Glasgow Chamber Of Commerce

Last week we hosted an evening at the Hilton to explore the impact of the Curriculum for Excellence with the Cabinet Secretary for Education Mike Russell MSP.  

First of all I should say thanks to Hilton manager Daniel van Wyk for hosting us in the 19^th floor Skylounge, which gives you amazing views over the west of the city to go alongside an excellent meal.

The Cabinet Secretary is on a mission to explain. The first cohort of pupils to have been through at least some of their schooling under the Curriculum for Excellence (CfE) are due to begin entering university, college or a job later this year. 

We are told as employers that we should expect to have a very different experience in our first meetings with our new young talent. Mr Russell is very keen that we should know more and that we should be ready in advance.

I remember earlier in the year consulting, alongside Stewart Farmer at the Federation of Small Business, a group of businesspeople running their own operations in Glasgow and who would describe themselves as members of the SME community. 

We had asked what the most challenging issues were in running your own business in the current conditions. The answer was illuminating.

Yes, generating custom is tough right now - but if you have a good, well run business there are still plenty of opportunities. And yes there are always issues about dealing with large organisations, whether it happens to be complex procurement processes or slow bill payments. 

But the issue that was the most strongly expressed was the difficulty a smaller business has in finding good young recruits. There was no shortage of scare stories; no shows at interview, unreasonable expectations of work content or the pervasive culture of smart phone usage on the job.  Generally there was disappointment at the work readiness of too many young people.

The Cabinet Secretary appreciates the challenge.  Just recently Skills Development Scotland launched a new service called the Certificate of Work Readiness offering support to employers and to new young employees involving 10 weeks of training, a minimum of 190 hours of work experience and a recognised qualification for the trainee.

But the more fundamental change is expected to come from the Curriculum for Excellence. It's been operating only since 2010, so pupils leaving school this year will obviously not have had the full impact - but Mr Russell was confident we would notice the difference. 

He highlighted the response from the University of Glasgow explaining how they would handle CfE through revised admissions policy as an excellent example of a reaction to what is coming. 

It was clear though that the understanding of the impact amongst the business community was patchy to say the least.  However some are trying to help that understanding.

Tricia Rainey, chair of the Glasgow Employer Board, offered to make the work of its Youth Employment Advisory Group available to the Scottish Government - an offer that was warmly accepted. And we at the Chamber are already working with Glasgow City Council to explore how we increase the depth and quality of relationships which schools have with individual businesses. 

In the meantime though you have an opportunity to hear direct from the Cabinet Secretary just what CfE involves. We are holding a meeting with him, free to all members, on June 6. Please look out for the details shortly.

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The Glasgow Economic Commission reported in the summer of 2011, and a great deal has been achieved in delivering against the recommendations it made.

I recently attended a meeting of private and public partners in Glasgow with University of Strathclyde principal Professor Sir Jim McDonald in his role as chair of the Glasgow Economic Leadership Group - to hear how he thought Glasgow was responding to the Commission's proposals.

It's encouraging to report that, on the whole, it looks as if we're heading in the right direction, with outcomes relative to the various Commission recommendations as follows:

1)     The city formed the Glasgow Economic Leadership Group under the chairmanship of Jim McDonald, and it has been meeting every quarter to provide supportive but challenging advice, as effectively a senior advisory group to the city, guiding and championing investment in Glasgow's economic base.

2)     Under the guidance of the Leadership Group, action plans have been developed by the six industry sectors identified in the Commission's report as those with the most promising potential for Glasgow. These are the sectors where we have the best assets and where global market growth is strong and where it would be sensible for us to invest public and private resources to help the city grow. These are low carbon industries, engineering, life sciences, tourism, financial and business services and higher and further education.

3)     Under these action plans a number of valuable investments have been announced and are under development:

• In low carbon industries, investment by the UK Government's Technology Strategy Board (TSB) in the UK HQ of Offshore Renewables Energy, the £50m Catapult Centre within the International Technology and Renewable Energy Zone ( ITREZ). This is helping to reinforce Glasgow as a low carbon industries hub - recognised last year by The Economist. Progress is also being made on the University of Strathclyde Technology and Innovation Centre (TIC), and relationships are being forged with the Edinburgh-based Green Investment Bank. Finally, we have the recent success in fighting off 30 other cities to win the TSB's £24m UK Future Cities Demonstrator Project.
• In engineering, there have been successes in securing investment from the Scottish Government - including the £30m innovation centre in sensors and sensor systems, which involves a combination of the Universities of Glasgow and Strathclyde. We also have the proposal between the colleges and the University of Strathclyde to form an Engineering Academy to increase the numbers of students coming out of universities by another 500 in response to recognised shortages in engineering skills, Equally welcome is the work of Skills Development Scotland in responding to the concerns of skills shortages in the sector with  a skills investment plan.  
• In life sciences, establishing the concept of the Glasgow Bio Corridor, from the Biocity Scotland development at Bellshill via the new South Glasgow Hospital right through to GSK at Irvine. Also the joint work of the universities, particularly led by Glasgow, and the £24m Strathclyde Stratified Medicine and Innovation Centre , which will be based at the South Glasgow Hospital.
• In financial and business services, concern over the availability of Grade A office space has been addressed with planning approval for such as Mountgrange's development at  2 West Regent Street and Abstract at St Vincent Plaza.
• All the progress towards the 2014 Commonwealth Games and its legacy outcomes, and the shortlisting recently for the 2015 Green City bid and for the 2018 Youth Olympics - upon which we'll have judgements  in the summer. 

4)     On infrastructure projects identified as important to the city, again progress has been made. We have had the Buchanan Galleries TIF approved, and work on it already underway. Work is also underway between Transport Scotland and Glasgow Airport on identifying options for surface access transport improvements, the ongoing work of SPT on the subway refurbishment and some very interesting discussions within the Council and at the Economic Leadership Group on new approaches to raising significant amounts of funding for investing in the city's infrastructure in the years ahead.

5)     The recent announcement of a branding review brought comment and potential controversy. Glasgow:  Scotland with style performed a really successful role in supporting the conference tourism work of the City Marketing Bureau, but the review is meant to ensure we have a brand and messaging that also works in inwards investment markets.

At this point it should be said that the branding review is bound to have quite a lot of sideshow arguments about how Glasgow portrays itself in the world. But from our perspective the most important thing is getting the message out to potential investors about how strong Glasgow's offer is in key sectors. It is not just about a clever slogan. It's about getting across the depth and weight of Glasgow's gravitas in a number of fields. A new brand is not a flippant thing. The evidence suggests, drawing on Cushman & Wakefield , that one of the challenges Glasgow faces in attracting investment into the city is that people simply don't know enough about us.  So we have to work hard and clever to get that message across, and that means a package of messaging.

These are early days. Good progress is already being made, as far as the Economic Leadership Group's role has become well-established, but there is still an enormous amount to do to help continue the transformation of Glasgow into a highly diverse smart city.

Please talk to us at the Chamber if you want to know more.

To view the GEL Annual Update GEP April 2013 click here.

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by Deputy Chief Executive Richard Muir

The Glasgow Chamber of Commerce is in the middle of our Engineering, Manufacturing and Design Season and so what better a place to hold a Behind the Scenes event last week than at Linn Products <http://www.linn.co.uk/> .   Linn design and make some of the best hifi systems in the world and are based just outside Glasgow in Waterfoot, East Renfrewshire.  They manufacture everything in-house and supply a complete range of exceptional hi-fi components for the home, including their industry-leading digital stream players such as the Klimax and the famous Sondek LP12 turntable.

The factory tour was a real eye opener and the thing which struck me the most was the craftsmanship and detail which goes into the components.  For instance it takes 2 full days to make the titanium tone arm for the turntable and a further 2 full days to polish the all important steel at the bottom of the bearing housing which holds the turntable in place.  The names of the workers who've assembled the systems are printed on all the finished product which is in keeping with traditional quality manufacturing methods and some clients come into the factory to meet the very individuals who have put their hifi together.

The sound quality as demonstrated in the Linn Home was incredible.  The team at Linn have produced a beautiful 1 bedroom apartment with a living room, fully functional kitchen, bedroom, bathroom and sound room and we were treated to a variety of artists being played digitally throughout the building in crystal clear quality.  The musical connoisseurs in attendance were in heaven.  In fact, the function room upstairs is regularly used for live performances which have included Tim Burgess of the Charlatans, Blue Nile and Gun and regularly feature artists from Linn Records and for client events.

The systems can vary in price from £1200 to £120,000 and some of the proud celebrity owners of Linn include Prince Charles, David Bowie, Mervyn King and Jackie Stewart.  I think all the guests on the tour would love to join this list of Linn aficionados at some point.

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At our Glasgow Talks Whisky event, Gerry O'Donnell, Public Affairs Director of the Edrington Group, called out in the words of rapper Will.i.am to the audience and asked them: "Where Is The Love?"

It's not often that the former Black Eyed Pea gets quoted at Glasgow Chamber events and indeed that may be the first and last time!

But Gerry has a point.  Do the Scottish take Scotch Whisky for granted?  Do we work hard enough to help in its promotion? Do we appreciate the extent to which it helps promote Scotland all around the world?

I wrote back in January about the success of the whisky industry and, as if to prove Gerry's point, around the same time I had to put a case against the remarkable suggestion of adding an extra tax on the industry for the water that it uses. 

We do seem to go out of our way to make it difficult for our whisky producers.

Why, as Scotch Whisky Association CEO Gavin Hewitt pointed out at the same event, does the UK government currently tax whisky at 47% more per unit of alcohol than beer? 

And why does the Scottish Government not appreciate the damage that minimum pricing would do to the work that the SWA has been carrying out to reduce trade tariffs on whisky in important markets like India or Brazil - by giving these countries an excuse for raising barriers further.

Indeed just this week Scottish Health Secretary Alex Neil latched on to some academic criticism of the evidence that the drinks industry had submitted to the consultation on minimum pricing. It was his view on Good Morning Scotland that 'some people in the drinks industry face the serious possibility of destroying their own credibility' No suggestion there that we had to consider the balance of the arguments and think carefully about the importance of our whisky industry.

Gavin Hewitt makes it very clear. 83% of the food and drink manufacturing exports from Scotland are whisky products. A quarter of all UK food and drink exports are whisky products.   Whisky exports were valued at over £4.3bn in 2012 and are now worth £135 each second to the UK balance of trade.

We have been rightly emphasising in both UK and Scottish Government economic policy the fundamental importance of growing our exports.  The most recent Index of Scotland's Manufactured Exports reminds us how difficult that is.  The fourth quarter of 2012 saw a dip of 1.4% on the previous quarter and a 2.9% reduction for the full year. But food and drink exports increased 1.5% and 0.6% respectively. The whisky industry is substantially outperforming the full index.

Douglas Crawford the FD at Morrison Bowmore underscored just how much optimism there is in future growth giving us an insight into that company's own planning assumptions for 2025, meaning that the industry is having to substantially outproduce its current demand so that it lays down, for maturation, the product it's going to need for the 12-year-old single malt you will drink in the mid-2020s.

Europe may be under pressure economically, and you can see that in the exports to Spain in particular, but markets in Asia and the Americas are currently growing well and have enormous growth potential.  The whisky industry has invested over £2billion in its production capacity in the last five years and is set to do the same again over the next two to three years.

So here is an industry that is doing everything we could want economically.  It's investing heavily at a time when corporate investment is low, it's exporting all across the world when we most need to see export growth to find a route out of our economic woes, and it's providing a reason for Scotland to be noticed when we are fighting the cause for attracting trade in other industry - most especially in overseas tourism.

Thanks to Gerry, Gavin and Douglas for helping us keep whisky at the forefront of our minds here in Glasgow, the whisky capital of the world.

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We're now getting acclimatised to there being a flurry of activity every so often around a particular topic on the constitutional question, and this week's was the fundamentally important matter of Scotland's future currency.

The Chamber was invited to attend the launch in Glasgow of the Treasury document Scotland Analysis: Currency and Monetary Policy - on the currency options available in the event of a Yes vote for independence.

At the same time as the UK Government's launch in the Trades Hall, and I should say that it's always good to see that historic place being used for significant events, the Scottish Government put out its currency choices for an independent Scotland in response to its fiscal commission working group.

So we are beginning to see some active engagement around one or two of the most important questions that we face when it comes to making the big decision on September 18 2014.

If the intensity of the debate around the currency issue is anything to go by, it does now seem that the constitutional issue is moving beyond the foothills. There is a lot more to come, and if you are minded to follow the debate closely, you are going to find out a lot about fairly obscure aspects of constitutional, financial, economic and monetary policy than you ever knew before.

With that in mind, Glasgow Chamber of Commerce has taken a decision to establish a Constitution Committee, tasked with examining the issues as they affect business in Glasgow. The Constitution Committee will submit reports to the Council of Directors advising on the position the Chamber might wish to adopt.

We will take our time to examine the issues, and we will ask our membership their views. We will engage with the two sides in the campaign - Better Together and Yes Scotland.

Two sessions, one with each organisation, have already been carried out and they were used as scoping meetings to establish the territory our Constitution Committee would cover.

The Committee has now met for the first time, and has set out a programme of work to establish member views and to help identify the most important issues that will then be taken back to the two campaign teams for further discussion.

One message I specifically want to get across to members is that we're available as a Chamber to be used as an access route into the campaigns. If members have a particular issue that they feel uncomfortable with either going directly to the campaigns on, or expressing in public, then let us know and we will make the approach on your behalf and find the answer.

We appreciate that for very many members, engaging in this debate is not easy. We're being asked regularly by the politicians to be vocal, but we know there are downsides to publicly raising issues or expressing doubts against the arguments of either side.

Glasgow Chamber of Commerce is not going to make public statements on the merits of either campaign until it has carried out thoughtful assessment of the issues through the Constitution Committee.

So please let us know if you have questions to ask, issues to raise or if you want to engage with us in any way on this.

We will provide some platforms for discussion during the consultation. There will be events which are relevant, but it's never too early to make your views knows to us in whichever way you feel appropriate - via the website, email, letter or a phone call.

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