Scottish Budget 2020-2021: Equality and Fairer Scotland budget statement

Chapter 6 Culture, Tourism, Europe and External Affairs

Introduction

The Culture, Tourism, Europe and External Affairs portfolio seeks to promote Scotland's interests at home and abroad through European and wider International Affairs. It contributes to delivering Scotland's economic ambition by investing in Scotland's unique heritage and culture as well as its capacity for creativity, tourism and major events.

The Culture, Tourism, Europe and External Affairs portfolio has a role to play in enhancing the quality of life for Scotland's communities. This is achieved through widening access to, and participation in, high quality cultural events and opportunities, and by supporting young people's learning and creativity through engagement with culture and heritage.

Key Inequalities of Outcome

One of the key challenges that the portfolio is working on is to ensure culture is accessible to all. The new national performance indicators indicate that attendance and participation in cultural events and activities is high, at 81 per cent and 76 per cent respectively. This indicator was amended in 2018 therefore figures from 2018 onwards are not directly comparable with previous years. Participation was greatest by women, younger people, those with degrees or professional qualifications, those with good physical and mental health, those living in less deprived areas and those with a higher household income. Work is ongoing in several areas of the portfolio to ensure that participation in cultural events and activities increases in less represented groups.

The Scottish Government Strategy, 'Scotland the Perfect Stage' provides the strategic focus for all those partners involved in any aspect of planning, securing, supporting and delivering events, of any size, in Scotland. The strategy is clear that festivals and events that take place in Scotland should be inclusive in nature, encourage responsible engagement, be underpinned by strong human rights practices and equality principles and seek to ensure that all of Scotland benefits from them.

Tourism presents a unique opportunity to learn from others, build communities, share ideas, embrace cultural differences and build a vibrant and dynamic economy in all parts of Scotland. Our tourism budget is largely focused on supporting VisitScotland, who have a crucial role in helping to deliver the Scottish Government's core purpose of creating a more successful country, with opportunities for all of Scotland to flourish. VisitScotland's activities are aligned to the two key pillars of Scotland's Economic Strategy, namely increasing competitiveness and tackling inequality. VisitScotland's equality and inclusivity work has developed from primarily supporting disabled people and others with specific access requirements to a fully inclusive approach. It now aims to fully embed inclusion within all of its internal activities as well as its support to businesses in the tourism sector and its marketing to make Scotland an internationally recognised 'inclusive destination' with a resultant increase in economic, cultural, and social benefits.

Key Strategic Priorities

Promoting Scotland and its interests at home and abroad is a key strategic priority for the Scottish Government. The External Affairs budget will continue to deepen Scotland's relationship with key countries in the pursuit of furthering sustainable economic growth in Scotland, increasing Scotland's profile on the world stage and contributing as a good global citizen towards the achievement of the United Nations (UN) Global Goals (including Goal 10, 'reducing inequality within and among countries'). The budget also supports the attraction of talented and skilled individuals to live, study and work in Scotland.

We will soon launch 'A Culture Strategy for Scotland' which will set out a vision for the future of how we support culture in Scotland. The strategy is built on extensive engagement with people across Scotland and centres on three ambitions: Strengthening culture; Transforming through culture; and Empowering through culture. Independent analysis indicates that there is broad support for the inclusive and democratic approach to culture outlined in the strategy and for everyone – regardless of their socio-economic background, ethnicity or where they live in Scotland – to have an equal opportunity to experience the transformative power of culture.

We will continue to invest in culture through Creative Scotland, the National Collections and the National Performing Companies. This helps to ensure that:

• Scotland's culture reaches a diverse and inclusive audience at home and abroad.
• All children and young people are encouraged to, and have the chance to, engage in culture; and that this engagement is sustained throughout their lives.

Within this portfolio, the Major Events budget will support a strong and inspirational programme of events and festivals each year. These events generate business, create jobs and boost the economy while delivering benefits to all of Scotland's communities and build on our nation's strong reputation and international attractiveness.

The historic environment is a vital part of Scottish heritage and communities and is also hugely important to the Scottish economy. The Scottish Government will work to ensure our diverse and evolving cultural heritage thrives and is celebrated, and that our historic environment and world-class collections are cared for and enjoyed by new and diverse audiences and future generations right across Scotland.

Using events of all sizes as a platform we can encourage widespread geographical spread and economic activity throughout the year, which also helps foster innovation and encourage entrepreneurship. Major events can be planned to deliver both significant impacts for host communities as well as a lasting legacy, with transport and accommodation often built into the planning process.

For example, a full inclusion plan was put in place for last year's Solheim Cup. A wide range of measures were delivered, including an accessibility guide and site map, access buddies at entrances, free-to-hire mobility scooters and toilet facilities that were gender neutral, baby-changing facilities and adult-sized changing benches, and offered free sanitary products to support period equality. The accessibility plans were commended by Euan's Guide, a disabled access review website and industry leader in visitor advice.

Equality Implications of The Scottish Budget 2020-21

Europe and External Affairs

In 2020-21, funding for the British-Irish Council remains the same as in 2019-20. We have sustained our International and European Relations budget to support us to deepen and strengthen our international presence and activity. Our relationship with Europe and Scotland's active membership of the British-Irish Council are critical to the delivery of other key strategic goals, including education, health and sustainable economic growth, which all focus on equality outcomes in their delivery.

The International Development Fund and Humanitarian Emergency Fund support international activities which seek to build upon historic and contemporary relationships that exist between Scotland, partner countries and the wider international community. This is in line with our commitment to be a good global citizen, continuing to make distinctive contributions to addressing global challenges. The overall International Development Fund and Humanitarian Emergency Fund budget in 2020-21 will be maintained with funding for International Development and Humanitarian Aid at £10 million and £1 million respectively. These funds support a range of specific projects focusing on sex/gender, disability and low-income households, covering health, education, renewable energy, civic governance and economic development.

In 2020-21 the Scottish Government will continue to support EU citizens who have made Scotland their home. We will promote our Stay in Scotland campaign; aiming to raise awareness of the UK Government's EU Settlement Scheme by providing practical information and direct support and advice to help EU citizens and their families to remain in Scotland. This work will focus on reaching more vulnerable EU citizens and those who may face barriers to applying to the Scheme. Similarly, we will maintain funding in 2020-21 for Citizens Advice Scotland to deliver dedicated national advice and information service to support EU citizens with more complex support needs, including those who may face barriers to applying for settled status such as limited digital access, language barriers or difficulties in proving residence in the UK. Together, these funding commitments will contribute to our objective to help EU citizens secure the rights that they are entitled to.

Culture, Tourism and Major Events

Creative Scotland and Other Arts support artistic work which explores and promotes equality and tackles discrimination in Scotland. Through their Equality Outcomes, Creative Scotland works to ensure that their funding support more accurately reflects the diversity of contemporary Scotland, that opportunities to engage with, and participate in, arts, screen and creative industries throughout the country, are more inclusive and accessible to everyone and that employment patterns in the arts, screen and creative industries better represent the diversity of Scotland, and their staff have a genuine understanding of, and commitment to, equalities.

Continued commitment to Creative Scotland in 2020-21 will ensure organisations can continue to deliver diverse programmes of work which are of particular benefit to equality communities.^[1]

In particular, we continue to support Screen Scotland, a dedicated Screen Unit within Creative Scotland. In addition to better alignment with and co-ordination of public sector support for the TV and film sector, it will also increase production and inward investment, boosting audience, company and skills development and helping increase diversity in the screen industry. Screen Scotland and Creative Scotland programmes, such as, Pact Indie's 'Diversity Training Scheme'^[2] and TRC media's 'rad: TV' Researcher Training programme,^[3] which are targeted at both protected characteristics and social mobility, will continue in 2020-21.

The National Performing Companies place education and participation at the heart of their core activity to enhance the wellbeing of individuals who participate. Continued support for the National Performing Companies will ensure a range of initiatives are targeted at young people to increase access to performing arts across Scotland, such as the Royal Scottish National Opera Junior Chorus Bursary scheme, and the 'Be The Change' programme, a partnership between the National Theatre of Scotland and Renfrewshire Council, which seeks to positively reimagine relationships between care-experienced young people and care-givers.

The latest in our series of Themed Years, Year of Coasts and Waters 2020, sustains and builds upon the momentum of the preceding Themed Years to spotlight, celebrate and promote opportunities to experience and enjoy Scotland's unrivalled coasts and waters, encouraging responsible engagement and inclusive participation from the people of Scotland and our visitors.

To boost equality outcomes related to the Year of Coasts and Waters 2020 it is important to build on the successes and learning from a range of policy initiatives. These include, but are not restricted to, other Major Events that have taken place in Scotland, the preceding annual events that have already been taking place around Scotland's coasts and waters, the ongoing work of VisitScotland's Inclusive Tourism Project (especially the accessibility strand) and to link into key strategies such as 'Scotland the Perfect Stage' the National Events Strategy 2015-25.

The equality impact assessment (EQIA) undertaken for the Year of Young People 2018 identified the potential for that Themed Year to provide quality opportunities to engage with Scotland's diverse range of young people and provide them with a significant platform to shine. Equality groups representing young people were engaged from the outset, across each of the constituent six themes. Organisations from protected characteristic groups were engaged through planning their own events and activities that aligned to the aims and objectives for the year.

Modern Scotland's sense of national identity is proudly and passionately inclusive, diverse, compassionate, open and outward-looking. Reflecting and emphasising those values, the Scottish Government continued to support a range of initiatives, under the broad banner of Scotland's Winter Festivals. These run from Scotland's National Day – St Andrew's Day on 30 November each year, across Hogmanay and culminate in Burns celebrations on 25 January.

Key delivery partners included BEMIS, a national ethnic minorities-led umbrella body supporting the development of the Ethnic Minorities Voluntary Sector in Scotland, and the Fair Saturday Foundation plus funding the Scotland's Winter Festivals Events Fund (which is administered through EventScotland). As well as boosting our key tourism and events sector (and thereby the wider Scottish economy) the events, large and small, cumulatively enhance community engagement through celebrating Scotland's national identity in an inclusive manner and internationalist spirit. Scotland's Winter Festivals help enhance the collective confidence of all our communities and affirm and promote our values of fairness, kindness, inclusivity and empowerment.

VisitScotland's budget has been maintained with additional funding for operational costs. This will enable VS to address increasing operational costs without impacting on their activities which include supporting inclusive tourism.^[4]

Our Rural Tourism Infrastructure Fund has been extended by a further £3 million, bringing total investment to £9 million, and will continue to provide for the services and facilities tourists and communities need to support the sustainable growth of tourism across rural Scotland. This will include improving accessibility through increased parking capacity for key rural tourism hotspots include increased dedicated disabled parking, provision of accessible toilets, and safe pathways allowing wheelchair access to key attractions such as the development at Glenfinnan Viaduct.

Scottish Government support to the National Museums Scotland (NMS), National Galleries of Scotland and National Library of Scotland to provide free public access to the collections will continue in 2020-21, with additional funding provided to help the National Collections to deliver the pay policy.

The National Collections are committed to making an important contribution across a range of areas within the Scottish Government's priorities, particularly in terms of economic contribution by widening access and promoting participation, social inclusion and wellbeing. Engaging with more diverse audiences and encouraging participation is also about changing the nature of their relationship with the public as owners and users and providing new opportunities to more diverse audiences to access the collections in different ways, including through digital, and other events tailored to meet their needs.

The National Collections continue to strengthen their strategic approach to community engagement and cultural place-making because of the important tangible benefits that culture brings to people's lives, communities and their environment. NMS launched the 'National Strategy 2016-20: Across Scotland in 2016', strengthening its approach to working nationally with a commitment to taking more of the collections to communities across Scotland – be it cultural, educational, social or economic to enhance the breath and reach of its national activity.

The collections will continue to engage extensively with schools and pupils by developing learning programmes especially tailored to meet the needs of children and teachers and delivering outreach sessions for some of the most vulnerable families in areas of multiple deprivation particularly over the school Summer holiday period.

Over the coming year, the collections will also continue to develop and deliver an active programme of events including events for Deaf/BSL using children and their families, descriptive tours for the visually impaired, events for people with dementia and a number of tailored autism-friendly sessions for targeted families to help them explore the collections. The National Collections will continue to comply with the Equality Act 2010 and the specific equality duties outlined for public bodies. The information contained in their reports on progress against these outcomes highlighting to mainstream equalities in the work they do, statements on the gender pay-gap and employee equality statistics is published on their website.

Historic Environment Scotland

Historic Environment Scotland cares for, and promotes, Scotland's historic environment, providing support for heritage building repairs, employment for those with traditional building skills, and contributing to the regeneration of Scotland's town centres. Through its new Corporate Plan, 'Heritage for All', published in April 2019, it is working to encourage greater engagement with, participation in, and enjoyment of the historic environment. This includes a direct commitment to widening opportunities for everyone to access and connect with the historic environment. The Historic Environment Scotland 'Equality Outcomes and Mainstreaming Report' outlines how it is working to deliver its public sector equality duties and sets out four equality outcomes it aims to achieve by April 2021.

Historic Environment Scotland is lead delivery body for 'Scotland's Historic Environment Strategy, Our Place in Time'. In 2020-21 this work will continue with the delivery of the Historic Environment 'Skills Investment Plan', through which Historic Environment Scotland is supporting the maintenance of traditional skills and providing young people with opportunities to develop new skills through apprenticeship and trainee schemes; and the development of a 'Built Heritage Investment Plan' for Scotland which will look at how heritage assets can be used more effectively for housing and other purposes.

In 2020-21 Historic Environment Scotland will continue their work on understanding the impacts of climate change on cultural heritage to manage the risks to Scotland's communities which are often disproportionately felt by those from disadvantages or vulnerable backgrounds. In particular, its conservation science work contributes to our understanding of the ways in which traditional buildings can be made more energy efficient and could result in lower housing and energy costs; and its Historic Environment Policy for Scotland and associated guidance, supports the re-use of historic buildings for purposes such as housing which will increase availability and affordability.

Historic Environment Scotland's Access Policy for their Properties in Care seeks to address the needs of groups who are less able to access the properties. Due to Historic Environment Scotland's capacity to generate additional income, budget reductions in this area should not have significant negative impacts on older people or those living with disabilities or limited illness who we know are the groups least likely to visit historical places. In 2020-21 Historic Environment Scotland will continue to work in partnership to promote activities at their sites which contribute to improvements in the service provided to disabled visitors.

National Records of Scotland

The budget for National Records of Scotland increased in 2019-20 to support the delivery of Scotland's Census 2021. The 2021 Census will take place on 21 March 2021, and will seek to learn about everyone in Scotland, reaching 2.6 million households and individuals living elsewhere, such as in hospitals, care homes or temporary accommodation. The census is the only survey of its kind to ask everyone in Scotland the same questions at the same time. No other survey provides the richness, depth and range of information the census does. The census is therefore key to supporting the measurement and delivery of Scotland's National Outcomes, informing decision-making across the public and private sectors.

As the census has been designed, National Records of Scotland has tested a range of equality-related questions, including questions on sexual orientation and transgender status/history. National Records of Scotland have proposed questions on these topics which, if agreed by parliament, will be asked on a voluntary basis in Scotland's Census 2021 for the first time. This would provide the first official estimate of the trans population in Scotland, the characteristics of this population and their outcomes across a range of policy areas. The sexual orientation question would build the evidence on the characteristics and outcomes for this group, addressing the current recognised gaps in evidence from existing data sources. These new questions, in combination with the existing questions on equality characteristics, are designed to provide evidence to support equality monitoring, policy development and service provision.

Work will continue on the delivery of the range of systems and services required for the 2021 Census. As part of that work, testing will be ongoing to ensure that paper and internet versions of the census questionnaire are easy to complete and comply with accessibility guidelines. National Records of Scotland will continue working with equality groups to further develop approaches to public assistance to ensure that everyone is enabled to take part in the Census. A large-scale public test of Census systems and approaches took place in October and November 2019. The evaluation of the test will provide vital feedback to ensure that the Census works for everyone in Scotland.

Work will continue across Registration Services in Scotland, delivered by local authorities, to collect improved information on ethnicity as part of the death registration process. The ability to produce accurate death rates broken down by ethnicity will be a huge step forward in helping understand the differential outcomes for people from different ethnic backgrounds. Working with the Scottish Government, the National Records of Scotland will be continuing to plan for the implications of potential changes to the Gender Recognition process, to the potential recognition of non-binary people, aspects of registration germane to intersex people and also options for the future of civil partnerships in Scotland.

Fairer Scotland Implications of The Scottish Budget 2020-21

The work we support on International Development aids numerous projects directed towards sex/gender, disability and low-income households, covering health, education, renewable energy, civic governance and economic development.

By continuing to invest in culture through Historic Environment Scotland, Creative Scotland, the National Collections and the National Performance Companies, we will help to ensure that Scotland's culture reaches a diverse and inclusive audience. Scottish Government support to the National Museums Scotland, National Galleries of Scotland and National Library of Scotland to provide free public access to the collections will continue in 2020-21 and will be of particular benefit to those on low incomes.

We will soon launch a Culture Strategy for Scotland which draws on the themes raised by individuals, artists and creative producers, organisations and communities across Scotland through our national culture conversation which began in 2017 and the public consultation of 2018. The Strategy recognises the intrinsic value of culture and the power of culture to inspire, enrich and transform. It presents an extended view of culture which includes the everyday and emerging, the established and more formal, celebrating culture as part of every community and essential to our lives and wellbeing. It commits to long-term change through greater collaboration and integration across culture, communities and policy development to ensure that culture's transformative power is experienced by everyone, regardless of where they live in Scotland.

The Scottish Government's long-standing investment of £127 million since 2007 in the Youth Music Initiative has made a huge impact^[5] in helping young people (aged between 0-25) across Scotland access music making opportunities and develop their wider skills and learning. In 2020-21, continued support for the Youth Music Initiative will continue to boost young people's confidence, self-esteem and personal skills and support the development of skills for wider learning, including literacy, language and numeracy skills and development.

We are committed to early intervention programmes that support our young people, raise attainment, tackle inequality and empower our communities.

The Scottish Government will continue to invest in Sistema Scotland viewed as a model for social inclusion and improving the lives of children living in poverty. This will enable Sistema Scotland to cope with existing growth, expand into further areas, and develop a toolkit to facilitate wider sharing of the model, resources and learning, allowing yet more children to benefit through its inclusive teaching and learning opportunities in 2020-21. Sistema Scotland works across four areas reaching 2,500 children weekly, and has huge potential to transform lives and help tackle inequality. Independent evaluation^[6] highlights that as well as increasing the confidence, aspirations and self-esteem in the children and young people involved, Sistema Scotland is making a real and positive difference benefiting families and wider communities in Raploch, Govanhill, Torry and Dundee.

Tourism is a key sector for Scotland's economy and employs over 8 per cent of the workforce. The workforce has a relatively high proportion of young workers (32 per cent) and 42 per cent are part-time workers and only 42 per cent earn the Living Wage, which is something we are looking to address through our Programme for Government commitments to promoting fair work practices across the tourism sector by increasing the number of businesses paying the Living Wage, reducing zero-hours contracts and promoting tourism as a career of choice.

Our national tourism agency, VisitScotland, is working to embed equality and to actively promote this within the sector. Funding for VisitScotland in 2020-21 will increase to over £41 million, supporting them to deliver their key role in ensuring Scotland is an inclusive, welcoming destination, collaborating with the industry in the delivery of inclusive and accessible tourism and assisting tourism businesses to promote and provide both quality customer service and access for the inclusive tourism market. VisitScotland will continue to work with the industry and the Family Holiday Association via ScotSpirit to provide vulnerable and disadvantaged families in Scotland with a short break or day out which they otherwise would not have had. Research shows this has many benefits for the families involved including improved mental health and improved school attendance.

Conclusion

This portfolio has a key role in enriching people's quality of life across a range of protected characteristics and socio-economic groups. Where budgets are protected or increased, this helps to enhance access to, and participation in, Scotland's culture and heritage. It will be important to maintain current levels of investment to ensure the long-term sustainability of programmes, activities and sites.

Footnotes

1. https://www.creativescotland.com/resources/our-publications/policies/equalities-in-creative-scotland

2. http://diversity.pact.co.uk/indie-diversity-training-scheme.html

3. https://trcmedia.org/training/rad/

4. (https://www.visitscotland.org/supporting-your-business/marketing-toolkits/accessible-inclusive-tourism)

5. https://www.creativescotland.com/resources/professional-resources/research/creative-scotland-research/youth-music-initiative-impact-report-201617

6. https://www.gcph.co.uk/children_and_families/evaluation_of_sistema_scotland