Events
At Our Scottish Future, we believe Scotland can do better.
We hold regular events to set out ideas on economic growth, tackling poverty and to debate a better way forward for Scotland.
Our events are advertised on our social media platforms as well as through our email list.
To ensure you don’t miss out, follow us on social media and sign up on our website to be kept up to date with our weekly newsletter.
Recent Events
Scotland: Creating the Jobs of Tomorrow Conference 6 June 2025
Summary
Our Scottish Future held a major conference at the University of Glasgow to explore how Scotland can harness innovation, talent and investment to create the high-quality jobs of the future.
The Rt Hon Gordon Brown brought together experts from Scotland and around the world to chart a way forward. These included Nobel Prize-winning economist Michael Spence, former Science and Innovation Minister David Sainsbury, leading technology entrepreneurs Jim Rowan and Chris van der Kuyl, and major international investors including Kate Bingham, Kasim Kutay, Saul Klein and Poonam Malik.
There was wide participation from an audience including business leaders, leaders of Scotland’s public sector enterprise agencies, academics and students.
Key findings from the conference are:
- Scotland has many of the key ingredients for success. We’ve already got a strong culture of spin-out companies growing from universities, innovative businesses e.g. in satellite technology and renewable energy, and talented people.
- We’re growing clusters of innovative companies in areas including life sciences, data-driven innovation and advanced manufacturing, though not at the scale of the most competitive regions in SE England and the most innovative parts of the USA.
- We’re not doing as well as we need to in growing innovative businesses to scale in Scotland. Too many great Scottish-originated businesses are selling or moving before they become large employers.
- There are things we can do about that, including:
- Leveraging UK and international investment into growing companies to scale in Scotland, including using pensions funds’ new freedoms to invest in higher-risk, higher-growth innovation.
- Infrastructure creation to enable companies to scale-up, e.g. investment in laboratory facilities that are ready for businesses to expand into.
- Strong civic and economic leadership in Scotland’s city regions to drive the creation of clusters of growth, learning from the success of mayoral Combined Authorities in England.
- A jointly-owned Industrial Strategy by the UK and Scottish Governments to create the policy conditions for growth of key clusters of innovative businesses.
These findings are reflected in OSF’s report Innovation Nation: Good Jobs for Scotland’s Future, published in association with the conference. Its recommendations are aimed at creating 300,000 jobs, lifting people out of poverty and building a fairer, greener, more dynamic Scotland.
Our Scottish Future would like to thank the University of Glasgow and Glasgow Chamber of Commerce for their collaboration in running this event.
You can see some brief insights from key speakers here:
Detail
The full content of the conference is available on Our Scottish Future’s Youtube channel.
Each of the sessions contributed substantial insight.
Lord Sainsbury of Turville spoke about the importance of investing in the right industries today to create innovation and future prosperity. He emphasised the need to support the creation of a critical mass of innovative businesses clustered around universities in key Scottish regions, building on our strengths. While some other nations had pulled ahead, the right policy and investment choices could change this for Scotland.
Dan Turner of Our Scottish Future summarised the recommendations in Innovation Nation: Good Jobs for Scotland’s Future.
Professor Michael Spence emphasised the need to support the disruptive economic change as old industries declined and new industries emerged – including structural changes that were being driven by the use of AI. Places such as Scotland should focus on the areas of specialisation where they had the best prospect of success. This was important because it would build better jobs and better lives.
Dame Kate Bingham of SV Health Investors emphasised the high potential of investment in new therapeutic drugs. While these investments had high risk at individual drug level, if well managed enough of them would succeed to produce good overall investment results. Scotland and the wider UK had great resources including fundamental research strengths: we could do better in agile investment and agile regulation to boost growth.
Kasim Kutay CEO of Novo Holdings reflected on how Denmark had become a hub of innovation-led growth across industries including life sciences, including creating clusters of high-growth enterprises and having a foundation ownership model for its most successful companies, which meant that they stayed Danish-based rather then selling out and moving to scale-up.
Jim Rowan reflected on his experience as a serial technology entrepreneur at Blackberry, Dyson and Volvo Cars. Among other things, he recalled the time 30 years ago when Scotland had a ‘Silicon Glen’. That had given a boost which had not been sustained, particularly because the companies at the core of that were not Scottish-based so had left Scotland in pursuit of lower labour costs. Future prosperity needed to be based on investment with long-term commitment to Scotland.
Chris van der Kuyl of 4J studios drew lessons from the games industry, in which Scotland had built world-class leadership and the example that showed of how successful support for innovative industrial clusters can drive prosperity and social inclusion.
Sir Andrew Mackenzie, chair of UK Research and Innovation, saw a time of opportunity. UKRI’s emphasis on catalysing growth throughout the entire UK, and on funding things that would leverage investment from the private sector, could stimulate innovation and growth. There were challenges for both the public and private sectors in the UK in working more effectively to crowd investment into innovation.
Saul Klein of Phoenix Court venture capital emphasised that private investment in growth and innovation was happening, especially at early stage of business growth – but that there is huge potential to grow the amount of investment in scale-ups. UK investors including pension funds needed to invest more in innovative companies, and could get better returns by doing so.
Dr Poonam Malik of Scottish Enterprise, Royal Society of Edinburgh, Skills Development Scotland and Microplate Dx chaired a session bringing together experts from academia and industry consider how to take forward lessons from the day to create a ‘Scottish Enlightenment 2.0’ of ideas, innovation and jobs creation.
Anas Sarwar MSP, leader of the Scottish Labour and Douglas Alexander MP, Minister of State for Trade Policy and Economic Security, affirmed political commitment to building policy at UK and Scottish levels that would enable innovation-led growth.
Fringe event at Scottish Labour Conference 2024
At the 2024 Scottish Labour Conference in Glasgow, we held a Fringe event to discuss how Scotland can get back to economic growth and ensuring the benefits of a growing economy are felt by all in society.
The event drew upon our recent report, “From Growth To Good” , which you can read more about below.
Present on the panel were:
Kirsty McNeill, PPC for Midlothian
Daniel Johnson MSP, Scottish Labour spokesperson on economy, business and fair work
Stuart Patrick, Chief Executive of Glasgow Chamber of Commerce
Jim Gallagher, Chair OSF
Launch of our new report “Rewiring Scotland”
On Tuesday 13th February 2024 we launched our new report, “Rewiring Scotland” at the City Arts Centre Edinburgh.
The report called for the Scottish Government to hand more power to Scotland’s cities and regions to help boost the country’s stagnating levels of growth. It also proposed councils should be able to join together to form new Scottish Combined Authorities, potentially led by a directly-elected provost, taking control over powers such as economic development and skills training, as well as calling for cross party consensus on replacing council tax.
On the panel discussing the report were:
Eddie Barnes, Director of OSF
Prof Jim Gallagher, Chair OSF
Wendy Chamberlain MP
Prof James Mitchell, Professor of Public Policy, Edinburgh University
Cllr Cammy Day, Leader of Edinburgh Council
You can read the press release for more information and the full report here.
Better Jobs, Better Skills, Better Pay Conference
On the 30th November 2023, Our Scottish Future, in partnership with the Edinburgh Chamber of Commerce, held a major conference on Scotland’s economy.
Featuring a high quality line up of speakers and panellists, the conference discussed and explored how Scotland can achieve sustained economic growth to make us an opportunity rich and poverty free country.
To support the conference, Our Scottish Future published a report, “From Growth to Good: a ten-year growth plan for Scotland” which revealed that Scotland has the economic firepower to create 300,000 jobs in new industries over the next decade.
You can read a quick summary of the event from OSF Director Eddie Barnes and watch the speeches on YouTube.
Launch of our new report “A Little Less Conversation: How To Fix Scotland’s Implementation Gap”
On the 1st November 2023, we launched our new report “A Little Less Conversation: How To Fix Scotland’s Implementation Gap” at the Royal Society of Edinburgh.
The launch was attended by journalists and professionals from a variety of policy areas.
The report argued that that the successes of devolution has been stymied in recent years by a combination of “too much politics, too much government, a failure to cooperate, and a centralised political culture”. It praised several successes under the Scottish Government but concluded that Ministers too often “govern by press release”.
The report found that the Edinburgh administration has published nearly 700 consultation papers and 529 strategies or plans since the 2014 independence referendum.
That works out at more than one strategy or plan being published every week.
You can read the press release for more information or watch the presentation on YouTube.
A Stronger Scotland in a Better Britain Rally
On the 1st June 2023, Our Scottish Future held a major rally in central Edinburgh to make the case for a plan that creates a stronger Scotland in a better Britain.
A sensational line up of speakers delivered fantastic speeches, setting out the case for radical reform to political institutions across the UK.
We heard from former Prime Minister Gordon Brown, former First Minister of Wales, Mark Drakeford, Mayor of Greater Manchester Andy Burnham, Mayor of West Yorkshire Tracy Brabin and Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar.
You can read OSF organiser Ross Newton reflecting on the event and watch the speeches on YouTube
Britain’s Northern Superpower: Building A Greater Glasgow Conference
On the 10th February 2023, Our Scottish Future and the Glasgow Chamber of Commerce hosted a major conference to set out the case to establish Greater Glasgow’s position as one of the UK’s key economic clusters outside London.
The conference heard from former Prime Minister Gordon Brown, former CBI director general Tony Danker, Centre for Cities founder Lord Sainsbury and Glasgow city council leader Susan Aitken.
To support the conference, Our Scottish Future published several papers, “Engine of the North: Making Scotland a European Innovation Leader“, “Glasgow’s Economy in Context” and “Precision Medicine and Scotland’s Opportunity“.
Gordon Brown told the conference that the UK and Scottish Governments should jointly commit to making Glasgow the global centre of precision medicine and said Glasgow had to enter a “new phase of industrialisation” seizing on the new sectors of growth in the global marketplace. You can read more in Gordon Brown’s article in The Herald.
Better Jobs, Better Skills, Better Pay Conference
On the 30th November 2023, Our Scottish Future, in partnership with the Edinburgh Chamber of Commerce, held a major conference on Scotland’s economy.
Featuring a high quality line up of speakers and panellists, the conference discussed and explored how Scotland can achieve sustained economic growth to make us an opportunity rich and poverty free country.
To support the conference, Our Scottish Future published a report, “From Growth to Good: a ten-year growth plan for Scotland” which revealed that Scotland has the economic firepower to create 300,000 jobs in new industries over the next decade.
You can read a quick summary of the event from OSF Director Eddie Barnes and watch the speeches on YouTube.
Better Jobs, Better Skills, Better Pay Conference
On the 30th November 2023, Our Scottish Future, in partnership with the Edinburgh Chamber of Commerce, held a major conference on Scotland’s economy.
Featuring a high quality line up of speakers and panellists, the conference discussed and explored how Scotland can achieve sustained economic growth to make us an opportunity rich and poverty free country.
To support the conference, Our Scottish Future published a report, “From Growth to Good: a ten-year growth plan for Scotland” which revealed that Scotland has the economic firepower to create 300,000 jobs in new industries over the next decade.
You can read a quick summary of the event from OSF Director Eddie Barnes and watch the speeches on YouTube.
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