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A new report from the Scottish Parliament’s economy committee has argued that the Scottish Government should review and update its economic strategy. The committee urges Ministers to ensure that the strategy takes account of the potential economic consequences of Brexit.

Their research recommends that more action should be taken to help smaller Scottish businesses win public contracts. The committee also suggests that the Scottish Government looks at what more could be done to support in-work training and reskilling

Stuart Mackinnon, the Federation of Small Businesses’ (FSB) external affairs manager for Scotland said: “The vast majority of Scottish businesses are small or medium sized. Therefore MSPs are right to argue that their success is vital to Scotland’s national prospects. Similarly, the committee is correct to press Ministers on our economic agencies’ preparations for Brexit.

On procurement and in-work training, Stuart Mackinnon said: “MSPs have correctly identified that Scotland needs to get to grips with its in-work training problem. For example, four fifths of Scottish businesses say that digital technologies are vital to their future growth, but only one in three firms say that they’re taking action to improve existing employees’ digital technology skills.

“However it isn’t just our skills and enterprise agencies which have the capacity to give the Scottish economy a shot in the arm. FSB believes that there’s more that could be done to use the Scottish public sector’s multi-billion pound spending power to charge local economies.”