Chamber and committees

It is not new—in fact, it is very similar to what has already been asked, convener.

Today, we have heard that there is confidence, but there is fragility, too. You have all intimated that the problem is the cost of running your organisations. It is about attracting performers or staff, rewarding them and maintaining them. At the moment, that is where you are all finding it really difficult to manage the process for the future. You have all done a lot more for less—we have seen that over the years—and you have touched on what the strategy should try to do to maintain and sustain the process.

If you do not maintain and sustain it, the sector will be decimated. There is no question about that—the writing is on the wall. You have talked about being cut to the bone and keeping the show on the road. I am not sure whether some of your organisations will be sustainable even with the £100 million, in the timescale that you have been given.

There is no question that the proposed budget has given us some sense of stability, but it has not alleviated any of the concerns about increased running costs, falling income and the implications of fair work, and such things, that might have to be added to the process.

During the earlier evidence session, there was some discussion of UK tax support. That has been welcomed by some organisations. It would be useful to take a view from Creative Scotland about what it thinks of that situation and how it affects the current running of many organisations. What would you like to see in future? Should it be included in the strategy that was discussed in the earlier evidence session about the implications?

The discussion has been interesting—thank you for your participation. You are the window of Scotland, wherever you are located, and that is fantastic to see. Successes are happening continually. However, you are trying to manage trade and industry, culture, education, innovation and energy—the list is endless—with the capacity issues that you identified this morning, so what becomes the priority to ensure that you capture the market that you want?

We would like to have you doing all of that, but that is not possible with the people and resources that you have, so how do you square that circle to ensure that you are trying to capture as much of those areas as you can? What priority is specific to the location that you are in—is it your biggest market, the one that you want to develop the most, or the one that has the most potential? You cannot cover it all, but I think that that is what you are trying to do. You have co-operation from UK embassies and others that you can draw on, but what is the main priority for each of you in your location?

You have spoken about success and there is no question that there have been successes. What is the working relationship between the Government, the Scottish Refugee Council and COSLA? You have said that you want to take a targeted approach in dealing with local authorities. How successful has that been? That was very successful in the initial stages, when a large number of people needed, and were given, support. How has that progressed since then? Are you now finding barriers within certain local authorities that are not able to give as much support now as they did in the past?

What is your response, Christopher? As you said, America has so much to offer on so many levels.

Katrine, what is your main priority in Copenhagen?

To make everything work, we need to have the resources, manpower and finances. We have touched on short and medium-term financial planning for the organisation and how it will progress. If it does not have financial stability, it will not be able to achieve some of the goals that it is trying to achieve. You have indicated that the Government is supportive of where the organisation wants to go, but there still seems to be a gap between the aspirations for the organisation and where we want to go with the strategy, and the financial situation. The aims of the strategy can be achieved only if it is backed up by funding from local government, national government, sponsorship, entrepreneurs or individuals who give legacies.

Without that, the strategy will not succeed, and the areas that have more engagement and financial support will manage much better than those on the periphery. You talked about the centre of the country—Edinburgh and Glasgow—having more of these places. However, in rural areas, we have many local attractions and institutions that are trying to support them. In the past, we have talked about sponsorship and how that is managed, and about people volunteering and giving their time and talents to ensure that something is restored or kept within a community. However, without financial back-up, that becomes a mountain for those organisations to climb. It would be useful to hear your views on some of that.

Thank you.

In your opening statement, you spoke about effective engagement, collaboration and partnership. All of those things are vital.

Last week, we had the opportunity to hear from Alex Paterson and Dr Adam Jackson about effective engagement and their belief that it is crucial for the strategy to succeed. However, one of the difficulties that has arisen is that there is sometimes not really effective engagement by local authorities. Some local authorities might well be supportive whereas others are not. There was talk about a local authority historic environment group, but that did not succeed in becoming a useful structure. That is seen as a potential barrier to engagement in local authorities.

How important should that role be for local government? If local authorities work in collaboration and partnership, things work well, but if they do not, there is a gap, and that gap creates complexities for the sector. The strategy will not succeed if co-operation and engagement do not take place.

I have a question about accountability and delivery. Last week, Mr Paterson told us that ways to measure the success of the strategy are “built in”. However, when I asked about what data is being used, our witnesses were not convinced that all the data that they need is being provided by all the groups in the sector. Therefore, how will the Scottish Government monitor HES’s performance in delivering the strategy? We are not clear about what the process will look like.