Scottish Independence
Debate between Baroness Chapman of Darlington and Lord Offord of Garvel(1 year, 11 months ago)
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Lord Offord of Garvel (Con)
I agree with the noble Lord; 60% of Scottish trade is with England, 20% is with the EU and 20% is international. This is part of the issue not addressed in the paper. I point to a couple of observations. The IFS has said of the paper that
“Scotland’s much higher levels of public spending … mean that it … would need to make bigger cuts to … spending or … increases to taxes”.
Richard Murphy, traditionally a pro-independence economist, said to the National that the
“currency plans are ‘so wrong’ he would vote No in a future referendum.”
A pro-independence campaigner, Robin McAlpine, commented that the prospect was dismal—Scotland has no lender of last resort under these plans and there is no solution to the border. In summary, he said the whole thing is “utter pish”. I defer to the Lord Speaker to explain to more genteel noble Lords that that is a Glaswegian euphemism for utter balderdash.
Baroness Chapman of Darlington (Lab)
My Lords, is not the truth that neither the Scottish Government nor the UK Government are doing a good job for the Scottish people at the moment? Does the Minister not think the Labour leader in Scotland, Anas Sarwar, makes a very strong point when he proposes that there should be an emergency cost of living Act, including halving rail fares, capping bus journeys, emergency debt legislation, a top-up to the welfare fund and a fully costed plan for £100 water rebates? Would that not be a better use of the Scottish Government’s time?
Lord Offord of Garvel (Con)
That is quite a long shopping list. We can see the strength of the United Kingdom in the measures recently put forward to address the cost of living crisis, which are distributed equally across all four parts of the United Kingdom. Scotland is a major beneficiary of those and is funded much more securely within the United Kingdom than it would be as an independent country.