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Yes. That is the fundamental difference between the bill and the specific provision on charging for single-use bags. The bill is a framework bill that will put in place powers to enable us to bring forward measures in a strategic way. By setting out a requirement for the Government to create a circular economy strategy and targets associated with that, we have put in place a framework to enable a more overarching approach.

I am happy to consider that. I have spoken to the construction industry. Last year, I spoke with the Royal Incorporation of Architects in Scotland, and it was particularly keen on material passports, passports for buildings and reporting, so that it can be aware of what materials are available for reuse and get systems in place. We want to do more work on that.

I am sorry, but there is one more provision in the bill that I want to be clear about. Some concerns have been voiced that the bill looks at only recycling and waste, so I want to be clear that there are many provisions of the bill that look higher up. Zero Waste Scotland has been very supportive of us, and it will now be a public body. I have asked it to undertake the sharing of good practice, particularly between our councils. For example, Moray Waste Busters, which many of you might be familiar with, is an exemplar of how reuse can be attached to a local authority for the benefit of the community and, of course, the local authority.

Do you mean the key findings of the report?

Absolutely. Mark Ruskell is absolutely right that the Circular Economy (Scotland) Bill establishes a legislative framework to support the transition. Each provision of the bill has an associated parliamentary procedure under which secondary legislation could be brought.

Mark Ruskell specifically mentioned charging for single-use items. There is intended to be a super-affirmative procedure attached to that when it is a new charge. For example, the introduction of a charge for single-use coffee cups would be done under the super-affirmative procedure. However, if we were to subsequently modify that charge, how it worked or any aspect of those regulations, that would be done under the affirmative procedure.

Ailsa Heine might be able to provide some more detail on the super-affirmative procedure.

As far as I understand it—I will get Ailsa Heine to clarify this, if I do not have all the detail—under the super-affirmative procedure, it is not set in stone exactly what must be undertaken. We can use our judgment as to what would be appropriate for different provisions, if there is a concern, for example, about speed.

As I highlighted, the circular economy strategy, as set out in the bill, talks about reduction in consumption of materials. The most effective reduction in consumption is to move materials up the waste hierarchy towards minimising their use in the first place, and towards reuse over discarding and recycling. That is built right into the strategy.

We have had a bit of discussion about what details might be included in the bill, but strategies would be produced every five years. As Gareth Heavisides has highlighted, they relate to particular sectors and systems—for example, putting in place repair cafes and the systems that we would need in order to implement that approach. The strategy sets out space for those to be created.

No amendments have been proposed to me, but I am all ears if there are specific ones that the member or others have in mind. I have certainly had many discussions with environmental non-governmental organisations on the matter of targets, but they have not presented me with what they think the targets should be; they have simply said that they think that we should have some, and we agree. That is why the provision to create targets is in the bill.

That is something that I have been thinking about a lot. There are three basic approaches to problematic items, particularly single-use items. One approach is to ban them. That is the approach that we have taken to certain single-use plastic items, such as styrofoam cups. We are looking at that approach to single-use vapes at the UK level. Another approach is to introduce charges, which is what we did for single-use plastic bags and are thinking about doing for cups. Another approach is to use producer responsibility schemes, such as the deposit return scheme and the packaging scheme. Europe is considering such a scheme for textiles.

We have those three broad tools that we can use for particular items. It is a question of ensuring that we are using the right tool for the right job. I think that banning is the right tool for the job in certain cases. That is why we are considering that approach at the four-nations level for single-use vapes. However, we do not require any provisions in the bill for that because we already have the powers that we need.

As we have already discussed, the intention is to use the provision on reporting of waste and surpluses in the first instance for food waste in particular, targeting those waste streams that have the biggest environmental impact. We are considering larger businesses—I have given the examples of businesses such as Tesco, Unilever and Hovis, which already carry out such public reporting. It should be really clear what kind of businesses and sectors we are looking at. We might look at the construction sector as a follow-on.

I recently met Ewan MacDonald-Russell of the Scottish Retail Consortium, who had some of the concerns that you mention. I have agreed to meet him early in the new year and to meet some of his members who already do such reporting. The concern that he raised with me—perhaps he brought it to your evidence session as well—was exactly how onerous the reporting will be and what it will look like. However, given that some of his members already report such data voluntarily, I considered it a good opportunity to meet them to understand what they do and whether it would meet our requirements so that we have a working model to go from.

Ewan MacDonald-Russell said that his members would find it comforting to know what those reporting requirements would be. I have endeavoured, as we have with the single-use cup charges and with COSLA, to start working on that even before the bill is passed, so that businesses can have some comfort as to what they will be looking at.

We already have extensive powers to require businesses to report. I will hand over to Ailsa Heine for more details on that.