Meeting of the Parliament 25 January 2024
The member raises an issue that is very topical and pertinent to the debate. Of course, at the moment, there is a huge amount of activity in Scotland, with lots of signs of progress in relation to that challenge. I will refer again to some of the progress that is now evident, because we want sticky jobs that stay in Scotland, which is particularly the case with tech jobs. In this country, we want not only to invent things but get the jobs and economic benefits from those inventions. I honestly think that there are signs of that now changing in this country.
Our national strategy for economic transformation and the recent innovation strategy set out a very clear model to build on that, by forging partnerships between Government, academia and industry to build an entrepreneurial, innovative and successful technology nation. Together, we have invested in an infrastructure that nurtures talent and provides opportunities to apply the technologies of tomorrow to the challenges of today. The National Manufacturing Institute Scotland, the medicines manufacturing innovation centre, the national robotarium and the Aberdeen BioHub are just a small sample of the new infrastructure that has opened, and those four examples have opened just in the past two years. The Scottish public contribution totalled more than £100 million for those projects. Since 2013, we have invested more than £155 million in innovation centres, and a further investment of up to £8 million per year was announced last week.