Chamber and committees

Although their intention of promoting accessibility is understandable, the amendments requiring standardised machine-readable formats for the various statements and reports are not necessary. The Scottish ministers and local authorities are already required to make the documents and websites accessible via other legislation. It is not just a question of the amendments being unnecessary—there is a further dimension in that including them would risk the primary legislation becoming dated. Technology evolves at such a pace that I would be concerned that multiple future amendments would be required for the legislation to keep pace. We should—

Yes.

I take the point, but I think that my earlier point stands. That requirement is already laid down in other legislation, which means that there is no need for it in the bill and, on the principle of not adding extra provisions to the bill that are covered elsewhere, I still urge members to vote against the amendments.

I would be happy to instruct my officials to include the topic of accessibility and format standardisation in the guidance development discussions, and to include representations from the relevant bodies and other organisations, such as COSLA, public bodies and the third and business sectors.

This is a large group of amendments, so I will try to be brief. I will begin by talking to the five amendments in my name, and I will then comment on those that other members have lodged.

Amendments 75 and 87 will ensure that supported businesses are listed in the bill, alongside employee-owned businesses, co-operatives and social enterprises. Supported businesses are important to many disabled workers who want to access work, and amendments 75 and 87 will ensure that promoting supported businesses can feature in the statement and the local community wealth building action plans. The Scottish Government intends to support amendment 21, in the name of Lorna Slater, which is in a different group, and, under amendment 75, commentary on supported businesses will have to feature in the ministerial statement.

The intention of amendments 76 and 88 is to ensure, by referring to the promotion of access to investment opportunities, that the financial pillar of community wealth building is represented in the list of measures that may feature in the statement and local action plans.

Amendment 81 will future proof the ministerial statement. Giving the Scottish ministers, through regulation, the power to modify the list of measures that feature in the ministerial statement is prudent, especially if amendment 21 is supported. Furthermore, it is right that any regulation of that nature should be subject to the affirmative procedure.

I urge members to support those five amendments in my name.

Although I appreciate the motivation for all the other amendments in the group, which have been lodged by colleagues, and while my door is open to further discussion prior to stage 3, I confirm that the Government’s position is to resist all amendments in the group, apart from Lorna Slater’s amendments 3, 4, 36, 15 and 16, Richard Leonard’s amendment 51 and Rhoda Grant’s amendment 86. I urge members to support those amendments, but not the others in the group.

I will quickly set out the rationale for the Government’s position with reference to the amendments that have been lodged by colleagues. I see merit in exploring through further policy dialogue the proposals that Richard Leonard has made in his amendments—other than those in amendment 51, which we support. I think that more consultation is required with stakeholders, including the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities, as well as further consideration from a legal and cost standpoint, before a proposition for primary legislation can be framed. As I have indicated in my conversations with Mr Leonard, I am sympathetic to the concepts in the Marcora approach and the Italian legislation, but a significant part of that would impinge on reserved legislation with regard to corporate law and employment law, and that would need to be considered.

Co-operatives are already in the bill. Section 1(3)(f) explicitly mentions

“supporting the development of … co-operatives”.

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I understand Richard Leonard’s intentions on insourcing, but the unintended consequence of setting out a preference for insourcing over outsourcing is that it would prevent the very businesses that we are trying to support locally from gaining contracts with public enterprises via public procurement. The work of the economic democracy group, which was formed following a recommendation in the Scottish Government-commissioned independent review on developing Scotland’s inclusive and democratic businesses, should include consideration of Richard Leonard’s proposals alongside all recommendations made in that review.

I appreciate Lorna Slater’s strong interest in the bill and the work that she has done on a range of amendments. However, the Government’s position is to resist all members’ amendments in this group except those that I have already indicated support for. Although I have sympathy with some of the policy ideas that drive many of the amendments, they need further consultation and, in some cases, detailed consideration of extant law.

As I have said, I want to keep the bill focused on economic development, and specifically on the creation of a new local format for local economic development actions. Other policy areas feed into the development of a successful economy, but I do not want to overburden future community wealth building ministerial statements with mandatory requirements to include matters that stray across too wide a range of Government policies. In keeping with all the stage 2 amendments that Opposition members have lodged, I expect my officials to feature the ideas that have driven them in future community wealth building policy development, including in the preparation of guidance, which, as I have indicated, is already under way.

For similar reasons, the Government’s position is to resist the amendments in Paul Sweeney’s name in the group. As I have set out, they need more policy development and stakeholder dialogue, as well as work on resultant costs. Again, I am interested in the themes that are raised by the amendments, and I look forward to having further policy dialogue in the next parliamentary session. However, it is too early to commit such proposals to primary legislation without that work being done.

Sarah Boyack’s amendments focus on promoting the creation of a community wealth fund on the part of the Scottish ministers and on local community wealth building partnerships. That is a complex area of work that requires more design, thinking and dialogue, which I am happy to engage with the member on.

I am happy to look at them and consider them.

The Government supports amendment 34, which is in a similar vein to amendment 5, in Murdo Fraser’s name, except that Lorna Slater’s amendment focuses on consulting

“local authorities, community organisations, and social enterprises.”

Regarding amendment 35, it is critical that businesses are consulted on any draft community wealth building statement. Any responsible Government would talk to businesses in that context. The bill already states:

“Ministers must … consult with such persons as they consider appropriate.”

I am also concerned that the way that the amendment is worded might require ministers to consult each and every business that is potentially affected, which would not be practical. However, I am happy to discuss the matter with Lorna Slater before stage 3, perhaps building on the content of amendment 34 to arrive at a more comprehensive and workable list of key consultees.

Amendment 52 is in a similar vein. Again, a specific obligation to consult Co-operative Development Scotland when preparing the community wealth building statement is not required, because it forms part of Scottish Enterprise, which, along with many other bodies and partners, will be consulted on a draft statement. A future Administration should be allowed to choose how to conduct an inclusive consultation exercise. However, as I said, I am happy to discuss the matter with colleagues before stage 3.

The Government does not support amendment 53. Moving from a five-year cycle of revision of the statement to a one-year cycle does not allow enough time for progress to be monitored and for new measures to be formulated. It would trap the Government in a perpetual cycle of continually revising the statement. Should five years prove too long, ministers are obliged to keep the statement under review and they can revise it at any point.

I urge members not to move the amendments in this group. If they do, I urge members not to support them, with the exception of amendments 23 and 34.

That is in the code of conduct, which businesses need to comply with in order to be able to access the relief.

I do not think that I or my officials have anything on the specifics of that. We might need to come back to you.

Obviously, that is part of the picture. It is important that the measures are targeted, that we are clear about what it is that we are trying to do and that we understand the reason for it. In relation to green ports and investment zones, it is about targeting specific industrial sectors and specific locations where there are inherent advantages, with the intention of building clusters in those technologies that are world-competitive, in order to attract those technologies.

The tax piece is a part of that. If you look at the total amount of money in relation to investment and so on, the amount that is allocated to tax—as opposed to skills, infrastructure or other site-readiness measures—is a small percentage of the total. It will be part of the decision-making criteria for companies, but, again, it will be a small part of the overall consideration. In answer to your question: yes, those incentives and reliefs can play a role, but they need to be targeted and we need to understand what we are trying to achieve with them.

The member will be aware that there is a list of criteria that a company must comply with in order to be eligible for relief.

The process, which I was not involved in at the time, was a joint process between the UK Government and the Scottish Government. As I said, it was a rigorous process that looked at several factors. The availability of underdeveloped land was one of them, but there were others, such as the existing business activity, its location, access to technology and the role of universities—several factors were chosen. Of course, in a perfect world, we would want to create more investment zones, but the offer that we took up from the UK Government was limited to two, and those two areas were chosen.