Chamber and committees

I am struck by some of the comments that Fiona Campbell made about—I am paraphrasing—endless strategies and plans and the time that is involved in considering them, which seems disproportionate to say the least when compared to the resources that you have to play with.

We have heard about joined-up working and collaboration. If we agreed to put more money into the national companies—not that it would be us; it would be the Government—that would be at the expense of the museums sector, whose representatives were on the previous panel also asking for more money. There is a finite level of money and, incidentally, I do not think that that will change. It will only get worse for the budgetary reasons that I mentioned before—for example, look at what has happened to the Scottish Government’s capital budget over the past 10 years.

Given that context, realising the resources that are available, would it be worth the sector coming together to make a joint approach to the Government or is that completely impracticable? Would it just end up with everyone getting a little more and not addressing some of the issues? Is there any scope for that? I have been on the committee for a few years now and, every year, I see panels of witnesses with everybody making their pitch for more resources, which can often only be done at the expense of others. Would there be benefit in the sector as a whole making a proposal to the Government for how it would like funding to be distributed?

I will go to Fiona Campbell first, as I mentioned her.

Going back to my point about the Wallace sword, I note that it was part of a substantial genealogical exhibition at Grand Central terminal for international audiences, and the National Youth Choir of Scotland was over there, too. That shows how central Government can help to raise the profile of, and increase access to, local things.

In Clackmannanshire, Creative Scotland spends not a penny—nothing. I think that we heard David Green tell the chamber last week that North Lanarkshire gets 39p per head, and I know that Edinburgh gets £30-odd per head. Meanwhile, Clackmannanshire gets nothing at all. That said, I note the mention that was made of the touring workshops. Robert Burns was brought to my kids’ school in Clackmannanshire, and the show was really enjoyed by everyone who saw it. Is there more that Creative Scotland could do, perhaps working with the Scottish Government, Scottish Enterprise and others, to be quite hard-headed about raising funding and enabling all of you to do other things?

We have already heard that appeal in the chamber during this parliamentary session.

I have a quick question for Joseph Peach. The Scottish Parliament is often accused of legislating for its own sake. What changes in law, through a culture bill, would be beneficial?

In previous years, many people from the sector have advocated that the committee should put pressure on the Scottish Government to allow cultural and arts organisations to take part in meetings relating to other portfolios. I have not heard that today, but I think that Veronique was hinting at it.

I come back to my question about whether there is any way in which the sector could come together to make a joint approach to the Government. For example, it could decide that, this year, it should concentrate on the basics—building up facilities—even if that meant that it would have to forgo other things. Is there no scope for the sector to make a joint approach to the Government? I appreciate that other actors, such as schools, are involved, but is there any scope for that in relation to the Scottish Government’s budget allocations?

Because we are short of time, I will not ask my second question, which was going to be on that idea of travelling around the world and the impact of Brexit on the sector. I am very pleased that Fiona Campbell mentioned Covid in that regard, because that is a huge influence that we do not pay enough attention to.

I have two questions: the first is for Lucy Casot and Liam Sinclair, and the second one is for Joseph Peach. First, though, I would just observe that, to be honest, it is amazing how quickly the one area of Government expenditure that we can identify as having a substantial uplift has generated a counsel of despair. However, I understand the points that have been made by Lucy Casot and Joseph Peach in relation to the long tail of constrained budgets that has led to underlying issues that will not be solved by one uplift.

Given the fact that the UK is £3 trillion in debt and has to deal with all the issues that we know of from the 17 years of austerity budgets, it seems unlikely that there is going to be a very substantial uplift from any Government to deal with some of the outstanding issues, in which case we have to look at other approaches.

I appreciate the extent to which this issue has been mentioned, but in relation to museums, in particular, although it might also be true of the wider sector, what can be done to better exploit—I am happy to use that word, although some people are not—for commercial benefit the vast treasure trove of things that museums in Scotland have? Has any analysis been done of the financial benefits that accrued from initiatives such as the Wallace sword going across to New York? I have bored the committee with that example before, but it brought important benefits for the Wallace monument in terms of its upkeep and running cost for a number of years afterwards. Another example is the world’s oldest football going across to the world cup this year, although that was a pretty damp squib, with not much being made of it at all.

Given some of the artefacts that we have in Scotland and the ability to exhibit things that are very appealing to discrete sectors overseas—I am thinking of things related to clan histories and so on—are you happy that there is enough systematic examination of such opportunities and of what such opportunities might realise in cash terms, which could help pay for the things that Lucy Casot talked about, such as keeping the doors of facilities open and ensuring that the facilities are serviced? To what extent is that currently happening, and is there the potential to do more of it?

From my point of view—this will probably go beyond your time as interim appointees—there should really be a root-and-branch review of all the assets that HES is responsible for, and we should find out whether there are any groups, such as clans overseas, that are interested in certain properties, so that we can tap into that interest by holding events, as you just said, Mr Uphill.

You mentioned that Edinburgh castle is hugely successful. I am interested in how its audience spreads out to places such as Stirling, for the benefit of the rest of Scotland.

On the point that Mr Hinds made, if there is competition for resources, which there always will be, one of the remedies for that is to increase the resources that are available to you, and some imagination and drive behind that would be welcome. However, I am not dismissing the importance of looking after what you currently have. In relation to that, in Stirling, the council has developed a number of sites around the battlefields of Bannockburn. HES has now agreed to come on a site visit to one of those sites, where the English army gathered before the battle. However, when HES was consulted on the project by the council, it had nothing to say about the importance of the site—it just nodded it through. The issue with that is that the council would have been looking to HES to provide advice based on its expertise about what it is important to preserve. Looking after such sites is important. Have you found any evidence of the issue that I am talking about, in the short time that you have been in your role?

I thank both witnesses for the work that they are doing just now. You were probably not expecting to be questioned on local government reform, but there you go. On public sector reform, let us hope that WICS does not go down the route that has been taken in England and Wales, with private water companies, because that is a whole other ball game.

As a caveat to my question, I note that you are both in interim positions, so I wonder how much you can affect the forward direction of the organisation. For a number of years, I have been concerned—this is almost the opposite of what Colin Beattie asked about—that the obvious troubles at HES have prevented a proper focus on the commercialisation and exploitation of the assets that it holds. I know that this will be some way down the line, but I will give a few examples.

There are two Alexander Graham Bell visitor centres in North America. He was born in South Charlotte Street, in Edinburgh, where there is an engraving on a stone and nothing else. It is right around the corner from the Johnnie Walker experience, but we do not exploit it at all.

In my constituency, we have Clackmannan tower. This issue came up before the obvious problems, but it is listed by HES as being open but has not been open to the public for years. Work has been done to make it wind and watertight, but it has never been open. Apparently, Robert the Bruce held an early Parliament there, in the 14th century. Cambuskenneth abbey is also in my constituency. It is an incredible asset; it is where Bruce went with his army after the Battle of Bannockburn. I recently inherited it in the new boundaries of my constituency and, having visited it, I can say that there is nothing pointing to it at all, but there would be interest in it.

On the one hand, it is important that HES changes its attitude and looks for the niche interests. Another example is Badbea, which is up in David Green’s area, it is where people were cleared to the edge of a cliff during the clearances. It is a desolate and tragic place, but there would be huge interest in that internationally. However, there is nothing there to highlight it.

I go back to the point that was made before about how we can marry up two things: preserving the heritage that we have and properly using it for profit—and I do not think that profit should be a dirty word in this context. In 2005, we took William Wallace’s sword from the Wallace monument across to New York and called it the Braveheart sword. It got huge attention, and the increase in visitor numbers at the Wallace monument—which, thankfully, is now back in my constituency for the first time in years—helped pay for the refurbishment of the visitor centre at the monument. That is how those two things can sit together. We can use profits to upgrade and protect the assets that we have.

However, I am not convinced at all that there is impetus for that or that that is the existing culture. I am interested in your views as to whether you have found that to be the case. There must be assets around the country that we could use more effectively.

Only during the past few years have Americans started coming back in real numbers. Do you do anything at the Edinburgh festival and fringe to get people to go further afield and visit places such as those that I have mentioned? Do you think that that culture is there, or are there signs that it might be there in future?

It is probably true to say that, over time, the committee will become more aware of the difference between the situation for culture and that for other parts of Government, because the £100 million increase with a £50 million increase on top is pretty unusual for Government functions. It is different compared with what happened before the £100 million kicked in and with what happened in other parts of the UK. It is a pretty strong position.

As always, we have heard a fair bit of special pleading today. We have heard it from performing companies and you will hear it from various festivals and from rural Scotland. Previously, we have heard it from people representing the northern isles. However, it is true to say that figures from the Government and the previous cabinet secretary showed that the lowest expenditure was in Clackmannanshire. I am trying to think whether that was expenditure generally or just from Creative Scotland, but it was roughly—in fact, exactly—zero.

The need in Clackmannanshire is just as great as it is anywhere else. It is a semi-rural area. I have tried not to do special pleading on that, but I will add my voice to those others to say that coming to see an organisation such as Resonate Together in Clackmannanshire would be a good move to let you see for yourself what the landscape is like.

I will move on to my substantial point. I do not know whether this is exactly one for Screen Scotland, but you will be aware of the decision by the BBC to end “River City”. That has ended a source of employment for indigenous talent, such as sound technicians, camera folk, writers and actors. That constant presence was vital to the ecosystem of creative arts in Scotland, and it strikes me that the availability of such talent is probably quite important to people such as Netflix and Paramount when they are considering locating productions here.

I imagine that the Scottish Government would not want to be in the business of trying to ensure that there is a baseline of talent here, but working with Screen Scotland and others towards that aim could pay huge dividends. We already see huge success with movies being shot in Scotland, but having more substantial productions would be a huge benefit as well. Is that on your radar?

Yes. We spoke with Mr Mackie last week, and I mentioned this at the time. It has been a long time since I have studied constitutions and so on, but there does not seem to be any comparator with the architectural jumble, inadequacies and ad hoc nature of what is in place just now. Much of that was agreed: that certainly represents the outcome that the committee came to as part of its investigation.

Given that, and given some of the tensions that exist, does the Scottish Government have, or intend to get, a proposal on what the architecture should look like, ideally, to best take account of the devolved Administrations and other such aspects? For example, meetings only happen when it comes up the Prime Minister’s humph. Who actually sets the agenda? How much information is passed on afterwards? I know how frustrated ministers feel when they try to get a hold of certain ministers. It all depends too much on individual personal relationships, which is no basis for a proper functioning system.

In short, does the Scottish Government intend to put any proposal to the UK Government about what the architecture could look like, ideally?