Tough decisions

Published on Saturday 4 July 2009 19:54

DARK clouds hang over Scotland's employment prospects and economic future, such as have not been seen since the traumatic shake-out of industry in the 1980s. Yet we should beware of drawing too close a parallel with that period: the problem then was domestic and related to traditional industries being superseded by hi-tech ones; today the crisis is global and not attributable to any failure of Scottish business to keep abreast of modernity.

The gravity of the crisis is starkly highlighted in a report commissioned by Scottish Enterprise from the independent consultancy Oxford Economics. It forecasts more than 100,000 job losses before the end of this recession and, over the next decade, 56,000 redundancies in manufacturing. The researchers believe it will be nine years before Scottish employment returns to its 2008 high of 2.7 million jobs. Last week the credibility of this grim analysis was reinforced by drinks giant Diageo's announcement of plant closures in Kilmarnock and Glasgow entailing the loss of up to 900 jobs, Lloyds Banking Group's cutting of 355 posts and BT's offer to staff of long-term holidays in return for pay cuts.

The prospect of unemployment is casting a pall over many Scottish households. State benefits may have eliminated the threat of the soup kitchen, but a 21st-century recession can mean the loss of the roof over a family's heads. Against this menacing backdrop, it is time to focus on the problem and exert every effort to ensure Scotland comes through this ordeal as relatively unscathed as determination and ingenuity can contrive. The politicians are in the front line.

That is not an entirely reassuring thought, considering the current standing of the political class. Last week's bad news on the jobs front prompted the political parties to indulge in partisan rivalry. After Alex Salmond had patently been taken by surprise by the Diageo announcement, Labour's Kilmarnock MP and former defence minister Des Browne stole a march on the SNP by accusing Alex Salmond of "snoozing on his watch" and securing a meeting in London with Diageo's chief executive Paul Walsh. Advantage Labour. Now finance secretary John Swinney is talking bullishly about saving the Kilmarnock plant. Deuce.

This is exactly the kind of game of political ping-pong the public does not want to see. Nothing is more calculated to disgust voters than the spectacle of politicians fighting over the issue of Scottish livelihoods like dogs tearing a piece of meat between them. The politicians will not be forgiven if they treat this serious economic crisis as an opportunity for point scoring. Their responsibility is to secure Scotland's long-term economic stability. If they are to attain that objective, the first requirement is complete honesty.

Last week was also the moment when it became evident that Gordon Brown's stubborn pretence that he could avoid all public-sector cuts and continue to spend prodigally was fooling nobody. Jim Sillars, on this page, blows away that fantasy with a forceful blast of economic reality. Governments in both Edinburgh and London need to adopt a similarly realistic attitude. The notion that the public sector can be quarantined totally from the consequences of recession is unsustainable. It will have to make a contribution to the nation's fight-back: resources are urgently needed for investment in green energy, biotechnology, universities, skills training – all the recalibration of our industries and workforces that will equip us to emerge from recession.

This need for honesty, despite a looming election, applies as much to the SNP as to Labour. These are not the economic circumstances in which Salmond would have hoped to serve an historic first term of SNP government; but he has no option other than to play the hand he has been dealt. That means taking tough, unpopular decisions, in a spirit of total realism; it means co-operating with all other parties and with the UK Government; above all, it means forsaking the habit of a lifetime by refraining from blaming Westminster for all our woes. It will be a character test for the First Minister and all our politicians.