We need to talk about Scotland

The Scottish government has published the first instalment of its new independence prospectus, a paper with the remarkably verbose title: ‘Building a New Scotland – Independence in the Modern World. Wealthier, Happier, Fairer: Why Not Scotland?’

Scottish government resources have been diverted away from the tedious day-to-day business of running the country to produce this paper and Scotland’s First Minister has taken time out from her busy schedule of talking about independence to hold a press conference to announce that ‘it is time to talk about independence’, so I felt duty bound to sit and study what has been produced.

But the further I got into the paper, the more I found myself asking the same question as posed by the paper’s title: why not Scotland?

There are 22 figures, 11 charts, six boxes and one table in the report and not one of them includes any data relating to Scotland. This is an extraordinary state of affairs: a report written by the Scottish government, which we are told is ‘designed to contribute to a full, frank and constructive debate on Scotland’s future’, failing to include any data about Scotland.