Seòmar agus comataidhean

Absolutely. I am happy to give some examples of that. I touched on one of the businesses that I visited in relation to some of the improvements that it has been making in its processing capabilities. The fund is being used for a wide variety of things. Some projects that have been taken forward have involved innovation and specific developments in aquaculture. The business that I visited in relation to the scheme was working on increasing its freezing capacity at the facility. I know that, after applying for funding, some fish processing businesses have been awarded funding for pieces of filleting equipment to make their businesses more efficient. Businesses have also applied for and been awarded funding for energy efficiency measures, which will have a huge impact, particularly in this climate.

I am happy to do that. The cost crisis is affecting everybody across Scotland, but it is particularly acute for people who live on our islands. That was brought into sharp focus by the figures that some of the local authorities have produced. Beatrice Wishart will know this better than me and will correct me if I am wrong, but I think that the work that was done in Shetland showed that people would need to earn about £104,000 a year to not be in fuel poverty. That is shocking.

We knew that we had to do something over and above to address the particular issues that our island communities face, which is why we introduced the islands emergency fund. We have provided £1.4 million through that. It is being distributed on a 100 per cent population basis, as determined by the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities. We wanted to make sure that the fund could be accessed as easily as possible, so we tried to minimise the criteria that need to be met when people apply for it. We want to make sure that it gets to where it needs to go and that it gets out the door as quickly as possible. Working with local authorities has been a key part of that.

An example is that, in the Shetland islands, that funding is being used to provide breakfasts to 14,000 children and young people. The plan is to run that until March. Again, I am happy to come back to the committee with more information on how the funding is being used by other local authorities if you would find that helpful.

Yes. I will update Parliament and provide more information on that next week. However, we have £3 million allocated for that in the budget this year. The work has been progressing well. There are initial steps that we have to get in place. First, we will look at carbon audits, and we want the climate action plans to be produced on the back of that.

It is central to all the work on carbon-neutral islands that this is not something that we are foisting on communities. We very much want it to be community based, so we are working with communities on each of the six islands. I will be happy to provide more information on that when I update Parliament next week.

Absolutely. I suppose that you are asking how we can develop a project pipeline. I know how challenging it has been, particularly given the feedback that the committee received in previous evidence sessions.

Ultimately, we will not be able to run a multi-annual fund, because we only get the annual allocations. What we are working to do, as I have said in relation to some other schemes, is to provide certainty and as much clarity as we can about what is coming. Some of the improvements that we have planned for the islands programme should help with that. We are actively looking to see how we can do that over the coming years.

We are engaging in that work with the Scottish Futures Trust. I think that the committee received a lot of positive feedback about that engagement, given the SFT’s expertise. We are working with councils where projects have not been successful previously. That on-going work and development will be key going forward. Ultimately, as I said, it will be an annual allocation, but we want to try to provide as much certainty as we can.

Absolutely. As I have said, we are trying to provide as much clarity, certainty and stability as possible, recognising the turbulence and challenges that businesses are facing. We know that those pressures are acute in our agriculture sector, for all the reasons that we have talked about. We have brought forward payments—we have made them at their earliest-ever stage—to help with cash flow, which we know has been an issue. We will continue to provide that stability over the coming financial year.

I have talked about the funding that we have already paid out through the basic payment scheme for greening. More than £424 million has been allocated towards that. The £65.5 million that we are getting out the door in LFASS payments has also been mentioned.

Let us look at the coming financial year and the budgets that we have in place. You touched on crofting. It is really important to mention some of the schemes that we continue to fund and look at. Our cash injections will help those communities. We have the croft house grant scheme and the crofting agricultural grant scheme. We have also provided extra funding to the Crofting Commission to deal with some of the particular crofting issues that we are aware of.

That is how we intend to provide support, and as much stability and clarity as we can, at a really challenging time.

I absolutely agree. To be honest, if I could put a lot more into that capital scheme, I would. However, I have outlined in my previous responses the challenges with regard to our capital budget. We have not seen the replacement funding come through, which has made things particularly challenging.

The first round of the sustainable agricultural capital grant scheme was very popular. However, as we received reduced capital allocations, we had to target that scheme where we thought that we would have the most effect, which is why we focused it on those elements, in particular, and why we are looking to fund those pieces of equipment that we know will have the biggest impact.

Of course, I would always welcome more funding and a bigger capital allocation, because we would then be able to do more. As it stands, with the budget that I have, and in relation to capital, we have to use and target that in the best way that we can.

I would not say that it has all gone wrong. As I said, we are still waiting for the final figures for that. Of course, I will be happy to keep the committee updated on those. We are keen to get that feedback, too. We have the funding there, and we want as high an uptake as possible and for people to be engaged. We have worked extensively on communications, contacting farmers directly to let them know about—

Those issues have been really important parts of the discussions. Somebody could tick a box to say that they have done that test but, as George said, what they do with the information that they have is really important. That is where those services will be vital.

I am happy to do that. As I said, our forecast spend on that is £2 million, so we expect that uptake to increase. I am happy to come back to the committee with further information.

The £5 million budget that has been allocated for that is for the sustainable agriculture capital grant scheme. In the current financial year, we have had £5 million available for that, and it has funded slurry store covers as well as slurry spreading equipment. On the utilisation of that fund, we made over 570 offers of grant and pretty much exhausted the fund, so there has been really strong uptake of that funding. Providing that the budget is agreed, of course, we will look to launch another scheme. We will announce the details of that in due course. Of course, we will be happy to keep the committee updated.