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Does Mr Golden share my thought that those targets are being abandoned at this stage because the Government has failed to meet them for the past seven years?

Amendment 81 is quite simple. It would change the word “may” to “must”. It might be just one word, but it is an important change that should be made to the bill. If we are serious about moving to a circular economy, we must set ourselves targets. The use of the term “may” in setting targets does not really cut it, which is why the Government must take this on board, change “may” to “must” and get a move on.

I understand that amendments 147 and 150, in the name of Bob Doris, go together, and I support them both. One thing that I would like to highlight about amendment 150 is that it states:

“The Scottish Ministers must, as soon as reasonably practicable after laying a copy of the proposed regulations, publicise them in such manner as they consider appropriate.”

I hope that we will hear from Mr Doris what is meant by publicising the regulations as ministers “consider appropriate”. Perhaps that phrase is always in legislation, but I would like to know what is meant by it; we might hear about that from the minister as well.

Another thing to flag in amendment 150 is that the

“representation period must be at least 90 days, of which no fewer than 30 must be days on which the Parliament is not dissolved or in recess.”

If it is the worst-case scenario of just 30 days, I want to get an idea of whether that would be enough and whether that period is standard in legislation. I hope to hear about that from Mr Doris and the minister.

I move amendment 81.

We should review progress on our targets and whether we are going to meet them. After making an assessment of the targets and seeing where we are heading, the Government may think that we have to make some changes—not to the targets but to some of the things that we are doing to ensure that we are on track to make progress on the circular economy that we are all hoping for and moving towards. If we do not measure the targets and do not know what is happening, it will be difficult to meet those targets.

Maurice Golden’s amendment 148 is about whether the targets are achievable. I think that it is only right that we look at that. Some of the climate change emissions targets have not been achievable for quite a while, which has been swept under the carpet. We are looking at whether the circular economy targets are actually achievable.

I am supportive of amendment 149 and I support amendment 12, in the name of Graham Simpson—he will talk to the amendment himself. It is often the case that the Government wants to set fines for other bodies, so if the Government is not meeting its targets, it should get fined. That money should go to local authorities and the third sector to be fed back into the system to try to ensure that we reach the targets that are set. If there are no fines for the Government, that may not move forward.

That would be up to the Government when it sets its targets. Just as it wants to fine other organisations, there should be a financial penalty for the Scottish Government. The money should be reinvested, which is key, into the circular economy through the third sector and local authorities.

I will speak to some of the other amendments in the group. Amendment 13 is just a review of targets. As we have heard, the Government has set emissions reductions targets before and those have not been met for eight out of the past 12 years. There should be a review of that, as targets are constantly being missed.

Amendment 14 links to the Climate Change (Scotland) Act 2009. Obviously, the legislation might change in the future, but that seems to be a sensible approach.

Amendment 152, in the name of Maurice Golden, is also supportive of the view that there is no point in the Government having a plan if the people who would have to deliver a huge chunk of the work do not have plans in place. It would ensure that plans are put in place.

I move amendment 82.

Yes—I will do exactly the same. I remind members that my entry in the register of members’ interests shows that I was a councillor at the beginning of the current parliamentary session.

Will the minister take an intervention?

If we were in a good place where both Governments were working together, I would agree that it was not required. However, from what we have learned over the past couple of years, we know that it is required, because things have not been working according to the frameworks. I imagine that both Governments would blame each other, and we would not find ourselves in a good position.

It would be good if the amendment was not required but, from our experience over the past couple of years, I think that it is required. I will leave it there.

I will join in briefly, convener. I have heard, and hear in the chamber a lot, that there is a climate emergency. If we are serious about that, we have to be serious about setting some timelines. The amendments in the name of Graham Simpson are trying to tell the Government that if it thinks that the issue is important and that it should be doing something about it—and we all agree on those points—then it should do so.

Maurice Golden mentioned that this is nothing new and that it has been in the making for eight years. If we do not have any deadlines, we will probably be sitting here in another eight years thinking that we might progress soon. It is right that what has been lodged should set clear deadlines for the Government to just get on and do it. I am sure that most people would agree to that and would be able to support the amendments.

I will go through my amendments, most of which I see as clarification amendments.

The purpose of amendment 83 is to set out that, for the purposes of this section, unsold goods cannot be defined as waste if they are in perfectly good condition. The aim of the amendment is to discourage the defining of unsold goods that are in perfectly good condition as waste and therefore not to be included under this part of the legislation.

With amendment 86, I am asking the Government for a list of goods that will be exempt from the unsold goods regulations. Off the top of my head, I am thinking of things such as medical goods, which we might not want to be defined as unsold goods in this section.

I missed out amendment 84, but I will go back to it now. We spoke earlier about not wanting the legislation to be overly burdensome for businesses. Therefore, we will be looking for the Government to set out the value of the unsold goods that would be covered by the regulations. I realise that there are potential issues around doing that, and maybe this is a bit of a probing amendment. Is one screw an unsold good or does it need to be a bigger packet? Which value do you go on? Maybe there needs to be a bit more work on that.

The value of goods will also decrease over time. For example, an unsold laptop will have a high value but, after year 1, its value will be less and, after three years, it will be even less. After five years, it will probably not have any value at all. The amendment is meant to make it clear how we would work around that issue.

On amendment 88, if we want enforcement, we need to ensure that the body that is responsible for that is resourced adequately to carry out that function.

I had been thinking that there might have been some confusion, but I was not quite sure myself. Last week was a long week.

I will sum up on a few points. I was trying to intervene on Bob Doris, who was actually intervening on someone else. He had made the point that public bodies are already doing quite a lot on procurement procedures. The minister also mentioned having climate change duties for many such public bodies.

I listened to what Sarah Boyack said earlier about trying to increase the issue’s profile and get it further up the agenda. If a lot of that work is being done already, it should not place too much of a burden on public bodies to create their own circular economy plans. That would be a good thing for raising the profile and getting bodies to think about the steps that they can take. Much of that work will be there already and could be fed back to ministers for approval. Such an approach would not place a great burden on public bodies at all, but it would help us get to where we are trying to go.

The aim of my amendment 82 is simply to firm things up. The minister said that a lot of progress might happen in the future, once its approach goes through co-design. However, my amendment would put urgency at the forefront by saying that it must happen and that the Government must report. If the Government has nothing to hide, I am sure that that will be accepted. It should commit to doing so.

I will also speak to amendment 12. As we have heard, and whether it likes it or not, the Scottish Government has missed out on its past 12 emissions targets, and there have been no repercussions at all. The point of amendment 12 is to say that if the Government is serious about hitting its targets, there has to be some penalty. It cannot just be the case that it misses its targets every year but nothing happens until the next year, when the targets might be missed again or they might be hit. The aim of amendment 12 is to say, “If you do not meet it, something is going to happen. There is going to be a fine.” It is to get the Government to step up. There is a good set of amendments in this group.

I will press amendment 82.