Scottish Council Foundation

Scottish Council Foundation (SCF) is a neoliberal Think tank that proclaims that it "develops leading edge thinking and world class practice to address the strategic challenges facing Scotland and other modern economies and societies in an age of complexity and rapid change." It was established by the Scottish Council for Development and Industry (SCDI) in 1999 [1].

The SCF is funded by big business and pushes market friendly policies. In January 2006 it published a report with the Fraser of Allander Institute proposing that Scottish Water be privatised.[2] In the same month it organised a conference with pharma giant Pfizer, one of the most active pharma lobbyists in Scotland on binge drinking. Andrew Harris, from the Foundation, said: "Education, improved housing, employment and environmental changes can all address problems such as binge-drinking far more effectively than trying to tackle the problem in isolation." [3]

Background

According to Hartwig Pautz 'Three of the SCF’s five trustees are highranking members of the SCDI executive and its board and all of them are important members of Scotland’s business community. The SCF employs seven full-time and one part-time staff; of whom five are involved in research and securing research income. The present director, James McCormick, was appointed in 2002. Previously he worked for the Institute for Public Policy Research’s (IPPR) Social Justice Commission Report, published in 1994.'

The following account draws on Hartwig Pautz 'Think-Tanks in Scotland' Paper for the 55th Political Studies Association Annual conference, 4-7 April 2005, University of Leeds, [4]

'Officially non-aligned to any political party, the SCF’s language resembles (New) Labour-speech: the institute’s core aims are ‘tackle[ing] inequalities in the marketplace’, in public health and in the distribution of wealth[5]. It demands action led by the Scottish Executive to ‘promote cost-cutting partnerships between local shops and major retailers, and offer incentives for new businesses to set up in low-income neighbourhoods’ in order to allow poor households to get more value for their money. In order to ‘enjoy the benefits of competition’ more commitment from government and a clearer challenge to private service providers is demanded [6]]. Equality is not an aim in itself; at best marked disparities are seen as economically undesirable for all members of society – ‘a pronounced set of inequalities is bad for everyone, for the economy, for the people in the middle, for the people at the bottom’(interview with James McCormick, 2004).'

The SCF, which employs an in-house research team, carries out more original research and only occasionally draws from external expertise in the form of cooperation between the SCF and an individual researcher on an original project. Unlike the David Hume Institute and Policy Institute, the SCF has cooperated on research with various groups, including the Washington D.C Centre for Excellence in Government, the IPPR, the Public Health Institute of Scotland and the Scottish Development Centre for Mental Health ([7] Accessed 1 June 2004). The SCF emphasises the international and national relevance of its projects and therefore the ‘exportability’ of its products. The in-house research competence allows it considerably more freedom to do research.

Funding

The SCF states that its "principal supporters: include:

• Associated Newspapers
• Boots
• BP
• BT
• Communities Scotland
• Diageo
• Liddell Thomson
• Pfizer
• Scottich Council for Development and Industry
• Scottish Adult Learning Partnership
• Scottish Enterprise
• Shell
• Volunteer Development Scotland

Personnel

SCF's Trustees are:

• Shonaig MacPherson, Chairperson
• Donal Dowds
• Crawford Gillies
• Mike Hambly
• Alan Wilson

All serve in a personal capacity.

Staff

• Linda Boyes Policy Manager
• Deirdre Elrick Policy Manager
• Jim McCormick Director
• Gillian Menzies Finance Officer
• Sandra Robertson Events Co-ordinator
• Janet Smith Office Manager
• Mark Langan Research Fellow
• Andrew Harris Programme Director

Contact details

Scottish Council Foundation,
23 Chester Street,
Edinburgh, Scotland, EH3 7ET
Phone: 0131 225 4709
Fax: 0131 220 2116
Email: scf AT @scottishcouncilfoundation.org
Web: http://www.scottishcouncilfoundation.org/index.php

External links

• Hartwig Pautz 'Think-Tanks in Scotland' Paper for the 55th Political Studies Association Annual conference, 4-7 April 2005, University of Leeds, www.psa.ac.uk/2005/pps/Pautz.pdf
• RICHARD GRAY Message in a bottle Scotland on Sunday, 29 January 2006.
• Alf Young The horse is at the water, but who’s nagging it to drink? the Herald, 24 January 2006.