Thanks very much for the invitation to come to the committee to speak about an issue that is, obviously, crucial to all the key organisations across Scotland in looking forward.
The area is a huge challenge. From listening to the evidence that was given last week, members will be fully aware of some of the very difficult practical problems in the delivery of structural funds.
I was involved in the development of the current programme and in the previous three programmes. Around 2012 to 2013, we were very much aware, in looking to put the new programmes together, that there had been serious issues—there had been a number of mistakes, and interruptions to and suspensions of the programmes. There was not always very good alignment between national and EU policy, which led to problems with match funding. At that time, there was quite a good process for looking at the new plans that involved key stakeholders across Scotland. We looked very carefully at what the options were and how to maintain some of the good aspects that had been developed in the 2007 to 2013 programmes—for example, the concept of the strategic delivery bodies, which, to a certain extent, delivered very well.
On looking carefully at what was happening elsewhere, at the time the University of the Highlands and Islands did a lot of work with, for example, the University of Corsica on its ESF programme and how it used it. We looked carefully at some interesting transnational aspects of ESF use.
We also did a lot of work with our partners in the northern Scandinavian regions, such as the Akademi Norr in the north of Sweden, on how they agreed the big-ticket issues that needed to be addressed and moved on to address them.
We also looked carefully at what was happening south of the border. We were involved with Yorkshire Universities in a study at the closure of the 2007 to 2013 programmes that considered precisely the point that you raised, convener—what had worked well and what had not. At the Highlands and Islands level, we worked on a partnership basis and carried out a comprehensive lessons-learned analysis of what had worked well and should be maintained.
Putting that all together, I think that there was a good understanding at the start of the 2014 to 2020 programmes of the need to be more strategic and aligned and to look at the implications for match funding if we do not get the relationship working properly. We understood that the money that comes to Scotland through the four ESIFs, although significant in itself and for the work that it does, is only a relatively small part of what is happening through the range of policy initiatives. We looked carefully at what we needed to do.
Even now, I believe that the concept at the start of the current programmes was correct: we looked at a small number of targeted, strategic interventions and the role of the national organisations—in our case, the Scottish Further and Higher Education Funding Council, which has overall responsibility for further and higher education and research—in administering part of the programme for these purposes. The problems began to arise thereafter. I can speak about those now, or they may come up in our later discussion. The starting point was sound and was informed by what was happening elsewhere.