New Deal for Business Group Minutes: September 2024

Attendees and apologies

Kate Forbes, DFM & Cabinet Secretary for Economy, Co-Chair, NDBG     
Dr Poonam Malik, Co-Chair, NDBG
Colin Borland, FSB    
Barry White, NSET Delivery Board Co-chair
David Lonsdale, SRC    
Marc Crothall, Scottish Tourism Alliance
Natalie Agnew, Muckle Media    
Ewan MacDonald-Russell, SRC
Sara Thiam, Prosper    
Liz Cameron, SCC
Caroline Colliston, representing Business in the Community Scotland 
Kate Miller, representing CBI Scotland
Ben Rose, representing SFE
Joe Hind, representing Scotland Food and Drink 
Catherine McWilliam, representing IoD Scotland

Apologies

Mairi Spowage, Fraser of Allander Institute
James Fowlie, COSLA
Karen Meechan, ScotlandIS

Items and actions

Welcome, Deputy First Minister and Dr Malik opening remarks

Deputy First Minister’s Opening Remarks

• Deputy First Minister (DFM) welcomed members and gave thanks for their continued engagement, enthusiasm, and work to deliver on the actions. 
• She reflected on the 2 key announcements from the previous week; the Financial Statement and the Programme for Government (PfG) noting the difficult financial position but highlighting the importance of building and developing the economy to strengthen the fiscal situation.
• Noted the success of the new approach to developing the PfG, demonstrating commitment to the New Deal for Business (NDB) principles and signalling that going forward where decisions need to be taken, they would adhere to these principles by considering the impact on business, and in particular the cumulative impact.
• Highlighted the importance of the Green Industrial Strategy (GIS), launched the previous day, to offer clear direction in the transition to net zero and to create confidence and encouragement for investment.

Dr Poonam Malik’s Opening Remarks

• Dr Malik welcomed members and thanked DFM’s commitment to the business community, recognising the progress in the relationship that resulted in the process around the Programme for Government feeling completely different this year. 

• Dr Malik invited members to share any reflections on the new approach to the PfG and, the following themes came up:

  • The new process in the lead up to the PfG welcomed and all members were grateful that there were no surprises in the published document

  • Members grateful for the steps taken to ensure consideration of cumulative impact

  • Members expressed interest and agreed that they’d welcome a continuation of the approach to the development of the Scottish Budget and beyond

  • Accepted the challenging financial situation but noted the planned reduction in hours for civil servants

  • Welcomed the planning hub and the benefits it could bring and pleased to see Community Wealth Building mentioned in the PfG

DFM responded that the updated approach and content of the PfG is a direct consequence of working with NDB Group, valued engagement and input provided by members. She is aware of what business and sectors need and can contribute to and will continue working to try to address these. In terms of staffing costs, she confirmed that creating an efficient public service is a priority and workforce planning is underway to consider this.

Members were invited to share any further thoughts on this item via email.

New Deal for Business Progress Update (Dr Poonam Malik)

Dr Malik offered a progress update, noting the good progress on the Implementation Plan actions, with 32 of the 78 actions complete and more nearing completion in the coming months.

Refinement work had been undertaken to improve action and outcome monitoring resulting in the introduction of the Blue , Red, Amber and Green (BRAG) rating system. In line with the standard Scottish Government (SG) approach, this uses blue to identify activities which are complete.

Dr Malik offered the following updates:
Key Actions Dashboard: 

• Highlighted progress of the 10 key actions, noting that 4 are complete, 3 are on-track with the remaining 3 being marked as a concern or off-track.
• Judith Young provided background on these actions; explaining that Action 52 (mapping cross-SG engagement mapping) started late but a series of awareness raising sessions has been delivered across the SG and an analysis of the results would be complete by the end of September and will be used as a benchmark for progress. Actions 74 and 75 related to metrics sharing, and the GIS was a key part of sharing information on opportunities; the GIS publication would allow this to move forward with an anticipated delivery date of 31 October.
• 4 of the key actions have an amber risk rating due to resource constraints.

Outcomes Dashboard:

• Advised that the reporting had been updated to include the percentage of completion at the previous meeting in addition to the percentage of completion to date, allowing progress to be monitored more effectively.
• Some outcomes appeared to have progressed significantly faster since the last meeting. This appearance on progression timeline and percentage is due to an error in the calculating formula which has recently been identified and rectified.
• All outcomes on track to achieve delivery on time and progress encouraging.

12-month Milestone:

• Dr Malik advised that the end of the next month will mark 12 months since the Implementation Plan was published. Communications plan is in development to showcase the significant achievements of the Group to wider businesses, industry sectors and communities including wider memberships of the NDBG group members.

The Group’s main point on progress reporting, included:

• Members questioned the reported large increase in the delivery of Outcome 4, relating to Non-Domestic Rates. The increase noted as partly due to the calculating formula error recently rectified and partly due to progress against the actions and milestones linked to the outcome. Highlighted that the reporting was a tool to manage resources and track activity on agreed actions and that completing actions doesn’t mean that all issues relating to Non-Domestic Rates (NDR) would be solved but shows that the review, engagement, and assessment of challenges on actions identified in the Implementation Plan are progressing to lead to wider change. A member of the NDR Subgroup suggested that the tasks and objectives of the group have changed since the group was formed and suggested pausing to review the tasks to consider whether they remain realistic, noting the complexity of reforming NDR, which cannot be resolved within the timeframe of this programme.

Population Health Framework Discussion

DFM welcomed Public Health colleagues to the meeting and invited Linda Bauld, Chief Social Policy Advisor to lead a scene setting presentation ahead of the breakout discussion that highlighted:

• The forecast of increased burden of disease for Scotland and the role business can play in improving population health in Scotland.  
• Plans to introduce 3 products:
  • Population Health Framework
  • An evidence narrative on population health in Scotland, both supplemented by Series of 2-page documents relating to different areas such as NHS, Business, Local Government, to be used as system summaries setting out that part of the system’s role in population health, how it can work in partnership to drive change and deliver key actions from the framework
• 2 contributors to of the Population Health ministerial roundtable the previous week offered reflections:
  • Significant and welcome shift in the relationship between public health and business, with business now being considered during the development of policy. 
  • Noted that there would always be areas where business and government disagree but both parties can work towards solutions that minimise harm to business – whilst continuing to focus on areas of shared priorities.
  • The Framework should lead to less siloed working, with a welcome whole-of-society approach to authentic dialogue. 

Population Health breakout discussion groups explored two themes: Working together and engagement priorities

WORKING TOGETHER: how business and health can work jointly toward shared goals around population health and the economy. 

Members’ Feedback on Working Together:

• Good quality employment – important to have productive businesses, but they should offer good quality employment, avoiding in-work poverty and the stress caused by precarious employment.
• Return to office working – the shift to home working could have a negative impact on employees mental and physical health. Starting the behaviour change to bring staff back into the office would help create a sense of community again. Noted that more time in a work environment would help businesses that rely on customers.
• Supporting the young workforce – young people are looking for more interaction and need more time in the workplace to avoid social isolation.  
• In-work poverty - Businesses have a responsibility to help address in-work poverty and increase the financial well-being of their employees, helping to improve their aspirations and hope.
• Preventative support – businesses need to know where best to focus their efforts to have the biggest impact on their workforce, e.g. mental health/ musculoskeletal support.
• Regulation – the framework should reward good business practices but if it disadvantages bad businesses, that may not be a bad outcome.

ENGAGEMENT PRIORITIES: Scottish Government and business partnership on population health – how can we deliver action in partnership, including reducing economic activity due to ill health?

Members’ Feedback on Engagement Priorities: 

• Grass roots engagement – Policymakers should get out into businesses to get ideas directly from them and include business representatives in all the different working groups.
• Shared responsibility – emphasise that we all have a role to play in solving this problem, it can’t be left to government alone.
• Accessible language – most businesses are put off by wordy documents and SMEs don’t have time to read them. Create products that meet the needs of the audience.
• Support for employees returning from sick absence – encourage employers to offer a phased return to work to ease their employee’s transition back into employment.
• Sharing best practice – encourage bigger businesses to showcase their best practice and provide help to smaller businesses to implement these practices.
• More help to the older workforce – by extending the targeting of apprenticeships to people over 24.
• Positive examples – Case studies help, for example, The Social Hub in Glasgow was highlighted positively as it offers a blend between student accommodation, a hotel, a café, and bar along with small business space. It brings together different age ranges, and cultures to provide a support network within the local community.
• Single Access Point to Information/Support – Many different sources of help could lead to “information paralysis”. Could ‘Find Business Support’ website be utilised?
• Benchmarking tool – establish what employers are investing in now to boost wellbeing.  Highlighting the good practice could encourage competition between employers and increase the overall offering. 
• Consistent messaging 
• Local solutions – different areas are likely to require different solutions.

Director of Population Health, summarised discussion and requested the Group’s commitment to co-produce a ‘Population Health and Business Document’.  Members agreed to commit to this action. Secretariat to confirm the Economy policy lead to work with Public Health and members to co-produce the document.

AoB

• Judith highlighted the approach of 12 months since the publication of the Implementation Plan. Consideration is being given to how the New Deal for Business recommendation actions and overall purpose and value this Group provides for Scotland as a competitive business landscape and ‘as the place to do business with’ for government and how to transition to next phase of engagement milestones with business community in this forum after April 2025.  
• To consider the impact of the New Deal for Business, members were invited to consider government attending some business organisation members meetings to hear directly from business.
• Next Meeting is scheduled for 12 December.

Actions

1. Members with any additional reflections on the PfG to share feedback through NewDealforBusiness@gov.scot by 5 October.
2. Members to provide any additional comment/ feedback on NDBG Progress reporting by 5 October.
3. NDBG Secretariat to share slides used in the Population Health Framework presentation. 
4. Secretariat to confirm Economy and Population Health policy leads to work with members on co-development of a 2-page ‘Population Health and Business Document’ by 27 September. 
5. Members to work with Economy and Population Health policy leads to co-develop a 2-page ‘Population Health and Business Document’. Final draft to be completed by mid-October.
6. NDBG Secretariat to liaise with members to identify opportunities to attend meetings with their members to gather feedback on the New Deal for Business.
7. NDBG secretariat to consider how members can be involved in the Budget process.