Chamber and committees

The Strategic Forum fosters a culture of collaboration between our economic development and skills agencies. Economic strengths since the establishment of the Strategic Forum were recognised in the recent Enterprise and Skills Review report. However, to deliver the step change necessary to realise our ambitions for Scotland to become a top performing OECD nation a refreshed and enhanced approach is required, as requested by stakeholders within the Ministerial Review Group. The Enterprise and Skills Review report, arising from Phase I of the Review, sets out this framework.

The decisions reached by the review will further drive alignment by establishing a new statutory board to coordinate the activities of SE, HIE, SDS and SFC, improve the measurement of their impact on delivering outcomes, establish a new vehicle to focus on the specific enterprise support needs of the South of Scotland and protect HIE’s delivery of support in the Highlands and Islands. The review also made decisions to promote Scotland as an open and international economy, streamline the innovation landscape and undertake a review of the learning journey focused on sustained employment.

The Review builds on successes delivered by the Strategic Forum which has a remit to provide strategic leadership and set the direction of travel for public and private sector bodies. It explores the most significant, cross-cutting strategic issues and agrees how to respond. By establishing shared future priorities, the Strategic Forum has provided a platform to develop coherent, united leadership within member organisations and to wider Team Scotland partners with which individual bodies closely engage.

The co-chairs of the Strategic Forum, when its remit was last revised in 2014, were the Cabinet Secretary Finance, Employment and Sustainable Growth and the Cabinet Secretary for Education and Lifelong Learning.

Core Membership includes the Chairs and Chief Executives of the main economic development and employment agencies: Scottish Enterprise; Highlands and Islands Enterprise; Scottish Funding Council; Skills Development Scotland; and VisitScotland. Scottish Government directors with lead responsibility for each of the agencies, along with the Chief Economist and Director General Energy, Enterprise and Digital are also members.

Ministerial membership of the Strategic Forum has evolved with portfolio responsibilities. It is co-chaired by Cabinet Secretaries with responsibility for the economy and for education. Membership has included the Cabinet Secretary with responsibility for infrastructure and the Minister with responsibility for enterprise or business. Depending on agenda topics, other ministers have attended individual meetings.

The latest published figures for 2014 estimate that Scottish exports to the rest of the UK are worth £48.5 billion making it Scotland’s largest export market. We are therefore well aware of the importance of this market to the Scottish economy. Our trade and investment strategy published in March this year set out a comprehensive action plan to boost Scotland’s export activity and to make it clear that Scotland is open forbusiness, including with the rest of the UK. The opening of an innovation and investment hub in London, for example, will play a crucial role in promoting Scottish goods and services to existing and new customers and markets in London and beyond.

All information on the Board Members of Scottish Enterprise is publically available on their website and can be found here:

https://www.scottish-enterprise.com/about-us/our-leadership/board-members?usedevice=m

Details of the remuneration of each Board Member of Scottish Enterprise can be found in their most recent Annual Report and Accounts:

https://www.scottish-enterprise.com/knowledge-hub/articles/publication/annual-reports

All information on the Board Members of Highlands and Islands Enterprise is publically available on their website and can be found here:

http://www.hie.co.uk/about-hie/who-we-are/board-members/

Details of the remuneration of each Board Member of Highlands and Islands Enterprise can be found in their most recent Annual Report and Accounts:

http://www.hie.co.uk/about-hie/policies-and-publications/annual-reports.html

Data on the number of companies owned outwith Scotland that export goods or services is not held centrally.

The Scottish Government produces a National Statistics publication, Export Statistics Scotland, which estimates the nominal value of Scottish exports for calendar years. The latest data is for 2014. Estimates of Scottish international and rest of UK exports for 2011 to 2014 are shown in the following table.

Source: Export Statistics Scotland, 2014

The Office of National Statistics estimate that in 2015 there were 11,500 companies in Scotland exporting goods or services.

Scotland’s Global Connections Survey and other survey and administrative sources provide the Scottish Government with information on companies in Scotland that export goods or services. However, specific company details and any data where it may be possible to identify an individual company is not published.

Our enterprise agency Scottish Development International (SDI) is continually working with Scottish companies to help them achieve their international growth ambitions. SDI has a network of 29 global offices and over 200 professionals on hand to help facilitate business opportunities for our companies in overseas markets.

Military flights that use the airport do so on a commercial basis. Glasgow Prestwick Airport’s management team will consider all potential business opportunities, including commercial opportunities connected to military aircraft, to maximise the use of the assets of the airport.

Ryanair has provided scheduled services from Glasgow Prestwick in each year since 2011. Wizz Air also provided scheduled services in 2011, 2012 and 2013. A wide range of other airlines use the airport for training, charter flights, technical stops, diversions and emergencies. In addition, the airport has handled a range of cargo aircraft in each year including services by Cargolux and Air France.

The Scottish Government refreshes the economic strategy periodically, in light of changing economic circumstances. The latest version of Scotland’s Economic Strategy was published in March 2015. There are currently no plans to review the published strategy. However, while not planning a further Economic Strategy review at this stage, the Government will continue to monitor the developing economic situation post EU referendum, to ensure Scotland’s economic strategy is aligned to Scotland’s economic needs.

Scotland’s Economic Strategy (SES) is directed towards achieving the Scottish Government’s central Purpose of creating a more successful country, with opportunities for all of Scotland to flourish, through increasing sustainable economic growth. Progress is measured through the National Indicators and Purpose Targets contained in the National Performance Framework (NPF).

The NPF was updated in March with additional indicators added to reflect the strategic approach of the SES. These included new measures of natural capital, access to local greenspace, underemployment, gender pay differences and payment of the Living Wage. The methodology used to monitor progress towards the Productivity and Solidarity Targets was also updated, to allow for a better assessment of progress towards the productivity and inequality ambitions contained in the SES.