Chamber and committees

It has been an informative evidence session. I want to focus on young people. All your written submissions referred to harnessing the transformative power of education for climate stewardship. We have heard about the young people’s forest and about the COP youth conference. How are your organisations working with young people in Scotland and perhaps connecting their voices with the voices of young people in the global south?

It is not so much a question; it is more of a comment. I was pleased to see Carolyn Sawers’s face light up when she talked about the young people’s forest. I have a connection, in that I am the champion for Celtic rainforests, so if possible I would like you to put that on your list of suggestions for the woodland.

That was a powerful point about what we want to achieve with the funding.

I would like to return to the education side. I asked the previous panel about the transformative power of education and young people being involved in climate change and climate justice. What have you learned about that from the work that you have done, perhaps in Malawi, and through your connections with young people in Scotland? I would be interested to hear your thoughts on that.

We heard Dr Pizzi’s views on the Scottish veterinary service, but how do the other panellists think the services in Scotland could be changed or improved? Dr Pizzi might want to add to his earlier comments.

I was interested in what you just said about the various challenges, and I would be interested to hear more about the work that you hope to do on climate emergency and the sustainability plan.

I was struck by something else in your evidence. It goes against what you have just said about different funding streams, but you give the example of the Creatives Rebuild New York initiative and the philanthropy that came into that. Is that something that you are looking to explore through creatives rebuild Scotland? As Ms Boyack said, the amount of economic benefit that the creative industries put into Scotland is large. I am interested to hear about those two slightly diverse things in relation to forward planning and finance.

That is right.

It goes slightly wider than that, convener. Before I start, however, I refer everyone to my entry in the register of members’ interests and to the fact that I am trustee of a small independent museum on Islay.

I want to widen out the conversation by considering the impact of the pandemic on the whole area of arts and culture, and how funding came to each of your organisations. What have you learned from that funding? The process to get funds out to people who needed it was far quicker in some respects.

I also want to look at this from the staycation perspective. I note the importance of not just investing in the central belt—more people are coming out to the wider parts of Scotland. From a culture perspective, how are your sectors supporting that shift of visitors and telling the story of the areas where people are visiting?

I do not know if you want to start with that, Ms Casot, or shall we give you a bit of a rest?

I will ask a slightly different question. Your submission mentioned the importance of research and development spend to allow the creative industries to come up with ideas. John McVay of the Producers Alliance for Cinema and Television mentioned that as well. What has been the success rate of that, if that is a fair question?

That was very helpful—thank you very much.

Yes—looking across the whole area, rather than farm by farm.