Shaping and Influencing Policy: Q2 22/23

Following a busy start to the 2022/23 year, the second quarter has continued to be busy with a large number of consultation responses submitted across a short timeframe.

You can read the last issue of Shaping and Influencing Policy on our website.

Strategic engagement and working collaboratively

We were delighted to attend Scottish Environment LINK’s Congress held in Perth and in person for the first time since 2019 – a great opportunity to network with other LINK members. The theme for the day was Wellbeing for All, and sessions explored equality, diversity, and inclusion as a human rights issue, disability and neurodiversity at work and developing an anti-racist approach.

The Cross-Party Group on Circular Economy was due to meet in September, however due to the death of Her Majesty the Queen this meeting will now take place in Q3 – the theme of the next meeting is Reuse and Repair and will feature a range of speakers.

Local government play a key role in keeping Scotland beautiful and we are very proud of the breadth and depth of collaborative action taken. As we embark on our programme of strategic engagement with local authorities, we will be looking to build on the successful partnerships and collaborative working taking place across all 32 of Scotland’s local authorities.

We were pleased to celebrate one year of our partnership with Keep New Zealand Beautiful, which has seen a number of our programmes adapted to suit the New Zealand audience including our award winning Upstream Battle® campaign and our pioneering Climate Ready Classrooms.  

Developing and engaging with policy

Much time was spent on engaging with the policy process during Q2, and we submitted four separate consultation responses. Alongside our own responses we endorsed those made by Scottish Environment Link:

• Draft Environmental Standards Scotland Strategy
• Circular Economy Bill
• Circular Economy Route Map
• Scottish Biodiversity Strategy

In partnership with Zero Waste Scotland and Scottish Government, we continue to take part in developing the new National Litter and Flytipping Strategy expected later in 2022.

Demonstrating expertise and credibility

We supported Scottish Government and the Minister for Environment and Land Reform to launch the new Marine Litter Strategy, and had Ministerial attendance at three further Keep Scotland Beautiful organised events held during Scotland’s Climate Week:

• Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills – launch of our Climate Action Schools framework event in Edinburgh,
• Minister for Biodiversity, Circular Economy, and Green Skills – Introduction to the Climate Emergency workshop online event,
• First Minister – attended our Eco-Schools Scotland Climate Change Live Lesson Assembly event in Glasgow.

Our CEO met with Hon Poto Williams MP, Minister of Conservation and Disabilities from the New Zealand Parliament. The Minister spoke with the CEO about the Green Flag Award® for parks and greenspaces; 85 Scottish parks were this year presented with the Green Flag Award® recognising excellence in park management and environmental standards.