60 degrees North in Shetland, feat. Santa, where the midday light was already low and the sun will set at 1457. Happy winter solstice to you all.

📣 What next for community wealth building in Scotland? Our new report asks what it’ll take to turn ambition into action. By our Co-Director @miriambrett.bsky.social, and @neilmcinroy.bsky.social, Global Lead for Community Wealth Building at @democracycollab.bsky.social. 1/13 🧵👇

~ Some personal news ~ Our beautiful wee one arrived, so I’ll be on parental leave over the coming months. Looking forward to catching up with folk when I’m back. In the meantime, the very talented Future Economy Scotland team has an exciting pipeline of work so keep an eye out!

Join us at SNP Conference! Funding Scotland’s Future: Where Next for the Public Finances? 🗓️ Sunday 12th October 🕘 9:15-10:15am ☕️ Food & refreshments! With: @shonarobison.bsky.social MSP David Phillips @theifs.bsky.social Sara Cowan @swbg.bsky.social Chair: FES Co-Director @lmacfarlane.bsky.social

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 Who owns Scotland's offshore wind assets? Our new interactive map with @cmmonwealth.bsky.social lets you explore who really owns ScotWind projects – and who stands to benefit Highlights in 🧵 Explore the map 👉 www.futureeconomy.scot/scotwind

Our new report explores Scotland's attempts to attract private finance to meet net zero targets. We model funding options for peat restoration + find private finance could increase costs for projects by 48%. We propose a public-led alternative + policy changes to address non-financial barriers. 👇

Instead of private finance, we need public investment for public goods – plus action on systemic barriers: 📈 Reducing financial uncertainty for landowners 💷 Tax reform 🌱 Fairer land ownership 🦌 Tackling deer numbers 👷‍♀️ Building skills & housing www.futureeconomy.scot/publications...

🚨 NEW: We’ve been told for years that private finance will fix Scotland’s nature crisis. Our new research shows why it won’t – and sets out a bold public-led alternative. Highlights in 🧵 Read full report 👉 www.futureeconomy.scot/publications...

🚨New survey finds oil & gas workers want decisive action from the UK government, Scottish government and industry to support the transition – but they aren’t getting it. Here’s what workers want: 🧵 www.heraldscotland.com/opinion/2547...

🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿🇺🇸 NEW: How are Trump’s tariffs impacting Scotland’s economy? In a new blog, our economist @jujupepe.bsky.social explores the latest data, and finds that Scotland's exports are defying expectations – for now. But significant risks lie ahead.

In a world riven by inequality and devastated by climate + ecological crisis, what would it take for "green industrial policy" to empower the working class in Global North + South, and be truly green? New @cplusc.bsky.social report by me and Isabel Estevez (1/3) t.co/78sQQe4d1g

Asylum support is being widely discussed again, but some figures circulating online are inaccurate. Ferret Fact Service checked a viral post and found it Mostly False. Here's why: theferret.scot/claim...

📢 NEW: Scotland faces a stark choice: act boldly to shape the economy, or be shaped by global forces. Read our second report with @mazzucatom.bsky.social and @iipp-ucl.bsky.social on how to rethink the state around a mission-oriented approach: www.futureeconomy.scot/publications...

No doubt Israel is trembling at the thought of political leaders expressing upset at the latest hospital bombing while providing weapons to the very state targeting hospitals as part of an ongoing genocide.

Next year’s Scottish election must move beyond business-as-usual Read our new briefing setting out 11 policy priorities for transformative change👇

NEW: Scotland is at a crossroads of crises. The 2026 election must be a turning point towards transformative action. Our new briefing sets out 11 bold, practical ideas to tackle the country’s biggest challenges. It’s time to move beyond business-as-usual 👇

Our new #ObserverSummer25 is out now🚀 This edition covers civil society demands of unconditional debt relief in #Jubilee2025, IMF's upcoming surveillance review, World Bank's billions to trillions 'fantasy', Sri Lanka, Argentina & the IMF, #FFD4, and more 🔥👇 tinyurl.com/ObserverSumm...

“In an increasingly volatile world, small economies like Scotland face a stark choice: either act boldly to shape markets, or be shaped by global market forces.” Read the latest blog by @lmacfarlane.bsky.social, analysing Alexander Dennis and the erosion of Scotland’s industrial base.

While other countries implement bold industrial strategies, Scotland is using taxpayer subsidies to erode our industrial base and offshore jobs abroad My analysis on the loss of 400 jobs at Alexander Dennis 👇

NEW: Alexander Dennis’s decision to halt Scottish manufacturing isn’t just a casualty of market forces It’s a story of how public money has helped to erode Scotland’s industrial base and offshore jobs abroad New analysis by @lmacfarlane.bsky.social www.futureeconomy.scot/posts/260-mi...

🚨 Uplift is hiring a Senior Political Adviser (Scotland)! 🚨 📍 Edinburgh, Scotland 💼 Fixed-term, 1 year contract 💰 £49,503 - £54,093 🗓️ Apply by 11pm, Tuesday 30th July 👉 Find out more and apply: cdn.prod.website-files.com/65fb154b5e34...

Foster care in England is now a business model. Private equity firms are cashing in on vulnerable kids while carers earn less than £1ph. This is what happens when you turn public care into a market. 📊 @sachahilhorst.bsky.social & @sophieflinders.bsky.social www.theguardian.com/society/2025...

This Palestinian boy is comforting his younger siblings after they were injured in an Israeli attack that targeted a displacement shelter in Gaza City.

As the genocide we’re complicit in rages on, it’s important to remember who the real criminals are: peaceful protesters and a random assortment of musicians.

MPs will vote on proscribing Palestine Action, alongside violent, far-rights group MMC whose leader has charges for acts of mass violence in US. These two groups are not equivalent to one another, yet MPs will have to vote on the list in full. This is a manipulation of parliamentary process.

🏠 Scotland’s rents have surged by 32 % since May 2020. This means tenants are paying an average of £245 more per month - in a cost-of-living crisis. 🧵

Thanks to absurdly generous tax breaks oil & gas developers receive in the UK, the development of the Rosebank oil field could result in a net LOSS of more than £250 million to the Treasury, while developers Equinor & Ithaca walk away with £1.5 billion in profit. /1 www.scotsman.com/news/politic...

The Mamdani campaign offers a blueprint for the climate left: the path to full decarbonization must run through working class demands for affordability and quality-of-life jacobin.com/2025/06/mamd...

🏠 Completions under the Scottish Government’s Affordable Housing Supply Programme fell by 22% in 2024/25. The number of homes completed was 7,444, a fall of 2,070 compared to the previous financial year, and the lowest level since 2015/16 (exc. the first year of Covid-19) 🧵

Have your wages increased by a third in five years? If so then you’ll have less problem than most tenants will in paying their spiralling rents. A Scottish government was formed in 2021 promising rent controls. These should have been delivered urgently. They still could be.

NEW: Our analysis of ONS data shows private rents in Scotland have risen 32% since 2020, an average increase of £245/month. This outpaces inflation and previous rent trends. 🧵

Our response to the Scottish Government’s proposed new climate change targets. The response in full can be found here: www.futureeconomy.scot/press/184-re...

tl;dr Scotland will need to ramp up action across a much broader range of devolved areas to decarbonise the economy. @miriambrett.bsky.social and I discuss last week's emissions statistics in our latest blog 👇

In our latest blog, we delve into the official statistics showing emissions of greenhouse gases in Scotland. How do the new findings fit into the longer term picture? Transformative action is needed to accelerate decarbonisation.

“Khem Rogaly, a researcher at Common Wealth, a progressive thinktank, has studied the relations of defence spending and jobs, and observes that “this is not a serious industrial or jobs strategy”.” Khem Rogaly in David Edgerton’s latest for @theguardian.com 🔗👇 www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

We’ve known community energy punches well above its weight for some time. It’s not just about energy - it’s about wealth, resilience, engagement, power and prosperity. It’s also really popular. It won’t do ‘net zero’ alone, but it has to be a core pillar of any successful, just transition.

Attempting to drill baby drill our way out of an aging basin with a decreasing rate of production and enormous job losses over the past decade - despite huge government support - is doomed to fail. Our response to Donald Trump’s illogical intervention today:

Among his other interesting comments today, President Trump has alleged that there's a century worth of oil & gas drilling left in the North Sea that the UK should incentivise in order to get energy costs down. Let's take a closer look at the veracity of that idea, shall we? /1

Very pleased to see Future Economy Scotland’s wage squeeze analysis raised at FMQs. In 2024 the average full-time worker in Scotland earned £38,464 a year. If earnings had instead grown in line with pre 2008 crisis trends, the same worker would be earning £53,923 today.

Our analysis of Scotland’s wage squeeze was raised at FMQs this week. The damage inflicted by austerity and runaway inflation cannot be undone. As we approach an election, rather than scapegoating migrants, the debate must focus on the true culprit: a broken economic model.

All of Scotland has water scarcity, with some areas approaching significant levels, after driest start to the year since 1964.

The Global North talk constantly about the "Finance Gap", but finance for climate is limited by orthodoxy, not reality. @laramerling.bsky.social writes for RIGHT TURN (ISSUE #1)

“Rather than scapegoating migrants for the country’s economic failures, the debate must focus on the real culprit: a broken economic model.” My comment in the Daily Record on Scotland’s earnings squeeze:

“Hard-pressed Scots workers are £15,000 a year worse off than they should be due to flatlining wages.” Our new earnings analysis is covered by the @dailyrecord.co.uk.web.brid.gy

Commenting on the analysis, our co-director @lmacfarlane.bsky.social said:

NEW: Average earnings in Scotland are £15,000 lower than they would have been if wages hadn’t flatlined since the 2008 financial crisis If real earnings had instead grown in line with pre-crisis trends, today the average full-time worker would be earning £53,923

How can Scotland deliver a just transition in the labour market? Join our webinar! Speakers include: 📣 Tom Arthur, Minister for Employment and Investment 📣 Satwat Rehman, Just Transition Commission Co-Chair 📣 Dave Moxham, STUC Deputy General Secretary 👉 www.eventbrite.com/e/how-can-sc...

Pandering to the far right will only serve to normalise the far right, and nobody but the far right wins in that scenario. All you do is compromise what you’re meant to stand for and throw marginalised and demonised communities under the bus in the process. It’s cowardly and electorally futile.

Shetland secured community wealth from oil, and now the isles face rapid renewables growth. Our briefing examines how Shetland presents an early test case example for a just energy transition, providing insights for other communities:

Shetland built significant community wealth from oil. Given this precedent, should the isles accept business-as-usual approaches for renewables? This briefing dives into the ownership of renewables in Shetland, drawing on lessons from the isles as an early test case example for a just transition.