I will respond to the previous question too, because it is important. Sustainable development is an important principle and concept. It is well established—it has been around for many years—and although there is a lot of debate about it, it has caused no practical problem that I can detect. It has added to thinking on a range of issues about the environment, climate and land management, and it has led to other action.
You will not be surprised to know, convener, that this is not the first committee of the Parliament to wrestle with the question. I am sure that Mr Stevenson, wearing previous hats, wrestled directly with it. I encountered it in my past life, as well. It has been the subject of a lot of debate in Parliament and at no time has Parliament ever sought to define sustainable development in a bill. There is good reason for that.
We also need to make it clear that the matter has been the subject of court challenge. The Scottish ministers were challenged on a definition of sustainable development in the case of Pairc Crofters v the Scottish Ministers, which took place a number of years ago. I will read to you what Lord Gill said when judging on it. He said:
“In my view, the expression sustainable development is in common parlance in matters relating to the use and development of land. It is an expression that would be readily understood by the legislators, the Ministers and the Land Court.”
I am prepared to accept Lord Gill’s judgment on the matter, I have to say.
On the second question, the bill is the right place for provisions about other land. Parliament has the opportunity to do so and, as I recall, the measure picks up a manifesto commitment from the Government—which was elected on that manifesto—to have a land agency. That, in turn, picked up arguments that were made in the passage of the Land Reform (Scotland) Act 2016 and the creation of the Scottish Land Commission. There was an outstanding issue to be resolved about there being a place for the Government to have other land. Given the extensive expertise that the Forestry Commission and Forest Enterprise Scotland have in land management, albeit that it is in the forestry context, it seems to be appropriate to put the wider holding of land by Government for a range of sustainable development purposes with those bodies and to try to apply some of that expertise.
I do not think that we would have a stand-alone bill to deal with the matter. It is not uncommon for bills to pick up matters on the way, and the provision is a reasonable fit. I welcome the fact that non-forestry land is in the bill. There is an opportunity for the Government, Parliament or the people of Scotland over time to manage other land in appropriate ways in the public interest, and it is appropriate to have it in the bill.