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Yes, I am totally open to attending such a meeting, but I think that Mr Bibby will appreciate that my primary focus is to support Sir Mark in the most appropriate way as he takes forward new leadership in Historic Environment Scotland. I look forward to being apprised by him of the changes that are taking place in terms of the on-going investigations. As the board changes, of course, no doubt the new members of the board, together with those remaining from the old board, will want to reflect on what has transpired at Historic Environment Scotland.

There is a wider point that emanates from Mr Bibby’s question: what are the learnings about how such a situation could come about in the first place, in order to ensure that such a thing never happens again? The range of leadership issues at Historic Environment Scotland are extremely serious, and that concerns us all.

As the board better understands and comes to terms with what has transpired and the solutions to deal with the issues, I certainly would want to be advised by it so that we can make sure that those learnings are available right across the public sector landscape for arm’s-length organisations.

I do not think that I have any meetings at the present time. However, as I have always said, I am open to dialogue with trade unions in any circumstance. I am aware that the trade unions have been involved in relation to some of the internal matters, which, as Mr Bibby will appreciate, I cannot go into in any level of detail. The trade unions’ locus, as I understand it, is in relation to their members as part of the staff team at Historic Environment Scotland.

I am not aware of any request for a meeting with the unions. They will appreciate that on these HR issues the locus is not mine. Mr Bibby will understand that. I do not want to give him the impression that I am against meeting with trade unions, especially where there are distressed circumstances. I am not against that, if it is felt that it is appropriate. However, there has never been a suggestion from them that they would wish to meet me, given that I do not have that direct locus in the issues that they are raising.

I want to give Mr Brown total assurance about my personal interest in, and the Government’s interest in, ensuring that organisations that have commercial potential are able to secure additional and sustainable funding streams. Forgive me—I am looking for the number, which is not at the top of my head. Historic Environment Scotland now has commercial income of north of £70 million annually, which is significantly more than it has been in recent years. HES is able to do that because the Scottish Government has changed the accountancy procedures that previously acted as a disincentive for it to make more commercial income. That is the first thing.

We have recognised the opportunity that Mr Brown has drawn our attention to. I think that we all understand the challenge facing Historic Environment Scotland, given the nature of our historic estate in Scotland. HES has more than 300 sites. In addition to historical wear and tear, the environmental impact is accelerating the decline at a lot of these very old sites. Anything that can be done to consider a “proper return”, to use Mr Brown’s words, and to think imaginatively about how we can marry up the diaspora and other interests with different parts of Scotland and support particular projects.

As Mr Brown knows, I have responsibility for diaspora matters for the Scottish Government. I have also spoken with the new chief executive and chair about signposting particular projects that are under way in Scotland. They might be Historic Environment Scotland projects, or they might be projects with the National Trust for Scotland or Historic Houses. There is a range of different bits of our historic estate that are, because of wear and tear and environmental damage, in need of significant investment. There is much more that we can do in that regard.

We have made the changes that have begun the process. Is there more that can be done? Yes. Do I believe that the new chief executive and the new chairman are and will be seized of that? Yes, I am. This is one of the grounds for the optimism that I have, notwithstanding the serious challenges that there have been in Historic Environment Scotland. HES’s core business and the opportunity that it has to deal with the challenges of maintaining the estate are issues that it will be able to address with the new leadership that is coming into place in the organisation.

I am sure that the incoming leadership at Historic Environment Scotland will be following this evidence session very closely. The sensible points that Mr Brown has raised will be heard, and I will follow them up in the on-going conversations that I have with the appropriate people at Historic Environment Scotland. Such conversations have taken place in the past and they will continue to take place.

I will add to that. We are all in the same position, in that much of the information about particular concerns in relation to senior management at Historic Environment Scotland has been shared with us anonymously. There is one particular whistleblowing source, and I do not know who that person is. That person has never requested to speak with me. I do not know whether they have spoken with any members of the committee, who might therefore know who are. However, whistleblowing gives people a very important opportunity to share concerns. This is a very clear example of a situation where it has been in the public interest for us to be informed about these concerns.

To underline Mr Hogg’s point, the opportunity has been there for the board and individual members of the board to share their views with the Scottish Government, and they have done so.

That is correct.

In the fullness of time, as some of the issues come out in the form of investigations, I think that it will become clear that we are talking about problems of a different magnitude compared with any other organisation, where there are standard HR issues that come up from time to time. We are talking about extremely challenging circumstances.

As Kenneth Hogg has pointed to, in the sponsorship team within the culture directorate—which deals with the national public bodies in the museums, galleries and Creative Scotland side of things—there is much greater sensitivity to any potential early warning signs of what we believe may have taken place at Historic Environment Scotland. We have no sign of that being the case elsewhere.

We have officials who are very involved, and I have given the committee evidence at some length about the number of meetings and the range of formats with very senior officials informing ourselves about the problems. That institutional memory and understanding within the civil service and with myself would stand us in good stead if there were to be any signs of similar developments elsewhere.

I am not aware of such a range of issues occurring in any other one of the arm’s-length, non-departmental public bodies. I have spoken with ministerial colleagues in the Scottish Government to ask, “Is anybody aware of these sorts of developments, at this scale with this range, and the potential reasons why?” Nobody has any memory of there being such an example. Therefore, we will do everything we can to deal with the matter now, and we will also learn any lessons to make sure that it does not happen in future.

There are three parts to the answer to Mr Kerr’s question, which is an entirely reasonable question.

First, as I have said to the committee and I have said publicly repeatedly, I have the utmost confidence in the ability of Sir Mark Jones to exercise his responsibility and leadership as chairman of the board of Historic Environment Scotland. We are all very indebted to him because he is acutely aware of the situation that he has come into. I met him personally to impress on him how keen I was for somebody with his track record to take on the task, to be absolutely candid about what I consider the scale of the challenge to be, and to give him the full confidence that he will have any resource at his disposal to be able to do what needs to be done to get Historic Environment Scotland back working in the way that we expect any non-departmental body to do.

I have had a subsequent and follow-up conversation with Sir Mark about the progress that is taking place and the next steps. Part of what is happening to bolster capacity is the recruitment of a chief operating officer. That is happening closely with help and support from the Scottish Government. It is also happening with the appointment of new members of the board with particular skill sets, and I am keen to confirm to the committee who they are as soon as possible, because I think that all committee members will agree that they are very good appointments. That will be a support for Sir Mark on the board as the change programme goes through.

If there is anything else that Sir Mark says that he requires, I have said to him—and I say this to the committee—that I will be very sympathetic to supporting him completely in any ask that he has. Mr Kerr is right: he has an expectation of how many days a week his chairmanship will take up, but we will be as supportive as required.

The second part is to understand that Sir Mark is chairman of the board and he has inherited a range of investigations, internal and involving others, into matters that are well known to the committee—you have been sent the reports, as have I, and I am as concerned as members of the committee are with all of them. Sir Mark is taking forward the on-going issues; he is doing that. It is not appropriate for me to appoint somebody to a post, to say I have full confidence in him taking that forward, and then to take over responsibility and oversight for such processes. He must be able to start his work as chairman of the board of Historic Environment Scotland and to go through these very challenging issues. If at any stage there is a suggestion that there are things that need to happen for which the Scottish Government has responsibility, we will take that on board.

The third part of the answer to Mr Kerr’s question is about the suggestion that there should be an investigation now into what has been going on in Historic Environment Scotland. As I have already signalled, I think that it is the place of Sir Mark Jones, the board and new board members to take those matters forward now. Should at any stage there be a requirement for further investigations, for further, wider or deeper understanding of the nature of the historic problems, or for anything else in the matter, I am not ruling anything out.

Absolutely. It was apparent to me that there were serious issues in relation to leadership generally in Historic Environment Scotland and that those issues needed to be better understood. You will understand that, by that stage, we had a new chief executive in place and we were approaching the issue of the chairmanship of the board—that was in the first quarter of this year.

I do not have in front of me the exact timeline of when complaints were being made and stories were appearing in the media and so on, but there was a growing general understanding that there were leadership issues in Historic Environment Scotland. As we were becoming aware of that, I was extremely keen for us to be best informed about how the board intended to deal with those issues.

Indeed.