Chamber and committees

I turn our attention to what all the witnesses, rightly, said in their submissions, which is that the pandemic has had a disproportionate effect and placed a disproportionate burden on many people who are on a low income. John Dickie, you gave an answer to John Mason, in which you mentioned employment opportunities. One of the things that holds many people back is a lack of access to digital skills and, therefore, to good work. What should the priority be in how we reduce inequality by enabling people to access those digital skills that will be crucial to the economy?

On that theme, do you feel that there is a need to ensure greater cohesion between the UK and Scottish Governments regarding the timing of the finance bills and information budgets in particular? One concern that has been put to us is that it is difficult for either the Scottish Government or the UK Government to plan ahead, because the timescales are apart. As such, there are lots of unknown variables, which matter to Government and economic advisers. Would part of the problem dissipate if we had better cohesion over timescales?

Thank you, that was helpful.

There have been a lot of interesting articles and debates recently about the play between inflation and economic growth, following one of the interesting comments that the governor of the Bank of England made a couple of weeks ago. In your overview of the Scottish economy, are there areas that you think have good potential for relatively quick economic growth? In terms of tax revenue coming in, what areas could be helpful for the Scottish economy and Scottish budget?

However, are there things that would perhaps reduce uncertainty and help you to plan ahead with regard to forecasting?

Notwithstanding the better news that you published last week, when you said that you felt that the scarring to the economy was not as bad as had originally been anticipated, you also said that there are significant risks ahead. You have said that that is partly due to the difficulty in predicting future consumer and business behaviour. All of that is tied to the significant pressures on the budget. Public spending and public sector debt are rising, and tax receipts are likely to fall because some businesses are failing.

It is not your job to hint at Government policy, but can you tell the committee where you see the most significant future risks to the economy?

With all the additional forecasting that now goes on and the improvement in the use of the data, do you, as statisticians who predict the future by using that data, think that economic forecasting is getting more accurate? [Laughter.]

I will put it in another way. If there have been improvements in the data over time, that implies that your job has become slightly easier—it is not perfect by any means, but it has become slightly easier. What you produce for the Government is therefore more accurate than it used to be, even though there are complexities. Is that fair to say?

A not-too-distant date on the horizon is 1 October, which the Government is identifying for publication of the outturn report for the fiscal framework, which will lead on to the revision of the fiscal framework and the agreement. Are there things that you would like to see within the fiscal framework parameters that would make forecasting a bit easier?

Yes—it is interesting that you say that, because it is contrary to some of the reports that we were getting. As Cabinet Secretary for Finance and the Economy, do you feel that there is a strong commitment from the Scottish Government that the announced infrastructure projects will go ahead? Business and industry consider those commitments extremely important, particularly with regard to connectivity and accessibility.

As you know, we have had a huge fuss—nothing to do with the Scottish Government—about ScotRail’s commitments to changing services, and people are anxious about the lack of connectivity and increased journey times. The projects to which the SNP had committed were trying to address some of those connectivity issues. Can you give a commitment that those projects will go ahead? They are obviously extremely important to Scotland.