Giving evidence at Lord Brailsford’s Scottish Covid-19 Inquiry earlier this week, FSB highlighted how a shortage of reliable local economic data and difficulties in turning high level Ministerial announcements into practical actions in real businesses hampered efforts to mitigate the economic impact of Covid.
“It was incredibly difficult to come up with public policy solutions that would work around the number of complicated lifestyles that many people running businesses have,” the business group’s witness statement read. “Arguably, that is why there were nearly 180 grant schemes.”
Speaking after the session, Colin Borland, FSB’s Director of Devolved Nations, who was one of three FSB witnesses giving evidence, said:
“This was a heartbreaking period for many small businesses in Scotland – 20,000 of whom didn’t make it out the other side. That’s not just an economic tragedy, it’s a personal one. For so many small business owners, your business isn’t just a job. Your life savings, your family home, your pension and more might all be tied up in an enterprise you’ve spent decades building. Business owners are also acutely aware of their responsibilities to their employees, customers and wider communities, so were determined to stay afloat.
“What we saw, though, were some long-standing issues with the mechanics of government in Scotland being becoming painfully apparent – and that’s what we hope we can learn from.”
Explaining how firms struggled under rapidly changing lockdown rules, due in part to the way changes were communicated, FSB’s Regional Development Manager, David Groundwater, cited the example of the Aberdeen local lockdown in August 2020:
“The communication of the extension for the local lockdown restrictions was often slow and inaccurate, which caused confusion for businesses and residents. Even once announcements had been made in the Scottish Parliament or at the First Minister’s daily briefings, it sometimes took approximately six hours for the updates to be made available across the Scottish Government and local authority platforms.
“Many businesses felt that a longer timetable with indicative dates for re-opening would have been more appropriate and allow better planning to make arrangements for re-opening.”
FSB also noted instances where there appeared to be a lack of communication between the Scottish Government and local authorities, with FSB pointing out support available that councils did not know about. FSB were told that in some cases grant letters were issued to local authority staff who had left their post, meaning funding was not distributed for a period by that local authority.
