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I have now said this three or four times, I think, so there should be no doubt about the clarity of the commitment that has been given about the additional £100 million. However, in terms of the route to get there, we are talking about £15.8 million in this budget and an additional £25 million in the following one—so that will be an additional £40.8 million—and then, in the two years after that, the numbers will be dependent on the budget discussions that take place in the usual way.

If I think back to previous discussions, there was a sense of doubt from some colleagues about whether this is a real thing. It really is a real thing. It is not an aspiration. In comparison to other Governments in the United Kingdom, including Labour-run Wales, which has cut its culture funding, we have increased it. Unlike the UK Government, which has cut culture funding this year, we are increasing it.

We have given the commitment—the Deputy First Minister did it in the budget statement—on the £25 million additional in the financial year 2025-26. As soon as I can, I would want to be able to confirm what the subsequent years will deliver.

I totally understand that the sector wants the front loading of funds. It is what I want—absolutely. It is what I argue for internally, and I want this to happen as quickly as possible. It is correct to say—and Iain Munro is absolutely right to say—that what we are able to do this year is very much within the sustain phase of the culture and arts recovery. As we are able to secure the additional cumulative totals that will boost the culture and arts scene, we will be able to support the sector in a much more significant way to develop and innovate.

First, that is not a sensible suggestion, given that a majority has been elected to the Scottish Parliament with a mandate to pursue Scotland’s independence. Secondly, in the grand scheme of the budgets that we are talking about, the amount is minute and it would make absolutely no serious contribution whatsoever to the scale of the funding challenge that we have as devolved Scotland. If that is the limit of ambition in relation to being able to reallocate money and deliver public services in Scotland, we are in real trouble.

I have always taken the view that it is really important to try to understand the perspectives of different people in different organisations. In this case, I see Creative Scotland demonstrating the demand in the culture and arts sector. If you ask organisations in that sector, “How much money would you like, in an ideal world?”, you will get a massive total, and what that illustrates for an organisation such as Creative Scotland is that it would like the maximum possible funding settlement. I understand that—that is what it wants. I understand that, whether it be Creative Scotland, individual organisations, venues or whatever, people who are receiving support either directly from the Government or through agencies need to illustrate the extremity of the situation as a way of securing support—and the situation is, indeed, very challenging.

The first thing that I would like to say, then, is that I understand why Creative Scotland and its board members are very keen to ensure that they have the funding to get through the massive change programme required for multiyear funding. That is why I was very empathetic in my opening statement and in my answers to the committee’s initial questions about what is being done at present. I work very well with Iain Munro and colleagues at Creative Scotland; I work very well with Isabel Davis and colleagues at Screen Scotland; and I can say the same for Historic Environment Scotland, our national collections and our national performing arts companies. I do not have a problem with any of that.

Is there what one might call a creative tension here, given the very nature of the process? The Scottish Government dispenses funds and organisations that receive them want as much as possible—I understand that. Given the constraints, people have wanted to gain public understanding as well as an understanding in Government of the requirement for money.

I definitely agree, though, that there is a profound lack of understanding about the extent of the financial constraint on devolved Administrations in the United Kingdom. It is unprecedented, and I have not heard a single person, whether it be a member of the Scottish Parliament, someone from an agency, a journalist or anybody else, contribute any suggestion as to where, this year, any additional means that one might want would come from. Nobody, but nobody, has come up with a suggestion on that front—not one.

This year, we have been able to make the case internally for a down payment on additional funding going forward, and no doubt everyone in receipt of funding will want to ensure that they get a part of that. I have talked at some length—and no doubt, convener, you will have me back to talk about it again—about how this new approach will work from the perspective of the Government, our agencies and beyond. We will have to be in a new place. I am working with the people in Creative Scotland and other agencies on the basis of trust and I am confident that we have a trust that is good enough to be able to deliver all that.

I said to the committee earlier that there are two particular constraints or realities around which our commitment operates; first is the reality of our devolved competence and the wider UK structures, and second is whether European Union measures have demonstrable effect. To take an easy example, we are in a country where, unless somebody can correct me, we cannot grow olives, and we do not have a wine production sector, so European Union legislation on olive growing or wine production does not have an effect. Then there are things that are obviously within devolved competence, have demonstrable effect here and do not have a disadvantage. Around those realities, consideration needs to be given as to what we are doing.

Were we in the European Union, the situation would be entirely different, because everything would be, from a legislative standpoint, part of a treaty obligation and a requirement to ensure that one fully integrates the entire corpus of EU law. We have already inherited 47 years’ worth of that in Scotland.

Ms Forbes’s point is absolutely correct. There is not a 100 per cent read-across, notwithstanding the commitment to remain aligned. However, for anybody who understands how the European Union works and the fact that we are now not in the European Union, there will be areas that require, because they do not have direct impact on us, or because of the nature of the devolved settlement and how that works, a caveat—if one wants to call it a caveat—around appropriateness and possibility.

I have written down a few of those, and they are there for a reason, which is that we will not incorporate things that have no impact here or where the constraints are such that we cannot. That should not detract from the fact that, in the main, we will do exactly that which we have intended to do, which is to remain aligned.

George, do you wish to add anything from an administrative point of view, as somebody at the sharp end of making the decisions?

I could not agree more. Indeed, I made that point prior to Mr Brown’s membership of the committee. There is a danger in saying, “We require everything in its raw format”—that is, unprocessed, unassessed and without prioritisation or the help of expert advisers, clerks or academics in assessing the importance of a regulation, a directive and so on. Having a sift process is a good thing, but it must operate in a way that can give individual committee members or different subject committees of the Parliament the opportunity in good time—I stress that phrase “in good time”, because it is the key factor—to influence the Government’s thinking and, indeed, the legislative programme, given that legislative instruments might well be at play, and to allow you as parliamentarians and collectively as a committee to discharge your responsibilities.

The injunction with regard to proportionality is key. Will we get that right all the time? Probably not, because of the volume of material. However, because we are looking back, looking at what is happening presently and looking at what is happening in the future, you can—to go back to Mr Ruskell’s specific example on legislation—allow evidence to be taken in good time, allow more information to be drawn down and satisfy yourselves that you have done everything that you think is necessary and proportionate.

We are trying to do exactly the same, and the fact that there is an open channel between officials and committee clerks is also very helpful. We should not be satisfying your demands as a committee just from evidence session to evidence session—it should be an on-going process. You should be aware of things that are happening in the meantime, and we should be aware of any specific issues that you might have.

Indeed, Mr Cameron’s question was a good example of that; he wanted to know something technical, but although I have a very big folder, I did not have that information, and I would have liked to have been able to furnish him with it. If we can get that process working well, questions will, I hope, be answered, but if more information is required, it can be given in good time, as part of the committee’s on-going investigations and inquiries.

We all understand that this is quite a technical area, so we are all very grateful to have the support of committee clerks and advisers and, in my case, my civil service colleagues here and a wider team. If any of them want to illustrate with specifics the points that I am making in generality, I would be grateful for additional comments.

The first thing that I would say is that we are seeking to remain aligned with the EU where it is appropriate to do so. Using phrases such as “where it is appropriate”, “where it is possible” and “where it is meaningful” matters. We are not in the European Union, so we are trying to find our best way, using a variety of different approaches, to make sure that we can remain aligned and working in parallel with the EU. We will do that within devolved competence, and we will do that to implement measures that have demonstrable effect.

There are areas in which it is unlikely that there would be demonstrable effect, and there are areas in which measures relate to EU organisations that we are not a part of, or they might be involved in particular areas in which there is no legal locus here. It is literally impossible to do 100 per cent of what the EU is doing in terms of its policy, because we are not in the EU now.

That said, we are going to do everything that we can to maintain the standards and values of the European Union and its strategic approach to things. We have a resource in the Scottish Government here and, indeed, in Scotland House in Brussels—I think that a good number of committee members have already been there, so you will know how competent the team is. Those resources will, in co-ordination, ensure the best way of providing you—and through you, to business and such like—with an understanding of which legislation will have an impact on what we are going to be doing. Everyone on the committee will understand the reporting mechanisms that have been brought in train and will, as a result, be aware of how, when measures are introduced, alignment will be achieved.

I think that we are in a much better place now. As there have been quite a few changes on the committee, some colleagues might not have heard this, but I have already given the committee a commitment in this respect and have made it clear that, having spent 10 years on the European Scrutiny Committee at Westminster, where every week we had to go through European Union proposals, and having quite literally sat where you are sitting, I do understand what you require to be satisfied that you can scrutinise what the Scottish Government is doing on alignment. However, it is appreciated that this has the potential to be a massive undertaking, so we are trying to find a balance between reporting the legislation, the policies and the strategies of the European Union and how we are seeking to remain aligned with them, in order that you can scrutinise what we are doing. It is about striking a balance between giving you something unwieldy and too technical, with perhaps too much being lost in the detail, and giving you everything that you require.

As I have said, this is the first published iteration of this approach. If there is something that you feel that you require more of or less of, or if you feel that you require something different, we are very open to hearing those comments. I know that my colleagues and the committee clerks have been working closely to ensure that our reporting method is of a standard that is appropriate to you.

My default position is that we should before we should not—if that makes sense. The policy of the Government is that we wish to see Scotland rejoin the European Union as quickly as possible. I look forward to publishing the Scottish Government’s paper on this very subject tomorrow. Anybody who understands how European Union accession works knows that there is a requirement for candidate countries to show that they are ready to join, which, in significant part, is because there is an alignment between candidate countries and the standards of the European Union. Our remaining aligned with the European Union is key to the speediest rejoining of the European Union, which is our stated aim.

My position is that, wherever we can, we should be seeking to align, and there needs to be a very good reason why not. Ms Forbes makes the point: in significant part, it is very much a matter of common sense.

I will refer to colleagues about this later, but I am not aware where there are issues that may have been on the cusp, but there is nothing at the forefront of my mind that falls into that category. Will there be such issues? No doubt. I am not aware of any that are of particular import at the present time, however.

That is a good question. There are quite a number of different sources that can be used as part of EU tracking mechanisms, which are very common in Brussels. I think that everybody knows about the scale of representative organisations, embassies and offices there. Scotland has its own capacity and representation. I would hope that our process is as informed as possible by those tracking providers that provide that service in the best, most useful way. The work that is conducted in the Scottish Parliament is an important part of that.

We will only know if we are missing anything as we go through a number of rounds of the reporting mechanism. Colleagues, clerks or academics can then point to ways in which other tracking mechanisms have caught something—or not—and then work out whether we have done as well as we can.

It is a major industry in Brussels to make sure that everybody is aware of what is happening, and we will avail ourselves of the best information both there and here. As you will know from your own deliberations, extremely talented academics and specialists in the field work daily on that and form part of a wider ecosystem of flagging up what is happening and the import of that. We just have to make sure that we capture it all.

That is a very complex area, and Alexander Stewart is absolutely right to highlight it. The European Union is one of the only bodies in the world with the scale and the heft to be able to come up with frameworks for some of those really big challenges, because it is a match for other trading blocs or for particular economic interests. We therefore have to watch very closely what European colleagues are doing in that area. Those of us who want the highest standards in those areas and others can invest some confidence in the fact that the EU will do a lot of the heavy lifting for us. That makes the case for why alignment is of import, quite apart from the sense of remaining aligned so that our return to the European Union is as seamless as possible.

The digital area is exceptionally complex. I am sure that Mr Stewart saw the coverage of the recent conference on artificial intelligence that was hosted by the UK Government—at which, unfortunately, Scotland was not present. Everybody has to think about how we approach all of that, in order to have the appropriate legal and other safeguards. We will work closely with European colleagues to make sure that it is fit for purpose here as well.

It is good to be back. The instrument before the committee is a technical one to update the devolved statute book for the new legal concept of assimilated law, which will become the new name for retained EU law under the Retained EU Law (Revocation and Reform) Act 2023. The change takes effect at the end of the year and cannot be prevented; therefore, as a responsible Government, we want to ensure there is maximal clarity in devolved primary and secondary legislation.

This is the only Scottish statutory instrument laid by the Government under the REUL act to date and the Government has no plans to use REUL act powers to alter policy. The range of policy areas that the SSI touches on—from aquaculture and fisheries to waste management—shows the potential of the REUL act to affect the full panoply of devolved competences.

The committee’s recent report “How Devolution is Changing Post-EU” found that the REUL act, like the UK Internal Market Act 2020, represents

“a significant shift in the constitutional landscape”.

I assure members that the Government is treating the REUL act as such. We are committed to protecting devolved interests in the management of UK statutory instrument proposals, and where powers allow, and it is appropriate to do so, we will seek to legislate in this Parliament. That is why we have brought forward the SSI.

I wish to touch on the report that the Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee issued last week, which

“draws the instrument to the attention of the Parliament on reporting ground (e), in that there appears to be a doubt whether paragraph 3 of schedule 1 is intra vires.”

That paragraph amends the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 so that the phrase “EU obligation” becomes “assimilated obligation”. I note the Delegated Powers and Law Reform Committee’s position, but I remain of the view that all aspects of the SSI are within the enabling powers, and are good law, so I do not propose to withdraw and relay the instrument to exclude the necessary freedom of information amendments. Where out-of-date EU terminology stands on the statute book, it is appropriate that such cases are remedied and, here, an appropriate legislative vehicle was to hand.

I look forward to the committee’s questions on this technical subject. I am delighted to be joined by the two leading experts in the field, who will be able to answer any technical questions that you may have.