 Welcome to the eighth meeting of the Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee. We have apologies from the convener, who is still self-isolating. As deputy convener, I will chair this meeting. We also have apologies from Maurice Golden, MSP. Can I welcome Fiona Hyslop, MSP, who is here as a substitute member for our convener? Fiona, do you have any relevant interests to declare? A new interest to declare. Before we begin, I thank the Ukrainian Council General in Scotland in public for taking the time to brief the committee this morning on the crisis in Ukraine. He gave a very powerful and moving evidence to us and we are incredibly grateful for him given how busy he must be. The committee reiterated the remarks of the convener on 24 February in expressing our solidarity as a committee with the people of Ukraine and our hopes for a speedy and peaceful recovery from the situation in which the people of Ukraine find themselves. The first item on our agenda is consideration of the crisis in Ukraine. I welcome representatives from the Disasters Emergency Committee to the meeting. We have Jane Salmondson, chair of the expert panel of the Humanitarian Emergency Fund, who joins us in person. Joining us virtually, we have Sue English, chair of the board of trustees, Madara Hetiarachici, director of programmes and accountability. Good morning to you all and thank you for joining us. I know that you are extremely busy and we are also grateful for the briefing that you have provided the committee in advance of this session. I believe that Ms English has a short opening statement. Thank you, Mr Cameron, and good morning, everybody. Thank you for asking us to come and brief you today. As you said, I am so sorry, I can't. We lost you for a few seconds there. I wondered if you could start again, please. I'm so sorry, yes. I will start again. I was saying thank you very much indeed for inviting us to come and brief the committee today on the work that we are doing as the Disasters Emergency Committee and Ukraine humanitarian appeal. Just to give you some background, the DC brings together 15 of the major humanitarian aid charities, including the Red Cross, Save the Children, Oxfam and the IRC. We come together for major disasters and emergencies only and we mobilise our rapid response unit, which includes the major TV broadcasters and a number of other organisations, in order to facilitate the ability of the public to donate to disasters and emergencies. We have a very strong relationship with the major TV news broadcasters, BBC, ITV, STV, Guy, Channel 4, Channel 5, and they allow us airtime for a two-minute appeal fund in order to launch the appeal, which we did last Thursday. We also work closely with organisations such as PayPal, Nat West, British Airways, Transport for London, all of whom give us their time and energy in order to make it easy for the British public to show their generosity. The response so far to our Ukrainian humanitarian appeal has been absolutely overwhelming. As of yesterday, we had raised over £120 million, which is an extraordinary amount of money. It is probably the second largest appeal that we have ever had, the largest appeal being the one for the victims of the tsunami back in the early 2000s, which raised around £380 million. However, the scale of the need, as you will have seen from the distressing pictures on our TV screens and newspapers, is massive. We are estimating that this is going to be the fastest-growing refugee crisis since the Second World War. Over 2 million refugees have already fled to neighbouring countries in the last 13 days. UN estimates are around 7 million people could be internally displaced within Ukraine and up to 18 million people affected in the country. So far, as I said, the DC appeal has raised £120 million, thanks to the extraordinary generosity of the British public. Estimates are that we have raised £12 million in Scotland, which includes a Scottish Government donation of £2 million, and we also have a UK Government aid match of £25 million, which is the biggest aid match that we have had from the Government. The work that we are going to be doing on the ground and the work that is already under way, Modara, will be able to go into more details on. Primarily, we are looking to provide immediate relief to people both inside Ukraine and in countries surrounding Ukraine. We will be distributing food and hygiene parcels, providing first aid, helping to evacuate people. The Red Cross is already working both in Ukraine and in neighbouring countries, and other members of ours are also active in Ukraine and in Poland, Hungary, Romania and Moldova. It is a massive crisis, and we all recognise that it is one that is likely to continue for many years. Our initial estimate is that we will be working through this appeal for at least three years. I will probably finish there. You have got the pack of slides that we have sent you, and I hope that you will be able to ask us a number of questions about the work that we are doing. I will ask Modara to pick up on some of the more detailed response to the crisis. Thank you very much for that. If I can ask the first question, if I may, and it is a very simple one, which is how can people in Scotland best support the Ukrainian people? I ask that in the context of suggestions in some quarters that providing goods in kind, aid in kind, is less helpful due to the administrative issues around collecting it, packaging it, transporting it and distributing it at the other end. I wonder if any of the witnesses have views on that. Perhaps I could start with that, Ms English. Sorry to interrupt, but you have summed up the issue for us. Our advice comes from members on the ground that it is much better to give cash rather than to donate goods. Modara can go into more details about why that is the case. This is in no way trying to minimise the response of people who are sending goods. It is simply a way of trying to say what the most effective means, we think, of helping people in Ukraine and the surrounding areas now and in the future. I will hand over to Modara. Thank you, Sue. As you summed up perfectly, it is not cost effective to send items from here. It takes extraordinary manpower to sort through it, package it, the shipping, delivery time means that people are affected, people in need on the ground, whether in Ukraine, Hungary, Romania, Poland. It takes time to get the right items to them. What aid agencies really prefer is to buy locally. One, it is culturally and contextually appropriate and it also stimulates the local economy. What aid agencies do, they engage with the population, whether it is refugees in these neighbouring countries or inside Ukraine, to really understand the needs of the affected population. These needs are changing by the hour, by the week, really understand the needs and by locally. That is really to ensure that we get the right support to the population, the communities, the family, as them when they need it and not something that is absolutely generous to the UK public to donate items, but it is really preferable to send cash so that what the right needs can be met at the right time. Just picking up on something you said, Madara, in relation to the changing picture and managing the changing picture, how do you, as a committee, manage that? I take it, it involves trying to predict what is going to happen, which is difficult, but I am just interested in how you manage changing needs effectively. When we went to appeal last week, it was over 150,000 people that had crossed the border, but we knew, based on decades of experience working in these types of environment, conflict-related environments, that people, what they need is safety and security. So we knew that the refugee population will be increasing. We knew that there will be population inside of Ukraine displaced and others that people, the elderly, infirm people with disabilities, who are unable to make that really difficult journey will be staying behind. For our members, they have local staff, local partners on the ground, and they have the fingers on the pulse to really understand these changing needs. So it is not people sitting in London making decisions, it is people in Romania, Poland and Ukraine, who are really talking to the community, understanding their changing needs and coming alongside, providing that solidarity and practical support. Thank you for that. I am going to ask colleagues now to ask questions. I first turn to Fiona Hyslop, please. Good morning and thank you for joining us. My first question is recognising the scaleness speed of the public's response to the disaster emergency committee appeal. They would like to know where the funding is spent geographically, but specifically, being struck by the number of women and children that are fleeing, what is happening for children particularly? If you could maybe, I think that Madara might be able to help to answer that question. Our priority countries are Ukraine, supporting the internally displaced population people remaining in situ, making sure that they are supported and protected the immediate needs net. In the neighbouring countries, refugee-receiving countries of Poland, Romania, Hungary, Slovakia and Moldova, ensuring that support is provided to people fleeing the conflict, ensuring that food, water and shelters are provided. In those countries, it is the state governments that are leading the response. It is the local structures that are providing the support, and aid agencies are coming alongside at that. As you stated, it is women and children by large numbers crossing the borders with just whatever they have on hand. We are particularly concerned about young women making the journey by themselves and children. In those situations, we know from previous crises such as the Rohingya refugee crisis that children can be separated from families in that difficult journey. Our aid agencies, particularly agencies such as Save the Children, World Vision, Plan International, take a role, focus on children, ensuring that children's needs are protected, that they are supported. Very practical things like in refugee reception areas, creating safe spaces so that children can play and talk things out. It is very traumatic that we know from reports from the ground that fathers and brothers are going off to the front lines of the conflict. Families are separated, and children are really trying to understand what is happening and make sense. Aid agencies bring children together and create safe spaces to bring some normalcy in a chaotic environment, but it is getting that support immediately and making sure that children are part of that decision-making process. My second question is about what is happening here in Scotland. Perhaps, Jane, you could help with that. The Scottish Government has committed funding. We know that we have the separate humanitarian fund that is established, but, clearly, in terms of humanitarian aid, I know that there is another disaster emergency committee appeal, the Afghanistan appeal. Where do you think the funding is coming from from the Scottish Government? In terms of the £4 million that is committed, you referenced £2 million for the disaster emergency committee appeal. Is that the correct figures? What is left to support for the remaining of this year and also into next year? Secondly, we understand that this medical aid has been provided by the Scottish Government in terms of its bandages or equipment that is needed on a medical basis. Is there anything else that the Scottish Government can do in terms of other provision, whether it is water or other mobilisation of governmental support, as well as the £4 million that has been allocated to the disaster? Reflecting on the continuous work of aid agencies across the globe, where does this Ukraine humanitarian appeal fit in in regards to the other work that you are all doing? Two sides to that. I think that the first thing to do is to acknowledge with real thanks, grateful thanks to the Scottish Government for the speed with which they responded. Therefore, the civil servants were in touch with the Heff, the humanitarian emergency fund that was inevitably referred to as the Heff, saying that which of the eight Heff panel members can respond very, very fast to this crisis. If we were to make a grant, how quickly could we spend it and where? Of the eight Heff panel members, two of them, one was Skiath and the other was the British Red Cross, said that we can spend this money immediately, either in Ukraine or in the neighbouring countries. They made £500,000 available instantly to each of those two agencies and the money has been paid and the money is being spent. The speed of that decision making is something to be noted. It was superb. Thank you, Scottish Government, for that. Of course, there is the Scottish Government beyond that, the donation to DEC, the Disasters Emergency Committee. Again, I am very grateful that that support was given. Since 2017, it was set up and has been making available allocating £1 million a year every year for its humanitarian emergencies fund, which it set up and created, specifically to be able to do a speedy response to emergencies. However, using the collective expertise of eight leading aid agencies in Scotland, six of those are also DEC members—two, Mercy Corps and Skiath are not. It was a financial year end and, by 31 March, that had come to an end. Thankfully, the Scottish Government did not see that as a reason not to make any funding available, so again, I think that that needs noting. We are very grateful for it. The new funding will kick in from the start of the new financial year. However, in the meantime, while the support has been superb and outwith normal procedures, the fact remains that there are other emergencies that will be underfunded and unnoticed. We are waiting to hear whether or not a proposal was put in at the end of last year to help to respond to the conflict in Burkina Faso or the humanitarian emergency that was created by the conflict in Burkina Faso has been approved. However, the HEF is set up quite well to be able to do two things. One is to respond to the DEC when there is a major emergency. The Scottish Government can use it to support the DEC in the DEC's appeal. The other half of the funding goes to respond to the emergencies that do not win media attention in the same way. The HEF funding has gone to help people in Tigray. We are waiting to hear whether we can get it to Burkina Faso. It has been for funding in the past to Mali. That will continue, I hope. I know that you will know that I am going to say this, but I have actually won £1 million a year. The HEF was the only element of Scottish Government funding to support international aid and development last year, which did not get an increase in funding. Obviously, we would very much like to see an uplift in the future. To be able to talk a bit more to the committee and the convener about what the HEF does, we think that we have something that was created in Scotland, which is particularly valuable for public life and for the institutions in Scotland. As the former minister that helped to establish it, I recognise both appeals. Finally, on the additional support, the medical aid and the actual kind of goods, obviously, we have heard the importance of having cash and the funding and the money, but we have been able to mobilise in Scotland other resources. If it is in response to a direct request for help, as I understand that the Ukrainian consulate said, please can you help us with these items? I am delighted to hear that they have now joined a flight to FCDO. There has also been a request from the Ukrainian Community Foundations, which went to Foundation Scotland, which was also for medical supplies. Conversely, I have also heard from Masikor about stories coming back about piles of goods with high-heeled shoes sitting on top of goods donated by well-meaning, kind, generous people which end up at borders needing to be sifted and sorted and holding back a mammoth volunteer effort. For the future, it would be excellent to see what we can do to encourage a response of in-kind donations where it specifically meets a specific request, but to find better ways of channeling the goodwill that will always be there and public generosity to prevent holding back the provision of badly needed aid in a hurry by sifting and sorting private vanloads of people who are driving private vans into dangerous areas. Another question for Jane. I know that we have talked in the past about the convening power that your fund and the Scottish Government have in bringing others to the table at times like this in Scotland. I wonder if you could say a bit more about whether you think there is scope in this emergency for that to happen and to get the most out of the sums of money that you are distributing in terms of bringing in others to the conversation. There could well be trouble as these things take focus, attention, time and money, but this could be a perfect opportunity to have a look at what has been working so well in Scotland and the wave of generosity is extraordinary and what has been working less well and see what we can do both to channel the generosity more effectively and to create, if you like, a recognisable body or consortium of bodies in Scotland for Scotland for the people of Scotland. Take the Heff, which is there, but the Heff has no budget. It is run on a shoestring. We have our part-time co-ordinator, who is superb, Mr Hugh Owen, whose other part-time job is to represent the DEC in Scotland, but that is its only resource. Otherwise, it is the eight panel members and a voluntary chair. There is untapped potential to raise more funds for another disaster and to manage the funds better. We have heard a bit about how the co-ordination works within Scotland and the United Kingdom. I am interested to hear how you co-ordinate with other international aid organisations, either in Ukraine or in the surrounding countries, that you mentioned. I do not know Madara if you are appropriate to answer that. Co-ordination is absolutely critical in such a humanitarian response. Large-scale, fast-moving, things are changing by the hour. What member agencies will do, along with UN agencies and local authorities, is to come together and look at thematic areas. Looking at shelter, non-food items, which are essential, co-ordinate that. One family here is not getting blankets, while another family needs blankets or not getting it. They will co-ordinate in other responses, such as Afghanistan, where we also have a deal. Cash is really valuable. Cash grants and cash assistance are really valuable to communities' suffering. Really looking at how much cash there is not tension that is being created as a result of aid work, that there is not disharmony as a result of aid work. There are existing co-ordination mechanisms that the UN and INGOs call UN clusters, and thereby thematic areas such as shelter, logistics, water, food, etc. They will be up and running in both Ukraine and other locations to ensure that co-ordination happens, collaboration happens and that people are maximising resources and not duplicating them. It is one of the things that we check as a funder to these implementing agencies to ensure that they are not just delivering aid very quickly, but that it is measured, considered and grounded on needs assessments, as I talked about, but also co-ordinated and delivering complementary support, particularly in the neighbouring locations where the Government of Romania is highly capable. It is the same with Polish authorities. They have state-run systems, for instance, cash programmes or social protection programmes, which they will try to move to support their refugees. It is the UN and INGOs to come alongside that and support and not create unparallelt structures. Thank you. Jeane, do you have anything to add to that? That again is tried and tested over the years, and the cluster system is the best way to do it. In Ukraine, because it would not have been considered a normal disaster setting, it might take a new approach, because setting up a UN system in one of the, say, African Oasis countries where this is more expected to happen can come into place more quickly, but it is the best way to do it that we have, and that co-ordination does prevent duplication and wasted money and reaches the people who are intended to benefit more quickly and more efficiently. It struck all of us, certainly myself, the shock of something like this happening in a country that, to all intents and purposes, looks like ours. Just when I was driving into Parliament this morning, I was thinking about the reports talking about people having to melt snow for water. When it becomes as stark as that, we heard and we have all seen the photographs of the maternity hospital being bombed. It is how you then co-ordinate the aid that you have to ensure that it is arriving at the places of major need. I do not know whether you can expand a wee bit on that. It is the places that have the local networks already in place. There has been a debate going on over the years about localisation, which essentially means that the international NGOs working as closely as they can with local-based partners who understand their own contexts, their own neighbourhoods, who are the ones who are in the best place to know where and how aid can be most effectively distributed and to whom. Therefore, just to take an example, we talked about the Scottish Catholic International Aid Fund being one of those two early recipients of Scottish Government grant funding. They work through the international caritas network. They would have in place in Ukraine bodies that are already involved with anti-poverty work that are there, irrespective of an emergency. Therefore, a body like SCAF can work through that international church-led network to meet need. It is just there. It has not been doing a disaster response with meeting local needs in local ways. Wherever possible, I think that all the major international NGOs will always try to work with local NGOs, particularly the ones with local networks that are close to the communities. That is the best way of doing it. Members and their local partners sadly have the experience of delivering in conflict zones whether they are Syria, Yemen or Afghanistan. They will—what we are hearing from Red Cross, Cafford and H—have local partners that can deliver a very quick response, assess safety and security of both the communities that they are trying to support, as well as their own staff, making sure that everyone is safe, and deliver and contract. It is that kind of response when they find the space, deliver and then go back. In Ukraine, it is an active conflict zone. It is a live conflict. Things are changing very rapidly. These aid agencies are in it for the long haul. They understand the needs of the communities. They will do their utmost to deliver aid safely without putting anyone's lives in danger. However, they are there and, as James talked about, they are really relying on the local networks. I work in conflict zones and war zones. It is the communities that keep us safe, and they really support the aid workers and really make sure that aid workers are safe while they are also trying to stay alive. There is real solidarity there, ensuring that safety and security while being assured that aid is going to meet the affected population. In the discussion that we had with the council general this morning, we got a sense of what the trauma of war is like and a sense of what that long-term impact will be on the victims. I wanted to ask you about the psychological offers of support that aid agencies can bring and how that works on the ground both in the countries where there is conflict but also in the communities where people are fleeing to. The sense of what is required in funding and long-term support for that. I do not know who would like to go first on that. I turn to Jane, perhaps first, and then Madara, and then Sue. It is a question that I welcome. Thank you. Partly because in stage 1 of an appeal like this, the humanitarian needs a paramount. People have no water. They have not got enough to eat. Stage 2 can be the time when people have forgotten about it and moved away or thought, right? Well, we have done that one. Of course, we have not done that one. The cameras, the film cameras, might have moved away. What can be done on things like traumatic counselling to help children and adults cope with the trauma of war? Education for children who are displaced, education for children in refugee camps. There is a whole raft of second stage interventions, which are so, so, so important, really important to fund. It can be at a stage, as I say, when the public does not realise in exactly the same way how much the continued support really, really does matter. Madara. Thank you for that. Focusing on that question is really, really quite critical that we do not focus on the hardware, the shelter, the water sanitation items that people often forget, people fleeing conflict. That is a lot of deep trauma, a lot of guilt, survivors' guilt of having left family and trying to survive. As we talked about, women and children are really the fabric of their community that is destroyed now. While they are delivering the much-needed food and water shelter, they will also be thinking about trauma care and counselling. How that has worked in other responses is, for instance, in Bangladesh and the Rohingya camps. Members established women and child-friendly spaces where women are engaged in day-to-day activities. They are sitting and thinking and really focused on that and getting them involved in some activity while getting the counselling, while getting that trauma care opportunity for them to talk to each other and getting that peer support, peer counselling—that is really important. It is really critical to ensure that counselling, psychological support, trauma care are not sidelined. It is as important as food and water. It is not just talking about it, but it is ensuring that the pregnant women, breastfeeding women and young women are engaged in day-to-day activities. They are agents of their own recovery, and they are not sitting on the sidelines why aid agencies are delivering. Many of our agencies, where possible, will include people and refugees as part of their aid delivery efforts. The decades of experience delivering aid in places such as Yemen and Syria has shown that to be a value add. I really get that sense of empowerment for people who have been disempowered. Sue, do you have anything to add to that? Yes. I absolutely agree with everything that Jane and Madara said. One of the most extraordinary, lean, moving and effective bits of intervention that I saw when I went to the Rohingya refugee camps in Bangladesh was the work that age international do, setting up safe spaces for older people in those kinds of circumstances. The needs of old people are very different from the needs of young families, but for them it is as traumatic, difficult and painful to leave their homes and their lives behind them. To be able to give them the space to address their particular needs both in terms of physical and medical needs but also by cosocial needs is incredibly important. Although this is a European disaster, which is not normally the kind of area that many of our members work in, the experience that they have got over many, many years of dealing with refugees across the world will stand them in very good stead. However, I think that we are all in it for the long haul. I want to thank you all for the work that you are doing. It feels like yesterday, but just before Christmas, we had a briefing from the Disasters Emergency Committee about the work that you are doing in Afghanistan. Being able to do all the work that you have done in the past couple of weeks is incredible. Can I pick up that very last point that Sue made about older people? Rightly we have been focusing on women and children who have been fleeing from their homes, but last night it was incredibly moving to watch on news at 10, just to watch older people who had actually wanted their younger relatives and the children to escape, but things are so bad that they are now moving. To watch people in wheelchairs, people who are on crutches, to try to escape, it is a different set of circumstances again for them, and the support that they need must be very different. One of the things that struck me was people who have got heart conditions, people who have got diabetes, long-term conditions. They all need medicine now, not in a couple of weeks, so just how on earth do you manage to make that intervention on the ground to support those very specific needs that are not about what happens in a fortnight, but about getting people those safe routes to get to somewhere else? How do you support those local agencies on the ground to go from nowhere to providing that kind of very detailed support overnight? Maybe you want to pick up—Is it that Sue would be the best place to start? I think that Madara would be better because she is much more immediately informed on what is going on on the ground. I can pick up any other points from it. Thank you for that. We have heard that leaving Ukraine, people are sat in 28 hours to just get across 100 kilometres or six-hour queues at the borders to leave Ukraine. You can imagine what toll that takes on people with disabilities, older people, really struggling to leave. We have just seen some assessment data from age, health age, and really focusing on the needs of older people, the elderly, the infirm, people with disabilities, and really looking at their immediate needs and what is to come. Age agencies are trying to ensure that the more visible people, people leaving the borders, are not just the main focus, that people behind doors are hunkering down and trying to shelter from this ongoing conflict that they are supported. It is no easy task to find the supplies when we are hearing about supply chains disrupted, shelves running out of food, stores running out of food, but agencies such as health age are really trying to ensure that they are on the front lines, working with their network and prioritising the needs of this affected population. Again, it is a really challenging, fast-moving situation, but they are really closely scrutinising it and talking to the elderly and trying to understand their needs so that they can immediately address it, but it is a mammoth task, it is a giant task. That takes us on to how does it go, where does it go next in terms of that support, because you are saying that once people have enabled, you have supported them to either stay safely or to move. It does feel that it is such a fast-moving crisis that it must be incredibly difficult to provide that support on the ground. I am not sure that the best person is to ask, but in terms of the immediate support for people in Ukraine, you have always had the disaster appeal. Where does it go next? We have lots of other crisis situations in the world that have less publicity. How do you cope with making sure that you have the investment in the right place for all the local organisations and making sure that the raft of different expertise on the ground is available? How do you make that work and what more can we do to support you in that process, whether it is getting our constituents to donate or the strategic relationships that you have referred to in terms of the Scottish Government's finance? I will pick up on the sort of DEC response to that. You are absolutely right to point out that there is a real concern about the needs of other parts of the world where people are facing very difficult situations. Our Afghanistan appeal, which we launched in December, has raised over £30 million, and it is being spent on the ground very effectively now, but that is going to be again an area that is going to need support for the foreseeable future. The other thing that our members are becoming increasingly concerned about is that, as you probably know, the Ukraine and Russia provide huge amounts of the world's grain supplies. We are already looking in parts of Africa at serious hunger problems. If the price of grain continues to grow up at the rate that it is and supplies are short, that is going to become even more of a problem. It is really important to remember that, although what is happening in Europe is immediate and we have raised a lot of money, which will be spent there as effectively and as quickly as we possibly can, that there are other parts of the world that are still going to require help. That is a long-term commitment that we are going to need funding for. I will hand over to Minar. Just in terms of the protracted nature of the crises, it is a great question, Sarah, that it is not just a meeting basic immediate urgent needs of the affected population, but BC funding is available for the next three years, really ensuring that members, their local partners, their affiliates are there for the long journey. As James talked about, long after the cameras that have moved on, our members, their local staff partners are there to rebuild this for either the refugee response or intramural displaced population inside of Ukraine. That is years, much longer than three, five, seven years. Lives have completely been uprooted, so aid agencies will really work alongside of the affected population inside of Ukraine, outside, to ensure that support is given. As we talked about earlier, changing needs, what families need today, is completely different from eight, nine months. Aid agencies, because they have got their finger on the pulse, will be able to support families with that, with those changing needs. Come in from the Scottish side. That would be very helpful, thanks. Again, it's back to the Heff. There are other disaster areas. Unfortunately, so many Syria, Yemen, we had a discussion at the Heff the other day about Horn of Africa areas afflicted already by a deadly combination of locus plates and then drought. What the Heff does is meet the eight panel members and decide between them when there is some funding available from the Scottish Government, particularly when it's not the, this is outside the DEC funding, how that other element of the Scottish Government funding can best be spent. When you look at where the crises are most severe, you also weigh up where you can make the most strategic impact with relatively small amounts of money. If you've only got from the Heff budget in this quarter of a year, there is only £250,000 to spend. There is absolutely no restriction on the choice. It's unfortunately terribly wide, but if small grants are to be made, where can the most impact be achieved on very small or relatively small amounts of money in facing severe humanitarian crises to try and help as best it can? Again, the Heff works quite well in combining the eight panel members, combining collectively their expertise and their knowledge, and also their reach through their field colleagues and local partners all the way around the world. We could be looking at a disaster in Haiti, which I think didn't get support the other day all the way around to a typhoon in Philippines, so it just makes the best use that we can of the human and financial resource that is available here in Scotland. That's really helpful because it's an immediate humanitarian crisis, but as a couple of you have mentioned, it's then rebuilding afterwards, so that's really helpful to get your evidence today. It's a long-term or protracted crisis. A couple of final questions from me. The first one is to Madara. It's just to get a sense of the balance between what aid is going to Ukraine itself and what aid is going to neighbouring countries to Poland, to Hungary, to Romania in terms of operations. I wonder if you could help with that. I'm not able to put a figure on it because, as they talked about, it is such a fast-moving situation. Members are right now deployed their assessment teams, their scoping teams to really understand the nature. Of course, as we talked about, inside of Ukraine, so much rebuilding recovery will need to happen. As the UN talked about, it's over £7 million to be internally displaced and outside of Ukraine 4 million refugees. As we talked about earlier, given that as a state-led response in the neighbouring countries, I anticipate that much of the funding will go into Ukraine over time, but in the immediate, given the responding, contracting nature, it is possible that funding will be largely for refugees, but over time, as access eases inside and security permitting, we would hope that the response inside Ukraine will be much larger. My final question is about the administrative burdens and costs that a big appeal like this places on the DEC. It is complicated by the fact that this is happening at scale and that you have 14 member charities. I wonder if any of you could give some sense of the bureaucracy, et cetera, that you are trying to wade through. Perhaps I start with you, Sue. The DEC is set up to deal with precisely these kinds of emergency situations. Our secretariat is small, but it is very efficient. We have very clear processes in place to ensure that we can manage the administration of this very large amount of money that is being made available to us. Fortunately, we have got 50 years of experience of doing it, so we know how to manage these events. Because we are completely focused on disasters and emergencies, we are very good at managing fast response response, which is appropriate, efficient and does not duplicate. That is one of the great advantages of having the coalition of humanitarian organisations, because they can come together around our board table and across their humanitarian directors, finance directors and so on, and work together at pace and at scale. It is tough, but that is what we were set up to do. That is what we will continue to do, because the generosity of the public is really humbling and absolutely overwhelming. For us, the focus is to spend that money as quickly and as effectively as we possibly can. That is what we will be doing over phase 1, which will be the first six months, but then at least another two and a half years after that, where we will attempt to do longer-term work. However, as everybody has pointed out, it is very unclear what the trajectory of this event is going to be and what the longer-term effects are going to be. Jane, do you have any final comments on that or anything else? I cannot really speak for the DEC. All I want to do is congratulate them on their superb fundraising efforts. I think that it is extraordinarily admirable what they have been doing, and I am so happy to work alongside them. I also want to thank the Scottish Government for the speed of its response and its ability to step aside from normal structures and those circumstances. It is for the long haul. I am sorry to say that those problems are not going to be behind the citizens of Ukraine in one, two, three, probably four or more years. Just to express a hope that the interests of this Parliament and this committee will continue, and you will invite us back another day to hear more about how it is going on. I can certainly give you that assurance that we will continue to pursue this in the months and years ahead. Finally, Madara, from an operational perspective, is there any final message that you would like to give us as a committee? Just on your question about bureaucracy, our non-negotiable is that programs are delivered with quality and accountability to the affected population. We will meet needs immediately, but it is about ensuring that international quality accountability standards and technical standards are met. That is our non-negotiable. We will ensure that our tried and tested methods of delivering aid are available for this response. It is hugely overwhelmed by the generosity of the public response to this incredible aid effort. As a previous sort of emergency responder in places such as Sri Lanka, Haiti and Pakistan, it is incredible when you are on the front lines working with affected communities delivering aid to see that solidarity, that support and that just overwhelming. The practical cash is brilliant, but that sentiment goes a long way, so it is incredible. Thank you for making the time for us this morning. I really appreciate it. Thank you very much. I thank all of our witnesses this morning. We are now going to suspend for five minutes for a changeover of witnesses, but thank you so much. We reconvene, and our second agenda item today is further consideration of the crisis in Ukraine. We are joined by Angus Robertson, MSP Cabinet Secretary for the Constitution, External Affairs and Culture, and two Scottish Government officials, Alison Byrne, director for equality, inclusion and human rights, and Joanna Keating, head of international development. Can I welcome you all to the meeting and can I invite you, cabinet secretary, to make a brief opening statement? Thank you very much, convener. I'm going to read the first half of my statement and then because of a very fast changing situation that no doubt members will wish to ask me about. I'll be updating the committee on my understanding of a very significant change in UK Government policy towards Ukrainian refugees. Can I begin by reiterating that the Scottish Government has condemned Russia's unprovoked invasion of a peaceful democratic neighbour in the strongest possible terms several times over the last weeks. Scotland offers its unqualified support for Ukraine's sovereignty, its independence, its territorial integrity. Russia's illegal act of aggression has no conceivable justification and we reject wholeheartedly the premise of the invasion that has been pedalled by President Putin and the Russian Government. I deplore, as I know colleagues right across the Scottish Parliament do, the heartbreaking loss of life, including civilians, which is a direct responsibility of the Russian regime. I wrote to the Russian ambassador on 25 February in these terms and I've spent time with the Ukrainian acting consul general to assure him of the Scottish Government's steadfast support. The Scottish Government has so far committed £4 million in humanitarian aid as part of global humanitarian efforts. £2 million of that has been allocated to the Disasters Emergency Appeal for Ukraine, which launched last Thursday. I want to thank everybody in Scotland who has contributed so generously on a personal basis. The DEC appeal has now raised more than £10 million in Scotland alone. We have allocated, as the Scottish Government, £1 million of our humanitarian aid to UNICEF to support their work in providing life-saving services and supporting families, while a further £1 million has been allocated to the British Red Cross and to SKEAF, the Scottish Catholic International Aid Fund. Our financial aid contribution will help to provide basic humanitarian assistance, including in health, water, sanitation and shelter to those who are fleeing Putin's bombs. On top of the £4 million in humanitarian aid, we have committed to providing around £2.9 million worth of urgently needed medical equipment for Ukraine. Our first donation of medical supplies arrived in Poland on Thursday 3 March, destined for the Ukrainian Ministry of Health in Lviv. Since then, a second donation worth £1.2 million left Scotland on 4 March, containing more than 130,000 items of medical supplies, including bandages and syringe pumps, and a further 32 pallets of bandages, IV sets and syringes left Scotland on Tuesday morning. I would like to place on record my thanks to NHS Scotland for responding to the specified needs of the Ukrainian Government with such lightning speed to fulfil the request of urgently needed medical equipment supplies and pharmaceuticals. Like many across Scotland in the world, I have watched with distress the most significant displacement in humanity since the Second World War. It is estimated that at or around, but soon to overtake, 2 million Ukrainians have been forced to leave their country because of Putin's invasion, and many more will, sadly, follow. If I can take any heart from this tragedy, it has been the amazing generosity shown by people here in Scotland who have rallied to provide support for their fellow humans on the other side of Europe. The stories of families, communities, churches, mosques, shops, schools and workplaces across Scotland raising funds and collecting provisions, and clothing for Ukrainians shows a long feature of humanitarian support from our country. As mentioned in the supporting documents for this session, the Polish Embassy in London has welcomed our community's generosity, but has asked those wanting to help instead make financial support and contributions available, given the scale of the logistical effort and to ensure the most effective use of resources. I would echo that the best way to support the crisis is now in providing cash so that agencies can respond quickly in Ukraine and surrounding countries. The Scottish Government has provided information on the Ready Scotland website where people can make donations for humanitarian support in a safe and effective way. If I can briefly update the committee on resettlement, Scotland, as ever, stands ready to offer refuge and sanctuary for those fleeing Ukraine as we do the Syrian Resettlement programme, which saw all of Scotland's 32 local authorities participate and welcome over 3,300 refugees into their communities. We have been working in recent days very closely with colleagues in the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities, the Scottish Refugee Council, Police Scotland, to co-ordinate plans and address the practical challenges of resettling Ukrainians here. However, those people need to arrive in the UK for the support to be given and the UK Government has, up until now, not, in our eyes, been doing enough to enable refugees to seek refuge. The UK Government's planned community sponsorship scheme has not gone far enough in supporting all those who are seeking refuge in Scotland and has placed the responsibility of resettlement onto the community rather than with the UK Government. We also have to ensure that we learn the lessons from the Afghanistan resettlement schemes in order to provide rapid and appropriate support for those who need it. We stand absolutely ready to offer refuge and sanctuary to those who may be displaced and we have been appealing to the UK Government to work with us in developing the detail of the scheme to ensure that we in Scotland can build in appropriate support from local government and other partners. We are working on the detail of the Scottish approach to implementing the UK Government's schemes, but to do this effectively the UK Government must share its plans and detail urgently and this seems to be changing literally as we meet now. We have to be clear that the route as has been foreseen is completely inappropriate to address what could become the biggest refugee crisis since the Second World War. There are the beginnings of reports emanating from Westminster that there has been a major rethink on the UK Government's resettlement and visa scheme that has required uniquely in Europe Syrian refugees to seek a visa from a UK Government office to provide biometric data in situ, so in the likes of Poland and other neighbouring countries and indeed in France when trying to reach those shores. We have all watched the very distressing television pictures of largely women and children distraught having to wait for hours to register their interest in getting a visa and then having to wait for an undeterminate amount of time to learn whether they will receive a visa. It has been widely reported that the UK Government is in the process of deciding and announcing a major policy shift on the front. I do not have the confirmed final details of that announcement. There will be colleagues who, while I have been speaking, have been able to follow updates probably on the social media and may know more than me because we have not been formally informed yet what the position is. My understanding is that the visa application process is set to change, and that it is supposed to be speeded up dramatically and that people will not have to automatically present to officers. The expectation is that that will dramatically increase the number of people who are able to reach those shores in a much shorter time. That raises for us questions, which myself and my colleagues from the civil service will no doubt, after this meeting, be in very detailed discussions to learn about what it is that we can anticipate as a result of this change in UK Government policy. As somebody who has been very vocal in calls for the UK to change its system, I would welcome anything that will make it easier for people seeking sanctuary and refuge to get it. Yesterday and the day before, I was in Dublin holding talks with the Irish Government on humanitarian and resettlement programmes. It is hugely encouraging to see the way with which Irish national and local authorities and public administration, including the health service, have been mobilised to be on hand as people will arrive of a plane from Poland in Dublin airport and are given the help and support and guidance that they require from the minute that they arrive in Ireland. No doubt, we are going to look at doing absolutely everything that we can to make sure that when people arrive here that they receive all of the help, support and guidance that they will be requiring. Convener, I will stop at that stage because no doubt there will be many questions, especially in relation to the change in UK Government policy, but I am happy to answer questions that committee members will have about any other aspect of the Scottish Government's response to the crisis in Ukraine. We move to questions on the issues that you touched on in your statement. In terms of a system where we expect a number of refugees to arrive in Scotland, what is the Scottish Government's preferred setup? You spoke about local authorities, some of them have already schemes in place over the previous years in dealing with other countries from whom refugees have arrived. What is your preferred system, particularly when it comes to housing and health issues? Before answering that question, I draw attention to the fact that I am joined by Joanna Keating and Alison Burnie of the Scottish Government, who are the experts in the field. I will ask them to follow on from any answers that I have where there are pertinent aspects that I have not been able to share with you or insights that they have had from the meetings that are running constantly at the present time. On our preferred scheme—this is something that we have been communicating with the Home Office and thus far have not had a response in terms of whether there is a view that this is, from their perspective, workable or preferable—we want to work with local authorities, given the experience that we have had, especially from the Syrian refugee scheme, so that there is a de minimus understanding of who is seeking resettlement where, so that local authority, given what is required to help and support people arriving in a new country, require whether that is housing—obviously, it is a primary consideration—and the wraparound care and support that people require. I think that we all know that we are largely talking about women and children. In addition to housing, there are questions relating to health service support, access to health visitor support and no doubt for children of nursery and school age—an understanding of how all of that will work. That is focused on the refugees who require that help and support, but it is also mission critical for our, especially our local government partners, to have an understanding of what it is that they will need to be doing, given that we may see very rapidly increasing numbers of people arriving in different parts of the country. They will need to know how many additional places will be required in nurseries, in schools, and so on. That is why we have been skeptical of what would appear to have been the UK Government's preferred approach, which is that people receive a visa and just arrive. There does not seem to be thinking in the Home Office and other UK Government departments about the primary role that local government needs to play as part of that process. That has been the situation up until now, that is the Scottish Government trying to impress on the UK Government that we think that we have established practices in place, that we want to learn from those best practices from the Syrian refugee scheme to make sure that when people arrive from Ukraine that we are doing, we have learned all the lessons about what works with that. My expectation is that we are talking about refugee numbers, which will be multiple times the number of those who arrived as part of the Syrian refugee scheme. At 3,300 it was then. Ireland has in the first week seen more than 1,000 arrive in the first week alone. Ireland is pretty much the same size as Scotland. I do not have any insight that would suggest to me that we would be looking at any significant difference between Scotland and Ireland in this question, so it is quite helpful for us to understand what it is that they are already going through. If it is the case that the updated UK scheme does expedite the ability of Ukrainians to arrive here, we are going to have to stand up those systems very quickly and at scale. You will appreciate that this is something that, when we end this evidence session myself and my Cabinet Secretary, Shona Robison, who has the primary responsibility in the domestic side of the challenge, we will no doubt be actively in meetings understanding how things are likely to work and what impact that will have. I am sure that other colleagues would like to return to that subject, but we have also heard this morning evidence on humanitarian aid. We have had a very useful session with the Disasters and Emergency Committee and then a private session before that with the Ukrainian consul general. The Government has indicated that financial aid to the Ukraine will be allocated following discussions with UN agencies. It is likely that the Scottish Government will use a mix of approaches working with both NGOs and UN agencies. Can I explore that and wonder if you can elaborate on that approach? As we all are aware, different charitable organisations have a different focus and locus of their work. They have different logistical abilities of delivering in different places. At the same time, we also have very strong guidance and requests from our Ukrainian Government partners. There is a mixing and matching process that needs to take place between our ambition to want to help as well as we can, and the delivery mechanisms that are offered by the different charities. It is the way that things usually work when emergencies happen. You have the likes of UN agencies, those that are focused perhaps on children, UNICEF, but other parts of the UN family that are dispatched to be able to react to situations. Then you have the likes of the Red Cross Network, an important understand, as I know the committee will do. We are dealing with a situation that is both of assisting the neighbouring countries that have taken in the largest number of people. That is in an arc north to east from Poland, to Slovakia, to Hungary, to Romania, to Moldova. All of those countries have seen very significant numbers of people. It is a very large numeric number for Poland, but I think that I am right in saying that the largest per head uptake of refugees is Moldova, which I think that I am right in saying is still the poorest country in Europe. We are having to make sure that we are being as helpful and supportive to Ukrainians in country, those who have already left, and in the different geographic areas where people have fled to. It is by working with the UN and working with in particular partners within the Disasters Emergency Committee sphere, but beyond that as well, so both the Mercy Corps and SkiF are two examples of aid organisations who are not currently within the debt consortium, but we are also working with them because of their capability and because of the reach in Scotland as well. It is again a very fast-moving process and it is an iterative process because once one has dispatched certain types of aid, that changes. One of the things, and this may be a follow-up question for consideration, is that we know that people have been enormously generous here as they have been right across Europe in providing what they think will make the biggest difference to people. Baby food, nappies, clothing, toys are literally being piled up in warehouses right across Europe. How can one either get that to people in Ukraine and neighbouring countries or now when you are seeing so many people arrive, it might be best suited to use that charitable giving to people who arrive as welcome packs or support packs for people who are here, whilst at the same time recognising that what the aid community is saying and what the countries are saying, both Ukraine and the neighbouring countries, is financial aid that is the top priority for them now. For people who are wanting to help and support Ukrainians in need, the best way to do that now is financial support through the charities that are delivering in the area. Those are primarily 12 or 13 charities that form the consortium in the Disasters Emergency Committee appeal. That is a very clear message that has emerged in the evidence this morning. I would like to move to questions. I take the first questions from Mark Ruskell. Thanks. It is obviously a rapidly developing situation. We will have one eye on Twitter to find out if there will be a genuine route to safety to the UK for Ukrainians. We spoke in private with the council general for Ukraine this morning and we discussed the Ukrainian population that is here, that is part of our communities already and that is part of us. We understand that there are around 7,000 Ukrainian nationals that are in Scotland. The majority of those are seasonal workers. The majority of those people are clustered on the east coast of Scotland working in North East Fife, in Dundee, in Falkirk and in Edinburgh. I am interested to know how we can support those people. Obviously, they will be incredibly anxious and they will be wanting to bring their family, in many cases their loved ones, over to Scotland as quickly as possible. However, there are challenges in terms of language, in terms of having enough qualified immigration advice to support them. On that particular aspect, immigration advice, what thinking is the Scottish Government given to how we can deliver that advice where people are, which is primarily within those communities in the east coast where they are currently employed as seasonal workers? There is a lot in that question. I, too, have been discussing this with the acting council general. There are two specific aspects to the Ukrainian community in Scotland. First, there is a long settled and long-established Ukrainian community in Scotland that largely goes back to the 1870s and post-Second world war. One is already in that case talking about the second generation, the third generation of Ukrainian Scots who are here. They live right across Scotland. There is no geographical concentration beyond the normal urban rural contributions that we are aware of. For example, there is a Ukrainian community facility in Edinburgh similarly in Glasgow, but there are established Ukrainian Scots right across Scotland. The estimates of how many those are, the council general told me, he thought that that was probably up to 5,000. On the seasonal side of things, at a maximum you could add another 5,000 on. So the figure that Mr Ruskell is given of at the present time there may be 7,000 speaks to that. 5,000 plus 2,000 seasonal workers, and yes, there will be concentrations of those people in certain parts of the country. That is something that one has to be thinking about. One of the things that was quite interesting from my conversations with Ireland's foreign minister, Simon Coveney yesterday was that the overwhelming majority of people arriving in Dublin are arriving with an address that they are heading towards. That is from a family member or a friend or somebody that one knows. So again, given the point that I was making in an earlier answer, unless somebody can tell me that there is going to be a profound difference between people arriving in Ireland and arriving in Scotland, my suspicion is that the first wave of people arriving will arrive knowing where people are. That may well be people who are working in the seasonal industry, but it is probably also the connection that we have had both with the Scottish Ukrainian community but also those people who have been working here for a number of years who also form part of that community, i.e., they are not people who have traditionally moved back and forward every year. We need to be aware of that as a phenomenon. That throws up the reason why the Scottish Government has been particularly keen to work on the resettlement scheme that has emerged from the Syrian scheme that we have experienced in and a very good experience in at local government level to make sure that we are able to match public service support for people who are arriving in situ in localities with the levels of demand. You may well be right that one might see a significant number of refugees heading to certain parts of the country because of the nature of work that people do, but we do not know that yet. That is why we would still be very keen to make sure that we are working hand in hand with our colleagues in the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities. We have been doing a great job in making sure that there is co-ordination right across the 32 local authorities so that we can be aware of what may be coming. The what may be coming are people in their hour of need. I have no doubt that the response that we will see in this country will be the same as we have seen right across Europe of people wanting to be helpful and want to be supportive. I would draw attention to the fact that I am sure that committee members saw this on their television screens as well. People arriving on trains in different parts of Poland or different parts of Germany and even all the way across to France, people literally standing on train stations saying, I will take in two people, I will take in four people, I will take in eight people. On a human level, that is extremely moving. I am sure that people who do not have family here would want to feel that they are able to live in safety with people who are able to help and support them. Having said that, we have to make sure that safeguarding issues are being considered, that there is an awareness of who is arriving and where are they going, primarily for the reasons of matching social service support that we would want to do. That all underlines the reason why we want to have a resettlement scheme that has our local government and the provision of local services at its heart. We are ready to do that. Our colleagues in local government are ready to do that. We are just trying to impress on the UK Government that, regardless of the route that they are going to open up and the preference that they may have for wanting that to operate in other parts of the United Kingdom, we are very clear that we have good experience. We want to apply that good practice to do the best that we can do. Is there anything that colleagues want to add to that? In a nutshell, that is our approach. I know that it is very fast moving, but I think that that is still where our preference lies. Just to add to what the cabinet secretary has said there, over the course of the week, while we have been engaging with the UK Government to try to understand plans for their humanitarian sponsor scheme, ship scheme and how that might work in Scotland, we have, of course, been talking to COSLA, Scottish Refugee Council and other key partners around how we can mobilise and organise in Scotland in what our preferred approach would be. As the cabinet secretary has said, there is a long-standing experience of local government and partners doing this well in collaboration and partnership across Scotland. That is certainly the approach that partners want to take. As Mr Robertson has said, very similar to the Syrian resettlement scheme where we saw over 3,000 Syrian refugees successfully resettled in Scotland would be very much the space that our partners want to get to in this space. So, hopefully, we will get more clarity from the UK Government over the course of the day around the role that the local government is playing and, indeed, the funding package that might come alongside that to enable and facilitate offers of accommodation and support. Forgive me to answer the point of the question from Mr Ruskell, which I did not get to. Was the question about language skills and making sure that one can assist people who perhaps do not have English as a second language? The Scottish Government has been identifying quite a number of colleagues who are either Ukrainian or Russian speakers. That is from the Scottish Government side of things. The Ukrainian community in Scotland is, as you might imagine, seized of doing absolutely everything and anything that it can do to help people who are arriving, which is why we are working so closely with them to mobilise as many resources as we possibly can. I should perhaps clarify to the committee that what we are learning about this significant change in UK Government approach is that it is not moving from a position of waving visa requirements into the UK to the same position as the European Union countries are doing. The system that they are changing to is making it possible for people to apply online and to receive a reply to that request online. What we do not yet know is how long might it take for any application to take place. We are still at the very early stages of understanding how things might work, but I imagine that it would probably be easier administratively to deal with any application given human resource constraints compared to a smaller number of outlying visa offices, where there are now long queues. Our preference would be that the UK would emulate the approach of Ireland and other EU member states to waive visa requirements entirely. That is not apparently what it is that they are planning to do, but what they are doing is changing the system. It is explained in a way that should make application and the processing of such applications a lot speedier with the anticipation that that would allow a lot more refugees to arrive here much more quickly than would otherwise have taken place. That leads me to another question, which is about the nature of the visas that are issued as short-term visas, visas for seasonal workers as well and some of the conditions that are applied to that, particularly the condition of no reference to public funds and no requirement for public funds. Whether the Scottish Government has an assessment of how many people may be potentially captured by that, if people's visas are being extended to the end of this year, to December and there is some security that they may be in employment during that period, that is good. However, if people are then out of employment during that period and are unable to access benefits and have no recourse to public funds, that is a very serious problem and that could lead to homelessness and a range of other problems. Is that something that you predict might be an issue and how would you tackle that? On the way here, I heard in the news headlines that it was expected that the Home Secretary was to make an announcement that would see a change to the status of Ukrainians who were in the UK without leaving to remain, that their situation could be regularised because, of course, they would not be able to return to Ukraine. That was at 9 o'clock this morning, and we are now in a situation where it is being signalled that there might be significant changes on a number of fronts. Forgive me, I have not been cited to what those might be. Obviously, it would be a good thing for the Scottish Government to be told by the UK Government what it was intending to do about something that is going to be having such a big impact on things here, but I have still not been informed what those actually are. In relation to no recourse to public funds, that is just totally unsustainable. We have to make sure that people who are here who have lost everything and have nothing do not find themselves in a position where they may be homeless or in penury. I will be looking closely at what the UK Government is now proposing, and I have not seen it. I would hope that common sense has prevailed so that those who are here already are able to remain and do not need to go back, and that we make sure that all those who wish to seek support and sanctuary here are able to do so, and that they do have recourse to public funds. Apart from anything else, they also have the ability to earn their keep if they want to work. We have been going through an experience in Scotland where we have unfortunately been losing people and seeing people leave on the impact that Brexit has had on our workforce. First, there is a humanitarian response, but if people are going to stay here for some time and looking at the damage that has been wrought on communities in Ukraine at the present time, notwithstanding the fact that most refugees would wish to go home as quickly as possible, you are talking about people going back to cities that literally do not stand anymore, so we have to be ready to support people for as long as it takes before they are able to go home. That requires, in my view, for public funds to be made available to ensure that people are properly supported as they should be. Keeping an eye on the time, we have a cut-off at 11.30, so I will move to Fiona Hyslop. Just very briefly as a follow-up, if reports are accurate from the BBC, it looks like a process change for online processing of a remaining restricted role base in terms of who can come here. If Scotland has a specific interest in seasonal workers, the rules that are currently being applied by the UK Government, unless they change them today, would mean that family of seasonal workers could not come here, even on their very narrow limits in terms of their current provision of immediate family can come, but not if you are a seasonal worker. In your discussions with the Home Office, which I expect to be today—I expect the Home Office to give respect to the Scottish Government and to speak to you today—could you specifically raise the issue of how we get, and we have heard an example of children, not being able to come to meet their parents who are seasonal workers here in Scotland, that that is a specific thing that we press on to get that change? Yes. That relates in part to the community scheme that the UK Government has talked about, where individuals, organisations or companies might be able to sponsor applicants so that they might secure a visa. Those are the kind of areas where we have been talking with the Home Office. That is a very good example of where we would want to press on the Home Office that families should be able to be together. My view is that we should be taking in everybody that needs to be taken in. If they are going to continue to use effectively immigration administrative systems to deal with a humanitarian crisis, then we have to do our best to make sure that it has the least restrictions possible. What Fiona Hyslop raises as a particular by-product of the existing approach is exactly the kind of thing that we have been bringing up. One of the problems that we have had in the Scottish Government—this will be exactly the same for our colleagues in Wales and Northern Ireland—is that, when one seeks to speak with the UK Government departments about the intended workings of schemes, there is literally nothing that comes back about how they are intended to work. We have made major suggestions about what it is that we would prefer. I described the committee earlier in terms of our approach involving local government at its heart, but one says this to the Home Office and is asking for an understanding of whether they agree that this is workable and advisable, regardless of what one concludes is the best way of doing it elsewhere in the UK. We are very clear about what we want to do here. We think that it is the best way of delivering for people, but, in addition to that, the specific administrative restrictions that it would appear may still apply with this update to visa applications that the UK Government is in the process of deciding and announcing. We may still be having to press to make sure that there aren't the circumstances that Mrs Hyslop has raised. If I could move on, and I am conscious that other colleagues might want to come in, you have just returned from Dublin. It will have to be brief, but it may be fair to share with us the Irish Government's view that they are part of the EU political response to Ukraine and any of the practical lessons that we can learn from them that you have already indicated. There are some. Ireland is 2 per cent of the European Union's population. It uses it as a rough rule of thumb of the consequences of what that means financially or in other things. I think that they are working on the expectation that they may be taking in up to 80,000 Ukrainians and that that process has just begun. At Dublin airport, there are welcome tables from Irish public authorities that take people's details. This is the whole problem of the UK scheme. It is the wrong way round. The Irish do all the due diligence when people arrive who are from Ukraine. One finds out people's details so that one has them, and one then makes sure that one can match that to health provision and local government support. People's positions are effectively regularised in Ireland. That is what they do from the moment that people get off the plane. They are obviously working very hard to make sure that they are able to provide the housing that will be required. I have made the point already. I think that the early indications were that among the first arrivals, one is dealing with people who have friends, family, relations that one can stay with, but there are. There is a proportion that do not, and one has to match that then, whether it is in Ireland's cases local authorities, but it is also religious institutions and others, where there is accommodation available. They run a national portal that people can indicate their willingness and ability to take people in. In addition to people who are friends and family from Ukraine, there are obviously people in Ireland, as there are elsewhere in Europe, and there are here, too, who want to help and take people in. It is that matching process. They have a system to be able to do that. They are expecting the numbers to go up quite dramatically. To build on a question that Mark was asking about, we had a very impressive conversation this morning from the consul general that created a very impressive contribution from him. One of the things that was coming through loud and clear was the pressure on the consulate to try and provide information at a time when the UK's policy on the matters that you have been describing has been and continues to change. Do you feel that looking back, for instance, at some of what we did in Scotland to provide information to people post Brexit, to communities living in Scotland who realise that the Scottish Government could not sort the problems that the UK Government was responsible for, but that we were able to provide information? We were talking in the session this morning about whether there was anything that could be done to provide a single point of contact for information, particularly for the community of Ukrainians in Scotland. Do you feel that the Government would be able to work with that community and with that consulate to try and find ways to do some of that? We are already working with the consulate and we are already working with the community on a daily basis to work out what are their needs, their interests, their concerns and their expectations. That goes from one side offering to be helpful and supportive to the consul general himself, because his phone just goes incessantly. I have met him quite a number of times. Forgive me, I do not know if you were meeting him personally or you were meeting him personally. I have been on numerous teams' calls where he is sitting there and talking about everything that is very important from the perspective of the consulate. The phone is just going non-stop. Help and support has been offered from the Scottish Government as there has been from other consulates. That is a matter for the consul general, because we are talking about the consular responsibilities of the Republic of Ukraine. It is for them to work out what is the most appropriate thing, but we have been very clear that we are wanting to help there. At the heart of the early stages of what we are doing and no doubt going forward a lot is the involvement of the Scottish Refugee Council, which has a lot of experience. In the meetings that I have been having with Shona Robison, the Ukrainian consul general and the Ukrainian community, including its organisations and the Scottish Refugee Council and the police and other public authorities, we have been trying to work through all of these different issues of messaging and communication. As is the way of those things, one just has to make sure that one is using every single route possible to make sure that people are hearing and learning about the things that they need to do. Some of what we are talking about here is a capacity issue. How can one make sure that the consulate has everything that it requires? How can the Scottish Refugee Council have the capacity to deal with the scale of the challenges that it develops? That is very much at the forefront of our thoughts. Office space is already being provided by the Scottish Refugee Council for the Ukrainian communities and is coordinating and supporting them. Is there more that can be done, whether it is on communication or anything else? Absolutely. We are doing that because things are changing very quickly. We will need to make sure that we are doing the right things and the circumstances as they develop. However, our Ukrainian colleagues are very well aware of the offers of help that are there for them, as are the Ukrainian community. The First Minister was with the Ukrainian community in Edinburgh yesterday. We are talking with one another on a daily basis to try to make sure that we can do everything that we can. On another theme, you mentioned the multiplicity of needs that people will have when they arrive in Scotland. One of those will presumably be people who have a whole variety of medical needs but who may not have medical records because of their situation. How do you feel that we can ensure that the NHS is in a position to try and support those people in that very unusual situation? In that group of people, there are others, including people with disabilities, who we are very mindful of. Our colleague Pam Duncan-Glancy raised with me in the chamber last week. We are very seized by the different spectrum of needs that people arrive with. On the technical question of Ukrainian medical records, I will have to come back to Dr Allan about that. Ukraine is a developed country that has computerised data management systems and is notwithstanding the fact that it is in a war situation, it has a functioning medical system and the largest part of the country is not occupied. There must be ways in which information can still be accessed. That depends on the capacity of the Ukrainian health system, which we can all understand is hugely under strain because of the injured civilians in particular, but also military personnel who will be treated right across the country. I will take that away, but I know that our health service and everybody that assists in areas such as disability will be very seized by making sure that we are able to do everything that we can to help. I think that your comments about the, hopefully, significantly changing picture and visa regulations reinforces the unanimity that our committee had about the need for intergovernmental working on issues has made very powerful this morning. I want to follow up on two things. Firstly, the comments that Mark Ruskell and Fiona Hyslop made about seasonal workers that really came through very powerfully from the Ukrainian consul this morning because there are 6,000 to 7,000 of them. They are very geographically located—Lothians, Edinburgh, St Andrews, Dundee and Falkirk—in terms of local authorities in those areas and the voluntary sector. I think that gearing up is critical because there will clearly be a demand there as well as the fact that it could be across Scotland in terms of people applying to come here. As you have acknowledged, the Ukrainian consul said that their ambitions are not as permanent refugees. They very much want to be short term. It reinforces those points. I would definitely guide you to look at the official evidence that we have had earlier today, which has been very specific and helpful. I just wanted to ask a point about work with employers. In my head, we have been talking about what our local authorities and third sector would do. One thing that is clearly, I hope that we can agree on, is using our soft power as a country. You have Gordon Brown talking about war crimes, working with lawyers. I met him to talk about that yesterday. You have also got work with employers in Scotland and companies. It is just a plea to think about what more could we do there, whether it is enabling staff or companies to donate to the Disasters Emergency Committee or access to work visas where companies are looking for that. Is there more that we could do to encourage those employers to be doing more now and let the sky scanner advertise and reach out to Ukrainian workers to work in their sector? I know that it is a fast-moving situation. We have been lobbying you about local authorities for weeks now in visas, but it feels like it might become more real. There are some practical things that I hope the Scottish Government will pick up on. There are a number of things related to Sarah Boyack's question, which are all excellent. It is about the wider assistance that can be provided both to those who are seeking sanctuary but also being more generally helpful to Ukraine and people who have been forced to leave there. We are receiving reports, and I am sure that there are members of the committee who have had that, of companies that are specifically wanting to offer Ukrainians positions should they arrive here. The Scottish Government is co-ordinating those offers that have been provided, so if you have any examples of that, I do as a constituency MSP from a leading local company, and no doubt when people are here they will be able to take up those opportunities. We also know and should acknowledge and praise Scottish companies that have made very principled decisions about divesting from Russia because they no longer want to work in a market with such a regime and want to join the rest of the civilised world in doing everything that they can to put pressure on the Russian regime. They are also looking at ways, and some have made very significant donations, for example, to charities and other efforts related to Ukraine. We should recognise that that is already happening. On the employer's front specifically, we already have an excellent working relationship with the Scottish Chambers of Commerce, and that has been in relation most recently with the Afghan resettlement scheme, and that will be being extended to include Ukrainians as well. There is that kind of co-ordination that is already taking place. For those who are wanting to be helpful and supportive, it is for us to capture the detail of those who are wanting to be helpful. Just as a supplementary to put it on the record, in relation to Dr Allan's previous question on health, it has been drawn to my attention about the existing arrangements that take place between NHS boards and local authorities, specifically in relation to refugees. That health question about making sure how does that connection work to the advantage of people who may come with medical conditions or disabilities and so on, that already takes place. That is another reason why this integrated, once-contained approach that we have taken to both Africans and Syrians is what we are wanting to do with Ukrainians when they arrive, so that all of our public services and the third sector and the private sector can be incorporated into the big challenge that we have. Everybody is wanting to step up to it, so we are just very keen that UK authorities hear that we have a good model that works here and that we want it to work for Ukrainians. It would be excellent to hear that they would understand that that is the route that we wish to pursue in Scotland. I have a very quick supplementary answer to Alasdair Allan about health issues. Just to follow up on the issue that I raised, we have had lots of women and children fleeing from Ukraine, but now you can see older people, people with disabilities and people with current health conditions beginning to leave because literally they have no home to stay in, so it is just a flag that it will be quite a range of health conditions that people may arrive with. It could be as basic as needing free medicines, so I hope that the Scottish Government is considering that range of supports or post-traumatic stress that people will need not just in the future, but that people will need that from day one, the minute they arrive. I totally agree with Sarah Boyat. Those are the considerations that need to be at the forefront of people's minds. We will probably have seen the same reports of children with cancer unable to continue to receive medicine in Ukraine, who have left and are receiving treatment in Poland. You can only imagine the challenges that that poses to the Polish health system, having a million refugees and those existing health conditions and other challenges. These are all underlying the reasons why we all need to do our share, so it is not all on the immediately neighbouring countries. We have an excellent health service in Scotland, and it is there for everybody who is here at the point of need, and it will be for Ukrainians who arrive here too. They are entitled to free healthcare, as they should be, and the medicines that go with it. We also took some evidence from the consul general about the sanctions that were being imposed on Russia. I am interested to hear more about the Scottish Government's position on that. Last night, we passed the LCM on the economic crime bill that was passing through Westminster. Within that debate, I have had constituents get in touch with me about the whole situation around shell companies for laundering money, which I appreciate is a reserved power, but also businesses and trading with Russia on how we can encourage or change their situations. In concert with all other European countries, there has been a reaction by Government and the private sector. That has been the case in Scotland, too. Most of our leading brands and most of our leading economic sectors that have had interest in Russia have already announced that they are divesting or that they are no longer continuing to operate in Russia. Committee members will be aware that the First Minister has written asking that companies or entities that fall into that category should consider their positions and should divest from Russia. I think that we all know that the UK has become a preferred location in London in particular for oligarchs to park often ill-gotten massive funds into different legal entities, including those with the name Scottish in them, which are Scottish only in name, buying expensive property in London, some of them are bought expensive property and estates in Scotland. I very much hope that the new legislation will finally begin to get to grips with what, up until now, has at best been a toleration of ill-gotten gains being whitewashed in the UK's headquartered financial systems and using overseas territories. At worst, it has been understood that that has been happening at scale and has been allowed to continue. It cannot continue. It is totally and utterly unacceptable. Part of the problem for us in our national Parliament and on behalf of our national Government is that we do not have many of the levers that can deal with this. We are dependent on legislation being passed in Westminster. If one has a look at the legislation, there are catch-all exemptions that allow on the grounds of national security and any other number of reasons for people to be exempted from the process. I am here to talk about the things that we have the power to make decisions over, but I was asked specifically about what we can do in an economic response. I think that it is good that the UK Government is finally making some progress on that front, but there is still much, much more that can be done. We should never go back. It should not be a temporary response to the circumstances that we find ourselves in now. Our company systems should be transparent. Landholding should be transparent. People who have ill-gotten gains should forfeit it, and we should use unexplained wealth orders as much as is necessary. If we are beginning to do that on a UK basis now properly, then that is to be welcomed. Can I pursue that in a slightly different way? I appreciate that this is a little off topic, but you are the culture secretary wearing your culture hat. We all support economic sanctions on Russia and on the regime. We have also seen in recent weeks some cultural institutions such as the Glasgow Film Festival and an orchestra in Cardiff. We are drawing Russian art music from their programmes. They each, to be fair to them, have justifications for doing that, but do you accept that there is quite a fine line between absolutely justified sanctions and boycotts of output linked to the regime and a more worrying cultural discrimination? Yes, in principle, I agree with the convener that there is a fine line in all of this. There are very principled Russian, often exiles, whether in the cultural sphere or in journalism or in political activism, who are opponents of the Putin regime, who have spoken out against the approach of the Russian Government, who have pursued, through violent means, their aims. This is not the first time, as we know, they have done so in Georgia twice. They have done so in Moldova. They have done so within their own borders in Chechnya. They are now doing it. This is not a new phenomenon. We have now got to a stage in which the international community is saying that we need everybody in Russia to understand that it cannot go on. There is a general approach of divesting from Russia. There is a general approach of ending the participation of official Russian delegations, teams and so on. At the heart of what you have asked, convener, is an appreciation of the nuances of the honorary president of the Edinburgh festival, who has not spoken out against the Putin regime being asked to give up his position, and quite rightly so. However, we have, in a conductor of the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, somebody who has taken a principled position in condemnation of the Russian Government. There is and must be a nuance about the approach that we are taking to Russia, which recognises that there are a great many people who should be applauded for their principled stand, whether those in exile or those who might be here, but also the thousands of people who have been protesting on the streets of Russia itself. We need to make sure that, while taking a very strong and principled stand that is aimed at having a significant impact on Russian public opinion and the Russian regime, at the same time, it is nuanced enough to encompass those Russians who are opponents of the regime, and I am sure that nobody would wish an intended consequence of causing them difficulties. On this topic, and just to finish off, I am going to bring in a previous culture secretary to follow up on that. I would point out that no Russian minister was ever invited to the Edinburgh International Culture Summit since 2014, when Russia obviously invaded Crimea. Culture is very powerful to build connections, and we have learned that with incoming refugees from other countries. I would impress on the cabinet secretary the importance of that cultural connection for when people arrive here and also in the rebuilding of Ukraine, when eventually peace arrives. On culture giving hope, one of the most hopeful things that we heard this morning from the consul general was the re-establishment of the online learning for Ukrainian children happening in Ukraine. We also need to prepare for that when they arrive here, so it might not necessarily be about assimilation in our schools, they might do that for social reasons, but I think support for the online learning because the spirit of education and culture to bring comfort solace but also provide and build the future for Ukraine through their education of the children is something surely that the Scottish Government can also try and support in a very practical measure in terms of when we receive those families here helping them with their education. I think that that might perhaps be paraphrased as an invitation to a further evidence session where we can talk at length about what it is that we can do because I've got a lot of views about things that we can be thinking about in the more medium and long term after Ukraine successfully repulses the Russian invasion of its country. One of the conversations I had in recent days was with the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities and the Lord Provost and Council Leader of Edinburgh City Council, which is twinned with Kiev. We had a conversation at some length about the potential for our local authorities, our cities, our towns that do not have existing links with communities in Ukraine to think about partnership and or twinning going forward from now. When Ukraine has emerged victorious and is needing to rebuild its infrastructure, there can be direct relations between Scottish towns, cities and regions with parts of Ukraine. I think that there is quite a lot of opportunity in that. More broadly, on the cultural point, absolutely, we are going to be enriched by Ukrainians who come here and we will learn a lot more about Ukrainian culture, which is a thoroughly good thing. However, at the same time, we are also going to have to think about how we can help and support Ukrainians who come here culturally. Talking about children, for example, and their education, of course they will learn English while they are here and, no doubt, they will learn Gaelic in various parts of Scotland as well. However, we have to think about the education support that we are able to give them so that their education can also continue in Ukrainian and Russian as national languages. However, I suspect that that is going to be a conversation for a further evidence session. However, we need to think about all of those things and the cultural points that are very well made. Thank you. That concludes our discussion this morning. I thank the cabinet secretary and his officials for their time this morning. I also ask people to keep an eye on the committee's website for further information about some of the issues that we have discussed this morning.