Economy, Energy and Tourism Committee, 16 Dec 2009

Meeting date: Wednesday, December 16, 2009

Official Report 301KB pdf

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Proposed International Trade Inquiry

The final item is consideration of a draft remit for our proposed inquiry on international trade and inward investment.

The clerks have produced a paper with a suggested remit. I open the discussion up for comments. The hope is that, if we can agree the draft remit today—subject to any tweaking that the clerks and I agree—we can get the call for evidence out before Christmas so that people can start to prepare their evidence, which will allow us to pursue this inquiry fairly soon after we conclude the banking inquiry.

I have a thought about the call for evidence. This is clearly not the best time of year to approach organisations, even those that are in the forefront of our economy. Therefore, although it might be appropriate to put a call out this week, it would also be appropriate to follow it up in the new year.

Absolutely. The aim is to give organisations as much notice as possible. The proposal is for written evidence to be in by the end of February, so there would be plenty of time. We would ensure at the beginning of the year that organisations were aware of that.

That is helpful. I will highlight one phrase at the end of the fourth paragraph of the terms of reference. We are doing the inquiry because we think that international trade is important, but saying

"future growth may need to be driven by an increased focus on international trade"

perhaps slightly overstates the point. We are certainly looking at an increased focus, but I am not sure that international trade is the sole driver of future economic growth, important though it is. Perhaps a slight tweak is needed.

In the same paragraph, a point is presented in a rather complex way through negatives and double negatives. It might be simpler to say, "Exports are important and we already have some success stories." In other words, we could make the same point in a slightly more positive way, because it is important to recognise that a significant element of the economy is already exporting successfully.

I would be interested in considering international comparisons with the services that smaller European countries provide so that we can try to gauge Scotland's position and results relative to theirs. That point might come out in the evidence, but perhaps we could consider it before we issue the call for evidence.

That point is covered by question 8 in the draft remit. The intention is to do at least some paper-based comparisons with other countries. This is really just about the terms of reference of the inquiry; we will come back with an approach paper on how the committee will pursue the inquiry. At this stage, we are just trying to get the thing into the public domain so that we can start to gather evidence.

Possibly, we could identify some key companies in that time. I am thinking of companies such as the Wood Group, Denholm and Aggreko, which have a big export market for their services. Also, we ought to be circumspect about looking at inward investment, as that often means just a takeover. We have just seen Borders, which wiped out the native Glasgow bookselling industry, itself wiped out to the great disadvantage of Scottish publishing companies. We should, therefore, ca' canny about inward investment. We want it where we need it, but we do not want it where it will check the development of small businesses in Scotland.

The nature of inward investment will obviously be part of the focus of the inquiry, which will also look at the type of businesses that we are trying to attract and our purpose in doing that.

The jacket that I proudly wear is from yet another menaced Scottish industry—it is Harris tweed. There is a need, bound up with Common Market regulations and that sort of thing, to preserve and enhance native specialities. I could go into a long disquisition about how cuckoo clocks saved the Black Forest—curiously, it was the companies that specialised in wood-motion cuckoo clocks that survived; those that went into electronic clocks went bust.

If you wish to spend the Christmas recess producing a report on that, that is entirely up to you.

I echo Lewis Macdonald's comments about being positive. We must be careful not to pretend that it is broke when it ain't. Let us just see what we can do. It is worth taking out every pejorative term. For example, the penultimate paragraph on page 3 says:

"This new inquiry will focus on the merits of the current approach",

which implies that there are demerits. I know exactly what the clerks mean, but I suggest that we take out the reference to merits and say, "The inquiry will focus on the current approach." That will include the merits and demerits without our having to mention them. I am not nit-picking; I think that we need to be careful about the tone of the remit. What is going on is good, but we are looking to see whether we can do something to improve it. I also make a plea for no double negatives—they may be used correctly, but they do not half confuse us.

The draft remit is good and what we want. It is important to recognise that, for many export industries, there is no choice between working with UK export bodies and working with Scottish export bodies—they work with both. However, I do not think that we need to adjust the remit to recognise that, as we are bound to focus on the relationship between different export bodies and industries in the course of our inquiry.

That is absolutely right.

In relation to question 2, we will want to check whether the support that is given is appropriate for the current economic circumstances—that is, whether we are still providing the appropriate support in a changed economic situation. In particular—perhaps to please Christopher Harvie—we might place the emphasis on the manufacturing side.

We also need to ensure that we look properly at the issues to do with our relationships with other UK-wide bodies, such as UK Trade and Investment and the British Council. VisitBritain is also important in the context of the services that it provides to VisitScotland. I was shocked to discover that VisitBritain has only four members of staff covering the whole of China.

That is important. It would also be worth while to find out how individual countries handle marketing within themselves. In Germany, it is very much concentrated around big trade fairs, but the situation could be different in other countries. It is a question of finding out who the key people to contact are.

Okay. Are members content with the draft remit with a little bit of tweaking? No major question has been left out that members feel should be added to the nine questions, and no question is being asked that members feel should not be asked.

Members indicated agreement.

Are members happy for the clerk and me to finalise the call for evidence? I take Lewis Macdonald's point that we may have to make a double call, as people might forget because it is Christmas.

Members indicated agreement.

I wish you all a merry Christmas and a happy new year. Thank you for your support for the convener, not just today, when he was feeling a little fragile, but throughout the year. It has been greatly appreciated. By and large, the committee has worked extremely well as a team over the course of the year.

Meeting closed at 12:40.