Comment: Silver lining is still a tarnished dream for many

That is comfortably ahead of the roughly eight out of ten businesses across the UK as a whole who are not planning any job losses.

It suggests that sentiment is stronger north of the Border that 2013 will be the first stepping stone to economic recovery, even if unlikely to be a giant one.

But the bad news in the Barclays Job Creation Survey is that it could still be a largely jobless recovery for those already out of work.

Only about 50 per cent of Scottish businesses say they are creating  jobs this year, down from 64 per cent in what was hardly a vintage year in 2012.

For a downturn that began in 2008, and has included a double-dip  recession, it is depressing and highly unusual that there is not greater  job creation happening or in the pipeline by this time in the economic cycle.

A banking crash, demand-sapping public austerity programmes from the UK to the Mediterranean and youth unemployment rates of between 20 per cent (Britain) and 50 per cent (Spain, Greece, etc) – everybody  knew that any recovery was likely to be a long haul. Now it is demonstrably so.

Most of us now have become stoics. The lack of even worse news (ie further job losses) is the new good news. Just as keeping one’s job has become the new promotion.

Oil giants all getting out of downstream

Shell’s disclosure that it is weighing up the sale of some of its “downstream” businesses in Italy is unsurprising. The British/Dutch oil giant is just reflecting a trend in the energy industry in recent years of scale becoming pivotal in companies’ minerals, marketing and refining operations.

In downstream, particularly after a lengthy period where profit margins were poor, big equals competitive and gives Shell and its peers a better chance of acceptable returns.

For this reason, Shell recently sold its refineries in the UK and Germany, as well as its downstream businesses in Finland and Sweden, while establishing joint ventures in faster-growing areas such as Brazil and Africa.

It is clearly not a retreat from downstream as such, rather a restructuring in search of competitive edge. In Italy, the company is considering the sale of its retail, aviation, and supply and distribution businesses, while keeping hold of its non-service station lubricants and marine businesses.

As a strong oil price should continue to help power global oil giants’ core exploration and production businesses, expect to see more of this trend of asset sales, restructurings and joint ventures.