Chamber and committees

Thank you. I know that colleagues will come in on much of what you have said.

I note my entry in the register of members’ interests with regard to tourism.

When we met your chief executive the other day, he explained how you have been able to pivot your budget to focus more on capital expenditure in readiness for the return of tourism, which is obviously good for laying the foundations for long-term recovery. The budget, which is slightly down, is split 50:50 between resource and capital expenditure. I guess that there might be a battle—an amicable one, I am sure—between destination development and marketing, but can you comment on that split? Given that capex has had the lion’s share of the budget in the past year or so, should the pendulum have swung more the other way towards marketing?

Thank you. Would anyone else like to comment?

Thank you. Marc, do you have anything to add to that?

The Finance and Public Administration Committee report also talks about longer-term low productivity and poor business investment. The latest blow to the development of a manufacturing supply chain is the opposition to civil nuclear energy, with the Rolls-Royce SMR Ltd consortium looking everywhere except Scotland for a site for its £200 million factory. Do you recognise that your Government’s policies—or “levers”, to use your word—are a problem when it comes to attracting inward migration to reduce labour shortages?

Both. I think that labour would follow investment. If companies were investing—

Thank you. To come back to my second question, what analysis will we be able to see of the reporting of the volume of electronic and written submissions? I appreciate that there will be no discrimination in terms of dates, but will we be able to see information on volumes and postcodes?

I hope that we all want continued inward migration from the rest of the UK.

You mentioned

“placing ideology above the needs of business.”

However, we now have a First Minister who is looking to introduce legislation on another referendum. After all the lessons that have been learned over the past eight years about referendums’ effects on the economy, in what parallel universe will the uncertainty that a referendum will bring attract people and investment, particularly when the rest of the world is focused on post-Covid recovery?

I note my entry in the register of members’ interests in relation to use of the land registry. I welcome the progress on digitisation and the development of electronic formats.

I invite the minister to comment on the position of people who will only be capable of submitting written paperwork to the register. We have a huge issue, particularly in rural areas, with a digital divide, because of people’s internet connections and so on. Can the minister guarantee that people will still be able to submit entries non-electronically and explain how they will be able to do that? For people who submit non-electronically, how will that be recorded and reported on to make sure that there is no discrimination in the quality or speed of service that they receive, compared with those who submit digitally?

I hope that the keeper will note that conversation.