Seòmar agus comataidhean

I work with a number of communities that are building up business cases for line reinstatements or bringing back stations on existing lines. They have been successful in getting money from the local rail development fund to do that. Those communities are concerned about the escalating costs of reopening railways and of capital projects on the rail network.

Michael Clark, why have we seen cost estimates, particularly for station reopening, double in recent years? I do not see where the additional costs are coming from.

How do we map out the good work that is happening around Scotland? We heard in evidence last week that Creative Scotland is doing some of the mapping but that it perhaps excludes those organisations that are working with the NHS. How do we get to grips with the extent of the work that is happening around Scotland? Do we approach that from a Creative Scotland point of view or from a SENScot point of view, or are there other organisations that should be taking the lead on making sure that we understand everything that is going on and the value of that?

That makes a lot of sense.

There is obviously a big and intricate national picture; there is also the local picture. That leads me to the question about who leads on strategy and development. Are councils able and willing to do that? Is there inconsistency across Scotland? We heard last week about Renfrewshire Council, I think, doing good work on social prescribing. Is it a bit of a postcode lottery as to how social or cultural enterprise organisations—however we wish to define them—are supported? Is there good practice to point to from community planning partnerships or elsewhere on how to do this work effectively?

There seems to be a difficult balance between ensuring that you have the conditions for creativity without overformalising it to the point that it is stifled. My final question relates to that issue and is about monitoring and evaluation. Is there capacity in the wider social enterprise and creative sector to articulate what the sector does in language that NHS and other bodies, which have harder targets, can understand, so that they say, “Oh yes, I can see that that is saving X thousand pounds”? I know that that is a bit dry, but the chief financial officers of those organisations need to see that stuff.

What needs to change, then? Should there be a duty on local authorities, a commitment through community planning partnerships or something else to state that this has to be addressed, rather than it being dependent on, as you say, a good relationship between one officer in a council and an organisation?

I think that we have all been inspired by the work of the Children’s Parliament and by the creativity of young people. They often see links that we do not necessarily see.

I want to ask a detailed question about the assembly’s recommendations on aviation and some of the tax options in that regard. Is it your view that a frequent flyer tax, for example, could be brought in? That could operate alongside the air departure tax. Do you have any thoughts about how the air departure tax should be changed in order to apply it to frequent flyers?

Again, I guess that we could go into quite a lot of depth, so it might be an area for a longer conversation with Government. However, given the work that you have done so far, do you have any emerging thoughts on how we could change the tax regime for frequent flyers in particular?

I thank all the assembly members for their incredible climate leadership. As a politician sitting on this side of the table, I find it pretty humbling. That is how it should be, so keep up the good work.

I spoke to some members of the French citizens climate assembly when they were in Glasgow at the 26th United Nations climate change conference of the parties—COP26—and they said that they were working quite closely with the French Government on a number of policy areas. Did the Scottish assembly discuss that sort of thing? Are there particular priority areas, such as retrofitting or public transport, in which you feel that you want to go a lot further in working directly with the Government? How would you want to do that? What level of engagement do you feel that you are able to have as you move forward?

To put it simply, the issue is how we utilise the resources and the advantages that we have with energy in Scotland to maximise the opportunities for green investment here and create a focus under a green taxonomy. Does the potential exist for there to be a divergence or a particular emphasis in Scotland under a green investment taxonomy in the UK?

That is particularly true with areas such as monitoring and evaluation of projects, and trying to share the understanding of how to do that.

I have a final question, which is a bigger one. The Government has a wellbeing economy bill slated to be introduced in this session of Parliament. Do you have any thoughts about that higher level of governance in Scotland and what could be in that bill to support the sort of initiatives that we are talking about? Is it about having the right kind of indicator? Is it about having a commissioner who can look at the needs of future generations? What would be useful to have at a legislative level to help to drive progress in the area and ensure that we do not forget about this work but prioritise it?

Do not worry if you do not have an answer, because there is time for you to feed into the Government consultations, but I am interested to know whether you have any top lines.