For the last few months I have been visiting businesses across Edinburgh South to hear about the challenges they face. As we all face a cost of living crisis our local businesses face a cost of doing business crisis and are desperate for government support. I was happy to host a “Edinburgh South Business Summit” on Friday getting business owners face to face with representatives from a range of organisations and elected representatives to start to connect businesses to the right support and pull together an action plan for business in Edinburgh South. Thanks to Scottish Power, RBS, Business Gateway, the Federation of Small Businesses and Women Enterprise Scotland for their time and insight and to my Edinburgh South colleagues Cllr. Mandy Watt, Cllr Tim Pogson for Southside Newington and Daniel Johnson MSP.

I am very grateful to the Edinburgh South businesses who took time out of their busy day to speak up about the current “doing business” crisis.