Chamber and committees

Will there be a lead Government agency for the games sector? Will that be Creative Scotland or Screen Scotland, or will the sector be considered part of the economy and enterprise portfolio?

Good morning, everybody, and welcome to the third meeting in session 7 of the Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee. We have no apologies to record.

The first item of business is a proposal to take items 4 to 6 on today’s agenda in private. Do we agree to take those items in private?

Members indicated agreement.

I will follow up on some of those themes. A range of mechanisms can be used, and some would regard their use as the UK Government legitimately protecting its constitutional position. Others would perhaps characterise it as abuse of that power, whether around breaches of the Sewel convention; the use of the internal market act, which was mentioned earlier; or the use of section 35 of the Scotland Act 1998 in relation to the Gender Recognition Reform (Scotland) Bill, which is one of the most extensively consulted on and scrutinised pieces of legislation that this Parliament has ever debated, with literally years of prior process and no indication from the UK Government that it intended to take that action. Many people took the view that that action was taken specifically because the UK Government politically opposed the policy, instead of for technical reasons.

If I think back to the not-so-happy days of the Smith commission—I do not know whether the First Minister’s recollection of the process is the same as mine—there was an expectation that there would be a range of actionable mechanisms in place, whereby, for example, if there was a breach of the Sewel convention, the Scottish Government would be able to take action to prevent that, or, where power was misused, that would be challengeable. That has turned out not to be the case. Is there any possibility of having a more robust framework in place, whether that is about defining the exemptions under the internal market act or limiting more clearly the circumstances in which other UK powers can be exercised? Is there a reachable robust framework that can prevent the abuse of these powers by a subsequent Government that is more ill-intentioned than we hope the current one is?

We all hope that it stays that way.

Our next item is an evidence session on the Scottish Government’s priorities regarding intergovernmental relations. I welcome Jenny Gilruth, the Deputy First Minister, and Chris Mackie, the deputy director for the constitution and United Kingdom relations. Thank you very much for joining us.

I invite the DFM to give us any opening remarks.

Did you want to come on to any other issues?

Let us carry on with that.

I am aware that other members have questions, but we might need to save them for a future evidence session, as we have another cabinet secretary coming in a few minutes’ time.

For the time being, I thank Chris Mackie and the Deputy First Minister for their attendance. We will no doubt have opportunities to follow up on the range of issues that we have discussed.

I suspend the meeting for a few minutes for a comfort break and a changeover of witnesses.

10:27

Meeting suspended.

10:32

On resuming—

The reason why I picked out that phrase is that it opens up the possibility that you have in mind a more fundamental restructuring of the types of organisations that exist to manage cultural assets. You will be very well aware that that was a serious concern for our predecessor committee.

In your opening remarks, you talked about seeking the recovery of Historic Environment Scotland. That has been the subject of ongoing discussion. The previous cabinet secretary with responsibility for culture tried to reassure us that a plan was in place, that people were in place and that that recovery was under way and would be well managed.

Now, the organisation has gone back into another period of significant uncertainty, with interim postholders in place and, I am sure, a great deal of anxiety for the people who work for it. At the moment, I am unclear about whether the Government has a clear sense of whether the organisation will recover in its current form or whether other options are on the table for how those functions will be carried out.

I have a quick follow-up and then Keith Brown has a question. I am keen to pin down and fully understand what you have said about the timing of a culture and arts bill. The SNP’s manifesto uses the phrase,

“consult to develop a Culture and Arts Bill”,

and talks about that happening

“By the end of the next parliament”—

that is, this session of Parliament. Some people might have read that and thought that it means the development of a bill during this session, rather than only consultation. Is the Government open to having a bill pass in this session, if consensus emerges in the sector about what is needed in it?