THE Scottish Greens have claimed nearly half of the £1.8 billion the Scottish Government announced would go to low-carbon capital investment is already being spent on existing projects.
MSP Mark Ruskell asked the newly appointed Finance Secretary Kate Forbes – who made her first parliamentary appearance after being promoted today – about the announcement during a Climate Change Committee meeting.
As part of the Budget, the SNP Government announced an increase of £500 million to produce low-carbon infrastructure over the next year. The move would take the total to £1.8bn.
A letter sent to the committee by Forbes in her former capacity as public finance minister outlining each part of the spending – separating them into low, medium or high-carbon investments – showed £894m would be spent on the ScotRail franchise, rail infrastructure, ferries, canals and the Ferguson Marine shipyard.
All of the previous commitments were classed as being "low-carbon" investments in the letter.
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During the committee hearing, Ruskell said: "Looking through that list of projects, over half of those are about existing contracts.
"So ScotRail contracts, keeping the trains running, canals, ferries – these are existing commitments that the Government has already got.
"Do any of those actually reduce emissions? Are they bringing additional reduction in emissions? Because if they're just keeping the trains running as they are, how is that actually contributing towards targets?"
Forbes replied: "Yes there is additional funding there to invest in new projects.
"Whilst the projects that you may have mentioned there may be existing, the point I made in my statement is that £500m more is being spent on low-carbon infrastructure than had been spent the previous year.
"That demonstrates a significant increase in low-carbon spend."
Forbes added that continuing to invest in low-carbon infrastructure like railways which is already in place is important, but said "we need to step that up".
She said: "I think that's what we've done in this year's budget."
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David Stevenson, head of infrastructure delivery at the Scottish Government, who was also giving evidence, said there was a £500m investment which "directly responds to the climate emergency", including tackling fuel poverty and emissions through a heat transition deal.
Ruskell then said there was not £1.8bn available for the actual reduction of emissions.
He said: "Some of this is about standing still. No-one is suggesting that we shut the railways, that would be really bad for emissions... I'm just trying to understand where is the evidence of carbon reduction that is driving that policy?"
Responding, the Finance Secretary said there was a "significant increase" in low-carbon infrastructure, while admitting there wasn't "an unlimited supply of money".
Concluding, Forbes said funding had been taken from high-carbon investments and moved to more environmentally friendly alternatives, which she believes will drive down Scotland's total emissions.
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