Scotland will fail to hit top-priority economic targets, reckon experts

Published on Tuesday 6 May 2008 22:06

THE economy was one of Alex Salmond's top priorities when he came into office, but a report has claimed that his government will fail to hit his two most important growth targets.

The study by the Centre for Public Policy for Regions (CPPR), a research centre run jointly by the universities of Glasgow and Strathclyde, has claimed the SNP government is well away from raising Scotland's economic growth rate to UK levels by 2011.

It says to meet this target, Scotland needs an extra 20 per cent growth in five years.

Added to that, it states Scotland is far from reaching the productivity levels of small independent EU countries by 2017.

But the CPPR report does say that all the other economic growth targets should be met.

The report concludes: "The picture overall is fairly positive for the government. However, this view is rather clouded by the fact that it is the government's prime targets, of higher growth and higher productivity, that are the two notable levels.

"If the improvement in population growth comes about, then this will help GDP growth but, even then, targets 1 and 2 (GDP growth and productivity] remain very ambitious."

Labour's shadow finance secretary Iain Gray said: "This report should make very worrying reading not just for John Swinney but for all of us. Without increasing growth and productivity, Scotland will be left behind. Alex Salmond talks big on economic growth but the SNP are not investing in the skills, infrastructure or research which would actually drive that growth."

However, the Scottish Government said that the report should be taken positively.

"The most recent GDP figures indicated that the Scottish economy grew faster than the UK in the third and fourth quarters of 2007. In the face of global economic uncertainty, confidence in the Scottish economy compares favourably to the UK as a whole at the present time," a spokesman said.

CBI Scotland has also been supportive of the SNP economic policy and growth targets.