Economy, Tourism and Energy Committee [Draft]

Meeting date: Tuesday, June 23, 2026

Official Report 468KB pdf

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Interests

Good morning, and welcome to the first meeting in session 7 of the Economy, Tourism and Energy Committee.

We have one apology, which is from Kristopher Leask, who has had trouble with his transport. He is flying down from Orkney. There is a chance that he might join online, but that looks unlikely.

That also covers off members who might be attending remotely.

I am very excited about the committee. We have a tremendous remit, and we will be discussing a very broad spectrum of things. The economy touches on everything. There is momentum in the Parliament to start talking about growth and how we get it, so that will be an exciting issue to look at. We will talk about that a bit later, in relation to our remit.

Tourism is a key part of that economy and is important for every community in Scotland. Energy is also a key input. I am very excited to be looking at that in the committee and working with all the members. I look forward to working with everyone constructively and collegiately.

Agenda item 1 is the declaration of our registrable interests. I refer members to paper 1. I will start and then go around the table to ask each member in turn to put on record any registrable interests that are relevant to the work of the committee.

I have just finished employment as a senior economist in the oil and gas industry. That employment ended during May, but is still a registrable interest of mine. I am a councillor on Aberdeen City Council. I have a shareholding in a dormant limited company that was used for consulting.

I voluntarily declare that I am a member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in Scotland—ICAS. We may well see some evidence from it in the course of our work, so I wanted to mention that.

In line with my entry in the register of members’ interests, I note that I am a company director and the sole shareholder of a company that has retail interests. It is a non-trading, holding company, which holds intellectual property for retail businesses. I am also a member of two trade unions—Community and the Union of Shop, Distributive and Allied Workers—and of the Federation of Small Businesses.

I welcome you to your role as convener, Duncan.

I am a shareholder in a hospitality business. You have asked us to share a little bit about our background—

I think that we will do that under item 4 or 5.

That is everything, then.

My registrable interest that is relevant to the committee is that I am currently a councillor on Falkirk Council. I was housing convener for the past four years. For the first five years, I was resources portfolio holder. On 18 June, I finished up as commercial manager with a company that is part of the Rentokil Initial Group. Those are probably the most relevant interests to this committee.

I am going to sound really boring because I have got no registrable interests, but I will do my level best to make my contributions a bit more exciting.

I have had a number of previous roles as a board member for arm’s-length external organisations for the City of Edinburgh Council, but none of those roles were remunerated. They were listed in my initial statement of interests. Although I have been given advice that they do not need to remain on the register of members’ interests, I will leave them there as a voluntary gesture of transparency. I am still waiting for advice about whether my role in a limited liability partnership, Edinburgh Living, which was a joint venture between the council and the Scottish Futures Trust to deliver market and mid-market housing in Edinburgh, should remain on the register of members’ interests; it is currently listed under voluntary. When the register is published, I will refer members to it and it will be clear where my interests sit.

How do we deal with Kristopher Leask’s declaration of interests?

If Mr Leask arrives when we are in public session, we will ask him to declare his interests. If he arrives when the committee is meeting in private, he can declare them then and we will record that in the minutes. If he does not arrive at all, we will ask him to declare his interests at the first meeting after the recess in September.