Speeches by Smith.

“Yes. Are you saying that the flexibility in the way they operate can be a benefit?”

“Where do we draw the line? We are trying to tease out, I guess, whether there should be some intervention or some new legislation from the Government that would create a greater level of consistency. Is it better to leave it to the local authorities to judge on their own?”

“Are you talking about some body that is, I suppose, a major events equivalent of the SGSA for the stuff that is not sport?”

“Have you had conversations with the Government or anybody else about putting something like that in place and what the framework would be?”

“I have one more to Annie. Talking again about consistency, if we had this body and the regulations, would you want it to say, for example, “This is the level of event that needs to go to a SAG”? Taking your example, should all EDM events over a certain capacity—500 or whatever—go to a SAG? Would you want that level of …”

“Yes, or 1,000.”

“Thanks, Chair. Can we talk briefly about what has been called Zone Ex? That is broadly generally understood to be the external zone immediately around the outside perimeter of an event, but we have heard that Zone Ex is defined by different bodies in different ways. What challenges does that lack of a single definition…”

“Annie, anything about the challenges it causes?”

“I was going to ask both of you about your respective guides. While we are on the Purple Guide, Annie, can you just tell us a little bit about that and what you have said in it?”

“Who should ultimately be the lead on that responsibility for Zone Ex? Who should be the person we look to? Is it the police or is it somebody else?”

“Yes, and we will have the same resource issues with different local councils, I guess, as well. I suppose people might want to come to a council and want to put on a big event, and those people might have varying experience and quality. How do we hold them responsible and give them the tools that they need to be able t…”

“Sorry, Chair. I realise I started to trail into your questions.”

“Who sits on the advisory group?”

“Just on that, if you do not mind, Chair, you are sounding a slight note of caution there. We have heard that Scotland is the leader in this field and that lots of people are saying that we need a UK strategy as well. You are talking about respecting the devolved nations, which is understandable. How do you think it cou…”

“How could it cause problems for the Scottish strategy?”

“Continuing to talk about collaboration, what is your role in liaising with the Scottish Government and bringing the various inevitably siloed bits of Scottish Government together when you are dealing with event organisers?”

“How do you work with local authorities? Say Glasgow and Edinburgh wanted to go for the same event. What is your role in managing that?”

“You do not have a role in deciding anything, by the sound of it. You are very supportive and it is clearly working well, but you are not an overseeing body that says, “You’ll do that. You’ll do that”.”

“Presumably you have regular catchups with the local authorities. Do you sit down and plan a strategy for each city?”

“Do you have a long-term plan for individual authorities; do you have a long-term plan for Scotland? How do you work on a strategic approach?”