Osborne’s dismissal of Sterling union ‘bad for business’, Salmond warns

17 Feb 14
Chancellor George Osborne’s threat to block an independent Scotland from retaining Sterling would amount to a ‘George Tax’ that would expose businesses on both sides of the border to ‘hundreds of millions of pounds’ in transaction costs, First Minster Alex Salmond claimed today.

By Keith Aitken in Edinburgh | 17 February 2014

Chancellor George Osborne’s threat to block an independent Scotland from retaining Sterling would amount to a ‘George Tax’ that would expose businesses on both sides of the border to ‘hundreds of millions of pounds’ in transaction costs, First Minster Alex Salmond claimed today.

In a speech to pro-independence business leaders in Aberdeen, Salmond dismissed Osborne’s rejection of a currency union as a negative and bullying campaign tactic that had sorely misjudged the character of the Scottish people. It had ‘backfired badly’ in Scotland, he said.

Salmond said Osborne’s assault on the currency union proposals, which was backed by Labour and the Liberal Democrats, was ‘a sign of just how out of touch and arrogant the Westminster establishment has become’. 

Echoing US President Barack Obama’s famous election slogan, he said: ‘To be told there are things we can't do will certainly elicit a Scottish response that is as resolute as it is uncomfortable to the No campaign. It is, “Yes we can”.’

The Scottish Government’s preferred strategy of remaining in a Sterling currency union with the rest of the UK, he said, was the product of detailed analysis by a working group of international experts, which included two Nobel Laureates. 

Salmond recalled that a previous Osborne prediction, that the very fact of a referendum campaign would be costly to the Scottish economy, had been followed both by an upturn in growth, employment and inward investment. He also highlighted Prime Minster David Cameron’s undertaking in the Edinburgh Agreement to negotiate a post-referendum settlement in the best interest of all Britain’s people.

Since 2007, he said, Scotland had operated within a balanced budget, a performance which he contrasted with the UK Exchequer’s record under Osborne of borrowing half the UK’s £1.25 trillion debt since 2010.

Last week’s attacks were, he said, in keeping with the ‘accumulated negativity’ of the No campaign. ‘I intend to make sure that the Yes campaign puts forward a positive case for independence, because I believe absolutely that the only time a negative campaign wins an election or a referendum is when it’s up- against another negative campaign.’

Salmond promised that, if Scots did vote yes on September 18, they would continue to regard England, Wales and Northern Ireland as ‘our best neighbours in the world’, and said it was ‘ridiculous’ for the pro-Union parties in London to try to portray an independent Scotland as a foreign country.

He also responded to a weekend comment by European Commission president Jose Manuel Barroso, that it would be ‘extremely difficult, if not impossible’ for an independent Scotland to join the European Union.  Salmond said the matter would be for negotiation, but that Scotland was more likely to remain a member of the EU than the rest of the UK if the planned 2017 referendum on membership goes ahead.  

 

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