Lorna Slater MSP

Lorna Slater is Scottish Greens MSP for Edinburgh Central, elected in May 2026.

Here is Lorna’s statement as a candidate in the Holyrood 2026 elections:

Lorna was a Co-Leader of the Scottish Greens for six years, alongside Patrick Harvie. Until the end of the Bute House Agreement in 2024, she was Minister for Green Skills, Circular Economy and Biodiversity in the Scottish Government.

Before being first elected to the Scottish Parliament in 2021, Lorna Slater worked as an electro-mechanical engineer in the tidal energy sector.

As Minister for Circular Economy and Biodiversity (2021-2024), Lorna was responsible for Scotland’s Nature Restoration Fund, and Biodiversity Strategy, and a national upgrade to Scotland’s recycling infrastructure, with the Recycling Improvement fund. Her work included banning the most problematic single-use plastics, preventing new waste incinerators being built, and stopping new opencast coal mines. She oversaw the legal protection of beavers and their re-introduction to new sites around Scotland.

Lorna’s work in Government made paying living wages a condition of receiving Government grants, raising the wages of thousands of workers.

Lorna held the Economy and Fair Work portfolio for the Scottish Green MSPs Group and regularly spoke in Parliament on building a fair and sustainable economy that respects planetary boundaries.

Locally, she is leading the creation of Friends of Holyrood Park, and is involved in the campaign to stop the pollution of Linlithgow Loch.

She is the Species Champion for the Northern Damselfly.