We have two excellent legacy papers that will be really useful. The one from the Culture, Tourism, Europe and External Affairs Committee is good and has a lot of recommendations. From my perspective, and bringing the two reports together, it is about what we can do to add quality to the Parliament’s scrutiny.

In relation to Brexit, there are clearly issues that we need to think through. Donald Cameron is right that other committees will be interested in issues such as Erasmus+ and trade. There are wider issues about what happens post-Brexit and how the devolution settlement is working. We need to pick up those overarching issues, as Donald Cameron said.

I am interested in the recommendations about scrutinising the Scottish Government’s external affairs and international development work. We should look at the external affairs strategy and the international development programme, both of which will be really important as the world begins to reopen post-Covid. We need to consider Scotland’s role—that is an important issue for us.

The points about common frameworks and interparliamentary work are important. It is key for the committee to promote such work. That is partly about our relationships under the devolution settlement, but it is also about post-Brexit relationships across the UK. That is a really important piece of work for us.

There is a huge agenda on culture post-Covid. Yesterday, the First Minister made a statement about the beginnings of reopening. In Edinburgh and the Lothians, festivals are a huge issue. There are issues about the capacity of theatres and venues such as live music venues to come back post-pandemic. Another issue is the impact of arts funding, both pre-Covid and in relation to what will happen to regenerate the sector. I suspect that I am not alone in having been contacted by artists, musicians and others involved in the culture sector who do not work full time and who basically have had no work at all during the pandemic. There are a lot of issues to pick up there.

We also have the legacy expert panel’s report. I wonder whether, for our first session, it would be useful to get an update from the panel, just to help to shape our work, as we have such a lot in our brief. It is about six months since that report was produced, so it would be useful to get an update.

Good morning. Welcome to the first meeting in session 6 of the Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee. I am a member of the Scottish Parliament for Lothian and, as the oldest member of the committee, I have the pleasure of convening the first two items of business this morning. I welcome all the members of the committee. I very much look forward to working with everyone.

Before we move to the first item on the agenda, I remind everyone to turn their mobile phones to silent.

Agenda item 1 is declarations of interests. This is a chance for everyone on the committee to declare any interests that they have that are relevant to the work of the committee. I will start by saying that I do not have any relevant interests that I wish to declare.

I thank everybody. For the information of people who are watching this broadcast, I point out that people can see our entries in the register of members’ interests and our voluntary records on our pages on the Scottish Parliament website.

Congratulations on your appointment, Clare. I now hand over to you.

I will take this opportunity to say that I am also one of the vice-presidents of the European Movement in Scotland. That is in the voluntary section of my entry in the register of members’ interests, too. Thanks for that reminder, Patrick.

Agenda item 2 is the choosing of a convener. Parliament has agreed that only members of the Scottish National Party are eligible for nomination as convener of the committee. My understanding is that Clare Adamson is that party’s nominee. If any member disagrees with that nomination, they should type N in the chat bar.

I am delighted to declare that no one has typed N in the chat bar.

Clare Adamson was chosen as convener.

I, too, congratulate Alasdair Allan on his success in securing a prized member’s business slot. I agree that there is much to be proud of since the establishment of our Parliament in terms of the higher profile of the Gaelic language, of investment in Gaelic-medium education and of Gaelic broadcasting through Radio nan Gàidheal and BBC Alba.

As Alasdair Allan and other members have highlighted eloquently, last year’s report was worrying because it concluded that without radical action Gaelic would be “dead within a decade”. Rhoda Grant and Jenni Minto made powerful speeches about the need for economic support in traditionally Gaelic communities. I thank the academics who have been in touch this week with their insights on what needs to be done now.

I want to focus on the consultation on the national Gaelic language plan, and to highlight the current challenge in Edinburgh with supporting Gaelic-medium education now and into the future. First, we need to ensure that we have enough Gaelic teachers so that GME can be delivered for all subjects, including maths and science. As Ariane Burgess said, the SNP election manifesto promised that there would be a new city centre school in Edinburgh. That caught people by surprise and cut right across current council plans for a new school at Liberton. Timing is critical, because parents need to know that there will be capacity for GME in the city in the future. The council is about to consult on its plans for a new GME school at Liberton, which will mean two separate schools being managed by two head teachers.

There is now a challenge because James Gillespie’s high school has an issue with capacity, hence the council’s plans to increase capacity in the short term at Darroch. It will therefore be interesting to hear from the cabinet secretary about the SNP manifesto proposal. Will it be dropped or promoted? What city centre site did the Government have in mind? Was it to be planned and funded centrally? It is crucial that we have the quality GME that our city needs, and that we support the Gaelic language right across Scotland.

I am glad that Alasdair Allan also mentioned Scots. I was going to apologise and ask whether I could sneak it in at the end of my speech. Oor Vyce campaigners do not want to divert attention from Alasdair Allan’s Gaelic language debate, but they want to take the opportunity to talk about the need for the Scottish Government to do more in the context of the proposed Scottish languages bill. Again, it would be helpful if the cabinet secretary would clarify what legislative measures the Government is considering on Scots, alongside the important work for supporting our Gaelic language.

On a point of order, Convener. My digital machine did not pick up my vote; if I had been able to vote, I would have voted yes.

This is a crucial debate for us. We need to make sure that the Covid pandemic and the fallout from it do not mask the skills crisis that Scotland was already facing. As the SNP Government’s motion acknowledges,

“a skilled and productive workforce is vital to addressing labour market inequalities, creating fairer workplaces and delivering an inclusive, green recovery”,

but those warm words have not yet translated into Government action with tangible outcomes.

As a result of the pandemic, the Scottish Government has received additional consequentials from the UK Government. The Scottish Parliament is one of the most powerful devolved Parliaments in the world, but we face a skills crisis and a jobs crisis—which have, of course, been exacerbated by Brexit—that need to be tackled. Therefore, we need to make sure that the additional consequentials are invested wisely. We need to create a system for reskilling that works for Scotland and pushes the boundaries of what is possible. In the process, real leadership must be shown so that we can address the inequalities and skills shortages that predated Covid.

It must be made clear that the crisis that we are talking about is a Scottish crisis. Over the past 14 years in Scotland, there has been a steady decline in employees receiving job-related training. People who are already in employment—especially those who are on low incomes—need access to training. I will come back to that point. One of the most striking issues to be raised in the excellent briefing that members received from Edinburgh College last week was the number of people in Edinburgh who are in low-paid employment who need access to skills and decent training.? To deliver on that urgent training requirement, our colleges need more funding. I hope that ministers will respond to that point.

It has been revealed that the SNP’s national transition training fund has had an unacceptably low uptake. Leadership means accepting it when things have failed, going back to the drawing board and starting again. The motion welcomes the extension of the fund to 2021-22 and the commitment to invest an additional £500 million in the current session of Parliament, but we need to know what lessons have been learned from what did not work previously. We need to know how success will be measured and, if success is not delivered, how the scheme and the £500 million will deliver the change that we need. I would like to hear a specific comment on that.

Yes, but we need to do more to accelerate this. The points that Alex Rowley made about the social and educational inequalities that hold people back were right. We need access, and I would like the minister to think about free training opportunities for people on low incomes and precarious or short-term contracts.

How will people be supported to get access to those opportunities and develop their skills, for example in the care sector, which several members have mentioned? We need to make sure that, if training will involve time off work, financial support is available to fill the gap of the missing hours, or uptake will be low. What impact do caring and childcare responsibilities have in preventing women in particular from accessing opportunities?

Scottish Labour has repeatedly raised the issue in relation to the principle of a national care service. Far too many people in the care sector are paid low wages and do not have opportunities to develop their skills or progress professionally, so the sector is not attractive to them as a long-term option. That is why we want nationally negotiated terms and conditions, and training needs to be linked in to that. I want the importance of training in the care sector to be highlighted, because it is becoming more and more vital. We need to recruit more people but also to retain them.

The Scottish Government’s ambitions need to be matched by real goals so that we can identify how they relate to people’s working experience. We also need to think about the job losses that have occurred during the pandemic, which have particularly hit women who have lost employment as they have had to home school or act as carers.

There are some opportunities here. In North Ayrshire and through the work of our UK colleagues in Preston, procurement has been used in such a way that apprenticeship and training opportunities have been created. I would like the minister to address that in his closing remarks.

Members throughout the chamber have mentioned specific sectors that have been hit by Brexit as well as by the pandemic. More needs to be done in those areas to support people to stay in employment and keep businesses going.

Paul Sweeney made some important points about flexible visas, which are also mentioned in our amendment. When Scottish Labour was in power, the fresh talent initiative made a huge difference to our economy. It enabled people to seek employment here after graduation and to switch into work permit employment or other legal migration routes that they qualified for. There was also a scholarship scheme for overseas graduates that enabled them to combine postgraduate study with a year of work experience. That is a good example of how we negotiated vital changes with our UK colleagues to meet our country’s needs at the time.

Something that has come across in this debate is the need for the SNP Government to work constructively to make more demands on the UK Government, but it is also important for the Scottish Conservative members of this Parliament to advocate change for Scotland within their party. As Graham Simpson said, different visas are on offer, but they simply do not meet the needs of the employees that we need in Scotland now.

I want to finish with a point about Edinburgh—