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Has the Scottish Government given the ACCC a date—by the end of this parliamentary session, the end of this year or the middle of next year, for example? I understand that the Scottish Government is nestled within the UK, as the signatory state, but what is the Scottish Government’s commitment to meeting the terms of the convention? Have you given a date for when that will happen?

That is fine.

Much of the development of land management plans will follow the guidance that will be produced. I am interested in hearing whether there needs to be specific guidance in relation to crofting estates, given the mixture of inby and common grazings and the complexities of getting joint action together.

You are passing it back to us to make a decision.

—it feels like we are edging along towards trying to meet the terms of that important environmental international convention. Ultimately, what is the sanction on the Government for not doing so?

That is helpful.

You are happy with the 3,000 hectares threshold.

One aspect of Aarhus compliance involves the ability of citizens to challenge not only a decision-making procedure that they believe was inadequate, but the merit of the decision. That is something that we do not really have. The convention talks about

“the substantive and procedural legality”

of environmental decisions. At the moment—this is the case with fracking and some other environmental issues—environmental non-governmental organisations can take bodies to court when they believe that they have not followed an adequate procedure, but they cannot challenge the substance of the decision. For example, they cannot say that a decision is not great in relation to our legal obligations around climate change. As long as the procedure that a minister or a body goes through to get to that decision is procedurally correct, there is no issue for the courts to consider.

Where does the Government sit on that issue? It would be quite a move to enable people to challenge a decision based on the merits of the decision, and not just on the procedure. I would be interested to hear your views on that.

I know that we are discussing licensing this morning, but I will bring my question down to a specific issue. Do you think that the Supreme Court’s recent decision on Rosebank starts to move into the area of concern about the merit of a particular decision rather than the procedural aspect of it?

You have suggested that the Government could have concerns about the establishment of an environmental court, because it could be disruptive—I think that that is what you said—to actions that we need to take in relation to delivering net zero by 2045. I suppose that Mr Lumsden might want to take the Government to court over its decisions on pylon lines or whatever.

Could you expand on that issue? What is the underlying concern? Is it about environmental NGOs possibly challenging offshore wind farms, such as the Berwick Bank project, about which there is concern at the moment? There have been concerns about other such projects in the past. Is the Government hesitating on the issues because there is fear that some of the tensions around environmental mitigation and impact could result in lengthy delays to some of the good stuff that it needs to do around net zero?