Meeting of the Parliament 14 January 2025
I will come on to that. I would certainly not disagree with Mr Kerr about that.
Of course we welcome the intention to increase the culture budget for the next financial year, as has been announced in the draft budget: it would be churlish not to. We welcomed the Government’s statement of intent, back in 2023, to increase funding. We demanded that the cabinet secretary set out a timeline for delivery, and I have been holding the Government to account so that it keeps its funding promises ahead of the draft budget.
I wish to make two important points. First, the welcome uplift in funding for Scotland’s arts and culture budget is a direct result of the new United Kingdom Labour Government’s record funding settlement to the Scottish Government. With £5.2 billion more coming to Scotland over the next two years, the cabinet secretary simply cannot argue that that is a coincidence.
Secondly, I do not think that anyone in the culture sector is going to be eternally grateful to the Scottish National Party Government just for keeping a promise to provide restorative funding.