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Another thing that I understand from conversation with people is that ICIAs are retrospective rather than proactive. I would like to hear a bit more about why people might think that that is the case. You talked earlier about there being some confusion around how ICIAs are used or triggered.

You have talked a lot about the CDOs, who seem to be crucial in ensuring that the plans are taken forward. The ambition is that the project will go up to 2040. Is there a commitment that the CDOs will be resourced throughout the whole time covered by the project?

Do we understand why people think that they are retrospective rather than proactive? Perhaps there is a communication issue there.

Rhoda Grant’s line of questioning was really helpful. How will the £1 million for catalysing and confidence building be divided between the six islands? Will they have to apply for it, or will the money be split evenly? What approach is being taken?

I want to explore a bit more about the ICIAs, following the questions asked by Beatrice Wishart and the convener. I need a bit more explanation so that we can perhaps understand. Island communities are saying to me that the assessments need to be reviewed and that the bodies and directorates that are charged with undertaking them are the same as those that assess whether the impacts have been mitigated sufficiently, so they feel as though the process is somewhat flawed. From the conversation that we have had already, I get a sense that you are listening and taking on the learning, but what would you say in response to the idea that the same bodies that do the assessments are monitoring them? Where is the opportunity for communities to get real consideration?

Thanks for that, Erica. That is really helpful and reassuring. I hear that this is something of an iterative process and that you are listening.

I want to come back to the piece around communities and public bodies and really ensuring that communities get their voices heard. How can we make sure that ICIAs are a mechanism that islanders can use? Examples that have been given to me include ICIAs being used to stop the air traffic control centralisation by Highlands and Islands Airports Limited and address the situation with Mull and Iona ferry capacity.

How can we make sure that ICIAs work for communities? In those two examples, the communities have been trying to raise the issues for quite a long time, and you would think that the assessments would flag them up and help us to be more proactive.

I am sure that we can also have help from Greig Liddell in the Scottish Parliament information centre. I have a host of other questions, but we do not have time to go into them now. Maybe I can pick them up in the round table that we will move on to next.

Thank you to our witnesses for joining us. The session was useful. It was fantastic to have Jackie Weaver’s perspective from England, which was useful for us to hear.

I suspend the meeting to allow us to set up for our round table.

Thank you very much. The clerks will not introduce themselves, but they are here and are really important. We have heard so much about the importance of support and administration, and the committee would not function without those people helping to keep us on track and doing that work.

I will kick off with the same question that I asked the first panel. We are interested in your reflections on the strengths of community councils. We have heard examples of the role that community councils in some areas in Scotland were able to play during the Covid pandemic—earlier, Emma Swift said that that was a demonstration of resilience—and they are also doing work during the cost of living crisis. We are interested in what is happening in your local areas.

That is tremendous.

Alastair Kennedy, do you want to mention any strengths from the Moray perspective?

Thank you. The Scottish Government’s matrix for place making is an example of a useful tool.