Politicians

Working With
Politicians

One of the most positive and productive ways of working with politicians that we have established is through our Species Ambassador programme, where USS Species Ambassadors link up with their counterpart MSP Nature Champions at Holyrood. You can read more about that over on our Campaigns page.

We love making this link between the kids and politicians as it creates such a bond between what we do on the ground locally and what can be achieved politically, when needed. Not only do the politicians back our calls for help, but we are able to feed into their understanding of what is needed to help protect the amazing marine wildlife that we all love.

One of the first big campaigns we got involved in was #nokelpdredge which involved USS heading down to Holyrood on the day when they were debating Mark Ruskell MSP's proposed amendment to the Crown Estate Bill, aimed at ensuring that the practice of dredging for kelp be prohibited in legislation. We met up with Mark, Gail Ross, John Finnie, Claudia Beamish MSP and many others, and sat in the chamber to listen as the amendment was passed and the Scottish Government demonstrated a real commitment to protecting our kelp forests.

Ullapool Sea Saver Seagrass Banner

We also visited Holyrood for the unveiling of our massive Seagrass banner by Species Champion for Sea Grass and friend of the sea savers, Gail Ross MSP.

Whilst there, we introduced them to the Rubbish Game – you can learn what that’s all about here. We got Roseanna Cunningham, Claudia Beamish, Beatrice Wishart, Maree Tod, Gail Ross and many others playing the game and discovered that it was a great way to get MSPs from all over Scotland discussing the variations in what can be recycled and how.

We also got a really interesting tour of the chamber from Maree Todd!

We met Roseanna Cunningham at the 2019 Sea Scotland conference in Glasgow, and were honoured to be mentioned subsequently in her Consultation Response to Protecting The Environment After Brexit, she also had a go at the Rubbish Game at Holyrood!

Protecting the environment after Brexit
Consultation gives support to Scottish Government proposals. Brexit threatens to have a negative impact on environmental protection, according to consultation responses published today.

Speaking ahead of a meeting of the EU Environment Council in Luxembourg, Environment Secretary Roseanna Cunningham said:

“I would like to thank everyone who responded to this consultation, in particular the young people of Sunnyside Primary School in Glasgow, and the Ullapool Sea Savers, some of whom I had the pleasure of meeting this year. Their passion for the environment is a reminder of our responsibility to protect the planet for future generations.”

More information can be found here: https://www.gov.scot/news/protecting-the-environment-after-brexit/