SNP report says Scotland should hold off on new currency
By Duncan Ferris
Date: Friday 25 May 2018
(Sharecast News) - An independent Scotland would need to delay the launch of an independent currency, cut spending and provide tax cuts to migrants, according to a Scottish National Party report on Friday.
The sustainable growth commission report, commissioned by Nicola Sturgeon, argues that "robust" controls on public spending in the first five to 10 years after independence would allow the country to cut its deficit and target a 2.5% growth rate, similar to that of small wealthy nations such as Denmark and Finland.
The report did warn, however, that achieving such a goal could take at least a generation.
It had been expected that the report would recommend the creation of a Scottish currency but the document instead emphasised a need to attract foreign migrants and students, as well as gain fiscal stability and financial reserves.
Richard Leonard, the Scottish Labour leader, said: "These plans would leave an independent Scotland as a rule taker not a rule maker. The SNP is proposing a decade of unprecedented austerity and no control over the value of their wages, rent and mortgages."
The latest official figures demonstrate that the country spent £13.5bn more on public services in 2016 than had been raised by taxes in Scotland and subsidies from the UK at large.
"It is not a report about the timing of a referendum - rather, it focuses on the 'why' of independence and how we can use the powers it will deliver to build a stronger economy and a fairer society. In so doing, it heralds the start of a debate based on hope and ambition about the future of the country, rather than on the despair of Brexit," said Sturgeon.
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