 Thank you very much, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the 21st meeting in 2014 of the Economy, Energy and Tourism Committee. Everyone welcomes our witnesses, who I will introduce in a moment, and also many visitors in the gallery. I can remind everyone who is pleased to turn off or at least turn to silent all mobile phones and other electronic devices so that they do not interfere with the sound equipment. We have apologies this morning from Richard Baker, and we are joined as a substitute by Jenny Marra. Welcome. Item 1 on the agenda. Can I ask if the committee agreed that we take consideration of item 3, a review of evidence heard in private later in the meeting? I agree. Great. Thank you. Item 2. We decided as a committee that we wanted to look at the economic importance of Edinburgh festivals, and we have one panel of witnesses this morning to help us to do that. I would like to welcome you all, starting just on the left-hand side. We have Amy Saunders, who is senior adviser international with Creative New Zealand. We have Gordon Dure, who is chief executive at Edinburgh airport. Faith Liddle, who is director of festivals Edinburgh. Lady Susan Rice, who is chair of Edinburgh's festivals forum. We have Kath Mainland, who is the chief executive of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe Society. Welcome to you all. We have got about 90 minutes or so for this session. Members will be interested in exploring a number of issues around how the festivals are set up and run, what the economic benefit is to Edinburgh, what the economic benefit is to the rest of Scotland from having the festivals here, issues around, for example, the infrastructure, the airport transport, things that have a number of things that we want to try and pursue. We have quite a large panel, and obviously we are going to very quickly run out of time if you all want to answer every question that is asked, even if you keep your answers very short, which I would always hope that you would do, and I always exhort members to keep their questions very short and to the point. I think what I'll do is I'll ask members to, if they could perhaps initially direct their questions on a particular member of the panel, and then if you want to come in and answer a question directed to somebody else, if you just catch my eye, I will bring you in and try and bring as many people in as time allows. But even with 90 minutes, we'll find the time runs away with us very quickly. I wonder if I can just start off and maybe just really give you all a chance to have a say at the very start, maybe ask you. All of you would comment briefly on a couple of issues. One is, what is, what do you attribute the success of Edinburgh festivals to, you know, that we clearly it's a success story, you only have to try and walk around or drive around Edinburgh at this time of year to see how successful it is. We've seen all the statistics about the number of bed nights, for example, being filled in Edinburgh, so it's a success. What do you attribute that success to? Secondly, what are the challenges going forward, you know, if we're seeing continual year-on-year expansion as it seems to be of the festivals, what are the challenges to that not occurring in the future? Maybe I'll just start with Cath Mainland from the fringe and just maybe work our way along the panel and just get your perspective. Yes, thank you very much, and thanks very much for inviting us to come and talk to you this morning. On your first question, why the festivals are successful, I think we'll undoubtedly talk this morning about our collaboration and our unique collaborative model through festivals Edinburgh, but I think the thing to remember is that each of the 12 festivals are uniquely distinct and independent and are formed because of artistic directors and programmers' desire to show the best of what they want to the world, so they have very good benefits in terms of economic impact, as we'll talk about, but they're themselves distinct individual world-class platforms, the best platforms in the world for Scottish artists and the best platform for international artists to come here. Do you have any thoughts on the second point about what are the challenges going forward in terms of continual growth? I think that the challenges going forward are about continuing to remember that that's why we're successful, to continue to make sure that we have the best environment here for artists and the media and industry and audiences to come to this city to experience the festivals. I think that there's a saying that there's strength in numbers, so we have a lot of festivals and we have a lot of activity, but what's unique here is that they are also absolutely unique unto themselves and the unique part of it is that they come together through the festivals forum, for instance, to work on shared infrastructure and other needs and to work with all of the stakeholders from the city government, from various supporting organisations and from the national government, so they can come together and converse and make this a better and stronger place for all of them and still maintain their separate identities. That's a really important thing, they're not all swept up into one common festival, that's very important. The infrastructure here in Edinburgh has obviously grown and developed to support the festivals over the years. Every festival needs different kinds of infrastructure in different ways, but what is helpful is that we have festivals that run throughout the entire 12 months of the year pretty much and so we have certainly the biggest part of it and the greatest activity in these few weeks in August, but we have a lot of very important festivals that happen right throughout the year. That means that the city and those who work in it and live in it can support those venues and the hotels and the kinds of transport that is needed. That all works throughout the year because there is a need for it throughout the year, so it's the 12 month thing. It's coming together when the festivals can and staying separate when they ought to. The final point that I would say is that the festivals have been very fortunate indeed even over the last six, seven years of financial difficulties in sustaining funding from both the national and city sources. That is absolutely essential and I know that they are hugely grateful for that. I think that you'll all be aware of the impact study that we did a few years ago and that we continue to update. That's on our economic but also our social, cultural and environmental impacts. One of the clear statements at the very beginning of that independent study was that none of those impacts, the economic and the others, would exist without, and they describe that as the diverse quality international programmes of the festival. My colleagues have already mentioned the importance of those individual festivals and their programmes, but the programmes of our festivals sit at the heart of every other impact and need to continue to be able to be innovative, to develop and to be invested in. It's also important about the adaptive city. Since 1947, when the international festival was founded, followed in the same year by the fringe and the film festival and then the tattoo, the city began to adapt and respond to the needs of the festivals and the needs of their audiences and artists. It's one of the things that we are able to show off to visitors from abroad is not just our festivals themselves but how our city has responded both through investment, of course we need investment, but also by being able to say yes through all the other complications that go on around planning and health and safety. This is an enormous enterprise, so our success is definitely founded on that. Our festivals are also loved by the people of the city as well. Almost 60 per cent of the people in the city attend our festivals. Obviously, we want more to be able to come, but that's a remarkable figure when you tell that to international colleagues, they can't believe it. A city of festivals and individual festivals that are loved by its own people can then host and bring in visitors from elsewhere in a generous way. Again, if you walk around the city, all the people who are providing all the other services are positive and welcoming and that's important. In terms of challenges, we would have to say obviously that the contracting public purse and pressures on both council and broader government budgets are a threat to us and we've currently commissioned a new Thundering Hoves report, Thundering Hoves 2, which is trying to ensure that we remain the world's leading festival city and competitive and to try and look at those factors. Although I would like to identify more of those challenges in a way that report will properly analyse those and bring them to the fore, but we know that that's a key challenge. Obviously, there are other trends that we need to be able to respond to and the continuing issue around competitor cities. We are generous with our model, but there are still cities around the world who want to be able to knock us off our pedestal, our perch. Possibly start by sort of declaring some other wider interests. Obviously, my Edinburgh port interest is obvious, but I'm also on the board of Visit Scotland and I'm on the board of the Scottish tourism alliance, which obviously represents the industry across Scotland. I think it's just in that context that I'd like to echo Faith's view that it's just the stakeholder embracing of the value of this and the general support of it. I think it's very key. I can't comment on how the internal workings or indeed the artistic value of the festivals are not really qualified, but what I see all the time is this value by all the stakeholders involved about how much it contributes and going forward. Looking at the challenges, I think we're already making progress against the two obvious ones. The overall capacity, dealing with that enormous peak that the festival represents of the city and indeed the surrounding areas and all of the infrastructure that supports it, but equally the answer has already been looked at in terms of the scheduling, where the festivals have already widened their reach, spread that load and given ourselves an opportunity to do more and, of course, enhance economic impacts by having that value coming through more of the year. I think that the two themes there are working together and I still think that there's a huge amount of optimism. We can do even more of that going forward. Thank you. Okay. Amy Saunders. Hello and welcome. Just to give you a context, I guess I'm not sure where New Zealand has brought over 200 artists. For us, we've invested a million New Zealand dollars in that. It's about £500,000. The reason that we've done that is because there is no other platform in the world that exists for us to give our artists that opportunity. For us, it's the biggest marketplace so we have artists across all the different festivals and really they're here to look onward touring opportunities, professional development opportunities. It's in such a scale here that we can't do it anywhere else really. It's been a very successful season and all those things have happened. Most of our companies have got touring opportunities. We haven't had any sell-outs yet but it really does offer us and I think other countries from all over the world a very unique platform to showcase artists across all the different art forms and year-round. There's a number of other services that are offered through the Fringe Society and Festival's Edinburgh, the momentum programme, which brings in other international producers that we can help connect our artists and producers with. The services that the Fringe Society run is an enormous professional development for our artists and producers. We've been meeting with them regularly over this month and their capacity building just goes up and up so they take that home and increases our own sector. I think it's something that will continue to invest in maybe in a smaller scale going forward but this was a big sort of risky project for us that has certainly had a lot of benefit and I can see other countries doing the same sort of thing so what Edinburgh has to offer hasn't been replicated yet anywhere else in the world but it is the scale and the expertise I think within the city are phenomenal. The challenges I guess are the obvious ones in terms of certainly for artists coming from a long way away, the costs in the city are escalating, accommodation is a big part of every company's budgets that can be off-putting particularly for artists coming from a long way away, they've got affairs etc. That's one challenge certainly from the budgets we've put together for the companies coming over as accommodation but on the whole yeah they're still coming at the moment. Okay thank you very much I mean I thought it was very interesting just listening to the contributions you know a lot of the same issues are being repeated about you know strength and diversity from having the 12 festivals working together the collaboration that there is the mutual support and the support that comes from the wider community whether that's the public sector or just the people of Edinburgh who are very supportive of having this event and challenges around costs we've just heard and infrastructure constraints and so on that we want to look at and I think you know members probably want to explore quite a few of these issues in some more detail and I'm just going to open up and bring in Dennis Robertson and I'll just remind members if they would keep their questions as concise as they can and I'm helpful if they could direct them initially to one member of the panel and if we can have answers that are as concise as possible that'd be very helpful and if you want to come in just try and catch my eye and I will I will I will bring you in as time allows. Right I'll hand over to Dennis. We're always trying to stay on the the right side of the convener. Good morning and maybe put my question to Gordon Dure because of his sort of multiple facets in the hats that he's got with regard to this. There seems to be a I feel good factor this year 2014 in Scotland I mean part of the Commonwealth Games success there you know we've got the up-and-coming Ryder cap and obviously the the festival that's going on and Susan Ricehead you know it's a 12-month aspect within Edinburgh and the the sort of various festivals that are going on and but you know I think perception is it's usually August he thinks it's going to be difficult this year to measure the economic success of the festivals given the other factors that were there that maybe conflate maybe the numbers that are coming in. Clearly measure economic benefits is in exact science but I think the tools we're using whether it's Visit Scotland or whether it's the festival itself and looking at the impact it is about the visitor numbers the spend they make you know whether they arrive to watch their tail end of the Commonwealth Games and then spend the next period of time at the festivals you might have a slight difficulty in distributing the value of that but the value for Scotland PLC I think is very clear and we can see that and measure that in pretty reasonable terms going forward so I wouldn't over concern myself about that boundary effect if you like but the one beauty of the festival is that we can measure the bed nights we can measure the ticket sales we can measure the number of other retail spend that's going on because all of the partners that understand the value of the festival share that in quite a lot of detail and the one thing we may be absolutely certain of is that 2014 is a phenomenal opportunity to have not just talked to those that came this year but hopefully put Scotland on the world stage for those that haven't quite made up their mind to come maybe next year or the years after. I mean of course we've had the homecoming as well. Does Inbury airport in itself and the proposed expansion are you coping with the visitor numbers that are coming? Always, we'll keep ahead of the demand for passengers. We're just about to open the new extension in October and we'll be starting work on the next one later in the year so we understand that we've got to keep ahead of that. It's a wonderful synergy where we know that if we make it easy and affordable for people to come to Scotland things like the festivals and just the wider Scottish tourism product is such that we will always have people to come. I often get asked you know if surely there's a limited number of passengers you can service in a country of five million. I think we're looking at the wrong end of the routes. There's seven billion out there that we want to attract. We didn't carry out an economic impact evaluation in our normal methodology this year deliberately because we felt that there were so many factors that might warp that in this year but as as Gordon says we're measuring all the other things that we can measure against previous previous years. In thundering hooves later in terms of reporting you're seeing that as the way forward in terms of future impact. In terms of how we move forward yes thundering hooves Susan as the as the chair of the festival forum may wish to say something about this as well but that examination of how much we've achieved to date on the previous thundering hooves report. We're also looking at the current context so threats and opportunities and the wider environment and then again we'll be establishing the terms for how we move forward in partnership with our stakeholders and funders which has been I think the recipe for success today. I would just say that the well first of all no I've never climbed on the back of the black horse who was called can carry but put that aside but we feel in the festivals forum that this report is really will be formative for the future. I mean the first thundering hooves 14 recommendations and we have assiduously since that came out in the festivals forum was formed gone through those prompted supported and seen that many of these things have been achieved. It's a terrific roadmap and not one that is formulaic one that has been absolutely specific for our needs and we expect the same from this one so we're very excited about it. I wonder if I may probably start with Amy and Susan. Clearly this is a tremendous product so it'd be so crude but the internationally known how do we or should we try to replicate this worldwide and if so how would we do that? You want to start or? I was going to say in a way organically it has been replicated worldwide and the fringe you know models of the Edinburgh fringe festival are all over the world but again the unique thing about Edinburgh is that famous statement that is the world stage as a city itself I haven't seen any model that's come anywhere near to being as good as the fringe and the scale and the size of it so I think festivals throughout the world are replicating it there's a fringe congress here in the weekend it's run by the fringe itself we had two of our fringe festivals that were over part of that so I think another great thing that the festivals here are doing is sharing that collaborative model and enhancing the kind of global reputation of festivals and offering artists and companies those opportunities worldwide and most people all know that those fringe festivals around the world all you know really were birthed out of Edinburgh so to speak and yeah and there are obviously international festivals other festivals throughout the world that have appeared and they're all here every year looking for work and this is sort of the mother ship in a way from my perspective. Yes I think that Amy said that said that very well I'm not sure I would actually and forgive me want to see this replicated everywhere else and I don't think that's absolutely possible because part of what is unique here is the city of Edinburgh I mean it is it is it's an extraordinary city we all know that but it's an extraordinary city for these festivals the backdrop the physical backdrop the size the ability to walk around it all of the infrastructure issues the people you can't lift that and put that anywhere else so any other festivals or indeed festival city would have to build on its own assets and I don't know of any city in the world that could do this having said that the reach of our festivals is phenomenal and Amy's talked about the fringe but if you look at a number of the other festivals the book festival has a word alliance which had set up over several years with book festivals around the world and it has influenced and it has helped create and it's helped support these other book festivals and other festivals do the same thing so we are seen as the leader elsewhere in prompting what those other cities and those other places can actually develop for themselves. Just to say that at the moment we have had this week the secretary of state for culture for the city of Rideau de Janeiro the mayor of Santiago and at the moment we have the culture secretary for Buenos Aires city literally this week we're looking after them I was having dinner with the the culture secretary from Buenos Aires last night and what we're there to do they're here to observe how we work they do think it's astonishing they think there's nothing else like it in the world and what they will take back is a sense of our generosity in terms of sharing that model a sense of the the strength and power of our individual festivals how they work the models of how they also collaborate and work together how the city works how Scotland supports and enhances the festivals and it's part of what contributes to our sense of a confident outward looking national identity so at every level from how the festivals work to how they relate to the city to how Scotland is seen is perceived by these people as being something incredibly strong it can't be replicated but elements of it can actually help to feed back into how we work so what we hope is that these countries will develop ways of working that will then allow their artists to come back to Edinburgh in a strong and confident way and enhance our programmes in due course. I was going to mention the congress that Amy said we had 39 different fringes from around from 15 different countries here in the city our colleagues at the international festival of course had the culture summits here in the parliament the weekend before students mentioned the literary alliance and I think these are not about replicating but it is about sharing our models and it is about increasing the global international reach of the brand of the festivals and it's also really important in terms of routes for artists so all of these festival directors and producers and cultural entrepreneurs and policy makers are in the city looking at what we do and we're generously sharing that with what with them ultimately leads to that to the marketplace element the fact that then Scottish artists and the other artists coming here then have routes to other work and tours and life and you know career development and professional development for the for the life and that's really good for the you know for those artists but it's really good for the for brand scotland too you know that scotland is an international cultural recognised brand I mean I think you know me no one can doubt the success your success and well done but and I apologize for a crude question with my financial background when I asked the question I was really looking to see what given that investment and sharing which is great and and develops a brand Scotland even more but I'm looking for what financial return do we get from spreading the marketing the brand who's that? I think Susan and Faith probably well the the first return is in marketing that brand we're bringing in more visitors more artists if you think about the fact that there are over 20,000 artists in the city for some places that would be a festival in itself in terms of the numbers coming in so we're doing a number of things when we're we're going out into the world so we're doing consumer marketing which is is dependent on the strength of the brand the cultural brand and we're also doing I suppose high level kind of cultural diplomacy relationship marketing which is about perception and then more broadly speaking we're doing active artist and producer engagement so encouraging people to come back here to enhance what what happens on the platforms of our different festivals and every one of those contributes some of them in more subtle ways obviously the consumer marketing is about increasing you know visitor number of visitors and visitor spend from our selfish perspective ultimately bringing more people into the city to buy tickets but every time that happens they're also extending their spend so there's a direct value in terms of that brand building internationally in terms of the broader in terms of the that kind of cultural diplomacy side of things then we definitely see ourselves as part of Team Scotland so when we are out in a country so to give you an example when I was out in China I was simultaneously meeting with artists and cultural organisations and we were part of a travel trade fair working with Visit Scotland and Visit Britain and the final thing I was doing was I was doing inward investment meetings for the city while I was there too now we don't do that on every occasion what we'll normally do is get into partnership if we can with SDI on the ground so that we're meeting with them to give you another example the Edinburgh international festivals director has done launches around the world of his program connecting to their program but when he's doing that we're also encouraging SDI and partners on the ground at diplomatic level to make sure that the business community is engaging and there's a sense when you have a very strong cultural brand that what you're conveying is an image of a dynamic outward looking connected country that's about exchange in both directions and exchange in both directions matters we can't just go out there and say we're fabulous we're also learning and connecting and exchanging ideas with these countries as well we think you're fabulous that's okay it's just a small point if we draw in the fence around the world and come to the nation there's also a lot of ripple effect outside of Edinburgh and we shouldn't lose sight of that either there I forget how many again I'm sorry to mention the book festival but since I chair that board as well as the festivals forum that's the one I know best but I've lost count of how many little local book festivals literature festivals there are right around Scotland and they all help in those local often very small localities often you know tiny you know really villages right around bringing people in they help the local economies they also again create a kind of feel good factor and that ultimately has probably an unmeasurable impact on the economy as well so we mustn't forget that kind of influence as well as the broader Gordon there's a huge amount there and the value of that is quite able to quantify but I think it's really evident how it's happening but let me give you a really tangible example we're out there obviously selling Edinburgh and Scotland as an opportunity for airlines to come and invest all the time on page three of our 24 page sales document which sets out what Edinburgh and Scotland's got to offer the festivals are front and centre because they do generate huge amounts of demand and we've gone about this in a really numeric very business orientated investment agenda where we're actually putting a business case in front of airlines and saying this is how you can make profitable investment coming into Scotland and if I look at just a long haul alone two years ago we had one long haul flight in Edinburgh into New York we've now got seven and that's hugely driven by the fact that we've got the opportunity to show that not just in August but actually through seven or eight months of the year the festival is directly contributing to demand and for the rest of the year it's actually raising the brand and people want to come to Scotland in Edinburgh because of what they've heard and what they've seen in terms of that coverage elsewhere be it through Visit Scotland be it through social media whatever the ability to sell that and in no way criticism or boasting but we've got to put the scale on this the festivals are significantly larger than the Commonwealth Games and they happen every year so we did their absolute Scotland did itself proud Glasgow did a fantastic job of talking to some new audiences sports-oriented audiences and of course selling the fact that Scotland is on all Edinburgh but we cannot undervalue what Edinburgh has every single year in driving people to come sample and hopefully come back time and time again to one of the best brands I think in the world without without a remote exaggeration I think Edinburgh is the best place on the planet to be in August is that level is that quality it's going to say actually one other thing is in terms of the artists that come here and for us because it's such a large number this year a they're going off to Stirling and places on their days off but b they're going home you've immediately got 200 ambassadors who've come on board as ambassadors for Scotland and they will come back and the off-seeds and on holidays and I've heard all of them talking and bringing families back and that so things like that that maybe we don't think about as immediate impacts are very strong because they have a genuinely such a positive experience whilst they're here I think that's great and I mean obviously it is fabulous and a great success faith you mentioned your analysis of opportunities in threats with perhaps some regard infrastructure what threats do you see in limiting the continued growth of the festival I want to say first of all it doesn't all need to be about growth what's most important in terms of brand is making sure that we maintain the quality and the innovation of the programme so there's something really important there's also an issue around how we can extend in all areas that we work and in a way this I really like this to be part of the conversation is that we are strong of course we need to continue to be invested in at the heart of all its investment in our programmes that is the most important thing but we we also want to be able to extend the benefits of what we do we want to be capitalised on I guess on all these levels so if I take it right down from the kind of relatively local to the global on the relatively local side you know we've got new rail networks coming in we think we believe that we can continue to grow if people are also staying out with the city and that the benefits of that can extend into the borders and up into five and further a field for lots of international visitors the kind of distances that we're talking about are not major we also learn a lot I think the summer between Glasgow and Edinburgh we cooperated a great deal on positioning and media and what we really understood was that the distance between those cities is nothing to most of the people who are coming here and again encouraging movement and benefits across the whole of the central belt but also beyond in terms of people staying and almost being festival commuters is a real is a real possibility on the global side of things we really do believe that we could be used more effectively we have amazing contacts we have profile we are a global brand we could be used more effectively to be part of the messaging which actually Gordon already uses in terms of you know the the relationships of encouraging companies to come in and invest in Edinburgh Airport and bring in bring in new routes but actually we really genuinely believe that our profile and positioning and our internationalism that generous accepted connection with other countries is a really great route for Scotland to say yes we're here to do business but the first thing is that we understand you we're connecting to you those are the foundations that we think we can build on okay thank you thank you yeah um Susan touched on a moment ago quite interesting point about spreading the benefits of this across the rest of Scotland and I think Mike McKenzie wanted to ask some questions yeah on that issue thanks my lord a couple of other questions as well that to um if it's all right i'll just ask the full suite um more general terms just before I get to that I was struck very much struck by the you know what we're talking about this in business terms or economic terms and it strikes me that it's you know and I suppose it was a surprise to me that it's a very sophisticated complex business and I just wondered what lessons there are for other business sectors I mean I was struck by faith using words like ecosystem organic by Cath talking about collaborative competition or it might have been competitive collaboration I'm not quite sure which but um and it almost has a kind of open source feel to it other lessons for other business sectors in in the success of the festival okay I'll maybe start while everyone else comes up with a sensible response um so the the answer is yes to to some extent and I think we actually see some of these things in very different ways what festivals do is is is present something to the public and so we connect with them in a certain way and we have ways of working together and as I said before working separately I would also say that if you are primarily on the festival side you really do try to think in organisational and business terms if you're primarily on the business side you tend to look at some of those other factors it isn't all just one or just the other so I said something about going around Scotland and little festivals coming up and the sense of well-being that that creates in other parts of the country that isn't a business concept but it's actually very important but having said that if you look at something like the oil and gas sector because they have up in the northeast primarily a geographic kind of invisible fence to some extent and have grown up together they have a body in an organisation that pulls them together that speaks for them that reaches out around the world that invites people in and so forth there are some things that are done that are similar but we don't see it in the same way because we don't see into businesses in the same way that we see we as as audience if you will or we as as as people within the city that we see into the festivals so there's a and the festivals bring bring what they bring to us whereas other businesses bring their stuff out if you see what I mean so we perceive it differently but I think some of these things happen I'm not sure that there are um primary lessons I think there are times when businesses get together because they share a common problem or an issue and then times when they compete if that's what you're talking about we do the same things I'll see shall I say something very very briefly just again in Scottish terms we were talking about kind of imitation elsewhere but what Scottish Enterprise our key partners describe us as in our collaborative context is as a pathfinder that we we work out ways to do things in quite a complex organic way we evolve effective models we test them out in in a in a very big environment and then we often roll them out into the wider cultural sector or indeed the wider tourism sector yeah face covered I I don't know whether there are things for businesses to learn but I think our what we have learned in the last six seven years of our collaborative model has been really interesting for us we are of course individually as we said at the very top of this distinct unique competing festivals in lots of ways but we've worked out a system of where we are stronger when we are collaborating and particularly in markets and countries for the fringe particularly international work it's very beneficial for us to have not just festivals Edinburgh in that collaborative working model but also at the international festival which is a proper pathfinder for international companies and artists coming here and working out where we where there are challenges and where we have to work with stakeholders on challenges to become easier to work with in some ways by collaborating together so I don't know whether there are lessons to be learned in that for businesses but certainly we've learned a huge amount from that in the last few years thank you I'll move on if I can convener to the the other thing that interests me is that you know to what extent do you see yourself as a hub and a springboard for some of the other festival type events that happen in other parts of the country I mean I'm thinking in Highlands and Islands obviously Orkney you know does this pretty well but there's a you know folk festival in Shetland jazz festival and I like head fest in the western Isles but equally there there are also areas that in festival terms are kind of cultural deserts across the Highlands and Islands do you see an opportunity to kind of help given the social economic impact and good that arises from this do you see do you feel a responsibility and do you see an opportunity to spread out into those other areas that are as you untouched by this phenomena I think we all we have to be concerned a bit about trying to colonise areas that actually have their own wonderful cultures and you know ways of doing things so one of the things that we do is that our individual festivals a lot of them work across Scotland with programmes that are drawn out of the festival so we don't go in and land a festival with people but to give some examples our science festival runs the biggest theatre and education programme in Scotland so it is out there working with you know a quarter of the school children in the whole of Scotland every year and then moving on and communicating with more of them the following year and our imaginary festival our festival for children and young people runs a major touring programme of their work so that they're rolling out the riches of their content to the rest of Scotland but we and the tattoo for example has just been doing it was I think it was in Aberdeen just yesterday or the day before so there are elements of what they do the international festivals reached out and done outreach events but one offs not not kind of landing with everything that that we do but what we do do is act as a kind of centre for advice we as I say we test out ways of working about how we collaborate we've kind of codified some of our knowledge and turned it into a seminar series which we share and I and some of my colleagues go out and talk to so for example we we ran a workshop with the cluster of festivals in Aberdeen which hadn't quite consolidated they didn't quite know how to work so I spent a day with them workshopping defining the things that they could work on together using our methodology to try and bring them together to work in a new way so we advise and support and our culture we've created a culture of festivals that is infectious so I would say that the growth in festivals around Scotland is partly through the inspiration of what has happened here and our individual festivals like the book festival have supported the the growth of a network I think of festivals around around Scotland. Amy's already touched on it with her artists you know that the Edinburgh and the festivals in Edinburgh being a gateway to the rest of Scotland for the audience and not to forget that as Faith mentioned before there are 25 000 artists throughout the year who are here as artists but also as audiences and one of the things that we were very careful to do through the momentum programme which is which Amy touched on which is about us bringing international culture practitioners cultural agencies governments creative entrepreneurs from around the world here not just in august but all throughout the year we always make sure that we widen that out to the wider cultural sector in Scotland not to determine what they might do but at least that those connections are being made so that so that so that there might be a legacy for work to develop throughout the year and we know that lots of work comes out of the meeting of artists here you know lots of artists not just from Scotland who come to the festivals we know from the impact studies said that it encouraged them to meet more people to see work from other countries that they wouldn't normally see and then to go on to create work that they perhaps wouldn't have created otherwise. The gateway idea is about us as a tourism gateway for people coming in here but also as a gateway in terms of opportunities for artists in Scotland to both present their work in Edinburgh but to take ideas back and nourish their communities with them. And final question convener if you had an ask of this committee this parliament the Scottish government what would it be? I guess what I would say off the top of my head is to be or to continue to be champions of this agenda and the cultural agenda more widely. Culture if you will goes in and out of fashion sometimes in societal terms. I personally believe and I've said this frequently in public that you don't have a healthy society unless you have a strong cultural base. I think it is utterly important to continue to support cultural activities and something as strong and powerful as this you know it's a jewel and so it would be to have that championship from parliamentarians and from from anyone in public life and then the other thing is I mentioned funding before and said we've been hugely grateful for the funding all of the festivals have for the funding they've had particularly the expo program which is of the last few years. We worry every year and every day about where will the money come from in the future that's what festivals do and so the other thing we could ask is please keep that on your agenda and please give us the funding but also keep the style of not intervening in what we do. Cultural matters have to be delivered by the artists. To continue to remember that the impacts aren't just cultural and they're not just in Edinburgh and that actually we're very strong on attracting talent and jobs and investment into businesses here into the creative economy and to remember that and then exploit us you know we've talked about the work that we do in the different areas that we touch on and so whether it's revisit Scotland or SDI or business community just you know don't forget that we are an exploitable resource for you too. I mean we really appreciate the cross-party support that we've had and we don't take it for granted and nor do we take for granted the kind of additional investment and it's program in the Thundering Hooves report the first report. Program innovation and investment was one of the key things that was pointed out as being essential to everything else. The expo fund has been really important that way but it's also allowed us to then leave our extended partnership so we brought in over a million pounds of additional investment in 2012 and 2014 through partnership working and expo definitely helped to motivate that partnership not just among ourselves but in that extended community and so I think the other thing I would just say is in order to kind of carry on being able to invest in our success for the benefit of Scotland we do also need to think about what we're dealing with in terms of budgets and contracting support and to think with us inventively about how we address that. We're not a part of the Thundering Hooves 2 report we'll be looking at how we do that but we know there's a contracting public person and we need to work with our partners in the private sector to make sure that we're investing not just in the festivals themselves but in their marketing in collaboration with the other assets of the city and the other assets of Scotland. I think that's true and I'll come at it from the point of view of hopefully a supporter where we contribute as a company to marketing Edinburgh which obviously again is looking at everything that Edinburgh has to offer with festivals being front centre. I think recognising the limited ability of the public sector I think the private sector does need to find a way of getting mechanisms to put more investment in. I think the case for that return on investment will be very strong. I think what we're missing at the moment is some of the mechanisms that would allow that to be rolled out so while I won't sort of guess the bit of what might be successful in terms of mechanisms what I think it's important is that the Parliament and indeed the City of Edinburgh Council are finding an environment that allows private investors to feel as though whatever is asked of them is equitable feel as though it's minimal in terms of its administration costs and I think the most important thing having some visibility of how that money will be invested and I think we're going to achieve these three things. I actually expect to find quite a willing audience amongst the corporates and amongst the business community because I think as I've said at the start I think people genuinely do understand the value of the festivals and indeed tourism. We just need to find ways of making an efficient way of them putting their money where their mouth is, where they can see the benefits rolling in every single year in terms of what the festivals bring. First of all can I just say I apologise that I wasn't able to attend the event last night because I was actually attending letter 2 and I have to see it was really enjoyable it was absolutely fabulous and my question is around that in that you know the tattoos happening over these two weeks how do you extrapolate the benefits of the tattoo from everything else that's going on in different regions the rest of the festival? Very detailed government green book analysis so the tattoo is one of our festivals and they're part of our extended collaboration so basically we analyse it in exactly the same way as we do our other festivals and look at the economic benefit by means of an agreed government green book economic impact process. We can break down the benefits between the festivals. We all know these methodologies change so but we have to use a methodology that's agreed by our partners and stakeholders and that's comparable with other areas so for example we are able to compare the economic impact of our festivals with the economic impact of golf tourism and our impacts are significantly higher we're able to do that because we stick to a government green book approach. My other question is around I think it was yourself Faith who mentioned the costs and obviously the costs for tourists and for artists alike. What collaboration is there with the hoteliers and you know other businesses who are providing accommodation around costs I know it's a free market but you know is there a sort of limit? At the moment it's a market limit we engage in a constant dialogue particularly through the Inmirturism Action Group and you know regularly raise our concerns. There is an issue about allowing the not interfering too much and allowing it to operate as a market but we do feel that there are yeah we're beginning to get to the stage and Kath may wishes to say a little bit more about this from a fringe artist's perspective but we do need to think about the visitors as well and I know that there is definitely been talked about that it's at the the limits of of tolerable so we all need to work on that together but at the same time we want the hotels to benefit you know it's part of it's part of the exchange of value that we're all engaging with in the city. Yeah I mean our job from a fringe perspective our job is to is to ensure that the environment here is still one where artists and companies want to come and showcase their work and you know Amy touched on it from an international perspective it is undoubtedly true that it's an expensive undertaking it's a you know it's a creatively risky experience for fringe companies it's also a it can be financially onerous too and I think we just have to be aware of that and just work with our partners on on balancing the you know the benefits into the business community and into the economy with the with the ability of fringe companies and other artists to still present their work here just what tell yours are co-operative and one you know are they just there because we all know I think we've all heard stories about you know the crisis triple and during the festival and how co-operative are they they're to to you know make a profit within the marketplace so we do feel that we're at the stage where you know they need to look at it as well as a risk to all of us and that's the that's the kind of because we can't oblige anyone a lot of how we have to work as festivals Edinburgh the club to body is through influence and not power so it is about a conversation and the conversation we're raising is about city reputation and that's in all our interests and and so I think that the surveying when we do our economic impact which will probably be again next year we would like to work on trying to look at attitudinal data which we'll then be able to feed into a more we have to we have to use evidence in order to be able to have a have a proper discussion about these things so the conversation continues it is an issue but in order to really address I think we need to do some some serious research thank you and just a small point where do you put the people who come in the artists and so forth and produces whatever in Edinburgh limited number of rooms costly rooms and so forth but then other entities jump in as well so Edinburgh University is another hat I wear opens up a lot of its residences to people who are coming in and that is low cost helps the university because they fill them when they might be empty and provides more beds on a different basis from a hotel so you know we are endlessly inventive on how to try to tackle some of these issues and that in turn contributes to the economy if you think about the relationship with the university as a both as a host for spaces and as a an accommodation provider is part of the economy that allows it to operate year round also a big contributor to why people want to come and study at the university here in the in the first place but I would also say that you know French French artists particularly are not staying in hotels there are other places for them to stay in and if we're talking about increased infrastructure links and actually your question check about spreading the benefit out maybe there are new models and infrastructure links that can help us actually find solutions not just in the city centre thank you Gordon obviously there's always an issue of peace and keeping up but I think the planning environment in Edinburgh at the moment in terms of hotel development is quite positive the city is very supportive of more capacity and indeed I can see quite a lot of green sheets of projects that are coming online we ourselves are going to be developing an airport a hotel at the airport in the next couple of years and we know of a number of other developments in that vicinity going around as well so it's probably coming a little too late and it's not been helped by the downturn in the economy but I think hopefully in the coming years we'll catch up with some of that capacity of course the big challenge is to make sure that that can be a profitable exercise all year round which again comes back to my comments about how do we make sure that we harvest the benefits of the festivals throughout the year although we have moved significantly in that degree over the last few already okay um marco piagin the msp representing Edinburgh central and and actually as somebody who as a student used to stand on the royal mile handing out flyers getting people to come to my show I never really needed to be convinced of the the great case and the great strength of Edinburgh but I would like to just take a little bit of credit for having pushed the idea of having this session in our agenda setting meeting but I'm really concerned about the breadth of participation I think others are going to refer to the audiences again but you touched on it there the the artists and the costs and the difficulties there so I wonder um cath could you the fringe programme is full of shows events being put on the vast majority of which will not break even is that an issue well we we talk a lot about costs and benefits and our job I think is to I mean I don't I don't know exactly if I would if there's evidence to to suggest what you say is right I don't know that but we know that certainly it is incredibly creatively and financially onerous to bring a company here one of the things that we look at as much as we try to to do what we can on the costs of coming is actually to look at the other side of that and to increase the benefits and so I know that for the vast majority of companies coming to the fringe each year they're doing it as an investment in the future life of their company so we work as Amy touched on before we have a big programme of professional and career development advice we we work with the arts industry we credit over a thousand arts industry professionals who are coming to the fringe each year from over 40 countries who are here looking to buy work we have all sorts of opportunities for fringe companies to get in front of those people to sell them their work and we get we put them in front of international media and all those things that so yes it's expensive to come here but if you see that an investment in in in your work so you look at companies like Catherine reels with with white you look at you know black watch stomp those companies that started here that then go on to have a life much much outside Edinburgh and for quite a long time there's a producer that we work with who's not scottish who's doing a show actually this year who launched a show here 10 years ago and you know she said that it was an incredibly expensive undertaking but she managed to launch something that went to 40 countries and then toured for 10 years on the back of it so so I think yes we have to be we have to be aware of the costs of companies and make sure that it's still an environment where people want to come but the other side of that is to make sure that the benefits are there that actually it's still a place where you can create a significant life for your work and your company that most of our companies have all done well but they've had a lot of lessons coming out of it so it's been good to go back and one and we had a lot of meetings with them beforehand about expectations and budgets and everything and I think some of the learnings going back are to have realistic expectations and to set your box office at a real realistic percentage of what you as you say is that 30% is it 40% and really come prepared for and we said everybody what are your top three reasons for coming none of those three reasons were to make money it was about onward turn about professional development and networking still the box office is onerous and they're all walking around this week kind of going it's one week to go but they all they if you would have asked them would you come back they would but they will come back with slightly more prepared in terms of what they're here to expect and I think we've learned that also in terms of coming it has to be the companies that really are coming and are very clear about why they're coming so I hear what you're saying but actually I think if the right preparation is done and the companies are in the right place before they come and they know why they're here that the benefits still exceed the potential negative financial that can so program that Amy has brought here with creative New Zealand led on from creative New Zealand side is across seven of our festivals so there are multiple platforms available for artists with their different needs one of the things that I think drives a lot of the costs and is an important area for the festival of the venue chains you know the likes of assembly guild balloon see the rest how is the relationship between the fringe in particular and the venue chains and and how important is that going to be for the ongoing economic viability of artists wanting to come here and showcase their work yeah I mean venues are venues are hugely crucial to the to the growth and success of the fringe and not just the the kind of managers that you're talking about but actually the landlords that faith has been tucked on before but it's a very the fringe is fueled by a sort of creative entrepreneurial drive I guess there seems to be a an ending ability to find space and to make space available but also to create different models of space and different models of venues so there are very very big venues with multiple spaces producing a huge amount of work themselves there are other venues that are very small and site specific and companies would say well actually I don't fit into that model let's find another model and I think one of the one of the great things I love about the fringe is it's a completely organic model and people will solve those problems themselves and there's clearly a lot of people involved in the fringe a lot of people mainly working for the venues in particular I think are possibly if the if the participants aren't making profits I think that the venue chains are are pretty good at doing it what is the balance between paid employees and volunteers with those venue chains I'm sorry there's there's not a venue chain here and you're the closest to an expert in that area what what is the balance between paid employees and volunteers in there I don't know the answer to that question but there are but in terms of I guess professional development as well I mean there's a great model here of people who are you know not to mention a well I'm going to mention a specific venue but you know northern stage for example who's who are a venue in Newcastle who have done a venue here for the last few years they're in a new space this year they've brought their entirely staff with their volunteers they bring them with them it's a great way for them to learn how to build a theatre for them to learn how to deal with a company for them to learn how to make work themselves I don't know what the balance is but I know that there are different opportunities and it's a great training ground for not just artists who are on stage but for you know venue technicians box office staff it's you know lots of it's where lots of people start their career. Stat at you 77% of temporary staff so that's the people who are passing through felt that their employability had increased as a result of their work with festivals. That was exactly what I was going to make because there when I just want to make a more general umbrella statement when we talk about economic impact we have a model for measuring that and you know it's it's beds and it's spend and all the rest of it but actually there are a lot of elements of economic impact that we don't measure that are economic and one of them is the what happens to these volunteers and particularly younger people who then actually have enough courage sometimes who maybe haven't been in work have enough courage and have a story they can tell about themselves because they volunteered to go and get a job that is an economic impact on a one by one basis we don't measure that in a number but we mustn't forget it. I guess I'm just asking out of an interesting quick bow know you know who benefits and are these people who are making the fringe happen by staffing the box offices manning the lighting stages all of that are they benefiting as well but there's just one one last question which occurred to me as as a sat down that is I've been on the economy committee for two years now and I don't think I've ever seen a panel come in front of us that's 80 women beforehand is that reflective of movers and shakers in Edinburgh festivals and is that a good sign? Of course it's a good sign. I thought you were going to say you've never heard a panel be so articulate. That engaging spirited convincing persuasive? The cultural sector is driven by a lot of women strong competent women but also we have lots of gifted men as well and we don't have to think about it too much we're kind of consciously aware it was actually interestingly it was Gordon who pointed it out whereas I think we would feel that it was relatively normal for a panel of women to be speaking. There are occasional moments where we don't pay enough attention and something happens and you suddenly go my goodness there's a panel of men but it's men on an event that we're organising but it's very rare it has to be said 10 out of 12 of our directors are men. Sorry I didn't catch your eye but the festival forum so this umbrella body is roughly half and half as I visually look around the table of men and women. I too like Margaret I'm sorry I couldn't join you last night but I was taking part in a just festival event and then it dawned on me that I've also taken part previously in an international festival event where I joined the hordes of people running about Arthur's seat with torches on our heads so I'll maybe discuss what my next venture perhaps something in the fringe with or without Marco something to look forward to or not. I remember a few weeks back I think I saw an article in one of our national newspapers I think Jonathan Mills was suggesting that festivals needed more funding if they were going to maintain their prominent position you know as a world leader and I'd just like to understand a bit more about how much money at probably a question for faith how much money festivals Edinburgh do receive you know from in total from local and national government what's the position at the moment? I don't have those I'm very happy to to get the festival send individual details because we don't we don't aggregate that partly because it's for the individual festivals to negotiate their their terms with their with their funders and the challenges at the moment obviously are that and we we completely understand that we're actually in a very very privileged position with the city because we've had standstill funding when other budgets have actually been cut and I just would like to note that and that also in very challenging economic circumstances we've actually brought in more investment to our programmes but the transformative effect of that investment both in terms of the the amazing projects that have taken place the audiences and the profile is remarkable and it's also remarkable that what those projects and that investment has allowed the festivals to do because when they're invested in they're innovative is that almost all of them have extended their networks of contacts from the storytelling festival to the book festival with the the alliance of book festivals around the world they've used it not just to create programmes but to create a wider a wider network we do have to look at this it's part of the thundering I don't want to pre-empt some of that work it will definitely be part of the thundering hooves to analysis about what levels do those needs sit at we did at the very beginning when festivals Edinburgh was founded about what do we need to do to maintain that's one thing what we do already which would you know be a good thing but actually what we should all be doing is investing in success and at relatively modest levels I think can be transformation transformational for a festival the very first investment into the storytelling festival from expo I think was something like 30 000 pounds it was the foundation on which a massive network of storytelling festivals around the world was created and new opportunities were created for the artists involved in that festival and festivals Edinburgh how big is your team oh we're we're we're uh we're almost all project funded so actually what we do is we and we just to explain festivals Edinburgh is the festivals so the board of directors is the 12 festivals they are my 12 bosses and my team works on their agenda and we have a clear kind of business plan we have collaborative projects that we agree to invest in around environment innovation program development and and marketing UK and international marketing but those projects are are a you know they're they're bound they're in particular timescales they're only project funded so there's no there's a very small amount of core funding we're a very agile organisation and we're not we're not there to kind of serve ourselves as an administration or an executive we are there to respond to the needs of the festivals and the possibilities of how partnership among ourselves and with our partners can enhance ourselves and how we work in the city and in Scotland as a whole I'm sure it must be very challenging having 12 bosses oh no it's wonderful the texture is yeah that's all on the record um I know previously Edinburgh has discussed yeah I'm not sure how far the discussion has gone and I've no doubt it will come back about you know the idea of a bed tax rather than a bedroom tax um you know so that a tourist tax and I'm just wondering if any of your organisations have been involved in that discussion because perhaps some of that could be ring fence to reinvest in the festival if it is providing so many economic social and cultural benefits. Gordon may want to say a little bit about this as well but actually he and I have worked very closely on and we you know I think it was called a visitor levy which sounds slightly less controversial there's been lots of work and examination of that but actually we're not set on that what we're trying to do and want to be able to do Gordon brought it up earlier on is look at an alternative funding model and it's not just about investing into our programmes it's also about looking at the the the marketing of the city as a whole and also the kind of public realm if appropriate as well so all of those things are have been identified as needs and what we need to look at is the method of doing that and we have to do that collaboratively. I think I said at the outset I think things are important to try and get this off the ground with a degree of enthusiasm and commitment is you know the equal equality of it so people feel as though they're being a regional summon they can see what they're getting back for it a very efficient way of collecting whatever that sums is and probably most importantly of the three is about understanding what that money is going to be spent on. I think the debate in the past but the visitor levy answered none of these and certainly didn't answer the equality element where it was really going to hit the the hoteliers far far harder and I think they had a perfectly legitimate case that said that was an unfair focus compared with who gets all the wider economic benefits in the city so I don't want to predicate what might work there are a number of models out there particularly the sort of bid type schemes which which seem quite efficient and you can kind of cast the net fairly flexibly but I think if until we've written down what this amount of money will be spent on and therefore predict the benefits and who gets these benefits it'll be very hard to get any business to sign up to it so I think you know the real push working with marketing Edinburgh, the festivals, working with the city and indeed working with hopefully some sort of leading thinkers in the private sector is if we can achieve the third one first and then work out how the other two can support that then I think we are talking to a listening environment obviously until people see the scale of that and understand what that means for the business that you can't predict entirely you'll be enthusiastic and you might be reluctant followers but I think there is a general understanding that the private sector has to step up to the post here and find a way of getting around this and certainly I don't get an awful lot of pushback when I'm having these private conversations with people it is about answering equality efficiency and understanding what return they can expect to get because we've all got boards to convince when we're making investment cases. Thank you I'd like to ask another question convener on a slightly different topic I think someone mentioned earlier that sort of 60% participation from people in Edinburgh and yeah I still have concerns myself about who it is we're attracting you know I walk down the royal mile every day and have done for years and there's a certain feeling about that crowd I know obviously there's some people who don't feel the festival is for them yet so just like a bit more information on that and also with regards to the timing now this is obviously a massive issue and we're trying to fit in with global holidays and I know from next year I'm quite pleased to see that the international festivals dates will will align with with other activity because you know it all seemed to me that last week was there's just a different feeling in the city next week but our schools went back to school last week you know it's right in the middle of the three week run now I know that there's imaginary and there's the festival of science and there's things going on across the calendar but I just wondered if that's reviewed from time to time are we doing everything that we can to include as many people as possible yes and it's a particular area of the work at the moment of work at the moment because we carried out our social impact study we've got more data around that including questions in the household survey which have allowed us to analyse the levels of attendance so we know that it's over 90 in the centre of Edinburgh it's down at 37 in some other in them in the kind of least attending area again we're not smug about this I think it's important to note that those are quite high attendance figures for any community in any city in the world but the festivals themselves individually are running programmes that are actually not included in those key attendance figures they're running many of them year round engagement programmes actually out in the communities themselves however working with the city on a programme called creative lives we're starting to do serious in depth mapping not just of where things are happening and what numbers but what kinds of work is happening and needs to happen to be able to address the needs of those communities and it's again key area of work we'll be looking at in thundering hooves too thank you just a couple of specific examples and forgive the book festival reference again I'm sorry about that but some years ago we set up a schools programme so it's important to us to overlap with the start of school and of course that date varies each summer and some summers it's really very hard but we sell sort of tickets if you will through schools and provide buses and teachers can bring classes into the book festival we have special programmes for them we have a day that's just for them and this can reach quite widely as widely as a school and a teacher is interested so that's a way to reach out and it covers all different social social economic classes there are also specific events so again we've done something with kind of creating a story in a picture book with school children and Craig Miller so we will go within Edinburgh and go to some of those communities that wouldn't think of of walking into some of the festivals and actually bring that out to them so I think a lot of the festivals really focus in that kind of area it's important not all festivals have to do all things in the same way and on the same scale one of the one of the benefits about working together is to understand the strengths in particular areas of particular festivals work but what we do think about together is are we delivering to the community and we're doing that more intensively than we ever have done before thank you convener okay um Joan McAlpine thank you very much convener and good morning and I wanted to actually further develop the points that my my colleague Alston had raised about tax and we've been given some figures from a spice I believe on economic impact 261 million I take it that's based on your your own last economic impact assessment is it and 5242 full-time jobs in Edinburgh um I take it that that 261 million will include tax revenue no it only includes two that's a two basically that is an analysis of our tourism visits from outside Edinburgh so it's the the economic impact is based on tourism impacts so right so in terms of say the amount of money raised through people that for example as people come into the city and see that that would be in addition to that 261 million what we analyse is the amount of spend on shopping transport entertainment food and drink and accommodation by people coming into the city from outside Edinburgh right so we'd include that then you must include that then and similarly with the jobs that would include income tax and national insurance that was generated well we count that as we just to count the number of employees of full-time equivalents right so it's not it's not a it's not a financial sum it's a right it's okay but the but those jobs obviously are generating tax and national insurance and things like that as well and your main funders are the city of Edinburgh council and the Scottish government your main public funders this is the thing we're 12 festivals and to give you an example of the variations in models we have a festival that is funded 50 25 25 between the city of Edinburgh council and the and through creative through creative scotland so through the national agency expo is an additional amount of money to invest into programmes so it's a program innovation and development fund for Scottish artists and then we would have a festival like the book festival where 80% of their income is self-generated so the models vary to such an extraordinary degree it would be hard to pin it so I totally understand the very sophisticated operation but in terms of your main public fund funders or the city of Edinburgh council and the Scottish if you look at scale yeah through creative scotland sorry yeah which is ultimately the Scottish government money now the tax revenue the tax generated you were talking about looking at other ways other ways to raise additional taxes from the private sector and because of the what you've described very eloquently as the squeeze on the public sector funding but of course you already raise a lot of tax through the festivals don't you but that doesn't go back to your main funders uh no no do you think it would it would make a difference if it did so that so that you're talking about the tax that you generate the your main public funders give you grants um but the the tax that you generate doesn't go back to your main public funders it goes back to the UK government yeah well that would be it I mean again that would be an issue for you to address not us yes yes I can understand you mean that what have we drawn on these issues yes yeah okay um but I think it's an important point to me you know that uh you are living in very constrained times and for example the Scottish Government's infrastructure budget has been cut by 26 percent and uh you're presumably generating a lot of the tax that could be reinvested in an infrastructure to benefit the festival and I think there's complication complications has to be said around the tax space in the city as well because of the services including our own that are then being provided for a wider catch significantly global but you know in Scotland wider catchment area and we know there's challenges around that as well sure and for mr dur in particular I know that you've talked in the past about air passenger duty um does that have an effect in the context of the Edinburgh festival um I think it does I mean the analysis we've done on the air passenger duty is that the current levels that apply here probably realise uh two million missing passengers that would otherwise be flying in and out of Scotland now a proportion of that I believe would obviously be associated with the festivals and other tourism other business other leisure trips for scots outbound as well so I haven't got the breakdown of what the the proportion of that would be but two million passengers missing from the Scottish economy is pretty serious gap that we could otherwise have had economic value from so yeah it's pretty significant. Apply to the festival as well because Amy talked earlier about the difficulties for long haul flights of bringing people and how expensive it was I take it you would be able to bring more people if it was more economically viable yeah we believe so in a sense that the real impact is on the airlines when they're looking at where to start where to invest next and APD in the UK is more than double the next most expensive and in fact most of our direct competition has got no air passengers at all so Ireland doesn't France doesn't Holland doesn't Spain doesn't so on so when we're talking to an easy jet and a Ryanair and they're looking at where do they put the next aircraft we start a minimum of 14 pounds per passenger behind our opposition down Europe and given that my charges for the use of the airport never mind the tax associated with it is less than that then that's quite a big gap to try and bridge and Edinburgh has to trade very well on its wider value where people know that it's a place where you can make a route very successful it's interesting statistic actually that Edinburgh although it's less than half the size in passenger numbers of Manchester airport we have more international arrivals than Manchester airport and I think you know you look at things at the festival as being a really strong explanatory factor behind that and you know just feeds that largest of Scottish industries which is tourism thank you very much and just one last question a completely different topic a convener and just out of personal interest we are going to be looking at the creative industries and we're going to be looking at the film industry in future coach here at the cross party group on culture and we're going to be looking at some of the challenges of the film industry I know that there was a lot of talk around the moving of the time of the film festival and now that that's been in place for a few years I just wondered whether you you thought that that move of the film festival to June was the right thing to do or whether it should be at the same time as the international festival is it used to be the film festival feel very strongly that it was the right decision obviously any festival needs to carry on asking big questions where issues are raised around it but at the moment it feels like it was absolutely the right decision but you'd need to talk to them directly to get some more detail on that thank you very much okay thank you just before I bring in Jenny Manard just to go back to this APD point I mean listen to what you had to say Gordon but there's not much evidence that Edinburgh airport's expansion is being held back by APD is there it's every time I go to the airport I fall over work when building your latest new extension and wouldn't be better if we're doing it twice as fast so I think that the evidence is very strong there are two million passengers missing from Scotland I reckon Edinburgh's share of that would be at least a million and that's and it's all about connectivity it's all about the pace we can get the the airlines to invest in Scotland and give us bigger because we know that wherever we get it easier and cheaper to come to Scotland people will come in huge numbers I think you know it's just really evident in just walking around the streets of Edinburgh this year just how many more long-haul passengers there are Chinese in particular India in particular Middle East and I'm saying salam aleykum as often as I'm saying good morning in the airport at the moment because we've got these new routes where we make it possible people come if you talk to Nick Finnegan at the castle he can plot his visitor numbers directly against the routes that started Edinburgh port if we make it easy they will come it's as simple as that and at the moment it's hard for me to attract as many as we could do simply because we start a minimum 14 and on occasion as much as 140 pounds per passenger behind my competitors in Europe okay Alison Johnson is about to explode but I'm fine convener you will let this pass I'll let it pass for now okay okay Jenny Marra thank you convener um I just want to start by um maybe putting on records if the convener will let me my party's thanks to for the work you do because the festivals are such an important and successful thing for Scotland and I think we all really really appreciate the the hard work that goes on I wanted to start I've got a couple of questions I wanted to start with Cath if that's okay with a question about the fringe and it's to go back to the issue of participation I was interested to um to ask you Cath um I'm always conscious that you said it was a very expensive undertaking to put on a production at the fringe I know there are a variety of different organisations that put on productions at the fringe bank I'm always conscious when I'm going through the fringe programme there are a lot of schools put on productions at the fringe and that's very exciting and confidence building and life-affirming experience for those pupils involved can you tell me maybe a bit about the balance of schools maybe from more deprived communities in Scotland that maybe undertake to do that because of the expense and if the fringe actually provides any support both in terms of supporting a production to come to the fringe and maybe financial as well so we don't we're an open access festival so we're not directly supporting financially any of the companies that are coming and I think it I think it can be expensive for companies to come there are other models where it's not so quite often when school groups are school groups are producing our student groups are producing on the fringe they're not in your I guess the kind of traditional venue model that Marco was describing before and I think it is an incredibly important part of a young person's development we know from the impact study as well that taking part and even just seeing the festivals is a great part of sparking imagination and wellbeing and so on but it's our it's not just schools in Scotland too there's an amazing literally thousands of American high school children who come each year to take part in the festival they do it they fundraise themselves at home to come and it's the first step for them quite often being outside the states let alone performing elsewhere and and I think it's a really important I think your point is good it's important that we continue to make sure that there are other models and other venues and other ways for for companies who are here for different reasons as Amy said one of the things we're talking to with companies all the time when we're talking to them about why about coming to the fringe is why they're coming so for a for a vast number of the professional companies taking part it's because of the media exposure and the industry exposure that international links that will lead to onward touring but for other you're absolutely right for other companies and artists it's not that at all it's something very different so it's our job to support all of that I mean I understand that you're the host and don't necessarily have funding streams for that kind of thing but do you think there are opportunities for that for other organisations my perception is and this may be wrong that it is more affluent children and communities that get that the chance to put on the production at the fringe do you think there is an opportunity maybe for for some funding either city council or government to support that from around our country our opportunities and actually it's interesting in your point Alton about the about the dates because we we talk a lot about the dates um where we we are still tied to a bank holiday at the end of august term dates per a grenade around the calendar too and so I think as we make the leap next year as we always do every seven years and therefore we'll coincide more with school term dates I think there's there are greater opportunities and yes absolutely it's one thing that we want to be working on thank you thank you um I think probably faith would be surprised as former director of dca if I didn't ask a question that was slightly dundee related but you talked faith a little bit about the seminars you do I think for other other parts of the world as well and I'm just conscious that my home city put in its bid to become the UK city of culture last year unfortunately we were we were picked to the post on that but these kinds of seminars that that you're putting on given the experience are these available in scotland as well to to cities like dundee and other communities to to build up their own festivals again I would say dundee is doing pretty well um but the example I gave earlier on so I was up in Aberdeen we were basically running a version of one of our seminars around collaboration how we work collaboratively with the festival uh with I think there's like 13 maybe festivals there so that's we do exactly that and we do sometimes we do a standard seminar but a lot of the time so for example the venue network that's been set up in Edinburgh we did initial sessions with them to get them up and running um and yeah that that that information and that sharing is available not just in um in how we collaborate but on areas like cultural tourism uh our innovation programme um we not only have we talked about it and presented about it around scotland but the models that we created we had a thing called a geek in residence programme so you often talk about artists in residence we had geeks in residence in our in our festivals and culture hack scotland which was a kind of bringing together of the festivals and their challenges and the developer sector to create new approaches to solving the big issues that we have creating new apps and tools both those programmes have rolled out as national programmes and similarly um on our environmental work we have um again we learned a lot we evolved our practice we learned how to work with venues artists but realised that we couldn't do what we needed to do and we scotland couldn't do in the cultural sector what it needed to do without that becoming a national programme so actually festivals in were created its first spin-off company which is called creative carbon scotland which is now joined with the federation of scotland's theatre and scan and created a new body that's now leading on behavioural change in environmental uh environmental behavioural change in scotland so we're very proud of that slightly we've learned how to do a peculiar business model that we've created where we test things out we share them the pain and the process so other people realise these things don't happen readily in a collaborative environment but when we get there we get there very thoroughly and when we get there we share thank you very much can i ask one final question convener it's um it's on thundering hooves on on the review because i see this as a very strategic and important piece of work because the last one in 2006 was it was was so and was very successful i was lucky enough to get one of the last tickets to see james the first this festival and enjoyed it immensely and then also was lucky enough to speak to some of the cast afterwards who were who were talking about the importance of the festivals and what they thought as aspiring you know as as they were going through through their careers and the importance of audiences and the audiences taking the festivals seriously and the critical mass of critics that come to the city so i'm kind of i know we've talked around this a bit this morning kind of interested as you approach thundering hooves too are you i think as you go into any review you're probably aware of the main threats and maybe from other parts of the world to that can you describe kind of the main things or what the main thing that scotland and edinburgh has to do to remain the premier international arts festival best in our programmes i mean that that is a classic example that you know the triumph of that trilogy at the at the international festival the collaboration it was created that could not have happened without the expo fund investment it simply couldn't it would have been unimaginable for all the parties involved and yet it's a it's you know it's a wonderful production so that's the biggest thing that is the biggest single thing the other things around trends that we need to respond to i think and uh a kind of increasing understanding not just you know in cultural cities and festival cities about the possibilities that investment in these areas can bring in terms of tourism in terms of inward all the things we're talking about all the things that we achieve so we're still looking at our competitive environment in terms of other cities but as important are the are just a very core threat which is how do we preserve what we do the heart of what we do which then leads to every other impact and particularly to the economic impact and that is the diverse quality international nature of our programmes and that that takes investment that's our content thank you okay we've got time for just one final question from thank you convener again it's with opportunities and challenges i'm just wondering in terms of people with disabilities in terms of performers within the festivals you know what the opportunities are for people with disabilities to be the performers and again accessibility to all the festival venues etc and you know susan you mentioned the book festival quite often how accessible is that to people say with century impairment you know whether it'd be a loss of vision or say who are deaf or hard of hearing and i'm just interested you know how do we accommodate people with disability against as far reaching and very very diverse as well do we do enough and are we managing that susan maybe first yeah i mean these are these are constant challenges and the festivals think about these things because they're talking about their audience they're talking about their performers so saturday night at the book festival frank gardener the bbc journalist who was almost killed some time ago in syria wheeled himself up on a stage at the book festival and gave an absolutely superb event and conversation i've been to dance programmes where some of the dancers in a dance troupe have been have had sort of mental deficiencies and have had other difficulties and others have been fully enabled so a lot of the performances can accommodate disabilities of various sorts the sites are all challenges in various ways and they all bring bring different kinds of challenges so theatres are better able to provide possibly you know words for those who can't hear and it just they all vary but we work on this all the time it's just they're very specific and unique challenges often for the audiences i think the performers were better able somehow to to handle some of their particular challenges faith you'll have more information we have a cross festival accessibility guide which is which has been involved over the last few years and app and all the individual festivals you know work in their own ways across this area but we've aggregated all of that information so in a way that we haven't done before i think and from a performer's perspective i think one of the most wonderful things about how about the made in Scotland programme and about how the expo fund investment is the support that's been given and the successes that have come from some of the most amazing performers disabled performers it's actually seen as a major strength in the work in Scotland and what we've been able to do across our festivals is promote that work and present it to the wider world i was going to mention the made in Scotland companies which have been very successful here not just here actually have toured some of the some of the most touring work that's come out of made in Scotland we as faith says we work a lot about on access issues with venues of course not just fringe venues you know old venues and particularly temporarily fringe venues are not necessarily instantly accessible but we've done a lot of work cross festival to try and at least gather that information see where the things that we can do to help and the other thing that we've been doing is over the last few weeks of this festival is take advantage of the combination of artists and practitioners from elsewhere in the city to talk to them about what's happening elsewhere and if there are programmes and and particularly on deaf access actually to that we can roll out and the things that we can do quite perhaps more easily that will that will help build that audience okay thank you i think that brings us the end of our time on behalf of the committee going to thank you all very much for for coming along for what was a very interesting and engaging session and you're giving us a lot to think about so thank you thank you very much it's been very good to meet you all and if anyone has any further questions then do please get in touch with us directly thank you okay thank you and at this point we'll have a short suspension and go into private session thank you