Meeting of the Parliament 10 February 2026 [Draft]
Just to make it clear, the Scottish Conservatives will be supporting the bill at stage 3, in a short time—as, indeed, we did at stage 1, when we backed the bill’s general principles.
I start by thanking everybody for the part that they have played: the clerks of the Economy and Fair Work Committee and the Scottish Parliament information centre, who supported us, and all those who gave the committee evidence. I thank my fellow committee members for their very collegiate approach in trying to improve the bill. Indeed, there were some perhaps unusual alliances. Lorna Slater voted for some of my amendments and I voted for some of Lorna Slater’s amendments. That demonstrates the value of cross-party co-operation and working. We did not agree on everything; nevertheless, we were able to get the bill improved at stage 2—not always to the delight of the minister. We had very constructive engagement with the minister in any case. Particularly when it came to stage 3, there was a joint endeavour to tidy up some of the bill’s imperfect wording that had been agreed at stage 2 to ensure that the bill got to the place that it needed to be at stage 3. We all worked together extremely well, and I am grateful to the minister for his co-operation and support.
I put forward only one basic issue at stage 2, dealing with the question of the percentage of spend that would go into local businesses and local economies through procurement. I felt it important for the community wealth building plans to have a target set in them. I do not think that we should be prescriptive as to what that target is, and I do not think that the Government should be setting that target; it should be set by the local partners. That principle was an important one. I am very pleased that the committee agreed on that and was able to get it into the bill, tweaking the wording at stage 3.
Community wealth building is a good thing—I think that we can all agree on that. It seeks to use the economic impact of anchor organisations—public, private or third sector—to stimulate and retain economic activity in a local area. As we discussed when we considered the bill at stage 1, there are five pillars to community wealth building: maximising the benefits of public procurement, which we have talked about; increasing fair work and skills development opportunities for the workforce; ensuring that land and property are used to benefit communities, SMEs and the environment; inclusive ownership; and finance.
The question of land and property is really interesting. Just yesterday, I met a community group in the Carse of Gowrie that is looking to take over what is, in effect, a derelict orchard and bring it into use for the local community. The group is doing so under legislation that the Parliament previously passed, but it strikes me that that is the sort of initiative that the community wealth building agenda seeks to support. It is about looking at lands and buildings that are either derelict or not being used to their fullest potential and bringing them back into more productive use—either economic use or, in this particular case, environmental and sustainable use for the benefit of the community.