Chamber and committees

Professor Young, do you have any comments about what we should be doing to attempt to mitigate the potentially damaging impact of the bill?

Dr Hood, do you want to respond on that issue? We are now six years on from the vote, and suddenly all this legislation has to be wrapped up in a year. It will be incredibly hard for us to scrutinise it. What would your advice to the Scottish Parliament be on ensuring that we do not miss out on any vital legislation that might change people’s lives here?

Perhaps I can follow up on those comments with Mr Livingstone, given his remarks about risk and uncertainty. What risk assessments should we, as parliamentarians, be carrying out to identify elements of the legislation that might be most vulnerable in the process?

I would add, as a postscript, that thousands of Ukrainians already live in Scotland, so could we create opportunities for people who are skilled in that sector and have those language skills? Could we make those connections?

Picking up on that last point, I, too, wonder what we do after today. Perhaps something that we need to think about is how we record some of the ideas that have been shared so that we can then share them with our cultural and higher education sectors and the Scottish Government. I am thinking, for example, of Erasmus, where things could be done, and are examples of best practice, including what the British Council is doing, that we could share more widely.

That was just a quick response to the previous comments. I just think that, if we did that, we would not lose the ideas that have come from around the table and it might encourage other people to think about what they could do, which would be a good thing.

On the theme of places, we obviously have twinning, but I am also wondering about the connections that can be made with institutions; after all, it is now a lot easier to make connections online. Some of the most inspiring things that I have seen have involved live broadcasts, but that sort of thing requires a lot of co-ordination. It might sound simple to put on a film, but people need to build and curate that. Are there any opportunities to make connections with our broadcasting companies to help people whether they are in Scotland or Ukraine—or, indeed, on the MS Victoria? Have we got the physical broadcasting capacity to make those connections?

That is a really good point. When it comes to the people, the partnerships, the links that we have, the better links that could be developed and the work that is being done by the British Council, it is all about how that work is promoted.

Before the meeting, Jenni Minto and I talked about individual sponsorship for sculpture in Scotland. There is something about giving people that opportunity, whether they are corporate sponsors or individuals who make donations to existing cultural organisations in Scotland that are doing that outreach work and supporting artists through the “perfect storm” that is talked about in the committee report that was published on Monday. How do we make such connections?

Looking forward, we have the excellent piece of work from the British Council, which is mapping what is coming in arts and festival organisations. Are there ways to co-ordinate so that individual artists can think, “In six months, I could be at X festival in Scotland”? Obviously, I am thinking of the Edinburgh international festivals and the range of opportunities there.

Is there something that we could do as a committee to help to make those connections? An example might be for us to write to the cabinet secretary, sharing the ideas that have come out today and talking about Erasmus—I am thinking about the points about visas and planning ahead. Are there things that we could do to give the work a degree of energy and include the connectivity that has come from this round-table discussion?

It has been really good to hear the evidence that we have heard so far. I want to follow up the question that Jenni Minto has just asked, which was about how we support people who have come to Scotland.

The witnesses have said that Ukrainians are already self-organising, which is great to hear, but we need to think about how we make connections with them. I know that there is the work that the British Council is doing and that the conservatoire has had fantastic initiatives, and we have also taken evidence from our national and local cultural organisations, which are facing challenges. What is the win-win in terms of networking and bringing people together? For example, the support that the Ukrainian community in Edinburgh gives people is off the chart, and we need to think about how we make connections there. Glasgow’s twinning links have been mentioned, and we have something similar in Edinburgh, too.

When I visited the ship a few weeks ago, I was struck by the number of people who were online or working. As we have learned during Covid, it is still possible to make these connections; we just need somebody to curate them and a bit of money to try to pull people together.

What opportunities can we support in Scotland? How can we support Ukrainian artists who have come here and then support networking with people back in Ukraine? We need to think about how we create connectivity. We have been talking about the wellbeing benefits of arts and culture, and the witnesses have talked about keeping their culture and identity alive. There is potential for networks that take in those ambitions, but the question is how we curate that and support people in making those connections.

I see that Professor Sharkey has some thoughts about how we could do that.

I will be brief, because I know that we have to wind up at some point.

To follow on from the Eurovision comment, there is the whole issue of film and broadcast media. Broadcast media are fantastic at telling us what is happening now. However, we had a humanitarian emergency fund meeting last week, and I am wondering whether there is a space for more stories of the people who are helped by the fund or of what is happening next. That is partly about communicating culture. People are still creating drama and documentaries. Is there scope for our broadcast media in Scotland, such as the BBC, Channel 4 and STV, to do more work in that regard to communicate those stories, both in Scotland and more broadly?

I thank both of you for giving us those comments. I think that there has been a huge level of objection. My colleague David Lammy said that the bill gifts ministers unaccountable powers, so I think that the points made by the cabinet secretary are important for all of us to reflect on. I am guessing that the challenge will be how the Scottish Government responds in terms of our parliamentary accountability, given that at this stage you do not know what it is you would be expected to bring forward and what the timescales are. Having this exchange today is very helpful.

Thank you for that. Professor Barnard, do you have similar concerns about transparency and accountability in the legislation?