That takes us to item 2, which is the budget process for 2002-03. The purpose of the item is to gather some evidence upon which the committee will base its report to the Finance Committee on this year's budget process. Members will recollect that on 24 April we considered the approach that the Finance Committee suggested we should take, and how that might be adapted to our needs. We agreed to concentrate specifically on funding for scientific work, as well as on the broad overall impact of spending.
Would anybody like to open the questioning?
I welcome Professor Peaker, whom I know of old. That sounds rather bad: my husband used to work at the Hannah Research Institute, which is how I know Professor Peaker.
It arises from the difference between intellectual freedom and independence of advice. In the light of BSE and so on, it is important that advice from research organisations is seen as independent. There is a difference between policy influences that enable vulnerable and new industries to get off the ground, and the content of the scientific advice, which has to be seen to be independent. However, there is no conflict between them. That was the basis of the 1912 Haldane committee report, which said that science had to be done at arms' length from Government, but funded, enabled and influenced by Government policies.
What do the SABRIs contribute? At the moment, consequent to the foot-and-mouth outbreak and so on, agriculture is in flux. How will the science research base be able to assist in the development of new industries or in the progress of agriculture?
That is a good question. Over the past 10 to 15 years, the SABRIs have addressed that question very hard. They have moved away from what was perceived—although it was not necessarily so—to be production agriculture to a broader biological base. They have moved into a broad range of areas that include biotechnology, lifestyle and health.
The five institutes—the Hannah Research Institute, Macaulay Land Use Research Institute, Moredun Research Institute, Rowett Research Institute and the Scottish Crop Research Institute—play an essential part in supporting the Scottish Executive rural affairs department. We are all becoming more aware of what each institute does. In your paper "Creating Opportunities in Scotland" you touch upon, but do not fully amplify, the ways in which the institutes create new opportunities for agriculture. Will you expand on that paper, in particular the comment that
Although I am speaking for CHABOS, if the committee does not mind, I will give a concrete example from the Hannah Research Institute. In doing so, I am being purely parochial. One of the great benefits of the Scottish Enterprise clusters strategy exercise that I took part in—mainly in relation to food, but also in biotechnology—is the importance that is placed on the primary producer in order to add value. It is also tremendously important that that value is added in, rather than outwith, Scotland. We are operating a de facto food and drink innovation centre, which we are setting up with the Scottish Agricultural College. The centre is designed for the innovative small food producer, because that is where value is added.
Are the institutes adequately funded?
The easy answer is no: if asked that question, a scientist will always say no. We can always use any amount of money from any source. If members consider the attrition—I use the word advisedly—of the past 14 years, they will see that it has been enormous. So-called efficiency gains have taken money straight out of science.
I rather expected you to say that the funding is insufficient, but your answer also illustrates the ways in which you would like the funding to grow to become sufficient. Are you able to answer the same question in respect of the institutes outside CHABOS? Is their funding also inadequate?
Yes.
I, too, know Professor Peaker from the Hannah Research Institute, which is in my constituency. I want to consider a more general point. What are your views on striking the right balance between the things that the SABRIs and scientists may find interesting and want to pursue further, and the priorities that the Executive has set? I am thinking about subjects such as food safety. Have we got the balance right or do we need to work on it?
I suspect that we have the balance about right across the SABRIs as a whole. I say that because the main economic problems are also major biological problems. If people are working on major biological problems, they are almost automatically working on issues of major economic importance. The difficult decisions are whether scientists should work on major biological problems and whether what they want to pursue themselves is rather trivial. It is a matter of persuading people to go in a certain direction and asking them whether what they are doing is really that important.
Do the SABRIs make use of their whole budgets or do they subcontract some of the research? How does that work?
There is a large collaborative element. We use part of the budgets that we get individually—forget centrally, because unfortunately I do not decide on that—for major international collaborative effort. We have pulled together the data and have shown that, over the years, we added value scientifically and levered in more money to the Scottish system from international agencies and commercial organisations outside Scotland. I drew up the list of countries with which we collaborate and even I was surprised by its extent. Pound for pound, we bring a lot into Scotland.
You suggested that the current budget is insufficient. Could you be specific about what the SABRIs could do that they are currently unable to do, because of budget constraints?
There is a need for capital investment and investment in technology as a result of the human genome project. I do not know how much investment—we would have to add it up collectively. There is a need for fairly major capital investment to allow us to be at the international cutting edge. The BBSRC compared the position in the UK with that of the USA and found that the US scientists were well supported. In addition, we would benefit from recurrent expenditure for subjects such as lifestyle and health. Almost all of us have a wish list—on which we could expand—just for our Scottish concerns, let alone for our wider role.
You outlined the role of CHABOS, but could you explain its position in relation to the SABRIs and to the Scottish Executive? We know about the relationship between SABRIs and the Executive, but where does CHABOS fit in?
That is a good question.
What is your relationship with the organisations that are not involved in CHABOS?
A close talking relationship is the best way to describe it.
Are you fully aware of the views that are expressed by those organisations?
Collectively, we are pretty well aware of those views.
Do the views that you expressed today differ in any respect from the views that would be expressed by those organisations?
I do not think that they would differ from the views that are held by the SABRIs, because we tend to agree about many issues. However, I am not familiar with some of the areas of technical support for Government or with the resources that are required for those areas.
I will move on to ask a final question.
I understand that concern, but I find it fantastically difficult to classify research. Therefore, I understand why that information is bolted together in the budget, because research can be classified in many different ways.
That is an interesting answer.
I have seen other organisations try to classify research, and they ended up with a matrix. One can look at research for relevance to particular sectors or clusters, but one can also look at it in other ways.
You explained that you see an advantage in the way in which the information is given at the moment. Would you concede that there is a disadvantage for groups, such as this committee, which have difficulty finding their way through it?
Yes—absolutely.
SABRIs are funded directly by the Scottish Executive, whereas the majority of research councils and universities are funded through the UK Government. Is that separation of funding advantageous for science in Scotland overall, or does it create barriers? You indicated that you had not caught up with some of the additional funding that has been made available through the UK Government.
It could be disadvantageous—we thought that it might be more disadvantageous than it is turning out to be, but it is important that we do not take a parochial view. When the funding streams are different and one cannot submit joint bids and so on, the situation becomes difficult—in fact, it is tricky and may become impossible in some cases. There is room for more a more joined-up approach.
Is insufficient funding of the institutes likely to hamper the efforts that everybody wishes to be made to meet the challenges that arise from foot-and-mouth disease, so that we can make progress on creating a more successful agriculture sector?
Probably not, as far as foot-and-mouth disease is concerned. However, the situation will be difficult, in the wake of the CAP, foot-and-mouth disease and BSE.
Perhaps we can return to that at a future date.
Yes.
In answer to a question from Fergus Ewing, you said that you thought that there was insufficient funding. However, when Fergus pressed you on what level was required, you said that there would always be insufficient funding. Is that your feeling?
That is what we feel after 14 years of not having sufficient money to keep up with inflation. In 14 years, we have lost more than 30 per cent of our core funding. That is what hurts. We cannot be scratched deeply, as we are very thin.
Thank you very much for helping us with our inquiry.
I would never wish to question any undertaking or indemnity that was given by someone as distinguished as you, convener, but I do not know what weight that would carry with the First Minister if I did not turn up at a Cabinet meeting. I am grateful for this opportunity to meet the committee at the outset of the 2002-03 budget process. I shall highlight one or two matters that may be of interest to the committee.
The clerks have passed me a note that asks whether, in view of the fact that the publication of the Official Report is rather slow at times, it would be possible to have a copy of your speech for the clerks' use.
Yes. However, the instruction at the top of the first page, "check against delivery" might be quite difficult to carry out after the fact.
Are there costs in respect of the foot-and-mouth disease outbreak that will be met from your budget?
Yes. I am not sure what they might all be, but, as I have said, there are only two areas in which it is clear that the money will have to come from the Exchequer. That is not to say that there will not be other areas, but the issue today is that the capital compensation payments that are being made are being made by the Exchequer. If payments are being made through the CAP that call on a UK contribution, they will come through the Exchequer. I envisage that some elements will have to be met from my budget, but there is also the question whether further resource is to be made available by a call on the reserve.
It is gratifying to hear that the compensation payments to farmers for slaughtered animals will be met from the Exchequer as that will no doubt be a substantial cost. Obviously, there will be additional and unforeseen costs in tackling some of the problems that exist as a result of the outbreak. Dealing with them is bound to require additional resources. Are you happy with the budgetary settlement for your department, given that Shetland Islands Council has stated in its response to the committee that the
The total budget contains elements that relate to the CAP payments. They are on our current projections but will be paid on a demand basis. In all discussions, we regard matters to do with the foot-and-mouth disease outbreak as being for the Scottish Executive rather than simply for the budget that we are discussing.
I ask because, according to the Scottish Executive's budget document, the rural affairs department budget will be £599 million and will decline in real terms to £576 million by 2003-04. That budget is alone among the budgets of every other department in suffering a real-terms decline. As the budget was negotiated before the unforeseen and devastating foot-and-mouth outbreak, will you now seek to negotiate a better deal for your department, which is the only one to have sustained a reduction in real terms?
I do not wish to get into a dispute with you. As you take the bottom line, your statement was correct. However, you must differentiate between the total domestic expenditure provision and the CAP market support provision. That figure is based on calculations made at a certain time, but does not show what will be spent in any given year under CAP market support. As Mr Ewing will no doubt have discovered, £40-odd million of the reduction over the three years relates to CAP market support and no reference is made to an increasing level of domestic support. I can only repeat that the aftermath of the foot-and-mouth outbreak will be dealt with properly at Scottish level and UK level.
I appreciate the fact that every budget has its complexities. I was aware of the reduction in CAP support—[Interruption.] I will conclude after George Lyon's mobile phone has finished ringing. Are you happy with the budget deal as negotiated? I invite you to agree that we should renegotiate the deal, especially in the light of the devastating impact of foot-and-mouth disease.
I appreciate that you wish to make a point, but I can only repeat that the outcome of the foot-and-mouth crisis will be dealt with through a Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food budget in London or a rural affairs department budget in Scotland. Matters in Scotland and the UK will be dealt with on that basis. I am confident that in discussing recovery in Scotland—as we have begun to—we will consider issues on that basis. Therefore, I see no point in renegotiating the rural affairs budget per se. However, how the Scottish Executive should approach the aftermath of foot-and-mouth raises issues.
Good morning and thank you for appearing before the committee. I have a wider question. Given the Executive's commitment to mainstreaming equalities and the equalities unit's guidance to all departments, will you outline how equality issues are incorporated into rural affairs spending plans?
By providing a specific budget line?
By thinking along the lines of mainstreaming equalities. My next question may give you more detail on what I am talking about. The rural affairs department has responsibility for cross-cutting rural policies, as outlined in "Rural Scotland: A New Approach", but it does not have budgetary responsibility for those policies, which falls to other departments. As you do not control the budgets that fund those policies, are you satisfied that you can deliver on them? Policies such as those on rural transport, housing and health involve great equalities impacts relating to gender, disability and other matters. To return to my first question, how will you develop equalities issues in rural affairs spending plans and your department's policies?
Gosh. You raise several issues. I will deal with the top-level issue first, which is about the rural affairs department's role in trying to take a more joined-up approach to delivering services. The key element for the department in the first instance is to ensure that in whatever policies the Executive pursues or develops, due cognisance has been taken of the different circumstances that often obtain in a rural area. It is proper that there has been a slight—perfectly laudable—tendency to develop policies with the major centres of population in mind. However, that has meant that it has not always been possible for those policies to deliver the same outcomes in rural areas. The Executive as a whole is committed to plugging into the general role that I have described.
The issue of equality in rural areas is pertinent in respect of transport, health and housing. As for any other budget, mainstreaming equality should be an integral part of your department's budget.
I do not disagree with that.
I have two slightly separate points. You mentioned the significant part of the budget that relates to scientific research. Indeed, your department is the only one in the Executive that funds research directly. How do you feed into the science strategy for Scotland, for example, or the UK science strategy? How do you feel about your department's involvement in the development of a wider strategy of scientific development in Scotland?
The nature of such funding has changed; it is now much more focused. The amount has also been brought into slightly sharper relief since the creation of the Scottish Executive. It is almost one of those hiding-your-light-under-a-bushel cases. I do not think that people recognise the huge international reputation that research bodies have.
My second question is on the use of modulation moneys. It was decided at UK level that 3 per cent of funding could be modulated. My understanding is that in England modulation money can be used for things that are included in article 33 of the rural development regulations, but that that option was not taken in Scotland. Why did you feel that it was not necessary to use modulation money for article 33-type activities in Scotland? Will you revisit that?
Can you be more specific?
Article 33 includes things such as rural development, soft loans and diversification. My understanding is that those options are available down south but not in Scotland.
I thought that was what was in article 33. We consulted on all the options before we finalised the rural development plan. You will forgive me if I do not recall all the aspects of the article, but the plan certainly included the matters contained within the article. Later, before publishing the rural development plan, we announced the specific measures that we were going to include in the Scottish version, based on that consultation. It certainly included matters related to diversification, which was a key element of the plan.
Is there an argument for revisiting some of the priorities as a result of foot-and-mouth disease?
It is possible. We will have to review that in terms of the resource that is available. Fergus Ewing made the point about the totality of that resource. There is a slight element of robbing Peter to pay Paul. It is difficult to deny that most of the measures in the plan are required, especially with the sad advent of foot-and-mouth disease. We will have to review the strategy as a result of foot-and-mouth.
In the past couple of years, we have seen the department change its name from agriculture, fisheries and food to rural affairs and now to rural development. How much power do you have over spending on developing rural Scotland? Given the budgetary constraints, there would seem to be a tension between the role of Europe's postman in Scotland—or facilitator in meeting European obligations—and the role of the Minister for Environment and Rural Development. What discretion do you have over your own budget? What percentage of the rural development budget is not tied to European obligations or to the common agricultural policy?
First, as I keep saying, I am responsible for an awful lot of things nowadays, but I am certainly not responsible for changing names.
I will, as long as it is a quick one.
There is a serious issue about whether it is better to build up budgets within the rural affairs department specifically for transport, health or education, or whether the budgets should be held in existing departments, which contain degrees of expertise on developing policy in those areas. When I took office, the clear perception was that, given the way in which the policies had been formulated and, as a consequence, the way in which they delivered in rural areas, the latter was the better way in which to focus attention. It was not always a question of money per se; it was about whether the policy was delivered effectively and whether it provided a sense that people in rural areas were getting a service equivalent to the intention of the policy.
Have you requested any other department's responsibilities? I am not talking about the environment portfolio or the water industry.
I have not really requested any responsibilities; they just keep falling into my lap. To be honest, I did not even ask for foot-and-mouth.
My question follows on from the points that Richard Lochhead raised and your response to him, which I understand. I will give an example of what I think Richard is getting at.
I have two points to make. First of all, you are absolutely right; who would have the authority to introduce such a scheme goes back to Elaine Murray's question about article 33 of the EU rural development regulations. You said that the scheme is not a high priority; it might not necessarily be a spending priority. That said, although exit from and entry into the industry might be connected, they are separate entities that can be tackled in different ways. Ways of entry already exist.
I appreciate that the minister has a number of responsibilities in his portfolio and the temptation is to ask lots of questions, but I will try to confine myself to one topic. I am interested in the timber industry, because it is pertinent to the constituency that I represent and to the south-west of Scotland as a whole. I was a bit unclear about a couple of things in the budget document. I seek clarification of the Scottish forestry strategy and how it is intended to be funded and supported.
Right—
Would it help if I had a more specific question?
No; I understand.
I particularly wanted to know about Forest Enterprise, which I understand is due to receive a budgetary allocation of some £59.8 million. What is the rationale for that?
Almost uniquely among many parts of Europe, we have a publicly owned forest. Our strategy has two or three key elements. The first is to try to ensure that provision is made for reafforestation in a much more planned way. We have a substantial amount of timber that will mature in the next two, three or four years. We have to plan that much more imaginatively than we have in the past, when we almost blighted great parts of the landscape by not introducing sufficient natural species to the forest plans. A substantial amount of the forest budget has been allocated to Forest Enterprise to assist with that.
Do you see an opportunity for some sort of supplement in future years?
That is possible. The great difficulty in the forestry industry is that the price of timber is at an almost world-record low, based on any graph and applying any form of equalisation to take account of inflation over the years. That has put huge stresses on the Forestry Commission, because it indulges in some commercial activity.
I have one other short question, which relates to what was said about the age profile in the agricultural industry. Has a budget been set aside to encourage people to come into the industry and be involved in training? How will that be supported in the future, so that there is a sustainable industry?
Although we elected not to include a retiral scheme in the rural development plan, there are provisions that would permit such a scheme to be worked up in the strategy, which sadly had to be postponed because of the outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease. When we revise the plan, I am sure that we will develop the discussions that we had with representatives of the enterprise network, in which they conceded the extent to which the network had not included people who wanted training and assistance to come into the business. That got chopped—I do not mean chopped permanently; I mean postponed—because of foot-and-mouth disease. We are trying to harness the resources that we have in the Executive. We have had discussions with Highlands and Islands Enterprise, Scottish Enterprise Borders and now Scottish Enterprise to make that a reality.
What scope is there within the budget to target money to remote and disadvantaged areas? You will be aware of the on-going discussions on less favoured areas. Shetland Islands Council has suggested that money could be targeted to islands and remote communities by adding a percentage over and above the baseline figure that is given to other areas. The council suggests that Shetland could get 25 per cent over and above what other areas get and that funding could be targeted to other islands and remote communities in the same way.
Given that we are talking essentially about the CAP regime as it is presently constructed, the only instrument that talks about disadvantage—and it defines it not in terms of transport costs but in terms of soil quality and difficulties in production—is the less favoured areas budget. It is not open to us to draw upon the suckler cow premium scheme, the arable areas payments scheme or the sheep annual premium scheme, as they are presently constructed, for that type of special need.
Is there scope to add funding from the Scottish Executive budget to those instruments to start working along those lines, or is that prohibited by European regulations?
The difficulty is that, in effect, you would be seeking to alter the instrument, so that would come under the state aid provisions. That is not the exact phrase but—if you follow me—a state cannot simply supplement an agreed European provision in that way.
You talked about the social dimension. The committee is keen to give Scottish Enterprise a social remit, in the same way as Highlands and Islands Enterprise has a social remit. From your comments, it seems that you are keen that the social dimension be addressed, but the Scottish Executive as a whole does not seem to want to bring the social remit of Scottish Enterprise in line with that of Highlands and Islands Enterprise. I do not know whether it comes down to money or control of budgets. I would like clarification because, at the end of the day, whether you, as the Minister for Environment and Rural Development, feel that it is a good thing, it will need money, but that money is controlled by another department.
My difficulty with that is quite simple. In all the discussions that I had leading up to the development of the agricultural strategy, I had no difficulty in obtaining responses. There was much discussion about the exclusion of some businesses, which had been done on historical grounds—there was a list of businesses that seemed to exclude some in the rural sector. I had no difficulty getting those included for the purpose of developing the agricultural strategy.
Fergus Ewing is lucky. As I mentioned in Parliament the other day, his constituency is on one side of the Cairngorms and mine is on the other. His local communities can access funding from Highlands and Islands Enterprise for social projects. On my side of the Cairngorms, they cannot. Both are rural areas that need rural development.
I would need to consider specific examples of what happens when someone is on one side of a line or the other.
We are nearing the end of the time and I do not want my name mentioned in the minutes of the Cabinet meeting as Ross Finnie's excuse for being late. We will have a comment from Fergus Ewing and one from Richard Lochhead. I ask them both to be brief.
Nearly three quarters of the forestry budget goes to Forest Enterprise, which is the commercial arm of the Forestry Commission, which will receive nearly £60 million next year. Is the private sector able to compete on a level playing field with Forest Enterprise, given that massive subsidy?
I am not sure that anyone is on a level playing field given the current price of timber. Forest Enterprise has additional responsibilities because it is the commercial arm of a public asset. I will frame my answer in a positive statement. I am not aware of any complaints from the private sector about Forest Enterprise acting in an anti-competitive way. As a natural course, we speak to those with commercial and non-commercial woodland interests.
I am aware of one company—perhaps I should not name it without express agreement—that argues that Forest Enterprise's £60 million subsidy prevents the creation of an effective Scottish forestry sector and of more jobs in the sector. I assume that we would all like the creation of more jobs to be part of the forestry strategy.
Forest Enterprise is the commercial arm of the publicly owned Forestry Commission. Unless you are suggesting, which I do not think you are, that the money given to Forest Enterprise be wound down and that private jobs be created at the expense of the Forestry Commission, it seems to me that the argument is about displacement rather than new jobs.
Efficiency, and perhaps some of the activities that Forest Enterprise is engaged in—especially some of the non-forestry activities, such as visitor centres—would merit close examination. The non-forestry activities also receive a subsidy and are competing against restaurants and shops in rural Scotland that do not receive subsidies.
I thank you for coming to the committee, minister—we will allow you to leave before the 3.15 pm deadline. There are one or two questions that we did not manage to put, so the clerks will contact you later for answers on those.
As they say in other places, I am obliged.
We have the opportunity to have a brief discussion on how to proceed with our budget inquiry. If members have any questions arising from the evidence that we heard today, now is the time to raise them. We will go on to decide on the drafting of the report.
I understood that the Transport and General Workers Union had submitted a response, but it is not included in the papers. Perhaps it arrived too late to be sent out. After my previous complaints about the amount of paperwork, I hesitate to make an issue of this, but I would like to know whether the response has been received and if so, to ask that it be circulated.
The only comment that we have had from the Transport and General Workers Union relates to the effect of foot-and-mouth disease on agricultural businesses—it is not related to the budget.
We need to prepare a draft report. However, to get feedback from the committee, we should appoint two reporters through whom Richard Davies can check information and facts while he is drafting the report and before it is brought back to the committee for consideration. Last year we appointed one reporter from the Executive parties and one from the Opposition parties. Given that we have dealt with the issues concerning the SABRIs, I wonder whether Elaine Murray would be prepared to act as a reporter. Is that acceptable, Elaine?
I ask the committee to nominate an Opposition member.
I happily nominate Richard Lochhead.
I happily nominate Fergus Ewing. [Laughter.]
Would either gentleman be prepared to take on that role?
I did it last year, so it is only right that Fergus Ewing should have the chance.
The alternative is to nominate Alex Fergusson in his absence.
I am never one to shy away from work. I will accept the role as reporter.
Good. Elaine Murray and Fergus Ewing will act as reporters.
I am concerned that, of all the departmental budgets, the rural development budget is being cut by the most. I was disappointed that there was no indication of willingness to renegotiate that budget in the light of the devastating impact of the foot-and-mouth crisis. I appreciate that, as yet, it is too early to be certain about the extent of its impact, but it is already clear that the impact has been devastating in both financial and human terms.
We should get some statistics on the amount of discretion that the minister has in respect of the rural development budget.
We will submit those points along with our additional questions.
It is worth noting that the minister indicated in his evidence that a significant amount of money is being made available by UK departments for the aftermath of foot-and-mouth disease. It also became clear during his presentation that a number of other Executive departments provide finances for services that are provided, or budget lines for work that is undertaken, in rural areas.
The minister also made it clear that some of the changes that have been made to the budget for the rural affairs department are the result of changes in European funding. Perhaps we should separate the two types of funding.
It would be useful to examine how money is being spent throughout departments in rural areas and to track that money. That was the approach that we took last year.
We spoke about doing that, but we discovered that that approach was impossible.
It was mentioned in our report. I think that the answer that we received was that it would take a lot of time to track the money, so that we would not immediately get the information for a particular year. However, we should continue to ask for that information, to ensure that our request does not fall off the agenda. Perhaps we will get those figures in a couple of years' time—if we do not ask for them, we will not get them.
I am sorry, but I did not quite understand. What figures were you referring to?
I was asking whether we could get figures on spending in rural areas that is made by departments other than the rural affairs department. Most of the spending in rural areas is not made by the rural affairs department, which concentrates on European money, agriculture, forestry and fishing. One of the committee's main interests is the social aspect of spending in rural areas. We need to know what spending is going into those areas and whether it can be broken down. Unless we keep asking for information, no work will be carried out to ensure that we get a breakdown of that spending.
Why has not the Executive provided that information?
The information is not available.
The Executive believes that it would be difficult to distil.
Does it believe that because it would be wrong to attribute the money to the rural affairs department if it is incorporated already in another budget?
The Executive made the case that when funding hospitals, for example, it was almost impossible to decide how that funding should be allocated to urban expenditure and to rural expenditure. It was simply an impossible task to distinguish between—
Is Rhoda Grant saying that money that is spent on a hospital should be disaggregated between rural and urban components?
That was merely an extreme example.
We need to know about the kind of funding that is going into service provision in rural areas. A hospital in Aberdeen would treat a lot of people from Shetland, but perhaps one cannot disaggregate funding information about that. However, funding could be disaggregated in other areas, and it would be useful if the Executive would start work on that information so that funding—
As a newly appointed—and reluctant—reporter, who was press-ganged into the job, I am anxious to be able to perform in it. I am not sure exactly what we are supposed to be looking for. To be frank, I think that one would be on a wild-goose chase if one were to try to disaggregate the money that is spent on a hospital into the part that relates to rural Scotland and the part that relates to urban Scotland. I am not sure that that would achieve anything, other than being divisive. On the other hand, I want to pursue Rhoda Grant's points, and it would be helpful if she were able to be more specific about the process that we are supposed to be engaging in, in order to find out whether there is any point to it.
I sympathise with Rhoda Grant's point, but we have gone down that line before. It is an impossible task to differentiate how much of, say, Grampian Health Board's budget is spent in rural Aberdeenshire and how much in the city. It would not be fruitful to expect the Scottish Executive to send out civil servants on such tasks for our benefit. It would be more useful to look at the other end of the scale—which is not what we are doing today—and do an audit of poverty levels in rural Scotland. That sort of thing would inform us much more. I agree with Fergus Ewing that it would be an impossible task to expect the reporters or the Scottish Executive to make that sort of differentiation for this year's budget exercise.
If we do not know how much funding is spent on tackling poverty in rural areas, how can we expect to be able to do anything about it? We need to know the cost of services. For example, the Arbuthnott report gave money to health boards in rural areas because of population sparsity and the make-up of rural areas. We need to see whether extra money is given to councils and other publicly funded bodies that work in rural areas to ensure that adequate funding is going into those areas.
Some of the information to which Rhoda Grant alludes is available. Possibly, Mike Rumbles and Fergus Ewing are being unduly negative. Obviously, for any bed in Dumfries royal infirmary, one cannot determine how many people from Dumfries have used it compared to those from rural Galloway.
Would Elaine Murray like to do that part of the report?
I think that that is an agreement.
When I raised the point, I was not necessarily suggesting that the reporters ought to gather all that information. That would not be a productive use of their time.
We touched on the issue last year, so all we need do is to say that further to last year's report we would like to have a progress report. Perhaps that could be borne in mind.
That is an important point.
Who is on that committee? How often has it met? Does it meet before or after budgets are decided? I suggest that at some time the committee should take evidence from the cross-cutting committee.
That is a very good suggestion.
Are there any more questions?
I ask that the equalities issue be included somewhere in the report.
In conjunction with the reporters, the clerks hope to have a draft report available for consideration in two weeks. Is that okay?
Yes.
Yes.
We will all have much to do during the next few weeks, so I ask the clerk to ensure that communication is electronic.
Indeed. Yes.
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