It Doesn't Matter

The SNP should be applauded for their remarkable General Election success. Those of us who criticised their campaign rhetoric and felt their economic policies were potentially hugely damaging to Scotland must take pause.  What do we learn from this?

It turns out that in Scottish politics at least, quite a lot of things don't really matter.

The SNP campaigned for independence based on a series of economic claims that were demonstrably misleading at the time and have since been shown to be clearly wrong.  If the SNP had won the Independence Referendum we would be starting our independent lives £8bn a year worse off (that's £1,500 for every man, woman and child in Scotland). This is no longer conjecture - it is a fact demonstrable from the Scottish Government's own published figures.

So the fact that the economic case they presented for independence has been shown to be nonsense? It doesn't matter.


John Swinney sat on the Smith Commission and signed up to the resulting agreement on behalf of the SNP. But on the day it was published he was already crying foul and stoking further grievance claiming the recommendations

"do not reflect the full wishes of the people of Scotland [..] falls short because it could only go as far as the Westminster parties were prepared to go"

Nicola Sturgeon adopted a similar tone

"it is not enough, it doesn’t live up to the vow, it doesn’t deliver a modern form of home rule"

SNP councillors publicly burnt the Smith Report and - after a brief suspension - remained in their posts.

Instead the SNP demanded Full Fiscal Autonomy (FFA) - before realising that their rhetoric about "sending more to Westminster than we get back" and oil being "just a bonus" would become rapidly exposed as untrue if we were to keep our own taxes and actually try and fund our own public spending.

When the IFS produced analysis showing that FFA would create an immediate £8bn black-hole in Scotland's finances the SNP - after initially dismissing the analysis as being simply "Project Fear" - proceeded to execute a spectacular reverse ferret.

They argued "it won't happen anyway" and "by the time it happens all the numbers will be different".  With quite breath-taking hypocrisy they even argued "we'd have to also keep the Barnett Formula in place otherwise the Smith Commission principle of no detriment wouldn't be honoured". That's the same Smith Commission report that - in order to achieve the no detriment principle - fell so far short of the SNP's expectations. The same Smith Commission report that they dismissed, ridiculed and set fire to in a dustbin.

This is not so much wanting your cake and eating it as saying your'e going on a diet but want to keep stuffing your face with cake.

So the fact that the SNP aren't actually prepared for Scotland to economically stand on it's own feet just yet, despite all of their indyref rhetoric? It doesn't matter.


The SNP have argued it would take us time to grow and fill the fiscal gap that separation from the UK exposes and - of course -  to achieve that growth we'd need more powers.

When asked how this growth will be achieved their supporters suggest a series of tax cuts (reduce Air Passenger Duty, reduce VAT on tourism, targeted tax cuts to SMEs) at the same time as arguing to increase public expenditure because they are "anti-austerity". That these measures would inevitably mean an acceleration in the rate of increase in debt at least in the short term is simply brushed over.

So the SNP - who spent the indyref complaining that the UK's debt mountain is ruinously high and a sign of Westminster's economic incompetence - now argue to increase the rate of debt growth? It doesn't matter.


How likely is it that these tax cuts would produce sufficient economic growth to off-set the tax losses? It's hard to say, but if this was such a "slam-dunk" economic strategy you might think the Tories (hardly shy of cutting taxes) would be all over it.

But let's assume it might work as an economic strategy and ask ourselves how much growth a nimble independent European country might achieve competing against the lumbering beast of the UK. Funnily enough the Scottish Government grappled with just that question when writing the independence White Paper. They offered the following;

"If Scotland moved from the rates of growth it has experienced in the past to instead match the levels of growth of small European countries, the benefits for people in Scotland in terms of prosperity and employment would be significant. As an illustration, had growth in Scotland matched these other independent nations between 1977 and 2007, GDP per head would now be 3.8 per cent higher, equivalent to an additional £900 per head"

So the SNP themselves have suggested that 3.8% higher growth over a 30 year period is a realistic growth dividend to expect from independence. Unfortunately, to close the £8bn deficit gap Scotland would require 16% higher growth than the rest of the UK.  So that would take about 120 years then.   During which time we would be funding the higher deficit how exactly?

So the fact that the SNP's claims that we could grow our way out of the black-hole caused by FFA are - on their own terms - hopelessly optimistic? It doesn't matter.


When the SNP manifesto was published the IFS (and any vaguely informed commentator who read the manifesto) noted that "the SNP's anti-austerity rhetoric does not reflect its plans". In fact The SNP's manifesto simply matched Labour's proposed tax increases and (according to the IFS) effectively matched their spending plans too.

So the fact that the SNP's actual economic policies were materially the same as those they accused of being "Red-Tories"?  It doesn't matter

When the question of Independence was raised during the election Nicola Sturgeon put on her baffled face and - adopting the tone normally reserved for explaining things to a three year-old - told us that voting for the SNP wasn't a vote for Independence, it was a vote to give us a stronger voice at Westminster.  That their manifesto includes a commitment to Full Fiscal Responsibility and that their written constitution commits them to pursuing Scottish Independence is not something we're meant to concern ourselves with.

So the fact that the SNP will use their voice at Westminster to pursue FFA and independence at any cost? It doesn't matter.


I've clearly been missing the point because the Scottish electorate have shown none of these things matter.

I've made the mistake of thinking that voters realise it's not enough to just want social justice, you have to be able to afford it.

I've made the mistake of thinking that voters would see through a party saying "we're anti-austerity" if they couldn't back that up with economically coherent policies.

I've made the mistake of thinking that the economic deceit attempted during the Yes campaign would be remembered and punished by the electorate.

It turns out that all that's required is to say "we hate the Tories", "they're as bad as the Tories" and "we're anti-austerity".

But. Look where we've ended up.

Put yourself in David Cameron's shiny Church's brogues for a moment:

Scotland is now represented at Westminster by a homogenous mass of grievance seeking, Tory hating SNP MP's who's declared aim in life is to make your life as difficult as possible. They also want Full Fiscal Autonomy - at least they said they did and to refuse it now would make them look exceptionally silly.

Giving Scotland Full Fiscal Autonomy means you can justify enforcing English Votes for English Laws (EVEL) which immediately boosts your effective working majority.  You might need to sweeten the pill with a transitional phasing out of Barnett but as Barnett goes you gain £8bn or so to spend in the rest of the UK.  Sure, you'll have to work out some stuff about fiscal constraints and borrowing limits to protect Sterling - but to all intents and purposes you can rid yourself of those troublesome jocks whilst claiming you've kept the Union together.

The fact that this would lead to even deeper public spending cuts in Scotland than we'd endure as an integral part of the UK?  That surely matters.