Chamber and committees

The Creative, Tourism and Hospitality Enterprises Hardship Fund (CTHEHF) provides support, unavailable elsewhere in the UK, for small creative, tourism and hospitality companies who have experienced at least 50% loss of current or projected revenue as a result of COVID-19 and are experiencing hardship. Due to significant demand we have increased the fund from £20m to £30m. The fund is administered by our enterprise agencies, which are currently progressing applications. The fund is now closed.

Each enterprise agency administers the fund in its respective area. The performance data are compiled by Scottish Enterprise on behalf of all three agencies. As applications are still being processed the fund’s performance data are incomplete. I have asked the Chief Executive of Scottish Enterprise to write to you this month as soon as the data you have requested can be reported.

Once all applications have been appraised and funding distributed, the intention is to publish information relating to the demand for CTHEHF and our other business support funds, including volume and value of applications.

As of 2 June, our targeted support funds to the creative, tourism and hospitality sector, along with support to SMEs who are vulnerable but vital to their local economies, and the newly self-employed have resulted in awards totalling £104m; that is grant offers to over 2500 businesses and 4160 self-employed people to date.

The Pivotal Enterprise Resilience Fund (PERF) provides grants for businesses, unavailable elsewhere in the UK, which:

• support Scotland’s productive capacity,
• are of local or national economic importance,
• impact the wider business community,
• are a supplier or potential supplier to NHS or other COVID-19 vital services,
• are a supplier to other essential businesses, or
• demonstrate a need to rapidly scale up or diversify due to COVID-19.

Due to significant demand, we doubled the PERF to £90m and have further increased it to £120m. The fund has now closed.

Each enterprise agency administers the fund in its respective area. The performance data are compiled by Scottish Enterprise on behalf of all three agencies, consulting and working together with Creative Scotland and Visit Scotland. As applications are still being processed the fund’s performance data are incomplete. I have asked the Chief Executive of Scottish Enterprise to write to you this month as soon as the data you have requested can be reported.

Once all applications have been appraised and funding distributed, the intention is to publish information relating to the demand for PERF and our other business support funds, including volume and value of applications.

As of 2nd June, our targeted support funds to the creative, tourism and hospitality sector, along with support to SMEs who are vulnerable but vital to their local economies, and the newly self-employed have resulted in awards totalling £104m; that is grant offers to over 2500 businesses and 4160 self-employed people to date.

The Pivotal Enterprise Resilience Fund and Creative, Tourism and Hospitality Enterprises Fund provide support to our businesses not available elsewhere in the UK. They were both heavily promoted through multiple statements to the media, including numerous Scottish Government Ministerial statements. This was amplified by our delivery partners across a wide range of communication channels owned by the enterprise agencies, VisitScotland, Creative Scotland, and Business Gateway. This included social media campaigns and extensive stakeholder communications, which reached out to elected members and key affected industries.

In addition the key business support website FindBusinessSupport.gov was regularly updated to promote the funds and make available key information about the application process. Our approach resulted in significant volumes of applications.

As of 2 June, our targeted support funds to the creative, tourism and hospitality sector, along with support to SMEs who are vulnerable but vital to their local economies, and the newly self-employed have resulted in awards totalling £104m; that is grant offers to over 2500 businesses and 4160 self-employed people to date. Both funds are now closed.

The Scottish Government does not currently hold information on how much Health Boards have spent on NHS operations and procedures undertaken in the private healthcare sector during the COVID-19 outbreak. Costs will be available at the end of each quarter according to the activity undertaken.

During the COVID19 pandemic our strategy for utilising the private sector capacity in Scotland is to support NHS activity by providing a COVID free environment for urgent procedures to be undertaken, specifically urgent cancer surgery.

As of the 24 May 2020, there has been 1542 outpatient appointments and 1132 surgical procedures delivered have been undertaken in a private sector facility. This additionally has supported 9 NHS Health Boards.

The Golden Jubilee National Hospital is also supporting territorial Health Boards around more complex cancer surgery.

Scottish Government officials met a number of outdoor learning stakeholders on 29 May including: Girlguiding Scotland; The Boys’ Brigade; Scouts Scotland; the Outward Bound Trust; Scottish Outdoor Education Centres and the Association of Heads of Outdoor Education Centres, all of which are involved in the running of outdoor residential centres.

Discussions focused on the support that can be provided to the outdoor learning sector at this time. This included keeping the sector informed of education recovery work in an effort to ensure providers can adapt their offer appropriately and ultimately support the re-opening of schools and other education establishments.

I refer the member to the answer to question S5W-28933 on 2 June 2020. All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at http://www.parliament.scot/parliamentarybusiness/28877.aspx

The Scottish Government has made a number of grant schemes available specifically for the cultural sector as a result of COVID-19, and in addition cultural businesses are able to apply to a range of other COVID-19 business support schemes. These funds are supported via a mixture of additional budget allocations to the sector and through repurposing of existing funding streams.

Specific cultural support:

Creative Scotland is providing the following support in response to the COVID-19 situation.

The Creative Scotland Bridging Bursary Fund for freelance creative professionals (£4.0m); As of Monday 25 May, 1596 arts and creative bursaries have been paid.

The repurposed Open Project fund to help practitioners adapt and respond to the current changing circumstances (£7.5m). As at 25 May, there have been 176 individual applications and 86 applications from organisations to the Open Fund. These will be assessed at the end of May.

One-off bursaries through Screen Scotland to film and TV sector workers (£1.5m). 519 have been paid as at 25 May.

Screen Scotland has also announced that Scotland’s independent film and TV production companies are able to apply for newly ring-fenced development support fund of £1m for awards over the next 3-6 months to enable planning towards production when Government guidance allows.

Museums Galleries Scotland have formed the Urgent Response Fund (£700k) and the Digital Resilience Fund (£115k). As of 25 May 2020, 24 applications have been received for the Urgent Response Fund, with 20 assessed. Nine museums have been awarded funding, nine decisions have been deferred, two declined and four to be assessed. The Digital Resilience fund has received 46 applications, with 42 assessments and 40 awards having been made.

We are supporting the Edinburgh Fringe with a £500,000 initial package of support comprising a £400,000 interest-free loan from the Scottish Government and a £100,000 grant from the Council.

Wider funds which cultural organisations may be eligible to apply for include the £30 million Creative, Tourism & Hospitality Enterprises Hardship Fund, the £34 million Newly Self-Employed Hardship Fund, the Third Sector Resilience Fund and the £120 million Pivotal Enterprise Resilience Fund.

Public funding for the heritage sector is primarily distributed through Historic Environment Scotland’s (HES) grant programmes. Since 2015, the National Trust for Scotland (NTS) has been awarded two three-year Annual Maintenance Grants to support the conservation and repair of properties within its estate. The grant funding made available is set out in the following table alongside details of the amounts claimed by the NTS.