Neil Cardwell, Labour’s candidate in Gordon, has urged the SNP to clarify the inconsistency and confusion which surrounds their policy of the future of the Scottish currency.
Cardwell’s comments follow a letter to The Herald newspaper by Bristow Muldoon MSP, Chair of Labour’s Scottish Policy Forum. , which highlighted the repeated gaffes by the SNP on the issue.
As recently as last week, nationalist MSP Alex Neil insisted his party was in favour of pegging the Scottish pound at parity with Sterling, in advance of entering the Euro.
However, on January 18-19 that position disappeared from the SNP website.
Cardwell is challenging the SNP in Gordon to say what their position on the future of the Scottish Currency actually is.
Neil Cardwell said:
“Given that the SNP have, apparently, dropped their support for a separate Scottish Currency, are voters in Gordon now to assume that they propose an independent Scotland whose interest rates would be set by the Bank of England – a bank based in its new and nearest economic rival?
“Like the rest of their financial plans, the nationalist’s position on a separate Scottish currency simply unravels when put under scrutiny.
“Are they now asking voters in Gordon to believe that they would try to negotiate entry into the Euro, despite Mr Neil being on record as asking “How can we in the SNP argue for full fiscal freedom from London if we are then prepared to hand back fiscal powers to Brussels and Frankfurt.”?
“Which currency would the SNP support if they were to lose a referendum on membership of the Euro?”
“Whether it’s their inconsistent and confused position on a separate Scottish currency or their proposals to tax hard-working families more while depriving local authorities of over a £1bn in revenue, the SNP’s separation agenda would threaten both Scotland’s prosperity and the future of our vital public services.
“People in Gordon don’t want to gamble schools and jobs on the SNP’s fantasy economics.”
The full text of Bristow Muldoon MSP’s letter to The Herald is:
The dangers in a suddenly rewritten SNP policy
ALEX Neil claimed (January 19) that the SNP has a clear and consistent policy on Scotland’s future currency. But it would seem at the very moment he was typing his letter, SNP high command was rewriting the policy, but nobody bothered to tell him.
On January 18 the SNP website confirmed: “The SNP is favourable to entry into the euro . . . In advance of entry into the euro, the SNP favours pegging the Scottish pound at parity with sterling.” A clear policy of creating a separate Scottish pound, pegged to sterling until the time was apparently right to scrap that Scottish pound and move to the euro.
That position, and the text on the SNP website, has now changed dramatically. Under cover of darkness on January 18-19 it scrapped the commitment to a separate Scottish pound. The Scottish Central Bank that would have been required to set interest rates in an independent Scotland presumably vanishes, too.
Instead, the SNP would still push towards the euro but without first establishing a separate Scottish currency. The Monetary Policy Committee of the Bank of England would set interest rates not just for England, Wales and Northern Ireland but also for a separate Scotland - a Scotland that had been torn from the UK, become the nearest rival nation to the rest of the UK and was experiencing economic flux. Worse still, Alex Salmond would negotiate conditions for Scottish entry into the euro while our interest rates and monetary policy were controlled by another nation.
How did the SNP end up with this latest policy flip-flop? Because Salmond said so. He gaffed on the BBC’s Today programme last week and then again on Newsnight. He agreed with Douglas Alexander that “Alex Salmond wants Scottish independence, but an English currency. That presumably means the Bank of England would set interest rates according to conditions within an independent country.” These fantasy economics would surely be laughable but for the fact that jobs, mortgages and bank balances across Scotland would depend upon them.
Spare a thought in all this separatist confusion for the man who lost out in a leadership race and then appealed to his party conference. “How can we in the SNP argue for full fiscal freedom from London if we are then prepared to hand back fiscal powers to Brussels and Frankfurt?” It should now be clear enough to that speaker, Alex Neil, that the SNP position is now even worse - to take a separate Scotland from a currency controlled by another nation straight into the euro - as a direct result of Salmond’s gaffe.
And, of course, the SNP has no answer as to what currency it would use in the medium to long term should it lose a referendum on joining the euro - surely the Nationalists wouldn’t wish to remain with sterling and having interest rates set by the Bank of England in perpetuity.
Bristow Muldoon, MSP
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