Chamber and committees

We are pleased to be joined by Kate Forbes, the Deputy First Minister and Cabinet Secretary for Economy and Gaelic, alongside Scottish Government officials Colin Cook, who is the director of economic development, and Aidan Grisewood, who is the director of jobs and wellbeing economy.

We will launch straight into questions after I open with an observation.

Over recent weeks, we have been taking evidence from enterprise agencies and the Scottish National Investment Bank. It has struck me that they are all clearly doing lots of good work in relation to attempting to take direct action and promote economic outcomes, but I question how well co-ordinated that activity is, because they all seem to be reporting on different metrics and in different ways.

If we compare ourselves internationally, 1,300 people work for Scottish Enterprise alone, which compares to the around 700 people who work for Business Finland. Enterprise Singapore employs around 2,000 people, which is slightly less than the total number of people who work across Singapore’s enterprise agencies.

Could we do a better job of joining up such activity? Do we get a good bang for our buck from our enterprise agencies?

The skills gap that Gordon MacDonald and I have identified during the preceding set of questions is our ability to lip-read.

I hand over to Gordon MacDonald.

Given the centrality of productivity, it strikes me that, for the sake of a day, the report’s publication date could be looked at.

I recognise that the numbers cover a 20-year period, but you might have seen the article in the Financial Times in June that focused on London’s productivity over the past four years. I will fully declare that it is based on Office for National Statistics data and, unfortunately, its regional breakdowns take some time to come through, so it only covers 2019 to 2023. The article focused on the fact that London’s productivity decreased in that period, but it also very clearly showed that Scotland’s labour productivity growth was fourth from bottom, at 0.25 per cent, narrowly ahead of Wales, the West Midlands and London but behind the north-west, which led the pack with almost 2.5 per cent growth.

The point is that, yes, you can look at a longer period, but more recently, the regional comparisons appear to show some issues with Scotland’s productivity. First, do you recognise that? Secondly, to come back to the point about context, should we look more closely at Scotland’s productivity growth compared to that of other regions and nations of the UK?

I do not disagree with that, but can I press you a little bit on that point? I must fully declare that I am slightly obsessed with the regional breakdowns, because they raise the question whether things are going on in other places that we could and should learn from.

There are some reasons not to talk about Manchester, given what has happened in recent days, but there are lessons to be drawn from what they are doing there. Should the Scottish Government use some of those comparisons—with Manchester, Northern Ireland or Wales—for both positive and negative insights?

Are you sure, Stephen?

That is a useful clarification.

I want to ask some questions on that, because the issue is really important. The issue here is context, because there are always different ways to look at data.

I note two specific things about NSET’s productivity measures. First, the progress report uses 2023 data, but the 2024 data was published only one day after the report’s publication. Is there an issue with the sequencing of data, and can we use the most up-to-date data?

The report uses nominal data and quotes an increase in productivity from £40.50 GVA per hour worked to £42.50 GVA per hour worked. That is described as an increase, but in real terms it is a decrease of 1.5 per cent. Do we need to think about how we use data, ensure that we use the most up-to-date data and provide greater context?

With that, I think that the Economy and Fair Work Committee is demonstrating excellent productivity by dealing with our agenda ahead of schedule.

Good morning, and welcome to the 27th meeting in 2025 of the Economy and Fair Work Committee. This morning, as part of our pre-budget scrutiny, we will take evidence from the Deputy First Minister, Kate Forbes. Before we do so, I first note that we have received apologies—[Interruption.] I ask everyone to turn their phones to silent. I probably should have said that before. We have received apologies from Willie Coffey, and from Sarah Boyack, who is joining the committee, so we will defer item 1.

Agenda item 2 is a decision on whether to take business in private. I refer members to papers 1 and 2 in their information packs. Do we agree to take items 4 and 5 in private?

Members indicated agreement.

On agencies’ insight into regional approaches to what drives economic growth, I do not particularly disagree with the work that HIE and SOSE do. They do an important job on that agenda. However, although we would not want all our enterprise agencies reporting on exactly the same things—that would be counterproductive—we should surely have them reporting on some of the same things, so that we have some common points of reference. It strikes me that we do not really have that.

Secondly, beyond the metrics point, and looking at other countries, Sweden has been on a similar path. It has a comparable number of enterprise agencies, but it also has an explicit team Sweden programme, whereby each of the agencies has a clear understanding of how it interfaces with the others, to the point where each of them articulates that clearly and explicitly on their website. Could we use more comparable ways of understanding and measuring our outcomes? Should we, in a qualitative sense, be better at articulating where they fit and collaborate together, as well as the areas where they do their own thing, so to speak?