Decisions ahead for a new parliamentary session

MSPs will return to parliament on 4 September after a summer recess dominated by a bruising general election campaign for Scotland’s governing party.

The SNP lost 39 of its 48 Westminster seats as Labour swept to power winning the most seats in England, Scotland and Wales.

At the time the election was called, First Minister John Swinney had barely started in post – stepping in to replace Humza Yousaf whose tenure lasted just over a year.

In fact, former PM Rishi Sunak announced the election the same day that Mr Swinney had given his first big policy speech in the Holyrood chamber – setting out his four ‘Priorities for Scotland’. These were to eradicate child poverty, grow the economy, tackle the climate emergency and deliver stronger public services.

There was no opportunity to flesh out those high-level themes, however, and we still don’t know exactly how those points will be translated into policy.

A new start?

With the beginning of a new parliamentary session, the FM has a chance to reset the narrative with a new Programme for Government speech, in which he will set out his government’s legislative plans for the year ahead.

This will come against a backdrop of severely restricted public finances, limiting room for manoeuvre.

Finance Secretary Shona Robison gave media interviews last week in which she announced emergency spending controls. This was partly due to the cost of improved public sector pay deals but also due to the uncertainty in terms of funding from a new Labour government in London.

We still don’t know, for example, what the envelope will be for agriculture. The previous Conservative government had maintained funding at the level of the old EU CAP for the duration of the last parliament.

What we do know, however, is that there is an urgent need to support farmers and crofters to meet the government’s vision for ‘sustainable and regenerative’ farming – and to ensure statutory obligations to reduce emissions from agriculture are met.

This will require more funding than at present. However, there is a risk that the new settlement for the devolved nations may be smaller than in previous years.

The UK Budget is not expected to be set until late October, and the Scottish Budget for 2025/26 will then follow in Nov/Dec, so the truth is that uncertainty will continue.

Natural Environment Bill

One key test for Mr Swinney will be whether he commits to delivering on a previous Scottish Government pledge to introduce a Natural Environment Bill, with legally binding targets for nature restoration.

The Bute House Agreement between the SNP government and the Scottish Greens in 2021 stated that this Bill would be introduced in ‘year three’ of this parliamentary term.

We know there is huge public support for action to restore nature in Scotland – with a recent survey showing three quarters of people support targets for nature recovery.

And Soil Association Scotland has been pleased to support the Scottish Environment LINK campaign ‘Scotland Loves Nature’ calling on the government to introduce this Bill.

The Scottish Government has already scrapped annual targets for cutting greenhouse gas emissions, and a failure to implement promised nature restoration targets would be another significant backward step.

Organic Action Plan

Another pledge from the Bute House Agreement was the delivery of an Organic Action Plan within this parliament to help meet an SNP 2021 election manifesto target to double the amount of land managed organically.

Supporting farmers and crofters to switch to organic can help deliver on multiple Scottish Government policy objectives, including the headline themes from the Agriculture and Rural Communities Act 2024 to deliver high quality food production, improved animal welfare, climate mitigation and adaptation and on-farm nature restoration.

Making a clear commitment to supporting organic farming, and to addressing the supply chain, infrastructure and market development challenges facing the sector in Scotland, would be a strong signal of intent towards more sustainable food production.

Funding splits for agriculture

Finally, an announcement on the funding split between Tiers 1 and 2 of the new agricultural support framework had been due to be made at the Royal Highland Show. However, due to the general election campaign, this was shelved.

The Scottish Government has said for several years now that 50% of direct support for farming and crofting would be subject to ‘enhanced conditionality’ to encourage more practices that delivered on reducing emissions and improving biodiversity.

With a previous announcement that the vast majority – at least 70% – of the total agricultural budget would sit within direct payments (Tiers 1 and 2), it is vital that the government follows through on this commitment to a 50-50 split between the top two tiers to better support farmers through the transition.

The government’s own analysis has shown that direct payments under legacy CAP schemes delivered little in the way of environmental benefit, so there needs to be a shift towards incentivising and rewarding practices on farm that deliver on climate and nature while supporting high quality food production. There are plenty of great examples of farms and crofts already doing this, and we hope the government follows through on its previous commitments.