Màiri Louise McAllan is a Scottish politician serving as Cabinet Secretary for Wellbeing Economy, Net Zero and Energy since 2024. She previously served as Cabinet Secretary for Transport, Net Zero and Just Transition^{[lower-alpha 1]} from 2023 to 2024 and Minister for Environment, Biodiversity and Land Reform from 2021 to 2023. A member of the Scottish National Party (SNP), she has been the Member of the Scottish Parliament (MSP) for Clydesdale since 2021. McAllan is a former corporate solicitor, who also served as a special advisor to First Minister Nicola Sturgeon prior to her election to the Scottish Parliament.^[2]

McAllan grew up and was educated in Biggar, South Lanarkshire, then studied Scots law at the University of Glasgow, also spending time at the University of Ghent in Belgium.^[3]

Her father Ian is also a politician who has served as a local councillor for South Lanarkshire's Clydesdale East ward (which covers Biggar) since 2017.^[3]

Before entering politics, McAllan co-founded human rights organisation RebLaw Scotland, which aims to use the law as a tool in the fight for social justice and held its first conference in 2017, worked as a corporate lawyer specialising in energy and natural resources and was a voluntary director of East Ayrshire's Women's Aid.^[4][5]

She stood unsuccessfully in Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale at the 2017 United Kingdom general election, where she came second to Conservative incumbent David Mundell.^[6]

McAllan served as a special advisor in the Scottish Government on environmental matters. First to then Environment Secretary Roseanna Cunningham and then to then First Minister Nicola Sturgeon.^[7][8]

On 6 May 2021 she was elected as Member of the Scottish Parliament (MSP) for Clydesdale.^[1]

On 19 May 2021, McAllan was appointed to the new government as Minister for Environment, Biodiversity and Land Reform.^[9][10] During her time as Environment Minister McAllan was responsible for scrapping the Scottish Governments' net zero target of 75% emission reduction by 2030, instead reverting to the UK target of 2045.^[11]

In February 2024, she and her husband Iain announced the pregnancy of her first child.^[12] She plans to take maternity leave in the summer.^[13] As a government minister she intends to return in March 2025.^[14]