Salmond’s lion
November 13th, 2007
SCOTLAND’S first minister Alex Salmond today unveiled a new economic strategy for Scotland which is a lot more inspiring than the efforts of his predecessors, Jack McConnell and Henry McLeish. Despite their claims that they wished to prioritise economic growth, both these men seemed willing to accept mediocrity. At least Salmond is prepared to lift his sights a bit higher.
One goal of the new strategy is to reverse the “brain drain” that has blighted Scotland’s economy for decades (if not centuries) – with many of its best and brightest leaving because they thought the streets of London were paved with gold. Another objective is to raise Scotland’s growth rate to the UK level by 2011, which does not seem a hugely challenging target.
Salmond now believes, if Scots and Scottish business can only be persuaded to raise their game, a new marvel will be unleashed on the world – the “Celtic Lion”.
But will this fearsome beast have what it takes to out-roar the din created by the Celtic and Asian Tigers? If so, Salmond will be lauded as an economic maestro. Who knows, he might even be able to convince the Scots it would be in their interests to risk entering the “sunny uplands” of political independence.
It is certainly refreshing that a first minister has acknowledged that Scotland’s economic growth since the 1950s has been dissappointing. There are one or two interesting ideas in the strategy about how this might be corrected.
Unfortunately, however, turning round Scotland’s economic performance is going to be a hugely difficult task, not least because of the bloated nature of the public sector in this country. Another problem for Salmond is that the macroeconomic levers – including the ability to alter tax rates – remain outside Scottish control, as does the ability to benefit from the surging revenues from the North Sea. He is likely to seek to use these facts to his advantage in his quest for separation.
In the end, it is probable that structural issues – for example Scotland’s over-dependence on three industry sectors and the comparatively low proportion of graduates in the workforce – will also need to be addressed before growth can take off.
Unveiling the strategy in Glasgow, Salmond said: “Any conversation about Scotland’s economic performance should begin with the acknowledgement that we live in a country with enormous assets – chief among them our people. We have a history and present reality of innovation, examples of educational excellence and individuals and companies succeeding in a competitive global market. But we need to set our sights much higher than we have delivered to date.”
“My hope for Scotland is that we will be honest about where we are and ambitious about where we can go. And, perhaps, as people now talk about the wonder of the Celtic Tiger, within the next generation we can introduce the world to a new marvel – the Celtic Lion.”
Short URL: https://www.ianfraser.org/?p=320
Posted by Ian Fraser
on Nov 13 2007. Filed under Blog.
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