What Neil Bibby has outlined is the position of the Governments of the Kingdom of Denmark, the Kingdom of Norway, Sweden and the Republic of Finland. If it is all right for them, why is it impossible for Scotland?

That commitment to additional funding despite the challenging budget situation signals our confidence in the Scottish culture sector. It is the starting point of a journey of three phases: the first phase is to sustain, the second is to develop and the third is to innovate. All of that is under discussion with our culture and arts sector colleagues to ensure that funding reaches all parts of the country and all parts of the Scottish culture and arts ecosystem.

If members from across the chamber have particular views about where that additional resource should bring additionality to the culture and arts sector, I am extremely keen to hear from them. We want to ensure that our organisations, venues and performers are properly funded, and we look forward to delivering the additional funding. We have already started the rise to an additional £100 million of annual funding for culture and the arts, which I hope is welcomed across the chamber.

The Scottish Government, through Creative Scotland, provides support to a number of cultural organisations and individuals in Stirling. In 2022-23 alone, Creative Scotland awarded £1.76 million through funds—including its regular, open and targeted funding—to 46 successful applications from individuals and organisations that are based in the Stirling area.

First, I commend Neil Bibby for his comments regarding Alexei Navalny.

Neil Bibby asks a very reasonable question about funding. He appreciates that there is an on-going standard budget process in the Scottish Government. We have already committed to the initial uplift in this financial year regarding this year’s financial commitments. Next year, an additional £25 million will take us to a net gain of £40 million. We then need to get into year 3 and year 4 to get towards the £100 million of additional support for culture and the arts. I appreciate that people want to know how quickly that money will be available, and I want to ensure that it is available as quickly as possible. As soon as I am able to give further clarity on that, Neil Bibby and colleagues will be the first to hear it. Everybody understands that we require the additional resources for the culture sector, and the Government is committed to that.

Mark Ruskell’s question is very timely. I know that Creative Scotland is very much seized of the need to introduce multi-annual funding, which I think everybody agrees will be hugely beneficial to the cultural sector. There is also an understanding about the issues of innovation, resilience and looking forward to the next year, given the significant change in public behaviour and so on, and that will be key for many cultural organisations. I have had those conversations with Creative Scotland, and I know that it is giving strong consideration to how it proceeds as we move from the current funding situation into the new multi-annual funding approach. No doubt it will be interested to hear Mark Ruskell’s views on ensuring that that can deliver for cultural and arts organisations, in Stirling and throughout the rest of Scotland, too.

I thank Kevin Stewart for his welcome for the broad range of festivals that have been supported in Aberdeen already. The fact that additional events have not been supported is a matter best raised directly with Creative Scotland, although I would welcome being copied in to such interventions.

The encouragement for Creative Scotland and VisitScotland to work together is helpful—no doubt, they do that already. It is certainly something that I will raise at my next meetings with them, to ensure that important cultural centres such as Aberdeen have the greatest amount of exposure in order to maximise the number of visitors to the granite city.

Since 2011, Creative Scotland has assisted 41 festivals and other cultural events in the Aberdeen City Council area, with total funding of £1,443,654. In the same period, EventScotland has supported 79 events, excluding business events, with a total funding of £2,107,607.

In addition, since 2018-19, Creative Scotland has funded Aberdeen Performing Arts with £333,333 every year, as a regular funded organisation, supporting its work in mounting the “Granite Noir” crime fiction festival, the “Delve” music festival, the Climate Week North East festival, the “Rise Up!” festival, and “Light the Blue”, which is a children’s festival. The Scottish Government also continues to fund Techfest, which is Aberdeen’s science festival, as part of our wider programme of support for science festivals, in line with our science, technology, engineering and mathematics education and training strategy. Techfest received a grant of £25,000 during 2023-24.

The Scottish Government works closely with partners to promote culture across the whole of Scotland. For example, the youth music initiative offers young people across the country access to music making. Creative Scotland’s funding reaches all 32 local authority areas. The regularly funded network includes organisations from the Scottish Borders to the Shetland Islands, while the Culture Collective includes the creative islands network and the Ayr Gaiety partnership’s Culture Collective programme. South of Scotland Enterprise recently published the “South of Scotland Creative Economy guide” to promote that region’s vibrant creative economy. Highlands and Islands Enterprise and its XpoNorth Digital programme provide innovative support, including their recent Highland heritage and film sector mixer event.

I am very seized of, first, taking the opportunity to commend cultural venues and organisations across the country—including some in the area that Sharon Dowey highlighted. Those matters are being considered by Creative Scotland, which is an arm’s-length organisation, for reasons that I think all members agree with. It is currently going through a programme of regularly funded organisations, and there are most certainly organisations from the region that Sharon Dowey highlighted. Is there more that can be done to highlight the vibrant culture and arts scene throughout Scotland? No doubt. However—as I already said in a detailed answer to the member—there are projects and organisations, which are well funded, throughout the country, including in rural Scotland and the south-west of Scotland, and I look forward to that continuing.

I commend Claire Baker for doing just that: she has used the opportunity of portfolio questions to highlight the importance of Dunfermline to Robert the Bruce. It adds to the list of the variety of places and events that will mark the life of Robert the Bruce in this important anniversary year.

I would very much like to come to Dunfermline and visit the abbey, and I commend everybody who is watching these questions to do likewise. The Scottish Government meets regularly with our agencies, whether that is Historic Environment Scotland or VisitScotland, and we have an on-going dialogue with local authorities. If there is anything of which Claire Baker would wish me and my colleagues to be aware, I look forward to hearing about that, and to underlining the importance of Dunfermline to the memory of the life of Robert the Bruce.