Seòmar agus comataidhean

Thank you. I return to Colin Beattie, who has a further question.

I am prepared to bring in Colin Smyth for a brief question, given that it is his region that is being discussed, after which we will move on to questions from Fiona Hyslop.

Yes, we can hear you.

Audit Scotland published a report this morning. I appreciate you have possibly not had a chance to be made aware of it, but Stephen Boyle was on the radio talking about the amount of funds that were put out during the Covid pandemic. I recognise that there was a need to deliver funds at pace, but Stephen Boyle raised some issues around transparency. I ask Malcolm Roughead and Adrian Gillespie, if Adrian Gillespie is still on the call, how challenging was it to administer the funds? Are you confident that a robust decision-making process had been put in place, and is there enough transparency about how funds were delivered?

That is much appreciated. I now move over to Maggie Chapman.

Thank you. We now move into private session for the remaining agenda items.

That brings us to the end of the evidence session. I thank Adrian Gillespie, Douglas Colquhoun and Malcolm Roughead for attending and for giving us their time.

We will have a short break to allow for the changeover of witnesses.

I welcome our second panel of witnesses, who are Carroll Buxton, interim chief executive of Highlands and Islands Enterprise; Nick Kenton, director of finance and corporate services with Highlands and Islands Enterprise; Jane Morrison-Ross, chief executive of South of Scotland Enterprise; and Anthony Daye, director of finance with South of Scotland Enterprise.

I will start with a question for the chief executives. We have been through a very difficult time with the pandemic, and the committee recognises the difficulties for businesses. What are the most pressing challenges that face businesses in your regions? I will go to Jane Morrison-Ross first.

I put the same questions to Carroll Buxton.

We move to agenda item 4, which is covered in paper 3. The committee is invited to consider the consent notification for the Recognition of Professional Qualifications (Amendment etc) (EU Exit) Regulations 2021. The Scottish Government gave its consent to the instrument during the campaign recess.

The purpose of the instrument is to make minor amendments to revoke savings provisions made in respect of the alert mechanism under the Recognition of Professional Qualifications (Amendment etc) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019 (SI 2019/312). Following the end of the transition period, the European Commission confirmed that it had withdrawn all alerts made by United Kingdom regulators, which made it necessary to amend the 2019 regulations to remove the statutory obligations in question, as they had become inoperable.

Are members content to note the consent notification?

Members indicated agreement.