���˿���

The Accounts Commission keeps telling us about the urgency of transformation—that it is urgent to see more councils transforming more quickly, better and so on. Do you get a sense that transformation is happening uniformly across Scotland and that we are seeing a transformation of services around Scotland?

This morning, the Accounts Commission reported on North Ayrshire, saying that, despite facing a budget cut, its performance

“is an exemplar of how to do change and innovation well and other councils can learn from what they are doing and how they are doing it”.

Do councils get the time to share the good practice that is happening around Scotland? We have often asked over recent years whether councils get the chance to see good practice and emulate it, copy it or adapt it in the way that is highlighted in this morning’s Accounts Commission report on North Ayrshire.

Thank you. Your response to that question is very encouraging.

I have another question about the fiscal framework and, specifically, the funding formula. I would like to test whether there is an appetite to look at the funding formula. It has been an issue for many years, and I think that everyone involved with it is scared to touch it or tamper with it in case they lose out. In my view, one of the key components is the impact that population change has on the funding allocation that is given to a local authority. Authorities that are losing population will tend to lose money. If the population in your local authority area drops by 1,000, you face losing up to £2 million. I would imagine that that will be felt in Dumfries and Galloway in particular, and it was felt in parts of Ayrshire, where I am from.

Is there any appetite in COSLA to have a look at that in the next session of the Parliament, to see whether we can make it fairer? I know that there is a floor and ceiling mechanism, but, by and large, if you lose population, you lose money, although the costs of delivering the service to the local community remain the same. Does COSLA see a need to have a look at that in the coming years?

With your hand on your heart, though, are you able to say that none of that could have happened if SOSE had not been there? You have access to the growth deal money and Scottish Enterprise has not gone away; it is still there serving the whole of Scotland. I am trying to get a handle on the regional element of the picture. What is unique and would have happened only because you were there?

My final question goes to our witnesses from SOSE. I am a great fan of our railways. I take a keen interest in the Kilmarnock to Dumfries line, in the middle of which lies Thornhill. Is SOSE still actively pursuing and promoting the reopening of Thornhill railway station? When I look around Scotland I see a lot of stations reopening. However, most of that is happening in the east and the north and very little of it in the south and the west. Thornhill is slap-bang in the middle of SOSE’s territory in the south of Scotland. Is the reopening of its station a project that you are still keen to support and promote?

It is about those bigger investments. I meet constituents every day, including on the weekend, and they will ask me what Scottish Enterprise has done to improve regeneration in the fabric of towns such as Kilmarnock. It is not about high street retail and stuff like that. Plenty of people have come to me and said they have tried to repurpose a long-closed nightclub, for example, and turn it into a small hotel but they have not got a penny’s help from anybody. I find that kind of thing difficult to explain. I look at Scottish Enterprise’s investments and I think, “Well, why not?”

Is it a question of scale and the particular model that you operate? Is your focus too national or too regional? Should there be another model that allows smaller-scale investment like that, which would provide the kind of assistance that local people would see and readily identify with?

Can you see where I am coming from? There is the national agency—you—and South of Scotland Enterprise, but we do not have an agency in my part of Ayrshire. We have not had that since Enterprise Ayrshire disappeared. Various other models have replaced it—South of Scotland Enterprise has a funding pot to help it—but the agencies that help places such as Kilmarnock, Ayr and Irvine directly do not have a funding pot. That is where I think there is a gap. Do you recognise that, and is there scope to think about the model and to intervene directly at a local level?

I do not have a hundred questions, convener; I have only one or two, which I hope are relevant. I will direct them to our witnesses from South of Scotland Enterprise, but I also welcome comments from those from Highlands and Islands Enterprise.

You might have heard that, at our earlier session, I asked our Scottish Enterprise witnesses about that agency’s focus. They said that its modal focus is on national and regional work rather than local work. Will you compare and contrast that approach with what South of Scotland Enterprise does? What advantages have you brought to the table, which would not have existed had you been relying on Scottish Enterprise interventions in your area? Jane Morrison-Ross, perhaps you could give us a couple of examples of what your agency has managed to achieve because it exists as a regional enterprise agency.

Stuart Black, HIE has been around for a long time. What is the contrast between what Scottish Enterprise does, as a national agency, and the added value that you can apply to your part of Scotland?

Are you actively providing support for reopening stations? Is that a priority for you?

I appreciate all your answers. Thank you.