Economic Development (Falkirk)

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship this afternoon, Mr. Chope. I am sure that you have an extensive knowledge of the economic situation in Falkirk, and that it has been added to by the contribution of my hon. Friend the Member for Falkirk (Mr. Joyce). It is of course an entirely legitimate and expected role of Members of Parliament to act as advocates and ambassadors for their constituencies in Westminster and Whitehall, but there are few more active advocates for their constituencies than my hon. Friend. He never misses an opportunity to promote his constituency as a good place to live, work and do business. It is to his credit that this is the second debate that he has managed to secure in a few months on economic development in the town of Falkirk and the wider region of central Scotland, and that he has been tireless in advocating the needs of his constituency in that regard. My hon. Friend asked specifically about how the UK Government's enterprise strategy will be taken forward in Scotland, about the effect of the changes that the Scottish Executive might make to the enterprise network, and about how those factors interact. He was right to say that it is impossible, in the 21st century, to isolate a nation, let alone a region or town, in terms of economic strategy. These matters are interconnected and that is evidenced by the fact that there are Government Departments in both Westminster and Edinburgh with the word ““enterprise”” in their titles. It is not possible to say that enterprise is either reserved or devolved; it is closely interdependent with other factors. Decisions that we take here, as a Government, on the macro-economic framework and the taxation regime, and in relation to European regulations and the wider fiscal framework within which business operates, must have an impact on local economic development in Scotland. It is false and simplistic to say that matters relating to enterprise and economic development in Scotland are devolved. That is not the case and my hon. Friend is right to highlight those factors today. I shall address the two issues that he discussed in a moment. My hon. Friend was right to locate his comments about how the economy in Falkirk is doing within the wider picture of how the Scottish economy is doing. Recent Scottish gross domestic product figures confirm that the Scottish economy continues to grow at above-trend rates. Since the beginning of 1999, there have been 20 quarters of greater-than-trend growth, which shows that Scotland, like the UK as a whole, is performing consistently well. In contrast, over the same period, progress in some of the major eurozone countries has been constrained by sluggish growth and high unemployment, the American economy has experienced well-documented difficulties and many economies in south-east Asia have been in crisis. So, at a time of international economic uncertainty and rapidly fluctuating commodity prices, Scotland continues to perform well, and more and more people are finding work in a growing economy. This year, there have been record levels of engagement with the labour market and historically low unemployment. Moreover, there have been record highs in the number of people available to take up employment. Those things have not happened by accident. The Government have pursued policies that combine active labour market stimulation with flexible labour market policies, which allow employers to create jobs and people to take those jobs, and which make that choice pay by ensuring that people are better off in work than they would be on benefits. Programmes such as the new deal have helped to provide more than 280,000 additional jobs in Scotland compared with 1997. The new jobs being created in Scotland since 1997 are overwhelmingly in the private sector. We do not apologise for creating more nurses, doctors, police and community support officers, but it is a myth about the Scottish economy that the growth and employment is located entirely in the public sector. That is not the case. As my hon. Friend discussed, the companies that are expanding and doing well in his constituency are typical of private sector companies throughout Scotland that have been expanding and taking on more workers. As he pointed out in his opening remarks, the Scottish employment rate is 76.5 per cent.—that is higher than the UK equivalent and has been for the past three years. The proportion of those who are economically active, meanwhile, outperforms the UK figure, and the Scottish unemployment figure is lower. Those figures would have been inconceivable 10 or 15 years ago, when my hon. Friend and I were growing up in politics and became used to Scotland lagging behind the UK even in a time of high unemployment. Constituencies such as Falkirk and Inverclyde used to be at the back of a long tail of constituencies with dreadful unemployment figures. Unemployment now stands at 5.4 per cent., whereas the figure across the EU is 7.1 per cent. Behind those figures are people and families who can now aspire to better things for their children, enjoy more holidays and look forward to Christmas in a way that simply would not be possible were we still in the high-unemployment economy that existed when unemployment was regarded as a price worth paying. My hon. Friend mentioned many companies in his constituency and the people who are creating jobs and driving economic growth. He mentioned in particular Malcolm Allan the butchers, which is a great example of a small, local company with an entrepreneurial spirit seeing an opening in the market and moving it forward. I would like to share with him an example from my constituency that highlights what is going on in Scotland beyond Falkirk. Port Glasgow, in my constituency, has a huge new Tesco store, which is very welcome and has created many new jobs but has put pressure on the traditional town centre. What is going to happen to the traditional small shops and businesses that employ small numbers of people and have been the backbone of the local economy for many years? My hon. Friend talked about the local butcher in his constituency making a difference; our active Port Glasgow town centre traders association is headed by the local butcher, Drew Mackenzie, who is an excellent businessman and has real entrepreneurial spirit and a passion for Port Glasgow. He is helping to drive forward an agenda that will see the town centre flourish alongside Tesco; it does not have to wither and die.