Chamber and committees

I travelled to Canada from the third to the seventh of June 2019, covering two cities, Montreal and Halifax. The trip provided an opportunity to showcase Scotland as an outward-facing, European nation, committed to building upon its already strong relationship with Canada.

This relationship is one of irrefutable importance, reinforced by the enduring cultural and personal links between our citizens. Our economic ties are vital, with Scottish exports to Canada worth £580 million in 2017, and Canadian owned businesses employing almost 6,000 people here in Scotland.

Scotland’s eagerness to further develop economic, political and cultural connections was pressed throughout the trip. The programme underscored key areas of the Scottish Government’s priorities, including emphasising Scotland’s position at the forefront of climate action and sustainable mobility.

In Montreal, I attended the Michelin “MovinOn” 2019 Summit following an invitation from Michelin CEO Florent Menegaux to provide a keynote speech at the conference. “MovinOn” is the leading international sustainable mobility event, and attendance provided a unique opportunity to join a global community of leaders in this sector. I articulated Scotland’s position at the forefront of the mobility revolution through schemes such as the Michelin-Scotland Alliance.

This Alliance centres on plans for a Michelin-Scotland Innovation Parc on the former site of the Michelin Dundee plant, due to cease tyre production in June 2020. The vision for the Parc is to act as a leading global destination for innovation and investment in Sustainable Mobility and Low Carbon energy; attracting companies, research institutions and a highly skilled workforce.

The project goals aligned with the aims of this year’s conference which focused on air quality and decarbonisation, multimodality and new technologies. Participation in the summit provided an opportunity not only to showcase plans for the Parc, but to announce the joint venture between Michelin and Scottish partners (Scottish Enterprise and Dundee City Council) to an international audience.

My speech at the summit highlighted how climate and technological change are driving a revolution in sustainable mobility; a revolution which Scotland aims to lead. Emphasised was Scotland’s position as a leader in the UK’s move to achieve net zero emissions, and its intensive efforts to work with industry and local government to deliver the infrastructure required to achieve this goal. Schemes such as the Low Carbon Transport Innovation Fund and the MSIP were cited as exemplifying this commitment.

Following the summit, I met with the CEO and Executive Vice President of Michelin to strengthen relations with the company at the most senior level and re-affirm Scotland and Michelin’s commitment to making the MSIP a success and also met with an existing investor in Scotland, CGI, to explore opportunities for further partnership and investment.

There was also an opportunity to meet with the Nova Scotian Cabinet Minister for Business Geoff MacLellan to discuss areas for collaboration such as energy, social enterprise and tourism. I was able to highlight the recent expansion of the Scottish Government’s presence in Canada and Scotland’s eagerness to take forward a range of issues with Nova Scotia in the coming months around the World Energy Cities Partnership and Social Enterprise World Forum.

Meetings were also held with potential inward investors to the MSIP and Scotland. In Montreal, I met with GHGSat, whose vision is to become a leader in the remote sensing of greenhouse gas emissions from industrial sites. I also met with the Executive Director of the NewCities Foundation to explore opportunities for future collaboration around the theme of smart cities, connected living and climate change. Similarly, a meeting with the Chamber of Commerce of Metropolitan Montréal and Propulsion Québec, was a chance to explore the possibility of Canadian based companies supporting the development of the MSIP.

I also attended a dinner reception hosted by the St Andrew’s Society of Montreal, where I gave a speech celebrating Scotland’s enduring links with Canada and the Canadian diaspora, and highlighted the ‘Scotland is Now’ campaign, which showcases Scotland as one of the best places in the world to live, visit, study and do business.

The trip also provided the opportunity to deepen collaboration and cooperation between Scotland and Nova Scotia. On the final morning travelled to Halifax where I was able to follow up on potential trade and collaborative economic opportunities developed by the Scottish Government and Scottish Development International team in Canada. At a meeting with the Nova Scotian Provincial Minister for Energy and Mining, Derek Mombourquette, I reemphasised the importance Scotland places on the relationship with Nova Scotia, and the desire to work more closely across key policy areas such as renewables. I highlighted that 2020 is set to be Scotland’s ‘Year of Coasts and Waters’, and with sustainable tourism one area where Nova Scotia and Scotland share strong synergies, the opportunity for collaboration is something the Scottish Government would be keen to explore.

I also promoted the possibility of partnerships during the Year of Coasts and Waters with visits to Irving Shipyard and the Centre for Ocean Ventures and Entrepreneurship (COVE). At Irving Shipyard, meetings centred on the important contribution shipbuilding makes to both the Scottish and Canadian economies. I highlighted the Scottish Government’s commitment to seeing this industry prosper, and discussed how a transference of knowledge and skills between Irving and Scotland could help secure this objective in both countries.

Meetings with COVE and officials from Marine Renewables Canada covered how Nova Scotia is responding to the value of the ‘blue’ economy through a ‘super cluster’ approach. Here companies are drawn together from a range of sectors to transform Canada’s ocean enterprises into a technology-driven and digitally-powered knowledge economy. I was keen to understand this integrated, strategic approach and how it could be replicated as a means of optimizing Scotland’s ‘ocean economy’. Also discussed was the world-class renewable companies based in Scotland and the ambition to open trade opportunities with businesses on the North American Seaboard, and the support which COVE/MRC could offer to help facilitate this.

The trip concluded in Halifax with a gala dinner to close the annual H20 conference. The conference brings together ocean industries across areas such as energy, marine observation, tourism, technology, fisheries and defence. I was able to conclude his visit by articulating Scotland’s strengths in areas such as offshore energy, aquaculture and research with key industry influencers.

Since the launch of the Waiting Times Improvement Plan funding has been made available to all territorial Health Boards and the Golden Jubilee in 2018/19 and 2019/20.

The tables below shows the additional funding allocated to each Health Board to improve waiting times across a range of services including cancer and diagnostics.

Table 1

The Scottish Government has published the Independent Advisory Group’s report on NHS Tayside Breast Cancer today. It is available on the Scottish Government’s website at http://www.gov.scot/ISBN/9781839600791 .

That report makes 19 recommendations which we intend to accept and implement.

The following table presents our current illustrative estimates of the number of children and families eligible for the Scottish Child Payment by local authority area, when the policy is fully rolled out to include all children in eligible families aged under 16.

As set out in the Fair Work Action Plan we are taking a phased approach to the implementation of Fair Work First.

As part of the initial implementation stage, starting from April 2019, Scottish Enterprise is attaching Fair Work criteria to a range of business support grants through Regional Selective Assistance and other job related grants. Grant recipients are being asked to demonstrate payment of the real Living Wage, no exploitative zero hour contracts and action to address the gender pay gap. Relevant grants are those over £100,000 which support Research and Development; Environmental Aid; Training Aid; Aid for Start-Ups and Aid for Disadvantaged and Disabled Workers. Ministers will be meeting with Scottish Enterprise in the Autumn to take stock of how they are taking forward this Programme for Government commitment and their plans for what more they might do.

Building on the Statutory Guidance for Addressing Fair Work Practices in Procurement (published in 2015), Fair Work First criteria has been included in the procurement process for a £400 million public sector facilities management contract. Bidders are being asked to demonstrate how they will adopt Fair Work practices for all workers engaged on the contract, over its 7-year duration.

The Enterprise and Skills Agencies are adopting Fair Work First in their organisation, as set out in sponsorship arrangements through Ministerial strategic guidance for 2019-20. Ministers will shortly be writing to the Chief Executives of all public bodies setting out the Scottish Government’s expectation for them to adopt the terms of the Scottish Government’s Fair Work Agreement with the Civil Service Trade Unions and to attach Fair Work criteria to appropriate grants and funding streams.

Grants issuing through the Fair Work budget for 2019-20 include Fair Work First criteria.

We will publish an implementation plan for Fair Work First in late August setting out the further steps we will take to ensure that, by the end of this Parliament, and wherever it is appropriate to do so, we:

• extend Fair Work criteria to as many other grants, funding streams and business support budgets open to us, and
• extend the range of Scottish Government and public sector contracts that Fair Work criteria will apply to.

The review of the Scottish Business Pledge has been completed. The refreshed Business Pledge will align more closely with the fair work framework and will include environmental impact as an element of the Pledge for the first time. We are working to implement the key changes over the summer, with a view to launching the refreshed Scottish Business Pledge in the autumn.

Following the announcement on 5 November 2018 that Michelin plans to close its Dundee plant by June 2020, with the loss of over 800 jobs, the Scottish Government established the Michelin Dundee Action Group to bring together a range of national and local public and private sector players and the trade unions to secure the best possible future for the site and its workforce. At its 5th meeting on 30 May 2019 the Action Group considered progress in supporting the workforce in to new employment opportunities including workforce engagement with the support service, most of which is being funded by Michelin with support from SDS and PACE. It also considered the work that Scottish Enterprise, Dundee City Council and Michelin have been doing, along with the Scottish Government and Transport Scotland, to create a globally recognised Innovation Parc, the Michelin Scotland Innovation Parc (MSIP), focussed on sustainable mobility and low carbon energy. This includes the development of a masterplan for the site and the announcement of a formal joint venture company, MSIP Ltd, between Scottish Enterprise, Dundee City Council and Michelin to deliver the Parc.

At the invite of Michelin, I will be attending the Movin’On on summit in Montreal from 4 to 6 June where I will be promoting Scotland’s approach to sustainable mobility and our strong partnership with Michelin to create the MSIP and meeting with a range of potential investors in the Parc and Scotland’s wider economy.

Over this parliamentary period, the Scottish Government has allocated Affordable Housing Supply Programme funding of over £75m to the City of Dundee to meet their strategic housing priorities and over the first two years of this parliament, 216 new affordable homes were completed. Scottish Government funding will continue to support both Housing Associations and Dundee City Council’s new build programme to deliver a range of housing in a mix of affordable tenures, but primarily focusing on social rented housing.

With regards to point (a): Dundee is a digitally creative city with a global reputation as a highly successful games cluster, with emerging expertise in life sciences and biotech. The Scottish Government is supporting Dundee businesses to enhance Dundee’s reputation as a leading technology hub by ensuring robust and effective infrastructure is in place; creating conducive economic conditions; and offering business and financial support to help our businesses to thrive.

We are investing in physical and digital infrastructure in Dundee via the Digital Scotland Superfast Broadband programme backed with an investment of £600 million and via the Tay Cities Region Deal backed with £150 million investment. The Scottish Government Economic Action Plan sets out the actions we are taking to support all firms, anywhere in Scotland, via a supportive business environment with competitive tax and business rates and dedicated and specialist provision from our enterprise and skills agencies, alongside the more general business support tailored to local economic conditions delivered via Business Gateway.

The Scottish Government has also funded a number of specific support programmes to increase the number of digitally skilled individuals and businesses across Scotland delivered via the Agencies, Business Gateway and other public/private partners. For example, over £23m has been invested over the past 5 years in programmes such as CodeClan for specialist skills needs and DigitalBoost delivered via Business Gateway, to help tackle immediate and longer-term digital skills gaps across the economy and to support our longer-term growth ambitions. Additional initiatives such as the Flexible Workforce Development Fund and the Digital Development Fund have been created to help companies to fund the digital skills investments they need to grow.

Dundee is perhaps best known for Video Games expertise. In June, Minister for Trade, Investment and Innovation, Ivan McKee MSP will launch a new multi-million-pound “Innovation for Games and Media Enterprise” (InGAME) project, which will establish a dedicated research and development centre for the Dundee video games cluster. The project is led by Abertay University, in partnership with the University of Dundee and the University of St Andrews and benefits from significant funding from the Arts and Humanities Research Council’s Creative Industries Clusters programme and the Scottish Funding Council. The project is expected to further grow and energise the Dundee cluster.

With regards to point (b): The most recent figures (2017-18)for Scottish Enterprise support in Dundee is as follows: Scottish Enterprise account manages 71 companies in Dundee, providing one-on-one support for these companies. 17 of these companies are in the growth pipeline and 1 in prospecting. SE also assisted 61 companies to internationalise, delivered 43 Innovation Support Grants to a value of £650,30. Awarded 1 R&D grant to the value of £2,745,58. Awarded 1 SIB investment to the value of £65,034. Delivered 16 Manufacturing reviews and supported 2 projects through the Scottish Manufacturing Advisory Service (SMAS) and awarded 1 RSA grant to the value of £250,000 to support the creation of 4 new jobs and safeguarding 57 (to Discovery Flexibility Limited)

There were 4 inward investment opportunities, resulting in 257 new jobs and 455 jobs safeguarded, of which 132 were High Value Added (i.e. paying over the defined threshold of £38,682).

Support for the fashion and textiles industry in Scotland is provided by Scottish Enterprise, Highlands and Islands Enterprise and Creative Scotland and is, therefore, an operational matter for those agencies. I have asked their Chief Executives to respond to you directly.