< Back to '11th September 2019' briefing
October 25, 2019
Change in community ownership?
Every two years, Scottish Government invests in a thorough assessment of the health of the social enterprise sector. The SE Census involves much number crunching and trawling through of financial reports in order to make some sense of what’s actually happening out there on the ground. From reading the headline figures, the big message seems to be that there really isn’t one – no great changes to report. However one figure does stand out – less than a quarter of the sector considers itself community owned and led. If that’s accurate, it feels like a bit of a shift is happening.
The latest social enterprise census was launched this week at the CEIS Social Enterprise Policy & Practice Conference.
Unveiled by Communities and Local Government Minister Aileen Campbell MSP, Social Enterprise in Scotland 2019 indicates that there are now over 6000 social enterprises operating in Scotland, generating over £3bn of annual income.
The figures confirmed that social enterprise in Scotland continues to be made up primarily of small, locally-focussed enterprises, with 26% of SEs operating within a single neighbourhood or community and 57% operating within a single local authority area.