Diverting attention from the real issues

Published on Monday 2 September 2002 01:00

APOLOGIES are rare in politics, but yesterday the Lib Dem rural development minister, Ross Finnie, said sorry.

Mr Jones blames two things: the Executive for high business rates and poor performance. And an introverted Scottish culture. He is right on the former but out of touch on the latter. There is precious little evidence that investment is failing in Scotland because of negative Scottish attitudes per se. In fact, more to the point, business investment is collapsing across the UK as a whole, implying much deeper causes. The latest figures show that, for the second quarter of this year, UK manufacturing investment was 18 per cent down on a year earlier and overall business investment (including services) was 8.3 per cent lower. Investment in the UK is falling faster than it normally does in a British recession, so Mr Jones should be calling on Downing Street rather than berating the Scots. For it is Treasury red tape and Gordon Brown’s tax rises that are really helping destroy investment. And if the head of the CBI really thought anti-Englishness was an issue, he too might have taken the diplomatic route and discussed it sotto voce rather than giving it a prominence it does not merit.

That said, Mr Finnie still deserves to be in the political doghouse. This is the second time in recent weeks that he has provoked controversy. Last month, his response to the discovery of the cryptosporidium parasite in Glasgow’s and Edinburgh’s water supply was less than surefooted. First, a public warning was delayed too long. Then, in the Edinburgh case, a warning against drinking unboiled tap water was issued and immediately rescinded. Throughout the affair, Mr Finnie’s attitude was that he knew best and did not need to explain to the public.

This is all in marked contrast to Mr Finnie’s measured performance during the foot-and-mouth epidemic, when he retained the confidence of farmers and public by proper consultation and a refusal to be panicked. Unfortunately, this good publicity seems to have gone to his head. Equally, the Labour end of the coalition seems increasingly happy to let the Lib Dems become the fall guys. The tough remarks of the CBI head should have been met with an equally trenchant response from the First Minister himself, or from the enterprise minister, Iain Gray, rather than from Mr Finnie. Or did they feel his criticism of the Executive’s handling of the economy was too close for comfort?