THE SCOTTISH Executive was yesterday urged to “stick to its guns” over its commitment to relocate civil service jobs away from Edinburgh, writes Ian Findlay industrial reporter.

Ministers were also urged to make long-awaited announcements about new sites for two health-related departments, accounting for almost 200 jobs.

The chief executive of Dundee and Tayside Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Mervyn Rolfe, called on the Executive not to be swayed from its relocation policy by the current row over the switch to Inverness of the HQ of Scottish Natural Heritage.

He said he had no doubt the row had contributed to delays in the Executive completing a series of departmental relocation announcements originally scheduled to be concluded by the end of last year.

Two announcements, namely NHS Health Scotland (formerly Health Education Board Scotland), with just over 80 posts, and NHS Education Scotland (100 posts), are still awaited.

Mr Rolfe said the case which Dundee and Tayside have been making for the siting of the health departments was “unanswerable”.

“It’s still obvious to anyone with any analytical skills that property prices are far cheaper in this area,” he said.

“We don’t have the congestion that exists in the Edinburgh area and we don’t have the economic over-heating that there is in the capital.”