A major report into the inventiveness of UK businesses has shown Scottish firms to be amongst the worst performing when it comes to innovation. Eastern Scotland which includes all of Perth and Kinross, Fife, Stirling and Clackmannanshire was ranked 43 out of 45 UK economic areas, with only Northern Ireland and Cumbria below them.
Conservative Spokesperson for Enterprise, Murdo Fraser MSP, has labelled these figures hugely concerning and has called on the Scottish Government to provide answers as to why Scottish firms aren’t innovating to the same degree as other UK companies.
The report from the Enterprise Research Centre (ERC), a partnership between five business schools at universities including Strathclyde, found the UK has a clear “arc of innovation” stretching from Cambridge through the south east Midlands, Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire. The ERC analysed data from 14,000 firms which responded to the UK Innovation Survey 2013, relating to their innovation activity over the period 2010-2012.
Commenting Mid-Scotland and Fife MSP Murdo Fraser said;
“The Scottish Government has strategies in place for encouraging innovation and entrepreneurship, these statistics would appear to suggest that they aren’t working.
“A lack of innovation is not an issue specific to geography. Whilst the south-east of England outperforms most of the UK, Wales outperforms Scotland and the Tees Valley area is ranked 7th.
“The Scottish Government must provide answers as to why the East of Scotland, which includes Perth and Kinross, Fife, Stirling and Clackmannanshire is performing so poorly when compared to the rest of Scotland and the rest of the UK.