Speeches by Smith.

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

“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?”

“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 could it cause problems for the Scottish strategy?”

“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…”

“Who sits on the advisory group?”

“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 …”

“You are nodding, Annie. Local government cost pressures must have an impact. How are they impacting the consistency of approach and the effectiveness of SAGs? Is it about frequency of meeting or other things? You are shaking your head, Annie. What are the other impacts on those cost pressures? Anne Marie Chebib: A lot …”

“The people and the amount of time and commitment that they are able to give to it is one issue. What other issues are there with inconsistency across the country?”

“We have to talk a little bit about consistency in how they operate now, which you have both mentioned. First, with the culture, Ken, you said that this is an open forum where people are encouraged to come along and contribute. Is that culture consistent across the country? Is that the general practice where everybody i…”

“Annie, anything to add on the problems that that inconsistency causes?”

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

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

“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?”

“You mentioned the Commonwealth Games. In that process, did the Commonwealth Games organisers come to you or did they go to Glasgow?”

“You mentioned the rally event. So that we understand how you fit into that, what was the process for bidding for and then organising that event?”

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

“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…”