INDEPENDENCE would give Scotland the power to pursue economic growth and control corporation tax rates, free of the restrictions of Westminster, its first minister Alex Salmond said last night in London.
“The Scottish National Party will campaign confidently for independence not just as an end in itself, but as the means by which the people of Scotland can best fulfil their potential and realise their aspirations,” he said.
Today Mr Salmond will unveil a consultation paper on the steps necessary for a referendum in 2014. There are disagreements on the wording of questions to be put to voters and whether London’s permission would be necessary for a referendum or not.
The re-establishment of the Scottish parliament in 1999 “was, of course, momentous in itself. But it still left Scotland with fewer powers than the German Länder, most American states, parts of Spain, such as the Basque Country or Catalonia, or, within these islands, the Isle of Man,” Mr Salmond said in his Hugo Young Lecture.
The lack of powers is “felt most deeply” on the economy, he said, adding: “We are still deeply aware, as are many places in England and Wales, of the lasting damage done by the mass unemployment of the 1980s, which left a legacy of alienation, ill health and hopelessness, which endured long after economic recovery had taken hold.”
Trumpeting the decisions taken to give free medical prescriptions, tuition fees and cheaper care for the elderly, Mr Salmond said: “I thank the heavens that Westminster’s writ no longer runs in Scotland on health issues.”
Such state help benefits all, he said. “They provide a sense of security, wellbeing and equity within communities. Such a sense of security is vital to a sense of confidence – and as we have seen over the last three years, confidence is essential to economic growth.”
However, he said the efforts of the Conservatives/Liberal Democrats coalition in London to reform UK-wide welfare rates, including housing benefit, which would see a cap of £26,000 a year imposed on claimants, exemplified why Scotland needed more powers. “What independence would do is to give us the tools – corporation tax, for example, or alcohol excise duty – which we could use to get on with the job of promoting recovery and improving our people’s lives.”
If Scotland became independent, it would share “more than a monarchy and a currency” with England, Wales and Northern Ireland, but social and cultural ties, too. “It just won’t be the same as a restrictive state, which no longer serves the interests of either Scotland or England,” he said.
