Minister for employment Jamie Hepburn strikes back at charity critics of Scottish job scheme Fair Start Scotland

The Herald reports that Jamie Hepburn MSP, the Scottish Minister for Employability and Training, has made a strong statement to support the process for commissioning Fair Start Scotland.

The initial reports of the contract awards were dominated by voluntary sector criticism of awards to for-profit organisations.

Minister Hepburn has responded to the effect that the commissioning process was designed to ensure that the beneficiaries of the programme would be 38,000 people helped into employment. The programme was not designed to subsidise any sector, but was designed to be fairer to smaller organisations with limited reserves (such as the voluntary sector) than was the Work Programme.