Crisis, what crisis? asks Robert Burns quango

A CAMPAIGN to bring home the Scottish diaspora for the 250th anniversary of Robert Burns' birth is still on track, despite the loss of two people appointed to oversee the event, ministers insisted last night.

Ministers have been forced to step in to hand control over the Homecoming Scotland campaign to the EventScotland quango after the initial organisation of the project foundered.

Yesterday it was confirmed that two senior members of staff who had been at the heart of planning for the 2009 event were no longer with the organisation.

Alison McRae, the project director, and Jo Wedlock, who was in charge of public relations, now have no connections with the project, an EventScotland spokesman confirmed. The spokesman – and the Scottish Government – emphasised that the new arrangements for the events, put into place in November of last year, were designed to get the homecoming drive back on course.

Under the new structure, Paul Bush, the chief operating officer at EventScotland, now has direct responsibility for Homecoming Scotland. Mr Bush, in turn, reports to the board of the VisitScotland quango which is in turn accountable to Jim Mather, the enterprise minister.

Last night the changes failed to convince the opposition. Frank McAveety, the Labour MSP and former tourism minister, said: "Efforts to woo visitors from abroad by the 2009 deadline are facing a major crisis. Very little seems to have been done."

The EventScotland spokesman said: "There is no major crisis going on. The responsibility for the delivery of the project passed to us in November last year and we are working with organisations like VisitScotland to deliver an inspirational programme of events that will engage with the Scottish diaspora."

A Scottish Government spokeswoman said: "It became clear that EventScotland was best-placed to manage the Homecoming project as it entered its next phase. Ministers viewed it as commonsense to provide the project with full access to the resources within EventScotland and VisitScotland."

CALLING ALL SCOTS
HOMECOMING Scotland was established by the previous Executive to attract the Scottish diaspora, or those of Scottish descent, to Scotland in 2009, the 250th anniversary of poet Robert Burn's birth.

A high-powered board, chaired by Allan Burns, at the time a director of the Diageo Scotland drinks company, was established in November 2005 by former culture minister Patricia Ferguson.

However, the project ran into difficulties, particularly over the funding of a £17 million Rabbie Burns museum in Alloway.

The organisation had a budget of £1.5 million over its first two years, with most of the money coming from the then Scottish Executive and some from South Ayrshire council.

A spokeswoman for the Scottish Government was last night unable to say what the budget for the project, now run by EventScotland, would be up to 2009.