Chamber and committees

The overall budget savings from my portfolio that have been outlined total around £61.5 million. I reiterate that I cannot stress enough to the committee how challenging the position is in my portfolio and across Government, and that we are trying to tackle some of the challenges that we face.

I just want to make clear to the committee that the vast majority of savings that have been put forward in my portfolio are from ring-fenced funding—although the sum has been offered as a saving, it ultimately has to come back to the portfolio because it cannot be spent in other ways. Some of the other savings that have been put forward are in relation to re-forecasts of some of our demand-led schemes and controls on recruitment.

We still try to deliver on our priorities as best we possibly can, while recognising the significant challenges that we face. I hope that that gives a broad outline of the savings that have been put forward.

Yes, that is right. The funding will come back to the portfolio.

No problem. On your first point, I clarify that the funding will come back to the portfolio. I will discuss with the Deputy First Minister when and how that will happen. It will have to be spent on the ring-fenced purpose. It is ring-fenced funding and cannot be spent in any other area, and it has to be returned to the portfolio—we are talking about the £33 million of savings that had been identified.

As I said, the capital allocations that we have been given are flat and falling. The funding that we would expect to receive in future years is coming through as resource, not capital, so we face particular issues in that regard. I know how vital capital spend is. The first round of the sustainable agriculture capital grant scheme was very successful. We faced really constrained budgets over the past financial year, which is why we had to target that funding, with a particular focus on slurry, given the new regulations. We allocated the full £5 million of the agriculture transformation fund to that, too.

I emphasise that the savings that have been put forward do not impact on any current spend or on the national test programme, to which we have committed £51 million over this year and the next two years. We are committed to maintaining those levels of funding.

Yes. We set out those commitments in our manifesto and in our vision for agriculture, in which we talk about introducing 50 per cent conditionality by 2025. That commitment is still there.

I will be happy to keep the committee informed as plans for the commission develop. I am not able to provide too much more information on that today, because we are committed to timescales in the Good Food Nation (Scotland) Act 2022 in relation to when a good food nation plan will be introduced. Given the nature of the food commission as set out in the legislation, we will be working to establish the commission on a similar timescale to that for the development of the plan.

The budget that we have projected for the food commission is based largely on that of similar-sized Government bodies. We believe those figures to be representative of the size of the food commission and what it will be expected to deliver. As I say, I am not able to give much more detail on that today, but I would be happy to keep the committee informed as things develop.

Yes, but we have specific powers. The Scottish Government should be given that funding so that we can allocate it in line with our policy priorities.

Any extra funding that we get is, of course, to be welcomed, but not when it is provided without any consultation with the devolved Administrations, which have responsibility for those policy areas. If the money had been given to the devolved Administrations, we could have aligned it with our priorities, and we would not have conflicting processes and priorities, which clutters the landscape and makes it even more difficult for people to apply to the funds.

We cannot underestimate the scale of the challenge that has been presented to my portfolio and others across the Scottish Government. As a result of the United Kingdom Government’s spending review last December and the inflationary pressures that you have mentioned, we have seen a £1.7 billion shortfall. The review came when inflation was sitting at about 3 per cent—but just look at the rates that we are experiencing now.

The situation has been particularly challenging. In my portfolio, we are trying to give people as much stability and clarity as we can. We want to protect the work that is being delivered through the islands programme and ensure that we are continuing to deliver across the strategic objectives.

Looking at the Government’s overall objectives, we have to try to tackle poverty and help people through the cost of living crisis. The Deputy First Minister will be making more announcements on that as a result of the emergency budget review, but my priority in all of this has been to look out for the communities in our rural and island areas, and, when it comes to agriculture in particular, to do what we can to ensure cash flow, which we know has been of huge concern to the industry.

For example, there were calls to bring forward payments, and this year we brought them forward to their earliest-ever position and we have since made payments of nearly £330 million to more than 14,000 businesses. We have tried to do what we can within the parameters that we have to ease any existing cash flow worries and to deliver on the priorities for our rural and island communities.

Yes, that is built into the programme. I am sure that Erica Clarkson will correct me if I am wrong about the figures, but I believe that nearly £200,000 was set aside for contingencies in this year’s islands programme. I see that Erica is nodding, so I am glad to know that my figures are not off. We have built that in, and I recognise the difficulties you have alluded to.

I would like to be an optimist and say that maybe—hopefully—the figures will improve in the coming years, but, from the way things are heading, I do not think that that will be the case.

The allocations are indicative. They are the overall funding envelopes that we believe we might have, and our work is based on that. However, as committee members will be aware from the budget process that we went through last year, we go through the detail and allocate the budget to our proposals in the normal fashion in relation to the legislation.