Last week, we submitted our response to the Scottish Government’s draft Climate Change Plan consultation.
This plan will shape how Scotland meets its climate targets and transitions to a net zero society, making it one of the most important policy blueprints for our collective future.
But we couldn’t have done it alone!
Thank you to all who contributed to our response!
As a Climate Action Hub, we represent and amplify the voices of our brilliant network of community groups, organisations, and local projects committed to climate action and working towards fairer, more sustainable and resilient Midlothian communities.
This submission was shaped by them along with thoughtful input from other local people too. By their ideas, their concerns, and their hopes for the future.
A huge thank you to everyone who shared their voice:
- Our Steering Group members: Mayfields and Easthouses Development Trust, One Dalkeith and Dalkeith Arts
- The staff from our host organisation: Midlothian Community Action
- The young people at Seeds of Disruption
- The National Mining Museum of Scotland
- Friends of Roslin Moat
- Growing Families
- St. John's and Newton Church
- Handicabs Lothian
- Skills Development Scotland
- As well as other members and individuals that filled our online form.
We also gratefully acknowledge Fife Climate Hub and Stop Climate Chaos Scotland for sharing valuable resources that informed and strengthened our response.
This rich mix of voices is what gives our response its strength. Thank you to everyone in our dedicated network!
But what is the Climate Change Plan and why does it matter?
The Climate Change Plan is essentially Scotland’s long-term strategy to address the climate crisis. It sets out how Scotland will reduce its emissions across all major areas of the economy and daily life: from how we heat our buildings and produce electricity, to how we travel, grow food and manage waste.
Scotland has a legally binding target to reach net zero emissions by 2045. This means dramatically cutting the emissions we produce and balancing any remaining emissions through actions like restoring nature. The Climate Change Plan is the roadmap that explains how we’ll get there.
The final version of this plan will shape the speed, scale, and fairness of Scotland’s transition. It will decide things like:
- How our homes and buildings will be upgraded to be warmer, more efficient, and powered by clean heating systems.
- What support is offered to help households and businesses make changes.
- How we invest in public transport, renewable energy, and local food systems.
- What skills and training are offered to help workers transition into green jobs.
- How we ensure the transition is fair and leaves no community behind
- and more!
Why does this matter to people and places like Midlothian?
A well-designed plan can deliver real benefits that will go even further than simply reducing emissions: warmer homes with lower bills, cleaner air, reliable public transport, new local jobs in green industries, and thriving natural spaces. But if the plan is weak, delayed, or unfair, the transition could become rushed, costly and uneven, leaving some communities behind while others benefit.
In short, the Climate Change Plan isn’t just about targets and emissions. It’s about shaping a healthier, fairer and more resilient future for everyone in Scotland. That’s why it’s so important that the final plan reflects the needs, voices and priorities of communities across the country.
Our response: the short version
To make our response more accessible, we’ve created a short version that captures the key points we advocated for. We’ve grouped it into clear sections for easy reading.
In our full, detailed response, we sometimes quote specific community groups and members directly. Other times, views are presented more generally on behalf of our wider network. We also specify when a view comes directly from the Hub or has been shaped by our member organisations
You can explore the summary by theme below. For the complete, question-by-question submission, you can follow the link at the bottom of this page.
Delivering a Just Transition for people, communities and regions
- The plan’s commitment to a just transition is welcome in principle, but it it must move from high-level strategy to clear implementation
- Funding and support must be stable and targeted to those most at risk of climate change effects, particularly for disabled, ethnic minority, and low-income communities to ensure they are not left behind.
- Listen to communities. The transition must be co-designed with communities, not delivered to them. Effective plans must be developed in partnership with the small, trusted organisations that already work on the ground with vulnerable groups.
- Heed the lessons of past industrial transitions and invest in proven green jobs. Workers in transitioning industries need concrete support. Regions like Midlothian, with a legacy of poorly managed industrial decline (e.g., mining), show that a just transition must deliver tangible benefits and good local jobs to build trust.
- Prioritise investment in proven sectors like renewable energy, building retrofit, and the circular economy over unproven technologies like Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS).
Skills, training and qualifications
- Education must put sustainability at its heart. The plan should require schools to embed Learning for Sustainability and outdoor education into their core curriculum. Children need opportunities to learn about and feel connected to nature.
- Invest in community-led skills development for key sectors, including regenerative farming, clean heating installation, electric vehicle repair, and repair and reuse.
- Remove barriers to green jobs. We need clear retraining pathways for people of all ages transitioning into green jobs. A key barrier is affordability. We need financial safety nets to help people retrain without facing financial hardship.
Support for employers and third sector
- Provide stable, flexible funding that builds long-term capacity. Support for organisations must be multi-year and cover staff time and expertise, not just equipment. This is essential for the third sector, Climate Action Hubs, and local authorities to plan and act effectively.
- Provide simple, practical guidance. Employers need clear, step-by-step support on how to decarbonise, including the co-benefits, not just generic advice.
- Support organisations without their own assets. Many groups don’t own their buildings. Support must include funding mechanisms for tenants to improve rented spaces and for shared ownership models.
Renewable energy and decarbonising homes
- Stronger support and investment in local community ownership of renewables to ensure local people benefit socially and economically from projects in their area.
- Improved energy efficiency in homes and businesses to reduce overall demand, instead of just building more renewable supply to meet ever-growing needs.
- Better support to make our homes warmer and cheaper to heat. The most common request from our members and the public is for better access to grants and support for home insulation and energy efficiency improvements, along with a clear information campaign so people know what help is available. Delaying will make the transition more difficult and expensive later.
- The current system leaves out lower-to-middle income homeowners and private renters. Financial help should be based on household need, and tenants’ rights must be strengthened so landlords make necessary upgrades.
- Make clean heat genuinely affordable. This means easier-to-access, zero-interest loans for upfront costs and working to introduce special lower energy tariffs to reduce running costs from day one.
- Prioritise retrofitting existing buildings and support community-owned heat networks.
Sustainable infrastructure and transport
- Make community engagement meaningful, not just a tick-box exercise. Consultations need to be accessible and show real impact. This means running in-person sessions with free childcare/food and, crucially, ensuring community feedback is implemented in the final plans to show it’s worth people’s time.
- There should be clear engagement quotas for underrepresented groups (like young people, disabled people, and low-income residents) before a plan can proceed.
- Design places for people, not just cars. We need to prioritise walkable towns, safe cycling routes, better, affordable public transport and new developments with built-in amenities. People want to walk and cycle more, but need better infrastructure and maintained roads. Making buses and trains cheaper than flying would also help shift travel habits.
Consumption and sustainable products
- Make producers pay for their waste. We need stronger Extended Producer Responsibility laws that force companies making single-use plastics and hard-to-recycle items to fund the cleanup and recycling of their products
- Prioritise durability and local solutions. Products should last longer, with regulated minimum warranties.
- We need investment in community-led repair and reuse projects to not only keep materials in use longer, but also increase jobs and wealth in the local community.
Agriculture, land use and biodiversity
- Support local food systems and farmers. We need more funding and training for sustainable and regenerative farming to increase access to healthy, local food.
- Help communities own and manage land. We need support for community buy-outs or management leases from large private estates, especially for biodiversity projects. Making land ownership data public would be a helpful first step.
- Targeted funding for community gardens and allotments can bridge gaps in deprived areas, creating pride, ownership, and access to green space where it’s often lacking.
- Prioritise biodiverse woodlands, not monocultures. The plan needs stronger requirements and funding to create and protect diverse, native woodlands that benefit nature, not just commercial timber plantations.
- Protect existing peatlands with concrete rules. The plan must include legal protections for existing peatlands, including restrictions on damaging activities like overgrazing by livestock, to prevent further degradation.
- The plan must take concrete action to reduce meat consumption and livestock farming, the largest source of farm emissions.
- Support farmers in a just transition. Reducing livestock isn’t about harming rural economies. The government should actively support farmers and workers to move into secure, sustainable roles in regenerative farming, forestry or conservation.
