Quakers call for transparency over Scottish Enterprise human rights checks
Quakers in Scotland have written to the new Cabinet Secretary for Economy, Stephen Flynn MSP, over how Scottish Enterprise checks public money isn't funding human rights abuses.
Scottish Enterprise is the Scottish government's economic development agency.
Last year, the Scottish parliament forced it to review the checks it carries out before giving grants, to make sure they look at what products are actually used for and follow international law.
The review followed years of campaigning by Quakers, Amnesty International and Christian Aid Scotland among others.
Scottish arms companies were receiving public money while making weapons parts sold into armed conflicts, including Israel/Palestine and Saudi Arabia/Yemen, where human rights abuses are known to be taking place, they argued.
It also followed a Scottish parliament debate in February 2025, and a further announcement in September 2025 by John Swinney that new Scottish Enterprise grants would not be awarded to defence companies linked to Israel.
Scottish Enterprise has now completed its review. But it did so privately, and the findings and recommendations have not been made public.
Every company checked so far has passed the assessment, one of the reasons the Scottish parliament called for the review in the first place.
Amnesty International raised similar concerns last month, warning that Scotland risks being complicit in serious breaches of international law.
Quakers are calling on Stephen Flynn to make the findings public, so they can be properly scrutinised.
They say public institutions have a responsibility to ensure that public money is not used in ways that contribute, directly or indirectly, to armed conflict, occupation or grave human rights abuses.