<\/p>\n
John Swinney: listening (pic: DB Media Services)<\/p>\n
John Swinney\u00a0has pledged a more pro-business approach from the new government after entrepreneur Sir Tom Hunter called for \u201cearly wins\u201d that could be achieved by his ministers.<\/p>\n
The two held a private meeting at Bute House on Tuesday where Sir Tom hammered home a series of demands to lower costs on business and help create investment and jobs.<\/p>\n
Sir Tom told the CBI Scotland annual lunch in Edinburgh today that the session with Mr Swinney was \u201cthe best political meeting I\u2019ve ever had from a business point of view\u201d.<\/p>\n
He also called for a chief assessor to oversee a reform of the rates revaluation process and suggested a zero rate of income tax up to \u00a340,000 with higher earners paying more.<\/p>\n
Fundamentally, he called for government to set the conditions for investment and job creation and to \u201clet business get on with it.\u201d<\/p>\n
The\u00a0First Minister told guests at the lunch that he would \u201cdo all that I can to take those ideas forward\u201d.<\/p>\n
He promised that the reform of planning and business rates as well as a focus on skills would be key to delivering economic growth over the next five years.<\/p>\n
Sir Tom Hunter: let us get on with it (pic: DB Media Services)<\/p>\n
The event was Mr Swinney\u2019s first engagement outside Holyrood since his re-election. He said another meeting in Perthshire meant he could not stay to hear Sir Tom speak, nor did he stay on to take questions from the audience, but he urged business leaders to come forward with ideas.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe business community is on the front line, and I need to hear loud and clear from you what is and what is not working,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
He explained that he had appointed Stephen Flynn \u2013 who was in the audience \u2013 as Economy, Transport and Tourism Secretary \u201cwith the very clear instruction to prioritise engagement with the business community.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe want to work with you, we want to hear about your businesses in the round, understand more fully the environment they are operating in, not only the pressures that we can help ease, or the representations we can make on your behalf, but the opportunities that we can help turbocharge.\u201d<\/p>\n
He has asked Mr Flynn to work with Ben Macpherson, the Innovation and Technology minister \u201cto be creative and flexible\u201d in catching the next wave.<\/p>\n
\t #Swinney #probusiness #pledge #Sir #Tom #showdown #Daily #Business<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
John Swinney: listening (pic: DB Media Services) John Swinney\u00a0has pledged a more pro-business approach from…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[7],"tags":[272,12782,306,12783,3543,12785,8567,12786,12784,3054,5620],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stock999.top\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6952"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stock999.top\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stock999.top\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stock999.top\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stock999.top\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6952"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stock999.top\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6952\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stock999.top\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6952"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stock999.top\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6952"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stock999.top\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6952"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}