The flaw in the SNP’s plan to ‘build a new Scotland’

The SNP seems determined not to stick to the day job of actually running the country. Scotland’s government this week launched a publication called ‘Building a New Scotland: an independent Scotland’s Place in the World’. It set out policies for something that doesn’t exist – an independent Scotland – in areas in which the devolved administration has no responsibility.

Angus Robertson, the party’s constitution and external affairs secretary who launched the report, hardly seemed fazed by those facts: he spoke fluently and familiarly about ‘defence, peace and security’ and Scotland’s role as ‘a good global citizen’, even if his party’s plan is unlikely to ever see the light of day.

Robertson set out a series of propositions which cannot logically be reconciled, while blithely refusing to acknowledge any obstacles. The individual building blocks of his policy were that Scotland would seek Nato membership, that it would build ‘strong relationships’ with its immediate neighbours, and that it would require the removal of nuclear weapons from its territory in ‘​​the safest and most expeditious manner possible’.