Samantha Barber: social responsibility and devolution

As central government reaffirms the case for corporate social responsibility, Samantha Barber of Scottish Business in the Community looks at where responsibility for CSR lies in the devolved administrations.

The UK government’s report: Business & Society – Developing Corporate Social Responsibility in the UK, is a welcome re-statement of the business case for involvement in CSR.

The title, however, begs several questions. What does CSR in the UK mean in the light of current devolved structures? Where does responsibility fall between the devolved and reserved powers of the Scottish and Westminster Parliaments respectively?

Since the elections to the Scottish Parliament in May 1999, Scotland’s political landscape has changed dramatically. The Scottish Parliament and Executive are changing the face of society at a smart pace. Unsurprisingly this has positive implications for CSR in Scotland.

A key component of CSR is corporate community investment. Within the first few months in office, the Scottish Executive (the government in Scotland) set out a commitment to tackling social justice – its first annual social justice report aspired “to a Scotland where social justice is the hallmark of society”.

The emphasis placed by the Executive on social justice has indeed raised the profile and increased the interest of businesses operating in Scotland in the benefits of investing in their local communities. A number of UK and international companies have created new corporate affairs positions with responsibility for managing their interface with the Scottish social justice agenda.

Market research by Scottish Business in the Community in July 2000 showed that business people associated elements of the CSR agenda (in particular CCI) with the Executive’s social justice initiative.

In addition, Scottish Enterprise (SE), the executive agency responsible for developing enterprise strategy across Scotland, has also taken up the theme of CSR, stating that “..social inclusion is now to become a mainstream goal for Scottish enterprise”.

It will come as no surprise that, since the appointment of former Minister for the Communities, Wendy Alexander, as the new Minister for Enterprise in November 2000, this commitment to engage companies in CSR has been re-enforced. SBC is working very closely with Scottish Enterprise to engage companies across Scotland with local communities -most of them designated as Social Inclusion Partnerships.

Three quarters of the case studies in the DTI report relate to community and educational initiatives, which fall within the devolved powers of the Scottish Parliament.

However, as the DTI notes, CSR covers a broad spectrum, including employee relations, social and ethical investment and environmental issues. Responsibility for policy in these areas is less clear.

In the main, employee relations remain a reserved power at Westminster. However, responsibility for environmental issues rests both with the Scottish Parliament and Westminster. It will be interesting to see how the CSR agenda for dual responsibility issues will be developed in the future.

It is encouraging to see that the current governments both at Westminster and the Scottish Parliament are switched on to the business case for CSR and in particular CCI. However, with the UK’s new devolved constitution, clarity of responsibility will be essential.

Samantha Barber joined Scottish Business in the Community as chief executive in May 2000. Samantha worked in Brussels for nearly four years as a policy advisor for the ERA group on the Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee. She returned to Scotland in January 1998 to take up the post of director of Business for Scotland. Samantha set up Business for Scotland to engender debate on constitutional change and the development of economic and fiscal policy. (http://www.sbcscot.com)

Corporate Citizenship Briefing, issue no: 57 – April, 2001