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I am fully aware of the issue that you raise. Again, I signal to John Primrose that he might want to comment at the end of my answer.

I think that everybody appreciates that all schemes that involve us dispensing taxpayers’ money are subject to review. That is a common practice. We need to ensure that we are actually delivering against the aims that are set for particular projects or funding streams. The evaluation came to the view that the scheme had not delivered against all the criteria for what the Scottish Government wished to deliver on the ground or the impact that we wanted to see. That is why we review the projects that we support.

My previous ministerial colleague Jenny Gilruth updated the Scottish Parliament on the thematic approach that we are now taking with the focus on women and girls. We are going to continue to dispense small grant funds, but it is not going to work in the same way as it has until now, because there has been an evaluation, and the recommendation is that we should do things differently.

The feedback that we have had from partner countries has been positive. I will share one example with you. The Government in Malawi has requested that Scotland finances a smaller number of larger programmes, which will help it to track progress and manage alignment with its aims. We are trying our best to work with our partners on the ground and ensure that the projects that we support work better for them, but also that they work in line with the strictures that we place on the projects.

In essence, we want to make sure that what we are committed to is working. If it is not working in the way that we intended, we have to pivot and ensure that we deliver in the way that we want with our partners in our partner countries. John, is that a fair assessment?

On a general point, as you know, a refresh of intergovernmental relations between the UK Government and the devolved Administrations was announced only a few weeks ago. You rightly point out that there was an agreement at the onset of devolution that underscores the opportunities that devolved Administrations, including the Scottish Government, can pursue on the international stage.

That is exactly what we do—we focus largely on the areas of devolved responsibility to maximise our opportunities internationally. Do we need to specifically revisit that agreement? I am not currently involved in that subject. To be frank, in the medium term, it would be much better for us not to have any form of restriction whatever on Scotland’s ability when it comes to European and international policy, and I look forward to that being secured during this session of Parliament. However, in the meantime, we will do everything that we can to make the most of the opportunities that we have. You might be aware that most Scotland House operations are currently co-located within UK embassies, and there is a high degree of co-operation and collegiality. I welcome that, and I know that our colleagues in the Scotland House networks value it. I hope that colleagues in the foreign office value it.

To answer your question, we should always keep our formal relationships under review. My last thought on the issue is that I do not lay the greatest store on such formal arrangements, given that we have had them until now in the devolved settlement and, frankly, they have not worked tremendously well because there has not been a willingness to let them work very well. One first needs to be minded to work positively with others, and the good news is that, on the ground internationally, that happens already. If there are any specific observations or suggestions about the arrangements that were entered into after devolution, I am happy to take a look at them.

It is more than a thought; it is absolutely right. That is what we are doing. One of the areas in which we are focusing our efforts relates to women and girls. That will be a very important factor with regard to taking a thematic approach, and there can and should be others. I will invite John Primrose, who has a great deal of experience in the area, to come in at the end of my comments and underline my points.

We are taking a thematic approach, but we should not be hidebound by that, because we can, I hope, do a number of things at the same time. Although the women and girls strand is very important, there are others that will also be key priorities. We are among the world’s leading countries when it comes to renewables and our climate ambitions, so that could and should be a key approach to our work.

Would John Primrose like to add to what I have said?

That is absolutely understood, convener. I was just ending my peroration.

The UK Government’s proposed bill will impact on the work of the Scottish Government and its offices, and on the work of the committee. It is unacceptable that the UK Government seems ready to unveil sweeping measures that will have such profound consequences for Scotland, its Government, the Parliament and the committee with such little discussion with, or respect for, the Parliament and the Government. The manner in which we were informed about the document to which I have referred makes a mockery of the UK Government’s recent commitment to reset relationships with the devolved Governments.

It is nice to see you, Mr Golden, and to see that your amazing clock is still in its place to tell me where I am with the timing of this evidence session.

At the recent climate change talks in Glasgow, I spent a lot of time speaking to colleagues from around the world. Scotland is held in extremely high regard because of what we are achieving, which I hope is not being done in a way that is preachy to the rest of the world. We are very fortunate that we have won on the natural resources lottery twice. We won once with oil, but we are now pivoting away from hydrocarbons, as we know we must. We are extremely fortunate to have a disproportionate amount of renewables potential, and we are trying to make the most of it. I do not think that that is a party-political issue, because we all know that we have to grab the opportunity with both hands.

In that area, we have a lot that we can share with countries that are trying to do their best, as we all are, to deal with the climate emergency. For example, I spoke to Malawians, including the Malawian President, who was here in Edinburgh at an event that I was speaking at. They are exceptionally keen to work with the Scottish Government so that we can share best practice and any learnings that we have. Just as importantly, it is about what we can learn from our partner countries. We do not know everything and we do not have the answers to everything, and there will be things that we can learn, too.

It is right that we need to do everything to ensure that we reach the targets that we have set ourselves, but we have set targets that are among the highest in the world, and most other countries in the world are significantly behind where we are. Therefore, we still hold a leadership role, and we have a responsibility to continue to do everything that we can on the renewables front. Working with our partner countries is one of the great prizes that we should focus on in our international development priorities.

Travel restrictions have meant that colleagues and I have not been able to travel to speak to people on the ground in our partner countries. However, during my most recent visit to London, I had the benefit of meeting diplomats from those countries at Scotland House, which is our excellent representative office. From speaking to the diplomats from our African partner countries, I know the tremendous appreciation that there is of the international development work that Scotland does. However, you are right to point out that there has been a review to ensure that what we deliver on the ground is, frankly, what people in those countries are looking for rather than perhaps priorities that are made in northern Europe and what we might think is important for our friends and colleagues elsewhere in the world.

On the reorientation of our principles of international development in the review, I can highlight four changes. One is to build back fairer and stronger. That is about an evolution of our funding and restructuring our current funding schemes.

Secondly, there is the global south programme panel. In our programme for government, we announced that we would establish a panel of experts by experience who principally work and reside in the global south. That goes back to the point that I tried to make about making sure that we have key input from people in the countries that we work with, led at ministerial level, to help us to ensure that global south voices are properly heard.

The third area is updating our funding criteria to ensure that we actually deliver that which we want to deliver and have the impact that we want to have in our partner countries.

The fourth area is ensuring that our international development offer is focused on the best matches and the asks from the partner countries that we work in.

I am going to read something out, because I think that it is quite important:

“Offices use a range of both qualitative and quantitative indicators to measure their performance. Evaluation reports for the international offices in 2019-20 have been published under FOI, as has the evaluation report for Scotland House Brussels in 2018-19.”

There is a continuous evaluation process to make sure that the work that is undertaken by the Scottish offices is measurable, and that process is transparent and is available to the public. It is good that people are aware of that. One is aware of the five key outcomes that we ask of the network, the fact that there is an evaluation process and the fact that it is publicly available.

In addition, it has been really helpful—this is where the committee has performed an important function—to see the people who are actually out there, doing the job. I know that you have had evidence from colleagues from Scotland House in London, Scotland House Brussels and our office in Berlin, and no doubt you will speak to others in the future. It has been helpful just to hear from them about what they do and how they do it.

The thing that I find tremendously encouraging is meeting not just the people who run the representative offices that we have, but the other members of the team. Last week, I spent an afternoon meeting, via a Teams call, the staff of Scotland House Brussels, who are an amazing and enthusiastic international polyglot staff complement, and they are there, working every day to promote Scotland across the piece. We should be very grateful for what they do.

It is now 20 minutes past 11, and I know that I am getting to the end of my time, so I will abuse my position by again saying a big thank you to everybody who does their best to promote all of our interests—our economy, our culture, education and all of that. They are doing a great job, and long may that continue.

I might get myself into all kinds of trouble with the convener, because I could happily talk about those issues for a long time.

I have a locus on the point about the diaspora because I also have responsibility in relation to the population challenge that we are facing. I do not know how widely people are aware that we are heading back into the territory of relative population decline, which is very concerning for us. That is the background to the perennial challenge—or opportunity—that we have.

We are one of the nations in the world that have a significant diaspora. The question is how we can best discover, maintain and develop our relationship with that diaspora. In the past, that has largely been thought of in terms of people who have left Scotland and gone to the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and so on. However, there are other forms of diaspora. For example, tens of thousands of people have studied in Scotland and then gone back to the countries from which they originally came. They are a form of Scottish diaspora as well—they are aspirational Scots. We need to find imaginative ways of striking a continuing relationship with those people and making the most out of that.

We have lessons to learn from other countries, some of which you mentioned. I would add Ireland to the list. The Irish have a great experience of fostering relationships with their diaspora. There is more to come on that issue, and I will be happy to return to the committee when I can say more. It is definitely something that we are thinking about—we are working out how we can move all of that forward.

On the softer areas such as culture, it is relatively simple for me to take that forward as I have responsibility for external affairs and culture, so I can do both at the same time. In doing so, we always need to keep an eye on other areas of Scottish Government policy that also have such interactions. For example, education was mentioned. Shirley-Anne Somerville is extremely focused on that, and we talk about that area.

An area that we have not gone into today is justice. Through Brexit, we are in the unfortunate position of having lost our place in a great many judicial co-operation functions. That is the bad news. The good news—if we can call it that—is that the Scottish Government is working well across directorates and its areas of expertise in the area. Recently, we had a deep dive, as it is called in the jargon, that was hosted by colleagues at Scotland House Brussels. That is another example of the value that that network and the colleagues who work in that field in Brussels can bring. We are able to brief my Cabinet colleague Keith Brown, justice officials, my directorate and others on those issues.

That is a concrete illustration of how we are moving beyond Brexit, if we can call it that, and understanding the downsides. As I pointed out in my opening statement, there are very few upsides to Brexit. What will we do about that? We can find workarounds for some things, but the honest truth is that there are many things for which we cannot find workarounds. We need to be honest with people that Brexit has been extremely damaging not only to trade, but to education, culture, justice and other areas.

We will have an opportunity during the current session of Parliament to put that right and to chart our course for rejoining the European Union as an independent member state. That will go a long way towards repairing the damage that Brexit has wrought for us.

It is fantastic that there appears to be general agreement on, and general enthusiasm for, the excellent job that Scotland’s international offices do. They attract investment, broaden our horizons, and create domestic opportunities and benefits for people in Scotland, and they do so at a very marginal cost in the context of the Scottish Government’s budget. Between 0.01 and 0.02 per cent of the Scottish Government’s overall portfolio spending plans goes towards our existing eight international offices.

The future funding that is allocated in the Scottish budget includes the funds for the opening of our office in Copenhagen, which will take place this year. That offers us huge opportunities for developing our links with the entire Nordic and Baltic region. Those countries are our near northern European neighbours.

Within the current session of Parliament, we are committed to opening an office in Warsaw, which will serve central Europe. That is a region that matters enormously to us, not just from the point of view of trade and educational and cultural exchange, but because so many people who were originally from that part of the world live in Scotland. Therefore, the opening of that office makes perfect sense.

There is an interesting discussion to be had about where the network should develop at the next stage. Given that there seems to be so much encouragement for the network to be as successful as it can be, I can definitely identify parts of the world where we are not currently represented by a Scottish Government office. There is, of course, Scottish representation through Scottish Development International, whose reach extends right around the world. The question is where might we look next. Should we consider having offices in capitals in which there are strong bilateral and cultural connections with Scotland? In some cities, there is a very strong multilateral diplomatic and third sector presence. All those factors will go into the thinking about where we might expand after Copenhagen and Warsaw.

We are talking about a fast-evolving situation, and we are moving with the situation as quickly as it moves. We do not have an end state at the moment. We were supposed to have international agreements and the basis of a new relationship between the United Kingdom and the European Union, but we are not there yet. The United Kingdom Government is still threatening to invoke article 16 of the Northern Ireland protocol, with all the problems that that would bring for us all in a worsening relationship with the European Union.

I will highlight two levels on which we interact with European colleagues. First, we talk to people about Brexit and its on-going and unresolved issues. Secondly, we interact on areas in which we have emerged beyond the immediate wreckage of the Brexit process. For example, on education, we know what has been transpiring with the Erasmus scheme and that, measured against it, its UK replacement is inadequate. Nevertheless, we still want to ensure that we have the best possible relations with other European countries in respect of education. I spoke with the German federal minister who has responsibility for that, because we want to ensure that we have the best possible relations. A few weeks ago, I spoke with the French culture minister about how we can move beyond the problems that Brexit has caused for Scottish and French artists and how it has made it much more difficult for them to tour and perform.

We are working on two levels. We are considering how we deal with the immediate issues and how we can move beyond them. Some things are moving very quickly, and we have to deal with the fast-moving circumstances. We are also doing exactly what you mentioned: we are working out where the different areas are in which we can move beyond the immediate Brexit transition issues to try to firm things up and, in some respects, ameliorate the damage that Brexit has caused.