Chamber and committees

If it is very brief.

Bob Doris, do you wish to ask a supplementary?

In that case, I will let you in before I bring in Kevin Stewart.

I have a couple of questions before we finish. We have had wide discussion of financial transactions. My understanding of financial transactions is that they are consequences of UK Government spending. The former First Minister initially described them as a con before they were seen as a solution to funding the Scottish National Investment Bank. The Scottish Government has said that it assumes that there will be no further financial transactions. I come back to the Scottish National Investment Bank. The £2 billion funding is dependent on financial transactions, and the Scottish Government assumes that there will be no further financial transactions. What discussions are you having with it about alternatives, and how confident are you about the £2 billion, given that assumption?

I have the same question for Scottish Enterprise about the assumption that there will be no further financial transactions, which play a significant part in your funding. There are options for the Scottish Government to transfer funds from resource to capital budgets. Would you ask it to do that, and what discussions are you having about alternative funding?

Other members will ask about those areas, so there will be an opportunity to say a bit more about them then. I am about to hand over to Lorna Slater, who will pick up on some of those themes, but, before I do, do you have any comment on the decision to move ScotWind’s revenues to resource funding?

Good morning and welcome to the 24th meeting of the Economy and Fair Work Committee in 2024. I have received apologies from Michelle Thomson, and Bob Doris is attending as a committee substitute. Colin Smyth will attend today’s meeting online.

Our first item of business is a decision to take agenda item 4 in private. Are members content to do so?

Members indicated agreement.

The ScotWind money was supposed to have been raised for investment in the offshore and renewables sector. The proposal to spend it on funding a shortfall this year means that that opportunity has been lost. Do you have any concerns about that, or does it present challenges for how we develop our renewables sector?

Finally, I have a question for the Scottish National Investment Bank. When you were here in June last year, we had a discussion about the finance that was provided to Circularity Scotland. As part of that, you said that you were reviewing the decision-making process. Is that process complete, and have you learned any lessons from it?

Professor Roy, do you want to add anything about what the barriers to private finance might be? Professor Bell spoke about interconnectedness between the UK Government and the Scottish Government and how addressing the challenges needs to be a shared venture. Is there more that we could do in Scotland to address the barriers to private finance, or are we waiting to see what the UK Government will do?