Regional development grants : the Scottish experience 1975-1979

In recent months regional policy has once more come under scrutiny. The recently established Select Committee for Scottish Affairs took regional policy as its first major topic for investigation. In particular it was concerned with the potency of the existing institutional arrangements in attracting mobile investment to Scotland. In a similar vein this article is concerned with regional policy in Scotland and the role that it plays in determining investment. Specifically out main aims are to show that the present system, irrespective of the institutional arrangements, is not likely to produce spatial equality of economic opportunity; nor in the last analysis is it necessarily compatible with any efficiency criteria