Seòmar agus comataidhean

Can you confirm that we do not necessarily need reforms in the EU market, where we are aligned—possibly until 2026—and that we can do enough in our domestic market to meet the needs of the United Kingdom energy market?

You will know that, in Scotland, we have an extensive range of renewable assets in generation, and we export much of our renewable electricity. However, your regime is tailored to the United Kingdom market as a whole, so clearly there are inhibitors for the expansion to net zero energy production in Scotland. Not least of those are the exorbitant transmission costs and the danger that, even under the new regimes that might be coming, the subsidy will go to the consumer bases rather than to the generation of energy.

What can be done to ensure that Scotland can contribute to net zero by powering ahead with renewables? What might have to happen in a UK market regime to enable that to happen, and what changes would you see—in transmission charges, in particular?

Bearing in mind the recent energy price spikes, is there a case for wholesale energy market reform? You have said that gas is the marginal generation technology and sets the price. What options are there? What major changes are needed? Obviously, as the regulator, you need the UK Government to instruct you as to what the changes will be, but what would you like them to be and what do you expect them to be? Bearing in mind the immediate issues that we face, do you envisage any steps being taken in the Queen’s speech today to enable changes to happen?

Okay—you want more of it. That is good to hear.

I am interested in what Carolyn Currie said about curating and communities of interest. I had a brief spell as Cabinet Secretary for Economy, Fair Work and Culture during the pandemic, and I introduced the digital boost programme, which we had to increase massively.

There are some general issues with businesses’ lack of investment in skills. Historically, there has been a lack of demand for digital from businesses, but the pandemic accelerated demand. Who would do the curating, how would we implement it and how can we make the step changes that are needed? It is, I assure you, a given that town centres will have to be both physical and use e-commerce.

Gillian Crawford talked about going to Strathclyde to do a course with Peter Mowforth. Were you talking about the University of Strathclyde?

We have heard some very interesting insights, some of which are contradictory, which is fascinating. Dr Mowforth, I am not sure whether attacking politicians for talking about e-commerce in a committee that is looking at e-commerce is necessarily—

Before the pandemic, the Scottish Tourism Alliance worked to try and stimulate demand and get tourism businesses to embrace e-commerce. It did that using what was almost a roadshow that was done in different towns.

We are looking at town centres, and there are different models. How do we get the curation that Carolyn spoke about? I can see how it would work for women. I do not know whether the Scottish Chambers of Commerce or a chamber of e-commerce could do it. How can we help the retailers in our town centres to do that? What would that model look like and who would deliver it? The whole point of the digital boost was to provide grants to get practitioners to help. It was commercial. How should that be delivered, and what is the role—if they have one—of agencies apart from to deliver funding?

I am conscious of the time. I think that the VAT registration requirement for digital boost funding was meant to stop the massive fraud that we have seen with pandemic funds in other places. However, that needs to be looked at. There is something in what Stuart Mackinnon said about how we develop it into a better product.

With regard to curation, women are 52 per cent of the population but are underrepresented in business in Scotland. I listened to what Gillian Crawford said about the need to localise. Packages exist and are free; we want the practitioners. Who does the curation and how do we do it?

I am conscious that the convener might cut us off, but those are really rich ideas.

Stuart Mackinnon, who should do that and how?

Good morning, and thank you for joining us. I want to ask about local authorities and how they can best support the delivery of integrated public and active travel networks. Do they have a role? What should that role be in co-ordinating information flows, ticketing and the development of transport hubs?

I will come first to Ewan Wallace. To bring the issue to life, could you reflect on what that means for cities and for semi-rural areas? For example, cities have multimodal challenges, and in relation to semi-rural areas, there are proposals for park and rides on the M8 at the Heartlands junction and at the new junction at Winchburgh on the M9. Should that be the role of the local authority or of the transport partnership?

I will then ask Paul White to talk about the role of integrated transport hubs from a bus perspective, before inviting Steve Gooding to reflect on what he expects in relation to cars and park and ride, and to relate that to the concept of shared electric vehicles, which he referred to earlier.