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Claire Baker and I are both involved in the cross-party group on culture and communities. Tayside Healthcare Arts Trust has spoken a lot about the importance of arts and culture supporting people through illness and chronic conditions, which was very helpful.

Councillor Heddle has his hand up. You are sitting in Orkney, which probably has more brown signs at roadsides per head of population than the rest of Scotland, so you are absolutely at the centre of the cultural sector.

That is what happens when you start making a list.

I thank the witnesses for joining us and for their written evidence.

Iain Munro, you talked in your evidence about trying to declutter the funding landscape and about a group that you have set up, or are part of, with Highlands and Islands Enterprise, South of Scotland Enterprise and Scottish Enterprise. Will you elaborate on the benefits of that and on how you have been progressing with that work?

Mr Munro, either in your submission or in the SPICe report, there was a mention of the varying income that comes from the Heritage Lottery Fund and from the national lottery. I think that the funding was at a high of more than £32 million during 2016-17, but it has fluctuated since then. Do you have any comments to make about why that is and the impact that that has?

That is very helpful.

Earlier this week, I visited Campbeltown grammar school, and I was interested in the importance that it attaches to art and music throughout its students’ learning. That tied in with a lot of what was discussed during the culture summit in the Parliament, when Claire Baker hosted a session on Ukraine.

You have talked about the usefulness of the UNESCO meeting in Paris in enabling you to hear about what other countries are doing and learn from them, and in allowing them to learn from Scotland. I am interested in your thoughts on how Scotland can support Ukraine from a cultural perspective.

That is helpful. When I drove past Stirling, I noticed that there was a big film base there. Clearly, the film industry is busy.

Last week, I attended a meeting of the cross-party group on India. The meeting was about trade, and it highlighted the important role that culture plays when countries are beginning and maintaining trade relationships. I am interested in whether, as part of your work through your partnerships with the development agencies, you are feeding in cultural aspects to plans for business expansion. Martin Booth, I notice that you are nodding. Do you want to add anything to that?

I recognise that there is collaboration between local authorities and the third sector across many different areas, including health and wellbeing. We heard from Mr Booth about Glasgow. Councillor Heddle, is there anything from a collaborative learning perspective that smaller councils such as Orkney Islands Council and Argyll and Bute Council, which is my own, can bring to the table in relation to how they operate when embedding culture in different areas?

I will add to that list. Museums Galleries Scotland also did an amazing job of getting funding out. I think that it made the decision that organisations should have three months of reserves to keep them going, which was very helpful. Local authorities also helped.

I will change the topic slightly. As you know, we have just taken evidence from Iain Munro of Creative Scotland. He spoke about the importance of the culture budget, but also highlighted the importance of cross-portfolio conversations. For example, I attended a meeting of the cross-party group on India at which we talked about trade, but culture is a really important part of that, as was recognised by the Minister for Business, Trade, Tourism and Enterprise, Ivan McKee.

We also talked about wellbeing. Last year, you were joined in an evidence session by the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Care, and we talked a bit about social prescribing and how the culture portfolio might be able to help in that. Iain Munro finished his evidence by saying that we must proceed with that in a determined way. Therefore, I am interested to know what the Scottish Government is doing in that area.

I would imagine that the knowledge that Historic Environment Scotland has would be useful, too. Indeed, Mr Cameron asked earlier about restoring buildings and so on.