The regeneration of towns such as Arbroath can be spurred at the local level, Scotland’s Conservative leader has told The Courier.
Ruth Davidson visited Arbroath on Saturday to make long-service presentations to local group supporters, and spoke on the future of Scotland’s small towns during a walkabout in the afternoon.
Her message was one of ”empowering” councils by giving them enough money to upgrade roads and services, driving people into their towns, rather than away from them.
Support for Angus College in supplying skills for the future was also on the agenda.
”We don’t want Arbroath to just be a commuter town for Dundee,” she said. ”We have to find a way in which to keep young people in rural areas, or in towns that aren’t attached to cities.
”In order to do that, you have to improve the infrastructure and facilities and provide good services, so that people have a good enough quality of life to raise families and stay here.
”We’ve seen here in Angus with the council, which the Conservatives have been involved in, that the housing policy has been improved in the last five years.”
Ms Davidson said the key to stimulating business and the local jobs market is increasing fiscal incentives, both for councils and prospective entrepreneurs.
”We will double the money that goes back to local councils in terms of business rates,” she said. ”As of April 1, a scheme was brought in so that there’s a target for councils that says, if they can attract a number of new businesses, they get to keep 50% of that money. Well we say why not make it 100% and they can then spend it however they like?
”If it comes to putting skins on some of the empty retail units, if that means giving people a rates holiday or some form of financial incentive to draw people here, let the councils have that opportunity.”
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Ms Davidson said she had experienced how hard finding a job can be, having tried to find work in Fife’s East Neuk after attending university in Edinburgh.
”When I came back to the East Neuk after university and tried to find work, I found I had to move to a city in order to go up the ladder,” she said.
After presenting long-service salvers to Conservative Association members John Hillman, Judy Stewart and her family, Ms Davidson was joined in town by local council hopefuls, Martyn Geddes and Adam Cormie.
On the subject of education, Ms Davidson’s message was that well-funded local government and colleges are the future for the survival of small towns.
She said: ”(Finance Minister) John Swinney had originally said he would cut £60 million from the colleges budget and said that wouldn’t have any effect on places.
”If you’re talking about growth, getting people back to work because we have had some tough times we have to give the opportunities to young people. In our negotiations to make sure the college budget would stay close to its level, we found where that money was going to come from because we’re a responsible opposition.
”Government is about political priorities and I think in cutting councils, the Scottish Government has made the wrong choice. Damaging our colleges take away from our communities, not just in Arbroath and Angus College but across Scotland. It was the wrong move.”
Photo Jim Ratcliffe