Meeting of the Parliament 05 June 2014
No.
I must point out that part-time courses and, indeed, older learners are not being excluded as a result of that. If people are serious about women taking their rightful place in the economy, we must ensure that women from all backgrounds can access the provision that will get them into work, self-employment or other well-paid career opportunities.
As I was saying, I had the great opportunity of meeting the female proprietors of Cranachan & Crowdie when the “Women in Enterprise” action framework was launched, and it was great to see that some of the stock and produce in the shop came from female winners of the Scottish EDGE—encouraging dynamic growth entrepreneurs—competition. At this point, I should note that 46 per cent of the Scottish EDGE winners were women.
The action framework that we launched sets out a range of actions to help and encourage more women to set up and succeed in businesses. This is a very exciting piece of work that I have been involved with and which the Scottish Government has been pleased to support right from the start. Indeed, we have supported Women’s Enterprise Scotland in leading on this important work with no less than £70,000 over two years, which has among other things helped with the development of an exciting new network of female role models and mentors.
At the event, I had the great pleasure of meeting some of those ambassadors, who hail from a range of backgrounds, business sectors and locations. The fact that they have all undertaken their own unique journey to get to where they are now makes them extremely well equipped to connect and engage with a wide audience that might range from schoolgirls to experienced female businesswomen. The key thing is to encourage more and more women to see themselves as entrepreneurs and to be ambitious in what they set out to achieve.
It is well known that women can and do face different and additional challenges and barriers, particularly when they have to balance the demands of family and caring responsibilities. In my view, that makes women potentially more equipped to be successful in the world of business, but we must make a concerted effort to bring those barriers down.
I believe that the framework in “Scotland CAN DO” and the “Women in Enterprise” framework set out a direction of travel that could help us to change radically our economic fortunes and the way our society functions. The new economy requires new ideas, not to mention ideals, and women and young people can play a very significant role not only in promoting those new ideas and ideals but in growing our economy.
Before I move the motion, I intimate that I will not support Labour’s amendment, because it misrepresents the nature and ambition of college reform and is an attempt to take the debate backward, not forward. I will, however, support the Tory amendment, because I and the spokesperson from the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities are on record as welcoming final publication of the Wood report—both of us have described the Wood report as “a landmark”—and I will be working very closely with COSLA on plans to implement it. In fact, on 17 June, I will be reporting back to Parliament on the issue in the form of a ministerial statement.
I move,
That the Parliament recognises the positive impact of entrepreneurial activity by women and young people on the Scottish economy; affirms its commitment to working with public, private and third sector partners to make Scotland a world-leading entrepreneurial nation by ensuring that all of Scotland’s people are better able to participate in entrepreneurial activity, and welcomes the work undertaken as part of Scotland CAN DO and Women in Enterprise, a framework and action plan to deliver public, private and third sector partnerships to bolster entrepreneurial activity among women and young people.
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