Welcome Message

Hello and welcome to the 3rd edition of Scotland Now.

All around the world, there are millions of people who proudly celebrate their Scottish connections. Scotland Now is designed to keep you up to date with the progress of modern devolved Scotland.

This has been a great summer for Scotland. Over the last few months, a record number of visitors have come to our shores. As well as the breathtaking scenery, rich history and legendary golf opportunities which Scotland offers, these visitors have enjoyed an exhilarating programme of festivals and events in our cities – and our pubs, clubs and restaurants have been smoke free for the first time ever.

This is an exciting time to visit, study, or work in Scotland.

But I want it to be even better. The choices we make now as a government, and as a nation, will determine the well-being of our society, the nature of our economy and the state of our environment for decades to come. That’s why earlier this month, I opened this session of the Scottish Parliament with a debate on Scotland’s long-term future. For almost two years, the Scottish government has been working on our Futures Project – a groundbreaking programme of work that is helping to assess some of the key challenges and opportunities that Scotland might face over the next 20 years or so. If you would like to find out more about the Futures Project, and take up the opportunity to offer us your views, you can do so via the following link: www.scotland.gov.uk/Topics/Government/futures/introdufutures

Later in this edition you can read more about the Scottish Rugby Union’s tour of Scotland with the Calcutta Cup, celebrating our victory over the world champions in this year's Six Nations. And earlier this year in Melbourne, I was delighted to witness the phenomenal achievements of the Scottish Commonwealth Games team. I am keen to build on these successes and encourage greater participation in sport, not just to develop future Scottish medal winners, but also to improve the general health of all young Scots. Two weeks ago I called a Sports Summit to bring together Scotland’s top coaches, administrators, politicians and sportsmen and women, to discuss the way forward for Scottish sport. Working with the sporting community we want to inspire youngsters and support the sporting talent that could potentially shine at a Glasgow Commonwealth Games in 2014.

As well as pursuing a confident and inspiring domestic agenda, devolved Scotland continues to develop international links and this summer we played host to a number of major international conferences, including the World Comes to Scotland conference at Strathclyde University. At that conference, I announced to ambassadors and diplomats from around the world that Scotland would be joining forces with Wales to work towards becoming Fair Trade nations. Alongside our commitment to our important partnership with Malawi, I want Scotland to do whatever it can to help end the scandal of poverty in the developing world – and our commitment to Fair Trade is at the centre of our national effort to help make poverty history.

In this edition, you will also find information on Scotland’s international business links in our Globalscots feature. In the next few days, the inaugural Globalscot Conference will see more than 200 top business people from around the world meeting in Edinburgh to share experiences and build networks. I look forward to welcoming these business experts and I am grateful for the considerable work they do on our behalf, promoting modern Scotland as a vibrant and entrepreneurial country to locations throughout the world. We also have the Global Friends of Scotland network – if you would be interested to learn more of this or to join, you can do so via the following link www.friendsofscotland.gov.uk.

I hope you enjoy reading this edition of Scotland Now.

With best wishes, Rt. Hon Jack McConnell MSP, First Minister of Scotland.