The Scottish Artists Union will this week write to all members of the Scottish
Parliamentary Committees for Education, Lifelong Learning & Culture and Finance
as follows:

The previous Minister for Europe, External Affairs & Culture gave the Scottish
Artists Union and others in the sector her personal assurance that the quickest
route to Creative Scotland, while cleaving to parliamentary rules, was to insert
the content of the Creative Scotland Bill into the Public Services Reform Bill.
(As well as establishing Creative Scotland 2009 Ltd in the interim). We met the
Minister shortly after the Scottish Government's announcement that the PSR
Bill's introduction was to be delayed. She echoed the statements given at the
time, saying the postponement was due to revisions of parts of the bill dealing
with health. She said that the content of the Creative Scotland Bill would be
included in its entirety along with a new financial memorandum.

In his first meeting with arts sector representatives (18/02/09) the new
Minister for Culture, External Affairs & the Constitution said that he had
"already made some suggestions in terms of the content of" the PSR Bill. It may
be inferred that the wording of the Creative Scotland portion of the PSR Bill
will differ from that of the Creative Scotland Bill.

Our understanding is that since the PSR Bill is to be introduced by the Cabinet
Secretary for Finance & Sustainable Growth it will pass before the Committee for
Finance as a matter of course, but the Committee for Education, Lifelong
Learning & Culture can make a request to scrutinise it. It will doubtless be a
very wide-ranging piece of legislation and we are worried that in the ensuing
debate on public spending the lasting reform of government provision for the
arts may be over-looked. If indeed the proposals for Creative Scotland do
differ from their previous formulation it becomes even more crucial that a
culture-minded parliamentary group examines them.

The PSR Bill is anticipated in May. We welcome responses from the members of
these committees on how they might allay the fears of many artists; that the
question of how Creative Scotland will be run and what it must do may "fall off
the radar" as the wider platform of spending reform and "organisational
reduction" is advanced.