GIVE CLIMATE CHANGE BILL REAL TEETH - LIB DEMS

12.00.00am BST (GMT +0100) Tue 5th May 2009

The Liberal Democrats will lead calls today (Wednesday) for the Scottish Government to give the Climate Change Bill real teeth and publish the long-overdue energy efficiency strategy.

Liberal Democrat Climate Change spokesperson Alison McInnes MSP has lodged an amendment to Stage 1 of the Climate Change Bill, which will be debated over the next two days.

Commenting ahead of the debate, Mrs McInnes said:

"The Climate Change Bill needs to be bold and ambitious if it is to tackle one of the biggest challenges facing the world today.

"Ministers need to give this Bill real teeth. They need to include more details about how they will achieve their emissions reduction targets, but we also need a commitment to robust reporting.

"There is little point setting targets if there is no way of holding Ministers to account for their departments' emissions. That is why Liberal Democrats are calling for full parliamentary scrutiny of Scotland's progress towards cutting emissions."

Mrs McInnes added:

"The SNP has already delayed publishing an energy efficiency strategy and this Bill kicks it even further into the long grass.

"They didn't need to publish the Climate Change Bill before the strategy. Ministers have effectively wasted two years where they could have made energy savings.

"The SNP needs to end the uncertainty, stop delaying and publish this strategy within the next six months."