Working with the Scottish Parliament

The Scottish Parliament is responsible for passing legislation directly related to the natural environment of Scotland.  Scottish Natural Heritage inputs to this process by making advice and expertise available at the appropriate stage, thus helping to ensure the development of the best possible legislation for Scotland.  We do this by offering written and oral evidence to Parliamentary Committee inquiries and during their scrutiny of legislative proposals.  We provide the Scottish Parliament Information Centre (SPICe) with our latest research reports and position papers, and provide background information to help Scottish Government prepare responses to Parliamentary Questions.  We also try to ensure that MSPs are well-informed on key natural heritage issues and activities relating to their interests and constituencies.

Current areas of the Scottish Parliament legislative programme of relevance to SNH include:

• the Marine (Scotland) Act 2010   
• the Public Services Reform (Scotland) Act 2010   
• the Crofting Reform (Scotland) Act 2010    
• the Wildlife and Natural Environment (Scotland) Act 2011