Hansard

I am sure that ticket sales are up because the minister is performing in the festival.

I am pleased to be winding up for the Scottish Conservatives in this short but useful debate. The Highlands and Islands are blessed with a wonderful array of festivals of all varieties and sizes, from the Islay festival of malt and music to Cowalfest, the Cowal walking and arts festival. I have attended a good many of them and will continue to do so. They make a big contribution to the economy of my region.

I have to issue a warning, though. Only this morning I was contacted urgently by constituents in Oban who run the Dunollie museum and are involved with "The Hidden Jewel", one of the 56 core events and festivals for the 2009 year of homecoming; 2009 should be a special year for festivals, but those constituents expressed dismay that a young lady of MacDougall descent, one of our Scottish diaspora who was coming to help, in a voluntary capacity, with this core EventScotland-funded event, has been refused entry into Scotland and is to be ignominiously flown home to America.

I have spoken to the chief immigration officer in Scotland, who was most courteous and helpful and informed me that the situation I have described is the result of a change of immigration rules in November—yet volunteers for the Edinburgh festival are exempt. Perhaps the minister can tell me what the Scottish Government has done to organise immigration clearance for genuine volunteers such as Rachel Rogerson, who wants to help with the homecoming. Such incidents send out the wrong message to the diaspora, who have been invited to come home in 2009, not to go home.

Festivals are brilliant for the Highlands and Islands. The Hebridean Celtic festival is a brilliant example of how something that starts out relatively small can become an international favourite. In 1996 it attracted 1,500 people to Stornoway; now, 14,000 go. That festival is hugely important not just to the local economies of Lewis and Harris but to those of the Uists, Benbecula, Eriskay, Barra and Vatersay. There is so much local talent from the Western Isles, inspired by the hills, the wind, the beaches and the sea. Highland festivals offer a window for people to experience not just the music but the beauty that inspired it.

I attended the original RockNess festival, dee-jayed by Fatboy Slim. There was a particularly enjoyable moment when

"What's that coming over the hill?
Is it a monster?"

was played. RockNess is inspirational and has gone from strength to strength. Its line-up this year included the Flaming Lips, Dizzee's Rascals, Basement Jaxx and Orbital.

Orkney's folk festival—a different kind of festival—passed successfully last month despite an economic climate that has made sponsorship harder to find. The festival's organisers do a very good job of combining well-established folk musicians and emerging talent from outside with the multitalented local musicians in a celebration of storytelling, ceilidhs, song-writing workshops, concerts and musical pub crawls. Orkney is of course famed for its hospitality, as well as for its music and its brilliant branding of foods, from crab to cheese and ice cream.

Looking ahead, the Tartan Heart festival at Belladrum, which was the inspiration of Highland impresario Joe Gibbs, has the Editors and Ocean Colour Scene headlining, with British Sea Power, Shed Seven and many more on the bill. It is so important for the Highlands and Islands to offer a diverse mix of tourist attractions. Tartan Heart certainly offers a varied mix, and it truly ranks alongside international music festivals.

A recent added bonus to festivals has been the interest in local foods and the ensuing change from a burger culture to home-made mutton stovies and delicious fresh local products. An innovative partnership founded by Fergus Younger of the Argyll and Bute agricultural forum takes a large tent with foods from Argyll to many of the festivals, and it is an eye-opener to see how people flock to the "Food from Argyll" tent, where quality reigns supreme at a reasonable cost. Those large music festivals have allowed such small businesses to prosper, which is a good thing for both the producer and the consumer, and it has heightened the profile of Highland food culture for visitors.

Festivals will feel the icy blast of recession, but the Scottish Government should remember how important they are to local Scottish economies and to so many small businesses. Scotland provides a perfect natural stage; people just need an excuse to go. The Outsider at Aviemore and the Connect festival at Inveraray, which I attended last year, are now not going ahead. Local businesses will miss them very much.

As other members have said, the Edinburgh festival and fringe is the largest festival of its kind in the world. I had direct involvement with the fringe last year, to help my daughter, Sarah McGrigor, put on a play that she had written at school—a religious comedy that, for some reason, is entitled "Forgive Me Father". My point in mentioning that is that friends and relatives travelled to Edinburgh to see the play, some of them from across Europe, and they stayed in local hotels, used the restaurants and travelled the Highlands and Islands. That emphasises how important the fringe is as a magnet to Scotland.

Like Elaine Murray, I very much enjoyed performing at the Edinburgh festival. I have done it twice, albeit in a very modest way—like the minister.

The Scottish Conservatives are happy to put on record our gratitude to all the individuals in Scotland who do so much good in organising so diverse a range of festivals. We recognise the massive importance of the sector to Scotland's economy and we look to the Scottish Government to do what it can to underpin its future success.

I am looking forward to attending the new festival at Kelburn castle in Largs, which opens this weekend.