Scotch Whisky Industry

Ian Blackford Excerpts

Wednesday 9th March 2016 Westminster Hall

[Ian Blackford (Ross, Skye and Lochaber) (SNP)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Moon. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Argyll and Bute (Brendan O’Hara) for initiating this important debate today.

Whisky is Scotland’s gift to the world, a gift that brings enormous benefit to the Exchequer. It has a substantial impact on our trade statistics and generates substantial employment in Scotland. The success of the whisky industry is rooted in rural Scotland, where the addition of well-paid employment puts substantial income into many local economies.

There has been a renaissance in Scotch whisky with so many iconic brands being marketed and sold throughout the world. Its brand identity is unparalleled and has been hard won, although it needs to be protected and invested in. There is a competitive threat from other products, but none have the right to call their product Scotch whisky. The rich diversity of successful Scotch whisky global brands has helped to create the circumstances for an explosion of investment in new distilleries, often small community-based operations that add to the rich tapestry of unique product offerings and the breadth of those offerings to the discerning palate. Each whisky is unique and is shaped by the environment and character of each distillery with the barley, the local source of water and the peculiarities of the still among other things affecting the character of each whisky.

We have several distilleries in my constituency, including some in the planning and development phase. In Skye, we have the iconic Talisker whisky, which was the favourite of writer Robert Louis Stevenson. In his poem, “The Scotsman’s Return from Abroad”, he said:

“The king o’ drinks, as I conceive it, Talisker, Islay, or Glenlivet.”

[Roger Mullin (Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath) (SNP)]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Ian Blackford]

Because of lack of time I want to press on, but before my hon. Friend the Member for Argyll and Bute gets excited about Islay being mentioned in the same sentence as Talisker, I should point out to him that the king of whisky, Talisker, is the first and foremost whisky to be mentioned in the poem.

Moreover, in the film “Charlie Wilson’s War”, CIA agent Gust Avrakotos presents Congressman Wilson with a bottle of Talisker. The agent explains to Charlie that Scotch is mentioned in a Robert Louis Stevenson poem, but the bottle is bugged and allows him to listen to the congressman’s conversations. One would hope that in this House Talisker may be enjoyed by all and certainly never used for more subversive activity, although with this Government you never know.

One website on whisky stated the following of Talisker:

“This alluring, sweet, full-bodied single malt is so easy to enjoy, and like Skye itself, so hard to leave.”

What must be kept in mind is that Talisker distillery and so many of our distilleries are located not just in the most beautiful parts of our country but in areas of varying degrees of fragility of economic activity. Talisker is located on the western side of Sky where the potential for full-time, year-round employment is limited. The distillery employs 45 staff members, a significant number for an island with a population of just over 10,000. It is of note that only nine of those jobs are in production, with the vast bulk of employment being around the visitor centre. Last year, it welcomed a grand total of 67,000 visitors. The distillery is the second highest visitor attraction in footfall on the island of Skye.

Clearly many people come to Skye to visit Talisker, among other places, helping to grow and develop our tourist offering and tourist spend, not just at Talisker but throughout the island. The motion today refers to the economic value of whisky to our country. That economic benefit is based on the direct value of the whisky industry to many rural communities in my constituency and elsewhere. Talisker is a well-established, successful brand, but the story does not end there.

Torabhaig distillery is under construction on the Sleat peninsula on Skye. This distillery is expected to employ a staff of eight when it enters production. There are also plans for a new distillery on the island of Raasay. There is a birth of a new spirit in the Hebrides, a spirit that will excite the whisky world with these new ventures adding to the appeal of Skye and Raasay as the premium whisky region of the entire industry.

I have many distilleries in my constituency. The Glen Ord distillery in Muir of Ord is a contrast with Talisker. It employs just shy of 60 workers and as well as production of the Singleton of Glen Ord brand and a successful visitor centre, there is also a maltings at Glen Ord as well as an engineering base for the parent company, Diageo.

I am glad to say that not far from Glen Ord, just outside Dingwall, is another new distillery, GlenWyvis, based on a long-held tradition of distilling in this area, under the name of the previous Ferintosh distillery. Our national bard, Rabbie Burns, famously lamented the previous loss of this distillery when he said in 1759:

“Thee, Ferintosh! O sadly lost!”

Well, it is lost no more.

Because of lack of time, I will wrap up. We celebrate the success of the whisky industry, but let me quote Douglas Fraser of the BBC, who stated in 2013:

“Scotch whisky is a national brand worth toasting. It is a drink that can only be distilled and matured in one country—Scotland—but which sells in to 200 markets around the world. How did Scotch go from cottage industry to global phenomenon and how does it benefit its country of origin?”

That question requires more time for debate than we have today, but let me reflect briefly on employment.

As has been mentioned, 40,000 jobs are connected with the industry, 7,000 of which are in rural Scotland. My challenge to the industry is that, as well as the very welcome investment in distilleries, more can be done to make sure a greater part of the supply chain is secured in the area of production. Let us increase the dividend available for those in whisky-producing areas and let us toast the success of the industry, but let us have the ambition to grow this fantastic industry on a sustainable basis. To encourage this to happen, the Chancellor must play his part next week by reducing duty and introducing greater equity for the Scotch whisky industry.