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Publication - Advice and guidance

Subsidy control: guidance

Last updated
3 September 2024 - see all updates
Directorate
Economic Development Directorate
Topic
Public sector

Guidance to help public sector bodies to understand and comply with subsidy control.

Supporting documents

Services of public economic interest

The Act contains provisions for public authorities to provide subsidies for services of public economic interest (SPEI). These are essential services provided to the public and may include, for example, postal services, social housing, and certain transport networks, particularly in rural or less populated areas of the country. Without these subsidies, these services would not be supplied in an appropriate way or may not be supplied at all by the market.

To designate a service as an SPEI, the public authority must be satisfied that:

  • the service is provided for the benefit of the public
  • the service would not be provided, or would not be provided on the terms required, by an enterprise under normal market conditions

For further detail on SPEI and how this provision can be used, please refer to Chapter 6 of the Subsidy Control Statutory Guidance.

Contact

subsidycontrol@gov.scot

First published
22 September 2022
Last updated
3 September 2024 - show all updates

  1. Updated transparency reporting template, notification of scheme template and MFA and SPEIA transparency reporting spreadsheet.

  2. Text updates throughout, added new pages 'subsidy schemes' and 'challenging subsidy decisions', updated transparency reporting template, notification of scheme template and added scheme document template.

  3. Updated 'Overview', 'Minimal Financial Subsidies' and 'The Subsidy Control Act'.

  4. Updated 'Subsidy control - guidance: transparency reporting template' and 'Subsidy control - guidance: MFA and EPEIA transparency reporting spreadsheet'.

  5. Updated all pages and all supporting documents to reflect the new Subsidy Control Regime going live.

  6. Updated Subsidy Control Act to reflect the new permanent UK Subsidy Control regime, which will commence 4 January 2023.

  7. Updated Determining if a subsidy and Transparency requirements. Removed Transparency reporting guidance.

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