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I absolutely understand the level 1 exam that one takes. Are you expecting people who come from overseas to take that exam, to prove that they are fit and competent, before they can go to the hill? When I last took it, which was a long time ago, it took two days and a range day on the back of it. Will people come over here three days early to get through it? Is that right? What about people who come from south of the border? Will they have to come up and do three days of training?

The agreement between the minister and Tim Eagle to work together on what mandatory training will be required and grandfather rights is absolutely vital. I found it very odd that, having been trusted for 12 or 14 years to carry a rifle in the Army, I was not considered fit and competent to shoot deer when I came out of the Army. It seemed a strange position to be in, and there should therefore be grandfather rights.

All that I am saying is that if you set targets for forest rangers to go out and shoot 300 days a year when they work only 150 days a year, there are going to be some misses and some woundings. However, we have no information about that. I have no idea where SNH got its figures from. Has it trawled all the local estates that have been shooting deer? How did it get that information?

I would be very happy to scrutinise the issue with you over a cup of coffee, minister, to see whether the amendment is required—I will take that offer if you want to make it at some stage. However, I find that mandatory training without grandfather rights would be particularly difficult and particularly galling for those people who are already out there, doing what we have asked them to do.

One thing that I did not hear in your response, minister, was any evidence that you have spoken with NatureScot, the police authorities south of the border and the Home Office regarding the licensing requirements. I will happily give way if you can give me examples of when you spoke to the Home Office about how the bill will affect firearms licensing across the United Kingdom.

Really?

You are absolutely right—if that person lives in Scotland. If they do not, it will not be Police Scotland that decides. You should have talked to UK police forces to find out what chance they have to liaise with NatureScot on whether firearm licences that are issued south of the border can be used in Scotland by fit and competent people. However, nothing has been done.

If I were ever to introduce legislation to the Parliament, I absolutely believe that I would carry out the consultation before I did so. I will leave it there, convener.

I will press the amendment.

I am always happy to come to the committee and be patronised about my knowledge of the Electricity Act 1989, which I know in quite great detail, having been a surveyor and having worked for Scottish and Southern Electricity Networks on power lines across Scotland, but what I will not take from you, cabinet secretary, is the idea that you do not have control. If you are saying that the amendment is incompetent, it is incompetent for you to say that you will not accept nuclear power in Scotland, because it is a totally reserved matter. You are doing it because you have control of the planning levers to stop it. You cannot argue one thing one way and another thing another way. Can you explain how it is possible to pick and choose, as you are doing?

You will be pleased to know, convener, that, considering the size of the group, I will try to limit my remarks to my own amendments.

Amendment 132 seeks to reinstate the stag season, or close season, for male deer in Scotland, following its removal by the Deer (Close Seasons) (Scotland) Amendment Order 2023, which came into force on 21 October 2023. The committee will remember that I spoke on the subject and drew up a large petition, which more than 2,000 people signed. It was then effectively ignored, which meant that not only could Bambi be shot with its mother, but every male deer would be shot whenever it was seen during the course of the year, if that were the decision of the landowner.

I have done a bit of research on the matter with Forestry and Land Scotland, which proves that, as a result of its use of what I call “deer mercenaries”—a subject that I will come back to—25,673 male deer have been shot out of season in Scotland since the removal of the close season, with 6,643 shot in the north region or the Highlands alone. That is a huge number.

Just to be clear, I point out that Forestry and Land Scotland spent £4.86 million on deer management control in 2023-24, and that money is being used to pay contractors, some of whom are being paid more than £100,000 a year to kill deer. On the basis of the figures used by Forestry and Land Scotland, that means that they are killing more than 800 deer per contractor, and some contractors are using subcontractors and paying them a proportion of what they get.

The figure equates to roughly 6 per cent of FLS’s total expenditure being spent on deer management control. The removal of the close season enticed people to go into contract deer killing. I made the point in relation to the previous amendment, which, sadly, was rejected, that it is important to keep people on the ground and not use travelling contractors from outwith the area to come in and kill deer.

I thank the minister for that very pertinent question. As I have said, I have been involved for more than 50 years, now, in deer management and in the selective culling of deer to ensure that deer populations are maintained at an acceptable level and that we do not just have the mass extermination of deer.

What the 2023 order said was that you could kill deer at any time. There was provision under the Deer (Scotland) Act 1996 for the killing of deer outwith the close season, but you had to apply for a licence and it could be done only in specific areas. Now, it is being done randomly across Scotland. In fact, I have seen advertisements for stag shooting at Christmas, which is the time when stags are at their lowest ebb and should not be chased around the hill, as they are probably at the limits of their reserves before they go into the spring. I think that that is wrong.

I am all for the management of deer, but I am all for doing it as carefully and kindly as possible, and in a way that ensures that we keep a balanced population. What I am suggesting is that we go back to the previous situation of people having to apply for licences, instead of their just carrying out night shooting with thermal sights, with deer being harried from dawn to dusk.

Minister, a further example is the deer management groups in the Highlands. They have been ferried around at NatureScot’s expense, with helicopters being taken to the most far-off parts of estates for deer to be shot and left there. They were culling calves only at a rate of 1 per cent, which is completely against normal deer management. We know that calving percentages are around 20 to 25 per cent, which means that 19-odd per cent of the calves were being left to starve as a result of the actions of NatureScot, which I find unacceptable.