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Travel restrictions have meant that colleagues and I have not been able to travel to speak to people on the ground in our partner countries. However, during my most recent visit to London, I had the benefit of meeting diplomats from those countries at Scotland House, which is our excellent representative office. From speaking to the diplomats from our African partner countries, I know the tremendous appreciation that there is of the international development work that Scotland does. However, you are right to point out that there has been a review to ensure that what we deliver on the ground is, frankly, what people in those countries are looking for rather than perhaps priorities that are made in northern Europe and what we might think is important for our friends and colleagues elsewhere in the world.

On the reorientation of our principles of international development in the review, I can highlight four changes. One is to build back fairer and stronger. That is about an evolution of our funding and restructuring our current funding schemes.

Secondly, there is the global south programme panel. In our programme for government, we announced that we would establish a panel of experts by experience who principally work and reside in the global south. That goes back to the point that I tried to make about making sure that we have key input from people in the countries that we work with, led at ministerial level, to help us to ensure that global south voices are properly heard.

The third area is updating our funding criteria to ensure that we actually deliver that which we want to deliver and have the impact that we want to have in our partner countries.

The fourth area is ensuring that our international development offer is focused on the best matches and the asks from the partner countries that we work in.

Thank you very much, convener. I am losing track of how many times I have been with the committee recently—I think that this is my fifth or sixth evidence session. I am delighted to be back, and I am happy to answer the committee’s questions.

First, I want to make a few remarks about events this week, not least because of what they might mean for the committee’s powers and role.

On Monday, the UK Government published what it called “The Benefits of Brexit: How the UK is taking advantage of leaving the EU” to mark the second anniversary of the United Kingdom leaving the European Union. As a political distraction from events at number 10, it clearly failed. It is no surprise that it failed. The simple truth is that there is a profound absence of Brexit benefits, whereas the disbenefits are all too evident. New polling this week showed that 75 per cent of people in Scotland have a negative opinion about whether the UK has benefited from Brexit and only 2 per cent of people in Scotland believe that Boris Johnson delivered a good Brexit deal. It is clear that, for people in Scotland, the proclaimed benefits of iconic blue passports and crown markings on pint glasses are small beer that does nothing to redress the significant step backwards that Brexit has meant for our trading position within the European Union and the wider benefits of EU membership.

The document celebrates an “ambitious Export Strategy”, but the truth is that Scotland’s total trade with the EU fell by 24 per cent in the year to September 2021 compared with 2019. For example, Scotland can no longer export the 20,000 to 30,000 tonnes of seed potatoes that we used to sell to the EU and Northern Ireland.

The document boasts of securing trading deals, but even the UK Government’s own research shows that there is little or no economic benefit from the new agreements that have been signed. The document also boasts of

“A highly-resilient food supply chain”,

with no acknowledgement of the significant labour shortages that are being experienced across the sector, especially in rural Scotland.

The document celebrates taking back control of our waters, but neglects to mention that total UK fish exports in the first four months of 2021 were 27 per cent lower than they were in same period in 2018 and that, because of new UK immigration rules, an average of 20 to 25 per cent of vacancies in the seafood industry are unfilled.

The document trumpets new initiatives to “tackle criminal activity”, but the reality is that, post-Brexit, we are now outside key policing tools, such as the Schengen information system and the European arrest warrant system, which makes it much harder for Police Scotland to combat criminality and for prosecutors to bring people to justice in Scotland.

The document claims that £1 billion of red tape will be cut, but it ignores the fact that UK Government officials have estimated that British companies that trade with Europe will have to fill in an extra 215 million customs declarations at a cost of a whopping £7 billion a year. It also ignores the fact that cutting red tape usually simply means undermining environmental standards, workers’ rights or quality standards, which is bad in itself and a sure way to trigger significant further disputes with the European Union under the trade and co-operation agreement.

The UK Government promised that the UK shared prosperity fund would, at a minimum, match the size of the EU structural funds in each nation each year, but the current spending plans fall far short of replacing the EU funds. The reality is that the “levelling up” that was announced yesterday for Scotland actually means “losing out”.

That is not all—do not worry, convener; I am not going to talk for much longer. There is very little good news, but we need to point out the bad news.

On interrelationships post-Brexit, I have spent a considerable amount of my time, as did Jenny Gilruth—and Neil Gray has hit the ground running as her successor—on our continuing relationship with our European partners, whether at the European institution level or at a bilateral level. We have a high-tempo level of engagement to try to make sure that we are still plugged in to the thinking of our European partners. That matters to us very directly and it is a very current issue.

If we take what is going on with the Northern Ireland protocol as an example, we need to be fully sighted on what is happening with all of that, not least because we are set to have a border post constructed in Scotland as a result of the UK Government’s agreement with the European Union. We know that the UK Government is resiling from its own agreement. The news from Northern Ireland in the past 24 hours has been extremely fast moving. We probably do not have time to go into working out what it means, but we have had a Northern Ireland minister refusing to see border control posts operating. That is in direct contravention to the international agreement that was signed by the UK Government.

Since then, we have had the announcement that the First Minister of Northern Ireland is resigning. Today is a day when what is happening is extremely dramatic, and what is happening matters to us: it relates directly to issues in and around Brexit and how we are supposed to be emerging beyond Brexit. It illustrates why it is important for us to have continuing deep and trusting relationships with our interlocutors, and we are doing that.

Are we going to do more of that? Yes. We have to have the best possible relationships. I know that you have a particular interest in the workings of the Scottish representative offices, so I should say that that is one of the things that they are able to do: they can nurture and further the relationships that we have in Brussels and other European capitals.

Having made that point, I will segue to your point about what we can learn from other places. The point about Copenhagen and Denmark is extremely well made. There are different things that we are probably best able to learn from different countries. You highlighted Denmark’s environmental policy, and I whole-heartedly agree with your point. We can learn a lot from our Nordic neighbours in that respect. As I have mentioned to the committee before, we can also learn a lot from Denmark and its neighbouring countries in the cultural sphere, particularly with regard to what they have been able to do in screen production and broadcasting. Like me, many members of the committee are acknowledged fans of Scandi noir and have watched amazing television series that have been produced by DR, the Danish public broadcaster. I am keen to learn from what those countries have been able to do so successfully.

I think that I have covered the two parts of your question—first, on ensuring that we have the best possible direct connections with people, and secondly on what we can learn from others—but if I have missed anything, you can come back to me.

I concur with the underlying sentiment of your question, which is about the attractiveness of expanding the network. I have not heard anybody suggest that the places where we are currently located are the wrong places to be. Far from it—the cities and countries that we are in are absolutely the places where we need to be. The next question is: where next? Preceding my time in office, decisions were made that we should look to Copenhagen and then to Warsaw, and those decisions make significant sense.

You are right to ask where we should go after that. You could suggest, given their importance, the Asian subcontinent countries to which we have close cultural and historical connections. You might point to Pakistan and India. You might highlight the importance of Japan as a trading partner. You might pass comment on Australasia as a part of the world to which we have strong historical connections and current trade and tourism connections. You would be right to ask where our presence in Africa is and, when it happens, as I am sure it will, where would be best suited to our having a presence. Of course, we have partner countries there, so should we have a physical presence in one of those, or are there regional capitals where there is a multilateral presence? There are a number of factors that come into play in making any assessment of where next.

I take a different view to you on the scope of the best network that Scotland could have. I have no difficulty in saying that I look forward to Scotland being represented on all the continents of the world. However, even the biggest states in the world have limits to their international networks. There is a process to be worked through for the question of where next. As I signalled to Alasdair Allan, I would be happy to hear members’ views on where they think we should be looking next. There is no monopoly on common sense on that.

I am content with where we are, where we are going next makes perfect sense and I look forward to the network being expanded even further. I am delighted that there seems to be cross-party agreement on that in the committee.

Members of the committee who have had the good fortune to visit Scotland House in Brussels will be aware that there has been a long history of co-operation between different Scottish organisations that have a locus in a European context. In the past in Brussels, there was representation from the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities, the Scottish Government, the Scottish Parliament and so on.

More can be done on co-ordination. That already takes place between Scotland House and other Scottish agencies that are currently represented on the ground. There is a high level of co-operation among people who answer to Scottish Enterprise internationally.

Alasdair Allan made a point about other strands of work that could be undertaken in an enlarged network. That is absolutely true, and we will look at that. However, that could be the case in places in which we already have a presence. There is very successful Scottish Government representation in Paris, for example. Paris is not just the capital city of France; it is home to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, which is in charge of education and culture, both of which are devolved areas. It seems to me that we could broaden and deepen the work that we do in places in which we are already represented, and we can look at places in which we are not yet represented, but perhaps should be.

I am really interested in hearing members’ views on where we should be looking next. Our network is comparable with those of other devolved parts of the world. We are of a comparable size to Québec, Flanders and German Länder, and many such places are increasing their networks.

The committee has taken evidence from colleagues who are in charge of Scotland House operations in a number of capital cities. They are extremely talented people, and I put on record my appreciation of all the work that they and their staff do. We need to grab every opportunity with both hands to ensure that Scotland is represented as widely as possible so that we can enjoy the benefits that such representation brings.

Are you talking about the Scottish Government’s international framework?

I am currently not looking at any update or changes to the arrangements. As things stand, we have a network of international offices. We have excellent people working on the ground around the world in the Scottish Government network and in our economic partners answering to Scottish Enterprise. We are doing what we set out to do.

Should Scotland’s constitutional status change—or when that happens—we most certainly will have to look at the network and the ending of the restrictions on what we can do. I very much look forward to that, because normal countries can develop their international relations in an unrestricted way. However, that is not within the scope of this morning’s evidence session. No doubt, we will come back to it during this session of Parliament as the Scottish Government’s prospectus towards the independence referendum is published.

My earlier query with you related to the updated international framework. That is extremely current and has been worked on. You will be aware that the update was a manifesto and programme for government commitment. We will publish the new global affairs framework in this financial year, so within the next month. It sets out the Scottish Government’s engagement internationally and the values that underpin that engagement, and it demonstrates our wish to be a good global citizen. We have an important role to play in demonstrating high international standards, and we will continue to support our internationalisation agenda to influence the world around us on the issues that matter the most. That is probably the furthest extent that I can go to in giving a sneak peak on the framework, which will be published shortly.

I know that time is short this morning, but I will be happy to share with you information about any specific questions that you have. The work on the priorities of the hubs is not un-transparent. The priorities that they have set are subject to assessment.

We have five key outcomes against which the external network reports. They are improving Scotland’s international reputation; improving Scottish businesses’ ability to trade internationally and more effectively; promoting Scottish research and innovation capability and securing further partnership and funding for it; increasing investment in Scotland; and protecting and enhancing Scotland’s interests in the EU and beyond. Those are the key headline objectives that the network works to.

There will be nuance in different capitals because of the different priorities that we have in different places. For example, it is very easy to see that, in Germany, we are pursuing closer and enhanced relations on renewable energy and hydrogen with the Länder especially, because that makes sense. We have gone through the advantages of the Denmark-based office, and we can go through the others. One advantage is working to those higher goals; there will then be specific areas of focus.

It is great that you have heard directly from colleagues who run hubs such as Scotland House internationally, and I am delighted that you were able to ask them about what they do. That is transparency in action, and I am sure that you will wish to invite them back. I speak to those colleagues extremely regularly. They are very keen to be able to say what they do and how they do it, and I encourage you to learn more about what they do. By and large, the operations are quite small ones by diplomatic standards, but we have extremely talented people out there batting for Scotland, and they are doing a great job. The more we can hear about what they do and the advantages that they bring, the more everybody should be enthused and encouraged.

I could talk at great length about all the activity that is going on in that area. I do not think that I will be able to do the issue justice, especially given the convener’s request for pithy answers.

In speaking to colleagues in our current network, I am always struck by what they say about being involved in this initiative or that event. The Covid restrictions have limited the ability to do much of the conventional outreach work—the soft diplomatic work—that normally takes place. However, last week, I spoke to the new Welsh representative in Brussels about what they hope to achieve for the Welsh Government. I said that they should feel free to work as closely as possible with our colleagues on the ground. I very much hope that there is a professional relationship with the UK mission to the EU. In the past week, Neil Gray spoke to the British ambassador to the EU in Brussels.

I could go on and on about where things work well. I could also point to other areas where there is room to grow. For example, I noticed—I do not want to embarrass the embassy in question, so I will not even mention the continent—a British embassy in a significantly sized country talking with pride about hosting its first ever Burns supper, which made me wonder why it had not been able to host one in the previous 200 years. That shows that there are ways in which we can help to influence the UK diplomatic network to make more of the opportunities to promote Scottish culture and Scotland in a general sense.

There is an opportunity to work well together. I hear lots of examples of that being the case and, in all constitutional eventualities, I look forward to that continuing to be the case.

There are some really good examples of co-location working well. The Nordic nations share an embassy in Berlin, and I think that I am right in saying that the UK and Germany share an embassy in Reykjavik. When it comes to international networks, we can work with one another in all kinds of ways. It would be a thoroughly good thing for us to be imaginative and supportive of one another.