Seòmar agus comataidhean

On that note, I suspend the meeting to allow the witnesses to change and to give members a very short comfort break of three minutes or so.

Mr Munro, we heard from some of the organisations that time is of the essence and that they are already having to commit to commercial contracts without knowing what their budget is for this year. You said that you have to have discussions with the Government. Are those already diarised, or do you have an indicative timeline as to when that process might be finished?

You said that the programme depends on national lottery income sales, which is understandable, but is there a formula for its distribution? Is it a proportionate cut or does a shortfall go to Creative Scotland or to all the organisations? You mentioned that six or seven organisations are funded by the process.

You said it is divvied up across the four nations. Is that done geographically, or is it distributed by population?

As there are no further questions from the committee this morning, I thank Iain Munro and Alastair Evans for your attendance.

I wish you a good morning and a warm welcome to the first meeting in 2024 of the Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee. Happy new year to everyone who is participating and watching.

Our first agenda item is to take evidence as part of our budget scrutiny of the culture spending portfolio for 2024-25. This follows the committee’s pre-budget scrutiny last year, and the publication of the budget at the end of December.

Our first evidence session is a round table with culture sector stakeholders. We are joined this morning by Lori Anderson, director, Culture Counts; Shona McCarthy, chief executive, Edinburgh Festival Fringe Society; Francesca Hegyi OBE, chief executive, Edinburgh International Festival; Simon Hunt, director of finance, Scottish Opera; Anne Lyden, director general, National Galleries of Scotland; Fiona Sturgeon Shea, chief executive officer, Federation of Scottish Theatre, who we hope will join us shortly; and Leonie Bell, director, V&A Dundee, who is also slightly delayed. We are joined online by Sam Dunkley, acting regional organiser, Musicians Union.

I offer a warm welcome to you all, and thank you for your written submissions for today’s evidence session. This is a round table, so discussion should be free flowing. Witnesses should indicate to the clerks if they wish to answer a particular question. We have eight witnesses around the table, so if answers could be concise and things that have already been said not repeated, that would be helpful.

I will begin with an opening question. Our pre-budget report concluded that the risks to the future of the culture sector were becoming more severe, and that there was an urgent need for the Scottish Government to restore the confidence of the sector. In your view, to what extent has the budget and the culture strategy action plan responded to the challenges that are facing the sector, and sought to restore its confidence?

Also, what are witnesses reflections on the Scottish Government’s response to the committee’s recommendations on innovative funding solutions?

Thank you. I invite Anne Lyden to make some comments.

Thank you very much, Fiona. I will move to Sam, who joins us online.

Thank you all for your opening contributions. I am now going to move to questions from members. We do not have a lot of time this morning, as we have a second session with Creative Scotland, so I ask you to be succinct and not to repeat points that have already been made.

Shona McCarthy mentioned the visitor levy. Do you want to expand on your thoughts on that?