AT the weekend, I was delighted that our Alba Party Holyrood leader Ash Regan MSP came to Gourock to support my campaign in the upcoming council by-election.

We enjoyed a tour of many local businesses and it was good to hear firsthand of their successes and of areas they felt needed improvement to support them going forward.

Many premises benefit from the small business bonus scheme that Alex Salmond introduced, but for larger hospitality businesses they aren’t getting the support they previously got.

Meanwhile, many of our manufacturing businesses continue to battle against ever increasing running costs. Under Part 11 of the Community Empowerment (Scotland) Act 2015, local authorities may also reduce or remit non-domestic rates.

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But despite this being a vital tool to attract inward investment into an area, creating jobs, pumping wages into the local economies and all of the supply chain benefits that creates, councils across Scotland refuse to use the power unless they get more money from the Scottish Government.

Former first minister Alex Salmond urged the Scottish Government last year not to allow businesses in the rest of the UK to gain a competitive advantage over Scotland – but sadly they now do.

The current approach to business taxation has created a set of circumstances that highlight better support for businesses in England and Wales over Scotland.

When Salmond was first minister, Labour peer George Foulkes said that in Scotland, Salmond’s government was intentionally creating better services to boost the case for independence.

But the Scottish Government is now in danger of letting the reverse argument hold sway.

Last year Regan also urged the Scottish Government to think again on its decision not to match the business rate relief prevailing south of the Border. Building a strong case for independence starts with the foundation of a competent government that doesn’t let important sectors of the economy believe they would get a better deal from a Tory or a Labour UK Government. Ash has consistently called on the Scottish Government to refocus on governing competently in order to rebuild confidence.

Hospitality businesses on Scotland’s islands currently get 100% non-domestic rates relief capped at £110,000 but the rest of Scotland’s hospitality businesses receive no relief, although poundage has been frozen for all businesses up to a value of up to £51,000. Firms in the hospitality, retail, and leisure sectors in England and Wales currently benefit from rates relief of 75%, up to £10,000 per business, under measures originally brought in to help companies recover from the pandemic. However, that relief has not been provided in Scotland since 2022-23.

Before last year’s Scottish Budget, the country’s hospitality trade bodies lobbied government with regard to the financial pressures that the industry is under, but their pleas fell on deaf ears.

Last year, the Scottish Government’s decision not to prioritise rates relief meant that we haven’t been able to stem the continuation of closures of Scottish hospitality businesses running at double the rate of that in England.

In The National’s sister paper The Herald at the weekend, Inverclyde businessman, and one of Scotland’s most successful self-made tycoons, Sandy Easdale, urged the Scottish Government to learn from the pro-business approach that Salmond adopted when he was first minister. And he is right.

The government Salmond led improved the lives of people across Scotland and established the social contract that protects our universal entitlement to free tuition, prescriptions and many more vital services.

For much of the period from 2007 Scottish growth and employment rates outperformed those of the UK for the first time in generations, much of it led by small business benefiting from very generous rates relief.

Many of these businesses are the thriving independent retailers Ash Regan and I spoke to at the weekend. Many of the staff we spoke to lived within a few hundred yards of their premises and I am certain that almost all of the profit they generate is reinvested back in their local economy.

Under Salmond’s approach to business and investment we made more progress in a short period than Labour had made for Scotland in several decades.

One of the most important aspects of how his government built the case for independence was to show people that we governed competently and created manifestly better services in Scotland – something he readily agreed with Lord Foulkes that he was doing on purpose!

Not only does our current approach to business risk job losses, threaten supply chains and further diminishing our town and city centres, it is politically naive.

If you want to build a case for independence, you can’t allow Scottish medium and large businesses to claim they would be better treated under the government in England, or even Labour in Wales.

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The current Budget is certainly challenging, largely down to the poor fiscal framework the Scottish Government allowed itself to be conned into – something only Ash Regan has consistently highlighted in the Scottish Parliament.

But there has to be improvement in this particular area or an important sector in Scotland’s economy will continue to be left behind and the case for independence further damaged.