Hansard

Dennis Canavan and Bruce Crawford have covered many of the points that I wanted to make, so I will add just one or two.One reason why we went to Finland was to look at the research situation there. We saw that the level of spending on research in Finland is high, and that a high proportion of that investment comes from private industry. As the committee suspected when discussing the issue, Nokia provides a substantial amount of the research.I do not often thank the European Commission, but I have written to Neil Mitchison to make the point that the trip was very worth while—it was certainly an eye-opener. After our deliberations, I was left with the impression that the term high-tech Finland registered not just in the activities of the companies but in the minds of the people—the Finns see themselves as a high-tech nation that is right at the forefront and is pressing ahead. That is tremendous in a nation such as the Finns, especially when we consider that no one else in the world speaks their language but they have become world leaders, to an extent, in high technology.My next point is controversial, and I promise Bruce Crawford that I am not making it as a political point. The emphasis that the Finns put on energy and the fact that they have decided, irrespective of the controversy surrounding the issue, to press ahead with a nuclear energy programme says a lot about them and about the situation in Europe with respect to security of energy supply. One report that we picked up from the Committee for the Future outlined three scenarios for Russia in 2017. I have looked at the report, and two of the options are quite scary. We must hope like hell that the third scenario turns out to be right and that Russia moves towards the European Union—members may be surprised to hear me say that—and adopts the EU approach towards co-operation with its neighbours. I like to think that the report will be valuable in the future.Reference has been made in the Parliament to the Committee for the Future. Initially I was impressed by the committee but, when we talked to the planners at the Prime Minister's office, they seemed to have forgotten about it in their deliberations. Although the committee is a good idea, I would like to explore further whether it is as valuable as it seemed to be on first impression.At Otaniemi Marketing, we talked about the incubator companies. One must be impressed by the huge number of small companies there, but the UK ambassador pointed out to us that once the incubator companies had got through the Otaniemi experience, they were left to sink or swim. She seemed to think that it might be advantageous for us to have a quiet look at that and to consider attracting some of those companies over to Scotland to develop at the stage after incubation. That would be valuable; it would not be doing down our neighbours in Finland because they very much welcome the idea of Finnish people with expertise going abroad to spread the word on Finland and continuing their relationships with Finland at the same time as helping other countries to meet their targets on economic development and progression.