Seòmar agus comataidhean

That is very useful. I just wanted to get that on the record. Having met people who support Ukrainians, I was aware that there were active discussions on doing that to ensure that those experiences are not lost and that there is accountability in future. Thank you for clarifying that.

It is good to see you. I want to follow up on questions about support from the local community. I have visited the Ukrainian support network, and it is really impressive to see what it is doing on the ground to provide food, advice and even clothes—many people have come with just one small bag, so they are rebooting their lives. What really struck me was meeting two psychologists who had just started supporting people.

My question is about the support that people are getting once they arrive, not just from the Ukrainian community in Edinburgh, which is clearly really strong, but in other parts of Scotland. Are there networks that people can tap into? Is the support mostly in Edinburgh and Glasgow?

I appreciate that. Are we at the point at which we need a strategy to pull things together so that people know what will happen next and the process is accelerated, given the points that the finance secretary made about the Christie principles? The evidence that we got from University College London included mention of the importance of access to the arts for children and people who have mental health issues, and use of the arts to reduce physical decline in older people.

Thanks for that. This is about the buildings and land, as well as the staff, so thinking about those budget lines is critical.

It has been said that this is about the whole Government responding. When we had the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Care at committee, there was a lot of talk about social prescribing, as the convener has said. One thing that has come out in relation to the resource framework is local expenditure on culture. Evidence from Audit Scotland said that, if we look at the local government benchmarking framework data, we see that culture and leisure services have taken the biggest cut—almost 30 per cent—over the past decade. In the local government budget, how will we fill that gap? There is a need for social prescribing, including using local community arts facilities. Who will pay for that, given the huge pressures on local authorities? Can the finance secretary comment?

I will follow on from Donald Cameron’s question. I take your point about the hope that visitor numbers go up as we recover from the pandemic, but I am concerned by the properties that Historic Environment Scotland manages that are not reopening. The discussion paper asks what will happen to those properties. Should we let them face managed decline because of climate change? They are part of our history and culture. You say that we should not worry because it is only a spending review and not a budget. Is that a suggestion that capital investment might flow to Historic Environment Scotland so that it could repair and keep those buildings fit for purpose?

Jess Sargeant, do you want to come in on interparliamentary work and how to make it work better?

It is good to get on the record those points about change that could make a big difference. On your point about transport, lessons could also be learned from the work that has been done on transport in Glasgow and Strathclyde.

I have a follow-up question for Coree Brown Swan about that issue of different levels and relationships. You talked interestingly about relationships and agreements in Canada and the cross-border and intergovernmental work that is done there. Will you say a little more about that? That could be a way of strengthening the impact that we could make. I am thinking about intergovernmental work, but I am also focusing on interparliamentary work. Do you agree that there is a potential role for, say, the metro mayors to change the dynamic at the centre so that it stops thinking about running things and acknowledges multilevel Parliaments and Governments?

I, too, thank you for the submissions that we received in advance. It has given us a bit of depth when looking at the alternatives.

To broaden out the discussion about interparliamentary work, we briefly heard from Dr Anderson about horizontal relationships, which are not factored in or formalised, the scope for doing that in the UK and for learning from other countries. I am thinking about the horizontal relations between the UK Government and the devolved Governments and between those Governments and local government, so it is about acknowledging that multitier set of relationships.

To kick off, can you say a bit more about where we are on that, Dr Anderson? We have met the Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Committee—the UK Parliament’s constitutional affairs team—and we have met the House of Lords team that is looking at constitutional change, and it feels as though there is an appetite for change. The issue is thinking through what priorities to push in terms of interparliamentary and intergovernmental relations, so that you do not miss out that potential radical change that could solve some of the challenges.

On one level, civil servants have longevity—they might be there longer than the politicians—but on another level, ministers get reshuffled and the composition of Parliaments change. Parliaments have greater stability through committees, as well as through cross-party links. It is interesting to consider how to make that work going forward.

Dr Brown Swan, you made some comments about the memorandums of understanding. Will you say a bit about how those have worked? We had not had them for that long before Covid came along. Are there any lessons from the past couple of years about what we need to accelerate to make them work better?

I look forward to seeing the strategy and I hope that it is produced soon, and not far into the future.