Seòmar agus comataidhean

My last question will give Louise Maclean a chance to come in. I imagine that there are very particular challenges for women working in hospitality. Returning to the original theme of the session, what specific things can the Scottish Government can do in your sector for the women working in it?

Before I ask my main questions, I want to go back to the earlier question about training. I think that Donna Bell said that some programme management training, particularly around financial management and scheduling, was involved, but from my experience as a programme manager many years ago, I know that those are the fundamentals. You cannot deliver anything without a basic knowledge of scheduling and financial matters.

Therefore, I have to say that that worried me a wee bit. What on earth made you think before that you could deliver anything without having that basic skill set in place first of all?

I am pleased to hear that, but it makes me wonder what on earth was happening before if that was not in place to tackle a bill of such scale. Those are fundamental skills. I have often seen situations where the focus has been on policy but there has not been the associated rigour in respect of delivery. Minister, are you now confident that that skill set is in place across the board, given how fundamental it is to delivery?

Following on from that, I recall that one of our previous concerns about the use of secondary legislation was that such an approach lacked scrutiny of what could be significant spend over the long term. Will the new approach of evolution rather than revolution result in more secondary legislation, which might mean less on-going oversight of spend by the Finance and Public Administration Committee? Is that not a logical extension of the approach?

I would very much welcome further opportunities for us to capture baseline costs as near up front as possible, instead of seeing them slip into secondary legislation. Please feel free to write to the committee after the meeting with any additional ideas, because I suspect that this will be a concern for all members.

I have a wee point off the back of that. We have not discussed the national care service board and the governance therein today, although we may well at some point in future but, in the light of the current situation, I would expect to see the same rigour in its financial governance as in the policy element and standard governance. Again, I ask that you give that just as much attention, with a bottom-up as well as a top-down approach.

I want to pick up on the point that Liz Smith made. As well as finance, the committee is concerned with public administration, and we all know that the public purse is right under the cosh and every penny is a prisoner, if I may use that terminology. That suggests that the relentless focus on cost and value must be accentuated, but I am not necessarily sure that I am confident about that yet. For example, we all concur that the Verity house agreement is about a positive process but we do not yet understand how the fiscal framework will operate, because that work has not been done.

I suppose that the question is whether, as well as the top-down, policy-driven and thematic approach that you have outlined, you are doing the work to ensure that every single funding line is managed very tightly. That underpinning will give the committee confidence, not just on the finances but in terms of the public administration part of our remit.

Being able to follow the money will work for us, I sense.

Good morning, everybody. We started this conversation with the convener asking about confidence. Sandy, what impact do you see on investor confidence and products in your sector of Rishi Sunak’s recent U-turn on net zero commitments?

Continuing on the theme of confidence, I am interested in the nature of confidence in women-led businesses. How is that distinct from the situation in male-led businesses? What is your data telling you?