Scottish Environment Secretary Roseanna Cunningham has said that UK Government policies could inhibit Scotland’s progress towards achieving its 2045 net zero target, which the Committee on Climate Change (CCC) recommended. She said this during a hearing of the Environment, Climate Change and Land Reform Committee held on 21 May.
Cunningham criticised the proposed increase of VAT on renewable generation technologies, saying: “If you are trying to get people to actually take these things up, whether in domestic settings or in any other settings, jumping the VAT from 5 per cent to 20 per cent is going to have the absolutely opposite impact to what you want.” She continued: “It’s another example of the kind of thing which we have no control over but nevertheless will have a very distinctive impact on decision-making at the level of quite ordinary people who are hoping to be able to do the right thing.”