation.

Therefore, the regulations are set at UK level and must be acted under in giving that consent.

Rachael Hamilton’s amendment 334 seeks to change what is in reserved law, fundamentally. That means that it is not legislatively competent. That was the case with previous amendments from Douglas Lumsden, where I was able to set out the same argument.

If Conservative members want me to have the powers that are associated with energy infrastructure, there is a simple answer to that: you devolve the powers to the Scottish Parliament and Government. They are not devolved, and, therefore, I cannot act in that way. That would be an infringement of the law and not legally competent.

Maybe I read the wrong bit.

If there are pressures on particular public bodies in dealing with existing laws, they can of course come to me and explain what that pressure is and what they need.

That is a good question. Again, I wrestled with that and spoke to Ms Lennon about it, and we made an offer to work on something like that. However, things are moving quite fast with regard to the international campaign to put ecocide into law, and I did not want there to be any sense that we were lagging behind when other countries were putting it into law.

I spoke to Ms Lennon about whether it was necessary to go ahead with a bespoke bill. My reason for supporting the bill is that it provides additionality, in that it sets a much higher bar than the 2014 act does, although the latter is still in place. I wanted—and I still want—to ensure that if something is not prosecutable or provable under ecocide legislation, that would not prevent the 2014 route from being considered.

I am sorry that I do not have a direct answer for you. If it is not covered in my letter, I will make sure that I will respond to you on that point.

I want to ensure that the nature of the penalties that you are associating with the provisions are not constraining the courts on what those penalties might be. As far as the mechanism is concerned, I will need to look into what mechanisms already exist.