Chamber and committees

I am delighted that Mr Bibby is predicting a Scottish National Party victory in the Scottish—

I do have an answer: it is £471,000.

Going back to the point about delivering increases in culture funding, I am committed to doing that, and we are doing it. The national performing companies are at the top of my list.

I join you and other members in paying tribute to the national performing companies, but I point to the fact that there has been a shared uplift of £1 million, which follows an uplift of £700,000 in the previous year. That is a 9.4 per cent uplift since 2023-24.

There is an awareness of the scale of the support for the national performing companies because it is significant. It is almost £25 million shared across the five companies, with Scottish Opera receiving £8.64 million, followed by Scottish Ballet on £4.86 million, the National Theatre of Scotland on £4.53 million, the Royal Scottish National Orchestra on £4.398 million and the Scottish Chamber Orchestra on £2.187 million. The level of support for the national performing companies is significant, and I understand their ambition to do more and not to have to make any decisions that do not match their ambitions for the years ahead.

As I have said to them already, we are now effectively 70 per cent through delivering the additional £100 million in the culture space, and the most significant part of that 70 per cent increase has gone towards the delivery of multiyear funding through Creative Scotland. That is where this year’s £20 million increase has been focused. Were that not the case, multiyear funding could not be delivered. It is important to understand that the priority has been to ensure that that foundational intervention in Scotland’s culture sector—successfully delivered through Creative Scotland—is paid for.

That puts us in a position in which we are able to think about the remaining 30 per cent of the £100 million uplift, which is £30 million. Had I been able to deliver the £100 million uplift, which is the biggest increase in culture funding outside Covid since the onset of devolution, in one financial year, we would not be having the discussion that we are having today. Our position reflects that we have been able to increase incrementally, year on year, towards that £100 million.

I am keen to deliver an uplift in spending for our national performing companies—I have said that to them and to this committee. I have also said that I wish to explore providing multiyear funding, which I keenly support, to the national performing companies. Multiyear funding does not only deliver financial certainty; it also allows cultural organisations to get on with what they wish to deliver creatively, rather than spending their time, year on year, on annual budget rounds. It is a distraction from what they want to achieve, and it also means that they cannot open up potential new income streams. One of the exciting areas that our national performing companies are exploring is how to be imaginative and make more money. What the RSNO is doing in the film sector is a really good example.

I have made it clear to the national performing companies that we are in dialogue about how we can best support them with additional funding—we will deliver this year’s budget and then think about the allocation of the final £30 million of the £100 million uplift. We want to understand how best they can be supported as part of that.

I want to deliver additional funding to the national performing companies, and I understand that they are disappointed that that has not happened this year. I wish that I was able to deliver the £100 million increase in a single year, but that was never a realistic prospect or one that we committed to. We are delivering the £100 million increase in the timeframe that we set out, and we have already done so with the Creative Scotland multiyear funding allocation. I am very focused on ensuring that, as part of that final stage of allocation, we include the national performing companies.

I agree with Mr Brown that we should aspire to have funded organisations and venues in every single local government area. I want to better understand why some parts of the country have more supported organisations and venues than others, especially when some local authorities have none, and others are in single digits. For me, that is one of the big takeaways from the Creative Scotland review, which pointed to information that can inform us all—the committee included—as to why that is the case in different local authority areas.

10:30

Mr Brown, you will have a much better idea than I do about the lie of the land. Did venues and organisations in Clackmannanshire apply—yes or no? Did they put in unsuccessful applications, and if so, what is happening with those applications and were they potentially viable? If they were potentially viable but for some reason failed to pass the initial round of adjudication, what has been done to help and support those venues and organisations?

As I mentioned, such a development phase was undertaken by Creative Scotland as part of the initial round. A range of venues and organisations that were not successful were deemed worthy of support to help them into a position where they would be successful. Therefore, it is absolutely right to ask why Clackmannanshire and the three other local authority areas were not successful. We should now have the data that can help explain the reasons for that. If it is because there is a lack of infrastructure but the application is on the cusp of being successful, what support do we need to provide to ensure that there is that level of cultural support in every local authority area?

I agree with Mr Brown on the premise of his question. I agree that both the Government and Creative Scotland need to look at the issue. It is an area of the Creative Scotland report that the Government has not formally responded to yet. However, I have already signalled to the committee that it is an area where data can be used. Creative Scotland will have a lot of data, for example, on who all the applicants were; where the applications were from; what projects had been supported in the past; and whether, in Clackmannanshire, there are arts workers, venues or organisations that apply for support through other funding streams and might aspire to become multiyear-funded organisations. If there are not, we should be asking why not and what can be done about it. That is one part of the equation.

The different attitudes of our enterprise companies towards the culture and arts sector were signalled to me, through the Creative Scotland review, as another area that we need to think about. There is a significant difference between the approach of Highlands and Islands Enterprise or South of Scotland Enterprise and that of Scottish Enterprise to the organisations and venues in the areas that they cover. I am not suggesting that Scottish Enterprise must become a vehicle for cultural funding. However, I think that we all understand that culture in itself has intrinsic value but that it is also a part of the economy, so why is it treated as a priority by Highlands and Islands Enterprise and South of Scotland Enterprise, but not by Scottish Enterprise, which covers Clackmannanshire? Questions need to be asked of a number of organisations that have responsibility in this area. The Scottish Government has a role in that through its conversations with Creative Scotland, Scottish Enterprise and others.

I am—and I am sure the committee would also be—keen to see the data in order to understand where there might be an underprovision of culture and the arts and what can be done about it. To my mind, doing nothing is not an option.

Again, I agree with Mr Brown. It is good to hear that Creative Scotland will produce those statistics, and I think that more data can be provided beyond that specific 16-year period. We need more information. What then follows is to ask why that situation is so, and to understand whether it is because the institutional memories of organisations are, unfortunately, marked by a lack of success—although that is not a reason not to support cultural organisations and venues.

In fairness to Creative Scotland, it did exactly that with a number of organisations that did not make the initial multiyear-funding round. The fact that there is experience of helping organisations and venues to get to a place at which they can apply successfully is a sign that there is a willingness to do it. I do not think that the situation is because there is no willingness to intervene and make it happen. However, Mr Brown is absolutely right to put a marker down to say that, if there is nothing or next to nothing in four local authority areas, we need to understand why, what will happen as a result and when, within a reasonable timescale, people in Clackmannanshire, West Dunbartonshire and wherever else can have confidence that local organisations or venues will be funded through those streams.

However, as I have mentioned, there are other funding streams through which organisations are supported, and one has to look across the piece at all of those. I wanted to satisfy myself on whether that had been the case in relation to Culture Collective and the creative communities programme. However, if Mr Brown were to raise that point, I would have to say to him that I am not aware that any projects in Clackmannanshire had been funded through those routes.

Having that overview points to the fact that there is no support through multiyear funding, Culture Collective or the creative communities programme. To me, that looks like the beginnings of a flashing light to ask, “why not”?

Yes. Those edits were undertaken by civil servants. I was unaware of the necessity for the edits to take place. They took place, and the numbers and the detail were restored.

Would I have wished that that was not necessary? Yes, because members such as Mr Kerr quite rightly ask why. That was done for an administrative reason, however; it is nothing to do with the allocation of resources through the other arts budget line, which totals just over £16 million.

On the question of artistic and cultural judgment, it is not the place for me, as cabinet secretary, to involve myself in the work of Creative Scotland and its responsibility around the funding of organisations. It is for Creative Scotland to make such decisions—and that is what it does.

However, the Scottish Government quite properly undertakes a range of other directly funded interventions that impact on all sorts of cultural areas. There is a balancing act. One gets advice from officials on what is required and then considers whether one feels that the balance is right to ensure that we are covering all the areas that we want to cover. Then, no doubt, there will be a view that there is too much in one area or not enough somewhere else but—

Forgive me, convener, but, with your permission, I want to answer part of Mr Kerr’s question that I did not answer. He asked about the festivals expo fund, which supports Scottish artists to showcase their work and develop international connections through Scottish festivals. Creative Scotland has distributed more than £30 million through the festivals expo fund. Since its inception in 2007, that has been to festivals in Edinburgh and, from 2018 onwards, to festivals in Glasgow.

Anything that will help the viability and sustainability of an organisation such as the Centre for Contemporary Arts should be considered, and none of the experience that there is in such an important institution should be lost. As we are talking about people’s jobs, Mr Harvie, I am sure that you would agree with me on that, and given the precarious nature of many people’s work in the freelance sector in culture and the arts, I agree that that has to be a priority.

However, given the history around governance issues and finance, if one seeks the reopening of the Centre for Contemporary Arts as a priority, one must look at all the options to ensure that it will be viable. Despite the priorities that Mr Harvie has raised with regard to the very talented people who have worked at the CCA, it is also the case that, at the end of the process, the organisation must be financially viable. I am sure that everybody at Creative Scotland who is taking this forward will be seized of that fact. I say again, as I did in my initial answer, that I would be very keen for them to explore all options, because it is in everybody’s interests that the venue reopens and that the talented people who work there are able to continue what they do. I wish to be as supportive as I can be in that endeavour.

I fear that I will have to write to Mr Harvie about the spending review period. In the external affairs budget, there are some minor changes that relate to property and lease arrangements as part of the network. That can cause in-year changes to what is required when there is a roll-over of a lease, for example, which means that one has to pay something in the first year but not the same amount in the second year. My memory is that that is one of the contributing factors to some of the changes to the external affairs budget. Mr Harvie will be aware that the Scottish Government has a very strong presence in London, and facilities in Brussels are not on platform—as it is known—because they are part of the UK embassy set-up, which is also the case in the other places where the network is located. I will write to the convener, so that Mr Harvie and the rest of the committee have some details about that.

I agree with—