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I do not have time to take interventions.

I ask the whole chamber to call out bogus arguments for more oil to deliver energy security for the UK, when we know that 80 per cent of North Sea oil is exported to global markets. I ask members to recognise that exploration licences that are granted today may not even produce oil until 2050, which is five years beyond our net zero target date. I ask members, including Liam Kerr, to wise up about false comparisons between the climate impact of North Sea gas and that of imported liquefied natural gas, when we know that the lowest-carbon gas comes from our nearest neighbours in Norway.

Members need to consider critically the assertion that a 3 per cent increase in the windfall tax would suddenly lead to the collapse of an entire industry overnight, because it is a fact that the energy profits levy came with a supertanker-sized loophole—a tax relief of up to 91 per cent for investment in more oil and gas, which was investment that was most likely going to happen anyway. Closing that loophole could have brought in billions to solve a cost of living crisis that was destroying ordinary people’s lives.

The UK Government could have chosen to make those tax reliefs available for renewable investments in order to create the jobs of the future today, but it chose not to do that. Tax allowances and reduced tax rates have allowed the Treasury to give more money to oil companies than it takes from them. In 2020, Shell was paid £80 million in negative tax, while the chief executive officer pocketed £5.5 million and the shareholders received record dividends, and at the same time, Shell made redundant 330 of its workers in the North Sea. That is absolutely shameful—did the Tories in the north-east condemn that when it happened?

The real traitors will be the ones who understood perfectly well what needed to be done but wilfully stood by, did nothing and condemned future generations to climate chaos and an unjust transition. It is time for responsibility and action, and I look forward to the Scottish Government leading the way.

We are now more than two years on from the 26th UN climate change conference of the parties—COP26: a summit in which the world did not dare mention oil and gas, despite all the warning signs. It was the year when the International Energy Agency and the United Nations called for no new oil and gas fields to be developed in order to keep the 1.5°C target alive. Since then, we have seen why holding down every fraction of a degree of global warming is absolutely critical. The planet has burned and flooded, and we have stood by, helplessly counting the cost.

Finally, last year in Dubai, at a COP summit hosted by a petrostate, there was a breakthrough of sorts—the world added oil and gas into an agreement for the first time. The world is beginning a new consensus on oil and gas, and it is time for the UK Government to abandon its reckless “Drill, baby, drill” approach. The choice that is before the UK Government is to either enable every last drop of oil and gas to be extracted, leading the industry to a deferred cliff-edge collapse, or start managing the decline now and put in place a transition that leaves no workers behind.

It is an inconvenient truth that North Sea oil and gas is in decline, and everyone in the chamber knows it. That is why it is so important for the Scottish Government to move away from supporting maximum economic recovery and start the conversation about a presumption against new oil and gas development.

We need to be aware of bogus arguments and where they originate. In its production gap report, the United Nations warned us that private fossil fuel firms are

“highly politically organised, investing considerable resources into lobbying, campaign finance, public relations and think tank sponsorship”,

and that they exert influence through what the UN has described as

“a revolving door between business and Government.”

I want to ask about the line between the individual cases—or multiple instances of a case—that are presented to you and the work that you do to look for systemic change and analysis of issues. Richard Dixon said earlier that there is evidence that SEPA is taking on more individual cases now, and we have certainly heard that that is the case. I am not entirely clear whether that is a result of increased awareness of the existence of ESS or referrals or whatever but, if the bodies that are primarily responsible for individual cases are picking up more casework, how is that starting to influence the themes and topics on which you then look to do further investigation, with a view to addressing what might be underlying systemic issues? It feels as if there is a bit of an interplay and a bit of a grey line between the two.

So, at the moment, there is a missing bit of the jigsaw puzzle. Currently, individuals come to you with individual issues. It sounds as if you need to screen those and work out whether a systemic issue underlies them. Do multiple individuals and organisations combine similar complaints that maybe point to a systemic issue? Do you discuss with SEPA and other organisations the volume of their individual complaints so that they can say to you that they have a problem with noise monitoring, environmental assessment or whatever, as they have had 30 complaints on that subject, and ask whether you are aware of that? I am interested in what that conversation looks like.

Do you work on that particular issue with the OEP in England and with the equivalent Welsh body? There is a huge debate about water quality, which is worsening in England. Are you taking a shared approach to that, or are there separate workstreams?

A related issue on which we have had correspondence is the Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Act 2023, and one piece of EU legislation that was revoked under that act was the National Emission Ceilings Regulations 2018. You raised concerns at the time about that whole framework and about how we would report and develop plans around air quality after going over the Brexit cliff edge. What do you see coming forward now? Do you have any more intelligence as to how that gap can be filled? I think that those regulations went in the autumn of last year. To my knowledge, no replacement in that area has been announced yet by any of the Governments.

Is there a practical implication if an organisation wants to challenge the Government on whether it is meeting its air quality standards? Is there an immediate gap there, and is that a problem?

I was going to ask about how long the ODPS has been in place and how many times the cap has been breached during that time, but I think that Ms Sizeland has already answered that question. If there is any more detail about that that you want to get on the record, it would be useful to know.

Was that at a time when patronage was growing substantially, or was that predicted? I think that we are now growing back very slowly from Covid—that seems to be the case from the modelling that I have seen. From discussions with bus companies, I think they are not expecting a huge surge in older people being back on the buses. What was the trend that led up to the breach of the cap in a single year, in 2018?

The young persons scheme has been really successful. There were a few teething problems at the beginning, but there is now substantial uptake among young people under the age of 22 who have the card.

Is there a target for how much you want the percentage of cardholders to go up in the next year? Will we reach a plateau in the numbers of people and their families who want a card, or do you think there is still a gap and that councils and schools could encourage young people to take up the card in greater numbers? Are we at the limit of uptake of the card, or do you think there is still a little way to go in getting the last folk on board?