New Deal for Business Group - Report on Progress & Recommendations: Implementation Plan

Annex B - Sub-Group 2 – Business Partnership

Overview

The Business Partnership sub-group objective was to develop a shared agreement and commitment on how Scottish Government will not just communicate, but also work in partnership with business on policy development from the earliest stages to ensure that the cumulative impact of policy on businesses is fully understood and that policy implementation is effective and proportionate.

It will also have a strategic role to play in designing the next phase of implementation for the NDBG workstreams, ensuring recommendations arising from all sub-groups which involve the systems and processes of the Scottish Government are delivered in a consistent and efficient way and that the right people are involved to maximise impact.

Recommendations

The sub-group presented 15 recommendations – two immediate to pull together a timeline for implementation of all 78 recommendations which is included in this report and a review of the membership and terms of reference for the NDBG. A further 7 are short-term (6 months) recommendations, 4 are medium-term (12 months) and 2 are for longer-term (18 months) implementation.

How we will report on progress

Two key recommendations are to establish benchmark metrics, firstly, to gauge the views of business on how SG engages/builds relationships with them and secondly, Scottish Government capability to undertake strong and meaningful engagement with business. Once these metrics are established, we will update via survey to keep a track on performance.