Regional economic policy review: paper 1 – the national perspective

7. Conclusions

7.1.1 Assessing the current context of regional economic development in Scotland has brought forward the following notable conclusions, mostly related to how better alignment may well be the key to effective improvements in delivery such that significant contributions to meeting the ambitions of NSET can be made. These conclusions will support the final recommendations.

Explicit Policy Support: Permission to be Regional

7.1.2 The acceptance of the content and recommendations of this review by Scottish Ministers will signal to regional partners an explicit and justified support for the regional scale of economic development, empowering regional partners to work and make decisions at this level. This may help unlock political barriers where working across boundaries has been viewed with some degree of scepticism, and allow officials to take forward regional work with more confidence and a stronger sense of regional identity.

Horizontal Accountability

7.1.3 By making a stronger and more explicit statement around regional structures, the overarching aim here ought to be to support a greater degree of horizontal accountability and integration between economic actors across each region. The absence of legislation for REPs is an advantage here as it lessens the requirement for traditional vertical accountability to Government, and instead permits responsibility, problem solving, responsiveness and ambition reflecting specific regional economic nuances and priorities to be shared in a collaborative manner between Scottish Government, Agencies and regional partners.

Use of Existing Structures

7.1.4 A common plea from stakeholders was that this review not result in additional structures being suggested. REPAG are entirely sympathetic to this view, and urge the Scottish Government to use the strengthening of regional identities to support engagement with existing regional governance structures such as REPs rather than creating new ones in different policy areas. This would also extend to the UK Government, who can make use of REPs as a funding recipient to realise strategic benefits.

Regional Policy Clarity

7.1.5 This review provides a clear rationale for considering the inclusion of certain policy areas in Regional Economic Strategies e.g., Just Transition, Population, Child Poverty, Digital Economy, Community Wealth Building, Transport, Land Use and Planning, Skills, High and Further Education. This clarity can empower REPs to take a holistic approach to strategic economic planning, looking at enablers and levers, constraints and barriers.

REP Memberships

7.1.6 This policy clarity will also support decisions around memberships of REPs that reflect appropriate priority policies for each region, once more giving the signal that the Scottish Government supports this holistic and collaborative engagement at a strategic level; potentially doing more with less by using the REP as a conduit, connecting local with national, and providing a strategic forum for national agencies to engage.

7.1.7 Though it is not the Scottish Government's remit to dictate membership, they could take steps to consider how to work with regional partners to ensure business, third sector and communities can engage with REPs more meaningfully. This would allow these non-public sector organisations and businesses to contribute to NSET via REPs.

Strengthening Scottish Government Placed Based Policy Making

7.1.8 Relatedly, the Scottish Government ought to replicate this policy alignment, developing placed-based regional, strategic conversation and activity across relevant policy areas, identifying shared outcomes and putting efforts behind those to bolstering the benefits, whilst refining the asks of regional partners to lessen the demands made from different parts of Government.

7.1.9 This extends to including Scotland's National Agencies, scoping out how SDS SFC and Regions might better align to support Regional Skills Strategies that compliment Regional Economic Strategies, and working with all of the Enterprise Agencies to assess where there are gaps between regional priorities and place-innovation priorities, ambitions, and research capability.

Exploring How Best to Support REPs

7.1.10 This relates to our finding that the Scottish Government ought to examine the current funding landscape across the public sector, including UK Government, using improved policy alignment to make more joined-up funding decisions, potentially using existing funding streams to support shared outcomes.

7.1.11 This analysis of funding should also examine the capacity challenges created by complex, short-term and varied funding streams, and the duplication in reporting, monitoring and evaluation efforts for regional partners. Easing the burden here may reduce at least some of the capacity challenges within regions. Additionally, a point that has been raised here, is the need to explore how analytical capacity can also be built across each region

Wellbeing Economy Metrics

7.1.12 It would be beneficial for the Scottish Government to examine how a needs-based allocation based on a variety of measures, that better reflects the nuances of different regions, might look and work with OCEA to ascertain how this might play into Scottish Government's Wellbeing Economy ambitions.

7.1.13 Given that NSET talks of a whole systems approach and collective endeavour, REPAG are keen that the Scottish Government ensure they bring everyone along with them and take an active role in ensuring regional partners make use of the new Monitor and its metrics. They may specifically wish to consider how REPs would make use of the Monitor when measuring the success of their Regional Economic Strategies, thereby making a direct link between regional endeavour and national ambition.