Lord Bruce of Bennachie
Main Page: Lord Bruce of Bennachie (Liberal Democrat - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Lord Bruce of Bennachie's debates with the Scotland Office
(2 years ago)
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Lord Offord of Garvel (Con)
The noble Lord should be well aware that Gordon Brown has been on this journey for quite a while; he proposes a federal United Kingdom. But when one of the four nations has 85% of the population and 90% of the wealth and it does not want devolution, you have a problem. So I agree with the noble Lord that devolution did not kill independence stone dead, but I am very clear that the Scottish National Party commands the support of only one-third of the Scottish electorate and therefore it should get on with the job in hand, which is to manage Scotland within the devolution settlement.
Lord Bruce of Bennachie (LD)
My Lords, does the Minister recognise that while this document is strong on nationalist rhetoric, it is almost entirely deficient in detail? Does he say that the SNP does not have the capacity to second-guess the outcome of negotiations with either the rest of the UK, the EU or the financial markets, and that it should recognise that Scottish opinion is still divided and what it should be doing is getting on with the job in hand, addressing what matters in the ailing health service and declining education, and end this embarrassing distraction?
Lord Offord of Garvel (Con)
The noble Lord is obviously well versed in the Scottish economy and Scottish affairs. I make two observations on the paper, the glossy document. First, as we have come to expect from a Scottish Government with 27 Ministers and 56 press officers, for every policy initiative there is a glossy document and a glitzy, headline-making press release. The problem the Scottish people have, which we have found to our cost, is that actual policy delivery on the ground ranges from non-existent to incompetent. Secondly, any reader of the glossy document will discover four glaring omissions: no explanation of how an independent Scotland would reduce our annual deficit of £24 billion, which is 25% of our annual budget; no explanation of how an independent Scotland would fund this deficit without access to international bond markets through its own currency; no explanation of how an independent Scotland would operate a hard border on the island of Great Britain; and no explanation of how an independent Scotland would access the knowledge economy when the SNP has wrecked our education system.