Scotland is taking sustainable development seriously

16 October 2009

SDC Chair Will Day says Scotland is rightly proud of many of the ways sustainable development is happening here but the job isn't done.

Scotland wants to take the lead on climate change and other sustainability issues. Director General for the Environment Paul Gray, set out the Scottish Government core values around sustainable development when he met SDC Chair Will Day. The Scottish Government feels it is leading this agenda internationally.

Day said:'There is no doubt there are some uniquely Scottish solutions and the Scottish Government is taking the climate change agenda very seriously. But targets are not enough and we have to focus on delivery.'

The talks centred on how to create the necessary behaviour change amongst Scottish people and businesses. In several key policy areas, such as transport, proposed projects simply don’t add up to programmes which will produce sustainable outcomes. 

Day said: 'There is really a very long way to go on some issues. SDC has an important role to play to bring different views together and try to get some solutions to some very difficult questions.'
'We can't be naive about how difficult some of the things we are asking for will be for politicians. The different political situations in Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and England provide opportunities to learn from each other and collect good ideas.'

Day is clear that sustainable development is not an additional cost, it is about doing more for less. There may be investments along the way but Day says we need a new organising principle for Government: 'We want to encourage and add value - financially and otherwise. To do this we have to stop using only crude monetary measures and start asking what the cost of an unjust and unequal society is.'

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