Finance: Interministerial Standing Committee: 9 February 2023

Items and actions

John Swinney MSP, Deputy First Minister and Cabinet Secretary for Covid Recovery (Scottish Government) chaired a meeting of the Finance: Interministerial Standing Committee (F:ISC) on 9 February 2023 in St Andrew’s House, Edinburgh. The meeting was attended by The Rt Hon John Glen MP, Chief Secretary to the Treasury (UK Government), and Rebecca Evans MS, Minister for Finance and Local Government (Welsh Government). Officials from the Northern Ireland Executive attended virtually in a listening capacity.
 
All Ministers welcomed the opportunity to meet in-person to discuss the current economic context and sought to build positive and constructive relationships across the governments. 
 
Ministers discussed the UK Government’s economic and fiscal plans with a focus on the on-going budget challenges and looking ahead to the UK Government Spring Budget and OBR forecasts on 15 March.

Ministers went on to discuss replacement EU funding and were joined virtually for this item by a senior official from the UK Government Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities.

The Welsh Government Finance and Local Government Minister then gave a brief overview of the Interim report by The Independent Commission on the Constitutional Future of Wales.

Ministers noted that the next meeting of the F:ISC would take place in June but welcomed interministerial engagement between the governments in the meantime.