Chamber and committees

Before we move away from the islands, cabinet secretary, what contingency funding is available to you to ensure island proofing by addressing any issues that might come up as a result of policies in other portfolios?

Our third item of business is evidence on the impact of EU exit on the rural affairs and islands remit. We welcome back the cabinet secretary and Caro Cowan, along with Jesus Gallego, deputy chief veterinary officer, and Jen Willoughby, head of the national and international regulatory alignment unit. I invite the cabinet secretary to give an opening statement.

Thank you, cabinet secretary. I will kick off with some questions before moving on to other members.

Are there still areas of on-going uncertainty given that other parts of the UK have advanced their future policies on rural support but Scotland is some way behind on that? What are the implications of that uncertainty? Is the rural affairs and islands budget expected to change during the current parliamentary session? Are there any anticipated implications for this portfolio from the medium-term financial strategy and the resource spending review?

I will ask you to clarify something, cabinet secretary. You seem to have contradicted yourself. One moment you were saying that there was lots of collaboration over common frameworks, then you were saying that there was none. Is there good collaboration over common frameworks or not?

Certainly. We wrote to George Eustice and got a response. Unfortunately, he was unable to attend on the date that we asked, but I am confident that we will have him in front of us at some time in the near future.

We move on to questions from Mercedes Villalba on keeping pace powers.

Thank you. That is very useful information.

Finally, Rachael Hamilton has a supplementary question.

Just for clarity, there is a reduction in cash of about 44 per cent. Has some of that been transferred to the national test programme and the development support programme?

We have no further questions on the budget, so I call this session to a halt. We will come back to discuss EU exit at agenda item 3, after a 10-minute comfort break.

Good morning, everyone, and happy new year. Welcome to the first meeting in 2022 of the Rural Affairs, Islands and Natural Environment Committee. I ask committee members who are using electronic devices to turn them to silent.

Our first item of business is a decision on whether to take items 6 and 7 in private. Do members agree to take those items in private? If members do not agree, they should type N in the chat box; otherwise, I will presume that members are content.

I see that we are content, so we will take items 6 and 7 in private.

We would certainly welcome details of exactly how the Government is going to engage with the committee on that.

Jim Fairlie will now ask his questions.